Mitch Daniels, Fiscal Conservative And GOP Savior? Maybe Not.

Read Robert Parry's Mitch Daniels, Darling of "Fiscal Conservatives," Was Architect of the US Debt Crisis, at AlterNet (16 May 2011).

Mitch Daniels is billed as the "serious" GOP Presidential contender. Rarely mentioned is a key fact that should disqualify him from office: he was Bush's original budget director.

Daniels was in charge until he left in June of 2003, while Clinton's $236 billion surplus became a $400 billion defecit. During his time in office, he oversaw the catastrophic tax cuts for the wealthy, the unfunded drugs program for Medicare -- he had been an executive for drug giant Eli Lily -- and the invasion of Iraq.

In 2002, Daniels famously low-balled the war's cost at $50 billion to $60 billion and joined in the repudiation of Bush's economic adviser Lawrence Lindsey, who had ventured an estimate as high as $200 billion. Daniels called Lindsey's price tag "very, very high."

But it turned out that even Lindsey's estimate, which led to his firing later that year, was very, very low.

Brendan Nyhan at Salon reported in a Feb. 12, 2002, article,
that as OMB director, Daniels was not a budget expert, but rather "an operative chosen for his political skills, particularly his ability to sell the administration's economic proposals in the media."

"In August [2001], Daniels admitted as much, telling the Wall Street Journal that '[t]o the extent I bring anything ... to this job, maybe it's an ability to think about how a product, whether it's Prozac or a president's proposal, is marketed.' Predictably, he has displayed a disturbing tendency to make dishonest claims for political advantage on federal budget issues."

Furthermore, according to Nyhan, Daniels fudged his accounting to mask the administration's profligacy and made "deceptive claims, often without challenge."

"It is a matter of serious public concern that the federal budget director has become just another spinner dragging down public debate. Though he is a political appointee heading an executive agency, Daniels is also a public official with a larger responsibility to promote honesty in federal budget debates. Daniels may not recognize the difference from his previous job [as a pharmaceutical executive], but we must. It is unacceptable to market our nation's economic policies like Prozac."

Although he has not yet declared his candidacy for president, with the prominence of tea party nutjobs, most conservative pundits are enthusiastic about the possibility, and would welcome his "serious" or "adult" presence in the race. Little mention has been made of his economic depredations when he was in charge of the budget; that will change if and when he declares.