Late Night Karaoke

post from Docudharma - Front Page on 23 February 2012 03:00:00 AM. © Docudharma - Front Page

[...]

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The last debate

post from Where's the Outrage? on 23 February 2012 02:47:26 AM. © Where's the Outrage?

So, after 992 debates, what have we learned? Rick Perry isn’t a debater and probably[...]

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French, British journalists killed during Syrian
bombing of Homs

post from US Politics | AMERICAblog News on 23 February 2012 02:00:38 AM. © US Politics | AMERICAblog News

Another day, another bloodbath in Syria.

The veteran Sunday Times correspondent Marie Colvin and the French photographer Remi Ochlik have been killed in the Syrian city of Homs when an artillery shell hit the house in which they were staying. Two other foreign reporters as well as seven activists from the ravaged Bab al-Amr neighbourhood were also wounded on Wednesday in the deadliest attack on western media since the Syrian uprising began almost one year ago. At least three Syrian activists were also killed, all of whom had played prominent roles in chronicling the regime's assault Homs over the past four months. One of those killed was the video blogger, Rami al-Sayed, also known as Syria Pioneer, who had uploaded to the internet at least 200 videos of death and destruction in his neighbourhood.

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Khameini's position on nukes

post from Docudharma - Front Page on 23 February 2012 01:17:14 AM. © Docudharma - Front Page

When you lay seige to a nation, making wild accusations about their intent to build and use nuclear weapons (all without providing the slightest evidence, even admitting that none of it is true!), you should listen to what the victim has to say on the[...]

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Wrong

post from jobsanger on 23 February 2012 01:07:00 AM. © jobsanger

The Supreme Court has made some very good decisions that made this country more equal (such as Brown vs. Board of Education and Roe vs. Wade). But the decision in Citizens United vs. FEC was an unmitigated disaster that can only harm our fragile democracy (and hasten it becoming a plutocracy). Corporations are not people, and money is not speech. The Citizens United decision must be overturned, even if a constitutional amendment is required to do it. The pictures above were found at the blog of Yellowdog Granny.

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The Rich Love "Wall Street Willie"

post from jobsanger on 23 February 2012 01:06:00 AM. © jobsanger

If you read this blog much, you'll know that I've started calling Willard Mitt Romney by a nickname -- Wall Street Willie. That's because with his massive income (more than $21 million a year) and tiny tax rate (13.9%), all of which he does without working a single minute during the year, he is the poster boy for Wall Street greed. And the charts above (from the website Talking Points Memo) show that the Wall Street bankers and corporate moguls love him and consider him one of their own.

But the ordinary citizens, those who make small donations to their favorite candidate, don't show him much love -- not even the small donors from his own party (the teabaggers and evangelicals). As the top chart shows, Wall Street Willie has received about 62.8 million from campaign donors, but only 10.19% of that money has come from small donors (people who donate less than $200). And as the bottom chart shows, nearly 70% of his donors have contributed the maximum legal amount of $2500 to his campaign.

The percentage of donors giving the maximum amount to Romney's campaign far exceeds the percentage giving the same to other campaigns -- whether it's his Republican opponents (ranging from 10% to slightly more than 30%) or President Obama (around 18%). And this is just donations directly to the Romney campaign. It doesn't count the many millions the Wall Street bankers and corporate moguls have poured into the Romney super-PAC (where there is no limit on giving).

But while the charts show the rich love Wall Street Willie, they also show something else. The small donors (aka the average voter) clearly favors the re-election of the president. The president has raised even more money than Romney (about $106.3 million) and most of it was raised from from people who gave less than $200 (59.92%). And 82% of the donations to President Obama came from those who could not afford to make the $2500 maximum legal donation.

Talking Points Memo says these two charts should make Romney gulp. I would go even farther. They should scare the hell out of him. The best indicator of how well a candidate is doing with the mass of voters is how many donations they get under $200 (since most voters cannot afford to donate more than that). President Obama wins that indicator hands down. He raised $63.7 million (about 60% of his total) from small donors, while Romney raised $6.4 million (about 10% of his total) from small donors.

Wall Street Willie has the love of the rich, but there aren't nearly enough rich people in America to elect a president. Money is nice, and I'm sure the Republicans will try to buy the election. But the president has the money to compete, and he has something even more important -- the support of the masses.

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Assuming The Fetal Position

post from jobsanger on 23 February 2012 01:05:00 AM. © jobsanger

Political Cartoon is by John Cole in the Scranton Times-Tribune.

