I'm blogging on the road today on the way to New York and noticed a nice piece from my old buddies at Newsmax.com (full disclosure: I used to write Newsmax's daily financial commentary from 2003-2005) on the jobs picture and on prospects for the U.S. economy.

I follow a wide variety of different business news and opinion sites and I'd slot Newsmax into the more right-of-center, pro-Wall Street publishers and that's perfectly fine. But lately, I've noticed a more bearish tilt coming from Newsmax, with more and more editorials touting tough economic times ahead. Again, no problem there - - I've penned a few blogs on these pages talking about the same scenario.

In today's editorial, Newsmax notes that  the U.S. Department of Labor reported that non-farm payrolls rose by 132,000 in May and that the unemployment rate held steady for the second month in a row at 4.5 percent. The payrolls report was cheered by Wall Street “experts” as an indication that the U.S. economy is healthy and that the bull market in equities is firmly intact.

But the financial gurus at Newsmax see these numbers as skewed, and  see any concuding U.S. economic scenario as anything but "healthy".

Says Newsmax: "While we agree that the employment report was favorable and that the U.S. economy is still expanding, a closer look at the payrolls report suggests the best days might already be behind us. And, the fact that the U.S. economy grew at an annualized rate of  only 0.7 percent during the first quarter of 2007 is certainly nothing to shout home about."

The editors point to the fact that the lion's share of May’s employment gains came from the service sector where 135,000 jobs were created, and the federal government, which added 40,000 jobs. At the same time, 24,000 jobs were lost in the retail sector, while the important manufacturing sector suffered a loss of 18,000 jobs.

Peering deeper into the future, the folks at Newsmax say that job growth is actually in full retreat, and the U.S. economy in full retreat mode right behind. "Job creation has slowed considerably since March 2006. Even more important, the number of hours worked by  manufacturing production workers has been trending significantly lower over the past year. Not surprisingly, we rarely (if ever) hear the major financial media or Wall Street “experts” comment on these trends."

The editorial also notes that the help-wanted sections of major newspapers are in decline, as well (although I would argue that's because fewer people rely on newspapers for their information these days, a fact reflected in subscription losses from major U.S. newspapers across the board.) But, as Newsmax points out, on-line job board ads fell by 2% last month, as well.

I'm inclined to agree with Newsmax that the rosy scenario painted by the U.S. Department of Labor, based on the last jobs report, ain't so rosy. We've had six years of sustained growth and we could well be topping out. And if we were, the jobs picture would be the first  place to go to verify that.

But, as Newsmax proves, you have to do a little digging first to get the real story.