I think people (those outside my circle) are playing “Message Received”. Excepting the 20% core progressives, no one wants to buy what golfer-in-chief is selling. No one can afford to anyway.
As we get closer to November, expect Democrats to pull out all the stops on getting Obama to remain in office. Let’s not get too over confident…but he is definitely having a bad week!
And yet Fox just posted poll results showing Obama up on Romney 46% to 39%??!!
So more bad news for Obama means dropping poll numbers for…Romney?
Either the sample was taken in downtown San Francisco or they’re just trying to energize Republicans. WTF?
You’ll note that the “Government dependency” number reported is 47% – very close to the 45% support level you noticed. Essentially we are at the point were the public has realized it can vote itself money earned by others – it’s time for us “others” to look at leaving.
Either Obama will be replaced at the last minute with Hillary or we will have massive unrest leading to a military coup that makes Obama our defacto Dictator. I don’t see the progressives ever allowing a peaceful transfer of power back to the conservatives. They are too close to their Utopia to allow another set-back on par with the Reagan years. They have convinced themselves that AGW, population control, wealth redistribution, and LGBT civil rights are much too important to delay the revolution.
They are all-in at this point and will not give it back. The MSM are complicit, they have our education system and almost all of our cultural outlets. They also have almost half the country on entitlements and a half-step from 3rd world living conditions. They have laid the groundwork and it’s time to tip the scale. In other words, they didn’t just arrive and they are not interested in what voters have to say about it.
The number of people on food stamps is now 45 million and growing. The number of people filing for disability is also growing. I guess if you can’t find work, just claim that you are “mentally disabled” and get on the government gravy train. I guess the whole country should be depressed about Obama’s incompetence.
It really is mind boggling that the government is spending over $100,000.00 a second with over $40,000 of it being borrowed to run the government. This will not end well.
It is disingenuous to lay all of these economic problems at the feet of Obama.
Certainly, the Bush tax cuts had their impact. The bank failures had their impact. The balance of trade (imbalance, more precisely) has had it’s impact. And the jobs? We traded them for cheap imported goods; we traded long-term job security for short-term savings. Those jobs are now overseas.
I am no fan of Obama. My strongest objections are on social issues(pro-life, pro-traditional marriage). But fair is fair. Maybe he hasn’t done great, but under the circumstances, he has kept us afloat, and so far, out of disaster.
I agree the economic problems started before he got into office, but I also think what he has done in office has made them worse. And the things he has enacted, like Obamacare (if it survives) and the stimulus, has made any future recovery that much more tenuous.
It will be overturned by the Supreme Court, and it has already been leaked to Obama by one of the appointees to the Supreme Court he got on it! You will notice that he almost immediately responded by admonishing them not to do what they are gonna do which is effectively repealing or abolishing his crappy law!
Notice also he is not going around campaigning about this great law which is one onf the only thing he accomplished with the congress as president!
Nice theory, but not quite true. Revenues have generally gone up every year, mainly because the population increases. That includes under Carter, Reagen, Clinton, everybody. One exception is 2001, after the Bush tax cuts, when revenues dropped from around $2 trillion to $1.8 trillion.
Are you serious??!!?? Look at the charts – he is a disaster! Rest assured – if he gets re-elected, he will make the last 4 years look tame in comparison. For the sake of our children and grand-children, we have to get this man out of office. He has devastated our economy, our defense, and created more racial animosity than one could have imagined. He campaigns endlessly but fails to lead even minimally. Obamacare, if not struck down by the Supreme Court, will add additional trillions to our deficit.
Wake up, friend. Put aside the emotion and look at this rationally – look at the numbers and stop trying to find excuses for this man. He’s been a failed social experiment since his college days – we need to retire him and let him make inflammatory speeches to a shrinking body of sycophants for the next few decades.
The list again, for those that may have missed it:
31. Kermudjin
Obama is so fond of saying everything he does is “unprecedented” or “historic”, I’ve made a hobby of compiling my list of evidence that, indeed, this is an historic presidency
1. For the first time in history, our AAA credit rating has been downgraded.
2. This is the slowest recovery from a recession since the Great Depression.
3. President Obama presided over the largest peace time economic stimulus in history.
4. Federal debt is increasing at the fastest rate in history.
5. No president before Obama had an annual federal deficit even approaching $1 trillion; Obama has not had a deficit below $1 trillion.
6. In April 2012, we had 40 straight months of federal deficit spending. The longest prior streak was 11 months.
7. Despite rhetoric to the contrary, corporate welfare (subsidies, tax breaks, bailouts, etc.) has increased dramatically from the $92 billion per year level it was at when Obama took office. Green energy spending alone quadrupled to over $18 billion.
8. Federal debt has exceeded Gross Domestic Product for the first time since 1947. We now join only six other nations with this distinction: Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, and Japan.
9. At 24%, federal spending as a portion of GDP is at its highest level since 1946. (OECD estimates combined federal, state and local spending is a whopping 41% of GDP.)
10. During Obama’s first 26 months in office, regulatory burden has increased by $38 billion. The number and cost of regulations is the largest for such a time period in history.
11. In March 2012, it was reported that new business start ups hit an all-time low.
12. The number of taxpayers who actually pay federal income tax reached 49%. Data going back to 1950 indicates this is a record low.
13. For the first time Treasury officials know of, private parties received priority over the federal government in a bankruptcy (the restructuring of the Solyndra loan).
14. The dollar fell to a record low against the Japanese yen.
15. In 2012, the U.S. dropped to tenth place on the Index of Economic Freedom, our lowest ranking since 1995, when the index was first calculated.
16. With other nations dropping their corporate tax rates, the U.S. had the highest corporate tax rate in the world in March 2012.
17. Unemployment remained above 9% and above 8% for the longest periods of time since the Great Depression.
18. Median length of unemployment is more than twice as high as it has been at any time in the past 50 years.
19. High school drop outs over age 25 are particularly vulnerable when it comes to employment. The 38 worst months of unemployment for this group have all come under the Obama administration.
20. The misery index (unemployment plus inflation) reached its highest level since 1983.
21. The percentage of the population that held a job hit 45.4%, down from a peak of 49.3% in 2000, the lowest level since 1983.
22. In 2010, 66.8% of men held a job, the lowest level ever recorded.
23. The number of people unemployed, marginally attached to the labor force, or working part-time rather than full-time has reached an unprecedented 26 million.
24. Unemployment by age group records were first kept in 1948 and unemployment among young adults (ages 18 to 29) is the highest on record.
25. Labor force participation has dropped to a 29-year low (63.7%), after a record one-month drop of 1.2 million people in January 2012. In March 2012 the number of people not in the labor force hit an all-time high of 88 million.
26. State and local governments have shed over half a million jobs, most of them since the end of the recession in 2009. State and local government job statistics have been kept since 1955 and this is the worst decline on record.
27. More people are on food stamps than ever.
28. Nearly half of all households has at least one person receiving federal benefits.
29. Direct federal payments to individuals increased a staggering 32% during the first three years of Obama’s administration.
30. Government transfer payments make up over 18% of all monies received by individuals, an all-time record.
31. The number of people receiving Social Security disability benefits increased 10% in Obama’s first two years.
32. The poverty rate is the highest since 1993.
33. The Heritage Foundation Dependency Index, a measure of dependency on government, has taken its biggest 2-year increase since the Carter Administration and is at an all-time high. In 2010, for the first time the per capita government spending on dependence programs exceeded per capita disposable income. Only about 20% of this rise can be attributed to the economic downturn.
34. Personal wealth declined $8.7 trillion from 2009 to 2011, the largest decline in history.
35. Household income has shrunk by 10% during Obama’s presidency, most of that coming after the end of the recession.
36. Disposable income, an indicator of standard of living, has been tracked for 50 years. It has dropped 4% in the past three years, the worst decline on record.
37. The percentage of young adults living with their parents is at the highest level since the 1950′s.
38. During the Obama administration there have been a record 5.4 million disability claims, a number that is more than twice the total of new jobs created.
39. Average annual family health care premiums topped $15000 for the first time ever.
40. Outstanding student loans hit record levels and are on pace to top $1 trillion this year.
41. The average annual gasoline expense was $4155 in 2011. This is the largest portion of household income spent on gasoline in over 30 years.
42. In 2012, gasoline prices hit their highest winter level ever.
43. In March 2012, a Washington Post/ABC poll found 50% of respondents disapproved strongly of President Obama’s handling of the economy, an all time record.
44. Home values have experienced their worst decline since the Great Depression.
45. Home ownership has seen its largest decline since the Great Depression.
46. In the first quarter of 2012, the home ownership rate dropped to 65.4%, the lowest in 15 years.
47. Home foreclosures hit a record pace.
48. New home sales were first recorded 50 years ago and they reached their lowest level ever in 2011.
49. Existing home sales are on pace to be the lowest level since record keeping began in 1950.
50. Housing starts reached record lows.
51. Regional and strip mall vacancies hit 9.4%, an all-time high since record-keeping began in 2000.
52. In 2011, U.S. airlines had the fewest flights since 9/11, signifying a broad and pervasive industry downturn.
53. For the first time since the 1973 War Powers Resolution, a president has engaged in hostilities without seeking congressional approval. Obama is also the first president to engage in hostilities without seeking or receiving any form of congressional approval.
54. When Obama sent troops to central Africa, he engaged the U.S. in an unprecedented four simultaneous theaters of conflict.
55. Obama is the first president to order and carry out the assassination of a U.S. citizen.
56. Opinion polling in Muslim countries indicates in most of them approval of the U.S. has declined during the Obama administration.
57. Education achievement scores dropped across the board in 2011 and reading is now at the lowest level since 1972.
58. The Obama administration has deported undocumented immigrants at a record pace.
59. In 2012, the Pew Hispanic Center found a net outflow of Mexican immigrants from the U.S. This is the largest reversal in people moving across the U.S.-Mexico border since the Great Depression.
