Job Market a Mess Despite Media Sugarcoating

The job market is a gauge as to how we are progressing in this recession. By the looks of it, it's still a regression:

On a non-seasonally adjusted basis, initial claims were 577,506.

“The improvement in first week of July was exaggerated by the timing of plant closures,” Vitner said. “This is something we’re going to be dealing with throughout the month.”

Meanwhile, the number of people requesting continued jobless benefits rose to a record high, indicating that the labor market remains weak.

The government said continuing claims rose to 6,883,000 in the week ended June 27, the most recent data available.

That’s an increase of 159,000 from the previous week’s revised total of 6,724,000 and was the highest reading since the Labor Department began keeping records in 1967.

Since 1967? That includes the recessions of the seventies, early 80's and the nineties. Things are bad and this is the single most striking example that the stimulus bill was a sham (a sham wholly-owned by the Democrats)and nothing more than a sop to Democratic politicians to give to there constituencies and for state governors to use to pay debt. It created no significant jobs in any area with the possible exception of government.

The money should have been targeted for infrastructure as Obama claimed it would and also used to cut taxes to spur growth as Reagan did. Instead we have the NEA meting out $10K here and there that accomplishes nothing more than putting a few pennies in the wallet of a sixth-rate artist in Chicago.

So how did CNN headline this story of utter failure? About how you'd expect them to:

Fewer than expected file for unemployment

This is spin on a grand scale but sadly expected from a once-proud news organization that is mired in last place at all time slots.

Things are bad and Obama is paying for it on a daily basis. His popularity will continue to wane as people see their life savings dwindle and the price of their house head into a ditch. "Sorry junior, I know you wanted to go to Notre Dame but we can only afford community college right now (unless we send you to the U of Michigan where there are quotas)" is a new refrain being heard throughout the nation.

This is Obama's recession now and any economist with any shred of dignity (Paul Krugman should be removed from all discussions on the economy for the next forty years) will have to finally admit that spending during a recession is not only poor fiscal policy but is poor political policy as well. At the end of his first term, Obama may well supplant Jimmy Carter as the worst president of the last fifty years.