(01-30-2019, 07:08 PM)jagibelieve Wrote: One of the largest government wastes is baseline budgeting.  I've personally seen it for years (over 2 decades) and it's not going away.  I have personally witnessed military aircraft filling up with fuel and going over the Atlantic Ocean to dump enough to get back to base, fill up and go back out again.  I have also seen flights from Jacksonville to several destinations to do "touch and go's" just to burn fuel and use money.  The idea is "if you don't use all of the money allocated, you will be allocated less the next fiscal year".

That kind of thing not only happens in an aircraft squadron, it happens in offices, warehouses, etc..  So much money is wasted for no good reason other than if they don't use their allotted money during the current fiscal year they won't get as much allotted the next fiscal year.  It doesn't just happen in the military, it happens in all government offices including contractors.

Other useless and needless spending occurs for things such as global warming or "research" on things that don't matter.  These are things that the federal government spends money on that are not part of the Constitutional duties that they have sworn to do.

Cut the needless spending and the deficit will go down.