
Hat tip: Ray.
48. Michigan
> State debt per capita: $2,963 (21st lowest)
> Pct. without health insurance: 12.4% (18th lowest)
> Pct. below poverty line: 15.7% (15th highest)
> Unemployment: 11.1% (3rd highest)
Michigan has arguably suffered more than any state in post-industrial America. The state is one of just four with a credit rating of AA-, although its debt per capita is actually below average. The state ranks among the worst in the country for violent crime, unemployment, foreclosures and home price decline.
Source: (September, 2011): From the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey for 2010, the percentage of residents 25 or older with a high school diploma49. Illinois
> State debt per capita: $4,424 (13th highest)
> Pct. without health insurance: 13.8% (23rd lowest)
> Pct. below poverty line: 13.1% (25th lowest)
> Unemployment: 10% (10th highest)
Illinois has fallen from 43rd last year to the overall second-worst run state in the country. The state performs poorly in most categories, but is worst when it comes to its credit rating. Illinois has a credit rating of A+, the second worst given to any state, behind only California. The state has been on credit watch since 2008 because of budget shortfalls and legal challenges against then-governor Rod Blagojevich.50. California
> State debt per capita: $3,660 (21st highest)
> Pct. without health insurance: 18.5% (8th highest)
> Pct. below poverty line: 14.5% (tied for 21st highest)
> Unemployment: 11.9% (2nd highest)
California has moved down one slot on from last year to earn the title of the worst-run state in the country. In the fiscal year 2009, the state spent $430 billion, roughly 14% of all the money spent by states in that year. Compared to its revenue, the state spent too much — California had the 10th lowest revenue per person, and spent the 15th most per person. California is the only state in the country to be rated A-, the lowest rating ever given to a state by S&P. Despite the huge amount the state spends each year, conditions remain poor. California has the second-lowest percentage of adults with a high school diploma in the country, the second-highest foreclosure rate and is tied for the second highest unemployment rate in the U.S.
My friend, when you're above the law, when you are the law, the phrase about ends justifying means has a real meaning. Put yourself in their place. If you felt that the state which you worshipped above your God was endangered by the life of one insignificant man, would you hesitate to have him shot? I can tell you that you wouldn't.
That's the danger of Fascism, of state-worship.
It supposes an absolute, an ego-centric unit. The idea of the state is not rooted in the masses, it is not of the people. It is an abstract, a God-idea, a psychic dung-hill raised to shore up an economic system that is no longer safe. When you're on the top of that sort of dung-hill, it doesn't matter whether the ends in reality are good or bad. The fact that they are your ends makes them good--for you.
Herman Cain: Wasted Potential: Sunshine State SarahQOTD: In a 2008 campaign speech, our Dear Ruler proclaimed: “I'll make our government open and transparent so that anyone can ensure that our business is the people's business. No more secrecy. That is a commitment that I make to you as president.”
...this shouldn’t come as a shock, based on the history of the Obama administration thus far. Did you know that the federal government’s 35 largest agencies actually decreased the number of fulfilled FOIA requests by more than 12,400?
How’s this for irony: “The Obama administration censored 194 pages of internal e-mails about its Open Government Directive,” according to the Associated Press." --Neal Boortz
5. Bullet holes. Nothing says you mean business like bullet holes. Before leaving on your commute, shoot 20 or more holes through non-critical areas of your car. This will intimidate other drivers and they will part like the Red Sea before Moses. (Important: make sure to use a .40 cartridge or higher; anything smaller is difficult to see in low light)
4. Dress like a Zombie. If someone pisses you off, jump out at the next stop light... and make sure fake blood splurts out of your mouth.
3. Armor your car like Humungus' command vehicle in Mad Max. Extra credit for having an insane assassin with a red mohawk come along for the ride.
2. Cow-catcher. A cast-iron cow-catcher attached to the front of your beater says you're serious about going places. And the ladies really dig 'em.
