pdq is right. The debt has grown every year. The only point that pdq was answering was the constantly made point that mistakenly gives Clinton credit for "balancing the budget" -- a term that, anywhere but in Washington, would mean that the government spent no more than it took in. That's just a flat-out political device created (one would assume) to purposely confuse the issue...

When it is to political advantage, any poliician who dares suggest that perhaps because $$ is tight, that we shouldn't grow at as fast a rate as projected, is accused of slashing the budget (...and killing our children, our poor, etc). In reality, in a "budget cut" more would be still be spent because more is always spent.

The only thing that a balanced budget meant (in Clintonian terms) was that they didn't get called for slashing the *arbitrary* budget. Had it been a Republican administration, rather than being praised for "balancing the budget", it would have been excoriatiated for "slashing the budget and killing people". Clinton, being a Democrat, was said to have "balanced the budget". But the "budget" was(is) nothing more than an arbitrarily set rate of government growth of spending.

"Thank you Don Firth...ok, ok...he was impeached for lying. But WHY wa his private life/sexual conduct anybody's buisness but theirs????"

It was about lying under oath. But if one were to concede that it was actually about sex, in retrospect, are you equally outraged at Anita Hill's (unsubstantiated) accusations against Clarence Thomas to try to keep him from being confirmed?