8 percent agree it’s the ‘Obama Recession’
The most recent NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll had a telling question about who to blame for the economic crisis:
“When you think about the current economic conditions, do you feel that this is a situation that Barack Obama has inherited or is this a situation his policies are mostly responsible for?”
Inherited: 84 percent
Responsible for: 8 percent
“And how much time would you say that Barack Obama has before his policies are mostly responsible for the country’s economic conditions?” (ASKED ONLY OF RESPONDENTS WHO SAID IT WAS INHERITED)
Responsible in less than six months 2 percent
Responsible in six months to one year 13 percent
Responsible in one to two years 25 percent
Responsible in two to three years 18 percent
Responsible in more than three years 23 percent
Not sure when responsible 3 percent
I don’t think the numbers about when Obama will become responsible actually tell us much. People can say one thing now and something else entirely at some point in the future. But that 84 percent who today understand that Obama has inherited this mess — and the meager 8 percent who try to blame him — represent trouble for those on the right already trying to argue that it’s Obama’s fault.
It’s one thing for anonymous bloggers to spout such nonsense about “the Obama Recession”; when the WSJ edit page and others join in, they not only look like fools, they reveal themselves as motivated by mindless hate. By doing so, they seriously compromise their credibility with the public should they make later, perhaps more grounded criticisms of Obama.
That poll also contained a finding that startled me. As usual, the NBC/WSJ pollsters asked Americans whether the country was headed in the right direction or was off on the wrong track. Last October, the numbers for right direction/wrong track were 12/78. By early January they had crept up to 26/59. By late February they had risen to a remarkable 41/44.
Frankly, I think that’s overly optimistic, but to the degree that public confidence can help blunt a recession’s impact, I guess it’s a good sign. But it also suggests high expectations of Obama that he could have a hard time fulfilling given the gravity of the situation we’re in.
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259 comments Add your comment
AmVet
March 10th, 2009
6:24 am
Is it just me, or is most of the 2% crowd — the BushCo apologists and RushCo bootlickers — posting here?
Stupid is as stupid does.
all…
AmVet
March 10th, 2009
6:33 am
As in later all…
G
March 10th, 2009
6:40 am
The American people must never be allowed to forget the orgy of vandalism, incompetence and economic mismanagement in which Bush and his elite cronies participated for the past eight years.
Curious Observer
March 10th, 2009
6:42 am
The American public is not as stupid as the Republicans like to think. Yesterday, the House minority whip acknowledged that the primary purpose of Republican obstructionism in Congress was to try to soften up the public for the 2010 elections, right down to blaming Obama for the mess he inherited. It looks as though the Southern Party is in for a big whuppin’ in November 2010. Couldn’t happen to nicer folks.
BDAtlanta
March 10th, 2009
6:47 am
If they don’t blame it on Obama, they’ll blame it on Clinton or Carter. (Actually, it is more Clinton’s fault than either of the other two – Clinton signed in the Commodities Futures Modernization Act and repealed the Glass-Steagall Act.)
Somebody give those wingnuts a tax break before they have a nervous breakdown!
Disgusted
March 10th, 2009
6:49 am
It also looks as though the Republican sweetheart contracts with Halliburton and other big campaign contributors are coming to an end. Yesterday, Obama directed the Office of Management and Budget and others to conduct a study of the abusive A-76 process, wherein federal jobs are given to private contractors at greater taxpayer expense. He also directed these agencies to look at single-source, noncompetive federal contracts and make recommendations. Sell your stock in Halliburton now. The free ride of the fat cats with big checkbooks is just about over.
Bubba
March 10th, 2009
6:49 am
Of course he inherited the recession. The real question is how is he handling it so far. And he gets an F. There’s still time to pull that grade up before finals though.
Mrs. Godzilla
March 10th, 2009
6:53 am
Hot Damn! 92% of Americans have their heads on straight.
That’s wonderful.
I Report/ You Whine
March 10th, 2009
6:54 am
Inherited from whom?
Barney Frank, the Banking Queen?
