Emmanuel Goldstein
Posted on 02/19/2012 7:03:49 AM PST by shortstop
President Barack Obama's budget has about as much chance of passing the Republican-controlled House as a proclamation applauding JCPenney for standing by Ellen. Since its unveiling, Obama's political opponents have been lining up to denounce the plan that projects a $901 billion deficit for fiscal year 2013.
House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan declared that "instead of an America built to last, this is a plan for an America drowning in debt." Presidential candidate Mitt Romney called it "an insult to the American taxpayer." Romney was thinking of himself here since Obama is proposing the "Buffett Rule" that would double Romney's tax rate from the unjust 15 percent he gets away with now to 30 percent. You can understand the hurt feelings.
All this mud being thrown at the president's fiscal stewardship, and yet it was the last Republican president who teed up the current challenges. From the date President George W. Bush took office in 2001 until he left in 2009, Bush took a surplus-rich federal budget he had been handed by President Bill Clinton and turned it into a debt-bloated monster, adding $5 trillion to the national debt, nearly doubling it at the time.
When Obama took office, his gift from Bush was an economy in ruins, disgorging 500,000 jobs per month, and a government that could not live within its means.
By examining this year's budget deficit of a little over $1 trillion it becomes instantly clear that very little can be blamed on any conceivable Obama "spending spree." The numbers are far more reflective of the hand he'd been dealt.
Michael Linden, the director of tax and budget policy at the Center for American Progress, broke down the numbers. He looked back five years to January 2007. At that time, the Congressional Budget Office forecast that in 2012 the federal government would run a surplus of $170 billion.
But then something happened. By the time Obama took office in January 2009, the CBO had changed its tune and was projecting a deficit in 2012 of $264 billion. What intervened was the Great Recession, brought on by Wall Street's recklessness and years of free market "regulators" looking the other way.
Spending also increased in 2007 and 2008, primarily for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq that Bush refused to pay for. All told, Linden finds that 35 percent of the differential between the CBO's 2007 estimates and the reality of 2012 was caused by events preceding the president's term.
The rest of the story — fully 48 percent of the differential — is one of sharply reduced revenues. In the month Obama came to office the CBO was projecting 2012 revenues at $3.1 trillion. Now the CBO says this year's revenues will be just $2.5 trillion, a loss of nearly $600 billion. Yes, the prolonged economic troubles are part of the equation, but more than $300 billion is due to the extension of the Bush tax cuts.
Of what remains, only 9 percent is attributable to higher-than-expected nondefense spending. Linden says most of that is recession-related, including the last of the stimulus dollars and extra demands on federal unemployment benefits.
What this demonstrates is that Obama's new domestic spending is not driving the country's deficits. Blame the wars and lack of revenues, policies written in stone before Obama took office. Had the Bush tax cuts never have gone into effect the national debt would be about $3 trillion lower than the $15 trillion it is now.
Obama's critics are attacking him because he failed to meet his early promise to cut the deficit in half by the end of his first term. These are the same folks who hamstrung the president's efforts by refusing to increase revenues, even by closing tax loopholes for oil companies. And let us not forget these immortal words from Bush in a February 2001 joint session of Congress: "I hope you will join me to pay down $2 trillion in debt during the next 10 years. … That is more debt, repaid more quickly than has ever been repaid by any nation at any time in history."
Oops.
When Sen. Obama took office in Jan. 2007 as part of the Democrat controlled Congress that replaced the Republican controlled Congress, unemployment was 4.5%, the DOW was at 14,000, and the deficit was around 1/10 of what it is now and shrinking.
Blumner is a piece of human debris. She’s so proud of her labor law experience, and she writes complete trash in the Tampa Bay Times.
For a true barf fest, look up her article about “Women’s Bodies, Republican Laws.” I think my testosterone dropped to the point of non-existence and I lost a testicle by the end of the article.
