http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2011/may/19/nancy-pelosi/nancy-pelosi-posts-questionable-chart-debt-accumul/ in which: she promotes this table on how much each president raised the debt:
Ronald Reagan: Up 189 percent
George H.W. Bush: Up 55 percent
Bill Clinton: Up 37 percent
George W. Bush: Up 115 percent
Barack Obama: Up 16 percent
PolitiFact concede that the numbers for Bush 1 and Clinton are correct. They ignore Reagan because the source they used didn't go back that far. But those numbers are easy to track down. I get 186% under Reagan. not the same but close enough The big discrepancy was that Pelosi's staff made a mistake, and started Obama's term on 20 Jan 2010, not 2009 as is correct. this moves one year of supposed Bush debt to Obama, giving Bush 86% increase and Obama 34% up to the date of the chart.
Then they double down. They point out that some economists think that the ratio of debt to GDP is what's important, to factor in inflation and such. GDP grew during Bush II, and collapsed in the worst recession in 70 years almost simultaneously with the election. So under Bush, the denominator grew, and under Obama it shrunk dramatically. So reporting things this way makes it look like Obama grew the debt much more than he did. To be fair, nearly all of Obama's debt is stuff he had no control whatever on: increased medical costs, unemployment insurance, and very little on things like the wars.
And don't forget, there's a recognized corrector for inflation: CPI. based on that, Obama grew it 35%, GWB 71%, Clinton 30%.
PolitiFact gave Pelosi's staiff their "Pants on Fire" rating. A fairer analysis gives it a "Half True" rating. This sort of thing is shockingly common on PolitiFact.
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