Why I'm Upset with Republicans

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I actually like many Republican ideals.  Limited government, low taxes, and helping out businesses are all good theory that never seem to be put into practice when appropriate.   

The past month however has shown the hypocrisy that really upsets me.  Republicans have repeated complained about "wasted spending", "too high taxes", and "huge deficits".  Where were they the previous 8 years with these complaints?!   Why when they were in control of the both Congress and the White house did all 3 complaints increase without a backlash of complaint?  

The economy right now can be considered an "emergency", and even though many can disagree that the government may be doing the wrong thing, they ARE doing the publicly demanded thing by at least TRYING.  (Check polls over the last month, even though many don't know if it will work, they still approve of the stimulus package).  Back when the economy wasn't in trouble Republicans were spending money like this (though spread out more) without a blink of an eye.

Check out this graph:

natl debt chart Why Im Upset with Republicans

The complaints you always hear in the media is that DEMOCRATS increase spending.  DEMOCRATS increase taxes.  DEMOCRATS can't be trusted to control the deficit.  Yet over the past 40 years, the deficit has always grown with a REPUBLICAN PRESIDENT and the sizes of the year-to-year deficits have SHRUNK or at least stayed relitively equal during Democratic presidencies. 

Both parties need to stop bickering with each other, and do some internal fighting to clean up their own homes.  

We have multiple parties so that we can have a difference of ideas, debate of policy, and a civilized discourse.  Not so we can provide fodder for 24-hour news stations to drum up ratings.

Chart Source

Source: U.S. Department of the Treasury, Bureau of the Public Debt

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  • JonB

    too bad this thing hasn't been updated, Obama now has spent more than all of these guys combined and he did it in under a year.... guess in the game of debt the democrats are now in the lead... it's all a farce anyways though, democrat republican, most of those people are still just serving special interests and banks. so it matters not what side is which, it's still part of the same coin.

  • dave smith

    hmm too bad this does not show who controled congress at these times seeing as how congress controls the budget the president only agrees or vetoes it. then we could really find out who is to blame

  • http://DrDawnLancaster.com DrDawn

    I think you would see a very different picture if you identified which party controlled Congress through these periods, since they are the ones who propose the budget. By the way, the Democrats took over both houses in the '06 election at a time when the deficit was going down. Take a look at your chart and see what happened when the Democrats had their first year controlling both houses. They caused the ending spike to Bush's presidency. Bush is at fault for going along with them. It is to Clinton's credit that he went along with his Republican Congress. Again, prior to the Democrats taking over, the deficit was starting to come down, even despite 9/11, Katrina, the tsunami, two active wars, and an average of 48 natural disasters on U.S. soil PER YEAR under Bush. I'll await your chart update.

    • http://billjaquette.net eliminat

      Yet now with the chance to reduce it further, they try to keep the alternative F-35 jet engine, keep the NASCAR sponsorship, extend tax cuts that were put in place because we had a surplus at the time, refuse to touch DoD spending, and cut R&D programs that have been proven to the economy at a better than 1:1 return. They're going by ideology regardless of whatever evidence or facts have been shown.

  • Anonymous

    Check to see who ran the house(s).

  • Stopanimaltorture

    Please create the same chart but instead of the President look at who controlled the House of Representatives and the Senate.  It is Congress who controls the purse strings, so it would be interesting to see who was in control of Congress in comparison to the debt.