The Federal Reserve “significantly reduced its forecast of economic growth through 2013, acknowledging that it had once again overestimated the nation’s recovery from the 2008 financial crisis,” the New York Times reports.

Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) told WLS-AM that Senate Democrats do not have enough votes to pass President Obama’s latest jobs bill.

Explained Durbin: “There are some senators who are up for election who say I’m never gonna vote for a tax increase while I’m up for election, even on the wealthiest people. So, we’re not gonna have 100% Democratic senators. That’s why it needs to be bi-partisan and I hope we can find some Republicans who will join us to make it happen.”

Mark Halperin: “Presidents who demand congressional action in a high profile way on
specific pieces of legislation don’t have a very great track record.
While the White House maintains its confident public posture that the
jobs bill (or something like it) will pass, at this point it remains
hard to see how, despite the President’s sales job.”

While extolling small business “might be a good way for politicians to win elections,” Bloomberg Businessweek notes that “the notion that small business is the force behind prosperity is not true.”

“Most small employers are restaurateurs, skilled professionals or craftsmen (doctors, plumbers), professional and general service providers (clergy, travel agents, beauticians), and independent retailers. These aren’t sectors of the economy where product costs drop a lot as the firm grows, so most of these companies are going to remain small.”

Michael Lewis interviews former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) on the “nightmare scenario” that has become the state’s economy.

“In November 2005 he called a special election that sought votes on four reforms: limiting state spending, putting an end to the gerrymandering of legislative districts, limiting public-employee-union spending on elections, and lengthening the time it took for public-school teachers to get tenure. All four propositions addressed, directly or indirectly, the state’s large and growing financial mess. All four were defeated; the votes weren’t even close. From then until the end of his time in office he was effectively gelded: the legislators now knew that the people who had elected them to behave exactly the way they were already behaving were not going to undermine them when appealed to directly.”

In a Washington Times op-ed, Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) criticized the Obama administration’s investments in green companies like Solyndra, which recently declared bankruptcy.

Wrote DeMint: “Billions more have been wasted by politicians betting on favored companies and making Washington bigger, using the brute force of government to force liberal preferences into the economy. Mr. Obama calls them ‘investments,’ but this is really venture socialism.”

A Bloomberg survey of economists concludes President Obama’s $447 billion jobs plan “would help avoid a return to recession by maintaining growth and pushing down the unemployment rate next year.”