60. A 2012 report indicated that DOJ criminal prosecutions for securities and bank fraud were at a 20 year low.
61. Refusals of Freedom of Information Act requests jumped 50% under Obama.
62. Barack Obama has received more Wall Street campaign contributions than any politician over the past 20 years.
63. The 2010 elections saw record-level losses for Obama’s Democrats in Congress, state legislatures, and state governorships.
64. For the first time in memory, large numbers of protestors on both the political left and right have been motivated to take to the streets.
65. In 2011 the U.S. dropped to 24th, two places from the previous year, in the Transparency International perceived corruption index.
66. 2011 saw a record number of medication shortages in the U.S.
67. According to the book “Throw Them All Out”, the alternative energy loans and grants portion of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act may be the largest example of crony capitalism in U.S. history.
68. With Keystone XL, Obama became the first president to ever block a pipeline project.
69. A record 19 journalists and media executives have joined the White House or groups that support President Obama.
70. In 2011 a record number of Americans renounced their U.S. citizenship.
71. In 2012, only 33% had a favorable view of the federal government, a 15-year low.
72. Obama has had more re-election campaign fundraisers than all presidents since Nixon combined. He is the only president to visit all election battleground states during his first year in office.
“Afloat?” Leave us the hell alone and stop making us fund ridiculous social engineering schemes based on the “fact” whites are racists and we’ll do more than float. The Dem Party are dismantling the goose that laid the golden egg based on the complaints of illegal aliens, CAIR, feminists, gays, and black activists.
Kept us afloat. Now who is being disingenuous? This guy is a DISASTER. Get ready for QE3 and more bailouts for his voting base. He is one of the most most blatantly corrupt politicians EVER.
And we have a WINNER for the first person to blame Bush. You lose points however for atttempting to make the defense “Obama, he could have made it worse”.
Keep on whistling past the graveyard if that is what gets you through the night.
The clock is ticking quicker and quicker on midnight when this President gets to once again become a “community organizer”.
It never ceases to amaze me that all the people who blame Bush NEVER mention the FACT that there was a Democratic Congress causing the problems the last 2 years of office.
Bush saw the bubble burst coming and begged Congress to pull back from the looming Fannie Mae disaster.
The Dems — (Barney Frank, whose lover worked at Fannie) and Maxine Waters (powerful defender of Franklin Raines at Fannie) together with Dem operative Jamie Gorelick on the payroll at Fannie — all blocked any questions.
The rest is history. Except for Chris Dodd and Barney Frank (who ought to be in jail) retiring to the Good Life.
Bush tax cuts were a net gain for taxpayers as well as gubmint revenue. Lower rates yield more tax payments. Surprising since they were so puny, too. We need to move into the Reagan range of 20-25% across the board cuts and watch things soar. Tax revenues, too.
Well, you’ve got the Democrat talking points nailed down. Truth is the “outsourcing” of jobs is a myth. More jobs were created by trade relationships with other countries, that’s why unemployment was so low under Clinton and Bush.
I guess Bush will be blamed for our troubles at least until the end of the century. If we can blame Bush for our terrible problems now, after our new Dictator-In-Chief has been in office so long, When do we get to blame Obama? How blind and ignorant are the liberal and non legal citizens in the US?
The president should be qualified to lead our government with plans that will improve our nation. This guy knows nothing about it. After the years he has spent talking about how great he is and what great plans he has, nothing has improved.
Even if it were true that “It’s all Bush’s fault,” after all this time, at least one thing should be better for us. He only destroys with his socialist plans. What has Obama done to help or save us? He and his wrecking crew are making out real well. What about the rest of us?
If Obama sneaks his way in for another term, even those that support him will find themselves without their handouts. Will it still be Bush’s fault? Bush is nowhere near the white house now. Obama is the guy now. The communist organizer is in place. If the mouth in the white house remains, It will be the end of us. Our nation will not exist.
The policies leading to the 2008 economic collapse were Democrat in origin; at worst the big spending Republicans did not fight them strenuously enough (ie, pushing to limit the systemic risk posed by Fannie-Freddie – the Republicans’ regulatory structure proposed in 2005 were fought from the start by the democrats who made it clear they would fight to the end on the issue, surely not wanting the CRA act gravy train to terminate- just google Bawney Fwank’s taking a gamble on Fannie – Freddie).
When the Pelosi-Reid democrats took over Congress, unemployment was well below 5% and had been for a long time, annual economic growth neared 5%, the deficit was 400 billion, and every other metric was positive, and improving. Two short years of Reid Pelosi big spending and economic idiocy later, we had the collapse. Despite spending nearly all his time campaigning (sound familiar?), Obama was a big supporter of their far left wing policies. You cannot absolve Obama of the policies that so destroyed our economy just because Bush was POTUS – the democrats controlled Congress and rolled Bush every time (he was unaware he had a veto pen). The policies that brought us to ruin were Obama’s, even if he was one of 100 senators, they’re still his policies…
These facts also demonstrate why Obamanomics is such a miserable failure – they’re the same Pelosi-Reid big spending, job killing policies that so undid the Bush economic success (measured from when the Democrats took over Congress in 2006), only made exponentially worse by super-sizing them with 1.6 trillion dollar deficits…
Your man Obama is completely responsible for the economic collapse, and the failure to produce true recovery – and its because of HIS policies, including the ones he’s advocated and implemented since the end of 2006. Quit pretending he and the Democrats have been innocent bystanders in all this unnecessary suffering – they’re the authors of it.
America would kill to regain the Bush economic success before the Democrats took over Congress at the end of 2006 – but we won’t have to, we can vote the bum(s) out in November…
Tom, you tried to be a reasonable person. Wrong forum. Next time just try making up nasty things about the president. Don’t worry about the truth. You’ll be a hero.
Tom, Tom, Tom…. kept us afloat??? And ready to list & sink with 4 more years of Socialism with no concern about reelection. Kept is afloat is now the standard for reelection???
What has he done to help? I can’t think of a thing. Everything I’ve heard him propose I expected to cause everything to get worse, and I’ve been right.
I was thinking more along the lines of ‘what have we done to ourselves’. Buying cheap foreign goods, putting domestic producers out of business, and moving jobs overseas. No politician is talking about this because people don’t want to face the truth that we did it to ourselves, and now the jobs are gone.
In the light of this situation, what are the president’s(any president) options in helping to change this? We want a free market economy, but then we destroy it ourselves. Then we look to the president(any president will do) to fix it. Okay, so what are the president’s options here, to bring back the jobs that we ourselves sent overseas? This is what I see as the crux of our economic problems.
Tom,
Big government is the problem. Here is just an example of why less jobs are being created in the USA.
Intel CEO, Paul Otellini
Take factories. “I can tell you definitively that it costs $1 billion more per factory for me to build, equip, and operate a semiconductor manufacturing facility in the United States,” Otellini said.
The rub: Ninety percent of that additional cost of a $4 billion factory is not labor but the cost to comply with taxes and regulations that other nations don’t impose. (Cypress Semiconductor CEO T.J. Rodgers elaborated on this in an interview with CNET, saying the problem is not higher U.S. wages but antibusiness laws: “The killer factor in California for a manufacturer to create, say, a thousand blue-collar jobs is a hostile government that doesn’t want you there and demonstrates it in thousands of ways.”) http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-20014563-38.html
RY: Thanks for your thoughts. I looked at your article, and made some notes.
2004: Craig Barrett(Intel)
1. Education system(does not elaborate; I will have to follow up on his comments)
2005: Bill Gates
1. Foreign engineers being kicked out after they get their degrees.
2010: Otellini
1. Bush tax cuts should be extended;
2. businesses burdened with new regs. on healthcare and carbon;
3. capital gains taxes,
4. R&D tax credit.
2010: Fiorina(HP)
1. Corporate tax rate 35%, average among industrial nations:18.2%
2. skilled worker visa system
3. R&D tax credit not permanent
Otellini:
“Since an unusually sharp downturn accelerated in late 2008, the Obama administration and its allies in the U.S. Congress have enacted trillions in deficit spending they say will create an economic stimulus but
have not extended the Bush tax cuts(Q:TRUE? I thought they were extended)
and have pushed to levy extensive new health care and carbon regulations on businesses.”(Q:IN FORCE NOW?I have no clue on this.)
It seems that at least a few of these items could be addressed in short order:
1. The R&D tax credit(This would act as a counter-force to the government support realized by Chinese businesses(?).
2. The engineer/immigration issue.
3. Begin to reduce the corporate tax rate. And declare an intention to continue doing so.
I can support this, though I am not an expert on the likely effects on revenue of doing so.
Remember, though, this is really one industry. How many industries have we completely lost? Shoes, textiles, large appliances(my fridge is 15 years old, and I discovered it was made in Brazil!); even tooth brushes(we lost a brush company nearby 10 years ago); steel(are you aware of the new bridge to open on Labor Day, 2013, from Oakland to SF, completely made in China?).
Here’s another point I would like to throw out:
With the retirement of the baby boom generation, there will be many opportunities for jobs for those who are trained to perform them.
Possible to identify these jobs through Social Security records, and begin training for these positions? Or create incentives for apprenticeships?
The Liberal-Democrat response is going to be that Obama inherited the unemployment, the national debt was due to necssary bailouts, stimulus, the Iraq war, and the Bush tax cuts, the drilling permits are due to BP and the evil gouging oil companies, and that drilling won’t lower gas prices either. Romney better be prepared to counter these arguments if he’s going to convince the American public to vote for him and be able to penetrate the effect of the media/whitehouse propaganda points.
The social issues are by far the least important to the country, although more so to me personally. People must realize that Obama keeps us afloat on the ocean of fiat currency. It cannot continue. Inflation will take all our homes, all our savings, all our security. Eventually we will rot away with nothing and and no one will care if we worship devils or angels and sleep with animals vegetables or minerals. It’s suicide.
That food-stamp chart is very misleading, graphically. The number of people on food stamps has gone up significantly (almost 70%), but because the chart doesn’t scale to zero, it makes it look like it’s more than quintupled.
It clearly shows an increase from 23.5M to 39.5M. I agree at a glance it may appear slightly misleading, but come on. The opinions of anyone that can’t see that it roughly doubled shouldn’t count.
