The Republican Party’s all-out effort to alienate women voters appears to be working.
Via TP, a new Washington Post/ABC News poll finds Mitt trailing Obama by 19% among women voters.
And that’s not all. Barry Hussein is up in several key questions amongst all voters:
Beats Romney 10 points, 49 to 39 percent, on “protecting the middle class.”
Edges Romney by three points on “creating jobs” and “handling taxes.” Up two points on “supporting small business.”
Crushes Romney by 17 points, 53 to 36 percent, on “handling international affairs,” and seven points on “handling terrorism.”
Beats Romney eight points on “dealing with social issues such as abortion and gay marriage.”
Mitt Romney has a woman problem. And Mitch McConnell’s not helping.
As Joe noted yesterday, Mitch took to the radio in Louisiville to start his week by debunking the “Republican War on Women”:
“Talk about a manufactured issue — there is no issue,” he said on Louisville, Ky., radio station WHAS-AM. “Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison and Kelly Ayotte from New Hampshire and Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe from Maine I think would be the first to say — and Lisa Murkowski from Alaska — ‘we don’t see any evidence of this.’”
You won’t want to miss what Snow, Collins and Murkowski have to say about this particular topic — read on.
The New York Times reported yesterday that Karl Rove’s Super PAC, American Crossroads, is finally ready to launch their $200 Million campaign against President Obama, based around the notion that “that Obama just may not be up to the job.”
Yeah. Karl Rove says Barack Obama “may not be up to the job.”
The Obama campaign has already fired back, but enough cannot be said about the insane premise of Rove’s claim.
Crossroads spent $28 Million in the 2010 midterm elections. Very little information has been made available about where Crossroads’ money comes — thanks, Supreme Court! — but one past filing showed 91% of their money was chipped in by billionaires.
(The head of Restore Our Future, Carl Forti, is an advisor to Rove’s Crossroads; one of Romney’s senior advisors, Ed Gillespie, is one of the founders of American Crossroads. Read more.)
But all the money in the world wouldn’t be enough to erase the obviously failed policies of Karl Rove, the ideologically bankrupt architect of the two-term Bush Administration.
Rove brought us the war in Iraq, the Bush Tax Cuts, and presided over the collapse of the American economy, among other things.
In other words, Karl Rove is responsible for all the central challenges he now claims Barack Obama can’t solve.
Karl Rove decimated the Middle Class.
Census data revealed that during the Bush Era, middle class income actually declined:
While the earnings of middle-income Americans have barely budged since the mid 1970s, the new data showed that from 2000 to 2010, they actually regressed.
For American households in the middle of the pay scale, income fell to $49,445 last year, when adjusted for inflation, a level not seen since 1996.
And over the 10-year period, their income is down 7%.
And lest any of you Karl Rove apologists out there (really?) want to harp on the collapse of the economy in 2008 as the reason for this regression (as if that weren’t the fault of the Bush administration) and refuse these facts as “fuzzy math,” let me point out to you that the trend — decreasing middle class wages, increasing economic inequality — predated the 2008 implosion:
Work harder, take home less
From 2000 to 2007, worker productivity rose significantly in the United States, but real income fell for middle-class families, a group of economists says.
By David Goldman, CNNMoney.com staff writer
Last Updated: August 28, 2008: 7:05 AM EDT
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — For most of the past decade, the economy grew much stronger – but middle-class Americans had little to show for it.
That’s the conclusion of a trio of economists who on Thursday released a preview of their book The State of Working America in 2008/2009 due out next year.
Despite two periods of recession in the past decade, U.S. worker productivity still rose 18% in the 2000s – about 2.5% per year, according to author Jared Bernstein, a widely followed economist from the liberal-leaning Economic Policy Institute.
But inflation-adjusted income for the American middle-class family actually fell during the same period. The median real income for working-age middle-income families in the United States dropped $2,000 between 2000 and 2007, from about $58,500 to $56,500, the U.S. Census Bureau reported Tuesday.
The onset of the George W. Bush/Karl Rove Depression didn’t change the fate of America’s Middle Class, it simply further solidified its downward arc in what has been called “The Lost Decade for the Middle Class“:
During Karl Rove’s tenure in the White House — a job he was clearly “not up to” — Americans saw corporations get exorbitantly richer while regular folks made less and less money. The number of Americans living in poverty went up. The number of Americans without health insurance went up.
This is Karl Rove’s record.
This is what he stands on, this is his resume, and this is why no one — save a handful of billionaires — should ever trust him again.
Development comes as 78 million boomers nearing retirement
Associated Press, 2/1/2007 4:56:51 PM ET
People are saving at the lowest level since the Great Depression, and that could be a problem for the millions of baby boomers getting ready to retire.
