"I think they are all homosexual communists in Satan's army...I espect as well they all live together and bathe together every morning and have the anal sex with one another, with the fisting and the guinea pigs." - Manuel Estimulo
"I can never quite tell if the defeatists are conservative satirists poking fun at the left or simply retards. Or both. Retarded satire, perhaps?" - Kyle
"You're an effete fucktard" - Jeff Goldstein of Protein Wisdom
"This is the most pathetic blog ever..." - Ames Tiedeman
"You two [the Rev and el Comandante] make an erudite pair. I guess it beats thinking." - Matt Cunningham (aka Jubal) of OC Blog
"Can someone please explain to me what the point is behind that roving gang of douchebags? I’m being serious here. It’s not funny, and doesn’t really make anything that qualifies as logical argument. Paint huffers? Drunken high school chess geeks?" - rickinstl
Fleshy, the Defeatist's Official Cat, displays an odd aspect of catnip on Cats...they are suddenly in need of Marshall Amps, Fender Telecasters, and bandannas..
Actually, a lot of really great music is coming out of Scandanavia. From Denmark, there's The Ravennettes, who have a lot of music that would fit the movie, especially something like The Last Dance which is an incredibly ironic piece of material...catchy, pretty, perky until you listen to the lyrics. "Every time you overdose, I rush to intensive care..."Lisabeth would approve.
Norway has the Cocktail Slippers among others, and they're pretty amazing as a group, whether covering some Girl Group piece from the 60s or doing one of their originals. They are in Steven Van Zandt's Wicked Cool stable, and they're excellent. Again, there's a lot of irony in their stuff -- "Who'll be the last lover standing, come St Valentine's Day?" Particularly for the scene with her walking down the promenade at the end in the Swedish version; sure there's an equivalent moment in the Mara-Craig version.
So, Happy New Year from AGI, ELS, Mr. Fun, Capt C at Defeatist Central and from our fellow travellers, Montag, Culture Ghost and all the rest at Guys From Area 51. Have yourself a very Tiffany New Year... and, if you aren't a machine and want to drop a comment even a la Rush Limberger "", well, we live for that crap. Actually, we don't...but it makes for a more fun conversation!
I generally hate Christmas music. Happy, happy, joy, joy -- elves, lollypops and sugarplums. . I am looking for a Bluegrass or Rock version of the Messiah. A goth or punk version would be fun.
Not that there aren't some great Christmas songs. A lot of them are in Latin or German, and reflect emotions other than "oh boy, oh boy, this is gonna be great!" They reflect a sense of yearning, hope and melancoly. If you're a believer, you realize the agony necessary for the promise of the Messiah to be fulfilled...and, if you're a realist, your recognize that the agony will go on far longer than the Passion. If you tend toward the agno-anti-atheistic side of things, you can scoff, or appreciate the need for balence and forgiveness and hope in a future that remains dark and beyond a present tied to a past full of pain, disappointment and loneliness. We are spared despair by those moments of anticipation, fulfillment and hope, and I believe that the best Christmas songs capture all of that. Even though few were written in minor keys, they can be played that way...from Away in a Manger and Silent Night -- which I once got to hear in a 9th Century Catholic Church played on zither and guitar and sung by the children of Berchtesgarden, a somewhat haunting moment --to White Christmas and Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.
Christmas is the Holiday that is most human. Perhaps since so much of it results from Christianity ripping off the various Solstace feasts and festivals; perhaps because it speaks not to the past in our western mythology but rather to the past living through and to a future, real or not; perhaps because it is child-centered regardless of the worst Church bureaucracy and commercialization have been able to do to it since the Milesian Bridge -- it is just that way. In China today, Christmas is celebrated as a lead-in to the Spring Festival, which starts in early January. The nicest Christmasy-Christmas I've spent in recent years was in Shanghai, where there was enough Christmas stuff around to not make me homesick, but it was weird enough in many ways to make me smile. The Chinese in Shanghai and I suspect other parts of China don't really get the whole realm of sacred versus profane thing. I saw this my first evening wandering around a Shanghai mall, where the anchor store, Carre-Foure, had a large number of displays with Santa, Reindeer, Angels, Cribs and Wisemen. All together -- with a tree and presents. Go figure.
So what are my thoughts on the best contemporary Christmas stuff?