I still see Obama getting around 45% in some of the polls. I’m still just surprised that it’s that high. With the economy in such bad shape and our standing in the international community so low, I’m really beginning to wonder who out there thinks this guy is actually doing a good job and how he’s getting 45% of anything? If we can keep Republicans as enthusiastic about this race as they are now, I think Romney will win big time.
It is gonna be the biggest blowout election since McGovern and Carter will no longer be one of the last few presidents that were able to serve two terms in office much less the party, it just boils down to if you are a shitty president you don’t get to continue being one!
The truth is that about 28% of the non-black population is committed to the Demo/Enviro/Marxist League. About 90% of the black population is going to vote for 0 regardless. So, you get a base of 38-40%, give or take a few.
We can decipher these charts because we have skills and are logical. We think that freedom is how we want to ride and we don’t believe in free stuff, because it has a hook. The big “however” is the voting populace of the entitlement nation who would take the free stuff over freedom (which includes the freedom to fail when taking risks).
The Greek/Spanish/French drama in play tells us of the other edge of the sword. That public violently rejects austerity, fiscal discipline, and self reliance. Like addicts everywhere, the logic of the situation is overruled by the gratis of the fix.
The numbers game goes to the swing states. The propaganda and push goes to those who will never read those charts.
Have no fear Libertyship46 – Remember, the polls leading into fall 2010 were similar to what we see now and look what happened. Of course, the msm is going to pull out ALL of the stops to muddy the waters, but right will prevail…..keep the faith Brother!
The polls now are unreliably FAVORABLE to Lord Obama, for the simple reason that we do not have any clear idea how many people are self-identifying as Republicans or Independents who are actually registered as Democrats, but who are regretting the 2008 vote. If they are “switching” allegiances in a phone call, they will tend to underrepresent themselves, being shifted over into the Republican category, where they don’t really belong. The key statistic is this: how many of the people who voted for Mr. Obama in 2008 will vote for him now? I hardly think he will be peeling any votes away from the McCain bloc. So then, if but 3 out of 53 are peeled away, and another 1 out of the remaining 50 stays home, he loses.
The Bush Tax Cuts: How have they affected tax revenue?
The Bush tax cuts contributed, along with underlying economic conditions, to a historic decline in federal tax revenue. In 2000 total federal tax revenue was as high in proportion to the U.S. economy as it had ever been. By 2004 federal tax revenue in proportion to the economy had fallen to its lowest level in almost fifty years.
In recent decades the federal tax take has generally fluctuated between 17 and 19 percent of gross domestic product (GDP). By 2000, however, total federal tax receipts had reached 20.9 percent of GDP, their highest level since 1970 and matched only in 1944, when the federal government collected 20.9 percent of GDP in taxes at the height of fighting World War II. By 2004, however, federal tax receipts had fallen to 16.3 percent of GDP, which is not only the lowest level since 1970, but the lowest since 1959.
Most of the decline in the ratio of federal tax revenue to GDP can be traced to the individual income tax. From 1970 to 2000 these taxes were typically in the range of 8 to 9 percent of GDP. In 2000 individual income taxes were 10.3 percent of GDP, their highest level ever. By 2004 individual income taxes had dropped to 7.0 percent of GDP, their lowest level since 1951. Total federal tax revenue declined by 4.6 percent of GDP from 2000 to 2004; of that total, 3.3 percentage points, or almost three-quarters, was due to the decline in individual income tax revenue.
Most of the remaining decline in the revenue-to-GDP ratio resulted from a drop in the share in total revenue coming from corporate income taxes, which fell by 0.5 percent of GDP from 2000 to 2004, and a drop in the share coming from the payroll taxes that finance Social Security and Medicare, which declined by 0.4 percent of GDP over that period.
Hey, Tom, instead of using the now-laughable “It’s Bush’s fault” that Obama’s socialist policies have not worked in our capitalistic society/economy for nearly four years, how about asking yourself “What the f*ck is Obama doing with our money, our children’s money, and our grandchildren’s money?” Never mind all his other socialist/communist plans for Amerika (see “Julia” and “Dreams from My Father”, which is sounding more like Mien Kampf each day).
Here’s another one: What does it mean to be an “American”? Go read some history and find out why this country was founded. Then try to defend your Dear Leader.
Total federal revenues declined not only in 2001, but also in the following two years, according to CBO historical budget figures. In fiscal 2002, total revenues declined by $138 billion, and in fiscal 2003, they went down for a third year in a row — by nearly $71 billion. Revenues turned up in fiscal 2004, but didn’t reach pre-tax-cut levels until fiscal year 2005.
We pointed out these figures to the senator’s spokesman, Stephen Miller, who blamed the revenue declines of 2001, 2002 and 2003 on the 2001 recession. But that recession ended in November 2001, and federal revenues continued to go down for the next two years. And, as we noted, CBO determined that both income tax revenues and total overall revenues would have increased in 2001, if not for the tax cuts.
Miller also said Sessions was referring to the period after May 2003, when Bush signed the second, and smaller, of his two major tax reductions. But the fact remains that the largest of Bush’s cuts was “put in” starting in 2001, and significantly reduced federal revenues.
Because we all know that continually raising taxes, growing government, and out-of-control spending is the path to fiscal sanity, eh, Tom? Again, take a look at history and find out what Reagan and Clinton did to turn woeful economies around. (Big hint: NOT what Obama is doing.)
So tell us why you’re going to vote for Obama again?
When Reagan came into office, the marginal tax rate was 70%–much higher than when Bush came into office.
Remember that the Laffer Curve does have a peak *between* 0% and 100%. (This is mathematically necessary.) If marginal rates are already low, then cutting rates further won’t produce much additional incentive. And hence the economy won’t grow enough to generate enough additional revenue to make up for the cuts.
You can argue that the government just spends too much. But the argument that cutting taxes always generates more revenue is false.
The fact that the Bush tax cuts didn’t generate anywhere near as much additional tax revenue as the Reagan tax cuts, suggests that we are already on the low side of the Laffer Curve. At this point, cutting taxes only adds to the Federal deficit.
These data show that Mitt Romney is a heartless, insensitive plutocrat who mistreats dogs and must be defeated. We must not allow ourselves to be distracted by the sins of G.W. Bush, vile as they are.
Impressive first term record. Can’t wait to see what happens in his second term when he’ll be more flexible. Perhpas Greece will provide us with some financial assistance.
Lol, people like you folks who have no idea whatsoever what’s going on in the real world make me chuckle a bit, and then cry a bit, and then smile when I realize that in another 20 years the old people will be dead and there’ll be way less of this paranoid BS going around.
The Bush tax cuts created record revenue receipts in 2006,07, and 08 before the economy collapsed. Look it up. You can google US federal government tax receipts and get a year by year rundown.
Thanks, Miller, I found the numbers for the later years.
Revenues as %GDP Spending as % GDP
2005 2,2 trillion 17% 20
2006 2.4 18 20
2007 2.6 18 19
2008 2.5 18 21
2009 2.1 15 25
2010 2.2 15 24
I keep reading about how our children and grandchildren will suffer if he is re-elected. The reality is, if he is re-elected, it will be our grandparents, parents, US, our children and our grandchildren, and even their grandchildren that will suffer. If this continues to accellerate at the same rate it is now, the end will come much sooner than we think. Remember, he wont have re-election to worry about after Novenber…
Obama is so fond of saying everything he does is “unprecedented” or “historic”, I’ve made a hobby of compiling my list of evidence that, indeed, this is an historic presidency
1. For the first time in history, our AAA credit rating has been downgraded.
2. This is the slowest recovery from a recession since the Great Depression.
3. President Obama presided over the largest peace time economic stimulus in history.
4. Federal debt is increasing at the fastest rate in history.
5. No president before Obama had an annual federal deficit even approaching $1 trillion; Obama has not had a deficit below $1 trillion.
6. In April 2012, we had 40 straight months of federal deficit spending. The longest prior streak was 11 months.
7. Despite rhetoric to the contrary, corporate welfare (subsidies, tax breaks, bailouts, etc.) has increased dramatically from the $92 billion per year level it was at when Obama took office. Green energy spending alone quadrupled to over $18 billion.
8. Federal debt has exceeded Gross Domestic Product for the first time since 1947. We now join only six other nations with this distinction: Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, and Japan.
9. At 24%, federal spending as a portion of GDP is at its highest level since 1946. (OECD estimates combined federal, state and local spending is a whopping 41% of GDP.)
10. During Obama’s first 26 months in office, regulatory burden has increased by $38 billion. The number and cost of regulations is the largest for such a time period in history.
11. In March 2012, it was reported that new business start ups hit an all-time low.
12. The number of taxpayers who actually pay federal income tax reached 49%. Data going back to 1950 indicates this is a record low.
13. For the first time Treasury officials know of, private parties received priority over the federal government in a bankruptcy (the restructuring of the Solyndra loan).
14. The dollar fell to a record low against the Japanese yen.
15. In 2012, the U.S. dropped to tenth place on the Index of Economic Freedom, our lowest ranking since 1995, when the index was first calculated.
16. With other nations dropping their corporate tax rates, the U.S. had the highest corporate tax rate in the world in March 2012.
17. Unemployment remained above 9% and above 8% for the longest periods of time since the Great Depression.
18. Median length of unemployment is more than twice as high as it has been at any time in the past 50 years.
19. High school drop outs over age 25 are particularly vulnerable when it comes to employment. The 38 worst months of unemployment for this group have all come under the Obama administration.
20. The misery index (unemployment plus inflation) reached its highest level since 1983.
21. The percentage of the population that held a job hit 45.4%, down from a peak of 49.3% in 2000, the lowest level since 1983.
22. In 2010, 66.8% of men held a job, the lowest level ever recorded.
23. The number of people unemployed, marginally attached to the labor force, or working part-time rather than full-time has reached an unprecedented 26 million.
24. Unemployment by age group records were first kept in 1948 and unemployment among young adults (ages 18 to 29) is the highest on record.
25. Labor force participation has dropped to a 29-year low (63.7%), after a record one-month drop of 1.2 million people in January 2012. In March 2012 the number of people not in the labor force hit an all-time high of 88 million.
