Aug 05 2011
Why Experience Really Does Count
The nation has learned a brutal lesson these last 3 years, ever since we naively elected a man of no great accomplishment to the most important and demanding job on the planet. We have a ‘community organizer’ who ruthlessly worked his way up through the political strata – not once accomplishing more than his own election – to become a President so unprepared he will go down in history as the poster child for why real leaders have to have done some real leading at some point in their life.
President Obama thinks in the vague, finger-paint-focus of someone who only has a cursory grasp of the wide spectrum of specialties that go to make up human culture and society. Outside of reading well from a telempropter, the man is nothing but a spectator on the rest of humankind. And because of this it makes sense he is the news media’s darling – for they too do little more than watch others and attempt to report on what they are seeing. It is why they fail so impressively when the story requires a grasp of details and nuance that only those who invest serious study or experience can skillfully manage and control, let alone understand.
Consider the difference between the person who can change the oil in the car, and the engineering team it takes to design it and make it strong and safe. The oil-changer has a cursory understanding, while the experts in the field know more than anyone outside their field could hope to grasp in a life time.
Another example: how the news media and pols attempt to weigh in on the scientific screw-up that is the theory of anthropogenic (human caused) global warming. These same people who struggled through public school math, and later ran from the hard science math of BS level classes to the sanctity of BA level credits, pretend they can grasp, weigh, mediate and determine the stronger argument in a sea of theories, statistical analyses and (sadly for AGW alarmists) shoddy work by niche scientists. They are so in under their heads they don’t even understand not all PhDs are equal in strength, integrity, skill and wisdom. They cannot distinguish the ‘impressive’ from the ‘mediocre’.
And so we have now as President the penultimate example of shallow expertise pretending to grasp what is happening around him. And his fellow shallow travelers in the news media run alongside him, just as ignorant and dumbfounded.
Take the jobs report this last month. Unemployment is supposedly down – except when you READ the data you learn unemployment is actually up. Ed Morrissey gathered the data this morning which proves the number of unemployed did not go down as reported:
Update II: More from Bloomberg:
The jobless rate declined as 193,000 people left the labor force and the number of unemployed dropped by 156,000. The share of the eligible population holding a job declined to 58.1 percent, the lowest since July 1983.
So we supposedly added 117,000 jobs, but at the same time 193,000 unemployed, out-of-work Americans stopped being counted as unemployed. Clearly, if they were still being counted as unemployed (since they ARE unemployed), one can perform the necessary 3rd grade math to realize the net effect is a net loss of 76,000 jobs in July. That is not progress.
And still Obama’s math-challenged, media groupies demonstrate once again why there is a floor to ignorance we must never fall below:
U.S. stocks waver after strong jobs report
The government reported that 117,000 jobs were created in the U.S. in July, and unemployment slid down to 9.1%.
AP really pegged the BS meter on that one!
Why the government can’t do the math right is an age old and ubiquitous question. But they don’t. And this erosion of the work force into uncounted limbo has been at work the entire time President Obama has been in office. I have shown every for the last few months that if we used the projected work force size as a normal percentage of our population size (a number easily derived from the workforce history going back to 2000) we find ourselves at a staggering 10.7% unemployment rate, and a 17.1% U6 unemployment rate (which includes partially employed, but still being counted by the government).
Click to enlarge.
This data is straight from the US Government. It shows how the work force was growing with our population up until 2008, when the results of reckless liberal schemes with home mortgage lending requirements finally came crashing down on us. In 2009 the work force stayed flat, but that was the window for real economic stimulus – in the form of tax cuts which hits everyone and every niche of the economy. Instead we got government-trickle down crap from the Democrats which only hit government workers and select government contractors. Even worse, the stimulus came in a painfully slow dribble which today – over two years later – still has not fully flushed out all the stimulus money from the bowels of the bloated federal bureaucracy.
The red line indicates a nominal growth path for the work force, the blue curve shows the harsh reality. Ever since President Obama took control, the work force shrunk as unemployed people stopped being counted by the government as unemployed. This is the false hope those 3rd grade math whizzes cling to – uncounted unemployed hiding the true depth of the problem.
If we were to add 117,000 jobs a month for the next 2 years we could bring all those unemployed back to productive lives. But that would only bring us down to a real 9.1% unemployment, not the error-ridden calculation we see blasted across the news media today. Our economy is not growing, we are not creating jobs and millions of Americans who want to work can’t. And they are losing precious years in their lives.
The failure of our inexperienced commander-in-chief is on full display, as reality begins to bite. Our debt is now equal to our total annual GDP thanks to reckless liberal spending. Our economy is slowly backsliding thanks to incompetent liberal economic policies. There is no escaping these chickens coming home to roost. There is no media-slathered lipstick thick enough to cover this debacle up. And there will be no amount of excuse making or spin that will stop the backlash come November 2012.
