j b-- Your assertions are demonstrably wrong.
<<Clinton did not balance the budget - it is not within his Constitutional authority to do so.>>
While I did not mean to imply that the President "passed" the bill in the literal sense, it is clear that Clinton was the primary driver of the stimulus package that was passed in 1993. (By your argument, Ronald Reagan cannot take credit for the tax cut in the early 1980s that he always crowed about as his greatest achievement.) Clinton was responsible for writing it, negotiating it, and getting it through the Senate and the House.
<<give credit to the Republican Congress that passed the bills.>>
The Stimulus package was passed when the DEMOCRATS controlled both the House and the Senate. I believe that the Congressional record will show that not a single Republican voted in favor of the Stimulus package. There was such anger among shortsighted voters who blasted the law as a tax increase, they threw the Democrats out of control of the House and Senate in 1994.
And as for Newt and the Contract for America taking credit for deficit reduction, that's a farce. You say, that deficit reduction <<has been something they were working on since 1992. They finally got the American people to put enough pressure on the Democrats in Congress and on the President to get the bill passed.>> What are you talking about? There was never any legislation that did this since Newt took control. Remember the govt shutdown in 1996? Clinton won that battle, and the Congress passed a status quo bill (i.e., no tax cut no deficit reduction targets) in that year. The GOP and Clinton agreed to cut taxes in 1997--only after it was clear that the deficit was drawing down and Clinton agreed to do it.
<<Most economists I have read or seen say it takes between 2 and 4 years for the effects of any change other than interest rates to affect the economic trends.>>
True, the STIMULUS part of the 1993 Act did not have an immediate effect, but clearly, the increase in revenue to the Federal Treasury was immediate. That's the graph you take a look at. FY93-94 shows a year to year decrease in the federal deficit, while up until that point, it was increasing. Tax increases (love 'em or hate 'em) do that.
I want to argue on the merits of the Clinton stimulus package (did the tax increase reduce the federal deficit?), but it's hard to do that when your false picture of recent history leaves you wanting to argue about which Party should take credit.
Doughboy. |
