"Their lives remind us that freedom is not bought cheaply. It has a cost; it imposes a burden. And just as they whom we commemorate were willing to sacrifice, so too must we—in a less final, less heroic way—be willing to give of ourselves." [Ronald Reagan, 1982 while visiting Arlington National Cemetery on Memorial Day]

The Trump administration will respect taxpayers, balance the budget, return the country to 3 percent economic growth, and push a parental leave requirement in its fiscal plan to be released Tuesday, said Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney. Mulvaney called it a “taxpayers first budget.”

The Trump administration’s 2018 budget to be released tomorrow will include a range of proposed spending cuts. The budget will call for cuts to food stamps, Medicaid, and other entitlement programs. These reforms come on top of proposed cuts to discretionary programs released in March.

The budget will propose cuts to the fat benefit packages received by federal workers. An April CBO report found that benefits for the government’s civilian workers were 47 percent higher, on average, than for comparable private-sector workers.

Israel expressed muted concern on Sunday to a major arms deal between the United States and Saudi Arabia announced a day earlier during the visit to the region by U.S. President Donald Trump. 

The central achievement of Trump's visit to Saudi Arabia was nearly $110 billion in deals sealed on Saturday in which Riyadh will buy U.S. arms to help it counter Iran, with options running as high as $350 billion over 10 years.

President Donald Trump likely will propose a plan next week calling for a balanced budget in 10 years, fiscal experts predict.| It also will address how to fund the border wall, higher defense spending, and other Trump initiatives over the next decade.

Americans are increasingly likely to make political donations, with the share of adults who say they have donated directly to candidates doubling since 1992, according to data from American National Election Studies (ANES). Political donations from individuals represent a large share of campaign funding: In the 2016 election cycle, 71% of Hillary Clinton’s fundraising total and 40% of Donald Trump’s came from individual contributions, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

Public attitudes about the debt are the lowest since the November 2016 election, according to the April Fiscal Confidence Index. Fully three-quarters of voters (75%) agree that the national debt should be among the President and Congress’s top three priorities, including over two-thirds of Democrats (68%), three in four Independents (76%), and 82% of Republicans.

Democrats and Republicans, who already tend to place their trust in different news sources and rely on different outlets for political news, now disagree more than ever on a fundamental issue of the news media’s role in society: whether news organizations’ criticism of political leaders primarily keeps them from doing things they shouldn’t – or keeps them from doing their job.

Iran will hit back at most of Saudi Arabia with the exception of Islam's holiest places if the kingdom does anything "ignorant", Tehran's defense minister was quoted as saying on Sunday after a Saudi prince threatened to move the "battle" to Iran.

Once Latin America's richest country, Venezuela can no longer feed its people, hobbled by the nationalization of farms as well as price and currency controls.

A Saudi royal decree allowing women greater access to government services without the consent of a male relative has drawn positive, but cautious, responses from human rights advocates.

What’s about to happen in Washington may be a little like the end of the Cold War — bipolarity gives way to multipolarity. A system dominated by two party-line powers gives way to a system with a lot of different power centers. Until now, people in that space have been slow to create donor networks, slow to form think tanks, slow to build coalitions of moderate legislators. But suddenly there’s a flurry of activity between the extremes.

Beyond partisan differences over economic policies, there are stark divisions on a fundamental question: What makes someone rich or poor? Most Republicans link a person’s financial standing to their own hard work – or the lack of it. Most Democrats say that whether someone is rich or poor is more attributable to circumstances beyond their control.

Recent press reports have suggested that amendments to the American Health Care Act (AHCA)—legislation to replace "Obamacare"—might run afoul of a piece of Senate procedure known as the Byrd Rule. The Byrd Rule is a set of limitations on the reconciliation process, which can allow the Senate to pass legislation with a simple majority rather than a filibuster-proof 60-vote majority. We explained reconciliation in detail in our recent Reconciliation 101; here we explain the Byrd Rule in more detail.

The White House released principles and a framework for tax reform today. We applaud the President's focus on tax reform, but the plan includes far more detail on how the Administration would cut taxes than on how they would pay for those cuts. Based on what we know so far, the plan could cost $3 to $7 trillion over a decade– our base-case estimate is $5.5 trillion in revenue loss over a decade. Without adequate offsets, tax reform could drive up the federal debt, harming economic growth instead of boosting it.

Creating a tax code that is more straightforward, fair, efficient, and competitive will boost economic growth, which would not only improve the nation’s fiscal situation but lead to higher wages and incomes. Ideally, comprehensive tax reform should broaden the tax base, lower the rates, grow the economy, and reduce deficits. However, as an absolute minimum standard, tax reform should not add to the debt.

CBO estimates that construction costs to build a fleet of 355 ships would average $26.6 billion (in 2017 dollars) per year over the next 30 years, which is 60 percent more than what the Navy has spent on average over the past 30 years.

The MIT Technology Review has released their list of 10 Breakthrough Technologies for 2017. The editors chose technologies ranging from advances in genetic treatments or improved AI technology. Some may have immediate effects on the world today while others will take longer to make an impact. Previous lists include smart wind and solar power, liquid batteries, cloud streaming, and supergrids. The 2017 list does not disappoint.

Today's debt is slated to double as a share of the economy over the next three decades, while four major government trust funds are projected to be insolvent in half that time. The Congressional Budget Office's (CBO) projections assume spending continues at scheduled levels even when trust funds deplete their reserves; our projections show that making the trust fund funds solvent could slow the growth of the debt this decade and stabilize the debt thereafter.