Really?

The poll itself says the public opposes ObamaCare, 47% against, 40% in favor.

So how the hell did it get that headline?

Well... they compared Obama's approval rating (a mere 52%) to the approval rating for Republicans in Congress.

That is, of course, apples and oranges, because Congress as a body (or a subset of that body) always gets very low ratings. Further, that question is not really about health care.

The major news here seems to be, as Qunnipiac itself declared in Sentence One:

American voters oppose 47 - 40 percent President Barack Obama's health care reform plan, and don't want an overhaul that only gets Democratic votes...

A Pew poll, by the way, finds even lower support for ObamaCare, with the same 47% opposition, but a mere 34% support.

But Bloomberg News thinks the public favors Obama.

Karl Rove disagrees.

Passing health-care reform could be harmful to the health of congressional Democrats.

Just look at how President Barack Obama's standing has fallen as he has pushed for reform. According to Fox News surveys, the number of independents who oppose health-care reform hit 57% at the end of September, up from 33% in July. Independents are generally a quarter of the vote in off-year congressional elections.

Among college graduates, opposition to health-care reform is now 50%, while only 33% support it, according to Gallup's Sept. 24 poll. College graduates are slightly more than a quarter of the off-year electorate.

Among seniors, opposition to ObamaCare hit 63% in last month's Economist/YouGov Poll. But the number from that poll that should spook Democrats is this: 47% of seniors said they "strongly" oppose health-care reform, just 27% "strongly" support it. Seniors are the biggest consumers of health care, and their family members will probably take their concerns seriously. Seniors will likely cast about 20% of the votes next year.

The trend behind these numbers is that voters are turning away from Democrats.

Dude, you're wrong. Bloomberg News Service assures me the public favors the plan.

In Fairness... I should note that the Qunnipiac poll finds 61% support for a public option, which frankly I don't understand. I think it's the wording.

By the Way: Quinnipiac has Obama's support virtually unchanged since last month at 50-41. (Last month he was 50-42.)

Which is cowbell-worthy.
more...

Posted by: Ace at 02:29 PM | Comments (117)
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Active Voice: Obama Urges Greater Civility

Passive Voice: Deficit Triples from 2008 to 2009

Damn that deficit, tripling itself like that.

$1.4 trillion this year, by the way, in case you missed it yesterday.

Bush's budget-busting super-deficit? $459 billion his last year.

Posted by: Ace at 02:06 PM | Comments (48)
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Neatly disobligating us from fighting them.

Jim Geraghty wonders if Obama would have been elected peddling this line -- "The Taliban is not our enemy" -- rather than posturing as a Kill-Crazy Super-Commando ready to wade into Waziristan and collect Taliban ears for his trophy-necklace.

Answer: No.

The other spin -- this from Kerry and other liberals -- is that it's a "false dichotomy" to claim the options are either trying to win the war through, um, trying to win it, or bugging out completely.

This is dangerous and cynical. They don't want to be seen as bugging out, so they're going to leave our troops in the meat-grinder without any actual intention to resource and reinforce them and give them a chance at actually accomplishing anything besides defending the Democratic Party's interests.

Disgusting.

If Obama wants to lose the war that must be won, as he used to declare hourly -- which he plainly does -- he should do our troops the courtesy of removing them from harm's way completely, rather that letting them twist in the wind in a war he's already decided to lose.

As John Kerry once asked -- "Who wants to be the last man to die for a lie?"

He ought to ask himself and our gutless worm of a president that question anew.

Posted by: Ace at 01:48 PM | Comments (125)
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Looks pretty damn good to me.

Via Gay Patriot.

PS: Compare to Obama's plan, as reported by The Onion.

Easy call, really.

Posted by: Ace at 01:36 PM | Comments (53)
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Well, no one said this proves global warming all the more. (Well, who knows -- someone probably did. Or will.)

Instead, they just don't bother reporting it.