The Guardian had a piece with some of their critics favorite Christmas songs and Fairytale of New York came in 2nd on their poll; Planet Rock did one of their listeners and the Fairytale came in first. It's one of my favorite pieces of Celtic stuff, as well as of Christmas songs. The reason that it didn't win the Guardian poll, by the way, was that one of the judges felt it wasn't really a Christmas song and it got zero points. Well, he's a fucking idiot. Yearning, past happiness, despair in the present and acceptance of a confusing future, forgiveness and redemption. If that isn't the best of what Christmas offers, then screw it. It should be.
While I was screwing around last night, I found a new Shane McGowan and Popes compilation and they had this one. I thought it was almost as good as the Fairytale. It looses points in my estimation because it feels overproduced and it takes the Toora-Loora-Loora melody without a lot of modification. However, I think people like Pete Seeger and Bob Dylan would have little problem with it, seeing the borrowing fo the tune as part of the folk process, and who am I to argue. (In case you're wondering why I cite Dylan, I recommend listening to Dominic Behan's The Soldier's Song and then to With God on Our Side; closer to home, listen to All I Really Wanna Do and then to Muddy Waters' I Just Want to Make Love to You --same song, same phrasing, different instrumentation, voicing and lyrics.) and, as with a lot of McGowan's material, the lyrics drive the train. The Pogues were a better band, and he needs someone like Kristi McCall or Sinead O'Connor of Delores O'Riordan singing harmony to make it perfect. But, it's close. Same emotions, stronger on the hope perhaps and on the acceptance than Fairy Tale. But in the same veing.
On a far more contemporary note, there's my young, sort of little friend Sheri Miller. She hasn't recorded this one yet, and doesn't want me to publish her lyrics for it until she's got a polished version and video. I can understand that -- the version is I've posted is from several years ago, and Sheri is still evolving artistically. He most recent effort included a wider variety of musicians, including people like Steve Cropper. This is more of a straight folk, kinda Shawn Colvin kind of thing, and she's done a variety of stuff in her short career. She recently wrote something about Rock and Roll Landmarks, and I'm not sure where she went with that. Although she got a kick out of Keith Moon's antics in various LA hotels and the idea of Sun Studios and Stax in Memphis among my various recommendations. I wish I had thought to mention the Edgewater Hotel in Seattle, by the way -- the hotel is on pilings over Elliot Bay, and supposedly John Lennon tried to fish out his bedroom window the first time the Beatles came through Seattle. Anyway,However, she's working on another album and says that this number, Merry Christmas...Jesus it's been a helluva year will be a great fit. While I'm looking forward to it, I think the rawness and starkness of this version combined with the lushness of her voice should be a performance classic in years to come. After this, musically, I can forgive her anything, even Spoons.
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Steve Earle has kind of a classic Chrismas protest song here, showing his Woodie Guthrie-Townes Van Zandt roots. I had a senior moment earlier, thinking that it had originally been titled Christmas in Taneytown, a city in Maryland between DC and Baltimore and Gettysburg. For some reason, I thought this might have had something to do with Larry McMurtry's book store that he owned before going back to Texas. Well, the song resounds even today, and adds Phil Ochs to the list of his antecedents. It also reminds me of some Guy Clark stuff and some Robert Earl Keen stuff. But, it is a Christmas song -- calling us to do, be and build something better.
Speaking of Robert Earl Keen, it would be blasphemous for someone like me to not cite Merry Chrismas from the Family as a marvelous contemporary take on things.And then, there's the Jeff Foxworthy vision which I first heard on a Christmas in Germany, and have chuckled over at least once a year -- especially those years where I own a Mustang GT.
Thinking again of my Celtic roots, I thought of the Chieftains. This is one of their carols, with Nanci Griffith providing the vocal. They have a history of recording with interesting talents, and here is a more normal carol, but with Ricki Lee Jones providing the vocal. However, again, the minor key and the sense of resignation.
How can you think about Ricky Lee Jones without a nod to Tom Waits? I suppose it's really not that hard, but this is a fascinating little piece by a major artist who irritates and illuminates. And then irritates again -- I suspect he wouldn't want to have it any other way. Now, in mercy for the season, I'm using Neko Case's cover -- his voice is an acquired taste, where as her voice is insanely good.
Finally, I thought of blues and R&B. As you probably know, Hubert Sumlin died recently and Etta James is dying -- and in the tradition of the music, friends paid for Hubert Sumlin's funeral and Etta James family is squabbling over her estate. Now, I heard this piece earlier this week on Little Stephen's Underground Garage at XM21. James Brown is definitely telling us to get a grip and a perspective -- particularly at this time of economic injustice and oppression. Still resonates, and I hate to say that, but I find that very sad indeed...
