Mark Knoller is the White House correspondant for CBS Radio, and a first-class right-wing tool. Monday night, he posted an article titled, "National debt has increased more under Obama than under Bush," which sent wingnuts scurrying to their Twitter accounts. The problem is, the piece is BS. Here's Knoller's key graf:
The Debt rose $4.899 trillion during the two terms of the Bush presidency. It has now gone up $4.939 trillion since President Obama took office.
Don't you just love the way he capitalizes "debt"?
What Knoller doesn't specify, naturally, is what the debt was when Bush began his presidency. And that's a glaring omission, because unless you don't know that, you can't accurately compare the records. So here it is.
In 2001, the national debt Bush inherited was around $5.7T, give or take. Some of that debt in 2001 has to be attributed to Clinton, just as some of the debt in 2009 when Obama took office has to be attributed to Bush. When W. left office in 2009, the debt was nearly $11T. That's an increase of 89 percent.
Under Obama, the debt has increased from about $11T to about $15T, about 40 percent.
And what's behind that increase? Historically low taxes and historically low revenues -- and the worst financial crash since the 1930s. There's been no "binge" in spending, as Knoller wants you to believe.
And PS, this isn't the first "look how Obama's bankrupting the country" hit job this guy has written.
This clown should leave CBS and go to Fox News. He'd fit right in.
