Posted on 08/01/2003 6:05:23 PM PDT by Harlequin
The Bush administration's newly released budget projections reveal an anticipated budget deficit of $450 billion for the current fiscal year, up another $151 billion since February. Supporters and critics of the administration are tripping over themselves to blame the deficit on tax cuts, the war, and a slow economy. But the fact is we have mounting deficits because George W. Bush is the most gratuitous big spender to occupy the White House since Jimmy Carter. One could say that he has become the "Mother of All Big Spenders."
The new estimates show that, under Bush, total outlays will have risen $408 billion in just three years to $2.272 trillion: an enormous increase in federal spending of 22 percent. Administration officials privately admit that spending is too high. Yet they argue that deficits are appropriate in times of war and recession. So, is it true that the war on terrorism has resulted in an increase in defense spending? Yes. And, is it also true that a slow economy has meant a decreased stream of tax revenues to pay for government? Yes again.
But the real truth is that national defense is far from being responsible for all of the spending increases. According to the new numbers, defense spending will have risen by about 34 percent since Bush came into office. But, at the same time, non-defense discretionary spending will have skyrocketed by almost 28 percent. Government agencies that Republicans were calling to be abolished less than 10 years ago, such as education and labor, have enjoyed jaw-dropping spending increases under Bush of 70 percent and 65 percent respectively.
Now, most rational people would cut back on their spending if they knew their income was going to be reduced in the near future. Any smart company would look to cut costs should the business climate take a turn for the worse. But the administration has been free spending into the face of a recessionary economy from day one without making any serious attempt to reduce costs.
The White House spinmeisters insist that we keep the size of the deficit "in perspective." Sure it's appropriate that the budget deficit should be measured against the relative size of the economy. Today, the projected budget deficit represents 4.2 percent of the nation's GDP. Thus the folks in the Bush administration pat themselves on the back while they remind us that in the 1980s the economy handled deficits of 6 percent. So what? Apparently this administration seems to think that achieving low standards instead of the lowest is supposed to be comforting.
That the nation's budgetary situation continues to deteriorate is because the administration's fiscal policy has been decidedly more about politics than policy. Even the tax cuts, which happened to be good policy, were still political in nature considering their appeal to the Republican's conservative base. At the same time, the politicos running the Bush reelection machine have consistently tried to placate or silence the liberals and special interests by throwing money at their every whim and desire. In mathematical terms, the administration calculates that satiated conservatives plus silenced liberals equals reelection.
How else can one explain the administration publishing a glossy report criticizing farm programs and then proceeding to sign a farm bill that expands those same programs? How else can one explain the administration acknowledging that entitlements are going to bankrupt the nation if left unreformed yet pushing the largest historical expansion in Medicare one year before the election? Such blatant political maneuvering can only be described as Clintonian.
But perhaps we are being unfair to former President Clinton. After all, in inflation-adjusted terms, Clinton had overseen a total spending increase of only 3.5 percent at the same point in his administration. More importantly, after his first three years in office, non-defense discretionary spending actually went down by 0.7 percent. This is contrasted by Bush's three-year total spending increase of 15.6 percent and a 20.8 percent explosion in non-defense discretionary spending.
Sadly, the Bush administration has consistently sacrificed sound policy to the god of political expediency. From farm subsidies to Medicare expansion, purchasing reelection votes has consistently trumped principle. In fact, what we have now is a president who spends like Carter and panders like Clinton. Our only hope is that the exploding deficit will finally cause the administration to get serious about controlling spending.
And I obviously need to swing by Burger King and order a Whooper...it's going to take me a while before I can fabricated anything like this.
Later guy.
If you had some proof, like a Novemeber 2002 blowout loss, or massive tanking in the polls that showed Bush wildly unpopular, then I maybe think you know what you are talking about.You've confused what animates you with what everyone else OUGHT to be focusing on, whence your anger and outrage.
Would you say you're an ideologue?
129 posted on 08/01/2003 7:52 PM PDT by habs4ever
I've never seen the anger and outrage tags thrown around more than by the Bush supporters. If you disagree with Bush you have to be angry. Okay let's say I am.
What has my opinion got to do with this? Seriously.
