CHEERS and JEERS for Feb 3, 2012!

CHEERS to Jobs! Last month the US economy added 243,000 non-farm payroll jobs, bringing the U3 ("official") unemployment rate down to 8.3%. The more comprehensive U6 rate - which includes the underemployed and people who have quit looking out of frustration - is at 15.1% Nate Silver figures that Obama needs 150,000 jobs a month, minimum, for his chances of re-election to remain steady or improve. Less than that, according to Silver, and he's going to be in trouble.

FEH to Susan G Komen For The Cure, which issued an apology for cutting off Planned Parenthood's funding for cancer screening, and have agreed to resume working with Planned Parenthood. This is most definitely a case of "too little, too late" for SGK, who now have irrevocably inserted themselves into abortion politics for years to come; but, frankly, I don't see how they could have done more than this, once the decision was made in the first place. Stories like this one make it clear that there's still a lot more damage left to be done by this fiasco.

By the way, there's no way this was an "honest mistake." The evidence points to SGK's plan, all along, being to sever their relationship with Planned Parenthood. More here, with a side bonus here. It also bears mentioning that their policy didn't seem to apply to Penn State, which is still under investigation over the nonce Sandusky.

Meanwhile, my wife and I gave $100 to PP to help make up for the lost funds. If you can, please consider donating to Planned Parenthood.

EDIT This isn't going to help, either. And the timing for SGK couldn't be worse.

EDIT 2 I said that SGK had involved themselves in abortion politics irrevocably; the rage from the pro-life right just solidifies this point.

EDIT 3 And now we're being reminded that Karen Handel is also a screaming homophobe.

JEERS to Israel, which is making a renewed PR push for an attack on Iran. Come on, this is getting old.

CHEERS and JEERS for Feb 3, 2012!

CHEERS to Jobs! Last month the US economy added 243,000 non-farm payroll jobs, bringing the U3 ("official") unemployment rate down to 8.3%. The more comprehensive U6 rate - which includes the underemployed and people who have quit looking out of frustration - is at 15.1% Nate Silver figures that Obama needs 150,000 jobs a month, minimum, for his chances of re-election to remain steady or improve. Less than that, according to Silver, and he's going to be in trouble.

FEH to Susan G Komen For The Cure, which issued an apology for cutting off Planned Parenthood's funding for cancer screening, and have agreed to resume working with Planned Parenthood. This is most definitely a case of "too little, too late" for SGK, who now have irrevocably inserted themselves into abortion politics for years to come; but, frankly, I don't see how they could have done more than this, once the decision was made in the first place. Stories like this one make it clear that there's still a lot more damage left to be done by this fiasco.

By the way, there's no way this was an "honest mistake." The evidence points to SGK's plan, all along, being to sever their relationship with Planned Parenthood. More here, with a side bonus here. It also bears mentioning that their policy didn't seem to apply to Penn State, which is still under investigation over the nonce Sandusky.

Meanwhile, my wife and I gave $100 to PP to help make up for the lost funds. If you can, please consider donating to Planned Parenthood.

EDIT This isn't going to help, either. And the timing for SGK couldn't be worse.

EDIT 2 I said that SGK had involved themselves in abortion politics irrevocably; the rage from the pro-life right just solidifies this point.

EDIT 3 And now we're being reminded that Karen Handel is also a screaming homophobe.

JEERS to Israel, which is making a renewed PR push for an attack on Iran. Come on, this is getting old.

Orly #Taitz loses. Again. To an empty table. | #Birthers

Orly Taitz and company tried, and failed, to get Barack Obama knocked off the ballot in Indiana. Undeterred from that failure, they then moved on to Georgia. Taitz and three other lawyers showed up; Obama and his lawyer did not. This, naturally, pissed off the judge. Thus Taitz et. al. argued against an empty table in front of a judge that was angry at the other side.

Taitz et. al. still lost, because the facts and the law are simply not on their side.

The ten-page decision is here. Both the judge's anger at Obama's counsel and his utter distain for Taitz's arguments are clear.

