We have heard numbers from the Left ranging from 2 million to 3.3 million jobs lost since 2001.

Of course, when you hear this number, you are hearing somebody quote something they read on LeftistButtmonkey.com, not actual labor statistics.

Some background and perspective from an October article:

...Especially when that 3 million figure is so shaky. Democrats and the media cite the Labor Department's so-called "establishment survey," which asks established firms about payroll. Yet the Labor Department also conducts an employment survey of individual households that shows a much smaller net job loss of 180,000 since March 2001 and says that more than 1 million jobs have been added this year. Lisanti of Standard & Poor's writes that the establishment survey often excludes self-employed workers. And the elimination of second and third jobs shows up as job losses on this survey, even though that often is a sign of families getting back on their feet. And Wesbury points out that new small businesses that drive the economy often are excluded from the establishment payroll survey. "If I were a Democratic candidate, I would cite the payroll survey, but the household survey has been most accurate at predicting booms," Wesbury says.

But even the numbers on the establishment payroll survey are improving. It shows 57,000 jobs were added in September. This coincides with other upbeat business news, such as computer giant IBM's announcement in October that the company soon will hire 10,000 additional U.S. workers. But in the presidential campaign a lot will depend on how the good news is reported. On CBS, Dan Rather prefaced the story about 57,000 new jobs by proclaiming that "a lot of people who need jobs can't find them." He then focused the story on workers who allegedly joined the armed forces because they couldn't find other work.

BTW, the blue-collar vote is going to Bush because unlike some hothouse tenured Berkeley socialist, a blue-collar guy knows how money and jobs are made in this country. Besides, who is he going to vote for? Dean?