Here's Etta James take on the holiday --
Sumlin isn't really identified with any Christmas music; there is a school of thought that "Sittin On Top of the World" is kind of a Christmas song. That school is wrong. If that's a Chrismas song, I can make the case that St Valentine's Day is a Christmas song. And, Sumlin wasn't in Howlin Wolf's band when he cut "Sittin..." for Sun Records before going off to Chicago and Chess. However, the Drifters cut this piece, and it's definitely worth considering..
Jerry Harvey, expert on management dysfunction and organizational behavior, has a classic finding called The Abilene Paradox. Basically, it discusses our inability to deconflict -- agreement. We may all "want to do X but there are hidden voices saying, We should do Y because..." His story involves the disruption of a family afternoon in north Texas in the summer because his mother in law figured that he and his wife were probably bored. This resulted in a four hour car trip over beat up roads in a beat up, unairconditioned car to a Rexall Drug Store and Lunch Counter in Abilene. It was hot, it was dusty, it was a lot like the Texas in The Last Picture Show. When they finally got home and collapsed in the living room, there was dead silence punctuated by gas and burps from that fine Rexall Lunch Counter cusine for about 45 mintues. As Harvey tells the story, realizing that he was a trained social scientist with a PhD in Organizational Psychology and Behavior, felt compelled "to make a behavioral intervention." So, he said, "That was fun now, wasn't it?" To which his father-in-law responded by looking at him and visibly questioning the wisdom of letting his daughter marry this clown and then saying as only someone who's from Texas or at least spent a lot of time there can say it, "SSSSHHHEEEEIIITTTT --that was awful." The family did a post mortem, and when their reasoning got exposed -- Momma thought the kids were bored and wouldn't want to eat left overs, the kids didn't want to deny Momma anything, Papa wasn't going to push back against eveyone else so...the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and in the early 70s, the road to Abilene was paved with kind thoughts and care for other people's feelings. Book is a classic, and I recommend it to anyone -- Harvey is one of my heroes along with Keith Richards, Guy Clark and Kierkegaard.
This war was a terrible idea as a use of blood, power, treasure and time. Our soldiers performed incredibly well -- the average enlisted guy in Vietnam served one tour of 11.5 months. Once. In World War II and Korea, once you got there, you stayed until you couldn't fight anymore but there were long lulls between battle and fear. But in Iraq, it was never quiet, never safe, never secure, never lulled -- every day, anywhere, was a day in combat. Everybody hated you, and if they didn't, you figured that there was something wrong with them. As I talked to our kids returning from this cauldron, the general theme echoed one I heard from a British Peacekeeper in 1994 -- "They're all guilty bastards."
Were there problems? Hell yes; war is nothing but problems. This one was fought so poorly that it makes you wonder if Rumsfeld, Cheney and Tommy Franks had bet against at some British bookies...their ignorance, stupidity and basic inhumanity wasn't just criminal. It was of some other dimension -- as if the DOD was run by Reptilian-Alien overlords. Bizzare...
Did we have soldiers do some bad things? Yup -- every war has soldiers do bad things. But, the vast, vast majority of the American military served incredibly well, honorably and effectively. It was a bad idea; it's the Iraqis country; we broke it, we fixed it, and we need to get our guys all home. Now.
So, it was with a certain degree of stunned outrage that the drumbeat from the Republican party managed to get through my skull. The leadership of the Republican party is so committed to reflexive condemnation of anything that this White House does that they're not only willing to destroy the economy of the foreseeable future, the lives and hopes of millions of Americans; they are willing to denigrate the sacrifices of the people in the boots on the ground by saying that this war was in vain because we didn't stay there. Motherfuckers...American values were defeated in Iraq, and American interests were crushed in Iraq. They were crushed when the first bombs fell in Bagdad; they were defeated when the first tanks rolled across the Kuwaiti border. We lost the war then, in early 2003; our political leaders, Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Bolton, etc., dealt us this defeat as sure as the Austrian high command dealt their army and empire defeat in 1914. Criminal ignorance, stupidity, cupidity, intellectual sloth and emergent dementia later, and here we are...again.
