Some Facts Don't Fly
Romney: [L]et me help you with the facts here, Senator. ... [T]he study you're relying upon is a study that included [former Acting Governor Jane Swift's] term in office, and during her term in office, 141,000 jobs were lost. During my term in office we added jobs, and from the lowest point we added 60,000 new jobs. So that study unfortunately included the wrong data.
The report to which Romney refers was released last November by the Massachusetts Institute for a New Commonwealth (MassINC), an independent, nonpartisan research and educational institute. The report does indeed cover both Romney's term (which ended Jan. 4, 2007) and that of his predecessor, Swift, who took office April 10, 2001. It actually said that during that span, Massachusetts ranked 49th (not 47th) in job creation, the worst in the nation save for Michigan.
But the report also gives figures for the period that began when the national job slump hit bottom, in August-October 2003, until the end of 2006. Romney was governor for the entire period. And during that span, Massachusetts indeed ranked 47th in job creation, just as McCain said.
We won't dispute Romney's claim that 60,000 jobs were added during the period he mentions, but it was a poor showing compared with what was going on nationally or in other states. The MassINC report says that the state's rate of job growth from the bottom of the slump to the end of 2006 was just 1.6 percent, compared with 5.4 percent nationally. (Table 7, page 35)
The report wasn't meant as a report card for any particular governor. Its only mention of Romney was to praise his administration for "substantial progress" in streamlining permits and regulations for businesses that want to locate in the state.
But overall it paints a bleak picture of the Massachusetts economy:
MassINC Report: Massachusetts suffered steeper job losses than the nation during the recession and has added fewer jobs during the recovery. In fact, Massachusetts is still down roughly 100,000 payroll jobs from the peak of 2001 and is one of only seven states that has still not recovered all of the payroll jobs that it had at the peak of the business cycle.
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Member Comments
Posted By: M_Whetstone @ 02/07/2008 3:33:20 PM
Comment: sorry, i didnt intend for this below to post three time, i dont know how that happened. Sorry again!
Posted By: M_Whetstone @ 02/07/2008 2:47:58 PM
Comment: I find it very interesting that with all the facts given by both McCain and Romney, they were wrong on many different areas of their own back patting. But because people are easily influenced by the most popular guy on the news that week they still seen to follow them like sick little puppy dogs. I understand that the news hates to give a "fair and balanced" view on anything that cannot benefit them financially, but i find it sickening when they completely ignore people that have their own voice and ideas that arent "main stream". People like Ron Paul will never be elected because there are other people out there that dont see the financial gain in supporting him. They'll even go as far as to cut him off in debates and try to exclude him all together. This is a flashback to the time when Harry Brown ran for office as Libertarian and the two "major" parties did everything in their power to make sure you as a people didnt hear thing that might benefit you as a whole. Ron Paul isnt that radical, he isnt crazy by any means, he just want to give everyone back what they've been loosing for years, your own identity and your ability to make decisions that make sense for you and you alone. As a whole we really need to think about why we spend so much time worrying about what everyone else is doing with their lives and start living their own. However, unless people in the main stream media openly support people like Ron Paul then this country will never be what it is truly supposed to be, free and independent and a mecca for individual civil liberties. So to those closed minded sheeple, keep following the herd and let them lead you nowhere.
Posted By: M_Whetstone @ 02/07/2008 2:47:43 PM
Comment: I find it very interesting that with all the facts given by both McCain and Romney, they were wrong on many different areas of their own back patting. But because people are easily influenced by the most popular guy on the news that week they still seen to follow them like sick little puppy dogs. I understand that the news hates to give a "fair and balanced" view on anything that cannot benefit them financially, but i find it sickening when they completely ignore people that have their own voice and ideas that arent "main stream". People like Ron Paul will never be elected because there are other people out there that dont see the financial gain in supporting him. They'll even go as far as to cut him off in debates and try to exclude him all together. This is a flashback to the time when Harry Brown ran for office as Libertarian and the two "major" parties did everything in their power to make sure you as a people didnt hear thing that might benefit you as a whole. Ron Paul isnt that radical, he isnt crazy by any means, he just want to give everyone back what they've been loosing for years, your own identity and your ability to make decisions that make sense for you and you alone. As a whole we really need to think about why we spend so much time worrying about what everyone else is doing with their lives and start living their own. However, unless people in the main stream media openly support people like Ron Paul then this country will never be what it is truly supposed to be, free and independent and a mecca for individual civil liberties. So to those closed minded sheeple, keep following the herd and let them lead you nowhere.