In Plan to Reduce Deficit, White House Turns to Old Projections

[quaoar]

More fun with statistics

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/02/politics/02fiscal.html

By EDMUND L. ANDREWS
Published: January 2, 2005

WASHINGTON, Jan. 1 - To show that President Bush can fulfill his campaign promise to cut the deficit in half by 2009, White House officials are preparing a budget that will assume a significant jump in revenues and omit the cost of major initiatives like overhauling Social Security.

To make Mr. Bush's goal easier to reach, administration officials have decided to measure their progress against a $521 billion deficit they predicted last February rather than last year's actual shortfall of $413 billion.

By starting with the outdated projection, Mr. Bush can say he has already reduced the shortfall by about $100 billion and claim victory if the deficit falls to just $260 billion.

But White House budget planners are not stopping there. Administration officials are also invoking optimistic assumptions about rising tax revenue while excluding costs for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as trillions of dollars in costs that lie just outside Mr. Bush's five-year budget window.

[Be Brave]

1. LOL! They sure know their smoke and mirrors, don't they?

[merwin]

30. It's what they rely on n/t

[The Doctor.]

34. No - not smoke and mirrors, Arthur Andersen.

Some 'creative accounting' this is.

[hraka]

38. Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!!

"Uh, hello Mr. Gopher. Yeah, it's me, Mr. Squirrel. Yeah, hi, just a harmless squirrel, not a plastic explosive or anything, nothing to be worried about. Yeah, I'm just here to make your last hours on earth as peaceful as possible. Yes, don't mind this, this is doctor's orders and so forth."

[ashmanonar]

48. i love caddy shack! n/t

[Solly Mack]

2. let me just whip this outta my ass...

here! it's a diamond! really!

you go with the deficit numbers you have... not the deficit numbers you wish you had

[Pirate Smile]

3. Their disdain for reality continues. Reality is whatever they say it

is, right?

"I've been watching this more than 30 years, and I have never seen anything quite this egregious," said Stanley Collender, a longtime author on budget issues and a senior vice president at Financial Dynamics, a communications firm in Washington.

"They are cutting the deficit from a number they never believed in the beginning," Mr. Collender said, referring to the decision to measure progress against the unrealized $521 billion deficit projection. "What if they had forecast that the deficit would be $800 billion last year? Would they take credit for having cut it by half?"

White House officials are making several budgeting decisions that make their tax revenues look higher and their spending look lower than many analysts think is realistic.

-snip-
Mr. Bush has consistently refused to include Iraq costs in his annual budget request, seeking money through a supplemental appropriations bill that lies outside the official budget. The White House asked for and received $87 billion for the last fiscal year, as well as another $25 billion to cover the first few months of the 2005 fiscal year. The administration is expecting to ask for as much as $80 billion more in the next few months, but it will not include any cost estimates in Mr. Bush's budget for the 2006 fiscal year."

[Just Me]

37. Utopian capitalists,...the most extreme "LIBERALS" to ever exist.

They are gambling a whole country,...and covering their asses along the way.

Disgusting.

The greatest anchor I have,...the rest of humanity,...which survive(s) these "evil-doers".

[ashmanonar]

49. you know what's funny?

the word billion has lost all meaning...

i mean, seriously...i thought a billion dollars was a LOT of money, not too long ago...but now, being on this board and hearing about billions of dollars being thrown around, 87 billion for iraq, 521 billion deficit...

its stunning to think that a billion dollars USED to be a lot of money, and now isn't...

[gratuitous]

4. Gee, if you just make shit up

I suppose you can make the budget numbers come out any way you want. The real question is, now that the New York Times has noticed this, what are they going to do about it? Will they be buttonholing administration officials, asking pertinent and pointed questions? Will they settle for nonsense answers, or will they press for some dealing in reality?

But George Bush is such a moral man! If he lies, there must be a good reason, right?

[Skink]

5. I'm sure glad Tony Snow..

is still around. That bastion of integrity.

[Selteri]

41. Tony Snow, the guy who buzzed buildings with his

jet for fun, right?

[Trillo]

6. Shift and Squirm. More on the way. nt

[lovuian]

7. Creative Bookeeping!!! Enron did it too!!!

But heres the deal which accountants are going to sign up and the WORLD isn't going to let him get away with it!!!

the dollar will crash with that kinda bookeeping!!!

This man is such a crook!!! and the World Knows it!!!

[Rose Siding]

24. Didn't Enron do it JUST like this?

snip>
One idea to prevent private savings accounts from causing an abrupt rise in annual deficits is to treat deposits into private savings accounts as a "transfer" within the government. Another idea is to include all the borrowing for transition costs in an account that would be separate from the government's operating budget

[quaoar]

29. What a great idea!!!

If I put all my debts into an account separate from my other accounts, it vastly improves my net worth. Cool.

[illflem]

8. Just watch

Stingy will use the tsunami aid as an excuse to either raise taxes or say he can't reduce the deficit.

