Obama pledges attack on waste

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Barack Obama says he's identified $2 trillion in budget savings that can be realized over the next 10 year.

By: Associated Press | Media General
Published: February 25, 2009

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WASHINGTON (AP) - President Barack Obama says he's identified $2 trillion in budget savings that can be realized over the next 10 year.

In excerpts of his speech to a joint session of Congress, Obama repeats his pledge to cut the deficit in half by the end of his first term. He says his administration has already begun a
line-by-line review of the federal budget to eliminate programs that are "wasteful and ineffective.

As examples, the president says his budget plan will end education programs "that don't work" and lop off payments to big agribusinesses "that don't need them."

Obama also vows to end no-bid contracts that he says have wasted billions in Iraq.

And beyond that, he says he'll "root out the waste, fraud and abuse" in Medicare that he says haven't made people any healthier.