The Budget Panacea They Are Not

It was sort of funny.  I heard a sound-byte of Pelosi's speech in the House yesterday, when she said, "No new deficit spending!"  And a commentator said that Pelosi was playing up the famous George H.W. Bush line of, "No new taxes!"  Turns out, Pelosi's use of the word "new" in front of "deficit spending" was not an allusion but rather the most important word in the sentence.  Indeed, according to North Carolina representative Patrick "Give Me Death" McHenry, the Democrat promise of "pay-go" or "pay as you go" spending really is ONLY for new spending.  In other words, all entitlement program spending (medicare, social security, etc.) is not part of the "pay-go".  This means that the Dems might not be that helpful in addressing government deficits through their promise of pay-go spending, though they probably won't add to the heap of debt that their Republican predecessors piled up and handed to them like a bag of lead rocks.