Friday news dump

The Bush administration is still reporting the bad news on Friday, so that fewer people will notice.

Consumer spending barely budged in April and growth in personal income slowed sharply, even though the government started sending out billions of dollars in economic stimulus payments.

The Commerce Department reported Friday that consumer spending edged up a small 0.2 percent in April, just half the 0.4 percent rise in March. Excluding inflation, the performance was even weaker, showing no gain in spending after excluding price changes.

Incomes rose by just 0.2 percent in April, just half of the March increase. That performance would have been even weaker without the boost it got as the government began mailing the first of $106.7 billion in economic stimulus payments.

And I’m still posting things here, so that more people will notice.