George W Bush, not Social Security, Destroyed the Budget

A recent email from my cousin, and godfather, the infamous Mark Mocarski:

"Ten years ago, the U.S. Government had a budget surplus.

Then the Supreme Court elected George W. Bush President of the United States.

That's when all fiscal hell broke loose.

First Bush instituted a gigantic tax cut. To pay for this, we had to borrow a trillion dollars from the Communist Chinese.

Of course, the jobs that this tax cut was supposed to create never materialized. Those jobs should have added tax-paying citizens to the nation's payroll. Instead, it helped fuel a massive bubble in the housing market and a huge increase in speculative investing overseas.

Then Bush started two wars, one Iraq and another in Afghanistan, without ever raising the necessary funds to fight these wars. This is the first time in our nation's history--going all the way back to the Revolutionary War--that taxes were not increased to finance a war.

At the same time, Bush created the second largest Federal government agency after the Defense Department--Homeland Security.

I find it odd that in our current debate about the Federal deficit, I hear very little about how exactly we got here. Yes, entitlement programs are an issue--particularly Medicare and Medicaid. And the interest on the debt is a big issue--especially given that we had to borrow even more money from the Communist Chinese when we refused to overturn the Bush tax cuts.

But let's get this straight--it's George W. Bush and his borrow-and-spend Republicans who drove the country into receivership. And now it's the Republicans who are threatening to destroy every government social program to make up for their incompetent and, yes, IMMORAL stewardship of our nations' treasury.

We don't have to raise the Social Security retirement age to fix the budget mess. We need to stop voting for Republicans."