Thread: 20 Million Out of Work Citizens and These RINOs Want to Import 12 Million More

It’s An Illusion: Here Are the REAL Unemployment Numbers

Mac Slavo 5 hours ago
3 Comments

Mainstream financial pundits are falling over themselves today following a report from the Labor Department indicating that the national unemployment rate has fallen yet again, this time to just 6.3%.
The Associated Press, whose report on the new rate is being distributed to news services around the country, says this is “the strongest evidence to date that the economy is picking up.” They cite numerous economic experts, claiming that the U.S. economy is now experiencing vigorous job growth, which they say is confirmation that the economic health of our nation is bouncing back from a rough winter. In fact, they mention bad “weather” and “winter” eight times in a single article just to make sure we understand that the problems we’ve seen over the last few months were seasonal.

But, as is generally the case with mainstream assessments and government statistics as of late, the devil’s in the details.

The drop in the unemployment rate from March’s 6.7 percent came as the agency’s survey of households showed the labor force shrank by more the 800,000 in April.
The participation rate, which indicates the share of working-age people in the labor force, decreased to 62.8 percent, matching the lowest level since March 1978, from 63.2 percent a month earlier.

Thus, while U.S. companies added some 288,000 jobs last month, three times as many people were dropped from the official unemployment statistics and are no longer counted in the labor pool.
At this rate we’re well on our way to achieving the Communist dream of 0% unemployment before the end of the President’s term.
Karl Denninger looks even deeper into the report at Market Ticker and points out that, while jobs were created last month, the claims of vigorous job growth are not even close.

Uh oh. Yes, that headline number looks good. But April is usually good, and that’s where the rubber meets the road; on an annualized basis we actually saw deceleration. Funny how that works, isn’t it?

That’s right. That little down-hook in the above chart says it all. We’re creating jobs at a slower pace now than at the same time last year.
Contrarian economist John Williams suggests the the government’s numbers are not even close. At his web site ShadowStats.com Williams calculates the rate of employment using the same methods that were used prior to 1994 when they were officially defined out of existence by bureaucrats looking to pad the numbers.
According to those numbers, we’re looking at an unemployment rate of over 23%.
As the above chart shows, nearly one in four Americans are without work. That’s quite a disconnect considering the government’s numbers are off by about 265%!
Moreover, how is it possible that our economy is officially growing, while everyone in 20% of all American family households is unemployed?

According to shocking new numbers that were just released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 20 percent of American families do not have a single person that is working.

So when someone tries to tell you that the unemployment rate in the United States is about 7 percent, you should just laugh. One-fifth of the families in the entire country do not have a single member with a job.

On top of that, nearly 50 million people are actively receiving food assistance – fully one in six Americans.
Yet, the stock market hit all time highs just this week.
Something isn’t right, especially if you take a look at the following chart which shows that America’s leading companies showed nearly zero earnings growth in the first quarter of 2014:

So, while the experts from the government and private business bloviate over the rigorous health of our economy and the success of President Obama’s policies, it’s important to keep in mind that they are doing their damnedest to bury the real story.
That’s because reality isn’t a fairy tale and as we have noted on numerous occasions it will end with the total detonation of the U.S. economy and financial markets, likely leading to a variety of serious issues that include a collapse of our currency and widespread impoverishment of the majority of people in this country.
What will follow will be nothing short of a total collapse of our way of life, so much so that Richard Duncan, author of The New Great Depression, suggests our entire civilization is in serious trouble:

If this credit bubble pops the depression is going to be so severe that I honestly don’t think our civilization can survive it.

When it does finally buckle, as noted by well known investor Doug Casey, it will be unstoppable and the speed of it will leave most people waking up to the danger after it has already happened.
How long the illusions will continue is anybody’s guess, but it should be clear that what we’re seeing from our government and their propaganda arm in the media is nothing but conjecture.
When the trick is finally revealed a whole lot of people are going to feel quite foolish.

Source
Don't forget to Like Freedom Outpost on Facebook, Google Plus, Tea Party Community & Twitter.
You can also get Freedom Outpost delivered to your Amazon Kindle device here.


Read more at http://freedomoutpost.com/2014/05/il...VATey8y0lHo.99

Artist's massive homeless sign collection 'makes some people uncomfortable'

He's planning cross-country trip to buy more signs and raise awareness

By Jason Sickles, Yahoo 11 hours ago Yahoo News

CLICK IMAGE for slideshow: Signs of the homeless. (Photo courtesy of Willie Baronet)

