by Bob Cesca - Daily Banter

Here are a few of the factual nuggets:

Fact: the president has reduced the deficit from $1.4 trillion to a projected $977 billion in the last fiscal year of his first term, 2013. $500 billion in total deficit reduction in four years. While I personally would have preferred more spending given the depth of the recession, from the perspective of deficit reduction, this can be considered a considerable achievement and far from the big spending, big government myth the Republicans have created. Meanwhile, the national debt continues to grow, but the year-over-year growth of the debt has slowed from 15% in the president’s first year to 4% in his third year. Likewise, the year-over-year growth in the size of government is the lowest since the 1950s.

One million unemployed Americans found jobs in the first six months of 2012 alone. Inflation is 1.4% — a full point below its all-time average and four points below its 5.6% rate in July, 2008. Home sales are up. Home prices are up. Consumer debt is down. Income tax rates remain at an all-time low. The Medicare prescription donut-hole is closing, with 5.2 million seniors and people with disabilities having saved $4 billion on prescription drug costs because of the evil, evil Affordable Care Act. Preventative medicine is now fully covered by both Medicare and private insurance without deductibles or coinsurance. Millions of Americans in their 20s are now insured under their parents’ health insurance. Medicaid and SCHIP have been expanded, making it easier for struggling families to get healthcare. Women are closer than ever to paycheck equality. The war in Iraq is over. Bin Laden was hunted down and killed.