When a politician talks fiscal responsibility, he or she is probably lying.

Hate to insert a dose of reality into all the political rhetoric. But all that talk about cutting taxes and getting rid of deficits?

I need to call it what it is: Bullshit.

Here’s the truth, thanks to Dave Manuel.com. In the last 40 years, the federal budget has been in surplus four times--from 1998 through 2001. So keep that in mind every time you see an ad with some politician talking about how he or she plans to bring fiscal sanity to Washington.  The fact is, politicians just find it easier to borrow to spend on their favorite programs.  For Republicans, that would be tax cuts for the rich.  For the Democrats, name your favorite social project.  For neither party is an actual balanced budget much of a priority, as history shows us.

I suppose those of us who think we would be better off if the federal government lived within its means and paid for such things as wars through the taxes collected have one hope in this dispiriting period: The one time in the last 40 years when we managed a balanced budget, we had a Democratic president and a Republican Congress.