Thursday, October 16, 2014

More Americans Support Ground Troops to Fight #ISIS

Boy, does this ever put Obama in a bind.

He's said repeatedly that he won't send ground troops back to Iraq (or into Syria), and more and more he's finding himself on the wrong side of public opinion. What a loser.

At NBC News, "More Americans Back U.S. Ground Troops in ISIS Fight."



Wednesday, October 15, 2014

5 Takeaways From the October WSJ/NBC News Poll

From Janet Hook, at WSJ:
A new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll finds that Republicans enter the final three weeks of the midterm election campaign well-positioned to make gains in Congress. At the same time, the political environment is riddled with volatile elements that could produce surprises. Here are some main takeaways of the new poll.
And got to the full survey, "Republicans Hold Advantage as Midterms Near: Poll Shows Low Interest, Disillusionment Create Room for Surprises."

Polls Show Massive Repudiation of Democratic Party on Election Day

Voters are actually highly dissatisfied with the direction of American politics, but as the party controlling the White House and the Senate, the public is on the verge of dealing a massive repudiation to the Obama-Democrats on November 4th.

Here's ABC News, "Trouble Looms for Obama, Democrats with Election Day 2014 Approaching" (via Memeorandum):
Barack Obama and his political party are heading into the midterm elections in trouble. The president’s 40 percent job approval rating in a new ABC News/Washington Post poll is the lowest of his career – and the Democratic Party’s popularity is its weakest in polling back 30 years, with more than half of Americans seeing the party unfavorably for the first time.

The Republican Party is even more unpopular. But benefitting from their supporters’ greater likelihood of voting, GOP candidates nonetheless hold a 50-43 percent lead among likely voters for U.S. House seats in the Nov. 4 election.

These and other results are informed by an array of public concerns on issues from the economy to international terrorism to the Ebola virus, crashing into a long-running crisis of confidence in the nation’s political leadership. Almost two-thirds say the country is headed seriously off on the wrong track. Even more, three-quarters, are dissatisfied with the way the political system is working.

Scorn is widely cast: Among those who are dissatisfied with the political system, two-thirds say both sides are equally to blame, with the rest dividing evenly between Obama and his party, vs. the Republicans in Congress, as the chief culprits. But as a nearly six-year incumbent president, Obama – and by extension his party – are most at risk.

Beyond his overall rating, Obama is at career lows in approval for his handling of immigration, international affairs and terrorism (long his best issue) in this poll, produced for ABC by Langer Research Associates. Approval of his handling of the conflict with Islamic State insurgents in Iraq and Syria has plummeted by percentage 15 points in the last two weeks, amid questions about the progress of the air campaign now under way.

Further, while Obama’s negative rating on handling the economy has eased, more Americans say they’ve gotten worse off rather than better off under his presidency; the plurality is “about the same” financially, for most not a happy outcome. Even with the recovery to date, 77 percent are worried about the economy’s future, and 57 percent say the country has been experiencing a long-term decline in living standards – all grim assessments as Election Day looms.

Such views can carry a punch. An analysis conducted for this report shows that presidential approval ratings (in data since 1946) and views that the country’s on the right track (since 1974) highly correlate with midterm gains or losses for the party in power. (The correlations are .68 and .65, respectively; 0 means no relationship and 1 is a perfect, positive fit.)

Moreover, an index of dissatisfaction, also produced for this study, finds that the public’s unease on a range of issues strongly predicts vote preferences; these wide-ranging concerns emerge as a key factor in the 2014 contest. In addition to persistent doubts about the economy, for instance, 71 percent express worry about a terrorist attack and 65 percent say they’re concerned about an Ebola epidemic – disquieting sentiments when confidence in the political system is so weak. (Details of the dissatisfaction index will be covered in a separate report tomorrow.)

History, for its part, offers the Democrats cold comfort. Obama’s approval rating matches George W. Bush’s heading into the 2006 midterms, when the Republicans lost 30 seats. The only postwar president numerically lower heading into a second midterm was Harry Truman, at 39 percent approval, in 1950; his Democrats lost 28 seats. While race-by-race assessments don’t suggest those kinds of losses this year, the comparison adds context to the GOP’s upper hand.

Such results also help explain why Obama is attending his first public campaign rally of 2014 only today, for Gov. Dan Malloy of Connecticut.
More.

Tuesday, October 14, 2014

Far-Left Ghoul Scott Lemieux: Killing Babies is a 'Positive Social Good'

Just wow.

Let's just kill more babies, as if we haven't killed enough already, with the left's pro-abortion genocide that's cut a murderous swath across America since the Supreme Court so egregiously ruled in 1973.

For as ghoulish at take you're likely to read, here's your go-to wannabe baby-killer Scotty Lemieux, at the regressive hate-site Leftists, Ghouls and Murder, "Abortion Rights Without Apology." (Via Memeorandum.)

