It's a mistake to take a small majority as a mandate. The GOP did it in 2000 and in 2004 and the Dems did it in 2008. The extreme right and left are shrinking and the parties are just nudging the vast moderate opinion to the left and right. Whichever party wises up, stops kow-towing to its most extreme branch and embraces the center will win. I see the Tea Party dragging the republicans right and the progressives dragging the democrats to the middle. Time will tell.
Not nearly "nuff". When Obama took office the economy had already tanked, Dubya's wars were out of control, the banks had been bailed out, and depression was looming.
That's innacurate, but I totally understand why you would think that. These programs can be used for all types of things. You can increase investments in infrastructure without increasing the amount you give an agency. Most government agencies are getting far less funding than have gotten in previous years. The difference is, instead of awarding a loan or grant for project X that concentrates on...say a community center, agencies are being instructed to award those dollars to an infrastructure project. You increase the investment by increasing the emphasis. That means some non-essential, albeit worthwhile, project will not get funded because infrastructure is more important now. That's one of the many problems with governments. They give enough information to cause controversy, but not enough to make it common sense. It's common sense to me because I work in that area of government, but I can understand how the everyday taxpayer wouldn't know that. It's not common knowledge.
When Reagan took office, unemployment was 7.6% and went to 9.8% by that summer and stayed there for 2 years. Unemployment is always a lagging indicator of a recovery. And the top tax rate is still 14% lower than what Reagan cut it to. and you don't want to even start talking about Reagan and deficits. The entire "Reagan revolution" cut unemployment 2.1% from start to finish. Do you consider Reagan's presidency a failure?
