Clinton Was the Best! He Balanced the Budget...

[gb13]

...Bullshit! I know.

But, I'm having a debate w/ someone on the topic, and I need some sources. The guy I'm debating is a raging liberal, so I'd prefer references that are not "overtly republican", because I know he'll just shrug them off.

Can anyone help?

Also, to anyone who had a heart-attack when they first read the thread title... I apologize. Send me you hospital bill. :D:p

[nbhadja]

"Raising the debt ceiling is nothing new. We last raised it during the Clinton era, despite that administration's claims that the budget was balanced each year. This can be refuted quite simply, because the national debt continued to rise throughout the 1990s. Obviously, if federal spending truly was being outpaced by revenues, the debt would not have increased. So how did the Clinton administration make it appear that annual spending did not exceed annual revenues? Mostly by using Social Security revenues to cover the difference, even though Social Security taxes are supposed to be held in a trust fund and not spent on other federal programs. Yet few Americans know that their Social Security taxes are never segregated or saved by the federal government, but rather spent immediately as general funds. Your Social Security benefits are nothing more than IOUs that are completely dependent on future revenues."

http://www.ronpaullibrary.org/document.php?id=1

http://www.ronpaullibrary.org/document.php?id=243

[James Madison]

Explain to me how you can have a "surplus" when there's also a national debt of over $3 trillion?

[specsaregood]

Despite everything said above, is the person not aware that the president doesn't make the budget and doesn't have anything to do with it? It was a Republican majority legislature in power at the time. So if any credit was going to go somewhere, it should go to the Republicans.

[Bman]

Clinton didn't balance the budget. The Republican legislature bablanced the budget.

Next Clinton is the reason that China now owns us. He gave them every advantage not to mention trade secrets and technology that he could. For christ sake he gave them the blue prints for international ballistic missles.

Bill was lucky enough to ride a wave of high investment from the brand new emerging market called the internet.

He was not special. He was lucky, and he was only able to balance the budget when, like I said before, he had a Republican legislature.

[InterestedParticipant]

Clinton pushed through the GATT treaty, which is probably one of the greatest forces leading to the destruction of the USA. Tell your friend to lookup Sir James Goldsmith and to research what he had to say about GATT and how it would destroy society. Then ask your friend how he reconciles Goldsmith's comments with his love for Clinton.

[PlzPeopleWakeUp]

nt

[amonasro]

Many people associate the Clinton administration with good times & the internet boom and bubble. I still do, but I realize Clinton had nothing to do with it. I was in high school at the time. The economy was amazing (or so we thought) and many still long for those times again. So they invoke Clinton as an argument, thinking he had something to do with it.

Don't shoot me, but I'd still take him over Obama.

[anaconda]

...Bullshit! I know.

But, I'm having a debate w/ someone on the topic, and I need some sources. The guy I'm debating is a raging liberal, so I'd prefer references that are not "overtly republican", because I know he'll just shrug them off.

Can anyone help?

Also, to anyone who had a heart-attack when they first read the thread title... I apologize. Send me you hospital bill. :D:p

Clinton got unexpectedly blind sided by hugely increased tax revenues produced by the most revved-up over heated economy in modern history. He had nothing to do with it.

[Pauls' Revere]

I believe that the movie or trailer for I.O.U.S.A had a factoid that the budget was "balanced" only once in our history.

YouTube - I.O.U.S.A.: Byte-Sized - The 30 Minute Version (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_TjBNjc9Bo)

at minute 3:40 is the historic timeline. In 1835 was only time in our history when the deficit was zero.

Hope this helps.

[anaconda]

Explain to me how you can have a "surplus" when there's also a national debt of over $3 trillion?

The "surplus" or "deficit" is the annual difference between tax revenues and expenditures. The national debt is the running total of prior deficits and surpluses. So, for example, if you have a national debt of $3 trillion and then you have a budget surplus of $400 billion the next year, your national debt would drop to $2.6 trillion.

[nbhadja]

There was no budget surplus!

[gb13]

Thanks..

I know he didn't really balance the budget, and I've heard Ron speak about this on numerous occasions... I just needed some nonpartisan resources that I could point him to.

Thanks a lot for the references, everyone.:cool:

[cindy25]

it was divided government that created even the allusion of a surplus

[Objectivist]

Explain to me how you can have a "surplus" when there's also a national debt of over $3 trillion?

People that believe he balanced anything are the same ones that think California is cashing checks at Bank of America.

Just because you make a $500 credit card payment at the end of the month doesn't mean you're out of debt, you still have a $20,000 balance of the card.

