US Prez Election 2012 Thread - Opinions and Discussions

[Coito ergo sum]

The wheels are coming off the bus.....

The Obama campaign sent out an email today asking supporters to urge Congress to at least vote on the president’s jobs bill almost immediately after Democratic majority leader Harry Reid blocked a vote on the bill in the Senate.

On the Senate floor today, Republican leader Mitch McConnell asked for unanimous consent to proceed on voting on the bill. Reid, who has struggled to find enough votes for the bill in the Democratic caucus, objected to the motion and killed the opportunity for a vote.

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/oba ... 95022.html

A Republican calls for a vote on the Jobs Bill.

A Democrat blocks the vote on the Jobs Bill, because he is not sure he has the votes of his own party for the Jobs Bill.

The President accuses the Republicans of blocking the Jobs Bill.

FFS.....

[Ian]

Another reliable report from the Weekly Standard.


In election news, Christie wisely decided not to join the fray.
Which is probably too bad for Obama, since he'd most likely just siphon votes away from Romney and thereby hand the nomination over to (probably) Perry, who would then be crushed by the President. But the GOP nomination is still wide open at this point, too wide for me to dare making a prediction.

[Tyrannical]

Michelle Bachmann had a few more setbacks.
She lost a few more campaign people and transferred a few others to her Congressional campaign. Also strongly believed to have serious fundraising issues. She'll probably stick around as long as she is still invited to presidential debates, but the way some of her poll numbers are that might not be for much longer.

[Coito ergo sum]

Another reliable report from the Weekly Standard.


In election news, Christie wisely decided not to join the fray.
Which is probably too bad for Obama, since he'd most likely just siphon votes away from Romney and thereby hand the nomination over to (probably) Perry, who would then be crushed by the President. But the GOP nomination is still wide open at this point, too wide for me to dare making a prediction.

Well....they quoted the email...and the conduct of Reid blocking the vote is public record.

It is certainly fine to question the bias of sources, but when the facts reported are verifiable, it's silly to simply hand-wave the the facts away when they are verifiable is silly.

If you're allegation is that the Weekly Standard got it wrong - how about posting the truth? If your allegation is that the Weekly Standard got it right, but we ought to dismiss it out of hand anyway because it is a conservative paper, then I think that's silly. That would be like taking a verifiable fact reported by The Nation, and dismissing it out of hand because The Nation leans left.

[Coito ergo sum]

More and more Democrats are publicly challenging Obama on a range of issues.

Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) ripped the administration on Tuesday for considering keeping U.S. troops in Iraq beyond this year. In a floor speech on Tuesday, Rep. Mike Quigley (D-Ill.) questioned Obama’s strategy in Afghanistan.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), meanwhile, are at odds with Obama on the trade deals he just sent to Congress. Reid has committed to moving them, though he has made clear he is not a fan. Pelosi has put the White House on notice she will not be twisting arms to pass the agreements.

Congressional Democrats are not exactly embracing Obama’s jobs plan. Pelosi has called for an up-or-down vote on it in the House, but Reid is in no rush to schedule a vote. Reid, who is worried about keeping his majority, is well-aware that voting on Obama’s proposal puts some of his politically vulnerable members in a tough spot.

If they vote for it, Republican opponents will use it in campaign ads next year, seeking to tie them to a president who calls himself the underdog for reelection. If they vote against it, liberals in their states will complain, and that could hurt turnout on the left.

http://thehill.com/opinion/editorials/1 ... inus-obama

[Coito ergo sum]

Four in 10 Americans “strongly” disapprove of how President Obama is handling job as president in the new Washington Post-ABC News poll, the highest that number has risen during his time in office and a sign of the hardening opposition to him as he seeks a second term.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the ... _blog.html

[Coito ergo sum]

Any Republican 47% - Obama 41% -- http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_ ... ial_ballot

[Coito ergo sum]

President Obama not only has a political problem with the economy, but with voters' confidence in his ability to handle it.

By a margin of 44%-11%, voters say the economy is getting worse, not better, according to a new Quinnipiac University poll -- and only 29% say the economy will get better if Obama is re-elected.

The Quinnipiac poll also says that voters believe Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney would do a better job on the economy than Obama, by a margin of 49%-39%; Rick Perry gets the nod over Obama by a margin of 45%-42%.

