Once again, conservatives get what the poutragers missed

There's an interesting article at Investors.com titled The Austerity Myth: Federal Spending Up 5% This Year. Its basically boohooing data released by the Treasury Department on Friday saying that overall, there haven't been any reductions in federal spending this year.

Surprise...surprise!!!! Let's recap what happened.

First of all, the Republicans took the government hostage over the 2011 budget and threatened a shut-down if they didn't get their cuts. Problem was, they only focused on a number (how much they wanted cut) and didn't pay attention to the details. The result was that President Obama and the Democrats were able to get them to sign on to a deal that turned out to be smoke and mirrors...basically cutting $ that wasn't going to get spent anyway. And what looked to be $38 billion in cuts turned out to only be $352 million.

Then the Republicans decided on another hostage...the debt ceiling. They took the government to the brink of economic collapse and Speaker Boehner bragged that he got 98% of what he wanted. We've already talked about how that one is likely to come back to haunt them in 2012. But the overall reality is that any possible spending cuts were delayed until 2013.

Conservatives are starting to wake up to the fact that they've been outmaneuvered on all this. I wonder how long it will take the poutragers to notice.