Just read it at the link --- and be ready for the most shameless advocacy for the killing of society's most vulnerable, the unborn.

Leszek Kolakowski: The Man Who Killed Marxism

From Mark Michalski, at RealClearReligion, "The Man Who Killed Marxism":
In Main Currents of Marxism, Kolakowski wrote that "Marxism has been the greatest fantasy of our century." According to him, socialism signifies giving the solution which can never exist. "At present," the author pointed out, "Marxism neither interprets the world nor changes it; it is merely a repetition of slogans." And this is because the ruling elite does not represent the society's needs, but places empty ideology above anything else. Clearly the most important premise of the socialist rule is that it can be exercised by those who possess power. The system which exacts stern order and blind obedience may only triumph through violence, fear, and military coercion. At the same time this system generates only alienation, and stagnation. The sad story of our times is that the system which claims to embody the rights, privileges and welfare of the working class is the same system whose biggest enemy is its very citizens. Kolakowski jokes that socialism would be a splendid idea if only there were no people.
An astounding tome, Main Currents of Marxism: The Founders - The Golden Age - The Breakdown.

Leszek Kowalewski photo photo27_zps0e88e8db.jpg

Accused College Rapists Have Rights, Too

From Judith Shulevitz, at the New Republic.

It's a great piece, so RTWT. The conclusion's killer:
What’s happening at universities represents an often necessary effort to recategorize once-acceptable behaviors as unacceptable. But the government, via Title IX, is effectively acting on the notion popularized in the 1970s and ’80s by Andrea Dworkin and Catharine MacKinnon that male domination is so pervasive that women need special protection from the rigors of the law. Men, as a class, have more power than women, but American law rests on the principle that individuals have rights even when accused of doing bad things. And American liberalism has long rejected the notion that those rights may be curtailed even for a noble cause. “We need to take into account our obligations to due process not because we are soft on rapists and other exploiters of women,” says Halley, but because “the danger of holding an innocent person responsible is real.”
There's your radical feminism infecting the "real world."

The Indecent Mind of Andrea Dworkin

Another one from Robert Stacy McCain!



The 'Government is Not Competent to Handle' the Ebola Virus and #ISIS Threat

Oh, well, here's that notorious right-wing whack job Susan Page, of USA Today, glibly circulating those widely ridiculed conservative fever-swamp talking points. You know, the ones where the White House is completely incapable of handling the various threats to basic American safety and security.

Yes, so go ahead and completely discount Ms. Page's comments. She's simply a FUBAR RWNJ. The truth is, the Obama administration has everything under control. It's all copacetic man.



Alison Lundergan Grimes Will Not Compromise Her Constitutional Right to Deny She Voted for President Barack Obama!

Because the Founders guaranteed the right to hide behind the "secret ballot" if you're a Kentucky Senate candidate who voted for President Obola.

She's seriously in contention for the worst candidate ever.

Truly mind-boggling.

From Mary Katharine Ham, at Hot Air, "Video: Alison Lundergan Grimes sticking with this whole my-vote-is-private shtick."



From Comedy to Farce

From Victor Davis Hanson, at Pajamas Media:
It was tragically comical that the commander in chief in just a few weeks could go from referring to ISIS as “jayvee” and a manageable problem to declaring it an existential threat, in the same manner he upgraded the Free Syrian Army from amateurs and a fantasy to our ground linchpin in the new air war. All that tragic comedy was a continuance of his previous untruths, such as the assurance that existing health plans and doctors would not change under the Affordable Care Act or that there was not a smidgeon of corruption at the IRS.

But lately the Obama confusion has descended into the territory not of tragedy or even tragic comedy, but rather of outright farce...
Keep reading.

Monday, October 13, 2014

Seattle Boots Columbus Day for 'Indigenous Peoples' Day'

I wrote on this earlier, and today's the day.

At NBC News:



Highway 73 Toll Road to Be Refinanced

I hate the toll roads. I avoid them like the plague, and I'm not the only one. Screw the transportation agency. They can suck on that debt until 2200 for all I care.

At LAT, "O.C. toll road to be refinanced again; drivers may be paying until 2050."

Go Navy!

Heh, just now on Twitter:



Penelope Cruz for Esquire Magazine November 2014

Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem have backed off from their attacks on Israel. That's good, especially since Ms. Penelope is one of the hottest of the hots.

See Egotastic, "Penelope Cruz Sweet Cleavage in Esquire Magazine November 2014."

Fire Rachel Maddow!

MSNBC's considering cancelling Ronan Farrow, which wouldn't be bad. But if you're going to can anyone it should be Rachel Maddow, the ultimate far-left hack whose show is a broken-record of GOP-bashing and tea party conspiracies. She's utterly ridiculous, and it shows in the ratings decline.

