Destined to be Disregarded and Consigned to the Dustbin The reviews have been swift and harsh. The FY09 budget proposal submitted yesterday by President Bush might serve better as wallpaper or fish wrapping than as a policy blueprint. The New York Times editorialized in Lame-Duck Budget thusly: President Bush's 2009 budget is a grim guided tour through his misplaced priorities, failed fiscal policies and the disastrous legacy that he will leave for the next president... accept[ing] the White House's optimistic accounting... would be foolish in the extreme.... The [tax policy] would be fiscally catastrophic... The budget bashing was not limited to those on the left. The ranking Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, Judd Gregg (NH), was as dismissive as anyone: "This budget must have been viewed by them more as an academic exercise than a serious exercise because it's not a serious budget" (Reuters, 2/4/08). "It's almost a pro forma exercise. I don't think they even worked very hard at it" (New York Times, 2/5/08). With its manifold deceptive economic assumptions, DOA entitlement-slashing proposals, the highest-ever post-WWII levels of Pentagon spending, and record-territory deficit projections, Bush's final budget stands as a sorry symbol of his fiscal fecklessness, destined to be disregarded and consigned to the dustbin. (click on image to enlarge)