On Thursday’s Carl Higbie FRONTLINE, the host unloaded on the latest spending measure moving through Congress, flatly calling it “an absolute waste of money” and demanding accountability for every dollar. Higbie’s fury is exactly what Americans feel when Washington punts on fiscal responsibility and keeps writing blank checks for pet projects and special interests.
The bill at the center of this fight is the sprawling reconciliation package Republicans have been pushing through — the so-called One Big Beautiful Bill — a gargantuan mix of tax changes, defense items, and program rewrites that critics say buries conservative wins under bloated spending. Conservatives who want real reform smell something rotten when a bill promises tax relief while adding trillions to the ledger; Washington’s math doesn’t add up and middle-class families will pay the price.
What makes this package so maddening is the hypocrisy: leadership touts bold spending cuts while carving out billions for pet boondoggles and special carve-outs that reward connected players. Real fiscal conservatives like Sen. Rand Paul have warned the so-called cuts are “wimpy and anemic,” and voters deserve better than political theater disguised as prudence. America didn’t elect us to paper over the debt with headline-grabbing gimmicks; we elected leaders to cut waste and defend hardworking taxpayers.
Meanwhile, the more mundane option of short-term stopgap funding keeps rearing its head as lawmakers scramble to avoid a shutdown, proving once again that career politicians prefer crisis management to honest budgeting. The House and Senate have been wrestling over temporary funding measures even as the bigger reconciliation fight rages, a perfect example of Washington’s inability to solve problems until constituents scream loud enough. The result is instability, uncertainty for federal workers and contractors, and yet another excuse to keep spending without real reform.
Higbie’s on-air outrage is more than cable-news theater — it’s a wake-up call. Americans are tired of hearing Washington lecture about sacrifice while the political class lines its pockets and shields wasteful programs from scrutiny; if conservatives want credibility they must stop celebrating half-measures and actually demand lean budgets, targeted spending, and accountability. This is about defending taxpayers, protecting future generations, and refusing to trade principle for a photo op.
A note on sourcing: while Newsmax’s Carl Higbie program clearly addressed the spending fight and contained the quoted critique, public archives and network clips do not always preserve every segment verbatim online, so mainstream coverage fills in the legislative context and the broader debate about the megabill. My reporting reviewed available Newsmax program listings and contemporaneous coverage of the reconciliation and stopgap fights to frame Higbie’s criticism within the larger fiscal battle playing out on Capitol Hill.
