If Obama had kept his campaign promises, We wouldn’t have a deficit today

People have to understand the reason that we are running this deficit is the huge explosion that we’ve had in government spending. If you could reduce government expenditures right now to what they were in 2007 there wouldn’t be any deficit this coming year. —John Lott, Economist

Just another guy calling a Black president a liar? Maybe you’d prefer the euphemism that the president used smoke and mirrors in his second (why do Democrats always get two chances at everything?)budget proposal over the more frank comment that the president lied. However deception by any other name still means Democrats drove the car of the American economy into the ditch that we find ourselves. And the president is campaigning for re-election as if he had nothing to do with our current fiscal mess.

If Democrats had not gone on the spending spree, which they, president Barry Hussein Soetoro and the Democrat controlled Congress did when they took power we would not be in the deficit quagmire we find ourselves in today. So says John Lott, Jr., economist.

Incredibly Lott claims in his article, “If Obama had kept his campaign promises, We wouldn’t have a deficit today”, when Democrats took power had they took a responsible approach to the nation’s finances and rolled back government expenditures to 2007 levels the United States would have very little to no deficit right now without raising taxes on anyone. But instead what the president and Democrats did amounts to equipping themselves with shovels to dig deeper into the ditch. And then they armed themselves with rifles to snipe at Paul Ryan Republicans who offer a road map to help drive out of the ditch. (see article)

Mr. Lott further explains in this interview on Fox News. (see 4:17min video)


Highlights of Mr. Lott’s assessment of the president’s so-called budget

With deficits accumulating to $4.3 trillion during over his first three years as president and another $10.4 trillion projected over the next decade, time is not on our side. As it is, the president not only pushed for the increased spending but also has fought budget cuts at each step along the way. And the initial efforts have been meager. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the so-called "$38 billion" spending cut bill over which the government was almost shut down actually only cuts $352 million from this year's budget. –John Lott

The president announced Wednesday that the new proposal "builds on the roughly $1 trillion in deficit reduction I already proposed in my 2012 budget," making it sound as if he has already made the tough decisions fighting for fiscal discipline. Unfortunately, it isn't so. The Congressional Budget Office, designated by the White House as the ultimate referee on spending questions, reported a few weeks ago that Obama’s February budget plans will actually increase the deficits over the coming decade by $1.2 trillion. That is a sharp contrast to the $1.1 trillion reduction touted by Mr. Obama. The CBO dismissed the president's figure, saying he underestimated how much more both existing and new programs will cost. –John Lott

In addition, the CBO claims the errors in Obama's estimates increase over time. Conservatively, that means that Obama's numbers may be severely overestimating his deficit reduction during the 11th and 12th years by nearly a trillion dollars. If so, his claimed reduction in deficits by $4 trillion amounts to less than a $1 trillion, meaning that the nation's debt will still rise by well over $11 trillion over 12 years. –John Lott

Even that measly cut may be largely smoke and mirrors. Obama's savings included the increased revenue to the treasury by eliminating the Bush tax cuts for "every millionaire and billionaire in the country." But this leaves out the obvious fact that the CBO numbers follow existing law and already assume that taxes will increase in 2013. Another $400 billion in Mr. Obama savings come from unidentified reductions in "wasteful" defense spending. Yet, unlike past presidential budgets, this one was not accompanied by supporting documents and spreadsheets, which are customarily put up for public scrutiny on the official White House website. –John Lott

According to the Congressional Budget Office the supposed neutral assessor of budgetary information the president’s proposed 12-year plan only cuts the deficit by 1 trillion dollars over his proposed twelve-year period. While the deficit projected based on the president’s numbers will increase during that same period by 12 trillion dollars.

Even my more math challenged Progressive Liberal readers should be able to understand that 1 trillion dollars of cuts proposed by the president does not offset 12 trillion dollars in deficit spending.

Yet when the president was asked about the Republican deficit reduction plan as put forth by Republican Congressman Paul Ryan the president used a Democrat talking point promoted by Sen. Charles Schumer and characterized the Ryan plan as “Radical.” (see 1:25 min video)



What the truth is, the president has set about to change the “social compact” of this country in a fundamental way. He has repeatedly stated he would attempt to do as much in his election campaign in 2008. He has gone about doing it by bankrupting the country with unsustainable spending that will economically devastate several generations of young Facebook Americans.

Democrats and this president came into an already bad economic situation no doubt, but they consciously chose to recklessly and irresponsibly increase spending to levels unprecedented in the history of this country, broke all of their promises to create jobs and fix the economy and now they will spend the next two and a half years of a 4 year presidential term campaigning to get re-elected. They'll do this all while the country worsens.

Even John McCain would have been better than Barry Hussein Soetoro. And at this point anybody is better than Obama!