Hillary to Run Against . . . Obama?

Dan Henninger reminds us in the Wall Street Journal this morning of the great Clintonian talent at “triangulation,” and notes the subtle “pivot” Hillary is starting to make against the sorry Obama economic record:

Watching this, one thought: Is the presumed extender of Barack Obama’s third term explicitly separating herself from the economy under his watch for 7 1/2 years? . . . The Clinton campaign is bending to the obvious: Pressed by Donald Trump, she has to free herself from the undertow of the Obama economy.

And just how bad is the economy? The Center for Economic and Policy Research offers this very telling chart today that tells the story pretty simply: this is the weakest economic expansion of the last 40 years. (Notice, along the way, that the most vigorous is still the Ronaldus Magnus boom of the 1980s.)

Recessions Compared copy

 

CEPR comments:

The weak growth for the quarter puts this recovery even further behind any prior recovery at the same stage. After eight and a quarter years, the economy is only 10.1 percent larger than its pre-recession level of output.  A more typical recovery would have seen at least twice as much growth.

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