It sounds better to say you only want to tax those making one million per year.

Because it sounds better, Senator Clownfart said it.

Jay Carney spins, below, that Biden was only offering "an example" of one range of incomes that would be subject to the tax. See, million-per-year earners will be taxed at higher rates.

So will $250,000 p.a. earners.

Biden didn't mention that, though, because he was just providing "an example" of people earning more than a million p.a.

See?

He wasn't being dishonest or flip-flopping or shaking an Etch-a-Sketch. He was just providing one example of an income level that will be paying higher taxes. There are other, lower income levels that will pay higher taxes; but he just wanted to point out that one "example."

Just a "fer instance." Certainly not an attempt to con people into thinking Obama's tax plans are less ambitious than they actually are.

more...

Posted by: Ace at 09:42 AM | Comments (165)
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From LauraW, or how she drunkenly spells it, "@laurww."

I admire her refusal to correct that. I don't like correcting misspellings either.

Then again, I try to get my own name right. more...

Posted by: Ace at 08:58 AM | Comments (223)
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This is amazing bias. The Hill just got a straight-up admission by the White House that Biden lied -- or at least misstated the facts when he said "We didn't know" about security requests -- and the White House is now walking him back, saying he speaks only for himself and President Modified Limited Hangout.

Rather than report this startling, newsmaking admission straight, The Hill buries it under the Nothing To See Here Folks headline "Report: Biden Didn't Know About Security Requests," a headline that suggests that Biden is being backed up in his claim.

In fact, Biden's actual statement is being discarded. And a new statement is being substituted in its place.

Further, that's not a "report" -- a confirmed report offered by disinterested parties -- it's a claim, a self-serving statement offered by an interested parties.

No link for these bastards. I'll quote 'em; people can find the article themselves, if they like.

Report: Biden didn't know about security requests in Libya

By Ian Swanson - 10/12/12

Vice President Biden was speaking for himself and President Obama when he said the administration was unaware of additional requests for security for U.S. diplomats in Libya, a White House official has told Foreign PolicyÂ’s The Cable blog.

Deputy National Security adviser Ben Rhodes told The Cable that Biden and Obama were unaware of the requests, and that this accounts for BidenÂ’s statement at Thursday nightÂ’s debate.

“We weren’t told they wanted more security. We did not know they wanted more security there,” Biden said Thursday as GOP vice presidential hopeful Paul Ryan hammered the administration over a Sept. 11 attack that left U.S. Ambassador to Libya Christopher Stevens and three others dead.

See how fact-checks work, kiddies? Biden lies, and The Hill's stenographer "reports" it as true. After all, a White House official, cleaning up for Biden and walking his statement back, says it's true. So it's true.

And The White House Didn't Know, Either. Keeping the smell of death away from the White House...

...it's over there, by Hillary.

But Obama and Biden don't blame Hillary. Despite Stephanie Cutter's insistence that all Obama is interested in is "getting to the facts."

Can you see the pattern here?

Fast & Furious? White House didn't know; neither did Holder. It was all disposable underlings.

Benghazi? White House didn't know; neither, I'm sure we'll soon be told, did Hillary. It was all disposable underlings.

Solyndra? White House didn't know; neither did Stephen Chu. It was all disposable underlings.

Gee whiz. What a difficult mystery to crack.

Posted by: Ace at 08:17 AM | Comments (254)
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So, Biden won, 48-41. In California.

Good news? Nah, neutral news. But... Partisan split: R 26% D 45% I 28%. Heavily Democratic sample. D+19. Thanks to t-bird.

Here's the good news:

22% of respondents said they changed their leanings based upon the debate. Of that 22%, here's how votes shifted (bearing in mind we are now talking percentages of that subgroup):

* 30% switched from the Obama ticket to the Romney ticket.
* 29% switched from undecided to the Romney ticket.
* A total of 59% switched to the Romney ticket.

* 20% switched from the Romney ticket to the Obama ticket.
* 20% switched from undecided to the Obama ticket.
* A total of 40% switched to the Obama ticket.

Does this help in California? No. We're not winning California.

But if there's a net-positive movement towards Romney in liberal California, you can bet there's movement elsewhere.

Now, SurveyUSA does robocalls, and such calls have half the response rate of human-conducted interviews. However, the response rate for human-conducted polls is about 9%.

So, robocalls get half that.

9% vs. 4%? Still a very, very low response rate.

But that's why robocalls are usually discounted (by firms who do not do robocalls, of course).

Via @conartcritic

By the way, while Liberal Poll Truthers slag the CNN poll (48 Ryan, 44 Biden) for being "too Republican" -- 32 R, 30 D; so R+2 -- they gleefully cite the CBS poll, which is... D+8.

Or, I forget-- what's the rule? That's right -- they can examine partisan splits and dismiss polls based on what they consider a crazy split.

But if I look at a D+8 poll, and similarly discount it, I'm a "Poll Truther."

Chuck Todd and the Washington Post's Chris Cillizza told me that!

It should also be noted that CNN polled undecided likely voters.

And yes, likely voters do tend to be more Republican, dearhearts.

So It's Hillary, Then? Jay Carney walks it back to say Biden meant himself, the President, and the White House didn't know.

Says that's a State Department decision.

Okay, gee, can you call up the person who runs State? If you don't have her number, I'm sure someone can find it for you.

Posted by: Ace at 07:40 AM | Comments (250)
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Well, that's before Biden's awesome debate performance moves the polls.

Sarcasm. No, it's not very funny. But I tried.

Slightly.

Maybe a little less than that.

But enough about me, let's talk about a poll.

