Tuesday, February 24, 2009

deficit

ordinarily i'd be all in favor of the president trying to reduce the deficit. but i gotta agree with robert reich, it doesn't make sense to do it now.

the administration has decided that it will try to spend its way out of the financial crisis. good for them! that's what i think should be done too. but spending your way out means you got to resign yourself to increased deficits until the crisis is over. it doesn't make any sense either logically or politically to push for both increased spending (and thus additional debt) and for less debt. the two goals are directly contrary to one another. trying to do both will only serve to undermine your own efforts.