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March Jobs Report Good News for America, Bad News for GOP

by Tommy Christopher | 1:10 pm, April 2nd, 2010

» 10 comments

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs tweeted this morning that “Employers added most jobs in 3 years in March,” and although, as Jake Tapper notes, almost a third of those are temporary census jobs, this is unquestionably good news.

Well, not for everyone. On the heels of their defeat on health care reform, the GOP has pursued an ill-advised and impossible “repeal and replace” strategy. Once a shoo-in to make big gains in November, the Republicans must now face the nightmare scenario that, given a little bit of help from the economy, Democrats could actually increase their majorities in the midterms. After the jump, a look at how the jobs report is unspooling, and how the Republicans should handle this news.

As David Frum continues to note, Republicans have exploded a health care grenade in their own foxhole. It’s not at all clear that anyone but the Tea Party crowd even wants the bill repealed. The fact that they can’t do it makes this not just a dubious threat, but a hollow one as well. Worse still, they’ve gone all in against the bill to such a degree that they can’t even take credit for the Republican ideas that made it in.

Add to that the crippling of the RNC at the hands of the Voyeur club, and this jobs report comes at an awful time for the GOP.

Here’s how the jobs report is playing out around the blogosphere. Over at Hot Air, Ed Morrissey finds the silver lining with the headline “Breaking: Unemployment stays at 9.7%.”

The Bureau of Labor Statistics published a good news/bad news report on employment today. The unemployment rate remained high at 9.7% in March, the same figure as in February. The economy added 162,000 jobs, with half coming in temporary or government work, as the Census Bureau began hiring its survey workers.

This is clever, lumping temporary and government jobs together. It’s a bit like saying that Hank and Tommie Aaron hit 756 home runs, and I doubt many unemployed Americans would turn their noses up at a government job right now.

Both Talking Points Memo and the conservative Daily Caller are running the same AP story that Gibbs tweeted, but Daily Caller adds their less-rosy headline “The Upside of Down: Job numbers lean heavily on census employees while unemployment rate means unchanged.”

Huffington Post is running a huge headline about the “Biggest Jobs Gain in US Since 2007,” but also ratchets down the excitement by pointing out the still-alarming state of our economy.

In a way, the White House seems to be playing right along with the Republicans on this news. The Hill reports that while House GOP Leader John Boehner pooh-poohs the census and government jobs, the White House is also trying to hold down expectations:

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner in an interview Thursday on “The Today Show” warned that unemployment will remain “unacceptably high” for some time.

Geithner said it would simply take more time for the economy to recover given the “huge amount of damage” done during the recession. The country lost 3.7 million jobs between December 2008 and March 2009 alone.

“The economy’s growing now, that’s the first step,” Geithner said. “But the unemployment rate is still terribly high, and it’s going to stay unacceptably high for a long time.”

This is smart on the administration’s part. By mitigating the jobs report, Republicans are actually helping the Democrats. If they were smart, they’d be trying whatever they can to raise expectations, or at least hold fire until June, when those census workers are let go. As it stands, this just seems like sour grapes to casual observers.

There are 7 long months to go until November. The Democrats have a strong pair now, which is not the time to start firing chips into the pot. The GOP should be checking their bets until they know what cards they’ll be dealt between now and then.

David Frum, ed morrissey, Jake Tapper, Jobs report, March jobs report, Robert Gibbs, Tommy Christopher

http://www.anonymousfinch.com AnonymousFinch

Tommy, want to make a bet about whether the Dems increase their majority in November? If the Dems increase their majority, I’ll send $100 bucks to the organization of your choice. If the Republicans gain seats, you’ll send $100 to the Marine Corps-Law Enforcement Foundation (Rush Limbaugh’s favorite charity).

I’m sure there are a lot of commentors who would be willing to take up you, or other members of the Mediaite staff, on similar terms.
TfT

CBS reporting new low polling numbers for Obama, now at 44%.

Tommy, I think you are really stretching facts in this article. I guess Tommy doesn’t realize there was bipartisan support AGAINST Obamacare, not for it.

Spin, spin, spin..
Tommy Christopher

TfT,

click the links from this article, like this one:

http://www.mediaite.com/tv/prediction-democrats-will-hold-or-gain-in-november/

Opposition to pending bill is not the same as wanting to repeal an existing law.
same2u

I am not predicting Democrats will hold or gain, but I am predicting they will keep the house.
http://www.anonymousfinch.com AnonymousFinch

Tommy, first of all, a clear majority still want it repealed:

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/current_events/healthcare/march_2010/health_care_law

But more importantly, and with all due respect, you are really lacking historical perspective here. The party of the incumbent President almost always loses seats in the first off-year election. So even in the best of times the Democrats would be swimming uphill. And it’s not the best of times. The Administration admits (quietly) that even if the worst job losses are over, we are years away from returning to the pre-2009 employment levels. The numbers may (repeat, may) be moving the right direction by November, but we’ll still be a long way from home. Moreover, Bush and the Republicans picked up seats in 2002, but at this point in the election cycle his approval ratings were in the 60s. Obama’s are in the low 40s (even in the very pro-Democrat CBS poll). Some liberals thought that passage of the bill would be an inflection point that would cause a turn-around in those polls. It didn’t; it gave a temporary, week-long bump (as even Glynnis admitted in her article two days ago). And if you look at the internals during that week, the bump came almost entirely from happy liberals; conservatives and independents didn’t budge.

