Due to the fact we were brought to a surplus the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) based existing tax and spending laws and future economic forecasts to predict a $5.6 trillion surplus in ten years.  So to be clear we never had a surplus of this much, this was the prediction if everything stayed on track.  The problem was the economic forecasts didn't meet expectations and challenges like 9/11, Katrina, and corporate meltdowns were not factored in.

     So how did we get to a deficit from a surplus and who is responsible?  When the country went into a recession just as Clinton was leaving about $2 trillion of the projected $5.6 trillion was cut back to adjust for different problems caused by it.  President Bush in order to jump start the economy cut taxes to the amount of $1.8 trillion.The rest of the projected surplus was broken down by the war on terrorism and the other issues mentioned above. 

     When Al Gore was running for President in 2000 his projects would have cost $4.3 trillion.  If one were to compare Congressional Democrat proposals versus Republican there is billions of dollars of overspending by Democrats.  Of course the problem is the Republicans were right there and are not blameless.  Right here and now we need to look at growth versus taxes.  Letting people keep their own money provides more revenue to the government than raising taxes (Obama).  A surplus is a good thing but projections of a surplus used by politicians as fact is not.