Your first reply doesn't say anything that's not true of any US president, particularly during a time of many crises, like this time.
it isn't the labor report i disbelieve, the facts are there in the numbers. it's the interpretation of the stats that is incorrect - bloomberg's "spin", if you will. i believe the BLS raw data. i also believe the consumer confidence data.
i beg your pardon, ricter. i was hungry, so i stepped out to lunch (it being lunch time here on the east coast) and i underestimated how critically you were waiting with baited breath on my answer. regardless, it is above. i am back from lunch now, so if you have a witty follow-up, feel free to post it. i'll do my best to scan in and out every once in a while to assure i dont keep you waiting.
Ahh, "interpretation", nice play! You're of course not "interpreting" the consumer confidence data... merely accepting it--the numbers speak for themselves. But the employment numbers, well, those need interpretation! Don't get me wrong, I actually like that move. : )
I'm just wondering to which tax cuts are we referring? Are we talking about the Bush tax cuts that were simply not left to expire? I'm only aware of a single significant tax cut that can be attributed to Obama right now. The one year reduction in FICA tax. All other main provisions of the Obama plan that could possibly have any effect on the overall economy were implemented during the Bush years, and then simply extended by Obama. Which cut am I missing? <serious question>
The only thing you are missing is the spin by Ricter. The only tax cuts are the extension of the Bush Tax Cuts. Obama said the Republicans were holding the middle class hostage to get the Bush tax cuts extended and now Ricter wants to call them the Obama Tax Cuts since he wants to credit them with helping the economic recovery. That's how liberals operate. They know no shame.
no, i'm saying the same thing i've said all along. the author is incorrectly interpreting what the job data is showing. for example, saying the employment situation is improving merely because the U3 shows that the unemployment rate dropped from 9.8 or so down to the latest release of 8.9%. it looks at 192,000 increase in payrolls and calls that an improvement in the job picture, without considering how many jobs must be created simply to hold ground in the declining labor participation rate. it also ignores, conveniently, the people falling out of the labor force as they are no longer counted. the article makes no mention of any of the army of folks that no longer qualify for benefits (like the so-called 99ers) and aren't counted any longer. if you consider ALL of the data (and the author does not) then you would have to be a complete and total idiot to think the job market is improving. challenge me on this stuff, please. the author takes the confidence data and merely regurgitates what the release board said - offering no new analysis - and is therefore, by default, correct. because the confidence board offers an interpretation of the data (which is no where near as complex as the BLS data) while the BLS focuses on providing an interpretation of only the U3 and ignores the rest of the data. spin, if you will. so you can be as sarcastic as you want in your responses, but i'm right, and you're not.
Your inclusion of the 99rs makes a good point, but people are always giving up and dropping out at some percentage of all those looking-- excepting the problematic 99rs, it's a wash. You have made a very good argument, which ironically I'll be able to use later, in other threads: there's little doubt that there is no place to go for many, many people, motivated to get off welfare or not. And to bring home tens of thousands of our boys, well, there's no place for them, either. Interestingly, my own sales, mostly in the US (it's nuts there right now), but to a good degree in Canada, too, are growing nicely. Welcome to another jobless recovery.
I really was asking a serious question though. I wasn't trying to be facetious. I know there were several alternative fuel tax credits and things of that nature, but I think it is obvious that these have little discernible impact on the economic measures that were cited. So there was the lower FICA tax for one year that was Obama. There was an extension of unemployment benefits, but I fail to see how that can be considered a tax cut, and it's very debatable as to whether it is really helping the economy, or just costing us more money.
You're dead wrong about that, pspr. I used "Obama" because I knew it would get a rise out of the right. You guys do the same thing but with one important difference: you believe he's responsible for everything.