26. State and local governments have shed over half a million jobs, most of them since the end of the recession in 2009. State and local government job statistics have been kept since 1955 and this is the worst decline on record.
27. More people are on food stamps than ever.
28. Nearly half of all households has at least one person receiving federal benefits.
29. Direct federal payments to individuals increased a staggering 32% during the first three years of Obama’s administration.
30. Government transfer payments make up over 18% of all monies received by individuals, an all-time record.
31. The number of people receiving Social Security disability benefits increased 10% in Obama’s first two years.
32. The poverty rate is the highest since 1993.
33. The Heritage Foundation Dependency Index, a measure of dependency on government, has taken its biggest 2-year increase since the Carter Administration and is at an all-time high. In 2010, for the first time the per capita government spending on dependence programs exceeded per capita disposable income. Only about 20% of this rise can be attributed to the economic downturn.
34. Personal wealth declined $8.7 trillion from 2009 to 2011, the largest decline in history.
35. Household income has shrunk by 10% during Obama’s presidency, most of that coming after the end of the recession.
36. Disposable income, an indicator of standard of living, has been tracked for 50 years. It has dropped 4% in the past three years, the worst decline on record.
37. The percentage of young adults living with their parents is at the highest level since the 1950′s.
38. During the Obama administration there have been a record 5.4 million disability claims, a number that is more than twice the total of new jobs created.
39. Average annual family health care premiums topped $15000 for the first time ever.
40. Outstanding student loans hit record levels and are on pace to top $1 trillion this year.
41. The average annual gasoline expense was $4155 in 2011. This is the largest portion of household income spent on gasoline in over 30 years.
42. In 2012, gasoline prices hit their highest winter level ever.
43. In March 2012, a Washington Post/ABC poll found 50% of respondents disapproved strongly of President Obama’s handling of the economy, an all time record.
44. Home values have experienced their worst decline since the Great Depression.
45. Home ownership has seen its largest decline since the Great Depression.
46. In the first quarter of 2012, the home ownership rate dropped to 65.4%, the lowest in 15 years.
47. Home foreclosures hit a record pace.
48. New home sales were first recorded 50 years ago and they reached their lowest level ever in 2011.
49. Existing home sales are on pace to be the lowest level since record keeping began in 1950.
50. Housing starts reached record lows.
51. Regional and strip mall vacancies hit 9.4%, an all-time high since record-keeping began in 2000.
52. In 2011, U.S. airlines had the fewest flights since 9/11, signifying a broad and pervasive industry downturn.
53. For the first time since the 1973 War Powers Resolution, a president has engaged in hostilities without seeking congressional approval. Obama is also the first president to engage in hostilities without seeking or receiving any form of congressional approval.
54. When Obama sent troops to central Africa, he engaged the U.S. in an unprecedented four simultaneous theaters of conflict.
55. Obama is the first president to order and carry out the assassination of a U.S. citizen.
56. Opinion polling in Muslim countries indicates in most of them approval of the U.S. has declined during the Obama administration.
57. Education achievement scores dropped across the board in 2011 and reading is now at the lowest level since 1972.
58. The Obama administration has deported undocumented immigrants at a record pace.
59. In 2012, the Pew Hispanic Center found a net outflow of Mexican immigrants from the U.S. This is the largest reversal in people moving across the U.S.-Mexico border since the Great Depression.
60. A 2012 report indicated that DOJ criminal prosecutions for securities and bank fraud were at a 20 year low.
61. Refusals of Freedom of Information Act requests jumped 50% under Obama.
62. Barack Obama has received more Wall Street campaign contributions than any politician over the past 20 years.
63. The 2010 elections saw record-level losses for Obama’s Democrats in Congress, state legislatures, and state governorships.
64. For the first time in memory, large numbers of protestors on both the political left and right have been motivated to take to the streets.
65. In 2011 the U.S. dropped to 24th, two places from the previous year, in the Transparency International perceived corruption index.
66. 2011 saw a record number of medication shortages in the U.S.
67. According to the book “Throw Them All Out”, the alternative energy loans and grants portion of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act may be the largest example of crony capitalism in U.S. history.
68. With Keystone XL, Obama became the first president to ever block a pipeline project.
69. A record 19 journalists and media executives have joined the White House or groups that support President Obama.
70. In 2011 a record number of Americans renounced their U.S. citizenship.
71. In 2012, only 33% had a favorable view of the federal government, a 15-year low.
72. Obama has had more re-election campaign fundraisers than all presidents since Nixon combined. He is the only president to visit all election battleground states during his first year in office.
re the above comments: Read them and weep; Barack Hussein Obama (Jr.) and his minions will pull out all the stops and use all the angles this year to win (grab) re-election—unless we voters use all the resources at our command to prevent it. This is probably the most crucial election in our history of 220-plus years, and our children and grandchildren will be effected by the next four years for the rest of their lives. (And get ready for record level claims and occurrences of election fraud next year,)
Here’s the dirty little secret folks… the general population doesn’t think with a big picture perspective…. numbers, stats, graphs, charts…. meaningless to the majority of the ‘common man’ voter.
What does matter, you may be asking?
“What’s in it for me” is what matters, as evidenced by all the stats and graphs re increases in welfare recipients, increases soc, sec. disability filings, etc….
Obama has a real shot to get re-elected if his minions can AGAIN mobilize the large population of ‘undeserving deserve-ee’s’ to get out the vote.
Last elections, there was a long line… more than a mile winding up and down the streets in my city waiting to register to absentee vote. There were dem. hacks 100+ feet from the door (a regulation here) holding ‘sample’ ballots saying ‘if you don’t fill in the circle completely for Obama, your vote will not count’. Van loads of people were brought down to the board of elections to absentee vote. None of this was ‘covered’ on the news, just the long line and ‘isn’t it great that so many people are showing an interest in the election process….’.
The mentality for many is I don’t care about anyone else, I just want my freebies…. and don’t let them stop coming or there will be hell to pay.
Hope and change? More like Hope more than just change is going to be left in my pocket after November….
Obama has done more to divide our Country along racial and class lines than any President in History. I used to live in Berlin Germany in the middle of the Cold War with our Military while the Wall was up. I would go through “Checkpoint Charlie” into Communist East Berlin on a weekly basis (our Govermeant wanted us to go through as often as possible to keep our access to East Berlin open.) I saw first hand what Socialism looks like. It was the total pits. Obama is a Socialist, he said so in his book. Obama says he is a “citizen of the world.” I have traveled to 34 countries and speak conversational German but I AM A CITIZEN OF THESE GREAT UNITED STATES—NOT A CITIZEN OF THE WORLD. Remember what Obama said in his own words about “not wearing the American Flag PIN because he “didn’t want to take sides.” HE SHOULD HAVE BEEN IMPEACHED ON THAT STATEMENT ALONE. Sorry folks, but the EXPERIMENT DIDN’T WORK!!
How can you fault the man for following through on his campaign promise of “CHANGE?” It’s certainly a promise that he kept. How can you fault somebody that even gets dead people to register to vote through ACORN? How’s it possible that the most powerful military officer in the world never even spent one day in Basic Training since that would mean that he would have to defend America against aggretion and you can’t win any “Peace Prize” in the Armed Forces of you own nation that’s a free nation at war? Whoops, war? No it’s Jihad isn’t it, and you can’t get any votes from Jihadist translating the word “Jihad” can you. Want to make Federal buck$$$$$? Go sit on your butt an tell ‘em that you’ll be happy to go to Acorn an vote. Why weren’t the phoney votes of the last election tossed out? Lord knows that we could have employed worthy Americans to get the stats on the voter fraud that took place.
Be fair though because if it weren’t for Nancy Pilousey, O’Bummah wouldn’t have been able to produce his “change!”
Oh, and one more thing since I didn’t and won’t vote for O’Bummah I must be a “racist” right? After all it was a black guy at my six in the “Democratic Republic of South Vietnam” and I got home on a stretcher. All they could get to put him in was a black plastic bag.
Taken together, they’re nauseating.
I think people (those outside my circle) are playing “Message Received”. Excepting the 20% core progressives, no one wants to buy what golfer-in-chief is selling. No one can afford to anyway.
To better days, friends.
As we get closer to November, expect Democrats to pull out all the stops on getting Obama to remain in office. Let’s not get too over confident…but he is definitely having a bad week!
And yet Fox just posted poll results showing Obama up on Romney 46% to 39%??!!
So more bad news for Obama means dropping poll numbers for…Romney?
Either the sample was taken in downtown San Francisco or they’re just trying to energize Republicans. WTF?
It’s interesting that, no matter what poll is taken, Obama typically receives around 45%. Me thinks that’s his number come election day.
I think we can safely assume that Obamesiah will recieve 95% of the black vote and a minimum of 99% of the ballots of the Voting Dead.
You’ll note that the “Government dependency” number reported is 47% – very close to the 45% support level you noticed. Essentially we are at the point were the public has realized it can vote itself money earned by others – it’s time for us “others” to look at leaving.
Ignore polls.
Remember, most Americans are polite and will not yell out ‘You lie!’ even though they are thinking it.
Obama is a liar.
People do not want to be called a racist for not agreeing with the pollsters.
Remember the exit polls in 2004?
Same deal.
Either Obama will be replaced at the last minute with Hillary or we will have massive unrest leading to a military coup that makes Obama our defacto Dictator. I don’t see the progressives ever allowing a peaceful transfer of power back to the conservatives. They are too close to their Utopia to allow another set-back on par with the Reagan years. They have convinced themselves that AGW, population control, wealth redistribution, and LGBT civil rights are much too important to delay the revolution.
They are all-in at this point and will not give it back. The MSM are complicit, they have our education system and almost all of our cultural outlets. They also have almost half the country on entitlements and a half-step from 3rd world living conditions. They have laid the groundwork and it’s time to tip the scale. In other words, they didn’t just arrive and they are not interested in what voters have to say about it.
The number of people on food stamps is now 45 million and growing. The number of people filing for disability is also growing. I guess if you can’t find work, just claim that you are “mentally disabled” and get on the government gravy train. I guess the whole country should be depressed about Obama’s incompetence.