Is big government spending and blown out budgets conservative?
Is support for a socialist education system, in fact a 70% increase in their budget, conservative?
Is support for open borders against our current laws and ideas of fair and equitable global immigration to the US, conservative?
Is allowing immigration from terrorists states to continue, conservative?
Is demanding Israel to aquiese, compromise and submit to terrorist demands conservative?
Is reinforcing some of Clinton's land grabs, conservative?
I could go on, but why should I have to? I am willing to congratulate Bush on the WoT. You aren't even able to take an honest look at these things and tell me they trouble you. Instead I'm supposed to be an angry ideologue for having the timerity to mention this. It doesn't make any difference to you that much of what Bush is doing goes against decades of conservative dogma. Yikes. Perhaps you can throw out a few more choice insults.
The infinitesimal tax cut means little compared with the HUGE increase in the cost of government. I suppose you think the democrats will pay the bill in the end?
The question is where is the money coming from? And the answer is we are spending the “good will” (used here in the accounting sense) that my parents and grandparents left us.
The dollar is over valued today because it is the most trusted currency – thus we get a lot for our dollar. But, the trust of the dollar is being pushed to the limits – one of the reasons the Euro is now here. (It took enormous pressure to get Germans to give up their mark – and that pressure came from US fiscal irresponsibility).
Now the rest of the world IS watching and understand that there is getting to be more and more risk in the dollar – and one day there will be a better exchange tool. If the Republicans keep us fiscally responsible we will have a better standard of living and a more stable world to live in.
The rate of growth that current Republican controlled government has instituted is unsustainable. If government grows at 10% per year (as it is doing and even accelerating) in a very few years we will all work for mother D.C. I don’t want my children to end up in a socialist world.
Yes.
They both take your money and try to buy your vote with it.
Correct. But neither party, and especially not a 3rd party, can compete by not doing it when the other is doing it.
That's one reason the push for campaign finance reform was so un-utterly stupid compared to the real problem.
rats have taught the American public to be dependent on government, and shake down their Reps and Senators, and Mayors, City Councils and State reps, etc. for goodies which amount to a bloated spending that includes government involvement with public funds that we cannot even conceive.
All GWB is trying to do right now is get some Conservative Judges put into office, get a REPUBLICAN Senate (not semi rino Senate) and a stronger Conservative House of Representatives.
We are at war, and this is a fight for survival against the socialists .
GWB is not winning any war - it was over quite a while ago. This is a police action. The war was never in doubt by anyone with a lick of sense.
I think it may have been better to have just offered the $30million for him dead from the start. Cheaper too.
Aim low and see what you get. If all you expect is GWB that is all you will get.
You said this:
"I'll be more than happy to support a conservative when one is eventually lofted for us to support again."
Then you said this:
"I didn't say I wouldn't help get him lofted."
What then did you mean by "WHEN ONE IS LOFTED FOR US"?
"Luis, you don't know what I do or don't do."
Hell Ron, YOU don't know what YOU are saying, or NOT saying anymore, let alone what you're doing.
139 posted on 08/01/2003 8:00 PM PDT by Luis Gonzalez (Yo soy la Cuba libre.)
In post 128 I said: "I didn't say I wouldn't help get him lofted, I just said I wouldn't until one was lofted. I can work for a guy, but if he isn't the nominee that doesn't mean I'm going to vote for the DimPublican anyway."
Was that too complex for you? Let me help...
1. There are generally a variety of Republican candidates at the end of second term Republican administration, or each Democrat term end.
2. I can chose to support one of them, but if they aren't the annointed candidate by party leadership they'll generally not be the nominee.
3. In 1996 the RP leadership actually fielded folks on the Sunday morning talk shows to call Pat Buchanan "the next Hitler", "Hitleresque" or "if not Hitler, walking right up to the line", after he won the New Hampshire primary that year.
4. If as in 1996, someone other than my candidate becomes the nominee, I didn't help loft him. I didn't loft Dole.
If you were a guy that was intimately as involved in the political process as you claim to be, I would think you wouldn't have to have this expained to you in detail.
You bet I and many others want GWB and what's more, we want, nay, we DEMAND that he be re-elected. This is far from " aiming low ".
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