30 billion here, 30 billion there...

During the campaign, the Tories said no deficits; wouldn't be prudent. Now they insist that only hair-raisingly huge deficits are prudent. As, apparently, is leaking your budget so it won't terrify people on the day. It's as if "prudent" were a magic word that justifies anything you decide to do. Except they didn't really decide to do this. Spending rockets up in good times and bad and when revenue drops off big deficits gape and none of it is the result of financial or political calculation. It's structural features of the budget the politicians neither control nor understand so they babble gravely in an attempt to look relevant. Happy budget day.