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Obama Worst President In History, According To 2004 Democrat Campaign Rhetoric

This is just too good.  Barack Hussein is far and away the very worst president in American history.  And that according to the very same standards that Democrats attacked George Bush with in 2004.

Democrats of 2004 Brand Obama Worst President
By Kevin Hassett – Jun 20, 2010

As we approach another general election, it will be interesting to see how the economic performance of Democrats is judged. If voters borrow the preferred method of John Kerry and other Democrats from 2004, Barack Obama will be revealed to be among the worst presidents in history.

During the 2004 election, Democrats constantly reminded voters that George W. Bush was the first president in decades to oversee a net loss of jobs.

The drumbeat was incessant. “This administration is the first since Herbert Hoover’s to actually lose jobs on its watch — 1.8 million jobs,” Kerry said at a campaign stop. His campaign chairman, Jeanne Shaheen, said Bush deserved “the first-ever ‘Herbert Hoover Award’ for having the worst jobs record since the Great Depression.”

The Hoover analogy was a stretch, as some recognized even back then. The watchdog election site factcheck.org wrote, “Comparing the Bush economy to Hoover’s Great Depression is just silly, and implying that tax cuts are not contributing to job growth deserves an ‘F’ in freshman economics.”

As an adviser to the Bush re-election campaign, I regularly rebutted the Hoover charge when I appeared on television to debate Kerry supporters in 2004. Here’s what I said then, and still say now: While some presidents arrive in Washington during boom times, others come during busts, and those often are the ones elected precisely because voters hope that they will change economic policies.

Jobless Recovery

Bush arrived just as the last recession was beginning — a bit of timing that Obama can relate to. Though that recession was brief, the subsequent jobless recovery did little to strengthen Bush’s record as he entered his reelection year.

Obama, of course, is just 17 months into his presidency, and more than two years from facing the voters personally. But with a big midterm congressional election upcoming, let’s see how Obama would fare if Kerry-like tactics were used on him.

The answer: not well. Whether the measurement is job creation, unemployment or growth of gross domestic product, the economy has been worse under Obama than it was under Bush.

First, job creation. According to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the U.S. shed 2.3 million jobs since February 2009, Obama’s first full month in office. Going back to World War II, that is by far the worst record for any president in his first 17 months, outpacing the job destruction experienced in the early Bush years by more than 800,000 jobs.

Campaign Fodder

For Obama, there is an even worse way to play the data, which might just become fodder for a political ad: From November 2008, the month he was elected, until now, the economy has shed an astonishing 4.4 million jobs. That’s worse than Hoover.

Sure, you can blame the first few months of that period on lame-duck President Bush. But perhaps companies accelerated their shedding of jobs because they were bracing for higher tax rates, increased union power and costly environmental taxes under Obama.

Other measurements are only slightly kinder to Obama. The two-percentage-point increase in unemployment rate during his presidency, to 9.7 percent from 7.7 percent, is the third-worst since World War II. Dwight Eisenhower and Gerald Ford saw bigger increases.

GDP growth under Obama, an abysmal 3 percentage points so far, is the fourth-worst in the postwar period. Eisenhower, Ford and Ronald Reagan all began their terms with worse GDP growth.

But hey, it was Kerry and the Democrats who made job creation the be-all and end-all measurement of a presidency, and by that standard, Obama is dredging a new low. It’s probably a good bet that Democrats who became so enamored of Hoover’s name in 2004 won’t be mentioning it much this year.

Republicans should be willing to drop it too — so long as some economic adviser to Kerry-Edwards ‘04 admits the campaign was wrong to bring up Herbert Hoover in the first place.

(Kevin Hassett, director of economic-policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute, is a Bloomberg News columnist. He was an adviser to Republican Senator John McCain in the 2008 presidential election. The opinions expressed are his own.)

So if you want to see the case that Barack Obama is the worst president in history, don’t bother reading what conservatives say; just listen to Democrats own rhetoric from just a few years ago.

This article’s findings as to just what a disaster Obama has been even measuring by the Democrats’ own standards does not include the recent information that Obama’s mortgage modification program has totally failed in every way imaginable, and that sales of new homes has fallen to the lowest level ever recorded? It was the mortgage industry that created the 2008 collapse – and Obama has done nothing but make a black hole of crisis even worse.

I can’t even imagine how shrilly the Democrats would have decried those facts had they occurred during the Bush years.

And, to go on, you want to talk about a president’s ability to handle a national disaster such as the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, day 64?  No matter how bad you want to say Bush was regarding Hurricane Katrina, Bush is now widely recognized to have done a far superior job.  How about war fighting?  Bush won in Iraq; Obama is floundering enormously in Afghanistan.

Basically, by whatever metric you want to use, Obama is the biggest disgrace to ever occupy the White House.

If this doesn’t prove that Democrats are a) pathological demagogues and b) completely unfit to govern, what possibly could?

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This entry was posted on June 23, 2010 at 8:58 am and is filed under Afghanistan, Barack Obama, Conservative Issues, Economy, George Bush, military, Politics, War. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

21 Responses to “Obama Worst President In History, According To 2004 Democrat Campaign Rhetoric”

  1. panjo Says:
    July 1, 2010 at 1:46 pm

    Your an idiot!!

