In the CBO report cited immediately below, the baseline budget projections are not a forecast of future outcomes; rather, they are based on the assumption that current laws and policies remain the same. So the report's incomplete picture of the projected 2008 federal deficit is no fault of CBO's. Having said that: ...it is important to note that CBO's baseline projections actually understate the likely short-term deficit levels, because they exclude expected costs such as a stimulus package and additional war funding requested by President Bush. Once these costs are added in, the deficit in 2008 is likely to exceed $350 billion, and the debt is likely to increase by over $600 billion. -- Sen. Budget Cmte. Chair Kent Conrad (D-ND) And you might as well add the cost of patching the AMT without offsets again this year, estimated at $75 billion, for a total deficit of $425 billion. So, at the end of the day, CBO's $219 billion projected deficit is about half of what you can reasonably expect.