Category Archives: President Obama

Who’s Really Responsible For Our National Debt?

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It’s popular for the Republican Party to blame our $16.7 trillion debt on President Obama. Certainly, like all presidents, he has some responsibility for it. But a much larger share of the responsibility goes to President Reagan, President George H.W. Bush and, most especially, President George W. Bush.

You see, the increase in spending in 2009 following the economic collapse of 2008 should rightfully be attributed to the Bush administration. That’s because the 2009 deficit was the result of a spending bill, including the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), authorized by Congress in October of 2008 and signed by President Bush months before Obama took office. In fact, spending in the first year of any administration is always the result of the previous administration. Properly credit 2009 spending to Republicans, and you’ll discover that President Obama has been responsible for the lowest spending increases since Eisenhower. Similarly, he is responsible for the most rapid cuts to our deficit in more than 50 years!

While it’s true that the debt has increased 18.5 percent since Obama became president, as discussed, he should not be held responsible for most of that increase. Even so, it’s still less than the 20.7 percent increase in national debt that accrued during George W. Bush’s second term. And it’s only marginally greater than the 13 percent increase during Bush Sr’s term, and the 11.3 percent increase during Reagan’s first term.

A better measure of Obama’s spending comes courtesy of Rick Ungar, a contributor to Forbes Magazine (hardly a bastion of liberalism). According to Ungar, in President Obama’s first term, overall government spending grew just 1.4 percent as compared to 7.3 percent in George W. Bush’s first term and 8.1 percent in Bush’s second term!

So why do Republicans continue to place the blame on Obama? First, it’s a matter of political convenience to portray Obama as a “tax and spend” liberal. Second, the narrative is relatively believable since government spending skyrocketed during the first year of the Obama administration. Third, the media has done a very poor job of countering Republican misinformation.

In order to truly understand the federal debt, you have to look at the history of US borrowing.

Following the Revolutionary War, the US debt stood at roughly 35 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). It again reached that level following the Civil War. In both instances, the debt was brought down by a combination of increased revenues and spending restraint. During WW I, the US debt again rose to approximately 35 percent of GDP. Before it could be paid down, our economy collapsed leading to the Great Depression. That was quickly followed by WWII. The two events caused the debt to soar to more than 117 percent of GDP. But, through a combination of post-war prosperity and income tax rates of up to 91 percent during the Eisenhower administration, the debt was again brought under control.

By the end of the Carter administration, the national debt had been reduced to 32.5 percent of GDP.

President Reagan’s expansive military spending during the Cold War once again caused the debt to soar, reaching more than 66.1 percent GDP. Under Clinton, it was reduced to 56.4 percent of GDP. Then, under George W. Bush, two wars (one of which was a war of choice) and lax government oversight led to the Great Recession – the worst economic calamity in nearly 80 years. At the same time, a Republican-led Congress cut taxes (and, therefore, revenue), particularly for the wealthy.

President Obama inherited a debt of more than 84 percent of GDP, along with a worldwide economic collapse, double-digit unemployment, spiraling health care costs, two wars estimated to have cost more than $6 trillion, a Congress that refused to rescind the Bush tax cuts, and a uniquely obstructionist Republican Party.

All of this was roughly the equivalent of combining the costs of World War II and the Great Depression without the primary mechanism needed to reduce the debt – taxes!

President Obama was left with few choices. He had to stimulate the economy through loans and tax cuts in order to put people back to work. This led to reduced revenue. He had to wind down the war of choice in Iraq as quickly as possible. He needed to stabilize the war in Afghanistan that had been allowed to languish under Bush at a cost of $1 million per soldier per year. Moreover, since few Americans had been asked to sacrifice for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, unlike World War II, they felt no need to pay for the wars through increased taxes. Indeed, even though federal income taxes were at a 50-year low, extremists funded by billionaires created the TEA (Taxed Enough Already) Party.

All of this led to the growth of our debt, which now equals nearly 102 percent of GDP.

