* Obama's stimulus, passed in his first month in office, will cost more than the entire Iraq War -- more than $100 billion (15%) more.It has, in fact, been a grand bill of goods sold by hucksters who have more in common with snake oil salesmen than they do with anything that resembles statesmen. The Stimulus Plan was proffered upon us in the wake of the Bush-initiated bail-out of General Motors and Chrysler. (I can only imagine what Thomas Jefferson would have thought of that.)
* Just the first two years of Obama's stimulus cost more than the entire cost of the Iraq War under President Bush, or six years of that war.
* Iraq War spending accounted for just 3.2% of all federal spending while it lasted.
* Iraq War spending was not even one quarter of what we spent on Medicare in the same time frame.
* Iraq War spending was not even 15% of the total deficit spending in that time frame. The cumulative deficit, 2003-2010, would have been four-point-something trillion dollars with or without the Iraq War.
* The Iraq War accounts for less than 8% of the federal debt held by the public at the end of 2010 ($9.031 trillion).
* During Bush's Iraq years, 2003-2008, the federal government spent more on education that it did on the Iraq War. (State and local governments spent about ten times more.)
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, passed in February 2009. Democrats pushed the legislation as a way to create jobs and extend unemployment benefits through a mix of government spending, tax cuts and financial aid to cash-strapped states. It adds $830 billion to the budget deficit between fiscal years 2009-2019, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
Whether of not the ARRA actually did get people "back to work" is not as important as the political philosophy behind the legislation. Succinctly, it was founded upon the assumption that it is the federal government which creates jobs in the private sector by either spending or by tax cuts for selected industries. In the reality of our world, the ARRA did neither with any measurable difference from the status quo ante.
More properly, job creation in a real Constitutional Republic is a result of what the government dosen't do than it is a result of what it does do.
The extension of unemployment benefits does not equate to job creation (which is not the Constitutional business of the Yankee fedgov anyway). The increase is fedgov jobs has been chiefly temporary ones with the Census Bureau and - more scarily - with the IRS.
How much more can we take of Bush 43 and his logical extension, Barry The Pretender?
Deo Vindice
Read more (and see another good graph) at the Washington Examiner:
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