The greatest lie about President Clinton.
If you’ve ever talked politics with me, I’ve probably admitted to you that I think former President Clinton was a good president. While an intelligent man himself, he surrounded himself with contextually intelligent persons to fill gaps in and enhance his knowledge resulting in a very complete and competent administration. For years, we’ve heard about Clinton’s surpluses and how Bush Jr. simply decimated the national budget and I think most people took that at face value. Realistically, Bush took us into two wars completely unfunded as a populist response to homeland attacks. Spending billions on wars over and above your regular budget really does a number on your ability to be fiscally responsible. Today… I learned those accusations aren’t necessarily founded in fact.
According to the government’s own data, Clinton increased the national debt consistently each year he was in office for a total of about $1.5T for his presidency (’93-’01).
- 03/01/2001 5,726,774,439,028.95
- 09/30/2000 5,674,178,209,886.86
- 09/30/1999 5,656,270,901,615.43
- 09/30/1998 5,526,193,008,897.62
- 09/30/1997 5,413,146,011,397.34
- 09/30/1996 5,224,810,939,135.73
- 09/29/1995 4,973,982,900,709.39
- 09/30/1994 4,692,749,910,013.32
- 03/01/1993 4,205,086,748,556.94
I do have to be fair to the numbers. Bush Jr. did much worse. While he never had a year over year growth in the trillions, he did increase the debt $5.1T (’01-’09).
- 03/01/2009 10,877,144,501,237.52
- 09/30/2008 10,024,724,896,912.49
- 09/30/2007 9,007,653,372,262.48
- 09/30/2006 8,506,973,899,215.23
- 09/30/2005 7,932,709,661,723.50
- 09/30/2004 7,379,052,696,330.32
- 09/30/2003 6,783,231,062,743.62
- 09/30/2002 6,228,235,965,597.16
- 03/01/2001 5,726,774,439,028.95
Why should anyone care? Depends… did you believe that Clinton was actually reducing our national debt? Meanwhile, Obama is really going nuts. $2.1T in less than 2 years. A third of Obama’s first term is well over a third of Bush’s entire presidency…
- 03/01/2009 10,877,144,501,237.52
- 09/30/2009 11,909,829,003,511.75
- 05/25/2010 12,987,796,841,336.51
Do you like taxes?