Great piece by Rex Nutting on the myth of a spending explosion under Obama:
Of all the falsehoods told about President Barack Obama, the biggest whopper is the one about his reckless spending spree.
As would-be president Mitt Romney tells it: “I will lead us out of this debt and spending inferno.”
Almost everyone believes that Obama has presided over a massive increase in federal spending, an “inferno” of spending that threatens our jobs, our businesses and our children’s future. Even Democrats seem to think it’s true.
Government spending under Obama, including his signature stimulus bill, is rising at a 1.4% annualized pace — slower than at any time in nearly 60 years.But it didn’t happen. Although there was a big stimulus bill under Obama, federal spending is rising at the slowest pace since Dwight Eisenhower brought the Korean War to an end in the 1950s.
Even hapless Herbert Hoover managed to increase spending more than Obama has.
Here are the facts, according to the official government statistics:
• In the 2009 fiscal year — the last of George W. Bush’s presidency — federal spending rose by 17.9% from $2.98 trillion to $3.52 trillion. Check the official numbers at the Office of Management and Budget.
• In fiscal 2010 — the first budget under Obama — spending fell 1.8% to $3.46 trillion.
• In fiscal 2011, spending rose 4.3% to $3.60 trillion.
• In fiscal 2012, spending is set to rise 0.7% to $3.63 trillion, according to the Congressional Budget Office’s estimate of the budget that was agreed to last August.
• Finally in fiscal 2013 — the final budget of Obama’s term — spending is scheduled to fall 1.3% to $3.58 trillion. Read the CBO’s latest budget outlook.
The big surge in federal spending happened in fiscal 2009, before Obama took office. Since then, spending growth has been relatively flat.Over Obama’s four budget years, federal spending is on track to rise from $3.52 trillion to $3.58 trillion, an annualized increase of just 0.4%.
There has been no huge increase in spending under the current president, despite what you hear.
You’d think that would be the end of it. But not when you have outrageous hacks like James Pethokoukis on the case. You all remember him, right? He’s the clown who, in AUGUST OF 2008, was denying that we were in a recession. He then, a few months later in October 2008, was forced to admit we were in recession (since the economy had crashed and the DOW had dropped 5,000 point), decided that the reason the economy tanked and the DOW dropped was because investors were afraid that Obama was leading in the polls, otherwise known as the Goldberg theorem. He later theorized that Obama’s interaction with Joe the Plumber would cost Obama the election. His crimes against reality and reason are so severe that we’ve almost had to dedicate an entire server to document the atrocities, but yet, for some reason, he is still held in some regard in some circle-jerks circles.
At any rate, here is Pethokoukis “refudiating” Rex:
Until Barack Obama took office in 2009, the United States had never spent more than 23.5% of GDP, with the exception of the World War II years of 1942-1946. Here’s the Obama spending record:
– 25.2% of GDP in 2009
– 24.1% of GDP in 2010
– 24.1% of GDP in 2011
– 24.3% (estimates by the White House ) in 2012
What’s more, if Obama wins another term, spending—according to his own budget—would never drop below 22.3% of GDP. If that forecast is right, spending during Obama’s eight years in office would average 23.6% of GDP. That’s higher than any single previous non-war year.
That’s a neat little trick he’s done there, so obvious that his commenters are once again openly mocking him:
Does ANYONE here recognize the economy contracted in 2008? Is everyone here a partisan hack who measures spending at % of GDP, but ignores revenue as % of GDP, which is what causes the deficit. Is anyone here cognizant of the fact that spending goes up during a recession because of unemployment, aid to the States, and food stamps increases?
Do any of you live in the real world?
and
James, didn’t something happen in 2008 that caused the GDP to contract rather violently, thereby rendering the stat of spending as a % of GDP to be somewhat nonsensical?
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/united-states/gdp-growth
In fairness to James, he did refuse to recognize the recession in 2008, so maybe now he is just pretending it never happened. At any rate, the beatings continue in the comment section over there.
Clime Acts
Another example of Democratic inability to get a message out.
With a combination of fecklessness and apparent ineptitude, this party regularly turns even its greatest successes into perceived disasters, with the help of the efficient Republican message machine of course.
A lot of democratic codependence going on.
The Dangerman
The spew (hey, I think that would be a great name for a new roundtable political talk show!) on this and other matters is really quite breathtaking. I haven’t waded into this muck much; I’m still trying to figure out whether or not I should be outraged that Kathryn Bigelow is making a movie about the killing of OBL “in an attempt to influence the election” (it will be released 12/19, so one lie exposed) and that “the filmmakers were given all sorts of classified information” (I haven’t figured out that lie yet, but it surely is one).
How does governing work when one side just makes shit up?
cathyx
Hey Obama, quit trying to get the republicans to like you. It’s killing us.
Jennifer
@The Dangerman: They aren’t interested in governing, so the question is moot.
They’re interested in ruling.
George Tierney of Greenville, South Carolina
BWAHWHAHAHAHAHAHHAAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHA
dailykos.com/story/2012/05/23/1094260/-Fox-News-Priest-HHS-is-Raping-the-First-Amendment
Commenting at Balloon Juice Since 1937
Are war years the ones when republicans are president? I’m glad we have not been at war since Obama was elected.
