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In a new TV ad, President Obama makes an inflated claim to have added 5.2 million new jobs. The total added during his time in office is actually about 325,000. In the ad, the president says “over 5 million new jobs” while the figure “5.2 million” appears on screen. But that’s a doubly misleading figure. Viewers would need to pay close attention to the on-screen graphic to know that the ad refers only to employment gains starting in March 2010, omitting the 4.3 million jobs that were lost in the first year of Obama’s term. And there’s no way a...

Pennsylvania small-business owners are delaying hiring plans to see who wins the fall elections, Philadelphia-based accounting firm ParenteBeard says, after surveying 70 Pennsylvania small-business bosses. Four in 10 said they're waiting for the vote before executing their current plans to add staff, John Nealon, head of the firm's small-business accounting practice, told me. (Despite persistent high unemployment, one in eight employers said it's so tough to find "qualified, talented new hires" in today's market that this has become their biggest challenge, though larger groups cited economic uncertainty, health insurance costs and weak consumer spending.) These bosses were overwhelmingly pro-Romney -...

Chemical company DuPont announced Tuesday it would cut about 1,500 jobs worldwide, or about 2% of its global work force. The company said it will make the cuts over the next 12 to 18 months as part of an effort to trim costs by $450 million. But the cost-cutting effort resulted in $342 million in after-tax charges in the most recent quarter.

One of the most delicious moments in last week’s presidential debates was when President Obama attacked Mitt Romney for having some of his money invested in Chinese and Cayman Islands companies. Mr. Romney replied by noting that the president has some of his investments in Chinese companies and also has investments through a Cayman trust. The president indeed, through funds he holds, has invested in a private equity and buyout firm (that operates like Bain Capital) that has put money into Chinese equities and Cayman Islands partnerships. Most everyone who has investments in mutual funds is very likely to have...

The super PAC backing President Obama raised $15 million last month, including $1 million from Sam Walton, the chairman of Wal-Mart, a traditional Republican-leaning organization. ...The overlap between campaign fundraisers and donors to the purportedly independent super PAC help illuminate the increasingly blurred line between the two types of organizations. The Supreme Court gave super PACs the green light in 2010 when it reasoned that because super PACs were supposed to be entirely separate from politicians, super PACs could not be corrupting to those politicians even if they received millions of dollars. 148 people have given $10,000 or more to...

Obamacare is a monumental house of horrors. Open a door and find another monster. Robert Samuelson opens the door on the law’s distinction between full-time and part-time workers. You think Obamacare might have something to do with suppressing the growth of full-time employment? Consider Samuelson’s observations.

GRUNDY, Va. -- More than 5,500 people turned out Sunday afternoon at a mountaintop park in remote Buchanan County to show their support for coal. With the "War on Coal" rhetoric that's been on a lot of Republicans' lips this election season, a lineup of political speakers that included Matt Romney, son of Presidential hopeful Mitt Romney, came to talk about the resource that powers both the electricity and the economy here. "Right now our country is in dire straits," Matt Romney said, promising that his father, if elected, would make the nation energy independent by 2020. "We can't ignore...

The Obama Administration has been touting the supposed upturn in the economy by using the September national unemployment rate of 7.8%. Don’t tell that to the blue-collar workers of Ohio. According to the Ohio Department of Jobs and Family Services, the private sector of Ohio took a nosedive in September. Construction: -4,100 Manufacturing: -4,300 Transportation: -1,800 Hospitals: -4,600 Financial activities: -2,900 Automobile dealers: -300 The surest sign of a failing economy can be seen in the one business that is necessary for survival: grocery statistics. And the September statistics reflect how bad the economy was, and which direction it headed...

To make consumers even more miserable, Senator Jame Inhofe released a study claiming that the EPA is delaying implementation of new regulations until after the Presidential elections that will destroy millions of jobs, increase gas prices and harm construction. “The Obama-EPA plans to move full speed ahead to implement this agenda if President Obama wins a second term,” Inhofe writes. “These rules taken together will inevitably result in the elimination of millions of American jobs, drive up the price of gas at the pump even more, impose construction bans on local communities and essentially shut down American oil, natural gas...

