5 Years of "Facts" of Obama

I have had two FaceBook friends post this graphic in the last couple of weeks.  Maybe it has popped up in your newsfeed as well.  I believe it is important to have the facts to counter these kinds of claims.

As with anything else, context is so important.  Here is my response to both of them.

When one is looking at stats, one has to have the whole picture. This graphic doesn't have the whole picture. Here's the context of these numbers. 

First, the timing of these numbers is misleading.  If you remember, the Democrats took control of Congress after the 2006 midterm elections. So the real effect of Democrat policies started taking effect in January 2007. Remember also that both Obama and Biden were in the Senate during that time ~as well as Hillary Clinton~. 

1)  The Dow is up because of Quantitative Easing.  Federal $$ being printed and pumped into the stock market.  Hang on to your hats.  Remember the .com bubble and the real estate bubbles? 

2)  For the real unemployment numbers, one needs to look at the labor force participation rate.
Jan 2007 – 66.40%
Jan 2009 – 65.7%
April 2014 – 62.80% 

Lowest labor force participation rate since 1978.  The reason that the umemployment numbers are down is because of workers that have quit looking for work.   

3)  GDP growth – US Dept of Commerce
2006 – 2.7%
2007 – 1.8%
2008 - -0.3%
2009 - -2.8%
2010 – 2.5%
2011 – 1.8%
2012 – 2.8%
2113 – 1.9%
1st quarter 2014 = 2.9%
4th quarter 2013 = 2.6% 

GDP after the Bush tax cuts
December 31, 2002 – 1.8%
December 31, 2003 – 2.8%
December 31, 2004 – 3.8%
December 31, 2005 – 3.4%  

The facts show that GDP increased after the Bush Tax cuts and started falling when the Democrats took control of Congress and the Democrats started spending like drunken sailors.  My apologies to sailors; at least drunken sailors quit when they run out of money.  DC politicians just borrow and print money.   

The federal budget goes from October 1 - September 30.  When we elected the Republicans to Congress in the fall of they took office in January of 2011 and the first budget they had was the 2012.  That was the fiscal year that the federal deficit started to decrease slightly.  Here are the actual numbers. 

The federal deficit the last year of the Bush/Republican Congress budget was $161 Billion. When the Democrats took control of Congress after the 2006 elections, the next fiscal year the deficit climbed to $459 Billion and $1413 Billion the year King Barry I was elected. That was when TARP was forced on us. We then had 2 additional years of $1300 Billion deficits with Obama/Democrat Congress. Finally with Republicans back in control of the House, the deficit has come down slightly to $1100 Billion and $973 Billion. So yes, the deficit is technically down from its highs, but doesn't really paint the whole picture. For comparison, the highest deficit during the Bush/Republican Congress days was $413 Billion. 

One fact that this graphic doesn't touch is the increase in food stamps.  If the economy is so great, why are there millions more on food stamps today than when Obama was immaculated?  Why has spending on food stamps doubled under Obama if the economy is doing so well?

So far, I have not had one of these friends ~one is my TN State Representative~ who have even tried to refute any of my facts.  I'll post updates when/if I hear from any of them.  Leave your thoughts in the comments below.

Update:  I just had one of the friends that posted this make a comment.  She didn't try to refute any of my facts, she just basically tried to make the point that Obama is only one person and doing what he can for the "betterment of all."  Sorry, but that doesn't cut it for me.  Even if you ascribe good intentions to Obama and the left, ~which I don't~ there are consequences to their wrong policies.  She did say she loved my "deep knowledge" though.  I guess when you can't argue with the facts . . .

Update #2:  There have been two friends of the original poster of this graphic that have said that they agree with the graphic ~no response to the facts I posted however.~  One of them was one my dh's cousins that unfriended me a couple of years ago when she couldn't handle my challenges.  She could call me racist, but heaven help if I pointed out her hypocrisy, but I digress.  I asked her if she was going to post my facts along with the graphic.  She responded with a long rant and called me rude, argumentative and accusatory.  She also proceeded to tell me what I could and couldn't say on this common friend's page.  You've gotta love libs . .

Update #3:  I was asked for my source by a reader below.  I have revised my numbers and added the link to the U.S. Dept of Commerce.  At the link, you can create your own table of stats by year and/or quarter.  While my updated numbers are lower, they still show that the economy started to tank after the Democrats took control of Congress in 2007.