As usual, Paul Krugman gets it absolutely right. The Bush Administration wants to say the evaporation of the surplus is because of the war on terrorism. But: "The answer is that emotionally, morally, [the war on terrorism] is indeed a big deal; but fiscally it's very nearly a rounding error." The reason we have no surplus is because of last year's tax cut, which had no business being implemented in a time of plenty, and now that we know the real impact, has no business being implemented now.