I agree that it’s easier to oppose a new entitlement than it is to repeal it. It’s also easier to never shoot up heroin than it is kick the habit once you’re addicted. But come November, voters will realize that they’ve bought the heroin, but they haven’t actually shot up yet. There’s still time to flush it down the toilet and forget about the mistake you almost made.

Now, let me be clear, I’m not predicting the Republicans will repcature the House or the Senate. People predicting that are premature. But a GOP takeover is a heck of a lot more likely than Dem gains.
http://www.nukethefridge.com MartiniShark

Did not Tim Geithner just give an interview this week declaring, “The unemployment rate is still terribly high and it’s going to stay unacceptably high for a long period of time?”
We also are in an unprecedented zone now where there are more union jobs in government than in the private sector for the first time in history, due to the rampant expansion of this administration while the private market continues to contract .

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/23/business/23labor.html

That is hardly the formula for an economic turnaround and the additional mandates that businesses will endure with the HCR law will be a further drag on companies. You can see the fix is in with the press as well as they trumpet job loss numbers that are not as bad as expected to be good news, while side-stepping the reality that we were told the stimulus bill would hold unemployment below 8%.
Smithy

Tommy Christopher :”March Jobs Report Good News for America, Bad News for GOP”
Nice piece of make-believe propaganda you passing of as “news” got going there haven’t ya?

Reality.
Gallup, April 2:
“Underemployment Rises to 20.3% in March”
http://www.gallup.com/poll/127091/Underemployment-Rises-March.aspx

Foxnews:
“The new unemployment numbers released today are decidedly mixed news. On the one hand, the unemployment rate remained constant at 9.7 percent in March and the share of the workforce taking part-time jobs because they couldn’t find full time unemployment rose by a tenth of the percentage point.

For the second straight month, the broadest measure of unemployment rose, this time to 16.9 percent. This measure includes people who have left the labor force because they can’t find a job as well as part-time workers who couldn’t find a full-time job”
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2010/04/02/john-lott-unemployment-numbers-mixed/

cBS:
“Obama’s Approval Rating Hits New Low
Last week, President Obama signed historic health care reform legislation into law — but his legislative success doesn’t seem to have helped his image with the American public.

The latest CBS News Poll, conducted between March 29 and April 1, found Americans unhappier than ever with Mr. Obama’s handling of health care – and still worried about the state of the economy.

President Obama’s overall job approval rating has fallen to an all-time low of 44 percent, down five points from late March, just before the health bill’s passage in the House of Representatives. It’s down 24 points since his all-time high last April”
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20001629-503544.html

Gallup again:
“Republicans Move Ahead in 2010 Vote for Congress
Registered voters now say they prefer the Republican to the Democratic candidate in their district by 47% to 44% in the midterm congressional elections, the first time the GOP has led in 2010 election preferences since Gallup began weekly tracking of these in March. The March 22-28 results were obtained after the U.S. House’s passage of landmark healthcare reform legislation on March 21. The shift toward Republicans raises the possibility that the healthcare bill had a slightly negative impact on the Democrats’ political fortunes in the short run.”
http://www.gallup.com/poll/politics.aspx

Rasmussen:
“Generic Congressional Ballot
Generic Congressional Ballot: Republicans 46%, Democrats 39%”
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/mood_of_america/generic_congressional_ballot

The underemployed and those who don’t have jobs actually ROSE in March, and most of those frustrated, angry guys are going to come out and VOTE in November….against the Democrats
We are not only going to take the House in November, in addition, if Pataki runs in New York, Rossi runs in Washington State, and Tommy Thompson runs in Wissonsin( I think all 3 will run), we are going to grab control of the US Senate as well. After that, you can say BUH BYE to the 0bama presidency, as we bring his Marxist agenda to a screeching halt.
And hey, Tommy Christopher ?
You can take that to the bank.
Smithy

Yet another poll shows how strong the public’s opposition to 0bamcare is. If anything, opposition to 0bamcare is now HIGHER than it was before the bill was passed.

CBS:
Poll: Most Americans Remain Against Health Care Overhaul
The public is increasingly skeptical of the health care reform bill signed into law last week, a new CBS News poll shows.
More Americans now disapprove of the legislation, and many expect their costs to rise and the quality of their care to worsen; few expect the reforms to help them.
-snip-
Fifty-three percent of Americans say they disapprove of the new reforms, including 39 percent who say they disapprove strongly. In the days before the bill passed the House, 37 percent said they approved and 48 percent disapproved”
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20001700-503544.html
mikesundown

Tommy, you’ve got to stop smoking that stuff during work hours. The unemployment rate will rise later this year because of census workers being let go and discouraged workers returning to the job market because they have to. That’ll be one issue in the election, but the big one will be government spending, the deficit, the debt burden on our kids and coming reduction in the country’s credit rating, rising interest rates, inflation, and the inevitable emergency spending cuts that Moody’s says will threaten the social cohesion of the country. The Democrats may not lose their majority this time, but they’ll lose a lot of seats.
balpert1

Besides 1/3 of the jobs being census takers the March figures do not reflect any loss of jobs from the
new health care bill. If I were in the administration I would wait for April and May numbers before crowing about
a pick up in employment. That bill is an incentive for large companies to decrease their work force not hire
more. If your looking for work I would definitely recommend not having your facebook page mention
anything about your grown childrenbeing in need of health care insurance.