Relevant and even prescient commentary on news, politics and the economy.

THE EMPLOYMENT SITUATION

The employment situation was mixed with the headline number, payroll employment adding 114,000 and the household report showing a gain of 873,000. To a great extent the very large increase in the household survey appears to be just a make up for earlier weakness when the payroll report was showing larger gains than the household […]

What? Romney’s Forgotten the Message That Wisconsin Voters Demand More Teacher Layoffs? So Soon?

Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney on Friday said that President Barack Obama’s call to hire more police, firefighters and teachers proved that he didn’t “get the message” from Republican wins in the recent Wisconsin recall elections. During a press conference earlier on Friday, Obama had called on Congress to pass a jobs proposal that would prevent layoffs and […]

Conflation and non sequiturs, thy name is Mitt Romney

Here’s an exchange between Tim Worstall and me in the comments to my post below titled “Spain. Please,Mr. Obama, talk about Spain. Please.”: WORSTALL: If you’re going to comment on the Spanish economy might help if you knew something about it. The big three banks, the equivalent of the Wall Street ones? They’re just fine.  […]

Spain. Please, Mr. Obama, talk about Spain. Please.

ROMNEY: Look, the revenue I get is by more people working, getting higher pay, paying more taxes. That’s how we get growth and how we balance the budget. But the idea of taxing people more, putting more people out of work, you’ll never get there. You’ll never balance the budget by raising taxes. Spain — […]

Richard Milhous Romney Gets Specific, Says He’ll Cut Out All Programs That Aren’t Worth Borrowing From China For

Yup. All those farmers in Iowa and Nebraska who’ve been waiting for the Farm Bill to pass are as nervous tonight as Richard Nixo … er … Mitt Romney was this evening during the debate, but their problem is different than his was.  Instead of babbling incoherently while wearing a frozen, glassy-eyed smile, the farmers […]

Health Care Thoughts: Hospital Job Cuts and Job Gains

by Tom aka Rusty Rustbelt Health Care Thoughts: Hospital Job Cuts and Job Gains I have been spending a great deal of time lately communicating with health care experts far above my modest standing, mostly on publishing projects and seminar scheduling for next year. One hot topic among the wired in folks is hospital layoffs, […]

Scotusblog roundup…fyi

Beverly Mann makes Scotusblog roundup again: Monday’s oral arguments in Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum continued to generate press yesterday. Coverage of the arguments comes from Jess Bravin of the Wall Street Journal, Garrett Epps at The Atlantic, Alison Frankel at Thomson Reuters, Steven D. Schwinn at Constitutional Law Prof Blog, Trey Childress at PrawfsBlawg, Julia […]

Polls and Reporting III Chilenski Strategies

By popular demand*, I am picking on another pollster — Chilenski Stategies. There is a poll which is getting a lot of attention. The Chilenski Strategies poll of the Missouri Senate race which shows Todd “legitimate rape” Akin actually one point ahead of Senator Claire McCaskill. I have noted a large number of brand new […]