May 7, 2010

"This is a totally -- I don't know what, biorhythms, karma, I don't know what it is, but nothing about this day is making sense to me."

"I'm not sure that I'm actually conscious and awake, living in a dream here. (interruption) No, no, no. I don't know how to explain this. But in the news today, I've got all kinds of people saying this and that. None of what anybody thinks is interesting is interesting to me. And the stuff that does interest me, I'm still not sure why it does. So this is going to be very, very weird today because I look at the stacks of stuff here and maybe in five stacks I got three things here I really care about. The rest of it is, 'Okay I gotta do a service here and get involved in this because this is news that needs to be discussed, analyzed as only I can,' but it's tough to explain here. It's not that I don't care about it. It's that I'm confused. I've got all kinds of people all fired up about all kinds of stuff and I can't for the life of me understand why. (interruption) No, Snerdley, I do get confused at times. It's just that I never admit it. Here I am admitting it."

Rush Limbaugh, beginning his show yesterday.

What we're seeing there is...
a man confused by what's happening in the news and his own reaction to it.
a man with a disordered mind and the arrogance to think it's okay to let it show.
a disoriented man without the sense to disguise his embarrassing state.
a clever showman warming up and drawing us in.
  
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120 comments:

AllenS said...

A man losing interest in his job.

Anonymous said...

Slow news day. Not much happening on the internet. Controversies all played out.

He's correctly measuring the temperature of the day.

All you've been able to come up with is how much Courtney Love weighs.

Pretty lame stuff.

Cubs are awful this year. Maybe that can stoke some posts.

Alternatively: In what way are we racist today and why? Extra points for fiercest level of outrage.

AllenS said...

Limbaugh has been taking off a lot of Fridays this year. I'm thinking that the work week is getting too long for him. Instead of working 15 hours a week, he's only able to work 12.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Seeing the slim contra Obama "stuck of stuff", Rush was suddenly mortified by how slooowly his - Obama fail - prognostication is panning out.

Lincolntf said...

His voice is his primary marketing tool. As long as he's talking, whether he's reading a grocery list or making a biting comment about the President, people flipping through the radio dial know that they've found him. He's his own jingle.

MadisonMan said...

Why doesn't he just talk about the flood in Tennessee? Very under-reported in the Media if you ask me.

Anonymous said...

OK,I'm racist today because I want the borders of my country to be closed and controlled.

I'm also anti-business because I want every employer found to have illegal aliens working for them fined $10,000 per illegal,thereby drying up the honey they seek and causing the illegals to go home by themselves.

I'm terrible.

wv.muleboan,there's a joke in there somewhere.

MDIJim said...

We have been very lucky with incompetent terrorists. It is amazing that they got the Times Square bomber to open up before he was read his rights. He should have been read his rights from the get go. No matter what anyone says, HE IS AN AMERICAN CITIZEN.

It is really weird to me that the would-be underwear bomber is not a citizen, was on an international flight, and had not stepped off the plane, yet he was read his rights.

Clearly, the Obama administration does not have its act together on terrorism. On the other hand, the Bushies erected this entire fascistic TSA monstrosity that failed utterly in the two cases. Why are we law-abiding Americans subjected to all this harassment while terrorists seem to operate with impunity and are caught by average people and only when they fould up?

Rush cannot ask these questions because he is a millionaire fat fascist who flies in a private jet over the huddled masses waiting in TSA lines.

By the way, I'm so old that I remember when people like Rush would blow a gasket if a school kid wore an American flag on a T shirt or as a hanky on his head.

Racist outrage: That this peace-loving Moslem, struggling to become an American citizen despite Obama's racist drone attacks on his homeland was a victim of foreclosure driven to terrorism by racist capitalists.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Why doesn't he just talk about the flood in Tennessee? Very under-reported in the Media if you ask me.

Rush usually avoids religious discussion.

KCFleming said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Lincolntf said...

