Know someone who thinks everything is Obama’s fault? Send them this

Fair is fair, you guys. I take a few pot shots at Mr. Obama myself, mostly from a progressive’s vantage. The whole lot of us are unhappy and most of our complaints are more similar than you realize.

But seriously, give the president just a little credit (har-har, no that’s not a pun) for the kinda still functioning day-to-day economy you and I live in. Wall Street and the Banks nearly slit our throats during the age of Bush and I think it’s only fair that everyone, left and right, understand what was handed to our current president when it comes to unemployment.

This video depicts an animation created by grad students in Washington University’s journalism program and its publication, The American Observer. It shows the grim tide of an month-by-month upward march for every county and parish in the country. As  unemployment crosses the tenth percentile in each area, colors lashed across the map grow ever darker. The crimson tide is simply incredible to watch in the months before President Obama was sworn in. What happened over his first six is almost unprecedented, and completely jarring to see it illustrated like this.

A more detailed outlay is available here.

Something, you know, to maybe keep in mind when Republicans preach their corporate economic Dogma. I’m no partisan, but it’s pretty clear that one of these two wolves we call “parties” has gone a bit easier on us.