Certainly, this debt is of great concern. But it’s not the short-term crisis Teapublicans would have you believe. (It’s the equivalent of a family earning $100,000/year holding a $102,000 mortgage.) And, without modest tax increases, there are few ways to reduce the debt.

One is to grow the economy, and according to most economists, including Lloyd Blankfein of Goldman Sachs, the economy is on the verge of significant, sustained growth if the nitwits in Congress would just get out of the way and stop dragging us from one self-inflicted crisis to another.

Two is to make cuts without adding to unemployment. (For example, we squander tens of billions each year on weapons systems that our military doesn’t even want, but Congress refuses to defund them because doing so would cost jobs.) And, once the economy shows sustained growth, programs such as food stamps can be cut – especially if we raise the minimum wage to reduce the large number of working poor who have little choice but to rely on government assistance.

In summary, contrary to what Teapublicans would have you believe, our national debt is not Obama’s debt. It’s the result of decades of wars, tax cuts, regulatory indifference, a struggling worldwide economy, out-of-control health care costs, greedy corporations that off-shore both jobs and profits, and a dysfunctional Congress that not only fails to help the economy. It makes decisions that are actually preventing economic recovery!

As a matter of fact, the Tea Party seems determined to force our nation into default. And, like the debt, they would have you believe that it’s all Obama’s fault.

How To Shut Up Teapublicans.

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John Boehner, Ted Cruz, et al are fond of blaming President Obama and Sen. Harry Reid for the government shutdown. In doing so, they claim that the Democrats “refuse to negotiate.”

Negotiate what?

The only thing Teapublicans want to “negotiate” is the Affordable Care Act, a bill that was duly passed by both houses of Congress, signed into law by the President and found to be constitutional by the US Supreme Court. That simply cannot be negotiated. It can be repealed. But that would take an act of both houses of Congress and the signature of the President, and that’s simply not going to happen.

So how about this? What if Obama and Reid offer to delay some aspects of the Affordable Care Act for a year in exchange for Teapublican agreement to pass a strict gun control bill that will ban all semi-automatic weapons and a bill to provide federally-funded abortions for any woman who needs one? I’m sure a majority in the Senate would agree to that, as well as the President.

What’s that you say? That’s unreasonable? Really?

It’s no more unreasonable than what Teapublicans are asking. So tell you what. When Teapublicans finally decide that they want to negotiate the federal budget in good faith, they should pass a temporary funding bill to restart the government. Then they should sit down with Democrats to discuss the budget like adults. That means both sides need to compromise.

Until then, the President and Senator Reid should stand pat.

Why You Can’t Negotiate With Terrorists.

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Long ago, our law enforcement agencies learned that you can’t negotiate with terrorists, especially those who take hostages. The reason is that their demands are always unreasonable and they never live up to the negotiated agreement.

House Republicans are no different.

The President and Senate have been negotiating the federal budget for more than four years, trying to strike a fine balance between keeping our fragile economic recovery going and bringing deficits under control. Under President Obama, the deficit has dropped faster than at any time in history. And Democrats reluctantly agreed to make permanent the $70 billion in cuts to the federal budget that were part of the sequester. But after agreeing to the cuts, Speaker of the House betrayed the Senate Majority Leader by allowing the defunding of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act to be included in the budget bill.

When the President and Senate refused to agree to the measure, the House offered a ”compromise” by attaching an amendment that would delay “Obamacare” for one year. Some compromise.

Since House Republicans have already voted to repeal or defund “Obamacare” more than 40 times, what assurance is there that they won’t vote to repeal the law another 40 times over the coming year?

After all, terrorists seldom live up to their word. And if they are willing to take our government and economy hostage once, they’re likely to do it again. Indeed, this is at least the third time in my lifetime that Republicans have shut down the government.

