The Democrats are engaging, once again, in economic revisionism. They want us to believe that the budget surplus was increasing when Bush took office, and that the increasing deficits are his fault.
In fact, the surplus was decreasing when Bush took office in 2001. The Fiscal Year 2000 budget had a surplus of $236 billion. That was the high water mark. The FY 2001 budget, passed in 2000 -- before Bush took office -- had a surplus of only $128 billion. The first budget passed when Bush was President, FY 2002, was pushed into deficit primarily by the recession (which he inherited, as Obama is inheriting a recession) and the cost of 9/11.
Now, the deficit did balloon significantly under Bush. It went up to over $400 billion. He and the Republicans spent way too much. But in Bush's second term, it was reigned in significantly, down to $162 billion for FY 2007, the last budget from a Republican Congress. The very first budget from the Democrats, FY 2008, more than doubled the deficit, to over $400 billion.
And now the projected deficit is triple that, to $1.2 trillion. Some think it will be as much as $1.6 trillion or more. This is ten times the last Republican budget deficit, and four times the current deficit.
I am not blaming the Democrats specifically. I am, rather, saying simply two things: first, that the surplus was decreasing when Bush took office; and second, that the President is not primarily responsible for the budget anyway: the Congress is. The Republican Congress was to blame for massive deficits in Bush's first term, and the Democrats are to blame for the massive deficit of FY 2008, and for much of the massive deficits to follow.
Oh, and no, Bush and the Republicans are not primarily responsible for the current recession, either, but that's another story.
Cross-posted on <pudge/*>.
Posted by pudge at January 10, 2009 09:28 AM | Email ThisI'm comfortable either way as long as the rule is consistently applied - but Pudge is right - Congress passes the budget.
Posted by: BA on January 10, 2009 11:15 AMIt is a fact, under Reagan social spending increased $2 for every $1 of increased defense spending. That was the cost Reagan paid to buy support for his military build-up from a Congress of liberal spenders who demanded payment to defend America.
It is also a fact that under George W. Bush, social spending growth has once again outpaced defense growth, including wars and Homeland Security, again by $2 of new social spending for every $1 of defense spending. And again, this was the price Bush paid to buy support from liberal spenders, from both parties, so he could defend America.
Note, the controlling party in the House and Senate has been irrelevant when you factor in the filibusterer and its 60-vote requirement in the Senate. When it comes to defense and social spending, presidents are forced to agree to the earmarks and pork in exchange for the support of liberals and spenders in both parties to get that magic 60-vote cloture in the Senate.
Today social spending makes up 2/3 of the Federal Budget, and nearly 4 times what is spent on National Defense. To compare that to Reagan's last budget in 1989, Social spending was less than half the Federal Budget, and less than twice the Defense budget.
Oh, and before someone charges that Reagan's defense spending was so much higher? The Defense Budget in 1989 was roughly $200 billion in 1980 dollars, and made up less than 27% of the Federal Budget. Today, even with buildups and wars, the Federal Budget is still less than $200 billion in 1980 dollars, and just 17% of the total Federal budget.
Posted by: Reality on January 10, 2009 11:19 AMUS Census Bureau - 2006 - 6,395,798
(2000 - 5,894,121)
Posted by: BA on January 10, 2009 11:19 AMI don't think we can have it both ways - either we stick with Pudge's point that Congress is responsible for budgets and deficits and therefore we can't tag Bush with any responsibility for the deficits over the length of his term, or since Paddy wants to tag Obama with the next year's deficit, then we should all agree that the last 8 years are Bush deficits.
I don't think we have to choose one of those two. My view is that Congress is primarily responsible, and that the President deserves responsibility depending on the circumstances. In the case of Bush -- setting aside Iraq for the sake of discussion here -- Bush pushed for a lot of the spending in his first term that bloated the budget, and he encouraged cuts in the growth of spending that decreased the deficit in his second term. And, of course, Bush actually SPENDS much of the money from Congress. So Bush bears responsibility, but MOST of it is Congress', IMO.
Which means I also don't give Clinton as much credit for balancing the budget as I do the (Republican) Congress, but OTOH, it probably couldn't have happened without a lot of help from Clinton. That, I think, highlights the point: you have to look at the specific ways in which the President was involved in cutting or increasing the deficit.
As to whether Arnold should be recalled, I lived in CA for nine years, and lived there for my formative high school and college years, and most of my family is still there, so I feel like a bit of a Californian myself, and I supported the recall against Davis, because he broke promises. Arnold has not done so, that I know of. I would, however, not support Arnold for re-election. He's fine for a Democrat ...
