EconomistMom.com

Stan Collender makes a provocative point on his blog this morning, titled “2009 Deficit Would Have Been the Same Under Bush“:

[E]ven a $1.6 rather than the previously projected $1.8 trillion deficit will be an excuse by some to say ridiculous things about the current state of the federal budget.  After all, $1.6 trillion would still be way above the previous record-high deficit of $455 billion set in 2008 during the last year of the Bush administration. But that’s not the right comparison and those that choose to use it will clearly be doing so in an effort to mislead and demagogue…

[T]he baseline deficit only takes into account laws that have already been enacted, and several tax and spending changes that have been adopted since Inauguration Day absolutely also would have happened under a continuing Bush administration (or, for that matter, a McCain administration).  This includes another one-year patch for the alternative mini[m]um tax and a supplemental appropriation for activities in Iraq and Afghanistan…

[and g]iven the state of the economy at the end of 2008 and the first two quarters of 2009, Bush almost certainly would have proposed a stimulus plan of his own…

In other words, the deficit produced by a Bush administration this year would have been about equal to what is going to happen under the Obama administration.

This bottom line isn’t at all surprising to me, and by the way, I predict quite confidently that it will hold true well beyond the current fiscal year.  Because as I’ve said a few times before, the Obama Administration is insisting that its own policy initiatives be deficit neutral, and yet (for some odd reason having something to do with campaign promises I suppose) wants to extend most of the Bush fiscal policy agenda and continue to deficit finance that agenda.  The current deficit outlook under the Obama Administration looks a lot like it would have under a continued Bush Administration, because Obama’s “fiscal vision” is awfully darn close to Bush’s “fiscal legacy.”