For the first time in his administration, President Obama directly address guns and the violence that is caused when irresponsible individuals get their hands on a weapon. Mr. Obama spoke at the National Urban League Convention and mentioned the recent shooting in Aurora Colorado where 12 people were killed in a movie theater.
The President acknowledged the difficult road ahead given the fact that this Congress and previous Congresses are and were in the pocket of gun lobbyist.
Mitt Romney sat down with CNBC’s Larry Kudlow, and made a curious observation. He said voters who want a strong economy should vote for him, but Americans “ought to give, whichever president is going to be elected, at least six months or a year to get those policies in place.”
At first blush, that may sound fairly reasonable. A president takes office, he or she needs time to put a team in place, craft an agenda, and get to work. What’s more, we generally don’t see the results of economic policies immediately; the agenda needs time to take effect. In Romney’s mind, six months to a year seems fair.
But let’s go ahead and apply this standard to President Obama, who took office in the midst of the worst global economic catastrophe since the Great Depression. Hey, look, here’s a new chart I put together.
So according to Mittens, President Obama is doing pretty good. Six months after he was sworn into office, almost three million jobs were created. And in February 20, 2010 – one year after the President took office, almost 4 million jobs were created.
Contrast that to George Bush, who spent 8 years in office to see a little over 3 million jobs created.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul will shrink rather than increase the nation’s huge federal deficits over the next decade, Congress’ nonpartisan budget scorekeepers said Tuesday, supporting Obama’s contention in a major election-year dispute with Republicans.
About 3 million fewer uninsured people will gain health coverage because of last month’s Supreme Court ruling granting states more leeway, and that will cut the federal costs by $84 billion, the Congressional Budget Office said in the biggest changes from earlier estimates.
Republicans have insisted that “Obamacare” will actually raise deficits — by “trillions,” according to presidential candidate Mitt Romney. But that’s not so, the budget office said.
The office gave no updated estimate for total deficit reductions from the law, approved by Congress and signed by Obama in 2010. But it did estimate that Republican legislation to repeal the overhaul — passed recently by the House — would itself boost the deficit by $109 billion from 2013 to 2022.
The polling in the presidential race over the past week has led to some interesting analysis, and depending upon your view of the numbers both candidates can claim to be winning, which also means that both are losing.
The latest RealClearPolitics composite shows the president with a small lead, but his aggregate score of 46.4 is rather low for an incumbent and gives Mitt Romney many opportunities to catch and surpass him. A case in point is an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll out Tuesday showing Mr. Obama with a 49-43% lead. The problem is that the poll oversamples Democrats by 11 points, 46-35%. My sense is that Democrats will not turn out in November in those numbers, so the poll is not as representative as it first appears. The other issue is that the poll uses registered voters (RV) as opposed to likely voters (LV), which at this point in the campaign might be worthless.
Another poll released on Tuesday by PPP/Daily Kos/SEIU shows the race tied at 46%, which would be great news for Romney if not for some troubling poll internals. First, it assumes that Romney will attract 17% of the African-American vote and 39% of the Latino vote. By November, that might be possible, but other polls show President Obama garnering support from those groups that approaches 80-90%, so this poll might be a bit optimistic. Further, the poll oversamples Democrats by 7%, which, again, is possible, but it also shows that 32% of respondents identify themselves at members of the Tea Party. That’s high. Finally, this is an RV poll using automated technology and did not call cell phones. All of this adds up to a poll that has a lot of holes in it for both sides to peek through a spin as they please.
The national tracking polls give us little to go on, with Rasmussen giving Romney a 1 point lead and Gallup giving that same lead to Obama.
The real action is with state polls, and for the most part these have been good news for the president. A Rasmussen poll of Michigan gives Obama a 48-42% lead using likely voters, and a Survey USA/KSTP poll of likely voters in Minnesota has Obama up 46-40%. Good news for Obama, but it shows a decline in his support from previous Minnesota polls which could be a signal of slippage or statistical noise. Your choice, it seems, depending upon which way you lean. A SurveyUSA poll of Florida using likely voters has the president with a 48-43% lead, but the same release showed Republican Senate candidate Connie Mack leading Democrat Bill Nelson by 48-42%. That kind of ticket splitting doesn’t make sense, so we’ll need another Florida poll to sort that out.
There has also been some considerable punditry about where this race is heading despite the polling. Two schools of thought seem to be controlling the debate. One says that the negative ads that Obama is running in swing states, combined with an improving economy in those states, will lead to his reelection. The other thought is that Obama has spent almost $100 million dollars on negative ads and only has a small lead on Romney and no poll has him at 50% or above on the national level (some state polls do have both candidates with sizable leads depending on the state). Both camps are looking for any significant movement in the polls, but won’t likely see much until mid-August when Romney unveils his pick for Vice president and the conventions get under way in earnest.
