Political Temper Tantrums and Jobs

Nevada’s unemployment rate held steady at 13.4 percent in September as jobless figures fell in other states. The September figure is a drop from a year ago at 14.9 percent.    

State employment department economists say 10,000 jobs were added, but most were seasonal and the net job gain was closer to 1,800.  Governor Brian Sandoval says the stabilizing numbers are a good sign but officials still need to work to spur job growth and re-training.    

The Las Vegas metropolitan area continues to post the highest jobless numbers, with 13.6 percent unemployment last month, compared to 12.6 percent in the Reno-Sparks area and 12.4 percent in Carson City.  Nevada lags behind the national September jobless rate of 9.1 percent.

But the state’s GOP leadership has bigger fish to fry, as the chairman of the Republican National Committee is urging Nevada Republicans to delay their caucuses by three weeks to February 4th. RNC Chairman Reince Priebus says in a letter that changing the date will benefit Nevada in several ways, including giving it a more prominent place on the nomination calendar.      

Several Republican presidential candidates and the state of New Hampshire are furious over Nevada having scheduled its contest for January 14th. They argue that would wedge New Hampshire’s primary too close to Nevada’s voting and Iowa’s caucuses, which are slated for January 3rd.          

My first reaction is wanting to tell New Hampshire, the RNC and any boycotting Presidential candidate to piss off — but I’m think better of this. Instead state GOP leaders ought to move the caucuses so they end after all others. This would place Nevada right on par with being dead-last in the nation with employment as well as its highest-in-the-country foreclosure rate.

Jus’ a suggestion, since arguing over caucuses isn’t bringing jobs to Nevada either.