Democrats dismiss data on economic growth under Bush

WASHINGTON -- After months of hammering President Bush over the sluggish economy, Democrats faced a startling political development yesterday: The economy has surged in recent months, growing at an annual rate of 7.2 percent, according to new data released by the Commerce Department.

Democratic candidates for president quickly dismissed yesterday's news as irrelevant. What matters most, they said, is the number of people still without jobs. Republicans also tried somewhat to downplay the positive third-quarter report, expressing doubts that the robust growth rate -- the highest in nearly two decades -- would continue in the next quarter without the onetime child tax credit to boost spending.

But for both sides, the economic news prompted an immediate flurry of political activity, turning the focus away from the war in Iraq for the first time in days. And for once, Republicans, including Bush, led the way in publicizing the economic news -- shedding some of their worries that the economy could sink the president as it did his father in 1992.

"The US economy surged ahead at the fastest pace since 1984 in the third quarter of this year!" the Bush-Cheney campaign crowed in an e-mail to supporters. Other Republican officials seized on the numbers as evidence that the Bush tax cut is doing its job, spurring consumer spending by "putting money in people's pockets," as the president so often says.

"That's the fastest growth we've had in nearly 20 years," Bush told a cheering crowd in Ohio during a fund-raising trip. "Exports are expanding. Investment is rising. Housing construction is growing. The tax relief we passed is working. We left more money in the hands of the American people, and the American people are moving this economy forward."

Still, Bush said: "We cannot expect economic growth numbers like this every quarter."

Democrats said that the spurt is unlikely to last -- and insisted that more improvements are needed.

"Of course, John Kerry welcomes any signs that our economy is improving," Kerry policy director Sarah Bianchi said. "However, George Bush still has a way to go to turn around the worst economic record since the Great Depression."

Senator Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut issued a similar statement, saying that the third-quarter gains are not enough to correct Bush's economic record.

"We've lost more than 3 million jobs. Three million people have fallen into poverty," Lieberman said. "The budget deficit and national debt are growing. Health care and college tuition costs are escalating."

Democrats, while caught off guard by the unexpected growth, believe the 6.1 percent unemployment rate, only slightly down from the decade's high, could affect the political landscape far more than any economic statistic, particularly if job losses remain high in key electoral states such as Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Missouri.

An economic recovery isolated to California and the Northeast would be unlikely to shift presidential politics, according to Bill Carrick, an adviser to Representative Richard A. Gephardt of Missouri.

"There's a difference between the statistical analysis about the economy and how people feel about the economy," Carrick said. "If the Midwest, the industrial states, continue to have this high level of joblessness, it'll be a huge problem for them [the Republicans]. All the battleground states will be up for grabs."

Chris Lehane, an adviser to retired Army General Wesley K. Clark, said: "A jobless recovery is sort of like going on a diet and gaining weight. What's the point?"

Lehane said. "No president has ever been reelected with a net job-loss record, and no matter what economic model you're looking at, even the most optimistic Republican model, in the next year you're not going to create more jobs than the jobs that have been lost since he became president."