[all the best]

The government can have a surplus even if it has trillions in debt, but it cannot have a surplus if that debt increased every year. This article is about surplus/deficit, not the debt. However, it analyzes the debt to prove there wasn't a surplus under Clinton.

[andyk]

I’ve been told by a couple of liberal friends that private governmental debt doesn’t count. Of course that’s only possible if you acknowledge that there is no social security trust fund.

[Bernard]

Sadly, the last time the National Debt was reduced from one fiscal year to the next was the fiscal year ending December 31, 1960. That was Dwight Eisenhower's last year as President. The National Debt decreased 3 times in the 8 years that Eisenhower was President. It has NEVER decreased since then.

Proof that some guys can play golf and find time to do their job.

[Cheerio]

The Myth of the Clinton Surplus, Part II

[freekitty]

Clintons = LAIRS

[yoe]

“Man Made Disaster”; “Workplace Violence”: ‘th nation is going over the cliff....” “Romney’s rich and doesn’t care....” “Obama not racist”.....it was a video that caused the deaths of four Americans.....whatever trash the MSM repeats and repeats becomes fact when it is really fallacy and it makes no difference that America’s credit rating is no longer respected that her word is no longer respected, that her products are no longer 1st or 2nd, third is fine with the idiots public school, and colleges/universities graduates produced...the MSM is anti-American...they love Obama and he can do no wrong regardless how reckless or almost treacherous to our nation and her Constitution this man is....the Socialist/Communist Obama is their man in the White House.

[WVKayaker]

[Hoodat]

Time and time again, anyone reading the mainstream news or reading articles on the Internet will read the claim that President Clinton not only balanced the budget, but had a surplus.

People listening to Noot Gingrich several months back would have heard the same thing. Unfortunately, the last year this nation saw a surplus was in 1957.

[onyx]

Some make more than one donation
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Some make more than one donation
Many make none
Have YOU contributed?

[ScottfromNJ]

The national debt increased by 1.3 Trillion under Clinton, although by today’s standard that’s not so bad and we can thank the Gingrich/Kasich Congress for at least keeping it somewhat in check. Still, the Clinton surplus is a myth.

[Morpheus2009]

Wow, goes to show you how much the media, and Billy Jeff, love to lie about how things were, much less are. I wonder what Billy is spending his time doing nowadays, hope he’s actually working, for a change!!!

[DManA]

None the less the fiscal situation at the end of the Clinton/Republican partnership was INFINITELY better than it’s been in the 12 years since.

[FreeAtlanta]

If we survive the Obama years, the left will try to tell us how great it was. We can’t let them.

[Eagle Forgotten]

I’m pretty sure that Bush41 and Bush43 used the same accounting methods (essentially, treating the Social Security System’s excess of revenues over expenditures as an offset to the deficit of the non-Social-Security portion of the government).

The linked article says “While not defending the increase of the federal debt under President Bush....” but doesn’t elaborate. The answer is that the deficits reported under both Bushes would have been even higher if Social Security had been accounted for separately.

I understand the author’s focus on the claims about Clinton. It’s misleading, though, if it gives the impression that this accounting method is solely a Democratic subterfuge. It was pioneered by Republicans.

[clearcarbon]

Those books he cooked were so delicious demRATS ate every bit of it.