About a month ago, during a White House press conference, Bush said with a smirk, “I think I got a B in Econ 101. I got an A, however, in keeping taxes low and being fiscally responsible with the people’s money.”
Those who oppose increases in government spending may disagree.
George W. Bush, despite all his recent bravado about being an apostle of small government and budget-slashing, is the biggest spending president since Lyndon B. Johnson. In fact, he’s arguably an even bigger spender than LBJ.
“He’s a big government guy,” said Stephen Slivinski, the director of budget studies at Cato Institute, a libertarian research group.
The numbers are clear, credible and conclusive, added David Keating, the executive director of the Club for Growth, a budget-watchdog group.
“He’s a big spender,” Keating said. “No question about it.”
How big? During Lyndon Johnson’s presidency, discretionary spending, adjusted for inflation, grew 4.6%. Under Bush, spending grew at an average annual rate of 5.3%.
Cato’s Slivinski noted that discretionary spending went up twice as much under George W. Bush than under Bill Clinton.
Now, I suspect the White House’s response will be that Bush has had two wars to fight. At first blush, it seems like a dubious argument — LBJ had Vietnam, and multiple presidents (most notably, Reagan) spent heavily during the Cold War, but Bush managed to boost spending more than all of them, even with a Republican Congress that claimed to be fiscally responsible.
But even beyond the surface, Bush’s defense is less persuasive the closer you look at it.
…Bush’s super-spending is about far more than defense and homeland security.
Brian Riedl, a budget analyst at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative research group, points to education spending. Adjusted for inflation, it’s up 18 percent annually since 2001, thanks largely to Bush’s No Child Left Behind act.
The 2002 farm bill, he said, caused agriculture spending to double its 1990s levels.
Then there was the 2003 Medicare prescription drug benefit — the biggest single expansion in the program’s history — whose 10-year costs are estimated at more than $700 billion.
And the 2005 highway bill, which included thousands of “earmarks,” or special local projects stuck into the legislation by individual lawmakers without review, cost $295 billion.
“He has presided over massive increases in almost every category … a dramatic change of pace from most previous presidents,” said Slivinski.
Of course, it’s also worth noting that while Bush has been spending faster than any of his modern predecessors, he’s also been cutting taxes for the wealthy, and putting two wars on the national credit card.
And yet, the president still feels justified lecturing others on fiscal responsibility. How odd.