November 12, 2015
OUR REPUBLICAN PRESIDENT:
Democrats keep getting rolled by Republicans on the deficit. When will they learn? (Ryan Cooper, November 11, 2015, The Week)The years 2010 and 2011 were an infuriating time to be a liberal -- particularly on the economy.After a brief period early in the Obama presidency in which Keynesian stimulus measures were understood and implemented, just about the entire political elite pivoted on a dime and began demanding immediate austerity. Though the Great Recession was not even close to being overcome -- unemployment did not peak until October 2009, and then came down with grinding slowness -- President Obama and just about everyone to his right effectively agreed that reducing the budget deficit was more important than restoring employment and growth.They got their way, too. The budget deficit is coming down fast -- at the cost of literally trillions in wasted output, millions of jobs not created, and hundreds of Democrats driven out of office for being in power at a time of economic crisis.
Posted by Orrin Judd at November 12, 2015 5:36 PM