What do they report? Well, they cherry-pick localized instances of greater-than-normal melting, while studiously ignoring that globally, this is the lowest level of melt ever recorded. Like so:

NASA Researcher Finds Days of Snow Melting on the Rise in Greenland

“In 2006, Greenland experienced more days of melting snow and at higher altitudes than average over the past 18 years, according to a new NASA-funded project using satellite observations….”

NASA Finds Greenland Snow Melting Hit Record High in High Places

“A new NASA-supported study reports that 2007 marked an overall rise in the melting trend over the entire Greenland ice sheet and, remarkably, melting in high-altitude areas was greater than ever at 150 percent more than average. In fact, the amount of snow that has melted this year over Greenland is the equivalent of more than twice the surface size of the U.S…”

Melting on the Greenland Ice Cap, 2008

“The northern fringes of Greenland’s ice sheet experienced extreme melting in 2008, according to NASA scientist Marco Tedesco and his colleagues.”

Oh, the northern fringes of Greenland? The northern fringes of Greenland? Like someone said,* "The northern fringes of Greenland are the fulcrum upon which the world turns."

Dicks.

Science.

Thanks to NormanS.

* That someone was, of course, Keith Olbermann, reporting live from the Medieval Courts of Chancery.

Posted by: Ace at 01:32 PM | Comments (32)
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You know in that earlier post? I said that just keeping this on the "he said a dirty word" level turns people off?

Well, as proof I offer this, wherein the Washington Post, which has been all but outright campaigning for Creigh Deeds, whines about Sheila Johnson being like a "nasty" Mean Girl in high school for poking fun of Deeds' lack of ability to articulate answers (especially as regards his moment-to-moment position on taxes).

Yes, she imitates the stammer he does when confronted with his tax-happy incoherence. So what?

If you read this and think "Oh, nut up Washington Post, and stop cryin' to mama every time you get your widdle feelings hurt," well, that's the sort of thing I'm warning against when we get too ticky-tack and yelly about our opposition calling us bad names.

The charges have to be addressed -- but in a way that speaks to something larger than you see on display here.

Should Ms. Johnson have mimicked the stammer? No, she shouldn't have. It's the sort of insult that insults far more people than the intended target.

But should people change their votes and vote for Creigh Deeds based on a McDonnell ally being mean, as the WaPo plainly wishes? Of course not. It's stupid, it's whiny, and it sounds like a kid screaming "Billy hit me and you didn't punish him so you should give me a cookie!"

Posted by: Ace at 01:10 PM | Comments (41)
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I do not understand why this freak is popular.

I have a suspicion, but it's a bit demeaning to older women. My theory is that he gets ratings for the same reason Pat Sajak was popular. He seems like a nice young man, handsome in a bland and non-threatening way, with a twinkle in his eyes.

The sort of guy who appeals to grandmas, in other words. (No offense to grandmas, but I get this sense.)

And no offense to Pat Sajak, who is, as you probably know, a pretty strong conservative.

But this guy is full-on liberal and full-on liberal activist, too. I remember his condescending statements on global warming -- "It's re-e-al....!" he said with a sing-song lilt as he went to break.

No doubt, there's a lot of editorializing at FoxNews. (Almost as much as they have at CNN, but nowhere near the amount they have at MSNBC.) But when critics talk of FoxNews' editorializing, they always overlook the hardcore liberal Shep Smith's constant editorializing.

Shep Smith fancies himself a major talent and is positioning himself to get a huge new contract with another network when he departs Fox. Fine. Man's got to eat.

But why we conservatives continue to give this jagoff ratings I don't understand. more...

Posted by: Ace at 12:03 PM | Comments (175)
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Two really good articles I've been derelict in linking.

The common theme? Nothing much changes in politics. The immediate point is that the crying over the "unprecedented" assault on President Prissypants is pretty damn well precedented, and so too is the eternal clash of the populist and elitists forces in politics.