Of course, it’s the states that matter most in our electoral system and Obama will want to lock down as many of his 2008 wins as possible, and the above discussion suggests that he’s moving in that direction. Still, polls are close in Ohio, Florida, North Carolina (where Romney leads) and Pennsylvania. This is where the election will be won or lost and Romney has yet to advertise seriously in any of those states (he can’t until after the GOP convention).
Stay tuned for more as the polls are released.
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In a world where partisan politics rule, this is a breath of fresh air. Republican Representative for Alaska Dan Young stepped over the partisan line and endorsed Democratic Representative for Hawaii Mazie Hirono, “a surprising move since the seat could be in play for Republicans this fall,” The Hill reports.
“Young praises Hirono for working across the aisle in the lighthearted web ad, in which he repeatedly jokes about criticizing House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) before hugging Hirono at the end.”
The Ad.
Wisconsin state Sen. Glenn Grothman (R) said Sunday that a voter ID law could help Mitt Romney win the state in the upcoming November election, implying that voter fraud only benefited Democrats.
“I think we believe that insofar as there are inappropriate things, people who vote inappropriately are more likely to vote Democrat,” he told Scott Keyes of Think Progress. “I think if people cheat, we believe the people who cheat are more likely to vote against us.”
Grothman’s comments echo similar sentiments expressed by Pennsylvania House Majority Leader Mike Turzai (R) in June. Turzai said Pennsylvania’s voter ID law was “gonna allow Governor Romney to win the state.”
Republicans in state legislatures have pushed for more restrictive voting laws to combat alleged voter fraud.
The new ad by the Obama campaign takes the focus off Mitt Romney’s vulture career at Bain Capital for the moment, and looked instead at the difference between candidates. The President explains what a Romney presidency would be like, saying that Romney would take us back to the same “Trickle-Down Economic concept,” tired (and failed) by George Bush.
This is apparently how you win over souls for Christ. You go on your network and without any logical explanation, you condemn an entire group of people.
This is nothing new for Fischer. Why is he even considered a “Preacher” is beyond me. With Religious leaders like this, it’s only natural for the right-winged to be so misguided.
This one will be filed under Insanity!
Mitt Flip Romney… I don’t know what else to say about this man.
After agreeing with the President that successful businesses owe their success to many factors, including Teachers, Firefighters, roads etc., Romney then criticized the President for saying that successful businesses owe their success to many factors, including Teachers, Firefighters, roads etc.
At a campaign rally in Virginia, the President was heard saying, “if you’ve been successful, you didn’t get their on your own. I’m always struck by people who think, ‘well it must be because I’m so smart.’ There are a lot of smart people out there.
The President continued.
“If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you have a business, you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen.
Anyone listening to those words would agree. Even Mitt Romney, and he was heard echoing President Obama’s words at one of his campaign events, saying “we value school teachers, firefighters, people who build roads… You really couldn’t have a business if you didn’t have those things.”
But because Romney would say anything to get elected, he nitpick the President’s speech and focused on one part – “…if you have a business, you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen.” And off he went, criticizing the president for something he agrees with the president on.
Now, even more evidence that Mitt Romney believes President Obama was correct.
Back when he headed the 2002 Olympics in Utah, Romney spoke to some of the competitors, telling them that they did not get to where they are on their own.
“You Olympians, however, know you didn’t get here solely on your own power,” said Romney, who on Friday will attend the Opening Ceremonies of this year’s Summer Olympics. “For most of you, loving parents, sisters or brothers, encouraged your hopes, coaches guided, communities built venues in order to organize competitions. All Olympians stand on the shoulders of those who lifted them. We’ve already cheered the Olympians, let’s also cheer the parents, coaches, and communities. All right! [pumps fist].”
Video
I have a proposition for anyone who thinks that our state and national gun laws make sense and/or adhere to the legal intent of the Second Amendment. Wake up Thomas Jefferson, John (and Sam if you’d like) Adams, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, George Washington and any other member of the founding class not named Aaron Burr. Give them a week or so to acclimate themselves to the modern-day United States, and then ask them if this is what they had in mind when they debated and wrote the Constitution:
Unhindered by federal background checks or government oversight, the 24-year-old man accused of killing a dozen people inside a Colorado movie theater was able to build what the police called a 6,000-round arsenal legally and easily over the Internet, exploiting what critics call a virtual absence of any laws regulating ammunition sales.
With a few keystrokes, the suspect, James E. Holmes, ordered 3,000 rounds of handgun ammunition, 3,000 rounds for an assault rifle and 350 shells for a 12-gauge shotgun — an amount of firepower that costs roughly $3,000 at the online sites — in the four months before the shooting, according to the police. It was pretty much as easy as ordering a book from Amazon.
