(Hat tip to RNC Research [link]). At this morning’s Dem debate in New York, candidate Edwards cited a Washpost piece: Kerry’s Spending, Tax Plans Fall Short - Review of Proposals Shows Expenditures Exceeding Savings by $165 Billion.

The relevant lines from the transcript of this morning’s debate:

Edwards: … These are great arguments about what he intends to do going forward. But it’s similar, for example, Senator Kerry has consistently said that he can pay for all the things that he’s proposing and substantially reduce the deficit, I think I’ve heard him say cut it in half, in his first term.

Well, The Washington Post today just analyzed his proposals, and its the same old thing. Here we go again. In fact, in fact, he overspends, in terms of being able to pay for all of his proposals, he overspends by $165 billion in his first term, which means he would drive us deeper and deeper into deficit.

[Dennis then talks but is ignored.]

KERRY: And John has just made some very important statements, and I want to respond to them.

I think John would have learned by now not to believe everything he reads in a newspaper. And he should do his homework, because the fact is that what’s printed in The Washington Post today is inaccurate.

A stimulus is by definition something that you do outside of the budget for one year or two years. The Washington Post included the stimulus when they figured the numbers. The stimulus is what you do to kick the economy into gear so that you can reduce the deficit.

Secondly, they did not include the reduction of the $139 billion of the Medicare bill which I have said I am sending back to Congress because it’s a bad bill. I voted against it, it’s bad.
Now, when you add up my stimulus that’s outside of the budget and the Medicare numbers that they didn’t even include, you do not go over, I do not spend more…

ELIZABETH BUMILLER OF THE NEW YORK TIMES: Senator Kerry, let me…

KERRY: No, no, I insist on being able to finish.

BUMILLER: I want to ask a really important question.

KERRY: This is important.

The point is, Kerry said that the Washpost piece linked above was fiction. Here’s a paragraph from that article:

But a review of his campaign proposals shows that the Democratic front-runner is promising to spend at least $165 billion more on new programs during his first term in office than he could save with his tax plan, a mix of breaks for the middle class and increases for corporations and the most affluent. The $165 billion figure does not include the cost of several proposals Kerry has not fully detailed or backed with estimates.

To borrow a term used by Steven Taylor at PoliBlog, Kerry is toast. He resembles toast, as well.