President Barack Obama’s statement, later “clarified,” and
explained by his faithful MSM spinners as “taken out of context,” created quite
a little stir as his GOP opponent, Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, got
a nice new point of attack in the presidential campaign. The president
apparently was trying make the point that the public sector was suffering more;
he wanted to push his idea of bailing our cities and states.
The public sector under Obama has grown greatly, and the
private sector (other than some large companies and some Obama cronies) has had, and still has,
the worst of it. The May employment figures testify to the continuing trials
and struggles of millions of American families. May figures were worse than
those of April.
Only 69,000 jobs were added, not as good as the weak 115,000
for April. Over 120,000 per month are needed just to keep pace with population
growth. The total number of unemployed persons grew by 225,000 to 12,725,000.
The “official” (U-2) unemployment rate rose from 8.1 percent to 8.2 percent.
The U-6 measure of total unemployed and underemployed rose by 300,000 to
14,800,000. Teenage unemployment was down slightly, but still very high at 24.6
percent. Overall, a dismal situation, and not improved.
In a U.S. News and
World Report article, Rick Newman
points out that small business is especially hurting.
Small businesses are reeling. Small business optimism has emerged from the cellar, but it's still at recessionary levels, according to surveys from the National Federation for Independent Business. Spending and hiring plans are extremely weak, which is bad news because small and medium-sized businesses create the majority of new jobs in the economy. Big businesses, by contrast, tend to consolidate employment via mergers and acquisitions and various types of scaling and streamlining. Some pockets of the private sector are actually doing okay. They're just not the ones where most Americans work.
The public sector is, on the whole, doing much better than
the private sector, but Obama’s sympathies are mostly with the public sector.
He wants more billions of dollars to protect the jobs of teachers, police
officers and firefighters, but, as Newman points out, these public employees
have fared better than private sector blue-collar workers.
Rush Limbaugh had a very interesting response to the
president’s comment, as the following indicates:
Polls such as Rasmussen are showing Obama and Romney about
even among likely voters. I would like to see the results of a poll among
unemployed people.
While Obama inherited a difficult situation, he has done
many things to make it worse. When he had Democratic majorities in both houses
of Congress who were ready to rubber-stamp whatever he wanted, his main concern
was not unemployment or the economy, but rather getting his socialist Obamacare
and cap-and-trade laws passed. He has blamed everyone except himself for his
failure to significantly improve things in over three years in office. He
doesn’t have the ability to deal successfully with the economy. People are
indicating that they trust Romney more than Obama on the economy. It is
puzzling that Obama, after his economic failures, foreign policy disasters,
multiple race card plays, nanny-state proposals, and serious scandals, still
has a chance to win the election.
Romney needs to forcefully articulate conservative
principles, educate more people on capitalism, and get the GOP united behind
him. If he does, he is very likely to be successful.
Photo: Sculpture of 1930 breadline from FDR Memorial. Via Public Domain Pictures.
