It’s moving day here at the Combat! blog offices, where certain dismayingly materialistic acquisitions (real mattress) have led us to A) complain that this was much easier last time, when literally everything we owned fit into the bed of a Ford Ranger and B) assume that the economy has recovered. Things must be going well when even people who don’t want stuff have stuff, right? Of course it turns out that things are not so sunny. The US economic metaphor has been upgraded from crash to lingering illness, and while total work hours, productivity and corporate profits are all up, unemployment and the housing market—the two segments of the economy that most pertain to actual people and not Excel files—continue to suck it for coke money. And yet, the hot issue in politics is deficit spending. As the New York Times points out, the international mania for curbing government spending and balancing budgets—which has thus far dominated the G-20 summit, to say nothing of discourse at home—has the potential to trigger another Roosevelt Recession. What the fudge is that, you ask? Looks like someone’s going to have to click on the jump.
Tag Archives: national debt
Oh, Yeah Department: Bush tax cuts cost more than twice as much as health care reform
The graph at right shows us the US national debt in billions of dollars by year and President, conveniently colored in accordance with political affiliation. Props to Smick, who sent me this wonderful gift and the crooksandliars.com article that accompanies it over the weekend. First of all, don’t let this graph get into a time machine somehow, because it will make George Washington’s head explode. Second of all, the Bush tax cuts are estimated to have added $2.5 trillion to the debt from over the 2001-2010 period. As Susie “The Anagram” Madrak over at C&L points out, that just happens to be two and a half times the cost of the House’s health care bill. Smell that? That’s some sweet, delicious hypocrisy, right there, and arrayed in their Kiss the Cook aprons are several Republican members of Congress, including John Boehner (R–OH, net worth $1.7–$6 million.) He’s just one of the many valiant defenders of fiscal responsibility who oppose health care reform because it will add to our $12 trillion national debt, but voted overwhelmingly to pass the Bush tax cuts.