"Mediocre" is the kindest adjective that comes to mind about the July jobs report. The seasonally-adjusted figure (subject to revision) has the economy adding 163,000 jobs, not enough to keep up with population growth.  The separately calculated, also seasonally adjusted and subject to revision, unemployment rate of 8.3% represents an increase of .1%.

Nonetheless, Obama can grab the talking point that "the number of new jobs is growing" so the course he is on is "working" and we just need to stick with his leadership.  Pundits are declaring there is "fodder for both sides" in the "mixed message" figures. As a description of the political discourse to come, that's probably accurate.

But in real terms, in the real economy, things are bad and getting worse, no matter what the spin generated and reported by the minions of the left. The broader U6 unemployment rate also went up one tenth of a percent, to 15%