The St Petersburg Times, now the Tampa Bay Times, is unworthy of being labeled “fish wrap”.
There will be a barrage of this for the next nine months.
The leftist media pays no penalty fo rbeing wrong ,or biased. Sometimes - it leads to promotions and jobs.
The Left - and Obama - don’t care how much credibility they lose wth rational voters. They aren’t after the rational vote. They know they have lost that.
What they want is the irrational vote - this, plus Blacks, plus Unions, oplus typical far left, plus a few nuts that can scare into the pile - is their goal.
They - quite literally - don’t care if what they say is gibberish. Wha they want to do is cloud the air with so much gibberish - that any rational discussion of reality is obstructed/smeared into a “he said/she said”.
A significnat poriton of our society has rejected reason. That is their target market.
I used to wrap fish in the St. Pete Times, but it made the fish stink.
I may be wrong but the Buffet rule wouldn’t change Romney’s tax rate since his tax, like Bufftet’s, is on investments, right?
With that said, W did spend too damn much money. obama has only trippled it. ha
The fact is, George W. Bush spent money like a drunken sailor and never even found his damn veto pen until 2006, and he presided over the largest and most far reaching expansion of federal power into our lives (with the resulting financial costs) of any President since FDR and/or LBJ, that other loser from Texas. It was Bush who uttered that nonsense about ‘abandoning capitalism in order to save it’ as he was pushing TARP on us, and it was Bush who paved the way for 0bama’s reckless and irresponsible spending.
When it comes to Bush and 0bama, I say a pox on both their houses.
Thankfully, this column is in the commentary section, because it so blindly partisan as to be laughable. I will concede that when the Republicans controlled both houses and the presidency they over spent. But, excusing bad behavior by supporting more bad behavior is inexcusable.
The facts are the facts. In every instance, Obama has done exactly the wrong thing when faced with creating a policy on the economy. From TARP II to Obamacare, they have created the environment of uncertainty causing businesses to stop spending and stop hiring. Make no mistake, this is Obama’s economy and he alone is responsible. He has failed at every turn and enslaved your children and grandchildren with a debt of $50,000 per. Obama and a Senate that has not passed a budget in over 1,000 days have got to held to account for their behavior and lack of leadership.
Years back, it was Reagan.
Interesting choice of metaphors.
But, just to be sure I fully understand the comparisons, which party represents the popular embodiment of the virtues of the free enterprise system and which is the over-rated homosexual who is popular for no comprehensible reason?
If libs think Clinton was so great and that his 8 years were so wonderful then why did these liberal Democrats pick Obama over Hillary in the Dem primary? Why were they trashing WJClinton in their primary? They don't believe half of what they say,
Another brilliant, really-really smart, all-knowing, Progressive, intellectual genius, speaks her infinite wisdom, unlimited knowledge and insightful intelligence, far above the mere mortals that surround her.
/s/
Question: Why are Progressives so smirkingly smart?
Just asking.
Yeah, Bush has been out of office for three years, but nevertheless, it’s all HIS fault!
Sorry, Tampa Bay Times, that dog just won’t hunt.
Put on your Thinking Cap, go back to the drawing board, and come up with something that has some sort of real-world validity - however tenuous.
This article is an act of desperate, Obama-loving fantasy.
Interesting and telling SELECTION of venues Ms Blummer. Shall we look at the record perhaps? The US Senate, where our President spent a glorious 2 years, has been Democrat controlled since 2006 and for the past 3 years not even passed a Budget bill of its own. Fact 2, last year when Obama's own budget proposal was voted upon, it was mildly defeated 99-0.
So when a leftist dim-bulb complains about the GOP House, know that their compatriots in the Democrat controlled US Senate are even more guilty because the are the President's party. Dunce-cap for you!
That's like a comedian saying the act before him was so bad that the audience was till booing halfway into his act.
2024, President Mackenzie: "I wish I could have improved the economy, but President George W. Bush ruined it all."
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.