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President George W. Bush 2007
d2d
Member Posts: 3,109
in Tug Tavern
This is all on Obubba
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=RRdoiTH_iZg
Comments
I recommend all people like yourself become familiar w/ da chooz. It will explain everything
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Withdrawal_of_U.S._troops_from_Iraq
"In 2008 the American and Iraqi governments signed the U.S.–Iraq Status of Forces Agreement, after being sought by the Bush Administration and the Iraqi government. It included a specific date, 30 June 2009, by which American forces should withdraw from Iraqi cities, and a complete withdrawal date from Iraqi territory by 31 December 2011.[27] On 14 December 2008 then-President George W. Bush signed the security agreement with Iraq. In his fourth and final trip to Iraq, President Bush appeared in a televised news conference with Iraq's prime minister Nouri al-Maliki to celebrate the agreement and applauded security gains in Iraq saying that just two years ago "such an agreement seemed impossible"."
Just because someone else ran up a deficit (let's forget the reasons behind it for the time being as it really isn't central to the point) doesn't mean that it gives the next guy the right to do the same and shrug the shoulders like it isn't their problem.
Regardless, cutting taxes and going to war doesnt reduce the deficit.
Keep *Gurgling*...
Let's summarize your claims in your post:
1) The deficit has fallen faster under Obama than any time since the 1950s.
2) Obama deserves significant credit for this
3) Bush is an idiot and it's not Obama's fault because Bush cut taxes and went to war running up a huge deficit for Obama.
Now, let's talk reality:
1) You rightfully deflect from the magnitude of Obama's deficits and instead focus on percentage drops to prop up Obama's record. There's a huge problem with that and it shows with about a millisecond of thought. If you look at the following link: http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/federal_deficit_chart.html, what you'll find is that there was a massive uptick in the deficit in 2009 heading into Obama's term. Why was that? While on one hand, you could very easily assign some of the blame to Bush, there was a very significant event that happened in the 2008/2009 time period - wasn't there? The banking bailouts that started at the back end of 2008 and into 2009 is the singular cause of the increase in the deficit.
While you can give Obama credit for taking the deficit down (eventually), it's important to note that not only did it take Obama until the FY13 fiscal year for his deficit to drop under $1 trillion a year and since the drop in FY13, it has remained relatively stable since then.
With the exception of FY09, there was not a single year during Bush's presidency where he ran a deficit HIGHER than the LOWEST deficit ran (or projected to run) under Obama. And while you can point to the banking bailout as a reason for Obama's deficits, Bush dealt with not only the military fallout of 9/11 as well as the depressed economy that stemmed from that.
2) Most objective commentary suggests that Obama's policies have benefits the upper class the most, the lower class the next, and in the grand scheme of things probably hurt the middle class.
If you look at the taxes collected, it's important to look at the receipts collected in a constant dollar since it accounts for inflation, currency fluctuations, etc. See attached: http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxfacts/displayafact.cfm?Docid=200. From a magnitude standpoint, the amounts under Obama (particularly in his 1st term) were underwhelming. Second, if you look at the difference between receipts and outlays, you'll find that the deficits that Obama was and is running are massive. This suggests to me that Obama's big talk about large tax collections can be supported by the numbers when they trot out the collection numbers and increases accordingly, but when you look at all the outlays that are made in the process, you realize that it's a song and dance show. And finally, if you look at the receipts as a percentage of GDP, what you'll find is that there's a strong relationship between the health of the nation's economy and tax receipts. The recipe for generating strong tax revenues for the government has never been a secret. It's the whole concept that those that like to bash trickle down economics fail to understand. If I have more money, I'm more likely to spend more money. In the course of spending more money, that means somebody else has more money. Wealth is generated by exchanging funds and increasing the concept of the money multiplier. Wealth is concentrated and destroyed when wealth is horded and protected.
3) You can bash a lot about Bush and there's areas where he did better than some people thought he did and other areas where he deserves to take shit. But the whole view of Obama supporters, and in time what you'll also hear in 2016 when Clinton runs will be that it's all Bush's fault. You can only continue that charade for so long. The numbers, when you actually look into them, normalize them, and have an understanding of its drivers, do not paint Obama as a skilled President when it comes to the economic side of things.
1) actually I said Obama was part of the reason the deficit increased,, which is true. Learn to read. There are many other factors to deficit reduction. Better economy, no more wars, Congress can't agree on shit, etc.
2) when tax rates are under 40%, trickle down economics is bullshit. When the top rate was 70% as it was under Reagan when he took over, there can be benefits. But no one says "this project can make me $100k a year, which means $64k after federal taxes at 36%. Taxes are now 39.6%, fuck I'll only make $60.4k. I'm not making that investment." It's called the law of diminishing returns.
Look how revenue as a percent of GDP dropped and the deficit increased in the 80s, while in the 90s after Clinton's tax increase, revenue as a percent increased while deficits decreased. Same for 2008/2009. See how revenues decreased drastically from the recession. Please explain how that's Obama's fault. Hence why there articles about how bush increased the deficit 7 trillion with his policies while Obama's was closer to 1 trillion.
3) Obama's economy isn't perfect, but it's not bad. We've had consistent job growth since October 2009 after losing 800k a month at one point. We've have GDP growth since June of 2009. Consumer confidence (the main driver of the economy) is higher now than in a long time.
Obama does take blame for obamacare in relation to the economy. In that, part of the reason for the slow growth was uncertainty with the bill. Conservatives share blame in that too for constantly beating the "obamacare will crater the economy" drum.
Fact is, if Republicans and Democrats would actually pass legislation together, then consumer confidence would go through the roof. See 1998 with Clinton and newt.