The factor (4.00 / 3)

that seems to be stopping Obama's ratings from tanking is that most people still blame Bush for the economy. That'll change, probably sooner than later.

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by: david mizner @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 16:32:53 PM UTC

Yup. Bush is gone for nine months now. (0.00 / 0)

For most people that's more than enough time to correct the false course, if you try hard. Nobody will believe the US is out of recession when the unemployment is at 10%. Either Obama really starts to fight this, or he's toast in 2012.

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by: Gray @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 16:50:26 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

actually your statement is false (0.00 / 0)

"Most people do not believe that" as was shown in polls. Only 5% of voters thought Obama would be responsible for how the economy went in the first 12 moths.


New Jersey politics at Blue Jersey.

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by: Hopeful in NJ @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 17:14:22 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

typo alert (0.00 / 0)

I meant to type 15%, not 5%.

New Jersey politics at Blue Jersey.

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by: Hopeful in NJ @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 17:16:40 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

That poll is from APRIL, Hopeful! (0.00 / 0)

How high was unemployment then, 7, maybe 8 percent? Now it's seven months later, people hardly remember what they answered then, and over ten percent is a quite different ballgame. Maybe not the majority, but certainly a much larger share of the people will blame Obama for the missing jobs now.

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by: Gray @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 17:18:17 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

October Fox News poll (4.00 / 2)

Says:

18% blame Obama, 58% blame Bush.  

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by: dreaminonempty @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 17:26:30 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Ok, I stand corrected. Didn't think people are THAT patient. (4.00 / 1)

In this light, I see that my statement was an exaggeration.  

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by: Gray @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 17:31:15 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

please ignore my comment below (4.00 / 1)

As I see this discussion went on while I was getting too worked up and writing War and Peace.

New Jersey politics at Blue Jersey.

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by: Hopeful in NJ @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 17:35:32 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

No problem, Hopeful! (0.00 / 0)

I should have checked the facts instead of making broad assumptions. Serves me well.

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by: Gray @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 17:44:17 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

what are you talking about? (0.00 / 0)

You say that a majority of people believe it is possible for a President to change the entire economy in 9 months. I showed you are wrong.

If you would like to see that people last Spring were able to described their beliefs correctly, here is a FOX NEWS poll from October that shows the same:

http://washingtonindependent.c...

Here's a somewhat surprising result from the new Fox News poll. Asked which president is "more responsible for the current state of the economy," only 18 percent say President Obama. Fifty-eight percent say former President George W. Bush. Nine percent blame both of them. Republicans are the only subgroup of voters who blame Obama, and only by a six-point margin of 35 percent to 29 percent.

Feel free to say that in 2012 Obama will be blamed for a bad economy because he will. Feel free to say that YOU blame him today. But you are not the American people.

New Jersey politics at Blue Jersey.

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by: Hopeful in NJ @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 17:34:02 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

The NYT says today the "inofficial" jobless rate is at 17.5%! (0.00 / 0)

And Charles M. Blow urges the president to fulfill his promises and haste measures to provide more jobs. So, sry to come back to his, Hopeful, but imho this is a sign that the patience of the public is really running out. After all, as you said, people gave Obama 12 months to get this under control. This was in march (not april, as a European I frequently make mistakes reading US dates), and the president has already wasted two thirds of that time span. I guess you will agree that something has to happen now!

And, excuse me pls for bringing this up, but 10.2% is even higher than the jobless rate in Germany, and I remember very well how the US has ridiculed us all the time for our high unemployment. Despite the fact that our jobless are much better off than those in the states. And while the recession hasn't changed the numbers here that much, our system being stable at the rate of 7.7%, for the US, the high numbers are an alarming signal. Those high numbers, a record unreached since the 30s, recommend urgent action similar to FDR's programs, not some halfhearted wishywashy!

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by: Gray @ Sat Nov 07, 2009 at 07:55:42 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Now is not the time for moderation. (4.00 / 5)

We are in the midst of one of the worst recessions in our history.  It seems that to address such a situation would require serious and significant action but all we see and hear is moderation from the party in charge.

RebelCapitalist - Financial Information for the Rest of Us.

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by: RebelCapitalist @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 16:42:25 PM UTC

As Krugman correctly pointed out, this is what Obama gets... (4.00 / 4)

..for doing so little. His half-hearted stimulus bill that doesn't include enough projects that put people into work is far away from FDRs measures and not sufficient to fight rising unemployment. High time for the Dems to give the economy anohter blood injection, and this time hopefully one that doesn't focus on the banks, but on real jobs. Remember, for one million that is paid as a bonus for a banker, 20 average Joes can be employed for a whole year!

