Staples to close 30 U.S. stores, dealing another blow to Mitt Romney's job creation claims

Mitt Romney probably won't be bragging quite so much between now and the election about all those jobs he supposedly created at Staples. In an inconveniently timed move for Romney's presidential campaign, the office-supply chain announced it would be closing 30 American stores and downsizing 30 more. How will that affect jobs? We don't know, because Staples is doing its best for Romney on that front:

Staples spokesman Kirk Saville would not comment as to whether any job reductions are in the works when the company lowers its store count by a net total of 30.

One analyst suggests that Staples might allow cuts to happen through natural attrition in a high-turnover workforce. But let's be serious. If you're closing 30 stores to cut costs, you're cutting jobs. Jobs held by people who are just barely getting by to begin with.

Of course, Mitt Romney was never responsible for creating the 90,000 jobs at Staples he has frequently claimed to have created. And his own convention speech laid out what was wrong with the jobs model at Staples, where sales associates make an average of just under $9 an hour:

[W]hen you lost that job that paid $22.50 an hour with benefits, you took two jobs at 9 bucks an hour and fewer benefits. [...]

But driving home late from that second job, or standing there watching the gas pump hit 50 dollars and still going, when the realtor told you that to sell your house you'd have to take a big loss, in those moments you knew that this just wasn't right.

Mitt Romney didn't create those $9 an hour jobs he knows just aren't right, but he wanted us to believe he did. For a while, those jobs were pretty much the basis for his entire presidential campaign. Now some of them'we don't know how many'are going away. Kind of like Mitt's political career.