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How Convenient: Jobless Claims Lowest Since February 2008 [Updated]

A job seeker (L) meets with a recruiter during the East Bay HIREvent career fair at Centre Concord on June 5, 2012 in Concord, California. Job seekers met with recruiters who were offering a total of 700 jobs during the East Bay HIREvent. According to reports the U.S. unemployment rate for May was at 8.2 percent.
Is this business really hiring, or is this part of the conspiracy too? Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

The polls may have gotten scary as hell for President Obama, but a different set of numbers could be a good omen for him. A week after the unemployment rate fell to 7.8 percent, the weekly jobless claims — the number of people seeking unemployment assistance — has dropped to 339,000, its lowest level since February 2008, although the legitimacy of the report has yet to be confirmed by Jack Welch’s gut instincts. Assuming the data isn’t part of a vast bureaucratic conspiracy, it raises the question: Can the economy save Obama from himself?

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Update: Apparently the numbers aren’t quite what they seem. CNBC has the somewhat complicated explanation, but here’s the gist: 

Jobless Claims Lowest Since February 2008