And how will Senator Bob Casey vote?

Correction: Whoops, botched that. I thought Johanns was a Democrat and wrote the headline that way. He's a Republican.

I also got his name wrong.

Apart from that, I stand behind everything I previously wrote.

Posted by: Ace at 03:37 PM | Comments (64)
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Silver bullet, AHFF Geoff says.

Under health-care reform legislation pending in Congress, the task force's recommendations would be used to help determine the basic coverage that insurance companies would need to offer for preventive services. But task force officials said that played no role in the panel's decision and costs were never considered. In fact, the task force decided to review the mammography guidelines and completed the bulk of its work years before the presidential election and the reform push, Ned Calonge, the panel's chairman, said in an interview.

...

A top federal health official said Wednesday that the controversial new guidelines for breast cancer screening do not represent government policy, as the Obama administration sought to keep the debate over mammograms from undermining the prospects for health-care reform.

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, in a written statement, said the new guidelines had "caused a great deal of confusion and worry among women and their families across this country," and she stressed that they were issued by "an outside independent panel of doctors and scientists who . . . do not set federal policy and . . . don't determine what services are covered by the federal government."

Um, yes, but when government has taken over health-care, and is scrambling to "bend the curve" to reduce costs so that it can pay for 40 million new clients, the task force's determinations will become government policy.

Posted by: Ace at 03:01 PM | Comments (546)
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But I don't know if I trust this stuff -- after all, AllahPundit is notorious for cherry-picking only happy, upbeat news to report.

Palin's favorables remain kind of weak -- remember, Obama's got something like a 56-60% personal favorability rating, depending on the poll; and yet his actual approval rate, as in job approval, is at least ten point lower.

It's good that her favorability rating is climbing, now up to a very ehhh 47-42. But John McCain got creamed in an election with a favorability rating of like 56% or something.

On the other hand...

[Obama's] possible opponent in the 2012 elections trails him in personal favorability by only seven points (54 percent to 47 percent). Among the critical segment of independent voters, they are virtually even (Obama at 50 percent; Palin at 49 percent).

Allah notes the poll is a bit skewed towards Republicans (for once!), but that independent segment should be unaffected by that.

Still, personal favorability, while meaningful, is just not the same as "I'd vote for her."

Meanwhile, a Kos poll says Rubio is on Crist's heels. And Kos thinks Crist is done as a Republican candidate, for what that's worth.

Done as a Republican candidate, that is. We now have to worry he'll run as an Independent, or even -- as Kos urges -- a Democrat.

And I suspect we will hear of some exploration of these possibilities, confirming Republicans' worst fears about him.

Posted by: Ace at 01:46 PM | Comments (361)
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Pretty serious stuff.

Republican Commissioner Judith Peck refused to speculate on whether the code that governs the counts could have been tampered with. She indicated that "as far as I know, the machine in question was not functioning properly and was repaired" by the technician.

Commissioners in other counties have stated that they were not made aware of the virus issue in Hamilton County. In Jefferson County, inspectors from four districts claim that "human error" resulted in their "mistakenly" entering 0 votes for Hoffman in several districts, resulting in Owens leading Jefferson County on election night though the recanvas of the computer counts now show that Hoffman is leading. Jefferson County has not conducted a manual paper ballot recount.

In St. Lawrence County, machines in Louisville, Waddington, Claire, and Rossie "broke" early in the voting process on election day. Republican Commissioner Deborah Pahler said that the machines kept "freezing up... like Windows does all the time," and that they experienced several paper jams as well. The voted ballots that could not be scanned were placed in an Emergency Lock Box and re-scanned later at the St. Lawrence County Board of Elections. Election officials in St. Lawrence County were given no advance knowledge of a potential virus in the system.

At least one County official thus far has raised concern that it's possible that ALL of the machines used in the NY-23 election had the 'virus' but only a few malfunctioned as a result. The counts from any district that used the ImageCast machines are suspect due to "the virus" discovered in Hamilton County, last-minute "reprogramming" by Dominion workers, and security flaws in the systems themselves. A manual paper-ballot recount of the vote could resolve computer vote accuracy questions.