Weather stories, and Americans dying by the dozens due to natural disasters, only get coverage when there's a bogeyman (Republican) to blame.
The MSM doesn't want Obama to get into yet another "it's STILL Bush's fault" whine fest (which is his universal response to anything bad that happens on his watch) because they know it's wearing thin with the American people.
If they can't spin the crisis to serve Obama, they'll simply ignore it.

KCFleming said...

Confused about what to talk about???

Stock market falls 1000 points.

Unemployment 'unexpectedly' rises ...again.

Students sent home from high school for wearing US flag shirts on cinco de mayo.

REP. ANDRE CARSON (speaking about Tea Party and health care bill protesters): "I’m from intelligence, and I’ll tell you, one of the largest threats to our internal security…I mean terrorism has an Islamic face, but it really comes from racial supremacist groups. (Its the kind of thing we keep a threat assessment on record [for]".

Steve M. Galbraith said...

Limbaugh's a crank - I'm tired of the "liberals are evil/conservatives are good" line (or the "conservatives are evil/liberals are good" line of the even bigger crank Olbermann as well) - but he is a brilliant entertainer.

Anonymous said...

NYTNY, you get 100 racist points. Acquire 10,000 racist points and its Diversity Training for you!

cokaygne, 1000 racist points for satirizing the Religion of Peace! Public denunciation and two minute hate coming your way!

I really love black people and Mexicans. Would give any black or Mexican who came my way the shirt off my back. Would kiss Al Sharpton's ass in public! Stick out that big booty, Rev. Al. Please wipe first!

10,000 anti-racist credits for me!

Dustin said...

I think Pogo has a point about there being interesting things to discuss.

Regardless, I think Rush is having some kind of problem. I don't think that means he's going crazy or having a medicinal side effect. People have problems sometimes. Not a big deal, but if you hadn't told me who said this, I would have guessed that US AMERICANS Miss South Carolina. Never in a million years would have gotten this right.

KCFleming said...

"Please wipe first!"

Racist.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Lets pretend I'm Rush.. (with a typo tied behind my back just to make it fair ;)

Folks.. the regime is giving out all this information about how we caught this Kaiser Sose - whatever his name is.. some of it purportedly do to his "incompetence".. lets also remember the supposed "incompetence" of the Christmas Fruit of the Loom.

Like the Christmas Day bomber, we were lucky that both of these folks were incompetent -- they couldn't trigger the explosives.. - Washington Post

I'm seeing this "incompetent" media template everywhere..

Reading about the Wall Street digital cascade that happened yesterday.. and believing that phenomenon was triggered by design to mimic predictive human behavior (by some very smart people I might add).. I'm not ruling out the possibility that the failure rate to successfully carry out an attack, a terror attack, could create an impetus of its own.. some sort of urge to copy cat, 'know knowing' what the others "incompetents" failed to comprehend.

I know I'm going to get in trouble for this..

Remember all the flack Bush got for his penchant for secrecy?..

Once again.. Bush was right.

wv - ditirte: A rush ditto segment.

Daniel12 said...

Maybe he was high.

KCFleming said...

Maybe Rush is taking oxytocin instead of oxycontin.

garage mahal said...

I think he is getting a little fed up with the lame and disorganized terror attacks not hitting their targets.

AllenS said...

I'm predicting that Limbaugh will retire soon. The show will be taken over by Paul Shanklin. The new show will be called Politically Humorist Music You Can Dance To.

WV: resti

I resti my case.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

I think he is getting a little fed up with the lame and disorganized terror attacks not hitting their targets.

I bet garage has never called the show.

You would make a great caller garage.

MDIJim said...

To call a Moslem terrorist "incompetent is a racist way of questioning the intelligence of people of choler.

Pogo @8:59 is the winner.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Callers that disagree with him bring out the better of him.

AllenS said...

Rush: "Garage Mahal from Madison, WI, welcome to the show."

GM: "So you're probably bummed by the fact that the bombs aren't going off, huh?"