Here's one of those standard type openings which surprise nobody as to the second-paragraph surprise, but it's effective nonetheless:

A young physician refers to the president of the United States as "the crackpot in Washington who is ruining the country." A businessman decries his "socialistic tendencies," another denounces him as a "despot." A banker claims the president is wrecking the banking system. The Republican Party proclaims National Debt Week and reminds Americans that deficit spending is passing a mountain of debt onto future generations. It is, one prominent Republican maintains, "the crime of the century."

Shock, shock, he's not talking about Obama, but you knew that. But still very interesting. Wake up, leftist racism-baiters -- this country was very divided about socialism in the 1930s under a white president, too, and we're not united in the socialist cause just because we have a black president now.

Obviously, there's an awful lot of racism and racial condescension balled up in that assumption by the left -- Gee, we have a black president now, people have to support what they have never supported before just because he is black. Otherwise we'll hurt his feelings, and you know how these people get when their feelings are hurt.

What? Huh? We've come a long way from MLKJr.

And then there is the centuries (millenia?) old clash of the elitists and populists:

Populism is the belief that the people should rule themselves. It is the opposite of elitism (or progressivism), which holds that society should be ruled by a credentialed elite - by those who come from the right families or went to Ivy League schools or who have big money or political influence. As Thomas Jefferson noted:

"Men by their constitutions are naturally divided into two parties: 1. Those who fear and distrust the people, and wish to draw all powers from them into the hands of the higher classes. 2. Those who identify themselves with the people, have confidence in them, cherish and consider them as the most honest and safe, although not the most wise depository of the public interests.

"In every country these two parties exist, and in every one where they are free to think, speak, and write, they will declare themselves. Call them . . . by whatever name you please, they are the same parties still, and pursue the same object."

The battle-lines in American politics today are drawn between liberals, the would-be aristocrats who would control every aspect of our lives, and conservatives, who represent the interests and values of most Americans and who believe that people should be free. In that conflict, intellectuals and non-intellectuals will be among those picking up their pitchforks.

Some even suggest that this struggle dates all the way back to the Medieval Courts of Chancery.*

* Gibberish I threw in to make fun of Keith Olbermann, still showing off the fancy-pants learnin' he got from Cowflop College.

Posted by: Ace at 11:10 AM | Comments (183)
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We'll get right on that. Agenda Item Number One.

There are plenty of needy countries at the U.N. climate talks in Bangkok that make the case they need financial assistance to adapt to the impacts of global warming. Then there are the Saudis.

Saudi Arabia has led a quiet campaign during these and other negotiations — demanding behind closed doors that oil-producing nations get special financial assistance if a new climate pact calls for substantial reductions in the use of fossil fuels.

...

“We are among the economically vulnerable countries,” Al Sabban told The Associated Press...

Saudi Arabia is projected to make $23 trillion more in oil over the next few years than they've made in recent yars, even with this climate-pact nonsense. They call these projections "biased."

Posted by: Ace at 10:31 AM | Comments (84)
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Like seeks like.

France’s new culture minister, Frédéric Mitterrand, who has defended the filmmaker Roman Polanski against extradition charges for statutory rape, was attacked on Wednesday for his admission in a 2005 autobiography, “The Bad Life,” that he “got into the habit” of paying “young boys” for sex in Southeast Asia despite “the sordid details of this traffic.”

...

[Mitterand's own quote:] "All these rituals of the market for youths, the slave market excited me enormously Â… the abundance of very attractive and immediately available young boys put me in a state of desire."

Mitterand has caused a furore (British spelling, yo -- I'm so classy!!!) in France and now says when he wrote about "young boys" he meant "men" and that he certainly didn't mean children.

Which is odd, given that Southeast Asia is known for child-sex tourism and that, um, "young boys" generally does not mean "men."

I believe the French word for "men" is, um, "men." But in French. Hommes. (Classy part II!!!!)

Posted by: Ace at 10:21 AM | Comments (82)
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