QOTW: WoPo editorial board
by digby
“the improvement in the short-term [deficit] forecast has removed the air of crisis that has hovered around the budget deficit since President Obama took office.”
Haha.
Wow, an “air of crisis.” And where did this “air of crisis” come from? It surely did not come from financial markets, were investors have shown a willingness to lend the United States governments trillions of dollars at very low interest rates in the years since President Obama took office. It certainly did not come from competent economists who were able to recognize that the large deficits were a direct result of the economic collapse in 2008. It also did not come from the millions of people who lost their jobs due to the downturn and looked to government stimulus as the only possible source of demand that could re-employ them.
A more accurate statement might be that:
“the improvement in the short-term forecast has removed the air of crisis around the budget deficit that the Washington Post and its allies have sought to promote since President Obama took office.”
I suppose that once they partnered up with a deficit monger like Pete Peterson it was inevitable, but I’m fairly sure they would have done it anyway. The beltway celebrity press loves human sacrifice. It’s been roman circus time ever since the financial crisis hit.
As Baker concludes:
Let’s be serious here, the crisis was invented by people in Washington who have an agenda for cutting Social Security and Medicare. That is as clear as day. The deficit crisis does not actually exist in the world. In the world we have a crisis of a grossly under-performing economy that the Post and its allies have attempted to perpetuate.
Deficit fever may have finally broken, but the ravages of the disease are still painful. So, it’s not as if they can’t have any fun at all.
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