  2. Michael Eden Says:
    July 1, 2010 at 9:03 pm

    Well, Mr. genius, all I can say in response is that if you’re going to call me an idiot, you probably shouldn’t use a possessive pronoun in place of the contraction you were clearly striving for but just not quite smart enough to pull off.

    The bottom line is that you really look like an idiot calling me an idiot.

  3. Michael K. Cantwell Says:
    August 9, 2010 at 7:36 am

    Bush took office at a time when the federal government was running a surplus and had an accumulated national deficit of roughly $5 trillion dollars. In his eight years he doubled the deficit, adding $5 trillion by launching two unpaid-for wars, one unpaid-for $1.7 trillion gift to the pharmaceutical industry (Medicare Part D) and two tax cuts designed to spur the economy. How did that work out?

    A study by the American City Business Journals in 2009 reported the following figures for job growth under post-WW II presidents (in descending order, with the top 4 presidents being Democrats, 5 of the top 6 Democrats, and the bottom 5 all Republicans, with Dumb and Dumber bringing up the rear):

    LBJ, 3.7%
    Carter, 3.11%
    Clinton, 2.42%
    Truman, 2.38%
    Nixon, 2.3%
    JFK, 2.28%
    Reagan, 2.04%
    Ford, 0.95%
    Ike, 0.87%
    Bush Pere, 0.59%
    Bush Fils, 0.28%

    http://www.bizjournals.com/jacksonville/stories/2009/01/19/daily7.html

    You are a clown

  4. Michael Eden Says:
    August 10, 2010 at 12:51 pm

    I’m going to respond to your post, Michael, and then I’m going to block you. People who begin their posting to me using personal attacks are not worth having a sustained dialogue with. If I ever go to your blog and start out by personally insulting you, please feel free to block me, too.

    It’s rather funny that you would call me a “clown” and then use as clownish an argument as one can find. Essentially, you’re argument is that Obama’s unprecedented massive spending is fine, because Bush (whom you condemn) spent a lot of money too. So you demonize Bush for spending, but refuse to criticize Obama even though Obama is spending three times more than Bush.

    Bush did some really bad things. When he said he was abandoning the free market system in order to save it, that was bad. When he passed that prescription drug act that you mention, that was bad. Nowhere near as bad as ObamaCare – which is the prescription drug program on mega-steroids – but it was bad. So I’ll tell you what: I’ll demand that Bush leave in disgrace if you demand Obama leave in disgrace.

    You go on to cite an op-ed by some guy writing in some pissant journal as though it’s somehow supposed to be accepted as some universal standard of measuring presidential worthiness? Really? And in particular, one that presents JIMMY CARTER as worthy of being the fifth face on Mt. Rushmore? Really?

    Bush created 52 consecutive months of job growth. That’s pretty darn good. It was either the longest or second longest streak for job growth ever recorded. Jimmy Carter could only dreamed he could have had that kind of record. And Bush’s average unemployment rate throughout his presidency was 5.2%. Same as Clinton.

    Let’s just take some numbers you present and go from there.

    Okay. Bush increased the national debt by five trillion, leaving us with a $10 trillion national debt. That’s really bad. Again, Bush should leave office in disgrace for that kind of spending.

    But the national debt is now over $13 trillion under Obama. Obama added three trillion to the debt in only 18 months. By the same measure you use to damn Bush, Obama should be triple damned. Obama should be impeached, don’t you agree, Mr. Damn-Bush-for-Spending?

    So let’s do the math. On the same eight year average in which Bush added $5 trillion, Obama will have added $16 trillion. Obama is spending at a rate more than three times Bush. And it is your contention that Bush was a failure for less than 1/3rd the spending that Obama is responsible for.

    Just ONE Obama bill – his so-called stimulus – is ultimately going to add $3.27 trillion to the national debt, according to the Congressional Budget Office:

    The gargantuan stimulus bill Congress has rubber-stamped with virtually no Republican support contains tens of billions of the very spending projects that made the legislation a lightning rod for criticism.

    And although the bill is generally described as costing $787 billion, the Congressional Budget Office reports the actual figure is now closer to $3.27 trillion.

    That stems from the $744 billion it will take to pay for the additional debt the legislation will create, and $2.527 trillion in increased spending from the new and expanded programs the bill will spawn over the next decade.

    Does that actually seem fair to you to attack Bush when Obama’s spending is that much worse? Are you that much of an ideologue?

    Do you understand why people like me just mock people like you?

    Bush deficits were 2-3% of the GDP. Obama’s deficit is 12.8% of GDP – which is five to six times higher than anything Bush gave us. Because not only did Bush have far lower deficits than Obama, but his economy was far stronger and produced far more. And that leaves us in a far more vulnerable position. Obama’s spending is completely out-of-control and we are now so far overextended it is beyond unreal.

    Obama expanded the government budget by nearly a third larger than when Bush left it just his first year. Bush never expanded government by more than 6% in any year.

    Now, having said that, I have to correct you and correct the record: it wasn’t CLINTON who gave us a deficit surplus. It was a Republican Congress that gave us a deficit surplus in fulfillment of their central plank of the Contract with America.

    I’m going to quote myself from another article I’ve written:

    Bill Clinton is widely hailed for presiding over a great economy that featured a budget surplus.

    But let’s consider a very basic fact:

    From the Herald-Journal, January 27, 1984”

    If you took a quiz on government and were asked who writes the national budget, would you answer “The President” or “The Congress”?

