Posted by Tina
While on the campaign trail President Obama recently said the following:
“…federal spending since I took office has risen at the slowest pace of any President in almost 60 years.”
Forbes took exception to this blatantly erroneous remark pointing out that he is either intentionally being misleading or, shudder, actually believes it’s true. Apparently he justifies his position by eliminating the 2008 passed budget for fiscal year 2009.
Democrats have been discounting the Pelosi/Reid run Congress under Bush for a number of reasons and the blame Bush excuses just keep rollin’ in. The truth about how specific budgets were proposed, written and passed, and comparisons to previous budgets, congresses, and presidents is peppered through this article and affords a more informed and illuminating picture:
…The previous administration, or President, proposes a budget. The previous Congress approves a budget. And what Congress approves can be radically different from what the President proposes.
As Art Laffer and Steve Moore showed in the Wall Street Journal on Tuesday, President Bush began a spending spree in his term that erased most of the gains in reduced government spending as a percent of GDP achieved by the Republican Congress in the 1990s led by former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, in conjunction with President Clinton. But for fiscal year 2009, President Bush in February, 2008 proposed a budget with just a 3% spending increase over the prior year. Fiscal year 2009 ran from October 1, 2008 until September 30, 2009. President Obama’s term began on January 20, 2009.
Recall, however, that in 2008 Congress was controlled by Democrat majorities, with Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House, and the restless Senator Obama already running for President, just four years removed from his glorious career as a state Senator in the Illinois legislature. As Hans Bader reported on May 26 for the Washington Examiner, the budget approved and implemented by Pelosi, Obama and the rest of the Congressional Democrat majorities provided for a 17.9 percent increase in spending for fiscal 2009!
Actually, President Obama and the Democrats were even more deeply involved in the fiscal 2009 spending explosion than that. As Bader also reports, “The Democrat Congress [in 2008], confident Obama was going to win in 2008, passed only three of fiscal 2009’s 12 appropriations bills (Defense, Military Construction and Veterans Affairs, and Homeland Security). The Democrat Congress passed the rest of them [in 2009], and [President] Obama signed them.” So Obama played a very direct role in the runaway fiscal 2009 spending explosion.
Do read the entire Forbes opinion piece, “President Obama: The Biggest Government Spender In World History” in Forbes. It is Brilliant! It includes the Reagan budgets and is very illuminating in terms of budgets and left political spin.
Don’t you love it when the light of truth cuts through the blather!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6lEGaIk1OU
Nice article, only it’s not true.
Most other sources say “Barack Obama has lowest spending record of any recent president”
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2012/may/23/facebook-posts/viral-facebook-post-says-barack-obama-has-lowest-s/
http://articles.latimes.com/2012/may/26/news/la-pn-obamas-spending-record-whos-telling-the-truth-20120526
“Of all the falsehoods told about President Barack Obama, the biggest whopper is the one about his reckless spending spree.”
http://articles.marketwatch.com/2012-05-22/commentary/31802270_1_spending-federal-budget-drunken-sailor
You are entitled you your own opinion, but not your own set of facts.
Thanks for the video link. I like Bill Whittle, he makes a lot of sense. -Jack
Thanks for sharing those opinions Jim. The facts presented by Forbes are a matter of record. Please explain how the following facts are in error:
1. Bush in February, 2008 proposed a budget with just a 3% spending increase over the prior year.
2. President Obama’s term began on January 20, 2009.
3. …the budget approved and implemented by Pelosi, Obama and the rest of the Congressional Democrat majorities provided for a 17.9 percent increase in spending for fiscal 2009!
4. “The Democrat Congress [in 2008], confident Obama was going to win in 2008, passed only three of fiscal 2009’s 12 appropriations bills (Defense, Military Construction and Veterans Affairs, and Homeland Security). The Democrat Congress passed the rest of them [in 2009], and [President] Obama signed them.” So Obama played a very direct role in the runaway fiscal 2009 spending explosion.
More political blather: fawning Obama supporters actually suggested that George Bush should step down because the economy needed Democrat attention immediately.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ben-cohen/bush-must-step-down_b_133916.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/paul-abrams/to-raise-confidence-in-th_b_133146.html
Big spending and big taxing would was supposedly the remedy to spark a recovery and provide jobs.
How’s that hope and change worked out 3 years later?
A semi-related side note: Read this morning that a quarter of small business owners didn’t take any pay over the last year…hardly what anyone would call “a living wage”. Some of them still keep and pay employees; I know because I’m one of them. Don’t EVEN start with me about which party holds the most responsibility for the debt or the housing mess or the lousy economy and sluggish non-recovery!
