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Unemployment: The
True Picture
By Dick Morris & Eileen McGann
Published on DickMorris.com on March 21, 2011
To paraphrase Mark Twain, the three kinds of lies are lies, damn lies,
and government statistics. Governments lie, particularly about
economic stats in the middle of a recession and the Obama Bureau of
Labor Statistics has refined misrepresenting our economic situation to
a high art form.
In a previous column, we reported that Rasmussen’s index of consumer
confidence has fallen dramatically since January from a height of 88 to
73 in mid-March. Now, from the Gallup organization comes the
reason why: Unemployment is up, not down!
Gallup has measured true joblessness in its polling during this entire
recession. Here’s the story:
• Unemployment stood at 10.9 in Feb, 10.
• It fell each month ending up at 8.9 in Aug.
• Then it rose again steadily to 10.1 in Oct.
• And dropped to a low of 8.8 in Dec.
• And then shot up again to 10.3 in March of 2011!
In other words, the American public had it right when they were
euphoric in January of 2011 with a consumer confidence rate of 88% and
are right, again, when they lost all confidence as unemployment soared
again over the past three months.
Economists predict “false dawns” in permanent recessions when the
clouds part and all seems well. But the dawns are, indeed, false,
and the dismal reality of the continuing depression pushes its way back
in.
You wouldn’t know that the economy has crashed in the past three months
by watching this president or this Administration. In fact, Ben
Smith, writing in Politico.com said recently that the Obama folks were
wondering when to declare that the recession was over. As
joblessness was rising again to new heights, Obama was declaring, in
his State of the Union speech that the darkest days of the recession
were over. Nobody called him on this Hoover-esque optimism.
But it now shows how out of touch with reality he is.
Not all of this economic downturn can be ascribed to the gas price
increases. The Middle East turmoil that triggered it had not
really hit until the middle of February. By then, according to
Gallup, joblessness had risen from 8.8 in December to 10.0 in February,
on its way up to 10.3 in March.
Or, if you get tired following the ups and downs, you can say that
unemployment has ranged between 9 and 11 percent under Obama’s entire
presidency and you would be right.
Until we repeal his social engineering, reduce the economic uncertainty
it has engendered, roll back his spending and his deficits, and
deregulate the economy, joblessness will continue. And continue.
And continue. And continue.
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