During his interview with "Meet the Press"’s Tim Russert, Bush said:

If you look at the appropriations bills that were passed under my watch, in the last year of President Clinton, discretionary spending was up 15 percent, and ours have steadily declined.

There are a couple of lies here. First of all, in the last year of President Clinton, discretionary spending was up about three percent, not 15%.

And "ours have steadily declined" is an even big whopper. Not only has discretionary spending NOT decreased under Bush, but it has increased far worse than Clinton’s. Discretionary spending is up 31% under George Bush (thanks largely to military increases).

But you can see the numbers yourself, from the White House (Excel-formatted spreadsheet). Just scroll down to Line 37. (And hurry before the WH takes it down!)

This isn’t "spin". This isn’t "making a case". This is an outright lie.

Hat tip to Slate’s Timothy Noah for catching this when few others had.