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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (480371)	10/23/2003 9:47:10 AM
From: JakeStraw	Respond to of 769667

"Then, there are the other uncomfortable facts. The deficit reached its 1990s high of $290 billion in fiscal year 1992 and fell to $255 billion in fiscal year 1993, a roughly $40 billion reduction even before Clinton got started. Why was the deficit already declining? The deficit tends to rise during recessions, and fall during expansions. It climbed with the recession of 1990-91, before declining again as the recovery took hold. So, just as Clinton was taking office, natural forces were already working to reduce the deficit. In light of this, the actual deficit reduction that can be attributed to policy changes in Clinton's plan is quite small. After all, even after all the hoopla of Clinton's deficit-reduction plan, the Congressional Budget Office in January 1995 projected annual deficits of more than $200 billion between 1997 and 2005. As for economic growth, the fact is that the economy was already growing before any Clinton policies took effect. In 1992, growth was 3 percent. From 1993 to 1995 it was 3.1 percent annually. In other words, steady as she goes. Now, later in the decade, the economy did indeed take off in a marvelous boom. This was a result of the corporate restructuring and downsizing of the 1980s and early 1990s, and the fantastic rise of new technology. You cannot attribute all this to the Clinton administration, unless you really do think that Al Gore invented the Internet. Where Clinton should get credit is basically for getting out of the way of the free market: He was generally free trade; he let Alan Greenspan keep inflation in check; he signed a "tax cut for the rich" in 1997; he signed various deregulatory bills; and his administration adopted a hands-off policy for the Internet (crafted by, of all people, former health-care guru Ira Magaziner). So, to the extent that Clinton made it possible for people to live like Republicans, it was by accommodating Republican policies." Message 19411051