First time unemployed benefit applications rose to 401,000, up from last week's 391,000.

We are looking at 159 weeks out of the past 164 with new applications for benefits; 22 weeks out of the past 25. Last week, the number was a surprising low of 391,000 before the adjustment, whatever that was (I cannot find it anywhere, but it usually goes up after the initial announcement).

Update: that 391,000 number from last week was adjusted upward to 395,000.

Understand that the "break even" point in this reporting is "375,000." It appears that the economy adds 375,000 jobs each week, assuming a positive number for GDP growth. That being said, the net job loss, in this case, is the difference between 401 and 375. In other words, last week alone, we added 26,000 to the monthly unemployment percentage, a number that comes out each month. Last month, that percentage was 9.1. Tomorrow, a new report will be issued.

You should know that Obama does not have 13 months to get this unemployment thing back on track. Rather, he has until late summer, 9 or 10 months from now. And, if he continues with this race/class warfare business, he has already run out of time.

Update: the four week average is 414,000, down 4,000 from the previous four week average.