Republicans and their Tea Party parasites are always quoting the Constitution. It’s time they actually read it. Not just the 2nd and 10th Amendments…but the entire Constitution. If they would, they’d find that the House is only one part of the federal government, and it doesn’t have veto power. If they want to have a bill passed, they have to find agreement with the Senate and gain the signature of the President.

Only the President has veto power.  And the House doesn’t have the votes to override a presidential veto.

That means the House terrorists have only one option – to fund the government, at least temporarily, and then demonstrate that they can negotiate in good faith.

I, for one, don’t think they’re capable of that.

House Teapublicans Throw A Snitfit.

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Recognizing that out-of-control medical costs represented a growing threat to the health of Americans and the health of our nation, then-candidate, Barack Obama, vowed to overhaul our health care system if elected president in 2008.  Almost immediately after being sworn into office, President Obama challenged the Democratic-led Congress to deliver a health care reform bill for his signature.  After much debate and many Republican-sponsored amendments, Congress passed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act promising to contain health care costs and to provide health insurance to nearly 50 million uninsured Americans. The president signed the bill into law. More than a year later, a conservative Supreme Court ruled the law constitutional. And in 2012, the public showed its approval by re-electing President Obama and Senate Democrats.

That’s how democracy works. Or, at least, that’s how it’s supposed to work.

Despite all of this, the Republican majority in the House of Representatives refuses to accept the law, having voted to repeal or defund it 41 times. In a final lack of defiance, they refused to fund it as part of their government funding resolution despite statements by Senate Majority Leader, Harry Reid, that the bill would be “dead on arrival” in the US Senate and statements by President Obama that he would veto the bill.

They passed the bill anyway, trying to place the blame on President Obama and Democrats.

In response, Congressional Republicans claimed to compromise by passing a spending bill that would delay funding of “Obamacare” for a year. Apparently, they believed that Democrats would be stupid enough to think that the delay was any more than a public relations attempt to deflect blame for the government shutdown.

So here we are. Our entire government has come to a standstill because of a Teapublican tantrum against a health care law their own party proposed during the 1996 presidential campaign to counter President Bill Clinton’s universal health care initiative.

Ironically, the Teapublican snitfit has not affected the implementation of “Obamacare.” Millions of Americans have signed up for health insurance exchanges since the government shutdown. Moreover, although the budget passed by the House does not fund “Obamacare,” it includes the savings which will be realized by the law.

Without “Obamacare,” the government budget being pushed by Republicans doesn’t add up! In other words, it’s ideological. But not mathematical. Indeed, it has been estimated that the government shutdown will cost taxpayers $10 billion per week! And that doesn’t even include losses by individuals.

Obviously, House Teapublicans need a time-out.

How long will Teapublicans whine, scream and cry before voters lose patience and slap them on their considerable behinds? No one knows. While tens of thousands of government workers go without paychecks, the congressmen behind the shutdown will continue to collect theirs. And, if you think that they will feel threatened by their constituents, think again. Most congressional districts have been so gerrymandered, they will likely be re-elected no matter how bad their behavior.

Despite this, there is reason to hope. Yesterday, it was announced that 17 moderate Republicans are willing to vote for a clean bill that would fund the federal government and “Obamacare.” Assuming that all House Democrats would vote for such a bill, that’s enough votes to end the government shutdown. But it requires Speaker Boehner standing up to the Tea Party parasites in his caucus and bringing the bill to a vote.

In other words, don’t hold your breath.

A Recipe For Failure.

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Since 2009, many conservatives have believed that Barack Obama is an anti-American socialist who was born in Kenya and, therefore, is an illegitimate president. Many in Congress refuse to recognize him as president, let alone negotiate with him. Even after he was re-elected in overwhelming fashion, they refuse to accept the results believing that he bought votes by offering “stuff” to the 47 percent they claim do not pay taxes.

On the other hand, Democrats in Congress believe that Tea Party conservatives were elected based on an avalance of misinformation and spending from billionaire ideologues. They also believe that many were the beneficiaries of conservative gerrymandering.