Rush: "Snerdley, ***** H ******!"

ricpic said...

Rush is successful enough to be honest. There are days when one doesn't give a fig...about anything. He just admitted it.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

I'm not ruling out the possibility that AllenS @9:15 is the winner.. lol

caplight said...

Even if Rush was confused he wouldn't think he was.

Anonymous said...

... questioning the intelligence of people of choler...

To paraphrase the punchline of the old joke about how many feminists it takes to screw in a lightbulb:

That's not funny!

How many racists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?

ricpic said...

People of choler need to take a chill pill.

Fred4Pres said...

Q. What do they call Chinese Restaurants in China?

A. Restaurants.

Meade said...

Rush, take your f***ing tampon out and tell me what you have to say.

KCFleming said...

Question: Was the health care bill invented by politicians or by doctors and scientists?

Answer: Politicians, of course.
Doctors and scientists would have tested it on monkeys first.


(Old Soviet joke repurposed, by a fellow kulak)

Largo said...

How many feminists it takes to screw in a lightbulb?

That's not funny!

How many racists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?

STFU!

Scott said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Scott said...

Rush is experiencing weltschmerz. From Wikipedia:

"Weltschmerz (from the German, meaning world-pain or world-weariness) is a term coined by the German author Jean Paul and denotes the kind of feeling experienced by someone who understands that physical reality can never satisfy the demands of the mind. This kind of pessimistic world view was widespread among several romantic authors such as Lord Byron, Giacomo Leopardi, François-René de Chateaubriand, Alfred de Musset, Nikolaus Lenau, Herman Hesse, and Heinrich Heine. It is also used to denote the feeling of sadness when thinking about the evils of the world—compare empathy, theodicy.

"The modern meaning of Weltschmerz in the German language is the psychological pain caused by sadness that can occur when realizing that someone's own weaknesses are caused by the inappropriateness and cruelty of the world and (physical and social) circumstances. Weltschmerz in this meaning can cause depression, resignation and escapism, and can become a mental problem (compare to Hikikomori). The modern meaning should also be compared with the concept of anomie, or a kind of alienation, that Émile Durkheim wrote about in his sociological treatise Suicide."

Scott said...

Or something like that.

Scott said...

Weltschmerz in the dictionary.

ricpic said...

Is weltschmerz all that different from melancholia? And in any case, does either condition need all that much introspection before it is induced? Some are just prone to weltschmerz. Most, thankfully, aren't.

Beth said...

Is prescription medication the theme of the day?

Anonymous said...

And here I thought that Weltschmerz was that cheesy stuff that's hard to get out of glans of the penis!

How does this relate to racism?

ricpic said...

I just want to say that I'm just going to start going easy on just, just not yet.

rhhardin said...

He's complaining about what the media consider newsworthy and not newsworthy.

He suggests they're catering to public taste, which is not his, and flatters the audience that they're like him in this.

ricpic said...

Head cheese. Head cheese is hard to get out of the glans. Which is why it's called hea....

KCFleming said...

I thought that weltschmerz came from eating too many beans.

Try Beano.

rhhardin said...

The cure for Weltschmertz is Lebensraum.

Phil 314 said...

What we're seeing there is...

How come
"Who gives a shit" wasn't a choice?

Scott said...

@ricpic: I think of melancholia as being more free-floating, like a garden-variety depression. By contrast, weltschmerz points to a cause: a world-weariness, that the cares of the world are of no great consequence.

Phil 314 said...

But I'll say a prayer for him.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

..Or something like that.

I think you might have something there Scott..

The modern meaning should also be compared with the concept of anomie, or a kind of alienation..

Rush has often said that he "doesn't care what people say about him"..

Scott said...

