As my colleague Jim Horney and I have explained, the causes of today’s large deficits lie largely outside the Administration’s control. Two weeks before President Obama took office, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projected that the 2009 deficit would exceed $1 trillion. CBO also warned that if we continued the policies the Obama Administration inherited, including the Bush tax cuts and funding for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, deficits would average over $1 trillion a year in 2010-2019.As the chart shows, the recession and the federal government’s responses to it under President Bush (e.g., the financial rescues) and President Obama (e.g., the Recovery Act) have certainly boosted deficits. But those factors are temporary and will fade in importance. URL:  www.offthechartsblog.org