    The correct answer is “The Congress.”

    The U.S. Constitution says that power belongs to Congress. All through our history, the Congress has exercised that power. The president cannot spend one thin dime that has not been approved by Congress.

    Article One of the Constitution of the United States refutes the argument that Bill Clinton should receive credit for his “surplus”. It was the Republican-dominated CONGRESS featuring promises that stemmed from the Contract with America, that resulted in the healthy budget that Clinton the media gave Clinton credit for producing. Even though all he did was sign (often after vetoes) that which Republicans had actually produced.

    What we don’t get told very was that Bill Clinton did such a miserable job running the country for his first two years in office that he suffered the largest (at least until this coming November) political defeat in American history when the Republicans swept into power over both the House and the Senate. We’re not told that Republicans continued to be the majority party in both the House and Senate during the years that the media assigned Clinton all the credit.

    It was those Republicans who were most responsible for the good times that resulted. They are most certainly responsible for the budget surpluses that Democrats have congratulated themselves for ever since. The very first item on the Republicans’ agenda was the Fiscal Responsibility Act.

    One quick example of these Republican changes was welfare reform. In his 1996 State of the Union, after losing even more fights, Bill Clinton was famously forced to admit, “The era of big government is over.” And Republicans were making that statement true by passing welfare reform legislation and an avalanche of other cost-cutting measures that made a budget surplus possible.

    Two welfare reform bills were passed by the Republican Congress, which Clinton vetoed. Then a third bill was passed by the Republicans, which Clinton finally signed. The National Organization for Women noted:

    “There is little difference between the welfare bill (H.R.4) which the president vetoed in January and the new plan H.R. 3734/S 1795.”

    An analysis by Steven Dawson for the Saint Louis University Law Journal observed that:

    “In fact, President Clinton vetoed two largely similar prior versions of the bill.”

    All rhetoric aside, Bill Clinton was FORCED to sign welfare reform into law by the Republican Congress. Just as he was FORCED into a balanced budget, and any subsequent budget surplus.

    But after being literally dragged into signing it, Bill Clinton took credit for it as though it had been his idea all along. And the media duly reported that slanted history as a matter of “fact.”

    That said, we can also point out that “the Clinton budget surplus” also had a lot to do with budgetary smoke and mirrors.

    And like I said, the same media that will never give Republicans credit for something good will never give Democrats blame for something bad.

    Consider the last three plus years’ worth of reckless spending. The Bush administration has been blamed for much of this reckless spending, but it was actually a Democrat Congress that swept into power in 2006 (largely due to what we can now readily see was hypocritical demagoguery over the Iraq War and Hurricane Katrina rather than any economic issue) which proceeded to spend America into the stratosphere:

    For the record, the last budget from a Republican President AND a Republican Congress – FY-2007 (passed in 2006) – resulted in a$161 billion deficit at a time when unemployment was 4.6%. That’s what happened the last time the GOP was in control.

    What happened when the Democrats took control in January 2007? Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi passed a FY-2008 budget that had a $459 billion deficit – nearly three times the deficit in the immediately previous Republican-passed budget. Three times. And this before the financial crisis that somehow “necessitated” all this massive spending.

    Now, that’s a pretty crazy increase under Democrat control. But you aint seen nothin’ yet.

    The Democrats passed a FY-2009 budget with a staggering, mind-boggling, totally reckless $1.42 TRILLION deficit.

    The FY-2010 budget approved by Reid and Pelosi and signed by Obama had an estimated $1.6 TRILLION deficit.

    The deficit has increased from $161 billion in the last budget before Democrats took control of the Congress (FY 2007) to $1.42 trillion in the most recent fiscal year (FY 2009)—an increase of $1.26 trillion or 782%.

    With three months remaining in the fiscal 2009 budget, the federal deficit just officially passed the $1 trillion mark. Worse yet, Obama borrowed more than forty cents for every single dollar he spent.

    We also suffered a budget shortfall of $94 billion in the month of June, which marks the first June in more than ten years (read, “encompassing the entire Bush presidency”). Bush’s success in raising revenues is bookended by two Democrat presidents who failed.

    And now the Democrats aren’t even bothering to pass a budget for the next fiscal year, so they can simply spend without any accountability whatsoever.

    The old annual deficits under Republicans have now become the monthly deficits under Democrats:

    In the 12 years that Republicans controlled the House, the average deficit was $104 billion (average of final deficit/surplus FY1996-FY2007 data taken from Table F-1 below). In just 3 years under Democrats, the average deficit is now almost $1.1 trillion (average of final deficit/surplus FY2008 and 2009 data taken from Table F-1; FY2010 data taken from Table 1-3). Source: CBO January 2010 Budget and Economic Outlook

    Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Minority Whip) rightly pointed out on ABC’s “This Week”:

    “If you look at the kind of deficit that we’ve incurred over the last three years that the Democrats have been in control of Congress, 60% of the overall deficit from the last ten years has occurred in that period. And frankly with the incurrence of the debt, we’ve seen very little result. That’s why we think we ought to choose another way.”

    And yet the media falsely blame BUSH and Republicans for that spending, rather than Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and the Democrat-controlled House and Senate, even though factually speaking the Democrats were ENTIRELY to blame for every single penny that was spent from January 2007 on. Because our Constitution forbids a president from spending; it is CONGRESS that spends.

