Former Labor Secretary: Obama Hopes to Distract the American People So We Forget About Grim Unemployment

Wednesday, August 10, 2011

I noted Monday that Obama is a pretend populist who says he's fighting for jobs ... when his policies actually increase unemployment. http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2011/08/ ... ulist.html

Economics professor and former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich - who presumably has good insider sources on job-related issues - agrees: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-re ... 23053.html

I'm told White House political operatives are against a bold jobs plan. They believe the only jobs plan that could get through Congress would be so watered down as to have almost no impact by Election Day. They also worry the public wouldn't understand how more government spending in the near term can be consistent with long-term deficit reduction. And they fear Republicans would use any such initiative to further bash Obama as a big spender.

So rather than fight for a bold jobs plan, the White House has apparently decided it's politically wiser to continue fighting about the deficit. The idea is to keep the public focused on the deficit drama -- to convince them their current economic woes have something to do with it, decry Washington's paralysis over fixing it, and then claim victory over whatever outcome emerges from the process recently negotiated to fix it. They hope all this will distract the public's attention from the President's failure to do anything about continuing high unemployment and economic anemia.

Cynical, indeed.

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2011/08/ ... ic-so.html