Archive for the ‘DNC’ Category
Based on this report, I’d say there’s better than a 50-50 shot that Debbie Wasserman-Schultz is defeated Tuesday night:
This past Saturday, Wasserman Schultz personally lambasted a longtime Democrat supporter from Miami-Dade County who was caught talking to Harrington. This same individual further annoyed Wasserman Schultz by refusing to display a “Wasserman Schultz for Congress” sign and then told Debbie that he had already voted for Harrington instead of her.
This longtime Democrat leader, who shall remain anonymous for purposes of this report, indicated that he was disgusted and said that had never been so insulted in his life.
On Sunday, the Shark Tank visited one of the strongest Democrat precincts in Congressional District 23- the City of Hollywood’s main public library- and in speaking to Democrats waiting in line as wells as those who just voted, many of them said that they voted for Harrington over Wasserman Schultz.
What a night Tuesday might be. It starts, of course, with Mitt defeating President Obama, ending this neverending economic nightmare. Defeating Debbie Wasserman-Schultz would be a nice bonus for Republicans nationwide who are tired of Ms. Wasserman-Schultz’s lippy behavior.
This information is potentially enlightening:
Coincidentally, Harrington herself was working voters in the line, she indicated that she was receiving extraordinary support from Democrats and Independents who were waiting in line to vote. There’s no doubt that there are many disaffected Democrats throughout the district are irritated with DWS’s partisan rhetoric and her neglect of congressional responsibilities as the Chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee.
DWS’s district has lots of Jewish voters. It isn’t a stretch to think that a healthy portion of the Democrats that are voting for Ms. Harrington are Jewish. Considering the possibility DWS spent considerable time defending President Obama’s harsh treatment of Israel, it’s entirely possible that Jewish voters are taking their frustrations out on DWS.
The recent Harrington v. Wasserman Schultz polling has the incumbent congresswoman with a 4.5% lead over there challenger, and some local politicos believe that not only is the race competitive, but also that an upset is possible.
This year’s polls haven’t been that trustworthy. That’s especially true if they’re basing their polls on 2008 turnout models. If people really have tired of DWS’s boorish behavior, then I’d bet the polling is essentially irrelevant.
Tags: Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, Miami-Dade, Hollywood, Florida, Jewish Vote, Independents, Polling, DNC, President Obama, Democrats, Karen Harrington, Campaigning, GOP, Election 2012
Each week, the DFL sends a Chanting Points machine to regurgitate the DFL’s Chanting Points during At Issue’s Face-Off segment. This week, that machine was Darin Broton.
Being the dutiful robot that he is, Broton even said that “President Obama has a plan to move America forward.”
If that’s true, it’d be great if President Obama quit with the spendaholic drunken sailor act. It’s time he abandoned his failed policies and started implementing a plan that gets America working again.
President Obama’s policies aren’t working. It’s time Democrats stopped with the partisan defense of indefensible policies and started putting America first.
It was heartbreaking to hear that the economy only created 96,000 jobs. The most heartbreaking statistic was that 368,000 people got so frustrated with the dismal jobs picture that they quit looking for work.
If Mr. Broton thinks 368,000 people quitting their search for employment is moving America forward, it’s time he dropped that line of thinking. In the real world, having 368,000 people quit looking for work out of frustration isn’t a positive step forward. It’s a major setback.
I think Mr. Broton thought he was being a faithful DFL spinmeister. That’s proof that the DFL’s first priority is to maintain political power. There’s no proof that they’ll put America first. It’s time they had a major change in attitude.
Another thing that shouldn’t be defended is this administration’s economic policies. This president’s explosion of regulations are killing the coal- and taconite-mining industries, which is killing jobs.
As a result of regulations implemented by President Obama’s EPA, almost 100 coal-fired power plants have either shut or announced that they’re shutting down.
Driving up electric bills while killing jobs isn’t a pro-growth, moving-America-forward agenda. It’s the opposite of a pro-growth, moving-America-forward agenda.
Finally, by saying that President Obama has a plan to move America forward, Mr. Broton is essentially saying that it’s ok for median household incomes to drop by $4,019 since the end of the Bush recession. I’m betting families disagree with his spin.