    I also point out in that article (and many others such as this one) that Democrats were primarily responsible for the disastrous policies that led to the 2008 collapse. They were basically completely responsible for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and their reckless policies, and then utterly refused to allow any reforms that would have averted the ensuing disaster.

    In an honest world, Bill Clinton wouldn’t get anywhere near as much credit as he does for the strong economy of the 1990s. And Republicans wouldn’t get anywhere near as much blame as they received for the 2008 collapse.

    The fact of the matter is that Bush wasn’t anywhere near as bad as demagogues such as you make him out to be.

    Whereas Barack Obama even worse than you accused Bush of being.

    Buh-bye.

  5. Ivelisse Says:
    August 13, 2010 at 10:34 pm

    Wow, you are incredibly talented and an eye opener! We need people like you to educate everyone! Good for you, keep the good work :)

  6. Michael Eden Says:
    August 13, 2010 at 10:51 pm

    Thank you for your gracious words, Ivelisse.

    You got one of my reasons for blogging: educating people about the truth.

    For the record, the other is leaving behind a record of what this terrible president did to destroy America at a time when great leadership was needed most.

  7. hanna Says:
    August 18, 2010 at 8:43 am

    I hope you don’t mind if i write down what you wrote to share with my very democratic sister’s. Your perceptions are great!

  8. Michael Eden Says:
    August 18, 2010 at 8:48 pm

    Thank you, Hanna.

    Mind? My purpose for blogging was 1) to get the word out, and help conservatives present a conservative case, and 2) to preserve a record of this incredibly failed presidency and Democrat Congress.

    I am delighted you are trying to reach out to your sister, just as I am delighted you find my work helpful.

    I’m saying a prayer for you and your sister and your outreach to her as I type!

  9. Anonymous Says:
    August 19, 2010 at 6:25 pm

    You’re (you are) right on. Obama’s politics make me sick. He is ruining our country and is backwards in his economic understandings. He surrounds himself with so many liberals who have no clue how to create jobs. They care more about an endangered fish than people being able to feed their families. So many people who voted for him, did not listen but are now finding out who he really is. I can not wait for the American people to have their voices HEARD in the upcoming elections. The presidential elections will not be here soon enough. His kind is a cancer that the American people will have to cut out of our government.

  10. Michael Eden Says:
    August 19, 2010 at 8:40 pm

    Well, let’s be fair. Liberals don’t just put “fish” over people; they put “Delta Smelt fish” over people.

    What, are you an arrogant specist who thinks your child is more important than a Delta Smelt? Particularly in a state where the Democrat vote has long-since been bought and paid for, such that the people who are literally left to die so the Delta Smelt can live don’t matter whatsoever?

    I’m joking, of course. Great comment. Agree with every word.

    Obama has fewer cabinet officials who have any business experience at all than any president in the 20th century.

  11. Kleinfeld Says:
    August 20, 2010 at 8:24 pm

    In Europe people laugh at us leaving in false dreams, wall streets spending false money, Bush starting a false war etc.

    America is the land of dreams, how come? Idiots like George Bush can get elected to president. If he can Become president, then what can the smart people do? Jump to pluto?.

    Do you really expect Obama to fix the worst recession in 80 years in a bit more than 18 months? Which was created by 8 years of Reagan, 4 years by bush, Clinton’s last period and 8 years by Bush? What is he some kind of god?
    I didn’t vote for Obama but I expect him to put us in the right direction in this 6 years (he most likely) has left. in 2007-2008 they estimated that the recession will peak in 2012, so there is still a lot left. Just imagine how it would be with Palin/McCain. McCain who wanted to keep Bush’s politics moving and Palin who thought Africa was a country.

  12. Michael Eden Says:
    August 22, 2010 at 8:28 am

    First of all, I must pause to mock you for making Europe the gold standard of measurement. I guess if you like Nazism, fascism, Marxism, socialism, and genocide up the wazoo, Europe must be the coolest place on earth. I can see why you lefties love it so much.

    What was it that Jefferson said? “The comparison of our governments with those of Europe, is like a comparison of heaven and hell.” Not that you give a damn what Jefferson said about anything.

    Let me assure you that the Iraq War – which 60% of Democrat Senators voted to authorize (just for the record) – was a REAL war indeed.

    Here’s a record of how Democrats were for that war before they were against it:

    Truth or Fiction
    Freedom Agenda
    Snopes

    And at least Bush had the decency to actually WIN his war. Barack Obama demonized the Iraq War and demonized the surge strategy that enabled us to win it. And Obama made Afghanistan “his war” in order to maintain the facade that he really wasn’t a weakling on foreign policy. Bush did so well in Iraq that the Obama administration actually tried to take credit for the victory. And now we’re “floundering in Afghanistan” under Obama’s failed leadership.

    That Sarah Palin who thought Africa was a country thing? False, you demagogue. It was a made-up “fact” that was reported as truth. And the ONLY documented “source” behind it has been revealed to be a hoax.

    Now, you want to see a REAL idiot in action? How about a guy running for president who thinks there are 58 states? This is a man who is so fundamentally ignorant he doesn’t even know jack squat about his own country.

    Youtube:

    Quote:

    “It is wonderful to be back in Oregon,” Obama said. “Over the last 15 months, we’ve traveled to every corner of the United States. I’ve now been in 57 states? I think one left to go. Alaska and Hawaii, I was not allowed to go to even though I really wanted to visit, but my staff would not justify it.”

