ouch! anyone else's wallet in pain?

[KSig RC]

Originally Posted by windinthewillow

From the same source you lifted the chart from (without providing any attribution,) here's the clarification of the chart -


"This is a study of the spending habits of our presidents since 1938. It shows that Conservative Presidents out borrow and spend Democratic Presidents almost 3 to 1. Just looking at the graph at the beginning of the study tells a powerful story: In the last 30 years, if you wanted a President to be fiscally responsible, you had better vote for a Democrat. Admittedly this study has the bias of a deficit hawk, but here are the facts, you can draw your own conclusions (the link points to an Excel spreadsheet, obviously if you do not have Excel this link will not work)."

"Most of the negative feedback received on the original paper concerned the lack of the comparison of the GDP to the national debt. To correct this oversight the last update added a section on this topic. The most recent dismal debt data was added and the percentages and analysis adjusted accordingly. "

"Addressed in the latest version is the role of Congress in the amassing of our debt. Both the right and the left may be surprised by the facts here.
I was shocked to see how far this document has spread. If you do a Yahoo or Google search for "United States National Debt" (with the quote marks) this study comes up on the first page. I am guessing that is why it is referenced on dozens of other web sites. Both professors and students have used the graphs in colleges across the county. I should have copy righted this one." - Steve McGourty

http://www.cedarcomm.com/~stevelm1/Bush_opinion.htm

Which of my points, specifically, are "disingenuous and specious, in addition to showing a knack for confusing causation and correlation" and why, specifically, do you feel that way?

First, that the national debt is directly related to the President - there are external factors that will force the nation's hand, even while realizing that conservative policies have followed a much more Keynesian-aligned deficit spending policy since Reagan. You're misunderstanding which is the horse and which is the cart, giving us a causation/correlation dilemma.

Second, the inference that Clinton's (nearly worthless) balanced budget was somehow an indictment of Bush is specious at best and intentionally misleading at worst. In context, that "balanced budget" shows innumerable problems, including context that indicates it was more parlor trick than the actual best thing for the nation (hence, disingenuous). Additionally, Clinton ran a deficit every other year - and one that does not seem out of line with any other time in history, especially accounting for inflation.

Third, assuming that running a national deficit is implicitly a negative without accounting for the reasons why a nation like the US often has to run a deficit, without any argument about why this particular deficit is worse than, say, 1982 (when accounting for inflation and different world events) again gives a specious argument rooted in emotion rather than logic.

We could continue if you'd like, but I think this is more than enough - no one is arguing the specifics of the debt, nor that Republicans have often utilized deficit spending to stimulate the economy and promote US interests abroad (not war, either - rather, shaping the world economy). However, you've provided no reasons why these are bad.

"Fiscal responsibility" does not mean "balanced budget" implicitly - there are other complex economic factors that state a balanced budget might be a net negative. You're missing that point, or avoiding it.