I have devoted some effort to debunking the administration's claims of a booming economy and the deplorable tendency of the press to fall into line and parrot these claims without putting them into context. Now here comes the new jobs report which should tax the ability of the administration and the press to claim the economy is going like gangbusters.

Here are the key findings:

1. The economy only added 112,000 jobs in June, well below expectations and far short of the numbers generated in the last three months (which, incidentally, were revised downward slightly). As Representative Pete Stark (D-Calif) correctly points out: "Despite 10 months of job growth, there are still 1.1 million fewer non-farm payroll jobs than there were when President Bush took office. There are 1.8 million fewer private payroll jobs, including 2.7 million fewer manufacturing jobs".

2. Manufacturing employement contracted by 11,000 jobs, ending a short spurt of job growth in that sector.

3. Average hourly wages went up only .1 percent in nominal terms last month. That means real wages (wages adjusted for inflation) almost certainly went down last month--again. As EPI's Job Picture points out, that means "real hourly earnings will be down in real terms over the past year, and will have fallen in six of the past seven months". In fact, as a recent EPI Economic Snapshot observes, real wages are now the lowest they've been in two years.

But what does President Bush have to say? You guessed it: "...the economy is strong and getting stronger". Trouble for him is, voters, living as they do in the real economy, don't agree.

The recent NBC News poll asked voters how strongly they agreed, on a five point scale where 5 is totally agree and 1 is totally disagree, with the following statement, which is, almost verbatim, the standard Bush riff on the economy:

Our economy is strong and it is getting stronger. America has added more than one-point-four million new jobs since last August. The rate of home ownership in America is at an all-time high, business investment is growing, the stock market is improving, consumer confidence is increasing, and personal incomes are on the rise.

Just 16 percent gave it a "5" (totally agree) and another 19 percent gave it a "4". Not so good. And here's the other statement NBC News gave to voters, which sounds like it came out of a Kerry speech:

The net loss of one-point-two million private-sector jobs is a serious challenge for the American economy. Middle-class families are also increasingly being squeezed by the rising costs of health care, college tuition, and gasoline at the same time that wages and incomes are stagnating and personal bankruptcies are at a record high.

This one sounded way more plausible to voters--46 percent gave it a "5" and another 19 percent a "4".

And you know what?--it not only sounds more plausible, it is more plausible. Let's hope this latest jobs report wakes up the press to that reality.