White House delays report hoping for good news. It does not arrive.

I got a chuckle at the very last paragraph of this story: "White House projects 9% jobless rate ahead of 2012 election"

The White House delayed released of the report, which was due in mid-July, as the debate over the debt limit and accompanying budget deal wore on. The delay caused a need to factor in new economic data released over the summer -- including downward revisions in the growth in gross domestic product -- and the result was a gloomier forecast than it would have issued based on information available in June.

So, basically, they were going "double down" on a reversal of fortune that didn't materialize, leading to the weekend-before-Labor Day news dump.