Clueless Chris Murphy= an Economic Baghdad Bob

Hardly any one is out there saying the economy is good.  Just yesterday we say the unemployment rate increase over a year into a so-called "recovery". At the anemic rate (47K private sector jobs/month) we are gaining jobs it will be a decade before the economy is well. And let's not even think about the tsunami of red ink gushing out of Washington. 

But for liberal Connecticut Democrat Chris Murphy, all is going well out in the hinterland.

He insists the people of his district are better off than they were two years ago. As the state's top TV station's anchor put it.

I asked Murphy if he thinks his constituents are better off than they were two years ago, when he was re-elected in a landslide, and he said they are better off.    I reminded him that the state labor department may disagree.   The highest unemployment rate in the state is in Murphy’s district:  Waterbury at 12.2% up from earlier this year.   The number of jobless is also up in Torrington and Danbury.   No doubt there are plenty of people who think they are not better off than they were in 2008, and Murphy will have to persuade them otherwise.

Nor was this a one interview gaffe. Murphy is running all over the 5th District telling people times are good, and not to believe their own lyin eyes. Here's what he told the Housatonic Times while campaigning in New Milford.

“All of the anecdotal signs in Connecticut’s economy are good,” Mr. Murphy said. 

Really.  Maybe Secretary of the State Susan Bysiewicz, a fellow Democrat,was off base late last year when she said Connecticut business failures were at an all time high.. 

Or the CT Labor Department is cooking the books when they show unemployment in CT going from 6.4% at the time of the 2008 election to 8.9 % today.  

Maybe the liberal group Connecticut Voices for Children had it wrong when it said CT had the 4th worse long term unemployment problem in the nation--worse than even Ohio, Nevada and California.

Yep, that $787 billion "stimulus' worked just like you planned, Chris. You said in February 2009 when you voted for it that it would improve retail business in CT.

Rep. Chris Murphy spent some floor time talking about how the stimulus will affect a New Britain business, Angelo's Market. "The people that used to come in every day are now coming in one day a week," Murphy said, saying that small businesses like Angelo's need a stimulus that gives the people confidence to return to their normal lifestyles -- "to start to make them feel good about spending again."

Dunno about you Chris, but the only people who feel good about spending money are politicians in Washington.

And Congressman Murphy, all those vacant storefronts and billboards for leasing vacant office space in your alleged "hometown" of Cheshire must also be some sort of right wing noise machine. Surely an inability to find paying tenants is an indicia of a thriving local economy. I haven't been by Angelo's Market, but there are delis, dry cleaners and shops withing walking distance of your house that are no more--- if you actually cared to look.

Murphy's personal economy may be prospering:he has amassed a $1.5 million warchest from special interest fundraising.  No doubt he will spent it trying to convince his blue collar constituents that their economic condiitions are actually improving because of his trillion dollar spending spree.

On the other hand, Connecticut residents who want a reality-based Congressman have a superior alternative: Sam Caligiuri