USA TODAY International Edition
Jobs numbers undermine Romney’s raison d’être
In a turn of events that threatens to lay waste to the central theme of the GOP challenge to Barack Obama’s presidency, the nation’s economy appears to be solidly on a path to recovery.
The unemployment rate in January dropped to 8.3%, the fifth consecutive month that it has declined and the lowest it has been in three years. Last month, 243,000 jobs were created. That’s significantly more than the 155,000 new jobs economists had predicted, according to the Associated Press. In the wake of this latest report indicating a healing economy, Mitt Romney, the front- runner in the campaign to win the GOP’S presidential nomination, tried to put a bad face on this good picture.
“This recovery has been slower than it should have been,” he said while trolling the Silver State for votes on the eve of Nevada’s Republican caucuses last weekend. “People have been suffering for longer than they should have had to suffer. Will it get better? I think it’ll get better. . . . But this president has not helped the process. He’s hurt it.”
After months of blaming Obama for the nation’s bad economic news, Romney now gives him no credit for the turnabout that seems to be underway. Instead, the former Massachusetts governor and one- time head of a private equity firm argues that he — not Obama — has the business acumen to speed up the recovery from the vicious recession.
This is the same Romney who in November 2008 opposed giving U. S. automakers about $ 85 billion of bailout money to avoid their collapse and a devastating ripple effect of other business failures. “If General Motors, Ford and Chrysler get the bailout that their chief executives asked for yesterday,” Romney predicted in a New York Times column, “you can kiss the American automobile industry goodbye.” This, from a man with Michigan roots.
He was wrong. GM is again the world’s largest automaker with sales of more than 9 million cars worldwide in 2011. And Chrysler, which also is back in the black, saw its U. S. sales increase 44% in January. Even Michigan’s Republican governor, Rick Snyder, credits the bailout for the auto industry’s resurrection.
Having largely made his case for replacing Obama by claiming he’d be a better economic steward, Romney has, at least for now, been reduced to arguing nebulously that the improving economy would be even better if he were at the helm. If the unemployment rate does dip below 8% — still a big if — Romney will have to retool his stump speech mainstay about the rate being “above 8%” for fill- in- the- blank months.
Of course, a lot can change between now and November. The decline in the jobless rate could stall. The forecasted turnaround in the housing market, which is crucial to any lasting recovery, might not materialize. Or a gamechanging event, such as an Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities, could dramatically alter the focus of the presidential campaign from domestic to foreign affairs.
Romney wants voters to think Obama is in over his head when it comes to lifting this nation’s recovery from the deep economic hole that George W. Bush dug. He’s betting that despite Obama’s deft handling of the war on terror, which was once a greater concern than the nation’s unemployment rate, the economy will still be Issue No. 1 in November.
For many voters, the job market is the leading indicator of economic recovery. And as the unemployment rate shrinks, so, too, does Romney’s chance of winning the White House.