September 21, 2011

Who's That Creepin'?

Hatched by Dafydd

Why it's good, ol' Mr. Sanity, the prodigal son come home at last!

One of my greatest frustrations for the past two and a half years has been the persistence of blindness: In the eyes of the American voter, the Untouchable who currently squats in la Casa Blanca, has somehow eluded and evaded all culpability for the fiscal calamity that has overtaken us. "It's Bush's fault!" has been the order of the day for 974 of them; Barack H. Obama's greatest eloquence has always come when pointing the finger at somebody else.

But as the man said, you can run on and on, but great God a'mighty gonna pull you down. And that's just what is finally happening: According to a USA Today/Gallup poll, Americans have finally dumped ownership of this wretched economy into the One's squirmy lap:

A slight majority of Americans for the first time blame President Obama either a great deal (24%) or a moderate amount (29%) for the nation's economic problems. However, Americans continue to blame former President George W. Bush more. Nearly 7 in 10 blame Bush a great deal (36%) or a moderate amount (33%).

Those assigning Bush significant blame have steadily dropped from 80% in July, 2009 to 69% today; at the same time, those assigning significant blame to Obama have steadily risen, from 32% then to 53% today. I suspect the lines will cross over sometime within the next year, and more Americans will blame Obama than Bush.

Gallup notes that the reason Bush still receives more blame than Obama is that Democrats are loath to blame Obama at all:

Americans are more likely to blame Bush than Obama mainly because a much higher percentage of Republicans assign a high degree of responsibility to Bush compared with the percentage of Democrats blaming Obama, 50% vs. 25%. At the same time, partisans are equally likely to say the president of the opposing party bears significant blame: 83% of Republicans blame Obama and 86% of Democrats blame Bush.

Only a quarter of Democrats blame Obama for the rotten economy even a little! Methinks a bit of wagon-circling hath crept into this Gallup poll. (The GOP is significantly more just and fair-minded, as usual; that is because staunch Republicans support philosophies and ideas, while yellow-dog Democrats support their leaders, with all the fervor of Nicolas Chauvin.)

But reality cannot long be denied: Simply looking at the annual deficits, how they sprouted like virulent weeds as soon as Obamunism took hold in America, should make it clear as can be who has done the most harm to our national finances:



United States budget deficits

United States budget deficits 2000 to 2021 (actual and projected)

  • Note that George W. Bush's last budget, FY 2008 (from October 1st, 2007, through September 30th, 2008) -- under a Congress completely controlled by Democrats -- showed a deficit of $450 billion.
  • The first budget to be substantially affected by the economic policies of Barack Obama was FY 2009, which ran from October 1st, 2008 through September 30th, 2009; Obama was the POTUS and gleefully ramming Obamunism down our throats for more than eight of those twelve months. That first Obama-driven budget showed the nation's very first unlucky 13-digit deficit, $1.4 trillion, more than thrice Bush's last deficit.

We can all agree that even a deficit of nearly half a trillion is unconscionable, and surely W. could have fought harder against the insane spending priorities of the Democratic Congress. Still, it's impossible to ignore the stunning increase that accompanied President B.O.'s ascension to the Delphic Throne.

And at long last, the American people are starting to wise up. They no longer fully swallow the One's self-serving blame shifting; and by the time of the next election, November 6th, 2012, I confidently predict that the percent still blaming Bush after four years will be in the teens, with 80% plus putting blame where it belongs... squarely on the pointy head of Barack H. Obama.

As that happens, get ready to start licking your chops; for the only thing rising faster than Obama's deficits will be his disapproval rating in the polls.

Hatched by Dafydd on this day, September 21, 2011, at the time of 4:09 PM

Comments

The following hissed in response by: MikeR

Not on topic, but anyhow: The Troy Davis execution reminds me - in reverse - of your principle, "Some crimes are so heinous that innocence is no defense." Here, "the death penalty requires such a high standard of evidence of guilt that proof of guilt is not sufficient." Assuming that 1) Anyone who reads through the case will see easily that Troy Davis is guilty of murder beyond a shadow of a reasonable doubt, 2) All the recantations put together make no difference to this conclusion, and 3) All the articles written about how he shouldn't be executed are by people who either (a) haven't studied the case, or (b) think that the death penalty is so awful that anything said to prevent it is justified -

Well, assuming that those are true, it's fascinating to me how many posts and comments I see that say, "Well, I haven't really read up on this, but given all these articles, how can any decent person be in favor of the execution of a possibly innocent man? If you don't know, how can you execute him?"

It is as if we have a new principle of jurisprudence: To justify an execution, you must prove guilt beyond any reasonable doubt on the part of people who haven't really followed the case! A pretty high bar.

The above hissed in response by: MikeR [TypeKey Profile Page] at September 22, 2011 12:48 PM

The following hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh

MikeR:

Is my memory mistaken... or did Patterico once propose, in a bold but desperate move to preserve the death penalty (which he thought was close to being abolished, at least de facto), that capital offenses should have to show guilt beyond even an unreasonable doubt?

I could be mistaken; it could have been someone else. But at the moment, I don't think so.

Dafydd

The above hissed in response by: Dafydd ab Hugh [TypeKey Profile Page] at September 22, 2011 6:11 PM

The following hissed in response by: LarryD

The opinion about X of people who are ignorant on X has no value. If the ignorant are offended by this, tough!

The above hissed in response by: LarryD [TypeKey Profile Page] at September 23, 2011 11:11 AM

The following hissed in response by: Rovin

Along with removing Obama, there should also be a concerted effort to point out that Harry Reid’s Senate IS just as inept. Remember, (and this should be hammered), it's the Senate that has not produced a budget, which is the direct reason for another continuing resolution and possible shut-down of the government---BOTH THAT WOULD NOT BE NECESSARY WITH A BUDGET.

The above hissed in response by: Rovin [TypeKey Profile Page] at September 23, 2011 6:00 PM

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