On the recordFebruary 16, 2012
Well, let me give you an example. We have seen the unemployment rate now drop to 8.3 percent, and that's not good, but it's better. We've seen it drop, and we have seen 23 months now of private sector job growth every month, which is a great thing, a great record. Yes, let everybody look at that chart. The orange-brown part is during the Bush administration when the economic crisis first hit. And then the blue is during the Obama administration, where you see a pretty steady decrease in unemployment, and then you see now we are above the line for many months and creating jobs, and that increase in jobs. But if the Republicans had not gone after public sector jobs, if there had not been the cut in public sector jobs at the Federal level as well as at the State level, because a lot of Federal dollars were lost to the States, causing the layoffs of many teachers and firefighters and policemen, public sector workers have been laid off, we would have an unemployment rate of about 7.5 percent if those cuts hadn't happened in the public sector. So, you know, who's really for getting our economy going, putting people back to work, letting them be taxpayers rather than having to receive unemployment benefits, you know, which we better extend because people need them, but they'd rather have a job.