Given the virus, and given the four "human error" tallies of zero votes for Hoffman, how can they possibly resist a full manual recount?

Drew predicted this would happen with these new machines, didn't he?

Remember the idiocy of people demanding computerized balloting machines in the wake of Bush v. Gore? Remember how transparently stupid that was, even at the time, to anyone who gave it more than three seconds thought?

People become utterly stupid when they get into herd/riot mode.

Via Jim Treacher's Twitter.

It's Over? Hoffman trails by more votes than there are left to be counted.

Ah, but there's always that hail Mary of a recount.

But... yeah, it's kind of over.

Posted by: Ace at 12:50 PM | Comments (279)
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We know this as a general matter. But to me it's significant that we can start seeing who specifically is in jeopardy due to ObamaCare.

If you're a soldier charging a hill, it's one thing to know that your group will take, say, 30% casualties. It's a different thing if you know in advance that you, specifically, will be one of the dead of war.

Blanche Lincoln is on notice that it won't be just some other soldiers dying on that hill, but she herself.

A Zogby Poll this week illustrates the stark choice facing Senate Democrats as they have to decide whether or not to vote for ObamaCare. The poll shows that Arkansas Sen. Blanche Lincoln, high up on the list of vulnerable Senate Democrats seeking reelection in 2010, literally faces a choice between being reelected and voting for the bill.

The Zogby Poll shows Arkansans opposed to the Obama/Reid bill by 28-64, with 50 percent "strongly opposed" to the legislation. To swim in the face of such a current of public opinion is risky business for a U.S. senator.

Lincoln's most likely Republican opponent, state Sen. Gilbert Bennett, is hot on her heels in the poll, trailing by only 41-39. But asked who they would support if Lincoln votes for ObamaCare, Arkansas voters switch to Bennett, giving him a 49-36 victory. That Lincoln goes from two points ahead to 13 points behind over one Senate vote illustrates the potency of the opposition to healthcare changes.

It has to be noted that this poll was specifically commissioned by a group, the League of Voters, hoping to use the poll to lobby senators to vote against the legislation. Still, it's a reputable polling firm; Zogby has incentive to add his secret sauce, but there are limits to what he can do.

Meanwhile, Rasmussen and Fox both show Obama's approval at 46%. That is an all-time low for the Fox poll, which has generally found middling-to-high support for Obama, compared to other polls. It's not a poll that has been stacked against him.

Posted by: Ace at 12:34 PM | Comments (174)
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Vid at Newsbusters; I'll just quote some of the transcript.

"This is a largely white -- almost no minorities in this crowd," reported MSNBC's O'Donnell live from the scene.

Matthews reiterated, "Well, they look like a white crowd to me," later claiming, "I think there is a tribal aspect to this thing, in other words, white vs. other people."

Liberals are fond of claiming their thinking is more nuanced, more multidimensional, more wide-ranging, than conservatives' thinking.

So why is it at every opportunity they indulge in retarded reductivism and reduce everything to the single variable of racism?

People don't want to give up their health care? Must be racism.

People don't want to pay more in taxes? Must be racism.

People don't want to import millions of new needy poor which they are then obligated to support through social welfare? Must be racism.

Racism, racism, racism. There seem to be no other variables in this equation or inputs in this program.

But they are more nuanced, and can think in three dimensions, and possess better "negative capability."

Posted by: Ace at 11:40 AM | Comments (450)
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Lotta sub-50% polls recently.

And on health care?

Overall 49% of voters express approval of ObamaÂ’s work with 46% disapproving. He has the support of 83% of Democrats, 47% of independents, and 10% of Republicans.

...

Hurting ObamaÂ’s overall reviews is that for the first time in our polling we find a
majority of Americans opposed to his health care plan. 40% say they support it with 52% opposed, including 58% of independents.

“This is the first time President Obama’s approval rating has dropped below 50% in our polling,” said Dean Debnam, President of Public Policy Polling. “It does seem that the health care issue is hurting him some with independents who voted for him last year.”

Gallup just emailed me: Maybe people actually approve of his health-care plan but are registering disapproval of a hypothetical future Republican filibuster of the plan.

Related: 76% of Californians oppose the proposed reduction in mammograms.

