By By JOHN EBY / Dowagiac Daily News
With defense and homeland security removed, the budget the House approved has less money in '06 than in '05. And '05 was less than a 1-percent increase from '04, which means that in the new budget estimates that came out (July 7) the deficit is almost $75 billion less than projected a few months ago, Cass County's congressman, U.S. Fred Upton, said in Dowagiac Friday.
June was the 25th straight month of job growth, with 146,000 jobs created last month. Almost 1.1 million jobs have been created this year.
Upton, between addressing a Three Rivers/Sturgis Chamber of Commerce breakfast in St. Joseph County Friday morning and Berrien County Farm Bureau Friday noon in Stevensville, returns to Washington today.
This week Upton said Congress will finish the highway bill, "which will mean more money for Michigan at the end of the day. We're still a donor state," but the return on each tax dollar will rise from 90.5 cents to 92 cents, "which ultimately means hundreds of million of dollars coming to Michigan that otherwise would have gone to other states."
Upton will be also be a conferee on the energy bill. "Our goal is to get it done by the end of July." Last year the conference report cleared the House, but the Senate had only 58 of 60 votes needed to end a filibuster.
Upton said nationally, Farm Bureau supports CAFTA, the Central American Free Trade Agreement. "Michigan Farm Bureau, as I understand it, has not taken a position in large part because of sugar," particularly Thumb beet growers.
Sandra Day O'Connor's Supreme Court resignation also looms. Upton expects to learn today who President Bush's nominee might be. "Perhaps plural. I think (Chief Justice William) Rehnquist will step down very soon. My prediction - and I've been wrong before - is that Rehnquist will step down and Bush will have two, which frankly it will be easier for him to work on a package. I think (Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, the former White House counsel and a friend of Bush since he was Texas governor) is a frontrunner," although Gonzales is under fire from conservatives as well as liberals.
Upton does not believe Thursday's terrorist bombing had anything to do with the Olympics because "it was a surprise London got it. Paris was favored. I think it had a little bit to do with the G-8" summit. We have to be lucky every day. They've got to be lucky once."