American Notes CONGRESS

When the House last week turned back a constitutional amendment requiring the Federal Government to balance its budget, Republican Congressman Robert Walker of Pennsylvania issued a tongue-in-cheek challenge to his colleagues. "If in 1990, we can cut $19.90," reasoned Walker, "then next year we can muster the courage to go to $19.91." So Walker introduced an amendment to reduce the $50 billion farm bill by 0.0000000002%. (That would, however, have cut $10 or so from the bill; his figure should have been 0.0000000004%.) By a 214-to-175 vote, the bid to save the taxpayers that trivial amount was defeated. So, as usual, were the taxpayers. It costs $480 a page to print the Congressional Record. Reporting the debate and vote on the Walker amendment consumed 3 1/2 pages.