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Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama on Thursday sought to tie a drop in the gross domestic product to the economic policies of his GOP rival John McCain. “The decline in our GDP didn’t happen by accident – it is a direct result of the Bush Administration's trickle down, Wall Street first, Main Street last policies that John McCain has embraced for the last eight years and plans to continue for the next four,” Obama stated. “These policies didn’t work then, they won’t work now, and I’m running for president to end them.” The Illinois senator touted his middle class tax package as a way out of the crisis. The McCain campaign, on the other hand, argued that Obama’s policies would “accelerate this dangerous course.” “Barack Obama’s ideologically-driven plans to redistribute income will impose higher taxes on families, small businesses, and investors; expensive, rigid, job-killing health mandates on employers; energy policies that fail to promote domestic oil, natural gas, and coal, and will impose a massive Washington-driven regulation of everything from home furnaces to factories; isolationist trade policies that endanger one out of every five jobs; and massive new spending plans that that will burden the economy and saddle our children with debt,” said Douglas Holtz-Eakin, a senior policy adviser for McCain. “Barack Obama is change Americans cannot afford.”
The Bush administration on Thursday announced that the GDP shrank in the third quarter, providing further proof of what many experts already fear – that the country is in a recession. The textbook definition for a recession is an economic situation that sees the GDP drop in consecutive quarters. In the third quarter the GDP dipped 0.3 percent, but it is expected to fall more in the fourth quarter. Obama’s surge in the polls has coincided with the current crisis on Wall Street and Thursday’s news will help the Democrat keep the focus on the economy with the election five days away. The White House said the “GDP report is weak, but it is not unexpected.” “A number of things contributed to the slowing economy in the third quarter – record high energy prices, housing and credit concerns, two major hurricanes, and a prolonged Boeing strike,” White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said. “The president is taking forceful actions to return the economy to growth and job creation by early next year. While we continue to face serious challenges, the United States remains the best place to do business, and we’re positioned to bounce back.” Sam Youngman contributed to this report.
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