Monday, February 15, 2010

Deficit Spending - Fiscal Insanity

The Washington Post reports that: "Obama has proposed a record $1.56 trillion deficit for fiscal 2010 ..." The Post then goes on to quote Obama as saying: ""It's easy to get up in front of the cameras and rant against exploding deficits. What's hard is actually getting deficits under control. But that's what we must do," Obama said." How can anyone (with a straight face) publicly propose a monumental deficit while simultaneously promising to get it "under control"??? If Obama were truly committed, propose a balanced budget now. This is insane.

Furthermore, the post quotes Obama as saying: ""Sometimes, particularly in tough times like these, you have to make hard choices about where to spend and where to save. That's what being responsible means. That's a bedrock value of our country. And that ought to be a value that our government lives up to as well," he said." The concern with this type of oratory fluff and empty rhetoric is that for whatever reason, it leaves open the door that we will never have a balanced budget since there will always be "tough times" (Reagan, Bush II, and now Obama have used this excuse) demanding Federal support to make the politicians look good.

2 comments:

Crosbie Fitch said...

I suspect Obama has learnt something from the banks being 'too big to fail'. He now realises that 'America is too big to fail', i.e. he is turning the US into a the world's biggest ever Ponzi scheme.

Like avoiding a conjurer's distraction, what you really have to keep an eye on are all the nouveaux aristocrats leaving the sinking ship with their bags of gold.

Steve R. said...

Quite true, a giant Ponzi scheme with a large dose of Bread and Circuses thrown in.