The date was Oct. 28, 1980. A tense election season had just unfolded between President Jimmy Carter and Republican Party nominee Ronald Reagan, culminating in the sole presidential debate before the election.
Carter, determined to baffle the newcomer in this debate, unleashed a barrage of criticisms against Reagan. Undaunted and boasting a grin, Regan replied to Carter’s charge in a line that would resonate in American politics for a generation: “There you go again.”
As you might imagine, as a liberal I’m not too big of a fan of the Reagan presidency. But in reading yet another far right-wing critique of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, as published in the Kernel last week, I could not help but recall Reagan’s words to Carter in that debate.
The columnist suggested that President Barack Obama has failed in “cutting wasteful government spending through a comprehensive analysis of the budget.” So let’s analyze the budget.
Social Security and Medicare accounts for 34 percent of the budget, with 22 percent spent on national defense. Twenty percent is spent on Medicaid, unemployment insurance and the Children’s Health Insurance program, while 9 percent is allocated toward interest on the national debt. This totals 85 percent of the budget for the U.S.
That leaves 15 percent which is spent on keeping the government running. It pays for the entire legislative and executive branches. This money, for example, pays the Environmental Protection Agency inspector who makes sure you’re bathing in fruity shower gel you bought on sale at Kroger instead of toxic waste from a chemical plant.
Pay careful attention when conservatives talk about government waste. They never tell you which government waste they want cut.
Looking at the summary of the budget below, it’s easy to see why. The vast majority of every single tax dollar pays for a vital service to the American people.
Another charge is that Obama’s efforts on the ARRA — passed by Congress and signed by the president at the very dawn of his administration — did not save any jobs.
It has been said that a picture is worth a thousand words, and I think I’ll let that old adage speak for itself in this matter, with the accompanying graph.
What you are seeing here isn’t the boogeyman of conservative punditry: the welfare queen, the unemployed bum laying around waiting for a check. You are seeing hundreds of thousands of people able to feed their families, pay for their homes and bills, and live their lives thanks to the ARRA.
Finally, calling the rise in unemployment from 7 to 10 percent over the last couple years the fault of the president, is like yelling at a firefighter for letting your kitchen burn down when he could have let the flames take the whole house. It makes no sense.
This economic downturn has not been named the “Great Recession” for nothing. We are enduring an economic uncertainty the likes of which we haven’t seen since the Great Depression, when unemployment hit 25 percent.
The only reason our nation’s joblessness hasn’t gotten anywhere near the levels found in the Depression was due to quick thinking by this administration when things started to head south.
It’s time for conservatives to stop maliciously lying about the successes of the Obama presidency. It’s time for them to join the rest of the nation in helping to rebuild from the ravages of this financial meltdown.
And, for goodness sake, it’s time for me to read a conservative opinion without smiling to myself and thinking, “There you go again.”
Sean Taylor is a chemistry junior. E-mail opinions@kykernel.com.
HEY JERK WAD:
Beginning In 2007 the Democrats became the majority in Congress in Spite of Bush. Democrats Suck, Republicans Blow. Congress has allowed every President Since Eisenhower to carry out illegal wars, they have ninety days to get it done then Congress says stop it or declare war. Only Congress can authorized deficit spending, not the pres, no shit, check it out. Thus far we have 8 MIL jobs lost due to Democrats which can not balance a budget, continue to over regulate, and continue to ingnore the needs of small business which employ 97% of all Americans (Includes Mexicans and Canadians Under NAFTA). Now get your ass out of Kentucky and go back to Oregon you non-talented non-working student know it all. Get a job when you arrive there.
I can’t believe the Kernel would let Sean publish the graph he did. It’s pure propaganda.
This graph here more accurately represents our job losses than the the distorted graph published above:
http://s3.amazonaws.com/data.tumblr.com/tumblr_ky2d2qNSgP1qz7x4so1_1280.png?AWSAccessKeyId=0RYTHV9YYQ4W5Q3HQMG2&Expires=1268148042&Signature=SJlSNgrX6DUphWkYNQ7HIHLjocw%3D
And here’s my question for Sean: Obama said that the stimulus bill would stop unemployment from rising about somewhere around 8%, and yet, after saying that, unemployment quickly hit that number and kept rising only to stop around 10%. Further, anyone who understands how unemployment numbers are calculated will tell you our unemployment rate IS closer to the 25% levels of the great depression because our current metric of measuring unemployment does not account for people who have given up on looking for jobs. So how exactly are you able to give credit to the Obama administration for “stopping” the loss of jobs? By his own metric, what the stimulus bill was supposed to do failed, and there really isn’t any evidence that the stimulus bill all of a sudden started stopping unemployment around 10% when Obama’s administration didn’t think the stimulus bill would let it get even that high.