Republican Sen. James Inhofe says the Environmental Protection Agency has delayed action or “punted” on numerous regulations while President Obama tries to “earns votes” for a second term. The Oklahoma senator and ranking Republican on the chamber’s Committee on Environment and Public Works has released a report stating that when the agency approves the roughly one dozen regulations next year in 2013, they will “spell doom” for jobs and economic growth. “The Obama-EPA plans to move full speed ahead to implement this agenda if President Obama wins a second term,” Inhofe writes. “These rules taken together will inevitably result in...

Repairing economy, cutting spending requires laser focus on business world. The greatness implanted in America's founding and manifested for more than two centuries cannot be restored until two goals are met: The U.S. economy must be repaired, and government spending must be brought under control. Each mission depends on the other.Directing those pursuits requires a president with a profound comprehension of business, the economy and job creation. This insight is most often acquired through long experience and success in the private sector. The Columbian endorses Mitt Romney for president, accompanied by our usual reminder that endorsements are opinions, nothing more,...

Welfare spending tops a trillion a year. Senator Jeff Sessions reports on a recent study of spending: “The results are staggering. The Congressional Research Service identified 83 overlapping federal welfare programs that together represented the single largest budget item in 2011—more than the nation spends on Social Security, Medicare, or national defense. The total amount spent on these 80-plus federal welfare programs amounts to roughly $1.03 trillion. Importantly, these figures solely refer to means-tested welfare benefits. They exclude entitlement programs to which people contribute (e.g., Social Security and Medicare).” ============== If poverty was simply a question of wealth redistribution, the...

One among the top tier of President Obama's army of surrogates strikes again. Trying to promote Team O's latest messaging that, why yes, we are indeed shameless enough to actually embrace our economic record and spin it as a positive, President Bill Clinton painted a picture of Americans that was somewhat less than flattering on the campaign trail on Friday, via CBS News: Campaigning for Obama in Green Bay, Wis., Clinton urged voters to stay the course as more signs of a recovery sink in. Clinton said voters should judge Obama on the past three years, in which private sector...

Our latest Pennsylvania poll conducted 10/11-10/13 and released by the Washington Examiner October 18th shows Mitt Romney has taken the lead over President Obama by a 49-45 margin. This automated poll, conducted with 1,376 likely voters, was conducted on behalf of the Republican State Committee of Pennsylvania, and released publicly by the Pa GOP shortly thereafter. This poll validates our last three publicly released polls showing the Keystone State as a tossup – including a pair of polls taken before the first televised presidential debate in Denver both showing the Keystone State was already in play even when other firms...

In a desperate effort to try to persuade voters that the economy is starting to recover, President Obama touted high gas prices as “proof that things are better than most people think they are.” “Rising demand is what pushes prices up,” Obama explained. “The fact that gasoline prices have more than doubled since I took office shows that people must be driving more. Since studies show that driving to work accounts for the bulk of most folks’ travel I think it’s safe to say that the jobs picture has to be a lot better than we’ve been led to believe.”...

The 10 lowest ranked, or worst, states in this year’s Index are: 41.Maryland 42.Iowa 43.Wisconsin 44.North Carolina 45.Minnesota 46.Rhode Island 47.Vermont 48.California 49.New Jersey 50.New York

Former President Bill Clinton said Friday that President Barack Obama is facing a tough re-election race because "impatient" Americans haven't fully recognized an economy on the mend. Campaigning for Obama in Green Bay, Wis., Clinton urged voters to stay the course as more signs of a recovery sink in. Clinton said voters should judge Obama on the past three years, in which private sector job growth has made up for lost ground. "This shouldn't be a race," Clinton said. "The only reason it is, is because Americans are impatient on things not made before yesterday and they don't understand why...

I was fired from my job today after 5 years. They have offered me a 5 month severance package, the catch is I have to sign some agreement that I can't understand. They explained they would not pay me my monthly salary this month or my 207 hours of vacation unless I sign the agreement. Can any one out there give me some advice as to what I should do? I am in Wisconsin and I know nothing about Employment Law here. Any suggestions would be very helpful and very appreciated.

Seven out of the 10 presidential toss-up states have lost jobs since President Obama took office, and the unemployment rate is higher today in six of those states than in January 2009, according data released Friday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. What’s more, six of those states listed as toss-ups by Real Clear Politics have seen their labor force shrink since January 2009, which masks the true size of their unemployment problem. The state data underscore the fact that, despite the recent drop in the national unemployment rate to 7.8%, the nation’s jobs picture remains bleak, particularly in states...