[emazur]

Raging liberal eh? Clinton doesn't really have the reputation of being a liberal - tell her he was able to balance the budget by acting on conservative principles. It was Clinton, after all, who declared in 1996 "the era of big government is over".
Here are a few bits from my textbook, American Government 7th Edition (1999)
"The Clinton administration plans to cut nearly 300,000 federal government positions by 1999... Clinton's proposed "reinvention of government", led by Vice President Gore, would cut 2,400 jobs from Health and Human Services by eliminating a layer of management, consolidating dozens of programs, turning some work over to private business, and giving states a bigger role in these programs. The vice president argues this would create a more "customer friendly" agency"
p. 350
Contrast this with Ronald Reagan, who had fantastic rhetoric on reducing the size and scope of the federal government but did just the opposite:
"Despite Reagan's pronounced feelings about the bureaucracy, it grew by over 200,000 employees during his administration. Although many agencies lost personnel (the biggest loser was the Department of Housing and Urban Development), others such as the Defense, Justice, and Treasury Departments gained"
p. 351
more slashing of federal spending:
"In 1993, President Clinton took office promising to end welfare "as we know it". In the 1994 elections, the Republican "Contract with America" promised even more dramatic reform. After heated debate throughout 1995, Congress passed, and the president signed, a welfare reform bill that abolished the previous system whereby welfare was an entitlement to all those who met federal guidelines. Instead, states were mandated to set up their own welfare systems under loose federal guidelines. The federal government now gives block grants to states to run these programs, but the states can decide who is eligible and (as in the previous system) how much to pay them."
p. 513

[Objectivist]

Ask your LPD friend why Clinton signed most of this legislation that Newt Gingrich penned. I still don't get a satisfactory answer on that question.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contract_with_america

[CUnknown]

Well, Clinton did balance the budget, but he was only able to do so because of the roaring (mega-bubble) economy and by raising capital gains taxes. That mega-bubble popped and the full effects of that have yet to be felt.

If you praise Clinton for balancing the budget, you have to damn him twice over for the current depression.

[Elwar]

I think that the Monica Lewinsky thing was the best thing to happen to our government. While Washington was fixated on that, the market was busy making money unfettered by reactive laws and regulations.

But the Lewinsky scandal went away...and the laws eventually caught up to the market.

[erowe1]

As other people pointed out, there was no surplus or balanced budget in the Clinton years. But part of this is kind of hollow, since, at the very least, we have to concede that the deficit was a lot smaller when Clinton left office than at any time in the presidencies of Reagan or either of the Bushes.

There are still a few mitigating factors though:
1) The Republican Congress. In his first 2 years the Clinton deficits were enormous. And if he'd gotten his way on everything he wanted, like universal health care, they would have only gotten bigger. This doesn't mean the Republicans were squeaky clean. But the gridlock we had from 1994-2000 went a long way to keeping new spending from getting passed (at one point even leading to a government shut down).
2) The stock market bubble. This is the real reason the deficit got so low in 1998-2000. Government revenues from capital gains taxes were huge. But then the bubble popped, as we all know it had to, and as it would have done regardless of who was president. It just so happened that Clinton was lucky enough not to be there when it did. Are we really supposed to give Clinton credit for the extra revenue during the bubble but then not also hold him responsible for the loss of that revenue when it popped? Really?
3) And finally, if your friend really does think that Clinton is to be so highly commended for shrinking the deficit, then according to the same value system, he must think Obama is positively terrible. There's no way around that.

[apropos]

I believe that the movie or trailer for I.O.U.S.A had a factoid that the budget was "balanced" only once in our history.

In 1835 was only time in our history when the deficit was zero.

Not coincidentally, this happened at about the same time that Andrew Jackson vetoed the charter of the Bank of America (a precursor to the Federal Reserve).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bank_War

[FunkBuddha]

I saved this link in my email for just this occasion.

http://www.craigsteiner.us/articles/16

[nayjevin]

they cook the books.... the numbers are based on whatever data necessary to paint the picture desired. no balanced budget -- just debt shifted away from the light of statistical economic study.

[Objectivist]

they cook the books.... the numbers are based on whatever data necessary to paint the picture desired. no balanced budget -- just debt shifted away from the light of statistical economic study.

Same thing goes for the "unemployment" numbers, which most of us here understand only count those actively collecting a unemployment check or benefit. They stopped counting the people that run out that benefit as they are no longer on the dole, in their eyes.

[angelatc]

...Bullshit! I know.

But, I'm having a debate w/ someone on the topic, and I need some sources. The guy I'm debating is a raging liberal, so I'd prefer references that are not "overtly republican", because I know he'll just shrug them off.

Can anyone help?

Also, to anyone who had a heart-attack when they first read the thread title... I apologize. Send me you hospital bill. :D:p

The proof is in the treasury numbers. http://www.craigsteiner.us/articles/16 Don't worry about the bill. Obama's gonna set me up.

[sevin]

Wow, I love this forum. Halfway down the first page and this argument was completely destroyed.

[Sandman33]

I hated Clinton from the first time I saw him. I just KNEW he was a lying beurocrat. I was in jr high at the time and I REALLY wanted Perot to win.

Everyone chastized me for it of course and my entire school was pro Clinton.

A self made billionaire that doesn't have to take bribes from special interests or CHINA for his campaign. VS A smiling twofaced asshole like Bill Clinton. Some things just make TOO much sense to ever happen.

Women voted Clinton in. He was the more attractive candidate after all.

[SimpleName]

Despite everything said above, is the person not aware that the president doesn't make the budget and doesn't have anything to do with it? It was a Republican majority legislature in power at the time. So if any credit was going to go somewhere, it should go to the Republicans.

Didn't even think, or for that matter, know, that. Definitely a good addition to the use of Social Security revenue argument. I will use that next time. Thanks