humanities.philosophy.objectivism

On Feb 22, 9:38 am, Mark Sieving wrote:
> On Feb 22, 5:25 am, Charles Bell wrote:
>
>
>
> > The government reports the numbers in the budget in two ways: the GAO
> > cash-flow of receipts minus outlays, and at the end of the fisclal
> > year, by a proper accounting audit. This is explained here:
>
> You should have read the whole Factcheck article:
>
> "But even under accrual accounting, the annual reports showed
> surpluses of $69.2 billion in fiscal 1998, $76.9 billion in fiscal
> 1999, and $46 billion for fiscal year 2000. So even if the government
> had been using that form of accounting the deficit would have been
> erased for those three years."

He also "accidentally" forgot to include this line about Bush in 2005
(from his own link)

"The set the government doesn't talk about is the audited financial
statement produced by the government's accountants following standard
accounting rules. It reports a more ominous financial picture: a $760
billion deficit for 2005. If Social Security and Medicare were
included -- as the board that sets accounting rules is considering --
the federal deficit would have been $3.5 TRILLION."

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-08-02-deficit-usat_x.htm

The general point being is Clinton was far far more fiscally
responsible than Bush. If Bush Republicans were sincere that they want
to cut social spending instead of just talking about it... fine do it.
Since the American people voted them into office to do that then its
only fair that their will be represented.

But they didn't... they didn't because they were too cowardly to face
the political consequences. Instead they create massive deficits due
to pork barrel cronyism and massive military spending (and that
military spending is starting to get closer and closer to the rest of
the world combined) And they leave it subsequent administrations and
future generations to pay for.

Forget theory. In practice (at least on a federal level) Democrats
have been far more fiscally conservative than Republicans the last
couple of decades. Plus you get the added perk they don't have
religious loons trying to bring to creationism and biblical language
into the US constitution.

I'm not American but I really do want a morally and economically
strong America. If the place turns into some sort of christo-fascist
state with an obsessively big military and bad economy....that ain't
good news for anyone.