• Herb Kohl,  J.B. Van Hollen,  Mark Neumann,  Paul Ryan,  Russ Feingold

    WI-Sen Poll Watch: Dem Sen Herb Kohl Looks Safe Against all GOP Challengers

    According to the latest PPP Poll.

    Favorable Vs Unfavorable:

    • Rep. Paul Ryan 36% Vs. 35%
    • Former Rep. Mark Neumann 24% Vs. 27%
    • Atty. Gen. JB Van Hollen 25% Vs. 28%
    • Former Sen. Russ Feingold 51% Vs. 39%

    Job Approval Vs. Disapproval:

    • Sen Herb Kohl 50% Vs. 30%
    • Sen Ron Johnson 32% Vs. 28%

    Heads Up:

    • 52% Kohl Vs. 37% Van Hollen
    • 49% Kohl Vs. 42% Ryan
    • 51% Kohl Vs. 37% Neumann
    • 51% Feingold Vs. 39% Van Hollen
    • 49% Feingold Vs. 42% Ryan
    • 50% Feingold Vs. 40% Neumann

    PPP surveyed 768 Wisconsin voters from February 24th to 27th. The survey’s margin of error is +/-3.5%.

    It has been rumored for some time that Senator Herb Kohl will retire and that defeated Senator Russ Feingold (who is still popular in the state despite being beaten by Ron Johnson last November) would try to regain a Senate seat.

    No matter from this polling data, either Democrat, Kohl or Feingold looks safe.

    Also, it is doubtful that Rep. Paul Ryan who is the best Republican in this poll is interested in running for the Senate.

    Note, however, Wisconsin WILL be a key battleground state for the 2012 Presidential race and voter participation will be high in this election. This will not be a priority for the NRSC unless Kohl retires and the seat becomes open.

    The full poll results are here (Pdf.)

  • Pinboard Links

    Flap’s Links and Comments for March 2nd from 15:05 to 15:09

    These are my links for March 2nd from 15:05 to 15:09:

    • Money Train – Story of California High Speed Rail – "Within 25 years, our goal is to give 80 percent of Americans access to high-speed rail," President Obama declared in his State of the Union address, making it the most ambitious element of his vision for "winning the future."

      Invoking national pride, Obama mused that "America is the nation that built the transcontinental railroad, brought electricity to rural communities, constructed the interstate highway system." Sadly, he lamented, the U.S. now lags behind Europe, Russia, and China in modern transportation infrastructure.

      If the nation met his goal for high-speed rail adoption, he said, "This could allow you to go places in half the time it takes to travel by car. For some trips, it will be faster than flying — without the pat-down. As we speak, routes in California and the Midwest are already under way."

      To most Americans, the passing reference to California was likely an afterthought, lost amid all the dreamy rhetoric of rebuilding the nation. But upon closer inspection, the state's proposed high-speed rail system serves as a perfect example of the gap between the promise of transformational liberalism and the reality of big government. Taxpayers everywhere should pay attention, because the project has already been granted $3.2 billion in federal funds, mostly through Obama's economic stimulus package — and its backers hope to gobble up billions more over the next decade.

      The $43 billion transportation project to link Los Angeles to San Francisco with a bullet train by 2020 would be considered grandiose during the plushest of times, yet it's being pursued during an era when governments at all levels are mired in deep fiscal crises. The plan has been subject to a series of scathing reports by independent analysts, raising concerns about everything from its cost estimates to its business model. The University of California at Berkeley has questioned its lofty ridership projections. And even the Washington Post has editorialized against it.

      ++++++++

      Read it all

    • The lunacy of California’s high-speed rail – Perhaps I can make my point more concretely. Suppose you work in Century City on the west side of Los Angeles and you want to commute to a business meeting on Sand Hill Road in Palo Alto. Would you want to drive to Union Station in downtown LA (over the ever-clogged Santa Monica Freeway or faster Olympic Avenue), then take a train for two hours and 40 minutes to downtown San Francisco, then drive nearly another hour down the Bayshore or I-280 to Sand Hill Road? Or would you prefer to drive to LAX, wait some annoying length of time (probably 15 minutes) in the security lines, then fly 50 minutes in the air to SFO, and drive the considerably shorter distance down the Bayshore or I-280 to Sand Hill Road? The rail trip is door-to-door five to six hours and maybe more; the airline trip is door-to-door is three to four hours door-to-door. I know which one I'd pick (if I couldn't manage to get out of the meeting altogether).

      They’re estimating an average speed of 143mph and a fare of only $105—I don’t think so.

      +++++++

      Not going to fly – pardon the pun.

