In the Sunday Review Section of the NY Times some simple graphs tell the story. For DKos'ers we've seen these charts before in various forms. Why doesn't the President and the Dems in Congress use simple graphics such as those in today's paper?
In a 1 column section on the Editorial page of this Sunday's Week in in Review section writer Teresa Tritch spells it out for those who don't have the time to pull together the information for themselves:
Source of th Deficit
I wasn't familiar with Ms Tritch but apparently she has been a member of the editorial board of the Times since 2004 after spending time at Money Magazine....
Teresa Tritch
The simple bar charts speak for themselves. How we went from budget surpluses as far as the eye could see under President Clinton to where we are today. How the total cost of the new policies and programs can be apportioned between Presidents Bush and Obama.....How the biggest cost sending us into deficit spending is the Bush tax cuts followed closely by the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and defense spending.
Ms. Tritch closes with something we know:
"Effective health care reform, and a willingness to pay more taxes, will be the biggest factors in controlling those deficits".
I assume reducing spending on wars wouldn't hurt.
President Obama should take a page out of Ross Perot's handbook and go on national TV with these 2 simple charts. Now....