Story #1 talks about Obama’s biggest problem and it is the growth
rate of the economy which is approximately ½ of what it traditionally should
be. #2 tells us why Obama’s favorability
has dropped with young voters. #3 posits
that the Liberals are looking back to a time gone by both with low skill
manufacturing jobs and college educations.
#4 is another look at the Pew Polls talking about the differences
between Conservatives and Liberals. #5 looks
at who was the brains behind the attack on Ann Romney. #6 is a mildly effective campaign ad about
what would you do if you “wanted America to fail.” #7 looks at Mitt Romney and finds him to be
very smooth. #8 looks at our News
Organizations and asks the question, “are they out of their minds?”
Today’s thoughts
Did you know that Obama only paid 23% tax of his 2010 total
income? His income was $1,795,614 so in
2010 he obviously didn’t pay is fair
share!
With
the warmer than average winter this year in the USA, people were talking about
global warming. With a record snowfall forecasted for the Northeast does that mean its
global cooling now?
In
the 2008 election there was evidence of
ballot box stuffing by Democrats in Pennsylvania and Ohio. John McCain went against advice and decided not
to make an issue of it for the good of
the country.
Who is the most televised first lady in history? With 44 cameo
appearance, Michelle Obama is the clear winner.
1. Obama’s 2.5%
problem
Wall Street headlines are full of
fears of a springtime stall for the already subpar economic recovery. And if
that weren’t bad enough for Obama’s reelection chances, a spate of new polls show Mitt Romney’s economic-approval ratings are
far outdistancing the president’s.
Even while the headline surveys
basically show an Obama-Romney tossup, it will be very difficult for Obama to
pull out a victory this fall. Traditionally,
incumbents who poll below 50 percent are in trouble. And with Obama
consistently in the mid-40s, he has a tough uphill climb ahead.
Of course, a subpar recovery has
kept the president’s reelection hopes in doubt for some time. Former Bush economist
Ed Lazear calls it the worst recovery in history. Okay. That may be a partisan
shot. But actually, the data points bear this out.
At roughly 2.5 percent growth, the Obama recovery is way
below the 4.5 percent average since World War II. And within Obama’s 2.5 percent economy, polling data show
high voter anxiety over gas prices, home values, and the ability to pay
mortgages. Voters even worry that they won’t be able to afford to send their
kids to college.
The people will throw Obama and the Democrats out of power
just as they did the Republicans 5 or so years ago. And the Republicans will have 4 years to fix
the problem. Fortunately the will have
energy to help them along. The Democrats
won’t do it because it violates the precepts of their base. It is akin to the Nazi’s refusing to work on
an Atomic Bomb because it was “Jewish” science.
2. One in Two
Graduates unemployed or underemployed
The
college class of 2012 is in for a rude welcome to the world of work.
A weak labor market already
has left half of young college graduates either jobless or underemployed in
positions that don't fully use their skills and knowledge.
Young adults with bachelor's degrees are increasingly
scraping by in lower-wage jobs — waiter
or waitress, bartender, retail clerk or receptionist, for example — and
that's confounding their hopes a degree would pay off despite higher tuition
and mounting student loans.
An analysis of government data conducted for The Associated
Press lays bare the highly uneven prospects for holders of bachelor's degrees.
Opportunities for college graduates vary widely.
While there's strong
demand in science, education and health fields, arts and humanities
flounder. Median wages for those with
bachelor's degrees are down from 2000, hit by technological changes that
are eliminating midlevel jobs such as bank tellers. Most future job openings
are projected to be in lower-skilled positions such as home health aides, who
can provide personalized attention as the U.S. population ages.
Taking underemployment into consideration, the job prospects
for bachelor's degree holders fell last year to the lowest level in more than a
decade.
"I don't even know what I'm looking for," says Michael
Bledsoe, who described months of fruitless job searches as he served customers
at a Seattle coffeehouse. The 23-year-old graduated in 2010 with a creative
writing degree.
Initially hopeful that his college education would create
opportunities, Bledsoe languished for three months before finally taking a job
as a barista, a position he has held for the last two years. In the beginning he sent three or four
resumes day. But, Bledsoe said, employers questioned his lack of experience or
the practical worth of his major. Now he sends a resume once every two weeks or
so…
I’m pretty
sure Michael Bledsoe’s chief concern is that millionaires pay their fair share
and that he has health insurance.
3. Liberal
Nostalgia and the Real World
… The liberal
nostalgiacs would like to see an economy that gives low-skill high school
graduates similar opportunities. That’s what Barack Obama seems to be
envisioning when he talks about hundreds of thousands of “green jobs.”
But those
“green jobs” have not come into existence despite massive government subsidies
and crony capitalism. It’s become apparent that the old Detroit model was unsustainable and cannot be revived even by
the most gifted community organizer and adjunct law professor.
For one
thing, in a rapidly changing and technologically advanced economy, the lifetime job seems to be a thing of the
past. Particularly “lifetime” jobs where you work only 30 years and then
get supported for the next 30 or so years of your life.
Today’s
young people can’t expect to join large organizations and in effect ride
escalators for the rest of their careers. The new companies emerging as winners
in high tech — think Apple or Google — just don’t employ that many people, at
least in the United States.
