263,000 jobs lost in September. 3 more banks fail this week. Saturn car company is doomed.

by James Buchanan

Despite a chorus of optimism and talk of a “recovery” from the mainstream media, the latest economic news is best described as dismal. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the net job loss for the month of September is 263,000, a sharp increase from the August number. The job loss number for July has been boosted from a preliminary estimate of 276,000 to 304,000. The total number of unemployed in America has increased by 7.2 million since January 2008. As a further sign that things are not going well, three more bank failures were announced by the FDIC for the week of Oct. 2nd.

As if bad job numbers and banks failures aren’t bad enough, a deal with Penske to break off and save the Saturn car company by turning it into an independent car company has fallen through. A CNN article reports “The town that Saturn put on the map is worried about its future and its residents hope the auto plant and jobs won’t go the way of its most famous product. The move to shut down Saturn has left some in Spring Hill, Tennessee, disappointed and perplexed. General Motors announced this week that it would close its Saturn line after its sale to Penske Automotive Group fell through. At the end of ‘Saturn Parkway’ in Spring Hill, Tennessee, sits the huge plant where — as the ads touted — ‘a different kind of car company’ produced a ‘different kind of car.’ The first Saturn, a red S-Series, rolled off the line in 1990 and it’s still on display at the factory. The factory, along with the town, have played a major role in the company’s image and advertisements, even hosting tours and ‘reunions’ for Saturn car owners.”

It seems like the liberals are trying to convince Americans that everything is fine and they should run out and start spending money. 70 percent of the US economy depends on consumer spending. Spending however continues to be anemic. Obviously, the 7.2 million people who lost their jobs aren’t spending much, and most Americans are deathly afraid their jobs will be next to disappear. The “cash for clunkers” program caused a minor increase in consumer spending which promptly disappeared as soon as that program ended.

Our current situation results from years of bad economic policies. Everything from outsourcing to Affirmative Action incompetence to minority subprime loans to a massive invasion by illegal aliens has put a huge crippling strain on the economy. Worst of all, there is no sign that our government has learned anything at all. Banks are still being pressured to make special subprime loans to minorities. American jobs are still being outsourced to China, and Obama seems determined to make citizens out of the 20 million illegal aliens even though they have played a key role in bankrupting California. This is exactly the wrong time to have a committed Marxist as president with little understanding of free enterprise economics, but that’s precisely what we have with Obama.