If you recall when the agreement to end the war was signed, GW Bush was president, Condi Rice was Secretary of State, and Petraeus was still in charge of the Army in Iraq. That team didn't negotiate a Status of Forces Agreement; the Iraqis want us gone. We just lost 4500 killed, thousands of lives shortened by wounds both physical and psychological fighting a war to bring self-determination and Jeffersonian Democracy to a nation made up of various ethnic, religious and cultural groups that all hate each other. As a whole, they want us gone, and we need to go.
Of course, these guys are all operating in a vacuum. What we do to them, they can do to us. If we torture prisoners, they will torture prisoners. If we bomb indiscriminately, they will bomb indiscriminately.
It's important as this mess ends that we honor the victors, the American Armed Forces and Veterans who overcame the strategic defeat that was the whole war, and won an operational and tactical success in conditions of incredible difficulty.
So, while I find Barrack Obama less than a success, and I resent the mistake that you can have bi-partisan cooperation when only one side cooperates as being the worst of new age gibbersih made into policy, we need to make certain that he is re-elected but, more importantly, that the Democrats take back the congress, a greater majority in the Senate and begin to work dismantling the Oligarchs on the right side of the Supreme Court.
Or, fuck it. We have backed a mythical monster -- Cthulhu -- an anarchist analytic philosopher --my brother from another mother, Crispin Sartwell -- and a dead Communist -- Gus Hall -- for President. We were being satirical...but, if you can't get your head out of your ass far enough to care this time around, just vote for our new ticket of Gary Busey and Callista Gingrich. What the hell -- he's beyond certifiable and she's obviously controlling Newt through a combination of shiny things and sexual deviance. At somepoint Gingrich will either choke on a ring or she'll suck his brains out; might as well get it over with.
Oh, where have you been, my blue-eyed son? Oh, where have you been, my darling young one? I’ve stumbled on the side of twelve misty mountains I’ve walked and I’ve crawled on six crooked highways I’ve stepped in the middle of seven sad forests I’ve been out in front of a dozen dead oceans I’ve been ten thousand miles in the mouth of a graveyard And it’s a hard, and it’s a hard, it’s a hard, and it’s a hard And it’s a hard rain’s a-gonna fall
Oh, what did you see, my blue-eyed son? Oh, what did you see, my darling young one? I saw a newborn baby with wild wolves all around it I saw a highway of diamonds with nobody on it I saw a black branch with blood that kept drippin’ I saw a room full of men with their hammers a-bleedin’ I saw a white ladder all covered with water I saw ten thousand talkers whose tongues were all broken I saw guns and sharp swords in the hands of young children And it’s a hard, and it’s a hard, it’s a hard, it’s a hard And it’s a hard rain’s a-gonna fall
And what did you hear, my blue-eyed son? And what did you hear, my darling young one? I heard the sound of a thunder, it roared out a warnin’ Heard the roar of a wave that could drown the whole world Heard one hundred drummers whose hands were a-blazin’ Heard ten thousand whisperin’ and nobody listenin’ Heard one person starve, I heard many people laughin’ Heard the song of a poet who died in the gutter Heard the sound of a clown who cried in the alley And it’s a hard, and it’s a hard, it’s a hard, it’s a hard And it’s a hard rain’s a-gonna fall
Oh, who did you meet, my blue-eyed son? Who did you meet, my darling young one? I met a young child beside a dead pony I met a white man who walked a black dog I met a young woman whose body was burning I met a young girl, she gave me a rainbow I met one man who was wounded in love I met another man who was wounded with hatred And it’s a hard, it’s a hard, it’s a hard, it’s a hard It’s a hard rain’s a-gonna fall
Oh, what’ll you do now, my blue-eyed son? Oh, what’ll you do now, my darling young one? I’m a-goin’ back out ’fore the rain starts a-fallin’ I’ll walk to the depths of the deepest black forest Where the people are many and their hands are all empty Where the pellets of poison are flooding their waters Where the home in the valley meets the damp dirty prison Where the executioner’s face is always well hidden Where hunger is ugly, where souls are forgotten Where black is the color, where none is the number And I’ll tell it and think it and speak it and breathe it And reflect it from the mountain so all souls can see it Then I’ll stand on the ocean until I start sinkin’ But I’ll know my song well before I start singin’ And it’s a hard, it’s a hard, it’s a hard, it’s a hard It’s a hard rain’s a-gonna fall
Earlier this week, on some medium somewhere, I read that a local entrepreneur was holding open auditions for proposed Christian videos, TV shows and Movies. My initial reaction was, By Bless Tiffany’s left tit, what a joke. However, turns out it’s real, and Crusader Axe is going to cover this as an unpaid staffer for the Crossroads of Opportunity’s Alternative Newspaper, the Mojave Free Press. This will be my first foray into true Gonzo journalism, so we’ll see how this plays out. I’ve seen some “Christian” stuff, and what they lack in aesthetic quality, they make up in perky white-anglo evangelical zeal and nonsense. So, I’m curious as to what is going on here – Why Barstow? A lot of things are filmed around here; for example, Clint Eastwood used the cave systems in the local mountains to film “Letters from Iwo Jima” and I think there are some local shots at various points in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. But, the average Barstonian is neither Biff nor Muffy and doesn’t conform to the traditional California image. It’s a small, poor, grungy blue collar town that depends on a couple of military bases, a lot of fast food restaurants and hotels, and the Burlington Northern to continue existing. So, this is either some local who spent too long in the sun or it’s a scam.
