Thursday, June 15, 2006

They Attacked Clinton, Will They Attack Bush?

Yesterday I posted that Rudy Giuliani feels that the folks in D.C. don't have an energy policy. I also provided a link to Republican attacks against Bill Clinton in a position paper from 2000. They accused him of not having an energy policy. Below I have listed some of the Republican attacks used against Clinton and compared them to economic times under Bush.

Attack: When OPEC slowed oil production in 1999, oil prices went up from $10 to $30 a barrel.

The Bush Energy Policy (if it exists) has had a chance to do it's magic for six years now, and what do we have? Just a couple months ago, oil hit an all-time record of over $75 a barrel.

Attack: Spikes in Oil prices affect other aspects of the economy. In March of 1999 the core rate of inflation was .4 percent, the largest in 5 years.

The core rate of inflation for the last 3 months has been .3 percent. This is the highest increase since 1995.

Attack: The Federal Reserve raised interest rates 5 times from June 1999-April 2000.

The Federal Reserve raised rates 14 times in 2005.


Now we see that economists are worried about what they call "stagflation" among other things. How did all of this happen? Will anyone take responsibility? All of this while the Republicans were in charge of the entire federal government? Are we to believe that this is just a strange coincidence or a long series of failing policies? Whatever the cause, someone should pay a price. Someone beside workers with stagnant wages and the poor with increasingly cut benefits.

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