‘Government has been shrinking’ under Obama
Surlepont | Wikimedia Commons | Altered by Dan
Your daily Letter to the Editor — March 14, 2013
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For several weeks, letters in this forum have derided President Obama’s leadership of the economy. As the late Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan said, “You are entitled to your own opinions but not your own facts.” It may be useful to interject facts into this debate.
When George W. Bush became president in 2001, the unemployment rate was 4.6 percent. When he left office in 2009, it was at 7.9 percent. Today, unemployment stands at 7.7 percent.
In January 2001, the New York Stock Exchange was trading at a volume of 10,400. When Bush left office, the stock market had fallen to 7,949. Today, it is trading at a record high above 14,000.
When Bush came into office, the national debt was $6 trillion. When he left, it was $10 trillion. Today, it is $16 trillion.
Of the $6 trillion added since Barack Obama was sworn in, $2 trillion is war debt not counted by Bush and $1.5 trillion is the unfunded mandate of Medicare Part D, pushed by Bush. The percent of government spending to GDP has fallen sharply under Obama.
Yes, tea party folks, government has been shrinking in the four years of Obama’s presidency. Look it up.
Wade Harbinson
BLUE RIDGE
March 14, 2013 - 2:47 PM
WOW!!! Does this post not personify “the low information voter”?
“WOW!!! Does this post not personify “the low information voter”?”
-Mike S.
Mike S, that depends. If you choose to disbelieve facts, and substitute for them the various meanderings of Limbaugh, Beck, Hannity and other elements of the RWer lie machine, you might come to that conclusion.
But in that case, the “low-information voter” would not be the letter writer. It would be you. . .
I love these skewed off the wall statistics and numbers that the liberals and gays pull out of the sky. Certainly everything must be Bush’s fault. Obama has added 500 million jobs at McDonalds.
I see we are back in 2012 mode where any statistic, study, or report, if not comporting with the RW noise machine, must be “skewed”.
No steep learning curves in the RW crowd.
Oh, we`ve learned Hillary…but it came in a time when we were approximately 6, maybe 7 years old. And the lesson we learned was that you CANNOT spend more than you bring in. You either sat in the rear of the school room, or you were just in the wrong school .Liberal teachers maybe ? Naw, no possible way.
GW Bush spent $ 4 Trillion in 8 years….obama ?? $6 Trillon in 4 years….Wade…ever heard of math ? Look it up.
“Liberals and gays” lmao. Do you people never tire of embarrassing yourselves?
#2…Prove him wrong, Casey…This won`t be the first time you`ve been challenged to do that, but you seem unable to come up with any `facts`. Well, Casey ??? Prove Rush….Hannity….FOX , wrong….We`re waiting ! You see folks…this` blame the rich` skit comes out of pure and utter jealousy…these little libs would love to be in the `rich` shoes, but they don`t have the backbone, or the moral fortitude to go and do it for themselves..they`re afraid of failure because they`ve never been `allowed` to fail.. they`ve gotten trophies for losing…They couldn`t hack it in the real world, so they are activists for `handouts` to the worthless who have decided, because of an ignorant president, that they would rather sit on thier butts all day and recieve a check. pathetic, to say the least. Why do you think obama actively promotes handouts? For votes which gives him his `all-needed power`… Poor littel thin-skinned child.
Hillary | March 14, 2013 at 4:42 pm
I see we are back in 2012 mode where any statistic, study, or report, if not comporting with the RW noise machine, must be “skewed”.
No steep learning curves in the RW crowd.
No learning of any kind Hillary. They learned every thing there was to know
during the Dark Ages and no amount of light or truth will ever bring them out of the shadows.
Great retort Mike S and Kendra, never allow facts to stand in the way of a good argument, not that you’ve even attempted a good argument..
Facts from where? Gutterville? Hollywood? Mainstream media? Msnbc?
Wade Harbinson offered verifiable facts and the right wing noise chimes in with insults and…well, nothing.
So Bush gets tagged with all the spending during his tenure plus a couple of years after. But Clinton’s carryover into Bush counts against Bush, and obama’s gigantic ACA carryover won’t count against him.
Neat system. The morons are sure to buy it.
Verifiable by whom? CNN? George Soros? Dan Rather? Chris Mathews?
“Facts,” “verifiable facts”? Only a “NO information voter” or a crack head could believe this post.
Btw Dan,that stamp should be changed to “Food Stamp.”
