Greenspan takes the heat for budget deficits because * made the tax cuts??

[NVMojo]

What exactly is going on here?? Bush can't be responsible for screwing up our federal budget and turning into monsterous deficits for his rich pals and their tax breaks??? He wanted to give them those tax cuts and bad!!!

Second thoughts
Fed chief acknowledges 2001 tax cuts encouraged deficit


Washington -- Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said Thursday that his support for tax cuts in early 2001 unintentionally encouraged policies that helped swing the federal budget from surplus to record deficits.

In addition, he explicitly said for the first time that he expects tax increases to be part of any bipartisan agreement on deficit reduction.

But Greenspan, responding to questions during a Senate Budget Committee hearing Thursday, said it was unfair for critics to ignore the warnings in his January 2001 congressional testimony that the surplus forecasts might be wrong and his recommendation of some trigger mechanism that would limit tax cuts if certain budget targets were not met.

Greenspan called it frankly unfair for critics to blame him for the fact that Congress chose to "read half my testimony and discard the rest," venting his frustration on the issue publicly for the first time, in response to a question from Sen. Paul Sarbanes, D-Md.

Sarbanes took the Fed chief to task, arguing that Greenspan is well aware of how Congress works and should have known lawmakers might not heed all his cautions.

Sarbanes said he believes it was fair for lawmakers to see Greenspan's 2001 remarks "as a green light to the tax cuts," which were enacted without any triggers.

"I plead guilty to that," Greenspan said. "I did not intend it that way."

Greenspan reminded Sarbanes that both parties were proposing tax cuts at the time, when government economists forecast budget surpluses "as far as the eye can see."

In May 2001, Congress passed a reduced form of President Bush's proposal, a tax cut worth $1.35 trillion over 10 years.

The exchange between the two men came at a hearing Thursday on how to rein in the budget deficit, which reached $412 billion last year and is projected to expand substantially in coming decades, particularly if changes are not made to the Social Security and Medicare programs.

more...

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2005/04/22/BUGO2CD4SC1.DTL&type=printable

[alcuno]

1. "unintentionally?" Oh please.

Greenspan is always playing this on the one hand/on the other hand game so that everyone hears what they want to hear.