The 2012 political horse race is like a Blob devouring everything in it path — the Truth, our Selves, even the very fabric of Reality itself.
Will anything will survive its onslaught?
What this video—as much as you can stomach—and then read the justified rant which follows.
I like Henry Blodget. Smart guy, a good guy. I know you're just doing your job, Henry, but give us a break!
In this unconscionable interview, Henry Blodget asserts at the outset that it now looks like things are going "better" for Obama because as Potomac Research Group's Chief Political Strategist Greg Valliere asserts, it is not the absolute unemployment rate and the shitty economy that matter, it is the change in the unemployment rate that matters for the incumbent. The "official" unemployment rate calculated by the BLS is 8.5% and it's been falling. This is known as the "headline" number.
It's bad enough that Hopey-Changey and his current economic advisers—whoever they are, the original losers were completely unsuccessful and quit—don't have a fucking clue how they will create jobs and heal our sick economy. It's even worse that the leading Republican challenger Willard Romney and his advisers have no fucking clue how to create jobs and heal our sick economy.
This is only one reason among a thousand others why this election is completely fucking meaningless—the candidates are bought & paid for, they're not really interested in fixing the economy, they're merely interested in maintaining or acquiring power. And that's the worst part of this farce. But I will not permit mere political expediency to trample on the truth about how many Americans can't find enough decent paying work or any work at all.
Not only is this corrosive political horse race a farce, but the jobless numbers cited to support one candidate or the other are a sham. It's all just so much bullshit. If we don't stand up and defend Reality and our Selves against this outrageous, eviscerating onslaught, who will? It may not do much good, but it's still got to be done. So please accept this small effort to do just that. I'll focus on jobs and the unemployment rate. I give you Exhibits A, B and C.
Exhibit A
Exhibit A — alternative measures of the unemployment rate (labor utilization) from the BLS December jobs report. Notice the parts outlined in the red boxes. The "official" unemployment rate is the U3, which stands at 8.5% (seasonally adjusted). The U5, which includes "discouraged" and "marginally attached" workers is 10%, which is probably an underestimate. The U6, which further includes those working part-time who want full time work stands at 15.2%, but see Exhibit C below. Source.
Exhibit B
Graph from Calculated Risk's December Unemployment Report. As the unemployment rate has dropped in 2011 (red line), the participation rate, which is that segment of the population counted as being in the labor force, has continued to fall, a trend which has accelerated since the "Great" recession began. The participation rate is now 64%. Those not counted in the labor force (not shown) has grown and grown, a trend which actually began in the early 1990s and has accelerated since 2007. To summarize, the civilian labor force is shrinking as the population grows and the BLS umemployment rate declines.
And from the Financial Times article America's incredible shrinking labor force—
The first is that the measured rate of unemployment has fallen to levels which are far lower than would otherwise have occurred. In the past 3 years, about 4.8 million people have disappeared from the labor force instead of becoming “unemployed”, and this has allowed the unemployment rate to drop from a peak of 10.0 per cent in October 2009 to 8.5 per cent now. If these people had stayed in the labour force, instead of drifting away from it, the unemployment rate would now be about 11.3%, and the whole debate on US economic policy would look very different.
Yes, the debate on economic policy would look very different if the "official" unemployment rate were 11.3%. But instead we're getting bullshit like that in the Daily Ticker video above.
Exhibit C
According to Gallup's daily polling, the unemployment rate was indeed 8.5% (top frame) at the end of December. That number does not include "discouraged" or "marginally attached" workers because those are not categories used in their polling. (Also, Gallup numbers are not seasonally adjusted, so they probably better reflect the reality on the ground, contrary to what most people think.) The pecentage of those working part-time who desired full-time work was 9.7%. The BLS U6 number (not seasonally adjusted), which is close to an apples to apples comparison with the Gallup result, stood at 15.2%. Adding the two Gallup numbers together, they came up with an underemployment rate of 18.2%. The discrepancy is an astonishing 3.0%. So who is right? The Bureau of Labor Statistics? Or Gallup?
As I pointed out in Closing Out 2011 — Six Graphs, there are fewer nonfarm payroll jobs now than there were prior to the 2001 recession. The "official" unemployment rate is as phony as a 3-dollar bill, as I have just demonstrated in Exhibitis A, B and C. (If you are not satisfied, I could trot out 17 more graphs, but showing them to you would obviously be a waste of my time.)
So we might ask how in hell can that phony jobless rate be used to support one candidate or the other? Quite obviously, this phony number can't be used for any legitimate purpose—citing that number as a positive development is evil, calculated, denigrating, expedient political bullshit. And therefore, and just as obviously, we are in the midst of one of the biggest, most intense propaganda campaigns in human history—I call it The Blob. Certainly it is the most expensive propaganda blitz the world has ever seen. And the outcome of this farce won't make one bit of difference in the lives of ordinary Americans.
Wait! I take that back. Whatever the outcome, things can only get worse for all but the wealthiest Americans.
There is much more I could say here. For example, Chief Political Strategist Greg Valliere asserts without argument that we've sucessfully avoided a recession—"fears [of a double dip] recession have totally been demolished. We are clearly in a recovery." That's news to me! John Hussman, among others, is sticking with his recession call. I'll post on that another day.
I hope my colleagues in the blogosphere will pick this theme up and run with it. Scream now while you can still breath because after The Blob has smothered all intelligent, decent, truthful life in the United States, nobody will be able to hear you scream.
Bonus Video — The Blob (trailer, 1958)
Dave:
Thanks so much for providing these graphs. It is interesting to see them in print, rather than just the summaries we get in the MSM.
Trust has deteriorated so much that I don't even trust myself as much.
I finally realized why talk is cheap: because the supply exceeds the demand.
Don Levit
Posted by: Don Levit | 01/13/2012 at 04:09 PM