Saturday, October 27, 2012

Hang On to Your Hat

I hope our local Vigilance readers are preparing for a few days without electricity, with possible flooding, high winds, and probably some impassable roads. The derecho lasted about twenty minutes and put us out of business for a week; this thing is going to blow for a couple of days at least, so it might be a while before things are back to normal.



You are not hearing anything on the news about "climate change" or "global warming" as this storm, which is of a type and intensity that has never been seen before, tears into the Eastern seaboard. As you can see from this map -- which came from the really cool Wundermap web site -- this convergence includes a huge system descending from the Arctic and a gigantic hurricane coming up from the Caribbean. Hang on to your hats, people!

108 Comments:

Anonymous frankenstormer said...

this may affect the election

Romney is cancelling to make sure emergency personnel are focused on preparations for the Frankenstorm while Obama says "I'm not pulling out of nothing"

at a minimum, nobody will be drawing any crowds in Virginia for the next few days

btw, on MTV last night, Obama became the first prominent Democrap to admit that Bush won the popular vote against Gore in 2000:

""In 2000, Gore vs. Bush, 537 votes changed the direction of history in a profound way and the same thing could happen," Obama said in an interview Friday with MTV."

there you have it

the Supreme Court didn't steal the election

537 more people voted for Bush

October 27, 2012 2:45 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"The race for the White House continues to be too close to call in Ohio, according to a new Cincinnati Enquirer/Ohio News Organization Poll that shows President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney each with 49 percent support from likely voters.

That's a slip for the president, who took 51 percent of likely voters in the newspaper group's September poll.

Romney's support grew among males, among high school and college graduates and among respondents in every age category except 18 to 29.

The two candidates also tied in scaring voters -- 29 percent of poll respondents said they'd be scared if Obama won, and the same amount said they'd be scared if Romney won. Half said they were very enthusiastic about voting, 21 percent said they were not so enthusiastic or not enthusiastic at all."

"SABINA, OH -- For the first time in four decades, Iowa’s influential newspaper endorsed a Republican candidate for president as The Des Moines Register announced Saturday night its support of Gov. Mitt Romney in the November election.

The Register, in an editorial that will run in Sunday’s paper, asks voters to give Romney "a chance to correct the nation’s fiscal course and to implode the partisan gridlock that has shackled Washington and the rest of America."

In 2008, the Register endorsed Barack Obama.

“Barack Obama rocketed to the presidency from relative obscurity with a theme of hope and change. A different reality has marked his presidency. His record on the economy the past four years does not suggest he would lead in the direction the nation must go in the next four years,” the editorial posted on the Register’s website said."

October 28, 2012 9:07 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Official PSA

October 28, 2012 12:45 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

NASA image shows enormity of Sandy

October 28, 2012 5:15 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

the whole thing is beign hyped by la media to distract from the Benghazi scandal and the deteriorating Obama campaign

October 28, 2012 8:37 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Benghazi - 4 dead and Obama took responsibility for it

9/11 - 2996 dead and Bush hasn't to this day

No hype, just fact.




October 29, 2012 2:06 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Benghazi - 4 dead and Obama took responsibility for it"

you mean when he lied about it, inflaming riots throughout the Muslim world?

or earlier, when he refused requests for help while watching the whole unfold live?

or during the debates, when he said he had no idea what happened but he's going to investigate and will get back to us (right after the election- wink, wink)?

or when he tried to throw Hillary under the bus?

or when he tried to throw Gen Petraeus under the bus?

or, after it happened, when he brought in a film maker for questioning, trying to imply it was his fault?

et al .............

October 29, 2012 7:07 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

You would have preferred he made a film joking about searching, but finding "No weapons of mass description under here!" or flying onto an aircraft carrier and declaring "Mission Accomplished" no doubt.


October 29, 2012 7:40 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I would have preferred he back up our citizens under attack.

Assuming he stills qualifies to be Commander in Chief after that failure in courage, I would prefer he not threaten someone's right to free speech to divert from the fact that he allowed al quaeda to strike us on the anniversary of 9/11.

October 29, 2012 9:33 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The president's campaign is now driven by desperation. Obama's team promised at the beginning of this election cycle to "kill" Romney, and yet the challenger is very much alive, weathering $300 million in attack ads.

Obama can't pivot from destroying Romney to making the case for his own re-election.

The campaign is stepping up the "war on women" charge, hammering battleground markets with abortion messages.

He's also hop-scotching college campuses to wake up voters who've returned to apathy because of their dismal job prospects. Obama recruited the morally-challenged character from HBO's "Girls" series to do a spot equating a vote for him to losing your virginity to a really nice guy.

Vulgar is part of the repertoire; Obama called Romney a "bullsh—er" in an interview. Very presidential.

What else will Obama backers pull out in the final days?

I got a taste last week, after The Detroit News published its endorsement of Romney. Even though we praised Obama for the auto bailout, I can't tell you how many messages I got accusing the newspaper and me of racism.

One voice mailer called me a bald dummy and threatened to bring "175 ministers to run my racist a-- out of town."

Liberal commentators are reviving the word Obamaphobe to describe those who oppose the president, saying his race, not his results, motivate the criticism. It's an effort to guilt those who supported Obama's historic election in 2008 into voting for him again, lest they be declared racist.

The tactic was tested by former President Bill Clinton at the Democratic National Convention when he declared Obama the subject of unprecedented vitriol (apparently forgetting the rabid right impeached him) and wondering if racism was the reason.

All this makes Obama look as if he's scared to death, blindly firing off his weapons in every direction.

Romney, meanwhile, appears confident and in command. That's a lot stronger image to project down the home stretch.

October 29, 2012 10:31 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

With Hurricane Sandy bearing down on the entire east coast, it's worth remembering back to when Mitt Romney was in his severely conservative primary phase. He told CNN's John King during the June 13, 2011 Republican presidential primary debate that federal disaster relief was "immoral" because deficit.

Here's a transcript of the snip.


KING: What else, Governor Romney? You’ve been a chief executive of a state. I was just in Joplin, Missouri. I’ve been in Mississippi and Louisiana and Tennessee and other communities dealing with whether it’s the tornadoes, the flooding, and worse. FEMA is about to run out of money, and there are some people who say do it on a case-by-case basis and some people who say, you know, maybe we’re learning a lesson here that the states should take on more of this role. How do you deal with something like that?

ROMNEY: Absolutely. Every time you have an occasion to take something from the federal government and send it back to the states, that’s the right direction. And if you can go even further and send it back to the private sector, that’s even better.

Instead of thinking in the federal budget, what we should cut—we should ask ourselves the opposite question. What should we keep? We should take all of what we’re doing at the federal level and say, what are the things we’re doing that we don’t have to do? And those things we’ve got to stop doing, because we’re borrowing $1.6 trillion more this year than we’re taking in. We cannot…

KING: Including disaster relief, though?

ROMNEY: We cannot—we cannot afford to do those things without jeopardizing the future for our kids. It is simply immoral, in my view, for us to continue to rack up larger and larger debts and pass them on to our kids, knowing full well that we’ll all be dead and gone before it’s paid off. It makes no sense at all. [emphasis added]


Severely conservative Mitt also picked severely conservative Paul Ryan for his running mate, the guy who attempted to cut a new disaster aid fund that "budgets help for victims of hurricanes, tornadoes and floods before they occur." Luckily for the entire east coast this week, party leadership nixed that idea.

But what happens with the next monster storm under Romney/Ryan? The Ryan budget, fully embraced by Romney, would make such deep cuts in federal funding that disaster relief would have to be passed on to states and localities. But funding for states and localities is also so sharply curtailed that they'll be hard pressed to respond to disasters. Which, as he made clear at the debate, is exactly what will force his ultimate goal: privatizing disaster relief.

Huffington Post asked Romney about this issue on Sunday, and a campaign official basically reaffirmed Romney's position that it's all up to the states:

"Gov. Romney wants to ensure states, who are the first responders and are in the best position to aid impacted individuals and communities, have the resources and assistance they need to cope with natural disasters," the Romney official said.

What again does Mitt Romney consider immoral?

October 29, 2012 11:06 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

here's what he said, and he was right:

"It is simply immoral, in my view, for us to continue to rack up larger and larger debts and pass them on to our kids"

disaster relief should obviously happen at some level

that's not to say any number Obama pulls out of his magic hat is right

or that his mismanagement is any excuse

a couple of weeks ago, Obama tried to blame Benghazi on Republican cuts

of course, when that didn't take, it was Hillary's fault, and the CIA's fault, and the fault of some obscure filmmakers and the fault of the victims

with Obama, the bucks never stops

it just twirls in the wind like a leaf in the Frankenstorm

a week from tomorrow, this error will come to an end

the American people are ready to admit they made a big mistake four years ago

October 29, 2012 3:29 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

how do you all defend the latest news on benghazi...

ie, charles woods coming out and saying that his son called for help 3 times, was told to stand down and not go help the seven or so left in the consulate, that the state dept KNEW It was happening, didn't help and then lied about it ?

Obama has completely disqualified himself to be president.

done.
http://www.independentsentinel.com/2012/10/tyrone-woods-father-heartbreaking-reaction-to-latest-news-on-the-murder-of-his-son/

October 29, 2012 6:16 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Anon, it is pathetic to see you trying to manufacture a Presidential scandal out of the unfortunate incident at Benghazi.

October 29, 2012 7:01 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

the "incident in Benghazi" was the murder of 4 americans while the President watched on TV and did nothing to help.
after they asked and asked and asked.

Leave no man behind.
Not while Obama is in charge.

No justification WHATSOEVER.

and gets on a plane and goes to Vegas while our embassy is burning.
and the dead seals dad goes on TV and asks for the truth, and no one in the media reports it....

October 29, 2012 7:49 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Pat Caddell, a democrat...

"these people have no honor"

I couldn't agree more.

http://clashdaily.com/2012/10/pat-caddell-hammers-obama-and-msm-on-benghazi-these-people-have-no-honor/

October 29, 2012 7:52 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Anon, we didn't hear this kind of talk from you when a Republican president ignored reports of a terrorist plot against Americans on our own soil, which resulted in more than three thousand deaths. We didn't hear anything from you when a major American city was destroyed by flooding and our Republican president joked around and visited with his friends.

Some violent Libyans took advantage of the chaos surrounding an anti-Muslim Youtube movie trailer to attack our consulate, resulting in the deaths of four Americans. You can try to blame the President but ... it just makes you sound stupid.

October 29, 2012 8:06 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

and those violent Libyans just happened to be carrying RPGs and heavy weapones with, but it was completely spontaneous because they were mad about the video !

who sounds stupid.
give me a break.

emails to the state dept confirmed it was a terrorist attack within 2 hours... copies have been published...

pull your head out of your dairy aire

October 29, 2012 8:19 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The emails that came out two hours after the attack were wrong. They said a group had claimed responsibility for the attack on Facebook & Twitter and the group had not. In fact, though the group was pleased about the attack, they announced that it wasn't them that had done it.

You know this, it is all a matter of public record.

October 29, 2012 8:25 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

you are seriously trying to defend Rice's statement that it was a "spontaneous attack".... SERIOUSLY ?

they JUST HAPPENED TO BE carrying around RPGs ... cause that's something you always have handy...

