Blogging Blue » Bill Clinton

Run Away!!!!

Phil Scarr — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 19:44:15 +0000

Republicans in Iowa run as fast as they can from history because history is not kind to the Republican Party.

“For Republicans, the Bush administration has become the `yadda yadda yadda’ period of American history.”

The eight-year Bush presidency has merited no more than a fleeting reference in televised debates and interviews.

The former president himself has been all but invisible since leaving office in 2009 with a Gallup approval rating of just 34 percent. His predecessor, Democrat Bill Clinton, had a 66 percent approval rating in early 2001 when he stepped down after two terms marred by a sex scandal and impeachment.

Taking office in 2001 with a balanced federal budget and a surplus, Bush quickly pushed through sweeping tax cuts that were not offset by spending cuts. The tax cuts have cost about $1.8 trillion, according to estimates by the Congressional Budget Office and the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

And then there’s that little matter of a war-of-choice in Iraq which cost trillions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of lives. Yes, if I were a Republican, I’d run away from that too.

No, Newt, YOU Didn’t Balance The Budget

Phil Scarr — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 22:59:49 +0000

President William Jefferson Clinton did.

Newt has been going around claiming that he balanced the budget. He did not. He and the House Republicans passed the balanced budget that President Clinton submitted.

How did he do it? Clinton isn’t shy about explaining what happened on his watch. The budget deals he made with the congressional Republicans were significant, but not nearly as significant as the tax increase on the wealthy that he passed, without a single Republican vote, in his first budget in 1993.

President Clinton, despite Newt and the Congressional Republicans balanced the budget. Sure, Newt and the other Republican congressmen nibbled at the edges, but ultimately the budget was balanced by a revenue increase, and a revenue increase that drove prosperity in America through the roof.

The Clinton Surplus (from factcheck.org)

FactCheck.org corroborates this as well.

The Clinton years showed the effects of a large tax increase that Clinton pushed through in his first year, and that Republicans incorrectly claim is the “largest tax increase in history.” It fell almost exclusively on upper-income taxpayers. Clinton’s fiscal 1994 budget also contained some spending restraints. An equally if not more powerful influence was the booming economy and huge gains in the stock markets, the so-called dot-com bubble, which brought in hundreds of millions in unanticipated tax revenue from taxes on capital gains and rising salaries.

By Newt’s logic, if he happened to be in Augusta during the Masters and he was in the gallery watching, Newt would later claim that he won the Masters. So while you happened to be in Washington at the time of the Clinton surplus, Mr. Gingrich, you certainly can’t claim credit for the balanced budget.

Because This Will Drive Them Crazy!

Phil Scarr — Sun, 27 Nov 2011 23:02:11 +0000

This picture is simply too awesome not to share. And that it will drive conservatives insane makes it double-plus awesome!

(h/t Ray Reynolds)

Non-Fact Based Political Debate

Jeff Simpson — Sat, 24 Sep 2011 16:02:26 +0000

H/T think progress:

While I have had my issues with Bill Clinton (like NAFTA for instance) he is a brilliant man. Here he is discussing the tea party:

Former President Bill Clinton blasted the “non-fact-based political debate” surrounding the Republican primary race and Tea Party economic policies which advocate for limited government services and low taxation.

Clinton went on to challenge the emerging GOP consensus that government size and spending require dramatic cuts, observing that the most prosperous parts of the U.S. “look nothing like the anti-government ideal of the Tea Party crowd”:

You know, there’s not a single solitary example on the planet, not one, of a country that is succesful because the economy has triumphed over the government and choked it off and driven the tax rates to zero, driven the regulations to nonexistent and abolished all government programs, except for defense, so people in my income group never have to pay a nickel to see a cow jump over the moon. There is no example of a succesful country that looks like that.

Yes, a simple History course should render the tea party more ineffective, than they already are!

Republican rhetoric on our national debt doesn’t match their history

Zach W — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 11:21:32 +0000

From Harry S.Truman to Jimmy Carter, every U.S. president – Republican and Democrat – steadily paid down the debt our nation incurred during our fight against Germany, Japan, and the rest of the Axis powers in World War II, but that pattern came to an end during the presidency of Ronald Reagan, as evidenced by the following graph:

Click for full size

While our national debt steadily declined under presidents Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, and Carter, that same debt rose steadily and rapidly under Republican presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush, before finally starting to decline again under President Bill Clinton. Thanks to two extremely costly wars and a hefty tax cut during those wars, George W. Bush drove the national debt back up, leaving me to wonder why it is that Republicans still claim to be the party of fiscal responsibility, given the fiscal irresponsibility of the last three Republican presidents.

