The Public Ain't Buying

But here he is, in a video clip from an otherwise embargoed interview with Brett Baier of Fox News: "Cutting taxes made a significant difference, not only in dealing with the recession and the attack in our country, but it made a significant difference in dealing with the deficit because a growing economy yielded more tax revenues, which allowed us to shrink the deficit."

The idea that his tax cuts helped shrink the deficit, however, is bunk.

Yes, the economy has grown and tax receipts have risen. But there is near unanimity among economists that the Bush tax cuts played a small role in that process and came at a huge net cost to the Treasury.

Tax cuts cause deficits, they don't reduce them.

You may recall that Bush inherited a surplus, then quickly turned it into a deficit. As the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities explains: "Congressional Budget Office data show that the tax cuts have been the single largest contributor to the reemergence of substantial budget deficits in recent years. Legislation enacted since 2001 has added about $2.3 trillion to deficits between 2001 and 2006, with half of this deterioration in the budget due to the tax cuts."

And as Lori Montgomery wrote in The Washington Post in October 2006, even the Bush administration's own economists don't claim the tax cuts paid for themselves -- never mind led to increased revenue.

"Robert Carroll, deputy assistant Treasury secretary for tax analysis, said neither the president nor anyone else in the administration is claiming that tax cuts alone produced the unexpected surge in revenue. 'As a matter of principle, we do not think tax cuts pay for themselves,' Carroll said."

Greenspan responded to Bush's comments on Fox News, saying: "My problem with the president is that he did not use the veto sufficiently." He added: "I think we've lost our way. I think Bill Clinton was the best Republican president we've had in a while."

The Washington Post has a partial transcript of Bush's comment and Greenspan's response.

In a Wall Street Journal op-ed this morning, Cheney also fires back at Greenspan's assertion that the Bush/Cheney economic and budget policies have been fiscally irresponsible.

"[H]is assessment is off the mark," Cheney writes. "The combined effects of recession and national emergency could have been devastating for America's economy. Yet President Bush's tax cuts -- following through on a promise he had made to the voters -- resulted in a shallower recession, a faster recovery, and a platform for growth that remains sturdy to this day."

Wiretapping Watch

Peter Spiegel writes in the Los Angeles Times: "The fight over the Bush administration's warrantless wiretapping program began anew Tuesday as the nation's top spy urged Congress to make permanent the law that gives intelligence agencies more latitude to monitor overseas phone calls and e-mails."

Legislation passed in a mad rush before the August recess (with Democrats cowering at the prospect of being blamed if there was a terrorist attack while they were on vacation) temporarily gutted the nation's wiretapping laws. (See my Aug. 7 column.)

Director of National Intelligence J. Michael McConnell argued on Tuesday that the expanded surveillance powers granted under the temporary measure should be made permanent.

He also made some news. James Risen writes in the New York Times: "The National Security Agency has not conducted wiretapping without warrants on the telephones of any Americans since at least February, the nation's top intelligence officer told Congress on Tuesday.

"Mike McConnell, the director of national intelligence, told the House Judiciary Committee that since he took office that month, the government has conducted electronic surveillance only after seeking court-approved warrants.

"In January, the Bush administration announced that it had agreed to allow a secret intelligence court to oversee the N.S.A.'s eavesdropping program, and that it would comply with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the 30-year-old law that regulates the government's domestic spying activities. The administration's decision appeared to end the basis for the warrantless wiretapping program secretly begun by President Bush just after the Sept. 11 attacks.

"Mr. McConnell's testimony Tuesday was the first time he has publicly said that the warrantless wiretapping of Americans has actually been ended."

Glenn Greenwald picks up on one line of the Times story, in which Risen writes that "Democratic Congressional aides say they believe that a deal is likely" to provide retroactive legal immunity to the telecommunications companies that secretly cooperated with the N.S.A.

Writes Greenwald: "Granting retroactive immunity to telecom companies for past lawbreaking is so plainly unjustifiable, even dangerous, that it ought to require no real debate. That Congressional Democrats are even considering submitting to this demand, let alone that they are likely to do so, dispels any doubt about what they really are."

No Threat

Thomas Ferraro writes for Reuters: "The head of the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday publicly renewed his call for long-sought White House documents but did not threaten to delay President George W. Bush's attorney general nominee to force cooperation.

"Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy said information about the administration's domestic spying program and firing of federal prosecutors would help prepare for confirmation hearings for Michael Mukasey, whom Bush nominated on Monday to replace Alberto Gonzales as chief U.S. law enforcement officer."

Erin P. Billings and John Stanton write in Roll Call (subscription required): "Senate Majority Whip Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) acknowledged that Democrats were unlikely to hold up hearings over the document issue. 'I don't think it's a deal-breaker for us to start [hearings], but if it's going to proceed quickly . . . we're going to need cooperation,' Durbin said."

Philip Shenon writes in the New York Times: "Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, said Mr. Mukasey, a retired federal judge, promised in a meeting with him on Tuesday that the rules would bar virtually all political appointees, including United States attorneys, from discussing specific cases with lawmakers.

"The rules would be intended to prevent the contacts that were perceived to be involved last year in the dismissals of several United States attorneys. The resulting furor focused intense scrutiny on Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales.

"'Mukasey said he wanted to depoliticize the department,' Mr. Schumer said in an interview. 'He said he would promulgate a rule that if any political official called about a specific case in the Justice Department, they would have to refer it to one or two high-up officials in Washington. Anybody who would not follow the rule would be fired.'"

D.C. Voting Rights Watch

Mary Beth Sheridan writes in The Washington Post: "Republican lawmakers yesterday blocked the Senate from taking up the D.C. vote bill, a potentially fatal setback for the District's most promising effort in years to get a full member of Congress."

Just before the vote, the White House issued a statement reiterating that Bush's "senior advisors would recommend that he veto the bill" if it came to his desk.

The Washington Post editorial board writes: "A few Republicans showed enough gumption to vote for principle and against party interest. Most Republicans, led by their leaders and egged on by President Bush -- who talks about democracy from Burma to Zimbabwe but not for his own neighbors -- did the reverse."

Amigos Watch

Manuel Roig-Franzia writes in The Washington Post: "President Bush and Vicente Fox once portrayed themselves as diplomatic allies and close friends, but the former Mexican president takes some jabs at Bush in a new autobiography, calling him 'the cockiest guy I have ever met in my life' and a 'windshield cowboy' afraid to ride a powerful horse."

Maher's View

Comedian Bill Maher talking to CNN's Wolf Blitzer yesterday: "What can you do with a situation where there's one man who stubbornly has the power and will not relinquish it?

"And he's such a liar, you know?

"I think that -- if he would just be straight with the American people instead of saying things like the people who are attacking us in Iraq are the same people who attacked us on 9/11 -- what a blatant lie. Or every day, every month since January, we've killed over 1, 500 terrorists and other extremists.

"Who is a terrorist? Who are extremists? Who are the enemy? What do these terms mean? Would they even be the enemy if we weren't in their country?"

Live Online

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Cartoon Watch

Tom Toles on Cheney's latest idea; Ann Telnaes on paper tigers; Stuart Carlson on Greenspan's critique.