  • Pinboard Links

    Flap’s Links and Comments for March 2nd from 14:05 to 14:10

    These are my links for March 2nd from 14:05 to 14:10:

    • California Still Barking Up the Wrong Tree for Taxes – The Amazon tax is back for debate. Again.  Despite court rulings that the thing is unconstitutional, despite proven records of failure in those states who have tried it, California’s Democratic leadership is again proposing the online tax.

      None of the excuses for this wasteful proposal make sense. Some retailers claim that taxes are needed to even the playing field between brick and mortar stores that do collect tax, and online retailers who do not. After all, that is why our local WalMart is suffering, right? But a recent LA Times article shows that retailers such as WalMart are hurting, not because they compete with Amazon, but because they have scaled back their merchandise offerings, forcing customers to look elsewhere to complete their shopping lists.  In fact, WalMart is not losing customers to online retailers so much as they are losing their customers to even lower priced offerings such as dollar stores. 

      Meanwhile, retailers like Amazon, using technology to streamline delivery processes, and offering a wide variety of items,  just posted major increases in sales. In this video from CNN  executives claim Amazon shows 26-40% growth, from the same time last year, with 15,000 employees hired in 2010. And yet, California’s Dems want to effectively slap one of the major employers in the US who is actually offering good paying jobs, with benefits.

      ++++++++

      But, California Democrats in the state legislature have never met a tax they did not like – even if it does not involve capturing that much revenue.

      To the LEFT, it is more about punishing people in the marketplace in search of a social justice "fairness."

    • Koch Brothers Receive Praise From Obama Administration – Progressives may have decided that businessmen and libertarian political benefactors David and Charles Koch are the latest harbingers of the vast right-wing conspiracy, but they could be shocked to learn that several Koch Industries subsidiaries have been working closely and productively with…the Obama administration.

      Specifically, it’s with Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency that Koch Industries has been playing nice. In Texas last fall, for instance, the Koch-owned Flint Hills Resources helped forge an agreement between the EPA and the Texas Commission on Environmental Equality in a regulation dispute. The move got the company praise from the EPA, calling the agreement a “model for other companies.” (…)

      The EPA under President Obama has also praised Koch subsidiaries Georgia-Pacific and Invista for their cooperation with the agency. Georgia-Pacific even won an award from the EPA in 2009. Leftists may complain that these right-wing bogeymen are unfairly challenging federal environmental regulations so they can “keep pumping out pollution for free,” but it seems the Obama administration has a lot of positive things to say about the brothers Koch.

      ++++++

      The Koch Brothers are businessmen and it is in their interests to NOT pollute the environment and alienate/poison their customers.

      The LEFT is laughable in their conspiracy theories regarding the Kochs

  • Shelia Jackson Lee

    Rep. Shelia Jackson Lee – A Congressional Boss From Hell

    Rep. Shelia Jackson Lee answers cell phone and blows off cancer survivor’s question

    Without a doubt.

    A lot of politicians give nicknames to their aides. George W. Bush famously referred to his attorney general, Alberto Gonzalez, as “Fredo.” Mitch Daniels, then head of the Office of Management and Budget, was known as “The Blade.” Barack Obama reportedly called Larry Summers, his chief economic advisor, “Dr. Kevorkian.”

    Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee of Texas also hands out nicknames to the people who work for her. The Houston Democrat addressed one of her employees as “you stupid motherf**ker.” And not just once, but “constantly,” recalls the staffer, “like, all the time.”

    Another Jackson Lee aide recounts the time her parents came to Washington to visit: “They were really excited to come to the congressional office. They’re small town people, so for them it was a huge deal. They were actually sitting in the main lobby waiting area….[Jackson Lee] came out screaming at me over a scheduling change. Called me a ’stupid idiot. Don’t be a moron, you foolish girl’ and actually did this in front of my parents, of all things.”

    And, look at her staff turnover numbers.

    Not surprisingly, Jackson Lee has one of the highest staff turnover rates in Washington. Over the last ten years, at least 39 staffers have left within one year. Over that time, Lee has employed at least nine chiefs of staff, eight legislative directors, and 18 schedulers or executive assistants, according to records of federal disclosure forms published by the website Legistorm. Nine staffers left within two months, 25 within 6 months.

    The many veterans of Jackson Lee’s office meet regularly for drinks and stories. We “still get together to have a cathartic release,” says one. “We sit around and tell these stories and just work ourselves into a state of rage.”

    She does nothing to improve the stature of Congress.

    Wonder what her response will be?

  • Pinboard Links

    Flap’s Links and Comments for March 2nd from 12:28 to 12:34

    These are my links for March 2nd from 12:28 to 12:34:

    • Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum taken off air by Fox News – Fox News announced Wednesday that it is suspending the contracts of political contributors Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum because both have demonstrated that they are seriously considering running for president.