FlipYrWhig
Isn’t the other part of the Republican sleight-of-hand on this that they start out talking about “debt” rather than “deficit,” and extend it out to a very long time horizon? This rebuttal is all about _spending_, but obviously you can spend less (or increase it at a slower rate) and yet see total debt continue to compound, leaving you looking bad at year 50.
It’d be like if your business partner burnt through your line of credit, then skipped town, leaving you having to borrow more, make cuts, and make steady payments. You owe more than you used to, and if you fall behind you’ll owe even more. _You’re_ being responsible, but _the business_ looks irresponsible, and you run the business now.
I think that’s the needle of quasi-truth in the giant haystack of Republican bullshit.
beltane
@George Tierney of Greenville, South Carolina: Just tell him the First Amendment is a little boy and he’ll be all for the alleged “rape”.
Both Sides Do It
I love this post. Calling out hacks and including just incredibly stupid stuff they said in the past is my favorite kind of blogging. The biggest contribution blogs can make to political discourse, besides quickly disseminating information, is to not let fucking asshats get away with extended fucking asshatery over an extended period of time. Posts like this contribute the most to that effort.
Thankee, Master Cole.
Linnaeus
Our government does need to spend more, but yes, I get the point here.
FlipYrWhig
@cathyx: I’m confused. What in the story motivated you to make that comment?
Rick Massimo
Great! At this rate it’ll only take another three years before someone suggests that just maybe the tiny growth in federal spending has something to do with how slowly and stutteringly the recovery has been going.
Someone besides Paul Krugman, that is, who obviously doesn’t know anything about economics because shut up that’s why.
Stuck in the Funhouse
It is easy to demagogue big spending liberal, when yearly deficits are running at around 1.5 trillion, and Obama passing some very big spending bills. The truth is more nuanced of course. A lot of that yearly deficit came from Bush and TARP 1, and other initial bailout monies later, with Obama. Not to mention democrats and Obama adding war spending into yearly spending overall. But the biggest reason for the large yearly deficit is a recessed economy, to a sluggish one growth wise.
But when everything is tallied up, Obama’s actual spending has been rather modest, or at least the bottom line. Nearly every new spending bill has been offset with being paid for by some other way, cuts, reforms, etc… That includes things like the ACA. Otherwise known as “Pay Go”
We are dealing with an ignorant voting public, that with the attention span of an Amoeba, only able to recognize the top layer of a very complex picture, and the wingnuts know this in their lizard brains, and kick up enough dust to fool the public long enough to get what they want.
Brachiator
Nonsense.
Some of this was mentioned on the Rachel Maddow show either yesterday or Monday.
What happens is that the GOP lies, Fox News lies, and a lot of people believe it simply because they want to.
By the way (because some people keep beating this dead horse), this is not about “low information” voters. It’s about low truth voters, who deliberately ignore facts that do not suit their world view of an evil Obama working for evil Democrats, Kenyans, commies and Islamic terrorists.
R. Porrofatto
They really are desperate to make the myth true. Unless he’s math illiterate, I’m sure Pethokoukis knows that even if under Obama the U.S. didn’t spend one penny more than under Bush the year before, spending as % of GDP would still have increased because the GDP decreased. Perhaps he’s experienced a similar contraction in his integrity.
gene108
To this James fellow, I say: MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!! {two thumbs up emoticon}.
The right-wingers have a simple talking point to refute any of those pesky facts Rex Nutting throws around – which have a decidedly liberal bias – from now until Dooms Day.
bemused
“Do any of you live in the real world?” I love that. However, mocking has no effect. Someone (Karl Rove?) in the Bush White House said, “You live in the reality based community but that’s not how the real world works anymore. We create our own reality”.
They prefer living in a fantasy world. “All of you will be left to just study what we do” is the next part of that quote. I’d go along with that if we could study them in a psychiatric clinical setting.
JPL
@George Tierney of Greenville, South Carolina: Maybe the Catholic Church can use another term besides “rape”. They could accuse Obama of being a Nazi, oh they already did. I wonder what the current Pope thinks about the Nazi label.
eemom
I cannot tell y’all how much it enrages me that that vermin is not only a Greek, but a Cretan, which is what I am on my mother’s side.
Die, you miserable festering gangrenous cancer upon the honor of my people.
Nutella
@Brachiator:
Yup. They all know that Democrats are big spenders and Republicans are fiscally conservative, just like they know that Jesus loves them. Any and all actual facts that contradict this fundamental religious belief cannot be true.
R. Porrofatto
@Jennifer: They’re interested in ruling.
True, but ruling is messy and implies that you might actually be interested in the welfare of the country, even if for nothing but self interest. They’re a lot more interested in the keys to the U.S. Treasury. All that sweet Social Security and Medicare money to generate even grander bonuses! Of course, they’ll also rewrite the Tax Code to ensure that none of the money they loot is from their patrons. Once they have that, who needs the burden of responsibility for governing?
