• Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: December 27, 2012

    Obama Over the Fiscal Cliff

    These are my links for December 22nd through December 27th:

    • Why States May Want to Fall off the ‘Cliff’ – Falling off the “fiscal cliff” is a bad thing, right? Not necessarily for some state governments that could begin collecting more in estate taxes on wealth left to heirs if the United States goes over the “cliff,” allowing sharp tax increases and federal spending cuts to take effect in January.In an example of federal and state tax law interaction that gets little notice on Capitol Hill, 30 states next year could collect $3 billion more in estate taxes if Congress and President Barack Obama do not act soon, estimated the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, a Washington think tank.

      The reason? The federal estate tax would return with a vengeance and so would a federal credit system that shares a portion of it with the 30 states. They had been getting their cut of this tax revenue stream until the early 2000s. That was when the credit system for payment of state estate tax went away due to tax cuts enacted under former President George W. Bush.

    • The Year the Dreams Died – 2012 – Barack Obama in 2008 won an election on an upbeat message of change amid hopes that the first black president would mark a redemptive moment in American history. Four years later, the fantasies are gone. In continuing dismal economic times, Obama ran for reelection neither on his first-term achievements — Obamacare, bailouts, financial stimuli, and Keynesian mega-deficits — nor on more utopian promises.Instead, Obama’s campaign systematically reduced his rival, Wall Street financier Mitt Romney, to a conniving, felonious financial pirate who did dastardly things, from letting the uninsured die to putting his pet dog Seamus in a cage on top of the family car.

      Obama once had mused that he wished to be the mirror image of Ronald Reagan — successfully coaxing America to the left as the folksy Reagan had to the right. Instead, 2012 taught us that a calculating Obama is more a canny Richard Nixon, who likewise used any means necessary to be reelected on the premise that his rival would be even worse. But we know what eventually happened to the triumphant, pre-Watergate Nixon after November 1972; what will be the second-term wages of Obama’s winning ugly?

    • Obama’s Numbers Went Down, but Romney Never Inspired Voters to Vote | RealClearPolitics – The 2012 election was different. Barack Obama got 6 percent fewer popular votes than he had gotten in 2008. And Mitt Romney got only 1 percent more popular votes than John McCain had four years before.In retrospect, it looks like both campaigns fell short of their turnout goals. Yes, examination of election returns and exit polls indicates that the Obama campaign turned out voters where it really needed them.

      That enabled him to carry Florida by 1 percent, Ohio by 3 percent, Virginia by 4 percent, and Colorado and Pennsylvania by 5 percent. Without those states, he would have gotten only 243 electoral votes and would now be planning his presidential library.

      But the conservative bloggers who argued that the Obama campaign’s early voting numbers were below target may have been right. If Mitt Romney had gotten 16 percent more popular votes than his predecessor, as John Kerry did, he would have led Obama by 4 million votes and won the popular vote 51 to 48 percent.

      Romney, like Kerry, depended on voters’ distaste for the incumbent; he could not hope to inspire the devotion Bush enjoyed in 2004 and that Obama had from a diminished number in 2008.

      But to continue this counterfactual scenario, if Obama had won 23 percent more popular votes this year than in 2008, he would have beaten Romney by 85 million to 69 million votes and by 54 to 44 percent.

      In reality, Obama’s vote and percentage went down. Considering what happened in Bush’s second term, that suggests a course of caution and wariness for the re-elected president and his party.

    • Piers Morgan: Bible And Constitution ‘Inherently Flawed,’ ‘Time For An Amendment To Bible’ – On Monday, CNN host Piers Morgan invited Saddleback Church Pastor Rick Warren on his program to discuss gay marriage and the bible. Fresh off his feud with Second Amendment rights activists following his full-throated defense of stricter gun control laws in the wake of the Newtown massacre, Morgan inspired further outrage among the religious when he told the pastor he thought it was time for an “amendment to the bible.” In Morgan’s opinion, the bible, like the American Constitution, is “inherently flawed.”
    • Supreme Court won’t block Obama health law’s contraception mandate – he Supreme Court on Wednesday refused to block the Obama administration’s contraception mandate from taking effect.Justice Sonia Sotomayor rejected a request for an emergency injunction that would have shielded employers from the mandate.

      by Hobby Lobby, an arts-and-crafts chain. The company’s Catholic owners say the contraception mandate violates their religious freedom.

      Hobby Lobby might eventually win on that point, Sotomayor said, but the company didn’t meet the standard for an injunction blocking the mandate from taking effect.

      The administration’s policy requires most employers to include contraception in their employees’ healthcare policies, without charging a co-pay or deductible. Churches and houses of worship are exempt, and religious affiliated institutions such as Catholic hospitals don’t have to cover contraception directly. (Their insurance companies cover the cost of making it available at no cost to the employee.)

      But some Catholic employers say they should be able to opt out of the mandate simply because it violates their personal faith, no matter what type of business they run.