REALLY ? okay, they had live video feed and they were watching it the situation room. why didn't they send help... for SEVEN HOURS ? why did they tell Ty woods not to go help... until he finally defied orders and went anyway, or are you also contending his dad is completely fabricating this story and that he got emails from folks at the state dept thanking him for his son's action, which saved their lives....

October 29, 2012 8:35 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

why won't the president answer the question ... did the embassy ask for more security ? (YES).

did the embassy ask for help while under attack (YES).

and he avoids and avoids the question, won't answer it, and our spineless press let's him get away with it.

NO HONOR WHATSOVER. LIAR LIAR LIAR

October 29, 2012 8:37 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I feel for the father. The other parents of those killed in the attack have vowed not to politicize the incident, and I cannot blame the father for wanting a simple explanation but there just isn't one. The grieving father has become a tool for people like you who are desperate for something to tarnish this Presidency.

Imagine, some Arabs had weapons, what a strange thing to have happened! Of course they went there to cause trouble, but there was no planning, no organization to it. You can't say if it was or was not a "terrorist" attack, because the word terrorism has almost no definition other than its ideological implication.

I know this plays well on Fox News, but those of us who live outside that bubble are not impressed by this attempt to generate a scandal where there is only tragedy.

October 29, 2012 8:42 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

you are right, it was entirely spontaneous but just happened to have occured on 9/11 with RPGs ... not a common weapon.

entirely spontaneous.

You do know that they had a predator with a live video feed into the situation room within an hour after the attack started ? right ? or had you not heard that...

and in the high tech field, I have some familarity with what those drones can do and yes, live video feed and reconaissance is a primary mission....

so again, can you justify why the President would not answer the question "was extra security requested"...

either he didn't know because he was on a plane to a LV fundraiser (unacceptable and he is incompetent)... or he did know, refused to give the order to go help, and is refusing to answer the question.

the question of "was additional security requested" is an answer this administration KNOWS THE ANSWER to . or they are completely incompetent.
take your pick.


October 29, 2012 8:57 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Lt. Col. Tony Shaffer said tonight that his sources tell him that Obama was one of the people in the room watching the Benghazi attack go down and both he and Col. David Hunt agree it would have taken an order by the president to intervene. Further, Col. Hunt said that we were only 20 min away by jet and a couple of hours away by AC-130 gunships and special forces, and the decision not to intervene had to be political. "

http://www.therightscoop.com/lt-col-tony-shaffer-my-sources-tell-me-obama-was-in-the-room-watching-benghazi-attack/

October 29, 2012 9:01 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Oh, so you're complaining because the President didn't start World War Three over a riotous, disorganized attack on a diplomatic outpost in Libya? I'm glad you were not in charge that day!

October 29, 2012 9:16 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

what an ass.

you really think WWIII would ensue if we protected the life of our citizens under attack?

move to Canada

and take Obama with you

October 29, 2012 9:25 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Heh, I seem to be getting under your skin, you're down to name-calling.

What do you think the President should have done? Sent troops to go kill some people after the lightning attack was finished? Really, what do you think he could do that he did not do?

October 29, 2012 9:30 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Notice: Governor O'Malley signs Executive Order cancelling Early Voting on Tuesday, October 30, 2012.

Notice: Governor O'Malley signs Executive Order cancelling Early Voting on Monday, October 29, 2012.

Early voting will be extended through Friday, November 2, 2012.

October 29, 2012 11:22 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I'll tell you what they should have done.

they have should brought in an f22, directed a missle at the mortar that was aimed at the embassy, and taken that mortar out before it killed our folks.

ty woods had lasered that mortar location, that means he has reasonable expectation that they were sending someone...

they should have brought in some helicopters and pulled the people out of there before the embassy was comprised. they should have brought in f-22 and peppered the area around the embassy with machine gun fire before the embassy was on fire. if they had scrambled a fighter jet, which goes at 6x the speed of sound, it would have been there in under 20 minutes. then perhaps our embassy would have not burned and our people would not be dead. we are not proactively starting anything, we would have been protecting our people, something I thought we always did ... leave no man behind.

instead we sent no help and watch them die over a video feed.

the president is a murderer, pure and simple.

October 30, 2012 9:12 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

and, of course, like Nixon, he has lied and stonewalled

when he blamed it on a spontaneous street riot caused by the reaction to a film about Islam, he knew he was lying

his lie inflamed tensions around the world, setting off real riots at many of our embassies

then, to cover his tracks, the film maker who was slandered is brought in for interrogation, basically for the purpose of intimidating free speech

Obama has to go and anyone who characterizes sending help to our public servants under attack as potentially provoking WWIII has gotten off very easy if they are merely called an ass

October 30, 2012 9:35 AM  
Anonymous Lies (And the Lying Liars Who Tell Them) said...

You and your ilk will say anything, true or not, in the effort to steal the election from actual American voters, pure and simple.

"The Romney campaign’s latest attempt to obscure its candidate’s true position on the auto bailout appears to be backfiring, as Romney has found himself under fire for releasing one of the least honest ads of the entire 2012 campaign.

As Sam Stein of The Huffington Post explains, the ad uses deceptive wording to obscure both Romney’s and President Obama’s true positions on the auto industry. It says that the president “took GM and Chrysler into bankruptcy,” without mentioning that he also provided government support to help the companies survive the process — or that Romney himself wrote an op-ed titled “Let Detroit Go Bankrupt,” and slammed the bailout as “crony capitalism.” It also cites the Detroit News’ endorsement of Romney as evidence of his support of the auto industry, without mentioning that the endorsement specifically criticized Romney’s “wrong-headedness on the auto bailout.”

Most egregiously, the ad repeats Romney’s lie that Jeep is considering moving its production from Ohio to China — a whopper that Chrysler itself forcefully debunked last week.

While the ad does not flatly lie, as Romney did, it accuses President Obama of selling “Chrysler to Italians who are going to build Jeeps in China.” Left unsaid is the fact that Fiat — the Italian company that owns Chrysler — is expanding production in China to meet rising demand, but not taking a single job out of Ohio in the process.

The Obama campaign swiftly responded to Romney’s misleading ad with a spot of its own, which will run in Ohio.

The ad, titled “Collapse,” points out that Chrysler rebuked Romney’s false claim about Jeep, and notes that Jeep is actually adding jobs in Ohio. “Mitt Romney on Ohio Jobs: wrong then, dishonest now,” the ad concludes.

Former President Bill Clinton also weighed in on the controversy, slamming Romney’s ad as “the biggest load of bull in the world.”

Romney’s reliance on the easily debunked Jeep lie suggests that, as Greg Sargent puts it in The Plum Line, Romney has run out of answers on the auto bailout. Throughout the course of the campaign Romney has attacked the Obama administration’s actions, falsely asserted that he supported early government intervention, and even claimed that Obama followed his advice on how to save the auto industry. None of it has worked, and — largely because of his weak record on the auto bailout — Romney has been unable to move up in the polls in Ohio. Now he’s been reduced to repeating an easily debunked lie in an attempt to scare voters into his camp. "The Romney campaign is deliberately misleading people with the Jeep-to-China claim, in a last-ditch effort to turn things around in Ohio, which benefitted enormously from the auto bailout Romney opposed."

That certainly doesn’t seem like the strategy of a campaign that is confident that it will carry the state."

October 30, 2012 9:46 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

4 Pinocchios for Mitt Romney’s misleading ad on Chrysler and China

October 30, 2012 9:59 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Gov. Christie praises Obama response to Hurricane Sandy as ‘outstanding’

October 30, 2012 10:46 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"You and your ilk will say anything, true or not, in the effort to steal the election from actual American voters, pure and simple."

actually, the new Republican Congress is planning to investigate the polling industry to find out how they have manipulated data in an effort to steal the election from actual American voters, pure and simple

I think we all know what they'll find

"The Romney campaign’s latest attempt to obscure its candidate’s true position on the auto bailout"

Romney's position is that GM's bankruptcy should have been supervised by the courts, as the law calls for, and not by Obama personally

the effect of Obama's action is that extravagant union benefits which make the American auto uncompetitive have been preserved

a court would have left GM in a more competitive position, structured efficiently with a feasible business model

October 30, 2012 10:48 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I would second Christie

Obama performed well in the crisis

Romney also acted appropriately by not taking advantage of the situation

one can't say the same about the craven Ben Cardin, from whom I've received four e-mails in the last two days, making sure I knew when early voting would resume

early voting should actually be reserved for extraordinary circumstances, not to give Democrats more time to drive all their lazy constituents to the poll

the day of the election is specified in the Constitution

October 30, 2012 10:53 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"the day of the election is specified in the Constitution"

No single "election day" is specified in the Constitution, but thanks for your repeated demonstrations that all the GOP has to offer is lie after lie after lie.

Election Day (United States)

"Congress has mandated a uniform date for presidential (3 U.S.C. § 1) and congressional (2 U.S.C. § 1 and 2 U.S.C. § 7) elections, though early voting is nonetheless authorized in many states. In Oregon, where all elections are vote-by-mail, all ballots must be received by a set time on Election Day, as is common with absentee ballots in most states (except overseas military ballots which receive more time by federal law). In the state of Washington, where all elections are also vote-by-mail, ballots need only be postmarked by Election Day.

Election Day is a civic holiday in some states, including Delaware, Hawaii, Kentucky, Montana, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, West Virginia, and the territory of Puerto Rico. Some other states require that workers be permitted to take time off from employment without loss of pay. California Elections Code Section 14000 provides that employees otherwise unable to vote must be allowed two hours off with pay, at the beginning or end of a shift."


Article Two of the United States Constitution: Clause 4: Election day

"Clause 4: Election day
The Congress may determine the Time of chusing [sic] the Electors, and the Day on which they shall give their Votes; which Day shall be the same throughout the United States.

Congress sets a national Election Day. Currently, Electors are chosen on the Tuesday following the first Monday in November, in the year before the President's term is to expire. The Electors cast their votes on the Monday following the second Wednesday in December of that year. Thereafter, the votes are opened and counted by the Vice President, as President of the Senate, in a joint session of Congress."


Election day is up to Congress and individual states.

October 30, 2012 11:56 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Help storm victims.

Donate to the Red Cross Disaster Relief

October 30, 2012 12:02 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Here's your biggest whopper of a lie on this thread:

"with Obama, the bucks never stops "

You must be thinking of the Bushmeister again.

BUSH NEVER ACCEPTED RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE 9/11 ATTACKS THAT KILLED THOUSAND OF INNOCENT AMERICANS ON AMERICAN SOIL UNDER HIS WATCH.

President Obama does not shy away from his responsibilities. TheHill.com reports: Obama says he is 'ultimately' responsible for Benghazi security

October 30, 2012 12:23 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

oh good

he's accepted responsibility so there won't have to be a long impeachment trial

accepting responsibility means accepting consequences

not just making some lame statement to make you good without any effect

he should resign

he refused to rescue our embassy personnel and watched them die live because of political calculations

he lied about it, inflamed the Muslim street worldwide and threatened the freedom of speech of an American

for multiple counts of willful failure to defend the Constitution, he should leave, now that he's accepted responsibility

October 30, 2012 12:53 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Anon, you ought to give up on this one, you just sound like more of a raving lunatic than usual.