Here's the headline at Mediaite, "MSNBC Eyes Canceling Ronan Farrow Show Amidst Schedule Shakeup."

And see Ed Driscoll on the New York Times report on MSNBC's epic collapse, "MSNBC: ‘Dukakis After Dark’ Meets Groundhog Day."



Richard Engel: #ISIS Hasn't Been Degraded at All

Of course not. Random pinpricks won't do jack.

Obama's national security policy continues to inspire no confidence whatsoever.



PREVIOUSLY: "Obama's Desultory Bombing Mission Won't Defeat #ISIS."

Fleet Week Air Show San Francisco (2014)

At Twitchy, "Amazing photos, videos of the Blue Angels in action from San Francisco’s Fleet Week."

PREVIOUSLY: "San Francisco Fleet Week."

Sunday, October 12, 2014

One Killed, Two injured After Being Struck Amtrak Train at Gaviota State Beach

Just not smart.

Lots of trains rip through Santa Barbara County. And they were on the trestle with no escape.

At LAT, "Couples taking sunset picture hit by train; one dead, two injured."

Despite the Left's 'Tea Party Fear' Meme, Democrat Constituencies Most Scared of Ebola

If you look at the headlines at Memeorandum, you'd think the tea party was hunkering down in wilderness outbreak camps to guard against Ebola. Here's the headline at NYDN, for example, "Tea Party and fears of an Ebola outbreak go hand in hand."

But according to Pew Reports, it's traditional Democrat Party minority groups who're most likely to fear contracting Ebola. Here, "Blacks, Hispanics More Concerned about Exposure to Ebola."

And a summary at Big Government, "PEW: BLACKS, HISPANICS MORE WORRIED THAN WHITES ABOUT CONTRACTING EBOLA":
The poll, conducted Oct. 2-5, found that "nearly half of blacks (47%) and 39% of Hispanics say they are very or somewhat worried about being exposed to the Ebola virus," while "just 27% of whites are worried" about contracting Ebola.

In addition, "women (37%) are somewhat more concerned than men (27%) that they or someone in their family will be exposed to Ebola," and those with with lower levels of education are more worried about getting Ebola than college graduates.

Pew found that while 22% of college graduates are worried about getting Ebola, "34% of those with some college experience and 38% of those with no more than a high school diploma say they are worried."
It's not just fear of an "outbreak," as the NYDN piece suggests, but fear of personally contracting the disease that has Democrats most worried. So whenever you see depraved leftist spewing lies about tea party Ebola fear-mongering, tell them to go suck a discarded Liberian intravenous blood bag.

Republicans Seize on Terrorism as Campaign Issue, Debunking the Left's Narrative of Lies

The way the press criticizes any mention of the rash of beheadings, it serves only to infantilize the American electorate, and of course, protect the Obama White House. Censoring images of Americans being murdered by ISIS does nothing to protect the families. It does everything to protect the crumbling leftist narrative, which needs all the help it can get.

These are not "shocking" images and showing snippets of them in campaign ads is not disrespectful. The opposite Obama-Democrat meme is the big lie of the current campaign season.

At the Los Angeles Times, "Some Senate candidates seize on terrorism as campaign issue":


Far behind in the polls and in need of a bump, a Republican running for Senate in New Mexico recently turned to the image of the knife-wielding Islamic State militant who beheaded an American journalist, building a campaign advertisement that flashes on the horrific YouTube video.

The online spot, from the campaign of Allen Weh, a decorated Marine who served in Vietnam and later in Iraq, is perhaps the most brazen effort by Republicans to use the threat posed by the militants to gain traction with voters. But it is not the only one.

At a time when no single national issue is dominating midterm election campaigns, GOP candidates in several battleground states are seizing on public unease with President Obama's strategy for containing the terrorist group.

In Colorado and New Hampshire, Democratic senators are being badgered by TV ads showing gun-toting Islamic militants against a soundtrack of Obama's comments — including his remark in September that "we don't have a strategy" for the threat.

The attacks come amid voter unease with developments in the Middle East. During debates this week in North Carolina and Georgia, both key contests for control of the Senate, the U.S. response to the terrorists was the first question of the evening.

"The president has continued to fail and show a policy of peace through weakness," said Thom Tillis, the Republican speaker of the House in North Carolina who is trying to oust Democratic Sen. Kay Hagan, during the debate in the military-heavy state. "This is a policy that needs to be on the ballot in November."
Also notice how the Times frames the issue as Republicans "struggling" and "grasping" for traction, when in fact public opinion polls have routinely found the public favoring more robust action to defeat the terrorists. Indeed, Obama's approval on national security has plunged to the low-30s in various surveys.

But hey, the leftist press will do anything to keep the flailing Democrat Party afloat. It's pretty pathetic.