I would support a recall against Gregoire because of all her lies, but that's not going to happen. Her whole campaign was a lie: we have no deficit, we don't have a spending problem, we are spending less so we don't have drastic cuts or tax increases, I will oppose tax increases, and so on. Not to mention her lies about Rossi. I think such lies are deserving of recall -- and I participated in a successful recall in California of a state rep, Paul Horcher, who ran as a Republican and switched to "independent" immediately after we elected him -- but again, it's just not going to happen, so I wouldn't waste my time on it.
I think if we all didn't run so fast to blaming the "other" party we'd have more productive conversations.
As for recalling Arnold - no, I'm not saying he should - I was just pointing out that Paddy made a point based on "facts", and his facts were so wrong that the conclusion he reached should have been the opposite.
As for recalling Gregoire so close to the election - nope, I think that makes no sense either. Aren't you really savoring instead the next few months as she and the legislature have to deal with the budget - not like they can say they inherited it from the other party...
Posted by: BA on January 10, 2009 12:30 PMBA: yes, agreed. As to gregoire, no I am not savoring that at all. Not trying to be self-righteous here, but Rossi's loss was one of the top two disappointments in my lifetime of voting, not because I am anti-Democrat or pro-Republican, but because of the complete mess we are in that Gregoire and the Democratic Legislature gave us, that they are not likely to make better.
Don't get me wrong, I will certainly point out their lies and 100 percent blame for this situation and so on. But there's no relish in my doing so. It's very depressing to me.
You'll see that every year the debt increased. The "surplus" was simply on paper - every year the national debt increased, meaning we had to spend more than the previous year.
The biggest financial lie of the 1990s was that "Clinton balanced the budget". It never happened, and we never had a surplus.
And note, this assumes we do not count the borrowing of SSI funds to decrease the annual budget deficit is fine as well.
Budget deficits were smaller under Republican control; they've spiraled out of control every time the Slavery Party gets in control. Now that they have the full Congress and the Presidency, they must accept ALL responsibility from here on out.
Posted by: Shanghai Dan on January 10, 2009 04:13 PMCrusader: and yes, absolutely, most Republicans are balanced-budget types. Unfortunately, most ELECTED Republicans are not.
Clinton gave us a smoke and mirrors balanced budget. It was like maxing your credit cards and transferring the balance to a deffered payment plan. He knew full well it would hose the next president. You can bet that was the plan so that Hillary could sail in as the savior.
They just didn't count on the chosen one and the Chicago political machine trumping his plans.
Posted by: Vince on January 10, 2009 05:14 PM* lowered taxes on investment side
* strong on national defense
otherwise he's a big-government statist and has possibly wrecked the GOP forever.
Posted by: Crusader on January 10, 2009 06:06 PMI care that you said that the leaders of the Republican Party are not Republicans, which is stupid, and that you can't admit that it is stupid of you to say it.
Look, I get annoyed at general ad hominem attacks against people we disagree with.
But even more so when that sniping makes a fundamentally false assertion.
So "RINO," being both ad hominem and false, is a pet peeve of mine. Why not just say McCain isn't conservative enough and is a poor representative of the Republican Party? That is far more direct and has a greater impact than a silly, and incorrect, epithet like "RINO."
Posted by: pudge on January 10, 2009 06:41 PMUnfortunately, most people don't vote that way at all.
All of the Clinton surplus was on paper as stated before. Both parties are guilty of this sham. They write a budget with spending and supposed cuts based on expected earnings. This looks like a reasonable approach but in actuality the spending always takes place from day one and the cuts are to come later, sometimes years in the future.
The cuts are promoted as money we won't spend in the future to keep the budget balanced and/or put us in surplus. These cuts never happen because we write a new budget every two years and they either eliminate the cuts or push them off to a later date.
Bottom line, both parties are spending us into oblivion. The interest on the national debt was over $600 Billion this year before they we added another Trillion to it. Obama wants to do the same.
It won't be long before we won't be able to pay the interest at the rate these a-holes are adding to the debt and nobody seems to understand or care. Rupert
Posted by: Rupert P on January 10, 2009 07:38 PMRupert P: and as I told Dan, it is already understood that the "budget" does not include everything, that there are off-budget expenditures and so on.
It's not about ignorance or lies (with most of us here, anyway) it's about semantics. Nothing you said is something I (and most of us here) didn't know.
