Ace of Spades HQ

October 31, 2012

Michigan: 2 Point Seven Damn Points
— Ace

As I do a lot, I'm taking a lot from @benk84's early headlines post.

2.7% Obama lead in Michigan, 47.7% to 45%.

The Obama campaign Tuesday announced its first network TV ads will begin airing this week in Michigan. Neither candidate had bought airtime here, but earlier Tuesday, Romney's super PAC launched a $2.2 million advertising final blitz in Michigan.
That brings Restore Our Future's investment in Michigan post-primary up to nearly $10 million, according to the PAC Â— which until now had been unanswered by the Obama campaign.

By the way, I just read an article -- not sure which; I closed it -- noting that Romney had plenty of money to spend and couldn't really spend it all by election day if he just concentrated on the swing states. So if you're worried that this is wasted money, well, thanks to those who donated to Romney (you know who you are, clap yourselves on the back) he's really not forced into difficult decisions. He can spend in Ohio and play in some speculative states too.

This is problematic for Romney:

lso new in this poll, Romney now has a more favorable impression than unfavorable among likely voters at 44.7 percent favorable. Obama's favorable rating is 47.8 percent.

If you assume (again, as I'm doing lately) that your favorable rating represents your upper bound of support, then Romney needs to move his favorable up to 51% or so.

Which he can do. He does have some positive ads which test well. That ad of him just addressing the camera is rated highly by undecided voters. Plus, there's that heart-string pulling ad about him helping the dying boy write his will. And all those ads cut from his great moments at the debates.

Romney does have an advantage here that Obama doesn't: After four years of campaigning, mixed in with golf, and an occasional foray into governance, Obama is very well known to people and his numbers are mostly inelastic. Romney's image has more elasticity, more upside. It can be more readily changed than Obama's.

And, as usual, Romney is tantalizingly close in Pennsylvania. Still behind, but just close enough to get hopes up. 49-45, within margin of error.

Posted by: Ace at 12:19 PM | Comments (260)
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ADP Changes Methodology of Job-Counting;
One Analyst Thinks The Change Suggests That Friday's Revisions "Will Be a Disaster"
— Ace

Assuming the BLS even releases data on Friday, which they're still hedging about. Update: Just heard on Fox the BLS is saying they will deliver the report on time.

ADP is a big payroll-service firm which releases its own assessment of job growth (or job losses), based partly on its own data.

Their new methodology occasioned a revision to their already-reported September figures.

ADP's new calculations put the monthly job creation [in September] at just 88,200, down from the 162,000 the firm originally reported earlier this month.
...

The soft ADP count could add credence to those who believe the pace of job creation is slower than the government's numbers indicate.
"It's huge, no doubt about it," said Todd Schoenberger, managing principal at the BlackBay Group in New York. "Their changing the methodology tells me that if the number is cut in half with that revision, then the revision we're going to see Friday is going to be a disaster."

I kind of hate posting expectations-game things like this. If a guy says it might be a disaster, then any non-disaster figure becomes a "win" for Obama.

Still, it's so grabby a quote I have to publish it.

But let's all remember the sudden appearance of almost a million new jobs last month, indicating a torrid pace of jobs growth that somehow managed to not show up anywhere else in America besides BLS' poll.

Update: Just heard on Fox that the "consensus" estimate from Wall Street analysts is an uptick in the unemployment rate.

Then again, who knows? Maybe another 1,000,000 phantom jobs will suddenly appear.

Posted by: Ace at 11:30 AM | Comments (227)
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Important Point From NumberMuncher
— Ace

NumberMuncher made a good point on Twitter, a general "I Call Bullshit" statement on the various polls showing Obama with big leads in Ohio, Virginia, and even North Carolina (!!!).

It's very simple: Swing states are swing states because neither party has much of a lead in the states. The outcome of any election, then, depends heavily on which way Independents vote.

A swing state is a swing state, basically, because the parties are tied there (basically, within a few points), and the Independents play tiebreaker.

Any state in which Obama loses Independents by six, eight, or ten points but somehow -- as these polls claims -- wins the state anyway are not "swing states," almost by definition.

We have a name for this category of states: We call them Safe Democratic states, where it really doesn't matter what Independents think because the Democratic majority is strong enough to carry the state in virtually any situation.

The welter of sillyass polls from Quinnippiac, CBS and the laughable PPP keep finding that Obama loses Independents, usually by six points or more, and yet Obama nevertheless triumphs.

I mean, for God's sake, this CBS/Qunnippiac poll has Romney up 21 points with Independents in Virginia but still has Obama winning!

Again, if this were the case, then they're not really swing states.

Sure, if Obama loses Independents by 21 points in Virginia he can win the state... if Virginia is Delaware.

But Virginia is not Delaware, and Ohio isn't Maryland, either.

