CHICAGO - President Bush is anxious to avoid the fate of his father, who lost in 1992 because people thought he did too little to pull the nation out of a recession.

Never mind that the perception was wrong, that the recovery was already under way, and that the elder Mr. Bush's restraint was entirely sensible. If the economy is going to recover, the younger Mr. Bush wants the credit. If it's not, he wants everyone to know he did all he could.

It's hard to argue with the political logic of taking conspicuous action to revive the economy. The flaws all lie in the economic logic, which is largely absent.

The administration is working on a fiscal stimulus package - which is Washington-speak for trying to end a recession with a massive transfusion of red ink. By cutting taxes or boosting outlays, the theory holds, you put more money in people's pockets, they spend it and everyone gets rich, fat and happy.

There are two obvious problems with this approach. The first is that the American economy is not in a recession or even at a standstill. It's not burning up the track at the moment, but it did expand by a more-than-respectable 4 percent annualized rate in the third quarter of this year.

And though forecasters think the pace has slowed considerably in the fourth quarter, they also expect it to speed up next year. The Federal Reserve decided Dec. 10 to leave interest rates where they are, indicating Alan Greenspan's belief that the recovery is firmly on track.

The second problem is that even if the economy was in need of a quick boost, the administration's fiscal stimulus package won't provide it. Congress doesn't resume work until January, and getting a major bill hammered out, passed and signed into law can be expected to take weeks or months.

Even if the stimulus should be approved, getting the hay to the goats will require still more time. Many of the changes being considered by the president wouldn't kick in until the future - like moving the 2006 tax rate cuts up to 2004. New tax breaks for corporate investment might increase capital outlays, but not necessarily soon.

Nor would the current Democratic favorite, a six-month suspension of payroll taxes, be much more timely. Either way, the help would arrive long after the need for it has passed.

A stimulus package, whether it's the Republican or the Democratic version, probably won't do much to expand the economy, but it will do a lot to enlarge the federal budget deficit. Thanks to the economic downturn, the war on terrorism and the general collapse of spending restraint in Washington, the budget hole is getting deeper every day.

Two years ago, notes Robert Bixby of the Concord Coalition, which lobbies for fiscal restraint, the 2003 budget was forecast to run a surplus of $359 billion. The latest projection is for a deficit of $145 billion.

The plans being considered in Washington would accelerate the hemorrhaging. The estimated price tag of the administration plan, according to The Wall Street Journal, is from $250 billion to $300 billion over the next decade.

The Journal says the president's advisers hope to pay for some of it by reducing the cost of Medicare. That would be more believable if both parties weren't also planning to create an expensive new prescription drug benefit for the elderly. In reality, we'll pay for the fiscal stimulus the way we pay for a lot of things these days - by sending the bill to our kids.

This undertaking isn't the only potential drain on the budget. There is also the minor matter of financing an invasion of Iraq, which could cost $200 billion. The new Homeland Security Department is anticipated to cost more than the administration claims.

It may be, as fervent tax-cutters believe, that a swollen deficit won't hurt the economy. But bigger government is bound to be a burden. Lowering taxes while increasing spending doesn't reduce the weight of government on the economy; it merely masks it. Budgetary discipline encourages spending restraint by forcing us to pay for all the government we demand.

Fiscal stimulus is just an excuse for embracing the old Washington trick of pretending we can get something for nothing. In case you haven't heard, we can't.

Steve Chapman is a columnist for the Chicago Tribune, a Tribune Publishing newspaper. His column appears Tuesdays in The Sun.