Does Obama Think We Are THIS Stupid?

 

So which is it?  Obama claims the sky is falling to justify spending trillions of dollars we don’t have.  Then when it doesn’t do anything to help, he acts as though he didn’t realize how bad things were.  Really?  Does he think anyone believes that?  He makes the case time after time about how dire our economic crisis is when he’s trying to get people to go along with spending trillions of dollars, then thinks he can simply just say “it was worse than we thought” and that gets him off the hook for his failures?  Wow.

See if any of the videos or statements below sound like a person who is not sure of how bad things were.

In 2008, when Obama was speaking about the economic crisis he said:  We are in the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.” He also called it “a defining moment in our history.”

 

Then, fast forward three years later and Obama says:  “I wish I knew just how deep the crisis was when I was first sworn into office.”

 

 

Stephen Hayes, of The Weekly Standard, nails it (emphasis mine):

In recent weeks the White House has been pushing a new argument about the economy: “We didn’t know how bad it was.”

President Obama used this line Tuesday in an interview with KIRO in Seattle, saying that he wished he understood just how deep the economic problems were when he took office. Obama said: “I think we understood that it was bad but we didn’t know how bad it was.” He added: “I think I could have prepared the American people for how bad this was going to be had we had a sense of that.”

So was Barack Obama surprised by the seriousness of the economic problems in 2008, as he now claims?

In a word: No.

On September 28, 2008, in the first head-to-head debate with John McCain, Obama said: “We are going through the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.” He called it “a defining moment in our history.”

A post on the Obama administration’s transition page said that the United States “faces its most serious economic crisis since the great depression.”

“Our country faces its most serious economic crisis since the great depression. Working families, who saw their incomes decline by $2,000 in the economic ‘expansion’ from 2000 to 2007, now face even deeper income losses. Retirement savings accounts have lost $2 trillion. Markets have fallen 40% in less than a year. Millions of homeowners who played by the rules can’t meet their mortgage payments and face foreclosure as the value of their homes have plummeted. With credit markets nearly frozen, businesses large and small cannot access the credit they need to meet payroll and create jobs.”

If Obama was exaggerating, others believed him. The depth of the recession was widely reported when Obama was elected. On November 5, one day after the election, Agence France Presse reported that “Obama faces the biggest global crisis since the 1930s Great Depression and a host of domestic economic ills, including rising unemployment, falling home values and deeply shaken confidence when he takes office on January 20.” An analysis by the Associated Press sounded a similar note, arguing “the president-elect must immediately confront the worst economic conditions since the 1930s Great Depression.” The Boston Globe called it “the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.” A memo from the Obama-friendly Center for American Progress called the situation “perhaps the most daunting economic challenge faced by a new president since the Great Depression.”

Why would Obama say something so easily refuted? Perhaps he’s simply hoping the media won’t call him on it – a reasonable expectation. Or maybe he’s hoping for the opposite – that the media will call him on his current mendacity and, as a consequence, remind voters just how bad the economy was when he came to office. Who knows?

Either way, the White House’s current claim that it was unaware of the depth of the economic problems is not true.

Who is More Believable: Steve Wynn or Obama?

 

This is an oldie, but goodie from Steve Wynn of Wynn Resorts in Las Vegas.

 

 

 

Fact-Checking Obama’s Stimulus II Speech

 

From Hot Air, the Associated Press(AP) has fact-checked Barack Obama’s speech to the joint session of Congress.

“the President emphasized that his new jobs plan had four specific qualities that made it easy to pass this bill immediately, as Obama chanted repeatedly during his speech.  His plan would be fully funded, it would not add to the deficit, it would create jobs immediately, and it was chock-full of bipartisan ideas.”

AP found all of those claims to be false.  (Note:  AP is widely considered to be pro-Obama)

Fully funded?  No.

“Obama did not spell out exactly how he would pay for the measures contained in his nearly $450 billion American Jobs Act but said he would send his proposed specifics in a week to the new congressional supercommittee charged with finding budget savings. White House aides suggested that new deficit spending in the near term to try to promote job creation would be paid for in the future – the “out years,” in legislative jargon – but they did not specify what would be cut or what revenues they would use.

Essentially, the jobs plan is an IOU from a president and lawmakers who may not even be in office down the road when the bills come due.”

Bipartisan?  No.

“Obama’s proposed cut in the Social Security payroll tax does seem likely to garner significant GOP support. But Obama proposes paying for the plan in part with tax increases that have already generated stiff Republican opposition.

For instance, Obama makes a pitch anew to end Bush-era tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, which he has defined as couples earning over $250,000 a year or individuals over $200,000 a year. Republicans have adamantly blocked what they view as new taxes. As recently as last month, House Republicans refused to go along with any deal to raise the government’s borrowing authority that included new revenues, or taxes.”