    So let’s talk about what a total and absolute ideologue you are to condemn Sarah Palin for a bogus fabricated quote that she didn’t even say, and to then defend a guy who is on video saying something about 20 times as stupid. Because that’s how the Democrat Party operates, in a nutshell.

    For the factual record, Obama actually called Europe a country. How is that not just as stupid as calling Africa a country?

    Youtube:

    Quote:

    “One of the things that is a huge advantage for America compared to countries like Europe is, actually, we’re constantly replenishing ourselves with hungry, driven people who are coming here, and they want to work, and they start a business, and our population is younger and more dynamic, and that’s a good thing!”

    Which is to say that Obama is unfit to be president by your own deceitful example.

    And as for Bush being an idiot, at least he didn’t need a pair of damn teleprompters to say his name right. Maybe Bush would have sounded more “intelligent” to you if he read absolutely everything he said at every venue he went to off his teleprompters.

    Here’s Obama without his teleprompter for one minute:

    Which is why he needs to bring one everywhere – even to sixth grade classrooms – to not sound like the gibbering idiot he truly is.

    So, oh, yeah, the country is much better off with its “Genius-in-chief,” isn’t it?

    You don’t give one damn about the truth; you live in your own self-created reality in which Sarah Palin is stupid for something that she never said, while Barack Obama who said something stupider than Sarah Palin ever said in her life is still brilliant.

    You would be completely ashamed of yourself, if you were capable of that attribute of moral character.

    I write an article that shows how BY THE DEMOCRATS VERY OWN STANDARD OF MEASUREMENT Obama is the worst president in American history. And you’ve got nothing to say about that. Nothing but more “blame Bush.”

    Another demonstration of your rabid leftist ideology that will NOT be fair: the economy goes into an absolute TOILET under Obama, but he’s not responsible for any of his policies.

    The unemployment rate was 7.6% when Bush left office. But Obama is not responsible for the fact that it’s near 10% now and by most expert accounts will rise higher after he pissed away $862 billion (actually $3.27 TRILLION) in his boondoggle “stimulus”???

    Why is it that you refuse to hold Obama to any kind of standard at all – even the standard he set for himself? The Obama administration said this was a terrible economy, but he had the solution, that his stimulus would keep unemployment from going over 8%. And by his own administration’s standard did he not utterly fail? Wasn’t he elected to make the economy better, instead of far worse?

    And what do we say about the fact that unemployment is going up, rather than down? Wasn’t Obama supposed to make things better rather than worse?

    Jobless claims rise to highest level in 9 months
    By CHRISTOPHER S. RUGABER, AP Economics Writer – Thu Aug 19, 2010

    WASHINGTON – Employers appear to be laying off workers again as the economic recovery weakens. The number of people applying for unemployment benefits reached the half-million mark last week for the first time since November.

    It was the third straight week that first-time jobless claims rose. The upward trend suggests the private sector may report a net loss of jobs in August for the first time this year.

    Initial claims rose by 12,000 last week to 500,000, the Labor Department said Thursday.

    Construction firms are letting go of more workers as the housing sector slumps and federal stimulus spending on public works projects winds down. State and local governments are also cutting jobs to close large budget gaps.

    The layoffs add to growing fears that the economic recovery is slowing and the country could slip back into a recession.

    Isn’t Obama kind of going the wrong way, Mr. “Blame Bush”???

    We’ve got all kinds of measures showing that things are far worse than they ever were under Bush. But you, total rabid fundamentalist leftist ideologue that you are – can only shout “blame Bush!” all the louder.

    Here’s one example from August 21, 2010 in the LA Times:

    With consumers and businesses keeping a lid on expenses, more and more small and mid-size restaurants are throwing in their dish towels and closing up shop. […]

    Nationwide, the number of restaurants dropped in 2010 for the first time in more than a decade, according to NPD, falling 5,202 to 579,416.

    So, wow. That means that things haven’t been this bad since Bill Clinton was president and the Dot-com bubble he created blew up. That means that things were NEVER this bad under George Bush.

    Bush inherited a terrible economic situation, too. First of all, the Dot-com bubble that Clinton passed to Bush created huge economic upheaval – to the tune of Nasdaq losing 78% of its value. Trillions of dollars of Clinton economic growth were just blown away like a fart in a hurricane. The mainstream media didn’t report the facts of Clinton’s recession because they are shockingly biased liberal propagandists. Which is why so few Americans trust them anymore. Clinton took all the credit for the Dot-com build-up; Bush got all the pain when it blew up, suffering a huge recession that was all on Clinton’s tab. Then you add to that the 9/11 attack, which crippled the airline and tourism industry for months, and you should understand how bad Bush had it. But he didn’t blame Clinton a gazillion times; he manned up and solved the problem. He took an economic lemon and made 52 consecutive months of job growth. In contrast, Obama hasn’t solved anything. All he’s done is blame and demonize.

    Here’s another one from the August 21 2010 Associated Press report:

    In the wake of news about a spike in new applications for unemployment benefits comes another potentially troubling sign: A record number of workers made hardship withdrawals from their retirement accounts in the second quarter.

    What’s more, the number of workers borrowing from their accounts reached a 10-year high, according to a report issued Friday by Fidelity Investments.

    Wow. Again, things haven’t been so bad since the last time a Democrat was president. Again, it was NEVER this bad under George Bush’s presidency.

