Quote of the Day
Tis the business of little minds to shrink, but he whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves his conduct, will pursue his principles unto death.
Thomas Paine
Jobs, Hype, and the Equilibrium Rate
Remember how much Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz has gone around for months crowing about how Obama gained more jobs last year than Bush over 8 years of his administration (with 4 of those years having the Democrats in charge of the Senate and/or the House)? Revisions have a way of coming around to bite you; Bush gained just over 1 million (keep in mind Bush went through a tough first 2 years inheriting the recession following the Internet bubble burst, not to mention 9/11 and the corporate scandals, and of course, the recession started in December 2007). Of the 8 million jobs lost during the recession, roughly 4.6M occurred on Bush's watch. The new numbers show 950,000 added last year, considerably shy of one million.
Now, of course, expect the Democrats to trumpet going to a 9% unemployment rate, the biggest 2-month drop ever in the rate. But before you celebrate that, you need to know the number of new jobs only amounted to 36,000 new jobs; depending on the source, the rule of thumb is that 110,000 to 150,000 a month is needed to sustain an equilibrium in the labor force, e.g., new high school/college graduates entering the job market. (The lower Fed counts, even as low as 100,000, reflects the effect of earlier retirement.) Obama is still roughly 3M jobs in the hole during his tenure--never mind recover the 4.6M since the recession started. So what is the difference, with 14M unemployed? Basically a larger number of discouraged workers left the labor force (i.e., are no longer actively looking for work) and hence are no longer counted in the official statistics.
A Note on the Endangered Palin Accomplishment List
Sarah Palin's signature achievement is that she managed to do something other predecessors had tried but failed to do--land an agreement for a natural gas pipeline from Alaska to the lower 48. But a funny thing happened to soaring natural gas prices and domestic shortages: natural gas "fracking", especially on subterranean shale, has better than doubled the US proven resources, a 100-year supply, allowing the US to overtake Russia as the world's leading producer; an increasing supply of natural gas on the domestic market has led prices to plunge, making it more difficult for Alaska and its pipeline partner (TransCanada) to find enough customers to make the pipeline project economically feasible. The Alaska legislature is already looking to possibly cap up to a $500M obligation on front-end costs for the projects.
Egyptian Vice President Omar Suleiman Target of Assassination?
Shortly after Suleiman was appointed to his new position, there was an attack this past Monday on his motorcade, killing two of his bodyguards. This is an ominous warning of what could be in store for an interim administration if Mubarak is forced into resigning ahead of the end of his term in September. Was it terrorists or even a cell within the military? There's not enough information available yet to comment. But let us remember, from our own history, what happened with the departure of military officers from the South, promised by Rutherford Hayes in the aftermath of a controversial Presidential election: a number of white Southerners attempted to intimidate poor blacks and whites from voting. In case the reader doesn't remember, recall when Iraq civilians voted, there had been explicit threats by terrorists to attack voters going to the polls. One should keep that fact in mind even if support for the Muslim Brotherhood has been modest to date.
Political Humor
It was so cold in Washington, D.C., that they needed jumper cables to get Dick Cheney started. - Jay Leno
[It was so cold in Washington, D.C., that the Democrats had to burn even more money than usual just to stay warm.]
The Chinese say the year is 4709, and we say the year is 2011. I’m just going to guess that they probably got the math right on that. - Conan O'Brien
[The Chinese later explained they use the year they estimate the US will finally pay off its debt to them...]
Yes, I realize we're just a month past New Year's, but I recently came across JibJab's year-end review and it's reasonably fresh...
Musical Interlude: One-Hit Wonders/Instrumentals
Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass, "Spanish Flea"
