The GOP’s entire identity is based on a lie: How the Obama presidency exposed Republican deficit delusions

The GOP’s entire identity is based on a lie: How the Obama presidency exposed Republican deficit delusions

"According to a new report from the Wall Street Journal’s Market Watch site, the federal government ran up a deficit of $439 billion for the 2015 fiscal year. That’s 2.5 percent of GDP, which is the lowest level since 2007. Why is this significant? The Obama administration inherited a $1.4 trillion (with a “t”) budget deficit — driven in large part by stimulus spending meant to combat the financial crisis — which authorized George W. Bush in October 2008.

Since then, Obama has presided over a gradual $1 trillion-dollar reduction in the deficit. Insofar as deficit reduction is important — and remember, according to the rhetoric of the GOP over the past several years, it is very important — this is a massive achievement for the Obama administration. Massive. And neither he nor the Democrats will get any credit for it.

If Mitt Romney’s lies about the deficit in 2012 were a predictor of the GOP’s attack plan for 2016, we can expect to hear the Republican ticket attack both Obama and the Democratic nominee on this very issue. But they won’t cite deficit numbers because, well, they’re not nearly as dumb as they look. Instead, they’ll recycle the Romney tactic of conflating the deficit and the national debt — two entirely separate numbers.

For example, Romney said during his first debate against Obama in 2012: “The president said he’d cut the deficit in half. Unfortunately, he doubled it.” Well, no. The deficit wasn’t “doubled” at all. It was the debt that rose, but analysts have repeatedly shown that the chief drivers of national debt were George W. Bush’s wars, Medicare Part-D (a Bush-era policy) and the impact of the Great Recession — none of which was offset with higher taxes or spending cuts. Obama can hardly be blamed for all that.

Not insignificantly, though, the Obama administration’s deficit reduction has slowed the growth of the debt. In fact, the year-over-year increase in the debt has slowed to 10 percent. Compare that with the highest growth rate for the debt ever — 13.4 percent per year under, yes, Ronald Reagan."