    How about trade deficit figures? From November 19 2009 Reuters:

    WASHINGTON: The US trade deficit widened in September by an unexpectedly large 18.2 per cent, the most in more than 10 years, as oil prices rose for the seventh straight month and imports from China bounded higher, a US government report showed on Friday.

    Hey, again, things weren’t so bad since a Democrat president last ran things. And it was never so bad under George Bush.

    How about all the foreclosures? Surely Obama has made that better? Oops. Again, things were NEVER this bad under Bush’s presidency:

    US foreclosures up 4%; top 300000 for 17th month on the trot
    by Jaspreet Virk – August 12, 2010

    Foreclosure crisis doesn’t seem to be loosening its hold on the housing sector. After declining for the last three consecutive months, foreclosure activity is back up in the United States.

    As per the ‘Foreclosure Market Report’ released by RealtyTrac, an online marketplace, giving insights into foreclosures, 325,229 houses received foreclosure filings in the nation, 4 percent up from June.

    Not only there has been a jump in the number of houses receiving filings, the foreclosures have exceeded 300000 for the 17th straight month. One in every 397 houses received foreclosure notice from the lenders in July.

    Hmmm. Obama’s been president for all of those 17 months. And Bush was president for none of them. But it’s all Bush’s fault, anyway, isn’t it? At least if you’re a hypocrite liberal, it is.

    Under Obama, and ONLY under Obama, foreclosures are up 75% in the major metropolitan areas:

    NEW YORK (Reuters) – Foreclosures rose in 3 of every four large U.S. metro areas in this year’s first half, likely ruling out sustained home price gains until 2013, real estate data company RealtyTrac said on Thursday [in its midyear 2010 metropolitan foreclosure report].

    Unemployment was the main culprit driving foreclosure actions on more than 1.6 million properties, the company said.

    “We’re not going to see meaningful, sustainable home price appreciation while we’re seeing 75 percent of the markets have increases in foreclosures,” RealtyTrac senior vice president Rick Sharga said in an interview.

    Has Obama done anything to solve this problem – which was why our economy blew up in the first place? Absolutely not.

    Obama failed – because he is a failure, and failing is what he does:

    WASHINGTON – Nearly half of the 1.3 million homeowners who enrolled in the Obama administration’s flagship mortgage-relief program have fallen out.

    The program is intended to help those at risk of foreclosure by lowering their monthly mortgage payments. Friday’s report from the Treasury Department suggests the $75 billion government effort is failing to slow the tide of foreclosures in the United States, economists say.

    More than 2.3 million homes have been repossessed by lenders since the recession began in December 2007, according to foreclosure listing service RealtyTrac Inc. Economists expect the number of foreclosures to grow well into next year.

    “The government program as currently structured is petering out. It is taking in fewer homeowners, more are dropping out and fewer people are ending up in permanent modifications,” said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics.

    There’s “hope and change” for you. A failed president with failed policies.

    As an update (August 24), I add the following headline:

    Instant View: Existing home sales plunge to 15-year low
    Tue Aug 24, 10:28 am ET

    NEW YORK (Reuters) – Sales of previously owned U.S. homes dropped in July to their lowest pace in 15 years, implying further loss of momentum in the economic recovery.

    Existing home sales dropped by a massive 27% in July. And, again, omigosh. We haven’t seen terrible numbers like this since the last time a Democrat was president. We NEVER saw anything like this during the Bush era.

    How about budget deficits? Bush never had a trillion dollar deficit in his entire presidency, and the Democrats still blamed him for his spending; but the CBO now says that Obama will run a trillion-plus dollar defict next year, making it three years in a row. And we will have massive trillion-plus dollar deficits for as long as the eye can see because of Obama’s reckless unsustainable spending programs and the debt they will create. How about this? Obama’s deficit for July alone was more than Bush’s entire 2007-year deficit! And how about this one? Obama outspent Bush’s entire eight-year presidency’s deficit in just 20 months – after demonizing Bush for his spending!!!

    From The Wall Street Journal, which, unlike the New York Slimes, the LA Slimes, the Chicago Tribune, and other major liberal papers, ISN’T actually financially and morally bankrupt:

    Mr. Obama cannot dismiss critics by pointing to President George W. Bush’s decision to run $2.9 trillion in deficits while fighting two wars and dealing with 9/11 and Katrina. Mr. Obama will surpass Mr. Bush’s eight-year total in his first 20 months and 11 days in office, adding $3.2 trillion to the national debt. If America “cannot and will not sustain” deficits like Mr. Bush’s, as Mr. Obama said during the campaign, how can Mr. Obama sustain the geometrically larger ones he’s flogging?

    Bush’s deficits were 2-3% of GDP. Obama’s are at 12.8% of GDP – which is five to six times higher and bringing us closer and closer every day to the point of collapse.

    Are the people better off under Obama than they were under Bush? I don’t think so:

    More Americans are on food stamps now under Barack Obama’s failed presidency than at any time in history. And that certainly includes George Bush’s presidency.

    But now Obama and the Democrats are going to raid the Food Stamp program to pay for their pet liberal projects. Because “Let them eat cake.”

    How about bank failures? We kind of need banks for a healthy economy unless we want to go back to the barter system, you know:

    Banks are failing at double the rate of last year. During 2009, which the government claims was the peak of the recession, the total number of bank failures at this point in the year was 40. It is already 83 for this year.

