Video: Two years ago today …

With Barack Obama’s green-jobs plan blowing up in his face, it’s a difficult time for the President to sell Porkulus II: Economic Boogaloo to a hostile electorate.  His track record of economic promises won’t help him out much, either.  The RNC notes that this is the two-year anniversary of Obama’s claim that the first Porkulus would raise middle-class incomes by $3,000 a year.  Obama made this promise to the 2009 AFL-CIO convention in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania:

All in all, many middle-class families will see their incomes go up by about $3,000 because of the Recovery Act, helping them get back much of what they’ve lost due to this recession.

How did that work out for the middle class? As Chris Matthews notes in the same clip, it moved some of the middle class into, er, the poverty class. Poverty hit a 15-year high the year after Obama made this claim. What happened to middle-class income overall, though? About what you’d expect — it dropped by over a third the same amount Obama claimed it would go up:

Inflation-adjusted median household income in the U.S. fell 2.3% in 2010 from a year ago, to $49,445.

That’s not the only promise blown by Obama, either.  Dan Gainor at CNS News recalls that Barack Obama promised five million new green jobs from his economic policies, a promise made almost three years ago today in Toledo, Ohio:

We’ll create 5 million new, high-wage jobs by investing in the renewable sources of energy that will eliminate the oil we currently import from the Middle East in 10 years, and we’ll create 2 million jobs by rebuilding our crumbling roads, schools, and bridges.

Gainor says he’s only 4,996,455 jobs short:

The Washington Post might be a day late and $38 billion short, but it’s being honest about Barack Obama’s failed green jobs program. According to the Post, the “$38.6 billion loan guarantee program” has created just “3,545 new, permanent jobs” “after giving out almost half the allocated amount.”

For those not doing the math at home, that means more than $5 million per job.

The Post outlined Obama administration promises to “create or save 65,000 jobs” in the green jobs category. What it left out was that, while campaigning, Obama promised to create 5 million “green” jobs. He’s about 4,996,455 short.

Gainor gives mild praise to the Post for finally getting around to the story about the green-jobs snowjob, but offers praise to ABC at the same time for its aggressive pursuit of the story.  As far as the rest of the media goes … well, not so much:

At least, however, the Post is reporting it. The broadcast networks are not. The Business & Media Institute analyzed the results of a Nexis search for the term “green jobs” and found only 4 stories out of 52 (roughly 8 percent) between Jan. 17, 2009, and Aug. 17, 2011, included any criticism. That means 92 percent had no criticism. An additional 10 stories focused on Obama’s former green jobs “czar” Van Jones resignation (because of his 9/11 Truther views) were excluded from the analysis.

Say, doesn’t the news media say that their mission is to hold those in power accountable?  Sounds like a few more empty promises, doesn’t it?

Blowback