CLASSIC EXAMPLE

The NYT motto reads "All the news that's fit to print."

After you read the posted story you should know why it ought to say: "All the news that's fit to spin."

Let's start at the top, the title: "The Incredible Shrinking Budget."

The only thing incredible about the incredible shrinking budget is whoever wrote this headline. If nothing else it shows you what contempt the NYT has for you.

The article claims the deficit is not only falling but falling rapidly. They then quote a report from Goldman Sachs aka in many eyes as Government Sachs. This is the same GS that shorted gold then put out a report to clients that gets spread to the public by MSM to short gold.

For anyone but GS that's called front running; it's illegal for you and me. It's also designed to pry the retail crowd loose from their metal ETFs and send a message about the economy.

Take a closer look at the paragraph below.

“Revenues have also exceeded expectations, with a 12 percent gain fiscal year to date. What is more notable is that the strength in revenues preceded the payroll tax hike at the start of the year, and the spending decline does not seem to reflect sequestration, which has just started to take effect.” To translate: the deficit could come in even smaller than currently anticipated because of spending cuts and higher tax rates.

To begin with, there's more qualifiers ("does not seem, "could come") in there than you'll see next month at the Indy 500.

The strength in revenues was no surprise. People cashed in some winnings to avoid higher taxes that they knew are coming. This was true at the state level also. Even tax-crazy California reported higher revenue.

This next paragraph would be even funnier if not for such blatant cheerleading. The growing economy, bolstering tax revenues, reducing the need for spending on unemployment insurance, the budget is finally coming into balance. Enough already.

"Washington has gotten its act together" and they write this BS with a straight face. The next time Washington gets its act together will be the first time.

On the face of it, this sounds like something to applaud: The growing economy is bolstering tax revenue and reducing the need for spending on programs like unemployment insurance. Washington has gotten its act together. The budget is finally coming back into balance. Indeed, Goldman now expects the budget deficit to fall to just 2.7 percent of economic output by the 2015 fiscal year. Many economists consider budget deficits that small to be sustainable — particularly if the federal government is investing in public goods like schools and roads — with the accrued debt paid off by later years’ economic growth.

This next paragraph is their coup d' gras, the final haymaker to knockout sequestration.

But a number of budget experts are booing rather than applauding, including the fiscal hawks at the International Monetary Fund. Last week, the fund nudged down its estimates for United States growth in 2013 and 2014. It said it saw many bright spots in the American economy, including the strength of the private sector, but it criticized Washington for imposing too much austerity, too soon, and thus sapping strength from the recovery and preventing the unemployment rate from coming down faster.

There always has to be another reason for the failure of the unemployment rate to decline. It couldn't be lousy government policy in the first place owing to huge budget deficits, big debt and out-of-control slopping at the public trough.  

You can't blame the author, though. She probably doesn't know yet: she's just another pawn. Toss her a by-line, a few chips, some guacamole and she's good to go.

http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/04/22/the-incredible-shrinking-budget-deficit/