Don Boudreaux links to an austerity denier article, which ham handedly lumps the eurozone together. Forgets us peasants can use the eurostat page too.

vdirequest · 2012-05-26T00:54:43.412049+00:00

Notice the weasel wording to get around the fact that spending had indeed gone down?

"Only by the merest of margins, the agency said, could it document any real, absolute reduction in spending. Indeed, Euro27 governments spent €6.2-trillion ($8-trillion) in 2010: 50.8 per cent of Europe’s GDP. Four years earlier, they had spent only 45.6 per cent. By this measure, European austerity has increased public spending by 12 per cent in four years."

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/commentary/neil-reynolds/what-austerity-europes-borrow-and-spend-train-rolls-on/article2440259/

Heres the eurostat. Select 'Total General Government Expenditures' from the drop down menu. Allows you to look at countries individually (because not of europe has austerity budgets, so why lump them together unless your intent is to mislead?)

http://appsso.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/nui/show.do?dataset=gov_a_main&lang=en

H/T Russ Roberts, who is also an austerity-denier but was dumb enough to include the link, probably thinking no one would look at it.

vdirequest · 2012-05-26T00:44:02.383205+00:00

"Russ Roberts, professor of economics at George Mason University, Roberts has been a harsh critic of the handling of the Obama Administration of the economic crisis and is the producer of a popular series of videos on YouTube http://www.youtube. com / user / EconStories using popular media formats to explain complex economic issues to the general public."

http://infopublico.com/economistas-de-renombre-participan-en-conferencia-economia-de-libre-mercado-de-israel-en-medio-de-tensiones-politicas-y-religiosas-en-el-instituto-de-estudios-de-mercado-en-jerusalen/224714/

ReneFonck · 2012-05-26T00:33:55.550009+00:00

Don't leave, I want you to stay and engage.

ReneFonck · 2012-05-26T00:29:35.216587+00:00

We also know that the last thing we can afford to do after we’ve started to make progress, as we’re starting to turn the corner, is a return to the policies — the very same policies — that got us into this mess in the first place,” Obama told an estimated 550 donors who packed the downtown ballroom. “Not now. Not with so much at stake. We have come too far to abandon the change that we fought for over these past years. And that’s the choice in this election. That’s the reason I’m running for a second term as President of the United States of America.”

http://coloradostatesman.com/content/993528-obama-tells-coloradans-%3Fwe%3Fre-not-going-back-we%3Fre-moving-forward%3F

If you're going to lie, you shouldn't tell such easily checked ones.