Try Google.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012/05/04/business/economy/off-the-charts-shrinking-government.html
http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/06/under-obama-a-record-decline-in-government-jobs/
http://www.businessinsider.com/the-public-sector-continues-to-shrink-under-obama-2012-7?op=1
http://www.economist.com/blogs/buttonwood/2012/07/economic-policy
Those links are all liberal controlled outlets, I.e., Josef Goebbels protégés. Do you seriously think objective and truthful folks do not see through your smokescreen.
Elementary Math: 2 + 2 = 4
Conservative Math: 2 + 2 = 2 x GDP / (true unemployment rate x unskewedpolls.com average Romney lead in the month of September) / (seasonal average intensity of Jupiter’s magnetic field ^ 2)
“As you can see by our adjusted-for-inflation revisions, the answer is obviously 3. We’re losing entire numbers under this administration, sheeple! Do you really want to live in a country where math is standardized and you can’t just add in unrelated factors to skew the numbers the way we want them to look? That’s one step away from fascism! All those ‘real’ numbers fed to you by ‘teachers’, the ‘government offices’, ‘mainstream media’ and the liberal-controlled ‘internet’? They’re all lies! It’s all part of the system designed to keep you complacent and malleable. You can’t handle the truth? This is just scratching the surface. If you’ll hang on while I take my Seroquel and Thorazine, I’ll tell you about the mind-control transmitters they put on all those cellular towers.”
Sandi – the right wing meme when presented with that which they choose not to believe = facts, shmacks…
We did this same presenting of facts throughout the Presidential campaign to no avail – don’t think much has changed.
@13. One question. Is Lent over?
Martin Luther | March 14, 2013 at 7:46 pm
Those links are all liberal controlled outlets, I.e., Josef Goebbels protégés. Do you seriously think objective and truthful folks do not see through your smokescreen
Yeah Sandi. Not a single link to Limbaugh, Hannity, Faux, Americans for Prosperity, The Heritage Foundation, or Freedomworks. You even left out World Net Daily and the weaselzippers. Whatever were you thinking.?
Kendra and Wayne you are awsome keep on poring it on I love to see them squirm. It just shows how easily the liberals are swayed by the lying leftwingers. On one hand they cry we wanna be bipartisan and in the other hand a stack of lies to feed the poor and less educated. WE WILL TAKE BACK THE WHITE HOUSE and fix this mess.
Robbie doesn’t even recognize good sarcasm when it smacks him in the face .
The writer’s snarky comments about “facts” generously omit that many of the measures he uses are produced by the Obama Treasury department and some now acknowledged as erroneous reporting by the CBO. One place to see some explanations that fly counter to interpretations used by the writer would be an evaluation of similar statements by Mr Obama himself at http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2012/sep/27/barack-obama/barack-obama-says-hes-responsible-just-10-percent
As to the spending as a percentage of GDP being “sharply reduced under Obama”, check out http://ycharts.com/indicators/govt_spend_gdp/chart for yourselves. It shows figures that are consistent with the figures that the New Your Times, Wall Street Journal, etc regularly cite. The only “reductions” are from the highs that have been established during the current adminstration.
I’m sorry, who said they wanted to be “bipartisan”, Robbie.
Wayne, none of them are sharp that way.
Yes “Martin Luther”, Business Insider and The Economist are some real “liberal controlled outlets”, nothing like the right wing media that appears to misinform you right wingers.
I know the comedy is unintentional, but it is still funny!
“When George W. Bush became president in 2001, the unemployment rate was 4.6 percent. When he left office in 2009, it was at 7.9 percent. ”
That may be a true statement, but what was the cause? I suggest the Democrat takeover of the House in 2006 (remember Pelosi carrying the big hammer all over DC), was the start of the decline. They began their obstructionist campaign that took us into the toilet. Similar to successes being due to the GOP controlled house and the Contract with America.
“On one hand they cry we wanna be bipartisan”
Personally, no I don’t. the dumb teabaggers lost the last election and should be coming on their knees to kiss the ring of Obama and be prepared to give up their 1%’er masters to paying their fair share of the tax burden.
Then we can talk about healing and becoming bi-partisan.
Cold, I really hope that is hyperbole, but more and more it seems that’s how liberals really feel. Perhaps if liberals would spend a little more time putting that vaunted brain power to use on our problems and a little less time slapping each other on the back and trying to convince themselves how much smarter, more enlightened and just overall better they think they are than everyone else, they would actually get around to governing and solving some problems. So far all we’ve seen them do is whine about how the irrelevant minority is able to obstruct the superior intellect’s every attempt to accomplish something and/or blame the guy that was president five years ago.