It’s comforting to know that the superhero action figure of the most recent presidential campaign, he who would lower the oceans and lavish us with hopeandchange, has, only after two months on the job, become more concerned with the 2012 election than doing what is necessary to put America back to work and on the road to prosperity.
Ignore the stock market, find someone else to blame, Rush Limbaugh, blah, blah, blah.
Wow, what a leader.
Sam
March 10th, 2009
7:05 am
Yeah, well wait in 12 months when the economy is still in the crapper as most economist still predict. The public “drones” won’t be so kind. His popularity contest numbers will fall faster than the DOW……it’ll be fun to watch.
Bubba
March 10th, 2009
7:07 am
Good point on 2012 election, IR/YW. I kept thinking somebody should tell Obama that the election’s over, he doesn’t need to keep bashing Bush in every speech. But the election’s not over. He’s already campaigning for 2012.
Taxpayer
March 10th, 2009
7:08 am
I was convinced about the ignorance of most that remain loyal to the Republican party, up to and including their public spokespersons and elected ones, once I read about the basis for the Republican party’s claims that cutting taxes increases revenue. It’s a real laugher. A genuine curve ball. But, right up there with Drill, Baby Drill.
Joey
March 10th, 2009
7:17 am
Jay, the most outrageous comment in your post: “….they reveal themselves as motivated by mindless hate. By doing so, they seriously comprimise their credibility with the public …….”
Jay, that was you and 90% of other Progressive commentators for 8+ years. But maybe you have managed a turnaround. It appears that you have greatly reduced your I Hate Bush/Bush Derangement articles. Good for you.
Of course President Obama inherited the recession. But did he inherit it from Bush or from Congress or both?
Has he made the moves that will improve the situation? I think not, but time will tell.
Taxpayer
March 10th, 2009
7:17 am
It’s a saga that began in a bar near the White House on a December afternoon in 1974. Huddled at a meeting arranged by Wall Street Journal editorial writer Jude Wanniski were Cheney, then the deputy chief of staff to Republican President Gerald Ford, and Laffer, who was teaching at the University of Chicago’s business school after a stint in the Nixon White House. In trying to explain to Cheney why a tax hike mooted by the President might not be such a great idea, Laffer drew a chart on a napkin that showed government revenues increasing as the tax rate moved up from 0% but then turning around and heading back toward zero as it neared 100%.
And, so the urban legend is born — on a napkin…in a bar. I wonder if we would be able to find that napkin stuffed away in one of Cheney’s file folders on economic policy.
I Report/ You Whine
March 10th, 2009
7:20 am
The focus is 2012 in the Oval Office, the business of We The People be damned-
First, the Obama policy is itself blatantly political. It is red meat to his Bush-hating base, yet pays no more than lip service to recent scientific breakthroughs that make possible the production of cells that are biologically equivalent to embryonic stem cells without the need to create or kill human embryos. Inexplicably — apart from political motivations — Mr. Obama revoked not only the Bush restrictions on embryo destructive research funding, but also the 2007 executive order that encourages the National Institutes of Health to explore non-embryo-destructive sources of stem cells.
Second and more fundamentally, the claim about taking politics out of science is in the deepest sense antidemocratic. The question of whether to destroy human embryos for research purposes is not fundamentally a scientific question; it is a moral and civic question about the proper uses, ambitions and limits of science. It is a question about how we will treat members of the human family at the very dawn of life; about our willingness to seek alternative paths to medical progress that respect human dignity.-Amspec
I Report/ You Whine
March 10th, 2009
7:28 am
Taxpayer- You crack me up, man:
Income Tax Cut, JFK Hopes To Spur Economy 1962/8/13
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aEdXrfIMdiU
What a loon you are.
Redneck Convert
March 10th, 2009
7:28 am
Well, the labs got to throw the embryos away if they ain’t used for making babys, the way they do now. It’s the only godly thing to do. You can’t go using them for research. Course, we could say a little prayer over them before we put them in the trash can. Have a good day everybody.
Tom
March 10th, 2009
7:31 am
FDR’s New Deal and Johnson’s Great Society are to blame for the economic crisis.
BDAtlanta
March 10th, 2009
7:37 am
2012? Hehehe.