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2012/05/22-million-go-on-disability-since-mid.html
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/video/number-people-food-stamps-increases-13725538
It really is mind boggling that the government is spending over $100,000.00 a second with over $40,000 of it being borrowed to run the government. This will not end well.
Hope&Change! sure ain’t cheap.
Can we afford foru more years of it?
It is disingenuous to lay all of these economic problems at the feet of Obama.
Certainly, the Bush tax cuts had their impact. The bank failures had their impact. The balance of trade (imbalance, more precisely) has had it’s impact. And the jobs? We traded them for cheap imported goods; we traded long-term job security for short-term savings. Those jobs are now overseas.
I am no fan of Obama. My strongest objections are on social issues(pro-life, pro-traditional marriage). But fair is fair. Maybe he hasn’t done great, but under the circumstances, he has kept us afloat, and so far, out of disaster.
I agree the economic problems started before he got into office, but I also think what he has done in office has made them worse. And the things he has enacted, like Obamacare (if it survives) and the stimulus, has made any future recovery that much more tenuous.
It will be overturned by the Supreme Court, and it has already been leaked to Obama by one of the appointees to the Supreme Court he got on it! You will notice that he almost immediately responded by admonishing them not to do what they are gonna do which is effectively repealing or abolishing his crappy law!
Notice also he is not going around campaigning about this great law which is one onf the only thing he accomplished with the congress as president!
FYI the tax cuts raised tax reciepts to an all tone high. Don’t believe the deceptive ones, look it up.
was scrolling down waiting to read this. Everytime taxes are cut, tax revenue rises.
Nice theory, but not quite true. Revenues have generally gone up every year, mainly because the population increases. That includes under Carter, Reagen, Clinton, everybody. One exception is 2001, after the Bush tax cuts, when revenues dropped from around $2 trillion to $1.8 trillion.
Are you serious??!!?? Look at the charts – he is a disaster! Rest assured – if he gets re-elected, he will make the last 4 years look tame in comparison. For the sake of our children and grand-children, we have to get this man out of office. He has devastated our economy, our defense, and created more racial animosity than one could have imagined. He campaigns endlessly but fails to lead even minimally. Obamacare, if not struck down by the Supreme Court, will add additional trillions to our deficit.
Wake up, friend. Put aside the emotion and look at this rationally – look at the numbers and stop trying to find excuses for this man. He’s been a failed social experiment since his college days – we need to retire him and let him make inflammatory speeches to a shrinking body of sycophants for the next few decades.
The list again, for those that may have missed it:
31. Kermudjin
Obama is so fond of saying everything he does is “unprecedented” or “historic”, I’ve made a hobby of compiling my list of evidence that, indeed, this is an historic presidency
1. For the first time in history, our AAA credit rating has been downgraded.
2. This is the slowest recovery from a recession since the Great Depression.
3. President Obama presided over the largest peace time economic stimulus in history.
4. Federal debt is increasing at the fastest rate in history.
5. No president before Obama had an annual federal deficit even approaching $1 trillion; Obama has not had a deficit below $1 trillion.
6. In April 2012, we had 40 straight months of federal deficit spending. The longest prior streak was 11 months.
7. Despite rhetoric to the contrary, corporate welfare (subsidies, tax breaks, bailouts, etc.) has increased dramatically from the $92 billion per year level it was at when Obama took office. Green energy spending alone quadrupled to over $18 billion.
8. Federal debt has exceeded Gross Domestic Product for the first time since 1947. We now join only six other nations with this distinction: Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, and Japan.
9. At 24%, federal spending as a portion of GDP is at its highest level since 1946. (OECD estimates combined federal, state and local spending is a whopping 41% of GDP.)
10. During Obama’s first 26 months in office, regulatory burden has increased by $38 billion. The number and cost of regulations is the largest for such a time period in history.
11. In March 2012, it was reported that new business start ups hit an all-time low.
12. The number of taxpayers who actually pay federal income tax reached 49%. Data going back to 1950 indicates this is a record low.
13. For the first time Treasury officials know of, private parties received priority over the federal government in a bankruptcy (the restructuring of the Solyndra loan).
14. The dollar fell to a record low against the Japanese yen.
15. In 2012, the U.S. dropped to tenth place on the Index of Economic Freedom, our lowest ranking since 1995, when the index was first calculated.
16. With other nations dropping their corporate tax rates, the U.S. had the highest corporate tax rate in the world in March 2012.
17. Unemployment remained above 9% and above 8% for the longest periods of time since the Great Depression.
18. Median length of unemployment is more than twice as high as it has been at any time in the past 50 years.
19. High school drop outs over age 25 are particularly vulnerable when it comes to employment. The 38 worst months of unemployment for this group have all come under the Obama administration.
20. The misery index (unemployment plus inflation) reached its highest level since 1983.
21. The percentage of the population that held a job hit 45.4%, down from a peak of 49.3% in 2000, the lowest level since 1983.
22. In 2010, 66.8% of men held a job, the lowest level ever recorded.
23. The number of people unemployed, marginally attached to the labor force, or working part-time rather than full-time has reached an unprecedented 26 million.
24. Unemployment by age group records were first kept in 1948 and unemployment among young adults (ages 18 to 29) is the highest on record.
25. Labor force participation has dropped to a 29-year low (63.7%), after a record one-month drop of 1.2 million people in January 2012. In March 2012 the number of people not in the labor force hit an all-time high of 88 million.
26. State and local governments have shed over half a million jobs, most of them since the end of the recession in 2009. State and local government job statistics have been kept since 1955 and this is the worst decline on record.
27. More people are on food stamps than ever.
28. Nearly half of all households has at least one person receiving federal benefits.
29. Direct federal payments to individuals increased a staggering 32% during the first three years of Obama’s administration.
30. Government transfer payments make up over 18% of all monies received by individuals, an all-time record.
31. The number of people receiving Social Security disability benefits increased 10% in Obama’s first two years.
32. The poverty rate is the highest since 1993.
33. The Heritage Foundation Dependency Index, a measure of dependency on government, has taken its biggest 2-year increase since the Carter Administration and is at an all-time high. In 2010, for the first time the per capita government spending on dependence programs exceeded per capita disposable income. Only about 20% of this rise can be attributed to the economic downturn.
34. Personal wealth declined $8.7 trillion from 2009 to 2011, the largest decline in history.
35. Household income has shrunk by 10% during Obama’s presidency, most of that coming after the end of the recession.
36. Disposable income, an indicator of standard of living, has been tracked for 50 years. It has dropped 4% in the past three years, the worst decline on record.
37. The percentage of young adults living with their parents is at the highest level since the 1950′s.
38. During the Obama administration there have been a record 5.4 million disability claims, a number that is more than twice the total of new jobs created.
39. Average annual family health care premiums topped $15000 for the first time ever.
40. Outstanding student loans hit record levels and are on pace to top $1 trillion this year.
41. The average annual gasoline expense was $4155 in 2011. This is the largest portion of household income spent on gasoline in over 30 years.
42. In 2012, gasoline prices hit their highest winter level ever.
43. In March 2012, a Washington Post/ABC poll found 50% of respondents disapproved strongly of President Obama’s handling of the economy, an all time record.
44. Home values have experienced their worst decline since the Great Depression.
45. Home ownership has seen its largest decline since the Great Depression.
46. In the first quarter of 2012, the home ownership rate dropped to 65.4%, the lowest in 15 years.
47. Home foreclosures hit a record pace.
48. New home sales were first recorded 50 years ago and they reached their lowest level ever in 2011.
49. Existing home sales are on pace to be the lowest level since record keeping began in 1950.
50. Housing starts reached record lows.
51. Regional and strip mall vacancies hit 9.4%, an all-time high since record-keeping began in 2000.
52. In 2011, U.S. airlines had the fewest flights since 9/11, signifying a broad and pervasive industry downturn.
53. For the first time since the 1973 War Powers Resolution, a president has engaged in hostilities without seeking congressional approval. Obama is also the first president to engage in hostilities without seeking or receiving any form of congressional approval.
54. When Obama sent troops to central Africa, he engaged the U.S. in an unprecedented four simultaneous theaters of conflict.
55. Obama is the first president to order and carry out the assassination of a U.S. citizen.
56. Opinion polling in Muslim countries indicates in most of them approval of the U.S. has declined during the Obama administration.
57. Education achievement scores dropped across the board in 2011 and reading is now at the lowest level since 1972.
58. The Obama administration has deported undocumented immigrants at a record pace.
59. In 2012, the Pew Hispanic Center found a net outflow of Mexican immigrants from the U.S. This is the largest reversal in people moving across the U.S.-Mexico border since the Great Depression.
60. A 2012 report indicated that DOJ criminal prosecutions for securities and bank fraud were at a 20 year low.
61. Refusals of Freedom of Information Act requests jumped 50% under Obama.
62. Barack Obama has received more Wall Street campaign contributions than any politician over the past 20 years.
63. The 2010 elections saw record-level losses for Obama’s Democrats in Congress, state legislatures, and state governorships.
64. For the first time in memory, large numbers of protestors on both the political left and right have been motivated to take to the streets.
65. In 2011 the U.S. dropped to 24th, two places from the previous year, in the Transparency International perceived corruption index.
66. 2011 saw a record number of medication shortages in the U.S.
67. According to the book “Throw Them All Out”, the alternative energy loans and grants portion of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act may be the largest example of crony capitalism in U.S. history.
68. With Keystone XL, Obama became the first president to ever block a pipeline project.
69. A record 19 journalists and media executives have joined the White House or groups that support President Obama.
70. In 2011 a record number of Americans renounced their U.S. citizenship.
71. In 2012, only 33% had a favorable view of the federal government, a 15-year low.
72. Obama has had more re-election campaign fundraisers than all presidents since Nixon combined. He is the only president to visit all election battleground states during his first year in office.
“Afloat?” Leave us the hell alone and stop making us fund ridiculous social engineering schemes based on the “fact” whites are racists and we’ll do more than float. The Dem Party are dismantling the goose that laid the golden egg based on the complaints of illegal aliens, CAIR, feminists, gays, and black activists.