Rick Massimo
P.S.:
Yeah, you have to count wartime separately. Because governments spend a lot of money in wars. In World War II, for example, there was massive government spending.
You know what happened to the economy in World War III?
It skyrocketed. Wingnuts know this. It’s one of their favorite talking points – “The New Deal didn’t end the Depression; World War II did. Because, from a strictly economic point of view, it was a massive government spending program.”
Oh, I’m sorry – they never say that second sentence. Some of them don’t say it because they’re stupid. Some don’t say it because they’re liars. I don’t care to sort them out.
piratedan
@Clime Acts: if only there was a news agency that actually reported the….news
WWStBreitbartD
From Political Math
That chart bakes inflation into the spending data. We had deflation in 2009, so it spending increases look smaller.
It blames Bush for all the spending in 2009. Go look up who signed the 2009 FY budget.
It uses CBO estimate for Bush’s final spending year. The CBO spending estimates were $40+B *larger* than what we actually spent.
So, for the baseline of spending increases, they use an imaginary number that never existed.
The 800 Billion Stimulus that only the Democrats voted for under the chart that is Bush spending.
FIGURES DON’T LIE: DEMOCRATS DO
dedc79
The Bush Administration realized the power of misinformation, and the value of doubling down, no matter how wrong they were.
We are essentially still living in that world. If anything, the GOP and their facilitators have gotten way better at it.
Yutsano
@WWStBreitbartD: Your sources are a random Twitter account and Ann Coulter. Try harder.
Brachiator
@Nutella: RE: this is not about “low information” voters. It’s about low truth voters, who deliberately ignore facts that do not suit their world view of an evil Obama working for evil Democrats
It’s kinda like this truth, recently reported, that conservatives will conveniently ignore.
But the weird thing will be the people with regular access to birth control who will vote for Republicans trying to take contraception away from everyone.
kindness
Fear not!
Romney will be repeating these statistics by the next news cycle (if he hasn’t already), and the media will give him a complete pass on the whole thing. When some (damn) lib suggests the error of Romney’s point, that same media will smile and laugh at the crazy person in their midst (and it won’t be Romney they are thinking is crazy). Afterwards everyone will go over to Sally Quinn’s for Mint Juleps.
yopd1
@George Tierney of Greenville, South Carolina: Nevermind. I was wrong so I’m editing this.
Villago Delenda Est
@Rick Massimo:
Prezactly.
The bottom line is that government spending ended the Great Depression. MASSIVE government spending.
As you indicate, they’re either too stupid or too dishonest to admit this.
Villago Delenda Est
@Yutsano:
You ask for the impossible.
Troll is a lying sack of shit, just like his worthless fascist namesake.
ruemara
@FlipYrWhig: Obama was mentioned.
Villago Delenda Est
@Stuck in the Funhouse:
Obama put the deserting coward’s excellent Mesopotamian and Afghan adventures “on budget”, ending the deserting coward’s lie of the “off budget” wars. A trick he picked up from his mendacious sire, who put the bailout of the bank robber Neil and his fellow bank robbers “off budget”.
replicnt6
@eemom:
FTFY
WWStBreitbartD
Shorter
@Villago Delenda Est:
@Yutsano
I can’t refute 800 Billion Stimulus was counted as Bush spending so I’ll just attack the messenger.
The Obama Spending Binge
Villago Delenda Est
@WWStBreitbartD:
Damn, you’re a cretin. Reason magazine? Home of neo-feudalist fucks?
Try again, maggot.
gaz
The sick part is that this debate is already framed, bagged and mounted.
We shouldn’t be talking about spending as a problem. That’s where Rex blows it by continuing the narrative, and allowing James to make hay with it. Lack of spending is the problem in a demand weak economy.
In the end, no matter who was right, we as a country lose by entertaining this “when did you stop beating your wife?” bullshit.
A better conversation would be focusing on the damages of austerity measures during a downturn. This is a fact backed up OVER and OVER again by history. The reason we always make poor choices around economic policy is the fact that we entertain debates like this in the first place
It’s wholly unproductive.
The Other Chuck
@R. Porrofatto:
I don’t think they’re really even interested in looting the treasury, at least not for their own direct gain. I think they’re primarily motivated by *spite* now, and the destruction of everything held dear by their political opponents, which includes such things as the very notion of a social contract. They’re simply applying Genghis Khan’s maxim: “It is not enough that I succeed — all others must fail.”
Yutsano
@Villago Delenda Est: And a deceptive article to boot. “Obama didn’t get us to this current level, but because he didn’t reverse it it’s all THAT ONE’S fault” Not to mention comparing GDP as a percentage of spending AFTER THE GDP CRASHED IN A MAJOR RECESSION is hackery of the highest order.
@gaz: I refused to give Ann Coulter the page click. Reason didn’t bug me as much, but it was just about as hacktastic as I was expecting.
gaz
@Yutsano: both articles are deceptive.
piratedan
@WWStBreitbartD:
I don’t see a personal attack here on you, just that we don’t believe your sources are legit….. to whit…if this was true, methinks you would have a better source than you have cited, n’est pas? So stop projecting your angst and come up with a better source and then you might warrant some discussion with your claim, otherwise you’re simply a drivebytroll.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@WWStBreitbartD: Actually, no, it has not been. If you look at the chart on the link John provided, you will notice that the stimulus was reassigned to Obama.
