The Colonel's Forum

Top 5 Obama contributors - University of California, Microsoft, Google Harvard, the Federal government. Top 5 Romney contributors - Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Credit Suisse, JP Morgan Chase, Morgan Stanley.  You can't make this stuff up. Obama is supported by higher education, IT, and government employees who want to keep their jobs.  Romney is supported by Wall Street, who has done SO MANY AMAZING things for America lately! http://www.opensecrets.org/

$0 - total dollars Obama has received from political action committees $901,524 - total dollars Romney has received from political action committees Relative to the obscene amount of money that is flowing into this election cycle, $900K is a drop in the bucket.  And Obama definitely benefits from PACs, they're just advertising on his behalf rather than directly contributing to his campaign.  It is interesting as a matter of principle though. Obama was the first candidate (in 2008) to reject PAC money because of the obvious influence it has once you're elected.   You don't need to look any further than Kentucky's own Mitch McConnell to see that.  His biggest contributors are investment bankers and coal miners, and guess what two industries he's gone out of his way to support? Here's the problem though - those companies aren't based in Kentucky, the state he was sent to the Senate to represent.  http://www.opensecrets.org/  is a great site tha...

How did Romney get $100 million in his IRA, a middle class retirement vehicle with a $6k maximum annual contribution? He lied, because that's what rich people do to dodge taxes.  In order to get that much money in there legally, he'd have to have given the max contribution for 16,666 years.  Read more here . Let me be clear - I have no problem with rich people, or the fact that they dodge taxes. Dodging taxes, legally or otherwise, is an American tradition that goes back to the founding of our country, literally. What bothers me is when they dodge taxes and then claim they need a tax cut.  They say this in the same breath that they complain about our budget deficit, and justify it by suggesting that the rest of us are all dumb enough to believe that "if you give rich people a tax cut, they'll go out tomorrow and create jobs." That's horse shit, and every tax cut since Carter confirms it.

Today's number is $4 Million.  That's how much Mitt Romney donated to charity in 2011.  Wouldn't it be nice if we all made so much money that we could all give $4 Million a year to charity and still maintain 3 very nice homes? Here's the problem Mitt made for himself though. Earlier this year, Mitt refused to release several years of tax returns.  Critics claimed that Mitt was hiding something. Senator Harry Reid went so far as to say that he had "strong evidence" that Romney had paid $0 taxes in recent years. Still waiting on Harry to back that one up. To silence these critics though, Mitt provided an extra tidbit of information; he said "I've never paid less than 13% in taxes."  He went on to clarify that he takes every deduction possible, and in a debate said  "I don't think you want someone as the candidate for president who pays more taxes than he owes."   You see, in Mitt's world, the fact that he maximizes his deducti...

Today's statistic comes to us from "the horse's mouth" - 47%. Thanks Mitt. It's been several days since the now-infamous "secret" fundraiser video was released (even more by the time this scheduled post goes live), but I have to say I honestly felt badly for the guy when it came out. The man was making a sales pitch to rich donors, and without rich donors you literally cannot run a Presidential campaign these days. This is a point on which both candidates agree. What Mitt was trying to do is explain how he planned to court the "undecided" electorate. This is like that TV show "shark tank"; he was pitching his business plan to investors. What he forgot was a cardinal rule: know when to shut up. His point about how to win this election is spot on. The polls have clearly shown that this is a close race, the country is roughly evenly divided, and both candidates are trying to court the "middle" without losing the "base....

Ironically, health care is one of the issues where it's very easy to compare the candidates. Thanks to Romneycare, we know exactly where Mitt stands on this issue, unless of course he's changed his mind again. Today's stat is 33,000,000 - that's how many MORE people will have health insurance 10 years from now, thanks to Obamacare. In Massachusetts, companies with more than 10 employees must offer health insurance or pay a penalty. The federal approach imposes the requirement on companies with 50 employees or more. So Obamacare gives a pass to the smallest businesses, while still extending them an incentive (in the form of a tax break) to provide coverage for their employees. FYI more than 90% of small businesses in this country have fewer than 50 employees. Both plans restructure the insurance market. In Massachusetts, the reform law merged the individual and small-group markets (that is, the market serving individuals not covered by their employer's plan a...

Let's talk about Obamacare, and how it helps the middle class. Two numbers today: 141% and 1.5 years. This is a chart showing health care spending relative to life expectancy for the richest countries in the world (OECD member countries). I think it's probably the best way to begin a health care discussion because almost anyone can agree that life expectancy is a pretty good measure of the effectiveness of healthcare, and also that, as Americans, we love a good deal. We want to get the most for our money. We spend 141% more per person than the average country on this chart, and our life expectancy is 1.5 years less. We spend more than twice as much as Japan, and they live 5 years longer.  We are not getting a good deal, at all, and this represents a tremendous burden on our economy as a whole, and the middle class. $2,600,000,000,000.  That's $2.6 Trillion, the total amount we spent on health care in 2010. We're spending more and more each year as a percentage of ...

