Fiscal Budget

Ron Kaye, Former L.A. Daily News Editor, Explains L.A.`s Fiscal Waste & Scare Tactics

Published by Papa Giorgio

Video Description:

NBC-LA this morning had a debate on one of the ballot measures to appear March 5th for voting in Los Angeles, “Measure A.” This is a concise soliloquies of the larger debate (here) where Mr. Kaye underlines the main problem in Los Angeles’ fiscal practice for the past 30-years. He points out that “Measure A” will not fix the core issue while also touching on the scare tactics of the city council and Mayor. This micro L.A. level issue is an example of what is ailing California as well as the country. (Posted by: Religio-Political Talk)

A Liberal Democrat Governor Of Hawaii Talks Unfunded Liabilities And Democratic Spending Habits ~ ReasonTV

Published by Papa Giorgio

From Video Description:

“When the special interests become too powerful,” warns Ben Cayetano, “the voter only has the collective conscience of the people who are in public office.”

Cayetano was a popular two-term Democratic governor of the state of Hawaii who held office from 1994 to 2002. In 2012, Cayetano became alarmed by what he saw as out-of-control spending and special interests run amok. He came out of retirement and made a failed bid to become the mayor of Honolulu, Hawaii’s largest city.

Cayetano opposed the city’s $5.26 billion rail project, which he says costs too much and will not address Honolulu’s traffic problems. The massive system and inevitable cost overruns, he fears, simply piles more debt on a government already straining under unfunded liabilities for public-sector pensions and benefits. “They are going to end up raising taxes,” Cayetano told Reason TV. “Or the city will go bankrupt.”

In a wide-ranging conversation, the 73-year-old Filipino American discusses the Aloha State’s fiscal mess, the trouble with Hawaii’s one-party government, and why he believes social issues are distracting voters from more pressing economic problems.

Obama, the Small Spender? That`s the Newest Claim

Published by Papa Giorgio

I frequent some liberal blogs, and this recent Think Progress graphic/story is popping up, like at Little Green Footballs. So I figured I would wade into this muddy water by posting a response I found over at National Review Online and The College Conservative (CC). Here is the CC’s input:

…The chart appears to be telling us that spending, taxes, and deficits are all lower today than when Obama took office. I applaud the chart’s makers – the goons over at Think Progress with the help of the Center for American Progress – for their crafty figuring.

The chart uses the percentage of GDP from the day Obama took office and the current estimates to fudge the truth and make it look like Obama isn’t everything we evil conservatives say he is, namely fiscally irresponsible. Even an amateur economist – like public school amateur – should see right through this.

Of what use is comparing spending using a percentage of GDP, unless you’re goal is to provide bad analysis? Spending as a percentage of GDP increased from 20.8 to 25.2 between 2008 and 2009 (from government stimulus). Assuming the calculations in the chart are true (in reality, they’re only based on estimations), all it shows is that spending went from one slice of a big pie to a smaller slice of an even bigger pie.

It’s the same dishonest game for their claim on taxes. The percentage of GDP does not at all associate with the increasing tax rates that Obama and the Democrats gave us with ObamaCare. Also, coming from left-wingers, why is low federal revenue a good thing?

Lastly – I assume this is their big hurrah – deficit spending has decreased from 8.3 to 7.6% of GDP. Even if this were true, so what? This is like patting yourself on the back for sticking to your diet by only eating the whole kitchen. Political Math fixed the numbers on the chart using actual data instead of flimsy estimates and found that spending and deficits are higher under Obama (every sane person says “Duh!”). Obama did, however, seem to lower federal revenue without raising taxes. Again, with a barrage of new spending, how is this a good thing?…

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(Chart above) It is easy to dispense with the argument that the president has been tight with money. Assume that during the year 2009 your already-overweight friend gained forty extra pounds, and since then your friend has continued to overeat such that his body weight has remained roughly constant. Since he hasn’t gained much weight in the past four years, can I conclude that he doesn’t have a weight problem? Of course not. Same goes with the president and his spending; a low rate of spending growth does not imply the absence of an extremely high amount of spending. (FORBES).

An email response to a Rich Lowry question responds to the chart as well. Investors Business Daily’s take is worth posting however:

…But since taking office, Obama’s policies have made everything far worse.

And that’s abundantly clear if you compare the rest of the CBO’s 2009 forecast to Obama’s actual results.

In each and every year, Obama spent far more than the CBO had projected, took in far less in revenues — not because he cut taxes, but because of the lousy recovery — and produced much larger deficits.

Whereas the CBO projected spending in 2012 would be 21% of gross domestic product, for example, Obama now pegs it at 24%. That, mind you, would have been far worse had Republicans not put the brakes on further “stimulus” spending.

Deficits as a share of GDP, meanwhile, have come in almost twice as high as the CBO projected just before Obama took office. And the government has piled on more than $5 trillion in additional debt.