He also bought bulletproof vests and other tactical gear, and a high-capacity “drum magazine” large enough to hold 100 rounds and capable of firing 50 or 60 rounds per minute — a purchase that would have been restricted under proposed legislation that has been stalled in Washington for more than a year.
I didn’t think so either
With all due respect to the current Supreme Court, which ruled in the case, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA et al. v. HELLER, (No. 07-290) 478 F. 3d 370, affirmed, that possessing a handgun is an individual right (and in the process overturned two centuries of precedent), the framers could not have seen this development. They were rational, reasonable men. They knew that freedom and liberty were just and correct goals, but that they had limits.
Tell that to the NRA.
I support the NRA’s existence and even most of its goals. We do have a right to a well-regulated (there’s a dormant phrase) militia and people do have a right to hunt and protect themselves. But what James Holmes amassed was not meant for hunting, protection or self-defense. He planned and carried out a massacre of innocent people at a time when they were relaxed and vulnerable. There are clearly lots of things wrong with him that society can’t anticipate or cure. He had a fairly clear record and was a brilliant student. Ominous music didn’t play when he entered a room. But did he have the right to those guns? Is that what the Second Amendment protects? I think not.
After the shootings at Virginia Tech, there were many gun rights advocates who suggested that the answer to the problem was more guns. They said that if students and faculty members were armed, they could shoot the shooter and limit the carnage. That debate has been reignited. Is this the kind of society we want to live in? Where anyone (after background check and safety course) can carry a concealed weapon anywhere? Do more guns equal less violence?
Anyone hunting for a political debate on this issue will go hungry until at least November 7 because gun rights advocates are already suspicious of President Obama, and Mitt Romney doesn’t want to say anything provocative or alienate his base. Meanwhile, gun control politicians such as Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York continue to press the issue. Honestly, I’d feel safer in a midtown Manhattan movie theater than in a multiplex in a state with fewer gun laws. Call me crazy.
But back to the framers.
I understand that they feared a tyrannical national government that would encroach on people’s liberties, so they included an amendment that left to the states the right to have its citizen’s armed. I get that. What they didn’t intend was that citizens would have free reign to arm themselves to the teeth with weapons that threatened the public order. They would have drawn a line at Holmes’s arsenal because it’s detached from the intent of the amendment.
We have limits on speech, religion and state’s rights. It’s only logical that we look at the totality of our gun laws and ask ourselves if they adequately protect us from people who seek to do us harm. At this moment, the answer is no.
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Marco Rubio is a Republican Senator representing Florida and he is “being considered” as a possible vice president candidate for Republican nominee Mitt Flip Romney. But in March of this year, Rubio expressed his true feelings for Romney with this classic quote from the Daily Caller;
“There are a lot of other people out there that some of us wish had run for President, but they didn’t. I think Mitt Romney would be a fine President, and he’d be way better than the guy who’s there right now.”
Of course Rubio would say that Mittens will be a better president than Obama. They’re both Republicans, so the second part of his comment is a given. The first part however, is the eye opener. It shows the flaw in Romney – his inability to connect to the very people who will hold their noises and vote for him.
Republicans don’t like Mitt, and they don’t care who knows it.
Citizens United has become the driving force behind the selling of the American Democracy. It allows Corporations to give unlimited amounts of money to any politician of their choosing. And because of the very foundation of the Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United that classifies Corporations as people, unlimited amounts of money are flowing from unknown sources to people like Mitt Romney, thus, a willful effort by the richest few to purchase the presidency.
The Court believes that since Corporations are People, Corporations are now protected by the first amendment of the United States Constitution that gives people the freedom of speech.
But what is “speech?”
The First Amendment’s reference to “Freedom Of Speech” has always been a source of controversy, but to many Constitutionalists, freedom of speech refers to the ability to choose freely, the ability to decide without fear of retribution. That as an American, you have an unbridled say through your vote in the structure of our government and who is chosen to govern.
That is what Democracy is all about – people voting for their leaders with no mention of “money.” That is what the Founding Fathers wanted when they wrote the framework for the Constitution. But what you will hear in the video below, one of the Justices who decided that Corporations are people also decided that speech means money.
It would seem to the average person that the Court’s decision in Citizens United was wrong. Unlimited funds from unknown sources should not be allowed into the American political system. It would seem that this decision must be reversed as soon as possible. But as you listen to the Republican appointed Justice Scalia’s defense of the Court’s decision saying “money is speech,” you quickly realize that the American people is losing their voice, as the people with the most money… the top 1%… out-shouts us all.