@c3:

The moment I wake up
Before I put on my makeup
I say a little prayer for you
While combing my hair, now
And wondering what dress to wear, now
I say a little prayer for you

Forever, forever, you'll stay in my heart
And I will love you
Forever, forever, we never will part
Oh, how I'll love you
Together, together, that's how it must be
To live without you
Would only be heartbreak for me

I run for the bus, dear
While riding I think of us, dear
I say a little prayer for you
At work, I just take time
And all through my coffee break-time
I say a little prayer for you

Forever, forever, you'll stay in my heart
And I will love you
Forever, forever we never will part
Oh, how I'll love you
Together, together, that's how it must be
To live without you
Would only be heartbreak for me

My darling, believe me
For me there is no one
But you ....


--"I Say A Little Prayer," Bachrach/David

Scott said...

I think Althouse should have a shot at guest-hosting the Rush Limbaugh program.

bagoh20 said...

I feel exactly the same as Rush and none of you hacks give a damn. Just remember that I would actually help change your flat tire, if you asked me. You ungrateful celebrity suck up S.O.B.s. don't deserve me, but I love you anyway, you bastards.

Scott said...

@Lem: Makes sense to me anyway.

wv:skinglog ... At highway rest stations, that smelly pink stuff you squirt on your hands before you wash them.

Scott said...

"Just remember that I would actually help change your flat tire, if you asked me."

Will you give me a ride in your Maybach to the next gas station instead?

Anonymous said...

Thanks, Pogo, for turning me on to Beano.

I've earned my Masters of Gas Preventionology.

Unfortunately, I suspect that Beano is racist. I don't see any indication that the Beano University of Gas promotes Diversity.

Is the Beano University of Gas an Affirmative Action institution?

Come on Beano. Black gas is just as important as white gas.

However, black weltschmerz is probably much more potent than white weltschmerz.

Titus (or Tight-Ass), where are you? We need your expert input. You are on the input side of weltschmerz, right?

wv:rumelf ... the stuff the elves drink before Santa takes off on Christmas eve.

garage mahal said...

I'm sure the +290k jobs report this morning sent Limbaugh into even deeper depression.

Joe said...

Garage, what about the "Unexpected" rise in Unemployment to 9.9%? Did they help or hurt your morning digestion?

Scott said...

... or about 3.5% of the 8.2 million jobs lost during this recession. And 30% of the 290k are temporary census jobs.

BFD

Anonymous said...

I'm sure the +290k jobs report this morning sent Limbaugh into even deeper depression.

All well and good, Garage, but since you're a liberal... what does this have to do with racism?

Racism is the unified theory that Einstein never quite figured out.

I'll bet most of those jobs went to the Kulaks... those horrible white middle class men. That would certainly be racism.

Did any Tea Partiers get jobs?

That would be racism!

ricpic said...

The regime has told us we'll have to get used to permanent 10% unemployment...it's the progressive thing to do...or have done to you...or something.

garage mahal said...

Positive numbers for America are bad news for Republicans. So it's easy to see why people like Limbaugh are so miserable lately. Tsk tsk.

Lincolntf said...

I think it's good news that there is a tiny glimmer of light within the dark cloud that is the explosive growth of unemployment under Obama. He needs something to hang on to or he'll be forced to confront a hard reality, and when he's been confronted by reality in the past, it's sent him right off the deep end.
A President having a nervous breakdown or acting on his ego-induced manias is not good for anyone. Let him live in the land of magic numbers where he's most comfortable. Best that we let him rest for now, and save the reality for November when the country roundly rejects him and his Party. That will be a traumatic and possibly catastrophic mental blow to Obama, and I want him healthy enough to handle it.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
garage mahal said...

I think it's good news that there is a tiny glimmer of light within the dark cloud that is the explosive growth of unemployment under Obama.

Reality Check.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Positive numbers for America are bad news for Republicans..

Rush used to say the same about democrats when Bush was in office.

Why cant we just Move on?.. just Move on ;)

ps.. when I say lets Move on why do I feel like I'm saying the opposite?

bagoh20 said...

