CNN news 2012-05-08 加文本

cnn news 2012-05-08

CARL AZUZ, HOST, cnn STUDENT NEWS: Thanks to Mr. Baltus` students for helping kick off Teacher Appreciation Week. Over the next several days, we are going to share some of the iReport videos that you sent in, and we`ll have more on Teacher Appreciation Week in a few minutes.

Right now, though, let`s get to the headlines. First up, we`re looking at the latest national unemployment numbers from the U.S. government. In April, the unemployment rate went down from 8.2 percent to 8.1.

It`s not because that many people got hired. It`s because hundreds of thousands of Americans dropped out of the labor force. If you stop looking for a job, you`re not counted in the unemployment rate. Edgar Treiguts looks at how this could impact this year`s presidential race.

EDGAR TREIGUTS, cnn CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Employment figures are crucial in an election year, and the numbers have not been in the president`s favor. The economy added just 115,000 jobs in April. That`s down from 154,000 in March.

The unemployment rate dropped slightly to 8.1 percent. But that`s only because the number of adults actively looking for work has fallen to the lowest level since 1981. Mitt Romney says the economy should be adding closer to 500,000 jobs a month.

FORMER GOV. MITT ROMNEY, R-MASS., PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: This is a sad time in America. When people who want work can`t find jobs --

TREIGUTS (voice-over): The Economic Policy Institute says 300,000 to 400,000 jobs should be added each month for the economy to recover, but President Obama insists the recovery is still alive.

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: After the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, our businesses have now created more than 4.2 million new jobs over the last 26 months.

TREIGUTS (voice-over): Employment growth began to slow in March after three strong months in the winter. Some economists believe the slowdown is a seasonal adjustment, suggesting warm weather earlier in the year gave the economy an artificial boost. President Obama says next week he`ll urge Congress to come together and take steps to accelerate job growth.

OBAMA: There`s too much at stake for us not to all be rowing in the same direction.

TREIGUTS (voice-over): If the employment figures don`t stay afloat, the president will be paddling against a strong current ahead of the November election. I`m Edgar Treiguts reporting.

AZUZ: The first several months of this year have been focused on the Republican side of that election, through primaries and caucuses we now know that Governor Romney is that party`s presumptive nominee. Now his Democratic opponent has officially launched his campaign.

AZUZ (voice-over): President Obama, running for reelection, kicked off his campaign with rallies in Virginia and Ohio over the weekend. Those are expected to be big battleground state in November`s presidential election. At the events, the president talked about some of his accomplishments since he took office. He pledged to, quote, "finish what we started."

Governor Romney is scheduled to be in Ohio today, working to gather support in that battleground state. His campaign also talked about President Obama`s time in office, describing it as a time of, quote, "broken promises and ineffective leadership."

In Greece, voters cast their ballots yesterday for members of the nation`s parliament. Exit polls showed that the political parties in the coalition that has been in power were probably going to lose a lot of seats in parliament. The polls indicated that many voters were angry with the government`s efforts to cut spending. That`s been happening as Greece tries to get its massive debt crisis under control.

And France is going to have a new president. The man who just went inside that voting booth is Francois Hollande. And the results from yesterday`s runoff election indicate that he beat out Nicolas Sarkozy, who`s been in power since 2007. Hollande will be France`s first left-wing president. He`s a socialist. This means its first politically liberal leader since 1995.