Pay attention.
gaz
This discussion is a lie.
Forum Transmitted Disease
@Brachiator: You cannot be seriously implying that Maddow has ANY viewership which is not of the hardcore liberal/political inside baseball junkie type.
The Republicans own all of one network (Fox), almost all of another (CNN), and all of radio. Maddow has one show on a cable network.
You think because you know better that everyone should. The truth is that you’ve got to be pretty fucking motivated to go digging for the truth, because it is not easy to find unless you are both of a liberal bent and internet fluent, and if you’re both of those things you already know the truth anyway.
Yutsano
@piratedan: I shouldn’t be feeding I know. But I’m also convalescing. What else am I gonna do all day? :)
gaz
@Yutsano:
What are you talking about?
See @#37
Brachiator
@Yutsano:
Economics is hard. Talking and writing intelligently about economics is harder. This is why Paul Krugman has to continually kick ass and take names, kind of like a pundit-punching Chuck Norris.
As an aside, the guest host on a recent Rachel Maddow interviewed Krugman and after some introductory remarks, respectfully asked if he had got it right. I was stunned. A welcome change from ignorant reporters and commentators shamelessly spouting the most uninformed crap imaginable.
jl
No time to read all the comments, so maybe been mentioned before, but the key point is that the December 2007 recession was the worst Post WWII recession, and the drop in economic activity was comparable to the Great Depression after the financial panic. So GDP, and revenues drop was more severe than previous downturns.
That is why the comparison of the percentages is meaningless.
And, what gaz said above.
piratedan
OT: your american taliban is already hard at work for YOU!!!!!
rhrealitycheck.org/article/2012/05/22/american-airlines-rejects-female-passenger-because-political-p…
change.org/petitions/american-airlines-apologize-for-kicking-o-off-her-flight-for-offensive-pro-choi…
FlipYrWhig
@Brachiator: That’s a signature Maddow move. She almost always does the intro, then asks the guest if she got it right. Then the guest says that she did. It’s kind of a ritual on the show.
jl
@Brachiator:
I disagree with your opinion about what is hard.
Maybe economics is hard, or maybe not.
But understanding that a percentage is a way of expressing a fraction, proportion, ratio, or whatever you want to call it, and it has a denominator and numerator is not hard.
At least for anyone who got halfway through sophomore in high school, to be lenient about it. Middle school should be enough.
Brachiator
@FlipYrWhig:
Yep. I’ve noticed that Maddow does it. It is good to see that it is a standard practice on the show. I know I should know the guest host’s name, he’s done the show before, but I do not.
This just in:
Birthers will continue to look for the conspiracy.
gaz
@Yutsano: Ahhh. I see what happened. When I said both articles, I meant the ones on the front page post about Obama’s spending levels. Mea Culpa for jumping into the conversation late, and missing the context. FTR, I ignore the troll, and wasn’t considering whatever garbage it posted.
My whole point is that the best thing we could do is DERAIL THIS DISCUSSION ALTOGETHER. The discussion itself IS A LIE.
This is a demand weak economy. Talking about whether or not Obama is spending less or more is disingenuous and/or foolhardy. Rex should be ashamed for taking the bait, and James should be ashamed for being a lying asshole.
It doesn’t matter who is right on the figures, because the debate about spending reduction is bullshit in the FIRST PLACE.
Yutsano
@Brachiator:
I hope they responded with a “SNARK OFF YOU WANKER!!” and gave him a lei. Customs must be observed after all.
The Sheriff's A Ni-
@gaz:
Meh. Austerity always sells right up until the hammer drops on the wrong people. That’s a fight they’re not going to win up front, or at the least without covering their flanks.
Brachiator
@jl:
Americans fight for their right to be math ignorant. Some of them will swear it’s in the Constitution.
This is one of the reasons that conservative cling so hard to simplistic notions of the free market, St Reagan, etc.
You can watch some reporters and pundits, and see the emptiness in their eyes when they try to wrestle with the most simple stuff, especially when it contradicts their deeply held dumbass beliefs. And then they fall back on some Reaganesque supply side parable like a drowning man grasping onto a life preserver.
jl
@Yutsano: Does that mean that the invasion of Hawaii is off if Mitt wins, or that it is definitely on?
gaz
@Yutsano: There we go. =)
Also, thankfully Off-Poisonous-Topic, How about them mets?
And related to your comment, we must ask Is Romney a Unicorn?. It would be irresponsible not to speculate.
FlipYrWhig
@gaz: I dunno. I think it’s reasonable to have a two-pronged attack, one on the falsehood of the principal Republican premise (Obama’s Prairie Fire Of Spending), another on what should be the proper course of action in a sluggish economy (more support for the public sector, not less).
gaz
@The Sheriff’s A Ni-: That’s because we give it room to breathe. Occupy accomplished something. Let’s not make it for nothing.
