The Obama team is crying deficit crocodile tears over the prospect of an extension of the Bush tax cuts to upper-income taxpayers, which it claims wouldn’t be fiscally prudent. (The more expensive extension for the “non-rich” is fine with the administration, however.) It’s laughable considering the utter lack of fiscal discipline by Obama and the Democratic Congress.

We learned from the CBO that “[s]pending rolled in for the year [2010] that ended September 30 at $3.45 trillion, second only to 2009’s $3.52 trillion in the record books.” Well, Obama blames the wars. Hardly. We know that “despite two wars, defense spending rose by 4.7% to $667 billion, down from an annual average increase of 8% from 2005 to 2009.”

What, then, are we spending gobs of money on?

Once again domestic accounts far and away led the increases. Medicaid rose by 8.7%, and unemployment benefits by an astonishing 34.3%—to $160 billion. The costs of jobless insurance have tripled in two years. CBO adds that if you take out the savings for deposit insurance, funding for all “other activities” of government—education, transportation, foreign aid, housing, and so on—rose by 13% in 2010.

As for the deficits, the 2010 total was $1.29 trillion, down slightly from $1.42 trillion. That’s a two-year total of $2.7 trillion, or more than the entire amount during the Reagan Administration, when deficits were supposed to be ruinous. Now liberal economists tell us that deficits are the key to restoring prosperity. But all we have to show for spending nearly 25% of GDP for two years running is a growth rate of 1.7% and 9.6% unemployment.

The Paul Krugman wing of the Democratic Party has convinced itself that we haven’t spent enough. But how much would suffice? The answer is always “more than we are now.” As the Wall Street Journal editors point out: “The 21.4% federal spending increase in two years ought to put to rest any debate about the nature of America’s fiscal problem. The Pelosi Congress has used the recession as an excuse to send spending to record heights, and its economic policies have contributed to a lousy recovery.”

It is an unconscionable record — and the reason, in large part, why its authors are going to take a drubbing in November.