When you are running for re-election, you try to expand the map if you've had a great first term.

If you don't, then you are on defense.

That said: more...

Posted by: CAC at 03:19 PM | Comments (134)
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Introduction (from his website)

My name is Lee Anderson. I am a conservative farmer and family man who is running for Congress for two simple reasons – to balance the budget and send John Barrow and Barack Obama back home. It's time to get back to the basics and get America back on track. Barack Obama is a socialist who is destroying our great country and John Barrow, despite all his political spin, is one of Obama's biggest enablers. If we return to the common sense, conservative principles that made our country great, we can restore the American Dream once again. If you believe in common sense, conservative, hometown values, I ask for your support.

Opponent:
Anderson is running to unseat Congressman John Barrow who is seeking a 5th term. Barrow is the typical “Blue Dog” Democrat who talks a good game back home but votes with the Democrats in Washington on a number of key issues.

The Club for Growth has the story on Barrow:

Representative John Barrow is not the most liberal Blue Dog, but he's definitely one of the most shifty members. He voted against ObamaCare, but refused to repeal the disastrous individual mandate when given a chance. He voted against TARP, but refused to later repeal it when also given a chance. He's bad on earmarks, fails to uphold PAYGO, and supported the Stimulus and the Auto and Fannie/Freddie bailouts. Hiding behind a Blue Dog guise, Barrow is a true liberal on economic issues.

The District:
It went pretty strongly for Obama but the Cook PVI has it as D+1.
Republicans are pushing Anderson as part of their “Young Guns” program so they must think the newly drawn lines give them a shot.

The Race:
Both campaigns have recently released polls showing them with narrow leads. But given that Barrow won in the 2010 tsunami year by double digits, the fact that heÂ’s boasting an internal poll showing a 4 point lead indicates the race is tight and very, very winnable.

If youÂ’re in the area and can volunteer or want to donate, visit the campaignÂ’s website.

Posted by: DrewM at 02:16 PM | Comments (129)
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Per Kimball Political, reported here.

PDF here.

One caveat- he deliberately used Gallup's D/R/I split in weighting the sample- R+1. Adjusted to match more Democratic samples, it would still give Romney a substantial lead.

Posted by: CAC at 01:28 PM | Comments (212)
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He claims "always" at least.

Even if it's just three or four times, it's pretty funny.

[KELLY LYNCH:] Every time Road House is on and he or one of his idiot brothers are watching TV — and they’re always watching TV — one of them calls my husband and says [In a reasonable approximation of Carl Spackler], “Kelly’s having sex with Patrick Swayze right now. They’re doing it. He’s throwing her against the rocks.” [Away from the receiver.] What? Oh, my God. Mitch was just walking out the door to the set, and he said that Bill once called him from Russia.

That's f'n' funny.

via @kenwheaton

Posted by: Ace at 01:05 PM | Comments (110)
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Hillary's statement was about as spontaneous as the Benghazi attack itself.

SHEPARD SMITH: To suggest that that was not a coordinated roll out of that event prior to this debate today, wouldnÂ’t that be a little bit disingenuous?

JEN PSAKI: Look, I’m always genuine with you. You just said that. Look, the Secretary of State had a foreign trip, she often does interviews–she said exactly what the vice president said last week, which is, he wasn’t aware

Ah. So her statement dovetailed with Biden's roll-out.

Yeah. Off the cuff. You've sold me.

Someone on Twitter cracked: "Jen Psaki based her claim on talking points provided to her by the intelligence community."

Posted by: Ace at 12:42 PM | Comments (166)
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As you might know, I've been pushing the idea of a preference cascade in Romney's favor for a long time. Stace McCain was just talking about it.

When asked if I still believed in it, I've said, prior to Romney's debate bounce, that while I still believed it, it was getting harder and harder to believe it without supporting evidence.

But that's because I missed something.

A preference cascade occurs when a substantial number of people are falsifying their preferences -- not just in public declarations, but also, more importantly, to themselves. They accept a Narrative promoted by a ubiquitous taste-maker that sets the terms of discussion and also attaches either a social credit to preferences in line with its own, or a social demerit to preferences contrary to its preferences.

Swamped by this ubiquitous, always chattering, always nagging Narrative -- pushed by the media, of course -- many people succumb to the bandwagon effect, and begin not so much accepting the Narrative as surrendering it to it.

Humans have a strong inclination to prefer the path of least resistance. And if you think about it, that's a pretty smart play. Humans generally take the easiest path when they're walking -- they don't go wildly out of their way to find hills to climb. If there's a nice, easy, level paved road, they take it.

And that's not crazy or "weak." That's just common sense.

The media is a superhighway of spin determined to make voting Democratic the path of least resistance for a majority of American voters.

At any rate, the preference cascade theory suggests that people will continue falsifying their preferences, overwhelmed by the reinforcement of what the media is saying (and thereby, what most of their social contacts are saying), until and unless something occurs to powerfully jolt the Narrative. When that happens, people feel a license to question the media's preferences which they have surrendered to, and ultimately reject these media preferences in favor of their own, real preferences.

So that's what I kept forgetting. I kept talking about the Preference Cascade just happening.

But they don't "just happen." There is an event which triggers the cascade. Like shaking a beaker of supersaturated salts will suddenly cause a precipitate to fall. But you need that shake. Otherwise, the liquid remains as it was.

Without the jolt, people will simply continuing doing what they'd done before -- surrendering to an easy Narrative, accepting the path of least resistance, as defined by their Media Narrative Manufacturers.