This front page is asinine.
jl
@Brachiator:
Perhaps. But they need to be informed, politely, that HS algebra is not hard, they need to know it. So, I try to never say or type anything that can be interpreted as giving them slack. Maybe because I am a stats and econ teacher, and am a meany.
Gex
@Villago Delenda Est: Listen, we’re going fascist as quickly as we can, so just be patient. Once we reach critical mass we can start our expansion and take on the world with our war machine. Then we’ll have some stimulus.
JPL
@Belafon (formerly anonevent): Another troll runs for cover. It’s amazing that Fox news viewer’s always come in last when questioned about specific issues. Why is that?
Yutsano
@gaz: Apparently there is disbelief in the unicorn community.
FlipYrWhig
@Brachiator: And how. They just Do. Not. Get. the idea that it might be a good idea to borrow money cheaply and spend it building stuff that lasts. It doesn’t seem that hard. I wonder if it’s because of a kind of hangover from inflation/stagflation in the 1970s, which was the last new thing they learned about economic peril. The major-media punditocracy always seems to be 30-40 years behind the times. In 2040 they’ll probably be pontificating from their robot bodies about the risks of a housing bubble.
gaz
@Yutsano: hehehe. UNICORNS UNITE!
FlipYrWhig
@gaz: Unicorn unity MY ASS!
jl
@gaz:
” we must ask Is Romney a Unicorn?. It would be irresponsible not to speculate. ”
I think there is more evidence that Romney is a sparkle pony, gold dust variety.
But every speculation should be investigated endlessly, even after resolution beyond a shadow of doubt, just to be safe.
Edit: Hey… Isn’t ‘shadow of a doubt’ an old Hitchcock film, about a guy who seems respectable and on the up and up, but is really fleeing a murder he committed?
Well, now it’s ‘out there’ and I think we should be concerned about how poorly the Romney campaign has handled these reports that he is murderer on the lam.
gaz
@FlipYrWhig: Austerity is a poison pill that looks like candy. It doesn’t just go back to Carter. It goes back to at least Hoover.
We need to invest in infrastructure and education, and as you said STUFF THAT LASTS. If we cut anything right now, it should be defense – the numbers don’t lie, defense spending at current levels is an absolute net loss. We should be investing in things that are a net gain.
Also, it helps to use the word INVEST instead of spend when talking about this stuff. People like investments. They don’t like spending. Let’s each do our part to reclaim the narrative.
The Obama admin, and congress are not INVESTING enough into this nation.
gaz
@FlipYrWhig:
Well, that’s kinky. I call rule 34
jl
Also, too, TPM reports that the GOP is about to go full on paleo/hydraulic fiscal Keynesian about the tremendous economic damage that the upcoming military spending cuts will do to widows and orphans.
Will be interesting to see how that mother of all nonsensical and very cynical flip flops will be reported.
Any corporate reporters or pundits who hack on that garbage has to be held accountable, at least by the fringe commie types who visit this blog.
FlipYrWhig
@gaz: YKIOK, but hot unicorn-ass action is nothing compared to getting succor from an Oakeshott in your Widener.
gaz
@FlipYrWhig: At this rate, the Urban Dictionary is gonna need to requisition another cage at it’s datacenter.
Villago Delenda Est
I see no reason, at all, for them to ever end on this worthless partisan hack.
FlipYrWhig
@gaz: Obama actually uses the “invest” lingo a fair amount, and IMHO feints towards cutting to placate conserva-Dems.
But, yeah, we need to increase the public appetite for Keynesian stimulus. My thought is that we need to talk more about how, exactly, in detail, the government can and should “create jobs.” I think liberals have a much better answer to that than Republicans do. For liberals, it’s “borrow money cheaply and use it hire people to do stuff that needs doing.” For conservatives it’s something like “cut rich people’s taxes so that they have more money to spend, which keeps businesses open, which compels those businesses to hire more staff to keep up with the orders.” I want to hear Romney explain how he thinks the government should create jobs.
gaz
@FlipYrWhig:
See though, propaganda doesn’t work that way. It’s a trap.
Particularly when there are so many other falsehoods that the GOP serves up daily. If you want to attack them for lying there’s plenty of ground to cover without ceding ground to toxic framing (which is what is happening in this case)
The more people talk about spending reductions, the more spending reductions are moved to the fore of peoples consciousness. If people are thinking about them, they aren’t thinking about other things, like expansionary economic policy. Generally, this is part of why FRAMING is so important. It’s really easy to send people on a wild goose chase so that they don’t notice when you are picking their pocket. It’s a psy-op
It needs to be strangled before it gets out of the gate. Discussing it legitimizes it, no matter what position one holds. The evidence for this is legion
jl
@gaz:
At this point, I think best approach is to call the TOP treacherous unreliable lying fatcat scumbags, details available upon request.
Opening with that line has worked for years with the GOP, and no one even bothered to check out whether they had a case or not.
The Democrats do have a case.
Edit: and speaking of fatcats, too bad we could not get Tunch into the GOP primary race in time to be a not-Romney for a month or so. That would have been fun.
