The budget proposal nightmare continues...

If you've been keeping track so far, the White House has suggested slashing Medicare but increasing defense by a record breaking amount. Now art and education, the most often neglected but arguably most important aspects of a thriving and relevant society, are getting trimmed down as well:

Bush proposed slashing funds to public broadcasting by more than $150 million. In the president's 2007 budget request, funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting will be cut by $53.5 million in 2007 and $50 million more in 2008. Those cuts don't reflect others made in funding at the Education and Commerce departments and the elimination of specific programs for digital TV conversion and satellite delivery system. Public broadcasting officials estimate that the entire budget cuts run $157 million over the two-year period...

The cuts in public broadcasting are part of an attempt by the White House to reduce the country's red ink as the administration seeks more money for the military and seeks to make Bush's first-term tax cuts permanent.

And what about those tax cuts? The one's we all know will benefit only the rich while the services the rest of us depend upon are being taken away one by one:

The Treasury says making permanent expiring tax breaks for dividends and capital gains, which expire at the end of 2008, would cost the government $7.74 billion in 2008 and $37.02 billion in 2009...

Extending lower marginal tax rates for individuals, which are set to expire at the end of 2010, would push foregone tax revenues to $119.39 billion in 2011, Treasury said.

From the New York Times:

George W. Bush ran for office as a "compassionate conservative," arguing that Americans did not have to choose between huge tax cuts and a government that would do its part to address social needs like education and health care.

Now into his sixth year in the White House, Mr. Bush offered a budget on Monday that showed more clearly than ever the inexorable limits of that political promise.

Mr. Bush is asking Congress, first and foremost, to make his tax cuts permanent and to increase spending on national security, while looking for savings in popular domestic programs like Medicare and vocational education. The tradeoffs, to his critics, are achingly clear, and unfair...

From the New York Daily News:

New York City took a hit yesterday in the new White House budget, suffering cuts to Medicare, housing, anti-poverty and first-responder programs.

Congressional analysts projected a $30 million cut in the city's Medicare funding, hurting many of New York's 1 million recipients.

The city also could lose $32 million in first-responder funding, $30 million in anti-poverty programs and $9million for housing.

"The message to children and families could not be clearer - you are on your own," said Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) at Union Settlement, an outreach center on Manhattan's lower East Side...