Doug Ross @ Journal

A Stellar Track Record of Accuracy

In a Sept. 2, 2003 speech in South Carolina, John Kerry claimed the U.S. is suffering "the greatest job loss since the Great Depression."


Throughout the 2004 presidential campaign, Kerry asserted that President Bush has "the worst economic record since the Hoover administration."


Throughout the election cycle, leading Democrats employed the term "jobless recovery" to describe the economy.


Not yet sufficiently humiliated, the Democratic theme of economic disaster continues apace.


Even today, in 2007 and despite overwhelming evidence, Speaker Nancy Pelosi echoes these bizarre assertions: "The Bush economy is moving in the wrong direction... Gas prices have doubled topping $3.00 a gallon, with the price of oil topping a record in July... Median family income has dropped every year of the Bush Administration, and Americans’ paychecks have been flat or declined in more than half of the 65 months of the Bush Administration..."


Furthermore, Pelosi has continued to wage war against American energy independence, stating: "Republicans voted to protect more than $5 billion in oil industry giveaways," thereby implying that domestic energy companies would suffer mightily under increased taxes, fines, and regulations. That's American energy companies that Pelosi intends to penalize, not foreign ones.

* * *

Interestingly, Friday's news brought a revision to the 2006 employment numbers. An upward revision, that is, to 2.2 million jobs created.


Chief Economist Michael Darda released a stunning appraisal of the situation last week:

...Our indicators suggest that the outlook for the labor market is stronger than anytime since the late 1960s, when the unemployment rate dropped below 4 percent on a sustained basis. Weakness in profits and high real interest rates undermined the tight labor market of 1999–2000, whereas profits are much stronger today while real rates are much lower... In fact, the profit and productivity backdrop is stronger now than it was during the first 20 quarters of the 1961–1969 expansion. ... We thus expect unemployment to drop below 4 percent during 2007...

A recent Virginia newspaper op-ed recapped the situation succinctly:

...In 2007, unemployment is low and productivity is high, the stock market is doing well and real wages are growing. Economist Michael Darda points out that real wages over the first five years of the Bush expansion are actually growing more rapidly than over the first five year boom than spanned the tenure two presidents - the first George Bush and Bill Clinton. Critics claim there is a huge wage inequality in the land, but they fail to detail why Bill Gates is a danger to the Republic. Local, state and federal tax revenues are increasing. Inflation is stable. National Review columnist Lawrence Kudlow notes that family wealth stands at a record of more than $54 trillion. Even removing Mr. Gates from that equation leaves 53 trillion, 950 billion for everyone else in the nation...

And what about the Democrats' ill-conceived campaign against the American energy industry? Just days ago, Ben Stein read the riot act to Pelosi and her posse of petroleum-hating unrealists:

...If we lost all oil and gas products tomorrow, ...the world would simply collapse. There would be an immense depression beyond anything we saw in the 1930s -- the economy would go back to a primitive state. There would simply not be a functioning society. It would be as if there had been nuclear war, minus the casualties from blast and radiation. In a word, we cannot as a modern society or even a modestly industrial society live without oil and gas. That is, we do not supply a luxury or a narcotic. We supply a basic necessity of life, as basic as almost any commodity there is. Years ago, under the Clinton administration, we were given incentives to drill for oil and gas in very deep water in federally owned areas. Today, some say we were erroneously given more incentives than was originally intended. Specifically, such critics say that these incentives should have stopped if oil reached a certain price on world markets... We do not know if this was a mistake or not. We do know that it's the law... Finally, the oil business is a big business. For some of us, lately it has been a good business after many lean years. But we are not princes of heredity and blood. Anyone who wants to can go to work at an oil company. We have serious labor shortages and we welcome you. More important, anyone who wants can buy stock in us can be an oil company owner. This business is open to anyone. If you think we make obscene profits, buy our stock. You'll soon find that our profits are not only not obscene, but far from certain or predictable...

Can I get an 'indeed'?

Put simply, the Democrats' record for accuracy is just a tad worse than Pinnochio explaining his losing streak at the track to a loanshark.

In fact, I'd rank the Democrats' economic stewardship abilities up there with their handling of Islamofascists and Communists.


Oven-baked good readin', just like Mama used to make:
Anchoress, Barking Moonbat, Captain's Quarters, David Phinney, Hang Right Politics, Hugh Hewitt, OTB, Right Scale, STACLU, Wizbang