Who Is The Smallest Government Spender Since Eisenhower? Would You Believe It's Barack Obama?

It’s enough to make even the most ardent Obama cynic scratch his head in confusion.

Amidst all the cries of Barack Obama being the most prolific big government spender the nation has ever suffered, Marketwatch is reporting that our president has actually been tighter with a buck than any United States president since Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Who knew?

First off, he attribues all of Fiscal year 2009 to Bush. Technically this is normal, however Fy2009 was different. Bush never signed that budget. Nancy Pelosi blocked Bush's budget. Bush's budget was $3.1 trillion. Remember Democrats controlled both houses from 2007 and on. Pelosi said NOPE to Bush's budget. Bush did not sign that $400 billion omnibus bill. He specifically refused to do so.

That would have made the budget for 2009 $3.5 trillion. When Obama took office in 2009, he signed the budget and omnibus bill on March 11, of 2009. When asked why he signed it in private (unusual), he ignored the question.

Yet this writer attributes all of 2009 to Bush, when Bush did not sign the bill. Obama did. Democrats rejected Bush's budget, as it wasn't enough. The Democratically controlled congress only approved 3 out of 12 appropriations bills under Bush. Confident Obama would win,they delayed it until 2009, where they signed the rest, plus the extra $400 billion.

But the writer attributes 2009 all to Bush, which would normally be ok, except for the fact Congress did not approve Bush's budget. Fy2009 is Obama's budget, but this writer gave almost all of it to Bush. That's just plain wrong and stupid. The last budget Bush got approved and signed was 2008. That was $2.9 trillion. Obama's number are terrible when you start from there.

It is dishonest to give FY2009 to Bush, when it was Pelosi, Reid and Obama that drafted and signed it. Those are the facts. A democratically controlled Congress, and a Democrat President is responsible for 2009.

Strike one.

Strike two. He uses CBO estimates for 2009 ... why? Why use estimates? It's 2012. You don't need estimates for 2009. We have records. It's ok to use actual numbers. But he uses estimates for 2009 anyway. The guy clearly has no idea what he' doing.

Strike three. He uses the CBO baseline for 2013. Wait a minute. He used CBO projections for 2009, even though we have real numbers. Ok, whatever, as long as he's consistent than that's ok. Oh wait, for 2013 he uses CBO baseline instead of estimates. What on gods name is this guy doing?

For those who don't follow fiscal policy and budget much (I don't blame you, I wish I didn't spend so much time on it, 1 minute is usually too much) CBO baselines are calculated twice a year to help determine how much spending will be needed. ON page 5 of the document you will find it.

http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/3xx/doc393/040198.pdf



So no serious economic pundit in their right mind would use the CBO baseline as some sort of measure of spending. Yet this guy does. But he only does so for 2013. Why? I'm not calling him biased because I don't know the guy. But he's effectively swiped 2009 from Obama and handed it to Bush, and then compressed 2013 to make Obama's spending seem flat. It isn't. He's used 3 different measures to come up with these numbers. As I said earlier, the numbers are bullshit.

If you take a look at the CBO, their estimate of Obama's 2013 is above $3.7 trillion. Nutting doesn't want to use that though. And uses the irrelevant baseline numbers. But only for 2013. Not for 2009, 2010, 2011, or 2012. Weird.

Another note is Obama got the benefit of being paid back for Tarp loans. When the loans are given out, they count as spending. When they come back in, they count as spending offsets. TARP I was paid out under Bush, paid back under Obama. So that is even extra money that is hidden in these numbers. But Obama isn't to blame for that, so I don't hold it against him here. It's just how it played out so it would be wrong to hold it against him.

He requested George Bush release TARP II for him. Bush complied. Nutting doesn't give it to Obama, but to Bush. See where this is headed?

You don't sign a 1 trillion dollar stimulus bill that is above and beyond normal spending, and then say you haven't spent anything. That's ridiculous.

Make no mistake, George Bush was a tremendous spender. I'm not defending Bush here. So let's get that out of the way. However the notion that Obama's been a miser is nothing short of ridiculous. Bush and Obama are both terrible spenders. I won't even say Obama is worse than Bush. So far, Bush has been worse. But Obama is no spendthrift.

Just pointing this all out so everyone can make an informed decision about this analysis.

Of course, this factual rebuttal will be chalked up to simply "non-believing" or some other such bullshit.