Federal Budget Deficit to Reach Record $1.5 trillion in 2011

At WSJ, "Deficit Outlook Darkens: Stark Warning for 2011 Fuels Battle Over Government Spending and Taxation":

WASHINGTON—The federal budget deficit will reach a record of nearly $1.5 trillion in 2011 due to the weak economy, higher spending and fresh tax cuts, congressional budget analysts said, in a stark warning that will drive the growing battle over government spending and taxation.

At that size, the deficit—up from $1.29 trillion in 2010—would be roughly $60 billion more than the White House projected last summer, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said Wednesday. Last year's tax-cut package alone will add roughly $400 billion to the deficit, the CBO said. As a percentage of the nation's economic output, the 9.8% deficit would be the second-largest since World War II, behind only the 10% level in 2009.

The grim outlook landed a day after President Barack Obama outlined plans to push for new spending that he said would help keep the U.S. globally competitive in his State of the Union speech, and the data could complicate that effort. Republicans have dismissed the president's plans as ignoring the more pressing need to reduce the deficit.

Wednesday, the battle lines sharpened. "This report is a reflection of the gross mismanagement of our nation's finances," said Rep. Tom Price (R., Ga.). "It should make every American think twice about the latest calls by the president to increase spending at a time when Washington can clearly not afford to pay its bills."

More at the link.

RELATED: At Fox News, "CBO Director: Trillion-Dollar Deficits Risk 'Fiscal Crisis' in U.S." Posted by Donald Douglas

So Much for Those Obama Promises to the LEFT … Obama Officials Step Back from 2011 Afghanistan Exit Date

RUT-ROH … there will be hell to pay for Obama in Liberal Moonbat Land on this one …
It was one of Barack Obama’s campaign promises to the LEFT, that the US would be out of Afghanistan by July 2011. However, much like the many other promises like the closing of GITMO, Cap & Tax, et all … Obama appears to be back tracking. Obama officials are now publicly abandoning the July 2011 deadlines for the withdrawal from the war in Afghanistan.

Hey LEFT, Who’s your Obamamessiah now?

The Obama administration has decided to begin publicly walking away from what it once touted as key deadlines in the war in Afghanistan in an effort to de-emphasize President Barack Obama’s pledge that he’d begin withdrawing U.S. forces in July 2011, administration and military officials have told McClatchy.

The new policy will be on display next week during a conference of NATO countries in Lisbon, Portugal, where the administration hopes to introduce a timeline that calls for the withdrawal of U.S. and NATO forces from Afghanistan by 2014, the year when Afghan President Hamid Karzaionce said Afghan troops could provide their own security, three senior officials told McClatchy, along with others speaking anonymously as a matter of policy.

 Oh how the LEFT is going to howl on this one as “The One” flip-flops on the withdrawal from Afghanistan. Obama had been told by many critics not to put a time line on the withdrawal; however, it fell upon his deaf ears. Now it not only looks like bad policy, Obama looks foolish in having to go back on his campaign promise. As Right Wing News aptly states, what did the LEFT think was going to occur, all of Obama’s promises  come with an expiration date.

What a year ago had been touted as an extensive December review of the strategy now also will be less expansive and will offer no major changes in strategy, the officials told McClatchy. So far, the U.S. Central Command, the military division that oversees Afghanistan operations, hasn’t submitted any kind of withdrawal order for forces for the July deadline, two of those officials told McClatchy.

The shift already has begun privately and came in part because U.S. officials realized that conditions in Afghanistan were unlikely to allow a speedy withdrawal.

“During our assessments, we looked at if we continue to move forward at this pace, how long before we can fully transition to the Afghans? And we found that we cannot fully transition to the Afghans by July 2011,” said one senior administration official. “So we felt we couldn’t focus on July 2011 but the period it will take to make the full transition.”

Wait for the liberal backlash on this one from the LEFT. can you say a Howard Dean challenge in the 2012 Democrat Presidental primary against Obama.