Yeah, what else is new. If the United States is the victim of a nuclear attack, it will have a very bad deficit problem and a big program like Social Security will be an especially large burden. That is the nature of Fred Hiatt's deficit whining in the Washington Post today. Actually, Hiatt isn't even clear on what he is talking about, telling readers that: "it is Obama's long-term budget that would more than double the projected deficit over the next 10 years, to $9 trillion." Yes, he meant "debt," not "deficit," but hey, you get the point. As everyone should know by now, if we fix our health care system, then we will have no serious deficit problem. In fact, if the Washington Post and other elite types were not such protectionists, we would take advantage of the more efficient health care systems in other countries to radically reduce our costs to international levels. But, the Post's editors have friends and relatives who are doctors and insurance company executives, which is not the case with auto workers, whose wages they are anxious to drive down through trade.
--Dean Baker
