The Daily Hatch

Senator Mark Pryor wants our ideas on how to cut federal spending. Take a look at this video clip below:

Senator Pryor has asked us to send our ideas to him at cutspending@pryor.senate.gov and I have done so in the past and will continue to do so in the future.

On May 11, 2011,  I emailed to this above address and I got this email back from Senator Pryor’s office:

Please note, this is not a monitored email account. Due to the sheer volume of correspondence I receive, I ask that constituents please contact me via my website with any responses or additional concerns. If you would like a specific reply to your message, please visit http://pryor.senate.gov/contact. This system ensures that I will continue to keep Arkansas First by allowing me to better organize the thousands of emails I get from Arkansans each week and ensuring that I have all the information I need to respond to your particular communication in timely manner.  I appreciate you writing. I always welcome your input and suggestions. Please do not hesitate to contact me on any issue of concern to you in the future.

Here are a few more I just emailed to him myself:

• End low-priority programs that should never have been created in the first place, including:

1. The Denali Commission (2004 spending: $56 million, discretionary);12
2. The Conservation Reserve Program ($1,879 million, mandatory);13
3. The Commission of Fine Arts ($8 million, discretionary);
4. The Historic Whaling and Trading Partners Exchange Program ($9 million, discretionary);
5. The Office of Navajo and Hopi Relocation ($14 million, discretionary);
6. AmeriCorps ($324 million, discretionary);
7. The National Endowment for the Humanities ($131 million, discretionary);
8. Farm subsidies for wool, mohair, lentils, and chickpeas ($28 million, mandatory);
9. The Marine Mammal Commission ($3 million, discretionary);
10. The East−West Center ($20 million, discretionary);
11. The Legal Services Corporation ($341 million, discretionary);
12. The protectionist programs of the International Trade Administration ($364 million, discretionary);
13. The Bureau of International Labor Affairs ($105 million, discretionary);
14. The National Commission on Libraries and Information Science ($1 million, discretionary);
15. The U.S. Institute of Peace ($17 million, discretionary);
16. The Agriculture Department’s wood utilization research ($6 million, discretionary);
17. The National Endowment for the Arts ($112 million, discretionary); and
18. Most of the 945 federal advisory committees and commissions scattered across 52 agencies.14

This is how bad it is getting:

Entitlement Spending