Trump is a fiscal conservative? National debt tops $22 trillion for first time in U.S. history

Mod: He's spending like no president in American in history, in the process saddling America with levels of debt never before imagined. Can't we take this damn fool's credit card away?

National debt tops $22 trillion for first time in U.S. history (CBS Newslink): The U.S. national debt has topped $22 trillion for the first time in history, according to daily figures released by the Treasury Department on Tuesday. The debt has ballooned by more than $2 trillion in the two years since President Trump took office in January 2017, when the debt stood at $19.9 trillion. It surpassed $21 trillion for the first time in history in March 2018. Under the Obama administration, the national debt grew from $10.6 trillion to $19.9 trillion, an increase that drew sharps criticism from Republicans.

In an interview with the Washington Post in 2016, Mr. Trump vowed to eliminate the national debt "over a period of eight years." Top White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow, who joined the White House after the president said he would eliminate the debt, told CBS News last month Mr. Trump probably didn't mean he would eliminate the debt entirely.

"I don't know, you know, I wasn't there, I read about some of this — I think what he was really referring to was he would stop the upward rise as a burden on the economy,"Kudlow said in January. "In other words, to me, the measure is not, what is the deficit or this or that. It's as a share of GDP. That's your burden on the economy. And I would argue that it is and will continue to come down as a burden on the economy."

But the ratio of debt-to-GDP has also increased, something that's unusual in a strong economy. In June 2018, the Congressional Budget Office said in a report that the level of debt as a share of GDP had reached its highest levels since World War II.

Federal deficit up 77 percent so far this budget year (NBC Newslink): The federal government recorded a budget surplus in January. But so far this budget year, the total deficit is 77 percent higher than the same period a year ago.

The Treasury Department said Tuesday that the deficit for the first four months of this budget year, which began Oct. 1, totaled $310.3 billion. That's up from a deficit of $175.7 billion in the same period a year ago. The surplus in January was $8.7 billion.

The higher deficit reflected greater spending in areas such as Social Security, defense and interest payments on the national debt. Meanwhile, the government collected lower taxes from individuals and corporations, reflecting the impact of the $1.5 trillion tax cut President Donald Trump pushed through Congress in 2017. Individual income taxes withheld from paychecks total $818 billion for the October-January period, down 3 percent from the same period last year. Corporate income taxes total $73 billion over the four-month period, down 23 percent.

Revenue, however, is up is in tariffs — border taxes collected on imports — which totaled $25 billion in the October-January period, up 91 percent from the same period a year ago. This reflects the higher tariffs the Trump administration has imposed on China and other nations in various trade disputes.

Trump trillion-dollar-plus deficits are putting America on a path to fiscal ruin (USA Todaylink): It became very clear this month that neither the Trump White House nor its allies on Capitol Hill want you to know that the federal budget is already in very bad shape ... and getting worse.

It happened when the Treasury, the official keeper of Washington’s financial results, issued its monthly statement for the first 10 months of fiscal 2018 about federal revenue, spending and, therefore, the budget deficit.

Treasury showed what no president ever wants to admit: The deficit is spiking. The federal government’s red ink this year is already 21 percent above what it was in 2017, and there are few prospects that the bottom line will improve anytime soon.

Except with infrequent and unsubstantiated platitudes about how the situation is going to get better, the Trump White House and Republicans in Congress have been doing everything possible not to talk about the budget this year.

To avoid tough questions and politically embarrassing votes, the House and Senate have even refused to consider a budget even though they are required by law to adopt one. But this year isn’t the real issue. Unlike the trillion dollar budget deficits that occurred during the Obama administration that were temporary and largely the result of the Great Recession, the Trump deficits that will soon reach and exceed $1 trillion are permanent and will only get worse in the years ahead.

The Trump deficits are the result of changes in federal spending and revenue that will continue to be in place until some president and Congress decide to reverse them, that is, to increase taxes and make cuts to popular programs.

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