President Obama’s economy isn’t creating enough jobs to keep up with population growth. The jobs that are getting created are low-paying jobs. That’s why median household incomes have dropped by $4,019.
President Obama will blame President Bush’s policies but their policies have caused pathetic job growth, dropping household incomes and people giving up looking for work.
That might be moving America forward in a Democrat’s spin but it’s failure in the eyes of the American people.
Tags: President Obama, Acceptance Speech, DNC, Spin, Jobs Report, Unemployment, Real Unemployment Rate, Labor Force Participation Rate, Forward, Darin Broton, DFL, Election 2012
The first thing I thought of when I saw this video was Howard Dean’s scream after the 2004 Iowa Caucuses:
It takes some doing to leave me speechless but that video left me speechless. Imagine how stupid Jennifer Granholm will look if GM has to file for bankruptcy:
President Obama is proud of his bailout of General Motors. That’s good, because, if he wins a second term, he is probably going to have to bail GM out again. The company is once again losing market share, and it seems unable to develop products that are truly competitive in the U.S. market.
Right now, the federal government owns 500,000,000 shares of GM, or about 26% of the company. It would need to get about $53.00/share for these to break even on the bailout, but the stock closed at only $20.21/share on Tuesday. This left the government holding $10.1 billion worth of stock, and sitting on an unrealized loss of $16.4 billion.
Right now, the government’s GM stock is worth about 39% less than it was on November 17, 2010, when the company went public at $33.00/share. However, during the intervening time, the Dow Jones Industrial Average has risen by almost 20%, so GM shares have lost 49% of their value relative to the Dow.
The UAW bailout that President Obama pushed through didn’t solve GM’s problems. It just gave GM employees collecting exhorbitant pensions a few extra years of solvency.
The UAW bailout didn’t solve GM’s legacy cost problem. It just kicked the can down the road. As a result of President Obama’s bailout, the American people are probably out of $25,000,000,000-$30,000,000,000.
Recently, Vice President Biden’s been saying that “Osama bin Laden is dead and GM is alive.” That’s a misleading statement. UBL is dead but GM is on life support.
Had GM been allowed to file bankruptcy to reorganize, GM’s legacy costs could’ve been renegotiated to a more affordable price that would’ve provided longterm stability for the company without significantly hurting UAW retirees.
Jennifer Granholm’s manic behavior might be the most bizarre behavior of the Democrats’ convention, which takes some doing.
Remember that this was the convention that removed “Jerusalem as Israel’s capitol” and “God-given abilities” from its platform only to have it re-inserted in the platform despite 3 failed attempts.
This is the convention where “Pat Lehman, the dean of the Kansas Democratic delegation,” and John Burton, the chairman of the Democratic Party of California, linked Republicans to Joseph Goebbels. This is where Dick Harpootlian, the chairman of the Democratic Party of South Carolina, linked Gov. Nikki Haley to Eva Braun, Hitler’s mistress.
This is the convention where, for a night, Sandra Fluke, Elizabeth Warren and Nancy Pelosi were the faces of the Democratic women.
Standing out from that bunch takes determination. Jennifer Granholm passed the others with flying colors.
Tags: Jennifer Granholm, Dick Harpootlian, Pat Lehman, John Burton, Joseph Goebbels, Elizabeth Warren, Sandra Fluke, Nancy Pelosi, Contraception, Party Platform, GM, DNC, Howard Dean, Democrats, Election 2012
If Mitt Romney keeps beating President Obama in the fundraising battle, this race could get rather lopsided relatively quickly. July wasn’t a terrible month for President Obama:
@BarackObama Reporting back on last month’s fundraising numbers: In July, 761,000 people donated to raise over $75 million for this campaign. Thank you.
It’s just that Mitt had a significantly better month than President Obama and the DNC:
Mitt Romney and the Republican National Committee brought in $101.3 million in July, making that the second consecutive month that the GOP nominee’s fundraising cracked the $100 million mark.
The Romney campaign, the RNC and the Romney Victory Fund have a combined $185.9 million in the bank, the Romney campaign announced.
Romney’s receipts almost match his June haul of $106 million and may position him to extend his cash-on-hand lead over the president. For all the rough news weeks Romney has endured lately, his campaign treasury doesn’t seem to have suffered for it.