Next, I was somewhat surprised to discover this morning that it had taken this long for the LindsayLohan spread to leak from Playboy. I was more surprised when I followed the link on HuffPo to the pirated material. Frankly, I wouldn’t be surprised if Playboy’s editorial and marketing staff figured they could get more of a bump from publicizing her and the leak as opposed from waiting for the reviews of the spread, so they leaked it all. I feel sorry for Lohan in some ways – she is kind of pathetic. She had lots of potential I guess, as a American Hailey Mills 40 years later. However, we need to remember that the old studio system prevented a lot of nonsense from the child stars. They may have had problems later, but when Walt ran the place, the kids didn’t get into lots of trouble as soon as they were old enough to drive. And, despite obviously dysfunctional situations—Jackie Coogan, Jackie Cooper, Mickey Rooney, Judy Garland, Danny Bonaduce, Patty Duke and so on – for the most part these people hit 21 with livers, brains and bank balance more or less intact. Lohan’s situations have been weirder by far than her films; and, she doesn’t seem to get it. The Star System in Hollywood has been gone for a long time; what sells now is bad press.
Anyway, the Playboy spread might have been considered sexy and titillating back in the mid-60s. While Playboy is still less graphic than Penthouse, it’s long since started showing public hair and related anatomy. While there are people still who claim to read the damn thing to read the articles, not so much these days. I suspect that Ms. Lohan might have been willing to show more and do more for more money although maybe she has finally gotten some advisors who realize this could degenerate quickly. Her career is teetering; appearing at times like a meth-addled hag with an absolute inability to control her behavior, desires or bodily functions combined with the spoiled diva sense of entitlement that puts a lot of people’s teeth on edge. The pictures are lifeless, continuing her Marilyn Monroe meme and while more risqué than the Vanity Fair shoot, she doesn’t work as well as she did in those photos. So, if I’m Playboy, my thoughts looking at these thing s would have been how tosqueeze the most value out of these things…frankly, she looks embalmed. So, stage an act of piracy of intellectual property and raise hell without ever getting anywhere. Perhaps there’s more stuff, better stuff in the magazine; possibly not. But, this will amp up their sales and possibly the positive impact on her career.
Perhaps she should come to Barstow for the open audition.
Another striking bit of weirdness this week revolves around Karl Rove and the Republican establishment. Rove's disinformatia operation, American Crossroads decided to go all in on the Scott Brown re-election bid, and ran an ad in Massachusetts 12 months before the Senatorial election trying to portray her as some kind of progressive reformer in league with the Regulators and OWS and probably the Illuminati and the Communist Internationale to encourage violence, disruption and scare away the “Job Creators.” Well, the complaints were very much over the top – Dr. Warren was a Harvard Professor at Harvard Law and was asked to come into government to administer and regulate TARP. She did and then began lobbying for a consumer protection agency focused on protecting those of us who are buying the financial products the banks and brokerages are dealing. The idea that Massachusetts is populated by tea-sipping, chardonnay bathing, Pekinese sodomizing commie pinko fags is actually pretty funny. Get past Newton, and you’re in pure rustbelt, redneck country. However, it’s a well-educated and pretty smart bunch of rednecks, who may not be politically correct but are pretty savvy. The sole reason that Scott Brown won the special election to replace Ted Kennedy was that the Democrat ran a wretched campaign based on a sense of electoral entitlement. After all, it was Teddy’s seat, so the voters would give it to the anointed Dem…not hardly. Teddy Kennedy always campaigned and campaigned fiercely. So, given the choice between a guy identified as a favorite of the Hedge Fund Managers and somebody who gives the Hedge Fund Managers nightmares, and Dr. Warren has a tremendous following. It helps that she can explain this crap in plain English. So, Rove’s over the top attack ad didn’t have the desired effect. It improved her standing in the polls.
