Today President Obama released his fiscal 2014 budget proposal, which set a record for arriving two months after the legal deadline of the first Monday in February. Here are the top five things to know about the new budget.

The State of the Union is usually a speech about a vision – not only for the twelve months ahead, but for years to come. This year is different.

Once again, NPP contributed facts about the budget, taxes, and federal spending to the Presidential Debate conversation happening on Twitter. Here are some of our most popular tweets.

NPP's research team live-tweeted and fact-checked the first debate of the 2012 Presidential Election. If you missed, here are our top 5 tweets.

This election season has put a lot of focus on Medicare, the federal health insurance program for the elderly. There’s been less emphasis on Medicaid, the health program for low-income Americans, though both President Obama and Governor Romney would dramatically change Medicaid. Currently Medicaid serves mainly children and those senior citizens who require long-term care.

A few weeks ago, with the announcement of Rep. Paul Ryan as Gov. Romney’s running mate, we wrote about how the two presidential candidates represent starkly different visions for this country in the years to come. One issue we didn’t cover in detail is the candidates’ projected budget deficits.

William from Denver, Colorado, asks: “Is there a way to show whether or not the private sector is actually ‘doing fine?’ In TV commercials I see that Mitt Romney is criticizing President Obama for saying that.” Great minds can disagree about what constitutes “fine,” so let’s look at a firm measure of private sector health – the most recent jobs report. It didn’t contain a lot of good news, though there was perhaps one bright spot.

President Obama released a budget in February, the House passed a very different budget in March, and the Senate has declined to do a budget. The seeds are planted for stalemate this election year. Why can't Congress just pass a budget without all this conflict?

I had an interesting discovery while combing through the numbers of the president's budget. I found that President Obama's spending priorities match pretty closely with the things Americans say they want. Of course the budget is complicated. But let’s say for a moment that it’s as simple as a public opinion polling question.