In fact, the Commerce Department reported Thursday that the nation’s personal savings rate for all of 2006 was a negative 1 percent, the worst showing in 73 years.
The negative rate means people are spending all of the money they have left after paying taxes — and then some. They are dipping into savings or increasing their borrowing to finance current spending.
But Karl Rove is psychologically unequipped to accept the blame for any of that. It’s not in his nature.
Turning to upcoming Kentucky races, in the 6th District, Ben Chandler is running against Andy Barr. What effect will the presidential race have on that race, and what effect might redistricting have?
It looks like the new redistricting plan in Kentucky was essentially an incumbent-protection map. As such, Chandler received some help from the new lines after having an extremely close call in 2010. If he managed to survive the 2010 GOP wave, it’s harder to see Chandler losing in a presidential year when turnout will be higher and when his district is centered around the fairly blue city (and college town) of Lexington.
We rate the seat as “Likely Democratic” at the moment, which means he’s favored to win re-election.
Sabato, the political analyst, goes on to predict a Yarmuth victory in KY-3 and a McConnell victory in 2014… unless Steve Beshear quits Frankfort for the big showdown.
Mr. Sabato will be speaking in Louisville on the 17th, if that’s your thang.
Here’s a picture Mitch McConnell and the Republican Party hope no one in America internalizes:
Yes, while the Republicans are busy lying about the state of America’s energy policy in a destructive attempt to again mislead voters, the truth is not on their side:
Here’s just one example of Mitch McConnell lying to the American people, from FactCheck.org:
“What [Obama] ought to do is increase public production on public land. Land in federal — within the federal jurisdiction, production is down 14%. He points, however, to increased production that he had nothing to do with. It’s up 96 % on state owned land and private land. The president simply is standing in the way of increasing domestic production.”
McConnell got one thing right — production on federal lands fell by 14% in fiscal year 2011 (after a 15% increase the year before). But overall, oil production on federal lands saw an increase of 1% during the last five fiscal years.
As for Mitch’s other factoid, that production is up nearly 100% on state and private land…
Mitch McConnell incorrectly claimed that oil production is “up 96% on state-owned land and private land,” which isn’t close to being true. Production rose 11% on those lands in fiscal year 2011, the period to which McConnell alluded. Even over the last five fiscal years, the rise has been 15% — not even one-sixth as large as he claimed.
As Mitch said recently (and the rest of the GOP chirped behind him), “It’s my view that the administration’s policies are actually designed to bring about higher gas prices.”
And it’s my view that Mitch McConnell knows full well that he’s lying to the American people, and his only hope is that you are all just stupid enough to believe him.
ormer Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney appears on course to collect the 1,144 delegates he needs to wrap up the Republican nomination, despite the best efforts of top challenger Rick Santorum who is facing growing pressure to drop out of the race.
The candidates still have primaries in Pennsylvania, New York, Delaware, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Indiana, North Carolina, West Virginia, Nebraska and Oregon before Kentucky voters go to the polls on May 22.
Kentucky GOP Chairman Steve Robertson said the outcome of those primaries will determine whether the voices of his state’s 1.1 million Republicans will matter.
“It’s still a question mark,” Robertson said. “It’s kind of a wait and see.”
The article goes on to explain that it’s not much of a question at all, including a positively defeatist Rand Paul who incuriously declares the race over and Romney the inevitable and glorious victor:
“There’s sort of an inevitability,” Rand Paul said. “It was that way with McCain last time. He didn’t have the exact number before Kentucky, but it was sort of on the way to becoming inevitable. And I think Romney is getting closer to that. Most of the statistics show that if Santorum was to challenge him he’d have to win like 80 percent of the remaining delegates. And that’s just not going to happen.”
In Louisville, but I guess it’s only fair that Lexington can’t have everything that’s cool. The details if you want to head over there in championship style:
Obama for America is opening a new state Headquarters in Kentucky. Come be a part of the grassroots movement for change that is growing throughout the state. Join your friends, neighbors, and other supporters at the opening of our Louisville Headquarters! Special Guest Include: Congressman John Yarmuth and Mayor Greg Fischer
Time: Saturday, April 7, 2012 2:00 PM – 4:00 PM
Host: OFA Kentucky
Location: Obama for America Kentucky Headquarters (Louisville, KY) 617 Baxter Ave.
