Wall Street Journal; Monday, November 21, 2005 Page A20

Federal Budget: A House vote to slow spending has horrified some interest groups who are predictably yelping about "cuts." It has likewise prompted yet another round of misleading coverage. Haven't we been through this before? A decade ago Washington was in a tizzy about the draconian cuts a new Republican Congress was visiting on the American people.

Out-of-power Democrats, left-leaning interest groups and grandstanding media types that posed as champions of the poor were red-faced in their outrage.

Except the cuts they were so indignant about weren't really cuts at all. The GOP Congress was merely attempting to slow the growth of spending.

Now it's 2005 and House Republicans, apparently feeling pressure over legitimate criticism of bridges to nowhere and out-of-control pork spending, have voted to slow spending increases, some of it from entitlements, by $50 billion over five years.

That's so small as to be nearly nonexistent. Congress will spend a massive $14 trillion over those same five years. So it's the equivalent of cutting $50 out of a $14,000 budget.

Nevertheless, the House's Deficit Reduction Act nearly failed to get enough votes, passing only 217-215.

Looking only at that narrow vote and reading media reports lamenting "sweeping" cuts and a plan that "squeezes" the poor, college students and farmers, one would never guess that in fact entitlements will grow — just not as fast as some demand.

Our children and grandchildren will suffer if entitlement growth isn't restrained. More than half of what lawmakers spend each year is considered "mandatory." That money is spent on Social Security, Medicare, the coming prescription drug benefit and other programs that have been set to automatically grow by previous Congresses. They've set in motion some painful train wrecks:

Consider Medicare. Through 2075, it's under-funded by $62 trillion. But it goes into the red much sooner. The hospitalization component, known as Part A, could go broke as early as 2019. Social Security faces the same fate. By 2018, it will begin to run a deficit. Within 25 years of that, the Social Security Trust Fund, which doesn't exist in any meaningful way outside the mind of Al Gore, will be exhausted.

What then? Tax hikes? Benefit cuts? President Bush tried to change the ruinous dynamic of Social Security, but his plan to establish modest personal accounts to help ease the crisis ran into heavy flak. It's been sidelined indefinitely — along with any hope of wrestling our looming fiscal insolvency to the ground.

The House's Deficit Reduction Act didn't shake the earth, nor should it have. But it's a small step and perhaps a grudging admission that Washington needs to get serious about reforming entitlements and trim overall spending.

The country is in deep need of some real budget cuts. This is a start — but only that.