Publicly, he says he is confident they'll uphold it.

Privately, he says he might have to "revisit" it.

I'm not sure this is a big thing. People generally look for a Plan B, even while declaring that Plan A will work.

But there is the chance that this is more than simply planning for the worst.

Perhaps word has leaked to Obama -- Elena Kagan would give them a heads up, right? -- and that Obama's words aren't just prudent planning, but actually tipping us off about the decision already made. They already did a test vote, and are now, I think, writing opinions.

Thanks to JohnE.

Posted by: Ace at 12:43 PM | Comments (202)
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...and lay out your actual plans for a second term, apart from the Big Do-Over on Health Care.

Drew covered this this morning. Clinton vigorously defended Romney's business reputation:

So I donÂ’t think that we ought to get in the position where we say this is bad work, this is good work. I think, however, the real issue ought to be what has Governor Romney advocated in the campaign that he will do as president? What has President Obama done and what does he propose to do? How do these things stack up against each other, thatÂ’s the most relevant thing. ThereÂ’s no question that in terms of getting up and going to the office, and you know, basically performing the essential functions of the office, a man who has been governor and had a sterling business career crosses the qualification threshold.

Sterling business career? Good Lord, that is going quite a bit further than honesty dictates. That's almost being vindictively honest, against Obama's interests.

And since then, via Andy aka @TheH2, Steny Hoyer -- the Number Two Democrat in the House -- has tried to walk-back Clinton's remark.

Let me explain. I think Hoyer's statement is being misinterpreted on the right, and his intent misinterpreted.

Hoyer claims he agrees with Clinton -- then changes what Clinton said, in order to claim that while private equity as an industry shouldn't be criticized, "bad practices" -- such as Obama is claiming of Bain -- should be.

See, here's what Hoyer said:

I think President Clinton is correct. Private equity is a very important aspect of growing our economy. Obviously there's good practices in private equity; there are bad practices. You criticize bad practices but not the whole enterprise itself.

But that is most emphatically not what Clinton said. Clinton said that Romney's career at Bain was "sterling." He did not just say that private equity, in general, is an important industry.

Clinton specifically called out Romney's specific career as "sterling."

They did this with Cory Booker too -- they are fighting to walk-back these statements into something that permits President F**kup to continue claiming that Bain is a Vampire Capitalist outfit.

"Sterling" has a meaning. Hoyer ought to look it up. Via m-w.com:

conforming to the highest standard

[examples of usage]: sterling character, a sterling record of achievement

And sterling now has that metaphorical meaning because "sterling" in coin production meant "a very high proportion of precious silver to filler metal" -- "sterling" was a standard of purity and value, 925 parts silver to only 75 parts copper (92.5% of the good stuff to 7.5% filler).

Sovereigns typically debased their coinage with much lower percentages of silver (or gold, or whatever the valuable metal was). Sterling thus came to mean "of the highest standard."

So no, Steny, Clinton did not merely say that some people in private equity are doing good things, but that the "bad practices" at Bain should be criticized.

Double Post Explanation: Originally I was just going to put up Steny Hoyer's remarks, "agreeing" with Clinton.

But as I listened to the quote and read it, I realized he wasn't agreeing at all. He was walking it back -- or trying to. You can't really walk back a comment someone else made.

So, I figured I would just start over, and then get to Steny's walk-back.

He called Romney's career there "of the highest standard of excellence" -- 92.5% pure.

Posted by: Ace at 11:48 AM | Comments (219)
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Key quote:

"It's painfully obvious the economic recovery in the U.S. isn't just slowing down, it's pulling up the emergency brake," said Todd Schoenberger, managing principal The BlackBay Group.

Some of their hopes pinned on the Fed -- they hope there's talk of QE3. If the Fed talks up Q3, then, they say, maybe this sell-off will be brief.

But others think this situation, while bad, isn't so bad to spur the Fed into a third round of "quantitative easing," or printing money.

The ISM manufacturing index has fallen. It is still above 50, so it indicates expansion in that sector, but barely, and is consistent with a slowdown.

Posted by: Ace at 11:15 AM | Comments (182)
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Zimmerman apparently said his family had little to no resources.

The prosecutor has asked the judge to revoke parole over the non-disclosure of the website's $200,000. The judge agreed.

Two points though:

This is a sandbag move by the prosecutor because they knew about the website. How could they not? The man they think is a 2nd degree murderer was soliciting donations before they arrested him.

Further, this is charity, and cannot be relied upon as income.

Zimmerman should have mentioned this -- but the prosecutor, who knew all about it, should have asked about it.

To say nothing at the bail hearing and then raise this issue later... seems like a deliberate sandbag move for a prosecutor who is over-invested in the proposition that George Zimmerman should be in jail.

Breaking on Fox News.

Argument: A woman on Fox is saying this should not be counted as Zimmerman's funds for bail, as it has a specific purpose: Paying attorneys to defend him.

More: Bob Owens has a detailed report.

[Zimmerman] and his wife lied about the money they had at their disposal prior to the bond hearing. Furthermore, they had their poorly coded conversation about the money recorded via the prison phone system.

Owens thinks Zimmerman has demolished his credibility for almost no reason at all.

Posted by: Ace at 10:54 AM | Comments (178)
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Nailed it.

Meanwhile, this seems to be a Thing, though I don't know why. It's just a joke, isn't it?

But Obama says he wants people to go out and buy a "thingamajig." more...

Posted by: Ace at 10:19 AM | Comments (261)
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Much like illegal immigration -- the law is kept on the books, as a nod to public opinion, but states will be sued if they actually enforce the law.