1. Flamethrower. Nothing says get the f*** out of my way like igniting a 90mph stream of molten naphtha.

[10] Neal Boortz: Prolific promoter of dangerous ideas such as the "FairTax" and "Tea Parties". Boortz commands an immense radio audience and frequently appears on television while shamelessly preaching heretical, extremist views such as changing the tax code and reducing the size of government bureaucracies.
[9] Hugh Hewitt: The former child star ("A Christmas Story") has grown up to become the reported leader of the far right-wing Northern Alliance, host of a syndicated radio program and television commentator. Do not approach without electronic warfare support as Hewitt is known to use social media at the drop of a hat.
[8] Andrew Breitbart: Internet savant who controls a powerful digital media empire, he should be considered armed (with an iPad) and dangerous.
[7] Glenn Reynolds: (AKA "Instapundit") mass purveyor of right-wing propaganda and linkage; performs "blogging" at rates that can only be called dangerous. His family members are also "bloggers" and may be considered equally radicalized.
[6] Sean Hannity: one of the few rightwing extremists who is fluent in all types of mass media; from radio to television to the Internets. He has become even more radicalized since his partner of many years quit (Alan Colmes). Colmes was reportedly a calming force and tempered Hannity's extremism. Without that balancing influence, Hannity is said to have become a cheerleader for extremist views like flat taxes and "smaller government".
[5] Rush Limbaugh: Said to command an army of right-wingers approaching 40 million. Do not approach without RPGs and other heavy weapons.
[4] Michelle Malkin: Right-wing extremist who is not easily pigeon-holed or stereotyped; appears on television and radio; in newspapers and on the Internet. Despises corruption and, unlike Joe Biden, does not utilize a comb-over as a disguise. Evangelizes radical concepts such as "secure borders", "strong national defense" and "fiscal responsibility for government." Therefore, do not approach without overwhelming superior force.
[3] Mark Levin: Highly dangerous and said to be the intellectual leader of many right-wing extremists. Known to openly flaunt radical documents such as the Constitution, The Declaration of Independence, and Bastiat's "The Law". Skilled in multiple forms of martial arts and once registered his feet as lethal weapons.
[2] All Veterans: Veterans possess combat skills and experience that are attractive to right-wing extremists. President Obama's Civilian National Security Force is concerned that right-wing extremists (hereafter referred to as "wingnuts") either are veterans or will attempt to recruit veterans.
[1] Larwyn: no details are available regarding this shadowy figure, who is said to be a hidden force behind right-wing extremism. A national task force has been assigned to determine the identity of this individual.Ineptocracy (in-ep-toc’-ra-cy) - a system of government where the least capable to lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a diminishing number of producers.
...If you look at the average labor force growth from 1948 to 2007 of 1,579,000 the labor force should have expanded by 6,316,000 2008-2011. Instead the labor force expanded by a mere 38,000!
Thus, 6,278,000 people are unaccounted for in the unemployment numbers based on historical averages... The unemployment numbers using this historical trend method show the following numbers for November in these years:Unemployment Rate Adjusted for Population Growth
2007 4.7%
2008 7.3%
2009 11.7%
2010 12.4%
2011 12.2%
I am sure it is just coincidence, but it is interesting to note that the flat lining of the labor force began in earnest with the Obama administration.
Hopefully you won't hate me and -- not to trivialize the real thing in the least -- but I can't keep myself from thinking that President Obama is the architect of an economic holocaust.U.S. Supports the Development of the IT Sector in Kyrgyzstan
The U.S. Government, through the United States Agency for International Development’s Local Development Program, will for the first time conduct a roundtable in partnership with IT experts from Kyrgyzstan. The roundtable will take place on November 29, at 15.30, at the Park Hotel (87 Orozbekova str., Bishkek).
This comes on the heels of last year's news that the U.S. is training thousands of foreign workers as potential outsourcers of American jobs.U.S. To Train 3,000 Offshore IT Workers
Despite President Obama's pledge to retain more hi-tech jobs in the U.S., a federal agency run by a hand-picked Obama appointee has launched a $36 million program to train workers, including 3,000 specialists in IT and related functions, in South Asia...
