Overnight Open Thread (7-12-2012)

I spent the afternoon at the dentist so that means you're gonna get a half-assed ONT and like it.

Unemployment Trends Over Time, State-by-State

Here's an chart showing the relative unemployment rates of different states over the past 40 years. They're ranked from from the worst long-term average to the best with shades of red denoting higher than national average rates and blue lower than average.

It's pretty clear that West Virginia, Michigan and Alaska have been under-performers for a long time but I was surprised to see that California had only slightly better employment.

Interestingly the rankings don't really change that much when you just look at employment rates since 2010. And unshockingly the best long-term employment states are mostly Red ones with ND, SD, and Nebraska currently dominating.

Why suffer in the Blue state doldrums when a better future awaits you in the off-world colonies Red states?

The 50 Best Movies That You've Never Seen

I've heard good things about most of these but have only actually seen four of them. And those 4 were pretty good actually.

Likely Voters Can't Rank Presidents for Shit

Here's their 10 Best Presidents:

1. Abraham Lincoln, +27 points (28 percent place in top-2, 1 percent place in bottom-2)
2. Ronald Reagan, +25 points (31 percent place in top-2, 6 percent place in bottom-2)
3. Franklin D. Roosevelt, +22 points (23 percent place in top-2, 1 percent place in bottom-2)
4. John F. Kennedy, +19 points (19 percent place in top-2, 0 percent place in bottom-2)
5. (tie) George Washington, +15 points (16 percent place in top-2, 1 percent place in bottom-2)
5. (tie) Bill Clinton, +15 points (28 percent place in top-2, 13 percent place in bottom-2)
7. Thomas Jefferson, +6 points (6 percent place in top-2, 0 percent place in bottom-2)
8. (tie) Teddy Roosevelt, +5 points (5 percent place in top-2, 0 percent place in bottom-2)
8. (tie) Harry S. Truman, +5 points (5 percent place in top-2, 0 percent place in bottom-2)
10. Dwight D. Eisenhower, +4 points (5 percent place in top-2, 1 percent place in bottom-2)

Alana Goodman comments:

Lincoln - great; Reagan - good; FDR - definitely not my choice, but okay, let liberals have their guy in the top three. But hold on here, JFK beats out George Washington? Bill Clinton outranks Jefferson, TR, Truman and Eisenhower? What is Bill Clinton even doing on this list, and how is it that he's tied with the Father of Our Country in fifth place?

And here's their 10 Worst Presidents:

33. (tie) Andrew Johnson, -2 points (0 percent place in top-2, 2 percent place in bottom-2)
33. (tie) Warren G. Harding, -2 points (0 percent place in top-2, 2 percent place in bottom-2)
33. (tie) Calvin Coolidge, -2 points (0 percent place in top-2, 2 percent place in bottom-2)
36. (tie) Lyndon B. Johnson, -3 points (1 percent place in top-2, 4 percent place in bottom-2)
36. (tie) Gerald Ford, -3 points (1 percent place in top-2, 4 percent place in bottom-2)
38. Herbert Hoover, -4 points (0 percent place in top-2, 4 percent place in bottom-2)
39. George H.W. Bush, -9 points (4 percent place in top-2, 13 percent place in bottom-2)
40. Jimmy Carter, -20 points (5 percent place in top-2, 25 percent place in bottom-2)
41. Richard Nixon, -24 points (2 percent place in top-2, 26 percent place in bottom-2)
42. Barack Obama, -25 points (11 percent place in top-2, 36 percent place in bottom-2)
43. George W. Bush, -39 points (4 percent place in top-2, 43 percent place in bottom-2)

The fact that George W. is so far down is a sign of just how successful the Democratic demonization campaign against him was. On the more positive side Obama has already fallen beneath the worst president and ex-president of all time.

Obama Plays The Fundraising Pauper But Is He?

Well to hear him tell it he's just trying to catch up to Romney:

Since losing the monthly fundraising battle for the first time in May to Mitt Romney, the president appears to have changed his fundraising strategy to suggest he's just trying to keep pace.

"We might not out raise Mitt Romney," the president said Saturday in an email to supporters. "But I am determined to keep the margin close enough that we can win this election the right way."

But looking at the funds raised through June 1st Obama has about 8x times as much cash on hand as Romney which means Mitt has a long way to go even with his ObamaCare reaction bump.

Rebuilt Engine: 11 Months, 3000 pictures and a lot of coffee

Super Teen 1985

Who was hot back then. Of all of these Rob Lowe is about the only one who could still make the A-list.

Yahoo group. That is all.

And my Twitter spew.

Tonight's post brought to you by Joan:

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posted by Maetenloch at 10:18 PM

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