Failure?
Depends on what the goal was, doesn’t it?
I wonder if in the election it matters what the valuations are.
Most Americans can not evaluate the difference between hundreds of millions and hundreds of billions and trillions. The numbers are so large they are incomprehensible. Most Americans cannot distinguish between federal debt and federal deficit. To attach incomprehensible values to incomprehensible concepts is , well, incomprehensible.
What is real, what is understandable, is no job, fear of losing a job, the price of gasoline, of hamburger, of cereal, of ice cream. What is real is the effect the incomprehensible facts have on the daily struggle. It is the increasing intensity of the struggle that will decide the issue.
Obama figures that he did cut the deficit in half -
It was only half of what he originally intended.
This is another big-time winning issue for Romney/Ryan, but they need to hit it from an emotional angle. Constantly remind voters that this debt will crush their children and grandchildren, and any hopes they have for a better America.
And his budget proposal called for more trillions of deficit spending in his next term...