John Kasich's Special Brand of BS: I'm Why Bill Clinton Had a Budget Surplus!

Kasich patented shtick includes how he fixed the debt back in the 90s. Too bad the truth is different.

Trust me. I thought of this bullshit all by myself.

John Kasich voted against the two bills, one by W.'s father and the other by Bill Clinton, that had the biggest effect on achieving a federal budget surplus in the last two years of Clinton's presidency. Clinton had a lot of help, but that help didn't come from John Kasich:

The key element of the Kasich myth is the 1997 Balanced Budget Act, which he credits with producing surpluses in the 1990s. “I balanced the budget in Washington as a chief architect,” he claimed at the last Republican debate, echoing a frequent boast. Kasich’s iteration of his origin story is almost a pure inversion of fiscal reality. Two major laws eliminated the structural deficits of the Reagan era. The first was the 1990 budget deal George Bush struck with congressional Democrats, which cut spending, imposed new rules forcing any new tax cut or social program to be paid for, and increased taxes. Kasich, like most members of his party, voted against it because it raised taxes. That law reduced the deficit by 1.4 percent of gross domestic product over five years. In 1993, President Clinton, working with Democrats in Congress, passed another major deficit-reduction plan. (Clinton’s cuts reduced the deficit by 1.2 percent of GDP over five years.) Kasich voted against that, too, for the same reason, and also predicted that its increase in the top tax rate would “kill jobs” and “[put] the economy in the gutter,” and insisted, “This plan will not work. If it was to work, then I’d have to become a Democrat.”

Instead of the recession Kasich predicted, an economic boom followed, which led to much faster growth and higher revenues than even the Clinton administration had forecast. If the events following the passage of Clinton's deficit plan did not show that it worked, then no evidence could prove that it worked. Nonetheless, Kasich did not become a Democrat.

In fact, by 1997, the deficit was on course to disappear. Lawmakers in both parties decided to capitalize on the good fortune by passing a budget they could call a “Balanced Budget Act,” thereby taking credit for something that was set to happen without any action. The resulting deal cut Medicare, but split the savings between a new Childrens’ Health Insurance plan, which Democrats liked, and a capital gains tax cut, which Republicans liked. It barely netted out, trimming the deficit by just 0.2 percent of GDP.

Kasich, in other words, opposed the two main laws that created the balanced budget in the 1990s, and supported one that had nothing to do with it. He continues to maintain that he would oppose any tax increase, even a budget deal that combined a 10-1 ratio of spending cuts to tax hikes.

I wish I could say that John Kasich, having been called out by numerous reporters and fact-checkers, would halt the flow of this bullshit, but I can't. He'll spout it until he's the GOP nominee or isn't and will continue to spout it until someone in his nursing home tells him to shut the fuck up. Then he just keep spouting it. Give it a rest.