https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2020/08/10/trump_won_last_week_143919.html
Even in a volatile political year with endless crosscurrents, once voters actually start casting their ballots it seems reasonable to assume that one traditional factor will still motivate most voters: Which candidate can create more prosperity? On this score, President Trump had an impressive weekend, and his achievements shine in contrast to Joe Biden’s week of embarrassing stumbles.
On Friday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics released the July jobs report, revealing that America added 1.8 million new hires and lowered the national unemployment rate to 10.2%. This report registers as the third-highest month ever, and the combined three-month total of new jobs created stands at 9.3 million. To be sure, much work remains to return our country to the thriving job market we enjoyed in early 2020 before our world was rocked by a new virus raging around the world, which threatened to crash the global economy. The damage remains real and widespread, but recent macro data also point to recovery, as green shoots abound. For example, last week’s ISM Manufacturing Index rose to the highest level in 1.5 years, as factories powered back up. On the consumer side, the most recent existing homes sales achieved the largest monthly increase ever, as historic low mortgage rates encouraged buyer confidence.
Predictably, much of the news media sought to downplay this encouraging trend of economic renewal. “July Jobs Report Could Show Losses as Coronavirus Spreads,” CNBC had warned its audience a week before. Instead of a correction, the network doubled down. On Friday, one CNBC anchor teed up market analyst Jim Cramer this way: “It’s less about what the numbers say today and more about how you extrapolate what you think they’re gonna mean next month and the month after and the month after. How do you see it?”