This budget is the opening act to a new era of irresponsibility and public deception. This budget is anything but signalling hard choices or priorities. It even neglects the presence of an economic disaster that is nowhere near finding either a bottom or solutions that work. The budget summary is full of inspiring words but when it boils down to the numbers, it's a whole different story. The mantra is to continue with a broken system and shift priorities on where to patch it up. 

The worst is in the fundamentals: 

The 2010 Budget is based on the following assumption for the total economy (GDP)

2008 $ 14,281 billion (+1.3 %)

2009 $ 14,291 billion (-1.2 %)

2010 $ 14,902 billion (+3.2 %)

2011 $ 15,728 billion (+4.0 % followed by continued solid growth)

Crisis? What crisis? If those are the numbers, seriously, there is no crisis. The decline in housing starts ALONE will prompt an economic decline of a multitude of this projection. However, if the budget is based on those assumptions, America is setting itself up for an incredible fiscal disaster. If we assume, just for pretend, that the real picture is only 5 % worse, the budget is $700 billion off. Just like that. However, it will be much more off. 

The second worst is that it does not separate stimulus spending from structural spending. Thus, it is hard to say what is going to sink in whereto. But, and I am in disbelieve, if the government projects a reduction of its deficit (including stimulus) for 2010 by almost $600 billion, I will have to cut very bad news to you: It offsets the Recovery Plan with a single sweep. That's exactly why it would be so important to have stimulus investments separated from other cost. If it is separated, you can cut the structural spending and prioritize it while you can compensate for the loss in government spending with stimulus investments in the short term. This is the antonym of transparency.  

That's not all. The budget, relying on delusional economic fundamentals, does not even attempt to wipe out federal deficits. The intention is to tolerate more than half a trillion of deficits - every year for the next ten years. If you did think that Bush has loaded a heavy burden on our children, you haven't seen anything yet. 

Who is going to finance it all? Is the money going to come from taxpayers - and I am not talking about the planned tax increases - or maybe from China? Has it evaded anyone's attention that China, Japan, or Europe might not be in a position to finance all that? They are fighting a crisis of their own. 

Then of course, budgets are always going to be missed. 

In terms of priorities and investments into the future, I am sorry to say that this budget does not create a future for change that America can believe in. For a sample of what a vision for an American future could look like please go to my article that was featured on CNN "Recovery Plan: more of the same is not change" http://www.ireport.com/docs/DOC-199883. You don't have to agree with it. Just take a taster of what our children would expect from us. 

This is the most irresponsible budget that I have ever seen. No wonder, it is done by the same kinds of people that have done the government budgets before. 

Please rate and comment. I will address questions, if I can. 

H.R. Tschudi, economist and entrepreneur, Vancouver 

February 26, 2009