Overall, voters disapprove of the job President Obama is doing, by a margin of 55%-41%.

http://content.usatoday.com/communities ... mMh/NfLkxd

[Ian]

An interesting prospect from a website I've always found to be remarkably insightful and, as far as elections go, accurate:

Apple's co-founder and Visionary-in-Chief, Steve Jobs, died yesterday from complications of pancreatic cancer. He was 56 and worth an estimated $8 billion. Unlike Bill Gates, with whom he is often compared, he was a creative genius without parallel. Gates was a clever and very lucky businessman (almost as an afterthought, IBM came to him when it was looking for an operating system for its new personal computer in the early 1980s, and he quickly bought one from a small Seattle company and sold it to IBM as MS-DOS, which later led to Windows). But Jobs was involved in every aspect of Apple's business, which ultimately transformed the computer, music, and telecommunications industries. Obituaries of Jobs can be probably be found in every newspaper in the country.

So what does this have to do with politics and especially the 2012 elections? In two words: pancreatic cancer. It is a deadly disease. Survival rates depend of the type of cancer and how early it is detected, but even if it has not spread, the 5-year survival rate is on the order of 20%. Being one of the most famous and beloved people in the world and with $8 billion in the bank, Jobs could have been treated by any cancer specialist in the world and no doubt he had the best. But it didn't help.

Have any other famous people had pancreatic cancer? Yes. Associate U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg (78) was diagnosed with it in 2009 and treated for it. She had previously been treated for colon cancer in 1999 and it is not known if the pancreatic cancer was a secondary tumor resulting from the earlier colon cancer or a new spontaneous mutation. Now possibly Ginsburg is in perfect health and will retire at 90, like John Paul Stevens did last year, but the odds are strongly against it.

Obviously this is premature, but some speculation about what Ginsburg's death or retirement early next year could do to the elections is nevertheless in order. It could radically change the situation and as the court's most liberal member, she is no doubt keenly aware of this. Suppose she were to announce her retirement as of June 2012 for reasons of health, just as Steve Jobs did shortly before his death. President Obama would quickly nominate a successor and we would see the mother of all confirmation fights in the Senate as the Republicans would filibuster any nominee in order to keep the slot open for a potential Republican President in January 2013. If they could replace the court's leading liberal with a conservative, that would cement the conservative majority for years to come as the next oldest justice, Antonin Scalia, is a mere stripling at 75. Justice Anthony Kennedy, the court's swing vote in many cases, is also 75.

Even if she is healthy, Ginsburg, knowing all this, might decide to resign next year just to change the focus of the presidential election from the economy to the Supreme Court. Then the main issue could easily become: "Who do you want to fill Ginsburg's seat?" The candidates would be endlessly asked about their choices. If Mitt Romney is the GOP nominee, he will be under pressure from the tea party and evangelicals to name someone who is against abortion and gay marriage. But naming a few potential candidates who are very conservative on those issues won't help him with the moderates and independents he badly needs to win. His best bet would be to say: "I dunno. Haven't thought about it too much. I'll let you know in January." But that hardly shows him to be a strong leader, especially if Obama has made one or two choices by then and fought vigorously for their Senate confirmation.

On top of this, if Obama were to name one or two people to the court and have the Republicans filibuster them because they didn't like the nominee's ideology, what would happen if a President Romney were to nominate a conservative? Might the Senate Democrats then simply filibuster all his choices on the grounds "well, you guys did the same thing last year." It could get dicey.

The Republicans could then use the 'nuclear option.' That would work like this. Some Republican senator would object, saying: "Filibustering judicial nominees is unconstitutional because the Senate has a constitutional duty to approve or reject all judicial nominees." The Senate parliamentarian, Alan Frumin, would then be consulted, but his opinion doesn't really matter. Ultimately the President of the Senate (the Vice President of the United States) makes the ruling and if he (or unlikely she) were a Republican, he would sustain the objection. If some Democrat complained about his ruling, as would certainly be the case, the full Senate would then vote to sustain or overturn the ruling by simple majority vote, with no filibuster possible. Once such a precedent had been set, no more judicial filibusters would be possible in the future.

But so far this is just speculation. Ginsburg has not announced any new health problems and has not indicated any plans to retire shortly. But it could happen. Stay tuned.

http://electoral-vote.com/

[Tyrannical]

I don't know many people that have picked up on this, but Ron Paul mentioned something very interesting about how he would handle the Supreme Court, specifically the Roe V Wade decision. He supports Congress passing a law removing the Supreme Court's jurisdiction over this matter. That would set aside all Federal court decisions and place the matter strictly in State hands.
That's his blue-print for dismantling much of federal power and returning it to the States.