Today's statistic is zero.  That's the net effect of tax rates on government revenues relative to GDP. So it doesn't matter if we have Obama's tax hike for the top 2%, or Romney's tax cuts for everyone, the Federal government tends to bring in about the same amount of money (relative to GDP) regardless. Surprised? I was too.  By the way, that top tax bracket number is worth point out too - the richest Americans really did pay 90% in the 50s, and 70% up until the Reagan years. Romney wants to give a big tax cut, Obama wants to raise them on the rich. These are largely symbolic gestures that will have no real impact on solving our budget problems. Ryan has proposed closing loopholes, but he continually refuses to say which ones. That actually could affect the middle class, because, even more so than the top 1%, middle class families enjoy tremendous benefits from the current loopholes (mortgage interest, child tax credit etc.). At the same time, Ryan wants to e...

With part 20 in the series, I am starting a segment on the middle class. Today's number is 281% - that's the starting point for this discussion.  Since 1979, the top 1% have seen a 281% increase in their after tax income, 10 times what the middle fifth has seen, and triple what the top 80% of families have seen.  Put simply, the rich are getting MUCH richer while the middle class is getting screwed. The GOP will tell you that Obama and the Dems talk in terms of class warfare. That's an exaggeration of course, but it's not entirely inaccurate, and there's a reason. Take a look at this chart. The red line at the top is the income gains of the wealthiest 1% of Americans since 1979: Over the past 30 years, the wealth gap in this country has increased dramatically. We all know that money runs modern politics, and if you look at this chart and don't think that the top 1% are using their money to protect the status quo, you're just nuts. Of course they are...

Today is the start of a series where I'll take a detailed look at the economy.  One of the common themes on both sides of this election is "are you better off than you were 4 years ago?"  I think that's pretty subjective, and it's typically a stretch to give the President either credit or blame for what's happened.  Still, politics is personal, voters love this framework, so I'll attempt to put some concrete numbers behind it. Today's chart tracks Gross Domestic Product, or GDP, which is a measure of the total output of the US economy.  The number is $13.6 trillion, which is our projected 2012 GDP.  It was $13.4 trillion in 2008, so that's an increase which is good.  So, based on economic output, we are better off today than we were 4 years ago.  That's just one measure though, so stay tuned in the coming days as we look at a few more.

Another ratio today, 10:1.  Romney was asked "would you agree to a deficit reduction program that offered $10 in spending cuts for every $1 in tax increases?" and his answer was "no."  I cannot think of a more clear example of how the GOP is not willing to compromise. 69% of the country favors some type of deficit reduction approach that includes a mix of spending cuts and tax increases.  Even billionaire Republican donor David Koch says the U.S. probably needs higher taxes to reduce the federal budget deficit.  Mitt Romney is among the 31% of Americans (and way too many people in Congress) who refuse to accept any tax increase.

Today's stat is a year: 2017.  That's the year Medicare will run out of money.  50,000,000 seniors depend on it, so we should probably fix it.  Medicare is also a major drain on our budget - right now 21% of our federal tax dollars go to support it, making it just slightly higher than defense spending. So how to the candidates differ?  Well, they both agree it's broken, and they both want to tie Medicare spending to a percentage of GDP, meaning as the national economy improves or declines, Medicare spending goes with it.  The key difference is this; Obama is a critic of premium support. He would retain Medicare's defined-benefit structure, meaning that the government will pay whatever it takes to cover a specified set of services.  Romney prefers a "defined contribution" approach, without actually fixing what's wrong with Medicare.  This means, rather than paying whatever it takes, he'll give you a check, and you're on your own if that isn...

Well, I guess #10 means we're 1/6 of the way there.  When I started this project, I wondered if I could actually find 60 relevant statistics, but maybe it's possible. Today's statistic is 608,000 - that's the number of government jobs lost or eliminated by Obama.  That's right, under his watch the government payroll (including state & local) has shrunk 2.7%.  At the same point in Bush's first term, public sector employment was UP 3.7%.  Are you noticing a theme here?  Republican Presidents absolutely do not shrink the size of government.  Here's a chart of just the Bush/Obama 1st term comparison .

Let's talk about the growth of government - 1.3% under Obama, 2.6% under "W."  Here's a chart showing the rate at which government spending has grown over the last 40 years.  Take a look at the Carter, Clinton, & Obama years relative to the Republican presidents.  Framing it as "per capita" is better than looking at the raw numbers because the size of our country has changed over the last 40 years . That's right kids, Obama and Clinton were the two most austere Presidents in recent history.