So where does this leave us?

It leaves us with a government that simply doesn’t function. If it were not for presidential orders, the government would be at a complete standstill. Congress and the president cannot agree on a budget, on foreign policy, on military action, on job creation…they cannot even agree on laws that have already been passed. The House continues to vote to repeal “Obamacare” without hope of actually doing so. Why? Merely because conservatives in Congress want everyone to know how much they dislike President Obama.

Conservatives in both the House and the Senate refuse to negotiate a budget deal. They merely want to dictate. In 2011, that led to an impasse over the debt ceiling that damaged the credit rating of government bonds, collapsed the stock market and brought economic recovery to a standstill. In 2012, it led to sequestration which created further problems.

Now conservatives in the House are threatening to pass a budget that will defund “Obamacare” and, unless they get their way, they not only threaten to refuse to raise the debt ceiling. They plan to shut down the government entirely.

In an attempt to reach some form of compromise, President Obama reached his hand across the aisle. In return, conservatives merely extended their collective middle finger.

Given the circumstances. it’s not at all clear which side will win. But I do know that we will all lose.

Could We Be On The Verge Of Peace In The Middle East?

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The key to unlocking peace in the Middle East may have just been handed to us by Iranian President Hassan Rouhani who told NBC News national and international correspondent, Ann Curry, that Iran has no intention of creating nuclear weapons or weapons of mass destruction of any kind. When asked about Iranian denial of the Holocaust, Rouhani replied that those statements were made by his predecessor.

He also revealed that he has requested a diplomatic meeting with President Obama.

Apparently, this is in response to a letter from President Obama congratulating Rouhani on his election, followed by a series of letters discussing issues. It certainly didn’t hurt that the US agreed to Russia’s agreement to remove chemical weapons from Syria rather than a military strike.

It is not yet certain if these overtures will result in a renewed relationship with Iran. But no matter what happens, it shows that diplomacy is a far better option than military strikes and senile threats such as “Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran!”

It also demonstrates that statesmanship can work better than military force. It almost always shows more strength to resist the temptation for violence than to make threats and attempt to bully others. Moreover, it shows what can happen when we have leaders determined to get us out of ill-conceived wars than to get us into them.

If we are able to eventually normalize relations with Iran, it not only would release the pent-up energy and intellectual capital that has been strangling in Iran as a result of religious fundamentalism and our economic sanctions. It could reduce poverty in the country and eliminate one of the greatest destabilizing forces in the region. Instead of sponsoring terrorists, Iran could redirect the money to help others who are struggling economically.

After spending all but 33 years of our history at war, wouldn’t it be interesting to finally enjoy the fruits of peace?

Ronald Reagan: Solar Assassin.

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When President Obama recently ordered the White House to be fitted with solar panels, he was following the precedent set by President Jimmy Carter in 1979. After the OPEC cartel’s decision to limit oil production in order to drive up oil prices, Carter had recommended a series of measures designed to conserve energy and limit US dependence on oil imports. An aggressive plan to develop solar energy was one of those measures. To promote his plans, Carter ordered the installation of solar panels on the White House.

But when Ronald Reagan defeated Carter in 1980, one of his first actions was to order the panels, which he called “a joke”, removed. He also set about reversing all of Carter’s other energy-saving measures.

As a result of Reagan’s short-sighted decisions, the development of solar energy in the US was set back decades. While European nations and China continued the development of solar and other alternative energies, the US redirected all of its subsidies and resources toward oil exploration and ensuring access to foreign oil.

One could argue that Reagan’s decision culminated in a series of oil wars intended to protect the supply of oil from the Middle East. The US fought Desert Storm in order to secure Kuwait’s oil wells and keep them out of Iraqi hands. Despite the Bush Administration’s statements to the contrary, oil was at the heart of Operation Iraqi Freedom. That fact was made clear when then Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, and his assistants stated that the invasion of Iraq would pay for itself (it didn’t) through profits from Iraqi oil reserves. And since American oil interests had long sought an oil pipeline across Afghanistan in order to deliver Balkan oil onto the world markets, oil was likely part of the equation that led to the invasion of Afghanistan.

