Remember the economy?
The election year was dominated by talk about jobs and the economy, but neither the administration nor Congress seems to have any grand ideas for jump-starting a still sluggish recovery — and they’re not even talking about it much.
President Obama sought to turn attention back to economic issues with a speech last week in Texas on manufacturing, but that’s already long since been forgotten. A cascade of scandals has driven the issue entirely off the Washington radar.
Even before Benghazi, the IRS and the Department of Justice controversies started heating up, the economy had consistently taken a back seat to issues such as immigration and gun control.
“The economy is by far the most important issue for voters,” says Karlyn Bowman, a polling expert at the American Enterprise Institute. “It’s not unusual for Washington preoccupations to be different than those of the public.”
She says that the public is skeptical that Washington can provide economic answers at this point. Politicians themselves seem a little dubious.
