Gibbs Scoffs at Loven's Criticism, Obama's $100 Million Budget Cutback Is A Lot Where I Come From

The AP's Jennifer Loven, usually liberally biased, actually asked a tough question to Obama press secretary, Robert Gibbs. She asked why is the amount of cuts Obama is proposing, $100 million, so small in comparison to the $3.5 trillion federal budget. Gibbs couldn't hold his amusement in while giving a ludicrous response. Although, to give Gibbs a little understanding, what else could he say:

GIBBS:  (Smiling) Well, I think only in Washington, D.C. is a hundred million dollars...

LOVEN:  The deficit's very large.  It's not a joke.

GIBBS:  No, I'm...

LOVEN:  The deficit's giant.  $100 million really is only a step.

GIBBS:  But no joke.

LOVEN:  You sound like you're joking about it, but it's not funny.

GIBBS:  I'm not making jokes about it.  I'm being completely sincere that only in Washington, D.C. is $100 million not a lot of money.  It is where I'm from.  It is where I grew up.  And I think it is for hundreds of millions of Americans.

It's quite a bit of money to me, too. However, we aren't talking about $100 million in Gibbs' hometown or mine. We are talking about Washington DC. They work on trillion dollar budgets. We work on thousand dollar budgets. There is a huge difference in between anytown, USA and DC. Can't Gibbs see that, or is he just trying to blow smoke?

Jack Tapper asked Gibbs a follow-up question. He basically asked how can $100 million be a lot and $8 billion small? What was Gibbs' response this time?

His answer was that it is a step in the right direction, and cutting $100 million here and $100 million there will add up to cancel out the $1.3 trillion deficit. By my calculations, it take about 1,300 of those small steps to cancel out the budget deficit.

The timetable that Obama gave the various departments to take this "step" was 90 days. If he continues on this timetable of cutting $100 million every 90 days, it would take Obama about 325 years to wipe out the deficit. Last time I checked, he only has 4 years, or 8 at most, to cut the budget deficit in half as he promised. At this pace, even cutting it in half will take well over 100 years. He doesn't have that long. He has to come up with a bigger number as Jennifer Loven suggested.