—especially when they don’t like the truth that figures tell.
When the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported job growth figures well under those our president had been bragging about or boasting did not, in fact, materialize, he killed the messenger, another indication that he cannot tolerate people who tell the truth.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported only 73,000 jobs had been created nationally in July, a third month that the numbers came up short of what had been promoted or predicted. The department, as it has done at times in the past, adjusted previously-announced figures for May and June substantially lower than originally reported. And our President—with no evidence the bureau was not being accurate with the adjustment—fired the director.
Trump hasn’t liked Director Erika McEntarfer anyway and has accused her of faking employment numbers last year to make Kamala Harris look good. He claims the July job figures are the latest thing “rigged in order to make the Republicans, and ME, look bad.” He says he will hire someone “much more competent and qualified” to take McEntarfer’s place.
We wonder which “more competent and qualified” FOX news anchor he will pick to replace McEntarfer, who has a doctorate in economics from Virginia Tech and was an economist in the Census Bureau’s Center for Economic Studies during Trump’s first term. Before that, she worked in the Treasury Department Office of Tax Policy. During the Biden presidency she was with the Council of Economic Advisors as a senior economist. The Republican-controlled Senate showed its confidence in her with a confirmation vote of 86-8 for directorship in early 2024.
What seemed to pull Trump’s cork was that revision downward of numbers from May and June and a paltry 73,000 new jobs reported in July. The original report for May calculated only 19,000 new jobs were created. The original report for June calculated 144,000 new jobs but was revised downward by ninety percent to only 14,000. The new three-month total is 106,000, well below the original report just for June.
The outlook for much improvement is gloomy. Coresight Research forecasts 15,000 stores will close this year. That’s added to the 7,325 closed last year.
From various sources we have put together a list of store chains shutting down big parts of their holdings:
Walgreens 500 this year, 1200 by end of 2027.
Advanced auto Parts 727 by mid-year.
Macy’s 150 stores through 2026.
Family Dollar 370 this year (600 last year)
CVS 300 stores already closed.
Big Lots 500-700
Joann Fabrics all stores
Forever 21 all locations
Rite Aid 200 in fourteen states
Denny’s Restaurants 100 this year; 50 last year
Red Robin 70
Foot Locker More than 400 by 2026
Dollar Tree 30
7-11 440 (out of more than 13,000 locations)
And none of those figures look at the jobs that are lost because workers are shipped off to some mysterious location and there hasn’t been time for Medicaid recipients to replace them in the face of threats to take away their benefits if they don’t work.
Political cowards do not accept bad news and often have a tendency to look for scapegoats rather than flaws in their own policies. Leaders look for ways to turn bad news around. Cowards kill messengers. Leaders do not fear truth to power; they welcome its challenges to be better.
Trump claims the national economy is booming because of his policies. The numbers say otherwise. His solution is to fire someone who looks at the numbers and tells us truths he doesn’t want us to hear—.
—as is the case with Federal Reserve Chief Jerome Powell, who won’t embrace the rosy picture Trump paints of the economy. He lies awake at night—-maybe we should put some punctuation in there so it more accurately reads, “He lies, awake at night”—because he lives in his own world where truth is kept under mental lock and key, and he cooks up new insults and threats to throw at those who have the courage to stand up to him.
When will this country, particularly those who have so easily shrunk from their responsibilities to the people at large, reach a tipping point with him?