In Which Trump Proves My Fallibility

A few months back I predicted that by September Donald Trump would be the Herman Cain of the current Rethug presidential field - a quirky, mildly offensive, moderately amusing performance artist whose star quickly rises, then goes poof in the middle of the night. Well, we’re only 1/3 of the way through August and I have to admit I got this wrong. And not by a near miss, either. My prediction was the the very antithesis, the exact polar opposite of correct.

Draft dodger Trump broke St Ronnie’s 11th commandment by speaking ill of a fellow Rethug, and in the process dissed the military service and PoW status of one who in conservatard circles is considered to be a war hero. And his poll numbers went up.

Trump has made a series of blatantly stupid and gratuitously hateful statements that are either racist or misogynist. And each time his pole numbers went up.

Now, he has taken on Fox news - that bastion of right wing punditry and thought control - and Fox backed down.

Let me make this crystal clear: Trump feuded with the official propaganda arm of the Rethug party, and won!

Presumably it was H. L. Menken who said, ”"No one in this world, so far as I know - and I have searched the record for years, and employed agents to help me - has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people.”

Well it wasn’t my money on the line, but I certainly failed to underestimate the intelligence - or perhaps gullibility, or maybe the amorphous bitterness and self-defeating, wrong-headed bigotry and hatred of America’s plain citizens, those simple people of the earth, the common clay of the right wing - you know: morons.

___________________

h/t to SEK, who said:

"Now that Donald Trump and Roger Ailes have reconciled after a brutal 96-hour-long estrangement in which both sides said many things they lack the moral capacity to regret, the GOP presidential hopeful was free to appear on 'Fox & Friends' this morning to complain about, among other things, ISIS’s superior Internet connections."

Notes:

Menken

Draft dodger

Morons

The Heritage Heritage

Here is a compendium of my posts on the lying liars at the Heritage Foundation.  [Titles are hot links]

Republicans: All Wrong, All the Time, Pt. 12 - Taxes and Revenues    2/25/10 [Reposted 4/21/14]

Riddikulus! Pt 2 -- Ludicrous                                                                  4/11/2011 

Another Lie From The Lying Liars at The Heritage Foundation         6/12/2011

More on the Lying Liars at the Heritage Foundation                              6/5/2013              

They never fooled me even once.  Don't let them fool you.

As I said, responding to a comment here, "When I disagree with someone who deserves my respect, I do it respectfully. But tools, fools, and liars get the contempt they so richly deserve."

Question of the Day

Is it over the top to consider bridgegate an act of domestic terrorism?

The Misguided Right Wing

One of my friends invited me into a FB debate on BHO.  There is certainly a lot to criticize in this administration, but very little real opportunity to legitimately criticize from the right.  This, I believe, accounts for a lot of the birtherism, and Muslim-Commie-socialist-fascist nonsense.  With few legitimate complaints, they just make $h!+ up.

Even without getting into wing-nut fantasy land, there is a lot the right wingers simply know about BHO and how he has ruined America that simply does not stand up to the harsh light of reality.  They blame on Obama things that have been going on since Reagan.  They blame the "left" [which is laughable - there is no political left in this country] for the actions of the Rethug dominated house.   The simple fact is, their minds are made up.  They will only hear things that reinforce their views, and contrary facts will only make them dig their heels in harder.  This is epistemic closure, aka DERP.

To an extent, this is human nature.  We all love our revealed truths and most cherished concepts, no matter where they came from. But open mindedness is a specifically progressive characteristic. None of us is immune to derp, but it is inherently more deep and pervasive among those who call themselves conservative, but are in fact regressives.  Reading a bit of Russell Kirk and my own observations have convinced me that the four pillars of conservatism are ignorance, prejudice [these come directly from Kirk - and he's proud of it!], denial of reality [global warming, New Deal Denialism], and magical thinking. Conservatives generally seek simple solutions, can't be bothered with complexity, and grasp at cleverly framed right wing talking points.  This all by itself accounts for the popularity of the Reagan mythology.  And these are the GOOD conservatives.  Tea Bagging Regressives are far, far worse.

You can argue until eternity with regressives, but you can't set them straight, because they will have none of it.  A Progressive, when confronted with new data, changes his opinion. A Regressive, when confronted with new data, changes the data.

Or simply ignores it

Regressives blame Obama for a variety of real and perceived ills.

Ruining the value of the dollar.
The trade weighted dollar index declined over 30% under W, then gyrated during the Great Recession.  Since then it has been dead flat.  Still, It's Obama's fault.

Graph 1 - Trade Weighted U.S. Dollar index

Decreasing the median income of households.

This has been going on since Reagan.  In nominal dollars, the rate of increase in median household income was lower under Bush II than under Reagan and Clinton, and has been flat since the recession.  Inflation adjusted, household income has zig-zagged to nowhere since the 70's.  The two most recent increases occurred first, and dramatically, under Clinton, and then only a bit from 2004-2007 during the housing bubble.  Recessions in '91, '01, and '08 have been devastating. The trend from 2000 on has been steeply down.

Graph 2 - Real Median Household Income

Income Data from the U.S. Census Bureau, Table H-8.  Inflation data from FRED

But to blame the recent decline on Obama rather than the decades-long assault on the middle class we call Reaganomics, the destruction of American manufacturing during the Bush regime, and House Tea Party Rethug obstructionist efforts to shut down the goverment and impose arbitrary debt ceilings takes a type and degree of blindness that simply cannot be penetrated by any wavelength of light.

Ballooning the debt

I've already put several stakes through the heart of the zombie idea that Obama is spending us into perdition - here, here, and here.  If you seriously believe that we have a debt problem due to Obama's spending, then please take the time to read and understand these three posts.

The debt results from a ledger imbalance, and both spending and revenues come into the equation.  Since the Recession ended, government spending at all levels is down.  Federal spending is dead flat and state and local govt spending is dead flat.

Graph 3 - Government Debt

Federal Debt annual growth ballooned to over 20% early in Reagan's first term, and was never less than 10% per year during his presidency.  It dropped every year under Clinton, who ran a surplus at the end of his term.  Under Bush, it was never less than 5% per year and peaked first at 10% in 2004, then over 20% in Q1, 2009.  Strangely, nobody on the right was complaining about debt growth when there was a White Rethug in the White House, and V.P. Cheney famously said, "Deficits don't matter." Which is true, as long as the Rethugs are in control.  During Obama's entire term, debt growth has been on the decline.