So sure, it's a law that only citizens can vote.

But Florida is not allowed to enforce that.

Enforcing the law is, itself, in violation of federal law.

Now the explanation for this is that states are required by the National Voter Registration Act to submit plans to purge names from the voter list to the DoJ, for DoJ review, ninety days before implementing it.

The trouble is-- the state says it did just that. And the DoJ stonewalled.

[T]hey indicated they might fight DOJ over its interpretation of federal law and expressed frustration that President Barack ObamaÂ’s administration has stonewalled the stateÂ’s noncitizen voter hunt for nine months.

Nine months is in excess of 90 days. The DoJ cannot be permitted to block a lawful purge of illegal voters just by sitting on the plan for nine months.

Posted by: Ace at 10:03 AM | Comments (122)
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Correction: Via Hot Air, I see I misread Breitbart's report -- they don't know yet if it was a church wedding. It was conducted by a pastor, not a justice of the peace or some Vegas Elvis. Right now they're checking on the church-wedding thing.

...

They "eloped"?

Is this more lore?

The definition of elope, according to Merriam Webster, www.m-w.com, is:

": to run away secretly with the intention of getting married usually without parental consent"

Breitbart has documents which it thinks is the certificate of marriage and marriage license.

They "ran away" to a church in the county seat 14 miles from their homes?

That doesn't sound, circumstantially, like an elopement.

That just sounds like a marriage.

Maybe Breitbart should see if they can get some more marriage certificates from this period, and from this area. If a lot of people in Elizabeth Warren's mother's town were getting married at this same church, it sort of suggests they just got married, and didn't "elope."

Posted by: Ace at 09:24 AM | Comments (207)
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(Bumped since we had a little timing issue earlier)

Over at Greg "He'll Print Anything Media Matters Sends Him" Sargent's blog once of his co-bloggers wrote a post entitled "DonÂ’t give in to the jobs report blues". I retweeted his link to it with the snark, "Libs: Let a smile be your umbrella".

Genius Greg then responded

It's customary to conceal your excitement about bad news for the country and continued economic misery for fellow Americans

So now pointing out that liberals are lamely trying to cheer themselves up in the face of the disaster they have created is being excited about that disaster? Ok Greg. Maybe Media Matters can get him some better talking points soon.

I think anyone who looked at today's news and wrote that maybe, just maybe there's a possible "silver lining" and this month is just "a statistical anomaly" deserves to be mocked.

Also, unlike Greg's co-blogger, I don't think the big take away items from today's jobs report is "at least thereÂ’s nothing here to change the entire trajectory of the campaign." against Obama. Well thank God for that, right?

BTW- If you don't think a worsening economy isn't going to change the "trajectory of the campaign", you either a fool or a hopeless liberal. Wait, those are often the same thing. Never mind.

Normally I wouldn't bother posting about a Twitter pissing match but I think it shows you how desperate the Democrats are. They can't talk about their policies so they'll just ignore the damage they've created.

But hey, Obama is losing Bill Clinton but he'll always have Greg Sargent.

Related enough, Team Mitt has a new add out that just happened to be released on the day the jobs report came out. Bottom line message: It's not morning in America but I'll turn the lights on if you let me. more...

Posted by: DrewM at 09:04 AM | Comments (210)
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Not 1984 big, but so decisively as to preempt any Dem claims of voter irregularities and to forestall any Dem voter irregularities themselves. ("If it's not close, they can't cheat." -- Hugh Hewett)

And when analysts look back at the 'turning point' of the 2012 election, they'll point to this week as the inflection point of the campaign, and in particular to three key points:

1) It's now apparent that the Emperor's campaign has no clothes. In spite of the best "wind beneath his wings" efforts of the mainstream media (haircuts? dressage?), every Obama campaign attack on Romney so far has blown up in their faces, either undercut by other Dems (gotta love Bill's statements last night -- remember, revenge is a dish best served cold and with plausible deniability) -- or by bringing to light background information about Obama that the MSM has carefully overlooked for six years.

2) Romney and his campaign staff are clearly moving themselves "inside the loop" in their campaign against Obama. They're raising more money, they're responding to the news cycle better, and they're aggressive about getting in his face. As others have noted, Obama has never faced a tough campaign before and for the first time he has a highly public, highly visible record to defend. I've been waiting 30 years for a bare-knuckled Republican Presidential candidate; who would have thought it would be Mitt Romney? Not me, but I couldn't be happier.

3) It really is hard to overstate just how bad the economic news today was for Obama. It's not just the slight tick upward in the artificially low unemployment rate; it's not just the horrendous May jobs numbers (69,000 actual vs. 150,000+ expected). It's the April jobs numbers being revised down from 114,000 to 77,000, with a chance that the May jobs numbers will be revised downward a month from now. Basically, the 'soft recovery' is sliding down a steep slope, and I'll give even odds that we see at least one month this year with negative job growth.

more...

Posted by: Open Blogger at 08:25 AM | Comments (112)
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Oh, wait, did I say the country's fortunes? Sorry, I meant his electoral hopes. Priorities, you know:

President Obama will jump-start what looks to be a major June fundraising push with six money events today in Minneapolis and Chicago – the most fundraisers he’s held in a single day since launching his bid for a second term.

Six fundraisers? How on earth will he find time to slip in a round of golf?

Image by Slublog. (There are more good ones at the link. He was on a roll last night)

Posted by: andy at 07:54 AM | Comments (130)
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