Mitt Romney, struggling to regain the lead from Rick Santorum in national polls and facing a serious deficit in the key primary state of Michigan, has doubled down on his position against the auto industry rescue, arguing that the industry should have gone through a “managed bankruptcy,” mainly to squeeze out the United Auto Workers.

Recently we have seen a string of positive economic indicators that all point to the same general pattern. While the individual pieces are subjectively good compared to pre-crisis level, the data gives the clear impression that the economy is modestly trending in a positive direction.

The private sector added 257,000 jobs in the month, with the public sector again reducing by 14,000. If we had a public sector that wasn’t consistently shrinking as it has over the past several years, the country would be in a much better economic position.

Yesterday, 25 of the 27 Eurozone countries signed a fiscal consolidation pact that almost immediately drew scorn from observers as inadequate and largely irrelevant to the problems of the continent, including the absence of growth stimulus policies and means to address internal trade imbalances.

But then I see articles across the Toobz like this from Tuesday from US News (via Yahoo) with the headline “Are We Entering a Jobless Recovery?” and I just want to weep at the incredible combination of stoopid and duplicity to that gives us such a headline.

OK, so you might have noticed a few headlines the last few days talking about how the economy is getting better, unemployment is dropping, and we’re all going to win Powerball tonight and retire tomorrow with our sparkly ponies.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the economy added 200,000 jobs in December, enough to tick the topline unemployment rate down another notch to 8.5%. This was above expectations, but given the decent economic news over the last month, I expected a good report.

The biggest reason I can find for economic optimism in 2012 is a belief that people will eventually have to buy new cars and form households, so why not this year? That appears to be the animating thought behind Matt Yglesias’ cheery forecast in the new year. But the economic story is a lot more mixed.

As 2011 comes to a close, millions continue to be without a job, and far too many haven’t had a job for at least half of the year.

To the MOTUs, these are statistics; to me, they are the people I see almost every day. They are my neighbors, my parishioners, and my friends. For them, my new year’s wish is that they find the jobs they so desperately seek. For the MOTUs, my new year’s wish is that they pay the taxes to fund the safety net my neighbors, parishioners, and friends so desperately need.

I don’t think growth will rebound, certainly not to a level that would lead to a rapid reduction in the unemployment rate. In fact, if the economy improves and more people return to the labor force, the result could be an uptick in that rate. We’re still moving at stall speed, not enough to return growth to trend, though not so slow to sink into recession. And then a European bank could fail and cause ripple effects that put us right back into the pit. We have the tools to solve this crisis, but the best we can hope for in Washington is that they don’t do anything actively harmful.