Patterico's Pontifications

6/13/2012

Obama Outraged He Is Being Blamed for Large Deficits

Filed under: General — Patterico @ 7:20 am



Push the Big Lie as often as possible:

The president also said that Republicans, not Democrats, caused the current budget crisis. “I love listening to these guys give us lectures about debt and deficits. I inherited a trillion dollar deficit!” he said. Obama compared Republicans to a person who orders a steak dinner and martini and then, “just as you’re sitting down, they leave, and accuse you of running up the tab.”

This seems like fuzzy math to me. I guess he’s including the TARP loans that were repaid? Is he including his own stimulus in Bush’s numbers?

Any way you slice it, blaming the current huge deficits on Bush is a joke. And nobody’s laughing.

77 Responses to “Obama Outraged He Is Being Blamed for Large Deficits”

  1. Big media is complicit in this crime.

    AZ Bob (1c9631)

  2. Er, Obama was part of the Congress that took control in Jan 2007.

    Inherited: The day Pelosi became Speaker; DJIA: 12,800; unemployment rate: 4.5%; Budget Deficit: $247.7 billion; AVG GDP growth 2006: 3.4%

    Jay (4f25cc)

  3. the silly payroll tax cut is causing us to borrow an extra 110 billion a year or so

    that’s a lot of steak

    happyfeet (3c92a1)

  4. Obama is most comfortable when blaming someone else for something he is responsible for.

    JD (95e569)

  5. The Democrats have, contrary to law, refused to adopt a budget for years, to hide their responsibility for our catastrophic financial situation.

    Instead, they keep repeating lies about the increase in budget spending.

    SPQR (edc546)

  6. Obama is most comfortable when blaming someone else for something he is responsible for.

    Comment by JD — 6/13/2012 @ 7:41 am

    Exactly. Doesn’t know the meaning of the word “responsible.” Just the kind of man I want in a President.

    no one you know (325a59)

  7. The Democrats have, contrary to law, refused to adopt a budget for years, to hide their responsibility for our catastrophic financial situation.

    Instead, they keep repeating lies about the increase in budget spending.

    Comment by SPQR — 6/13/2012 @ 7:51 am

    Another group which hates the word “responsibility.” And all the while demonizing the people doing the most to fix their messes. Far leftists make me sick.

    no one you know (325a59)

  8. DOOM! BHO support in NC was 95% in 2008.

    Currently running 76%, with Romany at 20%!!!

    Turn out of eligible voters seeking 40%?

    gary gulrud (dd7d4e)

  9. Yeah, slick – you inherited a 1 trillion dollar hole and dug it into a 15 trillion dollar hole.

    Congratulations. Now PUT DOWN THE SHOVEL!

    Space Cockroach (8096f2)

  10. Final word on spending:

    http://www.realclearworld.com/articles/2012/06/07/the_queens_decaying_throne_100076-2.html

    Spending is down because Bennie is afraid to print 20% of GDP.

    gary gulrud (dd7d4e)

  11. Ooops, wong link, sorry, lookin’ fo’ Laffer, hold on.

    gary gulrud (dd7d4e)

  12. I find the “blame” for deficits can usually be assigned in almost any way you like. Bush, for example, established certain policies which still contribute to the current deficit, even after Obama took office. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, for example. Does Obama get dinged for that, or was he supposed to magically stop that war spending on his own initiative on January 21, 2009?

    And who is responsible for the extension of the “Bush tax cuts” — a huge factor in the deficit — which were set to expire in 2010? Sure, that can be hung around Obama’s neck — he was, after all, in office — but Republicans were screaming that they should be extended more than Obama.

    There’s plenty of demonizing to be done, and since it is an election year, it will be done. But I think the smarter of us realize we can’t legitimately pin the deficit problem entirely on Obama or entirely on Bush, or even say who is more to blame. It’s more complicated than that.

    Kman (5576bf)

  13. 13. We’re past assigning blame.