Graph 4 - Year over Year % Growth in Federal Debt

But debt is still growing - only at a slower rate.  If spending isn't the cause - and clearly, it isn't, then inadequate revenues have to be.  And they are.  This comes from two factors.  First, slow income growth and business activity leads to slow growth in tax revenues. We're living through the worst recovery in at least a century.   Second, tax receipts are inhibited by tax rates and policy decisions.  All things considered, progressive taxation on personal income is close to non-existent, and collections from corporations are deeply depressed because of loopholes and off-shore evasion gimmicks.  The right wing talking points that we are overtaxed and this taxation inhibits growth are simply lies.

Decimated our Credit Rating

Moody's reaffirmed U.S. debt at AAA rating in July, and upgraded  the outlook for government debt to stable from a negative watch.  Danger to our credit rating comes from Rethug debt ceiling and government shut-down threats.  But now, if our credit was bad, the interest rate on federal debt would be soaring.  It's up from about 2.6% to 3.75% since last summer, but about where it was two years ago.  This is just market fluctuation in a trend channel.  Except for a dip during the Great Recession lower, the interest rate is lower than at any other time since the 60's.

 Graph - Interest Rate on 30 Year Government Bonds

 This is just a bit of the nonsense my friend's friend spewed forth in an ignorant, but passionate, anti-Obama rant.

What took him a few seconds to blurt has taken me hours to refute.

This is why simple lies always have an advantage over the truth.

And then, the liars and their fellow travelers just move along to the next talking point.

We are so screwed. 

Obama's Weak Leadership Emboldens Rogue Mid-East Governements - Again

I wondered how long it would take the idiots on the right to start criticizing Obama for involving Congress in the decision to engage in war-like aggression in Syria.   Only a few hours, as it turns out.  Of course, to the partisan hacks on the right, anything a Rethug does is A-OK, and anything BHO does is weak, stupid, communisitic, or some combination thereof.  Even if it's a 20 year old Rethug plan.

Obama claims he has the power to act without the consent of Congress.  But only Congress has the power to declare war, according to the tattered and trampled U.S. Constitution, if anybody remembers it.  And an act of war is an act of WAR.  Full stop!

But over the last 40 [or perhaps 60] years Congress has abrogated that responsibility, and Presidential Power has expanded to fill the vacuum that created.

While Obama is dong the right thing in consulting Congress, his underlying assumption that he doesn't need to is just plain wrong.

We have been witnessing the slow, agonizing death of representative government in the U.S.A. and the rule of constitutional law since [at least] the Nixon administration.

Or didn't you notice?

More on the Lying Liars at the Heritage Foundation

I've called them out a few times, here, here and here (with some help) and here.

Now, Steve Benen reports, one of their economists been caught lying to the Senate Budget Committee.  

As the occasionally reliable Matt Yglesias recently pointed out regarding a different passel of Heritage lies:

But it illustrates an underappreciated point in Washington, namely that even ideological think tanks do their movements a disservice when they do bad work. As Republican members of Congress ponder what to do about immigration, having accurate information about its fiscal impact would be very useful to them. You actually want to have a team of people "on your side" who you can trust to do good work. Heritage is not that team.

True, but MY misses a rather vital feature.  If you are trying to make points that do not comport with truth or reality, you have to lie, pretty much by default.  And you can't do good work if you are lying.

Benin replies:

That's true. If there are any Republican policymakers left who care about quality scholarship and reliable data, they'd no doubt like to rely on an institution like the Heritage Foundation as a go-to source for credible research. But as Heritage transitions from its traditional role as think tank to its new role as an activist group, and the intellectual infrastructure on the right deteriorates, GOP lawmakers no long have such a resource.

But that's not quite right, either.  Heritage has been lying to promote an agenda for as long as I've been aware of them.  If Rethug lawmakers ever had such a resource, it's been gone for a long, long time.

H/T to PK

In Which I disagree with Clive Crook

In this Bloomberg column, Clive Crook criticizes Paul Krugman for 1) smugly being right all the time, and 2) showing insufficient respect for those who are wrong all the time.  Please read it and form your own opinion.

I suppose it's not particularly relevant that PK has been called an idiot, a moron, a communist, a lying political hack, a racist lying hack, and my hands-down favorite, a war monger.  So let's just move along.

To support his point, Crook cites this blog post by PK, and extracts from it this idea:

Krugman was responding to critics who accuse him of seeing everybody who disagrees with him as either a fool or a knave. He says that’s not right: Many of those who disagree with him are sociopaths. 

 “The point is not that I have an uncanny ability to be right; it’s that the other guys have an intense desire to be wrong,” he says. “And they’ve achieved their goal.”

Do you see the problem here?  Crook overstates his case rather dramatically.  PK hasn't called anyone a sociopath, so far as I know, and certainly not in this post.  [Though I have no doubt that a certain congressman, whom PK has criticized loudly and often, qualifies - in spades.]  What he is saying is that they have an agenda, and being wrong means exactly nothing to them, as long as their agenda is promoted.


Crook goes on to say this:

Krugman says his opponents are motivated by politics. “Am I (and others on my side of the issue) that much smarter than everyone else? No. The key to understanding this is that the anti-Keynesian position is, in essence, political. It’s driven by hostility to active government policy and, in many cases, hostility to any intellectual approach that might make room for government policy.” 

 Talk about lack of self-awareness. Does Krugman imagine that he isn’t motivated by politics? 

Crook actually has a point, but not the one he intends.  First off, PK has a valid theoretical and practical basis for his beliefs, while the other side really has been consistently wrong, intellectually nihilistic, and responds by doubling down with more wrong.  More importantly though, if PK had been less polite, and said "rabidly purblind partisan politics motivated by a starkly anti-democratic agenda" he would have been less polite, but far more accurate.  So Crook's quibble with the word "politics" is either a bit vacuuous or the resultant of trying to hard to find something to dispute - an all-too-common feature of PK's would-be critics.

If you've read Krugman's writings from the 90's you know that at that time he was a basically apolitical middle-of-the-road, actually rather conservative writer, making economics accessible to know-nothings like me.  He later became politicized by the persistently willful wrongitude of the Bush administration, which set the stage for the even more wrong and more extreme current Republican party. He doesn't criticize them because of his ideology, he criticizes them for theirs, which is consistently and demonstrably wrong.   And he does this while generally maintaining a high level of politeness.

So, yes, PK is motivated by politics, but it's a politics that strives to reach the truth and promote the common good, rather than some ideological predetermined end point that favors an already privileged overclass. 

