Opinion: You doing okay?

By George Smith — September 29, 2021

Take this snippet and slip it into your mental maw and chew on it.

The country’s deficit and debt BELONG to the Republican Party and its presidents and GOP-held congresses.

Let’s go back to Bill Clinton: He left a huge surplus. (Trumpuppets, did you know that? Cat got your tongue?)

Clinton had budget surpluses for fiscal years 1998–2001, the only such years from 1970 to 2018. Clinton’s final four budgets were balanced budgets with surpluses, beginning with the 1997 budget.

Debt held by the public reached a high of 49.5% of GDP at the beginning of President Clinton’s first term. However, it fell to 34.5% of GDP by the end of Clinton’s presidency due in part to decreased military spending, increased taxes (in 1990, 1993 and 1997), and increased tax revenue resulting from the 1990s boom.

The debt held by the public relative to GDP rose again due in part to the Bush tax cuts and increased military spending caused by the wars in the Middle East and a new entitlement Medicare D program. During the presidency of George W. Bush, debt held by the public increased from $3.339 trillion in September 2001 to $6.369 trillion by the end of 2008. In the aftermath of the global financial crisis of 2007–08 and related significant revenue declines and spending increases, debt held by the public increased to $11.917 trillion by the end of July 2013, under the presidency of Barack Obama.

The Obama Administration increased the deficit but for six of his eight years, the GOP controlled both houses of Congress…you know…passing bills and raising the debt and deficit. And there was pesky 2008 worldwide economic downturn that bombed tax revenues exponentially.

WHAT ABOUT THE BUDGET DEFICIT?In Trump’s first three years the national budget deficit increased from $585 billion in fiscal 2016 to $984 billion in fiscal 2019, up 68%, for a total of $2.4 trillion. If the coronavirus had not hit this years deficit was on-track to be $1.1 trillion, per the Congressional Budget Office or CBO, which would then make Trump’s first four years deficits total $3.5 trillion. At $1 trillion or more this would have been the largest budget deficit in history with a growing economy and the largest as a percentage of GDP outside of recessions or World War II.

That deficit ballooned in Trump’s last year and that is understandable. Just like debt increases dramatically during wartime, national emergencies serve the same anti-budget purpose.

Cutting to the heart of the matter:
Government SHOULD operate as a non-profit business…it’s appropriate to run a surplus and “slush” the funds for emergencies.

The country now operates as a golden-egg-laying goose and assuming the goose will never die!

The only reason Trump and his GOP puppets cut taxes was to make sure rich folks and corporations were happy.

In case you have forgotten, trickle-down economics does not work; the 1-percenters and Big Business DO NOT, for the most part, pass along tax savings in any meaningful way…except in stock payments and executive bonuses.

The GOP is not fiscally conservative as a  party. Research it…debt and deficit.

Scary, scary read… if you are a Republican.