Independents also provide an indirect but real indication of where soft Democrats and soft Republicans are leaning. When Independents side with Romney, you can be reasonably sure that soft Republicans (more inclined to vote for Romney than Independents) are also voting for Romney, and you can also hazard a guess that some soft Democrats are voting for Romney too.

Two vids swiped from Breitbart TV. First, Mark Halperin makes this point, and then Halperin asks David Axelrod if he thinks Obama's ahead with Independents, and asks him to explain why polls say Obama is behind.

Axelrod seems flummoxed.

more...

Posted by: Ace at 10:51 AM | Comments (270)
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Romney Bringing Out Welfare Attack on Obama As Game-Clincher?
— Ace

Romney's welfare ad -- which accused of Obama of gutting the strict requirements for work, because, you see, he did -- was detested by the media, especially those pretending to be neutral fact-checkers, because they felt it was race-baiting.

Even if it was accurate, it was race-baiting, so they made the extraordinary claim that it wasn't accurate.

It's accurate. It's always been accurate. Previously, the law was firm that those on welfare must seek and find work. Now states may waive that requirement, so long as they submit a "plan" to reduce welfare caseloads.

Not that they actually do reduce welfare caseloads-- so long as the file a "plan" to do so.

As the best method of getting people off welfare is getting them on work, any plan that reduced the requirement to work is automatically not a plan to reduce welfare caseloads.

The welfare attack disappeared from the airwaves for a while.

Kaus says it's back.

I was worried the welfare issue hadnÂ’t tested well for Mitt RomneyÂ–it disappeared from his ads for a while and he didnÂ’t bring it up in the debates. But it now looks like he was just saving it for the endgame in Ohio, Colorado and IowaÂ–where ObamaÂ’s controversial welfare Â“waiverÂ” policy has again been raised in a Romney TV ad.

Posted by: Ace at 10:27 AM | Comments (145)
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GOP Routing Democrats in Pennsylvania Absentee-Ballot Returns, 55%-36%
— Ace

As far as history: the GOP edged the Democrats in absentee balloting in 2008, but only by 2%, in a 10% loss to Obama.

Absentee voting is a small slice of the voting pie, and not on the same scale as early voting. For example, in 2008, there were just shy of 300,000 absentee votes cast. So far in this cycle, 115,000 total absentee ballots have been returned.

I assume more ballots will be returned in the coming days.

Compared to 2008, Republicans have already cast ballots equal to about 1/2 of their 2008 level. Democrats, on the other hand, have cast 1/3rd of their 2008 level.

If Democrats are fired up in this election, why are they dallying about sending in their ballots?

It seems an indicator of both ground game and party enthusiasm.

Posted by: Ace at 10:06 AM | Comments (145)
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NYT, 1992: Bush's 2.7% GDP Growth Is a "Gross National Letdown"
NYT 2012: Obama's 2.0% Growth Is "Steady Improvement"
— Ace

The way they... surround a story, as an old ad said.

Same situation in 1992 as in 2012: An incumbent president is bedeviled by a recession. Late in the cycle, there is a slight improvement. Although in Bush's case, it was a lot more than slight improvement -- we passed from recession to recovery before the election; the economy was already growing when Clinton took office.

If that's not the way you remember it, that's because the media didn't want you to know that.

Flash forward to today. Now, the economy grows by a pittance -- much less than Bush's weak 2.7% growth -- and the NYT hails it a "slow but steady growth" which proves the efficacy of his plan.

Posted by: Ace at 09:50 AM | Comments (88)
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Biden: Transgendered Discrimination is "The Civil Rights Issue of Our Time"
Update: Biden Vows "I'm Going To Give You The Whole Load Today"
— Ace

Okay.

Some additional Biden Cringe Factor here: Biden said he called on the questioner (the mother of a transgendered beauty pageant winner) because her beautiful eyes caught his attention.

Does anyone in the media worry that the currently-serving Vice President isn't mentally all there? We had a National Panic about this when Sarah Palin was running for the post. Not a week goes by that Joe Biden doesn't have a senior moment, but apparently it's now okay that the Vice President might be ever so slightly mentally checked out.

Oh My: Biden vows "I'm going to give you the whole load today."

Is anyone else scared to death about this mental incompetent actually becoming president? And representing us in foreign affairs?
more...

Posted by: Ace at 09:12 AM | Comments (345)
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Leno: Obama's Policy on Libya Is "Don't Ask, Don't Tell"
— Ace

And some other Obama jokes, too.

Hannity says the audio tapes of Tyrone Woods pleading with his "superiors" (irony of the term intended) are "pretty damning." But will they be leaked?

Update: Newt Gingrich claims that "at least two networks" already have leaked emails from the National Security Adviser's office telling a counterterrorism group to stand down and take no action to save lives. Their rationale was apparently because this wasn't "terrorist action."

Posted by: Ace at 08:22 AM | Comments (224)
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Open Thread
— Pixy Misa