BTW Rob, which source do you want to use? MarketWatch, Forbes opinion article or the Weekly Standard because according the Standard:
I dunno, seems like a picture of fiscal restraint to me.
You're failing to note that Bush kept both wars off the books. President Bush's 2009 federal budget, did not declare how much funding the administration expects to need for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan next year. The omission appears to break a law that requires the inclusion of the year's total war funds in the annual budget plan.
The administration's budget includes an "emergency allowance" of $70 billion, but states that more money will be requested once the war's "specific needs" are determined.
Not providing a full-year war budget estimate is technically illegal, according to a provision in the 2007 Defense Authorization Act, although there's no mechanism for enforcing that law. Congress enacted the provision on the recommendation of the Iraq Study Group, which emphasized that funding GWOT through so-called "emergency" requests "reduces transparency and avoids the necessary reexamination of commitments, investment priorities and trade-offs."
Bush's flaunting of the legislation let him off the hook on explaining the enormous cost of war to the American people, according to Anita Dancs, research director of the National Priorities Project.
What's more, in its projections for fiscal year 2010 and beyond, the administration projected zero dollars for the wars. Based on these "projections" and only a thin slice of the funding necessary to continue status quo operations in Iraq, the administration argued that its 2009 plan will set the government on track to balance the federal budget by 2012.
Withholding Iraq/Afghanistan war funds from the budget estimate not only makes a balanced budget seem possible, it also prevents a clear view of how war spending affects the federal deficit, according to Craig Jennings, federal fiscal policy analyst at OMB Watch, a nonprofit government-watchdog organization. The budget slashed funds for health care, education and housing programs in the interest of "balancing the budget," while billions of dollars in war funds, not yet formally requested, are exempt from scrutiny.
Jennings pointed to how the omission of war costs from the annual budget has distorted thinking on the federal deficit in past years.
"In 2006, the administration spent $120 billion on war," Jennings said. "Almost half of the budget deficit was because of war funding, but we never had this conversation nationally, because it wasn't included in the budget. When you have supplemental funding, it looks like free money. It makes it seem like there are no consequences to spending it."
That illusion of debtlessness not only drains federal coffers; it also inhibits us from seeing what's at stake when military operations keep growing, according to Dancs.
Obama To Put Cost of War on the Books, for the First Time in Eight Years
Posted by ralphon February 27, 2009
Christi Parsons and Maura Reynolds, LA Times:
After eight years of budget practices that often camouflaged federal spending, President Obama is planning a new strategy of putting on the books as many costs as possible to demonstrate the extent of the nation’s economic troubles, senior White House officials say.
Obama’s first budget, scheduled to be released in broad outline Thursday, will include at the outset money for the Iraq war, the military buildup in Afghanistan and other expenditures. The approach is in contrast to that of the previous administration, which often tucked such costly commitments into separate spending requests that would go to Congress later.
When you examine the deficit, it might be a good idea to look at the money that was spent on the wars as a huge part of it. Just taking it off the books may make you feel better, but it's still there.