Kept us afloat. Now who is being disingenuous? This guy is a DISASTER. Get ready for QE3 and more bailouts for his voting base. He is one of the most most blatantly corrupt politicians EVER.
And we have a WINNER for the first person to blame Bush. You lose points however for atttempting to make the defense “Obama, he could have made it worse”.
Keep on whistling past the graveyard if that is what gets you through the night.
The clock is ticking quicker and quicker on midnight when this President gets to once again become a “community organizer”.
And for that, we thank you.
You misquote me.
..how did these people misquote you? Basically they deconstructed your Skittle-crapping Unicorn account of The Pantload’s Reign of Error.
“Afloat”?
..some turds float. This POTUS is the type that floats around in a punchbowl and ruins the party for everyone..
..except for tools like you who gladly ladle the stuff out along with the Kool-Aid and chu-a-lug it with mad abandon.
Ha Ha Ha Yassir u r an IDIOT!
It never ceases to amaze me that all the people who blame Bush NEVER mention the FACT that there was a Democratic Congress causing the problems the last 2 years of office.
Remember, Congress fell to the Dems in Jan, 2007.
Bush saw the bubble burst coming and begged Congress to pull back from the looming Fannie Mae disaster.
The Dems — (Barney Frank, whose lover worked at Fannie) and Maxine Waters (powerful defender of Franklin Raines at Fannie) together with Dem operative Jamie Gorelick on the payroll at Fannie — all blocked any questions.
The rest is history. Except for Chris Dodd and Barney Frank (who ought to be in jail) retiring to the Good Life.
Obama campaign troll.
Bush tax cuts were a net gain for taxpayers as well as gubmint revenue. Lower rates yield more tax payments. Surprising since they were so puny, too. We need to move into the Reagan range of 20-25% across the board cuts and watch things soar. Tax revenues, too.
“But fair is fair. Maybe he hasn’t done great, but under the circumstances, he has kept us afloat, and so far, out of disaster.”
Presumably what one passenger said to the other, about the ship’s captain, just before the Titanic hit that iceberg, a hundred years ago.
Well, you’ve got the Democrat talking points nailed down. Truth is the “outsourcing” of jobs is a myth. More jobs were created by trade relationships with other countries, that’s why unemployment was so low under Clinton and Bush.
Having him in the oval office has BEEN a disaster…
I guess Bush will be blamed for our troubles at least until the end of the century. If we can blame Bush for our terrible problems now, after our new Dictator-In-Chief has been in office so long, When do we get to blame Obama? How blind and ignorant are the liberal and non legal citizens in the US?
The president should be qualified to lead our government with plans that will improve our nation. This guy knows nothing about it. After the years he has spent talking about how great he is and what great plans he has, nothing has improved.
Even if it were true that “It’s all Bush’s fault,” after all this time, at least one thing should be better for us. He only destroys with his socialist plans. What has Obama done to help or save us? He and his wrecking crew are making out real well. What about the rest of us?
If Obama sneaks his way in for another term, even those that support him will find themselves without their handouts. Will it still be Bush’s fault? Bush is nowhere near the white house now. Obama is the guy now. The communist organizer is in place. If the mouth in the white house remains, It will be the end of us. Our nation will not exist.
The policies leading to the 2008 economic collapse were Democrat in origin; at worst the big spending Republicans did not fight them strenuously enough (ie, pushing to limit the systemic risk posed by Fannie-Freddie – the Republicans’ regulatory structure proposed in 2005 were fought from the start by the democrats who made it clear they would fight to the end on the issue, surely not wanting the CRA act gravy train to terminate- just google Bawney Fwank’s taking a gamble on Fannie – Freddie).
When the Pelosi-Reid democrats took over Congress, unemployment was well below 5% and had been for a long time, annual economic growth neared 5%, the deficit was 400 billion, and every other metric was positive, and improving. Two short years of Reid Pelosi big spending and economic idiocy later, we had the collapse. Despite spending nearly all his time campaigning (sound familiar?), Obama was a big supporter of their far left wing policies. You cannot absolve Obama of the policies that so destroyed our economy just because Bush was POTUS – the democrats controlled Congress and rolled Bush every time (he was unaware he had a veto pen). The policies that brought us to ruin were Obama’s, even if he was one of 100 senators, they’re still his policies…
These facts also demonstrate why Obamanomics is such a miserable failure – they’re the same Pelosi-Reid big spending, job killing policies that so undid the Bush economic success (measured from when the Democrats took over Congress in 2006), only made exponentially worse by super-sizing them with 1.6 trillion dollar deficits…
Your man Obama is completely responsible for the economic collapse, and the failure to produce true recovery – and its because of HIS policies, including the ones he’s advocated and implemented since the end of 2006. Quit pretending he and the Democrats have been innocent bystanders in all this unnecessary suffering – they’re the authors of it.
America would kill to regain the Bush economic success before the Democrats took over Congress at the end of 2006 – but we won’t have to, we can vote the bum(s) out in November…
Tom, you tried to be a reasonable person. Wrong forum. Next time just try making up nasty things about the president. Don’t worry about the truth. You’ll be a hero.
Tom, Tom, Tom…. kept us afloat??? And ready to list & sink with 4 more years of Socialism with no concern about reelection. Kept is afloat is now the standard for reelection???
Tom L.,
What has he done to help? I can’t think of a thing. Everything I’ve heard him propose I expected to cause everything to get worse, and I’ve been right.
I was thinking more along the lines of ‘what have we done to ourselves’. Buying cheap foreign goods, putting domestic producers out of business, and moving jobs overseas. No politician is talking about this because people don’t want to face the truth that we did it to ourselves, and now the jobs are gone.
In the light of this situation, what are the president’s(any president) options in helping to change this? We want a free market economy, but then we destroy it ourselves. Then we look to the president(any president will do) to fix it. Okay, so what are the president’s options here, to bring back the jobs that we ourselves sent overseas? This is what I see as the crux of our economic problems.
Tom,
Big government is the problem. Here is just an example of why less jobs are being created in the USA.
Intel CEO, Paul Otellini
Take factories. “I can tell you definitively that it costs $1 billion more per factory for me to build, equip, and operate a semiconductor manufacturing facility in the United States,” Otellini said.
The rub: Ninety percent of that additional cost of a $4 billion factory is not labor but the cost to comply with taxes and regulations that other nations don’t impose. (Cypress Semiconductor CEO T.J. Rodgers elaborated on this in an interview with CNET, saying the problem is not higher U.S. wages but antibusiness laws: “The killer factor in California for a manufacturer to create, say, a thousand blue-collar jobs is a hostile government that doesn’t want you there and demonstrates it in thousands of ways.”)
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-20014563-38.html
RY: Thanks for your thoughts. I looked at your article, and made some notes.
2004: Craig Barrett(Intel)
1. Education system(does not elaborate; I will have to follow up on his comments)
2005: Bill Gates
1. Foreign engineers being kicked out after they get their degrees.
2010: Otellini
1. Bush tax cuts should be extended;
2. businesses burdened with new regs. on healthcare and carbon;
3. capital gains taxes,
4. R&D tax credit.
2010: Fiorina(HP)
1. Corporate tax rate 35%, average among industrial nations:18.2%
2. skilled worker visa system
3. R&D tax credit not permanent
Otellini:
“Since an unusually sharp downturn accelerated in late 2008, the Obama administration and its allies in the U.S. Congress have enacted trillions in deficit spending they say will create an economic stimulus but
have not extended the Bush tax cuts(Q:TRUE? I thought they were extended)
and have pushed to levy extensive new health care and carbon regulations on businesses.”(Q:IN FORCE NOW?I have no clue on this.)
It seems that at least a few of these items could be addressed in short order:
1. The R&D tax credit(This would act as a counter-force to the government support realized by Chinese businesses(?).
2. The engineer/immigration issue.
3. Begin to reduce the corporate tax rate. And declare an intention to continue doing so.
I can support this, though I am not an expert on the likely effects on revenue of doing so.
Remember, though, this is really one industry. How many industries have we completely lost? Shoes, textiles, large appliances(my fridge is 15 years old, and I discovered it was made in Brazil!); even tooth brushes(we lost a brush company nearby 10 years ago); steel(are you aware of the new bridge to open on Labor Day, 2013, from Oakland to SF, completely made in China?).
Here’s another point I would like to throw out:
With the retirement of the baby boom generation, there will be many opportunities for jobs for those who are trained to perform them.
Possible to identify these jobs through Social Security records, and begin training for these positions? Or create incentives for apprenticeships?
The Liberal-Democrat response is going to be that Obama inherited the unemployment, the national debt was due to necssary bailouts, stimulus, the Iraq war, and the Bush tax cuts, the drilling permits are due to BP and the evil gouging oil companies, and that drilling won’t lower gas prices either. Romney better be prepared to counter these arguments if he’s going to convince the American public to vote for him and be able to penetrate the effect of the media/whitehouse propaganda points.
New campaign slogan: “Obama 2012: Hey, it’s not his fault.”
The new Obama 2012 slogan actually is “No really, he’ll do better next time.”
How about this:
Obama 2012 – “I didn’t do it; nobody saw me do it; it was like that when I got here”
I can’t see the forest because of the liberals.
I can’t see the forest because of all the bullshit!
The social issues are by far the least important to the country, although more so to me personally. People must realize that Obama keeps us afloat on the ocean of fiat currency. It cannot continue. Inflation will take all our homes, all our savings, all our security. Eventually we will rot away with nothing and and no one will care if we worship devils or angels and sleep with animals vegetables or minerals. It’s suicide.
The Welfare Spending chart does not include Obama’s term. Please add a newer version.
Good summary. Molte grazie!
That food-stamp chart is very misleading, graphically. The number of people on food stamps has gone up significantly (almost 70%), but because the chart doesn’t scale to zero, it makes it look like it’s more than quintupled.
It clearly shows an increase from 23.5M to 39.5M. I agree at a glance it may appear slightly misleading, but come on. The opinions of anyone that can’t see that it roughly doubled shouldn’t count.
