Consider this the first in a short series reviewing the data we have on hand from previous elections as well as polling courtesy of (strange it may seem) DailyKos.

We are forty-six days away from the Battle of Wisconsin. In the time between recalls, Scott Walker has improved to leading all of his rivals, seen his approval rating increase, and has enjoyed a more engaged base of support. Republicans came out of the woodwork to vote in the Presidential primary, a sign of motivation for the battle ahead.

There are three things to watch. more...

Posted by: CAC at 02:28 PM | Comments (160)
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He is on the brink of losing, despite a small rebound.

If history and numbers mean anything, then Gallup has a sobering reminder to any on the left who think Obama is still the odds-on favorite:

Presidents have a small sliver of "I approve of the President's effort, but I want someone else" built into their approval ratings. So if Obama is at 45.9%, his solid vote share is stuck in the low forties. The closer the President approaches 50%, the less sleepless nights he will have, as the margin his opponent can snag drops.

President Obama has seen his numbers recover from the nadir of last Fall, but he is by no means a lock for re-election. He's in a statistical tie with Mitt Romney, who just emerged from a nasty primary and who still has a chunk of his party vote dragging their feet to fall behind him.

When polling firms are oversampling Democrats to pump polling results showing the President up 9, or even to show him up 3 or 4, you realize how small a base he actually has.

And how much of a real shot we actually have of kicking him out.

Posted by: CAC at 12:55 PM | Comments (401)
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The guy who "lost" hundreds of millions of dollars of client money?

Fundraising for Obama?!

Corzine, according to the Obama campaign, has once again helped raise more than $500,000.

Via @PoliSisyphus

The Obama campaign is attempting to fire interest in Romney's "high dollar donors." Shouldn't we know who they are?

I saw someone crack a joke about Jon Corzine. Actually, it's right there, in that link.

But it turns out -- Corzine really is one of Obama's own "high dollar donors." Or bundlers/fundraisers.

Hello?

Is this real?

Is this really happening?

I'm still on Earth, right?

Jon Corzine, subject of an SEC Investigation by the Obama Administration, is raising money for the Obama Administration?!

Posted by: Ace at 12:40 PM | Comments (190)
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Well, I guess they're up front about it.

Except, they're not:

"It is common for news and commentary by the press to present viewpoints that tend to overly promote...a conservative, Christian-influenced ideology," the group said in its application for non-profit status with the IRS.



Vince Coglianese, a reporter with The Dailer Caller, has investigated the Media Matters' attacks on Christian organizations.



...



"Interestingly, though, in their public mission statement Media Matters makes no mention of the fact that it intends to target the Christian ideology," Coglianese noted.

It's pretty absurd, right out of the box, to claim that the media -- not the supplemental, alternative media, but the media itself, in whole -- is too damned friendly to Christian thought, and this dangerous bias of NBC, CBS, ABC, MSNBC, and CNN to curry favor with Christians must be combated.

But what do I know. I'm a conservative, ergo anything I say or write is false and stupid.

Obviously I just don't understand the proper interpretation of the facts.

Hey, Anderson Cooper

Stop coming at me every night with your "It's Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve!" Xtianist propaganda.

Posted by: Ace at 11:36 AM | Comments (154)
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First, they asked a question:

In Context, Did Obama Eat Dog In Indonesia?

Despite there being no ambiguity about the record, they left that question dangling, suggesting that, "in context," there was doubt about this question, and then refused (as far as I know -- for the first time) to add a True or False reading on the statement. Obviously, it's true, and they did not want to say so.

Now they've changed the headline so that it's not a question, in order to avoid adding that "True" to the article.

Which they will not do. No way. I know all day their house liberals (by which I mean-- the whole staff) has been saying these exact words, or something close to them:

"Over my dead body do we give them this."

And that talk of teams, of denying the truth for fear of giving something to "Them," really ought to be a self-alarm-clock that maybe they're not really checking "facts." They're providing the best liberal spin they can.

Anyway, so the new headline is:

In context: Obama's comments on eating dog in Indonesia

Still no true, and still no editorial acknowledgement that he didn't just comment on dog eating -- the dude ate f**king dog, period.

At least if Bill Ayers' autobiography of Barack Obama is accurate.