[Hermit]

Ron Paul mentioned something very interesting about how he would handle the Supreme Court, specifically the Roe V Wade decision. He supports Congress passing a law removing the Supreme Court's jurisdiction over this matter. That would set aside all Federal court decisions and place the matter strictly in State hands.
That's his blue-print for dismantling much of federal power and returning it to the States.

The US will have 50 jurisdictions regarding abortion? What a great achievement!

[Tyrannical]

Ron Paul mentioned something very interesting about how he would handle the Supreme Court, specifically the Roe V Wade decision. He supports Congress passing a law removing the Supreme Court's jurisdiction over this matter. That would set aside all Federal court decisions and place the matter strictly in State hands.
That's his blue-print for dismantling much of federal power and returning it to the States.

The US will have 50 jurisdictions regarding abortion? What a great achievement!

Well, we have 50 jurisdictions for lots of things.
One less question they'd have to badger prospective Supreme Court appointees with.

[Coito ergo sum]

An interesting prospect from a website I've always found to be remarkably insightful and, as far as elections go, accurate:

Apple's co-founder and Visionary-in-Chief, Steve Jobs, died yesterday from complications of pancreatic cancer. He was 56 and worth an estimated $8 billion. Unlike Bill Gates, with whom he is often compared, he was a creative genius without parallel. Gates was a clever and very lucky businessman (almost as an afterthought, IBM came to him when it was looking for an operating system for its new personal computer in the early 1980s, and he quickly bought one from a small Seattle company and sold it to IBM as MS-DOS, which later led to Windows). But Jobs was involved in every aspect of Apple's business, which ultimately transformed the computer, music, and telecommunications industries. Obituaries of Jobs can be probably be found in every newspaper in the country.

So what does this have to do with politics and especially the 2012 elections? In two words: pancreatic cancer. It is a deadly disease. Survival rates depend of the type of cancer and how early it is detected, but even if it has not spread, the 5-year survival rate is on the order of 20%. Being one of the most famous and beloved people in the world and with $8 billion in the bank, Jobs could have been treated by any cancer specialist in the world and no doubt he had the best. But it didn't help.

Have any other famous people had pancreatic cancer? Yes. Associate U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg (78) was diagnosed with it in 2009 and treated for it. She had previously been treated for colon cancer in 1999 and it is not known if the pancreatic cancer was a secondary tumor resulting from the earlier colon cancer or a new spontaneous mutation. Now possibly Ginsburg is in perfect health and will retire at 90, like John Paul Stevens did last year, but the odds are strongly against it.

Obviously this is premature, but some speculation about what Ginsburg's death or retirement early next year could do to the elections is nevertheless in order. It could radically change the situation and as the court's most liberal member, she is no doubt keenly aware of this. Suppose she were to announce her retirement as of June 2012 for reasons of health, just as Steve Jobs did shortly before his death. President Obama would quickly nominate a successor and we would see the mother of all confirmation fights in the Senate as the Republicans would filibuster any nominee in order to keep the slot open for a potential Republican President in January 2013. If they could replace the court's leading liberal with a conservative, that would cement the conservative majority for years to come as the next oldest justice, Antonin Scalia, is a mere stripling at 75. Justice Anthony Kennedy, the court's swing vote in many cases, is also 75.

Even if she is healthy, Ginsburg, knowing all this, might decide to resign next year just to change the focus of the presidential election from the economy to the Supreme Court. Then the main issue could easily become: "Who do you want to fill Ginsburg's seat?" The candidates would be endlessly asked about their choices. If Mitt Romney is the GOP nominee, he will be under pressure from the tea party and evangelicals to name someone who is against abortion and gay marriage. But naming a few potential candidates who are very conservative on those issues won't help him with the moderates and independents he badly needs to win. His best bet would be to say: "I dunno. Haven't thought about it too much. I'll let you know in January." But that hardly shows him to be a strong leader, especially if Obama has made one or two choices by then and fought vigorously for their Senate confirmation.

On top of this, if Obama were to name one or two people to the court and have the Republicans filibuster them because they didn't like the nominee's ideology, what would happen if a President Romney were to nominate a conservative? Might the Senate Democrats then simply filibuster all his choices on the grounds "well, you guys did the same thing last year." It could get dicey.

The Republicans could then use the 'nuclear option.' That would work like this. Some Republican senator would object, saying: "Filibustering judicial nominees is unconstitutional because the Senate has a constitutional duty to approve or reject all judicial nominees." The Senate parliamentarian, Alan Frumin, would then be consulted, but his opinion doesn't really matter. Ultimately the President of the Senate (the Vice President of the United States) makes the ruling and if he (or unlikely she) were a Republican, he would sustain the objection. If some Democrat complained about his ruling, as would certainly be the case, the full Senate would then vote to sustain or overturn the ruling by simple majority vote, with no filibuster possible. Once such a precedent had been set, no more judicial filibusters would be possible in the future.