Imagine what might have happened if the trillions of dollars used to pursue war had been invested in alternative energy that would free us from oil imports. Imagine where we might be had the Carter administration’s energy conservation initiatives been followed to their conclusion.

In all likelihood, we would not have sent our troops into endless wars. We would have greatly decreased our dependence on oil, especially oil imports from the Middle East. We would not have an enormous federal debt. And, perhaps most important, we would have contributed far less to carbon emissions which have led to climate change.

The Bush Legacy Of War.

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Whatever your position on military action in Syria, your decision has likely been influenced by the Iraq War.

In 2003, the Bush administration told the US and the world that the invasion of Iraq was necessary in order to overthrow a sadistic leader; a leader who had used chemical weapons against Iran (with our blessings) and had even used chemical weapons against his own people (we drew no red line then). We were told that there was a growing mushroom cloud over Iraq and that, if we failed to act, that mushroom cloud would likely appear over the US. We were told that the invasion of Iraq would take a matter of days or weeks and that it would pay for itself through the profits from Iraqi oil.

We now know that the Bush administration lied. Even General Colin Powell who made the case before the UN admits that he was given faulty information and misled.

Now many of the same people behind the invasion of Iraq are calling for war with Syria’s Assad. John (the Warhawk) McCain was the first to weigh in, along with his partner in war Lindsey Graham. Former Bush Secretary of Offense, Donald Rumsfeld has also made his opinion known. So has Richard (The Dick) Cheney. They tell us that the reputation of the United States is at stake; that if we fail to strike, our enemies will walk all over us.

Really?

Do our enemies not already know that we spend more on our war machine than the next seven nations combined? And most of those are allies. None are actual enemies. Given that fact, it’s hard to imagine that a failure to strike against Assad in Syria will cause our enemies to start assembling their forces off our shores.

Today, our real enemies are small rogue nations and terrorist groups angered by all of our previous missteps, mostly in the Middle East, as the world’s self-proclaimed police force. Some of these enemies are the very people who are trying to defeat Assad. They will not be threatened by any strike against Assad. However, Syria’s allies, Russia and Iran might be.

The consequences of a rushed and ill-considered strike could be devastating. It could provoke Russia and Iran. It could destabilize Syria, much like Iraq. And it could embroil the entire region.

If the Obama administration is determined to send a message to Assad, it is going about it the right way in asking for a vote by Congress. (A strike against another government is, after all, an act of war and only Congress has the power to declare war.) Unlike Bush, the Obama administration should encourage that vote by presenting what we actually know about Assad’s use of chemical weapons. Not just what we think or want to believe.

Once Congress has voted, the US should take a well-substantiated case to the UN. After all, the ban of the use of chemical weapons is the result of an international treaty. We should not go it alone. We should not be rushed into action. We should not be pushed by the warmongers from a few countries in the region. And we should all recognize that, after Bush’s misadventures in Iraq, much of the rest of the world is understandably skeptical.

If the UN does approve military action against Assad, there should be a real coalition. Not some “coalition of the willing” as Bush claimed in Iraq. Any nation that votes for action should be willing to participate. And they should be willing to help pay for it.

Beware The Pendulum.

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As a creative director for ad agencies and as a part-time college instructor, I used to teach that social trends and fashions responded like a pendulum with a 360-degree axis. The pendulum freely swings, but never back to exactly the same place twice.

I was reminded of that description while watching the ceremonies marking the 50-year anniversary of the March on Washington. In 1963, the US seemed hopelessly racist. In the Jim Crow South, blacks were segregated from whites. African-Americans were denied the right to vote. Peaceful civil rights demonstrators were met with fire hoses, police dogs, beatings and murder.

