NYT on Bush claim that he'll cut the deficit in half within 5 years

[Eric J in MN]

The NY Times points out that while Bush says he'll cut the deficit in half within 5 years, that projection DOESN'T include the cost of the Iraq War and assumes that his tax-cuts will expire, though he called for them to be made permanent in the State of the Union.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/10/opinion/10TUE1.html

"The president, who has never vetoed a single spending bill during his time in office, answered questions about the yawning gap between revenue and spending by recalling his plan to "cut the deficit in half" in the next five years. That plan avoids considering the consequences of locking in the current tax cuts, fails to address the needed indexing of the alternative minimum tax and does not even reflect the continuing costs of the war in Iraq. He threw up several other smokescreens, including reforming Social Security, without acknowledging that his own plan for the partial privatization of Social Security would require enormous new spending to cover the cost of the changeover. He seemed to regard this year's Medicare bill as another victory for cost controls, a peculiar stance for a law that includes a new entitlement priced at more than $50 billion a year."

[indepat]

1. Fairy tales...can come true....

[Martin Eden]

2. Patently false assertions

Sooner or later, the stench from the growing dungheap of demonstrably false Bush statements will reach enough nostrils to dump this malodorous adminstration down the trash chute of history.

[rexcat]

3. If the administration had been responsible concerning...

the past several years' budgets the debt would have been paid off in about 5 more years. If he* thinks the debt will be cut in half in 5 years I would like to know what he is smoking (or snorting as the case may be).

[reprehensor]

4. Ker-bump! (n/t)