Once again the media has worked to perpetrate a lie on the American public to help the Democratic party.

The economy is strong, and about as strong as in 96 when Clinton ran for reelection.

Yet then the media hailed the same performance that they now belittle.

Not only did Bush inherit a recession and of course, the terrorist problem, but he didn't get his first budget passed until October of 2001.

Realistically, any new president just cannot have much impact on the macroeconomy in their first year.

So really Bush should be judged more on the performance of the economy from 2002 through now, and that would show significant job growth.

It is an utter fallacy to judge a new president's economic policies from the day he is inaugurated, as if he can just snap his fingers and magically have his policies put in place.

How DARE you use logic to determine the worth of Democratic accusations?!? Don't you know that feeeeeeeeeelings are all-important?!?

{/moonbattus Californicus}

I've always believed that America would be so much better off if every American in school were taught basic economics.

Just teaching everyone the old axiom that there is no such thing as a free lunch would be huge.

If we had everyone understand that everything has a cost, it's just a matter of who pays, how much is paid and how much is received in return, then we would go along way to having better government.

As Neil Boortz has remarked, the Democratic party would cease to exist of all Americans became educated.

Bush has had to deal with a recession, the collapse of the dot-com bubble, and the collapse of the bloated airline industry (post-Sept 11).

Hell, I'm surprised the economy is doing as well as it is.

Kerry did a radio interview (more a radio speech, the interviewer didn't really ask him anything challenging at all) here in NH a week or so ago. I sort of laughed when he went into his litany of job loss spiel. NH has something like a 3.4% unemployment rate, and a pretty low overall tax burden-his spiel just didn't play with me.

Kerry is a reciter of useless facts-he would probably be a good trivial pursuit partner, but I wouldn't want him running the country.

Kerry has no real platform to run upon, except gloom and doom...that is his strategy...he knows he lacks the message and charisma to win on his own appeal, and so he is hoping to gin up enough anti-Bush sentiment...

I don't understand the job loss issue, could someone please direct me to where the raw data reall is?

Because when I go here:
http://www.economagic.com/

and select US Civilian Labor Force
under Bureau of Labor Statistics
and then select Civilian Labor Force

then select Civilian Labor Force; Thousands; SA

Pull up the Gif chart and adjust it for

Dec 2000 to now I seem to get an increase of about 4 million?

If I adjust the graph back to 1992 the slope seems to be constant. Except for a strange vertical jump about the beginning of 2000.

Kerry's negatives are running higher than his positives, and still we're in a very volatile race. In addition to the causes cited above, employment gains were also depressed by numerous hurricanes coming ashore in the southeast.

Dan:

The +4,000,000 number is correct (it is the total job increase). The jump in 2000 is from a change in the way they count jobs. I think it adds about 800,000 jobs created to Clinton's second term.

The number that they talk about in the press is something like "private sector payroll" employment, which does not include self-employed and government employed. Since there are something like 2,000,000 more self-employeds out there now (company owners, private consultants, etc), you can see how this number won't jibe with total employment changes.

You can go to the Bureau of Labor Stastics, but you still have to be very careful how you select the options---otherwise you will find an "unfortunate" increase in jobs.

Here is how you get the Kerry numbers. Go to this link, then select seasonally-adjusted total private, then click on the retrieve button at the bottom of the page. You'll find a net change since January, 2001 of -1.6 million jobs. Of course of you go since January 2002 (a more reasonable test of Bush's policies), you find instead +803 thousand jobs.

Hope this helps. Mea culpa for any errors in my post.

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Here is how you get the Kerry numbers. Go to this link, then select seasonally-adjusted total private, then click on the retrieve button at the bottom of the page. You'll find a net change since January, 2001 of -1.6 million jobs. Of course of you go since January 2002 (a more reasonable test of Bush's policies), you find instead +803 thousand jobs.

Hope this helps. Mea culpa for any errors in my post.

Posted by Carrick Talmadge at November 1, 2004 01:22 AM
****************************************
Thanks a lot Carrick of COURSE they don't want to count entrepreneurs THEY would probably be Republicans LOL

George W -

Go pick up an economics book and look up something called "sticky indicators." Wages are one of them.

Because of a structural change in the economy, our good jobs are just getting started.

I'm sorry that you work in a carriage factory, but perhaps it's time for you to move on and get some vocational training.

It's important to note that Kerry significantly understates his case regarding job losses.

Kerry doesn't bother to mention that the working age population has INCREASED by 10 million people since January '01, when Bush took office.

To add 10 million working age people and STILL have a net loss of jobs is a much worse record than Kerry give Bush credit for!

To stay even with the population increase, 6.6 million jobs would have had to been added!

Actually Will X, I do not make carriages. I am a water treatment professional (hard to get more basic than this) with a lot of years of experience. I am educated. I am literate. I do not confine my study to what I agree with. I am not naive enough to believe everything I read and I am highly suspicious of skewed statistics.

I do not need a propaganda machine to tell me the economy isn't in the toilet when I can see the evidence that it is.

Unlike the other George W...I can balance a checkbook.

I am blessed to have family and close friends scattered all over the globe so I get to hear first hand rather than rely on 'Reporters'.

I had wonderful teachers who taught me to think for myself rather than blindly following the media hucksters.

It is simple. Bush is going to pay off a lot of political debts in his last 4 years. This ain't rocket science. Every lame duck president does this. It is how and why they get elected. It is all about greed and Bush has some real greedy backers. The taxpayer is going to foot the bill for these payoffs and I, for one, do not think we can afford to.
We are already overdrawn.
George W.

George W -

I'm with you all the way. As I pointed out above: BUSH'S RECORD ON JOB LOSS IS MUCH WORSE THAN KERRY SAYS IT IS. Since the population has grown, the economy needs more jobs just to break even.

I think you meant to address your comment to "Bill from INDC".