Factcheck is not about facts.

One of my most viewed posts is the one about how Clinton did NOT balance the budget. Factcheck.org calls me a liar, and says that he did. They say:

there was a surplus of $1.9 billion in fiscal 1999 and $86.4 billion in fiscal 2000. So any way you count it, the federal budget was balanced and the deficit was erased, if only for a while.

Well, according to the Treasury Department, if you exclude Social Security, the National Debt on Oct 1, 1998 was $5,540,570,493,226.32 ($5.540 trillion), and the Debt on Sept 30, 1999 was $5,656,270,901,633.43 ($5.656 trillion). Any way you look at it, that is a deficit of $115 billion for FY 1999.

The debt at the end of FY 2000 was $5,674,178,209,886.86 ($5.674 trillion), which gives a deficit of $18 billion. In all, the US Debt increased by $1.3 trillion under Clinton, or 130% of what it was when he assumed office eight years before.

Now I realize that the $4.9 trillion spent during the Bush administration (185% increase over 8 years) and the $2.1 trillion (129%) increase of the Obama administration in his first 26 months makes an $18 billion deficit seem small, but the point is that the Clinton administration did NOT balance the budget, did NOT show a surplus, and I will not trust a word that comes from the so-called factcheck.org.

As for the CBO, I have this to say: Only a Government agency can look at an increasing debt and conclude that they are running a surplus.