Hotsheet Live: What do the unemployment numbers mean for Obama?

(CBS News) -- CBS News political director John Dickerson was joined on Hotsheet Live Friday by National Journal's Reid Wilson, PBS's Christina Bellantoni, and The New York Time's Michael Shear to discuss the April jobs report.

The Labor Department said the economy added just 115,000 new jobs last month, though the unemployment rate fell slightly to 8.1 percent as some workers gave up on their job search and are not counted in the unemployment statistics.

"We are at the point, traditionally speaking, at which people's opinions about the economy generally harden," said Wilson. "Here we are six months out, the way people feel about the economy now is probably going to look very similar to the way that people will feel about the economy on Election Day."

And the president will have an especially tough selling in states like Virginia and Ohio, Dickerson said.

"President Obama has another few months to get people to start feeling better about the economy," Bellantoni added.

Each guest concluded the show by sharing their endorsements for the week.

Michael Shear endorsed David Maraniss's new book "Barack Obama: The Story," as well as the new movie Avengers.

Christina Bellantoni shared a slogan she learned during a recent vacation. "The Costa Rican slogan on a keychain I have right here is 'pura vida,' which literally means 'good life,'" she said. "I thought I want to take that back with me to Washington because I think we all lose that sometimes."

Reid Wilson endorsed Joshua Green's column today in the Boston Globe, "Zombie Congress."

And lastly, host John Dickerson endorsed Bill Clinton's review of "The Passage of Power" by Robert Caro

Watch the entire discussion, including the panelists' thoughts on the Obama campaign's "The Life of Julia," in the video above.