So there was, I think, a preference cascade potential. But that potential only became real during the debate.

If Romney had not given what could well be the most dominating debate performance in the entire modern age of politics (since TV, in 1960), it seems very possible -- possibly likely -- that none of this would have happened.

The Debate Mattered. Among those voting for Romney (a number the debate increased overall, of course), a dramatic shift from those "just voting against Obama" to those affirmatively voting for Romney.

One thing I'm happy to be right about: Doing homework? It pays off.

Doing homework, taking your responsibilities seriously and working hard to accomplish them... these are moral virtues, too.

One of these days I might try this.

Posted by: Ace at 11:48 AM | Comments (240)
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What Tim Carney does to Politico here is only legal because of Lawrence v. Texas.

It may be legal, but that doesn't mean it's fit for family viewing.

You might want to read this after 10 pm, when the kids, and the dogs, are safely asleep.

Posted by: Ace at 11:23 AM | Comments (125)
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Here's a rant.

MSNBC is so relentlessly and stupidly partisan that liberals in other media feel they need to note that MSNBC is a joke -- to protect their own credibility. If they try to claim MSNBC is a real news organization, that raises questions about themselves-- if MSNBC seems like a genuine news organization to them, then their idea of a real news organization is a partisan Obama-loving Rainbow Party, isn't it?

So they have to distance themselves. It's a bit of a lie, of course. They actually like MSNBC and kind of wish they could take off the shackles and go Full Maddow.

But you never go Full Maddow. The public would cringe. You can only go partial Maddow, like Tom Hanks in Forrest Gump. You must present a dishonest, softened version of Mental Maddowization.

But they still insist the New York Times "The Greatest Newspaper in the World."

It's nothing like MSNBC, after all.

Despite... Well, just like MSNBC, the New York Times almost entirely avoids the topic of Benghazi. Full on embargo on MSNBC, very light, begrudging inside-pages coverage in the New York Times. Every once in a while.

FoxNews hosts Bret Baier and especially Greta Van Susstern have taken to displaying the front page of the NYT on days in which major Libya news breaks, and every real newspaper leads with it. But the New York Times? Libya is as absent from its cover as specifics are absent from Obama's so-called plan to cut $3 trillion from the budget.

So what is the difference between MSNBC and the NYT, apart from one being printed?

Today, of course, they do have a piece on Libya.

A piece which wonders if that YouTube video inspired the pre-planned terrorist attack on the consulate, and being greatly chagrined that "politics" is taking all the "nuance" out of our discussion of the topic.

After all, maybe that video did have something to do with it.

You don't know. It's possible. And other such stuttering Whoopi Goldbergisms. (Whoopi Goldberg becomes a strident fan of doubt and epistemological indeterminacy whenever there's news that hurts Obama. You don't know. No one can know. Oddly enough her epistemological cautiousness evaporates when there's something she wants to say about Republicans.)

So, the NYT ponders: Why are we rushing to judgment before an election? Why don't we just let this breathe a spell, until after Obama is safely elected? Then we can get to the bottom of these difficult, "confusing" (their word) questions without all the heat and furor of politics intruding.

Safe link to Hot Air, by the way.

And from Sunday, Laura Ingraham made me happy when she called out an MSNBC reporter, I mean a NYT reporter, to his face.

more...

Posted by: Ace at 10:41 AM | Comments (240)
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From March 28, 2011. Via Gateway Pundit.

After she realizes what she's said, she insists she meant this sarcastically.

Doesn't sound sarcastic. It sounds like she's calling this a "silver lining" (her words) for real.

And it does reinforce something about Obama and the Obama Democrats: People are not their priority. Jobs are not their priority. Prosperity is not their priority.

They have higher priorities. They wouldn't mind jobs -- but it's not their top priority.

Their top priority is global warming and "fairness." As Obama said, when Charlie Gibson asked him if he'd raise capital gains taxes even if such a hike resulted in, as it has historically, lower tax revenues: He would still raise taxes, because "fairness" is more important than real-life consequences.

They tend to think this way. They love "The Masses" in the abstract, but aren't big fans of actual people. There's a very strong Eggs/Omelet type of thinking here.

And speaking of:

Neera Tanden, a former aide to both Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, had this to say about the relationship of the two presidents:

Clinton, being Clinton, had plenty of advice in mind and was desperate to impart it. But for the first two years of Obama’s term, the phone calls Clinton kept expecting rarely came. “People say the reason Obama wouldn’t call Clinton is because he doesn’t like him,” observes Tanden. “The truth is, Obama doesn’t call anyone, and he’s not close to almost anyone. It’s stunning that he’s in politics, because he really doesn’t like people. My analogy is that it’s like becoming Bill Gates without liking computers.”

It's also like attempting to run a 300 million strong country without ever having managed so much as a hot dog truck, but I take your point.

more...

Posted by: Ace at 10:20 AM | Comments (194)
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Calling this a podcast would be overstating the facts just a bit. Call it....an experiment that might lead to an actual HQ Podcast.

In the meantime enjoy CAC talking about his favorite thing....polling.

We don't have a fancy (or any) theme song (yet) so we pick the action up right away with CAC talking about everyone's favorite swing state....Ohio and the myths about early voting numbers there.

Oh and a bit of caution...this is the first time I've ever actually spoken to CAC and he has a bit of a potty mouth So if you're at work....use your headphones.

Also, below the fold, John E. illustrates what happens when a lightweight like Obama tries to throw Hillary under the bus. more...

Posted by: DrewM at 09:47 AM | Comments (133)
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