From 1995 to January of 2007, Republicans held at least one house of Congress. However, in the 2006 mid-term elections, Democrats won control of both the House and Senate. They took their new offices in January, 2007. Soon after that time until now, the United States has entered a deep recession, often attributed to President Bush. However, examining the actions of the Democratic Congress and the effects that came, the truth is revealed.
Unemployment is a figure that commands the attention of everyone, from the rich to the poor. Examining its data seems the logical place to start. While President Bush and Republicans controlled Congress, unemployment stayed around 5%, increasing by slightly over 1% after 9/11, from 4.7% to 6.3% in January of 2002. However, it eventually fell to 4.1% by the time of the November 2006 election. After Democrats took office, they passed incredibly expensive new bills, including raising minimum wage and the CLEAN Energy Act.
Under the Democrats, unemployment started to balloon. It stated to climb, rising past 4.5%, past 5%, past 6%, and past 6.5%, all the way to 8.5% by the time they had been in office for just two years. By then, President Obama had been inaugurated, and unemployment continued to rise as spending increased. This chart explains, in depth, the bills Democrats passed, and the effects they had from November 2006-March 2010 (click for a sharper, bigger image):
A large National Debt data is also something that Democrats like to blame President Bush for. However, examining our debt as a percent of our GDP shows the truth again. This number sounds complicated, but in fact it is pretty simple. "Our debt as a percent of our GDP" simply means that if our GDP is $100 and our debt is $60, then our "debt as a percent of our GDP" is 60%. From 2001-2007 (when Republicans left office), the percent of our debt grew from 57.4% to 65.6%, or 8.8% (around 1.2% a year). Though the number did rise, you must take into account 9/11, the devastation from Hurricane Katrina, and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Further, from 2005-2007, it slowed to an average of .5% per year, which means it may have began to go down in the near future.
Then Democrats took office. In their first full year in office, the debt as a percent of GDP rose 4.6%, from 65.6% to 70.2%. The next year was even more astounding, as the percent rose 15.9%, to 86.1%. So far this year, the percent is up another 5% to 91.1%. This graph explains in greater detail (click for a better image):
The growth of our very economy is also very important to examine. Under President Bush and the Republican Congress, our GDP grew on average around 3%, peaking in the fall of 2003 to nearly 7%. The GDP only decreased in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, and that was only for one quarter.
Then Democrats took Congress. At the beginning of 2008, our GDP sharply dropped. By the end of 2008, it was retracting at a rate of almost 7%. This graph shows everything in more detail (click for a bigger, sharper image):
Examining this data, there can only be one conclusion: the United States entered our recession as the result of the Democratic takeover of Congress in 2007. The truth is out. Once again, the Democratic strategy of blaming President Bush for everything is revealed to be a lie. It is quite possible that the only way to remedy the recession we are in is to once again elect a Republican majority.
The truth is out.
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11 comments:
Actually, our economy has been destined to collapse since the phony central bank of the Federal Reserve was established in 1913. Opponents of the Fed at the time said it was not indefinitely sustainable. Bill Still has a wonder video on Google called The Money Masters where he was predicting a crash in 1996. If you really want to understand the nuts and bolts of our economy, I suggest you check it out.
Amazing article, great work. Finally the truth comes out!
Excellent article, Mike!
Thanks, Mr. K
Excellent article! I like the graphs!
Whenever I hear Obama's "car (economy) in the ditch" analogy, I want to spew. Perhaps someone who is better with words than I am should coopt that analogy with this:
"The Democratic Congress that took control in 2007 deflated the tires and caused the car to careen into the ditch. Now, come November, we must elect a Congress that can reinflate the tires so that the economy can move again."
If this became the narrative and went viral, I bet we wouldn't hear Obama go off on the car analogy anymore.
Interesting but even though Democrats took control of Congress in 2006, the economy was already showing signs of falter. Also, the president still needed to sign what Congress sent him into law.
Also it doesn't explain what's been happening in the rest of the world. I think, going forward, the debt Democrats have saddled us with will be a real problem.
You would have more of an argument if you looked at what Democrats did with Fannie and Freddie which was a main cause of the housing market bubble and defaults.
Also the fact that Democrats, Rangel, Frank, and Dodd, basically destroyed lending standards so anybody would get a loan:
Dodd’s idea of “financial reform” was creating yet another government agency to handle risk management and banking regulation. Mind you, this comes from the same man who helped require banks to extend loans to those unqualified to recieve them, a move which helped over-heat the economy and cause hundreds of billions of dollars in taxpayer dollars to be lost with no word on how much more it’s going to take.
http://capitolcommentary.com/2010/01/12/the-doddering-senator-chris-dodd/
Harrison, you are an obamalon. Pure and simple.
It's the Democrats' fault the economy collapsed. If it weren't for them, there wouldn't have been a collapse.
Nice job, Mike!
Anonymous,
Your integrity is so high you even used your real name.
Look at the Reagan's admin. and GOP congress repealing the sanctions on what our Savings and Loans industry could do to 'boost' the economy. They could do whatever they wanted and take as much risk as they wanted without being regulated. Get people who couldn't afford a loan to get one, then, raise the interest rates under the current law to benefit the Wall Street masses who bought the debts and left the middle class helpless. Giving tax breaks to the rich was scoffed at while middle class families suffered is offending to Americans, especially a Republican such as myself. Of course hey ran up debt on their credit cards. Wouldn't you, if all the sudden you had a government that was spending trillions of dollars on wars that were scaring people, all the while reluctant to spend money on goods because the were afraid that they may not make their mortgage payments that were perpetuated, no, manifested by greed. They depleted our surplus, this is a fact. When will Republicans start being conservative? When will we figure out that none of US can be left behind? I understand why we need to reduce government, but I don't understand why we must throw our countrymen overboard. This will not only define our present, but also how the world views the Greatest country in all of known history. Make or break time is in the works.
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