AP Blows The Deficit Reporting, Part II: The Invisible April Receipts Dive

In Part I of my coverage of Martin Crutsinger's Associated Press report about Uncle Sam's Monthly Treasury Statement and the Obama administration's deficit projections, I noted that the government "miraculously" shrunk the deficit through March, the first six months of its fiscal year, by $175 billion, by employing an "accounting change."

Even though this "accounting change," which does not report TARP disbursements as outlays because they are considered "investments," violates fundamental cash-flow reporting principles, Crutsinger gave the change an unskeptical treatment. He also failed to tell readers whether the administration used the old or new method in calculating its latest full-year deficit projection of $1.84 trillion.

If Team Obama used the new method to determine it, the deficit under the old and more correct method will more than likely be over $2 trillion.

Crutsinger also failed to report the steep dive in federal receipts that took place in April, which is the government's highest month for collections, compared to last year's all-time record April haul, which I referred to as the "Supply-Side Stunner," and which Crutsinger and others also failed to report when it occurred last year.

Here is how April 2009 collections compared to April of 2008...

[Anyone who thinks Obama's tax and spend policies are working isn't looking past them to businesses' interpretation of his plans: they're bailing.]

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