The Barnyard

3 months and it would still be on clinton. obviously.

and there is no bright line test i could think of time-wise. Recessions flow so much from structural issues that i could see past administrations being responsible for recessions that begin up to 6 months after leaving office.

Luckily i don't need to design a broadly applicable test because the recession was underway so soon (2 months) after bush 2 took office it's obvious the past pes (clinton) was responsible for the recession.

it's great to hear that you agree the 2001 recession is on clinton. Of course everybody (save 1) agrees with that but i was starting to think you were a robot.

YOU'RE WELCOME.

Cool. And just so we're clear, at what month in 2008 are job losses actually on Obama? In Romney's ad, he counted using all of January of 2008, even though Obama wasn't inaugurated until later in the month. What should Romney's ad have said in your mind? April 2008? Maybe July 2008 since you say above it may depend on severity and the great recession was certainly great (in the size sense, not enjoyment)?

Well, it is the belief of some that when our laws and government provides benefits based on marriage, it becomes more than a theological issue.

Maybe we completely take away all legal benefits for marriage and give them solely to domestic partnerships, that way marriage is purely a theological matter.

I'm glad that we agree your earlier statement was a semantic matter and not an argument for the underlying merits of same sex marriage.

Words do have meanings, semantics or not. That is a popular debate form today, to redefine words, but equal does mean equal. Or it used to.

And the definition of "equal" would be more than semantics if that word were actually important to any right or freedom people are seeking. Unfortunately, in this case it's just a name. It's no different than calling a certain idea an estate tax or a death tax. Same idea, same underlying issue, but surely you wouldn't say that estate=death.

Some people want to argue over the merits of an issue and some people want to argue over the word used to name an issue. This sentence highlights one of our many differences.

You are quite the double talker. I bet you sell a lot of cars

no that is not my position.

please tell me when you knew the economy had "turned around."

As a businessman, I want to know that answer as well...maybe I should start hiring more people...I'm slowing down the Summer of Recovery III. Unfortunately, my customers seem to think we're still in a recession...I'll get the word out.

CNL, sorry to be a smartarse but nothing has "turned around".

You don't have to be sorry, you can act however you want. Romney and Boehner both said they thought it was turning around so I thought that was the general way the debate was being framed. However, I am fine saying it hasn't turned around.

You must be in a business where lots of your customers are government employees. The growth rate for the private sector is actually running in the high 3's. Contraction in the public sector is what brings the total down to %2 1/2.

Unlike the two Reagan recessions, the GW Bush recession and the first Dubya recession where public hiring went up even as private sector hiring was going down and then improved gradually, the pubiic sector continues to shed jobs even as the private sector has added over 4 1/2 million jobs since 2009.

Turns out Republicans are plenty Keynesian when they are trying to stay in office. It's only when a Dem's in the White House that they get all Austrian School of Economics on us.

That aside, I'm the first to acknowledge that people continue to hurt and Obama has not advanced things as far as he should have,

Seems as though every other day someone wants to mention the Kenyan school of economy, everyone knows that Kenya's economy sucks...as for the Austrian School - how did California fare with Schwarzenegger?

so you think the economy hasn't turned around then?

i followed your lead and said 2008 when i meant 2009.