But so far this is just speculation. Ginsburg has not announced any new health problems and has not indicated any plans to retire shortly. But it could happen. Stay tuned.

http://electoral-vote.com/

To me, that's the the tail wagging the dog. To suggest that the next election will turn on who a Supreme Court nominee will be seems a stretch. The article appears to be written in such a way that assumes that the populace/voters would be more concerned about avoiding a Republican nominee than a Democrat nominee. That is by no means at all clear.

Further, every Presidential election cycle for the last 30 years has involved the same cries from the Democrats of "oh, my noGod!!!! If we get a Republican President, they'll appoint a Nazi to the SCOTUS and all of our rights will be taken away!!!! Nooooooo!!!!!!" -- Frankly, it, along with the "all Republicans are stupid" endless refrain, it's a little old. It's just a marketing ploy and a talking point.

Sure, the SCOTUS is important, but it's not a bell-weather issue with the average voter. Most of them can't even name anyone on the SCOTUS, or maybe one or two.

As for the nuclear option, the Democrats just dropped one of those legislative nukes yesterday: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/201 ... #pagebreak

Reid uses ‘nuclear option’ to block GOP amendments

Dems change rules...Senate in Chaos:

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1011/65383.html

[Coito ergo sum]

Ron Paul mentioned something very interesting about how he would handle the Supreme Court, specifically the Roe V Wade decision. He supports Congress passing a law removing the Supreme Court's jurisdiction over this matter. That would set aside all Federal court decisions and place the matter strictly in State hands.
That's his blue-print for dismantling much of federal power and returning it to the States.

The US will have 50 jurisdictions regarding abortion? What a great achievement!

Well, we have 50 jurisdictions for lots of things.
One less question they'd have to badger prospective Supreme Court appointees with.

I don't think that the Congress can limit the Suprmes' jurisdiction to decide constitutional issues. They can specify the number of Justices, and they can limit the court's jurisdiction in general, but I think there would be a Constitutional Crisis if the Congress tried to pass a law saying that the SCOTUS has no right to review a legislative statute as violative or not violative of the Constitution.

If it could do that, then the Congress could restrict the SCOTUS's power to decide ANY Constitutional issue, such as, if Congress or a state legislature passed a law saying "citizens can not express political opinions in newspapers," and Congress said, "and by the way, SCOTUS has no power to review that legislation for conformity with the first Amendment." So, I think Rand Paul won't get very far with his suggestion.

[Tyrannical]

Ron Paul mentioned something very interesting about how he would handle the Supreme Court, specifically the Roe V Wade decision. He supports Congress passing a law removing the Supreme Court's jurisdiction over this matter. That would set aside all Federal court decisions and place the matter strictly in State hands.
That's his blue-print for dismantling much of federal power and returning it to the States.

The US will have 50 jurisdictions regarding abortion? What a great achievement!

Well, we have 50 jurisdictions for lots of things.
One less question they'd have to badger prospective Supreme Court appointees with.

I don't think that the Congress can limit the Suprmes' jurisdiction to decide constitutional issues. They can specify the number of Justices, and they can limit the court's jurisdiction in general, but I think there would be a Constitutional Crisis if the Congress tried to pass a law saying that the SCOTUS has no right to review a legislative statute as violative or not violative of the Constitution.

If it could do that, then the Congress could restrict the SCOTUS's power to decide ANY Constitutional issue, such as, if Congress or a state legislature passed a law saying "citizens can not express political opinions in newspapers," and Congress said, "and by the way, SCOTUS has no power to review that legislation for conformity with the first Amendment." So, I think Rand Paul won't get very far with his suggestion.

The Bill of Rights were originally limits only on Federal powers, which is where the derived right to privacy that justifies abortion originates from. Though it is taken for granted now that it limits State powers also, that opinion is not based on law but judicial opinion. The 11th Amendment was even passed to enforce State sovereignty against the Federal government.

But Article II gives Congress the right to limit their jurisdiction "with such Exceptions, and under such Regulations as the Congress shall make" The only jurisdiction that the constitution requires on the Federal court System is foreign diplomats, maritime law, and intra-State law suits.

Technically, the Bill of Rights does not apply to the States. That is where State laws and the State constitution is supposed to place limits.