Unemployment and the Deficit: The Disconnect

A recent Gallup poll shows that Americans view unemployment as the biggest economic problem facing the country. So why are Republicans letting Tea Party zealots put out in their name a draconian plan to cut the deficit that would do nothing to bring joblessness down?

The Tea Party's focus on deficits is not about jobs. To the contrary, it is a way to shift attention from the real cause of joblessness -- egregiously greedy behavior by the American financial community and anti-regulation regulators -- to the government.

President George W. Bush learned nothing from his father's experience. He and Alan Greenspan, the overrated chairman of the Federal Reserve, stood by and cheered a much larger financial speculation in housing from 2002 to 2007. The Great Recession that followed is the reason the U.S. has 8.8 percent unemployed today.