WSJ on the amazing shrinking deficit

Interesting read, though I'm sure the thread will turn into a pissing match soon enough.

http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110009630

 

You might have a balanced budget -- even a surplus -- in 2012 if Congress lets the tax cuts expire after 2010.

Anyone offering projected numbers to this effect with the tax cuts intact is delusional. No one within a 500-mile radius of Washington is going to cut spending enough to make that happen.

And are war costs included in this budget? The writer seems to suggest that. That hasn't been the case before.

 

Let's see... in Clinton's final years we had a budget surplus. For fisical 2007 the Wall Street Journal is doing carwheels over a $172 billion deficit.
I didn't take any economics courses in college, but to me isn't a deficit that big a bad thing, while a budget surplus is a good thing?

The editorial also makes the claim:

But the editorial neglects the fact that the last two years in a row the average American spent more than he/she earned -- had a negative savings rate. So although household wealth might have grown by $14 trillion, none of it got saved, and more than that got spent. http://www.savingwithoutabudget.com/

 

The phrase, "Wall Street Journal Editorial" has been a synonym for "largely worthless swill" since about '80.

 

Use the Force, Luke.

 

Call me when the war's on the books.

 

"Who Is Fenian Bastard? " ..... was the heading

 

Eh?
Gubba. Gubba.

 

don't you recall those famous WSJ editorals of the clinton years that started out with heading

Who is .... such as Who Is Vince Foster or Who is Web Hubbell

 

I remember "Who Is Vince Foster?"
They don't have the blood off their hands yet.

 

I don't want the country sold out to a big national debt any more than the next person. However, as a very middling middle class person, with wife and two kids in tow, I can't argue that more money has stayed within my family with these cuts. And the people in Washington, regardless of party, are going to spend their asses off on all manner of unnecessary shit 'til death do us part, whether the tax cuts remain in place or not and no matter what level the deficit is at.

With that being the case, I prefer to continue keeping a little more of my money -- and I have been saving more because of it, between 401k and now starting a money market account. And the missus has been able to start contributing to her 401k because we've got a few more dollars around. Now I just hope I don't get my ass blasted off for making an honest assessment of my situation. Thanks in advance for your restraint.