THE BUSH BOOM: January 9, 2009, 12:04 PM ET.Bush On Jobs: The Worst Track Record On Record President George W. Bush entered office in 2001 just as a recession was starting, and is preparing to leave in the middle of a long one. Thatâs almost 22 months of recession during his 96 months in office. His job-creation record wonât look much better. The Bush administration created about three million jobs (net) over its eight years, a fraction of the 23 million jobs created under President Bill Clintonâs administration http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2009/01/09/bush-on-jobs-the-worst-track-record-on-record/
Dude, you need to do some serious review of history there... The Vietnam War began in 1955 and the last I checked, a republican was in office at the time. As far as WWI, the war started in 1914 but the U.S. didn't enter until 3 years later. In fact, Wilson had won his second term based on keeping the U.S. out of the war during his first term. His hand was forced due to the Germans resuming submarine warfare against non-combatant passenger and merchant ships. Regarding WWII, the war started in 1939. The U.S. didn't declare war until two years later since public opinion, prior to 12/7/41, was decidedly against war. However, after what happened to the fleet in Pearl Harbor the president, regardless of party, had no choice but to enter the conflict. However, if you review this list of US conflicts, the major wars are shown in bold case: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_Wars Funny how most of them occurred during non-democrat presidential terms: War of 1812 - Madison, democratic-republican 1846 Mexican-American War - Although Polk was in office when war was declared against Mexico, Tyler who was with the Whig party, had deployed troops to Texas two years before to defend the territory against the Mexicans. 1861 Civil War - Lincoln, republican 1898 Spanish-American War - McKinley republican 1899-1913 Philippine-American War - McKinley, Roosevelt, Taft, all republicans 1991 Desert Storm, Bush I, republican 2001 Afghanistan - Bush II, republican 2003 Iraq - Bush II, republican
Bush deserves more credit for turning the economy around in 2003. After 9/11 things were bad and with the wrong policies it could have gone the other way. Instead with tax breaks and a PR campaign to keep shopping and spending things turned good for 5 years. Had Bush did what Obama has done the economy would have continued to drop like it is now.
you have to remember one thing, the only reason Clinton had a surplus was because of a split congress (dem and rep) that never agreed on anything...to say they took charge is misleading. The only reason Clinton had a boom was due the long term effects of the Reagan years. Right place right time. Let's also not forget he helped pull us out of the shit known as the carter years.
Clinton is totally overated. Obama has listen to and employed lots of crooks from Clinton era and consequently the USA and probably a lot of the rest of the world will really hit depression levels. Americans and most of western world are fasinated by movie stars so they voted in a big mouth wanna be ! Clinton had $10 a barrel oil; and unless these dimwits realize they have to get the price of oil way down for a long time, there cannot be a real recovery, not this manipulation. Alternative energy is still at the joke stage.
Itâs conservative lore that Reagan the icon cut taxes, while George H.W. Bush the renegade raised them. As Stockman recalls, "No one was authorized to talk about tax increases on Ronald Reaganâs watch, no matter what kind of tax, no matter how justified it was." Yet raising taxes is exactly what Reagan did. He did not always instigate those hikes or agree to them willinglyâbut he signed off on them. One year after his massive tax cut, Reagan agreed to a tax increase to reduce the deficit that restored fully one-third of the previous yearâs reduction. (In a bizarre bit of self-deception, Reagan, who never came to terms with this episode of ideological apostasy, persuaded himself that the three-year, $100 billion tax hikeâthe largest since World War IIâwas actually "tax reform" that closed loopholes in his earlier cut and therefore didnât count as raising taxes.) Faced with looming deficits, Reagan raised taxes again in 1983 with a gasoline tax and once more in 1984, this time by $50 billion over three years, mainly through closing tax loopholes for business. Despite the fact that such increases were anathema to conservativesâand probably cost Reaganâs successor, George H.W. Bush, reelectionâReagan raised taxes a grand total of four times just between 1982-84. This record flummoxes the best efforts of todayâs Reagan hagiographers to explain away. Peter Wallison, for instance, after proclaiming that Reagan "stayed the course against changes in his economic plan," later dismisses the presidentâs tax increases as "a modest rollback" that "seems to have been the result" of his accepting a Democratic promise to cut spending by twice that amount. (Whatever happened to "Trust, but verify"?) Reagan continued these "modest rollbacks" in his second term. The historic Tax Reform Act of 1986, though it achieved the supply side goal of lowering individual income tax rates, was a startlingly progressive reform. The plan imposed the largest corporate tax increase in history ---------------------------------------------------------------------- As governor, Reagan was the biggest California spender of the last half century. Under him, state spending leaped 177%. And as president, he spent like the proverbial drunken sailor to expand the Navy and the nuclear missile arsenal while winning the Cold War. He left Washington with a then-record national debt. His first year as governor, Reagan raised taxes equal to 30% of the state general fund, still a modern record. And as president, he increased taxes several times, although conservatives pretend to remember only the one big tax cut. http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2010_06/024155.php -----------------------------------------------------------------------
George W loved to call reporters that too; well, W was more creative than you, he called one "a major league asshole".