Deficit-neutral?  No.

“It’s hard to see how the program would not raise the deficit over the next year or two because most of the envisioned spending cuts and tax increases are designed to come later rather than now, when they could jeopardize the fragile recovery.”

Immediately effective?  No

“One is to set up a national infrastructure bank to raise private capital for roads, rail, bridges, airports and waterways. Even supporters of such a bank doubt it could have much impact on jobs in the next two years because it takes time to set up.”

Hot Air summed it up:

“the same elements Obama insisted last night would stimulate job growth were the same elements that comprised the 2009 stimulus bill.  We have the same speeded-up infrastructure spending (this time masquerading as an “infrastructure bank”), the same money for state bailouts dressed up as rescue packages for teachers and first responders, the same Making Work Pay-type temporary tax cut for workers, and a “hiring tax credit” that flopped when Jimmy Carter first tried it.

Obama didn’t offer one single new idea last night.  He didn’t even offer an idea on how to pay for the bill, whose price tag Obama never mentioned once in his speech but has now bloated from an initial estimate of $300 billion to $450 billion.  Instead, he told Congress to figure out how to carve the cost out of future spending while it battles over meeting its $1.5 trillion commitment from last month’s debt-ceiling increase.”

Sen. Rand Paul Responds to Obama’s Jobs Speech

 

 

 

Obama’s Dilemma on Jobs and the Economy

 

Finally!! Obama is giving his BIG jobs speech tonight…sound familiar?

“Obama will command a national stage to insist on borrowing even more money to try a set of policies that spectacularly failed the first time around in the hope that doing it again will somehow produce different results.  By raising expectations of a new approach and delivering the same failure repackaged as a new policy, Obama will have made the best possible argument against his re-election.”

 

I don’t really see a way out for Obama and Democrats, as it relates to jobs and the economy.  If Obama and Democrats were to put policies in place that would free up CEOs, small business owners and entrepreneurs, allowing them to grow their businesses, make profits and hire more workers, it could lead to those CEOs, business owners and entrepreneurs getting rich!  Lord knows Democrats won’t stand for that.  Next thing you know, Obama and Democrats would be complaining about how much more the CEO or business owner makes than his employees and how it’s just not fair.

Decisions, decisions!  Think about it.  What a situation for someone like Obama to be in.  Everything about him, everything he believes in, everything he stands for, tells him to stick it to the private sector.  Pile on as much regulation, red tape and bureaucracy as possible.  But, at the same time, if he wants to be reelected, he’s going to need to do something about our dismal economy.  The policies he’s already tried (and will push for again in his BIG jobs speech tonight, as though they are new ideas) have failed to do what he promised they would do.

So, instead, Obama will just dip into his stash and give out money for projects that will temporarily employ people (hopefully until after the next election), instead of letting the private sector have a chance at create long-term, sustainable jobs, not paid for by taxpayers.  He will push for unemployment benefits and tax credits for businesses that hire new employees.  Big whoop.

If he really wanted to boost the economy and get the American people exicited about what lies ahead, he’s announce in his speech tonight that he’s going to scrap Obamacare and stop the insane, burdensome regulations put in place by government agencies, such as the EPA.

Or maybe, he could just announce his resignation.  That would be nice too.

 

 

1 in 7 Americans Now on Food Stamps

Food stamps put people to work and stimulates the economy?  If that is the case, why doesn’t everyone stop working and get on food stamps so that we can get our economy roaring again?

Hot Air has more.

Are Democrats Aware That Cameras and Microphones Record What They Say?

It’s hard to believe that it was just January that Democrats, including the newly appointed DNC Chair, Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, were calling for more “civility” in our political discourse.  In interviews after the shooting of Gabby Giffords(D-AZ), Wasserman-Schultz made her rounds on the cable networks stating “it is absolutely critical that we should lead by example” and that we need to “stop treating our opponents as the enemy.”

As Laura Ingraham points out on her show, that only applies to Tea Party people and Conservatives.  Democrats have no intention of abiding by the rules of civility that they called for less than three months ago.

From Allahpundit at Hot Air:

I know I said it once before today, but it bears repeating: Excellent job, Mr. President. Of all the shameless hacks in Washington whom you could have chosen for the DNC, you picked one whose shamelessness is truly exceptional.

“The Path to Prosperity: America’s Two Futures, Visualized”

It is nice to see that someone is serious about addressing out debt problem. Obama surely has no intentions of dealing with it.  To Obama and his fellow Democrats, nothing is more important than social, economic and environmental justice.  If it means spending our nation into a debt that will crush us in the future, so be it.

I can’t wait to see the Democrats demagogue this to death.

 

More from Hot Air.