The great economy is getting covered up by US soldier deaths

CINCINNATI, Nov 3 (Reuters) - White House budget director Rob Portman can point to plenty of good economic news that should have helped Republicans on the campaign trail this year, but the body count in Iraq kept getting in the way.

"The war has dominated the news, so when the economy gets better, as it has in the last six months and you have good numbers to show, we can't get that through," Portman said in an interview during a campaign stop in Cincinnati.

Over the last 6 months? Lets see, GDP has been below 2%, core inflation has increased, and unemployment has increased (granted a small amount).

He must mean national debt. No, that is still very high. The value of the dollar has gone down, residential investment saw an 11% decline followed by a 17% decline, and health care has been rising about 10% per year for the past 5 years.

Nearly 4 million jobs have been created in the past two years, the unemployment rate is at a 5-year-low, the Dow Jones industrial average is near a record high and wages are finally growing faster than inflation.

Oh, now I know what he means. The stock market and unemployment rate are now almost as good as they were 6 years ago. It is too bad that is getting covered up by deaths in Iraq.