Oh relax. If that's your basic point, I certainly do take exception to it. Entitlements grow automatically unless deliberate action is taken to change their rules; this is usually politically difficult, hence the durability of such programs over the years, and the desire of the Right to turn them into discretionary programs. (In this regard, look for the Repugs to try and turn Medicaid and/or Food Stamps into a block grant, as was done with AFDC.)
Therefore, your phrase "this was done" is a non sequitur. Clinton didn't do shit. You only change entitlements by changing the rules, and the one spending program in which this was done was AFDC, a.k.a. "welfare reform."
" . . . especially since the GOP now has the opportunity to do so without a Presidential veto in the way. And if it doesn't happen, it will be because there is a Democratic filibuster to stop them.
Charles's argument that there is no social spending left to cut is just plain wrong and dangerously wrong if people fail to see that political mobilization is needed to preserve the aid that is still important for countless people around the country. -- Nathan Newman
Right. You get partial credit.
mbs