How many jobs are created or lost means nothing with out the understanding of what kind of jobs they are. A government job uses more than it contributes, if anything. A real job creates wealth, and multiplies into more jobs that produce more prosperity and pays taxes rather than using them up. It's the difference between Dad getting a job or bringing home a pet. Our national family has too many pets and is getting more while Dad loses his job. Pet food continues to get more expensive and the shit is piling up.

I expect that we need 10 private sector jobs to pay for every public one. As long as that ratio is not happening, our family is getting poorer. We are becoming the cat lady with 100 cats living off the welfare check. Even worse, we are becoming unemployable; losing our basic skills, motivation and character.

Job numbers will rise and fall, but the nature of those jobs is going the wrong direction.

Lincolntf said...

REALITY per the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
(That was a cute little graph that the KosKids came up with, though.)

Annual unemployment rates going back to Bush's first year.

2000 4.0
2001 4.7
2002 5.8
2003 6.0
2004 5.5
2005 5.1
2006 4.6
2007 4.6
2008 5.8
2009 9.3


wv: dionvets

Celine's groupies?

bagoh20 said...

We are nearing our goal of matching Europe's permanent low employment and worthlessness. Imagine if Europe disappeared tomorrow. What would be the effect on the world? Now, imagine if the U.S. did. The world loses our defense and the stability it ensures, our innovation, medicine, economic engine and consumers. Freedom fails. That's the difference between Dad getting hit by a car or the family pet getting it. We do not want to go that way. The world cannot afford another Europe or one less America, and definitely not both.

Brian said...

@Garage:
Hope that trend you show holds up. Hope that job growth in the private sector picks up, as much of the job growth you cite is public sector work.

Because if job growth doesn't keep up with population growth, then the unemployment rate doesn't go down, it stays the same or goes up. Or more people give up looking for work and go on the public dole.

I can't find it now, but I read somewhere that 1 in 5 men are out of work, and that for half of those, their old job isn't coming back. That's a huge number of people that are SOL and will have to be trained to do something else.

bagoh20 said...

Lefties,

What is the goal? What is the dream? What do you hope will happen in the big picture, long term?

Scott said...

The left doesn't have a vision. They define themselves in terms of "not being who they hate."

When they win, they're lost. Barry O., Pelosi, and Reid -- need we say more?

A.G. said...

Do some people here have reading comprehension problems? This wasn't the intro to his show today- it was yesterday's.

And don't you think it's a bit interesting that he said, "I'm not sure that I'm actually conscious and awake, living in a dream here...I don't know how to explain this.. So this is going to be very, very weird today...", and then an hour later the stock market falls 980 points in minutes?

(And no, it wasn't that he was in on it with his fat cat broker buddies- in the words of BHO at the health care summit, that's a "talking point", so you'll need something more).

Phil 314 said...

Hmmmm...
In a thread concerning Rush Limbaugh a comment on Beano squirts out! A silent but deadly attack on the noxious vapors that emanate from Mr. Limbaugh?

It reminds me of this famous comment on Mr. Limbaugh's public pronouncements

Phil 314 said...

Odious or odorous?

wv: fecesses (I kid you not)

Doug said...

Who gives a flying crap about Rush Limbaugh

X said...

200,000+ census jobs. BFD. 17+% unemployment.

themightypuck said...

@bagoh20,

You are blindly riffing. Lefties are precisely the sort of people who think of "the" goal and "the" dream. End war. Feed the poor. Universal Healthcare. Grand plans in ignorance of the true driver of progress which is to outdo your neighbor.

Phil 314 said...

Who gives a flying crap about Rush Limbaugh

That can happen with so many Limbaugh fans.

garage mahal said...

200,000+ census jobs. BFD. 17+% unemployment.

Not that facts matter to you people, but 66k were new census hires in that 290k. And I bet those 290k people hired last month was a big fucking deal.

Anonymous said...

"rhhardin said...The cure for Weltschmertz is Lebensraum."

I read that too...

Lincolntf said...

"Not that facts matter to you people,..."

Here's as simple a fact as mathematics can express...

