Free Republic

The federal deficit is projected to roughly double this year from last ... The 2023 deficit appears to be headed for at least a doubling ... The federal fiscal year, which ends after this month, has already run up a $2.2 trillion deficit thus far ... The revelations come as the 2024 budget appropriations are set to be hashed out in Congress, setting up a difficult message for House and Senate Democrats' plans to continue to increase spending for progressive initiatives. ... The U.S. government has spent $6.7 trillion and taken in just $4.5 trillion, a 16% increase in spending...

You don't need a Mensa IQ to figure this one out. Mr. Obama's plan has been to increase spending to new, and what he hopes will be permanent, heights. Then as the public and financial markets begin to fret about deficits and debt, he'll claim that the debt is "unsustainable" and that the only "responsible" policy is to raise taxes. White House officials even talk privately about the galvanizing political benefit of a bond market crisis, which would force panicked Members of Congress to accept a big new value-added tax. The President's two looming tax reports—one from his deficit commission...

President Obama is putting the finishing touches on an ambitious first budget that seeks to cut the federal deficit in half over the next four years, primarily by raising taxes on business and the wealthy and by slashing spending on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, administration officials said. In addition to tackling a deficit swollen by the $787 billion stimulus package and other efforts to ease the nation's economic crisis, the budget blueprint will press aggressively for progress on the domestic agenda Obama outlined during the presidential campaign. This would include key changes to environmental policies and a major...

Taxes should be increased to help boost state education spending by at least $4 billion over Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's budget proposal, Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata said Tuesday. Perata, D-Oakland, said the state's per-pupil spending should at least be at the national average, and he doesn't want to see other state services cut to benefit education. "We have to raise taxes to pay for schools. There -- we've said it," Perata said at a news conference. Some possibilities include raising the state income tax or moving to a value-added tax system. Schwarzenegger has proposed spending $58 billion on education...