In his proposed budget for 2004, President Bush pledged $2 billion for global AIDS, including $450 million in new money for the initiative he announced last month in his State of the Union address. But advocates, who met Friday in Washington, say Mr. Bush is inflating his total by including $260 million for AIDS research and money for tuberculosis and malaria.

--from yesterday's New York Times

The conservatism seems less and less compassionate every time you look at it.