President Bush’s last budget ended 9 months after Obama took office. As every school child knows, the fiscal year runs from October 1st until September 30. It defies logic to say that Obama was busting a budget that was written before he was elected!
As for your facts?
“The Democrat Congress [in 2008], confident Obama was going to win in 2008, passed only three of fiscal 2009’s 12 appropriations bills (Defense, Military Construction and Veterans Affairs, and Homeland Security).” How could the author of the opinion piece quoted possibly know what motivated the Democrats? Mind reading is an iffy science, at best. Hardly a FACT.
If we remove from Obama’s budget the $600 billion he pays in interest on past presidents’ debt, Obama is just about $500 billion in the red. Fully ONE-HALF of Bush’s spending in FY ’09.
Obama may not be perfect, but he did cut the deficit in half–just as he said he would.
interesting read those options opposing the Forbes article. I liked the line in politifact attributed to Mr. Nutting regarding the Bush budget that Obama took over and Obama had 9 months to changes it: He continued (Nutting), “By no means did Obama try to reverse that spending. Indeed, his budget proposals called for even more spending in subsequent years. But the Congress (mostly Republicans but many Democrats, too) stopped him. also it is interesting how Percentages being applied to gross amounts can produce some misleading results; I.E. 1 trillion of say a 15 trillion deficit has a smaller percentage figure, than say 500 billion of a 2.5 trillion deficit, I would much rather deal with the higher percentage ,but lower debt of the latter. Anyway if I understand the politifact article correctly, it points out that debt has been increased , even though spending may not have, simple enough when you have a ‘kick the can down the road’ mindset, and borrow yourself into debt instead of resolving to eliminate it today.
“3. …the budget approved and implemented by Pelosi, Obama and the rest of the Congressional Democrat majorities provided for a 17.9 percent increase in spending for fiscal 2009!”
Yes, Tina, we remember. This would be the money printing that staved off the Second Great Depression … floated humungous “loans” to the nation’s big banks. And those banks, now recapitalized, thanks to us wage slaves, are refusing to risk what is, in fact, our money, to stimulate the economy.
Sick-making, so it is.
So you think inflation was running close to 15% when old Pelosi/Reid upped the Bush proposal from 3% to 17.9%? In your dreams girl. According to this chart:
http://inflationdata.com/inflation/images/charts/Annual_Inflation/annual_inflation_chart.htm
…about the time that Pelosi/Reid were tinkering with the budget we were headed into rapid deflation that has yet to rise above 4% and that in 2012. The fed has been holding inflation in check by keeping interest rates low. (Hard for banks or anyone else to make money with such low interest rates)
Your assessment of the money forced on the banks is not exactly accurate either. According to Geitner last year the infusion of cash to the banks has become quite profitable for our government:
http://money.cnn.com/2011/03/30/news/economy/tarp_program/index.htm
And still it’s not enough for Obama and the Democrats whose policies are tying the hands of businessmen and bankers that would love nothing more than to go about their business!
You should also know that some of those bankers didn’t want the money that was forced on them and they returned it as soon as they could.
See documents here:
http://articles.businessinsider.com/2009-05-13/wall_street/29994241_1_scribd-bank-documents
And this article claims that Obama refused to take the money back when it was offered:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123879833094588163.html
Heres more:
http://money.cnn.com/2009/03/27/news/economy/tarp_takeback/index.htm
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/blog/2008/oct/15/banking
Guess what Libby? This is supposed to be a free country. Bankers and businessmen are not required to invest money, create jobs, or make the economy work. Investing is a business decision…a choice they make that (happily) also happens to create opportunity for others to work and make money. Your precious progressive government is the reason they no longer feel that the risk or the investment is worth it. A government that makes an enemy of the hand that feeds both it and the people just isn’t very bright!
WORKS FOR ME AND I GUESS SAYING THAT “AN OLD YELLER DOG COULD BEAT OBAMA” IS A SIMPLIFIED WAY OF SAYING THE BELOW.
(From an email I just received)
A Las Vegas “odds maker” opines on why Obama will get “killed” by Romney in November
Wayne Allyn Root
May 30, 2012
Town hall Alerts
Most political predictions are made by biased pollsters, pundits, or prognosticators who are either rooting for Republicans or Democrats. I am neither. I am a former Libertarian Vice Presidential nominee, and a well-known Vegas oddsmaker with one of the most accurate records of predicting political races.
