The House budget continues to dominate the legislative world, with many appropriations subcommittees releasing proposals Thursday that were as bad as expected and in many cases worse, cutting millions in funding for individual programs in education and human services and directing agency heads to find even bigger cuts in their departments, exposing some individual programs and services to two rounds of reductions.

The subcommittee proposals could still change. They will be reviewed by top House budget leaders in preparation for another round of subcommittee discussions and votes next week, with the full House considering the proposal the week after.

One of the most important things we learned about the House budget this week is that we still don't know where a lot of the cuts will be made in health and human services. At this point, many of the reductions are listed in line items titled "adjust continuation budget.

The Division of Mental Health, Developmental Disabilities, and Substance Abuse Services is directed to make $74 million in adjustments.

That's on top of specific and troubling cuts in the division, like a $50 million reduction in the funding that local agencies use to pay for community mental health services and a $16 million cut in services for people with a developmental disability or mental retardation.

The unspecified cuts are called for in every part of the human services budget, most conspicuously in the state Medicaid program, where officials are directed to find $490 million in savings next year, $750 million the year after that.

The federal stimulus package prohibits states from changing eligibility standards so the cuts will have to come from lowering payments to doctors and other health care providers or from reducing the services that Medicaid provides, like prescription drugs, prosthetics, and dental care.

There are far too many offensive cuts in the health and human services budget to list and they affect the most vulnerable people in the state, seniors, people with a disability or mental illness, people living with HIV/AIDS.

And there's not any better news about education. The latest version of the House budget cuts funding for public schools, community colleges, and universities by a total of almost $2 billion. Ten thousand jobs in public education would be eliminated.

Imagine the outcry if a corporation in North Carolina that employed half that many people went out of business.

The budget news of the week also included the revelation that the State Banking Commission paid $500,000 in employee bonuses in the current year and had planned to give $200,000 more in extra pay next year. Not any more.

Students at UNC campuses will pay as much as eight percent more in tuition next year if the House gets its way. That exceeds the 6.5 cap that UNC President Erskine Bowles established a few years ago.

Officials at UNC schools were told this week to prepare for cuts of as much as 18 percent in their operating budgets, which is almost certain to mean more layoffs and fewer classes and services for students for their newly higher tuition.

Still no word on the status of the $10 million windfall for athletic booster clubs snuck into the budget a few years ago. That's a lot of tuition hikes and cancelled classes to keep the fatcats happy.

Meanwhile, the glee of the folks on the Right continues to grow with each round of disturbing budget cuts. One anti-progress think tanker told the Associated Press that the cuts were things they had been suggesting for years. 

It is apparently past time to make people with a severe disability fend for themselves.

The insanity in Raleigh continues.