By John Hawkins
4/24/2012
Whether you've had some form of head trauma that has caused you to like Barack Obama or like all good hearted people, you can't stand him, his performance has objectively been terrible. Of course, we can debate WHY his performance has been so bad. His supporters would probably blame Bush, Republicans in Congress, ATM machines, fairy dust shortages and people forgetting to click their heels together three times before saying, "There's no place like home." On the other hand, people who haven't been drinking Barney Frankosaurus brand Kool-Aid might note that if Obama is going to blame Republicans for everything that happens while he's President, we might as well just replace him with a Republican. Whatever the case may be, here are five devastating numbers that show how poorly America has fared under Barack Obama's watch.
1) 3 years and 2 months: "The National Debt has now increased more during President Obama's three years and two months in office than it did during 8 years of the George W. Bush presidency.
The Debt rose $4.899 trillion during the two terms of the Bush presidency. It has now gone up $4.939 trillion since President Obama took office."
-- CBSNEWS
Keep in mind that in 2008, when Obama was in full "hope, change, and bullflop" mode, he actually called Bush "unpatriotic" for adding so much to the debt which is kind of like being called a traitor by Benedict Arnold.
2) $9.5 trillion: At a certain point, it does get a little tedious to keep hammering home how much debt we're piling up, but it's such an urgent problem that produces so little reaction, that it's nearly impossible to do otherwise. It's almost like being chained to people in a house that's burning down, but they're too busy camping out on the couch eating chips and watching American Idol to bother to save themselves.
This country has already lost its AAA rating, we're 15 trillion dollars in debt, we have 100 trillion dollars in unfunded Social Security and Medicare liabilities, and barring a major course correction, we're going to default on our debts and start into a downward spiral that this nation will not recover from in the lifetime of anyone reading this column. So what is the Obama Administration doing to tackle an issue so serious that it makes every other problem we have pale in significance?
The Congressional Budget Office on Friday released its analysis of President Obama’s 2012 budget proposal and found it does less to rein in deficits and the debt than the administration had estimated. CBO estimates Obama's plan would produce 10 years of deficits totaling $9.5 trillion. By 2021, it would increase the debt held by the public to 87 percent of gross domestic product.
This is a "sit in the burning house until the roof falls in and we all die" budget. If we add another $9.5 trillion to the debt over the next 10 years, it will mean that generations of Americans will have to grow up in dire poverty, wear sack cloth, and have to eat their dogs to make it through the winter. On the upside, if American children do have to eat Fido, it may mean they'll grow up to be President one day.
3) 1091 days: We're now up to 1,091 days without a budget despite the fact that it's the most basic function of Congress and it's required by law. There's a simple reason for this: Democrats don't want to offend the general public by increasing spending or their base by cutting spending; so they've decided to do nothing. This is kind of like a police department full of officers who've decided that arresting people is too much of a hassle; so they're going to sit in the station, eat doughnuts, drink coffee, and play Angry Birds all day. Worse yet, when Republicans like Paul Ryan have presented responsible budgets that don't go far enough, but are at least valiant attempts to take the country in the right direction, they've been criticized by Barack Obama and the Democratic Party. In other words, not only are the Democrats not going to do their jobs, they don't want Paul Ryan trying to do their jobs and to top it all off -- they then complain that the Republicans are blocking THEM. What a perverse political world it is that we live in when the Democrats have decided that their best chance of keeping their jobs is to refuse to do their jobs and then blame the other side for their adamant refusal to remove their own thumbs from their behinds.
4) $2,170: One of the great ironies of this election is the still rabid support that black Americans have for Barack Obama. This is kind of like Columbine High School throwing a "We Sure Do Miss You" Memorial Rally for Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold.
When Mr. Obama was inaugurated black unemployment was 12.6%. 36 months later, it is at a depression era level 15.8%.
* Black teenage unemployment is a jaw dropping 42.3 percent.
* In October 2010, blacks accounted for 22.6 percent of the then 40.5 million Americans who received food stamp benefits each month. That figure was projected to rise in 2011. Mark Rank of Washington University suggests a whopping 90 percent of black children may eventually live in households that need food stamps.
* In 2007, before Obama took office, white households had a median net worth of $134,280, compared with $13,450 for black households. By the end of 2009, the median net worth for white households plummeted 24% to $97,860. But for black households, it dropped 83% to $2,170. The Chicago Sun-Times called it, “The Disappearing Black Middle Class.”
If a Republican President did the sort of damage to black Americans that Barack Obama has, it would be called a hate crime.
5) 5 Million: The average unemployment rate during George Bush's time in office was roughly 5.3% as compared to 8.2% today, which is part of the longest streak of over 8% unemployment since the Great Depression. However, because of the way the unemployment rate is calculated, even those horrific numbers don't give you the full sense of the Mt. Krakatoa-like havoc that Barack Obama has wreaked on the job market.
When the recession supposedly officially ended in June, 2009, the labor force participation rate was still 65.7%.
In the latest, much celebrated unemployment report, the labor force participation rate had plummeted to 63.7%, the most rapid decline in U.S. history. That means that under President Obama nearly 5 million Americans have fled the workforce in hopeless despair.
The trick is that when those 5 million are not counted as in the work force, they are not counted as unemployed either. They may desperately need and want jobs. They may be in poverty, as many undoubtedly are, with America suffering today more people in poverty than in the entire half century the Census Bureau has been counting poverty.
In other words, there are 5 million Americans who not only lost their jobs, but who became so discouraged trying to find a job that they just gave up. That's definitely a "change," but the only "hope" at this point is that Obama will be voted out of office so that those people will be able to get back into the labor market.
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To read another article by John Hawkins, click here.
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