Experts Shocked By Job Number Increases in September

Yet another example of why Biden’s poll numbers are in the basement—daily defamation and disinformation by billionaire-funded rightwing media.

This just in:

“…American payrolls grew by 336,000 in September on a seasonally adjusted basis, the Labor Department said on Friday.

The increase, almost double [170,000] what economists had forecast, confirmed the labor market’s vitality and the overall hardiness of an economy facing challenges from a variety of forces.

It was the 33rd consecutive month of job growth, and the increase was the biggest since January.”

– New York Times, Oct. 6, 2023[i]

“The September jobs report has left economics experts shocked at the ‘surprisingly strong’ numbers, with many again suggesting the U.S. is having a ‘soft landing’ from the effects of the COVID pandemic and see little chance of recession ahead…CNBC called it ‘a whopping 336,000 new jobs,’ and adds the unemployment rate is unchanged, at a near-historic low of 3.8%.”[ii]

Something that has vexed Democrats so much is that, in spite of the incredibly-long and impressive list of things Joe Biden has managed to accomplish in just 2 ½ years,[iii] his poll numbers are in the tank.[iv] It’s so bad that, according to the Gallup poll just footnoted, Republicans hold a stunning 24-point edge in the question of, “Which political party do you think will do a better job of keeping the country prosperous?”!

There’s a reason for this. It’s called a firehose of lies and disinformation, incessantly pouring forth from right wing media. No matter how good the economy actually is, attacking Joe Biden and “Bidenomics” is on their menu of everyday bilge served up hot and steamy.

You could complain that these aren’t good paying jobs, some of which is true. Many young people don’t want to work because what’s offered to them can barely pay their bills. But that too has been an exclusively Republican-created problem ever since the days of the Reagan administration, which did everything in their power to destroy working class unions.[v]

Economic Lies Are The Basis of All Their Others

During the nearly five decade-long New Deal years (1933-80), it was the activism of unions that “lifted all boats” (created higher wages) for all workers, union or not. Despite the Republicans’ appropriation of this catch phrase, their policies only “lifted all yachts” for the “morbidly-rich,” as Thom Hartmann calls them.

It was Ronald Reagan who was first persuaded to deploy Jude Wanniski’s fraudulent “Two Santa Clauses/supply-side economics” strategy[vi] in 1981. It was such a ridiculous theory that George Bush Sr. during the Republican primaries of 1980 called it “voodoo economics,” which it is.[vii] I call it “banker con man economics,” because it’s all designed to con the public into going into debt.  All over Christian radio what kind of ads do you hear nowadays but “get out of debt” services, mortgage refinance, time-share cancellation, etc.?

Wanniski cynically framed this as Democrats getting to “play Santa Claus” with the American public. The word “liberal” as in “tax and spend liberals” was demonized, even though both parties had a long and proud history of owning the term.[viii]

And it’s true. Democrats were always building infrastructure, investing in new technologies, developing a social safety net, sending us to the moon, subsidizing college for all who could qualify, etc.—and doing it all by high tax rates on the rich and corporations. This made Democrats very popular, got them re-elected, etc. And it balanced the budget, even as the rich still prospered enormously from an ever-expanding economy.[ix]

So Wanniski came up with an “ingenious” alternative—”borrow and spend.” Spend like drunken sailors when you’re in power (Santa 1), while cutting taxes for everyone (Santa 2). The first provided a sugar high stimulus for the economy for a while (the prosperous 80s), while the second only gave a few hundred back to most people, but put billions into the hands of the top tier of the wealthy.

This is why Bush Sr. called it “voodoo economics” because it would only lead to national debt and that “slavery” that right wing thinkers have decried since like, forever (The Road to Serfdom, e.g.). Not to mention the incredible immorality of dumping a mountain of debt on everyone’s children and grandchildren.[x] But not to worry. That’s the kind of voodoo sales job to be left for their AM radio wizards to explain it all away.

When the Democrats get back into power, then it’s time to scream about the national debt, blame the situation somehow on “tax and spend liberals,” and demand drastic slashing of social spending and the general welfare the Constitution provides for, right in its Preamble.

This explains why for instance, the Tea Party phenomenon appeared exactly when it did, just a few weeks after Obama’s Inauguration. This is why Republicans never have any problem raising the debt ceiling when one of their own is in the White House. But as soon as a Democrat is there, it’s time to take the world economy into a hostage crisis, shrilly demanding to slash social spending or they’ll kill the hostage. Some patriots.

Read It And Weep

This is why fifty trillion dollars has been “redistributed,” if you will, out of the pockets of the middle class into the coffers of the country’s top 1%.[xi] (And oh yes, make sure you scream it’s the Democrats who want to “re-distribute the wealth.”)

There’s an old saying, “Figures don’t lie, but liars can figure.” If you don’t believe me, here are some figures:

And this is only through 2007!

