Former President Bill Clinton is asking the American people to give Democrats in Congress another chance. He said Democrats need just a couple more years in power to get the economy going. Only after that, he said, should voters “throw us all out” if they are displeased.
Since Clinton is a Democrat, his plea to keep Democrats in power is no surprise.
What is surprising is the strange math he used to calculate how long Democrats have now been in full control of Congress. He implied that Democrats have been running Congress for only two years – when in fact they have been the majority party in Congress the past four years.
He said: “I think the Democrats ought to stand up and say … ‘You gave them [Republicans] eight years to dig this hole, and to double the debt of the country, and not to produce any jobs, and then to have a financial collapse and all this calamity. At least give us four [years] to dig out of it.'”
But Democrats have already had four years to “dig out,” and they have “dug deeper” instead.
Here is the history: The 2006 elections gave Democrats majority control of both houses of Congress. Then in 2008, they not only strengthened those majorities but won the White House and a rare filibuster-proof majority in the Senate. That meant they could pass almost any kind of legislation they wanted with little or no Republican support – and they did!
The $862 billion “stimulus” – which has not kept down unemployment as promised – got almost no GOP votes, and disastrous ObamaCare socialized medicine got not one Republican vote in either house.
At no point under President George W. Bush did Republicans enjoy a filibuster-proof Senate majority. So even during the four years – 2002-2006 – when they had narrow control of both the House and the Senate under Bush, they were repeatedly stymied by Democrats.
Did some congressional Republicans go along with too much spending when they were in power early this decade? Absolutely, and Bush failed to veto some spending bills that should have been vetoed. But Democrat-approved ObamaCare and the “stimulus” have added catastrophically to our national debt – and Democrats now want to spend more on yet another stimulus!
Those measures have significantly weakened our nation’s economy.
The recession and sky-high debt and unemployment are not entirely Democrats’ fault. But nothing in their current plans for more spending and higher taxes has any prospect of making things better. They have had the “four years” Clinton thinks they deserve. It’s time for a change.