The President didn't do anything wrong. His calculations were diplomatic, not political -- he could have gained political points, in fact, by acting tough and throwing a bunch of firepower at the situation. He is not going to resign over Benghazi, or be impeached, there is no inflammation of Muslims and no threat to domestic free speech. And it will not hurt him politically, either, people understand that he has a complicated job and does it well. That is a volatile region and our reputation is not especially positive after Bush's inexplicable crusade against Iraq.

October 30, 2012 1:09 PM  
Anonymous Let them eat cake! said...

Mitt Romney Refuses To Talk About FEMA After Hurricane Sandy Event

"Mitt Romney refused to answer reporters' questions about how he would handle the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), after a Tuesday "storm relief" event in Ohio for Hurricane Sandy.

From the Romney pool report:

TV pool asked Romney at least five times whether he would eliminate FEMA as president/what he would do with FEMA. He ignored the qs but they are audible on cam. The music stopped at points and the qs would have been audible to him.

A follow-up report noted the specific questions Romney ignored, as he was collecting hurricane supplies following his event:

"Gov are you going to eliminate FEMA?" a print pooler shouted, receiving no response.

Wires reporters asked more questions about FEMA that were ignored.

Romney kept coming over near pool to pick up more water. He ignored these questions:

"Gov are you going to see some storm damage?"

"Gov has [New Jersey Gov.] Chris Christie invited you to come survey storm damage?"

"Gov you've been asked 14 times, why are you refusing to answer the question?"

During a GOP primary debate last year, Romney had said he supported the idea of states and private sector groups taking over responsibility for disaster relief, adding that he would "absolutely" shut down FEMA....

The Republican presidential nominee and his running mate, Rep. Paul Ryan, suspended all campaign events on Monday evening and Tuesday "out of sensitivity" to the victims of Hurricane Sandy."


Why the secrecy? Isn't Mittless proud of his poitical decision to SHUT DOWN FEMA? Why does Romney think it's immoral to go into debt to save Americans in emergency situations but it's not immoral to go into debt to give himself and others in the top 1% huge tax cuts?

October 30, 2012 1:41 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"It’s become a platitude to say that no one should be playing politics with Hurricane Sandy, but that’s silly. When the performance of government suddenly becomes a literal matter of life and death to many Americans, we ought to be thinking about what kind of government we want to have, and that involves politics.

It’s impossible not to see that this storm has devastated Mitt Romney’s presidential candidacy. The response to the hurricane has seemed like one long dramatic Obama campaign commercial, a lesson in “We’re all in this together,” while Romney, the man who said he’d dismantle FEMA, flails on the sidelines.

Romney’s “relief” event outside of Dayton, Ohio, was surreal enough to be a campaign parody, with the candidate comparing the federal government’s hurricane relief efforts to the time he and some friends had to clean up a football field strewn with “rubbish and paper products.” It was supposed to be a parable of how Republicans handle disaster – with private charity, not government intervention – as Romney told his audience, “It’s part of the American spirit, the American way, to give to people in need.” The Republican went on to talk about the time some Hurricane Katrina survivors were rerouted from Houston to Cape Cod and the good people of Cape Cod responded by donating food and, yes, television sets.

Of course the Red Cross and other private charities are discouraging the donation of goods, preferring that kind Americans donate funds that can be used where they’re needed, not goods that must be sorted and distributed and may not even be necessary (television sets?).

Romney promised to put the goods on a truck to where they’re needed, “I think New Jersey,” he said.

That was a funny choice. Maybe it had to do with the fact that New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie has all but endorsed Obama in the last two days, repeatedly praising his “leadership.” He told the crew on “Morning Joe” that “It’s been very good working with the president. He and his administration have been coordinating with us. It’s been wonderful.” He told “Today” that FEMA’s response has been “excellent,” and he’s repeatedly tweeted his thanks to the president.

OK, let’s be honest: The New Jersey governor has not been Mitt Romney’s most loyal foot soldier. He was quick to join the calls for Romney to release his tax returns earlier this year, and his keynote speech in Tampa was more like a Christie 2016 campaign kickoff than a tribute to Romney. There’s obviously a heavy element of self-interest in Christie’s response. His approval as governor hinges on how he handles the storm, and so do his presidential aspirations. He’s got a huge incentive to work well with the president. He’s also got some incentive to stick a shiv in the flailing Republican contender, since a Romney loss would clear the way for a Christie 2016 bid as well. He’s clearly playing politics here.

But really, outside of Romney’s embarrassing European tour this summer, when he insulted Britain over Olympics planning and divulged a secret briefing by M16, this is Romney’s worst moment yet. As the storm approached, political reporters dredged up his pledge to “absolutely” restructure FEMA to give power to the states. At a Republican debate in June 2011, he suggested the private sector should do more, because federal spending even on FEMA was “jeopardizing the future of our kids.” Tell that to the kids of New Jersey, Gov. Romney. And of course the Ryan budget would slash funding for FEMA..."

October 30, 2012 3:17 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

After Romney’s laughable relief event Tuesday, reporters swarmed him to ask if he still favors sending FEMA funding and responsibility back to the states. From the Romney pool report:

“Gov are you going to eliminate FEMA?” a print pooler shouted, receiving no response.

Wires reporters asked more questions about FEMA that were ignored.

Romney kept coming over near pool to pick up more water. He ignored these questions:

“Gov are you going to see some storm damage?”

“Gov has [New Jersey Gov.] Chris Christie invited you to come survey storm damage?”

“Gov you’ve been asked 14 times, why are you refusing to answer the question?”

Romney won’t answer because he can’t. We saw him pivot to the center, to become the white Barack Obama, in the three debates, as he realized his unpopular policies and his contempt for 47 percent of the country was dooming his presidential bid. He’s got no standing now to talk about how he’d handle this disaster. The heroes of Sandy, so far, are the first responders, the cops and firefighters and emergency technicians, the folks evacuating patients from hospitals and trapped citizens from flooding. These are the people who’ve been demonized by Republicans for the last two years: the public workers who have become the new “welfare queens.” When Obama pushed a jobs bill that would have helped states and cities avoid laying off such workers, GOP Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell derided it as a “bailout,” and Paul Ryan, of course, voted against it.

To top it all off, George W. Bush’s laughable FEMA director, “Heck of a job, Brownie” Michael Brown, is criticizing Obama for reacting too quickly to Sandy. Are Democrats paying Brown to remind voters of the contrast between Obama’s quiet competence and Bush’s disastrous handling of Katrina?

As I write, the president is arriving at a Red Cross site to ask Americans for donations. Chris Christie, meanwhile, has rebuffed Romney’s offer to visit New Jersey’s devastated shore. (Politics aside: Really, what could Romney offer?) I can’t be sure whether or how much disaster relief will matter to swing state voters outside of the hurricane zone, but I am stranded (on a blue island) in the swing state of Wisconsin, where people are tuned in to the storm and the government response. No one can be reassured by Romney’s empty posturing. Unless there is some government-abetted or neglected further disaster, I think Obama will be reelected next Tuesday. Hurricane Sandy has reminded us what’s at stake."

October 30, 2012 3:18 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Information for the SCREAMER

"Former Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice broke with the majority of her party last night on Fox News, as she tried to hit the brakes on the right wing’s politicization of the recent attack in Libya.

Host Greta Van Susteren asked Rice directly and repeatedly about a set of emails uncovered by Reuters. In what has been dubbed “Benghazi-Gate,” the conservative media has jumped on the emails as definitive proof that the Obama administration has been lying about what it knew and when in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attack on a diplomatic mission in Benghazi. Rice’s response was likely not what Van Susteren expected:

RICE: "But when things are unfolding very, very quickly, it’s not always easy to know what is really going on on the ground. And to my mind, the really important questions here are about how information was collected. Did the various agencies really coordinate and share intelligence in the way that we had hoped, with the reforms that were made after 9/11?

So there’s a big picture to be examined here. But we don’t have all of the pieces, and I think it’s easy to try and jump to conclusions about what might have happened here.
It’s probably better to let the relevant bodies do their work."

Watch Rice’s full interview here.

Throughout the interview, Rice highlighted the difficulty that comes in a “fog of war” situation, with multiple stories coming in which need to be processed and verified. Her statements strongly align with the evolution of the Obama administration’s understanding of what happened in Benghazi. Rice also joined current Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in dismissing the big picture importance of the emails from the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli, as a small portion of the overall communication between the mission and the State Department.

With her reasoned response, Rice stands apart from other former Bush administration officials, including former United Nations Ambassador John Bolton and former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. Both Rumsfeld and Bolton have repeatedly insisted that the Obama administration has performed a cover-up of the events in Benghazi."

October 30, 2012 5:01 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

explain the difference in media coverage between Cindy Sheehan and Charles Woods.

thoughts ?

October 30, 2012 9:34 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

There is almost no similarity between the two. Sheehan's son was killed in an unjustified war of aggression, Tyrone Woods was killed in a sudden and unexpected attack on a consulate.

October 30, 2012 10:08 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

good news: Anderson Copper came out as gay this summer and the first chance the network got, it cancelled his show

October 31, 2012 11:18 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Michelle Obama sent me a personal e-mail admitting that Barack will have to beat the odds to win the election.

I agree, odds are he won't win:

"Friend --

I know we ask you to do a lot, and I cannot tell you how grateful I am for all you've done -- but with six days to go, we all need to dig a little deeper.

Right now, all of the progress we've made together is in danger of being undone. We just found out we're being outraised in this final month by a wide margin.

We've always known this race would be close, and we've always known we'd have to work harder than the other side -- the question is, will you step up and do that right now, before it's too late?

Please chip in $5 or more today:

https://donate.barackobama.com/Six-Days

We've beaten the odds before -- by coming together and giving all we can. Let's do it again. Barack needs you.

Thanks,

Michelle

P.S. -- Any donation you make by midnight tonight will automatically enter you to bring a guest to Chicago to meet Barack and have front-row tickets to his speech on Election Night."

I'm giving a buck just to be entered in the contest for the trip to Chicago. I'd love to watch Barry's concession speech. I'll be in the front row, throwing confetti and blowing a noise maker.



October 31, 2012 12:11 PM  
Anonymous Robert said...

Are these Obama emails with links to donate spam? I get perhaps 5 a day. As a matter of course I never click on links that come to me by email.

October 31, 2012 1:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

looks like most Americans disagree with the ass who thinks rescuing the American diplomats in Benghazi would start WWIII

from the NY Times poll:

"When asked specifically about the administration’s handling of the attacks on the consulate in Libya, the poll found that only 38 percent of voters approved and 51 percent disapproved."

October 31, 2012 1:01 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Are these Obama emails with links to donate spam? I get perhaps 5 a day. As a matter of course I never click on links that come to me by email."

I think they qualify as spam

they all come from Michelle but are probably written by Barack

he has a lot of time on his hands

btw, in a salute to the gay agenda that screwed both of their careers, ex-President Barack Obama and ex-talk-show-host Anderson Cooper will dance together next season on Dancing with the Stars

October 31, 2012 1:06 PM  
Anonymous Robert said...

