During tonight’s debate, Tim Pawlenty touted his economic plan that would explode the deficit and provide massive tax cuts to millionaires and billionaires.

REALITY: PAWLENTY'S TAX PLAN WOULD EXPLODE THE DEFICIT

Center For American Progress Budget Director: Pawlenty "Says That He Will Balance The Budget, And Cap Spending At 18 Percent Of GDP" but "His Tax Plan Leaves Him About $8.4 Trillion Short." [Center For American Progress's Michael Linden, Think Progress, 6/7/11]

Tax Policy Center: Pawlenty's Tax Plan Would Cost $11.6 Trillion Over The Next 10 Years. [Tax Policy Center, TPC Interpretation of Governor Tim Pawlenty's Tax Proposal Outline, Table T11-0166, 6/10/11]

Manhattan Institute’s Josh Barro: "Even If We Hit" Pawlenty's Spending Cap Of 18 Percent Of GDP, "Pawlenty’s Tax Plan Would Leave Us With An Unacceptably Large Structural Budget Gap." [Josh Barro, City Journal, 6/9/11]

Wall Street Journal: Pawlenty Must "Show That His Plan Would Not Explode A Deficit That Is Expected To Top $1.6 Trillion, Given That Cutting Rates So Steeply Could Prompt A Fall-Off In Tax Revenues." [Wall Street Journal, 6/7/11]

Star Tribune Editorial: "Pawlenty's Economic Policies Have Been Test-Driven In The Real World -- In Minnesota -- And The State Is Now Paying The Price" Which Is "An Ongoing Structural Deficit That Combined With An Economic Downturn To Culminate In The $5 Billion Deficit Crushing Minnesota Today." [Editorial, Star Tribune, 6/8/11]

REALITY: PAWLENTY'S TAX PLAN AMOUNTS TO A HUGE TAX CUT FOR MILLIONAIRES, COSTING BILLIONS

CBPP: "The Pawlenty Plan Would Give People In The Top One-Tenth Of 1 Percent On The Income Scale (i.e., People With Incomes Above $2.7 Million) An Average Annual Tax Cut Of $1.8 Million -- Which Is More Than Four Times What They Got Last Year From The Bush Tax Cuts." [Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, 6/15/11]

• Headline: "Pawlenty's High-End Tax Cuts Dwarf Even Those of President Bush." [Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, 6/15/11]

Bloomberg's Al Hunt: Pawlenty's Economic Plan: "Would Cut Taxes Just Dramatically For The Wealthiest Americans." [Bloomberg, 6/8/11 (video)]

Forbes’s Leonard Burman: Pawlenty’s Tax Plan Is "The Bush Tax Cuts On Steroids." [Leonard Burman, Forbes, 6/10/11]

Washington Post's Ruth Marcus: "Pawlenty Is Proposing Tax Cuts That Are The Equivalent Of Taking The Existing Bush Tax Cuts And Tripling Them Over The Next Decade" Which Is "The Very Definition Of Fiscal Insanity." [Ruth Marcus, Washington Post, 6/10/11]

REALITY: PAWLENTY'S ECONOMIC PLAN WOULD INCLUDE SPENDING CUTS THAT WERE CALLED "DRACONIAN" AND "MASSIVE"

Salon's Andrew Leonard: "If You Combine A Balanced Budget With Tax Cuts On The Scale That Pawlenty Dreams Of, You Inevitably End Up With Massive Cuts To Medicare, Medicaid And Social Security. There's Simply No Other Way To Make The Budget Math Work." [Andrew Leonard, Salon, 6/8/11]

Washington Post's Ruth Marcus: Pawlenty's Plan To Cut Spending Will "Make The Ryan Cuts Look Mild" Since He Would Cut Spending To 18 Percent Of GDP And Ryan’s Plan Cut It TO 20 Percent. [Ruth Marcus, Washington Post, 6/9/11]

National Journal: Pawlenty Economic Proposal Would "Imply Massive Spending Cuts." [National Journal, 6/7/11]

REALITY: PAWLENTY'S PLAN TO CUT ONE PERCENT FROM THE BUDGET EACH YEAR FOR SIX YEARS WAS "TOTALLY UNREALISTIC"

Washington Post Fact Checker: Pawlenty's Claim That Cutting One Percent Of Federal Spending For Six Consecutive Years Would Balance The Budget By 2017 Is "A Pie-In-The-Sky Statement" And "Doesn’t Seem Remotely Possible." [Glenn Kessler, Fact Checker, Washington Post, 6/8/11]

MPR's Poligraph: Pawlenty Claimed "Cutting Just 1 Percent Of Overall Federal Spending For 6 Consecutive Years Would Balance The Federal Budget By 2017" But That Would Only Be Accurate "If The Government Does Not Enact The Tax Cuts He Proposes." [MPR, Poligraph, 6/10/11]

Rudolph Penner, Former CBO Director Under President Reagan: Pawlenty's Plan To Cut One Percent Of The Budget Each Year For Six Years Is "Totally Unrealistic" Because "You Have Health Costs Growing Like Crazy And You Have Social Security Growing Fairly Rapidly Under Current Law" So "To Get A 1% Total Cut Is Just Extraordinarily Difficult To Do.'" [Talking Points Memo, 6/8/11]

REALITY: PAWLENTY'S "GOOGLE TEST" WAS CALLED "GIMMICKY"

Politico: Pawlenty's “Google Test" Proposal Is "Gimmicky" And "Leaves An Almost Infinite Array Of Government Services On The Chopping Block" Like Schools, Police, And Museums. [Burns & Haberman blog, Politico, 6/7/11]

Washington Post's Jennifer Rubin Questioned Pawlenty's "Google Test" – "Student Loans? A Space Program? An FDA? 'The Google Test' Is A Soundbite, Not A Coherent Philosophy." [Jennifer Rubin, Right Turn blog, Washington Post, 6/7/11]

New York Times' Paul Krugman On Pawlenty's "Google Test" Proposal: "The Army, The Navy And All That Were Built For A Time When The Private Sector Did Not Provide Their Products. But Now We Can Just Hire Mercenaries!" [Paul Krugman, New York Times, 6/7/11]