Romney: How does six percent unemployment by the end of my first term sound? (Promises, promises)

Hotair ^ | 05/24/2012 | AllahPundit

[SeekAndFind]

Normally I hate self-imposed benchmarks since there’s plenty of downside to them and little upside. But in this case, what does he have to lose?

Halperin: Would you like to be more specific about what the unemployment rate would be like at the end of your first year?

Romney: I can’t possibly predict precisely what the unemployment rate will be at the end of one year. I can tell you that over a period of four years, by virtue of the policies that we’d put in place, we’d get the unemployment rate down to 6%, and perhaps a little lower. It depends in part upon the rate of growth of the globe, as well as what we’re seeing here in the United States, but we’d get the rate down quite substantially, and frankly, the key is we’re going to show such job growth that there will be competition for employees again. And wages – we’ll see the end of this decline we’re having. The median income in America is down 10% in just the last four years. That’s got to stop. We’ve got to start seeing rising wages and job growth.

What are the odds that the U.S. economy won’t be able to shave two percentage points off the unemployment rate over four years with a much more pro-business regulatory regime to encourage it? There are various “black swan” events that could intervene to make that difficult/impossible, starting with a eurozone meltdown or soaring oil prices during a standoff with Iran, but in that case Romney will simply blame the failure of his prediction on the black swan. As it is, CBO already estimates that unemployment will reach seven percent by the end of 2015 and five and a half percent by the end of 2017, putting his six-percent figure by 2016 right in the ballpark.

Plus, look at it this way: If he’s able to knock only a percentage point or so off of unemployment during his first term, from roughly eight percent to seven, then come 2016 the fact that he broke a campaign promise will be a very minor footnote to the more important fact that he, er, was only able to knock a percentage point or so off of unemployment. The Unicorn Prince has already broken his own promise from early 2009 that he’d have the economy back on track within three years lest his presidency be a one-term proposition. (He’s broken a lot of other promises too, including/especially the implied promise to the left that he’d be dramatically different from Bush on the war on terror.) Most swing voters don’t care, though, I think; all they’ll want to know is how unemployment and GDP are trending come, say, September. If anything, I think Romney’s vulnerable to criticism here that, a la the CBO numbers, he’s not expecting as much economic improvement under his administration as some of his supporters are.

Nice to see someone in the media pressing him on an important subject, though. As a counterpoint to that, via Guy Benson, here’s how the public’s greeting WaPo’s atomic bombshell about Romney forcing a haircut on a classmate 50 years ago:

Exit question: Didn’t Romney suggest a few weeks ago that four percent unemployment should be the target? Click the image to watch.

[SoConPubbie]

Since we’re talking about unemployment in this thread... what was the unemployment rate of MA when Romney was governor? Higher than national average, lower, or the same?

From an article by Deroy Murdock in the American Spectator:

"Our analysis reveals a weak comparative economic performance of the state over the Romney years, one of the worst in the country," the researchers wrote in the Boston Globe. Specifically, they found:

* As U.S. real output grew 13 percent between 2002 and 2006, Massachusetts trailed at 9 percent.

* Manufacturing employment fell 7 percent nationwide those years, but sank 14 percent under Romney, placing Massachusetts 48th among the states.

* Between fall 2003 and autumn 2006, U.S. job growth averaged 5.4 percent, nearly three times Massachusetts' anemic 1.9 percent pace.

* While 8 million Americans over age 16 found work between 2002 and 2006, the number of employed Massachusetts residents actually declined by 8,500 during those years.

"Massachusetts was the only state to have failed to post any gain in its pool of employed residents," professors Sum and McLaughlin concluded.

[SoConPubbie]

If you don’t think it matters whether the guy making those calls is Mitt Romney or Barack Obama, I think you’re smokin’ something funky….”

So for anybody who is thinking of not voting because your favorite didn’t get nominated, or writing in a candidate who can’t win... Imagine this: SUPREME COURT JUSTICE ERIC HOLDER.

Your problem, as a Romney supporter, is that where judgeship nominations are concerned, Romney is not much different than Obama.

Out of 36 nominations, he nominated 27 extreme, left-wing, Progressive Liberal.

Legal analysts say candidate Romney is different from Gov. Romney.

Liberty Counsel Action Vice President Matt Barber said Romney’s appointments were constitutional “living document” poster children.

“Many of Romney’s appointments were not only liberal, not only Democrats, but were radical counter-constitutionalists. How on earth can we expect that, as president, he would be any different?” Barber asked rhetorically.

“Actions speak louder than words, and Mitt Romney’s actions as governor scream from the rooftops that he cannot be trusted with this most important of presidential responsibilities.”

Barber cites two specific examples of Romney’s radical appointments.

“As governor of Massachusetts, Mitt Romney not only failed in this regard, he appointed a number of very liberal, if not radical, ‘living, breathing’-minded judges to the bench,” Barber said.

“Two that come to mind were extreme homosexualists Marianne C. Hinkle and Stephen Abany,” he said. “They both had a long history of pro-gay activism, yet Romney didn’t hesitate to put them on the bench.”

“These are people who outrageously believe the postmodern notion that newfangled ‘gay rights’ trump our constitutionally guaranteed First Amendment rights,” he said.

Baldwin agreed, citing Romney’s statements about the two requirements he actually used when selecting judges.

“Romney did focus on two criteria: their legal experience and whether they would be tough on crime. In other words, the nominee could be a gay activist or a pro-big government, pro-quota, pro-gun control Democrat Party hack who detests every judicial principle treasured by our founding fathers,” Baldwin said. “But if he happens to be tough on crime and have prosecutorial experience, he gets past the Romney filter. Many of Romney’s nominees fit that description.”

Baldwin added that Romney did have some ideological criteria for many of his nominees:

“It was criteria commonly used by the left. For starters, his nominees were mostly pro-abortion. Indeed, while campaigning for governor in 2002, Romney told the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL) that his judicial nominees would more likely protect abortion rights than would those of a Democrat Governor, according to notes from a person attending this meeting.”

Another Romney criteria, Baldwin explained, was “diversity.”

“The other criteria consistently emphasized by Gov. Romney in deciding judicial selections was ‘diversity.’ This is the silly notion that judgeships should reflect the population in terms of race and gender and even sexual orientation, regardless of a person’s judicial philosophy,” he said. “Clearly, the use of diversity quotas demonstrates Romney’s lack of a coherent conservative worldview.”

[madison10]

I DO NOT care. What do you suggest we do...either not vote, or vote for a third party person and thus get Obama by default? I am a very reluctant “Romney supporter,” but I sure as *&%$# am NOT an Obama supporter like the non-Romney people will be.

My wish would have been for Santorum or Cain. That is NOT going to happen now is it? We were McCained again.

[Cementjungle]

The “official” unemployment rate will be below 3% by November of this year, thanks to everyone dropping out of the market.

[SoConPubbie]

I DO NOT care. What do you suggest we do...either not vote, or vote for a third party person and thus get Obama by default? I am a very reluctant “Romney supporter,” but I sure as *&%$# am NOT an Obama supporter like the non-Romney people will be.

You're never going to win your argument with the non-Romney voters or convince themn to vote for Romney with that tact.

You're armed with nothing more than false accusations.

They're armed with Romney's lying, left-wing, Progressive Liberal record.