I would dance with either one of them.

October 31, 2012 1:34 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

gays are now jumping up on the Romneymania train:

"Log Cabin Republicans is a national gay and lesbian Republican organization, focused on issues like marriage equality and employment non-discrimination and dedicated to working with GOP officials to advance equal rights.

The group announced its endorsement of Romney on Oct. 23, stating, "We are Americans first, and as such, must stand for what we believe is right for our country."

TTFers, time to hop aboard!!

October 31, 2012 2:16 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Obama's pre-election policy for Benghazi:

don't ask, don't tell

after the election, he can be more flexible

just ask Vlad

October 31, 2012 2:22 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The Log Cabin Republicans have been important in Kevin and Don Norte's lives. They run a blog called "BlogCabin: Our Life As Gay Republicans," and their affiliation with the group is mentioned in the second line of their Wikipedia page. They figure they've been members for about a decade, with Kevin winning a "Grassroots Leadership Award" from the group in 2009. At one point, Kevin served as a California trustee, and Don was on the board of the Los Angeles chapter. A fellow member was one of the best men at their wedding.

But on Oct. 25, Kevin and Don tweeted from their joint Twitter account that they were leaving the group: "@LogCabinGOP Please accept our resignation from #LogCabin effective immediately." The reason? The group's endorsement of Mitt Romney.

"Leaving them is kind of like a divorce," Kevin said sadly in an interview with The Huffington Post that night.

LCR is a national gay and lesbian Republican organization, focused on issues like marriage equality and employment non-discrimination and dedicated to working with GOP officials to advance equal rights.

The group announced its qualified endorsement of Romney on Oct. 23, stating, "There has been discussion about whether we, as members of Log Cabin Republicans, are LGBT first or Republican first. Ultimately, we believe the answer is neither. We are Americans first, and as such, must stand for what we believe is right for our country."

In its statement, the group added that if "LGBT issues are a voter's highest or only priority, then Governor Romney may not be that voter's choice."...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/31/log-cabin-republicans-mitt-romney_n_2039834.html?utm_hp_ref=politics

October 31, 2012 3:46 PM  
Anonymous Mitt morphs again said...

WASHINGTON -- There's nothing like a natural disaster to test the depth of politicians' preference for small government.

And so it turns out that after after superstorm Sandy battered the East Coast, Mitt Romney is far more supportive of the government agency in charge of coordinating disaster relief. Only last year, as Romney hewed to the right while battling for the GOP nomination, he appeared to suggest in a debate that the Federal Emergency Management Agency should be shuttered and its responsibilities left to the states.

"Every time you have an occasion to take something from the federal government and send it back to the states, that's the right direction," Romney said at a debate last June. "And if you can go even further, and send it back to the private sector, that's even better."

Asked by moderator John King of CNN whether that would include disaster relief, Romney said: "We cannot afford to do those things without jeopardizing the future for our kids. It is simply immoral, in my view, for us to continue to rack up larger and larger debts and pass them on to our kids."

Now, a week before Election Day, after of a massive disaster, Romney's campaign is reassuring voters that his administration wouldn't leave disaster victims in the lurch. The public's attention is locked on the devastation caused by Sandy at a time when Romney and President Barack Obama are locked in a close presidential campaign. With Obama heavily involved in getting federal funds to those in trouble, the Romney campaign moved quickly to reassure the public it supports a strong program of storm relief.

"I believe that FEMA plays a key role in working with states and localities to prepare for and respond to natural disasters," Romney said in a statement supplied by his campaign Wednesday. "As president, I will ensure FEMA has the funding it needs to fulfill its mission, while directing maximum resources to the first responders who work tirelessly to help those in need, because states and localities are in the best position to get aid to the individuals and communities affected by natural disasters."

Wednesday's statement came after the candidate ducked a spate of opportunities Tuesday to personally clarify his position and the statement essentially endorsed the current disaster aid system.

But what the campaign wouldn't do is say whether a President Romney would insist that help for disaster victims be funded by cutting other programs in the federal budget, as many conservative Republicans insist.

Running mate Paul Ryan is squarely on the side of cutting other spending to pay for disasters. Earlier this year, he tried but failed to scrap a new system, established in the 2011 debt ceiling-deficit cuts deal, that boosts disaster spending and budgets help for victims of hurricanes, tornadoes and floods before they occur. House leaders rebuffed him, siding with Appropriations Committee members of both parties who like the new system.

October 31, 2012 4:46 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"If you think right now I give a damn about presidential politics then you don't know me," Christie said Tuesday.

He was responding not to the announcement of the joint tour, which had yet to become public, but to questions about all the praise he has been heaping on Obama during and after Superstorm Sandy hit New Jersey.

The unlikely partnership began just hours after the worst of the storm knocked out power for 2.4 million people in New Jersey, south and west of New York City. Christie was quick to applaud Obama and the Federal Emergency Management Agency in interviews on major television networks on Tuesday morning.

"The federal government response has been great. I was on the phone at midnight again last night with the president personally," he told NBC's "Today" program.

"The president has been outstanding in this. The folks at FEMA ... have been excellent," said Christie, once thought to be a contender for the White House this time around or possibly Romney's vice-presidential pick.

"I don't give a damn about Election Day. It doesn't matter a lick to me at the moment," Christie later told reporters in a press conference about the storm damage. "I've got bigger fish to fry."

...On "CBS This Morning," Christie said he spoke with Obama three times on Monday as the storm hit. Obama declared New Jersey a major disaster area so the state can quickly receive federal aid.

"I can't thank the president enough for that," Christie told CBS.

And what about Romney?

Asked on FOX on Tuesday whether he would tour stricken parts of his state with the Republican nominee, Christie said:

"I have no idea, nor am I the least bit concerned or interested. I've got a job to do here in New Jersey that's much bigger than presidential politics, and I could care less about any of that stuff," he said.

Romney vs. Sandy

October 31, 2012 6:05 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"In its statement, the group added that if "LGBT issues are a voter's highest or only priority, then Governor Romney may not be that voter's choice."..."

actually, if LBGT issues are your highest, and especially if they are your only, priority, you likely are a pervert

"Romney hewed to the right while battling for the GOP nomination, he appeared to suggest in a debate that the Federal Emergency Management Agency should be shuttered"

key word here is "appeared"

John King was basically debating Romney himself, which is what these pompous debate moderators think is their job

FEMA is an agency that important to maintain at the Federal level because of the effect on national security

this does not excuse Obama trying to discourage growth and running trillion dollar deficits to cause a crisis he won't waste to force the country into socialism

"Asked on FOX on Tuesday whether he would tour stricken parts of his state with the Republican nominee, Christie said"

completely inappropriate

Romney is not currently the President and going to New Jersey for a photo op would simply be wasting the time of officials there

Romney is on the right path

btw, Obama wanted to also tour lower Manhattan and Bloomberg asked him not to come because city officials have a lot to do and can't waste time strolling Obama around Battery Park

October 31, 2012 6:19 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"NEW YORK (AP) - President Barack Obama will be getting a firsthand look at the damage done by the superstorm in New Jersey but not in New York City - and Mayor Michael Bloomberg is OK with that.

Bloomberg on Tuesday said he spoke to Obama and his chief of staff, Jack Lew, and told them the city would "love to have him, but we've got lots of things to do."

Bloomberg said that he wasn't trying to "dis" the president and that his trip to New Jersey on Wednesday would represent the whole region.

He also spoke highly of the relationship between federal and local officials. He said that on a conference call with the president and other mayors and governors of affected areas, everybody kept saying, "Thank you for the service."

"You know, there was a lot of criticism with (the Federal Emergency Management Agency) back in the (Hurricane) Katrina days, and today, you hear nothing but good things about FEMA, and they certainly have been very helpful to us," Bloomberg said...'

October 31, 2012 9:15 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

in other words, having the President tour the affected areas while relief work is being done, just for photo ops and publicity, is a hindrance to the work

Bloomberg was civil about it

Romney gets it, Obama doesn't

Obama is trying to pose like he is not campaigning and he got it right this weekend

but the trip to New Jersey is campaigning of a kind

it's certainly not helping in any way

November 01, 2012 4:10 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

what do Philadelphia and Cleveland have in common?

in two swing states, where polls are close, they represent Obama's strongest areas

they are also the two places in those states most affected by the Frankenstorm

and while power may be mostly restored by Tuesday, it wouldn't be surprising if voter turnout is suppressed in those areas

many of Obama-type supporters will simply have more important things on their plate

so, it looks like Mother Nature has voted

and while New York and New Jersey probably won't switch their electoral destiny due to Sandy baby, enough voter suppression could happen there to give Romney a decisive victory in the popular vote, creating a mandate for his first term

November 01, 2012 4:28 AM  
Anonymous "We've clearly entered some parallel universe during these last few days,” said...

Now General Motors Is Ripping Mitt Romney For Lying About The Auto Industry

Apparently undeterred by the backlash over his false claim that Chrysler is shipping U.S. jobs overseas [Mitt Romney Has Been Telling A Huge Whopper About The Auto Industry, And His Campaign Is Finally Paying For It, Mitt Romney broadened his attack to include General Motors Tuesday. And General Motors was not happy about it.

The dust-up stemmed from a new radio ad that the Romney campaign quietly launched in Ohio Tuesday, claiming that, under President Barack Obama, "GM cut 15,000 jobs."

Here's the script, courtesy of the Washington Post's Greg Sargent:

Barack Obama says he saved the auto industry. But for who? Ohio, or China? Under President Obama, GM cut 15,000 American jobs. But they are planning to double the number of cars built in China — which means 15,000 more jobs for China.

And now comes word that Chrysler plans to start making Jeeps in — you guessed it — China. What happened to the promises made to autoworkers in Toledo and throughout Ohio — the same hard-working men and women who were told that Obama’s auto bailout would help them?


Like the Chrysler television ad, the radio spot is extremely misleading. General Motors' U.S. employment did drop by 14,000 from 2008 to 2011, most of the losses came at the height of the recession in 2009. And those jobs were not moved to China.

Unsurprisingly, GM's reaction was swift and harsh:

"We've clearly entered some parallel universe during these last few days,” GM spokesman Greg Martin told the Detroit Free Press. “No amount of campaign politics at its cynical worst will diminish our record of creating jobs in the U.S. and repatriating profits back to this country.” [GM calls latest Romney auto ad 'politics at its cynical worst']

Chrysler has similarly debunked Romney's claims. And both ads have been widely panned, with virtually no response from the Romney campaign.

Which leaves us to wonder what Romney is thinking. Obviously, these ads are an attempt to weaken Obama on the issue of the auto bailout, which remains popular in Ohio, a crucial swing state. But assuming Romney is able to achieve this goal — and win the election — he will enter the White House on pretty bad terms with the nation's auto industry.

November 01, 2012 8:19 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"it's certainly not helping in any way"

GOP Governor Chris Christie disagrees with you

"In TV interviews and on Twitter, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a staunch backer of Mitt Romney, was effusive in his praise on Tuesday for President Barack Obama’s handling of Hurricane Sandy.