Louisville, KY 40204
Politico reports — “Republicans retreat on gay marriage” — the GOP is putting homophobia on the backburner as social morays change and the economy is the priority on top. They even spoke with Kentucky’s own Hal Rogers:
House Appropriations Chairman Hal Rogers (R-Ky.), a 32-year veteran of Congress, never a man of many words, simply said, “I don’t hear it discussed much.”
Even die-hard social conservatives like Texas Republican Louie Gohmert aren’t digging in.
“That’s not something we’re focused on now,” Gohmert said.
The idea that the GOP is reducing their anti-gay vitriol to a mere whisper campaign is ridiculous, but perhaps right now Hal and the Republicans are more interested in cross-dressing and shifting their focus to the war on women.
At The Atlantic, Philip K. Howard highlights several solutions to obsolete laws. In one part, Howard highlights Geoff Davis’ REINS Act, offering a more common sense alternative:
Under a bill being drafted by Sen. Warner, agencies could not impose a new regulation unless they first eliminated old regulations of equal cost. The advantage of this proposal is that it introduces into the bureaucratic culture the necessity of budgeting regulation. Britain has a similar law, which has thus far proven effective at cutting costs and slowing the pace of new regulation. Another proposal, the so-called REINS Act introduced by Rep. Geoff Davis (R-KY), would require congressional approval for any regulation with a projected economic impact of $100 million or more. But this proposal does nothing to clean out old regulations. The probable effect, as both critics and supporters suggest, is regulatory paralysis: in the current partisan environment, there would be no major new rules.
People are naturally fearful of change, but we don’t really have a choice. Better to confront the inevitability head on. Other countries have government agencies that do this job — in Germany, for example, the Federal Ministry of Justice makes sure statutes work together in a coherent way. South Korea has an entire cabinet-level department, the Ministry of Government Legislation, which works continuously to improve existing legal structures. And New Zealand rewrote from scratch many of its major federal laws — including environmental, tax, occupational safety and health statutes — in the late ’80s and early ’90s.
One way or another, America will have to confront the waste and inefficiency caused by obsolete laws. These proposals above provide a menu of possible frameworks that would compel Congress and regulatory agencies to rethink old law and make new choices.
In a show of bipartisanship, Kentucky’s 1st District Congressman, Ed Whitfield, and 6th District Congressman, Ben Chandler, joined forces to vote against every single proposed budget for the United States of America.
In all, nine Democrats and five Republicans pulled the “no” lever on all seven budgets the House considered on Wednesday and Thursday, which included offerings of all ideological stripes.
Last year there were nearly two dozen “none of the above” voters, this year just 14… and two of them from Kentucky!
The Blue Dog Coalition, the ineffectual group of which Ben Chandler is a member, split somewhat, with some of them voting for one budget or another (and one of them even proposed a budget). But no, not all Blue Dogs.
Six other members of the coalition – Reps. John Barrow (Ga.), Ben Chandler (Ky.), Joe Donnelly (Ind.), Jim Matheson (Utah), Mike McIntyre (N.C.) and Mike Ross (Ark.) – voted for none of the budgets, and none of their offices returned a request for comment.
Since no one has any idea why Chandler couldn’t find one of the budgets worth supporting, perhaps he was following Ed’s lead?
Three Republicans – Reps. Walter Jones (N.C.), David McKinley (W.Va.) and Denny Rehberg (Mont.) – also supported none of the budgets for a second consecutive year.
McKinley and Rehberg have opposed the Ryan budget both years because of its cuts to Medicare, which the West Virginia Republican labeled “drastic” on Thursday.
But the GOP House members who voted against all budgets – who also include Reps. John Duncan (Tenn.) and Ed Whitfield (Ky.) – also generally said that none of the budgets cut spending enough.
Oh… and that Paul Ryan budget that makes cuts so extreme to Medicare two conservative Republicans couldn’t stomach voting for it… is supported by Chandler’s opponent, Garland Barr IV. Lucky for Andy, the NRCC is taking him to school to teach him how to pander to Tea Partiers better and maybe understand what he’s doing as a candidate.
Rand Paul isn’t endorsing Mitch McConnell’s 2014 re-election campaign just yet, but the jellied-haired oracle of freedom is, nonetheless, getting behind Mitch:
Paul attended a fundraiser for McConnell’s reelection campaign on Tuesday evening and Paul’s spokeswoman issued a strong statement of support in response to a query about whether the Tea Party star would endorse McConnell.“Sen. Paul and Leader McConnell have forged a strong relationship and created a number of pieces of legislation on behalf of their shared constituents. It’s clear the commonwealth is best served with their combined efforts now and in the future,” said Moira Bagley, Paul’s communications director.
SHE WON'T GO!
KentuckyElection.org
BONNIE PRINCE BILLY
