Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
Steve Benen reports The fastest deficit reduction in generations:
We learned
about a month ago that the U.S. budget deficit for the most recent
fiscal year fell to $1.089 trillion, $200 billion smaller than it was
last year, and nearly $300 billion smaller than when President Obama
took office.
For many on the left, the news was discouraging —
the deficit should be going up, not down, as we invest in job creation
and economic growth. For the right, the complaints stayed the same —
the deficit that exploded under Bush/Cheney was still too high. But
regardless of ideology, the fact remains that there's been an enormous
drop in the size of the deficit in the first half of the Obama era.
How enormous? Matt Yglesias flagged this item
from Investors Business Daily noting a tidbit that's generally ignored
in the larger political debate over the nation's finances: "Believe it
or not, the federal deficit has fallen faster over the past three years
than it has in any such stretch since demobilization from World War II."
All this gloom and doom talk about the federal deficit requiring a "grand bargain" that undermines social security and Medicare only because conservative have always dreamed of destroying these New Deal and Great Society legacy programs is more GOPropanda than fact. It is the same reason why the Weeper of the House, John Boehner, tried to appease his Tea-Publican caucus by asserting that "ObamaCare" must also be on the table in the "fiscal cliff" austerity crisis negotiations. The Obama administration responded appropriately, the Affordable Care Act is not "on the table" when it comes to debt-reduction talks.