    • Poll: 46% say Obama’s second term will be better – President Barack Obama looks primed to do a “better job” in his second term than he did in his first term, a plurality of Americans say.According to a CNN/ORC poll out Thursday, 46 percent of Americans think the president’s job performance will improve this time around, while 22 percent say Obama will do a worse job. Another three in 10 see Obama offering “about the same” performance as he did during his first administration.
    • When will the right start hating Hillary Clinton again? – Her poll numbers are staggering. Fellow Democrats fear her. So do some Republicans. The main question now is, when will the right start hating Hillary Clinton again and kick a “Stop HRC” movement into high gear?You could hear the sounds of the ignition being turned during the past 10 days as an illness that led to a concussion (under circumstances that the public still knows little about) forced Clinton to cancel Senate testimony about the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi. That led to charges of a cover-up from some dependably anti-Clinton quarters, such as the New York Post and former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton.
    • Obama looks to retain upper hand as ‘fiscal cliff’ negotiations resume – President Obama will strive to retain the political upper hand in negotiations over deficit reduction when he returns to Washington Thursday morning.Obama had been in Hawaii with his family since Saturday but is scheduled to arrive back at the White House just before noon as the nation approaches the year-end fiscal cliff.
    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-12-26 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-12-26
    • Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-12-26 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-12-26 #tcot
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-12-26 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-12-26
    • Ed Driscoll » The Howard Kurtz Recursion – RT @rsmccain: Wow, @EdDriscoll is all over David Gregory like a cheap suit
    • U.S. to Hit Debt Limit Monday | Fox Business – LOL Obama, you really put it to the House GOP, now didn’t you? #tcot
    • Where’s Hillary? | The Weekly Standard – I she isn’t in a hospital having surgery then is she in the Middle East?
    • Day By Day December 26, 3012 – The Princess American – Flap’s Blog – Day By Day December 26, 3012 – The Princess American #tcot
    • Jerry Brown pushes new funding system for California schools – After California schools eliminated art programs and increased class sizes to survive budget cuts, they are finally on the verge of getting more money thanks to voter-approved taxes and economic recovery.But K-12 districts may not share equally in the expanding budget pie.

      Gov. Jerry Brown is pushing hard to overhaul California’s convoluted school funding system. His plan has two major objectives: Give K-12 districts greater control over how they spend money, and send more dollars to impoverished students and English learners.

    • Labor beat Prop. 32 via social media – Leaders of the California unions that spent $75 million to defeat Proposition 32’s union-busting campaign in November discovered something during the bruising battle: 40 percent of likely voters were not watching any Prop. 32-related TV commercials, even though the spots droned on nonstop throughout the fall.So the forces opposed to the measure, which would have banned the use of union payroll deductions for political contributions, changed tactics.

      Fusing a sophisticated data-mining operation with messages sent through social media platforms such as Facebook, the unions changed how they were singling out voters younger than 40 who don’t watch TV. Within weeks, they saw support for their position among younger voters climb from 40 percent to 60 percent.

    • In 2013, Millions Of Americans Face Obamacare Tax Hikes – As part of the negotiations over the fiscal cliff, Congress and President Obama are battling over whether to raise marginal tax rates at the very top of the income ladder.Regardless of how these talks turn out, millions of Americans are already facing tax hikes thanks to Obamacare.

      Obamacare’s authors chose to offset about half of the trillion-dollar cost of the law through higher taxes. Since the Supreme Court upheld the law’s individual mandate and allowed states to opt out of its Medicaid expansion, though, the cost estimate has swelled to $1.76 trillion between 2012 and 2021.

      In 2013, a number of Obamacare’s taxes will go into effect. Each will increase the cost of health care, yield job losses, and deprive our struggling economy of investment. These are the true costs of Obamacare.

    • FreedomWorks tea party group nearly falls apart in fight between old and new guard – The day after Labor Day, just as campaign season was entering its final frenzy, FreedomWorks, the Washington-based tea party organization, went into free fall.Richard K. Armey, the group’s chairman and a former House majority leader, walked into the group’s Capitol Hill offices with his wife, Susan, and an aide holstering a handgun at his waist. The aim was to seize control of the group and expel Armey’s enemies: The gun-wielding assistant escorted FreedomWorks’ top two employees off the premises, while Armey suspended several others who broke down in sobs at the news.

      The coup lasted all of six days. By Sept. 10, Armey was gone — with a promise of $8 million — and the five ousted employees were back. The force behind their return was Richard J. Stephenson, a reclusive Illinois millionaire who has exerted increasing control over one of Washington’s most influential conservative grass-roots organizations.

      Stephenson, the founder of the for-profit Cancer Treatment Centers of America and a director on the FreedomWorks board, agreed to commit $400,000 per year over 20 years in exchange for Armey’s agreement to leave the group.