Here is Crook's thesis:

Meanwhile, for the side that thinks it has the better arguments, naked contempt for dissenters is plain bad tactics. That isn’t how you change people’s minds.

But there's a problem here, too.  And it's one I understand, since the same criticism has been leveled at me.  There's a truth contained there, it's pure Dale Carnegie, and it would be spot on - if we were contending with rational well-intentioned people.  But there's a deeper truth that Crook reluctantly acknowledges in his final paragraph.

It’s true that the modern Republican Party includes a growing number of extremists who have no interest in the kind of discussion I’m recommending. In their case, attempts at outreach would be so much wasted breath.

That's the reality.  The suggestion that PK needs to get out more is fatuous in the extreme. When you are dealing with liars, the best and most appropriate response is to refute the lies and reveal these fools, knaves and sociopaths for what they are.

More Right Wing Lies - Redux

Foreword

Unlike right-wingers, frex. Amity Shlaes, I like to get things right.  In fact, when one is refuting a liar's lies, I believe its important to be meticulously correct.  Hence this rework of my previous post.

As I was thinking about Graph 3, it occurred to me that the numbers there were far too small, around 100 million at the maximum, when they should be in the billions.  I'm not sure what that graph represents, but it is certainly not the total of income tax revenues.  That sent me on a quest to find better numbers, which I did.  You will find them in Graph 3 and 4 of this rewrite.  Much to my chagrin, I also found I put the wrong data in Graph 2, now corrected here.  Since I want to cross-post this at Angry Bear, I've also made a few editorial changes to make it more Bear-worthy.

~ : ~ : ~

Amity Shlaes, the disinformation bunny, is still going.  In the latest issue of Imprimus, a publication of Hillsdale College, is a transcript adapted from a recent talk she gave there during a conference on the Income Tax, sponsored by Hillsdale's own Center for Constructive Alternatives and the Ludwig von Mises Lecture Series.  Right away, you know this is going to be good.  The Title of her contribution is Calvin Coolidge and the Moral Case for Economy.  Of course, by economy, she means austerity.

There is so much wrong here it's both impressive and depressing.  Rather than give her the full FJM treatment, which would take more time and energy than she deserves, I'll just hit on a couple of the lowlights.  Here is her opening paragraph.

With the Federal debt spiraling out of control, many Americans sense an urgent need to find a political leader who is able to say "no" to spending.

Here we go. Her first sentence is an exercise in made-up right-wing talking point mythology.  I've already exploded the 'Obama is a profligate spender" myth, here, here, and here. Further, we have just lived through three years when federal spending was close to flat line, as Graph 1 shows.  

 Graph 1 - Flat Federal Spending Under Obama 

There is only one comparable period in post WW II history, 1953-56, during Eisenhower's first term, as shown in Graph 2.   Still, over Ike's full term, spending grew by about 30%.

 Graph 2  Not So Flat Spending Growth Under Eisenhower ('53-'60)

To suggest that federal dept is now  "spiraling out of control" due to excessive spending is not merely disingenuous.  It is a sign that either Shlaes has no earthly idea what she's talking about, which in an alleged journalist, is unforgivable, or it's a bare-faced lie, which is unforgivable for anybody.  And if many Americans are feeling the urgent need to curtail government spending, it's because they have been lied to so repeatedly and often that they have no idea what the truth is.  As Krugman recently put it: "And I have to say, it’s extremely telling that conservative Republicans don’t seem able to make their case without resorting, right from the beginning, to obviously dumb fallacies."  The truth is that if we have a debt problem, it is due to a shortfall in revenues.

Yet they fear that finding such a leader is impossible.

Its not clear who made Shlaes the spokesperson for this sorry, disenfranchised segment of the population, nor that this is indeed what they fear.  Perhaps we should introduce Shlaes and the rest of these Real Americans to the real President B. Hoover Obama.

Conservatives long for another Ronald Reagan.

This is probably correct, though as Shlaes goes on to demonstrate, conservatives in this way - and, alas, right-wingers almost always - are rather badly disconnected from reality.

He was of course a tax cutter, reducing the top marginal rate from 70 to 28 percent.  But his tax cuts - which vindicated supply side economics by vastly increasing federal revenue - were bought partly through a bargain with Democrats who were eager to spend that revenue.

Wrong again.  The reality is that Revenue growth under Reagan was the worst of any 20th century President, post Eisenhower, except for the unfortunate Bush, Sr. under who's recession plagued regime Reagan's buzzards came home to roost. And was it really the Democrats who spent that anemic revenue stream, or did it go to Reagan's Star Wars fantasy?

Reagan was no budget cutter.  In fact, the federal budget grew over a third during his administration.

Here, she finally gets something right, if by "federal budget" she means Total Outlays, and by "over a third" she means over 80%  [as measured from 1980 to 1988.]

Things get really egregious further on in the section titled "The Purpose of Tax Cuts."  She informs us that President Coolidge and Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon campaigned to lower top rates from the 50's to the 20's.

Mellon and Coolidge did not win all they sought.  The top rate of the final law was in the forties.  But even this reduction yielded results - more money flowing into the treasury - suggesting that "scientific taxation" worked.  By 1926, Coolidge was able to sign legislation that brought the top marginal rate down to 25%, and do so retroactively.

I was surprised to learn that Coolidge and Mellon had anticipated the Laffer curve by 6 decades.  Let's have a look at how more money flowed into the treasury. In 1922 and '23, with a top marginal rate of 56%, tax revenues were $2.23 and 1.69 billion respectively. [Per FRED, 1923 was a recession year]  In 1924, with a top rate of 46%, total revenues were $1.79 billion.  This is what Shleas calls "more money flowing into the treasury."  Here's a bigger picture look.  In 1920, when the top marginal rate was 73%, receipts were slightly over $4 billion.  In 1925, when the top marginal rate was 25%, receipts were $1.7 billion, less than half of the 1920 value, and by 1929 had only increased to 2.23 billion.  Graph 3 shows revenues per year [Coolidge's term highlighted in red,] and belies Shlaes' assertion.

 Graph 3 Income Tax Revenues, 1915-1930

Graph 4 shows a scatter plot of this same data, with revenues as a function of top marginal rate, Coolidge years are again highlighted in red.

Graph 4 Top Marginal Rate and Tax Revenues, 1915-1930

A best fit straight line is included.  There's lots of scatter, for a variety of reasons, but the upward trend - the exact opposite of Shleas' assertion, is obvious.

