The Atlantic reposts a graph from The Economist showing the increase in government spending in the first three years of the first term of the last seven presidents. Guess who wins Biggest Spender in Chief?
But the bottom line is that it is really, truly time for the myth about Big Spender Obama to die. If anything, it is remarkable that, after a recession and a private sector implosion, the public sector expanded less under this administration than it did under Bush or Reagan, especially when you consider the government cuts made at the state and local levels.
There’s lies, there’s damn lies, and then there’s right-wing media.
Reality isn’t what it used to be. It never really was. The public believes whatever it is told to.
My brother-in-law was bitching to me last night about the Obama’s TARP bailout of the banks. I pointed out that it was signed in 2008, by Bush. He replied that it COULDN’T have been in 2008, as it was Obama’s program and he wasn’t in office yet.
Sigh. He also had some wrong information as to what the program allowed banks to do…
To play the wing-nut’s advocate, isn’t this an artifact that most of Obama’s spending came in his first year rather than later in his term? As near as I can tell, this is a ratio of two years’ spending. The fact that Obama increased spending at all after the stimulus is the bone of the right’s contention.