We Are Witnessing The Biggest One-Year Reduction In Deficit Reduction In American History

DEFICIT SHRINKS FROM LAST YEAR'S RECORD.... Deficit hawks probably won't be pleased with the total, but they should at least be pleased with the direction.

The federal government budget deficit shrank in fiscal 2010, but the big gap was only $122 billion lower than the record high set a year ago.

The U.S. spent $1.294 trillion more than it collected in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, the Treasury Department said Friday.

The deficit amounted to 8.9% of gross domestic product. That's down from fiscal 2009, when the deficit of $1.416 trillion was 10.0% of GDP.

Spending fell and revenues rose in fiscal 2010 as the economy recovered from the deep recession that contributed to the nation's troubled fiscal condition.

If this sounds familiar, it's because the Congressional Budget Office reported on its estimate of the federal budget deficit for FY2010 would just last week. Today's Treasury report is the official deficit tally, though as it turns out, the CBO projection was almost on the nose.

The $1.294 trillion shortfall is smaller than last year's total; it's slightly lower than the deficit President Obama inherited from his predecessor; and the final figure was smaller than projections made by the administration and the CBO earlier this year.

Want to have some fun? Ask your favorite Tea Partier whether the deficit they claim to care so much about is higher or lower now than when Obama took office. They won't care for the answer, but it's true.

What's more, as Stan Collender recently noted, the $122 billion improvement on the deficit "is the biggest one-year nominal drop in the deficit that has ever occurred." We probably won't see headlines blaring, "U.S. achieves biggest one-year deficit reduction in American history," but that just happens to be the case.

read full article:
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2010_10/026151.php
by: Steve Benen

----------------------pop quiz----------------------------------------------
Which of the following will make up a majority of the deficit in the next decade?

A) Social Security
B) Medicare
C) The National Park Service
D) PBS
E) George Bush's tax cuts

Give up? The answer is E -- George Bush's tax breaks for the rich.
Of course the Debt Commission focussed all its concerns on A), B),C), and D). They would rather turn Medicare into a voucher system, surrender "fair and balanced" news reporting to Fox News, decimate the National Park System and have working Americans drop dead on the job from old age.

Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it. I remember.

LIES, HALF TRUTHS, AND FALSEHOODS

Last week the Bureau County Republican's Editor Teri Simon lauded the positive campaigns of Sheriff John Thompson and his challenger Bill Rosenow but warned that in-spite of their professional and admirable example there were those that wished to drag this campaign into the gutter. The last minute, full page attack ad ran against Sheriff Thompson on Thursday, in papers all across this county validated Teri’s warning.

The ad against Sheriff Thompson and the letter to the editor, trashing the service of County Board member Rick Wilkin, were timed to cast a raft of half-truths, falsehoods and scurrilous innuendo before the voting public just days before the election. It is crass and craven tactics like this that make people hate politics and discourages those willing to serve the public. But then we’ve seen this all before, coming from some of the same crowd, defenders of a past Sheriff that had turned our county into a national laughing stock. The good people of Bureau County saw through these tactics before. I am convinced they will recognize them for what they are once again.

Respectfully,
mike kohr
Bureau County Board, district 18

‎7 REPUBLICAN LIES FOR ELECTION DAY:

1) President Obama tripled the deficit.
Reality: Bush's last budget had a $1.416 trillion deficit. Obama's first reduced that to $1.29 trillion, repeating the pattern of President Clinton's glide path to fiscal sanity.

2) President Obama raised taxes, which hurt the economy.
Reality: Obama cut taxes for 95% of Americans the lower 95% to be exact.

3) President Obama bailed out the banks.
Reality: While many people conflate the "stimulus" with the bank bailouts, the bank bailouts were requested by President Bush and his Treasury Secretary, former Goldman Sachs CEO Henry Paulson. (Paulson also wanted the bailouts to be "non-reviewable by any court or any agency.") The bailouts passed and began before the 2008 election of President Obama.

4) The stimulus didn't work.
Reality: The stimulus worked. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the stimulus raised employment by between 1.4 million and 3.3 million jobs.

5) Businesses will hire if they get tax cuts.
Reality: A business hires the right number of employees to meet demand. Having extra cash does not cause a business to hire, but a business that has a demand for what it does will find the money to hire. Businesses want customers, tax cuts not so much.

6) Health care reform costs $1 trillion.
Reality: The health care reform reduces government deficits by $138 billion.

7) Social Security is a Ponzi scheme, and is "going broke,"
Reality: Social Security has run a surplus since it began, has a trust fund in the trillions, is completely sound for at least 25 more years and cannot legally borrow so cannot contribute to the deficit. But make no mistake, the Republicans and Tea Partiers will kill Social Security if given the chance, just ask George W. Bush. In his new book he lists not privatizing Social Security as his biggest dissapointment. If you think the Bush ers stock market crash was bad just think how devastating it would have been if our Social Security money was wrapped up in the stock market.

Best Campaign Ad Of 2010

Here is a link to the Best Campaign Ad of 2010

Governor Pat Quinn Rocks The House!!!!



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OyxUnQbVJZY

Strongest Job Recovery In Decades is Underway

9 of the last 10 recessions occurred under Republican economic policy, including todays George W. Bush’s “Great Recession,” the deepest economic downturn since Hoover’s “Great Depression” of 1929. President Obama has not only halted the staggering job loss of over 780,000 per month he inherited from George W. Bush but President Obama’s “Bubble Up Economic” policies has reached positive increase in monthly job creation with unmatched speed.

Source: Chris Isidore from CNNMoney.com

The economic pain being felt today is a result of the depth of the hole that was dug by the Republican “Trickle Down” policies of the Republican Party. The nation suffered a loss of 8.4 million, or 7% of all jobs, in George W. Bush’s “Great Recession.” This compares with a loss of 3.1% of all jobs lost during George W. Bush’s first recession of March–November of 2001, and 1.9% of all jobs lost during George H.W. Bush’s recession of July 1990-March of 1991. -The deeper the hole, the longer the climb out of it- If Americans wish to avoid the pain of recovery from recession, we need to quit electing the people digging the holes.