So here's the reality.  A decade of tax cutting and deregulation led us into the Great Depression, the worst economic collapse of the 20th century. [You might note that the following decades of high tax rates and robust regulation were free of these horrible events.]  And what happened most recently?  A decade of tax cuts and deregulation - the end game of three decades of this supply-side approach - led to the greatest economic collapse since the Great Depression.  Significantly, the major deregulations of big finance, including the repeal of Glass-Steagall came at the end of Clinton's term, less than a decade prior to the financial melt down.  Last Friday on his radio show, Thom Hartmann pointed out that prior to the regulations put in place in the 30's, the U.S. had never gone for more than 15 years without a major financial collapse.  So this result should have been expected.

The extraordinary thing isn't that right wingers lie.  The simple reality is that they can't make their case without lying, because it has no merit.  The extraordinary thing is that their lies are so easily rooted out and refuted, in the era of free and easily accessible information, but so few people will take the required few minutes to go ahead and do it. Sadly, whenever the truth comes up against a cascade of lies, the liars have a significant tactical advantage. 

Shlaes' presentation is just one more manifestation of the right wing ploy of denying reality.   Sadly, it works, because you really can fool a lot of the people a lot of the time.

More Right Wing Lies

Amity Shlaes, the disinformation bunny, is still going.  In the latest issue of Imprimus, a publication of Hillsdale College, is a transcript adapted from a recent talk she gave there during a conference on the Income Tax, sponsored by Hillsdale's own Center for Constructive Alternatives and the Ludwig von Mises Lecture Series.  Right away, you know this is going to be good.  The Title of her contribution is Calvin Coolidge and the Moral Case for Economy.  Of course, by economy, she means austerity.

There is so much wrong here it's both impressive and depressing.  Rather than give her the full FJM treatment, which would take more time and energy than she deserves, I'll just hit on a couple of the lowlights.  Here is her opening paragraph.

With the Federal debt spiraling out of control, many Americans sense an urgent need to find a political leader who is able to say "no" to spending.

Here we go. Her first sentence is an exercise in right wing talking point mythology.  I've already exploded the 'Obama is a profligate spender" myth, here, here, and here. Further, we have just lived through three years when federal spending was close to flat line, as Graph 1 shows.  

 Graph 1 - Flat Federal Spending Under Obama 

There is no comparable period in post WW II history.  Graph 2 shows the next flattest era under Eisenhower, when spending grew by about 50% over the term.

 Graph 2  Not So Flat Spending Growth Under Eisenhower

To say federal dept is "spiraling out of control" is not merely disingenuous.  It is a sign that either Shlaes has no earthly idea what she's talking about, which in an alleged journalist, is unforgivable, or it's a bare-faced lie, which is unforgivable for anybody.  And if many Americans are feeling the urgent need to curtail spending, it's because they have been lied to so repeatedly and often that they have no idea what the truth is.   The truth is that if we have a debt problem, it is due to a shortfall in revenues.

Yet they fear that finding such a leader is impossible.

Its not clear who made Shlaes the spokesperson for this sorry, disenfranchised segment of the population, nor that this is indeed what they fear.  Perhaps we should introduce Shlaes and the rest of these Real Americans to the real President B. Hoover Obama.

Conservatives long for another Ronald Reagan.

This is probably correct, though as Shlaes goes on to demonstrate, conservatives in this way - and, alas, typically - are rather badly disconnected from reality.

He was of course a tax cutter, reducing the top marginal rate from 70 to 28 percent.  But his tax cuts - which vindicated supply side economics by vastly increasing federal revenue - were bought partly through a bargain with Democrats who were eager to spend that revenue.

 The reality is that Revenue growth under Reagan was the worst of any 20th century President, post Eisenhower, except for the unfortunate Bush, Sr. under who's regime Reagan's buzzards came home to roost. And was it really the Democrats who spent that anemic revenue stream, or did it go to Reagan's Star Wars fantasy?

Reagan was no budget cutter.  In fact, the federal budget grew over a third during his administration.

Here, she finally gets something right, if by "federal budget" she means Total Outlays, and by "over a third" she means over 80%  [as measured from 1980 to 1988.]

Things get really egregious further on in the section titled "The Purpose of Tax Cuts."  She informs us that President Coolidge and Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon campaigned to lower top rates from the 50's to the 20's.

Mellon and Coolidge did not win all they sought.  The top rate of the final law was in the forties.  But even this reduction yielded results - more money flowing into the treasury - suggesting that "scientific taxation" worked.  By 1926, Coolidge was able to sign legislation that brought the top marginal rate down to 25%, and do so retroactively.

Let's have a look at how more money flowed into the treasury.  In 1919-21, when the top marginal rate was over 70%, receipts were over $120 million.  By 1925, when the top marginal rate was 25%, receipts were in the $60 to 90 million range, and by 1929 had declined to about $50 million.  As Graph3 shows, Shlaes' lie is simply astounding.

Graph 3 Federal Revenues Collapse During the 1920s

So here's the reality.  A decade of tax cutting and deregulation led us into the Great Depression, the worst economic collapse of the 20th century. [You might note that the following decades of high tax rates and robust regulation were free of these horrible events.]  And what happened most recently?  A decade of tax cuts and deregulation - the end game of three decades of this supply-side approach - led to the greatest economic collapse since the Great Depression.  Significantly, the major deregulations of big finance came at the end of Clinton's term, less than a decade prior to the financial melt down.

The extraordinary thing isn't that right wingers lie.  The simple reality is that they can't make their case without lying, because it has no merit.  The extraordinary thing is that their lies are so easily rooted out and refuted, in the era of free and easily accessible information, but so few people will take the required few minutes to go ahead and do it. 

Shlaes' presentation is just one more manifestation of the right wing ploy of denying reality.   Sadly, it works, because you really can fool a lot of the people a lot of the time.

You Can Fool Most of the People Most of the Time

At least on certain issues.

I'm not inherently a great pessimist, but with few exceptions each passing month for over a decade now has seen my optimism whither, at least a little.  So I can't help but see the manure-colored lining in this otherwise rosy, fluffy cloud.

Steve Benen reports that according to the new NBC/WSJ poll, Americans trust Democrats more than Republicans on domestic issues, sometimes by large margins.  Here is a graph.  (As always, click to embiggen.)

 

Graph 1   Who Do You Trust?

