Should a Balanced Budget be required?

[ABQCOWBOY]

Should a balanced budget be a requirement for all Administrations? Excluding emergency situations or times of War, should a balanced budget be something required by the Constitution?

[Buford]

Balanced via any means?

[Teller]

Heart: Absolutely!!!!!

Head: Not possible.

[Midnight Judges]

So all a President has to do is start a war and then he can throw the rules out the window. Been there done that.

[ABQCOWBOY]

Balanced via any means?

No, the question clearly provides for emergencies or War etc. However, these should be clearly defined and activated via Presidential Acts, to be approved by congressional vote.

[Smoot Point Really]

I say "no"... by law? no... but we should require fiscal responsibility by the voting booth...

[HighOnHendrix]

Should a balanced budget be a requirement for all Administrations? Excluding emergency situations or times of War, should a balanced budget be something required by the Constitution?

Apparently not, since it didn't quite make it through Congress back in 95 - and we know what incredibly wise sages those people are. Shining beacons of citizenship, every one of them. How much better off would we be right now if the B.B. Amendment would have passed fifteen years ago?

[HighOnHendrix]

So all a President has to do is start a war and then he can throw the rules out the window. Been there done that.

No, the question clearly provides for emergencies or War etc. However, these should be clearly defined and activated via Presidential Acts, to be approved by congressional vote.

Pretty much everything the President does is subject to congressional approval. Bush had to ask to invade Iraq. And they let him.

[Kilmer17]

No. deficit spending itself is not bad. Just the way it's been practiced lately.

[ABQCOWBOY]

Pretty much everything the President does is subject to congressional approval. Bush had to ask to invade Iraq. And they let him.

He also had to pass a War Budget independantly via congressional approval, which was actually better. However, War is not something that happens every year. It comes and it goes. If you balance the budget in other years, you don't have nearly as much issue when you have to extend to account for things such as War or emergency.

BTW, War was never actually approved. Had it been, the President would have been free to invoke War Powers act and a lot would be different.

[Veretax]

I say no because you really never know when you'll want to roll over excess into next year's budget

[GibbsFactor]

It shouldn't always be balanced. it should be a goal in a perfect debt free world.

[Hunter44]

I say "no"... by law? no... but we should require fiscal responsibility by the voting booth...

Yeah, like that might work....

[GhostofSparta]

I say yes, and I don't even know if I'd let war count as an exemption. You should have to fund a war through a tax or a spending cut elsewhere. Also, if you include an "emergency" exemption, it had better be very well defined or else anything could pass under an "emergeny" tag.

[jnhay]

I don't think a balanced budget is all that important.