Which economy, stupid?

A Bush spokesman raises eyebrows by suggesting that the current economic surge is more robust than the surge of the late '90's

Allow me to preface this post by saying that presidents always get way too much credit and blame for the state of the economy.

Having said that, it's interesting to compare the economic conditions of the Bush presidency to the Clinton presidency. Bush Deputy Press Secretary Tony Fratto told the Examiner that "This is a much stronger expansion in a lot of ways. It's much deeper and more measured."

Fratto points mostly to today's extraordinarily low unemployment numbers, which, at 4.4%, are about a full percentage point lower than they were at the same point during the Clinton expansion. The Clinton people predictably took issue with Fratto's claim. I'm not enough of a student of economics to judge which economy takes the prize, but I do know that the media acts like today's economy is shaky at best, while during the Clinton years they acted like we should all be heating our homes by burning money.

The economy was good then; don't anyone tell the mainstream media, but it's good now as well. That's good news for everyone, and it's a testament to the ongoing benefits of the Reagan Revolution. The Clinton-era surge was powered, at least in part, by a hugely unsustainable dot-com boom. Bush's economy has the specter of the so-called housing bubble. However, while the correction has already begun to a degree, I don't see the housing bubble bursting in the same dramatic fashion as the likes of Pets.com. History, as always, will be the ultimate judge.