First, Mitt hasn’t had a rough couple of weeks. That’s just the storyline established by Mssrs. Axelrod and Plouffe, then parroted by their media puppets.
People living outside the DC echochamber recognize that Mitt impressed people in Israel. His statement about the Palestinians won’t hurt him. Further, people living outside the DC echochamber were impressed with Mitt’s speech in Poland.
It’s true that Mitt shouldn’t have said anything about the Olympics but that’s another tempest in a teapot issue that the DC media is throwing a hissy fit over but that voters just ignore. They’re worried that President Obama hasn’t gotten the economy jumpstarted. They’re worried that the ACA will hurt businesses.
The Obama train is quickly turning into a trainwreck. The real polling shows him in tough shape in the battleground states.
By the time the Democrats’ (abbreviated and underfunded) convention closes, they might be riding a 3-month fundraising losing streak. That’s a terrible position to be in heading into the final sprint.
Tags: President Obama, Fundraising, DNC, Democratic National Convention, Democrats, Mitt Romney, RNC, GOP, Election 2012
During yesterday’s roundtable on ABC’s This Week, Donna Brazile tried spinning her way through a question about what President Obama has done for small business owners. Here’s what she said:
What we can do is talk about what the President is doing to help small businesses compete, what the President is doing to help small businesses grow and hire people. That’s what we’re talking about. We’re not anti-small business. We’re trying to help small businesses compete.
Let’s have that discussion. When a small business files their taxes as an individual, the business’s earnings are counted as the individual’s income. President Obama wants these S-corps and LLCs to pay a marginal tax rate of almost 40%.
This money typically isn’t taken in salary by “the rich.” It’s frequently invested in their businesses. How will increasing their taxes at this time help small businesses or their employees? It won’t.
How has this administration’s EPA helped small businesses? It hasn’t. This administration’s EPA isn’t greenlighting the permits needed for switching vehicles from diesel fuel to liquified natural gas. That step alone would cut delivery expenses dramatically.
When President Obama delayed a decision on the Keystone XL Pipeline project, he stopped small businesses from playing an important support role in building the pipeline.
These small businesses have been hurt by some of President Obama’s lesser known initiatives. That’s before talking about the 8,000 elephant in the room, aka the ACA.
That’s before talking about this administration’s disastrous energy policy, if it can be seriously considered policy. President Obama put a higher priority on campaign contributions than on strengthening America’s energy supply for a generation. The deal that the Chinese are on the verge of signing won’t stop global warming like militant environmentalists want. The Chinese deal will officially stop the Keystone XL pipeline, killing thousands of jobs.
If that’s this administration’s idea of helping small businesses, then I’m betting small businesses wish government got out of the business of helping small businesses.
This administration’s economic legacy is a disaster. Job growth is anemic. Economic growth dropped from 4.1% in Q4/2011 to a tiny 1.5% in Q2/2012. FYI- That 4.1% growth was the best of this administration. The Reagan recovery started in earnest in Q2/1983. The GDP that quarter was 10.9%. That quarter was followed by quarters of 6.5%, 7%, 7.4% and 5%.
In President Reagan’s third September in office, the economy created 1,100,000 jobs. After a strong start this year, it’s questionable whether the economy under this administration will create 1,100,000 jobs this year.
Finally, we know from corporations parking their money on the sidelines that their money will stay on the sidelines until regulations are reformed, the ACA is repealed and Dodd-Frank is just an awful memory. That means this is the best economic performance we can expect in an Obama administration.
That’s why we can’t afford 4 more years of this economic stagnation.
Tags: President Obama, Donna Brazile, DNC, Recession, Keystone XL Pipeline, Energy, Affordable Care Act, EPA, GDP, Job Growth, Democrats, Election 2012
The organizing committee for the Democrats’ national convention is having difficulty raising money. That’s why they’ve canceled their kickoff event:
Democrats canceled a political convention kick-off event at the Charlotte Motor Speedway and will move the activities to Charlotte’s main business district, the convention’s host committee announced.
