With the news today of an unprecedented $1.2 trillion budget deficit in 2009, leaders on Capitol Hill pointed -- for differing reasons -- to the economic recovery package that President-elect Obama will soon introduce. Republican leaders used the news as an example of why Congress must act responsibly with the sizable stimulus plan, while Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the package will help Obama right the Bush administration's wrongs.

"As Congress and President-elect Obama work together to help middle-class families and get our economy back on track, the deficit estimate makes it clearer than ever that we cannot borrow and spend our way back to prosperity when we're already running an annual deficit of more than one trillion dollars," said House Minority Leader John Boehner. "I was pleased to hear the President-elect say yesterday that we need to stop just talking about our national debt and actively confront it."

"Today's bleak Congressional Budget Office deficit projections reflect the devastating economic policies of the Bush Administration that rewarded a wealthy few while undermining economic opportunity for the majority of Americans," Pelosi said, getting a shot in at the outgoing president. "While we cannot reverse the economic and fiscal mismanagement of the Bush Administration overnight, Congress is already working with the incoming Obama Administration to create good paying jobs and put America back on a path to fiscal discipline and long-term economic prosperity."

"Though we agree that Congress must carefully pursue ways to strengthen our economy," Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said, "this report should cause us to make certain that any dollar spent to stimulate the economy will in fact achieve that outcome and produce jobs and opportunity."

The full CBO report can be found here (.pdf).