Brachiator
@jl:
You have my sympathies. My mother taught math. I’m aware of the challenges and have shown people that they are doing math when they think they aren’t, and that they can comprehend much more than they think.
Still, I’ve seen people go out of their way to misunderstand and reject economic and math issues, especially when it’s tied to politics. It’s sad to see, and doubly sad when you see journalists and pundits do it. And I especially detest those conservative pundits who think they understand what they are saying, when they are as wrong as they could possibly be.
NR
@gaz: Yep. Looks like we’re in for another election of the Democrats trying to out-Republican the Republicans.
gaz
@jl:
This.
FlipYrWhig
@gaz: But that horse left the barn long, long ago. There’s just too much widespread agreement that it’s important to Cut Spending. And the national economy = household economy analogy feels right, because that’s by far the most common experience of budgeting. That’s why my perspective is to reclaim and redirect some of those tenacious analogies, like for instance to use “investing” as a meme, or to liken the government’s borrowing to get ahead to a college loan, or a small business loan. But I don’t think we can knock down those analogies and bits of conventional wisdom by ignoring them, because it’s too late for that.
gaz
@FlipYrWhig: This too.
=)
FlipYrWhig
@NR: Which Democrats, where, when? Oh, for fuck’s sake, never mind.
gaz
@FlipYrWhig: Well yes, the horse left the barn. FWIW, I’m saying we can attack this narrative indirectly by pointing at the enormous body of historical evidence against austerity measures – and talking about investing in the next generation. We don’t need to have the discussion about who spent less than who in order to undermine the GOP – and that actually plays in their favor. We can reclaim the narrative by angling with a better approach.
FlipYrWhig
@gaz: I get it, but I think the two are complementary. One is “as usual, the Republicans are blatantly lying to you, and here’s how this time,” and the other is “here’s what a better economic policy would look like.”
gaz
@FlipYrWhig: My problem with Rex’s piece is that I believe fundamentally that one comes away thinking “Cutting spending is good, therefore Obama is doing a good thing”.
Obviously the republicans will sell stiffer cuts, so that makes them “better”. Rex should know better.
Blaming bush for expanding govt has lost it’s legs as well – no point. People that voted for him pretend they didn’t anyway – or that he wasn’t a “real republican”. Also, we want to sell expansion, not undermine it.
Either way, the dems lose.
Rex would have done better talking about the successes of the administrations investments (such as GM), and HOW MUCH OF A RETURN WE GOT FROM THAT.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@JPL: Yeah, I was wondering where he/she went.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@gaz: I think its because of the lie that spending exploded under Obama that has to be dealt with. A candidate for railroad commissioner here in Texas has the “Debt out of control under Obama” in her campaign ad. People I facebook talk about Obama being the biggest spender in history, and their argument amounts to he’s running a deficit therefore he’s out of control.
FlipYrWhig
@gaz: See, I think a person would be more likely to come away from that piece saying, “Hey, that thing they keep saying about exploding debt, it looks like that turns out to be bullshit.” It’s debunking an attack rather than offering a counterattack. We agree on what a sharp counterattack would look like, but that piece wasn’t designed to do that. YMMV.
GeorgeTierneyOfGreenvilleSC
F*cking denominators. How do they work?
FlipYrWhig
@Belafon (formerly anonevent): It’s also because Obama’s deficits have gotten tagged by conservative critics as evidence of a kind of “welfare” or “giveaway,” while Bush’s were linked to tax cuts (always A Good Thing) and wars (Keeping Us Safe!). “The Deficit” doesn’t mean something on the national balance sheet, it means “money squandered on moochers.”
A Conservative Teacher
Those 2009 numbers include the one-time only bailout of the banks (trillion dollars) and the one-time only bailout to the auto industry. To include them as some sort of new baseline is just silly.
If I crash my car and have to buy a new one, that’s reasonable. But if I crash my car, buy a new one, and then every year after that buy a brand new car, that’s unreasonable and wrong. And that’s what Obama has done- he has taken the wild spending of Bush, passed by Democrats, and locked it in as the new normal.
America will soon collapse under this debt load, resulting in old people eating cat food, pensions destroyed, people unable to get medical care, and riots in the street (see Greece as an example). It’s immoral and unethical to push for continued deficit spending. If you’re a friend of the poor, the unions, the old, or women, you should be against Obama and his spending agenda.
FlipYrWhig
@A Conservative Teacher: Dude, you’re repeating Pethekoukis, right down to the lousy “new car” analogy.
piratedan
@A Conservative Teacher: OMG! you’re so right, especially this last year where Obama has hoodwinked those stalwart Tea Party rookies into massive increases in spending. Look at all the new monies that were allocated to infrastructure, education and welfare and medicare in those massive spending bills and defense, all that cash spent in Syria, Libya and Egypt! If only we hadn’t raised the debt ceiling after we ruined our credit rating…..
