Temper Tantrum Tuesday: Economic Reality

George W Bush once commented, “We make our own reality!”

Well I just read this article over at Tax.com that examined how that reality played out.

If you cherry-pick the numbers going through 2003 to 2007 the “best” years of the Bush Administration you find out that Bush’s tax policy cost the government $951 Billion and average incomes dropped $3,512. That is ignoring the worst years of the Bush Administration.

I’m not posting this just to beat up on George W Bush, I think everyone can agree that his stewardship over the economy was a disaster. I’m post this because GOP’s “Plague on America” promises the same policies that led to the “best” years costing the government billions and making average incomes drop by thousands of dollars.

I totally understand the frustration that people are feeling by the fact that this country is effectively being run by a hand full of Blue Dog Democrats who are basically the diet version of Republicans. I understand how people would want the government to go one way or another and stop with the half measures that these Blue Dogs have made sure are the only things that can get through the congress. But the Republican answer of doing the same thing that made the “best” years of the last administration be down right horrible is not the answer.

My congressman Ben Chandler used to be a decent slightly conservative democrat who shifted after the last election to be a full fledged Blue Dog Democrat. I would do almost anything to get rid of him, anything but vote for someone who promises to return us to the “best” years of the Bush Administration.

A decent Eisenhower Republican could sweep him out of office in a second, but instead I’m left with the choice of one candidate that will pursue half measures that guarantee that the economy will only slowly improve and take a decade to recover from the Great Recession or a candidate that will pursue bad economic policies that guarantee that, at best, average wages will continue to drop and the Federal Government will have to make huge cuts in services over the next decade.

I guess I have to look at the graph above to make my choice.

By Darrell B. Nelson author of Invasive Thoughts