    The issue is there are no credits on the ledger. Zero.

    gary gulrud (dd7d4e)

  14. Thank you for your sophistry, Kmart. It was nothing short of predictable. One time stimulus added to baseline, Bush’s fault. Projecting surge levels of spending out for 10 years, and then spending phantom savings, Bush’s fault. Not passing a budget since 2009, Bush. Signing extension of tax cuts for everyone in 2010 when Dems control White House and Senate, Bush.

    JD (95e569)

  15. Wow, JD. Nice lack of reading comprehension.

    Kman (5576bf)

  16. And who is responsible for the extension of the “Bush tax cuts” — a huge factor in the deficit

    Except they’re not a “huge factor in the deficit” at all.

    In fact, revenue increased after they were passed.

    Sure, that can be hung around Obama’s neck — he was, after all, in office — but Republicans were screaming that they should be extended more than Obama.

    Um, Obama extended them.

    How silly.

    Jay (4f25cc)

  17. I touched on your nonsense, and added others we have seen. I was mocking a composite.

    JD (95e569)

  18. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, for example. Does Obama get dinged for that, or was he supposed to magically stop that war spending on his own initiative on January 21, 2009?

    Um, if they were so harmful to the deficit, yeah.
    What you conveniently ignore is that the Democrats in congress increased funding for those wars every year they were in control.

    It is beyond bizarre that people like you attribute things as “Bush policies”

    Using your “logic” Democrats own a majority of the deficit since SS, Medicare, and Medicaid all were created by Democrats.

    Jay (4f25cc)

  19. was he supposed to magically stop that war spending on his own initiative

    Was Bush supposed to stop all these big Democratic spending programs on his own initiative?

    Isn’t this game fun?

    Jay (4f25cc)

  20. Jay:

    Isn’t this game fun?

    My point exactly.

    Kman (5576bf)

  21. But I think the smarter of us realize we can’t legitimately pin the deficit problem entirely on Obama or entirely on Bush, or even say who is more to blame. It’s more complicated than that.

    Since we have actual numbers we can look at, why can’t we say who is more to blame? I take it you think you’re one of the “smarter”. How much do you think Afghanistan is costing per year?

    Gerald A (cc0aaa)

  22. My point exactly.

    Comment by Kman

    Um, fail.

    See, Obama has increased spending, the deficit, and debt.

    Jay (4f25cc)

  23. Was Bush supposed to stop all these big Democratic spending programs on his own initiative?
    Comment by Jay — 6/13/2012 @ 8:49 am

    God YYYYYYYYYYYYEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS…

    GWB was an OK president for foreign stuff–But his lack of vetos and working with the Democrats/Leftists (I repeat myself) set the ground work for the 2006/2008 GOP defeats.

    And you can lay at Pres. Obama’s feet the 2008/2009 budget too:

    The final spending bills for the budget were not signed into law until March 11, 2009 by President Barack Obama, nearly five and a half months after the fiscal year began. MSNBC reported that “Obama signed it (the bill) in private. He declined to answer a shouted reporter’s question why.” This final bill also featured 7991 earmarks totaling nearly 5.5 billion dollars.

    And, this is not fun… It is national suicide/the killing of our kids and those yet to be born.

    BfC (fd87e7)

  24. kman : If you will check and see (“Statistical Analysis of the United States”) the tax revenues actually increased as a result of the tax cuts. It is a Liberal fallacy that tax cuts on the “rich” means lower tax revenues. Except in the case of middle & working class taxpayers, increasing tax rates results in lower tax revenues while lowering tax rates generate increased tax revenues. Check out the Bush tax cuts and the resulting increased tax revenues. For an extreme example – look at what happened when Treasury Secretary Mellon cut tarrifs in the 1920’s.

    Michael M. Keohane (e0f839)

  25. Another point of clarification.

    Obama supported the auto-bailouts and brags about them. So as current President, he clearly has responsibility for that spending.

    Obama supported TARP, implemented TARP, and asked Congress for TARP 2. So as current President, he clearly has responsibility for that spending.