9.3 (Obama)> 5.8 (Bush)

...and yet you seem utterly baffled by it.

Anonymous said...

"...9.3 (Obama)> 5.8 (Bush).."

correction: it's now 9.9

garage mahal said...

-750k/month as Obama entered office.
+290k/month a year later.

I'm sure it's just a coincidence.

Lincolntf said...

That's right, Lars.
I forgot about the robust Obamanomics "recovery" that increased unemployment by .6%.
Now, if Obama can just increase unemployment by a whole percentage point for next month, we'll know we're really on the right track...

AC245 said...

Unemployment rate in 2006 when Democrats took over the House and Senate promising "A New Direction for America: 4.6%

Unemployment rate in 2008 when Democrats took over the White House on the slogan of "Hope and Change": 5.8%

Unemployment rate in 2010, with the Democrats in charge of the House, the Senate, and the White House: 9.9%

How is that "New Direction" working out for you, average American? What about that "Change"?

"Are you better off now than you were four years ago? Is it easier for you to go and buy things in the stores than it was four years ago? Is there more or less unemployment in the country than there was four years ago? Is America as respected throughout the world as it was? Do you feel that our security is as safe, that we're as strong as we were four years ago? And if you answer all of those questions yes, why then, I think your choice is very obvious as to whom you will vote for. If you don't agree, if you don't think that this course that we've been on for the last four years is what you would like to see us follow for the next four, then I could suggest another choice that you have."

Phil 314 said...

An improving economy is good news for everyone. Of course, given the skeptism created by the "job created/jobs saved" meme, we'll likely reserve the overwhelming joy until the "good" numbers persist.

I'm embarrassed to do this but this guy outlined the "persistence" issue

"Even if we add 300,000 jobs a month, we’re looking at a prolonged period of suffering"

Anonymous said...

"...Now, if Obama can just increase unemployment by a whole percentage point for next month, we'll know we're really on the right track..'

That's my thinking too.
Worse is better.

AllenS said...

The American economy added 290,000 jobs in April, while the unemployment rate rose to 9.9 percent

Good news, bad news.

AllenS said...

Interesting caller on Limbaugh just now. He thinks that the unemployment numbers went up because unemployment benefits were extended, and those people, who would have been still unemployment, but not counted after their benefits expired, are now counted as being unemployed. Sounds good enough for me.

MDIJim said...

C3 @11:14 "fecesses" sounds like a misogynistic word that Rush would use to describe a NOW convention. Close, but no racist prize.

garage mahal said...

Sounds good enough for me.

As usual, Limbaugh is wrong. The reason the unemployment figure is up is because people are back out looking for work again. There was an increase of 805,000 in the labor force in April. [people looking for work].

AllenS said...

How would you know that someone is looking for work? How would you count such a person? Is there a government form that they sign?

AllenS said...

There was an increase of 805,000 in the labor force in April. [people looking for work].

Excuse me, but if you're looking for work, you can't be in the labor force. Again, how can you know how many are looking for work?

Phil 314 said...

re: Unemployment numbers. When I first heard the explanation I said
Yea, I can understand that

Now the WSJ has got me more confused and more concerned

John Stodder said...

garage mahal said...
I think it's good news that there is a tiny glimmer of light within the dark cloud that is the explosive growth of unemployment under Obama.

Reality Check.

5/7/10 10:40 AM


Your link is to a Daily Kos chart that is virtually meaningless. Jobs aren't lost monthly. Lost jobs are counted monthly. Given the economic cycle, you'd expect the accelerating job losses during '08 and '09 to slow down and eventually go into positive territory no matter who was president. BUT: The jobs lost per each month are cumulative. Where Obama is failing is in pursuing policies that will reinvigorate the economy to soak up all the unemployment, both actively-looking and discouraged. If you're a big Obama fan, you might say, anything in positive territory is a win. But really, that's absurd. We can hope that his policies will drive a more vigorous recovery in the next year, but what has he or Congress done to make that happen? Looking at the numbers today, what should inspire confidence that the trajectory is good enough to provide hope to the millions who became unemployed in '08-'09?