But the causes of my pessimism are four-fold.  First, as Benen goes on to note, the same polling reveals that in the popular mind "Republicans have an advantage on the (sic) reducing the deficit, 'controlling' government spending, and national defense."  Well, there's three reasons for pessimism right there.  A) Reducing the deficit is an issue of exactly zero urgency, and attacking it now will certainly cause economic hardship, especially for those at the bottom. Further, Republicans have been huge debt increasers for decades, while Dems have not.  B) We absolutely do not have a spending problem.  We absolutely do have a revenue problem, as graph 2 plainly indicates.  I think the Republicans have become convinced of their own lies.

Graph 2   Federal Gov Current Recpts by GDP

C) From FDR through LBJ to BHO, Dems have been every bit as war-mongerish as their Rep counterparts; BHO has continued his predecessors war initiatives almost seamlessly;  and 9/11 happened on W's watch.  This just makes me want to cry.

But I have a bigger list.  Second, a look a graph 1 reveals some disturbing details.  A)  Joe BeerCan must not connect "Looking out for the middle class," Medicare," "Health Care," "Medicare,' or "Social Security" with "Economy" or the results for those categories would line up better.  B) Considering Paul Ryan and the never-ending series of Republican contrived cliffs, scoring Dems only marginally better than Repubs on the economy is, all by itself, cause for despair.  C) As is the close call on taxes.

Third, and I've already alluded to this, there is almost no daylight between the two parties on foreign policy issues.  Still I have to give a slight nod to the Dems, based on practicality, because: John Bolton.

And last, though I firmly believe to the bottom of my heart that the Dems are superior on absolutely every issue, problem and question that might rise, they still aren't that damned good.  Case in point: the new head of the Michigan Democratic party is a venture capitalist.  As Bill Maher sagely put it, while the Democrats have moved to the right, the Republicans have moved to the insane asylum.  They demonstrate this anew, almost every single day. 

The lessons of history and even a casual observation of the current failures of European austerity show that progressive policies are the clear and present necessity.  But even if we had strong Dem majorities, we still have Reaganite B. Hoover Obama in the White House, and a genuine progressive movement in congress the exact size and shape of Bernie Sanders. 

As one of my college professors put it long ago:  Booze is the only answer.

Republicans, All Wrong, All the Time, Part 34 -- Thus Spake The Rube

For the hundredth time the foreign-born Muslim commie Nazi extends an olive branch across the aisle, and for the hundredth time it's dashed to the floor, stomped on and set ablaze - along with the latest spokes-liars trousers.   It became a conflagration that the infamous water-stop could not staunch.

Early in Marco Rubio's alleged rebuttal to B. Hoover Obama's latest exercise in political theater it became painfully obvious that his pants were on fire.  This was even before it became obvious that his diatribe was utterly incoherent.  Steve Benen explaines.

By any sensible measure, Rubio's entire pitch was incoherent gibberish. He thinks President Obama is hostile to free enterprise and wants to increase the deficit, neither of which makes any sense. Rubio thinks the housing crisis was caused by big government, which is simply idiotic. Rubio celebrates his family's history of dependence on government social programs like student loans and Medicare, while articulating a policy agenda that guts government social programs like student loans and Medicare.

Forget ideology, subjectivity, and areas of opinion -- the fact is Marco Rubio's speech was filled with a series of claims with no meaningful connection to reality. The senator even thinks combating the climate crisis means asking government to "control the weather," which is just genuinely dumb.

Part way through I started taking notes, and discovered an unappetizing platter of rewarmed left-overs [or more accurately: right-overs] of Romney's failed presidential campaign, where lying and incoherence were the norm.  It was deja vu all over again. Viz:

Obama's obsession with raising taxes
Solyndra [God help us - I am not making this up]
We should open Federal lands to energy exploration
Grow Energy industry [but not renewables]
Lower Corp tax rate
Incentivise school districts
Schools of choice
Solve the debt problem [As if BHO ignored it - or, more importantly - as if it were a real problem]
Obama created the debt with excessive spending  [my personal favorite]
Need a balanced budget amendment  [the ignorance - it burns, too]
Obama's in favor of leaving Medicare just the way it is [though he clearly stated otherwise]
He also wants to unconstitutionally undermine 2nd amendment rights
The President's devastating cuts to our military [Seriously -- WTH?!?]
Moral breakdown in society - need more faith
Economic liberty

That's what I was able to capture as Rubio's litany of [mostly] decades old Republican clap-trap spewed forth almost faster than I could record it.

One of the MSNBC commentators pointed out that this nonsense wasn't directed to the American public, who I hope are beginning to see through the smoke screen, but to the hard-core right-wing base.  As such, it's Rubio's first gambit in his run for the 2016 presidential nomination.

I don't know if I should laugh, cry, or drink myself into a stupor.

Another look at Spending and Revenues

How many times have you heard Boehner, McConnell, Ryan or one of the legion of right-wing talking heads say, "We don't have a revenue problem, we have a spending problem?"  I refuted that lie repeatedly in this AB post and at the included links.   But this is one of those zombie ideas that simply will not stay in the grave.  

Therefore, some prominent voices have found it necessary to sing out again against the lie. I will add my humble quavery baritone to the chorus.

Here in Graph 1 is Kevin Drum demonstrating how Real Government Expenditures per Capita have changed under the last three presidents.

What we have isn't a spending problem. That's under control. What we have is a problem with Republicans not wanting to pay the bills they themselves were largely responsible for running up.

 Graph 1, Real Government Expenditures per Capita

By using real [inflation adjusted] and per capita numbers, Drum has introduced a couple of denominators.  Real expenses per cap is a rational way to display the data, but not the only way. So lest someone cry out about that ol' devil denominator, let's have a different look.

Via Paul Krugman we get Graph 2 and Graph 3, from FRED, showing total Government expenditures and Federal Government expenditures, respectively, on log scales.

Graph 2. Government Total Expenditures

Graph 3, Federal Government Total Expenditures

Yes, you can argue that spending was growing too fast under Bush, although it’s funny how few deficit scolds saw fit to mention that at the time. Or you can say that you just want less spending, although as always people who say this tend to be short on specifics. But the narrative that says that spending has surged under Obama is just wrong – what we’ve actually seen is a slowdown at exactly the time when, for macroeconomic reasons, we should have been spending more.

Remember, a log scale represents constant growth as a straight line, and zero growth as a horizontal line.  So, in pure dollar numbers, spending hasn't quite declined, but it has stagnated to almost zero growth.  Hence Drum's decline in inflation adjusted, per capita terms.

In Graph 4, we get one more longer range look, using Krugman's data series, this time on a linear scale.  Also presented is the difference between the two, which is the amount of spending by state and local governments.