    I also love how people magically pretend Obama wasn’t in Congress and had nothing to do with federal spending prior to Jan 2009…

    Jay (4f25cc)

  26. was he supposed to magically stop that war spending on his own initiative

    Yes. He’s the commander in chief. He has the authority to stop war. He chose to stay the course, and then expand the course.

    I have no problem blaming bush for what he did. He messed up a lot. But after 3.5 years of continuing the same failed policies, it’s a bit much to blame the guy who made the policies. They had two years of complete control, and they used that to cram more debt down our throats.

    Yes, we can lay blame, but it’s not obama’s fault; Keynes is to blame. He’s the one who came up with the policies. Obama is just continuing them.

    Ghost (6f9de7)

  27. “Obama Outraged He Is Being Blamed for Large Deficits”

    Poor baby.

    Dave Surls (46b08c)

  28. These guys have giant, crystalline balls.

    physics geek (6669a4)

  29. The President and Dem senate have refused to pass a budget, as is their clear responsibility. Any problem with spending should be “credited” there for a start

    Most of us don’t readily believe that people in public office would lie this blatantly and persistantly. “Normal” adults don’t do life by bluffing their way through it, do they? Or am I in my little alternative reality?

    MD in Philly (3d3f72)

  30. This sounds like one of those trick mathematical puzzles. If Obama wanted to say this, he should have been saying this the last two years. This almost amounts to a claim that there was no stimulus!!

    Is he just simply comparing the current year’s budget with a projection from Fiscal 2009? He could be just talking about the size of this year’s deficit. The stimulus and the auto bailout and all those things are in previous fiscal years and maybe that way this makes sense.

    Obama is therefore not talking about an extra trillion Dollars or so added to the national debt. He’s saying where we are now, we would be anyway more or less.

    The bottom line on all of this is this: Mitt Romney is too clueless and confused to argue against of this. What little he tries to say he botches up. The most he can do is make absurdly heroic efforts to make the point that the economy is not so good.

    When he tries anything more he stumbles. Romney came pretty close to saying we need to fire policemen firemen and teachers – the problem actually is the bloated pensions, even granted actually of course these should not be jobs programs.

    Sammy Finkelman (c720af)

  31. Comment by MD in Philly — 6/13/2012 @ 9:54 am

    “Normal” adults don’t do life by bluffing their way through it, do they? Or am I in my little alternative reality?

    Well politicians aren’t always normal.

    Oe problem here is that Romney is bluffing his way through this even moer than Obama. Obama tries to expand upon talking points and turns out to be wrong because the talking points are misleading. Romney doesn’t say anything, and I think probably doesn’t know or understand anything at all. He’s just trying to bluff his way through this. he;ll endorse the Ryan budget without paying any real attention to it. Things aren’t working out all right, Obama has no ideas left and therefore he should replace him.

    Sammy Finkelman (c720af)

  32. ______________________________________________

    But I think the smarter of us realize we can’t legitimately pin the deficit problem entirely on Obama or entirely on Bush

    True to a certain degree, but behind that sentiment (if not from you personally than from many of your fellow liberals) there is plenty of moral equivalency, or a form of it. Sort of like those people (also generally all of the left) who say, for example, that the Soviet Union was oppressive and ruthless but, heck, so was the United States—towards the Indians, etc. Or that, yes, Fidel Castro may be the leader of a totalitarian regime, but — along with his providing wonderful healthcare and education for the masses — the US and its pressure against him have made a bad situation far, far worse.

    Mark (a2e041)

  33. I find the “blame” for deficits can usually be assigned in almost any way you like. Bush, for example, established certain policies which still contribute to the current deficit, even after Obama took office. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, for example. Does Obama get dinged for that, or was he supposed to magically stop that war spending on his own initiative on January 21, 2009?

    The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq weren’t on the budget. They were and are off-budget supplemental spending.