“While we regret having to move CarolinaFest away from our great partners at the Charlotte Motor Speedway and the City of Concord, we are thrilled with the opportunity that comes with hosting this event in Uptown Charlotte,” said Dan Murrey, the executive director of the Charlotte in 2012 Convention Host Committee.
The move comes as party planners are grappling with a fundraising deficit of roughly $27 million, according to two people familiar with the matter who requested anonymity to discuss internal party politics. With a party ban on direct contributions from corporations, the host committee has raised less than $10 million, well short of its $36.6 million goal, said one of the people.
This is a major problem for Democrats. Their fundraising totals for their convention have been pathetic. A few weeks ago, they went with hat-in-hand to the unions to help pay for their convention.
That, apparently, didn’t go well because they’re changing their plans for their kickoff event. That’s a major embarassment to the party. At a time when families are struggling, they’ll trust the party that’s got their financial house in order.
That Drudge headline screams ‘financial disaster’. This tidbit of news indicates they’re in deeper trouble than just the headline:
In January, Steve Kerrigan, chief executive officer of the convention committee, said that Democrats were shortening their convention from four days to three “to make room for a day to organize and celebrate the Carolinas, Virginia and the South and kick off the convention at Charlotte Motor Speedway on Labor Day,” Sept. 3.
That’s code for ‘We can’t afford to do a real convention so we’re shortening it.’ Forget about 2 steps forward, 1 step back. Democrats have been stepping backward most of the time this year.
What a fitting image for their campaign.
Tags: Democratic National Convention, Fundraising, Crisis, Unions, Burn Rate, Democrats, Election 2012
Minutes ago, I published this post titled Scariest headline this am. Had I seen this headline, I would’ve ranked them 1 and 1A.
The contents of the article aren’t a joy to the Obama campaign either:
(Reuters) – Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney and Republican groups raised more than $76.8 million in May, his campaign said on Thursday, topping the $60 million President Barack Obama and his Democratic allies hauled in.
The campaign and Republican National Committee have $107 million cash on hand, the campaign said.
(Reporting By Patricia Zengerle)
This is the worst news President Obama could get from the campaign operation. First, news that President Obama’s major ad blitz didn’t barely move the needle of public opinion. Next, the news that he’ll actually be outfundraised (and probably by a pretty wide margin) won’t cheer him up, either.
This is shaping up to be another miserable morning for the Obama campaign. It’s time for Mssrs. Axelrod and Plouffe to order more cases of Maalox.
Tags: President Obama, Fundraising, DNC, Democrats, Mitt Romney, RNC, GOP, Election 2012
Ed’s post about the fundraising reports for Team Obama/DNC and Team Mitt/RNC is fascinating on multiple levels. This is the part that most fascinates me:
As I write in my column, it’s not just Obama and his team, but also his allies in the media. The more they talk, the more people they alienate from Obama. And the more that happens, the fewer donations they get, and the more in both voters and contributors that Romney and the RNC can attract. This should be a very interesting summer in the fundraising race.
The reason I find this fascinating is because Axelrod and Carney have talked at length about how this would be a choice election. While there’s no doubt that President Obama, Axelrod and Carney want it to be a choice election, it appears as though the American people are saying that they’re treating it like a referendum on President Obama.
This should frighten the administration because their record isn’t popular. The stimulus stinks. O’Care isn’t popular, either. The early Obama bailouts are failures. The Solyndra scandal, a biproduct of the stimulus, is a portrait of the worst of DC. Job Growth has been lethargic and inconsistent.
In short, there’s nothing for the American people to rally around in terms of President Obama’s record. That’s hardly the type of thing a campaign wants to hear as we near the home stretch.
I’ve meant to write about something earlier in the week but I’ll include it here. President Obama is criticizing Mitt about his time at Bain Capital. That’s fair game. I went after Mitt’s record at Bain Capital, too.
The thing is that President Obama played the role of venture capitalist when they shipped billions of dollars to Solyndra, GM, BofA and other multi-national corporations.
Simply put, Mitt’s record as a private sector venture capitalist is stronger than President Obama’s record as a public sector venture capitalist. In fact, President Obama is a total failure as a venture capitalist.
