President Barack Obama was hit with more devastating jobs news on Friday, less than a week before he gives his heavily touted speech to Congress on getting unemployment down.
No new net jobs were created in August according to Labor Department figures and the jobless rate remained the same at 9.1 percent.
At the same time a new Fox News polls showed three out of every five voters say they are disappointed with Obama’s handling of the jobs issue.
Republicans immediately jumped on the August figures, the first time since the end of World War II that no new jobs were created in a month. The president, though, made no comment as he helicoptered out of Washington for a Labor Day weekend at Camp David.
“Today’s disappointing unemployment report is further proof that President Obama has failed,” presidential candidate Mitt Romney said in a statement released just minutes after the figures were released.
House Majority leader Eric Cantor added, “The president says he wants to put job creation first and put politics aside. We agree.
“It is a two-way street and if the president is willing to roll up his sleeves and join us in helping get Americans back to work, we are ready to work together."
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The figures pile the pressure on to Obama to come up with something new and significant to jumpstart the jobs market in Thursday’s speech to a joint session of Congress. Anything less will give GOP leaders another chance to attack.
“I look forward to hearing his ideas to bolster private-sector job creation. The American people are still asking, ‘Where are the jobs?’" said House Speaker John Boehner.
And Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus said Obama must announce a change course in the address.
"Today's unemployment numbers are another painful reminder that America still awaits economic leadership from President Obama,” said Priebus. “He spent his summer fundraising and golfing, promising to lay out a jobs plan only after his Martha's Vineyard vacation – all while nearly 14 million Americans remained jobless.
"The president needs the courage to admit his regulatory regime is the biggest road block to job creation. America's job creators cannot hire workers while handcuffed by regulations, crushed by mandates and threatened with taxes. If the president refuses to change course, America's unemployed with be the victims of his failure.”
Katharine Abraham, a member of Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers, admitted that the unemployment rate remains “unacceptably high,” in a posting on the White House blog.
"Clearly, faster growth is needed to replace the jobs lost in the downturn," she added. “Next week, the President will lay out a series of additional bipartisan steps that Congress can take immediately to put more money in the paychecks of working and middle class families; to make it easier for small businesses to hire workers; to put construction crews to work rebuilding our nation’s infrastructure; and other measures that will help the economy grow while still reducing our deficit and getting our fiscal house in order.”
At a Thursday press briefing, made before the figures were released, White House spokesman Jay Carney said Obama’s speech comes at a “an important moment for the American people who are demanding that Washington put an end to the gridlock and bickering that has paralyzed the process here and take action to help the economy, to create jobs, to help them."
But in an exclusive interview with Newsmax.TV, former Republican presidential candidate Steve Forbes said he is not confident that Obama will come up with anything new.
“Doing more government spending, doing more stimulus under another name, is not going to help getting this economy back on track again because again the government is in the driver’s seat,” Forbes said.
“Extending unemployment benefits does not stimulate the economy. A payroll tax cut, because it’s temporary, does not encourage real spending or investment and the creation of new resources.”
The Fox poll figures show a record-high 60 percent disapprove of Obama’s handling of job creation while only 35 percent approve. The station said that was a record-low approval figure on the subject, “one of the most important issues facing the country.”
Only 9 percent of those polled said the administration “knows exactly what it’s doing” on jobs.
The August jobs report was the worst since September last year and was underscored by downward revisions for June and July, which lowered jobs added in those months by a total of 58,000.
Even the White House seems to be giving up on the hope that the unemployment rate will fall significantly before next November’s election, saying it will still be hovering around the 9 percent figure. The rate stood at 7.8 percent when he took office.
The report also showed that even those with jobs aren’t doing well as average hourly pay fell by 3 cents to $23.09.
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Economist Warns: 50% unemployment, 90% stock market drop, 100% inflation.
See the Evidence. Click Here to Watch the Aftershock Survival Summit Now.
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