RICHARD EPSTEIN: Why are Democrats serving up a smorgasbord of job-killing policies? “Who cares if jobs are gained the public sector when so many will be lost in the private sector?” Er, public-sector unions?

Plus this: “It is a testimony to the resourcefulness of the American economy that the unemployment figures are not more dismal than they are. That said, this nation will not be able to get off the road to economic perdition unless it junks both parts of the Obama administration’s economic policy—its futile macroeconomic programs and its mindless labor market restrictions. Let us hope that President Obama takes these harsh realities into account when he makes his own job proposals later this week. But after reviewing his uninspired Labor Day remarks, we shouldn’t count on it.”