Binder full of women! Come on people

[Mosiah]

don't know much bout economics, but that looks like trending down to me!

[Islandman]

I think unbiased people generally understand that he got a bad situation and they still mostly blame Bush...if they didn't Obama would be losing by a landslide.

But its not about "who caused it" any more, we all know that is Bush. the question is "who is the better person to fix it".

Quite frankly Clinton has done a better job of selling Obama as the right choice than he has for himself.

[Islandman]

It is not that complicated and you do not have to be an economist:

Deficit: The amount by which the government's total budget outlays exceeds its total receipts for a fiscal year.
Or, approximately, the federal deficit is the amount by which the federal debt increases in a single year.

The US national debt is still increasing and has increased more under Obama than any other president. That is not a debatable topic.

http://www.usgovernmentdebt.us/federal_debt (the same site)

[Assasin]

Obama can use the recession and the wars as the main reason but other than that he can't win the deficit argument. Plain and simple.

Him can't have it both ways. He got a chance to make the Bush tax cut permanently gone for the rich and he made a deal with the republicans. You think people nah see. If he made that deal then it would be a different arguement on deficits.

[Islandman]

Thank you sah.

I am not even saying that it would have been easy to do what he promised, it was always going to be difficult. But the fact is he made some decisions and now just does not have a strong argument to make on the debt and deficits.

That is basically all I was arguing until i was forced to give a macro-economics seminar

[Jangle]

My wife made the same comment last night.

[Lazie]

I doubt very much that Rachel said that the national debt is trending lower. She is a typical pro Obama MSNBC-er but she generally bases her pieces on factual data.

It is simple, if you are running a deficit every year your debt cannot be trending lower after 4 years. If you borrow 10 grand every year till you owe 50 grand, then you start to borrow just 9 grand every year, is your debt trending down?

She said the deficit is being lowered .... Go to 9:22 and play.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908..._show#49425000

[Baddaz]

i-man, no question the deficit has been reduced... that is fact... hope we can agree on that...

the total debt under obama has increased... fact, as well... the obama debt includes the two wars that were not accounted for under gwbush..

[Baddaz]

bush added 4.8t to the debt, not including the wars which were not accounted for and saddled obama... that is also a fact... hope we can agree on that as well... obama has added 4.9t to the debt, approx 2t just from the unaccounted war... not disminishing obamas contribution, just saying throwing out numbers doesn't give a true picture...

later, i will give you another document that give more detail...

[Jangle]

President Obama has shown that he can be very calculated and decisive when necessary. Maybe he is holding back to deliver the knock-out punch in the next debate, which is on foreign policy. Myth Romney has shown that he is very weak when it comes to this area. The Benghazi incident gave him some amunition to attack the president on, but in the full picture of this election, it is a small factor with the voters. What the next debate will highlight is who comes across as more presidential.

[Baddaz]

i-man, on clinton selling... yes, he has... there are factors that contribute to this... clinton is not the president... more latitude for assigning blame... and he is a white man who is still revered despite his indiscretions... obama, isn't granted such luxuries of preferential treatment and trust...

it is the unspoken reality...

[Islandman]

If we want to give blame for the first 2 years to Bush that is fine, I am not here to defend Bush just to get the facts straight.

The original point I disagreed with was about the TREND. The national debt is trending UP and is projected to continue. Lets all be clear on that.

Yes for now the deficit is slightly trending down but is still near historic highs.

[Islandman]

OK, so we cleared that up.

She did not say the debt is not being lowered, the deficit is. She is correct on that.

[Islandman]

I agree with your analysis on that, I would add that he also presided over a period of economic prosperity and that gives his views some additional weight as well.