I meant to post about this a few days ago, but sometimes I just need a break from the horror that is our president.
Congress and the White House have become adept at passing legislation with hidden long-term price tags, but those huge costs began coming into view in Bush’s latest spending plan. Even if Bush succeeds in slashing the deficit in half in four years, as he has pledged, his major policy prescriptions would leave his successor with massive financial commitments that begin rising dramatically the year he relinquishes the White House, according to an analysis of new budget figures.
Bush’s extensive tax cuts, the new Medicare prescription drug benefit and, if it passes, his plan to redesign Social Security all balloon in cost several years from now. His plan to partially privatize Social Security, for instance, would cost a total of $79.5 billion in the last two budgets that Bush will propose as president and an additional $675 billion in the five years that follow. New Medicare figures likewise show the cost almost twice as high as originally estimated, largely because it mushrooms long after the Bush presidency.
… By the time the next president comes along, some analysts said, not only will there be little if any flexibility for any new initiatives, but the entire four-year term could be spent figuring out how to accommodate the long-range cost of Bush’s policies.
Part of the plan for the permanent Republican majority? If the next president is a Democrat — more and more imaginable considering the continuing incompetence of the current occupant and the number of Republicans deserting his ridiculous policies — he would then be the recipient of the biggest fiscal mess in history, left behind by Bush. It’s only fitting, since Bush was left the largest surplus in history, he’ll go down in the record books for the biggest economic 180 ever.
What I find most galling about this is the way that the White House doesn’t include the whole story in their budgets, thus painting a rosy picture where none exists. Take this week’s supplemental request for the war, $70-something billion that doesn’t appear anywhere in the budget. Once you add in all the off-budget items, the damage is severe.
You know, whether or not you agree with Bush’s war, his scapegoating of segments of American citizens, his curtailing of civil liberties, and other un-American activities; you have to at least agree that he is a bumbling, lying idiot when it comes to finance. Math is an absolute. You can’t make 2-1=12.
