People Have Every Right to Be Bitter

The whole dust-up about Obama's statement about people being bitter is, well, overdone.  People have every right to be bitter right now.    Consider the following facts.

First, the last expansion saw the weakest establishment job growth of any expansion since WWII.

As a result, real median household income has been stagnant for this expansion.

People are seeing massive inflation spikes in oil

and agricultural prices

The dollar is hitting fresh lows

They've see the Republican party piss away a budget surplus into a mammoth  increase in debt.  Here is a list of total debt outstanding at the end of the government's fiscal year:

09/30/2007   $9,007,653,372,262.48
09/30/2006 $8,506,973,899,215.23
09/30/2005 $7,932,709,661,723.50
09/30/2004 $7,379,052,696,330.32
09/30/2003 $6,783,231,062,743.62
09/30/2002 $6,228,235,965,597.16
09/30/2001 $5,807,463,412,200.06
09/30/2000 $5,674,178,209,886.86

To place that in perspective, total debt as a percentage of GDP increased from 57% to 64% under Bush's tenure.

Bottom line -- the US economy isn't doing that well and hasn't for some time.  Thanks to Republican mismanagement the federal government's finances are a shambles. And I haven't even mentioned anything about health insurance, college tuition costs, or CEO pay.