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- From: paul@hsh.com
- Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton
- Subject: Re: DEBT PER CAPITA (was Hillary Clinton....President ?)
- Message-ID: <1992Nov19.102730.270@hsh.com>
- Date: 19 Nov 92 14:27:30 GMT
- References: <=8==tsA@engin.umich.edu> <1dsn5eINNrd@roche.csl.sri.com> <2B029523.207@deneva.sdd.trw.com> <1ee8efINN8e6@agate.berkeley.edu>
- Organization: HSH Associates
- Lines: 74
-
- In article <1ee8efINN8e6@agate.berkeley.edu>, lazarus@ocf.berkeley.edu (Andrew
- J. Lazarus) writes:
- > In article <2B029523.207@deneva.sdd.trw.com> helding@pooh.sdd.trw.com (Steve
- Helding) writes:
- >>pcorless@cisco.com (Peter Corless) writes:
- >
- >>On a related note, I've often wondered how much the increase in spending can
- >>attributed to the executive branch as opposed to Congress.
-
- *sigh* ALL spending is mandated by Congress; read your grade-school textbook.
-
- >>Personally, I believe a good deal of the national
- >>debt can be attributed to the tremendous tax cuts instituted during the
- >>Reagan administration along with the hugh defense outlays. But then, doesn't
- >>Congress share in this responsibility?
- >
- > Yes. I have posted many times the statistic that Federal Funds receipts
- > (this excludes Soc Sec, Medica*, and other trust funds) fell
- > precipitously frm the Reagan Tax Cut. Adjusting for inflation, Federal
- > Funds Receipts did not return to their 1981 level until 1986! 1984
- > incometax receipts were below 1982 in current (a fortiori constant)
- > dollars.
- > The net Reaganistas like to confuse the issue by posting revenue figures
- > which include Social Security (taxes for which went UP) with Federal
- > Funds.
-
- There's no confusion. It's intellectually dishonest to EXclude Soc Sec,
- Medica*, and other trust funds, since -- as we all know -- most of that is
- p*ssed away on day-to-day operating expenses, just as Congress legislated.
- (Again: the President doesn't spend any money; Congress does.)
-
- > Sure Congress bears some responsibility: especially the REPUBLICAN
- > Senate (1980-1986, net Reaganistas claim falsely that it was only two
- > years)
-
- So, according to your history, the Democrats are completely innocent, despite
- having controlled Congress almost continuously since before you were born?
- Never mind, let it pass. How far some will go to rewrite history! As for your
- assertion that the other party controlled the Senate for four additional years,
- please post your source.
-
- > Of course, even then Congress's budget often
- > had a smaller deficit than the budget plan submitted by the President.
-
- Irrelevant, since it's Congress' budget -- not the President's -- that is
- implemented. This should have been taught to you at about the fourth-grade
- level. And, as has been pointed out before, the "official" budget does not
- include the traditional "appropriations" bills that are passed after the budget
- deal is done. If there even IS a budget: for the fiscal years 1985, 1986,
- 1987, and 1988, there WAS no budget, only one huge "continuing resolutions"
- that were tossed at Reagan on a pass-it-or-shut-down-the-gov't basis.
-
- > However, most of the blame goes to the architects of the plan: President
- > Ronald Senile Reagan and his administration.
-
- Have a care, Andy: your historical revisionism is coming back to bite you.
- Pretend, if you like, that the Congress (Democratic or otherwise) sits idly by
- while the President creates, passes, and implements the budget single-handedly.
- Pretend for four years, if you want. But know this: the new "architect" is
- only now admitting that he won't be able to keep his campaign promises; even
- now, he's about to scrap middle-class tax cuts (he will probably, in fact, be
- 'forced' to increase taxes on us), and he will have to cut the sacred
- entitlement spending. Read today's (11/19) Wall Street Journal, page one.
- Read it and weep, because you'll have to revise history again if you want to
- make Clinton out to be the innocent party.
-
- ------
-
- Paul Havemann, VP HSH Associates (201) 838-3330
- Internet: paul@hsh.com Compuserve: 70410,3507 AOL: HSH Assoc
- "Any opinions expressed are not necessarily those of the company."
-
- "He walks again by night! Out of the fog, into the smog -- doggedly...
- relentlessly... ruthlessly... toward his weekly meeting with The Unknown..."
-