Disappointed, discouraged – but American optimism will soon start to return
Philadelphia
‘We should always love America, not for its leaders — who generally turn out as disappointing as our own — but for its vitality, its collective belief in the possibility of renewal.’ That’s what I wrote from Los Angeles, exactly two years ago, having flown into the blissed-out Californian version of post-election Obama-mania, which all too briefly vanquished the clouds of financial crisis. Crossing the pond again, this time to Atlanta and Philadelphia, I find the clouds have closed in and the economic mood is, by American standards, strikingly downbeat.
Even a good-news item that forecasters had feared would be bad — 151,000 new jobs created in October — is marred by shadows. The headline number represents one new job for every hundred unemployed, and that doesn’t take account of 1.2
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