MaggieMae
Reality bits
- Apr 3, 2009
- 24,043
- 1,635
- 48
No shit. So was Gramm-Rudman. What's that got to do with the point I made? It was the law of the land for us to have a balanced budget, and Clinton was given the tools to be able to obey that law.Bill Clinton understood that he was the most powerful president ever, because Congress armed him with tools no other President had ever enjoyed and none have since: Line-item veto and Gramm-Rudman. It also helped immensely that back then, Paygo had some actual teeth instead of this garbage the House passed -- which by the way never made it to the Senate, therefore isn't law yet... -- and even if passed is just a toothless mouse in a house full of feral cats.
Obama's simply paying lip service to his massive deficit, because opinion polls and focus groups showed that's an area he needed to pay lip service to. This is how he governs, by polls and focus groups. His approval rating is by far the most important thing to him.
Line item veto was struck down by the Supreme Court.
That those laws were later struck down by DEMS in the SCOTUS, isn't relevant to what Clinton actually had when he had it.
Clinton didn't face the massive economic problems we have today, so it surely isn't clear how he would have handled the current situation. Clinton definitely would have gotten more cooperation from Republicans, that's for sure. As for PAYGO, Bush allowed that to expire in 2002, I believe, knowing full well that as we went to war, there was no way the rules could be met.