HOWEVER our total debt is actually $16.0 trillion (perhaps more, since that was the debt limit reached during the demoRAT convention), so who accounted for the additional $3.2 trillion debt ($16.0 - $12.8 trillion) that got us to $16.0 trillion? Did we have a period of time in American history with no president in office, that accounted for the $3.2 trillion difference?
So who accounted for the $3.2 trillion difference? It seems to me, that it would have to be added onto the previous presidents up to GW Bush. And believe me, I am a staunch lifelong conservative. I am just curious as it seems the total of all previous presidents should be $9.5 trillion ($6.3 + $3.2) rather than $6.3 trillion.
Here’s another take on it. Even the nytimes can’t make obama look good. This is their way of trying to make Obama look good, but imagine the impact on some of their readers learning this for the first time. This is roughly the equivalent of Romney saying Obama was responsible for the Benghazi murders, and the nytimes countering with “He only killed one or two of them.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/20/us/politics/fact-checking-obama-and-romney.html?pagewanted=all
In Romney and Obama Speeches, Selective Truths
Federal Debt
Mr. Obama has “added almost as much debt as all the prior presidents combined.” — Mr. Romney
The total national debt now stands at $15.8 trillion, up from $10.6 trillion when Mr. Obama took office, an increase of nearly 50 percent. A commonly cited and more economically important subset, debt held by the public, has grown to $11 trillion from $6.3 trillion, a 75 percent increase — closer to Mr. Romney’s claim, but still $1.7 trillion short of matching the accumulated public debt of the first 43 presidents. Adjusted for inflation, the debt Mr. Obama incurred is smaller relative to the combined prior debt.