This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Friday, April 8, 2011.

I'm Caleb Brown.

The ultimate spending cap should be the Constitution.

There's plenty of federal spending not authorized by the Constitution that according to

Republican Senator Mike Lee of Utah for the rest of federal spending Lee

argues that amending the Constitution is a sound long-term way to rein in federal excess.

We spoke at a conference on federal spending held yesterday at the Cato Institute.

I was talking to Bob Corker in here earlier and asked him about activities that the federal government

shouldn't be involved in, for whatever reason, and asked him to identify departments that based upon the fact that

they should the federal government should not be engaged in these activities which

ones would he get rid of?

Didn't quite give me what I was looking for

here at the Cato Institutes.

We do talk about whole departments going.

Do you have any that you think just ought to go?

Yes, this question has come up from time to time on my campaign and since I've been in office.

I want to preface what I'm about to say with, I recognize that at almost every level, what things that the federal government does

will benefit someone.

I don't want to say that there are many federal employees or departments out there that aren't doing any good.

That in my mind isn't the question.

The question is whether the federal government's doing only those things that only the federal

government can do, doing only those things that the federal government can do, doing only those things that the federal

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