Tags: President Obama, Fundraising, DNC, Solyndra, Venture Capitalist, GM, Democrats, Mitt Romney, RNC, GOP, Election 2012
This article highlights President Obama’s decisionmaking prowess:
President Barack Obama’s decision in February 2011 to hold the Democratic National Convention in North Carolina looked like a bold move to reclaim a state he’d won in 2008. Today, it’s more like an awkward fit.The state’s Democratic Party is mired in a sexual harassment scandal. Voters just approved a state constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, which conflicts with Obama’s view on the issue. Convention fundraising has been slow, and labor unions tapped to fill the financial gap are angry the convention will be in a city, Charlotte, with no unionized hotels and in a state where compulsory union membership or the payment of dues is prohibited as an employment condition.
North Carolina’s 9.7 percent unemployment rate is above the national average and one of the host city’s top employers, Bank of America (BAC), has announced job reductions. Obama is scheduled to accept his party’s nomination at Bank of America Stadium in September.
FYI- Bev Perdue is the governor of North Carolina. She’s another cookie-cutter Democrat.
National conventions are the opportunity for political parties to highlight their successes. When President Bush accepted his party’s nomination in New York City, he highlighted the fact that he’d prevented another 9/11 without saying a word about it. The setting said everything that needed to be said.
President Obama, on the other hand, will be accepting his party’s nomination in a stadium named after a bank that’s still too big to fail. He’ll accept the nomination in a state where the Democratic governor’s economic plans have failed.
What’s worse is that a major part of President Obama’s base isn’t excited over the possibility of being forced to paying tons of cash to pay for this national convention.
That’s just the start of it. What do you think the Democrats’ lineup of primetime speakers will look like? Will the list include Bernie Sanders, Dennis Kucinich and Chuck Schumer? Will Cherokee Warren get a primetime slot?
Perhaps that’s why they’ve shrunk the convention an additional day. Is it that, in addition to being too broke to pay for the convention, they don’t want to highlight the left wing looniness of their legislators?
Get out the popcorn. Things are about to get interesting in North Carolina.
Tags: President Obama, Democratic National Convention, North Carolina, Right to Work State, Too Big To Fail, Unions, DNC, Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Socialists, Democrats, Election 2012
Imagine how uncomfortable the Obama campaign must’ve felt asking the unions to pay for the Democratic National Convention. Those negotiators/fundraisers must’ve felt nervous and then some.
President Barack Obama’s political advisers are pressing labor unions to contribute to the Democratic convention in September to cover a fundraising shortfall resulting from their self-imposed ban on corporate donations, according to two people familiar with the matter.
Democratic officials gave representatives of the major U.S. unions, including the AFL-CIO, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and the United Auto Workers, a tour of the convention sites in Charlotte, North Carolina, April 23 in advance of a request for donations, according to the two people, who requested anonymity because they weren’t authorized to discuss internal strategy.
There’s nothing in this article that says these political advisers wore flack jackets while giving the AFL-CIO, the Teamsters and the UAW a tour of the stadium. Had they given the tour to the construction unions or engineer unions, they would’ve been well-advised to wear a flack jacket.
They’re the people President Obama stiffed on the Keystone XL Pipeline project. I can’t imagine that they’re happy with how President Obama’s administration has treated them. I can imagine them being prepared for open revolt against President Obama’s administration.
This is exceptionally telling since the DNC was trimmed from the customary 4 days down to 3 days, presumably to cut expenses. Now DNC officials are having difficulty raising the money needed to present a scaled-down version of a convention.
This speaks to the Democrats’ lack of enthusiasm compared with 4 years ago and their inability to raise money, which is directly tied with the lack of enthusiasm for Democrats this cycle.
The polls are painting a modestly positive story for President Obama and the Democrats. Stories like this paint a bleak picture for President Obama and the Democrats.
When the polls finally tip, and they will, the Democrats won’t have a positive story to tell about their stewardship of the economy. They won’t have a positive story to tell about their not passing a budget in 1,092 and counting. They won’t have a positive story about how this administration’s EPA and NLRB have hurt families and small businesses through regulatory overreach.
Tags: Democratic National Convention, President Obama, UAW, Teamsters, AFL-CIO, Fundraising, Charlotte, Enthusiasm Gap, Democrats, Election 2012