But as an oddsmaker with a pretty remarkable track record of picking political races, I play no favorites. I simply use common sense to call them as I see them. Back in late December I released my New Years Predictions. I predicted back then- before a single GOP primary had been held, with Romney trailing for months to almost every GOP competitor from Rick Perry to Herman Cain to Newt- that Romney would easily rout his competition to win the GOP nomination by a landslide. I also predicted that the Presidential race between Obama and Romney would be very close until election day. But that on election day Romney would win by a landslide similar to Reagan-Carter in 1980.
Understanding history, today I am even more convinced of a resounding Romney victory. 32 years ago at this moment in time, Reagan was losing by 9 points to Carter. Romney is right now running even in polls. So why do most pollsters give Obama the edge?
First, most pollsters are missing one ingredient- common sense. Here is my gut instinct. Not one American who voted for McCain 4 years ago will switch to Obama. Not one in all the land. But many millions of people who voted for an unknown Obama 4 years ago are angry, disillusioned, turned off, or scared about the future. Voters know Obama now- and that is a bad harbinger.
Now to an analysis of the voting blocks that matter in U.S. politics:
*Black voters. Obama has nowhere to go but down among this group. His endorsement of gay marriage has alienated many black church-going Christians. He may get 88% of their vote instead of the 96% he got in 2008. This is not good news for Obama.
*Hispanic voters. Obama has nowhere to go but down among this group. If Romney picks Rubio as his VP running-mate the GOP may pick up an extra 10% to 15% of Hispanic voters (plus lock down Florida). This is not good news for Obama.
*Jewish voters. Obama has been weak in his support of Israel. Many Jewish voters and big donors are angry and disappointed. I predict Obama’s Jewish support drops from 78% in 2008 to the low 60s. This is not good news for Obama.
*Youth voters. Obamas biggest and most enthusiastic believers from 4 years ago have graduated into a job market from hell. Young people are disillusioned, frightened, and broke- a bad combination. The enthusiasm is long gone. Turnout will be much lower among young voters, as will actual voting percentages. This not good news for Obama.
*Catholic voters. Obama won a majority of Catholics in 2008. That wont happen again. Out of desperation to please women, Obama went to war with the Catholic Church over contraception. Now he is being sued by the Catholic Church. Majority lost. This is not good news for Obama.
*Small Business owners.Because I ran for Vice President last time around, and I’m a small businessman myself, I know literally thousands of small business owners. At least 40% of them in my circle of friends, fans and supporters voted for Obama 4 years ago to give someone different a chance. I warned them that he would pursue a war on capitalism and demonize anyone who owned a business…that hed support unions over the private sector in a big way…that he’d overwhelm the economy with spending and debt. My friends didnt listen. Four years later, I can’t find one person in my circle of small business owner friends voting for Obama. Not one. This is not good news for Obama.
*Blue collar working class whites. Do I need to say a thing? White working class voters are about as happy with Obama as Boston Red Sox fans feel about the New York Yankees. This is not good news for Obama.
*Suburban moms. The issue isnt contraceptionits having a job to pay for contraception. Obamas economy frightens these moms. They are worried about putting food on the table. They fear for their childrens future. This is not good news for Obama.
*Military Veterans. McCain won this group by 10 points. Romney is winning by 24 points. The more our military vets got to see of Obama, the more they disliked him. This is not good news for Obama.
Add it up. Is there one major group where Obama has gained since 2008? Will anyone in America wake up on election day saying I didnt vote for Obama 4 years ago. But hes done such a fantastic job, I cant wait to vote for him today. Does anyone feel that a vote for Obama makes their job more secure?
Forget the polls. My gut instincts as a Vegas oddsmaker and common sense small businessman tell me this will be a historic landslide and a world-class repudiation of Obamas radical and risky socialist agenda. It’s Reagan-Carter all over again.
But Ill give Obama credit for one thing – he is living proof that familiarity breeds contempt.
Don’t you have to eliminate the 2008 budget passed for 2009 since it wasn’t passed for his administration? Congress made sure they all passed themselves the fat bail out and TARP before Obama took office. Federal spending has slowed since Obama took office. Personally I agree that we should be spending on ifrastructure right now. I don’t understand why cutting education, fire and police protection is a shared sacrifice, but cutting the Pentagon’s budget is “disastrous.” It is the first place we should start cutting in my opinion. Stop with the fat cat defense contractors outsourcing our jobs to other countries.
