To reallocate funds toward sensible priorities such as improved children's education, increased children's access to health care, expanded job training, and increased energy efficiency and conservation through a reduction of wasteful defense spending, and for other purposes.
March 8, 2006


Ms. WOOLSEY (for herself, Ms. LEE, Mr. GRIJALVA, Mr. KUCINICH, Mr. DAVIS of Illinois, Mr. NADLER, Mr. MCDERMOTT, Mr. OWENS, Mr. MCGOVERN, Mr. CLAY, Mr. CONYERS, Mr. HONDA, Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas, Mr. STARK, Ms. SCHAKOWSKY, and Ms. MCKINNEY) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Armed Services, and in addition to the Committees on Energy and Commerce, Education and the Workforce, Homeland Security, and International Relations, for a period to be subsequently determined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee concerned

A BILL

To reallocate funds toward sensible priorities such as improved children's education, increased children's access to health care, expanded job training, and increased energy efficiency and conservation through a reduction of wasteful defense spending, and for other purposes.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.


This Act may be cited as the `Common Sense Budget Act of 2006'.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS.


Congress finds the following:

(1) The Department of Defense's increasingly large budget provides for total defense spending that is greater than that of the other 192 countries in the world combined, yet--

(A) the United States now ranks 25th in the world in infant mortality, behind most of the nations of Western Europe and the industrialized Far East, while $60,000,000,000 of the United States defense budget is expended annually on weapons designed to thwart Soviet Union aggression during the Cold War and other wasteful programs;
(B) Federal spending on elementary and secondary education has fallen to less than 10 percent of the proposed 2007 outlays for the Department of Defense, while schools throughout the Nation are eliminating programs in music, foreign language, and physical education;
(C) 61,000,000 individuals in the United States lack health insurance during some period of any given year, and half that number of individuals (over 10,000,000 of whom are children) lack such insurance for the entire year;
(D) the Government Accountability Office estimates that--

(i) 1/3 of the Nation's public schools, serving 14,000,000 children, need extensive repair or need to have their entire physical plants replaced;
(ii) 85 percent of the Nation's public schools, 73,000 facilities serving 40,000,000 children, need some repair work; and
(iii) the total cost for the repairs and replacement described in this subparagraph is over $120,000,000,000;

(E) research conducted by the National Center for Education Statistics shows that middle school students in the United States rank 18th in science test scores and 19th in math test scores internationally, behind students in such countries as the Republic of Korea, the Slovak Republic, Singapore, the Russian Federation, and Malaysia; and
(F) the Government Accountability Office estimated in 2003 that the Department of Defense could not account for over $1,000,000,000,000 in funds appropriated to the Department of Defense.

(2) The United States spends over $20,000,000,000 annually to maintain its nuclear arsenal, although many of the weapons in that arsenal no longer have practical utility. The United States needs to eliminate spending on obsolete weapons systems and use the funds saved to meet urgent domestic needs for health care, education, job training, and increased energy efficiency and conservation.
(3) The Department of Defense is spending billions of dollars developing space weapons and preparing plans to deploy them, although--

(A) those expenditures and plans contravene White House policy, in place for a decade, that emphasizes arms control and nonproliferation pacts; and
(B) the development of those weapons is opposed by many United States allies, who have rightly stated that a shift in policy towards that development will create an arms race in space.

(4) The United States needs to reduce its dependence on foreign oil by promoting long-term energy security through greater investment in sustainable and renewable energy alternatives.
(5) The United States is facing unprecedented challenges to national security and broader national interests. Sustainable development and humanitarian assistance programs should be a central part of United States foreign policy. To address the root causes of instability and terrorism and undercut the ability of terrorist organizations to recruit effectively, the United States needs to address the global challenges of poverty, illiteracy, unemployment, disease, and disaster by increasing funding for sustainable development and humanitarian assistance programs.