 Graph 4, Government Spending at Different Levels

 The red line is total spending at all levels of governemnt, the blue line is federal only, and the green line is the difference, state and local spending.  Note that the green line flattens early in the recession

To bring things full circle, Graph 5 shows Federal Government current receipts.  Look at this and tell me we don't have a revenue problem.

Graph 5, Federal Government Current Receipts

To drive this point home, Graph 6 shows Federal Receipts as a fraction of GDP.  The purpose of the ratio is to provide context, using GDP as a proxy for the size of the economy.

Graph 6, Federal Receipts as a fraction of GDP

As you can see, revenues/GDP are in a historically low range.

Conclusions:
- Federal spending is flat in nominal dollar terms.
- Federal spending is declining when adjusted for inflation and population growth.
- Federal revenues are far below trend lines based on any historical reference you chose.
- Federal revenues as a fraction of GDP are historically low.
- The Republican claim that we have a spending problem not a revenue problem is simply a lie, on both counts.
- Disproportional spending growth has only occurred under two presidents: Republicans Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush. 

Why do Republicans lie?

The truth is hostile to their agenda.  PK Explains.

Psuedo-Ecnomics Round Up for 2012

Menzie Chin regales us with his list of the top 10 examples of economic malfeasance for CY 2012.

Time to emulate the media’s "year in review" pieces, with my own take on the most outrageous, nonsensical assertions presented in the guise of analysis. Here are my ten most hilariously deluded excursions into the fantasy world from my postings to Econbrowser. The inspirations range from (once again) the Heritage Foundation's analyses (where have you gone, Bill Beach!) to the ongoing search for hyperinflation/crowding out.

Strategic Lying as Political Art

If you listen to Randi Rhodes, you know she is still livid over Romney being declared the "winner" in last week's - we'll call it a "debate" for the nonce.

Alas, though, the reason he won is that poll numbers have moved in his favor.  Whether that bounce is robust remains to be seen.  But it did gain Romney some sort of advantage, at least in the near term.

Randi's objection is that Romney lied, repeatedly, and about almost everything.  In the process, he flatly repudiated some of the major planks in his platform - the destruction of Medicare as we know it, the $5 Trillion dollar tax cut, the reduction of tax share paid by high income people, and an insurance plan not covering pre-existing conditions stand out in that regard.   And these are but a few of the 27  debate lies that can easily be recognized and refuted.

Indeed, the one rare moment of lucid candor came when he eagerly, gleefully announced that he would send Big Bird to the unemployment line in order to avoid borrowing money from China.  Big NPR whoop!  To put this in perspective, for CY 2012, the Federal Government, via the Corp. for Public Broadcasting, is contributing $26.65 million in support of PBS, or 0.0007% of total Federal expenditures ($3.77 Trillion) for 2012.    In fact, the entire Federal contribution to CPB is $445.2 million, or 0.0118% of total expenditures. That's sure going to help balance $5 Trillion in tax cuts over ten years. (CPB data from Wikipedia, current expenditure data from the St. Louis Fed.)   Romney isn't lying about our creditor position with China, but he was certainly misleading.  According to Fox News (!) "China, it turns out, holds less than 8 percent of the money our government has borrowed over the years."

OK, I get where Randi is coming from - to have a totally unprincipled opportunist in charge of running the world's greatest super power is not a recipe for any kind of enduring success, either for the U.S.A. specifically, or for the world at large.  There are many historical examples one could cite, but we really needn't go back any further than the "compassionate conservatism" of unprosecuted war criminal and would-be social security privatizer George W. Bush to make the point.

But what Randi refuses to acknowledge is that what we witnessed last week was not a debate, by any recognizable definition of the term.  Lying will get you disqualified in a real debate - right?  This was political theater - and what is theater but staged fiction? 

And there is nothing unusual here.  I've been saying for years that all Republicans do is lie, and then lie about their lies. (I might have gotten that phrase from Randi - the memory is foggy.)  Here is a four-year-old exposé of some of Romney's shape shifting.  (H/T to Dave Brockington at LGM.)




A more insidious kind of lie is simply denying reality, as characterized by birtherism, New Deal and global warming denialism, and Friday's epidemic of conspiracy theories surrounding the latest favorable jobs report.   But I digress.

Here is my point.  Brad Delong points us to a 1984 Fay Joyce article in the N. Y. Times uncovered by Michael Moore.  It turns out that lying during a debate is a time honored Republican strategy.  Even 28 years ago, when there was some chance of the main stream media doing actual journalism, they were confident in their lying strategy.

The Republicans are unabashed in their discussion of their ability to use the television medium. "You can say anything you want during a debate and 80 million people hear it,'' observed Peter Teeley, press secretary to Vice President Bush. If reporters then document that a candidate spoke untruthfully, ''so what?''

''Maybe 200 people read it or 2,000 or 20,000,'' he said.

Now, they have honed it into an art form.  And it's worth remembering the one reason that always accounts for every person's lie: their agenda is not compatible with the truth.

James Bullard Is A Liar

It took a little bit of effort to keep the words "god damned" out of the title.

Tim Duy explains.

My comment:

Two thoughts -
1) The FED totally abrogates its dual mandate with its intense focus on inflation. Their actions over recent years - actually, decades - makes it clear they have absolutely no concern for unemployment.
2) It's time to drop "disingenuous" from the lexicon. If the man is a liar, he's a liar, and deserves to be revealed as such.

The Effect of Capital Gains Tax on Investment - Appendix

In comments to my previous post, Robert requested the unsmoothed data from Graph 3.  Here it is.   GPDI is plotted against the Capital Gains Tax Rate.

Since the Capital Gains Tax Rate (X-axis) is quantized, the result is columns of data.  Compared to the smoothed version, there is little change in either the slope or intercept of the best fit straight line.  R^2 is, of course, much lower.

The Effect of Capital Gains Tax on Investment

Matt Yglesias, servitor to our corporate overlords, suggests that the reduced capital gains tax rate paid by rentiers like Willard Romney is really a very, very good thing.  To wit:

The main reason Romney's effective rate is so low is that the American tax code contains a lot of preferences for investment income over labor income.
. . .
But this is definitely an issue where the conservative position is in line with what most experts think is the right course, and Democrats are outside the mainstream.
.  .  .
That's the theory, at any rate. It's a pretty solid theory, it's in most of the textbooks I've seen, and it shapes public policy in basically every country I'm familiar with. Even researchers like Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez (see "A Theory of Optimal Capital Taxation") who dissent from the standard no taxation of investment income position think capital income should be taxed more lightly than labor income. Empirically, it's a bit difficult to verify that variations in capital gains tax rates and the like really are making a material difference to investment levels. But then again the data is noisy.