...Following their training, the tech workers will be placed with outsourcing vendors in the region that provide offshore IT and business services to American companies looking to take advantage of the Asian subcontinent's low labor costs...
...USAID is contributing about $10 million to the effort
Late Friday Fast and Furious Document Drop: Nice DebQOTD: "The ironic thing is that I present to networking people all the time and one of the things I talk about is network security. The comment that resonates with them is "Network security is great in order to keep people out of your network. But what do you do with those who already have access to your network? What if the problem is someone is supposed to have access to your network?" To a certain extent this is what the Carrier IQ story feels like. Carriers already have access to your device so you wouldn't think something to this level that would violate that trust. Carriers are PROHIBITED from listening in to your phone calls without a warrant. Law enforcement cannot look at your phone records without a warrant. Now a piece of software on your phone can send your habits, phone calls and SMS strings to a PRIVATE 3rd party? Very troubling indeed." --Jason Bautista
This is why the situation seems so dire. Why people are walking around in a daze. Why your neighbors are worried and glum....the unemployment rate has been very high for quite some time. If you look at the U6 figure [Ed: now 15.6%], which includes people who are working part-time, the underemployed because they can’t find a full-time job, or people who have simply given up looking for work; that figure is always extremely high.
But there is another figure I like to focus on. It is called the participation rate. That figure has really been plummeting... Now this figure is never 100%, because, of course, there are some people who are capable of working who aren’t working. An 18-year-old who is in school, for example, is not going to be working. Someone who chooses to be a stay-at-home mom or dad is not going to be working, or somebody who is 65 years old and retired but is capable of working is not going to be working.So in a healthy economy, we would expect this figure to be somewhere above 70%. It is currently down at 64%, which means that there are a lot of people who cannot find jobs—they want to be working, they can’t find jobs.
No matter how the dying, legacy media tries to spin it, no matter how the administration twists arms at the Bureau of Labor Statistics to make things look rosier, the facts are clear:Eurozone woes have created “an exceptionally threatening environment” as falling government bond prices, eroding confidence and asset fire sales threaten to “spiral” into a systemic financial crisis, the governor of the Bank of England has warned... King urged the UK financial system to continue building up capital against an “extraordinarily serious” situation it had not created and could not solve.
“The crisis in the euro area is one of solvency not liquidity. And the interconnectedness of major banks means the banking systems and economies around the world are all affected. Only the governments directly involved can find a way out of this crisis,” he said.
Underscoring their concern, Sir Mervyn and Hector Sants, head of the Financial Services Authority, revealed that the watchdog was allowing UK banks to dip into their liquidity buffers when they encountered funding squeezes.
Oh, my.
Attention, RINOs: we are trying to nominate a man or woman who can save this Republic. Get focused, schmucks.MF Global proves Enron-era accounting lives on
The off-balance-sheet accounting methods that Enron and Lehman Brothers made famous in their epic failures years ago have a modern-day poster child: MF Global... Like its predecessors, the bankrupt brokerage formerly run by Jon Corzine took advantage of an accounting maneuver to keep certain financial obligations off its books, making the firm look less indebted and thus less a risk than it really was.
On Thursday, Mary Schapiro, chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, told a committee of Congress the SEC was investigating the accounting treatment that helped mask MF Global's exposure to risky foreign sovereign debt.
The fact that MF Global was able to use the technique highlights how off-balance-sheet moves are evolving as quickly as new accounting rules intended to stop them. Earlier this year, the Financial Accounting Standards Board changed its rules to bar an off-balance-sheet loophole that had helped Lehman Brothers get into trouble in 2008.
For Democrats, Politics Trumps Human Trafficking: FoundryQOTD: 'Most people say, "Where there's smoke, there's fire." I say, "Where there's smoke around a conservative, there are journalists furiously rubbing two sticks together."' --Ann Coulter
The U.S. workforce has declined by approximately 6.5% since its year 2000 peak to roughly 58.2% of working age adults and the U.S. now suffers chronic unemployment of 9.1%. Although the workforce grew in the 1980s and 1990s, as dual income families became the norm, the size of the workforce is shrinking due to a lack of economic opportunity...
