The Only Structural Unemployment is Between Politician's Ears

In his NY Times blog, Paul Krugman takes politicians to task for refusing to take responsibility for the missing recovery from the 2008 financial meltdown:

And if we had a structural unemployment problem, we’d be seeing labor shortages and rising wages. We aren’t: wages actually fell last month.

So what’s with the rush to declare our problems structural, not amenable to easy solution?

Partly, that’s what always happens — it’s what happened during the Great Depression.

But I’d add a second factor: the truth about our slump — that we know how to fix it, that we could fix it in a year if we had the political will, but that bad ideas and worse politicians are standing in the way — makes people uncomfortable. They want to believe that we have a deep problem, and that’s why we’re in such a mess.

The truth is that the fault lies not in our structure, but in ourselves.

He doesn't name names. Let me put forward a name: Obama. They guy who promised "hope" and "change you can believe in" has gone missing in action. The guy with the underdog childhood, the guy from the disadvantaged race has shown a complete blindness to the victims of the Little Depression. Instead Obama is solicitous to his new buddies on Wall Street and has shoveled hundreds of billions to them to ease their pain. I guess he believe more in hope for Wall Street than Main Street. He wants change you can believe in for guys with two thousand dollar suits but not they guys in $30 work clothes.

Oh, and don't forget the snake in the grass Republicans who are milking the pain and suffering of the American people for all its worth. They are purposefully slowing the recovery and sabotaging everything so that the economy in 2012 is anemic because they are convinced that using the stab-in-the-back technique is the best road to the White House. The party of red, white, and blue believes you kick those who are down and you lick the feet of those with their boot on your face. Yes, Republicans stand for the sleaziest ideals America has on offer to the highest bidder.