Lyman: A packet of envelopes buy blast xl In addition, today’s budget politics are different from what they were in 2010, when Obama, prematurely as it turned out, pivoted from expansionary fiscal policies to deficit reduction. In 2010, he appointed the Bowles-Simpson Commission, which pressed in vain for a deficit-cutting formula but did influence public opinion in favor of budget cutting. In 2011, the president approved the Budget Control Act, and its deflationary spawn, the dreaded sequester.