Are you saying this chart is a lie?
http://blog.heritage.org/2010/02/05/...s-in-pictures/

Good one. Where are you getting your figures DJ? The sources for villagegolfer's chart seem pretty unimpeachable.

I got my figures from the OMB.

For some reason, the chart isn't loading. I'm going to take a GUESS at the point you're trying to make and I'll ask the following..

Is that simply going on Calendar Years as opposed to Fiscal Years? The reason I ask is that Bush's last budget was FY 2009, which started on 10/1/2008 (before the election Obama won). The FY 2009 deficit was $1.4T, according to the OMB.

Obama's first FY was FY2010, starting Oct 1, 2009. According to the OMB the FY 2010 deficit was $1,293,489,000,000 (they list it in millions).

I got my figures here: http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/Historicals using the spreadsheet downloaded form the first link on that page. This includes on AND off-budget numbers.

Now, to be fair, Bush's deficits were (in order starting in FY 2002), $157B, $377B, $412B, $318B, $248B, $160B and $458B in FY 2008 before the big $1.4T in FY 2009.

But to be even more fair, Clinton's surpluses started in FY1998 and were, in order, $69B, $125B, $236B and $128B in FY 2001. Clinton's deficits ran from $203B in FY 1994 to $22B in FY 1997.

Clinton had the luxury of a fiscal conservative congress. Bush was saddled with a spend happy congress. Remember the Contract with America?

The Contract With America was released during the 1994 congressional campaign. I most certainly DO remember it.

Bush's spend-happy Congress was also GOP-controlled. It shocked me that so-called 'fiscal conservatives' would produce the Farm Bill, the Prescription Drug Plan and two wars with no way to pay for them.

To me, something happened to the GOP when they got the whole ball of wax (WH, House, Senate). They suddenly made the Democrats look like pikers when it came to spending.

That was the problem, they were not fiscal conservatives. A real conservative is fiscally responsible.

Apples And Oranges?
 

Did those deficit numbers include the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan?

For the entire eight years of the Bush administration, the wars were funded with requests for special appropriations. Begnning with Obama, they added the costs of the wars as line budget items.

I'm sure not going to argue that our deficits haven't increased under President Obama, but are we comparing apples and oranges?

Those figures are included.

To the best of my knowledge, those costs are included. I made sure to use the column that was the total of the ON *and* OFF budget receipts and expenditures.

I believe the huge rise in Bush's last term was the stimulus package combined with plummeting tax receipts.

Ok, I finally got that to load.

There's a SLIGHT problem with that chart - it's almsot a year and a half old.

The $1.5T for Obama's first year didn't turn out to be that bad now that FY 2010 is over. By the same token, the next projection was more optimistic than the latest $1.6T coming.

Remember that chart was before the December 2010 battle that resulted in extending ALL the Bush tax cuts. The CBO can only go with what they had at the time and, the way this Congress is going, you can never tell WHAT laws will be in place next week (that can affect the projections).