Unemployment Falls! Wow!

So the media, desperate to portray Obama in a positive light, is falling over itself to declare the recession over because unemployment fell this month for the first time in over a year. So it's true, the stimulus must be working. How else could unemployment possibly fall?

But wait, the reports also note that 247,000 jobs were lost in July. So how did unemployment drop? Well, a lot of people must have given up looking for work. According to the BLS release, a net 422,000 people left the labor force, including 267,000 net from unemployment.

So the conclusion is: 247,000 jobs disappeared, and 267,000 people who were actively looking for work decided to give up. That doesn't sound like a recovery to me. To its credit, the Obama Administration is not believing its own hype: they still predict 10% unemployment sometime this year. On the other hand, they continue to push discredited Keynesian policies despite their obvious failure to make a dent in the recession.

The same media who were skewing data trying to declare a recession last year are now skewing data trying to declare a recovery. What changed? Only the man in the White House.