Well, I’m convinced. The chart should use the actual information from 2017, not projections!
I’m sure friend Bricker will loan us his time machine to quell his outrage. :rolleyes:
No, but the income existed, so Obama’s numbers benefit. Money is fungible; he had $194 billion that he could use to cover costs. That number should be removed from Bush’s column or shown as offsetting income on Obama’s side.
What does this even mean?
I’m not suggesting the use of a time machine. I am pointing out that the two charts, though placed right next to eahc other and drawn with identical colors and sizes, show different periods of time, and the numbers on Obama’s side are estimates, not actual figures. For this reason, comparing the two as though they were of indentical parentage and probity is not justified.
Do you understand that point? Do you dispute it?
There is certainly one aspect of your post that is correct.
In 2017, we will be able to accurately have this discussion, showing eight years of Bush, four or eight years of Obama, and four years of whoever comes next to the White House.
This chart isn’t showing net at all - it’s showing the effect of certain policies. If anything, it helps Bush by limiting the effects of the tax cuts and Medicare changes to his time in office, rather than in perpetuity.
It’s an additive delta, if you will.
As to the projections, based on what I know about the various policies listed it’s only there for the Obamacare part - the CBO scored it out to 2017 so that’s the number they are using. The other portions (stimulus and non-defense discretionary) are fixed in time.
The only misleading part, to my eyes, is that the Bush column is actuals over 8 years where Obama’s is only over 3ish. Which is, of course, misleading.
I prefer the line chart I’ve seen elsewhere that shows the continuing impact of the various policies.
One other thing that should probably be in Obama’s column is extending the Bush tax cuts for two more years. That would add some more negative to his side.
I think you’re looking at a different chart than the one linked to in the OP. Can you point to where the paybacks are even referenced in the chart?
Fun with numbers. How quaint. :rolleyes:
I don’t want the hijack this thread more than I have already but my point was that the TARP paybacks aren’t all they’re cracked up to be, and even that bastion of liberalism “The National Review” agrees with me. cite
Frankly, I think you are picking nits. But I’m paying attention. What do you think the difference actually looks like? Can you demonstrate a reduction in Bush policies’ impact on the deficit by more than 4.4%? Because as it stands, the chart looks pretty compelling even taking for granted the reduced TARP costs.
The point is certain factions would very much like to place all the blame for the current economy at Obama’s feet and this chart demonstrates why that is quite wrong. I invite you to prove the chart wrong.
[QUOTE=Brown Eyed Girl]
The point is certain factions would very much like to place all the blame for the current economy at Obama’s feet and this chart demonstrates why that is quite wrong. I invite you to prove the chart wrong.
[/QUOTE]
How can he, since on one side we have the actual figures from Bush’s time in office, and on the other we have projections? Obama hasn’t even won his second term yet…or completed his first. What if the economy turns around and starts booming? What if the economy goes completely off a cliff? What if the US is embroiled in an unexpected and costly war? What if a huge national emergency strikes that costs the US trillions? What if space alien cuddle fish land tomorrow and give us magic technology with limitless clean energy and all the porn we could ever want?
We just can’t know, so any chart doing a comparison right now is pretty much going to say whatever you want it to say, on Obama’s side of the ledger. Personally, I think Bush bears quite a bit of blame for the current economic crisis, but so does current and former members of Congress from both parties, and the American people as well. There is plenty of blame to go around, and it’s natural for one party to try and put the blame on the other, especially when elections are coming up.
-XT
That’s my point. They are not.
Yet they obviously happened, and so the Obama administration had money to spend on things that otherwise might have required new spending initiatives and would have appeared as negatives against him.
“How quaint” is not a rebuttal remarkable for its cogency.
Neither was the simple math you used to demonstrate something completely besides the point. My point was that not all the TARP fund repayments were quite what they were cracked up to be and that it was difficult to calculate how this should be calculated vis a vis Bush2 & Obama. Your point was a dismissive, “So what, it is a immaterial amount of money anyway”, which is a pretty unintentionally ironic point for a purportedly conservative penny pinching conservative to make.
What about the difference in time scales? The chart measures eight years of Bush actuals against three years of Obama actuals and six years of future predictions.
I suspect you’d find, if we looked at similar predictions from 2001, that Bush’s outlook was rosy.
Sure it does. Bush certainly contributed to the current economy.
But so did Obama. It’s not correct to place all the blame at either president’s feet.
Well, I’ve certainly proved the chart wrong with respect to the TARP issue.
But apart from waiting until 2018, how would you propose I prove the chart’s future predictions wrong?
My point is that the chart is unreliable, because it measures Bush actuals against Obama projections. To prove those projections wrong, we must revist the issue in 2017.
If we do, I suspect (based on past experience) I will be assailed as “a dick” (post 2); told that “these sorts of things should simply be left alone” and “it’s OK for someone to be wrong on the Internet” (post 10); that’s it’s “pathetic” to call someone out for being wrong (post 16); and that I am “the single most impressive multiple-year-grudge-holding poster” ever (post 30).
Right?
Or will this one be different?
How about the fact that even accounting for those small business funds as lost, the total paid back ($193.8 billion) exceeds the $190 billion paid out? That seems pretty relevant for a penny-pincher.
Okay, but two years of Obama’s numbers PLUS six years of projections is still less than all of Bush’s, so to say Obama RIGHT NOW is equally guilty as Bush for our debt is plum wrong.
Oh. That’s your … point? Well, then. You’ve completely undone the argument inherent in these data. Congratulations.
Bush is clearly to blame for the current economic crisis.
Obama is to blame for doing shocking little to correct it or make substantive changes.
Weird. Somehow I quoted myself instead of Bricker in the post above. If not clear, I was not intending to talk to myself, but rather to Bricker.
My biggest criticism of Bush and of congressional Republicans over the years was their failure to get spending under control or reform entitlements. Given that, why should I let the Democrats off the hook for doing just as bad or worse in that area?
Also of interest this screed from the raving Trotskyites at Business Week.