On Thursday, The Washington Post let reporter Zachary Goldfarb do some stand-up comedy on the front page. Or somebody is not carefully reading the news copy. From Alpha, Illinois came this paragraph with the ridiculous ending:
President Obama has decided to press Congress for a new round of stimulus spending and tax cuts as he seeks to address the great domestic policy quandary of his tenure: how to spur job growth in an age of austerity.
How can a national newspaper call the Obama presidency an "age of austerity" when it's been a spending binge like the country has never seen before? Or perhaps the "age of austerity" began with the 2010 elections. But can the new debt-limit deal really be called "austerity" before the ink is dry, and the Congressional appropriators begin breaking out of whatever paper chains were just announced? But Goldfarb wasn't done with the weird fiscal math:
The president is thinking about proposing tax cuts for companies that hire workers, new spending for roads and construction, and other measures that would target the long-term unemployed, according to administration officials and other people familiar with the matter. Some ideas, such as providing mortgage relief for struggling homeowners, could come through executive action.
Obama also plans to announce a major push for new deficit reduction, urging the special congressional committee formed in the debt-ceiling deal this month to identify even more savings than the $1.5 trillion it has been tasked with finding.
In packaging the two, he will make the case that short-term spending can lead to long-term savings.
Does any of that make mathematical sense? Especially from people who never think tax cuts can have growth effects?
Two days ago: WaPo's Goldfarb Promotes Voter Proclaiming Obama 'Inherited a Very Big Deficit'