    Most of the more than $1 trillion to fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan passed the Congress as “emergency” spending – that is, funded off-budget. In the Bush years, these were typically big, bipartisan votes, with Republican votes a given.

    Ergo by definition they can’t contribute to any budget deficits.

    Obama has increased both the budget deficit as well as off-budget supplemental spending.

    Just Google “Obama breaks emergency war spending pledge” and you can read the lefties themselves dump on Obama for this at DU and other sites.

    And who is responsible for the extension of the “Bush tax cuts” — a huge factor in the deficit — which were set to expire in 2010? Sure, that can be hung around Obama’s neck — he was, after all, in office — but Republicans were screaming that they should be extended more than Obama.

    As already has been pointed out, the “Bush tax cuts” are a non-factor in the deficit. If revenues are down, Obamanomics is a much greater factor. You can’t collect as much in taxes from people who aren’t working, and people who are making less if they are still working.

    And the “Bush tax cuts” are simply the current tax rates.

    The bottom line, though, is that this President is the biggest whiner to hold the office in our history.

    I’ve often wondered how people such as Obama can maintain their delusions. For instance, he’s constantly blaming Bush, speculators, the Japanese earthquake and tsunami, instability in the Middle East destabilizing oil prices, racists, and just about everything else for preventing his brilliant economic policies from working.

    He doesn’t realize that he’s advertising the fact that he’s incapable of developing any sort of economic strategy that can work in the real world. I’m not convinced he wants to; I believe that he thinks things are working out just fine according to his own personal criteria.

    But if he wanted to come up with a strategy that actually addressed people’s concerns, he couldn’t do it. Because in the real world there’s instability in the Middle East, earthquakes, bad weather, people trading futures contracts, and the historical fact that things occurred before he became president.

    And he’s incapable of dealing with those things. He says so himself. Constantly. And I somehow doubt that list of things that exist in the real world that nothing in Obama’s entire life has prepared him to deal with is exhaustive.

    But for some reason he thinks it’s a brilliant re-election strategy to keep reminding the country that the only things he’s good at is vacationing, playing golf, fundraising, and making up excuses.

    If I were to design a candidate that would rehabilitate the GOP’s image in the public eye following George Bush’s presidency, it would be this Democrat. I think Karl Rove is the evil genius behind this media creation, not really David Axelrod.

    Steve57 (c441a6)

  34. The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq weren’t on the budget. They were and are off-budget supplemental spending.

    So they don’t count as part of the “deficit”?

    Brilliant.

    And did we budget for the emergency stimulus spending, too? The bailouts?

    To quote Patterico, this seems like fuzzy math to me.

    Kman (5576bf)

  35. Obama: “And they put in a prescription drug bill that they didn’t pay for.”

    And Democrats wanted a bigger plan than was enacted.

    AZ Bob (7d2a2c)

  36. If Barky didn’t know how bad it really was when he entered office ChimpMcHitlerBurton certainly didn’t months earlier.

    The question before us is should Tyrone get a pass having booted a term? Bush isn’t running and is constitutionally excluded.

    Choombaracka is a cipher, it’s over.

    gary gulrud (dd7d4e)

  37. The Spanish bailout, increasing public debt 10% at a stroke just to cover some bank losses, mollified the stock markets all of 6 hours.

    It further, caused an immediate 3 hundredths drop in bond prices.

    Italy, France and Belgium will be dead by the Democratic Convention.

    gary gulrud (dd7d4e)

  38. The standing of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars as either in the budget or as supplemental spending has nothing to do with whether or not that spending appeared in the deficit – it always did.

    Nor was an attempt to “hide” the spending as Democrats often dishonestly claimed.

    It solely was an issue as to whether or not it was included in baseline spending – ie., whether or not the next year’s budget assumed that spending as a baseline.

