For some time now, the InstaPundit, Law Professor Glenn Reynolds, has been describing the Obama Administration in terms of the Second Coming of Jimmy Carter as a best case scenario. Now comes Stephen Green, the VodkaPundit, saying that the comparison to Jimmy Carter is not fair to Jimmy Carter.
Mr Green's point is the President Carter, although he lacked charisma, was learning as he went along. And, I would add, people forget that the Reagan Military Buildup was really the Carter Buildup. By the time President Reagan took the oath of office there wasn't much spare capacity to increase military production.
Now we have Karl Rove on The O'Reilly Factor suggesting that President Obama is more like the Second Coming of President James Buchanan, our 15th President, the one just before Abraham Lincoln. The one who let the South slip away between the election and the Inauguration.
I think all are wrong. If President Obama is like anyone it is his immediate predecessor, President George W Bush.
Let us examine the facts. President Bush started wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. President Obama has sustained those wars and more. Drone attacks into Pakistan are up and we are now embroiled in Libya. (And GITMO did not go away.) President Bush, in the face of a possible economic downturn increased deficit spending, running up the National Debt. President Obama has followed suit. Frankly, he not only followed suit, we are now "Doubled" and "Redoubled". President Bush, in the name of Compassionate Conservatism, gave us increased drug coverage for seniors. President Obama lent his name (Obamacare) to the efforts of Senator Reid and Speaker Pelosi to get a foot in the door for a National Health Care System.
We can make this a parlor game if others wish to show comparisons between President Bush and President Obama, or we can offer alternatives to President's Bush, Carter and Buchanan. Comments are not moderated and seldom deleted. Bad language could get a comment deleted.
Regards — Cliff
Has Obama really run up the debt as Bush did? The biggest way Bush ran up the debt was with his tax cuts to the wealthy and by starting two wars. Obama could not exactly just pull out the troops as soon as he took office, and he has been drawing the troops down. Obama capitulated to an extension of the tax cuts because the GOP was going to hurt working Americans if he didn't; he has vowed to end the cuts, and hopefully will next year. And Obamacare is a long-term reduction in health-care costs, not a raise in these costs -- it is not the equivalent of the Bush drug package, which was a giveaway to the pharma lobby.
ReplyDeleteI do think that there was a surge of forces into Afghanistan under President Obama.
ReplyDeleteDefense spending was 9% of GDP in 1962 and was at about 4% in 2007. I doubt it has gone up, at least back toward the neighborhood of 9%. As I recall, during the Eisenhower years it was running about 10%—Cold War and all that. Over 1,000 B-47s and some 600 B-52s, plus aircraft carriers (and the beginning of missile submarines) and the Army and Marine Corps and a defense space program.
All that said, defense spending will have to decline, especially since VA costs are going to go up, as a lot few combatants die on the battlefield, but rather go on to live long lives. Thus, we are going to have high relative VA costs than in WWII, for example.
Regards — Cliff