Now, Mafoo, you wouldn't just make blanket statements without any data to back up what you are saying would you? I know you have never done that in the past, right?
This isn't their economy, but this is their unemployment rates. I don't really see any significant correlations between red and blue states. Larger states on average have been hit the hardest. That is a much more significant correlation.
There is also a much stronger correlation with unemployment and states where the real estate market was hit the hardest. As a whole, the Southwest has been the least negatively effected. Texas, for example, has seen a much lower drop in average home price than California, Florida, or Michigan, where the markets were essentially obliterated.
| State | Jobless Rate | Change since start of recession | Difference from national rate |
| Alabama | 8.4 | +4.7 | +0.3 |
| Alaska | 8 | +1.7 | -0.1 |
| Arizona | 7.4 | +3.2 | -0.7 |
| Arkansas | 6.6 | +1.1 | -1.5 |
| California | 10.5 | +4.6 | +2.4 |
| Colorado | 7.2 | +3.2 | -0.9 |
| Connecticut | 7.4 | +2.6 | -0.7 |
| Delaware | 7.4 | +3.9 | -0.7 |
| District of Columbia | 9.9 | +4.2 | +1.8 |
| Florida | 9.4 | +4.9 | +1.3 |
| Georgia | 9.3 | +4.8 | +1.2 |
| Hawaii | 6.5 | +3.4 | -1.6 |
| Idaho | 6.8 | +4.1 | -1.3 |
| Illinois | 8.6 | +3.3 | +0.5 |
| Indiana | 9.4 | +4.9 | +1.3 |
| Iowa | 4.9 | +1.1 | -3.2 |
| Kansas | 5.9 | +1.7 | -2.2 |
| Kentucky | 9.2 | +3.9 | +1.1 |
| Louisiana | 5.7 | +1.7 | -2.4 |
| Maine | 8 | +3.1 | -0.1 |
| Maryland | 6.7 | +3.1 | -1.4 |
| Massachusetts | 7.8 | +3.5 | -0.3 |
| Michigan | 12 | +4.6 | +3.9 |
| Minnesota | 8.1 | +3.4 | 0 |
| Mississippi | 9.1 | +2.8 | +1 |
| Missouri | 8.3 | +3 | +0.2 |
| Montana | 6 | +2.8 | -2.1 |
| Nebraska | 4.2 | +1.4 | -3.9 |
| Nevada | 10.1 | +4.9 | +2 |
| New Hampshire | 5.3 | +1.9 | -2.8 |
| New Jersey | 8.2 | +4 | +0.1 |
| New Mexico | 5.4 | +2.2 | -2.7 |
| New York | 7.8 | +3.2 | -0.3 |
| North Carolina | 10.7 | +6 | +2.6 |
| North Dakota | 4.3 | +1.1 | -3.8 |
| Ohio | 9.4 | +3.6 | +1.3 |
| Oklahoma | 5.5 | +1.4 | -2.6 |
| Oregon | 10.8 | +5.4 | +2.7 |
| Pennsylvania | 7.5 | +3.1 | -0.6 |
| Rhode | 10.5 | +5.3 | +2.4 |
| South Carolina | 11 | +4.8 | +2.9 |
| South Dakota | 4.6 | +1.7 | -3.5 |
| Tennessee | 9.1 | +4.1 | +1 |
| Texas | 6.5 | +2.3 | -1.6 |
| Utah | 5.1 | +2.2 | -3 |
| Vermont | 7 | +3.1 | -1.1 |
| Virginia | 6.6 | +3.4 | -1.5 |
| Washington | 8.4 | +3.8 | +0.3 |
| West Virginia | 6 | +1.4 | -2.1 |
| Wisconsin | 7.7 | +2.9 | -0.4 |
| Wyoming | 3.9 | +0.8 | -4.2 |
We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half full of cocaine, a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers…Also a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of beer, a pint of raw ether and two dozen amyls. The only thing that really worried me was the ether. There is nothing in the world more helpless and irresponsible and depraved than a man in the depths of an ether binge. –Raoul Duke
It is hard to shed anything but crocodile tears over White House speechwriter Patrick Buchanan's tragic analysis of the Nixon debacle. "It's like Sisyphus," he said. "We rolled the rock all the way up the mountain...and it rolled right back down on us...." Neither Sisyphus nor the commander of the Light Brigade nor Pat Buchanan had the time or any real inclination to question what they were doing...a martyr, to the bitter end, to a "flawed" cause and a narrow, atavistic concept of conservative politics that has done more damage to itself and the country in less than six years than its liberal enemies could have done in two or three decades. -Hunter S. Thompson
