Where are the 150,000 jobs saved or created by stimulus?

ABC News' Senior White House Correspondent Jake Tapper (pictured) wonders where the 150,000 jobs are that the stimulus was to have saved or created.

Mr. Obama said in his speech last Wednesday night, "We began by passing a Recovery Act that has already saved or created over 150,000 jobs and provided a tax cut to 95% of all working families,"

We wondered where the president got that from, given that the Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that more than 1.3 million jobs were lost in February and March, with dismal April numbers to come.

We were told by a White House official that the Council of Economic Advisers estimated the effect of the stimulus bill on employment in two ways:

One was to prorate the original quarterly estimates by the CEA of the effect of the stimulus bill at the time of passage in a conservative way."

The second way was to use the data available on actual spending to replace the assumed spend-out rate. CEA then applied the same estimates of the likely impact of spending on output and employment used in the original calculations.

Both methods yielded similar results: 150,000 jobs.

This fuzzy math is challenged by FactCheck.org as they wonder about Obama’s fantasy jobs.

FactCheck shows that the number of jobs is actually plummeting and provides a link to a Bureau of Labor Statistics survey that shows that the economy lost more than 1.3 million jobs in the two months after Obama took office. FactCheck also says the economy has probably lost at least another half-million in April.

The day after Obama spoke, the Department of Labor announced that another 631,000 workers (seasonally adjusted) had filed new claims for unemployment insurance the previous week!

So what 150,000 jobs was Obama talking about?

It turns out the president’s claim is really an estimate of what his economic advisers think the stimulus bill is doing, and not based on any evidence of its actual effects.

Ninety percent of the media goes with whatever Mr. Obama says.

Blatant misinformation may make Obama and his fawning media feel better, but sooner or later the people are going to learn the real truth - that the president is often untruthful.

I tip my hat to Jake Tapper who is one of the very few main stream media reporters not afraid to make an attempt to hold the Obama administration accountable. We just hope he doesn’t lose his job at ABC as a result.

Link here, here, and here.