Another month of the Obama presidency and another lackluster, subpar performance for the American economy.

There were 215,000 new jobs created in July, slightly below the consensus estimate of 225,000. The unemployment rate remained the same, as did the number of unemployed, at 8.3 million. Over the last year, the unemployment rate has declined .9 percentage points while the number of unemployed is down 1.4 million.

The participation rate was 62.6 percent in July, unchanged from last month and down from 62.9 percent a year ago.

While hardly a boom, the Federal Reserve has begun dropping Delphic hints that it might, just might, begin raising interest rates ever so slightly in September. Ten years ago, the Fed waited too long to begin raising interests rates in the face of the growing housing bubble, and it doesn’t want to make the same mistake again. But it equally doesn’t want to choke off what there has been of recovery. So it won’t be an easy call.