Month: October 2014
Obama Can’t Even Get Credit for … a Meal in a Restaurant
I went to a restaurant up in New York when I was … during the U.N. General Assembly, and my credit card was rejected. It turned out I guess I don’t use it enough. They were … they thought there was some fraud going on. Fortunately, Michelle had hers.
— President Obama, quoted by the Washington Post.
Christie Might Run for Prez to Get Secret Service to Babysit His Daughter
By the way, one of the biggest motivating factors for me actually considering this is to have 24-hour surveillance on my daughter. It would be great.
— Gov. Chris Christie, quoted by Business Insider, on why he might want to run for president.
Deficit Drops to Lowest Level Since Before the 2008 Financial Crash
The budget deficit in the U.S. shrank in the last fiscal year to the lowest level as a share of the economy since 2007 as faster growth and falling unemployment boosted tax receipts, the Treasury Department said.
The shortfall was $483.4 billion in the 12 months to Sept. 30, compared with $680.2 billion a year earlier, the Treasury said today in Washington. That’s about a third of the record $1.4 trillion deficit reached in 2009. Revenue jumped 8.9 percent and spending gained 1.4 percent, the figures showed.
Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew said the fiscal improvement is partly tied to stronger growth, as the nation’s unemployment rate dropped to 5.9 percent in September from 7.2 percent a year earlier. Still, the deficit is forecast by the Congressional Budget Office to start widening again as an aging population prompts more spending on Social Security and health care.
Initial Jobless Claims Fall to Lowest Level Since Clinton Left Office
“The number of people who applied for U.S. jobless benefits fell 23,000 to 264,000 in the week that ended Oct. 11, hitting the lowest level since April 2000, showing that employers are laying off few workers, according to government data released Thursday,” Marketwatch reports. April 2000 was three months after Pres. Clinton left office. The chart above from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that employment never recovered during the six years Republicans controlled the White House and both houses of Congress. The chart also shows that unemployment surged in advance of the financial collapse on Bush’s watch and only began to recover very slowly after the Stimulus kicked in. It’s impossible to say how much more quickly employment might have rebounded if Republicans in Congress and GOP governors hadn’t deliberately stalled the recovery by cutting funding to government services and employment.
More from Marketwatch:
Billionaire Behaving Badly – Florida GOP Gov. Rick Scott Delays Debate in Fit of Pique
In case you missed it, check out the remarkable first start of the debate in the Florida governor’s race last night. Incumbent Republican governor Rick Scott, a billionaire, refused to take his place on the stage with his opponent, former Gov. Charlie Crist, a former Republican now turned Democrat, because Crist decided to have a small electric fan placed at his feet.
“Are we really going to debate about a fan?”
– Charlie Crist
– Charlie Crist
When asked why he wanted the fan at his feet, Crist said, “Are we really going to debate about a fan? Or are we going to talk about education and the environment and the future of our state? I mean, really.”
When Scott finally got over himself and the debate began, one of the moderators asked him why he’d held up the event, which was televised live in all 11 Florida television markets and on C-SPAN.
“I waited to see if he––’til––we figured out if he was going to show up,” Scott said, addressing millions of viewers who’d just seen Crist show up five minutes earlier and stand there alone on the empty stage. “He said he wasn’t gonna come to the––he said he wasn’t gonna come to the debate. So why come out until he’s ready?”
Poltico.com has a substantive account of the debate HERE.
Voters Appear Set to Hand Control of Congress to the Party They Like Least
With the midterm elections less than a month away, polling suggests that voters will give the Republican Party majorities in both houses of Congress for the first time since 2006, when they booted GOP out of power after its disastrous six year run as George W. Bush’s “Rubberstamp Congress.”
The NBC poll found that while 59 percent of Republicans say they’re engaged in the election, just 47 percent of Democrats are paying attention
FiveThirtyEight gives Republicans a 60 percent chance of taking the Senate, and, largely because of Republican gerrymandering in 2011, there is little chance Democrats will take back the House. To keep their majority in the Senate, Democrats need to hold and/or win six seats, including five current seats in red and purple states — Alaska, Arkansas, Louisiana, North Carolina and New Hampshire — and one blue state that looks wobbly, Colorado. They are likely to hold the open seat in Michigan, the race for the open seat in Georgia is considered winnable, and — if they’re having a good night — upsets are possible in Kansas and South Dakota.
How likely is that Democrats will have a good night on Nov. 4? An NBC poll this week found that likely voters favor a Republican-led Congress by two points, 46/44 percent, while the larger cohort of registered voters prefer to put Dems in charge by the same margin, 46/42 percent. The preference for Democratic-control by registered voters ought to be encouraging — the Dems have put time and money into getting out the vote in critical states — but NBC also found that while 59 percent of Republicans say they’re engaged in the election, just 47 percent of Democrats are paying attention.
The Panic’s Infectious
Democrats have panic growing in their eyes,
As Republicans see their Senate hopes rise.
But one thing’s for sure,
In the absence of a cure,
Ebola is this election’s “October surprise.”