The Voting Rights Act of 1965 began to change that.

In the last two presidential elections, African-Americans voted in record numbers helping to elect the first US president of African-American heritage. (I’ve always marveled that his Irish-American heritage is seldom mentioned because of the color of his skin.)

Obviously, the pendulum has swung a long way from 1963. But it seems to be swinging back.

Since the election of President Obama, numerous states in both the North and the South have passed restrictive voting laws to make it more difficult for minorities to vote. No other US president has been subjected to such angry derision. No other president has been repeatedly asked to show his papers to prove that he is a citizen. No other president has been interrupted during a State of the Union speech by a “Congressman” calling him a liar. No other president has been met by such congressional obstruction.

Racism did not disappear in the sixties. It is just more subtle. There are fewer racist killings, beatings and other hate crimes. Today, the racism is economic and institutionalized. Unemployment for African-Americans is roughly double that for whites. Many of those who do have jobs are not paid a living wage. Schools in African-American communities are grossly underfunded compared to those in white communities. African-Americans are not only three times more likely to be arrested as whites, they receive longer sentences for similar crimes.

Indeed, young African-American and Latino males are seen as a source of profit for the private prison industry. They are also disproportionately represented in our military and asked to fight wars to protect the economic interests of large corporations that are almost exclusively owned and managed by wealthy white Americans.

News organizations, once again, insert race into stories of crime. Media commentators feel comfortable talking about the disintegration of African-American families while ignoring the disintegration of white families. When minorities bring up discrimination and other issues of race, white political pundits refer to it as “playing the race card.” They would like us to believe that racism no longer exists. (Of course, it doesn’t for them.)

Most disturbing is the fact that the conservative majority of the United States Supreme Court has voted to weaken the Voting Rights Act and to undermine affirmative action.

On the anniversary of Martin Luther King’s iconic “I Have A Dream” speech, we should all take a moment to celebrate how far we’ve come. But only a moment. It’s time to get back to work to make sure the pendulum swings in the right direction again.

Rules Of War?

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The assumed response to Syria’s use of chemical weapons raises an obvious question: Where do we draw the line in warfare?

Following World War I and World War II, the world came together at the Geneva Conventions which banned the use of chemical weapons and torture. They also provided for the humane treatment of prisoners of war. The Geneva Conventions did not, however, ban nuclear weapons (the US is still the only nation to use them). They did not ban carpet bombing of cities. They did not prohibit incendiaries that can level cities in a firestorm. They did not ban attacks on food supplies and infrastructure that can turn large populations of civilians into starving refugees. In fact, they did not control many weapons and techniques that are now routinely used in modern warfare.

Why draw the line on one type of weapon of mass destruction while ignoring others? Are unarmed civilians any more dead from a chemical attack than from a remote-controlled bomb? Is it more painful to die from a nerve gas attack than from explosives?

Long ago, many cultures romanticized warfare and bound it by rules of honor. But, with the development of weapons of mass destruction (including automatic weapons, artillery, bombs, chemical and biological weapons, and nuclear devices) today’s warfare has become a glorified video game in which those most at risk are unarmed, innocent civilians.

How absurd that it’s okay to kill masses of people in one way, but not another! How senseless that, although some forms of torture are banned, others are not! How idiotic that we can allow despots in Rwanda and Cambodia to murder tens of thousands, but draw the line in other countries.

Truth is, there has been no real honor between warriors for centuries. No country or culture that willingly participates in warfare has a corner on ethics and morality. The development of ever more lethal weapons has turned today’s warriors into breathing, bleeding killing machines. Is it any wonder, then, that these machines we create have such difficulty adapting to so-called polite society following their service?

What has happened in Syria is awful. But why is a red line drawn at the use of chemical weapons? If we level Damascus and its population with unseen missiles and bombs, is that better than allowing them to be killed by an unseen gas? What will be the outcome of our choosing to participate in this civil war? What will be the benefit?

Personally, I see none.