Give Gene Sperling credit--he managed to keep a straight face. Sent out onto the White House lawn to explain away the horrendous jobs report showing that the economy created no new jobs in August, the director of the White House National Economic Council actually resorted to blaming the economy inherited from George W. Bush, then making the mind-boggling boast that the failed Obama stimulus program somehow made an 11-million job difference.
Sperling was speaking with Chris Cillizza of the Washington Post, guest hosting for Chuck Todd on MSNBC's Daily Rundown. View video after the jump.
Watch Sperling say things that would have made Baghdad Bob blush.
CHRIS CILLIZZA: Gene, the President I assume is going to have to make a pretty forceful case to Congress on why what he's going to propose is necessary. How much does this jobs report, though, erode the kind of political foundation that he's standing on, allowing Republicans to simply say we've listened to that, we've tried that--now we need something new?
GENE SPERLING: Exactly the opposite. The President inherited an economy that we now know was falling at almost 9% a year, actually 8.9% in the last quarter of 2008. Independent analysts found that the recovery act that the President put forward meant a difference of about 8 million jobs in 2010 and up to three million jobs in the second quarter of this year. And what the President was fighting for, working his heart out every day this summer was to get a long-term plan that would do fiscal certainty.