...Officially, long-term unemployment is 16.5% and the ranks of the long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks and over) include 5.9 million, 42.4% of those unemployed. However, prior to the Clinton administration, unemployment measures included workers who are now no longer counted as part of the workforce. Using the more accurate pre-Clinton criteria, unemployment exceeds 22%, only 3% below the worst point (24.9%) of the Great Depression...
...if household income is adjusted for inflation, most American families have grown significantly poorer over the past ten years. In 2010, for example, real median household income fell 2.3%. Although the average wage has risen steadily in nominal terms, dwindling purchasing power is a reality for most Americans. When adjusted for inflation, the wages of most Americans have not kept up with the Consumer Price Index (CPI)...
...Although CPI is sufficient to illustrate declining real wages, CPI does not measure the cost of living in a realistic way. According to economist John Williams of Shadow Government Statistics, CPI systematically understates inflation...
...The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), commonly known as “food stamps,” serves 45.8 million households as of May 2011. The program now feeds 1 in 8 Americans and nearly 1 in 4 children...
The United States is quickly becoming a post industrial neo-Third World country. Partly as a consequence of worsening unemployment and lack of economic opportunity, falling real wages and household incomes [and] growing poverty, the U.S. government faces a historic fiscal crisis.
...Barring fundamental reforms or a hyperinflationary collapse of the U.S. dollar (due to the fiscal problems of the U.S. government), the deterioration of the U.S. economy will continue and accelerate. As the U.S. economy continues its decline, public health, nutrition and education, as well as the country’s infrastructure, will visibly deteriorate and the Third World status of the United States will become apparent.
GOLD ADOPTION RATES LOW
Gold investor holdings stands at $2.0 trillion (Nov 2011), 0.96% of Global Financial Assets (GFA). In 2000 gold holdings were worth $227 billion, or 0.2% of GFA, but this isn’t the whole story...• Today 0.2% would be worth $1.45 trillion ($1800 troy oz. Au) or 0.7% of Global Financial Assets (GFA).
• Therefore new investment gold only provided 0.26% increase in % gold holdings.
• In 1968 to 1970 % gold holdings of GFA = 5%, to attain this % at current values of gold ($1,800), $10.4 trillion dollars need to be invested...
• $10.4 trillion is equivalent to 5.8 billion troy oz at $1,800 or 1.2 x gold ever produced.
• 5.8 billion troy oz. is 3.6 x known gold reserves (based on US Geological Survey).
• Clearly not only is public ownership miniscule, but to return to the 70s % holdings requires too much gold than these prices can handle.
• This transfer of gold will take place at much higher prices.
Repealing a ban on women drivers in Saudi Arabia would result in ‘no more virgins’, the country’s religious council has warned.A ‘scientific’ report claims relaxing the ban would also see more Saudis - both men and women - turn to homosexuality and pornography.
The startling conclusions were drawn by Muslim scholars at the Majlis al-Ifta’ al-A’ala, Saudi Arabia’s highest religious council, working in conjunction with Kamal Subhi, a former professor at the King Fahd University.
Their report assessed the possible impact of repealing the ban in Saudi Arabia, the only country in the world where women are not allowed behind the wheel... [and] was delivered to all 150 members of the Shura Council, the country’s legislative body.
The report warns that allowing women to drive would ‘provoke a surge in prostitution, pornography, homosexuality and divorce’.
Within ten years of the ban being lifted, the report’s authors claim, there would be ‘no more virgins’ in the Islamic kingdom.
And it pointed out ‘moral decline’ could already be seen in other Muslim countries where women are allowed to drive... The astonishing report comes after Shaima Jastaniya, a 34-year-old Saudi woman, was sentenced to 10 lashes with a whip after being caught driving in Jeddah.