by Mark Silva
Jim Nussle, the former Iowa congressman whom President Bush has nominated to serve as director of the Office of Management and Budget, admitted this today in testimony to a Senate committee:
"It was almost 30 years ago that I sat in the classroom of one of my college political science classes when my professor decided to teach us about the budget. At the time I remember thinking to myself, “When in the world am I ever going to use this information?”
“Do I really need to know this stuff?”
He does now. The newest in a series of White House budget directors, following former Ohio congressman Rob Portman's resignation, faces a challenge of pressing the president's final budgets -- including supplemental war budgets -- through a Democratic-run Congress.
"I got hooked,'' Nussle said of his acquired taste for the art of budgetmaking. "Yes, I’ll admit it – I love the budget, the budget process and everything else that goes along with it.
"But never, in a million years, would I, as a 19 year old Luther College Student, have ever thought that I would have been chosen by my peers to become the House Budget Chairman, let alone have this opportunity to sit before you as you consider me to be the next director of OMB,'' Nussle told the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.
"It is truly an awesome thought for me and I hope my teenage daughter and son are paying attention today,'' he said. "My story is a lesson of listening and learning, even at times when you don’t know exactly why you are doing it. It is because you truly never know where life is going to take you.''
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Comments
I hope someone on the Hill has the moxie to ask him how much debt he's carrying on his credit cards.
Posted by: Kenny Bunkport | July 24, 2007 12:18 PM
Despite being from Iowa, going to an Iowa Conference College like Nussle's, and having him hand me my college diploma back in 2005, I think Nussle's useless.
He lost the Iowa governorship to Chet Culver last year by a wide margin, and in consolation was given a mouthpiece budget-job by the administration who taught him everything he knows about overspending.
Posted by: EK | July 24, 2007 2:19 PM
"It is truly an awesome thought for me and I hope my teenage daughter and son are paying attention today,'' he said.
My question is do we truly think it would be awsome to have someone who talks like he's a valley girl in charge of the budget?
Posted by: lochnessmonster | July 24, 2007 3:17 PM
It will be truly awesome, dude, if Mr. Nussle can help the Bush administration improve the accuracy of their budget forecasting.
The White House cost estimates for the Iraq war ranged from Wolfowitz's $0 (Wolfowitz said that Iraq oil revenue would cover the cost) to economic advisor Lawrence Lindsey's $100-200 billion estimate which was criticized for being much too high. (After being off by a mere $600 billion dollars so far, who'd ever believe that Wolfowitz was qualified to work for a bank?)
It's much more likely that he's just responsible for trying to sell us the same old White House fantasy land estimates.
Posted by: Tom O | July 24, 2007 5:40 PM
"It was almost 30 years ago that I sat in the classroom of one of my college political science classes when my professor decided to teach us about the budget. At the time I remember thinking to myself, “When in the world am I ever going to use this information?”
“Do I really need to know this stuff?”
No you really don't. As Director of the Office of Management and Budget you will be following Bush Administration Standard Operating Procedure and will make up facts as required to defend what ever policy Bush comes up with, not matter how great a failure. Please refer to the employee manual section "Making stuff up to hide the truth, By Donald H. Rumsfeld"
Posted by: Tony | July 24, 2007 6:16 PM
Sad thing was he was learning about budgeting in a ploysci class and not an economics or accounting class.
Posted by: Terry | July 25, 2007 10:04 PM