Austerity Hysteria Redux

Digby reviews the austerity hysteria in this weekend's WaPo.  The Villagehas the deficit as the Beltway's number one priority right now (emphasis mine):

If Congress doesn't provide additional stimulus spending, economists inside and outside the administration warn that the nation risks a prolonged period of high unemployment or, more frightening, a descent back into recession. But a competing threat -- the exploding federal budget deficit -- seems to be resonating more powerfully in Congress and among voters.

Whether or not Obama's directive to spend more now and tackle the deficit later -- which he laid out in a letter to Congressional leaders Saturday -- is the right economic medicine, some lawmakers say it sounds like political doublespeak outside the Beltway. Polls show most people don't think Obama's first stimulus package worked, and they are sending mixed signals about whether Washington should spend more on jobs or start minding the national debt. 

This is a flat-out lie.

The only recent poll that gives the slightest hint of support for the Post's thesis is the USA Today / Gallup poll from late May (not even their newest). Participants were asked "How serious a threat to the future well-being of the United States do you consider each of the following." For "federal government debt", 40% said extremely serious, 39% very serious, and 15% somewhat serious. For "unemployment", 33% said extremely serious, 50% said very serious, and 15% said somewhat serious. If you use only the "extremely serious" numbers, you get 7% more for the debt. Greg Marx at CJR makes the case that this poll, nevermind its headline, should not be read as some sort of overwhelming evidence of a shifted public view.

And in fact a newer Gallup poll, from a week ago, asking "What do you think is the most important problem facing the country today?" finds the economy and jobs on top. "Economy in general" gets 28%, "Unemployment/Jobs" gets 21%, and "Federal budget deficit" gets 7%.

Wisely, Digby makes the connection between the deficit as Public Enemy #1 and the run up to the war in Iraq where Saddam Hussein was the foe that had to be stopped.

I think we've developed another reason why the press runs with this sort of thing. It's the Very Serious People syndrome, in which the media are reluctant to challenge the "experts" who insist that we believe them or believe our lying eyes. I don't know if it's because they are afraid of losing access or if they are just lazy and choose to rely on these people for their analysis rather than challenge the prevailing CW. Either way, it's happening again and the consequences are just as dire. And it's journalistic malpractice.

She's right, but that's only part of it.  Poor people don't own newspaper empires.  Rich people who don't want to pay more taxes and want to see massive social spending cuts so that there will be more tax cuts for businesses and the wealthy do.

We're seeing it again.  Call it the "run up to the spending war" if you want to.  But it's coming.  And the Neo-Hooverites are about to throw this economy into a dead depression.