No, Big O is cleaning up the mess of the Retard-In-Chief.
Scrub-a-dub-dub will get the idiocy out of our system – stem cell research, signing statements, etc, etc.
You have to admit, everything Bush touched turned to poop…and he touched a lot of stuff.
Mrs. Godzilla
March 10th, 2009
7:38 am
Tom,
Do you consider yourself one of the 8%?
Ray
March 10th, 2009
7:43 am
The poll is seriously flawed when you admit that “the numbers don’t mean much”. If so, why post them? The Annointed One’s financial policy has not had time yet to have much of an influence on the fiscal policy of this country but just give it a chance. Then see how your numbers pan out.
Copyleft
March 10th, 2009
7:44 am
BD: Actually, they DID get a tax break. Obama’s stimulus package included the largest middle-class tax cuts in history.
But you’ll notice the term “middle-class” stuck in there. What’s REALLY got the GOP upset is that the tax cuts weren’t targeted at the wealthy (their tried-and-false answer for every economic question), and that it included something OTHER than tax cuts.
To the supply-side cultists, that’s heresy. And they won’t stand for it. Good thing nobody’s paying them any attention.
Taxpayer
March 10th, 2009
7:50 am
The idea that high tax rates brought diminishing returns was not controversial or even new–Laffer traces it to 14th century Muslim philosopher Ibn Khaldun. But few economists in the 1970s even considered that real-world tax rates could be on the wrong side of the Laffer Curve. Laffer thought they might be, and Wanniski argued on the Journal’s editorial page and elsewhere that they almost certainly were. The claim became a key plank of Ronald Reagan’s successful 1980 campaign for President.
Well, what do you know. The Republican party places its faith in Muslim philosophy. No wonder their policies and actions are being compared to the Taliban.
Taxpayer
March 10th, 2009
7:52 am
Jay, did you strike “twit” and leave Andie’s “loon” comment. Really!
Dave R
March 10th, 2009
7:52 am
Find me someone in the middle-class who creates jobs, copylefty, then I’ll be all on board.
However, to be fair, any tax cut is welcome, as long as they don’t increase them elsewhere to pay for them.
They need to CUT SPENDING when they cut taxes.
"The Corporal"
March 10th, 2009
7:53 am
But ……… he had ALL the answers during the campaign !!!
Tom
March 10th, 2009
7:55 am
Mrs. Godzilla; With all due respect, yours was a dumb question. FDR and Johnson came before Obama. That puts me in the 84%. Social engineering in the interest of big government has always brought catastrophe. This collapse was predictable and likewise ignored by government. The policy of socially engineering a society or economy should cease and desist immediately. Painful? Yes! Necessary? Yes!
mt
March 10th, 2009
7:59 am
There you guys go again playing the blame game because that’s the only thing you have..That and trying to get everyones attention on Rush Limbaugh..I have an idea..try to concentrate on the task at hand instead of worrying about where it came from. All you Democrats dont seem to want to talk about what “The Chosen One” is doing about it(which by the way is making it worse than we could ever imagine), you just want to blame everyone else!…Typical
Observer
March 10th, 2009
7:59 am
Even among the ranks of arch-conservatives, I don’t know too many who would say the recession is Obama’s fault. That would certainly not be the opinion of anyone with half a grain of sense. Clearly, he inherited a financial disaster and those wishing to blame the recession on him are partisan hacks who publicize their lack of intelligence by doing so. Likewise, those on this board who persist in suggesting that George Bush somehow caused the sub-prime mortgage crisis that led to this whole mess are equally ignorant and partisan.
I do believe Obama’s actions have been largely responsible for the recent meltdown in the stock market and I (along with many others) feel his economic policies will lead us much further down the road to ruin rather than helping to solve our problems. Growing government is not the answer to our problems and unfortunately we have two parties in Washington that want to do just that.
Doggone/GA
March 10th, 2009
8:00 am
“Find me someone in the middle-class who creates jobs, copylefty, then I’ll be all on board.”
