Quick Hits II: A Recovery Not For You

The New York Times called it a "fraught topic." Others are calling it a "jobless recovery" and a "joyless recovery." As the sobering October jobless numbers show, the suspicion grows that employers aren't hiring in sufficient number to signal a robust, which is to say more traditional, recovery because they have found that they can make their nut with less.

And so 10.2 million Americans are officially listed as unemployed with another 7 million or so off the books because they have given up looking for work or are working part time but not by choice. And the long-term unemployment rate -- the share of the unemployed population out of work for more than six months -- also continues to set records. It is now an astonishing 35.6 percent.

Only another healthy shot of government stimulus money -- exactly what the Party of No so vociferously opposes -- could begin to turn things around. So do it, already.