    In reality, it was Obama’s claim to include the wars as part of the baseline, since it was already planned to reduce spending on those operations he intended to claim the reduced spending as part of his “deficit reduction” success.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  39. More of Kman’s dishonesty:“And who is responsible for the extension of the “Bush tax cuts” — a huge factor in the deficit — which were set to expire in 2010? Sure, that can be hung around Obama’s neck — he was, after all, in office — but Republicans were screaming that they should be extended more than Obama.”

    When the tax rates were extended in the final weeks of December 2010, Democrats controlled the White House, the House of Representatives and the Senate.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  40. But Kman thinks the Republicans were screaming, so they are responsible.

    The fact is, tax cuts have to go along with spending cuts. And tax cuts are needed to get government out of the way of the economy.

    So the real responsibility, Kman, is in the democrats failing to produce a budget that cuts spending. Fighting tooth and nail to get the debt ceiling increased. That kind of things.

    And you know that. But spending too much money is a bipartisan problem. Had the GOP been consistently balancing budgets from 2000-2006, their political fortunes would have been better. And yes, it was possible.

    I don’t feel like playing the lame ‘who is worse’ game. It’s obvious which party is worse, but neither party is good enough. I’m tired of voting against democrats (rather than for something that will actually be effective on spending), and I hope the GOP, starting with President Romney (Who I will be voting for, though not enthusiastically) gets the budget balanced.

    It will be much like what happened with Walker. Criticized relentlessly, successful in reality, endorsed in the next election.

    Dustin (330eed)

  41. Boy POTUS said he would reduce the Debt $4 Trillion.

    With some months to go he goosed it at least $5 Trillion.

    May’s return to deficit revenues wiped out April’s one-time surplus.

    With Ben printing 10% of GDP there’s only one reason governments are hurting–they’ve run out of other peoples’ money.

    gary gulrud (dd7d4e)

  42. ‘Real voter income growth’ and ‘Consumer confidence’ are the best predictors of POTUS re-election.

    Sucks to be Barky, both rolling around the toilet on their way down.

    gary gulrud (dd7d4e)

  43. The standing of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars as either in the budget or as supplemental spending has nothing to do with whether or not that spending appeared in the deficit – it always did.

    When the CBO projects budget deficits, and produces figures used to create charts like this, they are looking purely at what is included in the budget. Or in Obama’s case, what’s in his proposed budget.

    Off-budget items don’t contribute to these deficits. But of course, they are part of overall spending and they do contribute to the national debt.

    It’s purely a question of comparing apples to apples, not apples to oranges.

    In reality, it was Obama’s claim to include the wars as part of the baseline, since it was already planned to reduce spending on those operations he intended to claim the reduced spending as part of his “deficit reduction” success.

    Except, of course, Obama has continued the practice of requesting supplemental, off-budget spending bills to pay for operations in Afghanistan (and pork for the teachers unions, etc.; spending that he might otherwise not get through Congress if it weren’t attached to the emergency spending bills). Not to mention procurement.

    In this case, it really is a shell game. Obama can add the war spending to the budget, claim that the spending is now part of a single budget, cut the core defense budget, make up the short-fall through emergency off-budget spending bills, and claim to have cut the budget deficit.

    While actually increasing spending.

    Steve57 (c441a6)

  44. “At some point, it’s hard to spin your way out of a trash heap,” said Drew Westen, an Emory University clinical psychologist who studies the role of messaging and emotion in politics.

    Obama’s “fundamental error,” Westen said, was not blaming former President George W. Bush and conservative lawmakers early enough and often enough in his term for creating the country’s economic troubles before he got into office.

    “It’s too late to make that argument now,” said Westen, who has consulted with House and Senate Democrats on messaging on health care and energy issues. “It just sounds like sour grapes. Whether it’s true or not, it sounds like sour grapes.”

    Neo (d1c681)

  45. … and this from Reuters .. tomorrow “sour grapes” ..

    In an economic speech on Thursday that could set the tone for months of campaigning, Obama is not likely to unveil new ideas to boost the economy and create new jobs, according to Democrats familiar with the preparations for the address.

