And Still They Believe What Washington Says
by James Glaser
May 11, 2009

I wasn't surprised that the American media believe that things are looking up because employment numbers are up. Well, actually not up, but rather not as down as they have been. It isn't only news people, but politicians are looking at "only" five hundred and thirty some thousand people losing their jobs last month as some sort of sign that things are getting better.

Try and remember back a few years ago when the job numbers were on the plus side of the equation. Back then if we didn't create at least 120,000 new jobs in a month, the media would say that we were losing ground, because it takes a 120,000 new jobs just to keep up with population growth.

Nobody is talking about those 120K jobs today. If we added that to every month's job loss figure, we would be.... we would be honest with ourselves. Still most of America believes the numbers Washington puts out.

Tell me, do you believe unemployment is really at 8.9%, or do you think it passed the 9% level, but 8.9 sounds better? I do! Here is a quick example of how Washington does things, and why I question their honesty. If Washington were honest, they would have said that this month's figure might not really reflect how serious the job loss in the last month was, because the federal government hired 72,000 new people for temporary employment with the 2010 Census.

How about this. In March, Washington told us that the private sector lost 663,000 jobs, but now they say the real number was actually 699,000. Do I believe they fudged that "real" number down, and that it was actually over 700,000? You bet I do. But over 700,000 jobs lost sounds so bad, they almost had to fudge the number down. The same story is repeated every month. February's reported number, 651,000 jobs lost, but the revised February number 681,000.

If Barack Obama really wanted to change how things were done in Washington, he could start out with the government being honest about the number of jobs lost, and add to those numbers the number of jobs we also need for all the new people coming into the job market. Americans do much better when they really know what is going on.

Also, President Obama could change things and have the government release job loss numbers and every other economic number on Monday instead of Friday. That way the public could watch the political debates on what we as a nation should be doing to turn things around. The way they do it now, and the way our government in Washington has it planned, is that they release numbers on Friday, and by Monday those numbers are old news, and we go on to something else.

Barack Obama ran as an anti-war/change candidate. We now know he is not about to stop any of the killing going on in our name, but he still could bring about change in Washington. If Barack Obama directed our government to be honest with the facts and figures they present to us, that would be a step in that direction. I don't know if any elected official can do that, because they don't trust that the American people can accept the truth about what is really going on in this country. They don't trust us, but they expect us to trust them.

Remembering Growing Up With My Mom

I called my mom yesterday. She is 90, in good health, and lives in the home I grew up in. When I was young, my dad worked at the Post Office and owned a bar that he worked at night. My mother was a stay at home mom, and I was blessed because of that. In the morning she made my sister and I breakfast and packed us a lunch for school. She was there when we got home, and was always interested in how our day had gone. Every day we had a sit down supper with my dad, and we all talked about whatever we wanted.

There was no television during meals, and nobody could accept a phone call. That time was family time. For a few years my mother worked a part time job during school hours, but she was always home when we got there, and she took the summer off to be with us.

My mom was not unusual. Almost every mother in the neighborhood was at home, but yet we lived good. We had a car, my sister and I both attended a private school, and every summer we went on a two week vacation.

Of course we didn't have a computer, nor a second car or a microwave oven, an extra television, dishwasher, or any of the things we take for granted today. If I had an older brother, I could have been the "Beaver" or if I had a younger brother, I could have been Wally. I sure had the parents for it.

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