Jobs are ONLY “created” in response to demand for products and services. No demand, no jobs. Rich people don’t create jobs out of the goodness of their hearts. They create them to meet demand. No demand, no jobs. Keep repeating that until you understand it. No demand, no jobs.
mt
March 10th, 2009
8:02 am
Oh, and CopyLeft, to respond to your notion that Obama gave the middle class the largest tax break in history(not)…tell him thanks for the extra $13 a week in my paycheck, all my problems have been solved!
"The Corporal"
March 10th, 2009
8:03 am
To TnGelding:
To TnGelding:
I’m not sure how one can “violate” the 5th Amendment (the right against self-incrimination) as in indictable offense. Do you have an example?
Taxpayer
March 10th, 2009
8:03 am
But Reagan’s tax cuts for the nonrich were big money losers, and it took the fiscal discipline of Bill Clinton to mop up the resulting red ink. Laffer gushes with praise for Clinton, but he’s also a fan of Clinton’s successor. “What Clinton did was, he gave Bush the fiscal flexibility to do what was right,” Laffer says. In the face of the recession and terrorist attacks of 2001, Bush “needed to stimulate the economy and spend for defense, and Clinton gave him the ability to do that.”
In other words, the Bush tax cuts were meant to create big deficits. But Laffer’s O.K. with that. “The Laffer Curve should not be the reason you raise or lower taxes,” he says. Perhaps not, but it does make for great campaign promises. – Time
So, according to Laffer, the father of Cheney’s understanding of economics (and, apparently, most, if not all, Republicans), Clinton did good work with the economy and set the groundwork for Bush to be able to go into deficit spending in order to deal with the pathetic little recession that he had on his watch.
Mrs. Godzilla
March 10th, 2009
8:06 am
Tom,
I must say it is your answer that lacks clarity. I don’t think anyone here is unaware of the order in which the Presidents were inaugurated.
Do you agree with the 8% that think this is Obama’s resession?
GayGrayGeek
March 10th, 2009
8:07 am
Doggone, the RightWingNut Paleocons can’t grasp the fact that by “outsourcing” and “offshoring” jobs they have precluded folks from buying those now-cheap-to-produce-but-still-high-priced goods. If “workers” don’t have money, how are they supposed to keep buying?
The RightWingNuts claim to love the “free market”, but don’t understand that in a market one has to have both sellers AND buyers – and that their own actions are keeping buyers from being able to do so.
Dave R
March 10th, 2009
8:08 am
Gee, Doggone, a liberal who understands the free market? Who woulda thunk it?
Duh!
And if the GOVERNMENT would get out of the way of BUSINESS, there’d be MORE DEMAND for goods and services.
Address the PROBLEM, not the SYMPTOM.
Sam
March 10th, 2009
8:08 am
Hey Limp wristed Copylefty,
That extra $15/week in your paycheck won’t do much good after Barry implements “cap and trade” and doubles your energy costs and all goods and services. Then Barry will be known for the largest “tax increase” on the middle class and poor. See his poll numbers then……
Copyleft
March 10th, 2009
8:08 am
DaveR: Doggone already responded to your point (and correctly), but I’ll add this. A sensible economic policy ALWAYS focuses first and foremost on the middle class. That’s the segment that matters to our overall economic health.
Bosch
March 10th, 2009
8:09 am
Yeap, that 8% right here.
Mrs. G.,
If you only paid attention to the blog here, one might get down right depressed.
This is kind of sad: I find myself looking forward to the “Find Five” game on the front page of AJC.com. I love those games!
Bosch
March 10th, 2009
8:12 am
Dave R,
The government HAS BEEN OUT OF THE WAY OF BUSINESS for the past few years – they’ve been turning their heads while corporation have raped our country, and poisoned our products.
Oh, and we also have to have things MADE in the country too. Don’t forget that part.
Dave R
March 10th, 2009
8:16 am
Bosch,
Please tell us how many laws and ordinances regarding the operation of all facets of business were repealed in the past few years? Feel free to cite specific U.S. Code.
(crickets chirping)
And Copylefty,
There is NO sensible economic policy when a GOVERNMENT is involved in implementing it.