“It’s been very good working with the president,” Christie said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.” “He and his administration have been coordinating with us. It’s been wonderful.”

On NBC’s “Today,” Christie said the president had been “outstanding” and FEMA’s response has been “excellent.”

The GOP governor also sent out a thankful tweet: “I want to thank the President personally for all his assistance as w recover from the storm.”

Christie said he spoke with Obama three times on Monday, including at midnight, when Obama agreed to speed along an major disaster declaration for New Jersey without all the “normal FEMA mumbo jumbo.” The declarations for New Jersey and New York were issued this morning.

“The president has been all over this and he deserves great credit,” Christie said. “I’ve been on the phone with him, like I said, yesterday, personally three times. He gave me his number at the White House, told me to call him if I needed anything. And he absolutely means it.”

Christie also said he wasn’t worried about the upcoming presidential election, and was confident New Jersey could get power back so voters can head to the polls a week from Tuesday.

“I spoke to the president three times yesterday,” Christie said on CNN’s “Starting Point.” “He has been incredibly supportive and helpful to our state and not once did he bring up the election. So if he’s not bringing it up, you can be sure that people in New Jersey are not worried about that primarily if one of the guys running isn’t.”

On “Fox and Friends,” Christie bristled at the mere mention of presidential politics when asked if Romney would come and tour damaged areas.

“I have no idea, nor am I the least bit concerned or interested,” Christie said. “I’ve got a job to do here in New Jersey that’s much bigger than presidential politics, and I could care less about any of that stuff. I have a job to do. I’ve got 2.4 million people out of power. I’ve got devastation on the Shore. I’ve got floods in the northern part of my state. If you think right now I give a damn about presidential politics, then you don’t know me.”"

November 01, 2012 8:28 AM  
Anonymous Facts about Ohio, early voting, and Sandy said...

COLUMBUS—A strong side-swipe from the western edges of Hurricane Sandy did not appear to have a significant impact on early voting in all-important Ohio this week.

Though much of the state did experience a nasty fall storm as a result of Sandy, including areas of snow, rain and high winds that caused some damage and power outages in the Cleveland area, party and elections officials said they did not anticipate voting to be slowed.

Only one county—Erie County on the banks of Lake Erie—reported a power outage at its early voting site Tuesday morning. An election official said the start of voting for the day was delayed from 8 to 10:20 a.m.

Voters have been mailing in absentee ballots and voting in-person since Oct. 2.

Campaign officials for Mitt Romney and President Obama have engaged in a vigorous spin war over which side has been doing better among early voters, who do not register by party making independent analysis more difficult.

Most public polling has indicated that early Ohio voters favor Obama by a wide margin and Democrats’ have been pushing the practice especially aggressively, so any weather-related slow down would likely have concerned Democrats.

Instead, several of major Ohio counties reported that they saw especially brisk business at their early voting centers on Monday, as the storm bore down. Franklin County, home to heavily-Democratic Columbus, saw its busiest day since voting began on Monday, as did the swing county of Hamilton, home to Cincinnati.

Democratic stronghold Cuyahoga County, which includes Cleveland, saw its second busiest day on Monday. On Tuesday, voting started on time in Cleveland, though voting in the morning was a bit slower than it has been on past days.

Total in-person early vote tallies for Cuyahoga are running slightly behind the counties’ total at the same time before the 2008 election.

Ohio Democratic Party Chairman Chris Redfern said he was not concerned.

“These are folks who spend three-and-a-half hours sitting the dog pound at a Cleveland Browns game in December,” he said. “A little bit of rain, a little bit of freezing rain won’t keep us from the polls.”

Still, he said he was pleased that a court decision over early voting had been settled in Democrats’ favor, requiring polls to be open this weekend.

November 01, 2012 8:37 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"GOP Governor Chris Christie disagrees with you"

if he does, you didn't cite an example of it

Christie has been pleased with the response from the White House to requests for help

not by Obama coming up there to take pictures of himself, making it look like he was doing something

and while Christie was happy with how Obama worked within the current system, that's not to say he agrees with it

just think if NJ controlled its own FEMA

then, they could cut out the middle man and not worry about getting a quick response from him

November 01, 2012 10:26 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"It comes down to numbers. And in the final days of this presidential race, from polling data to early voting, they favor Mitt Romney.

He maintains a small but persistent polling edge. As of yesterday afternoon, there had been 31 national surveys in the previous seven days. Mr. Romney led in 19, President Obama in seven, and five were tied. Mr. Romney averaged 48.4%; Mr. Obama, 47.2%. The GOP challenger was at or above 50% in 10 polls, Mr. Obama in none.

The number that may matter the most is Mr. Obama's 47.2% share. As the incumbent, he's likely to find that number going into Election Day is a percentage point or so below what he gets.

For example, in 2004 President George W. Bush had 49% in the final Gallup likely-voter track; he received 50.7% on Election Day. In 1996, President Clinton was at 48% in the last Gallup; he got 49.2% at the polls. And in 1992, President George H.W. Bush was at 37% in the closing Gallup; he collected 37.5% in the balloting."

November 01, 2012 10:27 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"One potentially dispositive question is what mix of Republicans and Democrats will show up this election. On Friday last week, Gallup hinted at the partisan makeup of the 2012 electorate with a small chart buried at the end of its daily tracking report. Based on all its October polling, Gallup suggested that this year's turnout might be 36% Republican to 35% Democratic, compared with 39% Democratic and 29% Republican in 2008, and 39% Republican and 37% Democratic in 2004. If accurate, this would be real trouble for Mr. Obama, since Mr. Romney has consistently led among independents in most October surveys.

Gallup delivered some additional bad news to Mr. Obama on early voting. Through Sunday, 15% of those surveyed said they had already cast a ballot either in person or absentee. They broke for Mr. Romney, 52% to 46%. The 63% who said they planned to vote on Election Day similarly supported Mr. Romney, 51% to 45%.

Furthermore, in battleground states, the edge in early and absentee vote turnout that propelled Democrats to victory in 2008 has clearly been eroded, cut in half according to a Republican National Committee summary.

But doesn't it all come down to the all-important Buckeye State? Here, too, the early voting news isn't encouraging for the president.

Adrian Gray, who oversaw the Bush 2004 voter-contact operation and is now a policy analyst for a New York investment firm, makes the point that as of Tuesday, 530,813 Ohio Democrats had voted early or had requested or cast an absentee ballot. That's down 181,275 from four years ago. But 448,357 Ohio Republicans had voted early or had requested or cast an absentee ballot, up 75,858 from the last presidential election.

That 257,133-vote swing almost wipes out Mr. Obama's 2008 Ohio victory margin of 262,224. Since most observers expect Republicans to win Election Day turnout, these early vote numbers point toward a Romney victory in Ohio. They are also evidence that Scott Jennings, my former White House colleague and now Romney Ohio campaign director, was accurate when he told me that the Buckeye GOP effort is larger than the massive Bush 2004 get-out-the-vote operation.

Since Mr. Romney has led among independents in nine of the 13 Ohio polls conducted since the first debate, the likelihood is that the GOP is doing as good a job in turning out their independent supporters as Democrats are in turning out theirs.

Desperate Democrats are now hanging their hopes on a new Quinnipiac University/New York Times/CBS News poll showing the president with a five-point Ohio lead. But that survey gives Democrats a +8 advantage in turnout, the same advantage Democrats had in 2008. That assumption is, to put it gently, absurd.

In addition to the data, the anecdotal and intangible evidence—from crowd sizes to each side's closing arguments—give the sense that the odds favor Mr. Romney. They do. My prediction: Sometime after the cock crows on the morning of Nov. 7, Mitt Romney will be declared America's 45th president. Let's call it 51%-48%, with Mr. Romney carrying at least 279 Electoral College votes, probably more."

November 01, 2012 10:27 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Karl Rove's Magical Mystery Tour continues!

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204846304578090820229096046.html


November 01, 2012 11:05 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

CLEVELAND -- The stakes for President Obama could not be higher in this liberal bastion, an economically hard-hit region in the nation's premier battleground where the incumbent needs a massive turnout to prevail on Nov. 6.

For Obama, this area is a firewall that could offset likely gains by Republican Mitt Romney throughout other stretches of Ohio -- but fault lines have emerged.

Early voting, touted as Obama's secret weapon in the Buckeye State, is down nearly 10 percent in Cuyahoga County, which includes Cleveland, compared to the same time in 2008. Even before Hurricane Sandy ushered in nasty rain, early turnout was lagging behind the benchmark it set four years ago, local election figures show.

Politically speaking, the failure to turn out a vote in this Democratic fortress is almost as good as casting a vote for Romney. And even while the number of Democrats voting early is down, there are indications that some of those who are voting are crossing over to Romney instead.

"I come from a Democratic family, a union family," said Dave Koler, an information technology program manager from North Royalton. "The first debate was a real swing for me. This might be the first time that I actually go Republican."

November 01, 2012 11:26 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

ADP JOBS REPORT BEATS ESTIMATES AT 158K

The number is out, and ADP has beat estimates.
158K is well ahead of estimates, and up huge from last month's 88K.

The company has just changed its methodology, and there's a lot of skepticism surrounding ADP, so it might take awhile before this number gets too much weight from the market.

But there you go.

November 01, 2012 11:57 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"The Human Rights Campaign (HRC), a gay-rights group, has asked the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to investigate an onslaught of anti-Obama text messages.

The group said the unsolicited messages, which reached an unknown number of people Tuesday night, were a "blatant" violation of anti-spamming rules, and urged the commission to impose the maximum fine on those responsible.

The texts covered a variety of topics, including gay rights, abortion and Medicare, and reached people who had never asked to receive them, including HRC supporters.

"Obama supports homosexuality and its radical social agenda. Say No to Obama on Nov 6!" one read, according to HRC.

"Stop Obama from forcing gay marriage on the states. Your vote is your voice," read another.

One claimed: "Obama denies protection to babies who survive abortions. Obama is just wrong."

The messages were sent from websites rather than phone numbers. According to records on GoDaddy.com, a Web registrar, the sites belonged to ccAdvertising, a GOP advertising firm based in Virginia.

ccAdvertising did not respond to requests to comment.

“It’s unsurprising that our opponents are employing such underhanded tactics and trying to attack equality from behind shrouds of secrecy,” HRC Vice President of Communications Fred Sainz said in a statement issued late Wednesday. "

November 01, 2012 12:37 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Mitt Romney apparently still thinks that downsizing and privatizing the functions of FEMA is a good idea. After all, everyone knows that federal bureaucracies are cesspools of incompetence.

Except....it turns out that they're only cesspools of incompetence during certain eras. See if you can spot the trend here:

George H.W. Bush: Appoints Wallace Stickney, head of New Hampshire's Department of Transportation, as head of FEMA. Stickney is a hapless choice and the agency is rapidly driven into the ditch: "Because FEMA had 10 times the proportion of political appointees of most other government agencies, the poorly chosen Bush appointees had a profound effect on the performance of the agency."