Don’t worry, when we go “forward,” he’s going to fix everything.
He has LOTS of new ideas to fix everything! Here’s a partial list…
1. Raise taxes
2. Another stimulus
3. Distract w/social issues
4. Blame Bush
I still see Obama getting around 45% in some of the polls. I’m still just surprised that it’s that high. With the economy in such bad shape and our standing in the international community so low, I’m really beginning to wonder who out there thinks this guy is actually doing a good job and how he’s getting 45% of anything? If we can keep Republicans as enthusiastic about this race as they are now, I think Romney will win big time.
It is gonna be the biggest blowout election since McGovern and Carter will no longer be one of the last few presidents that were able to serve two terms in office much less the party, it just boils down to if you are a shitty president you don’t get to continue being one!
it’s 45% because the people who take the polls lie and because the people who answer the polls lie.
The truth is that about 28% of the non-black population is committed to the Demo/Enviro/Marxist League. About 90% of the black population is going to vote for 0 regardless. So, you get a base of 38-40%, give or take a few.
We can decipher these charts because we have skills and are logical. We think that freedom is how we want to ride and we don’t believe in free stuff, because it has a hook. The big “however” is the voting populace of the entitlement nation who would take the free stuff over freedom (which includes the freedom to fail when taking risks).
The Greek/Spanish/French drama in play tells us of the other edge of the sword. That public violently rejects austerity, fiscal discipline, and self reliance. Like addicts everywhere, the logic of the situation is overruled by the gratis of the fix.
The numbers game goes to the swing states. The propaganda and push goes to those who will never read those charts.
Obama thinks he took over a boat with a hole in it. Problem is his solution was to drill more holes in the boat to get rid of the water.
You have to laugh at people who say it isn’t deliberate.
If you don’t think it’s deliberate, YOU are part of the problem.
You can’t do 100 things in a row that destroy an economy and a country and just have bad luck.
Expect obama to add about 2-3% to his vote total by vote fraud. This means that romney will actually have to win by over 3% to win the election.
Have no fear Libertyship46 – Remember, the polls leading into fall 2010 were similar to what we see now and look what happened. Of course, the msm is going to pull out ALL of the stops to muddy the waters, but right will prevail…..keep the faith Brother!
The polls now are unreliably FAVORABLE to Lord Obama, for the simple reason that we do not have any clear idea how many people are self-identifying as Republicans or Independents who are actually registered as Democrats, but who are regretting the 2008 vote. If they are “switching” allegiances in a phone call, they will tend to underrepresent themselves, being shifted over into the Republican category, where they don’t really belong. The key statistic is this: how many of the people who voted for Mr. Obama in 2008 will vote for him now? I hardly think he will be peeling any votes away from the McCain bloc. So then, if but 3 out of 53 are peeled away, and another 1 out of the remaining 50 stays home, he loses.
The last screen-cap made me LOL! That should be Romney’s next ad
What oil spill?
The Bush Tax Cuts: How have they affected tax revenue?
The Bush tax cuts contributed, along with underlying economic conditions, to a historic decline in federal tax revenue. In 2000 total federal tax revenue was as high in proportion to the U.S. economy as it had ever been. By 2004 federal tax revenue in proportion to the economy had fallen to its lowest level in almost fifty years.
In recent decades the federal tax take has generally fluctuated between 17 and 19 percent of gross domestic product (GDP). By 2000, however, total federal tax receipts had reached 20.9 percent of GDP, their highest level since 1970 and matched only in 1944, when the federal government collected 20.9 percent of GDP in taxes at the height of fighting World War II. By 2004, however, federal tax receipts had fallen to 16.3 percent of GDP, which is not only the lowest level since 1970, but the lowest since 1959.
Most of the decline in the ratio of federal tax revenue to GDP can be traced to the individual income tax. From 1970 to 2000 these taxes were typically in the range of 8 to 9 percent of GDP. In 2000 individual income taxes were 10.3 percent of GDP, their highest level ever. By 2004 individual income taxes had dropped to 7.0 percent of GDP, their lowest level since 1951. Total federal tax revenue declined by 4.6 percent of GDP from 2000 to 2004; of that total, 3.3 percentage points, or almost three-quarters, was due to the decline in individual income tax revenue.
Most of the remaining decline in the revenue-to-GDP ratio resulted from a drop in the share in total revenue coming from corporate income taxes, which fell by 0.5 percent of GDP from 2000 to 2004, and a drop in the share coming from the payroll taxes that finance Social Security and Medicare, which declined by 0.4 percent of GDP over that period.
Hey, Tom, instead of using the now-laughable “It’s Bush’s fault” that Obama’s socialist policies have not worked in our capitalistic society/economy for nearly four years, how about asking yourself “What the f*ck is Obama doing with our money, our children’s money, and our grandchildren’s money?” Never mind all his other socialist/communist plans for Amerika (see “Julia” and “Dreams from My Father”, which is sounding more like Mien Kampf each day).
Here’s another one: What does it mean to be an “American”? Go read some history and find out why this country was founded. Then try to defend your Dear Leader.
Total federal revenues declined not only in 2001, but also in the following two years, according to CBO historical budget figures. In fiscal 2002, total revenues declined by $138 billion, and in fiscal 2003, they went down for a third year in a row — by nearly $71 billion. Revenues turned up in fiscal 2004, but didn’t reach pre-tax-cut levels until fiscal year 2005.
We pointed out these figures to the senator’s spokesman, Stephen Miller, who blamed the revenue declines of 2001, 2002 and 2003 on the 2001 recession. But that recession ended in November 2001, and federal revenues continued to go down for the next two years. And, as we noted, CBO determined that both income tax revenues and total overall revenues would have increased in 2001, if not for the tax cuts.
Miller also said Sessions was referring to the period after May 2003, when Bush signed the second, and smaller, of his two major tax reductions. But the fact remains that the largest of Bush’s cuts was “put in” starting in 2001, and significantly reduced federal revenues.
http://factcheck.org/2011/07/sessions-wrong-on-bush-tax-cuts/
Because we all know that continually raising taxes, growing government, and out-of-control spending is the path to fiscal sanity, eh, Tom? Again, take a look at history and find out what Reagan and Clinton did to turn woeful economies around. (Big hint: NOT what Obama is doing.)
So tell us why you’re going to vote for Obama again?
When Reagan came into office, the marginal tax rate was 70%–much higher than when Bush came into office.
Remember that the Laffer Curve does have a peak *between* 0% and 100%. (This is mathematically necessary.) If marginal rates are already low, then cutting rates further won’t produce much additional incentive. And hence the economy won’t grow enough to generate enough additional revenue to make up for the cuts.
You can argue that the government just spends too much. But the argument that cutting taxes always generates more revenue is false.
The fact that the Bush tax cuts didn’t generate anywhere near as much additional tax revenue as the Reagan tax cuts, suggests that we are already on the low side of the Laffer Curve. At this point, cutting taxes only adds to the Federal deficit.
These data show that Mitt Romney is a heartless, insensitive plutocrat who mistreats dogs and must be defeated. We must not allow ourselves to be distracted by the sins of G.W. Bush, vile as they are.
Send these charts to Letterman and ask him to explain why he said: ““What more do we want this man to do for us, honest to God?”
“What more do we want this man to do for us, honest to God?”
i think that letterman quote should be rephrased to read “What more do we expect this man to do to us?”
Impressive first term record. Can’t wait to see what happens in his second term when he’ll be more flexible. Perhpas Greece will provide us with some financial assistance.
Lol, people like you folks who have no idea whatsoever what’s going on in the real world make me chuckle a bit, and then cry a bit, and then smile when I realize that in another 20 years the old people will be dead and there’ll be way less of this paranoid BS going around.
Tom,
The Bush tax cuts created record revenue receipts in 2006,07, and 08 before the economy collapsed. Look it up. You can google US federal government tax receipts and get a year by year rundown.
Hahaha you don’t know how economics works. Good job guy!
http://www.usgovernmentrevenue.com/total_2006USrt_13rs1n
Federal direct revenue
2004: $1.9 Trillion
2005: $2.2 T.
2006: $2.4 T.
2007: 2.6 T
2008: 2.5 T.
Thanks, Miller. I had half the picture.
Thanks, Miller, I found the numbers for the later years.
Revenues as %GDP Spending as % GDP
2005 2,2 trillion 17% 20
2006 2.4 18 20
2007 2.6 18 19
2008 2.5 18 21
2009 2.1 15 25
2010 2.2 15 24
Sorry, my chart got clobbered in the upload.
I keep reading about how our children and grandchildren will suffer if he is re-elected. The reality is, if he is re-elected, it will be our grandparents, parents, US, our children and our grandchildren, and even their grandchildren that will suffer. If this continues to accellerate at the same rate it is now, the end will come much sooner than we think. Remember, he wont have re-election to worry about after Novenber…
Obama is so fond of saying everything he does is “unprecedented” or “historic”, I’ve made a hobby of compiling my list of evidence that, indeed, this is an historic presidency
1. For the first time in history, our AAA credit rating has been downgraded.
2. This is the slowest recovery from a recession since the Great Depression.
3. President Obama presided over the largest peace time economic stimulus in history.
4. Federal debt is increasing at the fastest rate in history.
5. No president before Obama had an annual federal deficit even approaching $1 trillion; Obama has not had a deficit below $1 trillion.
6. In April 2012, we had 40 straight months of federal deficit spending. The longest prior streak was 11 months.
7. Despite rhetoric to the contrary, corporate welfare (subsidies, tax breaks, bailouts, etc.) has increased dramatically from the $92 billion per year level it was at when Obama took office. Green energy spending alone quadrupled to over $18 billion.
8. Federal debt has exceeded Gross Domestic Product for the first time since 1947. We now join only six other nations with this distinction: Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, and Japan.
9. At 24%, federal spending as a portion of GDP is at its highest level since 1946. (OECD estimates combined federal, state and local spending is a whopping 41% of GDP.)
10. During Obama’s first 26 months in office, regulatory burden has increased by $38 billion. The number and cost of regulations is the largest for such a time period in history.