    For the record, only 25 banks failed under Bush in 2008. That number soared to 140 banks under Obama’s watch in 2009. And now we’re already past 118 bank failures this year in 2010 with four more months to go.

    But you can’t hold Barack Obama responsible for the fact that things are far, far, FAR worse under his presidency than they ever were under Bush’s. The ONLY reason you’ve got to “blame Bush” is that the 2008 economic meltdown happened under Bush’s presidency. You don’t even offer an actual reason or state an actual policy reason for the failure; you just blame Bush because he was there. You don’t consider the fact that things were great until Democrats took control of both the House and the Senate in 2006 and royally screwed up the country (the unemployment rate before Democrats took over Congress in January 2007 was 4.6%). Nope. Bush was president in 2008, so it was all his fault. Even though he warned SEVENTEEN TIMES that we needed to reform Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae or have an economic disaster on our hands, and even though Democrats were in lockstep refusal to deal with the landmine that caused us to implode in the first place. But you are way too much of a twisted unhinged ideologue to apply the same argument to Obama now. What happened while Bush was president was Bush’s fault; and what happened while Zero was president is still Bush’s fault.

    Do I want to go back to Bush’s “failed policies” when unemployment never got above 7.6% and averaged 5.2% for his presidency? As opposed to “moving forward” with Obama and his 10%-and-rising level? Pardon me, but I’ll take Bush.

    Democrats are currently saying, “Do you want to go back to the way things were when Republicans were in control?”

    When Republicans were last in control prior to 2007, we had full unemployment with an unemployment rate of only 4.6%.

    So, yeah. I WOULD like to go back to the way things were when Bush and Republicans were in control. And I frankly want to know what idiot wouldn’t?

    As for your question as to whether Obama is some kind of a god, I can’t help but point out that it wasn’t conservatives who kept putting the halo on Obama’s head:

    A funny video provides a giant montage of Obama halos.

    We weren’t the ones who said “This is the moment when when the rise of the oceans began to slow and the planet began to heal,” either.

    We weren’t the ones who said, “You can divide history. BB Before Barack. AB After Barack.” So don’t blame us for Obama not living up to the ridiculous expectations he and his liberal minions fed to the culture.

    The fact of the matter is that Obama is such a miserable, total failure that I see that even you can’t admit you voted for him.

  13. alanstorm Says:
    August 25, 2010 at 9:19 am

    Re: Kleinfeld’s comment

    I must agree with Kleinfeld, Europe is the ideal to emulate. Let’s generate 80% (or more) of our electricity with nuclear power like France, and require people to keep automatic weapons in their homes like the Swiss.

    Go Europe!

  14. Michael Eden Says:
    August 25, 2010 at 4:07 pm

    You’ve got me there, alanstorm.

    Emulating Europe in the sense of having abundant nuclear energy and having an automatic weapon in every home sounds pretty good.

    I remember my father saying, “If you keep the steering wheel and one of the wheel lugnuts, and then replace every other part, you’d have a good car.”

    I guess Europe is the same way.

  15. Yanks52 Says:
    October 6, 2010 at 5:42 am

    Bush was blaming Clinton for the economy in the 2004 election. So by the 2004 Republican standards, Obama is doing fine & should get a pass on the economy for 4 to 8 more years.

    Applying the standards of the political parties from 4 years ago shows the hypocrisy of both sides.

    In actuality, it is ridiculous to blame Obama for the economy when he’s had less than 2 years to fix the biggest meltdown since Great Depression.

  16. sensistar Says:
    April 19, 2011 at 7:49 pm

    The Bush Deficit Bamboozle
    OK, even by contemporary standards, this is rich: the official Republican stance is now apparently that Bush left behind a budget that was in pretty good shape. Mitch McConnell:

    The last year of the Bush administration, the deficit as a percentage of gross domestic product was 3.2 percent, well within the range of what most economists think is manageable. A year and a half later, it’s almost 10 percent.
    They really do think that we’re idiots.

    So, that 3.2 percent number comes from here (pdf). Where’s the bamboozle? Let me count the ways.

    First, they’re hoping that you won’t know that standard budget data is presented for fiscal years, which start on October 1 of the previous calendar year. So this isn’t the “last year of the Bush administration” — they’ve conveniently lopped off everything that happened post-Lehman — TARP and all.

    Second, they’re hoping you won’t look at what was happening quarter by quarter. Here’s net federal borrowing as a percentage of GDP, quarter by quarter, since 2007:

    Click to access historicaltables.pdf

    Can we agree that the deficit in the first quarter of 2009 — Obama didn’t even take office until Jan. 20, the ARRA wasn’t even passed until Feb. 17, and essentially no stimulus funds had been spent — had nothing to do with Obama’s polices, and was entirely a Bush legacy? Yet the deficit had already surged to almost 9 percent of GDP. Even in 2009 II, Obama’s policies had barely begun to take effect, and the deficit was already over 10 percent of GDP.

    What this chart really tells us is what you should have known already: the deficit is overwhelmingly the result of the economic slump, not Obama policies. But the usual suspects want to fool you.

