Most Americans know that politicians use a lot of fiction when it comes to things like budget calculations. That is especially true in the nation's capital, where simply not increasing spending as much from one year to the next qualifies as a real budget cut.
So it is no surprise that President Obama, who is on pace to add more to the U.S. debt than all previous presidents combined [http://cnsnews.com], has proposed a budget for fiscal year 2013 that he says cuts spending in a major way, but really increases spending in a major way (as well as taxes).
In fact, according to an assessment of his budget by Investors Business Daily, it is far from the "balanced" approach to "revenue increases" and cuts, and is rather more like "a monument to fiscal irresponsibility."
Lies, damned lies and statistics
Here are some particulars:-- Spending and deficits will actually rise over the next two years. The president's own budget numbers "show that he wants to hike spending over the next two years by $247 billion," says IBD, compared to the "baseline" budget which, even after all of the taxes he wants to raise, "would mean $157 billion in additional red ink."
As is customary for this president (and Congress in general) the tough spending cuts will come at some point in the future (if ever). Besides, most seasoned federal budget observers know that increasing spending now will only make it harder to truly cut later.
-- Budget claims far more spending cuts than it delivers. Much of the Obama echo chamber that passes for the mainstream media has reported far and wide that his budget would cut federal expenditures about $1.2 trillion over the next decade. "But Obama's own budget shows that he actually cuts spending a mere $186 billion," IBD says, noting that "the relevant tables can be found at http://www.whitehouse.gov on pages 187-190."
Obama exaggerates his reputed "savings" first by canceling the automatic sequester spending cuts he signed into law (before later blaming them on opposition Republicans), "then reclaiming them as new savings, and by adding in cuts in interest payments on the debt," IBD says. Cute trick.
-- To flatten out spending, the president focuses nearly exclusively on new taxes. Based on historical accounts, our founding fathers would have never put up with the level of taxation currently burdening Americans and American businesses (and that includes the "47 percent" who don't pay income taxes but do pay payroll, sales, usage and property taxes, to name a few). But Obama's budget would push them even further to rebel; his "budget shows his plan would increase revenues by $1.14 trillion over the next decade," says IBD. "That means his budget proposes $6 in new taxes for every $1 in spending cuts." Obama should be nicknamed "Robin Hood" because he loves stealing wealth from "the rich" then redistributing it to "the poor" (who, by the way, still live with incomes far above the world's truly poor.
-- The deficit gets a "haircut," but that's about it. Earlier in April, Obama said of his plan, "My budget will reduce our deficits by nearly another $2 trillion." In a word, BS. According to his plan, deficit reduction might - might - reach $1.4 trillion, but then the deficit starts rising again after 2018.
-- His love for the Nanny State shines through. Obama's budget also creates a new entitlement "without reliable means to pay for it," IBD says. "Obama claims he can finance a new $76 billion 'preschool for all' program by raising tobacco taxes again. But after an initial spike, tobacco tax revenues will start trending downward year after year as more people quit smoking, while the costs of this new program will keep climbing."
When Obama hiked tobacco taxes (which disproportionately affect the poor, who smoke more, as a percentage of the population, by the way) to pay for a Medicaid expansion, revenues fell some $2.2 billion short of what was expected.
-- No friend of the Middle Class. Obama talks a lot about wanting to "help the Middle Class," but this budget doesn't do that. In fact, it boosts taxes on the Middle Class yet again via a proposal to change the government's "consumer price index," or CPI, "in a way that will lower the official inflation rate," IBD says. "He's selling it as a way to cut Social Security annual 'cost of living' adjustments, which are based on the CPI."
But because this "chained CPI" would also apply to annual adjustments of the tax bracket, taxes will actually climb by about $124 billion - on top of new taxes already imposed, such as those associated with Obamacare and the expiration of the 2 percent payroll tax holiday.
Again, another accounting gimmick that harms, rather than helps, the bulk of the population.
In remarks after releasing his 65-day-overdue budget, Obama claimed, "The numbers work. There's not a lot of smoke and mirrors in here."
Fact is, his budget proves that Obama has a great career as a fiction writer, once he leaves the Oval Office.
Sources for this article include:
http://news.investors.com
http://cnsnews.com
http://www.whitehouse.gov
Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/040129_Obama_budget_taxes_deficits.html#ixzz2RwSPore7
by: J. D. Heyes
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