Everyone knows it is happening. The economic growth is flat, revenues are down, anger is growing. Yet the fools in DC look at another set of dodgy numbers and declare all is good. Some days it really sucks living through history making times.
While I don’t always see eye to eye with you, today’s analysis is first rate.
I think you might just be charitable in suggesting our leaders are just dumb (some clearly are). Others, are just plain liars (many on the left I suspect may fall into this category). They know the truth, but it interferes with their agenda. This might be a gross generalization, but the exceptions are so few.
In the ultimate drive for power, nothing said is too outlandish for these people. I think they believe if you just keep repeating it often enough, people will accept anything is true. Inconveniently for them, the cat is out of the bag on global warming and now no one is listening; the brainwashing didn’t take.
Many ascribe money as the motive for big brother, but I think power is the main driver for these people wanting to rule over us. Money is a side benefit that comes along with power. After all, they are superior to us, aren’t they?
Regarding your graph, I think your numbers may be on the conservative side, as the trend is clearly not linear. A least squares fit for the pre 2008 data might suggest unemployment is much worse. But then again, our “pols” wouldn’t understand that either.
Sorry AJ, but I take umbrage with your very first sentence that says ” … ever since ‘WE’ naively elected a man of no great accomplishment to the most important and demanding job on the planet.
My emphasis on the word ‘WE’ because I was not fooled by any of the crap put out about this empty suit. In my many years of business experience, it is pretty easy to spot a poser and Barry was a fake from the beginning. What sickens me is that after three years and tons of evidence to the contrary, the mental left still clings to their self-centered delusional interests and are not able to look at the big picture, or anything close to reality.
Otherwise, your posting was right on but please do not include everyone in your condemnation. We are not all fools!
Remember how the left touted Sarah’s so-called lack of experience and how Obama played on it?
The left still stand by obama. They have no choice. Morning Jay Cost has a good article that explains that no matter how unhappy the left is with Obama, they have to stand by Obama.
Has the American Public learned from this PR game?
I guess Italy is troubled with Hobbits and economic terrorists as they now pledge to pass, of all things a balanced budget amendment.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Italy-to-balance-budget-a-apf-4189344609.html?x=0&sec=topStories&pos=main&asset=&ccode=
I do not know if the above link will work but if you go to Yahoo Finance you will see the story. 8/5/11
I also picked up that “we naively elected a man of no great accomplishment” statement.
From the moment I first saw and heard this man, my “commie detector” sent maximum alarms.
The fact that this guy was elected is a statement to as much the general level of understanding and common sense dropped in this country and how marxist and corrupt the media is for covering for this thug.
“The man is nothing but a spectator”, and I would add who has zero general understanding of America or Americans. His intellect and his heart are equally inhospitable to what has made this country unique, and special in the world.
Well said AJ.
The odd thing is that in my particular line of work, the people install and configure the equipment that makes the Internet go make more money than the people who designed and built the gear.
AJ:
I think you were too generous to the President with your oil change analogy. At least someone changing their own oil knows that their car needs oil, has an oil filter, knows they need to be changed, knows that you need tools to do so, knows you have to dispose of the waste, etc.
Mr. Obama is more like the kid whose father tells him he needs to change the oil so he goes to Jiffy Lube and has someone else do it for him, then comes home and announces, “I changed the oil in my car today!”
He is totally cluesless as to any of the intricacies involved in the job. That is why his Presidency is a failure of epic proportions.
I’m with the Smart Bear. I didn’t vote for this fool either.
I’m also not so sure experience has much to do with his ineptness. I could imagine him with 10 years of experience and being 10 times more inept.
What makes me really nervous is his ability to come out and proclaim that a brilliant blue sky is actually red and his minions grab it and run with it. It’s a new world in the US and I don’t know what the future holds, but I am not hopeful.
No offense intended at all to Jiffy Lube. At least they know what they’re doing.
Perhaps he’s more like the kid who gets his buddy to do it for him. They successfully change the oil but in so doing spill at least a quart on the driveway. They don’t clean it up and don’t throw away the spent quart bottles – leaving a mess everywhere, and they don’t even know that there is a filter that must be changed, so they leave in the old one eventuallly wrecking the engine.
Yep… that’s our President!
I understand that 117K jobs are seasonal…summer jobs….not good there either.
Hey folks, this news:
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/08/05/americas-third-wardid-us-cut-deal-with-sinaloa-cartel/?test=latestnews
On top of the whole “fast and furious” thing, has my blood boiling.
We had better see some heads roll from all of this.