>Not exactly.
My numbers are exactly what is in here:
http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdoc.cfm?index=8589&type=1
>But you'd have a hard time winning an argument that the swing to surplus had no effect on long rates.
Oh I don't know. Tell me about the swing after 2001 and the long rates.
> Tax the fuckers, don't pay 'em tribute.
The tribute they pay is a cheap return on their investment. I don't mind using debt to pay for grandma's gall bladder operation. Even less to pay for public investment. Of course it's be nice to not postpone payment for military $$, but it would be even better not have it in the first place.
>There's a lot that sucked about Clinton, but it seems to me the
>message that you can balance the budget by raising taxes on the
>richest 1%, thereby lowering debt service and quite possibly interest rates, while doing no harm to the economy (and quite possibly stimulating it) is a good one for our side. What's so wonderful about chronic deficit spending, really?
>Doug
The Clintons' actual message is that budget surpluses are the be-all of economic policy and lead to All Good Things. That ain't my message.
The alternative to deficits, 'chronic' or otherwise, is some kind of offset. When the offsets are unappealing, deficits are preferable.
Under some wave of pacificism, we wouldn't need to have this conversation. A reduced defense budget could be the source of wonderful things. Absent that, moderate deficits are more tolerable than the alternative.