3 must-see graphs for a good election

32-straight months of job creation

Payrolls were up by 171,000 jobs in October and the unemployment rate now stands at 7.9%, according to the Labor Department.

Since President Obama took office, the private sector has added 5.2 million jobs - 1.3 million in 2012 alone. When you count the number of private sector jobs created against the number of jobs lost in 2009, job creation is in the black under Barack Obama.

As ThinkProgress reports, "Overall, even accounting for the horrific month for jobs that was January 2009, the private sector has added 759,000 jobs overall under Obama."

As of October 2012, we have experienced 32 consecutive months of job creation.

GDP up 2 percent in the 3rd quarter of 2012

The Commerce Department reports that economic growth in the United States was up two percent in the third quarter of 2012. Our economy has grown for 13-straight quarters - 39 straight months - since 2009. GDP is the measure of the value of all goods and services produced in the United States. According to the report, increased consumer spending and increased housing investment as well as an uptick in federal spending drove the increase. "U.S. economic growth is slow, but not slowing," said Conference Board economist Kathy Bostjancic to the Washington Post.

The U.S. economy has grown for 13-straight quarters.

Federal spending increased by slowest rate in 60 years

Has President Obama presided over a crazy spending spree since taking office? The President's opponents point to the national debt - up from $5 trillion since 2009 - as proof, but "the vast bulk of the increase was caused by a combination of revenue losses due to the 2008-09 economic downturn as well as Bush-era tax cuts and automatic increases in safety-net spending that were already written into law," says Talking Points Memo:

Obama’s policies, including the much-criticized stimulus package, have caused the slowest increase in federal spending of any president in almost 60 years, according to data compiled by the financial news service MarketWatch.

Growth in federal spending by President.