Back then, however, the inside-the-Beltway crowd was obsessed with deficit reduction. And it wasn’t just politicians. As Ezra Klein, now the editor of Vox, noted at the time, “the rules of reportorial neutrality don’t apply when it comes to the deficit. On this one issue, reporters are permitted to openly cheer a particular set of highly controversial policy solutions.” And those of us who argued that reducing the deficit shouldn’t be a high priority were treated like freaks.

But the deficit wasn’t a crisis then, and it isn’t one now. In fact, leading economists are now telling us that concerns about government debt have been greatly exaggerated all along. The Very Serious People were completely wrong, and those who opposed austerity have been vindicated.

Of course, while practically everyone in Washington was hyperventilating about debt circa 2012, the most apocalyptic warnings came from Republicans — people like Paul Ryan (remember him?), who declared then, “In this generation, a defining responsibility of government is to steer our nation clear of a debt crisis while there is still time.” His pose as the ultimate deficit hawk won him media adulation, which in turn propelled him into becoming speaker of the House.

The truth, however, is that right from the beginning it was obvious that Ryan was a phony. All you had to do was look at the actual content of his budget “plans.” But the media narrative demanded that there be serious, honest Republicans, so that blame for the deficit could be equally divided between the parties; so Ryan was slotted into that role even though he was totally unsuited for the part.

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And then, when he and his party got a chance to exercise the fiscal responsibility they declared essential, they blew up the deficit instead. Republicans only pretended to care about debt as an excuse to hobble President Barack Obama and slash social programs. They were and are complete hypocrites when it comes to budgeting (and other things too, like patriotism, but that’s another topic).