Romney hits GOP for increasing deficits

[left-of-center2012]

Source: The Hill

Utah Senate candidate and former Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney criticized the GOP on Monday for ballooning the federal deficit after years of party rhetoric about fiscal responsibility.

"Republicans have been shouting about this as long as I can remember,” Romney wrote on his campaign website. “We called for an amendment to balance the budget. Just a few years ago, the Tea Party movement brought new energy to the issue. But now that Republicans are in charge in Washington, we appear to have become silent about deficits and debt.”

The federal deficit swelled this year following the December 2017 passage of the GOP's signature tax law and a bipartisan deal to boost discretionary spending. The tax law alone was projected to add almost $1.9 trillion to deficits over a decade. In the first 10 months of the fiscal year, the deficit hit $682 billion, up $116 billion from the same period in 2017, and more than than the deficit total for last year, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.

Spending rose 4 percent in that time period, while revenues increased 1 percent.

Read more: http://thehill.com/policy/finance/405941-romney-hits-gop-for-increasing-deficits

[BeyondGeography]

1. Reagan proved deficits don't matter.

http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2004-01-12/news/0401120168_1_deficits-don-t-matter-treasury-secretary-paul-o-neill-john-snow

[Fred Sanders]

2. Not true..it is a matter of life and death when Democratics have power, so say the media well.

[left-of-center2012]

3. GOP talking points from 14 years ago ?

[sandensea]

5. Well, he's just pointing out the hypocrisy of GOPee dogma on the subject.

As with eveything else they see fit to opine on.

[BeyondGeography]

8. Yeah, thanks

Thought that would be clear.

Mitt trying to convince Republicans that their political empire is built on something other than fear and greed is cute though.

[sandensea]

9. Chat rooms in that sense are like chats with real people:

Half of what's said, gets misunderstood.

That said, it never ceases to amaze me how the GOPee coopted people - people who have few if any savings - into believing that what's just for the Panama Papers crowd is good for them.

[BeyondGeography]

10. The media also routinely credits them for being the adults in the room when it comes to budgets

And then Democrats do silly things like commit to pay-as-you-go just so they can measure up, or something.

Crazy world.

[sandensea]

11. Excellent point. It's probably their favorite win-win

They get their Big Media surrogates - and tactical allies like Andrea Mitchell - to parrot the idea that "Democrats have to abandon their progressive agenda for their own good."

Then sometimes we do - and then of course the GOPee peels away many of our working-class supporters by convincing them that "see? They only worry about big business, lawyers, and Hollywood elites - not yoooou!"

The must get a big laugh every time they pull this.

[JHan]

25. hmm.

I've read criticisms of paygo and I don't grasp them. The Republicans are now about ethnonationalism and dominionism, they have now abandoned fiscal responsibility and strong foreign policy as their main selling points. In any case, House paygo rules were in effect 2007-2010, has been a statutory rule since 2010. Also worth mentioning this is the time Congress passed some tax bills that cut or provide rebates.

If Pelosi ( if she retains speakership) wants some progressive legislation passed she can get it passed ( once she has the votes) even if it's deemed difficult to finance via paygo, she would probably introduce or support a motion to waive ( As she did in 2009 for the stimulus)

[BeyondGeography]

27. What's to grasp? Republicans treat pay-go as a joke and we pick up the pieces

Every.time.

And how have voters rewarded us? By kicking us out and turning the store right back over to the Republicans.

Every.time.

Politically, this serves almost no purpose. Whatever tiny benefit Democrats might get from telling everyone how responsible they’re being will be dramatically offset by the risk that they’ll have trouble passing their (extremely popular) agenda. Are they really foolish enough to think that it matters whether some corporate-funded centrist think tanks scolds them for not holding the line on deficits? Who cares?

Voters certainly don’t, even if they might nod their heads when somebody says, “Your family has to balance its budget, so government should have to too.” I should note that Obama was disturbingly prone to using this completely inaccurate formulation, but the truth is that government doesn’t have to balance its budget. The last time it did was 20 years ago, and since we can borrow money for almost nothing, it’s often the case that the wisest course is to borrow in order to fund important programs.

Voters will reward Democrats if the legislation they pass makes those voters’ lives better. If more people have health coverage, more people can access college and more people have economic security, Democrats won’t be punished if they increase the deficit, just as Republicans haven’t been punished for it in the past.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2018/06/07/stop-trying-to-be-responsible-on-the-budget-democrats/?utm_term=.89290be12a96

Even Pelosi cheerleader Charles Pierce is begging her to update this page of the playbook:

https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a21206043/pelosis-pay-go-rule/

[JHan]

28. Again..

I am not convinced this plays into the hands of Republicans. She has waived it before.

Is paygo on the ballot? How many people have heard of it?

"whether some corporate-funded centrist think tanks scolds them for not holding the line on deficits? "

Oh dear God.

[lark]

22. Fear and greed is the cement they use to build their castles.

The base is tax cuts and the building blocks are varied and include ending all business regulations including overtime and child labor laws, ending free education, ending all government involvement with healthcare including Medicaid, Medicare and ACA, taking all the social security money from the working class and giving it to the rich through various schemes, ending all environmental laws so businesses can pollute as much as they want, ending freedom of speech and could even include ending the constitution.

