Had a debate about this the other day...
I have a difficult time saying what president is the best, because we have a 3 tier system.
When it comes to decisions to go to war or the national deficit. Congress has a hand in that as well. They make choices as well.
Do a search on the biggest bills that were every presented to congress for approval and then track the pay out on those entitlements over time and which successive administration modified them or opened them up. How the oversight or people abuse the system for those bills? How much of those payments are a portion of the deficit...right now to adjust for cost of living, etc. So when I look at those and who introduced them it's not what you think of .... you think about who was in office when it happened.
FDR was one of my heroes for a long time and when I look at how much the new deal taken a big chunk of our deficit the way people bill for services against it, it makes my stomach turn. When you realize it was the robust manufacturing of tanks, war planes giving americans job that got us out of the depression, not the new deal, I look it differently now.
I hated Regan for years, but when you look at the percentage of what the deficit was to GW Bush's deficit, Regan's was higher. When you look at the numbers, Regan spent a lot - but his democratic congress wanted a lot of entitlements. Regan got what he wanted and his congress got a lot of entitlement bills passed as well.
Then I looked at the Clinton administration. Regan actually brokered a draw down of arms race w/ Russia, Berlin wall fell and started a defense reduction in spending - as did George Bush Sr. We had a 30 day war in Kuwait and it took some time before inflation settled and it was one month after fiscal budget 1992 was passed that elections were held. Bill took office.
So I read about how the Clinton's balanced the budget and yadda yadda. I was a big time supporter of them for it. Yet the reality is they further reduced the intelligence budget and we lost linguists that actually harmed US intelligence (9/11 fallout). Also the (.) com market shot up there was more money being invested and people had more money to pay down the deficit with the reduction in spending.
What do you think the budget would look like if her universal health care bills were passed? That's another entitlement bill that would raise taxes for us and think about how it would change how doctors and insurance companies find ways to bill the universal health care instead of pay it from their company? Or vice versa? If you have alternate insurance, we're going to bill them first, etc. How about malpractice lawsuits? Our oversight for this is poor for social security to the point we're going to run out 30-40 years...and we're going to take on healthcare as government oversight as well?
It's for those reasons I have a hard time, gaging which president is better or not, there are too many things happening within congress that effect us in the long run. Or things happening in the market place that affect the market. The new FED chairman not doing more to offset the slowdown and inflation that we see today. I miss Fed chairman Al Greenspan, as a result. The job of the FED is prevent this from happening, not respond to it, like Bernacke has been and talking about how he'll respond in the future.
...favorite president...does it matter the way congress has helped or harmed him along the way?
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