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@piratedan: I wouldn’t try too hard. They don’t mind spending when there side does it, whether it’s during a recession or during good times. Point out to them that the size of government grew 11.6% during Reagan’s first three years in office and shrank 2% during Obama’s first three years, and they’ll tell you it’s because Reagan cut the deficit even though he did exactly the opposite. Point out that he raised taxes again after cutting them, and their feeble little brains cannot handle it. They are wired to not look at evidence and figure out what has worked and what has failed, except for what gets their side reelected.
mclaren
Does “everyone” really believe that Obama has vastly increased government spending? Most of the people I talk to are well aware that one of the main reasons for our current high unemployment is that Obama has sharply curtailed federal spending, and most of the jobs being created in the period immediately after the 2008 global economic collapse are (wait for it) government jobs.
The other reason for our current high unemployment is of course sharp cutbacks in state government due to the massive drop in revenues. Between state workers losing their jobs and the federal government holding the line on spending, that’s much of the reason for our current prolonged high unemployment.
Moreover, let’s assume the counterfactual: it’s not true, but let’s say Obama did sharply increase government spending. Do the math. A huge recession like this with real negative yields on T-bills is exactly the time when you want to increase government spending and create a lot more govenrment jobs.
Why?
Because, as economists like Brad deLong and Paul Krugman have pointed out, right now a real negative yield on T-bills (zero percent interest plus some miminal inflation means that the public is actually paying the federal government to hold their money) means that the market is actually paying more than a dollar to the government for every dollar it borrows by issuing a T-bill. Under those circumstances, it’s insanely stupid not to take advantage of the situation and spend federal dollars like they’re going out of style.
Look: let’s simplify it to anyone can understand. The federal government right now can borrow money at a negative interest rate to create jobs via federal spending. Those jobs then generate tax revenue which goes back to the federal government. In effect, the federal government is getting paid to borrow. Every dollar the U.S. government borrows right now, under these extraordinary fiscal conditions when we’ve hit the zero bound in fiscal policy, generates much more than a dollar in tax revenue by the multiplier effect and is borrowing that Uncle Sam is getting paid to engage in.
Federal spending should be rising sharply right now. It’s insane for the U.S. government not to borrow to create jobs right now, because in effect the U.S. government is getting paid to borrow. Negative interest rates? That’s amazing, it means the people to whom you loan money get no actual interest on their money and to the contrary, pay you for holding their money.
The fact that the congress isn’t going on a borrowing-and-spending spree is in fact what’s keeping millions of Americans out of work right now. It’s crushing the U.S. economy. A wild borrowing-and-spending “inferno” under these extraordinary economic condition, when real interest rates are negative, works. Don’t believe me? Just compare the unemployment at the depths of this downturn to the unemployment rate at the depths of the Great Depression. This economic collapse was worse than during the Great Depression, yet our unemployment peaked at less than half that of the Great Depression. That’s because fiscal policy works in an exceptional economic collapse like this. When the govenrment is the lender of last resort, as Walter Bagehot wrote in 1873, it must “lend freely, and at a penalty rate.” It worked in 1873, it worked when FDR finally tried it after 1932 (after Hoover’s insane counterproductive economy-wrecking austerity policy) and it worked in 2008-2009.
Obama should be going on a wild borrow-and-spend spree. Unfortunately, our brain-damaged congress blocks that. But Obama has done what he could.
So the entire criticism is foolish and ignorant. The big problem with the American economy is that we’re not borrowing enough money, not that we’re borrowing too much.
As for the various claims that “this is another failure of Democratic messaging,” blah blah woof woof, no, I think the problem is really that all too many Democrats are hopelessly ignorant of macroeconomics. All too many Democrats have joined the mindless chorus screaming for austerity.
Under these economic conditions, austerity and a balanced budget is the path to ruin and economic collapse. Herbert Hoover tried it in 1930-32. Didn’t work. Britain has been trying it since 2009. As you’d expect (repeat after me), hasn’t worked.
James Gary
@A Conservative Teacher:
Yes, because America is just like a bunch of drunken sailors starting a prairie fire, and buying new cars. Or some stupid shit like that. Really, do you know how stupid you sound? You’d do well to look beyond your tired Fox News talking points.
The Greek crisis was largely the result of money lost/wasted due to three causes: 1) widespread tax evasion, 2) rampant corruption in the government (elected officials simply pocketing whatever they could) and 3) civil-service empire-building by means of *massive* bureaucratic expansion (and before you start saying, “it’s just like that here”– no, it f*cking well isn’t. Do some research, or talk to some actual Greeks—there are probably some living near you.) NONE of those factors are even remotely similar to those in the present-day US.
some guy
@WWStBreitbartD: FTFA:
Take Breitbart’s ghost-cock out of your mouth for a second and work on your reading comprehension.
FlipYrWhig
@mclaren:
The people you’re talking to are farther to the left, more logical, and more informed than at least 90% of the population of this country. Probably better looking, too. I bet if you polled the question of whether Obama has spent too much, just enough, or too little, the breakdown would be something like 65-30-5.
mclaren
@FlipYrWhig:
Well, it’s possible that the people I’m talking to about the economic state of America are more logical or better informed than 90% of the population. But it seems to me that something different is going on.
