LARRY KUDLOW: This is the single biggest obstacle to growth

Joe Biden and the Democrats are simply incapable of telling the truth and, once again, we are seeing this as they are accusing Republicans in general and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in particular of wanting to cut Social Security, Medicare and the payment of interest on the federal debt.   

Now, here's Joe Biden yesterday on the budget and the economy. 

PRESIDENT BIDEN: We also want to talk about the extreme Republican economic plans. Apparently, they're generally serious about cutting Social Security, cutting Medicare, and I love their 30% sales tax. I have no intention of letting the Republicans wreck our economy, nor does anybody around this table, in my view.  

Now, here is some more Democratic blarney after a White House meeting this afternoon.  

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HAKEEM JEFFRIES: We believe in Social Security and Medicare. Extreme MAGA Republicans want to destroy Social Security and Medicare.

CHUCK SCHUMER: Do they want to cut Social Security? Do they want to cut Medicare? Do they want to cut veterans’ benefits? Do they want to cut police? Do they want to cut food for needy kids? What’s your plan? 

Now, here is exactly what Speaker Kevin McCarthy told me last night on this program. 

KUDLOW: They're saying you're going to cut Social Security, you're going to cut Medicare and you're going to default on the interest payments on the bonds.

MCCARTHY: None of that is true.

Could he be any clearer? The GOP has no intention of cutting the major entitlements, nor will they ever default on U.S. government debt. You know, the Democrats are playing the "big lie" game. It's an authoritarian approach where you keep repeating a lie over and over, hoping that people will somehow come to believe it's the truth. Communist dictators have used this tactic since time immemorial.   

One more point: Biden and Democrats keep insisting that Republicans are going to double up on a national sales tax. This is the so-called FairTax, which purports to end the income tax and rely solely on a consumption tax, which would be an add-on to state and local sales taxes.   

For many reasons, I've always thought this was not a good idea. Here's what Speaker McCarthy said about it last night.   

LARRY: The White House is yelling the FairTax will put us imposing another sales tax on middle-class people and that you you're in favor of that.

MCCARTHY: No. All he did was introduce a bill. For a bill to get to the floor, it would have to pass the committee.

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The basic point here is that Democrats will do anything, I mean anything, to avoid any spending cuts at all and they remain in complete denial that in Democratic Washington — they have the White House, Senate, and House — in the last two years they passed massive spending legislation which triggered the worst inflation in 40 years. 

Even though the Federal Reserve, acting without any help from Democratic fiscal policy, has brought the inflation rate down somewhat, consumer prices are rising at over 6%, grocery prices are still rising at 12% and food away from home over 8%.   

Democrats have increased spending and borrowing somewhere between $5 and 6 trillion dollars, as the total debt has jumped to over $31 trillion.   

Here's another factoid: Federal spending is now absorbing 24% of the economy, almost one-quarter, and federal, state and local government spending is now absorbing 44% of the national economy. If that isn't big government socialism, I don't know what is.   

Remember, these big spending programs carry with them a tremendous web of regulations, including, of course, the Democrats’ climate obsession, but also all of their woke infatuations with "diversity, equity and inclusion." That's always in the fine print. 

This is the central-planning, regulatory strangling of what used to be a merit-based, free enterprise-based economy, but no longer. I've talked about the decline in economic growth and prosperity over the last 20-plus years.   

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Our once envy-of-the-world economy, which for over 50 years after World War II grew at better than 3.5% annually, has stagnated to less than 2% and I will continue to argue that the single biggest obstacle to growth, the biggest prosperity killer we face, is the massive increase in the size and scope of government and the curtailment of free enterprise incentives.   

Here are these Democrats, with their systemically fraudulent misstatements, unwilling to acknowledge the problem and permit even the most modest of budget reforms to solve it. So, let me say again: Save America. Stop the spending.