AllenS said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Sofa King said...

The reason the unemployment figure is up is because people are back out looking for work again. There was an increase of 805,000 in the labor force in April. [people looking for work].

If that is true, then what you are saying is that workers are shifting from then U-6 to the U-3. So then why did the U-6 *also* go up?

garage mahal said...


Your link is to a Daily Kos chart that is virtually meaningless.


Oh I'm sure if the graph showed losing jobs after he took over instead of the other way around it would be meaningful as hell to you.

AllenS said...

The only way to count the unemployed, would be to count those workers collecting unemployment benefits. Something that every state should be able to do. If an unemployed worker uses up their alloted unemployment benefits, then that worker will not be counted as unemployed anymore. Nobody will ever know if that person is looking for work, or not looking, or presently working for cash.

John Stodder said...

Oh I'm sure if the graph showed losing jobs after he took over instead of the other way around it would be meaningful as hell to you.

Do I know you? What's your surmise about how I would feel based on?

I don't have to prove shit to you about where I'm coming from. All I'm saying is that chart tells us nothing other than that there is such a thing as an economic cycle. The test of Obama (or whoever was president now) is how vigorously the recovery. So far, I don't care how Kos tortures the numbers, he won't find much vigor at all. That's a neutral fact that would be true whether I was in the bag for Obama or not.

Indeed, you as a fanboy should be looking even more closely at the numbers, so as better to prepare your defenses. Putting out lame-ass charts isn't going to turn the zeitgeist around.

garage mahal said...

It isn't a terribly hard chart to graph, Einstein. It's data is right from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. How can you "torture" unemployment numbers directly pulled from that?

Unknown said...

The U-6 is the figure that should get everyone's attention, as it's closer to the real unemployment figure; it's back up to 17.1. This was the figure used from FDR through Bush 41. Willie switched over to using the U-3 which is short term numbers only (think he saw this coming? After all, expanding the CRA was his brilliant idea).

Scott said...

I think Althouse should have a shot at guest-hosting the Rush Limbaugh program.

That would be fun.

garage mahal said...

Positive numbers for America are bad news for Republicans.

You must be the one who cooked the books on ZeroCare. U-3 and U-6 both up .2% and that's good?

KCFleming said...

"You must be the one who cooked the books on ZeroCare. U-3 and U-6 both up .2% and that's good?"


Dependency über alles.

garage mahal said...

Could be better, but sure as hell better than when he took over.

231,000 private sector jobs added last month.
523,000 private sector jobs in 2010.
44,000 manufacturing jobs which is the best performance since Aug 1998.

Obama last 3 months: 500,000+ jobs gained.
Bush last 3 months: 1.8 million jobs lost.

AlphaLiberal said...

An addict.

Lincolntf said...

Imaginary numbers and magical thinking were good enough for Obama in his first year. But now that his assault on capitalism is in full swing, there will be no disguising either the effects or the intent of his leadership.
Anyone who's ever read Obama's books or actually listened to him speak would be aware that he considers businesses/employers to be the source of all evil in the world.
His "new normal" is one in which as many people as possible are dependent on Government, rather than industry, for their well being. At this time next year, unemployment will be even worse, the deficit even larger and the class warfare rhetoric even more shrill. These are features, not bugs.
I'd be surprised if he can keep his approval number above the 40-42% range by then. As he enters his lame duck stage, the numbers will rebound a bit, but we can't expect any real improvement until he's back in Chicago hiring a ghostwriter to revise the history of his four failed years in DC.

AlphaLiberal said...

It sounds like Rush Limbaugh is addicted to something again.

It's pretty funny that the leader of the Republican Party is a dope addict.

But then you have the numerous sexual adventurers in Republican leadership, like Larry Craig, David Vitter, John Ensign, Nevada Gov. Jim Gibbons, Mark Sanford.