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Two Losers To Run For Re-Election

There were originally 11 candidates for the Republican presidential nomination -- Pawlenty, Bachmann, Cain, Huntsman, Perry, Johnson, Roemer, Paul, Gingrich, Santorum, and Romney. Five of those have abandoned their presidential ambitions for this year (Pawlenty, Bachmann, Cain, Huntsman, Perry), and two others are now running for third-party nominations -- Gary Johnson for the Libertarian Party candidacy and Buddy Roemer for the Americans Elect slot or the Reform Party candidacy.

Now we learn that at least two of those whose presidential hopes were dashed by voters are now planning to run for re-election to their old jobs. The first is Rep. Michele Bachmann. She wants to run for re-election to her current seat in Minnesota's 6th Congressional District -- even though no longer lives in that district. Amazingly, a quirk of the election laws is that they don't require a person to live in the congressional district they represent. This is something that needs to be fixed, but until it is Bachmann has the right to run in a district where she doesn't live.

Why doesn't Bachmann want to run in the district where she lives? Because she knows she can't win in that district. When the district lines were redrawn for congressional districts in Minnesota (by a judicial panel), Bachmann's home wound up the the 4th Congressional District. Popular Democrat Betty McCollum also lives in that district and currently represents it in Congress. McCollum is running for re-election, and it is extremely doubtful that Bachmann could beat her. So Bachmann, already a right-wing nut-job, is now going to be a carpetbagging right-wing nut-job. Hopefully, the voters in the 6th Congressional District won't like that.

The other loser running for re-election is Rick Perry, although he'll have to wait a couple of years to do so. Last Tuesday, Perry told the Texas Tribune that he is "leaning toward" running for re-election as Texas governor in 2014. In "perry-speak" that means he will run. He is already in his 12th year as governor (having assumed the office in December of 2000), but sadly Texas has no term limit on the office. Perry can serve forever -- as long as the voters keep re-electing him every four years.

The crazy part of all this is that Perry is not really interested in being governor anymore. He has demonstrated this by largely ignoring his gubernatorial duties since dropping out of the presidential race. Why would he run for re-election then? Well, he was pretty honest about that in the interview. He wants to be president.

He wants to run for the Republican nomination in 2016 (evidently he believes Obama will be re-elected this year, because there wouldn't be an opportunity for Perry in 2016 if Obama lost). And staying in office as the governor of Texas is the best way he knows to stay in the news and launch his next presidential campaign. We can only hope the voters in Texas realize this, and opt instead to elect a real governor.

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No GOP Compromise

Political Cartoon is by R.J. Matson in Roll Call.

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Santorum Leads In Washington State

There has been a lot of discussion about the upcoming Republican primaries in Michigan and Arizona on February 28th, and the primaries to be held a week later on Super Tuesday, March 6th. But there is a caucus to be held between those dates. It is in the state of Washington on March 3rd. This caucus has been ignored up until now, even by me, because there was nothing in the news to indicate what was happening in Washington. Now there is.

Public Policy Polling has done their first survey in Washington. It indicates that Rick Santorum has a substantial lead (11 points) among Republicans in that state. And it looks like it will be hard for Willard Mitt Romney (aka Wall Street Willie) to catch him. Numbers show that 69% of Republican voters view Santorum favorably while only 18% view him negatively. Those are much better numbers than Romney has (47% view him favorably and 42% view him negatively). Here are the current numbers:

PUBLIC POLICY POLLING (Washington)
Rick Santorum...............38%
Mitt Romney...............27%
Ron Paul...............15%
Newt Gingrich...............12%

Meanwhile, Michigan now looks like a toss-up, and the winner in that state's primary probably can't be predicted until the votes are counted on the night of February 28th. Two new polls have been released showing this volatility and unpredictability. One poll shows Santorum with a small lead, and the other has Romney with a small lead. Here are those numbers:

RASMUSSEN REPORTS (Michigan)
Rick Santorum...............38%
Mitt Romney...............34%
Ron Paul...............10%
Newt Gingrich...............9%
Other/Undecided...............9%

NBC NEWS/MARIST POLL (Michigan)
Mitt Romney...............37%
Rick Santorum...............35%
Ron Paul...............13%
Newt Gingrich...............8%
Other/Undecided...............7%

The NBC poll also surveyed voters in Arizona. That poll shows that Romney remains the favorite in that state (although his lead is not nearly as big there as it was a few weeks ago). Here are their Arizona numbers:

NBC NEWS/MARIST POLL (Arizona)
Mitt Romney...............43%
Rick Santorum...............27%
Newt Gingrich...............16%
Ron Paul...............11%
Undecided...............3%

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