Unless I’m mistaken, polls show pretty conclusively that the vast majority of the American population doesn’t give a shit about “government borrowing” or the “size of the deficit.” On the contrary, polls shows that most Americans are worried about one thing, and one goddamn thing only: jobs.
This entire brouhaha about “government borrowing” and “the size of the deficit” as far the polling data shows appears to be a confection ginned up by billionaires like Pete Peterson as a cheap excuse to slash social security and medicare. The only people who really give a damn about the size of the U.S. deficit right now, as far the polling data show, are the bobblehead pundits in Washington D.C. like David “I don’t know spit about economics but that doesn’t prevent me from carrying water for thugs like Grover Norquist” Brooks and the PR flacks hired by extreme far-right billionaires like Peterson.
I’ll let Paul Krugman have the last word:
Source: “Nobody Understands Debt,” Paul Krugman, 1 January 2011.
(“Nobody” is an overstatement here. Read Krugman’s op-ed and you’ll see that what he means is “nobody in Washington D.C. understands debt,” i.e., none of the talking head pundits understand it and none of the paid-whore Heritage Foundation flacks understand it.)
I think the evidence shows that most Americans are lot smarter and more knowledgeable than anyone here gives them credit for on this issue. Deficit panic isn’t a real issue that real people in America care about, it’s a scam, a bogus non-issue — just like flag-burning or partial birth abortion or the satanic child molestation panic of the 80s, a con job cooked up by extreme far-right ideologues for the sole purpose of bashing Democrats. And it seems to me that the average American realizes that, and the polls show it.
FlipYrWhig
@mclaren: IMHO that’s why Republicans say things like “job-killing debt” and what have you, to link the two. I agree that few people care about the deficit in and of itself, but there’s a story that sounds seductive to almost all Republicans and some middle-of-the-road voters, and it’s this: “we owe too much money and can’t keep borrowing more to spend more, and Obama is making the problem worse by loading up on giveaways to lazy bastards, so it’s time to bring that to a stop. Then we can cut taxes and let everyone keep more of their hard-earned money, instead of having to gouge them to feed the beast like we do now.”
So no one really cares about The Deficit in isolation. But _a lot_ of people have the issue of “government spending” all bound up in their minds with jobs and the economy, and it’s all backwards as you point out, but it’s got a hold on them, fiercely. And Obama needs to tell a story that works against that mentality, and it’s difficult because the Republican story, let’s be honest, kind of feels coherent and powerful to a lot of the kinds of people who have been feeling left behind since the crisis began. Arguing that the government should spend more money and worry about paying for it later, which you and I agree is the better course of action, has a HUGE headwind against it because it doesn’t chime with people’s experiences as consumers and bill-payers.
So you’re right and your friends are right, but being convincing about it is a whole different matter than being right about it.
TenguPhule
mclaren
@TenguPhule:
You’re absolutely right. And that suggests a good way Obama could hammer back at these clowns. “These guys were all for crazy spending when some nut jobs flew two jets into a couple of skyscrapers. But now that millions of Americans are out of work, they don’t want to spend a dime. Which is more important: a couple of skyscrapers, or tens of millions of Americans losing their jobs and their homes and their cars?”
If Obama really wanted to hit back, he could point out that the Repubs are gung-ho for spending that the military itself has said it doesn’t want and doesn’t need — like the 2nd engine on the F-35 joint strike fighter. If the Republicans are so all-fired concerned about spending, why is it that they’re eager to throw away money on worthless boondoggles as long as they have the label “military”? Something doesn’t add up here. The Republicans just aren’t being honest.
Both of these sound like good arguments to me. I suspect we’ll see variants of them as Obama’s campaign progresses. He has certainly decided to run against a “do-nothing congress” like Harry Truman in 1948, so he’ll probably hit the Republicans hard with their dishonesty about deficits (oh so important…except when we’re spending like drunken sailors on worthless Rube Goldberg weapons that don’t even work and the military doesn’t even want, like the Osprey tilt-rotor thing).
Skippy-san
What I find really disturbing is that the facts proving Nuttings point have been out there for the last three years. The charts showing the causes of the deficit and the size of the federal budget are available to anyone with a brain to see and analyze themselves. But so many Americans have abandoned any type of critical thinking anymore-that they believe a hack like James P.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@A Conservative Teacher:
Where have you been Teach? People are already eating pet food and have been for some time now. The healthier are lucky because they can go dumpster diving for their meals!
Again, where have you been Teach? Pensions have been being destroyed for decades now, all to satiate our corporate overlords need for profit. Ask your buddy, Mitt Romney, about that. Bain sucked one company dry and left the government on the hook for the pension fund, to the tune of $44 million dollars.
Again Teach, we’re already there and have been for a long fucking time now.
People are already in the streets, all we need is some rioting and we are there.
I’ll ignore the rest of your post because you are wearing blinders. That and what I have posted above will go in one ear and right out the other because there’s nothing in between them to absorb it.
Conservative Teacher? Yeah, I can believe that…lol! You’re fucking blind, deaf and dumb to the world.
Neo
>Except the FY 2009 budget wasn’t Bush’s, a Democratic Congress held it up with continuing resolutions until Obama was sworn in