Posted by: Ace at 11:20 AM | Comments (214)
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Down at BlogCon (where I'm not), they just tributed Brietbart.

Neat portrait of him, made up of his quotes.

Posted by: Ace at 10:10 AM | Comments (270)
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By the way, Breitbart lives. They have an interview with Dershowitz. Pretty good for a California kid who just decided to do something about the media.

Dershowitz continued, “An affidavit that willfully misstates undisputed evidence known to the prosecution is not only unethical but borders on perjury because an affiant swears to tell not only the truth, but the whole truth, and suppressing an important part of the whole truth is a lie."
When asked if it made a difference whether the prosecution had the bloody photograph at the time they charged Zimmerman, Dershowitz responded, “We do know that there were earlier photographs before the affidavit was done that strongly suggested blood on the back of the head, and we know the police had first access to him, so if there was blood they [the prosecution] would know about it …

More at the link. I don't want to take it all.

A Gabe already noted (but it's worth noting again) a photo plainly shows Zimmerman's head, bruised and bloodied. Not spurting blood, but definitely running with it.

Lee Stranahan wonders why another defendant in a shooting case with a claim of self-defense was only charged with manslaughter. And there, the gun-armed guy came out to stop... a kid from skateboarding, which was against the local rules.

Another guy, out playing with his daughter, stood up for the skateboard boy, and the defendant shot him. After an altercation.

Manslaughter was the charge. Over a beef about skateboarding.

Anyway, the defendant there was not a "white Hispanic," but black.

And he got a more appropriate charge.

But he was going out to settle a skateboarding beef with a boy, while armed with a gun. Which he used.

Manslaughter.

And Zimmerman gets Murder Two?

Posted by: Ace at 09:43 AM | Comments (200)
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First of all, after lunch, enjoy this older Daily Mail article on dog slaughtering. Colorful local custom.

BuzzFeed, Ben Smiths Gonzo Liberal Spin Shop, links that, but then makes this dubious argument. See, okay, Obama ate a dog. But is that such a big deal?

No. Because both eat chicken, and that's worse or something, so it's a draw. Isn't it?

Isn't it?

These images (and the vastly more horrifying ones that emerged from a recent investigation into the dog-meat trade in China) are certainly jarring, but the fact of the matter is that the squeamishness and outrage that this subject seems to generate is somewhat misplaced. When I raised this issue with Matt Prescott, who is the Food Policy Director at the Humane Society of the United States, he brushed it off:

Abusing dogs for their meat is certainly horrible. Though itÂ’s important to note that the way chickens and pigs are abused on U.S. factory farms is also horrific, with animals crammed into tiny cages and crates, suffering immensely for much of their lives.

If that's the case, we should probably drop this whole obscure Indonesian dog meat issue and ask both the candidates about these pictures. I won't hold my breath.

Yes, we should drop this "obscure Indonesian dog meat issue" (in what way is it "obscure"? Dude ate a f***ing dog. What's wrong with your brain that you're having difficulty with this very simple fact set?) and focus on what really matters: Chicken.

And the chicken issue just happens to cut both ways but that's a coincidence.

Swearsies!

Meanwhile, PolitiFact, whose whole raison d'etre to declare things as "True," "Mostly True," "Misleading," or "Pants on Fire," claims in its headline that there is some question regarding the matter:

In context: Did Obama eat dog in Indonesia?

What the hell does "in context," in this context, mean? Dude either ate dog or he did not eat dog. There is not some context by which you'd say, "Well, he ate a dog, but in context, he didn't."

They quote from the book, attempting to add context, but placing the quote about eating dog where of course it should go -- at the end of the extended excerpt, buried under paragraphs of irrelevant material which all but beg of you, "Stop reading this and click over to the Huffington Post to find out if Kim Kardashian does butt stuff."

The paragraph that answers the question posed, dispositively, is placed at the bottom?

And then they refuse to answer whether it is "True," "False," or "Misleading" that Obama ate a dog. They just don't say either way. I don't really follow PolitiFact, but I have never seen a "Fact Check" in which they refused to render some verdict on the facts.

They refuse to do so here -- and to my admittedly limited knowledge, this is the very first time they've so refused.

