I have not heard of any "faith-based economics" but perhaps the President would do better with those budgets than he does with actual numbers. Three recent articles on Bush's fiscal legacy.

I have long wondered how fiscal conservatives, aka Republicans, reconcile their professed beliefs with the President's actions. It is a little hard to swallow the "tax and spend Democrat" epithet when one actually compares the President to his predecessor.

The bottom line is that one's political party is no guarantee of fiscal responsibility and it is high time we voters acted that way.

"Impostor : How George W. Bush Bankrupted America and Betrayed the Reagan Legacy" by Bruce Bartlett

Shot From the Right

A Reaganite Rips Bush's Fiscal Plan, But Wider Salvos Land Off Mark

By STEPHEN MOORE

February 24, 2006

The title of Bruce Bartlett's "Impostor" makes it sound like another anti-Bush screed in the Al Franken and Michael Moore mold. It certainly is not that. It is an anti-Bush screed in a mold all its own.

What is unusual about this broadside against the president is that it comes from an ostensible ally: Mr. Bartlett is a conservative columnist and a former Treasury official from the administration of Mr. Bush's father. He is a proud Republican, too, and says that he plans to remain one. Still, Mr. Bartlett probably won't be invited to the White House Christmas party this year.

And for good reason. As the subtitle of his book suggests, Mr. Bartlett believes that the president has "bankrupted America and betrayed the Reagan legacy." The phrasing is woefully hyperbolic, but at least one point is hard to dispute: Mr. Bush's record on federal spending has been less than exemplary -- in fact, it has been downright awful.

As Mr. Bartlett notes, the president has allowed federal domestic spending to grow 8% annually, which is a higher growth rate than that of any White House occupant since LBJ. Mr. Bartlett riffles with evident disgust through reams of new spending programs: the manned mission to Mars; the "No Child Left Behind" education bill; the massive hike in foreign-aid spending; the quadrupling of the number of earmarked pork-barrel projects; and the multi-trillion-dollar Medicare prescription drug bill ("the worst legislation in history").

Mr. Bush's embrace of big government has understandably infuriated some of the president's supporters on the right. They may be even more furious when they see Mr. Bartlett contrast Mr. Bush with his predecessor. The budget hardly grew at all under Bill Clinton, Mr. Bartlett observes, in part because of a stingy Republican Congress after 1994. But government expenditures have exploded on Mr. Bush's watch, making Mr. Clinton look "like Calvin Coolidge," at least in this one respect.

Hey, I have an idea! Let's make some future schmucks pay for it in 2010 or 2016 or something... Heck, whats a few hundred Billion between friends?

Bush's Deficit Math Sidesteps Some Big Outlays

War, Medicare and Tax Cuts Loom Large as Factors Undermining Forecasts

By JACKIE CALMES Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

February 7, 2006

WASHINGTON -- President Bush projects the deficit will widen again this year to $423 billion, but steadily shrink for the rest of his term if his new budget proposals are adopted. But even if they were, which isn't likely, there are significant caveats to the rosy scenario.

In the budget request sent to Congress yesterday, Mr. Bush revived his unsuccessful bid to divert surplus Social Security payroll-tax revenue to personal accounts for workers. But with Mr. Bush promising to cut the deficit in half by the time he leaves office in 2009, the change wouldn't take effect until fiscal 2010. From then, through fiscal year 2016, it would add $712 billion to annual deficits, according to the administration.

...

The president's 2004 campaign promise to halve the deficit had as its starting point his administration's own projection that the deficit would peak that year at 4.5% of GDP, a forecast that many observers considered high at the time. (The actual deficit was 3.6% of GDP.) Yesterday, Mr. Bolten said Mr. Bush was on track to do much better than he promised: A 2009 deficit equal to 1.4% of GDP would be well below half of the 2004 projection.

Rep. John Spratt of South Carolina, the senior Democrat on the House Budget Committee, said the administration's preliminary victory claim was "questionable at best" and, if realized, certainly would be "short lived."

As Mr. Spratt noted, current government projections assume Mr. Bush's first-term tax cuts would all expire by 2011. But Mr. Bush hopes to extend them, for a revenue loss put at $1.8 trillion over 10 years. Current forecasts also assume more middle-income Americans will be paying the "alternative minimum tax," which was intended for wealthy taxpayers who otherwise can use tax breaks to reduce or wipe out their income-tax liability. But the president and Congress want to fix or repeal the AMT. That also would reduce anticipated revenues in coming years -- just as the retirement of baby boomers is causing costs for Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security to explode.

Dont forget: "tax breaks" is the answer to EVERY question. Yessir, just cut revenue and watch the profits roll in!

Tax Breaks to Boost Cost Of Bush's Health Budget

Medicare Cuts Are Modest, But Plan Adds To Incentives For Private Savings Accounts

By SARAH LUECK Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

February 6, 2006

WASHINGTON -- President Bush's plan to encourage Americans to use privately administered health-savings accounts would cost the Treasury about $60 billion over five years -- roughly double what he proposes to save through another health-care initiative: trimming Medicare spending.

The disparity between those figures -- the cost of tax incentives and the Medicare savings -- underlined what is emerging as a basic tenet of the Bush administration's health-care policies: individuals can help rein in the nation's medical spending if more of their own money is on the line.

That philosophy will take concrete form today with the release of Mr. Bush's fiscal 2007 budget. The effort to scale back Medicare would reduce spending by only about 1.4% of the $2.56 trillion the Congressional Budget Office projects the program will cost over the next five years if no changes are made. Those savings would come mainly from reducing payments to hospitals and other health-care providers, as well as requiring more beneficiaries to pay higher premiums for physician services.