FIRST he entered with a scalpel. The next day he brought in a Bowie knife. The third time round it was a machete.
Congressman Bob Livingston's showy illustration of what his Republican Party are going to do to the US Federal budget leaves no avenue for misinterpretation. They are going to butcher it.
It was supposed to be humorous. If you happen to be a fat cat living in riches on Capitol Hill then maybe it was. For the majority of America however the new Republican majority in Congress will mean a ruthless attack on living standards.
Most of all, the victory of the right signifies a new war on the poor.
They call it a drive to end 'big government'. This is just rhetoric.
Just like the British Tories, the right in America uses the public perception of bureaucracy as a cover for social dumping. Behind the talk of freeing the individual' from state control lies another intention dropping all responsibility for the weltare of its citizens.
The Republican amendment to the constitution that will compel the administration to "balance its books' is an essential ingredient of this offensive.
Ever since the Reagan allowed the federal budget to spiral deep into debt economists have been looking for a solution. The plan before Congress is to amend the Constitution so that by 2002 deficit budgets will be forbidden.
According to the Congressional Budget Office, it will require $1,200 billion of cuts over seven years to achieve the 2002 target. Clinton and his cohorts ask where it is supposed to come from. They have a point.
The US budget can be divided into three -defence, interest payments and so-called 'entitlements', which includes social security, health and welfare.
Of these only the third is being considered for cuts. The Republicans' 'Contract with America' actually calls for an increase in military spending.
But even if there were massive reductions in military spending combined with the slashing of welfare it would still be insufficient to cope with the projected $322 billion deficit forecast for 2002. Aid for families with dependent children cost the federal budget less than $14 billion last year.
The really big money goes into Medicare and Medicaid -$600 billion in 1995. And the people who benefit most from these packages are not the poor.
To cut them would mean not only taking on the companies who make a fortune out of private health care, but also directly attacking the better paid constituency on which the political system relies. It's one Clinton: make-over push-over? been pitiful. They are hiding behind a supposed shift to the right in American society evidenced