Unfortunately our new president has a bad habit of not telling the truth, especially in regards to numbers.

Thanks to Randall Hoven at The American Thinker blog, you, too, can learn the truth regarding exactly who the Washington big spenders really are. You shouldn’t be surprised.

Included:

Myth. Our national debt doubled in the last eight years.

Fact. Nope, no matter how you measure it. In fact, if adjusted for inflation, real economic growth and population growth, it didn’t budge at all.

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Myth. President Bush increased spending dramatically. Specifically, he spent more than President Clinton did, dramatically increasing our national debt.

Fact. Only if measured in nominal dollars. But by that measure, or even in inflation-adjusted dollars, Clinton spent more than Bush 41, who spent more than Reagan, who spent more than Carter, on down the line. Measured in a meaningful way, namely as a fraction of GDP, Bush spent less than the pre-Bush average, including that of President Clinton. Similarly, he kept national debt below the pre-Bush average.

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Myth. Republicans spent more on bailouts than Democrats. After all, Bush’s bailout, supported by John McCain, was $850B while Obama’s stimulus was only $787B.

Fact. It is true that 850 is more than 787. But when you get into who really asked for what amounts, and who voted for those amounts, the Democrats are responsible for 80% of all bailout spending – and the worst 80%.

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Myth. Bush spent irresponsibly huge amounts of money on his unnecessary war in Iraq and defense generally, crowding out non-defense spending.

Fact. No he didn’t. What he spent was nowhere near unprecedented, as a fraction of GDP. And he spent more on non-defense than Clinton did, even measured as a fraction of GDP.

Read the whole post; Hoven includes all kinds of numbers to back up his claims. What I particularly identified with is the opinion he expressed at the end of his piece. It is something I have tried to articulate for several years, though probably not as effectively as Hoven. He says (pay attention, those of you who consider me a partisan, here comes criticism of my own party):

Myth. When Republicans were in charge, they spent too much.

Opinion. Yes they did.

But why do I say that? I say that because I am a limited-government conservative. I waited 50 years for Republicans to be in charge so they could do what they always said they would do: cut taxes, cut spending, cut regulations. They cut taxes a little bit in their first year or two, and that was it. I didn’t want them to do the same thing that had been done the previous 50 years; I wanted them to cut, cut, cut.

Instead, Bush gave us prescription coverage under Medicare, No Child Left Behind, ethanol subsidies, massive transportation bills, etc. I’ve written of this previously (e.g., here and here).

But when all was said and done, spending levels remained about where they were for the previous 50 years (as a fraction of GDP). That is only upsetting to me because I thought Republicans would cut spending.

But if you are a Democrat, you should be pleased as punch. Your worst fears turned out to be unfounded. Here you had a Republican President and Republican majorities in both the House and the Senate and you still got more spending overall, especially on health and education.

Bush didn’t touch Social Security. He expanded Medicare and Clinton’s AmeriCorps. Grandma was not pushed into the street or forced onto dog food. That draft you said was coming right after the 2004 election if Bush won? It didn’t happen.

The only people who should be upset with the Republicans in office are the Republicans who voted for them. The rest of you got what you wanted, namely the same damn status quo that we’d had for the previous 50 years of Democratic-majority rule.

Lessons? Never forget how large a role the Congress plays in spending or cutting (yeah, right!). In retrospect, Clinton’s presidency looks good in some areas because the then-new Republican Congress forced him to do some good things (that worked, by the way). And, as I have said several times before, big government liberals should have loved Presidnent George W. Bush. He brought no threat of paring the government’s size. This leads to the last lesson: liberals consider no government too large, nor any rate of growth too rapid. So long as the populace has one uncommitted dollar, some politician somewhere will develop a plan to help you invest it for the betterment of society.

At least they have the best of intentions.