The ability to detect and understand insincerity is another basic social deficit that can occur with disease.

WSJ: When Social Skills Are a Warning

This vision is less about reducing the deficit than it is about changing the basic social compact in America.

WHITEHOUSE: The Country We Believe In: Improving America��s Fiscal Future | The White House

This is because the basic analysis is that an increase in the budget deficit provides a fiscal boost to aggregate demand.

FORBES: Payroll Tax Reductions as Fiscal Stimulus

He should explain to the public the basic facts that all budget experts know: We do not have a chronic deficit problem.

CNN: Look beyond the fiscal cliff

Some folks in Washington also want to close the deficit by gutting our investments in things like clean energy or medical research or basic science.

WHITEHOUSE: Town Hall on America��s Fiscal Future

And they asked a basic question: What are the pros and cons of using a VAT to cut the deficit compared to an across-the-board hike in income tax rates.

FORBES: Deficit-Fix Cage Match: VAT Vs. Higher Income Tax Rates

We'll hear of the need for more outlays on infrastructure, education, green energy, basic research and other costly "investments" in the future, alongside contradictory promises to increase jobs and reduce the deficit.

FORBES: The 10,000 Commandments

But we're not going to reduce the deficit by gutting education investments, gutting investments that we make in our infrastructure, gutting our investments in basic science and research that can lead to discoveries in clean energy or lead to discoveries in curing cancer.

WHITEHOUSE: The White House