IIRC, this whole taxing the future to pay for the present has been classified by James and others as a ponzi scheme.

It's pretty clear that to take advantage of luck you have to be good. Simply having luck isn't good enough.

I know y'all are genetically incapable of ascribing to democrats anything good, but this world view you have to explain Clinton is quite amazing.

Obama proposes to eliminate the tax burden for all person’s 65 and older who make $50,000 or less.

Holy crap. Those seniors are the same ones who are responsible for most of our $9 trillion debt. At some point before those leeches die off, the Millenials need to take out their ear buds and get really angry. And this is "their" candidate who is supporting this bunk?

Our spending has become our big issue. So much of it lies outside the discretionary budget, that it will take a major push to overhaul big programs, like Medicare, to rectify. In the meantime we just run up debt. In what way is that considered conservative?

Steve

Rather than ballooning government spending, he brought it under control. Rather than expanding the size of the government he actually shrank it.

It helped tremendously that he was working from a Cold War baseline and was able to cut the military by a third. A process, incidentally, already put into motion by Bush 41.

I agree with Dave regarding Clinton by the way. He was smart enough to compromise with the Republicans and not raise taxes too much to hinder the growing economy he largely inherited. He also favored free trade which probably didn't hurt either. Overall, I think Clinton did a fine job as President, but he was the beneficiary of some good timing that was largely beyond his control. If he had gotten his health care plan though, it would have likely been really bad for the deficit, irrespective of the growing economy.

So, I can't really see your logic here. I don't think anyone is claiming that Clinton was responsible for the great economic conditions - well, not too many. But to say that he didn't manage the government extremely well is to simply be blind to the facts. You seem to be simply looking at the money flowing in and saying that wasn't due to his great management. Fair enough. But to ignore what he did while this money was flowing in is to believe that there is no such thing as management and that management only occurs when there's budgetary difficulties.

I mean, really Dave. You seem to have a one dimensional viewpoint here.

I give the Clinton Administration credit for not getting in the way but not for the boom of which it was the beneficiary.

So, it's not the case that Clinton raised taxes - despite the tales of horror and destruction on the right? It's not the case that the government got smaller under Clinton? It's not the case that welfare was reformed under Clinton? It's not the case that wise fiscal policy prevailed under Clinton?