Perry claims he is a miracle worker!

You gotta have faith, because if you just use your common sense you'd never believe what Rick Perry is selling today:

First Read - Perry calls for creating jobs through energy production: "WEST MIFFLIN, PA -- Seeking to refocus his campaign after a month of controversies and shaky debate performances, Texas Gov. Rick Perry visited a cavernous steel plant outside of Pittsburgh Friday to unveil his plan for job creation through reform of the energy industry.
Speaking here at U.S. Steel's Irvin plant, Perry said that his proposal -- which would open protected land for oil and natural gas production as well as lift federal regulations on the energy sector -- will create 1.2 million jobs.
"Today, I offer a plan that will create more than a million good American jobs across every sector of the economy and enhance our national security. And the best news is it can be set in motion in my first 100 days," he told a crowd of hard-hat-wearing steelworkers."

Just because Rick Perry says so, doesn't mean it IS so.

We've been routinely been fed this line that the reason the nation's energy resources aren't tapped is because of government regulation, and that the way out of our economic woes -- and high energy prices -- is the "drill, baby, drill."

About all they're going to drill is another hole in their listeners' heads, in case they need one, to pour this crap into. Think the Deepwater Horizon explosion and the mammoth oil spill that resulted was caused by over-aggressive regulation of BP and the other polluters? Sure, the government hasn't opened all the potential areas up for exploration and exploitation, but considering that the industry has plenty of opportunities in places to which they already hold leases, they've got plenty to keep them busy -- if they want it!

No, Perry and his ilk are blowing smoke, as usual. Where there are pathetically weak regulations now, they'd simple weaken them even more. Or simply eliminate them altogether. Think the oil industry doesn't develop more refining capacity because of onerous regulatory burdens? How about, instead, that they're limiting supply in order to keep prices elevated? How can an industry that owns the politicians that write energy policy be held back? It just isn't happening.

The hardhats listening to Rick Perry may like the sound of millions of new jobs, since after all, they may need a new one once the steel mill closes down and moves production to China. Even if new jobs do come, however, they won't be in manufacturing or anything that pay enough to support a middle-class lifestyle. Eventually, Americans won't even be able to afford the burgers they'll be flipping, if the oligarchs that Perry and his fellow politicos work for have their way.

As economist Michael Hudson says, Obama is working to lower the standard of living in the US by 30 percent, and is doing yeoman service to his masters by pushing for the dismantling of social programs like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. Rick Perry or Mitt Romney or any of the rest of them would do no less, but it's Obama who has the constituency to actually pull such a thing off, so in that respect he's far more valuable to TPTB than any of the strivers on the GOP side

It's simply a matter of convincing the Yahoo Nation to put enough GOP lawmakers in congress to make this 80-year-old dream of the plutocracy a reality, and dismantle the New Deal once and for all. It's taken longer than anticipated, but the past 30 years have been a period of exceptional progress on the quest for ultimate wealth concentration.

The wrench thrown into this process has been thrown in New York City with the Occupy Wall Street movement, as it now spreads throughout the country. This has raised the stakes for the travelling demagogue revue that's spreading the gospel of more, and more profitable, wars, as well as more exploitation and repression at home, by means of the well-oiled propaganda machine the oligarchs have constructed with single-minded resolve since the 1970s. There's enough energy on both sides of the equation for some very interesting pyrotechnics to come about, if by no other cause than an explosive chemical reaction that's beginning to take place in the streets.

Palin and Perry and Obama have their orders, but they aren't miracle workers and as the sorry state of the economy strips the finish off these clowns, we'll begin to see the fake smiles and empty blandishments' effectiveness wear off like a cheap whisky drunk. I'd love to see one of those hardhats punch Rick Perry in the face.