Unemployment and Obama's Policies

A couple thoughts:

"You would think $1 trillion in spending stimulus and $2.5 trillion of Fed pump-priming would produce an economy a whole lot stronger than 1.9 percent gross domestic product, which was the revised first-quarter number. And you'd think all that government spending would deliver a whole lot more jobs than 69,000 in May. But it hasn't happened. The Keynesian government-spending model has proven a complete failure. It's the Obama model. And it has produced such an anemic recovery that, frankly, at 2 percent growth, we're back on the front end of a potential recession. ... The unemployment rate rose slightly from 8.1 to 8.2 percent [in May]. The so called U6 unemployment rate, tracking the marginally employed or completely discouraged, increased to 14.8 percent from 14.5 percent. And labor earnings are barely rising at 1.7 percent over the past year, almost in line with the inflation rate. ... Barack Obama doesn't get this, but businesses create jobs. And firms have to be profitable in order to hire. Yet the president is on the campaign trail criticizing Mitt Romney by degrading the importance of profits. ... The Fed may yet launch a new quantitative easing to stop commodity deflation and accommodate the gigantic worldwide dollar demand. But the merits of this move are dubious. On the other hand, an extension of the Bush tax cuts right now would stop the economic and job slide and re-establish certainty. In fact, all the countries around the world should move to the supply side with lower tax rates to spur economic-growth incentives. Europe, China and Latin America ought to go back and read Ronald Reagan's speeches and examine his actions when he faced a similar crisis 30 years ago. It would be an hour or two well spent." --economist Larry Kudlow

"Franklin Delano Roosevelt never denied that he created Social Security. Lyndon Baines Johnson didn't forswear any responsibility for Medicaid. Ronald Reagan never argued that his defense buildup didn't happen. The Obama White House, in contrast, wants to wish away the historic federal spending that is one of its signature accomplishments. White House press secretary Jay Carney ... urged reporters the other day to steer clear of 'the BS that you hear about spending and fiscal constraint with regard to this administration.' Not one to be outclassed by his press secretary, President Barack Obama kept up the edifying livestock theme by calling Mitt Romney's attacks on his deficit spending 'a cow pie of distortion.' The White House has a deeply conflicted relationship to its own record. It is saddled with a bad case of spender's denial, a rare psychological disorder afflicting committed Keynesians facing re-election at a time of record debt. On the one hand, spending is the lifeblood of 'Forward.' It saved us from another Great Depression. It is forging a glorious new future of green energy. ... On the other hand, the deficits and the debt that come with all this spending are alarming and unpopular. So Obama calls himself the most fiscally conservative president in more than half a century. ... He needs to consult an accountant and a therapist, and not necessarily in that order." --columnist Rich Lowry

A reminder:

And:

Connecting the dots is seldom so easy.