I'm not entirely sure what to make of this story. The Oregonian's Brent Hunsberger reports:

Oregon employers shed jobs for a second consecutive month while the state's unemployment rate fell one-tenth of one percentage point for the third month in a row, state employment economists say.

Oregon employers typically cut 2,500 jobs in November. This year, they trimmed 3,200, leading to a seasonally adjusted loss of 700 jobs, according to the Oregon Employment Department's monthly jobs reports.

At the same time, the unemployment rate dropped from 7.2 percent to 7.1 percent, somewhat mirroring the decline in the nation's unemployment rate from 5.5 percent to 5.4 percent.

The figures underscore a flattening of the state's economic recovery in the last half of 2004 after comparably blistering employment growth in the first half.

Since June, Oregon employers have added 2,900 seasonally adjusted jobs after adding 36,600 in the first six months. Since February, Oregon's unemployment rate has ranged from a low of 6.7 percent in April to a high of 7.4 percent in August.

In Oregon, like much of the rest of the nation, Bush's "economic recovery" is stalling. To make matters worse, Bush's immense budget deficit allows little room for the type of spending necessary to improving our economy. The onus for this problem lies squarely on one man, and if this nation doesn't hold him accountable in the midterm elections, I'm not sure if anyone is actually paying attention.