Bill Clinton: Appoints James Lee Witt, former head of the Arkansas Office of Emergency Services, as head of FEMA. The agency is reborn as a professional operation: "As amazing as it sounds, Witt was the first FEMA head who came to the position with direct experience in emergency management....On Witt's recommendation, Clinton filled most of the FEMA jobs reserved for political appointees with persons who had previous experience in natural disasters and intergovernmental relations."

George W. Bush: Appoints Joe Allbaugh, his 2000 campaign manager, as head of FEMA. Allbaugh explains that his role is to downsize FEMA and privatize its functions: "Expectations of when the federal government should be involved and the degree of involvement may have ballooned beyond what is an appropriate level. We must restore the predominant role of State and local response to most disasters." Once again, the agency goes downhill: "[Allbaugh] showed little interest in its work or in the missions pursued by the departed Witt....Those of us in the business of dealing with emergencies find ourselves with no national leadership and no mentors. We are being forced to fend for ourselves."

Allbaugh quits after only two years and George W. Bush downgrades FEMA from a cabinet-level agency and appoints Allbaugh's deputy, Michael Brown, former Commissioner of Judges and Stewards for the International Arabian Horse Association, as FEMA's head. A former employer, Stephen Jones, is gobsmacked when he hears about it: "Brown was pleasant enough, if a bit opportunistic, Jones said, but he did not put enough time and energy into his job. 'He would have been better suited to be a small city or county lawyer,' he said."

Barack Obama: Appoints Craig Fugate, Florida's state emergency management director, as head of FEMA. Fugate immediately revives FEMA, receiving widespread praise for the agency's handling of the devastating tornadoes that ripped across seven Southern states last year: "Under Fugate's leadership, an unimaginable natural disaster literally has paved the way for a textbook lesson in FEMA crisis management....Once the laughingstock of the federal bureaucracy after the bumbling, dithering tenure of director Michael Brown, FEMA under Fugate prepares for the worst and hopes for the best rather than the other way around."

The lesson here is simple. At a deep ideological level, Republicans believe that federal bureaucracies are inherently inept, so when Republicans occupy the White House they have no interest in making the federal bureaucracy work. And it doesn't. Democrats, by contrast, take government services seriously and appoint people whose job is to make sure the federal bureaucracy does work. And it does.

November 01, 2012 2:50 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hey, remember how the Obama campaign’s fantastic get-out-the-vote operation was going to create this impregnable firewall of key swing states, and run up such an enormous advantage in the early vote that Romney would never be able to make up the difference?

First interesting indicator of the morning from early voting: I mentioned Tuesday that early voting in Cuyahoga County, Ohio – the Democrat vote stronghold that includes Cleveland – slipped behind the pace of 2008 after running ahead for the first twenty-eight days of early voting or so. (We don’t know how these early voters are voting, but Obama won this county 69 percent to 30 percent last time around, so we can presume he’s leading this cycle on a somewhat comparable rate.) Well, the early vote collapsed Tuesday and Wednesday. Of course, a big chunk of that dropoff is from the remains of Hurricane Sandy dumping snow and wind and miserable weather on the Cleveland area. But if we see early voting continue to be slow in these final days, it will be a bit of evidence that the Democrats get-out-the-early vote effort in Ohio isn’t really expanding their total share of the vote; they’re just getting their traditional Election-Day-voters to vote earlier.

November 01, 2012 4:35 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

A Vote for a President to Lead on Climate Change
By Michael R. Bloomberg Nov 1, 2012 2:55 PM ET


..."the president has achieved some important victories on issues that will help define our future. His Race to the Top education program -- much of which was opposed by the teachers’ unions, a traditional Democratic Party constituency -- has helped drive badly needed reform across the country, giving local districts leverage to strengthen accountability in the classroom and expand charter schools. His health-care law -- for all its flaws -- will provide insurance coverage to people who need it most and save lives.

When I step into the voting booth, I think about the world I want to leave my two daughters, and the values that are required to guide us there. The two parties’ nominees for president offer different visions of where they want to lead America.

One believes a woman’s right to choose should be protected for future generations; one does not. That difference, given the likelihood of Supreme Court vacancies, weighs heavily on my decision.

One recognizes marriage equality as consistent with America’s march of freedom; one does not. I want our president to be on the right side of history.

One sees climate change as an urgent problem that threatens our planet; one does not. I want our president to place scientific evidence and risk management above electoral politics.

Of course, neither candidate has specified what hard decisions he will make to get our economy back on track while also balancing the budget. But in the end, what matters most isn’t the shape of any particular proposal; it’s the work that must be done to bring members of Congress together to achieve bipartisan solutions.

Presidents Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan both found success while their parties were out of power in Congress -- and President Obama can, too. If he listens to people on both sides of the aisle, and builds the trust of moderates, he can fulfill the hope he inspired four years ago and lead our country toward a better future for my children and yours. And that’s why I will be voting for him."

November 01, 2012 9:28 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"One believes a woman’s right to choose should be protected for future generations; one does not. That difference, given the likelihood of Supreme Court vacancies, weighs heavily on my decision."

thanks for reminding us

protecting innocent life is another good reason to vote Romney

"One recognizes marriage equality as consistent with America’s march of freedom; one does not. I want our president to be on the right side of history."

thanks for reminding us

affirming the true meaning of marriage is another good reason to vote Romney

"One sees climate change as an urgent problem that threatens our planet; one does not. I want our president to place scientific evidence and risk management above electoral politics."

don't really remember the last time Obama had the nerve to bring this up

you sure this is an endorsement of him?

"Of course, neither candidate has specified what hard decisions he will make to get our economy back on track while also balancing the budget."

actually, Romney has courageously come out in favor of putting all tax deductions on the table to lower tax rates and boost the economy

Obama says "these trillion dollar deficits will pick things up eventually. forward...march!"

"But in the end, what matters most isn’t the shape of any particular proposal; it’s the work that must be done to bring members of Congress together to achieve bipartisan solutions."

thanks for reminding us

another good reason for voting Romney

Obama has definitely failed here and Romney worked successfully with a Democratic legislature in Massachusetts

which is why, in an AP poll released today, Americans say 47 to 36 that Romney will do this better

"Presidents Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan both found success while their parties were out of power in Congress -- and President Obama can, too."

he has shown an inability to do this

"If he listens to people on both sides of the aisle, and builds the trust of moderates, he can fulfill the hope he inspired four years ago and lead our country toward a better future for my children and yours."

he has never said he will change anything he's done for the last four years

"And that’s why I will be voting for him."

you obviously didn't think this through

November 01, 2012 10:32 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

DailyNebraskan.com reports

Chuck Hagel endorses Bob Kerrey for open Senate seat

With less than a week to go until Election Day, Republican and former Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel gave his support Thursday afternoon to Democrat Bob Kerrey’s campaign for Nebraska’s open U.S. Senate seat, an unexpected splash in a tight Senate race against Republican Deb Fischer.

Both Hagel and Kerrey, whose past terms in the U.S. Senate overlapped, are known for breaking with their party lines – Hagel over the Iraq War, Kerrey over immigration and other issues. With today’s highly divisive politics, Hagel said, that willingness to meet opponents in the middle is exactly what Nebraskans need in Washington.

“Bob was a Democrat and I was a Republican, but it didn’t matter,” Hagel told the assembled group, echoing Kerrey’s frequent references to bipartisanship throughout his campaign. “We were serving the interests of the same people in the same state in the same country.”

Kerrey and Hagel announced the endorsement together in Lincoln, where they met with about 60 supporters and reporters in the Nebraska State Capitol Rotunda. Hagel, who retired from the Senate in 2008 and moved away from Nebraska, said the rotunda has particular significance to him: There, he announced his Senate candidacy in 1995. He said the Capitol, home to a nonpartisan, one-chamber legislature, symbolizes the need for political moderation and unity.

Hagel and Kerrey both served in the Vietnam War, after which Kerrey was awarded a Medal of Honor. Hagel said military experience is more important than ever when neither President Barack Obama nor Mitt Romney, candidates for the presidency, are veterans....

November 02, 2012 8:10 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Republican Women for Obama

Republican women share their history with the Republican Party and how the party's views are no longer aligned with their own.

November 02, 2012 8:12 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

“Pro-life” can mean only one thing: “respect for the sanctity of life.” And there is no way that respect for the sanctity of life can mean we are obligated to protect every fertilized egg in a woman’s body, no matter how that egg got fertilized, but we are not obligated to protect every living person from being shot with a concealed automatic weapon. I have no respect for someone who relies on voodoo science to declare that a woman’s body can distinguish a “legitimate” rape, but then declares — when 99 percent of all climate scientists conclude that climate change poses a danger to the sanctity of all life on the planet — that global warming is just a hoax.

The term “pro-life” should be a shorthand for respect for the sanctity of life. But I will not let that label apply to people for whom sanctity for life begins at conception and ends at birth. What about the rest of life? Respect for the sanctity of life, if you believe that it begins at conception, cannot end at birth. That radical narrowing of our concern for the sanctity of life is leading to terrible distortions in our society.

Respect for life has to include respect for how that life is lived, enhanced and protected — not only at the moment of conception but afterward, in the course of that life.

November 02, 2012 8:19 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

It seems appropriate that the anti-abortionists should lobby for changing "Happy Birthday" to "Happy Conception Day" That way we will be able to pry into everyone's bedroom to determine whether their sexual activities are "legal". Just what the looney Republicans want!!

November 02, 2012 10:55 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"“Bob was a Democrat and I was a Republican, but it didn’t matter,” Hagel told the assembled group, echoing Kerrey’s frequent references to bipartisanship throughout his campaign."

this is one reason that Romney will win next week

according to the AP poll released yesterday,the American people perceive that Romney has this commitment and Obama doesn't

"Republican Women for Obama"

if you believe the current polls, this is not a large group

in my neighborhood, there's a sign: Democrats for Romney

so what?

"“Pro-life” can mean only one thing: “respect for the sanctity of life.”"

that's right

"And there is no way that respect for the sanctity of life can mean we are obligated to protect every fertilized egg in a woman’s body, no matter how that egg got fertilized,"

this is hateful bigotry, excluding the right to life based on what a child's father has done

"but we are not obligated to protect every living person from being shot with a concealed automatic weapon."

there are laws against shooting people

no one is claiming there is a constitutional right to shoot living persons

"I have no respect for someone who relies on voodoo science to declare that a woman’s body can distinguish a “legitimate” rape,"

an unfortunate remark but it is sad how hard Democrats have tried to keep it alive even after the speaker recanted

"but then declares — when 99 percent of all climate scientists conclude that climate change poses a danger to the sanctity of all life on the planet — that global warming is just a hoax."

there are few that claim that global warming is a hoax

there are some that say that:

1. it has been exaggerated

2. it is wrong to say life can't adjust

3. mankind should be careful about trying to tinker with weather in an attempt to overcome this

4. there is no proof that it is caused by human activity

5. not all the effects of global warming are negative

6. most predictions of global warming alarmists, such as an increase in hurricane activity, have not been realized, rasing doubts about predictions

7. most solutions proposed by tree-huggers are more expensive than it would be to cope with climate change

8. scientists in the field have fallen into the trap of being propagandistic advocates rather than empiricists

"The term “pro-life” should be a shorthand for respect for the sanctity of life."

that's right

"But I will not let that label apply to people for whom sanctity for life begins at conception and ends at birth."

you're arguing with a straw man

no one thinks that

"What about the rest of life?"

it should be protected

"Respect for the sanctity of life, if you believe that it begins at conception, cannot end at birth. That radical narrowing of our concern for the sanctity of life is leading to terrible distortions in our society."

