Federal Budget Watch: Same Old Talking Points, But the Parties Are Reversed

It’s almost like magic (poof!)–how the roles in the debate over the federal budget have been reversed now that the Democrats are in charge, with the Republicans now using the same old talking points that the Democrats used during the Bush Administration. Here are some parts of (Republican) Senator Judd Gregg’s response to yesterday’s Presidential radio address that make me sentimental about my days on the Democratic staff of the House Budget Committee…

First, there’s the old “compare this president’s debt to the debt of all previous presidents” strategy:

In the next five years, President Obama’s budget will double the national debt; in the next ten years it will triple the national debt.

To say this another way, if you take all the debt of our country run up by all of our presidents from George Washington through George W. Bush, the total debt over all those 200-plus years since we started as a nation, it is President Obama’s plan to double that debt in just the first five years that he is in office.

(It’s always handy to refer to the nominal dollar value of the debt if you want to make the point that it’s growing by an enormous amount over time.)

Let me here note that in return, the Democrats of the House Budget Committee are bragging about the deficit reduction accomplished in their proposed budget plan in the same manner that the Bush Administration used to brag about their budget (emphasis added):

WASHINGTON – The House Budget Committee today passed by 24 to 15 a budget resolution for Fiscal Year 2010 that embraces President Obama’s goal of cutting the deficit in half by 2013 and funding critical initiatives in health care, energy, and education…

A well-understood, critical component of the above talking point: don’t dare extend the budget window far enough to reveal the deficit coming back up. Hence the five-year, not ten-year, window adopted by the congressional budget committees–it makes bragging (and “success”) easier. And to the extent the deficit is easy to cut in half because it starts at an unusually-high level, and to the extent that it will come down mostly due to an economic recovery rather than hard policy choices…well, just try not to mention that.

And now, it’s the Republicans accusing the Obama budget of intergenerational inequity…Boy, does this part of Senator Gregg’s response bring back memories:

[President Obama's budget] will lead to an immense national debt that not only threatens the value of the dollar and puts at risk our ability to borrow money to run the government. But it will also place our children at a huge disadvantage as they inherit this debt which will make their chances of success less than those given to us by our parents. It is not right for one generation to do that to another generation.

But don’t worry too much… the Republicans still hold dear to their hearts this line (again, from Senator Gregg’s response):

[President Obama] also is proposing the largest tax increase in history, much of it aimed at taxing small business people who have been, over the years, the best job creators in our economy.

In fact, I’d like to critique this line of argument that Senator Gregg emphasized several times in his remarks:

[T]he budget of the President spends too much, taxes too much and borrows too much.

It can’t be true that a budget plan could both tax too much and borrow too much. As I’ve argued before, the problem with the Obama budget is that it both spends a lot and cuts taxes by too much (i.e., taxes too little). That’s how you get to the borrowing too much part.

Comments

[EEB:]

I would like to thank the author for these insights. Another thing that I noticed was that the current administration was continuing the last administration's use of rosy forecasts to claim that the budget deficits will be reduced in the future. The Obama administratin projected a peak unemployment rate of 8.1% for this recession. We will officially be over that very soon.

Mar 29 08:41 AM

[russ:]

I agree with Ed K that fixing the econmy comes first. However, improving our sorry education system, improving the energy effieincy of the economy and getting some control and fairness out of health care will help provide long term structural improvements to our economy. We have 'talked about' these problems for decades and done nothing. We need to do more that just return to the "same old song". There is a need and opportunity to make some changes which will have long term benefit.

Mar 29 01:02 PM

[Mr. Ed, Jr.:]

"It can’t be true that a budget plan could both tax too much and borrow too much"

Sure, it can. To make it simple, $1 of taxation and $1 of borrowing could, arguably, both be "too much".
Also, I am not sure if your point is that Republicans are hyppocrites (Your emphasis on Sen Gregg would seem to indicate that position), but it is possible that the Democrats were correct that Bush's budget called for irresponsible overspending-- and that the Republicans are also correct that Obama's budget calls for even more irresponsible overspending.

Mar 29 01:38 PM

[Mbuna:]

Budget politics, an ugly subject no matter what angle you're looking at it from. I think there are too many entrenched political interests all around for something wonderful to happen with all of this. That being said, I still think Obama is better than the other real choice we had.

Mar 29 02:01 PM

[joedst:]

For the last eight years I never heard you republicans cry about our grandchildren paying off our debt for years and years. Maybe because you were the recipient of most of the tax cuts, but not this time. Crybabies!!