A Dutch proverb says that, "A soft doctor makes bad wounds", at least it was first expressed to me by a chap from the Netherlands.
So it has become today. Business' won't accept responsibility, congress won't and the executive branch rolls over. Who is left, the taxpayer!
Posted by: Fed Up on January 10, 2009 08:08 PMIn early Dec I submitted a public records request to the Puget Sound Partnership for their itemized budget and budget proposal to the legislature.
Before and since then Gregoire has declared this a sacred cow.
A month and a half later I still haven't gotten jack from them.
Posted by: Andy on January 10, 2009 10:37 PMNothing about the Bush years needs revising. The 10 trillion dollar reality is bad enough....
"more than $10 trillion in new debt and new obligations piled up by the Bush administration in eight years" (with nothing to show for it)
And yer worried about a few billion here....
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/11/opinion/11rich.html
All your tax dollars get sent to dc to be thrown (pissed) away, and all you can do is complain about our governator. Grow up.
Whatever you do, don't read that article. It will make your right wing heads explode.
Posted by: All Facts Support My Positions on January 11, 2009 06:22 AMhttp://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/12699486/paul_krugman_on_the_great_wealth_transfer/print
"But what is happening under Bush is something entirely unprecedented: For the first time in our history, so much growth is being siphoned off to a small, wealthy minority that most Americans are failing to gain ground even during a time of economic growth -- and they know it."
Big government vs small government? Gimmee a break. How much of the "loot" is going to the top 1%? Offshore? You think Bush's Justice Department is prosecuting looters? If you do, I have a bridge to nowhere in Alaska to sell you.
The GOP has been defending, and promoting this looting the last 8 years, and trying to blame the trillions missing on welfare queens. Too many dems are in on it too I sadly admit.
There is only one thing that will stop it.
PROSECUTIONS!!!!
Start with every SEC / GAO official...
Now who is for --> REAL
(crickets chirping)
Sorry pudge. There are no real Republicans. Only Republicons. You can fantasize all you want about smaller government....
Posted by: All Facts Support My Positions on January 11, 2009 06:51 AMRevisionism?
Yes.
"more than $10 trillion in new debt and new obligations piled up by the Bush administration in eight years"
And a significant amount of that is the direct result of the recession Bush inherited, and the increased spending deficit of the Democrats since they took control of the Congress. That's a fact.
But what is happening under Bush is something entirely unprecedented: For the first time in our history, so much growth is being siphoned off to a small, wealthy minority that most Americans are failing to gain ground even during a time of economic growth -- and they know it.
That's a lie, of course. In fact, the tax burden of the top tier of taxpayers INCREASED under Bush. The "wealthy minority" paid MORE of the taxes under Bush than they did under Clinton.
Very different statistics, and not being specific muddies the water.
Separately, are you arguing that generally all Americans, across the economic spectrum, saw their wealth rise proportionally the same? Did the poor get richer in the same proportion as the rich?
Do we want that to happen?
Posted by: BA on January 11, 2009 10:25 AMIn the meantime Bambi is now promisiing 4.5 million new jobs... um Bambi, who will pay for them? Let me see if I understand: you are taxing people who are already losing money in your Bambi depression to pay for jobs for those same people who will then be taxed... you're merry-go round is cute...not actually effective in getting anywhere...
Finally, someone asks the right question about the stimulus
If you hire your neighbor for $100 to dig a hole in your backyard and then fill it up, and he hires you to do the same in his yard, the government statisticians report that things are improving. The economy has created two jobs, and the G.D.P. rises by $200. But it is unlikely that, having wasted all that time digging and filling, either of you is better off.
God help us.
No. The percentage of the total went up, but the rate went down (just like it went down for everyone else).
Very different statistics, and not being specific muddies the water.
I thought I was specific, but I see that it probably wasn't clear enough; thanks for the opportunity to clarify.
Separately, are you arguing that generally all Americans, across the economic spectrum, saw their wealth rise proportionally the same? Did the poor get richer in the same proportion as the rich?
I don't know and don't care. The fact is that for every group other than top tier, both their total tax AND their share of the overall tax burden went down: so if you are middle class or poor, you are paying less tax AND someone else is paying more of YOUR share of the tax burden. So I see nothing for them to complain about in regard to the tax burdens.
If they want to complain about government spending, of course, that's a different, though related, matter. But government is not, and should not, be in the "increase your wealth" business, it is only in the "take your wealth" business.
You hypocrite. You decry the deficit by the promised spending of Bush, yet you call for a magnitude more with nationalized healthcare.