      Dianne Brandi, the network's executive vice president of legal and business affairs, said in an interview that the channel made the move because Gingrich aides told Fox News executives that the former House speaker is stepping up his exploration of a presidential bid.

      While Gingrich is not expected to announce that he is forming a federal exploratory committee this week, he is expected to say in Georgia on Thursday that he is meeting with advisors to explore seeking the 2012 Republican presidential nomination, a Gingrich aide said.

      Santorum, a former senator from Pennsylvania, has indicated that he plans to participate in Republican primary debates, Brandi said, "so that leads us to believe he is seriously considering running."

      Brandi said the network acted out of journalistic principle.

      +++++++

      They will pull Mike Huckabee and Sarah Palin too if they make too much more of an effort to run.

      I expect neither of them to give up the nice fat Fox News paycheck.

    • Oprah Winfrey’s new TV channel fails to win viewers – The OWN channel, which launched two months ago, is being watched by only 135,000 people at any one time.

      The ratings are 10 per cent lower than for the cable channel it replaced which was called Discovery Health.

      And only 45,000 of those watching are women aged 25 to 54, the audience the channel is being aimed at.

      Miss Winfrey, 57, has urged patience and supporters say ratings will improve when the chat show host begins appearing more regularly herself towards the end of the year.

      She will still be busy filming "The Oprah Winfrey Show" for the ABC network until September, but will then be able to devote more time to her own channel. That will include having her own show two or three nights a week.

      ++++++

      Most of the Discovery-Health Channel's shows have been moved the FIT TV and that is where the viewership has gone.

      Oprah's vanity channel will maybe more successful when she ends her ABC show.

  • Pinboard Links

    Flap’s Links and Comments for March 2nd from 10:11 to 10:52

    These are my links for March 2nd from 10:11 to 10:52:

    • Should public employees have collective bargaining? California’s Collective Bargaining Laws – California collective bargaining laws

      (Meyers-Milias-Brown, 1968) provides collective bargaining rights for public agency employees including firefighters, police officers and emergency medial personnel employed by cities, counties and some districts.

      SB60 (Rodda, 1975) granted collective bargaining rights to employees of K-12 schools and community colleges.

      SB839 (Dills, 1977) extended collective bargaining rights to most state employees, excluding higher-education employees.

      AB1091 (Berman, 1978) extended collective bargaining rights to employees of the University of California, the California State University and Hastings College of the Law.

      +++++++

      A good summary

    • Poll Watch: American Voters Split On Government Shutdown, Quinnipiac University National Poll Finds; Democrats, Republicans Divided On Gov’t Worker Pay – American voters are split as 46 percent say it would be a good thing and 44 percent say it would be a bad thing if the U.S. government shut down because of disagreement in Washington over federal spending, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today.

      Looking at the controversy over pay for government workers, 35 percent say the pay is "about right," while 15 percent say it is too little and 42 percent say it is too much.

      To reduce state budget deficits, collective bargaining for public employees should be limited, 45 percent of American voters tell the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pe-ack) University poll, while 42 percent oppose limits on collective bargaining. But voters say 63 – 31 percent that government workers should pay more for benefits and retirement programs.

      Efforts by governors to limit collective bargaining rights are motivated by a desire to reduce government costs rather than to weaken unions, voters say 47 – 41 percent.

      If the federal government is forced to shut down because of the impasse over spending, voters say by an overwhelming 78 – 18 percent neither President Barack Obama nor members of Congress should be paid for that period. Voters would blame Republicans more than President Obama 47 – 38 percent if the government shuts down.

      +++++++

      This poll certainly is different than CBS poll. It is difficult to poll labor issues since most folks unless they are in a union understand what is collective bargaining.

    • Barbour to Obama: Why don’t you let federal employees collectively bargain? – Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour said he stands behind fellow Republican Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin in his battle against public sector unions, and knocked President Obama for supporting the protests while presiding over millions of federal workers who cannot collectively bargain.

      Obama recently voiced support for state workers and labor groups in Wisconsin, who have been protesting a bill that would would force them to pay more into their pensions and for health care, and end collective bargaining for public workers.

      Barbour, a potential 2012 presidential contender who met with the president this week at a White House governors meeting, didn’t call Obama a hypocrite outright, but he came close.

      “The fact of the matter is, the president told us at the White House that he had unilaterally frozen spending for federal employees. Federal employees don’t have collective bargaining rights,” Barbour told reporters during an event at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Wednesday. “The idea you guys have given the country is it’s just like there’s some constitutional right to collective bargaining. About half the states either don’t have it at all – my state does not have collective bargaining – or they limit it. The federal employees are not allowed to have collective bargaining for pay, for pensions, for health care.”

