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Originally Posted by Arty By 2008 the economic cycle is expected to have flipped, so you really ought to be in surplus then. Having a deficit at the peak of the cycle is irresponsible. If you're not going to pay your debts in the good times, when else are you going to pay them? Having a $250 billion deficit at that stage of the cycle is no solution to anything. |
It's well below the average rate of 4.5% of GDP by then. We ran deficits for 30 straight years when Democrats ran Congress.
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A grasp of the facts might help you. Republicans controlled the Senate between 1980 and 1986, so you can't blame it all on the Democrats.
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All spending bills originate in the House, not the Senate. I'll forgive you for your lack of grasp of the facts, as you are a foreignor.
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Well if the Republicans are so wonderful I don't see why they making such a balls up of things now.
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Hmm, the best economy in 20 years, the lowest interest rates in 50 years, the lowest inflation rate in 50 years, and unemployment lower than the average of each of the last 3 decades.
We'll take it!
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I never once said it was. What I did say, and what you have ignored (this is getting to be a habit with you) is that it doesn't matter how big it is compared with other times. This is not then, this is now, and it is wrong now. The recession that we've just had was a very shallow one, it doesn't justify this sort of borrowing.
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The borrowing was in part, left over from previous debt, based on rosier economic conditions. We've has a recession, a terrorist attack, and corporate scandals, all that were rooted in Clinton's term. We've had to spend to create an entirely new branch of Government, the Dept. of Homeland Defense, plus fight two wars.
Borrowing money is appropriate during economic slowdowns, and times of war. We have had both.