I don't know about that but as a high-falutin' excuse to sanction the murder of the unborn, it is an evil line of thought

nothing else excuses any single murder

"Respect for life has to include respect for how that life is lived, enhanced and protected — not only at the moment of conception but afterward, in the course of that life."

enhanced?

sounds like you're building a fallacious case that enough comfort and pleasure for one individual overrides the right to life of another, based on who has more power

again, an evil thought but if you want to develop it, try the writings of Nietsche and Hitler

November 02, 2012 11:57 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Poll: Most Republicans believe in demonic possession
Meanwhile, less than half think humans are responsible for climate change

November 02, 2012 9:23 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Harry Reid Slams Mitt Romney Bipartisanship Pledge As 'Laughable'

Mitt Romney may be promising bipartisanship in his closing argument in the 2012 contest, but one of the Republican presidential nominee's harshest critics on the other side is calling that pledge "laughable."

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) -- who looks likely to keep his leadership job and would be the top Democrat for a President Romney to deal with -- said in a statement Friday that he and the Democratic caucus have already shot down most of the things over which Romney says he could find cross-aisle agreement.

"Mitt Romney’s fantasy that Senate Democrats will work with him to pass his 'severely conservative' agenda is laughable," said Reid, paraphrasing Romney's assertion during the earlier part of the campaign that he was a severe conservative.

"In the past few months, we have voted down many of the major policies that Mitt Romney has run on, from the Ryan plan to end Medicare as we know it, to the Blunt Amendment to deny women access to contraception, to more tax giveaways for millionaires and billionaires, to a draconian spending plan that would gut critical services for seniors and the most vulnerable Americans," Reid said.

"Mitt Romney has demonstrated that he lacks the courage to stand up to the Tea Party, kowtowing to their demands time and again. There is nothing in Mitt Romney’s record to suggest he would act any differently as president," Reid said. "As governor of Massachusetts, he had a terrible relationship with Democrats, cordoning himself off behind a velvet rope instead of reaching out to build relationships."

Reid has been a painful thorn in Romney's side during the campaign, often bringing up the former Massachusetts governor's taxes and driving weeks of discussion over whether or not Romney even paid taxes.

The Romney campaign did not immediately respond to Reid's comments.

UPDATE: 3:30 p.m. -- Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus released a statement later Friday firing back at Reid, suggesting that the majority leader -- by his statements -- was actually recognizing that Romney would win.

"I am encouraged that Harry Reid recognizes Governor Romney's momentum and is joining the hundreds of millions of Americans who are preparing for a Romney Administration," Priebus said. "While Sen. Reid might want to continue Washington politics as usual, I'm confident that there are many Democrats who value balancing the budget, reducing burdensome regulations, investing in U.S. energy resources and will be willing to work with Gov. Romney to help grow our stagnant economy."


Uh, Reince, what part of what Harry called "Mitt Romney’s fantasy" do you imagine means Harry is "recognizing" Mitt for anything other than his non-reality-based view that Democratic Congressional members will suddenly vote to support vouchers for medicare, the Blunt Amendment, additional tax cuts for the rich, and additional service cuts for seniors if Mitt asks them to?

November 03, 2012 6:31 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Polls tilt for Obama in battleground Ohio

"Polls show President Obama will enter the final weekend before Election Day with a small lead in Ohio, the lynchpin state in both campaign’s pursuit of 270 electoral votes.

A CNN-ORC poll released late Friday showed Obama hitting the 50 percent mark, leading Romney, who took 47 percent support. The party identification for the survey of likely voters was 38 percent independent, 32 percent Democratic and 30 percent Republican.

A Reuters-Ipsos poll released earlier in the day found the president with a small lead, 47 percent to 45. And a Rasmussen survey of the state showed Obama pulling into a tie with Romney at 49 percent, after having trailed 50 percent to 48 in the same poll earlier this week.

Obama now leads by nearly 3 percentage points in Ohio, according to the RealClearPolitics average of polls.

With Rasmussen now showing Romney’s lead erased, no recent poll shows Romney ahead in the Buckeye State.


All of Mitt's lies about Jeep production jobs being moved away are not winning him any votes. No GOPer has won the race for President without taking Ohio.

November 03, 2012 7:26 AM  
Anonymous Bushmeister has been found, but shhhhh said...

Don't tell anyone! The former president just gave a speech at Romney's favorite parking place for offshore cash

November 03, 2012 7:28 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

the biggest rally of the campaign was for Romney

yesterday, 30,000 showed up for his rally in Ohio

evangelical voters in Ohio are ignored by mainstream pollsters and, since debates, have settled on Romney after early doubts due to the Mormon issue

they are the stealth factor that will sink Obama

final electoral college tally will be 315-223

Obama takes HI, West Coast, NM, MN

that's all west of the Mississippi

here in the East, he takes IL, MI, MD, DE, NJ, NY, New England except NH

popular vote: Romney 52, Obama 48

you heard at TTF first, people

November 03, 2012 11:57 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Washington Post: "As always, the polls could be wrong, and Romney could still win. But the polls would have to be overwhelmingly, systematically, catastrophically wrong in multiple states for that to happen."

November 03, 2012 12:38 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

both Gallup and Pew have recently looked at the breakdown of likely voters and found there is a one point advantage for Republicans

most polls have assumed a signigficant advantage to the Dems

yesterday, for example, the Post have a poll with Romney leading by one nationally but assumes Dems voting will be four points above GOPers

factoring to correct for what Gallup and Pew discovered would indicate Romney is ahead by several points nationally and slightly ahead in all swing states except Nevada and also ahead in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin

you can conform all this by observing the behavior of the campaigns

Obama knows he's toast

he'll be working on his concession speech this weekend

November 03, 2012 4:15 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Anon, why is this so important to you? Do you think that reinterpreting the polls will somehow make a Romney victory more likely?

November 03, 2012 4:28 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

important to me?

you guys are making assertions that Obama has Ohio all sewn up

don't think that's correct

also, think the polls are based on the false assumption that Dems will show up at the polls in droves similar to 2008

that, I'm positive, won't happenq

November 03, 2012 10:33 PM  
Anonymous Robert said...

Peter Sprigg published a piece in the "Local Opinions" section of the Post editorial page today, essentially asserting the notion that the purpose of marriage is to support the raising of children reproduced in that marriage, and that LGBT couples are the equivalent of close relatives or friends living together: Peter Sprigg's Local Opinions piec in Post today

November 04, 2012 7:31 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"you guys are making assertions that Obama has Ohio all sewn up

don't think that's correct"


RCP reports twelve different OH polls average to a 2.8% Obama lead. In 11 of those 12 polls, Obama leads, and in the 12 poll, the usual outier Rasmussen, they are tied.


Columbus Dispatch* - Obama +2
Rasmussen Reports - Tie
NBC/WSJ/Marist - Obama +6
CNN/Opinion Research - Obama +3
WeAskAmerica - Obama +4
Ohio Poll/Univ of Cin. - Obama +2
SurveyUSA - Obama +3
Gravis Marketing - Obama +1
PPP (D) - Obama +4
CBS/NYT/Quinnipiac - Obama +5
Purple Strategies - Obama +2
ARG - Obama +2

November 04, 2012 11:35 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

well, Obama doesn't feel as comfortable as TTFers apparently do

Friday, when Romney drew 30,000 at a rally in Ohio, Obama had one that drew 3,100

the polls are skewed

any lead of two or less for Obama is a Romney lead

further, any poll where Obama has less than 50% is likley a Romney victory

meanwhile, new polls out today show Pennsylvania is tied and Romney has a slight lead in Michigan, of all places

either would substitute for Ohio

finally, in 17 of the last 18 elections, when the Redskins lose, the incumbent party loses

the Redskins are down 14-3 at halftime

November 04, 2012 2:43 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Again, Anon, why does this matter to you? If you didn't vote early, then go to the polls Tuesday and cast your vote like everybody else if you care. Nobody is going to get up election day morning and open the paper to see who the polls say they should vote for. Only one thing matters, and that is the majority of the electoral college after Nov 6th.

I am pretty sure you are not going to demoralize any Democrats or convince any undecided voters to vote Republican by saying these stupid things in the TTF blog comments. People have been citing the numbers and quoting journalists, it is interesting watching public opinion swing back and forth (but mostly FORWARD) by fractions of a percent but it is not really a campaign issue and at the end of the day we will see if a new guy gets elected or if we stay with President Huckabee. Oh, wait a minute ...

November 04, 2012 4:45 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

actually, the psychology is that people want to side with the winners

not everybody lets that inclination change their votes but enough do that it could affect a close election

right now, the race is virtually tied and yet Obama's teams preens as if they have it all sewed up

it's been their strategy all along because they have no message other than that they've done everything right and we have to get rich people

as polls in non-swing states, with Romney leading in Michigan and tied in Pennsylvania show, Obama disaster glow is fading along with stories of hardship is NJ that the federal government is not ameliorating

Obama is in for a long night Tuesday

Ohio may not be called for weeks

"Again, Anon, why does this matter to you?"

I'd ask you the same

November 04, 2012 5:02 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Anon is skewed and has been reduced to counting on superstitions about Redskins scores in hopes they might ensure his candidates win.

No GOP candidate has ever won the White House without winning Ohio and Romney won't because 1 in 8 jobs in Ohio is related to the auto industry and Romney's lying ad about Jeep is backfiring on him.

Romney and his campaign continue to dodge questions about their lies.

"A top staffer for Mitt Romney’s campaign avoided commenting Sunday on a controversial ad campaign that suggests Chrysler is moving U.S. jobs to China.

Asked by Fox News’ Chris Wallace if the misleading ad was a “mistake,” Romney political director Rich Beeson quickly changed the subject."

November 04, 2012 5:09 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Anon, it doesn't matter to me at all. I voted already, and I don't know who was ahead in the polls when I did it. I will probably watch the news Tuesday night to see if they call a winner before it gets too late, but I am comfortable letting the American people vote and decide. Pretending that one guy or the other has some advantage so that people will vote for them assumes that people are too stupid to think for themselves.

November 04, 2012 5:14 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Romney leading in Michigan and tied in Pennsylvania"

Today's RCP average in Michigan has Obama up by 3.8 and in Pennsylvania has Obama up by 3.9%.

Anon and Romney, two lying peas in a pod.

November 04, 2012 5:18 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Anon is skewed and has been reduced to counting on superstitions about Redskins scores in hopes they might ensure his candidates win."

actually, it was just a humorous aside, as you well know

"No GOP candidate has ever won the White House without winning Ohio"

has about as much validity as the Redskin factor

if he wins Pennsylvania and/or Michigan, and right now he has as much chance as Obama in both, he can easily win without Ohio

as a matter of fact, with those two very much in play, scenarios of a tie in the electoral college have gotten a boost

in that case, we'd have Romney for Prez and Biden for VP

it would be amazingly amusing

"and Romney won't because 1 in 8 jobs in Ohio is related to the auto industry"

so what? Obama has ruined GM's chance of long-term success by saving the ridiculous benefits that unions negotiated

eventually, GM will either become a ward of the state or be properly re-organized through a court-supervised bankruptcy

"and Romney's lying ad about Jeep is backfiring on him."

