The Road to Recovery Is Paved with Political Blamemanship

Here is a chart on job losses that the Democrats are using in their fundraising and organizing efforts. It shows job losses topping out just shy of 800,000 lost jobs a month in January 2009.



The message here is that the job losses started under President Bush and were only arrested under President Obama. But you can also write Pelosi-Reid Congress under the whole decline, and blame Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid for this happening on their do-nothing Congress's watch. As one or both of them may lose their jobs come the fall 2010 elections, you may find some justice in that.

If you believe the Obama administration turned the situation around, you can draw a straight line across the chart at 750,000 job losses a month. Then count everything between that line and the blue bar as a job saved, perhaps 3.5 million jobs. The Obama administration claims 2.4 million jobs saved through the end of 2009.

But the public perception focuses more on the continuing job losses now at 24 of the last 25 months. That is a pretty big hole and replacing the lost jobs that weren't saved means the economy has to climb a pretty big hill.

The Obama administration may have to share some credit to get the jobs creation legislation passed that is needed to climb that hill. But doing so is the best chance for Barack Obama to win reelection in 2012. That may be too late for Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid.

President Obama understands what is a stake:

"I realize that for every success story, there are other stories, of men and women who wake up with the anguish of not knowing where their next paycheck will come from; who send out resumes week after week and hear nothing in response. That is why jobs must be our number one focus in 2010."

Let's hope he can translate that understanding into 10 million new jobs.