No Thank You, Obama

While touting the new Census report on income and poverty in America, Barack Obama took credit for $2 a gallon gasoline, and immodestly shouted to his crowd of supporters: “Thank you, Obama.”

I don’t want to sound ungrateful, but given that for eight years your administration has done everything to decapitate the oil and gas industry that gave us low gas prices, sorry, no thanks are in order Mr. President.

Even more amazing was Mr. Obama’s victory lap on the income numbers. Yes, incomes for middle class families rose by an impressive 5 percent in 2015. And poverty fell. Thank goodness. It’s about time.

But the Census report was anything but cause for celebration. It is a stinging indictment of the policy results of both the George W. Bush and the Obama legacies. They both miserably failed and are equally culpable for the sad state of the American family finances today.

We now have a greater insight as to why Americans say by a two-to-one margin that the country is going in the wrong direction. Census found that American incomes are lower today (adjusted for inflation) than they were in 2007. What kind of recovery is this, when we still haven’t made up the lost ground from a recession that happened seven years ago? Thank you, Mr. Obama.