"This has been one of the mildest recessions ever"
You MUST be kidding.
It has been one of the longest, at least 3.5 years, since the late 1930s.
Many major companies went belly up. Some due to embezzlement, of course. Many jobs were permanently lost. In particular, the information technology sector was devasted and is still far away from recovery.
"If we had done as the dems wanted and raised taxes, we would have deepened the recession." For sure. Which was just what the Dems wanted, to prepare to retake the White House and both houses of Congress.