Prometheus 6

It seems impossible for them to unscrew their lips enough to let the truth pass through.

Bush's Deficit Plan Is All in the Math
The budget strategy to halve the shortfall by 2009 relies on how and what things are counted.
By Joel Havemann
Times Staff Writer

February 7, 2005

WASHINGTON   The budget President Bush will present to Congress today will show the federal deficit cut in half by the time he leaves office in four years.

At least technically it will.

... It is the 2004 deficit that Bush is promising to cut in half, but he's not starting with the actual 2004 deficit of $412 billion.

Instead, his benchmark is the projected $521-billion deficit that his Office of Management and Budget estimated a year ago, when the fiscal year was four months old. Using half of that figure, Bush's goal is to reach a deficit of $260.5 billion.

If Bush were to start with the actual 2004 figure, his goal would be a deficit of $206 billion   $54.5 billion more.

There are more twists. Bush proposes to cut the deficit in half not in dollars but as a share of the economy. If the economy grows, as is projected, then the deficit will decline as a share of the economy even if it does not shrink by a single dollar.

The 2004 deficit was 4.5% of the economy. So in fiscal 2009 it must be 2.2% or less. That is exactly the average share of the last 43 years, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

Finally, the budget that the president will send to Congress will, like his past budgets, omit some major deficit-raising items.