05-22-2009, 06:15 PM
![[Image: wapoobamabudget1.jpg]](http://blog.heritage.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/wapoobamabudget1.jpg)
Whatâs driving Obamaâs unprecedented massive deficits? Spending. Riedl details:
* President Bush expanded the federal budget by a historic $700 billion through 2008. President Obama would add another $1 trillion.
* President Bush began a string of expensive finan*cial bailouts. President Obama is accelerating that course.
* President Bush created a Medicare drug entitle*ment that will cost an estimated $800 billion in its first decade. President Obama has proposed a $634 billion down payment on a new govern*ment health care fund.
* President Bush increased federal education spending 58 percent faster than inflation. Presi*dent Obama would double it.
* President Bush became the first President to spend 3 percent of GDP on federal antipoverty programs. President Obama has already in*creased this spending by 20 percent.
* President Bush tilted the income tax burden more toward upper-income taxpayers. President Obama would continue that trend.
* President Bush presided over a $2.5 trillion increase in the public debt through 2008. Setting aside 2009 (for which Presidents Bush and Obama share responsibility for an additional $2.6 trillion in public debt), President Obamaâs budget would add $4.9 trillion in public debt from the beginning of 2010 through 2016.
