RALEIGH — Wanna see me link up “American Idol,” President George W. Bush, and the economy?

Naturally, it has to do with a song.

On Wednesday night, North Carolina’s own Fantasia Barrino became the new “American Idol,” in case you’ve been living under a rock lately. I think she clinched the competition several weeks ago with her beautiful, touching rendition of George Gershwin’s “Summertime.” It was, said one of the judges, the best performance ever on “Idol.” I agree, though I’m biased because I prefer big-band music over disco. I’m funny that way.

“Summertime” began life as a piece from the Gershwin opera Porgy and Bess, also famous for “Bess, You Is My Woman Now,” “It Ain’t Necessarily So,” and other great tunes. Among America’s most gifted composers and lyricists, George and Ira Gershwin wrote many songs that properly remain famous and often-covered today (“Summertime” has been performed by Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Paul Anka, and the Zombies, thus by artists literally from A to Z). One of my favorite Gershwin songs is “They All Laughed”, first recorded by Fred Astaire for the film Shall We Dance. Here’s a taste of the witty lyric:

They all laughed at Christopher Columbus
When he said the world was round.
They all laughed when Edison recorded sound.

They all laughed at Wilbur and his brother
When they said that man could fly.
They told Marconi wireless was a phony.
It’s the same old try.

(This is fun, if bad history; Columbus’ serious critics didn’t actually believe the earth was flat, as the ancient Greeks had proved it was round centuries before. They thought he was wrong about its circumference, and they were right.)

The end of the chorus is “Who’s got the last laugh now?” I was thinking of that line the other day when I saw another discussion of the federal government’s job-creation data. Remember the furor that erupted earlier this year when it came to light that President Bush‘s Council of Economic Advisors had predicated its economic forecast on a projected 2.6 million increase in jobs during 2004? “Rosy scenario!” screamed the Washington establishment. “Cooking the books!” screamed the press corps. By February, Bush was reportedly backing off the 2.6 million figure while, yes, they all laughed it up in the nation’s capital.

Only, now it’s May, we have the jobs reports for the first four months of 2004, and the data show an increase of 867,000 jobs nationwide. At that rate, the U.S. economy will produce — get ready for this — 2.6 million jobs by the end of the year. I’d like to know who came up with this projection, so I can track which Wall Street firm he or she eventually joins and bet some money with them.

Actually, the job-expansion rate might be higher or lower than that through 2004, but at the very least the Bush administration deserves an apology from all those who maligned them. Fat chance. Also, don’t buy the spin that these jobs are of the low-wage, hamburger-flipping variety. In April, reports The Wall Street Journal, manufacturing and service-sector jobs were roughly comparable in hourly pay.

So, who’s got the last laugh now? Fantasia Barrino, for one, and perhaps Bush’s economic forecaster. And now I do, for finishing this loopy column.

Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation and publisher of Carolina Journal.