Steve Benen's right. The GOP has a plan to make matters much worse.

[flpoljunkie]

June 03, 2011

The wake-up call
By Steve Benen

As Republicans dominate the agenda, and Congress tackles abortion bills and austerity measures, the economy is faltering badly.

Indeed, we’re already seeing the results of austerity — state and local governments are being forces to cut spending, and as a result, tens of thousands of public-sector workers are being forced from their jobs. This, in a nutshell, is the agenda Republicans are desperate to bring to the federal level.

In other words, the GOP has a plan to make matters much worse.

As awful as this morning’s jobs report was, it should, in theory, have one important upside: policymakers who were content to ignore job creation and focus on the deficit just got a startling reminder that those priorities are backwards. The stimulus made the jobs landscape better, and now that the Recovery Act has largely run its course, the job market is deteriorating.

The dominant theory on Capitol Hill is that everything will get magically better just as soon as we take money out of the economy, scrap public investments, focus on inflation that doesn’t exist, and prioritize the debt over the economy.

It didn’t work for Hoover, but congressional Republicans are slow learners.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/political-animal/2011_...

[RBInMaine]

1. Gas spiked, riddled with storms, Japan mess...and still ADDED 54,000 jobs. SO STOP THE DOOMING AND

GLOOMING ALREADY. Sheesh. We are going into summer. Virtually ALL economists are saying the economy is going to do better in the months immediately ahead. We are still expanding, and the causes of the May semi-setback are well known. After the worst recession since the Great Depression, it is going to take YEARS to FULLY recover. So you have a choice. Bitch, whine, moan, complain, and wallow in a self-induced mental depression funk, or get the hell up and be part of the solution. i.e. Get engaged in politics. Join and or at least donate to politicians and organizations working on your issues. Work on campaigns to vote OUT RePUKES. Write letters to the editor, op-eds, etc.
Better yet. Not happy? Then RUN FOR OFFICE YOURSELF.

[bvar22]

4. "added 54,000 jobs"...

Gee,
Thats only 180,000 jobs LESS than we need to Break Even,
especially with all those graduating from school in May!
Happy Days are Here Again!!!


http://www.zerohedge.com/article/obama-must-create-2300...

[girl gone mad]

6. The best economists working today...

you know, the ones who actually saw the last crisis coming, all say that austerity will take us over the edge and no driver for private sector job growth exists on the current horizon.

Hudson: http://michael-hudson.com

Keen: http://www.debtdeflation.com/blogs

Stiglitz: http://www.josephstiglitz.com

Galbraith: http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2009/0903.gal... \

Think happy thoughts all day and night, if you prefer, but there's no point in insulting those who would rather address reality.

[high density]

2. Government has already cut 1.1 million jobs in the past two years

The corporations that the Republicans love so much clearly are not eager to pick up the slack for their own survival. People without jobs can't buy things, but no company can apparently realize that fact. "Cutting regulation" and this other nonsense that the Republicans are flapping their gums about will do nothing to change this.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

3. They're not slow learners

They simply don't learn at all--or rather they choose NOT to learn IMHO.

Their logic *seems* to be that the we can create jobs by cutting $$$$ that results in more people LOSING their jobs. Got that???

[flpoljunkie]

5. Agree. They know exactly what they're doing--making things worse while enriching their benefactors

[annabanana]

7. They are not shy about it. A more profoundly unamerican crowd

is hard to imagine.

[mikekohr]

8. The GOP Has Every Right To Complain About the National Debt, Creators Of It, They Own It -graph-

THE LAST 3 REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTS HAVE ACCOUNTED FOR NEARLY 100% OF OUR INCREASE IN THE NATIONAL DEBT SINCE 1981


Every President, from Truman to Carter, steadily paid down the staggering debt that was run up in our fight against Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan. That pattern came to a screeching halt with Reagan/Bush and Bush. Clinton’s fiscal policy was a brief respite during this orgy of deficit spending.

Clinton's economic policies balanced 5 budgets, which is 5 more balanced budgets than the last 5 Republican presidents combined.


President Obama, like President Clinton, inherited a sea of red ink and a recession from his predecessor. He, like President Clinton, recognizes the importance of getting America back to work and then getting our fiscal house in order.


?