deficits matter

Mighty thanks to Crooks and Liars for delivering this graph to my rss reader.

It also came with this quote: Ronald Reagan came to office in 1981 promising to simultaneously slash taxes, massively increase defense spending and balance the budget. Instead, as his budget director David Stockman acknowledged last year, Reagan produced red ink as far as the eye could see:

"[The] debt explosion has resulted not from big spending by the Democrats, but instead the Republican Party's embrace, about three decades ago, of the insidious doctrine that deficits don't matter if they result from tax cuts."

See how that works? Republicans would like to think of themselves as frugal spenders who cut government waste. All they really do is cut spending to help the underprivileged and piss away any so-called-savings on tax cuts for the rich and corporations. Even a 5th grader can understand that if you're taking in less money than you used to then you have to cut spending by that same amount or go into debt. The Tea Party seems to think that tax cuts can't hurt anything because "it's not the government's money to lose, it's yours". Well guys, if that's true then your paycheck isn't yours, it's your employer's. You say you earned it so it's yours? The government earns your tax money every time they arrest a drunk driver and put him in jail, every time they regulate how much your utilities can charge you, every time they help pay for your cholesterol medication that you need because you won't put down the Doritos and exercise.

The stupid! It costs!