Federal Budget Negotiations

Re “The 7-Year Goal Is Baloney,” Commentary, Jan. 7: Of course Martin Mayer is right, although he maligns baloney by associating it with the Republican-led Congress. The “balanced budget” is a fiction that everyone over 12 knows--no Congress can dictate what we must do in the future, as the Gramm- Rudman- Hollings Act proved.

That same 12-year-old can see the Republicans are trying to make up an issue where there is none-- to divert the public from seeing that they are doing nothing about the real domestic issues of poor education, poor health care, poor housing and, most important, the massive job losses caused by corporate downsizing.

ROBERT D. McCONNELL

Manhattan Beach

* Federal workers will eventually be paid for the time they were not permitted to work during the government shutdown, plus overtime to catch up on the work they will be paid for not having done; meanwhile, Republican members of Congress received their paychecks for preventing federal workers from doing the work they will be getting paid for.

With brilliant fiscal management like this, it’s a wonder the national debt is only $5 trillion!

RONALD G. ROWE

Moorpark

* President Clinton has finally been forced to put money where his mouth is. The President has finally countered with his offer of a seven-year budget balancing plan, using Congressional Budget Office estimates (Jan. 7). Bravo, Mr. President-- glad to have you finally on board!

The real battle of the 1994 election was fought well-- and the American people won this war! A $5.3-trillion national debt and interest payments of $257 billion are unconscionable to U.S. taxpayers.

ETELVINA R. PATMAS

Orange

* That was an excellent article on the deficit and the national debt that you ran on Jan. 6. I’ve been waiting for someone to do a graph that shows exactly where we stand (Business). I did something that makes it even more enlightening. I drew a line down from the top to the bottom chart delineating the terms of presidents. It becomes obvious where both the debt and the yearly deficit skyrocketed. To make it even more interesting I drew in six years that the Republicans controlled the Senate. They came in with Reagan. I then drew in the year of the massive tax cut that Reagan passed. Funny, how all these things coincide.

I know Rush Limbaugh likes to tell the big lie, and one of them is that the Democrats have been in control both houses of Congress for 40 years. He also likes to make fun of Clinton’s claims of lowering the deficit. Lo and behold, it’s dropped almost $100 billion per year since ’92. It’s amazing what facts can show you.

ALEX MAGDALENO

Camarillo

* Regarding a balanced budget: When these Republican congressmen state they are doing this for our children and grandchildren, they are leaving out one very important adjective-- “wealthy.” They could care less about our “poor” children and grandchildren! I’ve gone from Republican to independent to Democrat, and I now know that I’ll never go back! It’s Clinton-Gore ’96 for me!

MARC RENFROE

Los Angeles

* I can understand that cutting spending is necessary to try to get the federal budget under control and balanced. One thing I cannot understand is, why is it also necessary to cut taxes at the same time? That is like saying, since our income does not match our expenses, we will therefore have to cut our income.

It sounds to me like the Republicans want to take from the needy (cut spending) and give to the greedy (cut taxes). God bless President Clinton for looking out for the vast majority of us who are not rich. He seems to be the only one doing that sometimes.

DOUGLAS W. FRITTS

Inglewood

* Gridlock, gridlock, gridlock. That’s never what we vote for but it’s always what we get. The real problem is that the people in Washington and Sacramento have our concerns on the back burner. They care most about what the corporations and wealthy campaign contributors want.

We need leaders in government who are accountable to the people of their district, not slaves of the special interests who give them big money for election campaigns. Until we have campaign finance reform that requires candidates to raise most of their money in small contributions from voters who live in their district, nothing in Washington and Sacramento will change.

JON GOLINGER

Venice

* A new canine group has appeared on the political scene. In addition to the Blue Dog Democrats of the House and the Senate who offer budget compromise, there are now the Mad Dog Republicans of the House who take hostages and offer no compromise.

HARRIS S. MOYED

Irvine