Obama can’t blame the deeper-than-expected recession on these dismal results. The real problem has been the extremely poor recovery he engineered. Whereas the CBO’s January 2009 forecast put GDP growth in 2011 at 4.4%, it came in at a mere 1.7%. This year, GDP growth is running at half the rate the CBO predicted…

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One last point that is worth mentioning. Since we are dealing with projections, let’s throw this one out into the ether:

…This year, he [Obama] introduced a fiscal 2013 budget that would have reversed the debt deal’s caps on increased spending.

“Over the 2013-2022 period,” CBO concluded in its analysis of Obama’s proposal, “the cumulative deficit that would result from enacting the president’s budget — $6.4 trillion (or 3.2 percent of GDP) — would be $3.5 trillion larger than the cumulative deficit projected under current law.”

When Obama told the people in Waterloo, Iowa, this month that he would make sure government did its part to reduce the debt, it was not a $1 trillion lie. It was a $3.5 trillion lie…

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White House Press Secretary Jay Carney Embarrassed by 414-to-0 Rejection of His Bosses Budget ~ Obfuscation

Published by Papa Giorgio

HotAir:

To cleanse the palate, a simple question: Since only 51 votes are needed to pass a budget in the Senate and there are 53 Democratic and left-leaning independent senators, why doesn’t smilin’ Harry Reid ram through O’s latest spending blowout? The White House gets awfully fidgety when the media presses them on this, to the point where even former OMB director Jack Lew was forced to play dumb about how many votes are needed for Democrats to pass this thing. Any theories? Any hypotheses for why The One might be nervous about vulnerable red-state Democrats like Claire McCaskill and Jon Tester taking a vote on a budget that calls for another $1.3 trillion deficit this year and a cool $901 billion deficit next year? Leave your informed speculation in the comments.

Green Job Costs~Leadership We Can`t Count On

Published by Papa Giorgio

Gateway Pundit has an interesting commentary on a recent “Obama lauding” of a Michigan company:.

And, you wonder why we were downgraded? With leadership like this? Seriously?

President Barack Obama toured a vehicle battery plant in Michigan on Thursday. During his visit Obama touted his administration’s focus on green technology and jobs. Thanks to the Obama-Pelosi failed stimulus bill this same corporation has created “green” jobs at a cost of about $2 million in federal subsidies per job. This is Barack Obama’s definition of success.

Today in his Weekly Address, Barack Obama praised this same battery plant as the way forward.

What do Dems have to say about the leadership that got us into this mess?

Democrats describe a White House which has been aloof on the debt crisis

“Political thermonuclear explosion.”  “‘Forget about the economic consequences, which could be very bad, this is a political thermonuclear explosion that probably just wiped out President Obama’s re-elect,’ fretted one senior Democratic official. ‘The worst part is, if this White House showed a gram of leadership on the debt crisis we could have avoided this historic embarrassment.’”  (Jonathan Allen, “S&P spurs blame game,” Politico, 8/6/11)

“The numbers add up to defeat.”  “Privately, however, Obama’s team is concerned about the factors beyond its control, talking of an imminent need to retool their economic message and strategy heading into 2012. Absent the president’s ability to defy political gravity, one Obama adviser conceded, ‘The numbers add up to defeat.’”  (Jim VandeHei and Mike Allen, “Obama’s big drags,” Politico, 8/4/11)

“The president has been invisible.”  MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough: “[D]emocrats all saying the same thing. And that is this president has been invisible. He is not a leader. They said this all behind closed doors. Democratic leaders, Democratic rank and file – in fact, 40-50 of the most powerful Democrats on the Hill, I will just stop right there. … The president has vanished. ‘He has left us here alone again like he did with healthcare. Where is he?’ Now they didn’t call him a loser but they sure as hell didn’t call him a leader.” (MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” 7/29/11)

S&P downgrade “damaging.”  “The real reason for White House fury at S&P is that it realizes how symbolically damaging this downgrade is to President Obama’s economic record. Democrats can rail all they want about the tea party, but Republicans have controlled the House for a mere seven months.” (Editorial, “America Gets Downgraded,” Wall Street Journal, 8/8/11)

Paul Ryan Takes Sen. Reids Fiscal Plan to Task

Published by Papa Giorgio

A great example of this comes from when Bush was President.

Draconian Cuts
During Bush’s last run, I heard a lot of politikal talk about Bush cutting veteran benefits by 2-million dollars. “Bush is putting these vets in the poor house, “ or, “Bush doesn’t care about the military veterans.” What is a person suppose to think if Bush is cutting 2-billion dollars out of veteran benefits? Well, as you can see from the graph below, this is merely a play on words/deeds. Bush was originally going to raise the benefits by almost 5-billion, but decided to trim the proposed increase for the next fiscal year by 2-billion. The opposing side took this decrease and used it as if Bush was actually cutting benefits, when in fact he was increasing them by 3-billion. In fact, as shown, Bush seems more compassionate about the veterans than do the opposing sides “cigar aficionado.”