The American Debate: Deal traps Obama into helplessness on jobs creation

 In dysfunctional Washington, this is what passes for a major achievement:

The Republicans snatch Uncle Sam and threaten to drive him over the cliff. In response, President Obama agrees to pay a historic ransom. To please the hostage-takers, he ushers in a new era of fiscal austerity that will make it virtually impossible for the government to address what the American people want most.

Namely, jobs.

On Tuesday, while hailing the convoluted deal that allows America to keep paying its bills and avoid deadbeat status, Obama briefly mentioned the issue. Down in the seventh paragraph of his prepared remarks, he said he would "continue also to fight" for "new jobs." That was something, at least. When the deal was first announced, the White House fact sheet said virtually nothing about job creation. The House Republicans' seven-page deal document said nothing.

No surprise there. Because you can't exactly stimulate job growth if you're slashing $3 trillion in federal spending, essentially removing all of that money from the economy. Obama, having weathered the ginned-up debt-ceiling crisis, is again declaring that he wants to "put America back to work," but those words are hollow. He's handcuffed by this deal. He and the Democrats won't have the money to launch any big job-creation programs even if they muster the will to try.

Of course, that's precisely what the Republicans intended - to starve the government. Most Americans probably don't agree with that strategy, but since when do they have a say? Polls suggest they just want to get back to work, by any means possible. Last month, when Gallup asked people to name their most important issue, 31 percent cited the "economy in general"; 27 percent cited "unemployment/jobs." A distant third, at 16 percent, was "federal budget deficit/debt."

This is a time when the jobs crisis requires more government spending, not less. Consumers won't prime the economic pump, because they're still in a fetal position. Private businesses won't hire, because they're still playing it safe. There's a myth going around - brought to you by the same people who deny climate change - that the 2009 stimulus was a failure. Congressional Budget Office and Commerce Department figures say otherwise; the stimulus plan saved millions of jobs and would have created more had it been bigger.