And now this gay partner of James Dobson's from focus on the Family.

And they are everybody else's moral superiors! Just ask them!

Alex said...

Because if job growth doesn't keep up with population growth, then the unemployment rate doesn't go down, it stays the same or goes up. Or more people give up looking for work and go on the public dole.

Garage has no answer about basic macroeconomics. But go ahead, keep flogging the 290K jobs. Like that means anything to the 17% unemployed.

garage mahal said...

You guys are such fucking hacks. LOL

mariner said...

Pogo:

REP. ANDRE CARSON (speaking about Tea Party and health care bill protesters): "I’m from intelligence, and I’ll tell you, one of the largest threats to our internal security…I mean terrorism has an Islamic face, but it really comes from racial supremacist groups.


It's sounds like Rep. Carson is a long, long way from intelligence.

mariner said...

garage mahal:
Positive numbers for America are bad news for Republicans. So it's easy to see why people like Limbaugh are so miserable lately. Tsk tsk.

You've gotta lotta nerve, seeing that it was the Democrat Adam Clyburn who said, "Good news in Iraq is bad news for Democrats."

John Stodder said...

It sounds like Rush Limbaugh is addicted to something again.

That was my first thought, too, in reading the quote Althouse put up. But then ALS goes on as if it's a fact. Hey, fingers crossed!

Of course, a painkiller addiction is not the same thing as, say, addiction to heroin or cocaine. It's serious, but it happens because the person is...in pain. Anybody else to whom such a thing happened, you would, I hope, show a bit more empathy for. Chronic pain is horrible. And the meds available are generally ineffective after awhile because they are opiods for the most part, and you build up a tolerance. Out of desperation, patients like Limbaugh start doing the doctor-shopping and other skulky behavior. But it's not in pursuit of a kick.

Limbaugh's case could have been...ahem...a "teachable moment" about an underreported issue. But the liberals just couldn't resist the cheap shot. That's their addiction.

John Stodder said...

It isn't a terribly hard chart to graph, Einstein. It's data is right from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. How can you "torture" unemployment numbers directly pulled from that?

No one's disputing that. But the implied conclusion is what's so inane about Kos, and then Garage, posting it. You also forget the context -- defending the bloated, completely ineffective stimulus bill. It was said to be an investment in recovery that would contain unemployment and turn the economy around. It did not contain unemployment. The economy is slowly turning around, as it would have done even if nobody was president, but even Obama has stopped bragging on the stimulus package as a cause. He knows it's bad politics for the Democrats to remind people of it.

But the point about the chart is, the bars suggest something that isn't really true. What matters is that each month is added to the previous month, creating a humongous job deficit. What happened in the past four-five months is better than what was happening before, to be sure. But it barely scratches the surface of what needs to be done to get America back to work.

Lincolntf said...

Careful, John. It's a long established fact that only racists use real mathematics when discussing economic issues.

A.G. said...

Garage mahal (and others), you might want to look a little closer at the numbers:

Of the "290K jobs added" in April:
Census was 66k
"Birth/ Death model" was 188k
Real jobs added a booming, uh, 36k

And this after 800B of stimulus= Fail

Synova said...

I get this way sometimes. I sort of feel that way about this blog today. It's not that there is nothing interesting or nothing important, but maybe that there is too much that is important and I start to feel compelled. Instead of being fun, it's all suddenly a chore.

Chores are boring.

Largo said...

Synova said... Chores are boring.

Ritalin helps*.

--
*ObDisclaimer about using responsibly, etc, etc.

amba said...

None of the above. He's having an existential moment and, like a good comic, exploiting that too.

Ever sort of wake up to yourself walking down the street and feel as if you've just come back from far, far away? And the real seems unreal because you've forgotten to check in with it? A kind of human hitting the refresh button.

It's comforting to realize Rush has them too.

amba said...

In other words, Rush wonders if he's a butterfly dreaming he's a talk show host.