Obama: 'I Built This Economy, Not Trump!'
Ex-president Barack Obama attempts to take credit for Trump's economy
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Former President Barack Obama is back out on the road, but now he's attempting to claim credit for President Trump's booming economy.
The reality, however, is that the only thing Obama deserves credit for is making it simple for Trump to undo Obama's anti-growth policies.
The United States is currently in the midst of an economic boom.
This success was kickstarted after Trump reversed almost all of Obama's failed policies, yet we're somehow expected to believe that it's Obama who deserves all the credit.
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Daily Wire reports: The U.S. economy sputtered throughout his eight years in office (he blamed predecessor George W. Bush, of course, and when that got tired, he blamed Congress). But now that the economy is booming, Obama's demanding credit.
"We worked hard to turn this economy around when I was president," Obama told a crowd of thousands in a school auditorium in Cleveland, Ohio, on Tuesday as he campaigns for a Democratic candidate.
"And the actions that we took during the economic crisis returned the economy to healthy growth, initiated the longest streak of job creation on record, which continues to today ... "
"So just remember that: When you hear these folks bragging about this economic miracle, just remember when it started!" Obama yelled, prompting cheers.
"Just remember when the ball got rolling."
But Investor's Business Daily did a nice piece this week on the two economies headlined "Sorry Obama, But It's Trump's Economic Boom, Not Yours."
The rate of GDP growth was decelerating in Obama's last year.
It went from 2.3% in Q2, to 1.9% in Q3 to 1.8% in Q4 of 2016.
Under Trump, GDP growth has averaged 2.9%.
It was 4.2% last quarter and might be higher in the current one.
The stock market also was stuck in neutral the year before the November 2016 elections.
The Dow is up by some 45% since then.
Real median family income didn't budge from August 2015 to November 2016, according to Sentier Research.
It's up more than 4% since Trump came into office. Wages are on the upswing.
In Obama's last year, the unemployment rate remained basically unchanged — it was 4.9% in Jan 2016, and 4.8% when Trump took office in Jan. 2017.
Now it's down to 3.9%
We could go on.
Meanwhile, the same reporters now patting Obama on the back for today's strong economy were reporting in late 2016 about how — as The New York Times put it — "the underlying reality of low growth will haunt whoever wins the White House."
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That certainly hasn't haunted President Trump.
In Ohio, where Obama was speaking, Republican Party Chairman Jane Timken said Obama was all wrong.
"Obama can't take credit for the economy. Republicans should take credit for the economy," Timken said.
"As I said, the Democrats want to tout their economic policies, but I think you see that overwhelmingly in 2016, voters in Ohio rejected those policies.
"They knew that they weren't working for them."