In episode #7 we talked about jobs, but what about the economy as a whole?  Which party has a better history when it comes to economic growth?  Let me put on my financial adviser hat. Over the five decades since John F. Kennedy was inaugurated, $1,000 invested in a hypothetical fund that tracks the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index (SPX) only when Democrats are in the White House would have been worth $10,920 in February of 2012. That’s more than nine times the dollar return an investor would have realized from following a similar strategy during Republican administrations. A $1,000 stake invested in a fund that followed the S&P 500 under Republican presidents, starting with Richard Nixon, would have grown to $2,087 on the day George W. Bush left office. So, if you like a good return on your investments, and I do, vote Obama/Biden.  Or to put it in terms my GOP leaning friends might better understand "If you vote Romney/Ryan, you're anti-business!"

Let's continue the jobs theme for today's statistic.  Thanks to Bill Clinton for researching this one for me :-) 42,000,000 - private sector jobs added to the economy under Democrat Presidents over the last 52 years. 24,000,000 - private sector jobs added to the economy under GOP Presidents over the last 52 years. Think he's full of it?   Politifact says his numbers are accurate . In case you're wondering, that's 24 years of Democrats, 28 years of Republicans, going back to (and including) Kennedy.  The Democrats achieved that number with 4 fewer years in the oval office, and this includes Obama's 4 years which were the worst recession during the period. Mitt Romney said " this election is about jobs ."  I agree.  If you can look at these numbers and honestly convince yourself "Romney's financial plan is not at all like Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush, Bush; he'll buck the trend," then I can't help you.

Today's number is 4,500,000 - the number of private sector jobs created over the past 29 months.  It doesn't take a genius to look at this graph and see how Obama turned around a negative jobs situation upon taking office.  Mitt Romney claims his time at Bain Capital resulted in the creation of 100,000 jobs, but the Washington Post awarded him 3 Pinocchios for that claim.  For those who don't know how private equity firms work, Bain actually invented a model that is very popular called a leveraged buyout; buying existing firms with money mostly borrowed from banking institutions and using the newly bought firms' assets as collateral, and selling them off in a few years.  A side effect of this is often bankrupting the company or shutting down factories/stores to make the firm more profitable.  It actually makes perfect business sense, to the point that the model has become widely adopted in the finance industry.  You just need to not care about the poor s...

Today's statistic is on a different defense topic - ZERO.  That's the number of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) found in Iraq, where George W. Bush launched an unfunded war on the premise that they had WMD.  Related numbers include 4,805 coalition forces killed, 32,753 wounded, and 110,000 Iraqi civilians killed (that's the official number, many suspect the actual is higher). Total cost of the war ?  $3,700,000,000,000.  That's $3.7 trillion, kids, and that number is still rising.  August 31, 2010 - that's the day that Barack Obama ended the Iraq war he inherited.  I agree - Obama can't blame Bush for everything.  But that particular $3.7 trillion is fair game, I think. Here's where US Defense spending is today, compared to the next 15 biggest spenders: Mitt Romney wants to place a "floor" on defense spending at 4% of GDP , which is roughly 20% of the federal budget.  He wants to cut government spending, he wants to balance the budget, h...

Today's number is 262, that's the number of drone strikes in Pakistan that Obama has ordered.  That's 5 times the number Bush ordered over his 8-years in office.  Here's a map and a link to more details: I'll leave it to the military experts and ethics wonks to debate whether drone strikes are moral or not.  What I do know is that drone strikes work.  In a New York Times article , a former Air Force officer turned philosopher says "all the evidence we have so far suggests that drones do better at both identifying the terrorist and avoiding collateral damage than anything else we have.”  Sounds pretty good to me. I think this is relevant because it says Obama is not a wuss, which is what the GOP would have us believe.  I guarantee any detailed analysis of any Romney/Ryan budget will reveal that age old Republican stance of "we need to be spending more on defense."  There have already been suggestions that Obama wants to cut defense spending, and...

In part 2 of this series, I'd like to look at Obama's record.  The number is 190 - that's how many of his campaign promises Obama has kept, according to the people over at politifact .  That sounds like a big number, but any good stats professor will tell you "when they give you a number, ask for a %, and when they give you a %, ask for a number." 190 represents 37% of the campaign promises that candidate Obama made in 2008.  He has broken 83 (16%) and there are a total of 161 (32%) that are either stalled or in the works.  A related interesting number is 72 (14%) - that's the number of campaign promises where Obama has COMPROMISED with the Republicans to achieve something that advances his goal, rather than nothing at all. Let's put that in simpler terms with a little rounding.  For every 10 promises this guy made, he's delivered on 4 of them, broken 2 of them, compromised on 1 of them, and the remaining 3 are either stalled or in the works. ...