[UpInArms]

9. and all of *Co's plans have led to such a wondrous

economic expansion!

The five-year plan, due in February, is likely to reaffirm previous predictions of a $217 billion surge in tax revenues in 2005, the biggest one-year jump on record, and almost $800 billion a year by 2009.

"We still believe we will see new economic growth, with revenues increasing as a share of G.D.P.," said Chad Kolton, a spokesman for the White House Office of Management and Budget, referring to the gross domestic product. "I think our numbers are very realistic because they are consistent with the best estimates of Wall Street and of the Congressional Budget Office."

But the sheeple will continue to follow their Pied Piper over the cliffs into the sea, knowing they are led by a gawdly man of perfect principles. :puke:

and the MSM will continue to rah-rah their puppeteers and claim that the economy is getting better every day in every way - until all of their miserable existences eat their souls into hard little shriveled balls.

[SharonAnn]

12. Hmm, didn't the old Soviet Union always have grand "5 year plans"?

And, of course, they never achieved them. But each year they'd roll out a new 5 year plan telling their citizens how they would all have enough housing, and food, and cars, etc. by implementing THIS 5 year plan.

[The Judged]

10. * To Announce New Cabinet Level Position: 3 Card Monty Secretary!

[UpInArms]

11. and as I continued to read, I found this part too unbelievable to

miss:

But the issue poses a ticklish problem for the administration, because it is already using surplus revenues in the Social Security trust fund to cover part of the annual budget deficit. The Social Security and Medicare trust funds took in about $146 billion more than they paid out in benefits in the last fiscal year, which reduced the government's overall deficit to $413 billion from about $560 billion.

One idea to prevent private savings accounts from causing an abrupt rise in annual deficits is to treat deposits into private savings accounts as a "transfer" within the government. Another idea is to include all the borrowing for transition costs in an account that would be separate from the government's operating budget.

White House officials say it is reasonable to treat the expected transition costs separately, because they will eventually be repaid as the government's obligation to pay benefits declines sharply after 30 or 40 years.

"These aren't costs, they are savings," said Scott McClellan, Mr. Bush's spokesman, at a recent news conference.

Ah, the "costs are savings" routine! Love that one - just too priceless! Money you wouldn't spend is now "saved"!

ROFLMAO!

I learned better math than that at 10. Morons.

[chicagojoe]

13. When all of the followers are idiots, you can tell 'em anything.

[snippy]

16. "costs are savings" Doubleplusgood Comrade Squealer.

Orwell was such an optimist.

[aggiesal]

39. Here is a very good article, on the State of Social Security

You will find out that during the Reagan Administration, Alan Greenspan convince Reagan to increase the Payroll Tax, thus overpaying Social Security to fund the Baby Boomers retirement (This is the $146 billion mentioned).

The excess overfunding (revenue received exceeds benefits paid), was to go into purchasing "Special Issue" Treasury Bonds, pledging repayment with interest whenever Social Security Benefits paid out exceeds revenues collected. This was expected to happen in 2018. These "Special Issue" Treasury Bonds would have been worth $3 Trillion dollars by 2018, enough to support Social Security another 30 years.

But instead of investing the money, the government simply spent it. All of it. Leaving nothing to invest. They did however keep track of how much money was looted, and what it would be worth by 2018. These are just accounting entries, and cannot be sold to private investors because a line item in a ledger has absolutely no cash value!

Now what King George II and his administration are saying, is that the money has been looted legally, fair and square, and that the government doesn't have to honor the "Special Issue" Treasury Bonds. In other words, the government has no obligation to repay it. It's OK to fund King George II's multimillionaire tax cuts (trying to make them permanent), instead of honoring obligations made to the american worker that paid into the Social Security system for years.
Quoting Allen W. Smith, author of "The Looting of Social Security", "...this is a financial crime against the american public that makes Enron pale in comparison."

http://www.nwanews.com/story.php?paper=adg§ion=Editorial&storyid=102652

[MidwestTransplant]

14. I'll vomit when I see how Fox reports this.

[JusticeForAll]

26. This is too difficult a topic for FOX to report

Now back to the fluff news: Our King will be coronated later this month!!

:puke:

[Supersedeas]

44. No sound bites here....none of the networks are likely to touch this one

[LynnTheDem]

15. Gee...can we all use bush's accounting method on our TAX RETURNS?

After all, if creative accounting is good enough for the United States government, surely it's good enough for us...

[Vidar]

17. Shrub motto: When all else fails, fraud works

[Massacure]

18. Wants to use fuzzy math eh?

[snippy]

19. Fire the Liar!

[Brundle_Fly]

20. He wont even hit the fake prediction

let alone the full amount.

Prediction, sinks even deeper.

[radric]

21. Orwellian

[3days]

46. Good work from the Ministry of Truth

[Buns_of_Fire]

22. After so much cooking of the books

aren't they a nice, tasty, finger-lickin'-good done-to-a-turn by now?