And it's an easy question to answer. In his own voice, reading from the book that Bill Ayers wrote for him, Obama says he was "introduced" to dog, and found it "tough."

But PolitiFact leaves this as an unanswered question -- the headline question unanswered by the writer or the site -- as if this is a proposition over which reasonable minds might draw differing conclusions.

Is Obama lying when he says he ate a dog? I guess PolitiFact thinks maybe he is.

Meanwhile, while these pictures are horrifying, I do urge you to email around what cooked dog actually looks like.

It's not like you don't know you're eating dog. The heads are cooked intact, eyes and all.

It's not just like some meat in a stew.

More: When delving into the important question of whether Mike Huckabee ate squirrel, PolitiFact had no trouble in answering the charge as "True."

Suddenly they're confused about the meaning of the word "eat."

No Problem... Declaring the Seamus on the Roof story "Mostly True."

ht @will_antonin and @justkarl

Posted by: Ace at 08:42 AM | Comments (369)
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A lot of the supposedly "professional" news websites engage in traffic-whoring games. For example, posting lots of celebrity/sex stuff (Huffington Post), with computer-generated SEO headlines (also the Huffington Post).

Another game is the ludicrous trolling headline -- a headline designed to troll partisans from the other side.

See, look: Traffic is nonpartisan. Money is nonpartisan. Cranking up your hit count puts money in your pocket, even if you have to enlist partisans from the other side to do so.

So a game has emerged, especially on the left, of just writing the most absurd Troll Headline possible.

Please don't go over to Mediaite for this. Let's not play. But I will "credit," ahem, Tommy Christopher for his, ahem, "writing." And quote all you need to know of it.

Don't bother going over to comment about what a dickbag he is -- he knows he's a dickbag. He intends to be a dickbag. Being a dickbag gets him traffic and praise from his dickbag bosses.

If you want him to know he's a dickbag, don't worry, I'll tell him on Twitter later. And he responds, because he's always so afraid that They're all gonna laugh at you, they're all gonna laugh at you. If you have a good "You're a dickbag" comment, I'll pass it along to him.

Anyway, here's the risible troll headline:

Mitt Romney’s ‘Obama Isn’t Working’ Banner Evokes Racial Stereotypes

Let's note what we always note, and we always note it because it's true: This didn't occur to us. We weren't the ones whose minds immediately sprang to the notion that some minorities don't like working.

That was Tommy Christoper -- but he's not a racist, and you are.

We just thought it was a halfway decent linkage of several notions: 1, Obama actually doesn't work much, with his golf and his vacations, 2, the country isn't working much, due to Obama's policies, and 3, Obama's in over his head he's not working out.

But for Tommy Christopher -- the man who is so anti-racist he must become a raging racist for the Good of the Community -- immediately leaps at hoary stereotypes from the 1940s.

The slogan is a multiple entendre, but one of those entendres, intentionally or not, is evocative of a nasty racial stereotype about black men.

When I first saw the banner this afternoon, the multiple meanings were clear: President Obama‘s policies aren’t working, the Obama presidency isn’t working, President Obama…isn’t working, as in, doing any work.

Uh, obviously. This is what I just said. The obvious intended meaning.

ThatÂ’s not a nice thing to say about any president, but like it or not, it becomes a more loaded accusation when leveled at our first black president.

Why is it loaded?

Look, I don't happen to believe that a black person cannot be criticized. That is pure condescension, and all condescension is the result of a strong feeling of superiority.

This is the way you'd treat children or the mentally impaired.

Does Tommy Christopher think a black man -- even one who is serving as President of the United States of America -- must be condescended to as if he were a slow child?

Gold stars for the mental gimp?

I don't agree with this. I think this is every bit as racist as the cruder, more direct, and ultimately more honest ravings of Kluxer.

Tommy is instead dishonestly masquerading his transparent disdain for the capabilities of blacks in the guise of being "sensitive" and "anti-racist."

Here is how we treat normal, legally-competent people: We judge their job performance, we rate them, we criticize them.

If Obama, whether by race (as Tommy seems to think) or by lack of talent and intelligence, fails to rise to the level of "normal, legally-competent person whose performance can be judged as anyone else's might be," Obama cannot be President.

