Romney calls jobs report not a real recovery

>>> the romney campaign is downplaying the drop in the jobless rates saying it's not a sign of real recovery. douglas is a former economic adviser to the 2008 mccain campaign and romney supporter and former government official. the cbo as well. let's talk about this jobs number today. good news in general. what is your take looking deeper into the numbers?

>> most people look at the top line number as 114,000 jobs created, unemployment rate 7.8%. inside the report there are more news and in particular the drop in the unemployment rate comes from the fact that when they went door to door and asked people do you have a job, are you unemployed they got back answers that suggested we created 8937,000 jobs last month. there's no way that's right. it's a statistical mirage.

>> going to be revised?

>> almost certainly will go away. throw that out and you have a picture that looks like the reports in recent months, enough jobs created to sort of barely keep up with population growth, some increase in earnings, increase in --

>> revisions in the last two months, upwards. the summer was not as weak as we thought.

>> we're not getting 200,000 jobs. we have a labor force participation rate that are 1981 levels. it's not a report that you want to celebrate. it's not a report that says we're falling off a cliff either. more hum drum economic news.

>> mitt romney was saying the participation rate was bad but this month the participation rate is good. more people are coming back in, less discouraged than before.

>> we got a tenth of a percentage point tickup in the participation rate . good news. i wouldn't dance. i think this is the situation the u.s. finds itself in. every time we see things go up it's from very low levels. we have to get people back to work and economy running at a higher level .

>> what about mitt romney 's big message from the debate which is that he says that there is not a $5 trillion tax cut , which was roger altman just on the show and a lot of our fact checking shows it does add up to $5 trillion, what he's proposed including the 20% cuts that he's talking about, at the same time he's now saying that deductions will be eliminated and make up for it so it's revenue neutral but won't specify which deductions. doesn't he owe it to the american people to say is it the mortgage deduction, charitable deduction, how will you get enough eliminated to make up for that hole?

>> let me say three things. first on the $5 trillion stephanie cutter herself said yeah, it's not really $5 trillion because we haven't acknowledged he's going to broaden the base. that top line number really is a suspect number. the second thing is there now have been as you know a variety of competing studies, some liberal organizations say, hey, here's a tax reform that meets his specifications you have to raise taxes on the middle class .

>> you really don't have five or six conservative ones, heritage and ai but others are editorial boards not real studies from what i've seen.

>> harvard university is pretty serious place. it can be done. now, that's fair, we have some that say can be done --

>> some nonpartisan.

>> and then the candidate himself and which ones he got and there we have a great example of why not fill in the details, that's the president himself, said, we want to get the corporate rate down to 28% but not going to specify how you broad than base because when questi when we go to capitol hill we want to negotiate. that's exactly the same tactic governor romney has proposed and i think it's just not a position of strength for the president to be pointing his finger.

>> what about these negotiations on the fiscal -- averting the fiscal cliff? do you think that anything seriously can be done during the lame-duck session to give the business community some confidence that there will be some reason to invest to hire?

>> let's just be very clear if we go over the fiscal cliff it's a serious recession and i believe it will be irresponsible to voluntarily go into recession.

>> and say to the republican leaders and democratic be leaders --

>> both sides.

>> hands have been tied particularly by tea party advocates, a lot of those freshmen not willing to give at all on taxes. you have to give something on the tax side, on the revenue side, as well as the spending side and, obviously, entitlements.

>> on the politics democrats in charge of the white house and senate and at least equally if not more responsible for the outcome so i take that with a grain of salt. here's the important thing, there are two different issues. issue one how do we get from now to the spring of 2013 without having a recession. the best way to do it is extend current policy and not have a sharp increase in taxes. the second issue which must be dealt with regardless of who's in the seats next year, an be enormous debt that's exploding. that's where there has to be an adult conversation about the future of entitlement spending, democrats unwilling to touch that, the revenue situation in the united states , that's been the touch point for republicans. we have to have the conversation. there's no way around it.

>> understood. thank you so much.