_James Pethokoukis, writing on the blog of American Enterprise, broke down the June jobs numbers.  Here are some of the main points:

• We have had 41 straight months of unemployment over 8%. This is the longest it has been since the Great Depression.
• If the labor force participation rate was the same today as it was when Obama took office, the unemployment rate would be 10.5% (Even if you take into consideration the LFP rate should be declining because of age. )
• If you include people marginally attached to the workforce, plus part-time workers, the unemployment rate would be 14.9%
• The average time spent unemployed went up to 39.9 weeks.
• Job growth during Obama's first three years averaging 75,000 per month. During Reagan's first three years, job growth averaged 273,000 per month

With all of this in mind, let's revisit the Obama Administration's chart showing where we should be unemployment-wise since the passing of the stimulus bill. It would be funny if so many Americans weren't out of work.

It is the summer of 1776.......

The only thing hotter than the temperature is the passion for freedom and liberty that is burning in the hearts of the Patriots. Men gather together to pledge their life and their treasure to the cause of independence knowing full well that if they fail, they will probably lose one or the other, or both.......

Thomas Paine, whose American Crisis papers helped keep up the morale of the Patriots during the Revolution, had this to say just a few months later in December, but no doubt these sentiments were on the minds of the Americans that summer:

"Britain, with an army to enforce her tyranny, has declared that she has a right  (not only to tax) but "to bind us in all cases whatsoever" and if being bound in that manner is not slavery, then there is not such a thing as slavery upon earth. Even the expression  is impious, for so unlimited a power can belong only to God."

Let's pretend that you are an observer at  a town hall meeting in Boston, 1776. A speaker rises and laments against the taxes that have been levied against the colonies. He makes an impassioned plea for the audience to take up the revolutionary cause.

You look around and on one side of the room, you see Jim DeMint, Rand Paul, Paul Ryan, Bobby Jindal and Scott Walker.  On the other side of the room, you see Barney Frank, Charlie Rangel, Chuck Schumer, Harry Reid and Barack Obama.

Who would have risen up and stood with the speaker? Who would have seconded the speaker's cries for liberty? Would it be the ones who fight for limited government or the ones who support Obamacare, the largest tax increase in American history?
Would it be the ones who fight for fiscal restraint or the ones who support the largest tax increase in American history? Would it be the ones who fight for individual liberty or the ones who support the largest tax increase in American history? Would it be the ones who fight for private property rights or the ones who support the largest tax increase in American history?

Who would have stood with the colonists who took up arms largely as a result of taxation? The ones who fight to keep taxes low and government small or the ones who support the largest tax increase in American history?

Who indeed.