If you’ve been following the debate over the House Republican budget proposed by Wisconsin congressman Paul Ryan, you have probably heard that it savagely cuts programs for the poor in order to fund tax cuts for the rich, that its numbers don’t add up, and that in the short run it expands the deficits. These claims, though asserted confidently, either depend on highly contestable assumptions or are demonstrably untrue.

◼ Paul Ryan vs. the Mythmakers - Ramesh Ponnuru/National Review Online

• David Frum writes in The Week that Ryan’s “debt reduction plan actually increases the debt over the medium term — by even more [than] President Obama’s budget would.”

The CBO’s actual projections for the Ryan plan show a debt level in 2021 that is $4.7 trillion lower than its projections for Obama’s budgets. Ryan’s plan is designed to rapidly stabilize federal debt as a share of the economy: That percentage peaks in year three and then starts falling. The CBO projections for Obama’s budgets just show the number rising higher and higher over the decade.... IMPORTANT POINTS Read the rest, there's lots more...