Posted by Tina
The American Spectator adds shape and color to the good news resulting from the Republican victory in 2012:
In the wake of the Bush-Pelosi-Obama spending splurge from 2008-11, federal spending has fallen by 3.1 percentage points of GDP. In the second quarter of 2009, according to National Income Products Account data, federal spending hit 26.5 percent of GDP, thanks to the Obama stimulus and the Bush recession. As of the second quarter of 2013, just as the sequester was beginning to take effect, federal spending as a share of GDP is down to 23.5 percent and, barring some unforeseen emergency, is on track to fall to around 23 percent by the end of this year. The turning point in spending from the binge years of 2009 and 2010 came when the Republicans took control of the House in 2011.
State and local government spending as a share of GDP has also fallen by more than one percentage point over the same period that federal government spending fell by 3.1 percentage points. If Republicans in the House stick to the sequester and future caps already built into current budget law, federal spending will stay at this low level for years to come, and state and local government spending will follow suit.
Not since the economic boom following World War II have we seen such a rapid decline in the federal government’s claim on the nation’s resources. Amazingly, federal spending was $3.92 trillion in 2011 and is now down to $3.80 trillion on an annual basis in the second quarter of this year. This is the first time in 50 years we’ve had two straight years of declining spending.
More good news is that the annual deficit is falling too. The Great Recession, followed by stimulus, bailouts, Cash for Clunkers, unemployment insurance extensions, and other follies raised the deficit to $1.4 trillion in 2009, or just over 10 percent of GDP. By the end of this year, however, the deficit will be closer to $600 billion and 4 percent of GDP. In other words, federal deficits will be 2 percentage points less as a share of GDP than they were three years ago. And the decline may not stop even then.
Republicans have shown themselves to be better managers of the people’s money.
More could be done with cooperation from their esteemed collegues. Not much chance of that happening but think of it…we’d be spared all the finger pointing and buck passing by these desperate Democrats who cannot run for re-election on their dismal record. If they just did their jobs instead of playing stupid political grow the government games we would all be having a more pleasant day…every day!.
Their adolescent (criminal) games have resulted in unnecessary, dire, misery and hardship for the people of the United States of America that surpasses the malaise experienced under Jimmy Carter!
There is no excuse for such irresponsible behavior! Meanwhile the lame duck President will trot himself in front of the cameras to shill for his Democrat pals just before he runs out to play another round of golf.
Methinks it won’t help them this time.
“The turning point in spending from the binge years of 2009 and 2010 came when the Republicans took control of the House in 2011.”
Now, there’s some spin!
Yes, the GM bailout was very costly, but it saved several hundred thousand people their jobs, and the American auto sector probably, and GM’s paying it back. Not all of it, of course, but most of it.
The unhappy fact is that since the House went totally obstructive, the economy has totally flat-lined.
Libby the economy has been in flatline, except for a few short-lived blips, since the recession ended in the spring of 2009:
The economy is responding (badly) to the lousy policies of the President.
The economy actually started going south when Pelosi and the Dems took control of the House in 2006.
Nancy Pelosi took the gavel as Speaker saying, “After years of historic deficits, this 110th Congress will commit itself to a higher standard: Pay as you go, no new deficit spending.”
She was lying of course. They had already set Bush up as their whipping post. They knew they could do what they wanted and blame him with impunity.
The debt increased by 5 trillion dollars under Pelosi’s stewardship of the budget.
Sadly, Bush let the Democrat evil twins Pelosi/Reid get away with it. As a badly beat up and damaged lame duck he had little power in his corner…the people had spoken.
The most devastating thing about the Obama/Reid/Pelosi economy is the affect on the poor:
The middle class is in decline under Obama. (see charts)
We are nearly five years into the Obama Presidency. His leadership and policy decisions along with his unrelenting my-way-or-the-highway redistribution agenda has brought us to this dangerous precipice.
We told you it would be bad…you can see it is and still you stubbornly cling to excuses and blaming the only “adults’ in DC that have worked.
Obama’s budgets rejected even by his own party.
Reid refuses to pass a budget.
The Democrat position is we will talk to Iran but we won’t talk to Republicans who also represent the the people of the United States.
By the way…Republicans are still working. They are about to send a bill to harry Reid to keep the National Parks open. Your trip to Yosemite might be on after all.
Spending is way down because of the sequester. I’m glad spending is down, but the sequester only happened because these clowns are such idiots, they put that in there to force themselves to govern, then couldn’t do their most basic duty and the sequester was triggered. How pathetic that these idiots make $174,000 a year and work 137 days and cannot do the barest of their duties. And I am really disappointed in the GOP. They have managed to let Obama spin this into being all about hard right religious ideology. And today, prison guards and border patrol agents are working for no pay. Shame on the USA.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/washington-braces-for-the-first-shutdown-of-the-national-government-in-17-years/2013/09/30/977ebca2-29bd-11e3-97a3-ff2758228523_story.html?Post+generic=%3Ftid%3Dsm_twitter_washingtonpost
The Daily News has the best cover ever today. House of Turds indeed.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/01/ny-daily-news-shutdown-house-of-turds_n_4021642.html
Princess you keep saying you’re conservative but you sure don’t think like one. You’re always disappointed by the GOP but never with Reid or Obama.
Tina, Princess sees both problematic sides of the problem. Something that you, apparently, simply cannot do.
Is that right?
Then tell me…what Democrat has been specifically criticized for the debt, for the budget, for the sequester, for the job losses, for the unemployment, for the rising numbers of poor, for the shrinking middle class…on this blog by you, by Chris, or by Princess? Cause If it’s happening I’m missing it.
Princess says she is “very conservative” but I never read a criticism about the donkeys and how they have blown it.
Bush was criticized by conservatives on this blog during his eight years when people had jobs and the debt was climbing but not like this!
And I’m sorry but pretending to be critical of Democrats with a “they’re all turds” swipe just doesn’t cut it!
I want to know what makes it okay for Reid to fail to pass a budget. I want to know what makes it okay for Obama to send a budget to his dem run Senate that not one Democrat will give his vote. I want to know what makes it okay for them to declare they won’t negotiate with the other side of Congress? I want to know what makes it okay for them to leave town and refuse to negotiate when the government is about to shut down.
Republicans represent the people just like democrats do. Relegating them to the back of the bus and then insisting they were in the drivers seat is absolute bunk!
Seeing both problematic sides is something you and to a lesser degree, Princess will not do.
Explain…give me names, and I might be able to take your comment seriously.