President Clinton offers advice to President Obama

Zach W — Wed, 22 Sep 2010 10:05:56 +0000

As usual, former President Bill Clinton knows of what he speaks:

Giving credit to the Republicans for their candor in the wake of Tuesday’s primaries, President Bill Clinton urged President Obama to take his ‘story’ to American voters and make a more rigorous case for what his administration has accomplished and what they plan to do to spur economic recovery and job growth.

Clinton offered his analysis in an interview with Yahoo! News and The Huffington Post. He acknowledged both the administration’s efforts to reverse the economic downturn and the frustration, anger and anxiety so many Americans feel in this precarious financial climate: “He and the Congress have done a better job than they’ve gotten credit for. But they shouldn’t ask for credit because people can’t give credit if they don’t feel better.”

In response to the success of conservative Republicans in Tuesday’s primaries, he urged the President to get “out on there on the stump” and sell his own plan. “He’s got a story to tell. Talk about the stakes, not name call but tell the facts. The Republicans have been very candid and I give them this, with what they intend to do if they get into Congress,” he said.

Congrats Chelsea BUT…….

Jeff Simpson — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 14:51:22 +0000

Something is seriously wrong with our system. When we have very well paid government officials(the president makes $400,000 a year plus expenses, the governor of WI makes $136,000 yearly.) waiting until they get out of office so they can cash in. As Tommy Thompson so succinctly put it “”Everybody knows I was broke when I left the government five years ago, I’ve made a few shekels, not as many as you guys think I’ve made, but it’s tough to go back, there’s no question about that. But the country’s in trouble right now and I’m looking at that.”

While it was nice of Tommy to consider forgoing Millions of dollars of repayment of favors to come and bail us out. Most people consider $130+K a year with full benefits and expense account to be a pretty good salary.

Then there is this Gem from George W Bush “I’ll give some speeches, just to replenish the ol’ coffers.” With assets that have been estimated as high as nearly $21 million, Mr. Bush added, “I don’t know what my dad gets — it’s more than 50-75″ thousand dollars a speech, and “Clinton’s making a lot of money.”

Who knew how hard it was to live off a measly $400k a year with cadillac benefits!

To not blame republicans strictly for this, we know its a bipartisan effort as Bill and Hillary ($186,600/yr salary) just threw a wedding for their only daughter that costs somewhere between $2-5 MILLION dollars. (http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/38444780/ns/today-today_weddings/)

I am all for rewarding public service and , as someone who ran for office before, think its great that people(regardless of party) devote their time to public service. I do not however think it should be a pass after service to “go directly to GO” and collect MILLIONS of dollars. Makes me wonder what kind of deals were made while in office(Google: Billy Tauzin).

Unfortunately, I do not know how to fix it, but the system is definitely broken!

The best Democrat since FDR?

Zach W — Sun, 30 May 2010 12:39:04 +0000

According to Dale over at Reasonable Citizen, former president Bill Clinton is the best Democrat since FDR, in his opinion. I’m inclined to agree, and you can read why here.

A thought on Obama’s approval numbers

Zach W — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 12:53:43 +0000

For all those conservatives who are making a big deal of the fact that President Barack Obama’s approval rating isn’t quite as robust as it was shortly after he was inaugurated, just remember former President Bill Clinton’s first-term approval rating was 50%. What’s more, Clinton’s approval rating at the start of the 1996 election year was just a tick above 40%.

And we all know how President Clinton’s reelection campaign worked out…

GOP’s favorable rating at its lowest in a decade

Zach W — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 13:19:37 +0000

There’s been some talk on the right about President Barack Obama’s approval rating, namely the fact that it stands near 53%, depending on the poll, but according to a new national poll, the Republican Party’s favorable rating among Americans is at its lowest level in at least a decade:

Thirty-six percent of people questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Friday say they have a favorable opinion of the Republican Party, with 54 percent viewing the GOP negatively.

According to the poll, 53 percent have a positive opinion of the Democratic Party, with 41 percent holding an unfavorable view. The survey indicates that favorable ratings for the Democrats have dropped 5 points since February, with the Republican number slipping 3 points.

Yeah, that’s hardly a ringing endorsement for the Republican Party.

It’s also worth noting at the same time during his first term, President Bill Clinton’s approval rating stood at a robust 48%, and we all know how his reelection campaign turned out.