Why Doesn't Trump get Credit for Revving up the Economy?

As real data and anecdotal accounts of a growing economy begin to pile up, it will be interesting to see whether the media give President Donald Trump even partial credit for the building momentum. And it isn't just a question of whether the media will treat Trump fairly, but also a question of whether giving credit where credit is due will have a positive effect on his approval ratings and lift the Republican Party's prospects for the November 2018 midterm elections. It is important that Trump and Republicans be associated with the robust economy.

Throughout President Barack Obama's reign, the media rarely if ever blamed him for subjecting the American people to years of historically weak economic performance. There was little criticism of his high-tax, job-killing policies, and practically no one dared to question the thousands of burdensome regulations produced by Obama's imperial presidency.

Indeed, Obama was the only president who never had a single full year with 3 percent gross domestic product growth in the postwar period despite adding more than $9 trillion in debt. Yet there was never much analysis by Democrats and their allies in the liberal media of the damage wrought by the hundreds of billions of dollars in economic activity that didn't happen. Fast-forward to 2017, however, and there is no shortage of stories suggesting that people will — wait for it — die as a result of the Trump tax cuts. Death by tax cuts? Hmm.