Informed Comment Homepage

Thoughts on the Middle East, History and Religion

Header Right

  • Featured
  • US politics
  • Middle East
  • Environment
  • US Foreign Policy
  • Energy
  • Economy
  • Politics
  • About
  • Archives
  • Submissions

© 2025 Informed Comment

  • Skip to content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
Uncategorized

Paul Ryan was for Big Deficits before he was against them (graphic)

Juan Cole 08/12/2012

Tweet
Share
Reddit
Email

Paul Ryan blames President Obama for the government’s budget deficits, and singles out the stimulus program as the culprit. But stimulus was one-time expenditures, not ongoing annual ones, and so over time will contribute little to the deficit. What does drive up the deficit annually is a series of Bush-era measures, including the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars, tax cuts and unfunded medicaid prescription drug benefits, and the economic collapse that derived in some large part from extensive deregulation of the banking and financial sectors.

Paul Ryan voted for every single one of the government measures that created the current deficits, and he opposes the obvious measures that would bring them down. He was opposed to the US withdrawal from Iraq. He opposes letting the Bush tax cuts on the super-wealthy expire. He opposes re-regulating the banks.

Ryan wants to blame those deficits on President Obama, who was not even in the federal Senate when Ryan voted to spend a trillion dollars on an illegal and unjustified war on Iraq.

Filed Under: Uncategorized

About the Author

Juan Cole is the founder and chief editor of Informed Comment. He is Richard P. Mitchell Professor of History at the University of Michigan He is author of, among many other books, Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires and The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Follow him on Twitter at @jricole or the Informed Comment Facebook Page

Primary Sidebar

Support Independent Journalism

Click here to donate via PayPal.

Personal checks should be made out to Juan Cole and sent to me at:

Juan Cole
P. O. Box 4218,
Ann Arbor, MI 48104-2548
USA
(Remember, make the checks out to “Juan Cole” or they can’t be cashed)

STAY INFORMED

Join our newsletter to have sharp analysis delivered to your inbox every day.
Warning! Social media will not reliably deliver Informed Comment to you. They are shadowbanning news sites, especially if "controversial."
To see new IC posts, please sign up for our email Newsletter.

Social Media

Bluesky | Instagram

Popular

  • America's worsening Solar Gap with China, which installs 100 Panels per Second
  • Siamese Criminals: Trump and Netanyahu
  • Early Farming in Middle East, Sometimes Matriarchal, Spread through Learning, not Conquest
  • Misreading and Misrepresenting Iran
  • The Day Evin Prison Burned: Why Israel's Attack Crossed a Moral Line

Gaza Yet Stands


Juan Cole's New Ebook at Amazon. Click Here to Buy
__________________________

Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires



Click here to Buy Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires.

The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam


Click here to Buy The Rubaiyat.
Sign up for our newsletter

Informed Comment © 2025 All Rights Reserved