Picked up this story on Politico, but I then went to Senator Bayh's web page and found the actual statement.
In summary, Bayh thinks that the 10% increase in spending authorized under the omnibus bill that was passed by the Senate is too much.
(Meant to post earlier, in part because of the plethora of Liebermann diaries on the site now, but missed because I'd posted a dupe of the Bush email diary first and deleted it but it didn't let me post :) )
First, about the bill in question:
The appropriations bill now on the president’s desk includes federal spending for all FY2010 spending bills that Congress failed to consider on their own merits this year. Overall, the spending bill increases FY09 spending levels by almost $34 billion, or 8.1 percent, and includes more than 5,200 earmarks totaling almost $4 billion.
This is the bill that was passed by a 57-35 roll call vote after busting a Republican filibuster. A couple more paragraphs about the bill Bayh wants Obama to veto are below.
The spending bill passed Sunday includes $447 billion for departments' operating budgets and about $650 billion in mandatory payments for federal benefit programs such as Medicare and Medicaid, which provide health care benefits to the elderly, disabled and poor. Those programs under immediate control of Congress would see increases of about 10 percent.
The FBI gets $7.9 billion, a $680 million increase over 2009; the Veterans Health Administration budget goes from $41 billion to $45.1 billion; the National Institutes of Health receives $31 billion, a $692 million increase.
I happen to agree with all three of these increases, but there may be some other programs that I don't agree with the increase. My current salary is indirectly paid for by the NIH, so I can't argue with that one!
Back to Bayh's statement, after that detour to properly examine the bill. One of the interesting paragraphs is here:
Bayh was one of only three Democrats, along with Senators Claire McCaskill (D-MO) and Russ Feingold (D-WI), to cross party lines and oppose the massive year-end spending bill, which will raise spending for a host of federal programs at more than four times the rate of inflation.
Here's Bayh himself:
“At a time when families and businesses are struggling to make ends meet, for Washington to increase federal spending at four times the rate of inflation is just irresponsible. And to have 5,000 pork barrel earmark appropriations in there, with politicians showing no willingness to cut back at a time when ordinary folks must—well, that is just deeply wrong.
“Voting against this kind of spending, voting for fiscal responsibility, and voting against pork barrel earmarks was the right thing to do. I am going to continue to stand up against the powers that be in Congress and make the case that it is past time to get our fiscal house in order.”
My quick calculation is that Republicans would love this, but it would severely undercut some Democrats and it'd potentially set up an easy attack line against the Democrats in the 2010 elections, etc. It could help Obama with independents in 2012, but I think that if Obama vetoed and sent it back the "minuses" would be greater than the "pluses". I also don't think that it's likely that Obama would veto this bill, but it's possible - especially if he wanted to make a statement about earmarks (5000 earmarks for 4 billion dollars - in other words, the total sum of earmarks is equal to the increase in budget for the VA).
Incidentally, the last appropriations bill - the defense one - is being held back for the moment purposefully in order to add in the debt ceiling increase. I like that they've set up the choice between voting to fund the war effort and the Department of Defense or voting to block the increase in the debt ceiling for Repub's ; it sets up a nice attack line that can be useful in 2010 or 2012 ads.