Harold Camping is “flabbergasted” that the world did not end on May 21^st as he had predicted. I think it’s because he didn’t account for the devastation that will be wrought by Republican budget cuts for fiscal 2012, which doesn’t begin until October 1^st. Therefore, Camping’s new predication that the world will end on October 21^st is much more plausible.

The Washington Post reports that both Republicans and Democrats are looking to require federal employees to pick up a larger share of their pension contributions. The article notes that federal employees enjoy benefits that aren’t available to most private sector workers:

Last week I discussed the Obama administration’s decision to redistribute federal high-speed rail money rejected by Florida Gov. Rick Scott. I noted that “Florida taxpayers were spared their state’s share of maintaining the line, but they’re still going to be forced to help foot the bill for passenger-rail projects in other states.” My underlying point was that the states should be allowed to make their own transportation decisions with their own money.

A year-long investigation by the Washington Post into the Department of Housing & Urban Development’s HOME affordable housing program uncovered systemic waste, fraud, and abuse. The tale is yet another example of why the federal government should extricate itself from housing policy and allow the states to chart their own course.

George Will makes a good point in his latest column: Democrats maintain a peculiar “conviction that whatever government programs exist should forever exist because they always have existed.” Will’s observation centers around the shameless Democratic attacks on Rep. Paul Ryan’s (R-WI) proposal to reform Medicare and Medicaid.

Florida Governor Rick Scott deserves a big round of applause for dealing a major setback to the Obama administration’s costly plan for a national system of high-speed rail. As Randal O’Toole explains, the administration needed Florida to keep the $2.4 billion it was awarded to build a high-speed Orlando-to-Tampa line in order to build “momentum” for its plan. Instead, Scott put the interests of his taxpayers first and told the administration “no thanks.”

Postal Vision 2020 is a conference scheduled for June in Arlington, VA, that will discuss the U.S. Postal Service’s long-term prospects in our increasingly digitized world. Here’s how the Washington Post’s Ed O’Keefe frames the gathering:

When Republicans took control of the House in November, it set the stage for a brawl with Democrats over the sorry state of the federal budget. Round one — over funding the federal government for the remainder of the fiscal year — left both sides gasping as they staggered to their corners. Round two — over raising the debt limit — will be even tougher, but Republicans should come out swinging for fiscal responsibility.

Local officials, like their federal and state counterparts, spend other people’s money. Policymakers are naturally unlikely to spend other people’s money as carefully as they would their own. This situation is exacerbated when local officials spend money obtained from federal taxpayers. At least when local taxpayers foot the bill, they have an incentive to keep an eye on how their money is spent. That incentive is largely nonexistent when the money comes from Washington.

Republicans ride a wave of voter discontent over a Democratic president's big-government agenda to victory in the November elections. The new Republican majority in the House puts together a package of spending cuts. The defiant president tells upstart Republicans that he has “strongly and consistently opposed the House version of the bill because it would have unnecessarily cut valuable, proven programs that educate our children, invest in our future, and protect the health and safety of the American people.”