I'd agree but this pales comparison to the lies in the typical Obama commercial

"Anon, it doesn't matter to me at all. I voted already, and I don't know who was ahead in the polls when I did it. I will probably watch the news Tuesday night to see if they call a winner before it gets too late, but I am comfortable letting the American people vote and decide."

actually, I find all the political stuff entertaining

and, in this election, the result will be consequential

"Pretending that one guy or the other has some advantage so that people will vote for them assumes that people are too stupid to think for themselves."

we actually have all kinds of people in America

and just looking here at the average TTFer, its obvious some people are too stupid to think for themselves

"Today's RCP average in Michigan has Obama up by 3.8 and in Pennsylvania has Obama up by 3.9%.

Anon and Romney, two lying peas in a pod."

actually, you stupid jackass, I was referring to two new polls out today

the RCP averages have dated information in a highly fluid situation

November 04, 2012 6:13 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"has about as much validity as the Redskin factor"

You think so? So tell us, how many electoral college votes would a Redskin victory before the election bring to a candidate?

Once again, a GOPer proves himself unable to get the math to add up.

November 05, 2012 7:51 AM  
Anonymous GOP State BOE early voter death panels said...

Elderly Woman Gets Sick In Long Voting Line, Rushed To Hospital

Ariel Kowalick, a North Carolina resident, wrote to The Huffington Post with a story about her 84-year-old grandmother's experience early voting in Boca Raton, Fla., as an example of the toll the long lines are taking on senior citizens, who make up a significant portion of Florida's population.

According to Kowalick, her grandmother was waiting in line for an hour and a half on Friday when she became sick and had to be rushed to the emergency room. Kowalick believes that the heat, combined with the fact that her grandmother was battling a cold, contributed to her condition.

"These long lines are dangerous for our elderly [and] there should be something else done," wrote Kowalick, noting her grandmother had actually served for 15 years as a poll worker.

She is now trying to figure out how to figure out a way for her grandmother, who is still in the hospital, to vote in the election.

November 05, 2012 8:05 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Local Ohio Newspaper Endorses Obama In 2012 After Endorsing McCain In 2008

The Chillicothe Gazette, Ohio’s oldest newspaper, endorsed President Barack Obama on Sunday, though the paper had supported Sen. John McCain in the 2008 presidential election.

In an editorial titled “Obama’s skills needed for second term,” the paper said that the president “has proved his ability to lead in tough times” and expressed its “misgivings” with Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney -- focusing in particular on his “evolving positions” on issues such as health care and abortion.

“He’s vacillated from a more liberal Republican as a senatorial candidate in 1994 to an even-handed governor to a much stronger conservative position in this campaign,” the editorial stated of Romney. “Many of Romney’s proposals also foster more questions than they do answers. For example, how does he purport to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act without a true replacement? His plan to 'create 12 million new jobs' leaves out many specifics, and his bluster on foreign policy issues could pull us into further conflicts that would deplete our military resources.”

The editorial asked the president to work across the aisle and focus on reducing the debt if granted a second term, but overall it praised Obama for his foreign policy record, the passage of banking and housing reforms, and “a bailout of the auto industry that helped Ohio immensely.

The auto bailout, of course, has largely been seen as a winning issue for Obama in Ohio, the must-win battleground state this election. Polling in the Buckeye State currently shows the president with a slight but critical advantage over Romney.”

November 05, 2012 8:14 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

last week, everyone was high-fiving Obama for the great job with the hurricane

now, citizens in NJ and parts of NYC on the bay are growing desperate at the inadequate and incompetent FEMA work

NJ might even flip to Romney

if they could get to the polls

or, if the polls worked

November 05, 2012 1:21 PM  
Anonymous sarah gets involved said...

the endorsements for Romney keep piling up

Clint Eastwood, Billy Graham, Kid Rock, Meat Loaf, John McCain...

and now this:

"Sarah Palin offered GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney her endorsement on her Facebook page late Sunday night.

The former Republican vice presidential nominee penned a lengthy statement about the bearing of this year’s election on the future of the country:

'Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan have offered a credible alternative to Barack Obama’s failed policies. Governor Romney understands how the free market works. His pro-growth economic policies will benefit all Americans. He has promised to move us toward energy independence, deficit reduction, and responsible entitlement reform that honors our commitment to our seniors and keeps faith with future generations. Governor Romney deserves a chance to lead. President Obama had his chance. He’s failed, and we can’t afford to go backwards.'

Palin concluded by urging voters to cast their ballots for Romney on Tuesday.

'On Tuesday, please vote for Governor Mitt Romney and the commonsense conservatives running for office in your states,' Palin wrote."

November 05, 2012 1:59 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Wow Anon, this is shocking news. Clint Eastwood, Billy Graham, Kid Rock, Meat Loaf, John McCain, and now you say even Sarah Palin have all endorsed Mitt Romney! What can I say? Wow. Just wow. What a line-up of fence-sitters and progressive intellectuals! All switching sides and admitting they will support Romney for president. Veeerrrryyy impressive.

November 05, 2012 2:12 PM  
Anonymous And don't forget Ted said...

Sensitive and thoughtful musicians Gene Simmons, Alice Cooper, Rush, Sammy Hagar, Joe Perry of Aerosmith, the surviving members of Lynyrd Skynyrd, and don't forget Ted Nugent have all switched sides to support the rockin' Mormon.

November 05, 2012 2:19 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

sounds like Romneyiacs will be rockin' on inauguration day

guess what is not going to be elected?

that's right

gay marriage:

"Supporters of Maryland’s same-sex marriage law had hoped to parlay the backing of Mr. Obama, who is expected to win the state, into a victory.

The Obama campaign announced the president’s support for Maryland’s law in October as Marylanders for Marriage Equality began broadcasting a radio advertisement featuring Mr. Obama’s endorsement of same-sex marriage.

“I think President Obama’s endorsement has been a significant factor in more conversations being had in all communities, including the African-American community,” said Kevin Nix, communications director of Marylanders for Marriage Equality, adding, “The needle has moved.”

But even with the president’s support, whether the law will survive Election Day is unclear. Recent polls show a close race, and some experts caution that they may be misleading anyway as voters may be hesitant to voice their opposition to the "rights" of others, with the vote against legalization often undercounted in polls.

A recent poll by The Baltimore Sun showed likely voters were likely to vote down the gay marriage bill.

The Baltimore Sun poll did not use the ballot’s wording. Explaining that opponents had petitioned to get the law on the ballot after it was approved by the legislature and Gov. Martin O’Malley, the Baltimore Sun’s poll asked simply, “In November, will you vote to make same-sex marriage legal or illegal in Maryland?” In response, 46 percent said legal while 47 percent said illegal.

In Maryland, which has one of the largest black populations in the country, black voters may make the difference. The Maryland Marriage Alliance, the campaign opposing the state’s same-sex marriage law, recently aired a radio commercial featuring Alveda King, niece of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and a minister, rejecting comparisons between the civil rights movement and efforts to legalize marriage for gay and lesbian couples and arguing Maryland already has protections for them

“It is possible to be tolerant of gay and lesbian rights without redefining marriage, God’s holy union,” she said in the commercial."

so, when Obama has a one-point lead in Ohio, TTFers feel sure he will win

what about the one-point lead marriage has against the gay agenda?

November 05, 2012 2:38 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Last week, Bob Fitrakis and Gerry Bello at FreePress.org reported an important story concerning what they described as “uncertified ‘experimental’ software patches” being installed at the last minute on electronic vote tabulation systems in 39 Ohio counties.

The story included a copy of the contract [PDF] between Republican Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted’s office and ES&S, the nation’s largest e-voting system manufacturer, for a new, last-minute piece of software created to the custom specifications of the secretary of state. The contract itself describes the software as “High-level enhancements to ES&S’ election reporting software that extend beyond the current features and functionality of the software to facilitate a custom-developed State Election Results Reporting File.”

A subsequent story at the Free Press the following day included text said to be from a Nov. 1 memo sent from the Ohio secretary of state’s Election Counsel Brandi Laser Seske to a number of state election officials confirming the use of the new, uncertified software on Ohio’s tabulator systems. The memo claims that “its function is to aid in the reporting of results” by converting them “into a format that can be read by the Secretary of State’s election night reporting system.”

On Friday evening, at Huffington Post, journalist Art Levine followed up with a piece that, among other things, advanced the story by breaking the news that Fitrakis and his attorney Cliff Arnebeck were filing a lawsuit for an immediate injunction against Husted and ES&S to “halt the use of secretly installed, unauthorized ‘experimental’ software in 39 counties’ tabulators.” Levine also reported that Arnebeck had referred the matter to the Cincinnati FBI for criminal investigation of what the Ohio attorney describes as “a flagrant violation of the law.”

“Before you add new software, you need approval of a state board,” says Arnebeck. “They are installing an uncertified, suspect software patch that interfaces between the county’s vote tabulation equipment and state tabulators.” Arnebeck’s alarm is understandable.

November 05, 2012 4:42 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

November 05, 2012

Latest Swing State Polls


"Here are the latest polls from the battleground states:

Colorado: Obama 52%, Romney 46% (Public Policy Polling)

Florida: Romney 52%, Obama 47% (InsiderAdvantage)

Florida: Obama 50%, Romney 49% (Public Policy Polling)

Florida: Romney 50%, Obama 48% (Pulse Opinion Research)

Florida: Obama 50%, Romney 45% (Zogby)

Florida: Obama 49%, Romney 45% (UNF)

Iowa: Romney 49%, Obama 48% (American Research Group)

New Hampshire: Obama 51%, Romney 48% (WMUR)

New Hampshire: Obama 49%, Romney 49% (American Research Group)

New Hampshire: Obama 50%, Romney 46% (New England College)

North Carolina: Obama 49%, Romney 49% (Public Policy Polling)

Ohio: Obama 48%, Romney 46% (Pulse Opinion Research)

Ohio: Obama 50%, Romney 44% (Zogby)

Ohio: Obama 50%, Romney 49% (University of Cincinnati)

Ohio: Obama 49%, Romney 49% (Rasmussen)

Ohio: Obama 49%, Romney 44% (SurveyUSA)

Pennsylvania: Obama 49%, Romney 46% (Pulse Opinion Research)

Pennsylvania: Obama 51%, Romney 47% (Angus Reid)

Virginia: Obama 48%, Romney 47% (NBC/WSJ/Marist)

Virginia: Obama 49%, Romney 48% (Pulse Opinion Research)

Virginia: Romney 50%, Obama 48% (Rasmussen)

Virginia: Obama 52%, Romney 44% (Zogby)

Wisconsin: Obama 49%, Romney 48% (Pulse Opinion Research)"

November 05, 2012 5:28 PM  

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