There's nothing like a threat to national security for government to expand bureaucracy and ratchet up spending. After a 653-day budget hiatus, Finance Minister Paul Martin finally sketched out the country's finances for the next year, or will that be two years

The document in itself is a far cry from what's needed to blunt the blow of a recession and hasten an economic recovery.

As expected, national defense and public safety got a boost, but fiscal security took a beating. Using the war on terrorism as its excuse, the government deserted the heroes of the last year's budget - tax cuts and debt relief - and instead walked into a minefield of questionable spending items.

As in all multi-billion dollar spending announcements the devil is in the details. And sometimes the devil is just in plain view. Take for example the $100 million budget line for rural broadband Internet access. Talk about a boondoggle in the making. It's about as intelligent a move as the government buying typewriters and fax machines for every Canadian home in 1990. Bad idea. Costly broadband technology runs the same risk of obsolescence.

Then there's the less so obvious train wrecks waiting to happen, like the $2 billion on the new infrastructure foundation. If it's business as usual, meaning shoddy fiscal monitoring, the foundation is well on its way to becoming another HRDC jobs fund fiasco.

Another big budget winner in the wake of 9/11 is not surprisingly government bureaucracy. A not-for-profit agency for aviation security will step in where the airlines left off. The challenge to post 9/11 should not to how to grow government but to structure passenger safety and baggage screening regulations with existing stakeholders. All told, program spending will rise by 20% over the next three years alone.

National defense and public security spending is a no brainer. But the war on terrorism is being fought on the backs of over-taxed Canadians instead of the flatbeds of wasted tax dollars identified by the Auditor General last week. Martin should have scaled back corporate welfare, shut down regional development agencies or ended some of the $16 billion in discretionary grant spending.

To the chagrin of many Canadians who hoped for a another round of tax cuts and debt repayments to hedge against a recession, Martin was empty-handed, opting instead to re-announce last year's tax cuts and raid the debt contingency reserve by over 60%.

Should a recession hit and tax revenues fall, the reserve fund was supposed to be the difference between a balanced budget and a deficit. Canadians can now kiss that bit of fiscal security goodbye, as they can any hope of paying down the debt in the near future. In the meantime, the debt will continue to bleed taxpayers for $110 million in debt interest payments each day of the year.

If income tax cuts were to be passed over this year, Martin should have at least slashed EI premiums for workers and employers. Come January 1st, Canadians will pay as much as $158 in new payroll taxes. While EI rates will drop a nickel, CPP premiums will skyrocket by 40 cents.

Martin should resist the temptation to go shopping and spend his way out of a recession. National security spending and "get me out of a recession" spending should not be mixed into the same budget. Now more than ever the feds need to cut income and payroll taxes to soften the blow of a recession and speed up the economic recovery.