So, they next roll out some bizarre thing about how she’s buddy-buddy with the bankers. Yeah. That will work well – in this age of new media, social networks and a nascent political uprising of progressives united with a pissed off middle and working class, attacking Warren and then being identified with Rove is not terribly helpful. Saying things that are factually absurd is even more damaging. I suspect next, to Dr. Warren’s and her husband’s surpise, Rove will accuse her of either being gay or being anti-gay. We can only hope…
Karl, if you’re listening, Jon Stewart cocking an eyebrow and calling this bullshit will hurt Brown more than this ad could ever help.
Finally, I must say I’m really tired of these “Gambling in Casablanca? I’m shocked, shocked. Arrest the usual suspects…”We’re sending drones over Iran and this is a surprise? To whom? Rick Perry? Michelle Bachmann? John Boenher? Katarina van der Heuvel? A drone malfunctions and the Iranians recover it and try to make it a big deal.
Hell, this is where our media’s occasional lack of historical context and limited attention span come into question. Of course, it was over 60 years ago, but the USSR were able to shoot down a U2 and capture the pilot. Eisenhower caught hell from the nonaligned nations and the world’s press, and the poor CIA contractor-pilot, Francis Gary Powers was vilified for not following the Geneva convention and breaking under interrogation. But seriously, the shock was that the Soviets had the capability to engage high altitude air craft. If we had the capability to collect intelligence and didn’t then we’d have been wrong.
I’d rather they played this newest iteration of the great game with drones and technology than with human beings. Got enough problems on that front already.
WILL WRESTLE YOUR MOTHER-IN-LAW FOR A BUCK!--Homeless Guy's Sign, Trust Stop Near Barstow
So, the unemployment rate has dropped below 9% to 8.6%. Why is the AXE less than excited by this? The unemployment rate is based on the number of people who are considered to be in the workforce, so if you eliminate people from the workforce who are unemployed, the percentage employed is skewed to teh right. In other words, So, most of the drop is due not to the imaginary job creators of Republcian lore, legend and myth, but due to people giving up after months of trying, running out of unemployment benefits and falling off the grid and under the bus. In other words, a historically low number of workers are doing less badly, while there's an increase in people who are literally just waiting to die.
American governments at all levels continued to bleed workers, for one. And the decline in the unemployment rate had a down side: It fell partly because more workers got jobs, but also because about 315,000 workers dropped out of the labor force. That left the share of Americans actively participating in the work force at a historically depressed 64 percent, down from 64.2 percent in October.Even excluding these hundreds of thousands of dropouts, the country still had a backlog of more than 13 million unemployed workers, whose spells of unemployment averaged an all-time high of 40.9 weeks. “They say businesses are refusing to look at résumés from the unemployed,” said Esther Perry, 59, of Bedford, Mass., who participated in a recent report on unemployed workers put together by USAction, a liberal coalition. “What do you think my chances are? Once unemployment runs out, I don’t know what I will do.”
Do the Occupied folks stay in the Workforce? Probably not -- while they're doing their thing, exercising their constitutional rights and getting pepper sprayed and beaten and shot with rubber bullets and so on, they're not looking for work or, conversely, they are working, just not getting paid. See how much fun this is? Statistics measure what you measure -- basing policy decisions on them or making political decisions on them -- THE PRESIDENT"S CHANCES FOR RE-ECLECTION IMPROVE AS UNEMPLOYMENT DIPS! -- without asking some structural, almost existential questions about what these things mean is really stupid, and I'm sure we'll do it soon, 24/7 on cable news, blogs like this one and talk radio.
So, here's the test -- who do you know who's unemployed and you don't understand why? When they get a job, assume that the unemployment rate may be going down. Whom do you know who hates their job -- trick question, the stats that I have seen are pretty straight and seem confirmed by reality, just about everybody hates their job. However, pick someone who's dramatically underpaid, overworked and unhappy...see when they get a raise. Or feel comfortable quitting their job to look for a new one. Then what's happening is an actual increase in employment, as opposed to an artifical decline in a rate.
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