Defending President Obama’s small business agenda on MSNBC this afternoon, White House economic advisor Austan Goolsbee said the President is “completely in agreement to help small business grow… It’s why he’s called for setting the capital gains rate to zero for small business.”

This is the sort of slight of hand that President Obama’s budget outline is rife with. Yes, the budget does propose eliminating capital gains taxes for small businesses – but not until 2014, after the President’s first term in office is completed. (See page 122 of the budget here.)

For something that he is not actually proposing during his first term in office, President Obama’s gotten a lot of mileage out of promising to eliminate capital gains on small businesses. It was one of his top priorities of his campaign and transition team’s economic agenda, and his advisors continue to point to it in the media. But judging by his actual budget, the President thinks it’s a better talking point than policy.

Tags: economics, Goolsbee, obama, talking points, tax cuts