Scott Lemieux at LGM demurs.

Sure, if you 1)accept the premise that reducing or eliminating capital gains taxes will result in productive infrastructure investments rather than worthless accounting tricks, 2)ignore the economic benefits created by consumption, 3)assume that significant numbers of people will forgo money for doing nothing just because the profits will be taxed , and 4)ignore the fact that in most jurisdictions consumption is also “double taxed,” then reducing capital gains taxes looks good.   But since all of these assumptions are (to put it mildly) highly contestable, it’s just question-begging.

My response to Matt is that in my jaundiced opinion, you might as well consult The Necronomicon of Abdul Alhazred as an economics textbook for an issue like this; and that in a world that has on the one hand Krugman, Thoma and Delong, and on the other Fama, Cochran and Cowan, a consensus among experts is about as likely as lions lying down with lambs for some purpose other than a quick snack.

To Scott I say, why assume or ignore anything when that oh-so-noisy data is readily available?

What the Hell?!? Friday - Romney is ODIOUS, LOATHSOME and DESPICABLE Edition

What Obama said:

I strongly condemn the outrageous attack on our diplomatic facility in Benghazi, which took the lives of four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens. Right now, the American people have the families of those we lost in our thoughts and prayers. They exemplified America’s commitment to freedom, justice, and partnership with nations and people around the globe, and stand in stark contrast to those who callously took their lives. I have directed my Administration to provide all necessary resources to support the security of our personnel in Libya, and to increase security at our diplomatic posts around the globe. While the United States rejects efforts to denigrate the religious beliefs of others, we must all unequivocally oppose the kind of senseless violence that took the lives of these public servants. On a personal note, Chris was a courageous and exemplary representative of the United States. Throughout the Libyan revolution, he selflessly served our country and the Libyan people at our mission in Benghazi. As Ambassador in Tripoli, he has supported Libya’s transition to democracy. His legacy will endure wherever human beings reach for liberty and justice. I am profoundly grateful for his service to my Administration, and deeply saddened by this loss. The brave Americans we lost represent the extraordinary service and sacrifices that our civilians make every day around the globe. As we stand united with their families, let us now redouble our own efforts to carry their work forward.

What Romney said (emphasis added):

I’m outraged by the attacks on American diplomatic missions in Libya and Egypt and by the death of an American consulate worker in Benghazi. It’s disgraceful that the Obama Administration’s first response was not to condemn attacks on our diplomatic missions, but to sympathize with those who waged the attacks.

 What Jim Wright said:

Looking at this event in the cold light of a rainy Alaskan afternoon, this is what see I immediately:

Barack Obama condemned the attacks, he spoke against violence and expressed sadness for the dead and sympathy for their families and friends, he told us what he was doing to protect our people in similar situations around the globe, and he promised us justice.  About what you would expect from your President in such a situation.

Mitt Romney attacked his own government and his fellow Americans. 

The President was coldly angry, but determined in his public response to prevent further bloodshed, further violence. 

Mitt was outraged.

The President’s concern was for the dead, for their families, for people.

Romney’s concern was that somebody touched our stuff.

Obama responded like a president.

Romney acted like a businessman.

Do the math for yourself.

Wright riffs on this at considerable outraged length, and I encourage you to go read it all.

Two three points stick out for me, even beyond Mittens swallowing his foot before he had any clear idea of what the hell was going on:

1) At a moment when our PEOPLE were under attack and dying, Mittens chose to ATTACK our people.

2) I haven't said often enough what the loathsome Romneybot makes crystal clear: while real people have as their first concern PEOPLE, conservatives (and yes, I believe this about ALL conservatives, not simply the regressives into which the modern Repugnicant party has degenerated) have as their first concern THINGS.

3) The Rethugs have been saying stupid things to their stupid base for so long that it has become reflexive.  Any why not?  They've gotten away with it since at least the Nixon administration.  But the stupid has gotten proregressively stupider over time. Perhaps at last now, famous Republican Abe Lincoln will be right about not fooling all the people all the time.

And what was the Obama administration's pronouncement that Willard found to be so disgraceful?

This, issued by the Cairo embassy staff several hours BEFORE any of the attacks:

The Embassy of the United States in Cairo condemns the continuing efforts by misguided individuals to hurt the religious feelings of Muslims – as we condemn efforts to offend believers of all religions. Today, the 11th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, Americans are honoring our patriots and those who serve our nation as the fitting response to the enemies of democracy. Respect for religious beliefs is a cornerstone of American democracy. We firmly reject the actions by those who abuse the universal right of free speech to hurt the religious beliefs of others.

Obama's statement, quoted above, and this statement from the embassy are pretty much boiler plate in these kinds of circumstances.  It's very easy to imagine these banal documents written well in advance and stuck in a drawer, ready to receive fill-in-the-blank details at the necessary moment.

For Mitt to attack the president and the embassy staff over this incident is not merely odious, loathsome, and the very antithesis of patriotism, it is also stupid.

Time and time again Romney has revealed himself to be a fully inside-the-bubble ideologue and ignoramus.  And after issuing these remarks, the son-of-a-bitch left the podium smirking.

And yet, this is going to be a close election.

Oh my god, are we screwed!

____________________________________
Endnotes:
a) I lifted all the quotes from Wright's post, and I appreciate his legwork in rounding them up.
b) H/T to Tux.
c) For a whole lot more, see LGM here and here.
d) Plus this at AB.

Yes, The Right Wing Lies When They Say Obama is a Profligate Spender

Part III - How to think about time series data.

For reference:
Part II  Federal Spending as a Fraction of GDP

Part I  Federal Spending Growth

Some commentors to the previous posts have rightly concluded that I consider spending under Obama in the context of historical trends.  In fact, if you don't consider historical trends, you are ignoring the most important element of context that is available.  I only mentioned trends briefly in Part II, but the directional changes in the graphs of Parts I and II implicitly suggest them.

Time series data that relate to the size of the population, the government, or the economy generally follow a quasi-exponential growth pattern.  I say quasi- because a perfect exponential growth pattern  results from a continuous constant rate of growth, while real world growth rates vary from year.  Graph 3 of Part II shows how these variations have occurred over several decades.  Usually this does not result in a large or permanent deformation in the shape of a quasi-exponential curve, since the growth rate typically oscillates irregularly around a mean value that only changes slowly over time.