Unfortunately, as with any religious cult or screwball movement, defeat for the birthers has the dual effect of scattering some while hardening the resolve of others. So it shall be in this case. And so Taitz will go on wasting her time, and her clients' time and money, arguing that Barack Obama is, somehow, not a citizen of the United States. And she will continue losing.

Orly #Taitz loses. Again. To an empty table. | #Birthers

Orly Taitz and company tried, and failed, to get Barack Obama knocked off the ballot in Indiana. Undeterred from that failure, they then moved on to Georgia. Taitz and three other lawyers showed up; Obama and his lawyer did not. This, naturally, pissed off the judge. Thus Taitz et. al. argued against an empty table in front of a judge that was angry at the other side.

Taitz et. al. still lost, because the facts and the law are simply not on their side.

The ten-page decision is here. Both the judge's anger at Obama's counsel and his utter distain for Taitz's arguments are clear.

Unfortunately, as with any religious cult or screwball movement, defeat for the birthers has the dual effect of scattering some while hardening the resolve of others. So it shall be in this case. And so Taitz will go on wasting her time, and her clients' time and money, arguing that Barack Obama is, somehow, not a citizen of the United States. And she will continue losing.

#Obama is the front-runner, part three.

(Sorry folks, LiveJournal hated these charts. Trying again with screenshots.)

Let's take a look at this aggregate of polls, presented by HuffPo. This is Obama vs. Romney when you include a bunch of Internet polls, including Zogby.



I frankly think that those Internet polls are complete crap, particularly Zogby - the selection bias is staggering. So, let's remove them. Then we get this chart:



There is good, bad, and ugly for Obama in this chart.

THE GOOD: with the exception of a short period in January, Obama has outpolled Romney in a head-to-head match-up for almost two years. That's been the case even through the Republican wave of 2010, and even though the President's approval ratings through that time haven't been that great. Part of the reason for this, frankly, is that even though Obama isn't as popular as he used to be, Romney is less popular right now. That's going to be hard for Romney to overcome.

THE BAD: Romney did tie with Obama in January, although that's now changed. He's lost that lead now, but it tells us that he can catch up.

THE UGLY: Obama is polling better against Romney now, in absolute numbers, than he has in two years ... and that number is 48.2%. It is, in other words, under 50%, and has been for two years. He's been the President now for three years. As hard as it's going to be for Romney to catch up, it's going to be just as hard, if not harder, for Obama to push over the 50% mark in this political environment. It's not necessary for him to push over the 50% mark -- if the election were held now he'd probably make up the difference with one-third of the undecided vote - and it's not sufficient either - as demonstrated by Florida in 2000. But it would sure help.

#Obama is the front-runner, part three.

(Sorry folks, LiveJournal hated these charts. Trying again with screenshots.)

Let's take a look at this aggregate of polls, presented by HuffPo. This is Obama vs. Romney when you include a bunch of Internet polls, including Zogby.



I frankly think that those Internet polls are complete crap, particularly Zogby - the selection bias is staggering. So, let's remove them. Then we get this chart:



There is good, bad, and ugly for Obama in this chart.

THE GOOD: with the exception of a short period in January, Obama has outpolled Romney in a head-to-head match-up for almost two years. That's been the case even through the Republican wave of 2010, and even though the President's approval ratings through that time haven't been that great. Part of the reason for this, frankly, is that even though Obama isn't as popular as he used to be, Romney is less popular right now. That's going to be hard for Romney to overcome.

THE BAD: Romney did tie with Obama in January, although that's now changed. He's lost that lead now, but it tells us that he can catch up.

THE UGLY: Obama is polling better against Romney now, in absolute numbers, than he has in two years ... and that number is 48.2%. It is, in other words, under 50%, and has been for two years. He's been the President now for three years. As hard as it's going to be for Romney to catch up, it's going to be just as hard, if not harder, for Obama to push over the 50% mark in this political environment. It's not necessary for him to push over the 50% mark -- if the election were held now he'd probably make up the difference with one-third of the undecided vote - and it's not sufficient either - as demonstrated by Florida in 2000. But it would sure help.