Barack Obama is lying about the federal debt

  During the 2008 presidential campaign much was made about President Bush’s accounting gimmick of not including the expenses of the war efforts in the official budget when the national debt was calculated. Barack Obama promised to end this practice, which he claimed would help to bring more transparency to the federal government.

  Here is an excerpt from the article I linked to above:

the U.S. military has largely paid for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan through emergency spending measures, in effect keeping wartime costs off the books. In addition to masking skyrocketing budget growth at the Department of Defense, this process has allowed the services to treat budget supplementals as a piggy bank for new procurement

  Here is what Barack Obama said in February of 2009 about President Bush’s defense department using an accounting gimmick to hide the true budget of the United States:

That is why this budget looks ahead ten years and accounts for spending that was left out under the old rules – and for the first time, that includes the full cost of fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan,” he said. “For seven years, we have been a nation at war.  No longer will we hide its price

  So, Barack Obama is now including the price of the wars in his budget so that Americans will see the truth about the federal budget and national debt; this means that no longer will the federal government use accounting gimmicks to hide the true spending of the federal government, right?

  Not so fast; while Barack Obama may not be hiding the money spent on the wars in his budget, he has resorted to similar accounting tricks to hide the real federal debt. He may not be hiding the war money, but he is hiding money nonetheless. While Barack Obama’s war accounting may be more transparent than his predecessor’s, he is being less than forthcoming when it applies to other aspects of the federal government.

  According to this article, Barack Obama is not only using the same type of tactics that President Bush used, he is using tactics similar to Enron to hide the true depth of the federal deficit from the American people.

The Government is lying about the amount of debt. It is engaging in Enron accounting,” said Laurence Kotlikoff, an economist at Boston University and co-author of The Coming Generational Storm: What You Need to Know about America’s Economic Future.

“The problem is we’re seeing an explosion in spending,” added Andrew Moylan, director of government affairs for the National Taxpayers Union

  How is Barack Obama perpetrating this scam on the American people:

They do not count off-budget obligations such as required spending for Social Security and Medicare, whose programs represent a balloon payment for the Government as more Americans retire and collect benefits

  Barack Obama’s budget does not include Social Security or Medicare costs, which will balloon in the upcoming years. Without drastic changes to either of these programs they will both be bankrupt in the near future. This leaves only two options for the Obama regime if he hopes to keep these programs fluid; he can either cut benefits to those that have paid into the system their whole lives, or he can raise taxes to make up for the shortfall.

  But many Americans are oblivious to the plight of these programs because Barack Obama is hiding these numbers from the American people using the same accounting gimmick that he railed against during his bid to win the presidency–he is not including these numbers in the official federal budget.

  The only difference between Barack Obama and President Bush when it comes to the budget is which numbers are being hidden from the American people. The end result is still the same; the American people are being misled by the federal government. The numbers that are being manipulated may no longer be coming from the defense department’s budget, but that does not make it any less insidious.

  So much for Barack Obama’s pledge of transparency in government. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. All I am asking for is a little consistency here, is that too much to ask for?