Graph 2 in Part II shows that the spending and GDP growth curves stay close to exponential tracks over long time spans.  It also illustrates that the recent recession was one of those rare times when growth rates deviated substantially.

Human eye-brain coordination doesn't deal well with exponential curve shapes.  Straight lines are much easier to comprehend and extrapolate.  Graphing quasi-exponential data on a log scale reduces the curve to a quasi-straight line that is much easier to use and understand.

Graph 1 shows Federal Spending and GDP, since 1995, plotted on a log scale.  Constant growth results in a straight line segment, and a higher growth rate causes a steeper slope.  Zero growth shows up as a horizontal line.   I've again included a line for 5 times spending, to get a close overlay with the GDP line.

 Graph 1.  Spending and GDP since 1995 (log scale)

There is an upward bend in the spending line in 2000.  This is most easily seen in the blue line.  During the 90's, we can see that GDP grew faster than spending.  In 2001-2, GDP growth flat-lined, as expected during a recession. Then, from 20002 to 2008, the growth rates for GDP and spending were close to identical.  Both lines twist during the most recent recession.  Curiously, spending growth was flat for a large portion of 2008.

Since the recession, the spending lines are very close to flat, and GDP growth has been anemic.  Here is a close up.

Graph 2.  Spending and GDP since 2007 (log scale)

Graph 3 provides context, all the way back to 1947.  Ponder the inflection points and slope changes at your leisure.

Graph 2.  Spending and GDP since 1947 (log scale)

Note that there are only two flat-ish spots in the spending lines: now, and during the Eisenhower administration. The current administration has, at least temporarily, broken the decades-long trend in continuous spending increases. 

To emphasize the obvious, spending growth is now very close to zero.  In context, this is remarkable.  Saying Obama is a profligate spender is a lie. 

In this post, I am not suggesting that the rate of spending growth under any president is good, bad, appropriate or inappropriate.  I am only pointing out what was and is. 

So, this is how you think about time series data.
0) Forget your preconceived notions.    (Frex:I had no idea that spending growth has essentially stopped until I looked at the data.)
1) Identify trends. The history of time series data provides meaningful context.
2) Identify break points and trend changes.  These are key data points.
3) Note the directions of these changes.
4) Think hard about what these observations are actually telling you, not what you want them to say.
5) Double down on 4) if you are looking at a ratio.  Ponder that denominator.
6) Don't cherry pick.  It's dishonest.

There are a lot of ways to look at a data set: linear and log scales, rate of change, etc.  Chose the one that gives the clearest picture of the data you want to analyze, or simplifies the analysis, or makes it easier to understand.  Studying different views can be informative, as can a comparison of different data sets. 

Here is the working page at FRED for the graphs in this post.  I encourage the interested reader to spend some time working with the capabilities of this very powerful tool.

Editorial Comment:
In case it's not obvious, I'll tell you that I write these posts because they interest me and I think they generate some knowledge, or at least information, that is worth sharing.  I have virtually no interest in the fool's errand of convincing anybody that I am right - either the data analysis convinces you or it doesn't.  So unless you have better data, or can point out some specific flaw in my reasoning [and then tell me specifically and in detail how to get it right] don't bother arguing with me.

I appreciate rational discourse, and am always willing to engage thoughtful readers. I'm also willing to be proven wrong by a cogent argument.  That said, though, I don't really care if anyone comments.  At this point, I'd almost rather nobody did.  But if you chose to, please do me the courtesy of having your comment be somewhere in the general vicinity of on-topic.  And - fair warning: naked assertions and unsubstantiated ideologically approved talking points will be scoffed at, so please check that nonsense at the door.

Why Spending/GDP is a Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Metric For Judging Obama's Performance

A post like this really shouldn't be necessary, but part of the right wing canard that Obama has been a profligate spender is based on spending as a percentage of GDP.

It looks like this - Graph 1.

Graph 1.  Fed Expenditures/GDP

Sure enough, by the end of Clinton's term the ratio had fallen from Reagan's high of 24% to a modern low of 19%.  But note that the 19% value wasn't typical.  It was the end point of a decade-long decline.  And, yep, there's Obama with an all-time-high approaching 26%.

What otherwise intelligent, and sometimes even famous people seem to ignore though, is that every ratio has not only a numerator but also that ol' devil denominator.   Let's have a look at both of them.  Graph 2 shows GDP and Expenditures since 1980, expressed in $ Billions.  I've also added a line representing 5* Expenditures, since 20% of GDP is a reasonable rough estimate for the post WW II era.

Graph 2.  Expenditures and GDP Compared

Actually, the 5x Expenditures line runs pretty consistently above the GDP line, telling us two things that we should have already known from looking at Graph 1.  First, Expenditures greater than 20% of GDP have been the norm since before 1980, and 2) Clinton's final number is not representative of anything other than a single year.  Using it as a comparator is cherry-picking and fundamentally dishonest.

The 5x line also emphasizes that the majority of the spending increase under Obama unavoidably occurred during the officially designated recession.  The GDP line shows that, post recession, GDP growth has not recovered to the pre-recession trend line.  In fact, growth has established a new trend line with a lower slope.  This is unprecedented in the scope of FRED historical data.  My guess is that insufficient Federal spending has been a big drag on this recovery.  But it's also true that GDP growth has been in secular decline since the Reagan administration.  Note that skewing the denominator down will automatically skew the ratio up.  This is what Bill Clinton calls "arithmetic."

Slicing across this a different way, Graph 3 gives us year-over-year percentage growth in Expenditures and GDP, dating back to the Eisenhower administration.

Graph 3.  YoY % Change in Expenditures and GDP

A few simple observations:
- The spending increase during the recent recession was modest by any standard, and dwarfed by earlier surges.
- That increase, coupled with the most severe GDP decline since the other Great Depression gave our beloved ratio a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad double whammy.
- GDP growth during this recovery is only marginally better than it was during the 2001-2 low, and far below Clinton era levels.
- Clinton was the most consistently frugal president of the post WW II era - until now.
- Since the recession was declared over, B. Hoover Obama has been miserly.

One can legitimately argue that Obama's approach to the economy has been excessively conservative.  Krugman has made this point repeatedly.  I often say that Clinton governed to the right of Eisenhower - who was a genuine deficit hawk - and that Obama is to the right of Clinton. That is intended to be slightly hyperbolic, but using this data as the benchmark, it's dead on.

Any questions?

Cross posted at Angry Bear