Holy crap! I think that was sarcasm. Did you recognize it Kristen?
#28…How do you like your lower paychecks ? I`m so glad you voted for tax and spending… and won. Enjoy less. Of course, you probably collect a check from uncle obama for your lack of work. Molon Labe.
I agree Cold, I am fresh out of bipartisan on anything and “my give a damn is busted” where the right wing “concerns” are concerned. I have no respect for the people trying to destroy this nation from within because they continue to lose.
I guess another wave of Democratic victories in ’14 might wake up the wingnuts, but I doubt it. They are determined to destroy this great nation and bring anarchy to reign under the guise of “Limited Government”
BUT, DON”T YOU DARE TOUCH THEIR SOCIAL SECURITY!!!!
Chuck, you neocons have been dishing out the partisan bull crap for years expecting the Dems to fold and we have. You just don’t know how to take what you have been giving for years. Don’t expect anything less for some time to come ace.
The only losers, Saunders, are the left…most have come to realize that the `social utopia` that you sooooo desire will NEVER come to fruition. This Agenda 21 is a weak attempt at a utopian `push`, but is falling on its face. Folks…any attempt on the `left` to tell you that this Agenda 21 is the product of RW zealots, etc. is an attempt to decieve you…They want this so bad that they ache within, and know the only way for it to suceed is to trick and decieve. Sound familiar ? Believe NOTHING from the left. They have lost the truth.
Also, for the other subject(which is a leftist lost cause)….Molon Labe.
Al, your #28 shows a dangerous level of dishonesty or ignorance and neither is s good thing.
You can ignore or decry the economic crash that happened in 2008, or you can lie and blame it on “the Democrat takeover of the House in 2006″ which only proves your ignorance, but what you cannot do and will never be able to do Al is prove it. That is how a lie works in the end, you cannot prove it true.
I get it that you right wingers literally do not understand how government works but it is really getting old.
How about you, Awood, Maloof, Suzie and all of the other right wingers prove what you are saying?
Tell us precisely how that Congress caused the economic crash?
Al is correct sandi, you are not..don’t need to prove anything, we were there babe..REAL LIFE, NO INTERNET LINKS THAT YOU DEPEND ON SO MUCH
they didnt fold enough cold…not enough
Awood, your ignorance betrays your need to insult people, no one here and certainly most liberals I know have no desire at all for this nation to become some “`social utopia`”. And that is not what we work for. Equality is the American ideal. Check some history and see for yourself.
The lie that “Agenda 21 is a weak attempt at a utopian `push`” is indeed failing because it is a completely fabricated, right wing lie. Enjoy the small successes in the low population and low information corridors because that is all you are going to get. There is no truth involved in the effort to demonize the UN, there is only the twisted interpretation that the right wingers have put on population, conservation and developmental concerns for their own efforts to take over and exploit all three.
The truth is that the people who “want this so bad that they ache within” are the right wing TEA “Party” liars. Yes, “the only way for it to suceed is to trick and decieve” (otherwise known as a typical day of right wing posts here), which has always been their strong suit, even back when they were standing in the school house doors, lynching blacks, wearing hoods, protesting at Planned Parenthood, storming the offices in Florida, wearing tea bags as they hover-rounded on DC decrying “socialism” while cashing their social security checks, and lying at every opportunity about President Obama.
Hell no, you will never win. Your gains will stay small and offensive, but never join the mainstream or become the majority. Not with the help of FOX, Limbaugh and the WSJ! Not because you lack the will, but because you lack the way, the capability and the integrity to do so.
You would not recognize the truth if it slapped you in the mouth.
“Hell, No, you will never win“ ??? I`m already a winner because I didn`t rely on Government. I`m profoundly sucessful because I am a leader, not a leftist follower. And as far as your little obama, he has done nothing but lie to the Amercain people from day one…Unemployment under 6%…Hah ! Most transparent Goverment ever..Double Hah ? Will bring us together ??????? He is the `great divider` and you are his puppets. He couldn`t care less about you with the exception of your vote, which you gladly supply because you are a slave to the democratic party….You`ve been brainwashed and I`ll give them credit, because you don`t even know it. And, as far as me proving what I normally say about the left, socialism, communism ? Easy proof….look around the world….it ALWAYS FAILS….proof in the pudding.Grow up, get off of your duff, and create for yourself instead of waiting on `Nanny` to do it for you…How spineless.
