The new employment numbers are not bad. In fact, they are very positive. Unemployment dropped to 7.8, the lowest it has been since the month Obama was inaugurated, and last month's estimate was revised from 96,000 to 142,000. Romney really needed bad numbers this morning to start something that would feel like momentum. That did not happen. The stock market rose on this report. USA Today:
The Labor Department's report that unemployment has fallen below 8% for the first time since January 2009 is sure to provide a needed political boost for President Obama......For President Obama, the first national unemployment rate to fall below 8% during his presidency couldn't come at a better time.
The GOP is so spooked by these numbers that some are now turning to conspiracy theories:
UPDATE: Yes, the GOP is totally freaking out about the job numbers.
“Chicago style politics is at work here,” Florida GOP Rep. Allen West wrote on his Facebook page. “Somehow by manipulation of data we are all of a sudden below 8 percent unemployment, a month from the Presidential election. This is Orwellian to say the least...
UPDATE: A day after the euphoria, the GOP is in a state of panic. It knows the show is over if the US believes in those job numbers...
Americans for Limited Government, a conservative group that has been a steady critic of the Obama administration, issued a statement that said the numbers the Bureau of Labor Statistics "used to calculate the unemployment rate are wrong, or worse manipulated. Given that these numbers conveniently meet Obama's campaign promises one month before the election, the conclusions are obvious...Anyone who takes this unemployment report serious is either naive or a paid Obama campaign adviser."