    Instead, he will make the case that he needs four more years to undo the damage left by George W. Bush, his Republican predecessor in the White House, and argue that a President Romney would bring back the weak financial regulation and budget-busting tax cuts of the Bush years.

    Neo (d1c681)

  46. Abstract from a Heritage Founation paper on the auto bailouts:

    Abstract: The U.S. government will lose about $23 billion on the 2008-2009 bailout of General Motors and Chrysler. President Obama emphatically defends his decision to subsidize the automakers, arguing it was necessary to prevent massive job losses. But, even accepting this premise, the government could have executed the bailout with no net cost to taxpayers. It could have—had the Administration required the United Auto Workers (UAW) to accept standard bankruptcy concessions instead of granting the union preferential treatment. The extra UAW subsidies cost $26.5 billion—more than the entire foreign aid budget in 2011. The Administration did not need to lose money to keep GM and Chrysler operating. The Detroit auto bailout was, in fact, a UAW bailout.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  47. From the Times

    At some point, it’s hard to spin your way out of a trash heap,” said Drew Westen, an Emory University clinical psychologist who studies the role of messaging and emotion in politics.

    Obama’s “fundamental error,” Westen said, was not blaming former President George W. Bush and conservative lawmakers early enough and often enough in his term for creating the country’s economic troubles before he got into office.

    narciso (494474)

  48. At this point, narciso, I and a large chunk of the electorate are completely unclear about what Obama would be blaming George Bush and conservative lawmakers for.

    Would it be reckless deficit spending that Obama’s now unfairly getting the blame for? Or would it be for not approving all the spending he’s been asking asking for?

    It varies from day to day with this guy.

    Steve57 (c441a6)

  49. And who is responsible for the extension of the “Bush tax cuts” — a huge factor in the deficit

    Actually, they weren’t a huge factor in the deficit, even if you use static accounting. But the fact is, you have no idea what the GDP would be absent those tax cuts, so you can’t make any rational claim as to how much lower the deficit would be without them.

    Here, however is a fact: in 2007, with these same tax rates in effect, the revenue collected by the federal government as a percentage of GDP was quite a bit higher than it was in 2010 or 2011. So, tax rates have almost nothing to do with the deficit.

    Chuck Bartowski (3bccbd)

  50. The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq weren’t on the budget. They were and are off-budget supplemental spending.

    They may have been off-budget (how can you budget for a war, anyway?), but expenditure on the war effort did count toward the federal deficit.

    Chuck Bartowski (3bccbd)

  51. 50. They may have been off-budget (how can you budget for a war, anyway?), but expenditure on the war effort did count toward the federal deficit.

    Comment by Chuck Bartowski — 6/13/2012 @ 1:51 pm

    I never said they didn’t count toward the federal deficit. I was pointing out that if you’re going to do an apples to apples comparison of budget deficits, then you can’t include items that aren’t in the budget.

    Adding the off-budget items to total federal spending under Bush makes his deficits look worse. But since Obama has continued the practice, his deficits are also far worse than even the CBO numbers. Which are bad enough.

    Steve57 (c441a6)

  52. Ghost #28 – you are just one of them thar ‘birthers’, ain’t ya, claiming that our President is a Keynesian !

    (/irony)

    Alasdair (e7cb73)

  53. If I claim great wealth
    will chicks hold it against me?
    colonel gotta know

    Colonel Haiku (56d9ee)

  54. He no longer claims
    He’s doing a great job but
    still wants mulligan

    Colonel Haiku (56d9ee)

  55. Wisdom has shown me that Republicans seem to understand better that you have to examine the traits and character of candidate before you elect them, while Democrats more typically believe that you can penalize bad public officials after the fact.

    History has shown me that trying to penalize bad public officials after the fact just doesn’t work well (i.e. Clinton impeachment, Walker recall, specious “war crimes,” etc.).

    Neo (d1c681)

  56. There comes a point where Obama’s whining about George Bush will make people realize that perhaps they should elect a Republican so at least there will be a valid reason to blame them for the country’s ills.

