[Heopretg2006]

The largest segment of hiring during this period was in the retail sector, which added 57,000 jobs as a response to increased consumer spending headed into the summer season. It's a welcome and larger than expected seasonal bump fueled by middle class spending, as all recoveries are.

As for crediting Bush, maybe you should re-read this and note that this month's job creation alone is more than the entirety of net jobs created during the entire last year of the Bush administration. The golden age of job creation was during the Clinton administration, at the tax rates that most centrist analysts agree would do much to close the deficit.

Wall Street Journal 1/9/09: http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2009/...ord-on-record/

Bush On Jobs: The Worst Track Record On Record

President George W. Bush entered office in 2001 just as a recession was starting, and is preparing to leave in the middle of a long one. That’s almost 22 months of recession during his 96 months in office.

His job-creation record won’t look much better. The Bush administration created about three million jobs (net) over its eight years, a fraction of the 23 million jobs created under President Bill Clinton’s administration and only slightly better than President George H.W. Bush did in his four years in office.

Here’s a look at job creation under each president since the Labor Department started keeping payroll records in 1939. [Full chart at link] The counts are based on total payrolls between the start of the month the president took office (using the final payroll count for the end of the prior December) and his final December in office.

Because the size of the economy and labor force varies, we also calculate in percentage terms how much the total payroll count expanded under each president. The current President Bush, once taking account how long he’s been in office, shows the worst track record for job creation since the government began keeping records.