    I’d like to think that the raw dishonesty of this latest Bush defense would be obvious to everyone. But after the past decade, I’ve stopped believing such things. They think we’re idiots — and they may be right.

    http://www.bea.gov/national/nipaweb/TableView.asp?SelectedTable=87&ViewSeries=NO&Java=no&Request3Place=N&3Place=N&FromView=YES&Freq=Qtr&FirstYear=2007&LastYear=2010&3Place=N&Update=Update&JavaBox=no#Mid

  17. Michael Eden Says:
    April 20, 2011 at 12:51 am

    One of the very interesting things I noticed from your CBO chart was that revenues from Bush dwarfed Clintons.

    I totalled them up. In his eight years, Clinton created $13,507.6 trillion in revenue. Versus Bush, who created $17,159.1 trillion in his eight years. That in spite of a major market crash created by Clinton, a massive attack and two wars. Not bad for the guy you say was the worst president ever. And the numbers really took off for Bush following the enactment of his tax cuts. Which INCREASED REVENUE. Because lower tax rates ALWAYS increase revenues.

    You want to consider debt from 2009? First of all, you need to realize that Bush only used HALF of the $700 billion in TARP money. He left the rest for Obama to use. That $350 billion would be on Obama’s tab in a fair world (alas, it’s not one). Second, according the CBO, the actual cost of Obamas’s terribly-named “stimulus” was $3.27 TRILLION.

    A couple of pictures that are worth a thousand words as we look at Obama:

    Obama deficits

    Democrats double then triple deficits

  18. Iman in mass Says:
    September 4, 2011 at 8:04 pm

    Tell me if this doesnt ring true. During the Clinton administration americans were attacked on foreign soil and domestically several times with little to no response from us, this led up to a boldness on the terrorists part that brought us to 9/11.

    During the Bush administration after 9/11 I can recall no attacks on our soil or soveriegn soil.

    During Obama’s 3 years we have had several more “little attacks” fort hood etc, that have gone with NO response from the white house, often not even called acts of terror and we are advised not to prejudge even after the connection has been found.

    He is setting us up with all this political correctness and dont judge terrorists, or better yet call them something else like undocumented soldiers of another religion we should try to understand!!!

    Hate to say it but without someone strong in the WH we are doomed to repeat 9/11 on an even more catastrophic scale.

  19. Michael Eden Says:
    September 4, 2011 at 8:54 pm

    Iman,

    It rings pretty true. Even though it sounds awfully terrible.

    Bill Clinton couldn’t have been MORE responsible for 9/11. First of all, Bill Clinton is the president who took advantage of the so-called “peace dividend” that Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush won before Clinton took office to gut both the U.S. military and the U.S. intelligence community.

    Thanks to Bill Clinton, George W. Bush took office presiding over an America that was both far weaker and far more blind than it had been when Bill Clinton took office.

    Secondly, Bill Clinton massively expanded the humanitarian operation in Somalia that Bush I began. Clinton decided to get the warlord Mohamed Farrah Aidi. That would have been fine if Clinton had done it right; but Clinton DIDN’T do it right. He didn’t want to create any bad PR by building up the military presence, but he expanded their military mission in a way that DEMANDED a massive buildup. We needed tanks and we needed heavy armor to go into Mogadishu in force.

    All it took was for one Blackhawk helipopter to get shot down and the entire mission turned into a total disaster. And the U.S. force was powerless to get in and get their people without sustaining huge losses. It ultimately took us literally begging a very pissed-off armored multinational force that was beyond angry for not having even been notified of the botched operation to get what was left of our shot-to-hell rescue force.

    It was BECAUSE of that failure, BECAUSE of those pictures of the naked U.S. personnel being dragged in humilitation down the streets and BECAUSE of the way we cut and ran with our tails between our legs that a man named Osama bin Laden concluded that America was “a paper tiger” and that we would flee if we suffered any casualities.

    As a result of Osama bin Laden being emboldened, ALL of the 9/11 terrorists were in the United States with the operation having already been planned and put into motion during Bill Clinton’s watch.

    Then there comes the fact that 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed – maybe after having been waterboarded until he grew gills – said that the American response under Bush was so massive and so terrifying that he doubted that al Qaeda would ever dare to directly strike the United States again. Saddam Hussein – the strongest strongman in the Middle East – was humilitated and executed. Muammar Gadhafi – the craziest nut in the Middle East – abandoned his WMD programs.

    Then a pathetic weakling became president.

    As long as the pathetic appeaser Neville Chamberlain was prime minister, England was a weak nation desperately hoping that Adolf Hitler wouldn’t hurt them; when Winston Churchill took over (after Leo Amery’s famous denunciation to Neville Chamberlain: “Depart, I say, and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go!”), England became strong.

    Just as England went from weak to strong under Churchill, America went from strong to weak under Obama.

    One of the areas where the weakness of Obama was MOST readily apparent was Iran.

    George Bush was determined to confront Iran over its nuke programs, rightly understanding that this religiously insane nation would use them. The only thing that stopped him was the pathetic treasonous weakness of Democrats. And then the most pathetic and treasonous weakling of all the Democrats became their king.

    And now it’s full speed ahead as Iran works non-stop toward Armageddon.

  20. allen Says:
    September 13, 2011 at 5:37 pm

    fascist moron

  21. Michael Eden Says:
    September 13, 2011 at 8:59 pm

    You call me a “fascist moron” for printing THE FACTS without bothering to even try to in any way, shape or form show how those facts aren’t facts?

    That’s a very fascist moron thing of you to do, Allen.

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