Kent Conrad: America’s Debt Problem Really Isn’t All That Bad

Senator Kent Conrad, the self-styled “deficit hawk” heard recently expressing a warning against (I kid you not) “premature deficit reduction” and suggesting that current deficit spending is “critically important for the economy,” is now also trying to that America’s current debt load really isn’t all that bad.
Because hey, we’re not as bad off as the Japanese yet!

(CNSNews.com) – Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) in reference to the latest economic forecast by the Congressional Budget Office [CBO] said “we can handle” the current level of debt.
According to the CBO’s most recent report on the budget and economic outlook for fiscal years 2010 to 2020 that was released yesterday, the U.S. public was $7.5 trillion in debt by the end of 2009, and that is expected to more than double to approximately $15 trillion by the end of 2020. …
During a press conference aimed at discussing the CBO budget and economic forecasts, Conrad indicated that although the current level of debt is close to unprecedented, it is manageable.
“Already the gross debt of the United States is reaching near historic levels,” explained Conrad. “We are not there yet.
“We can handle this level of debt. In fact, this is substantially a lower level of debt than Japan has today,” Conrad added. “Their debt is approaching 190 percent of GDP, but what is most troubling and our greatest concern is our long-term trajectory.”

One could almost feel sorry for Conrad. Usually his duplicity on spending and deficits is an easy sell for him. Especially when the opposition party is in power. When Bush was President, a small (by Obama standards) $200 billion deficit was enough to give Conrad the vapors. But now his party, and the President he supported early on in his party’s primary process, ran up $1.4 trillion in deficits last year and has budgeted for another $1.5 trillion in deficits in the coming year. And suddenly Conrad finds himself having to justify all of this spending in the short term while simultaneously maintaining the pretense of his deficit hawkishness by blasting long-term deficits.
Which leads to ridiculous statements like “premature deficit reduction” and “hey, at least we’re not as bad as Japan!”
Comment from the Whistler:
It’s ironic that he compares our debt to Japan because the source of the Japanese debt is stimulus plan after stimulus plan that failed to lift them out of their economic malaise while the rest of the world was booming.
Rather than helping their economy their stimulus (or jobs) plans made things worse.