Obama by the Numbers

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Excerpt: "The unspun numbers sometimes benefit the administration, and sometimes they do not, but they always act as a corrective to the serial crimes against the truth that are playing out daily in the ongoing election fight..."

U.S. President Barack Obama speaks at the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials Conference, 06/22/12. (photo: Reuters)

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+23 # TomDegan 2012-09-16 08:28

This is what is known as one of those good news/bad news scenarios:

If the American people decide to reelect Barack Obama, they're taking a HUGE risk.

That;s the good news. Are you ready for the bad?

If they're stupid enough to send Mitt Romney to the White House they're committing economic suicide.

Ain't politics a hoot-and-a-half?

http://www.tomdegan.blogspot.com

Tom Degan

+44 # Reductio Ad Absurdum 2012-09-16 08:48

Even this articles doesn't represent the truths and facts as accurately as it should. Two quick examples. Obama did not mangle his oath of office, Roberts did. If you want to cite gas prices during presidential terms, you should cite the wild fluctuations, as well: The cost of gas in the summer of of 2008 averaged $4.11 per gallon. Gas went down to $1.84 right before Obama's inauguration, indicating wild swings beyond presidential control.

Facts and figures are useless in painting an accurate picture without CONTEXT. For example, slashing public sector jobs ultimately affects private sector jobs. Those who want to shrink government in a recession can't seem to grasp that relationship.

Also, the Republicans wanted slower-acting tax cuts in the Stimulus Bill as opposed to faster-acting stimulus spending on shovel-ready projects we we were going to need sooner or later anyway. Thanks to Obama's misguided efforts at bi-partisanship (his worst mistake), they got their way, yet only three Republicans voted for the Stimulus Bill — meaning the Republicans voted against what some say was the largest tax cut in history, yet they now rail against the Stimulus Bill, calling it a failure and accusing Obama of raising taxes.

The Republicans missed a great opportunity during their convention to apologize to all Americans and the world for George W. Bush's Decade of Disaster and its continuing aftermath.

+24 # Reductio Ad Absurdum 2012-09-16 10:53

I should have mentioned that upswings in gas prices during part of Obama's administration were due to the Republicans saber-rattling about attacking Iran. The oil market hates uncertainty, and irresponsible tough talk about blockading and attacking Iran shot prices up for a while earlier this year.

+6 # demongel17 2012-09-16 13:38

Demongel
Yesssssss, an apology would certainly have been in order. After reading through this exhaustive 'numbers' game, (?), I find myself pretty much as confused as when I started. We look at all these 'leaders' of ours, living and dead, what they've done and failed to do and have to wonder? What, if anything, are any of them good for?
Sure, "We the People" is overused, abused and generally left without meaning when half 'our', (?) money gets spent on prisons, wars and military bases 'birthing' each other exponentially because of? Isn't it fair to say that, (again), "We the People" is, first, gross fiction, second, an idea that was once viable and has now been turned into an absurd perversion and third, propaganda/nons ense dreamed up by some obscene combination of Poe's opium state and Orwell's WORST NIGHTMARE.
And I guess, last....I'd have to say something about responsibility. 'Leaders' come and go and we, that is everyone from THE MOST DESTITUTE homeless individual, (I've been there, homeless that is, and destitute), to whoever holds the most 'cards'. My question would have to be, who is to be held responsible?

The Republicans missed a great opportunity during their convention to apologize to all Americans and the world for George W. Bush's Decade of Disaster and its continuing aftermath.

+17 # WestWinds 2012-09-16 09:00

It is interesting to note that Ronald Reagan had two terms in the oval office, but George Herbert Walker Bush only had one term as president; the public replacing him with Bill Clinton. The we got the shrub for one rigged election and an incumbent second term, followed by what was perceived to be a Progressive Democrat at the time.

For all of the hoopla the media punditry puts out about how fabulous the Right is, evidently, We the People aren't so sure as seen in the waffling. One can't help but wonder how many more Democrats or Liberals would appear in the White House were there public campaign financing.