I am sick and tired of watching America crumble while we fight endless unpaid for wars. I mean we are seriously debating cuts to Social Security and Medicare like we have no other choice, but we can’t even consider cutting the budget of the Pentagon. Ridiculous.
“Guess what Libby? This is supposed to be a free country. Bankers and businessmen are not required to invest money, create jobs, or make the economy work.”
Indeed. Say a government contractor, having raked in such-and-such a sum, and having weedled a disposable K from her tax obligations, opts for a weekend in Vegas, over the Salvation Army … well … we understand. Really, we do.
But don’t turn around and snivel about the state the nation is in … I mean, just don’t.
Libby, this is off topic, but curious to know if you have visited the DeYoung recently and what you thought of the collection and restoration work?
Decidely off topic.
I cannot stomach the new DeYoung. I was a kid in the old DeYoung and in the Academy of Sciences across the concourse. We paid taxes when I was a kid and admission was not charged, that’s for a start.
As a tween, I took art classes several summers at the DeYoung … and there’s no more of that.
Now it’s just a hoity venue where the affluent fete themselves, and no museum at all.
Libby, I’m sorry to hear that, but we can agree on this one. I remember the old DeYoung as a kid and as a teen, then an adult. The old exhibits were fascinating. Statues, medieval armor, swords, rare guns, the Castle room with its ancient furniture, European painting, we could relate to this, they were much more exciting to me than when they changed over to just Asian art…boring. I’ve not been back since the latest renovation, maybe I won’t either.
Libby: “Say a government contractor, having raked in such-and-such a sum, and having weedled a disposable K from her tax obligations, opts for a weekend in Vegas, over the Salvation Army … well … we understand. Really, we do.”
What an attitude case! You assume automatic dishonesty of tax obligations. If it were true “she” would have personally recovered only a nano fraction of the fraud, waste and abuse that goes on using her tax money every single day. Since it isn’t true…and since “she” does give personally to the SA every year as well as paying her taxes in full according to tax law…she deserves a vacation and it’s truly none of your business how much see spends or where she goes.
Is it terribly evil of me to say you seem to be playing out there on the fringes of sleaze lately?
And you know, they seem to know the place sucks. You just don’t hang impressionists (I seen Whistler’s Mother in the flesh!) in a Hyatt Hotel lobby, so they were shown at the Legion of Honor.
And you know, they seem to know the place sucks. You just don’t hang impressionists (I seen Whistler’s Mother in the flesh!) in a Hyatt Hotel lobby, so they were shown at the Legion of Honor.
“You assume automatic dishonesty of tax obligations.”
Uh, you need to read that post again, you wishful thinker, you. I assume the dishonesty of those entrepreneurs not subject to withholding.
Which is why we are going broke, and why said entrepreneurs have no grounds for complaint.
Libby, you need to make yourself clear in your communications.
You’re going to have to assume the absolute incompetence of procurement agencies and collection agencies in your little scenario. Government agencies that would allow “entrepreneur” contractors to do work without demonstrating their legitimacy and without collecting the tax due on the sale would be criminally complicit if not incompetent.
But blaming an imagined cash only, under the table contractor, even if a few were able to make deals as you describe, for the utter failure of the socialist system you laud is laughable. In fact it only demonstrates the failure of socialist systems. How the hell do you think the Union of Soviet Socialist Republic operated (still operates) except through the underground/criminal black market elements? These systems create survival by any means necessary which often means criminal activity increases.
“We” are going broke because government has made promises it can’t keep. “We” are going broke because government has put too many restraints on freedom and made laws too complex and costly to work well. “We” are going broke because too many of our representatives cared more about political power than the overall health of the nation. “We” are going broke because too many of our politicians were willing to pander to the poor and the elderly, handing them poverty perks for votes, with other peoples money that they cannot count on, especially when they strangle the wealth producers. “We” are going broke because people on the left do not understand human nature and will continue to do the same thing over and over even when it is demonstrated that it DOES NOT WORK! “We” are going broke because progressives, in cahoots with socialist politicians, are content to let our educational system turn to crap. “We” are going broke because the progressive utopian dream, with its attendant lack of moral underpinnings, is a drag on society and destroys the spirit in human beings that makes them want to strive and work toward bettering their conditions and communities. Progressives are negative, distrustful, and controlling. When you put one of them in charge its easy to see they’re in it for personal gain without personal contribution or risk. They are in it for the perks of power and the adoration of the masses. All of that “we must help the poor” crap is just a ruse.
You would make an entire nation suffer and dependent just so you can stop the few from being a little stingy. It’s a stupid way to run a country Libby!