Sorry, that's a base-minimum qualification: If you're so incompetent that it is mean-spirited to say you're incompetent, you're too incompetent to hold the job in the first place.

As Obama said: "They talk about me as if I was a dog."

Just to be sure it wasnÂ’t just me, though, I asked several friends...

Oh, this should prove, scientifically, this is in no way a silly, racially condescending conceit.

...about the banner, and four out of four pointed out, unprompted, the stereotype of the “lazy,” “shiftless” black man. One of the people I called was cable news fixture Goldie Taylor, who, upon hearing my description of the banner, said “Are you kidding me? You have got to be kidding me.”

Complete side-point here, but there was once an age when we identified people by their skill-set or profession -- plumber, engineer, entrepreneur, cop -- rather than non-descriptors like "cable news fixture."

Kim Kardashian is a cable news fixture. This description doesn't really pin it down for me.

Wikiepedia says she's a "social critic," editor of a website called "The Grio," and, yes, a "cable news personality."

I guess I'm having trouble with that as a job descriptor -- "Personality."

Anyway, what is she a "fixture" on cable TV to talk about? I looked up her YouTube clips. First one, "the Racist Roots" of Trump's birth certificate charge. Third one, her wearing a hoodie while talking to Lawrence O'Donnell about Trayvon Martin, demanding that the Sanford Chief of Police be suspended for not arresting Zimmerman.

So: Her "social criticism" is pretty much just calling "RAAACIST" on everything.

And this is the person whose sage counsel Tommy Christopher sought out to make sure "it wasn't just him" thinking Romney was a racist.

Now, in a way, all the above is pointless; if he hadn't asked Goldie Taylor, he could have asked another bud like, I don't know, Matthew Yglesias, and would have, of course, got the same answer.

Pretty much all of Tommy Christopher's friends think exactly the same things, because, see, they're diverse.

I can't figure out if this stupidity is just Tommy Christopher being stupid and self-unaware as usual (it's true, Tommy-- as the unexamined life isn't worth living, unexamined thoughts aren't worth having), or if this is some kind of crafty Secondary Trolling beneath the Primary Trolling Layer.

Anyway.

One other observation here: Because the media is so liberal, a conservative really doesn't have to engage in gross overstatement and stupidity to seem different from the media. Just posting an unreported fact (like "Obama ate a dog") is enough to differentiate oneself from the media.

But if the media is liberal, as it is, what's a liberal troll like Tommy Christopher to do to get attention? He can't just say what the media is saying.

No, he's got to say things that are even 40% stupider than what the media's saying. To garner attention from a public already drowning in liberal bias, he needs to be extreme and, indeed, rather absurd.

Eh.

And yet people like Tommy Christopher and his Very Good Friend Goldie Taylor are acceptable voices as far as the media is concerned, but no one in the media will ever call me for a quote.

Because, see, I'm the one who's unreasonable, illogical, and partisan.

Bonus: You'll not be surprised to learn there might be some double-standards in play here. For when Obama made merry of Romney's use of the word "marvelous," Tommy Christopher asked, approvingly, gilddily: Did Obama Just Play the "White Guy" Card on Romney?

And s/he thought that was just TEH ROXXOR.

Posted by: Ace at 08:25 AM | Comments (146)
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Liberals are forever saying the rich want to pay higher taxes, they just aren't being "asked" to. They tend to ignore that the IRS doesn't refuse a little extra something in the check to help make things "fairer".

Massachusetts goes one step further...they have a voluntary higher tax rate people can elect to pay. Naturally, Elizabeth "We Need The Buffett Rule" Warren avails herself of that option, right?

Eliz Warren just confirmed she did not pay voluntary higher state income tax rate. "I did not make charitable contrib to state"

Liberals: Putting Your Money Where Their Mouth Is.

Via Jim Pethokoukis

In case you missed it yesterday, Warren also supports repealing the medical device tax in ObamaCare.

I love how much effort the left is putting into getting Warren elected. All that time, money and effort being spent to win a seat in Massachusetts of all places. Those are resources that won't be spent in battleground states that we need to win. That the GOP is likely to keep that seat is just icing on the cake.

Posted by: DrewM at 07:53 AM | Comments (155)
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