You are just as bad at distorting numbers as conservatives, except you do it with smug arrogance.
1) Taking money from the people who produce in the US and giving it to people who don’t so they can buy products made in China and India does not help the job market.
2) Paying a government employee 20% more than what that person could get in the private market is wasteful and does not provide taxpayers any value.
3) Giving someone a job in government that does not provide much benefit to the rest of society is wasteful.
What is Obama doing to fix these problems that he inherited? Nothing. Things will not get better until he does.
The American political structure is going to ensure that the rich stay rich and the poor stay poor. If the best way to do that is letting unemployment rise or fall, then that’s what will happen.
In short: We aren’t a democracy, we are a Corporatocracy.
The end.
It’s refreshing to see someone express their opinion in a logical manner without resorting to emotional appeals, loaded words, or name calling. As Sean suggests, It is doubtful that one particular political party is solely to blame for our current situation.
King,
If by “logical manner” you mean “completely illogical distortion of facts” then I agree.
Cheers!
Abe
I see some of the commenters have made the common mistake of confusing the stimulus bill (ARRA) and the bailout bill (TARP). None of the money from the ARRA went to banks, just to clarify that point.
Abe, honey, the data from that chart is directly from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. I just double-checked it. As for your comments on unemployment, I do understand how it is calculated. But it is important to have consistency here, and the aforementioned Bureau of Labor Statistics actually didn’t have unemployment during the Depression at Obama’s current 10% level until 1941. It took eight years for FDR to bring unemployment officially down from 25% to 10%, so I hope that clarifies your confusion. Now, if you’re suggesting a vast left-wing conspiracy involving all branches of government, fine. Okie dokie. There’s not much more I can say to that.
I think there are plenty of things to complain about in regards to Obama, but I think it’s particularly helpful to be so angry about an area the president has been succesful in, especially given the great jobs numbers that came out this month.
“…particularly *unhelpful* to be so angry…” Pardon me!
:-)
Abe,
Good to see someone finally agrees with me on something. The Bureau of Illusion and Propaganda Statistics is at it again. Let’s both pledge to post irate comments on their website until they begin to collect some data we can agree with.
Fraternally yours,
King
*Ponders* Whose stats would you agree with Abe and King of Dorks?…
Wouldn’t happen to be those that agree with your opinion would they?
Sean, did you seriously say that the job numbers were “great”? We did not add jobs, we just lost less than we had a few months ago. Job losses will decline in any recession, regardless of who is in charge. The question is this: what is Obama doing that will sustain employment? You can’t run trillion dollar deficits forever.
We lost 36,000 jobs; economists projected far worse numbers than that. Again, if I might borrow an analogy: if you’re expecting an F on an exam and get a C+, do you feel defeated or elated? While everyone wants an “A” economy, right now that’s not happening under any circumstances.
The economy, just like the last time this happened in the 1930s, will correct itself. The president is merely ensuring that the economic bubble-burst triggered by Wall Street greed and conservative deregulation does the least amount of damage possible as they come, shortening and softening their impact on working American families. How can you ask me how the president plans to sustain the economy? You may as well ask how a doctor who’s administered antibiotics to a patient plans to keep a patient alive when the infection’s gone! The markets will come back. This bill is merely the antibiotics which shorten the span and severity of the recession’s infection until it has time to heal.
You may criticize the president for reactionary extremist ends, but again I find it better to criticize Obama where he has erred, not where he has succeeded.
“The economy, just like the last time this happened in the 1930s, will correct itself.” Wrong !! Very Wrong !! After numerous social programs and a World War, then the US Market Recovered, the victors took all. It was not until 1952 that GDP and the ‘worth of the stock market’ reached 1928 levels.
“Economists projected far worse numbers.” DUH !
When is the last time ‘economists’ predictions of the market were correct ? Where were all these voodoo snake oil salesmen during the Bush Administration ? Where were all these PhDs of B.S. when the value of the stock market soared at exponential rates during the 90s when nothing of value was being produced.
One more thing, President Obama is not an economist and it is not his job to sustain the economy, only those that actually produce goods and services make a market place work. Go back to ECON 101 and then write something of VALUE.
Oh I get it Sean! Because the Bureau of Labor created the graph, it is no longer a misleading piece of propaganda.
Your rhetorical prowess has left me defeated. I concede my entire argument due to my ability to come up with a comeback to your rock-solid reasoning.
Markets tend to correct themselves over time, Smith. I don’t think that’s very debatable, but whatever. My point is despite a market’s tendency to be in equilibrium, occasionally due to certain influences, cycles of boom and burst can occur. Still, a even as a market will correct itself, there is often a lot of damage done to the system and the people involved therein in the process of equilibrium being re-established. Stimulus during these periods can alter the depth and severity of these dips.
