Steve Benen noticed something about Friday's solid jobs report. Or rather, Benen noticed something missing.
For years, the Republicans’ economic line was, "Where are the jobs?" With over 14 million new private-sector jobs created in the last 70 months, the new, more salient question has become, "Where are the Republicans on jobs?"
Over the weekend, for example, I checked House Speaker Paul Ryan's (R-Wis.) official blog, which used to publish a statement with the release of every new jobs report. Friday, however, featured plenty of new content, none of which referenced the job numbers.
The Republican National Committee's official blog also used to issue once-a-month press releases on unemployment, but on Friday it said nothing. The same is true of RNC Chairman Reince Priebus' Twitter feed.
There was similar silence from Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and the Senate Republican leadership team.
How about the presidential candidates? Nothing from Donald Trump. Or Ted Cruz. Or Marco Rubio. Or Jeb Bush. Or Chris Christie.
So what exactly is their rationale for undoing everything Barack Obama has done in his two terms in office? It's not jobs and the economy anymore, that's for sure. In fact, last week's "debate" in the House about repealing Obamacare had nary a whisper about "job-killing." It's hard to make that argument when a whole bunch of recent studies—and actual people's experience—argue against it. So that one is slinking away.
As Benen says, "Republicans no longer seem interested in talking about job creation at all." You hardly expect them to have a round of applause for President Obama, given past performance. But even an acknowledgement that jobs as a public policy issue still exists would be expected, in a campaign year. But then, the jobs side of things hasn't ever been something Republicans have really cared about, outside of whether they could use it as a cudgel against a Democrat.