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Economic Impolitic

Fiscal discipline: You'll find it with the WMDs

<![CDATA[The New York Times > Washington > The Big Picture May Seem Rosy, but the Deficit Is in the Details: The budget is notable for including limits on spending that are unlikely to be enacted and for excluding expenses that are sure to be incurred. Here are the most important points: ¶It assumes that all […]

<![CDATA[The New York Times > Washington > The Big Picture May Seem Rosy, but the Deficit Is in the Details:

The budget is notable for including limits on spending that are unlikely to be enacted and for excluding expenses that are sure to be incurred. Here are the most important points:

¶It assumes that all discretionary spending outside of military and domestic security – everything from paperclips to space shuttles – will be frozen for the next five years.

¶It includes no spending for the war in Iraq and Afghanistan in 2006. Those costs are now running about $5 billion a month and are likely to continue at some level in the 2006 fiscal year and beyond.

¶It omits the initial cost of Mr. Bush’s Social Security plan, which would let people divert some of their payroll taxes to private saving accounts. Administration officials estimate the plan would cost $23 billion in 2009 and $754 billion over the next decade.

¶It leaves out the cost of reining in the Alternative Minimum Tax, a tax that was created to affect the nation’s wealthiest taxpayers but is now ensnaring millions of moderate-income families as incomes rise with inflation.

There is much more to take in, but as I wrote this morning this “fiscal discipline” is exactly the kind of misdirection we got about WMD…. By the way, I tried to download the full budget today, but, gee, the link was broken.]]>