No modern American president was granted the opportunity President Obama received to preside over explosive economic growth while in office – and his presidency and the country could have thrived if he simply would have recognized the opportunity before him.
Consider this: Politically speaking, if a president assumes office during a recession, the luckiest time for him to do so is around twelve months in, when the economy is near rock-bottom and ready to come roaring back. If he plays his cards right, he can take credit for some of the recovery by claiming that his policies contributed to it. What’s least fortunate is to assume office near or before the start of a recession, because then the downturn occurs entirely under his watch and everyone blames him for it.
Harry Truman took office two months into the 1948 recession—a precarious position, because unemployment plunged for a year under his watch before recovering. Eisenhower assumed office six months before the 1953 recession and was forced to serve as the face of twelve months of decline.
Kennedy was fortunate enough to assume office nine months into the 1960 recession, one month before the recovery, the latter of which he sustained by cutting income taxes for all earners.
Nixon assumed office eleven months before the 1969 recession and presided over twelve months of decline. Reagan took office six months before the 1981 recession and endured sixteen months before the recovery. Bush assumed office two months before the 2001 recession and held office through ten months of decline.
When did Obama take office? A whopping thirteen months after the start of the 2007 recession, the longest lag time any president has experienced while assuming office near the start of a recession since the Great Depression. Only Kennedy came close to being as lucky, and he didn’t squander his luck.
The economy had been hemorrhaging jobs for a year before Obama took office and the sharpest decline was behind us. Job losses would have continued for several months under Obama no matter what he did, but no one would have blamed him for that if had he appropriately positioned the country for recovery. Had he governed like a fiscal conservative, à la Bill Clinton, Republicans would have been delighted and vindicated, even if his policies didn’t yield immediate results. Democrats would have griped, but they would have covered for Obama.
But that’s not how Obama governed.
Obama was dealt the opportunity of a lifetime to preside over historic recovery and growth, and he blew it.
To be continued in a follow-up article…