And if you'd actually LEARN a few facts, you'd find that the percentage tax cut for the wealthy - those you demonize - was less than those at the bottom end of the scale.
The wealthy pay the most in absolute dollars, as a percentage of total income taxes per capita, per percentage of population, and as a percentage of their own income.
Stupid is no way to go through life, son.
Posted by: Shanghai Dan on January 11, 2009 02:36 PMCorrect- however 100 dollars a day is small change when you've got a 14 million dollar budget- and I have to drag them to court to get it enforced.
What I find astonishing is Gregoire has vowed to increase the PSPs budget while slicing all others. Other state agencies should be going ballistic that PSP hasn't published their priority deliverables.
BTW- that report they published last fall was had a budget allocation of 2 million dollars.
Posted by: Andy on January 11, 2009 02:56 PMIt's the old dot-bomb mentality. It's OK to lose money on every transaction because you'll make it up on volume!
In the Government's case, it's bad to run really big deficits because they hurt the economy, but a really REALLY huge deficit (the trillion plus dollar deficits that the Marxist Messiah is promising) is good.
Posted by: Shanghai Dan on January 11, 2009 07:35 PM#47 America fails faster under Dems Ragnar? Stop smokin that stuff. With most manufacturing outsourced, and so much energy imported, where are we gonna make up the 700 billion trade deficit? Oh that's right. Severe economic depression... The numbers will shrink.
#48 pudge my friend. It is about as many Americans prospering as possible with government and tax policies that do "the most" good. Not just helping the super rich become more rich while the other 98% of us lose ground. Let it sink in before you type something silly. I hear that there is an argument being made that the top 1/10 of 1% makes half the money in this country. They don't pay half the taxes. Go figure.
#51 hypocrite? Strong language for one so confused. We already pay more per capita than any other country for health care. We just don't get the care to 50 million because of greed. Isn't health care a right? I remember something about life, liberty, and the pursuit of something....
#53 katomar. What the money is spent on makes all the difference. For every dollar spent on food stamps $1.73 goes back into the economy. For a corporate tax break, or capital gains tax cut, the "good" is around 30 cents according to Forbes. War stimulates the economy, buy by only 1/5 of the level that infrastructure does. Look it up! Handing hundreds of billions, if not trillions off to the super rich hasn't seemed to help us much at all has it?
Yes, hypocrite. You complain about the deficit, yet you applaud a five-fold increase in that same deficit. Your deficit spending is righteous, other deficit spending is profane.
Hypocrite.
Posted by: Shanghai Dan on January 11, 2009 10:04 PMI love how they gave bad banks the loot so they can have an advantage over the banks that played by the rules. Only in Bushworld...
#56 So crusader, I am personally responsible for Bush's mistakes? Why? Because I didn't oppose his criminal administration hard enough?
Why have regulations and oversight when we can have the wild wild west on wall street instead? The bigger, and more connected you are, the more people you can screw right crusader? Grandma Millie didn't need her retirement money anyway right?
I can't wait to have grownups in charge once again.
Compared to the whole bucket, Fannie, and Freddie are only a couple drops. They still did screw up though.....
Posted by: All Facts Support My Positions on January 11, 2009 11:00 PMRed herrings
Name one.
So Krugman won that Nobel Prize for lying pudge? ... Krugman is still right. The gap between rich and poor is exploding.
No, YOU are lying by implying I meant such a thing: Krugman's Nobel had nothing whatsoever to do with the tax rates or the rich vs. the poor; it was about international finance and trade.
But yes, it is a lie that "growth is being siphoned off to a small, wealthy minority," and when Krugman says it, he is lying.
It is about as many Americans prospering as possible with government and tax policies that do "the most" good.
Yes, if you are a socialist who believes in the evil process of controlling individuals to produce your desired result, instead of allowing individuals to act freely to produce their own desired results for themselves.
katomar, you are repeating a myth.
I agree: those GSEs were NEVER good banks. But it is fact, not myth, that the Democrats prevented meaningful and important oversight and reform and regulation of those banks, and, in fact, forced them to compete to offer bad loans.
You are talking about forcing banks to stop redlining minorities because, and only because they were minorities.
No, he is not. That was not the issue at all. Yes, that was the issue in the Civil Rights Act of 1968, but that's not what katomar is talking about here: he is talking about the federal government literally requiring loans to financially unqualified buyers.
Get yer facts straight
You first.
Posted by: pudge on January 13, 2009 10:39 PM