The great thing about data is it is so easy to make it speak to you're beliefs, as a matter of fact I am particularly fond of the use of the phrase "under control", forest fires can be "under control" yet still be burning hundreds of acres of woodlands and wild life. .
really, data is easy to make it speak to your beliefs? can you provide an example of that. I find cons tend to try to 'limit' the actual data in their posts and 'editorials'. And your example was about a phrase not data.
No one here has mentioned or blamed either side right or left but I dont even know what a "conservative entertainment complex" is, sounds like a place you would go if you only wanted to be entertained...just a little. .
You started the thread with
"I think we all agree that government spending has gotten out of hand."
"out of hand" is quite similar to the conservative narrative of "out of control" And I don't agree because President Obama has gotten spending under control.
For his last budget Bush asked for 3.1 trillion. Revenues were expected to be 2.8 trillion. This process started before they realized the recession started. And before Bush let lehman fail. So with Q4 GDP 2008 at -8.9%, 700,000 jobs lost a month, the TARP and GSE bailout, the CBO revised the budget estimates on Jan 7, 2009. Here's that estimate along with actuals.
_____________1/7/09____actuals
Total Revenues__ 2,357__ 2,105
Total Outlays__ _ 3,543__ _ 3,518
mmmmm, spending came in around the estimate but revenue collapsed another 250 billion from the estimate. So spending went up 400 billion but revenues collapsed 700 billion. If I had to pick just one thing that was "out of hand " it would be revenue collapse. The truly strange thing was I never heard anything about revenue collapse. I only heard about "out of control spending". And now four years later, you think we all agree "spending is out of hand" mmmm, lets look at President Obama's first 4 budgets.
Fiscal year_______2010____2011____2012___2013(est)
Total Revenues___ 2,162___ 2,302___ 2449___2,708
Total Outlays____ 3,456___ 3,598___ 3,538___3,553
mmmm, I'm not seeing "out of hand" spending. As a % of GDP its flat and then declining. kind of seems to me to be the opposite of "out of hand"