Not a good data-point for a president proposing cutting a whole swath of "unnecessary" testing.

Thanks to AHFF Geoff again.

Posted by: Ace at 11:19 AM | Comments (58)
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Obvious, but nice to have an official non-partisan analysis.

Actually, the whole thing is a pack of lies in the first place. I can't repeat enough that the same behavior with the doc-fix -- forever delaying/suspending supposedly-required "cuts" -- will happen here with the five or six hundred billion dollars in "cuts" that the Democrats are supposedly proposing to keep costs down.

And if those cuts do occur -- congratulations, seniors are now being denied care on a routine basis.

Which would mean Democrats would be out of office in two years.

The whole point of this lie is to pass the plan in small pieces. Oh look, if we just pass ObamaCare and the doc-fix, with the cuts proposed, it only costs us a hundred billion or so.

What's that? It's not fair that seniors got their care reduced? Okay, we'll pass a "fix" for that. We'll delay those cuts by a year. It will only cost us $60 billion to do that... for a single year.

Oh it's next year again? Oh let's suspend those cuts. It's only another $60 billion, after all.

And on, and on, and on. For ten years, for twenty years, for forty years. The "bend the curve" cuts that supposedly kept this from being a budget-busting extravagance will never happen, and therefore it is a budget-busting extravagance from day one, and people should know that.

They're just trying to avoid sticker-shock by refusing to give you the total costs up-front. Instead you're promised one price, but they know damn well they'll be extracting another trillion from you in smaller bites.

Sure, this car only costs $15,000. It's a steal.

Oh -- you wanted an engine? There's an additional fee for that. Engines aren't standard in this car.

You wanted tires, too? Well, Mr. Sinatra, I didn't know you were in town. I didn't know you'd want all the "extras." Okay, I can give you some tires too at the low, low price of $500 per.

Etc.

Posted by: Ace at 11:07 AM | Comments (219)
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Ouch. The trouble with this sort of statement -- even though I agree with it -- is that it's hard for even a hack like me to explain why this statement is unobjectionable while Dingy Harry's "The war is lost" statement is noxious.

And yet: It is. Thompson is saying this to spur President Present into action, while Dingy Harry was urging only defeat.

"It really doesn't matter how President Obama divides the Afghan baby, how he splits the difference between McChrystal and Biden. Because the war has been lost," Thompson said on his radio show today. "I say this because of one sad and simple fact. The president does not have the will and determination to do what's necessary to win it. His heart's not in it, and never has been. The Taliban knows it. Al Qaeda knows it. Our allies know it. And the American people know it.

"Our enemies are now emboldened and our friends are discouraged. We cannot prevail if the American people are not willing to make the sacrifices necessary for an extended effort. The case has not been made to them to justify this effort. The case can only be made by the president. This president is unable or unwilling to make that case," Thompson said.

I can see the spin: Even conservatives like Fred Thompson say the war is lost, so Obama of course should surrender.

Posted by: Ace at 10:48 AM | Comments (191)
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Police suspected she was DUI due to her high-beams being on in inappropriate situations. (NSFW explanation of high beams, here.)

Senator John Kerry's daughter, Alexandra Forbes Kerry, was arrested early this morning on suspicion of DUI ... law enforcement sources tell TMZ.

It went down in Hollywood at 12:40 AM. Alexandra, a 36-year-old film producer and director, was pulled over for a traffic stop, then arrested and booked at LAPD's Hollywood station. She was released at 5:25 AM.

Cops tell us Alexandra violated a traffic law which got their attention. They then conducted a field sobriety test and it appeared she was under the influence of an intoxicant. She was then placed under arrest. At that point, cops asked her to take a preliminary alcohol screening test in the field, but she refused.

Cops took her to the station and then conducted a formal blood alcohol test which showed a level of .06. Under California law, the legal limit is .08, but a driver can still be prosecuted -- even under a .08 reading -- if the vehicle is being operated unsafely due to alcohol.

Because she's a Democrat, she can expect her legal troubles to come without paparrazzi coverage and months-long smearing of her. She gets to live a human life, in other words.

Must be nice.

Posted by: Ace at 10:07 AM | Comments (179)
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