In selling his big-spending ideas for reviving the U.S. economy, President Obama has chastised “the same policies that, for the last eight years, doubled our national debt, and threw our economy into a tail spin.”
We couldn’t agree more with the president.
Unfortunately, he seems unaware that exploding the size of government, as he is proposing to do with this stimulus package, is a remarkably Bush-esque ideal.
While Bush was in office, scholars at the Cato Institute were critical of his big government policies. In a new section on cato.org/fiscalreality, you can find some of our research and commentary throughout the Bush years, including:
- “Bush’s Overspending Problem,” by Chris Edwards, The National Post, February 6, 2003
- “The Bush Legacy: Inflation or Deflation?,” by Steve H. Hanke, Globe Asia, September 24, 2008.
- “ ‘Conservative’ Bush Spends More than ‘Liberal’ Presidents Clinton, Carter,” by Tad DeHaven and Veronique de Rugy, cato.org, July 31, 2003.
- “Bush’s Stimulus Flop,” by Alan Reynolds, The Wall Street Journal, January 22, 2008.
- “A Sweeping Rejection of President Bush,” by David Boaz, Cato-@-Liberty, November 5, 2008.