[kysrsoze]

4. Like he wouldn't have voted in lockstep with them

Whatever.

[bucolic_frolic]

6. Romney is more dangerous than Trump at this point

Romney could get elected, without Russian booster rockets

[C Moon]

7. WTF? The GOP is famous for raising the deficit. Where's R$ been?

[SWBTATTReg]

12. And what are they going to do about it? Probably lower the taxes again on the 1%ers and raise ...

ours...wouldn't be surprised and it's amazing that you don't hear anything anymore from Paul Ryan, who the loudest one of all regarding the deficits and federal debt.

[BumRushDaShow]

13. Remember we were supposed to "grow our way out" of the loss of revenue from tax cuts.

Instead we are handing out money like candy to certain constituencies due to an idiotic trade war.

[paleotn]

14. Yea, Robme. Whatever.

[bullwinkle428]

15. Muthafucka, you would have voted for EVER LAST ONE of

those tax cuts that ballooned the deficit out of control!

[Dave Starsky]

16. Romney has sucked on Trump's balls since Day One.

There's a picture of him happily eating frog legs with the Fathead. Frog legs, for crying out loud.

[progree]

17. Interest on debt, going mainly to the wealthy, and about 33% to foreigners

"The interest paid last year by American taxpayers on that debt was nearly $300 billion,” the former Massachusetts governor wrote. “To put our interest payment in perspective, it’s about 20 times as much as a wall facing Mexico would cost, and approximately 40 percent of our total military budget.”

-- http://thehill.com/policy/finance/405941-romney-hits-gop-for-increasing-deficits

That the interest on the debt is something we pay ourselves is bullshit, as the non-wealthy collectively own a small percentage of the bonds. The above does not include interest on intragovernmental debt, such as the interest earned by the Social Security Trust Fund bonds.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Under current law, national debt held by the public projected to expand from 78% of GDP currently to 152% of GDP by 2048 (30 years from now). By 2048, interest on the debt is projected to nearly quadruple as a percent of GDP (from 1.6% in 2018 to 6.3% of GDP in 2048) and reach the same level as spending on Social Security - Congressional Budget Office 6/26/18

My old links have gone bad to the exact documents, but start here:

The 2018 Long-Term Budget Outlook, 6/26/18, https://www.cbo.gov/publication/53919

In the above projection, the CBO assumes that Congress does something to prevent the Social Security benefit cuts that will otherwise result after the SS trust funds are exhausted in about 2034.

[cstanleytech]

18. Repugnants honestly never ever cared about reining in spending because if they did

the military would not be bloated with it.

[YOHABLO]

19. Well there's only one thing to do ...

scrap all those ''entitlement" programs. Because you know we can't let the top income brackets pay for those ''freeloaders''.

[JHB]

20. The last wheezing gasp of "party of fiscal responsibility" was under GHW Bush...

...when he went back on the "Read my lips, no new taxes" slogan. Conservatives never fogave him for it.

But at the time Romney was still at Bain, shuffling paperwork to suck companies dry while steering their assets into his pockets.

[Astraea]

21. If you really cared, you wouldn't be a Republican

[MissMillie]

23. Deficits are an issue only if you expect the middle class to pay for them

At the expense of not having a middle class.

[progree]

24. Bad news in August, and for the first 11 months of Fiscal Year 2018

In my 4 paragraphs, I'm going to skip the August 2018 vs. August 2017 comparison, because of the timings of weekends and holidays -- the deficit nearly doubled, but when adjusted for the timing of weekends and holidays, its up 19%, still a scary number. But I'm not a big fan of 1 month comparisons, Rather, I'll focus on the 11 months of this fiscal year vs. the first 11 months of the last fiscal year.

U.S. budget deficit widens to fifth-highest ever, CBO Reports, MarketWatch, 9/11/18

... The Treasury Department will report final official numbers on Thursday, and they are usually very similar to the CBO’s.

... The big picture: The budget deficit is widening in a big way. In the first 11 months of the fiscal year, the deficit was $895 billion, which is $222 billion more than the previous year (that's a 33% increase -Progree). Outlays have climbed 7% while revenue rose 1%.

Corporate taxes have plummeted by 30% this fiscal year, both because of the lower rate as well as the expanded ability to immediately deduct the full value of equipment purchases. Individual income and payroll taxes have climbed 4%, as increasing wages — mostly, due to more people having jobs — offset a lower withholding rate.

Spending on Social Security and Medicare have climbed 4% as more baby boomers retire, outlays on net interest on the debt have jumped 19% in part due to a higher rate of inflation triggering more payments to inflation-protected securities holders, and defense spending has jumped 6%.

More: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/us-budget-deficit-widens-to-fifth-highest-ever-cbo-reports-2018-09-11?siteid=yhoof2&yptr=yahoo

I highlight the big jump in interest on the debt, since that comes out of revenues, leaving less to spend on programs.

[cos dem]

26. Willard, did you not get the memo?

Deficits only matter during Democratic administrations.

[blueinredohio]

29. Isn't that the first smart thing he has ever said?

[TomCADem]

30. What Difference Is There Between Romney's Proposed Tax Cuts and Trump's?

It is the exact same economic policy with the exception of Trump ripping off Bernie Sander's trade policy.