    Given that George Bush can’t run by constitutional mandate, it will be Romney who will get the nod.

    Neo (d1c681)

  57. Obanal was elected in 2008.

    it is now 2012… the SCOAMF owns the whole stinking mess, whether he wants to admit it or not.

    redc1c4 (403dff)

  58. Obama’s “fundamental error,” Westen said, was not blaming former President George W. Bush and conservative lawmakers early enough and often enough in his term for creating the country’s economic troubles before he got into office.
    Comment by narciso — 6/13/2012 @ 1:33 pm

    ???? (picture totally befuddled face)

    I wonder how much Weaten thinks would be enough??
    Kafka is running amock these days. This stuff, Holder and multiple disasters, the treatment of Z and wife vs BK. If this keeps up, Alice will have been in a more sane place.

    MD in Philly (3d3f72)

  59. Joe Wilson did not lie.

    mg (44de53)

  60. Yes, but apparently the truth is racist.

    Steve57 (c441a6)

  61. Calling Obama cool is racist. Ditto angry. Ditto articulate. Ditto half-white.

    JD (318f81)

  62. ‘Bearded spock, and Fringe with the Zeppellin ports

    narciso (494474)

  63. The wealth will recede
    the economy will suck
    teh boot will kick out

    an honest assessment of 0bama’s one term

    Colonel Haiku (b6f803)

  64. _______________________________________________

    will make people realize that perhaps they should elect a Republican so at least there will be a valid reason to blame them for the country’s ills.

    I recall various polls taken back when George W. Bush was still in the White House indicating large majorities of Americans felt the country was on the wrong track and had diminishing confidence in the economy. At that time we still were in the middle of a fairly robust GNP (even if it were a bubble or not), with housing sales and prices zooming, unemployment surprisingly low — in spite of more and more manufacturing headed to China and India — and things like the media and advertising still not wheezing as much as they are today.

    I saw one poll far more recently that indicated a good percentage of Americans continue to cite Bush for triggering the current economic morass.

    When so many people were skittish back in the early 2000s, and when so many of them today still seem foggy as to which end is up (or who really deserves blame), the motto of the day is: “Be careful of what you wish for. You may get it.”

    So if a good portion of the populace felt the need to be pessimistic over 7 years ago, and when so many of them apparently shrug off the way that lazy liberalism (and its biggest adherents) incubates economic anomie, then the attitudes of such people and the political figurehead in charge (ie, President “Goddamn America”) when their attitudes are more downbeat than ever before represent a synchronicity, or two points finally making a full circle and joining together.

    Mark (a2e041)

  65. The wars since FY-08 don’t count against the Budget Deficit, since there has not been a BUDGET.
    However, the do, and have always, counted against the FISCAL DEFICIT.

    And, kmart is still a maroon.

    AD-RtR/OS! (2bb434)

  66. Mark, if the MSM tomorrow turned on a dime, and started to blame O for current conditions to the same degree that they laid such blame at the feet of W for most of his terms, those same “voters” – after recovering from the whiplash – would blame O to the same degree they blamed W for a “jobless recovery centered on ‘burger-flipping’ jobs”.

    AD-RtR/OS! (2bb434)

  67. “The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, for example.”

    The cost is miniscule compared to what the Dems spent on WWI, WWII, Korea and Vietnam or the Cold War (all their babies).

    Defense spending over the years…

    In 1945 defense spending accounted for an astounding 42% of GDP.

    In 1962 the figure was 10.9%

    In 1980 6.0%

    In 1990 5.9%

    In 2000 3.6%

    In 2008 5.1% That was the highest figure for the Bush presidency.

    Military spending basically has nothing to do with the ever mounting federal debt.

    It’s all the “social programs” that are beggaring us.

    Dave Surls (46b08c)

  68. Department of Education, $100 Billion a year, employing 4500 Feds.

    EPA, SEC, Dept. of Health and Human Services, FCC, etc.