And, by the way Casey(and the others) The `facts` presented at the beginning of this blog are as distorted as they come. Maybe Dan made them up…maybe he is just a sucker for another lying media outlet, but they are false and most certainly misleading. Once again, this is how they operate…Lie and Decieve in order to gain your trust. Dan, if you are going to just out-and-out lie to the readers, you need to at least make it believeable….I guess there is some nobility is NOT being a good liar. You would do good to learn from this continuing mistake as well, Saunders.
Awood, fwiw, people like you are why the SWVA TP comes off as a bunch of loonbags.
If “utopia” means no child goes to bed hungry. That every child goes to bed in a home, not a car, not a box. If every child has access to healthcare. That every child can breath clean air and drink clean water. That every child no matter their gender, race, ethnicity, religion or sexual orientation has a fair shot at a good and decent life – and two parents, whether they are straight or gay – who love, nurture and protect them.
Well then yes, I am looking for “utopia” because that is my definition – and no TP, no right-wing republican defines utopia that way. Their utopia is a world of the rich, exploiting the poor and middle class, destroying the environment for wealth. They worship the almighty dollar without consideration of how they got it.
Saunders needs proof that socialism fails ?? If I were her, I`d be embarrased to even aks, but here goes….The State of California….run by Democrats forever….broke as a church mouse. The state of New York…run by Deomcrats….in deep dog-do. The City of Detroit(if they still qualify as a city)…run by Democrats forever….just drive through it…you`ll get the picture……Greece….Spain….they are all FAILING ….spending more than they bring in….When you throw out the math, you are doomed. Period. Saunders ??? Do you spend more than you bring in ?? I`ll be sure to remember to ask you that again, as I`m sure you will hide from the fact that its impossible to do so…unless you have a bank w/o a bookeeper.
Awood, this was a letter to the editor published in the newspaper. It is a fact that it was published, exactly as it appears here. Blather all you want about me “making stuff up” — that simply isn’t true.
Yeah Awood, “winner” is sure the word that comes to mind when I read your dishonest bile.
Define “profoundly sucessful”? Somehow I doubt it seriously. Leaders do not hide in the safety of anonymity and insult people.
I get it that you all do not understand the economic crash and why it happened or how we get past it; you prove it daily. Ignorance resounds in your shallow, unfair and wrong partisan talking points.
Oh let’s pretend that the GOTP “cares” about us? Dear Lord in Heaven what a laugh!
I am not the one who is hiding in anonymity and spewing the parroted right wing talking points, so the brainwashed blogger here is you, pammala, Al and Suzie. I also believe you know it and that is the basis for your hateful posts. You are angry that we will not follow your bogus lead.
I see you could not offer any of the proof I asked for. Nor can you prove Obama or any of us want “socialism, communism”. YOU “look around the world”, this capitalist giant is not number one anymore. THAT has NOTHING to do with MY politics and EVERYTHING to do with YOURS.
You hide behind a screen name, lie, insult people and the president then have the gall to call anyone else “spineless”? You are so obviously clueless.
Sandi…you sting me by calling me dishonest and/or ignorant in #37.
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Bills for revenue originate in the House. He who controls the House controls the purse strings.
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How can today’s MSM blame the GOP controlled House for all our woes and yet the Dem controlled House was not the problem. Its the same situation but the partys are reversed.
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I have related to facts and connected the dots. How is that dishonest. I cannot prove gravity either, but it exists. And just because you disagree, we do not float away.
Something about a cloudy Saturday seems to bring out the eye dee ten tees. Kind of like the full moon and werewolves. I strongly suggest that al, pammala, awood et al check themselves carefully today for excessive hair growth and sudden urges to howl aT the moon.
Al, will you explain how you go from #28 blaming the unemployment rates on the Democratic majority in 2006 to #48 blaming the spending on them? Which is it.
The unemployment rate soared when the economic crash of 2008 landed on us like the ton of bricks it was predicted to be. That was completely out of the control of any Congress as Congress does not create jobs and neither did Bush tax cuts.
Then you go off in #48 talking about spending. Do you believe the two are connected?
The spending was to prevent another Great Depression and was at the request of the Bush White House and the Fed.
If it is true that “He who controls the House controls the purse strings” why are you all complaining about Obama and his spending? How can he spend what the House will not allow?
You have related skewed facts and mis-connected the dots and called that truth. It isn’t.