Of the $789 billion swing to a $455 billion deficit, Bolten attributed 53 percent to the economic downturn, 24 percent to war, homeland security and other new programs, and 23 percent to the three successive tax cuts enacted since 2001.

53 percent is the economic downturn: $418 billion.

24 percent is the war: $189 billion.

23 percent is tax cuts (static analysis, as usual): $182 billion.

So, if we eliminate the tax cuts we would subtract (again, static analysis) 182 billion from the deficit for a deficit of "only" 273 billion.

On the other hand, if we had not gone to war, AND scrapped the tax cuts, the deficit would be down to $84 billion.

Finally, if our economy was in great shape, and we were paying for the war and giving citizens their money back, the deficit is just $37 billion. Under these good economic conditions, if we didn't have to deal with worldwide terrorists giving us grief, we would be looking at a possible $152 billion surplus.

But it's all the fault of the tax cuts?

A reasonable person might conclude that a lot of our problem is an economic downturn that started in the spring of 2000.

Naturally, nobody is mentioning spending tax money hand over fist by both parties, including the idiotic move of creating a brand new open-ended entitlement.

Also, it is worth remembering that the Democrats were as hard over agains tax cuts back when everyone was depicting surpluses as far as the eye could see, which makes me think that deficits are not their prime mover.

I don't have a recent estimated number for 2003 GDP (if you have a better number, let me know), but the documents I usually refer to (Table 1.3) say 10.7 trillion (estimated). Let's call it 10 trillion. This would make a $455 billion deficit about 5 percent of GDP*. The highest deficit during the Reagan years was 1983, when it was 6 percent of GDP. When we were fighting WWII, we racked up deficits as high as 30.3 percent of GDP.

Year: Percent

1942: 14.2
1943: 30.3
1944: 22.8
1945: 21.5

We got over it. In 1946 the deficit was down to 7.2 percent of GDP, and the budget moved into surplus in 1947. And basically, it was plus or minus a few percent ever since.

*I am usually reluctant to use percentages of GDP for numbers since it is a prime tool for pulling the wool over people's eyes, but I use what I'm given.