While Obama is trained in constitutional law, I assure you, there is a position under him called “Treasury Secretary,” and at its helm is an economist.
In any case, you seem to be both trashing economics and telling me to take an economics class, so I’m confused as to what exactly your point is. I also hope you’d find a way to tone down the rhetoric. There’s no need to lose your temper over a mere political debate.
Abe, I just cannot join you in these down the rabbit hole conspiracy theories. I don’t believe there is a massive conspiracy brewing just under the obvious. However, you will find there is a local tea party chapter in this area rife with conspiracy theorists willing and ready to find meaning in the Rorschach Test with you. I’m just not going to go there, for either side of the political spectrum.
Sean Markets can not be self correcting as long as the Four Levels of Government continue to regulate supply and demand period. Everything Congress touches is doomed for failure. Look at the real numbers and post another bar graph. Try this one on just for s***s and g*****s, graph the overall employment numbers for every major industry Congress has regulated and relate that to GDP and Unemployment. Get the picture now ? Also while you are at it graph the purchasing power of the US Dollar say from 1971 when the production of fiat by Congress began.
Sean – I know that you think you’re winning this debate by constantly talking about “conspiracies” but I never mentioned such a thing. YOU’RE the only one talking about conspiracies – I’m just talking about a bad graph being used as propaganda.
Why don’t you address the deficiencies of the graph rather than continue to label me some kind of conspiracist who wants to hang out with “tea partiers”?
Typical Democrat: When you don’t know what to say, you resort to demagoguery with no rational basis for it. Next thing I know, you’re going to say that my pointing out the flaw in your graph has some type of subconscious racial motive.
In short, you don’t know who I am or what I believe. Rather than talk about who I should hang out with and accuse me of conspiracy theories, why not actually address the flawed graph in the first place? Or do you think it’s a more compelling argument to say “OOOH! The Bureau of LABOR made this graph so it HAS to be good!”? Because that’s all you’ve done so far.
I don’t see what’s so bad about this graph… It clearly shows that the economic policies implemented during the Bush Administration began to take effect at the beginning of the Obama Administration. What’s misleading about that? Typical Republicans, always trying to downplay their own successes in an attempt at humility. Too bad there’s not a third party in the spectrum to join the fun and games!
KING OF DORKS YOUR NAME FITS PERFECT.
Overall economic policy is designed and implemented by Congress (Democrat Majority Since January 2007). The President does not make the rules and regulations, Congress and the bureaus created by it control this entire nation, not a conspiracy just the matter of fact. The entire world economy is in a great recession and not one single head of state (Pres. Bush) and not one single nation (USA) has caused this economic turndown due to ‘policies’. To believe otherwise is complete tripe.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aeSenIUvpSK0&pos=10
Your failure, Sean, is in believing that economic recovery is due to Obama’s efforts. The fact that the economy might be getting better and the fact that Obama is president does not translate into the fact that the economy might be getting better because of Obama.
Under your logic, rebounding from the recession after 9/11 was due to Bush. Which means that completely opposite economic philosophies both create recovery. Which doesn’t do much to defend Obama’s porky stimulus bill.
Well, that’s not what the economists are saying. From that article, posted above:
“We’ve had a phenomenal run in asset classes across the board,” said Dan Greenhaus, chief economic strategist for Miller Tabak & Co. in New York. “If he was a Republican, we would hear a never-ending drumbeat of news stories about markets voting in favor of the president.”
“You have to give [the Obama administration] — along with the Federal Reserve – - a lot of credit,” said Joseph Carson, director of economic research at AllianceBernstein LP in New York. “A year ago, there was panic, as well as concern. And a lot of the expectations were not only that we were going to have declines in activity but they would stretch all the way to 2010, if not 2011.”
Oh come on. You want us to believe that you’re actively engaged in economic issues but you think a couple of quotes from some token economists is going to be evidence that Obama’s economic agenda is causing a recovery?
Once again, the fact that panic of a continuing recession has calmed doesn’t say ANYTHING about how Obama’s economic policy actually caused the recession to slow down and reverse. All it says is that people thought the recession was going to get worse, it has calmed down, Obama was president during this time, therefore, Obama caused the recession to slow down and reverse. For all you know – the economists predicting the continued recession that caused the panic in the first place were wrong. We know they have sure as hell been wrong in their predictions before. If they were wrong, then Obama didn’t have to do anything for the economy to recover.
Oh, and the first guy’s analysis is so powerful I can’t even respond. I mean, what do you say to someone whose brilliant remarks start off with “if it were a Republican…” Commmme on.
Quit trying to portray yourself as someone who is intellectually engaged in these issues. It’s pretty clear you just parrot whatever authoritative talking points you can find.