FOR
IMMEDIATE RELEASE |
|
CONTACT:
MURFY ALEXANDER |
SEPTEMBER 20, 2006 |
ANNE SMART |
|
615.736.5295 |
COOPER JOINS CONRAD IN DISCUSSION OF
NEW, MORE ACCURATE BUDGET DEFICIT MEASURES
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Rep. Jim Cooper (TN-5-D) joined Sen. Kent Conrad (ND-D), the ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, in a press conference today to discuss new, more accurate, measures of the federal budget deficit.
- The 2005 deficit is at least two times, and probably ten times, larger than the Bush Administration will admit. Instead of being $318 billion, the real deficit was $760 billion (if you count veterans and civil service benefits) or $3.3 trillion (if you also count Social Security and Medicare obligations).
- This means that, if you include Social Security and Medicare, the deficit for 2005 was larger than the entire federal budget.
- The Bush Administration and many major media outlets have suppressed this information although it was produced by the Bush Administration itself in the annual Financial Report of the United States, issued by the Treasury Department.
- These new deficit numbers are produced using the accounting that all large U.S. businesses are required by federal law to use: accrual accounting. The U.S. Government may be the last large entity in America to still use cash accounting. Only accrual accounting can handle credit cards and other future obligations.
WARNING: Cash accounting is a controlled substance. Highly addictive pain medication and anti-depressant. May cause false sense of well-being and delusions. Do not operate heavy machinery after taking.
See Financial Report of the U.S., by the Dept. of Treasury
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Your share of the federal debt, as a working American, is already $375,000, and doubling every five years.
- America’s credit rating is literally being destroyed. Standard & Poor’s, the leading credit analyst, projects that U.S. Treasury bonds will lose their AAA rating by 2012, and will become junk bonds by 2025.
Cooper focused on the new book,
Financial Report of the United States: The Official White House Annual Report, published on August 15, 2006 by Nelson Current, a division of Thomas Nelson. Cooper wrote the Foreword to the book, which is a reprint of the 2005 official U.S. Treasury
Financial Report, issued on Dec. 15, 2005. The information in this press conference is detailed in his Foreword, and in columns that Cooper has written for the
Financial Times, Roll Call, and other publications. More information is available at Cooper’s website,
www.cooper.house.gov.
[For a printer-friendly version, click here]
[To read the full Financial Report of the United States, click here]
[Click here to read a letter from Former Secretary of the Treasury, John Snow]
