Howey
05-01-2015, 03:17 PM
Ted Cruz blames Obama for the 2008 crash.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2015/04/29/ted-cruz-uses-george-w-bush-to-accuse-barack-obama-of-being-jimmy-carter/
Speaking at an event hosted by the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce on Wednesday, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) linked the economic policies of President Obama with those of the much-maligned Jimmy Carter. "Historically, the economy has grown 3.3 percent a year since World War II," he said. "There are only two four-year periods where growth averaged less than 1 percent: 1978 to 1982, coming out of the Jimmy Carter administration, and 2008 to 2012. Same failed economic policies."
If you didn't catch it, Cruz employed a nifty little bit of rhetorical spin there. What he's actually comparing isn't Jimmy Carter and Barack Obama. It's Jimmy Carter and George W. Bush.
Let's look at the first number: that 3.3 percent. Data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis puts the average at 3.2 percent since 1947. Close enough. The annual data look like this.
We've highlighted the two periods Cruz mentioned. They're five-year periods, really, but we assume he means the change from 1978 to 1979, the change from 1979 to 1980, 1980 to 1981 and 1981 to 1982. So it's four bars on the right in each block of years.
Do you see what Cruz did? Let's walk through it.
The average prior-year change from 1979 to 1982 was 0.9 percent -- less than 1 percent. From 2009 to 2012, it was 0.9, same thing. But those averages are lower because each group of years had especially slow spots. In the first bunch, it was 1980 and 1982. In the second, it was the dumpster fire that was 2009.
Cruz waves away 1982, the second year of Ronald Reagan's first term, by saying that the economy was "coming out of the Carter administration." So what was it doing in 2009, if not "coming out of the Bush administration?" Either 1982 was Reagan's fault and 2009 was Obama's, or 1982 was Carter's fault and 2009 was Bush's. You can't have it both ways.
But we can settle that dispute. Blaming Obama's economic policies for the drop in 2009 -- the second-straight downward trending year, the second year of the recession and the earliest days off the Obama administration -- is ludicrous on the face of it.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2015/04/29/ted-cruz-uses-george-w-bush-to-accuse-barack-obama-of-being-jimmy-carter/
Speaking at an event hosted by the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce on Wednesday, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) linked the economic policies of President Obama with those of the much-maligned Jimmy Carter. "Historically, the economy has grown 3.3 percent a year since World War II," he said. "There are only two four-year periods where growth averaged less than 1 percent: 1978 to 1982, coming out of the Jimmy Carter administration, and 2008 to 2012. Same failed economic policies."
If you didn't catch it, Cruz employed a nifty little bit of rhetorical spin there. What he's actually comparing isn't Jimmy Carter and Barack Obama. It's Jimmy Carter and George W. Bush.
Let's look at the first number: that 3.3 percent. Data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis puts the average at 3.2 percent since 1947. Close enough. The annual data look like this.
We've highlighted the two periods Cruz mentioned. They're five-year periods, really, but we assume he means the change from 1978 to 1979, the change from 1979 to 1980, 1980 to 1981 and 1981 to 1982. So it's four bars on the right in each block of years.
Do you see what Cruz did? Let's walk through it.
The average prior-year change from 1979 to 1982 was 0.9 percent -- less than 1 percent. From 2009 to 2012, it was 0.9, same thing. But those averages are lower because each group of years had especially slow spots. In the first bunch, it was 1980 and 1982. In the second, it was the dumpster fire that was 2009.
Cruz waves away 1982, the second year of Ronald Reagan's first term, by saying that the economy was "coming out of the Carter administration." So what was it doing in 2009, if not "coming out of the Bush administration?" Either 1982 was Reagan's fault and 2009 was Obama's, or 1982 was Carter's fault and 2009 was Bush's. You can't have it both ways.
But we can settle that dispute. Blaming Obama's economic policies for the drop in 2009 -- the second-straight downward trending year, the second year of the recession and the earliest days off the Obama administration -- is ludicrous on the face of it.