Answer to "No president since FDR has been reelected with unemployment over 7.2 percent"

[JaneQPublic]

The problem with this statement, says Steve Benen of the Maddow Blog, is that it separates FDR from all subsequent presidents, when in fact Obama's situation has more in common with FDR's that it does those of the modern presidents.

http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2012/08/07/13162190-the-limited-value-of-recent-history?lite

In 1936, Roosevelt sought re-election despite 17% unemployment. One can imagine Mitt Romney, Karl Rove, and the Koch brothers running attack ads, reminding Americans that unemployment has been "above 17% for 48 consecutive months" as incontrovertible proof that the New Deal was a "failure."

But on Election Day, FDR won 46 out of 48 states. How could an incumbent president win re-election with an unemployment rate at 17%? Because voters realized the Great Depression wasn't Roosevelt's fault, and the economy was getting better, not worse.

Seventy six years later, President Obama is in a tough fight because unemployment is stuck at 8.25%. Is this high for a modern incumbent president? Obviously it is. But here's the detail I think much of the political establishment fails to appreciate: the Great Recession was a catastrophic economic crisis, unlike anything Americans have seen since the Great Depression.

When pundits compare Obama's economic record against every president since Truman, they're making a fundamental mistake -- no administration was forced to confront a crash of this magnitude since FDR. Comparing Obama to the last 11 presidents is, at its root, deeply misguided.

MORE...
http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2012/08/07/13162190-the-limited-value-of-recent-history?lite

[indepat]

1. Every utterance from the far right is deeply misguided

[Lint Head]

2. No Black President has ever been elected since FDR also.

[catbyte]

3. Simple answer: Mitt Romney wasn't running

[kenny blankenship]

4. Ronald Reagan would be so proud.

[1StrongBlackMan]

5. Absolutely true and sound reasoning ...

except the big difference is FDR didn't have gop-central fox"news" telling working class people that things aren't getting better, despite those working class people having got tax cuts; despite those working class people being able to find jobs; despite those working class people's friends being able to find work; despite those working class people watching the gop do everything that they can to kill what little gains there have been in the economy.

[AnotherMcIntosh]

6. "no administration was forced to confront a crash of this magnitude since FDR."

What you say is true (and there is no doubt that Obama will be easily re-elected), but it might have been helpful if he had not particpated in giving billions to the banksters that helped destroy this economy.

And although Obama will be re-elected, it might have also been helpful if he had not given de facto immunity to them.

It might have been helpful if he had not signed three more job-transferring "free-trade" agreements.

Given the economy, it might have been helpful if his administration was not working on another let's-send-more-jobs-to-foreign-countries "free-trade" agreement.

Trans-Pacific negotiations have been taking place throughout the Obama presidency. The deal is strongly supported by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the top lobbying group for American corporations. Obama's Republican opponent in the 2012 presidential elections, Mitt Romney, has urged the U.S. to finalize the deal as soon as possible.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/13/obama-trade-document-leak_n_1592593.html

Because Obama is running against Rmoney who is worse, he will be re-elected. But no Democratic President other than Obama would have done the about things. At best, we can hope that some of the Democratic Senators can block the pending job-transferring "free-trade" agreement.

[tk2kewl]

7. simpler: no potus has fucked the economy worse than gwb since hoover