Similarly,
today’s manufacturing firms produce
about as large a share of the gross national product as they used to with a
much smaller percentage of the labor force.
Moreover,
there’s evidence that recent growth in some of the professions — the law, higher education — has been a
bubble, and is about to burst,,.
This is a
good follow on to the previous story.
The problems are systemic and rather than adjust to them, we are getting
tired slogans about everyone should have a college education. This represents vision in some people’s
minds. It isn’t.
4. Liberals vs
Conservative
…Pew’s new study echoes
the results of many other reports and studies that show GOP supporters are better educated, more empathetic and more
open to criticism than Democrats.
A March 12 Pew study
showed that Democrats are far more
likely that conservatives to disconnect from people who disagree with them.
“In all, 28% of liberals
have blocked, unfriended, or hidden someone on SNS [social networking sites]
because of one of these reasons, compared with 16% of conservatives and 14% of
moderates,” said the report, titled “Social networking sites and politics.”
The report also noted
that 11 percent of liberals, but only 4 percent of conservatives, deleted
friends from their social networks after disagreeing with their politics.
A March Washington Post
poll showed that Democrats were more
willing to change their views about a subject to make their team look good. For
example, in 2006, 73 percent of
Democrats said the GOP-controlled White House could lower gas prices, but that
number fell by more than half to 33 percent in 2012 once a Democrat was in
the White House.
In contrast, the opinions
of GOP supporters were more consistent. Their collective opinion shifted by
only a third, according to the data. In 2006, 47 percent in believed the White House could influence gas prices.
By 2012, that number had risen to 65
percent up 17 points compared to the Democrats’ 40 point shift.
Not really surprising unless you are a
liberal. But if you are, I’m sure you
won’t read my blog again.
5. Was Michelle
Obama behind the Ann Romney attack?
Political sources revealed to The ENQUIRER that MICHELLE OBAMA
brain-stormed the scheme to sic a pit bull strategist on the GOP contender’s
wife ANN ROMNEY and it backfired!
Talking head Hilary
Rosen set off a firestorm when she mocked Mitt Romney for relying on
his wife for advice on the economy, sniping that Ann – who raised five sons,
has battled breast cancer and suffers from multiple sclerosis – “never worked
a day in her life!”
Rosen was
forced to apologize, saying her words were “poorly chosen.” Even President
Obama got into the act, saying there’s “no tougher job than being a mom.”
A publicly
sympathetic Michelle, 48, tapped out a message on Twitter, writing: “Every
mother works hard, and every woman deserves to be respected.” But behind the
scenes, her fingerprints were all over the scandal, said an inside source.
“Michelle had
her claws out to get Ann, but it quickly backfired and Barack was livid when he
heard she had secretly directed the attack,” said the source.
“What Michelle
didn’t remember was that when Barack was running for president, he told
ABC’s ‘Good Morning America’ that it was unfair to attack Michelle, saying his
wife was off limits. Here they were, however, doing the same thing to Romney’s
wife four years later.
“But even
though Michelle was the instigator, the political grenade blew up in the
president’s face.”..
It looks like Michelle may not be proud of her country in
this election.
6. What would you do if you wanted America to fail?
A predictable, but very effective political
ad.
7. How smooth is Mitt Romney?
Mitt Romney
slowly but surely is showing how he will turn Barack Obama into a one-term
president: One block at a time. At a Republican retreat in Arizona, Mitt
Romney made the case against President Obama. Nothing personal, just business.
Indeed, Mitt Romney went out of his way to
compliment the guy: “I think he’s a nice
person. I just don’t think we can afford him any longer.”
That is smooth.
You don’t
have to be in full attack mode 24/7.
Romney is not playing to the base. Obama is. The candidate who plays to the base the
most loses. You have to reach out. Not just for votes but to disarm the
other side and make them more at ease with staying at home on November 6….
As Obama and
the Democrats turn up the negativity, Romney gives America an excuse to get rid
of Obama without feeling racist. This is
smooth and effective. Nothing personal here, just taking care of
business.
8. Have Our News
Organizations Gone Crazy?
I wrote here about MSNBC’s campaign to tie the Koch brothers to George Zimmerman’s
shooting of Trayvon Martin. That effort was, it is fair to say, insane, but
it apparently inspired one or more liberals to take MSNBC’s theories a step
farther. Someone wrote–I think it was on Facebook–that Koch Industries had paid
for Zimmerman’s legal defense and/or put up his bail money. Other liberals
happily repeated the claim, to the point where
Snopes deemed it a rumor worth addressing.
The claim is not
only false, but entirely baseless and, in fact, stupid. There is no
connection whatsoever between Koch Industries or the Koch brothers and George
Zimmerman. None. Further, while the Koch
brothers have championed a number of libertarian causes, gun rights have not
been among them. In the one instance where Koch Industries is known to have
lobbied on a firearms issue, it was against a proposed liberalization of
firearms laws in Florida. And the brothers have no history of participating in
the defense of criminal defendants. …
It is a shame
that many on the left want to attribute anything they find suspicious to either
Fox News or the Koch Brothers. This not only makes them sound foolish, it makes
them sound paranoid.
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