De Rugy, de Rugy, de Rugy's on Fire!
Reason's econ columnist is all over the joint today, starting with a piece in the Washington Examiner entitled "To deal with debt, we have to stop lying about it." Sample:
The following criteria should provide some guidance to the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform in assessing the quality of the solutions it puts forward.
These criteria are simple: 1. Do the recommendations really cut spending rather than focus on cutting the deficit? 2. Do the recommendations allow for political carve-outs? 3. Do the recommendations fix the budget gimmicks?
These criteria address the three major issues that put us in our current state of fiscal irresponsibility. We have overspent; we have made excuses for our overspending; and we have lied about our overspending.
She also has a new piece up at The American, about what happens "When Debt Flies Off the Charts." Starts like this:
At a time when Paul Krugman and other Keynesians are arguing against austerity measures and in favor of more stimulus money, it is worth asking how bad the country's financial situation is. The answer, unfortunately, is: really bad.
De Rugy also took time out of her morning to throw cold water on a Barack Obama Recovery Summer ribbon-cutting over at National Review, and also sit for an interview about stimulus jobs on C-SPAN's Washington Journal, which you can watch below at the link.
Read de Rugy's Reason archive here.