Eric
March 10th, 2009
8:19 am
Granted, most of us with the ability to have an original thought hated George W. Bush. But he earned every ounce of hate we could muster. In eight years he managed to do enough harm to last a generation. He was hated for the things he did and didn’t do, not because of the R next to his name. On the other hand, most of those brain tumors who hate President Obama have no valid reason for their hatred. They hate him because he won the presidency…because he is black….because he’s a democrat. His policies haven’t been in place long enough to have any affect one way or another. Hatred of Bush was a rational response to his performance. Hatred of Obama is irrational at any level.
Davo
March 10th, 2009
8:19 am
Why you invest so much faith and print in polling data eludes me, Jay. I find political polls tedious and manipulating but you lean on them with all your might. Makes for boring discussion.
Mrs. Godzilla
March 10th, 2009
8:20 am
Bosch
I don’t let being blue in a red state get me down too much….
Oh and…
FIFTEEN DOLLARS will buy the makings of a pretty darn good dinner, meatloaf, mashed taters and some green veggies.
I support good dinners for families.
Rage Against The Machine
March 10th, 2009
8:22 am
Trying to label this as the Obama recession is about as stupid as trying to blame it all on Bush like the annointed one keeps trying to do. That’s not gonna hold water for much longer. Especially when Obama and the Democrats are spending three times the money the Bush administration did. If things don’t improve soon, it won’t matter who caused it. Obama and the Democrats will be the ones who pay for it as people tend to be impatient when they are loosing the a$$!
Jayson
March 10th, 2009
8:26 am
WASHINGTON (AP) — Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner urged House Democrats to be patient with President Barack Obama’s young administration on Monday as lawmakers conveyed the frustrations of their economically anxious constituents.
Rep. Lois Capps, D-Calif., said her colleague, Rep. Carol Shea-Porter, D-N.H., implored Geithner: “Hurry, whatever you’re doing, please hurry.”
We’re in a world of hurt. Geithner doesn’t know what he’s doing and neither do the democrats in congress.
TnGelding
March 10th, 2009
8:26 am
I don’t think it’s mindless hate, Jay. It’s more of a strategy to undermine the president so they won’t have to admit they were wrong. It’s shocking that the WSJ could make such assinine statemendt. Aren’t they supposed to be experts on financial matters? Coming from them it borders on treason.
As for the poll, I’m impressed by the huge numbers that understand it’s going to take years to “right” the wrongs. Carter never did improve on what he inherited from Nixon/Ford, and it was in the 3rd year of Reagan’s administration before it got turned around with huge deficit spending for the time.
I sure wasn’t expecting that good news from Citi this early, but we’ll take it. Maybe it will produce something more than a bear market rally.
Bosch
March 10th, 2009
8:28 am
Dave R.,
Well, gee, Dave, I don’t know about specific codes, and I’ll eat my shoe if you yourself can name every single one that you expect me too. It’s easy to try and sound smart and throw out useless information like “name the specific business codes” blah, blah, blah.
But I do know that government regulation is kaput, and in doing so, there has been a transfer of our country’s wealth to the top tier of income earners. And I also know that we’ve seen a tremenduous increase of cases where products consumed in this country are poisonous toxic waste perpetrated by corporations who knowingly distribute them with absolutely no regard to public safety or well being, as long as they make a buck, hey! anything goes.
Quit trying to blame all this on the big bad government regulators because they are a figment of your imagination.
TnGelding
March 10th, 2009
8:28 am
Jayson
March 10th, 2009
8:26 am
Who does? We’re in uncharted waters. We’ve never had a global banking problem of this magnitude before.
Vinny
March 10th, 2009
8:28 am
Jay,
It’s funny to watch how you libs in the media constantly have to defend ol’ barry. He’s a big boy, and has made his bed with the far left socialist movement. Sure he inherited a recession, that doesn’t mean that he had to go and turn it into a depression by thinking with all of the unnecessary spending that he is implementing.
This is now the Obama economy – he bought it lock, stock, and barrel.
Get used to it.
BTW, the Seattle Post Intelligencer is going out of business within days. The AJC is next.