It is pretty easy to predict what you are going to hear from the President the next many months. Once the Osama bin Laden thing is behind us.
You will hear the same from the Vice-President. And from anybody from the administration who gets near a camera or microphone or op-ed page.
You will hear and read “This has been the worst recession since the Great Depression.” “This has been an unprecedented recession we have had to recover from.”
Sorry, but it has not been. The so-called Reagan Recession in the early 1980’s was just as bad. It lasted just about as long. It destroyed millions of jobs. It wiped out businesses galore. It ran unemployment higher than the most recent recession did.
Why then will the President be telling us our recent recession was the most horrible? Because his economic policies have flopped. They have led us to an anemic recovery. Reagan’s policies worked. They led to a robust recovery.
Reagan’s medicines for recovery were simple: Restrain spending. Lessen regulation on business. Cut taxes, especially for small business people. Promote the free market economy. Heap praise upon our entrepreneurs and businesses and economic system.
Obama’s medicines were the opposite: Increase spending phenomenally. Increase regulations a lot. Grow government. Threaten repeatedly to increase taxes, especially on small business people. Criticize the free economy. Browbeat and make villains out of business leaders and industries.
Their policies could hardly be more opposite. The results could hardly be more opposite.
The Reagan Recovery saw unemployment tumble. And saw long-term unemployment shrink. The Obama Recovery has unemployment finally edging downward. Edging. And long-term unemployment has soared.
The Reagan Recovery saw new jobs by the millions. The Obama Recovery has been a jobless recovery.
The Reagan Recovery saw growth in the GDP averaging 7.1 percent over 7 quarters.
The Obama Recovery has seen growth in the GDP average 2.8 percent over 7 quarters.
The Reagan Recovery saw the deficit shrink. Because he held back government spending. The Obama Recovery has seen the deficit surge. Because he opened the government spending spigots.
The Reagan policies were designed to kick-start the economy. By restraining government. By freeing investors in various ways. Those policies did, indeed, kick the economy in the keester. (Fancy economic term there.)
The Obama policies were designed to kick-start the economy. By enlarging government. By increasing government regulation. They penalized investors in various ways. And they kicked the economy in the shins.
Nobody in this administration can admit any of this, of course. Least of all the President. However, the economic advisors who created the Obama policies have already jumped ship. Or been tossed overboard. That was admission enough.
The President is left in an awkward situation. He can say things are gradually getting better. And that “Hey, this was the deepest hole since the Great Depression. My policies kept it from being worse.”
The speech writers have already written the lines for the upcoming campaign.        
From Tom ... as in Morgan.                  
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