    I think the big prob with transfer payments is the cut for guvmint off the top. The waste, for a lousy couple million jobs, is the better portion of a $TRILLION annually.

    Let’s not lose sight of that.

    gary gulrud (dd7d4e)

  69. Please please please!!! Someone with good graphics chops needs to produce a video that shows the way the weekly unemployment figure ‘narrative’ gets done

    –preliminary number comes out, gets added to a graph
    –next week the preliminary number comes out, flash the news reportage that it “declined 2000 from the prior week’s REVISED figure…and show the prior week plot point bump UP to show this week’s plot point is slightly “down”

    –repeat for a few weeks slowly so viewers get the point, then ACCELERATE thru the 67 or so weeks of that bullship, with the overlays of “slightly reduced” or “unexpected small increase” text flashing by, while zooming out to show the weekly numbers graph is steady or increasing, not decreasing week to week…and showing a top plot line of total percentage of employed vs. population (with growth factored in) which will clearly be a declining line.

    End with some sort of tagline about lies, damn lies, and statistics….

    rtrski (336865)

  70. Comment by Michael M. Keohane — 6/13/2012 @ 9:22 am

    If you will check and see (“Statistical Analysis of the United States”) the tax revenues actually increased as a result of the tax cuts…..Check out the Bush tax cuts and the resulting increased tax revenues. For an extreme example – look at what happened when Treasury Secretary Mellon cut tarrifs in the 1920′s.

    Can you tell me where this can be found out/ Any semi-contemprary newspaper articles that note this thing? Were there increased imports? Or is everything being compared to the depression year of 1921?

    Is there something maybe on this website:

    http://www.taxhistory.org/

    http://www.taxhistory.org/www/website.nsf/Web/THM1901?OpenDocument says they could have passed a national sales tax in 1921. This whole page seems to have nothing about tariff reductions in the 1920s.

    Sammy Finkelman (d22d64)

  71. Comment by rtrski — 6/14/2012 @ 9:24 am

    End with some sort of tagline about lies, damn lies, and statistics….

    the waqy that should really go is:

    There are four kinds of lies: Lies, Damn lies, Statistics, and Scientific Proof.

    Sammy Finkelman (d22d64)

  72. From Reuters on late events from Egypt, site of Urkel’s groundbreaking address to Islam:

    “the constitutional court ruled that a third of seats in the lower house were invalid, plunging the country into into deep political uncertainty two days before presidential elections. It in effect cancels an Islamist-dominated parliament assembled painstakingly”

    Ys know bois, that word ‘painstakingly’ prolly doesn’t mean what you think it means.

    Winning.

    gary gulrud (dd7d4e)

  73. Barone via Ace:

    “in the last three presidential elections, the winning candidate has won a percentage of the popular vote identical to or within 1% of the percentage of the popular vote for the House of Representatives in the election held two years before. In this case, the November 2010 results are very different from 2008. In 2008 Obama won 53% of the popular vote. In 2010 House Democrats won 45% of the popular vote.”

    Yeah, well, hope was remembered in 2010.

    gary gulrud (dd7d4e)

  74. gary gulrud #75 … I have just re-re-read the quote you posted, and, each time, the quote’s comparison is between the General Election and the immediately-*prior* mid-term election … so 2008 should be compared with 2006’s mid-term election, should it not ?

    Alasdair (e7cb73)

  75. Does Obama get dinged for that, or was he supposed to magically stop that war spending on his own initiative on January 21, 2009?

    Well, since a lot of that spending wasn’t even on-budget, he actually could have. And as the commander-in-chief, he does have the authority to completely pull every single troop out of whatever foreign country they are in.

    It might not have happened the first day, but if the Bush the Elder could get half a million troops and the supplies necessary to house, feed, and arm them over to the Middle East in about a month during Desert Shield, then surely Obama could have pulled out far fewer numbers from Iraq and Afghanistan in the same time period.

    Another Chris (3b44a8)


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