President Bush took a risky gamble on this week's Congressional elections by turning them into a referendum on his presidency. To his credit, Republicans defied traditional mid-term election returns and won virtually all the tight races on Tuesday, reaping major dividends for the President.

Now that the Republican majority has been secured, Bush is claiming a new legislative mandate. But, taxpayers beware! The Bush administration has a boatload of billion dollar ideas that lack a coherent plan to pay for them. To make matters worse, there is little evidence that he has the political will to take on congressional appropriators in an effort to control the growth in federal spending.

To take an example from recent history, the vast majority of programs that the Republican's placed on the chopping block in their 1994 “Contract with America” now receive even higher levels of funding. With experts projecting that next year's deficit might reach as high as $300 billion, it's a no-brainer to start saving federal dollars by rooting out the waste, fraud and mismanagement that has pervaded just about every federal agency. Sadly, many of the legislative proposals will instead be written to line the pockets of those who contributed towards the $140 million that the President raised to finance this victory.

Here are some of the Bush proposals that will send shivers up the spines of taxpayers:

One of more expensive Bush proposals is an industry-friendly energy bill. The current version of the bill already includes $80 billion worth of spending and subsidies to almost every special interest in Washington. The word on K Street is that Senate Republicans might be confusing this bill with the Thanksgiving turkey and have plans to fatten it up with even bigger giveaways.

Terrorism Insurance is one of the items at the top of President Bush's list. The insurance industry has shown signs of almost full recovery from 9/11, despite the government's delay in providing a bailout. Nevertheless, the administration keeps claiming it will create 300,000 blue-collar jobs as an excuse to award the profitable insurance industry with this sweetheart deal. It's awfully simplistic to think that terrorism insurance is the only thing to blame for delayed or cancelled real estate deals. More importantly, even if it were, the math just doesn't add up to the magic 300,000 figure. However, you can bet your bottom dollar on the fact that this massive giveaway will help protect the jobs of some folks in Armani suits and Gucci loafers. The real losers in this deal are the nation's taxpayers, who will get stuck with billions of dollars in liability in the event of another terrorist attack.

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Across the board, it is expected that more corporate tax breaks will be the payback of choice to the election financiers. For example, there are plans underway to provide stimulus to the technology industry by offering more write-offs for investments in plants and equipment.

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The federal government's return this year to massive budget deficits doesn't even include the costs of homeland security, the war on terrorism and a possible war with Iraq. For two years running, the Bush administration has proposed a litany of cuts in federal spending, but has shown as much courage as the lion in the Wizard of Oz when it came time to defend them. If the administration continues to talk the talk on federal spending and not walk the walk, the size of our federal deficits will start to challenge those of the 1980s as the biggest in the nation's history.

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