A customer in a Texas restaurant tells his waitress:

[Mr.Bill]

Did you know governor Perry has created more jobs than any other governor in the country?

She says, Yes, I know, I have three of them.

[Fearless]

1. Zing!

[progree]

2. Well, its the second most populous state, so being number one in job creation is no big stretch

It reminds me of some idiot I was arguing with on some news.yahoo.com article commentary back in August. He was claiming that 8 of the 10 fastest job growth states were governed by Republicans. Here is what I replied with.

Hmmm, just as I suspected -- many have high unemployment rates.

Here is your list, again but with the unemployment rate ranking (lowest is best), followed by the unemployment rate, both in August 2013, the last month I could find unemployment rankings by state. From
bls.gov/web/laus/laumstrk.htm

Top 10 states in order 1-10 in job creation in 2013 and the party of the governor.
Utah –Rep. (7th, 4.7%)
Nevada - Rep. (51st, 9.5%)
[font color = blue]Hawaii – Dem. (4th, 4.3%)[/font]
South Carolina – Rep. (35th, 8.1%)
[font color = blue]Colorado – Dem. (22nd, 7.0%)[/font]
Idaho – Rep. (20th, 6.8%)
Florida – Rep. (22nd, 7.0%)
Texas – Rep. (17th, 6.4%)
North Carolina – Rep. (44th, 8.7%)
Arizona – Rep. (39th, 8.3%)

(Washington D.C. is included as a "state" in the unemployment rate table, so that's how Nevada can be 51st).

The average unemployment rate ranking of the Republican ones is =Average(7,51,35,20,22,17,44,39) = 29.4. So worse than average (which would be 25.5). No surprise they are growing faster. Very nice try though.

And like I said, a snapshot of one year's growth statistic doesn't mean anything, the rankings among states changes all the time.

For a longer term view,
Want a Better Economy? History Says Vote Democrat! - Forbes
http://www.forbes.com/sites/adamhartung/2012/10/10/want-a-better-economy-history-says-vote-democrat
Democratic presidents beat Republican ones: Disposable income, GDP, profits, stock market, ...

[Mr.Bill]

3. I think Texas

also leads the nation in percentage of minimum wage jobs.

That's the point of the joke. (all good jokes have a foundation in truth) It takes several Texas jobs to make ends meet.

[KansDem]

4. "Perry’s Texas Has Highest Percentage Of Minimum Wage Jobs In The Nation"

From "ThinkProgress"--

Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX) has been making some noise about potentially entering the 2012 Republican presidential race, and if he chooses to throw his hat into the ring, it’s quite clear that he will point to Texas’ economy as one of his credentials. “In Texas, you don’t have to use your imagination, saying, ‘What’ll happen if we apply this or that conservative principle?’” Perry said earlier this week. “You just need to look around, because they’ve been in play across our state for years, generating real results like unmatched job creation, more exports than any other state and a balanced budget.”

That Perry has a stellar record on job creation is simply not true. As the Austin American-Statesman noted, “while the national unemployment rate is 9.1 percent and the Texas unemployment rate is 8 percent, some 23 states, including New York, have lower unemployment rates.” In addition, “jobs grew at about the same rate during Democrat Ann Richards’ four years as governor” as they have under Perry.

Between 2008 and 2010, jobs actually grew at a faster pace in Massachusetts than they did in Texas, and “Texas has done worse than the rest of the country since the peak of national unemployment in October 2009.” But as it turns out, Texas is leading the nation in one employment metric — the number and percentage of minimum wage jobs:

Additionally, Texas has by far the largest number of employees working at or below the federal minimum wage ($7.25 per hour in 2010) compared to any state, according to a BLS report. In 2010, about 550,000 Texans were working at or below minimum wage, or about 9.5 percent of all workers paid by the hour in the state. Texas tied with Mississippi for the greatest percentage of minimum wage workers…From 2007 to 2010, the number of minimum wage workers in Texas rose from 221,000 to 550,000, an increase of nearly 150 percent.

http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2011/06/16/246892/perry-minumum-wage-jobs/