Obama's once up-beat predictions about the economy are hitting reality and going splat. The summer update will show higher deficits and unemployment and slower growth than what the President projected in February and update in May 2009.
It is suspected that the bad news is being put off being exposed until after Congress leaves for it summer recess on Aug. 7 instead of being released in mid-July which is the usual time for it to be made public. Some are questioning whether this is an attempt to keep the figures hidden because Obama wants the $1 trillion health care initiative passed and Congress might finally balk when even the Democrats see the budget update. The sticker shock could cause the most spendthrifts among them to hesitate.
According to Tony Fratto, a former Treasury Department official and White House spokesman under George W. Bush,
Instead of a dream, this routine report could be a nightmare. There are some things that cannot be escaped.
The public is aware of one prediction that went sour when Obama predicted that unemployment would peak at 9 percent if the big stimulus package was not passed and at 8 percent if it was. After Congress spent $787 billion on the two-year package, in June the figure was 9.5 percent and is expected to go double digit thereafter.
What the downward revision in growth or revenue indicate is that the budge deficits would be much higher than Obama predicted. Even Vice President Joe Biden has said,
We misread how bad the economy was in January,
which Obama changed to that the White House had incomplete information.
However, the American public doesn't have to see the figures because they live with the reality every day, unlike the political elite that resides in Washington. Support for Obama's health care reform has begun slipping as well as that about the economy, unemployment and the swelling budget deficit.
House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) has accused the Democrats of
burying this budget update until after Congress leaves town...an attempt to hide the record-breaking deficit as Democrats break arms to rush through a government approved takeover of health care.
Obama's prediction are so far off reality, projecting it would hit $1.84 trillion, four times that of last year's deficit of $455 billion, that private forecasters are suggesting that the shortfall may actually reach $2 trillion.
Meanwhile, the economic nightmare being created the Obama administration and Democrats in Congress is being glossed over, trying to convince the American public that they have saved it from catastrophe. It appears that the folks aren't buying hope and change anymore as almost daily the polls reflect their discontent with promises not kept.
To read the entire article, go to:
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/07/20/us/politics/AP-US-Midsummers-Budget-Nightmare.html?_r=1
To read more about Obama and economy realities, go to:
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Comments
FDR wasted money on bogus projects and helped the Great Depression last for over a decade. Obama's advisers have indicated they felt FDR didn't spend enough. Imagine how long THEY can drag out our recession/depression by blowing all this money?
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