The "Real" Unemployment Rate

No doubt you have heard from Faux News and your redneck uncle that Obama's 5.5% unemployment rate isn't the "real" unemployment rate because Obama came up with a way to cook the books so he can give black people more welfare...Or something to that degree. They contend that the "real" unemployment rate, including those who have been unemployed for over a year and have stopped looking for work or are unemployable, is more like 10.8%.

There is a small amount of truth to that. However, Obama hasn't changed anything that would affect the way we calculate unemployment. Unemployment today is measured and reported exactly as it was through ALL of the Bush Presidency and most of Clinton's term. Of course, when President Howdy Doody, the President of all things White, was in office, they weren't at all concerned about the "real" unemployment rate and were happy using what was reported at the time and if unemployment was rising under Obama, they would be happy to report those numbers as well. But, since unemployment has been free falling for most of Obama's term, even dipping below what Rmoney said he would bring us as President, they have to find a way to poo poo the numbers any way they can, thus the need for  the "real" unemployment number...Which by the way, will never be discussed again if we get a Republican President as they won't want to talk about "real" unemployment at that time.

But here, as usual, is where their logic backfires. Yes, it's true that the longterm/unemployable is no longer counted in the reported unemployment numbers. But, it's also true that as unemployment goes down, more people from the long term unemployed start entering the work force. Not only that, in 2014 Obama set aside grants and programs to get the long term unemployed back into the work force; contrary to popular belief, his goal was not to just get as many people on welfare as possible to somehow secure the "welfare vote" for his next election...Wait, right, none of that makes sense...Welfare people are not likely to vote and Obama has no more elections to win so there is no reason he would do such a thing. But if we were to use the Republican's metric of including the long term unemployed with the reported unemployment rate, using then Obama has actually reduced unemployment MORE than he did using the current metric used by Bush and Clinton.

If the unemployment rate is now 5.6%  but the "real" unemployment rate including the long term unemployed is 10.8% then we have to go back to the "real", long term unemployment rate when Obama took office, which was 17% as opposed to Bush's reported unemployment rate of 7.8%. Either way, Obama has reduced unemployment under both metrics. Using the current metric, unemployment has decreased 29% under Obama, but using the Republicans "Real" unemployment metric including the long term unemployed, Obama has reduced that number by 36%!

So the next time a Republican says 5.6% isn't the "real" unemployment rate, ask them what the "real" rate is and then inform them that the "real" rate under Bush was 17% when he left office and that by using their metric, Obama has improved unemployment even more so than by using his own metric, which again, is the same exact metric used by Bush and Clinton.

Allah Akbar! Not!

http://www.cnn.com/2015/01/07/europe/france-satire-magazine-gunfire/index.html

So the question I would pose to all the fundamentalist Islamists/Jihadis of the world would be if "Allahu Akbar" God is truly great, why does he need you to go kill cartoonists who hurt his feelings when they make fun of him?? If he were great and powerful as you claim, couldn't he just send a hurricane to kill all the satirists who make fun of him like he does when New Orleans has a gay pride parade (wink wink)? And if he were even greater, wouldn't he be able to look past any satire aimed his way? Couldn't he just laugh it off and possibly just send them to Hell in the afterlife for their "blasphemy"?

And if he were yet greater, wouldn't your countries of origin that have blasphemy laws and Sharia law based on god's word, be places of paradises that would keep anyone from wanting to move far away to liberal secular France? If France is so godless and not doing god's will, why would you even immigrate there in the first place and why is it a place where many strive to immigrate and so many want to live? Wouldn't your god, if he is as vengeful as you think, reward your homeland, which is most likely ruled by Sharia Law and lives under his laws and punish the liberal, secular, gay marrying Western states such as France and the Netherlands? If their ways are so unholy, why are they so much better than the places you come from which you claim to live under god's law?

Could it be that you are praying to the wrong god? Or that your god isn't great after all?? Or just simply belongs in the history books of other desert dwelling, bronze age sky gods...Many of which came long before yours??

Just something to think about...If you are capable...

And by the way, the same goes for you Bible Belters...Why does the Bible Belt lead the nation in crime, murder,divorce, underage out of wedlock child births,poverty, etc...And not coincidentally, illiteracy??