Job hunting for 2009 Graduates

So I've been reading a lot of news online and even the occasionally old-fashioned newspaper (gasp!) and overwhelmingly the news about the Class of 2009 has been bleak. And the mood of us graduates has been even more bleak, and understandably so, for most of us, our loan grace periods have expired and bills are due, we've been kicked off parents/schools health insurance plans. And overall getting rejected over and over from jobs sucks the self esteem right out of you.
I started my job search in what I thought was a timely fashion, aka September 2008 for a graduation date of May 2009. As of yet I don't have a full time job and that seems to be the resounding theme for everyone. You know the job market is tough when you are begging Starbucks to call you back (and they won't. Apparently a $200,000 degree in International Relations does not qualify a person to work as a barista at Starbucks. Who knew? )
Most of what we get fed everyday, in between episodes of Maury's "Who's the father?" episodes and Grey's Anatomy are images of how bleak things are for the youth. The media has branded us as lost. How are we supposed to get up and face the job market when the news persists in calling us the "Lost Generation"? I'm not lost! I'm right here! Just because only 19% of the graduating class of 2009 have full time jobs doesn't mean that the rest of us went into a black hole. We are still here, waiting to move out of limbo and get started on the real business of being a 20-something college graduate WITH a job. We still have hope and we are far from lost. So there!