On Mar 29 02:01 PM Mbuna wrote:

> Budget politics, an ugly subject no matter what angle you're looking
> at it from. I think there are too many entrenched political interests
> all around for something wonderful to happen with all of this. That
> being said, I still think Obama is better than the other real choice
> we had.

Mar 29 02:37 PM

[Lin:]

Joedst-- You are correct !

Mar 29 04:30 PM

[Freedoms Truth:]

"embraces President Obama’s goal of cutting the deficit in half by 2013"

This Democrat talking point is beyond stupid. Next years deficit is the largest in human history, larger in real terms than any deficit the US has ever run, and the 4 year total deficit is something like $3-4 trillion - the largest ever and over 4 TIMES the level of the prior 4 years.

This is like a 200lb man going on a binge spree, balooning up to 400lbs so he can come back down to 300lbs, and declares that "I am going to lose 100 lbs".

Mar 29 06:01 PM

[Freedoms Truth:]

"It can’t be true that a budget plan could both tax too much and borrow too much"

Yes it can. Obama is spending $16 TRILLION in the next 4 years. That is far too much, and it doesnt matter which portion of that $16 trillion is borrowed (at least $4 trillion) and which is taxed (up to $12 trillion), the amounts involved will destroy the US economy, either sooner or later.

Mar 29 06:03 PM

[Freedoms Truth:]

" I agree with Ed K that fixing the econmy comes first. However, improving our sorry education system, improving the energy effieincy of the economy and getting some control and fairness out of health care will help provide long term structural improvements to our economy."

1. Our education system is getting worse due to special interests (teachers unions, NEA) that have a lockhold on the Democrats and prevent real reform. In the past 25 years, we have double per pupil spending but gotten no improvement in outcomes.
The Democrats keep making it worse.
2. "energy efficiency" - the wasteful and inefficient squandering of resources on energy saps our economy - Ethanol subsidies, alternative energy subsidies, regulations that prevent domestic drilling or other energy generation. The Democrats with their drill-nowhere tax-success and subsidize-the-inefficient mentality are making it worse.
3. "control and fairness out of health care" It is unfair that the Democrat are taxing people making under median family wage to subsidize health care for people making over that amount; it is unfair that Democrats added regulations that increase the cost of health insurance and insist on stopping reasonable medical malpractice reform. They are creating the crisis with over-regulation and now intend to harm the 250 million of us who have health insurance in the name of helping those without ... except many of those without health insurance are illegal aliens. If we started enforcing immigration law a lot of these problems would be lessened.

Democrats will make these problems worse not better. These issues are problems because of previous failed and flawed policies of the Democrats. Imagining the further socialization of health care, energy and education will 'fix' anything is a sorry pipedream.

Mar 29 06:11 PM

[Freedoms Truth:]

"It's time for the political bickering,inconsequential distractions and blame game to end,the goal should now become a unification of Dems and Reps to fix this mess. "

Rahm Emanuel gave it away right after the election, saying that they werent going to 'let this crisis go to waste' meaning, the crisis is their excuse to ram through their entire left-liberal agenda. That's why the 'stimulus' became a phony trillion dollar boondoggle of every pet liberal project imagined in the past decade. It was not stimulus at all, IT WAS A TROJAN HORSE for liberalism.

Multiple opportunities for real private sector stimulus have been taken away - regulatory reform (eg fixing sarbanes-oxley), tax reform/reduction, and market-confidence building. They didnt go that route. They went the grow-the-govt route.

With that mentality in the Obama white house, there is no 'working with Republicans', there is only attempts to brow beat them to accept the toxic assets of bad left-liberal policy.

Mar 29 06:16 PM

[Leftfield:]

Washington is fully capable of taxing too much AND borrowing too much. By SPENDING too much.

They won't tax too little, trust me.

Mar 29 07:08 PM

[jksisco:]

The projected spending is not sustainable without tax increases, and no you can't make the top 5% earners to pay it all. Initially they will try to raise revenues through job-killing taxes, then when it's apparent that's not sufficient, they will be forced to raise income taxes at all levels, which should stifle any gains made by infrastructure spending. Throw in inflation that occurs by running the printing presses 24/7 and our economy could be in worse shape 3 years from now than it is today. That's why I will be standing shoulder to shoulder with my fellow citizens at the Tax Day Tea Parties April 15th, enough is enough!

Mar 30 02:22 AM