Checking the Facts, in Advance -NYT

[Clinton Crusader]

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/12/opinion/12krugman.html?oref=login&pagewanted=print&position=
October 12, 2004
OP-ED COLUMNIST
Checking the Facts, in Advance
By PAUL KRUGMAN

It's not hard to predict what President Bush, who sounds increasingly desperate, will say tomorrow. Here are eight lies or distortions you'll hear, and the truth about each:

Jobs

Mr. Bush will talk about the 1.7 million jobs created since the summer of 2003, and will say that the economy is "strong and getting stronger." That's like boasting about getting a D on your final exam, when you flunked the midterm and needed at least a C to pass the course.

Mr. Bush is the first president since Herbert Hoover to preside over a decline in payroll employment. That's worse than it sounds because the economy needs around 1.6 million new jobs each year just to keep up with population growth. The past year's job gains, while better news than earlier job losses, barely met this requirement, and they did little to close the huge gap between the number of jobs the country needs and the number actually available.

Unemployment

Mr. Bush will boast about the decline in the unemployment rate from its June 2003 peak. But the employed fraction of the population didn't rise at all; unemployment declined only because some of those without jobs stopped actively looking for work, and therefore dropped out of the unemployment statistics. The labor force participation rate - the fraction of the population either working or actively looking for work - has fallen sharply under Mr. Bush; if it had stayed at its January 2001 level, the official unemployment rate would be 7.4 percent.
<more>
:kick:

[cthrumatrix]

1. send this to the Kerry campaign....kick

[MSgt213]

2. Doesn't anyone want to hear the truth? Bush simply lies and no one asks

the hard questions like "show us how what you say is even remotely the truth".

[life_long_dem]

3. What is SO hard about understanding these things?

What is wrong with Half of the people in this country? I can't believe so many people still support this failure.

P.S. see my signature quote.

[MatrixEscape]

4. The problem

with a naked Emperor is that he tells everybody what he is wearing.

[TaleWgnDg]

5. Okay. So, why, then, is 1/2 the voting population still gonna . . .

vote for this idiot called George Walker Bush?

. . . . . . . .

[liberal N proud]

6. Good post

[Stephanie]

7. I heard this explained better on the radio today - NPR

That in the past four years we should have had 4.8M new jobs (?) but we only had .6M (?) - something like that. Comparing the four year total needed to the four year total actually gained makes it clearer, for me anyway.

[spooky3]

8. Every word is terrific, but IMHO the best point is in these paragraphs:

"By singling out Mr. Bush's lies and misrepresentations, am I saying that Mr. Kerry isn't equally at fault? Yes.

Mr. Kerry sometimes uses verbal shorthand that offers nitpickers things to complain about. He talks of 1.6 million lost jobs; that's the private-sector loss, partly offset by increased government employment. But the job record is indeed awful. He talks of the $200 billion cost of the Iraq war; actual spending is only $120 billion so far. But nobody doubts that the war will cost at least another $80 billion. The point is that Mr. Kerry can, at most, be accused of using loose language; the thrust of his statements is correct.

Mr. Bush's statements, on the other hand, are fundamentally dishonest. He is insisting that black is white, and that failure is success. Journalists who play it safe by spending equal time exposing his lies and parsing Mr. Kerry's choice of words are betraying their readers."

[Stephanie]

10. "Mr. Bush's statements...are fundamentally dishonest."

That's a good way to put it. Not too euphemistic, hits hard but doesn't use the L word.

[kaitykaity]

9. Paul Krugman = National Treasure

I can't wait for his "I told you so" column.