First off, I would like to note that I do not have an iPad. As cool as they are, I don't have nearly enough money to buy one. And I'm not frustrated because my NCAA bracket was screwed over long before tonight's championship game. (Go Butler!).
No, my frustration is coming from one thing and one thing only: the GOP's insistence on denying the importance of the job numbers as somewhat insignificant or worthy of contempt. These people are in the pockets of big business, and they're showing their true colors again.
I understand that we still have a long way to go before jobs really return back to previous levels. Although the economy has generally returned to where it was before the recession started, job numbers are traditionally the last benchmark to recover, because it takes a sustained recovery effort to really increase hiring numbers.
But we saw a growth last month of 162,000 jobs last month. We haven't seen an increase like this since 2007, when the economy was actually on good ground. (This should also debunk the idea that Republicans are so great at creating jobs, when they wer unable to do so for the last two years of a failed presidency). Clearly, Obama and his team of economic advisors are doing something right in turning around a stalled economy.
And yet, the new talking points issued by GOP operatives are quite simple: Because the Census Bureau has hired a large amount of temporary workers, the economy can't really be growing, and we are just enabling the growth of a massive government that is spending everything you've ever made.
Yes, I know we hired 48,000 temporary workers to help get Census data we haven't received yet. Yes, a good deal of these workers probably are still unemployed, and will go back to hunting for a solid job when the Census collection ends.
But our economy still added 114,000 jobs last month. 114,000 people will wake up today and get ready to punch the clock. 114,000 people will be receiving a paycheck at the end of the week for a job well done. They can go home and know their family is OK.
And yet, we're supposed to believe these numbers mean nothing, that those 114,000 people are nonexistent because the government just keeps getting bigger and bigger in its intent to destroy private enterprise. Do Republicans have any brains at all? And most importantly, do they have any hearts?
Something tells me that if you told any of those workers that their new job was insignificant because the government just enables the growth of massive spending, they would probably sock you in the face. At a time like this, any new job is appreciated.
Last spring, my family was in New York City to celebrate my dad's 50th birthday. I'll never forget the day we were in Times Square, waiting to buy tickets for a Broadway show, when we got a call. My dad's comapny had suddenly shut its doors, and we were now in the middle of NYC with little money and my dad facing unemployment. We had to rush home the next day. But eventually, my dad found work at a new foodservice company, and our family has largely gotten back on its feet.
If a Republican had told me that my dad's new job didn't matter because Obama had ruined our future with the stimulus bill, I would have called him names that can't be said here. The GOP doesn't care about the average American worker. They just want to fill their pockets with campaign contributions from companies who routinely ignore the pleas of the workers that build their business.
I apologize for going off on a little bit of a tangent there, but my basic point is simple: Jobs are jobs. It doesn't matter where they come from, as long as they continue to be created.
That's all I've got. See you on the flip side.