By my own estimations, I should have made roughly $50,000 last year. However, I only really made under $1000. So, by my estimation, somebody owes me $49,000 and change. If you're that person, please remit immediately, and I'll waive my customary 21% APR on the unpaid balance.

On the other hand, I didn't spend $49,000 that I would have liked to spend, so I guess I'm really $48,000 to the good. I didn't know I was so well off, Lucky Duckie that I am...

[Massachusetts]

23. Figures don't lie

BUT LIARS FIGURE.

[snippy]

25. Bush isn't even trying to be deceptive about his lies anymore.

He just openly states that he is going to lie about something, then he describes the lie he plans on telling and then he tells it. It would be funny if it wasn't so dangerous and destructive.

[quaoar]

27. Lying is necessary

to protect us from the terrorists. It's only the Democrats who are too weak and unwilling to use deception to fight these terrorists. Bush is so strong he's not afraid to lie to save America.

Kerry would have opted for honesty and left our great nation vulnerable to attack.

[dkofos]

31. I believe you may be on to something!!

[rodeodance]

28. The 'new' admistration is starting out with lies!!!!!!

:crazy:

[Festivito]

32. How very liberal* of them. Liberal in the free with money sense.

Liberal still means free with money. That is until a RepubliCON looks at how much RepubliCONs DO spend, then liberal means someone who does not want to flog gays, stop people from hearing what they choose to hear, or do not want to have daughters raped by their father to have an abortion without permission of the rapist.

As long as liberal never means someone who his liberal with the number of faces they have.

[Selteri]

42. Hence why the democratic party needs

to start refering to itself as the Progressive party.

[Festivito]

47. Or, redefine and take the liberal mantle as good. nt.

[Megawatt]

33. Just more lies from a group that specializes in it

eom

[Supersedeas]

35. claiming victory w/out ever doing a thing--Brilliant

are there any intellectually honest fiscal conservatives out there who have a problem with this....one?

[Blower]

36. "BUDGET MISSION ACCOMPLISHED" n/t

[quaoar]

40. Welcome to DU, Blower

[imabadman]

43. This is the type of accounting

That would put members of the private sector in jail.

[sweetheart]

45. Enronomics at their most pathetic

Seems like the enron accountants are on a rebound.

[imabadman]

56. Yes, but a lot of those guys are in jail.

You will never see a government employee in jail for improper accounting practices.

[ulTRAX]

50. DAMN IT!!!!!!!!!!!!! LET'S GET HONEST FIGURES!

The true Bush 04 deficit is NOT 413 Billion.... that's the bogus unified budget figure of what we have to borrow from outside the government. The TRUE Bush deficit is in the 570 Billion range. The lower figure hides the 150 Billion we're borrowing from various federal trust funds such as SS. That money has to be repaid... or at least we hope it will.

BTW.... Kerry was no better. He claimed he wanted to cut the deficit in half. He didn't mean the deficit in on-budget spending... he meant the bogus unified budget. He pretended that the 150 billion borrowed from the trust funds didn't count.

[BadGimp]

51. In YOUR FACE LIBBIES!!!

I have to admint the brazen "in your face" tact that this administration takes deserves to be admired.

In my chosen profession which is Sales, we have a saying that gets to the basic means by which one convinces a client or group: "Tell em what you're gonna tell em, Tell em, and then Tell em what you just told em".

With the Bushistas it goes like this: "Tell em you're goona lie to em, Lie to em, and then repeat the lie as often as necessary to make it real to them".

But to reuse the same lie again... now thats brazen in your face "up yours" politics.

Sorry but I have to admire that.

In the end of course it will be precisely the thing which is their own undoing. How long it will take I cannot say.

[OrangeCountyDemocrat]

52. They're Full Of It

They won't even be able to half the deficit based on the "projected" numbers. Does anybody really expect the deficit to go in any direction but UP?

Is it any wonder the dollar is crumbling? Things will get much worse, Not better. Regardless of what phony numbers they attempt to use.

[zann725]

53. "Voo Doo Economics" re-visited.

Great!

[The White Tree]

54. What really sucks about this garbage is that in four years

Republicans will be trumpeting about how well they did this under their great leadership and the press, instead of exposing blatant lies will in the interest of fair and balanced reporting have an article that will say something like:

"Are the republicans right in their calculations. Well Yes, if you consider the criteria they are using which excludes this that and the other thing. But if you look at it from another standpoint they are wrong."

This will then allow the republican pundits to selectively quote like they always do that even the liberal media says they are right.

Makes you want to :puke:

[OrangeCountyDemocrat]

55. The Liberal What?

Oh yeah...the media. LOL

"Well Wolf, it's true that you have to get to half you have to exclude about 100 different figures from the deficit number, and of course back out the cost of the Afghanistan, Iraq & Iran wars, or about $800 Billion, which congress has determined should not be a part of the deficit. But clearly, when you do that, the * administration has managed to cut about 25% from the deficit of 4 years ago, so they deserve a great deal of credit.

Thanks John. Guess that's an issue the democrats won't really be able to use against jeb in this year's elections."