DALLAS — A dozen pieces of cardboard are sprawled on an art gallery floor in a hopscotch pattern.
It looks like child’s play, but the situated squares also bear prominent passages penned by homeless people looking for assistance.
“Anything Will Help”
“Out Of Work”
“Stranded & Hungry”
Artist Willie Baronet watches as the attendees skip across his exhibit in their sock feet.
“There is a moment when they realize they’re stepping on a homeless sign, and they have this visceral reaction,” Baronet, 54, said. “The symbolism of that to me is profound. I believe we all sometimes step on the homeless metaphorically without meaning to.
“I find it odd that somebody would think that stepping on a piece of cardboard on a gallery floor is a big deal when they might be willing to ignore a person day after day.”
There was a time when Baronet avoided homeless people or concocted stories in his head as to why they were begging — anything to justify his own discomfort.
But his mindset started shifting in 1993 when, on a whim, he began buying and collecting signs from homeless people on street corners. Two decades later, Baronet has amassed hundreds of the signs.
“I don’t want to stop,” he recently told Yahoo News. “This keeps me connected in a way I want to stay connected.”
On any given day, Baronet rolls down his car window at a red light and pleasantly asks in his soothing native Cajun dialect, “Hey, will you sell me your sign?”
His offers, initially met with surprise, often induce smiles and engaging conversations.
“They’re me, I’m them, and this is all really just about human beings connecting and resisting putting somebody in a box because of their circumstances,” he said.

View gallery
.
A homeless man in Dallas seeks money in May 2014. (Jason Sickles/Yahoo News)

Baronet first asks how much a person wants for the sign and negotiates from there. Most go for about $10, and he estimates he's spent $7,000 on signs over the two decades.
His collection comes in many forms: colorful, crumpled, heartbreaking and hilarious. He has his favorites, but he admires each piece as a unique artifact.
“Sometimes it’s the writing, what they say,” Baronet said. “Sometimes it’s the way they do their lettering. Sometimes it’s typos. I’m interested in the expression that goes on.”
It wasn’t until 2009, after he had sold his successful ad agency and began working on his Master of Fine Arts degree, that Baronet finally saw his hobby as art worth sharing.
“You’ve got to do something with these,” a professor once told him, Baronet said. “It gave me the confidence at that point to take it very seriously.”
In recent years he’s created sculpturelike exhibits such as the homeless hopscotch as well as a colossal wall collage and a room filled with signs suspended chest high by fishing line.
“I know this makes some people uncomfortable,” Baronet said. “Sometimes I like creating art that furthers that.”
In July, Baronet will embark on his biggest endeavor yet. With the help of a friend, Baronet plans to drive from Seattle to New York City to buy signs and connect with homeless people in 24 cities.
“It’s scarier to be open to a conversation and hear their truth,” he said.
Several years ago there was a one-legged woman standing at an intersection in Austin, Texas. Before he reached her, Baronet says, he “crafted this big victim story in my head.”
“But she was powerful,” he recalls of the woman who had been injured in a boating accident. “When I had a conversation with her, she was funny, charming and confident.”
Baronet paid $20 for her sign, which read "On My Last Leg."
The Dallas resident is the first to admit that he’s not a researcher or an expert on homelessness.
“Most of my knowledge is just from what I’ve uncovered and my gut intuition,” he said. “But I say 99 percent of the people I run into have a legitimate need.”
And, yes, he’s aware he could be getting scammed or funding bad habits.
“I don’t think it’s up to me to pass judgment on somebody for how they make their living and what they do with the money they get,” Baronet said. “It’s fine if people decide that they don’t want to give money. It’s fine if I don’t want to give money. But if I do give money, I don’t give it with strings attached.”

View gallery
.
Homeless sign collected by Willie Baronet.

He will chronicle the 31-day “We Are All Homeless” journey so he can later produce a book and documentary film. Baronet, who also teaches advertising at Southern Methodist University, is raising funds to help with expenses but says the road trip will happen regardless. “We’ll cut as many corners as we can cut,” he said.
“My point is not to make money,” Baronet said. “Material stuff isn’t my sort of thing. My point is to put the art out there. My point is to start conversations and raise awareness. My point is to keep learning about me. And that’s a selfish point.”
Growing up, Baronet was the oldest of eight children in South Louisiana. He remembers winning a coloring contest in the second grade and always enjoying drawing, “but I think I baffled” my parents, Baronet said.
“We were a poor family, and art was not a thing,” he said.
As they struggled to make ends meet, Baronet said, his dad at times took out his aggression on the family.
Years of being drilled to keep his nose “to the grindstone and don’t think too much of yourself” likely contributed to his delay in becoming an artist.
It wasn’t until he opened his eyes to the unfair circumstances that the homeless are sometimes born into that he was able to confront his own unstable upbringing, he said. “My dad didn’t know how to support me,” said Baronet, who now has a healthy relationship with his father.
His mother, Dorothy Baronet, was 64 when she died of lung cancer in 2003. It was then that he sought to fulfill his dream.
“I believe her death was very much a clarifying event for me in ... that I don’t have forever,” Baronet said. “It was pretty clear that it was time for me to do what I was most afraid of, which is the art.”
He beams as he recalls his mother’s Cajun cooking, teddy bear collection and gift for storytelling.
“The creative mojo came from Mom,” Baronet said. “She really had the juice.”
Now he laments that she’s not here to witness his new passion for storytelling — sharing the struggles of thousands of homeless people.
“She would be proud,” Baronet says, wiping away tears.

Follow Jason Sickles on Twitter (@jasonsickles).

View Comments (526)

http://news.yahoo.com/artists-unusua...144416870.html