Now before you bitchez complain, I just dropped a gen-u-ine serious news story. So get off my nuts.

Mitt Romney has taken a commanding 7-point lead over President Barack Obama in another Virginia poll.

According to a McLaughlin & Associates poll that had an R+.02 sample, Romney leads Obama in Virginia 51%-44%.

Among independents, Romney beats Obama by 11 points, 50%-39%.

Rasmussen will be posting VA numbers later.

In Florida (not VA), Rasmussen has it 51-47 (Romney winning), so it seems like two of our must-haves are moving our way. That Rasmussen poll confirms the Mason-Dixon/Tampa Bay Times one yesterday, showing Romney ahead (but by an even larger lead, seven points).

So you will understand why Democrats are so insistent on claiming Senator Clownfart totally rilly won the debate!!11eleventy!

CAC passed a fun little poll on that to me, too, but I'm holding that for now, because I'm spacing my poll-posts out. 'Cuz I'm takin' a half-day, bitchez.

(BTW, the new season of It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia debuted last night. I didn't warn you because I didn't know myself; I caught the last half of the 2am repeat. But I started watching old episodes recently, so everything with me is "bitchez.")

Monte Carlo Simulations: @seanmdav ran some simulations (trial runs) to determine the likelihood of victory based on current poll numbers in swing states.

Note this chart is the likelihood of winning or losing.

It's a big pro-Romney shift.

But also note that Ohio continues to be a real prick. So's Virginia, actually. Even after poll movement, Obama is still narrowly, narrowly favored.

More! ARG finds...

Florida: Romney 49, Obama 46

New Hampshire: Romney 50, Obama 46

New Hampshire? For real?

That's a neat little bonus.

Rasmussen Preview: CAC says Rasmussen will post Virginia Romney 49, Obama 47 when they publish later.

Plus ME2. Maine allocates two of its Electoral votes according to the winner of its two districts. Maine 2, the more Republican district, leans in Romney's favor, by five points.

That's another EV.

Posted by: Ace at 06:50 AM | Comments (204)
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Jim Lehrer let two men debate.

Martha Raddatz, by CNN's admission, became the "third debater."

But not a moderator, as a moderator might have cautioned Joe Biden to stop interrupting and wait his turn to speak, as the rules required.

But she was a debater, and that's what the media wants. They insist they get to "control" the outcome of the debate.

At times it seemed as if Martha Raddatz, who moderated Thursday's vice presidential debate, was the third debater.

At other times she was the seasoned ABC News war correspondent who kept the two guys in suits taking snarky swipes at each other in line.

Um, only one candidate was snarky. The other was serious.

And she didn't keep the snarky one in line.

...

Raddatz also pressed for specifics such as when she demanded of Ryan: "I want to know how you do the math and have this increase in defense spending?"

Five things we learned from the VP debate

When she wanted to direct the foreign policy debate to a new topic, she commanded: "Let's move to Iran."

And to Iran the conversation moved.

So she did. When Ryan had more to discuss with Ol' Joe on his administration's deadly failure in Benghazi.

She might have also asked if Joe Biden was doing okay, or needed another tab of his dementia medicine.
more...

Posted by: Ace at 04:45 AM | Comments (352)
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Proverbs 29:9

When a wise man has a controversy with a foolish man, The foolish man either rages or laughs, and there is no rest.

Via Twitchy, from @RightInAmerica.

I re-watched it. It was like having an argument with your drunk, blowhard, dullwitted uncle at Thanksgiving. And your drunk blowhard dullwitted uncle, who is superior to you only in age, keeps asserting he's right about everything by shouting "I WAS THERE!!!"

Posted by: Ace at 04:06 AM | Comments (156)
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If Biden was trying to lock up the hyena vote, he succeeded wildly.

But other than that, WTF was he trying to do here?

GOP web ad below the fold. more...

Posted by: andy at 03:42 AM | Comments (64)
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Happy Friday.

Most of the politics news out there this morning is debate related. But since we all know how that went, I'll just stick with a few items.

The DNC fired the OFA director who James O'Keefe caught coaching a voter to vote in two states.

And Google is caught up in the election again as image search results are turning out odd results for Team Romney. (I won't use the words because I don't want to add to the problem.) Shades of "Google bombing" here.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 02:50 AM | Comments (140)
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When you're a buffoon, your brain is stupid enough to believe anything you tell it.

"Trust me," Joey Chompers implored voters. Look at our words; look at our records.

"Trust your instincts," Joey Chompers said.

Video of the lie at the Free Beacon. The below is from their story:

“By the way, they talk about this great recession like it fell out of the sky–like, ‘Oh my goodness, where did it come from?’” Biden said. “It came from this man voting to put two wars on a credit card, at the same time, put a prescription drug plan on the credit card, a trillion dollar tax cut for the very wealthy.”

“I was there, I voted against them,” Biden continued. “I said, no, we can’t afford that.”

Then Sen. Biden voted for the Afghanistan resolution on Sept. 14, 2001 which authorized “the use of United States Armed Forces against those responsible for the recent attacks launched against the United States.”

And on Oct. 11, 2002, Biden voted for a resolution authorizing unilateral military action in Iraq, according to the Washington Post.

The one thing they told this drunken buffoon not to do is to spin some grandly self-serving lie about an important issue which could be easily disproven.

He did exactly that.

WaPo Fact Check: Shockingly, they find than Biden lied a lot (though they don't do that "Pants of Fire" stuff) and Ryan's "mistatements," to the extent they exist, seem pretty debatable.

Posted by: Ace at 08:51 PM | Comments (410)
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