"Gunner" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 17 Feb 2005 13:55:52 -0500, "Ed Huntress"
wrote:

"Gunner" wrote in message
.. .
On 17 Feb 2005 15:58:01 GMT, Dave Hinz wrote:


All I can tell you, Ed, is that Clinton claimed to have a surplus,
and in each of those years the amount of debt went up. If my
checkbook
balance gets more negative on any given month, I don't call that a
surplus.

Clintons "surplus" was largely based on expected revenues stretched
over a 15 yr period. The implosion of the dot.com bubble, and the
recession pretty well took care of that.

And here, I thought you had no comment. g

The surplus was on current accounts, Gunner. Look at the budgets. Explain
them away, if you can.

Cites?

You can use the Treasury Dept. data that Dave and I have been discussing.

First, go to this site and see what the terms mean:

http://www.ustreas.gov/education/faq...onal-debt.html

Note their comment, after you see the definitions, "Debt held by the public
is the most meaningful of these concepts and measures the cumulative amount
outstanding that the government has borrowed to finance deficits."

The reason they say that is that the debt represented by bonds held in the
SS trust funds is not addition to debt. The debt has already been accrued by
statute. The bonds add nothing more, they're just notes that make it look
like there's some money stored somewhere to pay them off. Haha!

Then go to this Treasury site and look at the data itself:

http://www.publicdebt.treas.gov/opd/opdpdodt.htm#years

Note that the "debt held by the public" went down during the later Clinton
years.

Next question?

--
Ed Huntress