Per Stormin Mormon:
I just can't see what you're implying. Which years did the
Dems reduce the deficit? Point it out to me, please.

Debt as a percent of GDP.

Carter: 3.3%, Dem house & Dem senate.

Clinton: 10.6%, Republican house & Republican senate.

I have to agree with the observation that the prez doesn't do it,
but congress does - but would think that the prez has the ability
to set direction.

Note that Bush II managed to increase the debt by almost 30% with
a largely Republican congress. That's definitely setting a
direction.

I would also recall that, after O'Neil got sacked in (2002?) for
opining that a half-trillion dollar deficit might not be in the
best interests of the country, vice-president Cheyney stated
"Reagan proved deficits don't matter." (http://tinyurl.com/96mdl)
Cheyney's statement and Bush II's presidency pretty much tore
away the Republican's claimed mantle of fiscal responsibility for
me. Where were all these guys who, today, are posturing and
profiling about the deficit when Bush II and a Republican
congress were running it up?

The ultimate direction, of course, is set by the voters. If the
population is so uneducated as to, for instance, cheer when a
presidential hopeful promises two-dollar-per-gallon gas if she is
elected, that says something.

Frankly, I think Cheyney was factually correct. Deficits don't
matter - *to the voters*. This isn't Germany - where a woman
physicist who isn't all that great looking can get elected head
of state and there's a national memory of the hyperinflation of
1918 - and the German kids I've known are better educated after
8th grade than the kids here are when they graduate from high
school.

On the contrary, this is a place where the average credit card
holder maintains a balance on their account. This is a place
where a close family member of mine just spent six weeks
interviewing college-degreed job applicants before he found
somebody who understood compound interest.

I'm no fan of either party. Both are pandering to the fantasy
that we can get out of this mess without experiencing some
significant pain in the form of reduced spending on entitlements
and higher taxes.

Every source that I've heard - which didn't have an obvious
political agenda - has said that we need to raise taxes and cut
entitlements - and that one or the other cannot raise enough
money to do the job.

David Brook's recently-expressed opinion that we're hard on the
tail of Greece rings true to me. David Brooks strikes me as
being a very smart/knowledgeable person and strongly
conservative. If he doesn't have hope, I have to take that
seriously.

If the Republicans prevail, we will follow Greece down the toilet
with lower taxes and, probably, reduced spending. If the Dems
prevail, we will head to the same end with higher taxes and the
same or higher spending.

--
PeteCresswell