The President’s Priorities

WSJ

One rule of budget reporting is to watch what the politicians are spending this year,not the frugality they promise down the road. By that measure,the budget that President Obama released yesterday for fiscal 2011 is one of the greatest spend-while-you-can documents in American history.

We now know why the White House leaked word of a three-year spending freeze on a few domestic accounts before this extravaganza was released. No one would have noticed such a slushy promise amid this glacier of spending. The budget reveals that overall federal outlays will reach $3.72 trillion in fiscal 2010,and keep rising to $3.834 trillion in 2011.

As a share of the economy,outlays will reach a post-World War II record of 25.4% this year. This is a new modern spending landmark,up from 21% of GDP as recently as fiscal 2008,and far above the 40-year average of 20.7%.

In the “out years”in mid-decade,the White House promises that spending will fall all the way back to 23% of GDP. Even if you choose to believe such a political prediction,that still means Mr. Obama is proposing a new and more or less permanently higher plateau of federal spending.

And here you thought the “stimulus”was supposed to be temporary. This is also before the baby boomers retire and send Medicare and Social Security accounts soaring.

If this budget is Mr. Obama’s first clear demonstration of his long-term governing priorities,then it’s hard not conclude that this spending boom is deliberate.

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