This is the party that not only normalized greed but “celebrates” it, a term the right loves to hurl at the left. They parade their right-wing billionaires around like they’re rock stars, when most of them are just lecherous old men who can never get enough. You know, the kind that love to exploit underage girls for instance, Jeffrey Epstein style? Illuminati-style? Human trafficking style?

What? You think these people are flaming progressives?! It’s a rare thing to find a George Soros among them, willing to fund “Open Societies” (democracies). That’s why he’s been so demonized, a Republican specialty.

There is absolutely no redeeming value in a mindless quest for more and more when there’s no need for “more things to buy.” The only reason the billionaire class is stuck in this mentality is either because of “the pride of life” (“someone’s got more than me”—e.g., Donald Trump), or because concentrating and monopolizing all the wealth is a form of subjugation of the masses. If you’re too exhausted or broke all the time, you can’t participate in “participatory democracy.” It’s only a matter of time before their minions on the air start suggesting replacing democracy altogether with a “red Caesar” [the Antichrist] and other dunderhead “solutions.”[xii]

You will notice too that James in his letter notes a major characteristic of the times leading to the Great Tribulation—the rich defrauding their workers of their just wages (5:1-6). Neither he nor anyone else mentions abortion as a major wickedness of the last days, aside from some general statements about sexual immorality. But greed—that was one of the seven deadly sins of the early Church. Today it’s paraded around in Libertarian circles as the greatest of virtues. Everyone else is a loser.

I am going to say it many times on this website, “the Devil’s in the details.” Some of that army of right wing talk show hosts that run rings around your mind are professional psy op artists who specialize in generalities, trigger words and other techniques designed to keep you from discovering the facts of a matter. They are expert at twisting a situation, distorting the facts, falsely accusing the innocent,[xiii] ignoring damning but earth-shaking news events, sloganeering, throwing undefined or vague terms out there to confuse you, like “woke,” “death tax,” “welfare queens,” “two-tiered system of justice,” and the like.

Most of these men (they are almost always men), are “as graves which appear not,” such that those who listen to them are not aware of their ulterior agendas (Lu 11:44). All of them have “hearts exercised in covetous practices” (II Pet 2:14). Their tactics are bottomless, their hearts shameless.

Whenever someone tries to throw a story at you that is distorted, lacks context or is designed to confuse you, you owe it to yourself to listen to at least wider sources of information. This is a battle to define light vs darkness, whether some think they’re the “illuminated ones” or not. Nothing less than the eternal destiny of your soul hangs in the balance (II Thess 2:12).

Here’s a great article about perception vs reality on this, and some of Biden’s economic accomplishments that a second Trump term will loot till the cows come home.

[i] https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/06/business/economy/september-jobs-report.html

[ii] https://www.rawstory.com/blockbuster-experts-shocked-as-whopping-new-jobs-nearly-double-predictions-biden-to-deliver-remarks/?cx_testId=6&cx_testVariant=cx_undefined&cx_artPos=2&cx_experienceId=EXC93HV4HK4I#cxrecs_s

[iii] E.g., https://dianeravitch.net/2023/08/23/thom-hartmanns-debate-prep-bidens-accomplishments-in-three-years/#:~:text=%E2%80%94%20making%20significant%20investments%20to%20address,straw%20purchases%20distinct%20federal%20crimes.  

[iv] https://news.gallup.com/poll/511979/neither-party-liked-gop-holds-advantage-issues.aspx

[v] https://hartmannreport.com/p/heres-the-genuine-litmus-test-for-biden-s-support-of-unions-405e223634b0

[vi] Absolutely essential reading here from Thom Hartmann if you are ever to see through the entire fraud the Republican Party has been and still is perpetrating on us:  https://hartmannreport.com/p/are-we-seeing-the-last-gasp-of-the  and https://www.salon.com/2018/02/12/thom-hartmann-how-the-gop-used-a-two-santa-clauses-tactic-to-con-america-for-nearly-40-years_partner/

[vii] “Bush Ends His Waiting Game, Attacks Reagan,” by Robert Shogun, Los Angeles Times, April 14, 1980. https://donclasenseriousguy.com/economic-beast-11-13-(2).pdf

[viii] https://janda.org/politxts/PartyPlatforms/LIberal%20as%20a%20Dirty%20Word.pdf

[ix] When a rich German businessman was asked by a post-Reagan reporter why he tolerated such high taxes at home, he answered, “Because I’d rather be a rich man in a rich country than a rich man in a poor country.”

[x] Bush did not think the American public would be that stupid as to buy such a ridiculous, illogical theory, though had no problem pivoting his family to join in on the looting once he realized they were.

[xi] https://time.com/5888024/50-trillion-income-inequality-america/

[xii] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/01/red-caesar-authoritarianism-republicans-extreme-right

[xiii] The word “Devil” means literally “slanderer,” or “false accuser” (of God before men or men before God).