Good morning.
Sunday in Whitewater will be mostly sunny with a high of 64. Sunrise is 6:26 and sunset is 7:18, for 12 hours, 52 minutes of daytime. The moon is full with 100 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
On this day in 1776, according to American colonial reports, Ezra Lee makes the world’s first submarine attack in the Turtle, attempting to attach a time bomb to the hull of HMS Eagle in New York Harbor.
How odd, how very unexpected, that a man with six business bankruptcies has led America to a place where it’s the toughest time to be searching for work in America in years:
New data last week showed a fourth month of tepid job growth and propelled joblessness to its highest level since late 2021, when the economy was still recovering from the effects of the covid-19 pandemic. Now, as companies wrestle with inflation, economic uncertainty and trade policy whiplash, many are shredding payrolls and shifting tasks to artificial intelligence while pulling in higher profits. And some executives are pointedly broadcasting sizable layoffs as wins, a sign they’re making workforces leaner and more efficient.
Hardly any corner of the economy is untouched by jobs cuts and slowdown: Employment in all goods-producing industries slumped in August, with the deepest losses coming from manufacturing and mining. The service sector was racked by steep layoffs in business and professional services and IT.
Meanwhile, job vacancies are shrinking as employers hold fire on hiring, data show. Factor in dimming consumer sentiment — which hit a three-month low in August — and conditions are ripe for labor market gridlock, said Bill Adams, chief economist for Comerica Bank in Dallas, leaving the economy “operating in low gear.”
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Mark Cohen, the former director of retail studies at Columbia Business School, expects those numbers to grow as retailers contend with tariff headwinds and as consumers feel increasingly pessimistic about the economy.
“There’s enormous uncertainty throughout the economy. Retail and retail support is well over 70 percent of the economy’s makeup, and the inputs to retail are entirely linked to international trade,” he said. “In the face of uncertainty, what choice do they have? Hire fewer people.”
See Taylor Telford, Jaclyn Peiser, and Federica Cocco, Why it’s the toughest time to be searching for work in America in years, Washington Post, September 7, 2025.
Trump’s role was never economic. His role was, is, and always will be to deliver retribution for far-right populists against their ethnic, racial, and cultural enemies.
World’s largest iceberg is beginning to break apart: