You think it's a double post, but it's not. I fooled you.

And then-- and then I said, "The police acted stupidly!"

Just an update: When the Washington Post mentioned, in that last article I linked, that Obama was meeting with "black leaders"... well, I didn't read to the end, where they kinda-sorta buried the fact he was meeting in NYC to celebrate Al Sharpton.

"It proves again that 2012 will be very different than 2008," said Larry Sabato of the University of Virginia. "Then, Obama was very wary of the race issue and of being labeled as a 'black candidate.'"

"But some of the enthusiasm surrounding that election has faded," said Sabato. "He needs an injection of energy and Sharpton can provide some of that, at least in the black community."

It's all about black turnout, of course, because a key segment of Obama's victory coalition -- a good performance among working-class whites -- has turned against him pretty sharply.

So: Obama's courting the sort of racist bomb-throwers he avoided in 2008 (in his effort to appear post-racial).

And he's doing this -- working on 2012 turnout -- when something he declares is a dire crisis is about to occur.

Obama For President

In 2008, I voted "Present."

In 2012, I'm voting "Absent."

Thanks to Lemmiwinks for that -- that is a very sharp and smart way to put it.

Posted by: Ace at 07:31 AM | Comments (158)
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President Priorities.

A fiery President Obama insisted Tuesday that if he and congressional leaders couldn’t reach a deal to avert a government shutdown, “I want a meeting again tomorrow here at the White House.”

“I will invite the same folks that we invited today,” he added. “And if that doesn’t work, we’ll invite them again the day after that. And I will have my entire team available to work through the details of getting a deal done.”

ObamaÂ’s team may not include the president himself. Despite the impasse in Washington over federal spending, the president as of early Wednesday was scheduled to give two speeches outside of Washington: one on energy in the Philadelphia suburbs, then another Wednesday evening to a group of black political activists in New York.

Yesterday Jonah Goldberg made the necessary-but-kinda-obvious point that Obama's strategy is to be the invisible man. He's a nonstop FAIL machine, so the least seen, the better he can avoid being associated with all the FAIL he's making.

Obama's ducking out of town seems to indicate he believes the government will shutdown, and he wants to therefore not be closely associated with the process. Apparently he's counting on the public sort of forgetting that maybe he has a role in this and is not, as he implied in his press conference yesterday, merely a referee or mediator between the Congress and the Senate, the Republicans and the Democrats.

Asked if his fakey budget faked a lot of fake cuts, he said to a reporter: "Ask the Democrats," who, he implied, were upset about it and so that proves it's not fake cuts. But notice that he referred to the Democrats as if they were outsiders, as if he was referring to a group beyond his control. As if he'd been asked if the rebels in Libya planned to re-take Sitra. "Ask the rebels."

He's talking about "the Democrats" as if he were asked about the NFL lockout and was just as frustrated about the situation as any concerned fan.

So he's distancing himself. He wants to pretend that this is entirely about other people and all he is is a concerned citizen, just like you and me, throwing up his hands in frustration that these Washington insiders can't run the country. He shares your pain -- and also, your powerlessness to directly influence events.

That's what he wants you to know. What can he do? After all, he's just a President. He has nothing to do with budgets and partisan deadlocks and such.

I can almost hear him making excuses in a smarmy Phil Hartman voice. "Your strange world, with continuing resolutions and fiscal quarters, amazes and confuses me... What do I know? I'm just an Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer."

So, as government shuts down, he'll be out of town. See, man, I wasn't even there. While more responsible politicians are preparing gutsy and wise plans for the future, Obama's merely preparing... an alibi.

Posted by: Ace at 07:16 AM | Comments (71)
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I won't keep updating as we already had one thread today and the tallies are likely to keep changing.

What a shock, though, that these late votes being discovered and hand-counted just happen to go to the Democrat.

Posted by: Ace at 07:00 AM | Comments (216)
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The big news yesterday was the release of GOP Congressman Paul Ryan's "Path to Prosperity" budget proposal. Ace Of Spades' very own Geoff posted his thoughts here; mine are pretty much the same. It's the best plan we are likely to see out of any politician, so I support it wholeheartedly. It's also been received favorably in most conservative quarters. I don't think it comes anywhere near to solving our basic fiscal and economic problems, but as Geoff said, it's a necessary but not sufficient step in that direction. (A link to Ryan's presser can be found here, and the PDF of the report itself can be found here.)

The United States Postal Service has been on life-support for as long as I can remember. If it were truly a for-profit business (as they like to pretend), they'd have gone out of business long since. However, since they are not really a for-profit business but a government-supported tax-dollar sink-hole (just like Fannie and Freddie), Uncle Sam will probably end up spending billions of dollars keeping them from collapsing.

Annals of the boned: Gov. Jerry BrownÂ’s pension reforms amount to a mousefart in a hurricane. Which was inevitable, really -- Brown gave birth to the public-sector unions in California, and they look out for each other.

Speaking of ranking members of the Loyal Order of the Terminally Boned (LOTB) -- Illinois is working hard to beat Calli across the FAIL finish line.

CalPERS adopts the “George Costanza apology” to apologize for embezzlement and fraud: “Was that wrong? Were we not supposed to do that?”

Dingy Harry keeps getting poked in the eye by John Boehner. Perhaps he will write some federally-subsidized cowboy poetry about it.

This story conforms to my anecdotal experience as well: Indian and Chinese technical-college degrees are often not worth the paper theyÂ’re laser-printed on. (But to be fair, the same can be said of many American colleges.)

And finally, here's why austerity measures in the Emerald Isle may not work without getting rid of the Euro and going back to a sovereign currency: Ireland's economy has shurnk for the third straight year. The normal path here for most countries in this bind is to devalue the currency and/or default on the bond debt, but Ireland can't do either right now. I fully expect a default at some point, but I'm not sure how much good that will do unless they also cast off the Euro.

[UPDATE]: (Via Insty) A tale of two Americas: Public vs Private Employees.

[UPDATE 2]: On the Ryan plan, Mish Shedlock says, "No sir, I don't like it."

[UPDATE 3]: DOOOOOOOM!

[UPDATE 4]: It's like getting punched in the face and kicked in the nuts.
more...

Posted by: Monty at 05:06 AM | Comments (167)
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Here's the latest. 99 percent of ballots have been counted. Prosser has 733,074 votes. Kloppenburg has 732,489.

Folks, that is, as we say in the election game, inside the margin of fraud. Police guarded the ballots overnight, but that doesn't really reassure. Would this be the same police that stood by and did nothing while union thugs tore up recall ballots aimed at Democrats?

The final tally should be up sometime today. At that point, either candidate can request a recount and, considering how close and contentious this race has been, why wouldn't they? After that comes the litigation phase of the election, which could conceivably end in the Wisconsin Supreme Court. That's probably the most obvious reason why Supreme Court justices---or any judges, really---shouldn't be elected.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 03:04 AM | Comments (326)
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Thank you, Mario...but our princess is in another castle!

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 02:45 AM | Comments (37)
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From the news-morons-can-use department comes: How to Pee in Public

Listen up all you young whippersnappers - dudes have been going in public for millions of years so you might want to take a few lessons on technique from your elders. Well unless you enjoy getting urinating in public citations.

Remember that you are either the master of your bladder or its slave. But if you truly learn these techniques and the mental disciplines behind them, you'll be able to whizz anytime, anywhere no matter how many opponents you face. But like magic the key is always misdirection - while they're busy watching your middle finger, you're busy adding their car to your own territory.

Now get off my freshly-marked lawn.

Posted by: Maetenloch at 06:24 PM | Comments (428)
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Don't have a heart attack yet.

But I do expect to lose.

I think my feelings can best be summed up by the character Meat Loaf, expressing his deep frustrations to the character Gary Busey, in Tennessee Williams' The Celebrity Apprentice 3.

You took my motherf***in' sponges.

Yes, yes you motherf***ing did.

Two interesting facts: Meat Loaf is actually a conservative, and Gary Busey is sexually obsessed with improperly-cooked pork.

No link on that last one; you'll just have to take my word for it. I just get that "vibe."

Posted by: Ace at 05:21 PM | Comments (2028)
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Oh I'm totally joking. She stabbed a guy.

Mangum, 32, is charged with assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill inflicting serious injury. She is being held without bond.

Investigators believe that Mangum stabbed her 46-year-old boyfriend in the torso during a dispute, police spokeswoman Kammie Michael told CBS affiliate WRAL.

We have no hint yet of her defense, but legal analysts agree it will probably involve group rape.

Daye told officers that Mangum stabbed him on his left side and took his money...

Well, maybe she feared the guy was going to gang rape the money. She's a hero.

That last quote from here.

Posted by: Ace at 04:55 PM | Comments (124)
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The scare quotes are there because this is not really a response to the specifics in Ryan's plan. It's more a mash-up of the general Democrat talking points that always come up when Republicans talk about spending cuts.

The President believes that dramatically reducing AmericaÂ’s long-term deficit is essential to growing our economy and winning the future...Any plan to reduce our deficit must reflect the American values of fairness and shared sacrifice. Congressman RyanÂ’s plan fails this test. It cuts taxes for millionaires and special interests while placing a greater burden on seniors who depend on Medicare or live in nursing homes, families struggling with a child who has serious disabilities, workers who have lost their health care coverage, and students and their families who rely on Pell grants.

How generic is this statement? The Democrats could reuse this ad, with basically the same message: more...

Posted by: Slublog at 02:12 PM | Comments (299)
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