      While labor unions that represent federal workers do have some collective bargaining rights, provisions in the Civil Service Reform Act passed under President Carter in 1978 restrict federal employees from using it for pay or pensions and federal workers cannot be forced into a union or required to pay dues.

      +++++++++

      And, this misinformation about public employee collective bargaining is reflected in the polls.

  • Barbara Boxer,  Carly Fiorina

    Video: Sen. Barbara Boxer Beclowns Herself Over PBS Funding – “A Vendetta Against Elmo”

    Come on California. You cannot tell me that Carly Fiorina would not have made a better Senator than this idiot.

    Sen. Barbara Boxer posited a new theory about what lies behind GOP cuts to the budget. The Republican Party hates Elmo, she suggested in a floor speech Tuesday.

    “I believe they use deficit reduction as an excuse to carry out political vendettas,” she said, speaking about GOP cuts to health care, the EPA and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which she noted is funded by the government at a much lower percentage than the BBC in Britain.

    “Now they want to zero it out,” she said. “A vendetta, against Elmo.”

  • Barack Obama,  Mike Huckabee,  Mitt Romney,  Newt Gingrich,  President 2012,  Sarah Palin

    President 2012 Virginia Poll Watch: Obama 48% Vs. Romney 42% – Huckabee, Gingrich and Palin All Do Worse

    According to the latest PPP poll.

    Favorable Vs. Unfavorable:

    • Romney – 33% Vs. 48%
    • Huckabee – 40% Vs. 41%
    • Gingrich – 29% Vs. 56%
    • Palin – 30% Vs. 63%

    Heads Up:

    • Obama – 48% Vs. Romney – 42%
    • Obama – 51% Vs. Huckabee – 43%
    • Obama – 51% Vs. Gingrich – 39%
    • Obama – 54% Vs. Palin – 35%

    President Obama leads Mitt Romney – the best faring GOP candidate by the same margin he beat Joh McCain in 2008.

    So, what does this poll mean in Virginia – a key battleground state and one which the Republican need to win the Presidency in 2012?

    Part of the reason Obama’s doing well in Virginia is that he has respectable, if not great, approval numbers there. 48% like the job he’s doing to 45% who disapprove. There are two keys to his solid standing. The first is that 87% of Democrats stand with him- that’s an indication he’s generally holding onto white voters within his party, even ones who might lean a little bit more to the conservative side of the ideological spectrum.

    The other key to his standing is that he’s coming close to breaking even with independents- 48% disapprove of him to 42% who approve. It may seem counter intuitive that negative numbers with those voters are a good sign for Obama, but after two straight election years where independents in Virginia leaned toward the GOP by a margin of about 30 points a Democratic politician getting just slightly negative reviews from them is progress.

    Even more important to Obama’s leads in the state than his own approval numbers though is how dimly voters there view all of the leading Republicans considering the Presidential race.

    Exit answer: The GOP better get some better candidates.

    The entire poll is here (Pdf).

  • Elton Gallegly,  Illegal Immigration

    House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration Policy and Enforcement: “Making Immigration Work for American Minorities”

    Yesterday’s hearing, chaired by my Congressman Elton Gallegly proved partisan and combative with Democrats accusing Republicans of playing racial politics.

    A congressional hearing led by Rep. Elton Gallegly quickly turned partisan and combative on Tuesday, with Democrats accusing Republicans of trying to drive a wedge between African-Americans and Latinos over illegal immigration.

    Some lawmakers are trying “to pit black against brown” by essentially arguing that illegal immigration is the reason minority communities still struggle nearly 50 years after Martin Luther King Jr. led a landmark civil rights march on Washington, said Rep. John Conyers, a Michigan Democrat who was one of the founding members of the Congressional Black Caucus.

    “This is a very sensitive subject,” said Conyers, who called the idea of dividing minority groups “abhorrent and repulsive.”

    Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Los Angeles, charged that the hearing was an attempt to divert attention from the real causes of high unemployment among African-Americans.

    “We cannot afford to let people who have political agendas divide us,” she said.

    Gallegly, who called the hearing as chairman of the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Immigration Policy and Enforcement, disputed the assertion it was part of a divide-and-conquer strategy.

    “I think it’s shameful,” the Simi Valley Republican said of the Democrats’ accusations. “I hope we’ll bring a little more civility to hearings in the future.”

    You can read a more complete summary of the hearing here.

    I am glad to clue in Conyers and Waters, there is already a racial divide between Hispanics and African-Americans and it has nothing to do with illegal immigration. I know the Democrats need racial demographics in order to win elections, particularly statewide in California, but to bury their head in the sand about the impact of illegal aliens on society is just pathetic.