Eddie—

NYTimes is the go to source for you?

Here is one I prefer.
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There are two basic truths about the enormous deficits that the federal government will run in the coming years…

The story of today’s deficits starts in January 2001, as President Bill Clinton was leaving office. The Congressional Budget Office estimated then that the government would run an average annual surplus of more than $800 billion a year from 2009 to 2012. Today, the government is expected to run a $1.2 trillion annual deficit in those years.

You can think of that roughly $2 trillion swing as coming from four broad categories: the business cycle, President George W. Bush’s policies, policies from the Bush years that are scheduled to expire but that Mr. Obama has chosen to extend, and new policies proposed by Mr. Obama.
Now, once again, here is the truth on the Bush years.
From an earlier article at American Issues Project:

During the Bush years, despite the 2000 Recession, the attacks on Sept. 11, the stock market scandals, Hurricane Katrina and wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Bush Administration was able to reduce the budget deficit from 412 billion dollars in 2004 to 162 billion dollars in 2007, a sixty percent drop. In 2004, the federal budget deficit was 412 billion dollars. In 2005, it dropped to 318 billion dollars. In 2006, the deficit dipped to 248 billion dollars. And, in 2007, it fell below 200 billion to 162 billion dollars. During the Bush years, the average unemployment rate was 5.2 percent, the economy saw the strongest productivity growth in four decades and there was robust GDP growth. These were amazing accomplishments considering the unexpected challenges. You certainly didn’t read much about this in the press.

But, things changed in 2007. Democrats took over Congress, gas prices started to rise, and at the end of the year and into 2008 several financial institutions started to crumble as the housing bubble began to burst. Of course, it should be noted that President Bush publicly called for the reform of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac 17 times in 2008 alone before Congress acted. Democrats, on the other hand, blocked reform numerous times. It was later reported after the 2008 election that Bush had nothing to do with the financial crisis. Hoover Institution visiting fellow Scott S. Powell wrote in Barron’s in February of this year that the present crisis began in the 1970s, during the Carter administration, with passage of the Community Reinvestment Act to stem bank redlining and liberalize lending in order to extend home ownership in lower-income communities. This risk was acknowledged in the Bush administration’s first fiscal-year budget, released in April 2001. Sadly these warnings were ignored by Congress.

But, this didn’t stop Barack Obama and other liberals from blaming George Bush for the market meltdown last year….

The truth is that Obama inherited a 2008 budget deficit of 459 billion dollars. He voted for the 700 billion dollar bank rescue in the fall. He was left 350 billion from this spending bill when he took office. He then spent 787 billion dollars on a Stimulus Bill, 33 billion dollars on the SCHIP bill, and 410 billion dollars on his record-setting Omnibus Bill. Karl Rove explained that if Obama didn’t like the banking bailout bill he could have refused to spend that 350 billion dollars that Bush left him but he didn’t. Obama went ahead and spent it anyway.

The CBO estimated that the Obama budget deficit will total an astounding 13.1 percent of GDP this year. As a comparison, under George Bush, the federal deficit for 2008 was 3.2 percent of GDP. The deficit for fiscal year 2007, in the last budget adopted when Congress was controlled by Republican majorities, was 1.2 percent of GDP. Obama’s deficit will force the United States to borrow nearly $10 trillion in the next decade.
Democrats and the state run media are still trying to blame Bush for the deficits they are creating.
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I want you to re-read this part, as it seems I’ve heard this before. Oh yeah, I remember. I said it months ago—

“Hoover Institution visiting fellow Scott S. Powell wrote in Barron’s in February of this year that the present crisis began in the 1970s, during the Carter administration, with passage of the Community Reinvestment Act to stem bank redlining and liberalize lending in order to extend home ownership in lower-income communities. This risk was acknowledged in the Bush administration’s first fiscal-year budget, released in April 2001. Sadly these warnings were ignored by Congress.”—American Issues Project.

Funny, or something more sinister, how the Times gets it so consistently wrong?

Why don’t both sides spit out the partisan kool aid and admit you’re being played for fools by the politicians and special interest lobbies. You are like first graders trampling grandpa’s garden. It doesn’t matter who took the first step. Stop arguing and just get out of the garden!

Democrat and Republican; left and right; liberal and conservative. Everyone has their hand in the federal cookie jar. And the voters who would rather watch Dancing With The Stars while government assumes their responsibilities are the ones to blame for federal deficits and debt.

Well, the Great Society doesn’t come cheap. Just suck up and pay up…and pay up…and pay up… Just look what a wonderful world you bought for your grandkids… too bad they will never be able to pay the bills. Do the math.

Doubt any response is necessary after that A#.

Yep.. A+ for A#

A#—

Generally agree with your statement, however the response was to a specific question about the current deficits. More specifically to the “source material” backing up the statement.

Maybe you are so jaded by political shenanigans from both sides, you don’t see the tree for the forest. Never have I been partisan for “republican” issues, only conservative.

However, Democratic policies have been much more a part of trillion dollar deficits than Republican weaknesses. Granted they’ve done themselves no favors by their inability to derail, or even voice coherent
opposition to, those policies. But don’t pretend there is not a relevance to my argument. The seeds of calamity were planted under Carter, weeded and watered under Clinton, and blossomed under Bush. The only hope is if those who actually pay taxes see the coming storm and act before the bloom is off…

In essence, we agree that both sides are responsible, but one can argue the degree…and what makes a good “source”.

………Bravo A#!….They may sound different when they run for office, but once they become ensconced in the business of Washington DC, there isn’t a dimes worth of difference between them.

— dr-debunk

Ok. Let’s concede the other kid took the first step into the garden and has bigger feet. Now how do we get them all to stop stomping on the cucumbers?

By the way dr.debunk; the “seeds of calamity” were planted in the early twentieth century when the U.S. Constitution was amended to allow direct election of U.S. Senators and direct federal taxation of the populace.

State governments were the firewall against federal excess and the protection for local and personal interest. Once they were made irrelevant the seeds were sown for subsequent federal abuses and the imperial bureaucracy on the Potomac.

Conservatives with too much power are much slower, but no less malevolent than liberals in the long term.

Big, government-funded studies

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31190909/

A#—

And here I thought I was the resident pessimist.
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“Now how do we get them all to stop stomping on the cucumbers”—A#—

“The only hope is if those who actually pay taxes see the coming storm and act before the bloom is off…”—Doc—

This is what I think about that. If that means voting every legislator out of office, with a direct mandate to those we vote in.

Don’t underestimate the power of your voice, as well as your vote. With the internet, one can “voice” their opinion readily, and to effect. Have spent this last 75 minutes e-mailing every one of Letterman’s sponsors with specific boycotting directives. CBS server is melting down…conservatives pile on…find the list at Gateway Pundit…