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by: Gray @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 16:46:18 PM UTC

Alan Khazei, the "Jobs" Senator from Massachusetts? I hope! (0.00 / 0)

Taking a cue from today's spotlight on unemployment, the Massachusetts man seeking Sen. Ted Kennedy's seat, Alan Khazei explained his plan for tax credits for job creation as reported in Boston.com. His background (per Wikipedia) is amazing:

Alan Khazei is the son of a Muslim Iranian American surgeon and a Catholic Italian American nurse, born in Pittsburgh and raised in Bedford, NH for a few years. He graduated in 1979 from St. Paul's School in Concord, NH where he was President of his graduating class. He graduated from Harvard College with honors in 1983 and from Harvard Law School in 1987. Khazei is married to Vanessa Kirsch, a social entrepreneur and graduate of Tufts University who has established several philanthropic organizations, most recently New Profit Inc., a group that provides grants to innovative social projects. The couple live in Brookline, Massachusetts, with their two children.

His surname rhymes with "daisy" and "hazey."

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by: Books Alive @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 17:11:19 PM UTC

TAX CREDITS? (4.00 / 2)

Sry, but this is a very centrist, and economically uninformed idea (prolly some rethuglicans like that, too, similar stuff has been proposed by right wingers). Pls look up all those stories at Krugman's blog where he pointed out that tax credits are less efficient than direct fiscal spending for job creating projects like highways, bridges, building etc now.

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by: Gray @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 17:21:46 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

So, why not do both? (0.00 / 0)

The small businesses that would benefit from Khazei's ideas would hire people immediately, and offer a wider range of job opportunities than the heavy construction projects you mention. Not everyone can step into those construction jobs. More truck/heavy equipment drivers than stop/slow sign holders are needed!  

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by: Books Alive @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 17:48:04 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Prolly those small businesses don't make any profit now,... (4.00 / 1)

...and so they don't pay any taxes, and any tax credit is useless for them now. Simpy hiring people DOESN'T help the economy, this is lame old supply side thinking that has been debunked by the insights from the depression. The government creating programs that will give those businesses something to do will be much more helpful.

And don't forget, tax credits are very similar to Bush's grand tax reduction program, which was supposed to pay for itself, too. And we now the great results that came from it.

Really, I understand you're a fan of Khazei, but it would be vastly preferrable if he would seek some expert opinions before coming up with such inefficient stimulus ideas.

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by: Gray @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 18:03:43 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

"Not everyone can step into those construction jobs." (0.00 / 0)

But others can create construction equippement, build telecom stuff for enhancing the internet, do the planning and administration jobs, help the homeless to get new housing, or do other things in an economy that will be boosted by the influx of money.

Hmm, excuse me pls, no offense intended, but you don't know much about economics, right?  

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by: Gray @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 18:08:21 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Very true (0.00 / 0)

Tax credits for individuals, on the other hand, do work well in ameliorating poverty and increasing consumer spending. Unfortunately, however, ordinary people don't have Capitol Hill lobbyists.

Forgotten Countries - a foreign policy-focused blog

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by: Englishlefty @ Mon Nov 09, 2009 at 13:27:30 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

it would be interesting (0.00 / 0)

to correlate these unemployment numbers with other Presidents' approval rating in their first year. A glance at the charts here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U...

suggests that the disapproval of most Presidents would correlate extremely well because nearly all increase during the first year.

It's also odd that you skipped months in your analysis. Why is that? Disapproval dropped September to October, but unemployment increased. It seems like you removed datapoints that were inconvenient.

New Jersey politics at Blue Jersey.

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by: Hopeful in NJ @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 17:26:03 PM UTC

Well (0.00 / 0)

I just took data from every other month but you can add in the other months and it will be the same or very close. The curves for each are mostly smooth.

I agree that Obamas approval numbers were bound to come down some. But the state of peoples wallets also has a strong influence on how they judge leaders. Clinton had high job approval right through the Lewinsky mess for partly that reason.  

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by: tremayne @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 18:01:22 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

For series that are roughly linear (4.00 / 2)

For two series that are roughly linear, like the two that you chose, the correlation value doesn't mean much. Any two sets of points that independently fit a linear curve will have a high value for the type of correlation you are calculating. There has to be some non-linearity in the data (like an inflection point) for the correlation to suggest that there might any link between the observations.

Nonetheless, I get your point that unemployment is the key issue for Democrats. That is just common sense.  

ec=-8.50 soc=-8.41   (3,967 Watts)

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by: Mark Wallace @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 18:45:29 PM UTC

He wasn't elected to the Blamer-in-Chief (0.00 / 0)

Do you know what makes people really angry?

When they feel like they're being ignored.

Obama made mistakes. So be it.

But when the American people said "hey Barack, let's try it our way now" he just pressed on.

Bush did the same thing.

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by: Paul Goodman @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 20:44:00 PM UTC

Buying the Farm (0.00 / 0)

Six more months of the unployment numbers going up and Obamma will have "bought the farm."  

Conservative......CNN news:Nopenhagen: US PRES 2 WKS LATE ATTEND 1 DAY, GORE JOURNEY BY TRAIN.

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by: Money Man @ Fri Nov 06, 2009 at 21:23:48 PM UTC