11. In March 2012, it was reported that new business start ups hit an all-time low.
12. The number of taxpayers who actually pay federal income tax reached 49%. Data going back to 1950 indicates this is a record low.
13. For the first time Treasury officials know of, private parties received priority over the federal government in a bankruptcy (the restructuring of the Solyndra loan).
14. The dollar fell to a record low against the Japanese yen.
15. In 2012, the U.S. dropped to tenth place on the Index of Economic Freedom, our lowest ranking since 1995, when the index was first calculated.
16. With other nations dropping their corporate tax rates, the U.S. had the highest corporate tax rate in the world in March 2012.
17. Unemployment remained above 9% and above 8% for the longest periods of time since the Great Depression.
18. Median length of unemployment is more than twice as high as it has been at any time in the past 50 years.
19. High school drop outs over age 25 are particularly vulnerable when it comes to employment. The 38 worst months of unemployment for this group have all come under the Obama administration.
20. The misery index (unemployment plus inflation) reached its highest level since 1983.
21. The percentage of the population that held a job hit 45.4%, down from a peak of 49.3% in 2000, the lowest level since 1983.
22. In 2010, 66.8% of men held a job, the lowest level ever recorded.
23. The number of people unemployed, marginally attached to the labor force, or working part-time rather than full-time has reached an unprecedented 26 million.
24. Unemployment by age group records were first kept in 1948 and unemployment among young adults (ages 18 to 29) is the highest on record.
25. Labor force participation has dropped to a 29-year low (63.7%), after a record one-month drop of 1.2 million people in January 2012. In March 2012 the number of people not in the labor force hit an all-time high of 88 million.
26. State and local governments have shed over half a million jobs, most of them since the end of the recession in 2009. State and local government job statistics have been kept since 1955 and this is the worst decline on record.
27. More people are on food stamps than ever.
28. Nearly half of all households has at least one person receiving federal benefits.
29. Direct federal payments to individuals increased a staggering 32% during the first three years of Obama’s administration.
30. Government transfer payments make up over 18% of all monies received by individuals, an all-time record.
31. The number of people receiving Social Security disability benefits increased 10% in Obama’s first two years.
32. The poverty rate is the highest since 1993.
33. The Heritage Foundation Dependency Index, a measure of dependency on government, has taken its biggest 2-year increase since the Carter Administration and is at an all-time high. In 2010, for the first time the per capita government spending on dependence programs exceeded per capita disposable income. Only about 20% of this rise can be attributed to the economic downturn.
34. Personal wealth declined $8.7 trillion from 2009 to 2011, the largest decline in history.
35. Household income has shrunk by 10% during Obama’s presidency, most of that coming after the end of the recession.
36. Disposable income, an indicator of standard of living, has been tracked for 50 years. It has dropped 4% in the past three years, the worst decline on record.
37. The percentage of young adults living with their parents is at the highest level since the 1950′s.
38. During the Obama administration there have been a record 5.4 million disability claims, a number that is more than twice the total of new jobs created.
39. Average annual family health care premiums topped $15000 for the first time ever.
40. Outstanding student loans hit record levels and are on pace to top $1 trillion this year.
41. The average annual gasoline expense was $4155 in 2011. This is the largest portion of household income spent on gasoline in over 30 years.
42. In 2012, gasoline prices hit their highest winter level ever.
43. In March 2012, a Washington Post/ABC poll found 50% of respondents disapproved strongly of President Obama’s handling of the economy, an all time record.
44. Home values have experienced their worst decline since the Great Depression.
45. Home ownership has seen its largest decline since the Great Depression.
46. In the first quarter of 2012, the home ownership rate dropped to 65.4%, the lowest in 15 years.
47. Home foreclosures hit a record pace.
48. New home sales were first recorded 50 years ago and they reached their lowest level ever in 2011.
49. Existing home sales are on pace to be the lowest level since record keeping began in 1950.
50. Housing starts reached record lows.
51. Regional and strip mall vacancies hit 9.4%, an all-time high since record-keeping began in 2000.
52. In 2011, U.S. airlines had the fewest flights since 9/11, signifying a broad and pervasive industry downturn.
53. For the first time since the 1973 War Powers Resolution, a president has engaged in hostilities without seeking congressional approval. Obama is also the first president to engage in hostilities without seeking or receiving any form of congressional approval.
54. When Obama sent troops to central Africa, he engaged the U.S. in an unprecedented four simultaneous theaters of conflict.
55. Obama is the first president to order and carry out the assassination of a U.S. citizen.
56. Opinion polling in Muslim countries indicates in most of them approval of the U.S. has declined during the Obama administration.
57. Education achievement scores dropped across the board in 2011 and reading is now at the lowest level since 1972.
58. The Obama administration has deported undocumented immigrants at a record pace.
59. In 2012, the Pew Hispanic Center found a net outflow of Mexican immigrants from the U.S. This is the largest reversal in people moving across the U.S.-Mexico border since the Great Depression.
60. A 2012 report indicated that DOJ criminal prosecutions for securities and bank fraud were at a 20 year low.
61. Refusals of Freedom of Information Act requests jumped 50% under Obama.
62. Barack Obama has received more Wall Street campaign contributions than any politician over the past 20 years.
63. The 2010 elections saw record-level losses for Obama’s Democrats in Congress, state legislatures, and state governorships.
64. For the first time in memory, large numbers of protestors on both the political left and right have been motivated to take to the streets.
65. In 2011 the U.S. dropped to 24th, two places from the previous year, in the Transparency International perceived corruption index.
66. 2011 saw a record number of medication shortages in the U.S.
67. According to the book “Throw Them All Out”, the alternative energy loans and grants portion of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act may be the largest example of crony capitalism in U.S. history.
68. With Keystone XL, Obama became the first president to ever block a pipeline project.
69. A record 19 journalists and media executives have joined the White House or groups that support President Obama.
70. In 2011 a record number of Americans renounced their U.S. citizenship.
71. In 2012, only 33% had a favorable view of the federal government, a 15-year low.
72. Obama has had more re-election campaign fundraisers than all presidents since Nixon combined. He is the only president to visit all election battleground states during his first year in office.
Thanks for this – it really helps offset the BS that Obama-bots like Tom T push.
Of your 72 points, how many relate to Bush’s policies?
I’m not a big fan of Obama but it is surprising how many people ignore the mess Obama inherited.
Those graphs are RACIST!1!!111
Treason is still punnishable by death in the United States!
re the above comments: Read them and weep; Barack Hussein Obama (Jr.) and his minions will pull out all the stops and use all the angles this year to win (grab) re-election—unless we voters use all the resources at our command to prevent it. This is probably the most crucial election in our history of 220-plus years, and our children and grandchildren will be effected by the next four years for the rest of their lives. (And get ready for record level claims and occurrences of election fraud next year,)
Here’s the dirty little secret folks… the general population doesn’t think with a big picture perspective…. numbers, stats, graphs, charts…. meaningless to the majority of the ‘common man’ voter.
What does matter, you may be asking?
“What’s in it for me” is what matters, as evidenced by all the stats and graphs re increases in welfare recipients, increases soc, sec. disability filings, etc….
Obama has a real shot to get re-elected if his minions can AGAIN mobilize the large population of ‘undeserving deserve-ee’s’ to get out the vote.
Last elections, there was a long line… more than a mile winding up and down the streets in my city waiting to register to absentee vote. There were dem. hacks 100+ feet from the door (a regulation here) holding ‘sample’ ballots saying ‘if you don’t fill in the circle completely for Obama, your vote will not count’. Van loads of people were brought down to the board of elections to absentee vote. None of this was ‘covered’ on the news, just the long line and ‘isn’t it great that so many people are showing an interest in the election process….’.
The mentality for many is I don’t care about anyone else, I just want my freebies…. and don’t let them stop coming or there will be hell to pay.
Hope and change? More like Hope more than just change is going to be left in my pocket after November….
Tom L: ” . . . kept us afloat”?? Are you serious?? No, actually, more like the Titanic . . . sinking FAST!!
Obama has done more to divide our Country along racial and class lines than any President in History. I used to live in Berlin Germany in the middle of the Cold War with our Military while the Wall was up. I would go through “Checkpoint Charlie” into Communist East Berlin on a weekly basis (our Govermeant wanted us to go through as often as possible to keep our access to East Berlin open.) I saw first hand what Socialism looks like. It was the total pits. Obama is a Socialist, he said so in his book. Obama says he is a “citizen of the world.” I have traveled to 34 countries and speak conversational German but I AM A CITIZEN OF THESE GREAT UNITED STATES—NOT A CITIZEN OF THE WORLD. Remember what Obama said in his own words about “not wearing the American Flag PIN because he “didn’t want to take sides.” HE SHOULD HAVE BEEN IMPEACHED ON THAT STATEMENT ALONE. Sorry folks, but the EXPERIMENT DIDN’T WORK!!
How can you fault the man for following through on his campaign promise of “CHANGE?” It’s certainly a promise that he kept. How can you fault somebody that even gets dead people to register to vote through ACORN? How’s it possible that the most powerful military officer in the world never even spent one day in Basic Training since that would mean that he would have to defend America against aggretion and you can’t win any “Peace Prize” in the Armed Forces of you own nation that’s a free nation at war? Whoops, war? No it’s Jihad isn’t it, and you can’t get any votes from Jihadist translating the word “Jihad” can you. Want to make Federal buck$$$$$? Go sit on your butt an tell ‘em that you’ll be happy to go to Acorn an vote. Why weren’t the phoney votes of the last election tossed out? Lord knows that we could have employed worthy Americans to get the stats on the voter fraud that took place.
Be fair though because if it weren’t for Nancy Pilousey, O’Bummah wouldn’t have been able to produce his “change!”
Oh, and one more thing since I didn’t and won’t vote for O’Bummah I must be a “racist” right? After all it was a black guy at my six in the “Democratic Republic of South Vietnam” and I got home on a stretcher. All they could get to put him in was a black plastic bag.
Y’all left out the stat on the outrageous rise of race related, black on white crime, and the gun sales…the largest growing market there is….