Demanding a federal budget that is fair, responsible, and meets our nation's priorities

Tuesday, January 24, 2006

White House Called Out on Manipulating Budget Forecasts

Stan Collender, contributing editor of the National Journal, makes two excellent points calling out the White House for their faulty and ideological budget projections in his January 17 column Wolf! (subscription only). Collender has previously called attention to the misleading projections being churned out by OMB during the Bush administration and recommended a very high dose of skepticism when considering OMB budget forecasts (an issue OMB Watch has also highlighted frequently).

In his column, Collender states the White House has almost zero credibility on budget projections and writes there is more to the recent White House's release of the estimated budget deficit than meets the eye:

The White House's announcement of a possible $400 billion deficit estimate was for the current fiscal year -- 2006 -- rather than for the 2007 budget it will send to Congress in early February. That makes it possible, perhaps even likely, that the administration is trying to set us up for a 2007 budget proposal that will show a deficit higher than the $319 billion recorded in 2005 but lower than the new estimate of $400 billion in 2006. That would allow the president and his economic team once again to claim credit for making progress even though 2007 would actually be a retreat from 2005 results.

In addition, the White House has begun to try and blame increased spending for hurricane relief as the main culprit in the increasing deficit in order to deflect attention from the huge cost of additional tax cuts, another round of funding for Iraq and Afghanistan, and the first year of the new prescription drug benefit.

The continued use of smoke and mirrors around the administration's federal budget forecasts is a shame. President Bush has shrifted responsibility and side-stepped addressing the serious long-term fiscal problem the country faces by putting political considerations above honest analysis with regard to America's finances. We all deserve better.