1115.org

Okay, boys and girls, children of all ages. Pick up those pencils. Here’s the question: “How much has the national debt increased under President George W. Bush?”

You can give yourself full marks if you said either “More than three trillion dollars” or “By more than 50%”.

It is now “$8.648 trillion, up from $5.63 trillion when Bush took office”.

Or if you’d rather look at the picture that’s worth a thousand words, here’s a graph that shows how the national debt fared under different Presidents (since 1938). It starts to shoot up under Reagan, keeps increasing at an increasing rate under Reagan and Bush the First (a convex curve), starts increasing at an decreasing rate under Clinton (a concave curve) and actually levels off at the end. Then along comes Bush the Second (aka Bush the Destroyer). There’s a sharp discontinuity as the graph shoots up with the steepest slope it’s ever had.

Over Reagan’s eight years, the national debt went from roughly one trillion dollars to three. Over Bush the first’s four years, $3 trillion became roughly $4.4 trillion. Clinton’s eight years saw it go from 4.4 to 5.6. Now, by the time Bush the Destroyer is done having his way with the economy, we’ll be close to $10 trillion.