+19 # Old Man 2012-09-16 09:34

Great article, helps clear the air about this President and the job hes done & doing.
This country can't afford to elect Romney,Ryan ticket due to their trickle down methods, they just don't work for the middle class and never will.

-2 # Antemedius 2012-09-16 10:55

Number Crunchers Anonymous recently dispatched a Bean Counter Task Force to 2013.

They've returned bringing this candid photograph with them...

http://antemedius.com/files/images/2013_economy.jpg

+1 # panhead49 2012-09-16 11:25

I just want to know how much that ".000" is going to amount to - according to this articles' quote from Plouffe.

+7 # MidwestDick 2012-09-16 12:14

It seems unfair to measure the performance of the current administration from January of 2009, since it was not until May or June that any of the remedies that it prescribed were actually enacted and administered. Taken at this point the POTUS' numbers look a lot better.

+3 # MindDoc 2012-09-16 15:35

Lots of data to crunch and/or distort... Perhaps it is a public service to release actual data (unlike, say, a Presidential candidate refusing to release a simple singular tax document). But this is a great example of how there is just so much data out there, presented from different angles, that there is no one clear conclusion to be drawn. We know our economy was imploding in 2008, and "it is what it is" now, with help from many parties.

To me, this is a feast of raw data for spinning or hardening whatever position one takes - a "Rorschach". Clearly, economies go up, down, around, and (hopefully) through the ravages - including that of W-style 'economics'. You know, stand back so corporate, energy/health/i nsurance/media 'people' can vacuum up almost the entire pie, to be shared by the 1% sponsors who complain and bleed money in their pursuit to gain even more of the pie. Lots of pie charts is nice, but it's our whole country pie which needs to be reconfigured. A slice must be gently returned to We the People who have been good citizens, paid our taxes, and worked lifetimes to attain the American dream, or at least a sliver of the big pie. Then we grow. America is a country created once upon a time, by the people, for the people. Not for 400 families to hoard $s offshore.

Truth is truth, lots of data is better than none, surely - though "facts" can be "stupid things" is a mantra of some, and others pick & choose & spin.

+7 # Billy Bob 2012-09-16 17:28

Any time someone tells you defense spending is about $700 billion, they're twisting the truth. We DEFINE defense spending as that.

Some costs we DON'T INCLUDE:

WAR (NO KIDDING)!
intelligence/security agencies (how many are there now?)
war contracting
Pentagon money WE AREN'T ALLOWED to know about specifically!

--------

Any time someone counts Social Security as a percentage of our "spending" they're twisting the truth as well. Social Security is "supposed" to be completely separate and pay for itself. The only problem it has is that it's SO successful it's HAD to be raided to fund other things - AND NOBODY HAS BOTHERED TO PAY IT BACK.

-------

DON'T ASSUME "the numbers" aren't presented with an agenda in mind. Pie charts are really only useful when you're discussing pie. Otherwise, grown-ups should be given more detailed and less condescending information. The details being left out are kind of a big deal.

+7 # doneasley 2012-09-16 19:33

The one thing you forgot, Billy Bob, is the VA, which handles all those broken young people who are "lucky" enough to make it home from WAR. Also much of the cost of WAR is taken on by the State Dep't when the Pentagon goes into occupation mode.

True, the real cost of WAR is staggering, and Rmoney is berating the President for not spending more. This coming from a man who hid out in France during the Viet Nam War and has 5 sons - all of whom look to me to be in peak physical condition - who have not seen or never will see the horrors of WAR!

+1 # Rascalndear 2012-09-16 22:40

Quoting panhead49:

I just want to know how much that ".000" is going to amount to - according to this articles' quote from Plouffe.

Yeah... Esquire... where are your proofreaders?

+5 # mjc 2012-09-17 08:30

Only problem with these numbers and graphs is that most Americans, and all Republicans, do not either know how to read such or don't want to. Republicans are dead set against any facts getting in the way of their campaign lies.

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