    • Gallup poll: Public’s fear of falling over ‘fiscal cliff’ grows – A new poll finds the public’s fears over the looming “fiscal cliff” growing, as the year-end deadline for a deficit deal nears.Fifty percent of those surveyed in a new Gallup poll released Wednesday believe President Obama and lawmakers will reach an agreement to avoid January’s set of tax increases and automatic spending cuts. Forty-eight percent are doubtful a deal will be reached in time.
    • Starbucks makes political push on fiscal cliff – CNN Political Ticker – CNN.com Blogs – RT @PoliticalTicker Starbucks makes political push on fiscal cliff –
    • Fiscal Cliff: Fears mount over dive, poll says – POLITICO.com – RT @politico Poll: Americans are rapidly becoming more pessimistic about averting the fiscal cliff
    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-12-25 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-12-25
    • Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-12-25 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-12-25 #tcot
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-12-25 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-12-25
    • Affordable Care Act presents many unknowns for California officials – As California positions itself at the vanguard of the national healthcare overhaul, state officials are unable to say for sure how much their implementation of the federal Affordable Care Act will cost taxpayers.The program, intended to insure millions of Americans who are now without health coverage, takes states into uncharted territory. California, which plans to expand coverage to hundreds of thousands of people when the law takes effect in 2014, faces myriad unknowns. The Brown administration will try to estimate the cost of vastly more health coverage in the budget plan it unveils next month, but experts warn that its numbers could be way off.

      =========

      The costs will be astronomical and the POLS will be scrambling to pay for it all.

    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-12-24 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-12-24
    • Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-12-24 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-12-24 #tcot
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-12-24 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-12-24
    • Merry Christmas 2012 – Flap’s Blog – Merry Christmas 2012 #tcot
    • Realignment’s unintended consequence: No supervision, rehabilitation for criminals – The first wave of felons sent to county jails instead of state prisons under Gov. Jerry Brown’s public safety realignment plan are back on the streets after serving their sentences, and local law enforcement officials are worried they will trigger a spike in crime.Almost all of the felons are under no obligation to report to a parole agent or probation officer, and many did not get job training and other rehabilitation services while behind bars.

      “Of those 9,000 who have been sentenced to jail in lieu of prison, about 90 percent of them are going to come out without supervision by a probation officer or a parole agent,” county Chief Probation Officer Jerry Powers said during a recent meeting of the Southern California Association of Governments.

    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-12-23 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-12-23
    • Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-12-23 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-12-23 #tcot
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-12-23 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-12-23
    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-12-22 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-12-22
    • Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-12-22 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-12-22 #tcot
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-12-22 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-12-22
    • Gregory Flap @ Ronnie’s Diner – The pre- Christmas 10 miles is finished. Now, the protein plate at Ronnie’s! (@ Ronnie’s Diner) [pic]:
    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-12-21 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-12-21
    • President Obama’s dilemma – Carrie Budoff Brown – POLITICO.com – President Obama’s dilemma – Carrie Budoff Brown – #tcot
  • Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: December 14, 2012

    Drudge Screencap Obama Sending Troops to Turkey

    These are my links for December 13th through December 14th:

    • U.S. to send troops, Patriot missiles to Turkey – The United States gave the go-ahead Friday to deploy Patriot anti-ballistic missiles to Turkey along with enough troops to operate them as the heavily embattled government in neighboring Syria again vehemently denied firing ballistic missiles at rebels.The United States has accused Damascus of launching Scud-type artillery from the capital at rebels in the country’s north. One Washington official said missiles came close to the border of Turkey, a NATO member and staunch U.S. ally.Syria’s government called the accusations “untrue rumors” Friday, according to state news agency SANA. Damascus accused Turkey and its partners of instigating rumors to make the government look bad internationally.

      U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta signed the order while en route to Turkey to send two Patriot missile batteries and 400 U.S. troops to operate them. The surface-to-air interceptors will help in “dealing with threats that come out of Syria,” Panetta said after landing at Incirlik Air Base, a U.S. Air Force installation about 80 miles from Syria’s border.

      Panetta was unconcerned about possible reactions from Damascus to the Patriot deployment. “We can’t spend a lot of time worrying about whether that pisses off Syria,” he said, adamant that helping Turkey was the priority.

    • Extremism in Defense of Liberty – The rise of the Tea Party, and its swift incorporation into the GOP, can best be understood as a response to a dilemma that presented itself to conservatives 20 years ago. In the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 and the federal government shutdowns of 1995 and ’96, it appeared that the fight against the Evil Empire was Mission Accomplished while the fight to curb the size and influence of the federal establishment was Mission Impossible. Take away the two goals that had defined the conservative movement since the first issue of National Review, and it was unclear what conservatives were supposed to do, and what conservatism was supposed to be about. The innovations proposed to fill this lacuna included national greatness conservatism, compassionate conservatism, and George W. Bush’s call after 9/11 to “support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world.” These missions proved to be, respectively: vague and pointless; a project of social reinvigoration to which political measures could make no more than a marginal contribution; and an extravagant ambition far exceeding America’s capacity and her citizens’ patience.========A must read for the weekend!
    • Only 15 States Opt to Run Obamacare Exchanges – Only 15 states have told the federal government they plan to operate health insurance exchanges under President Barack Obama’s reform law, leaving Washington with the daunting task of creating online marketplaces for two-thirds of the country.On the eve of a federal deadline for states to say whether they will run their own exchanges, a top health care policy official told lawmakers that the exchanges will start enrolling eligible families starting on Oct. 1.”I am confident that states and the federal government will be ready in 10 months, when consumers in all states can begin to apply,” Gary Cohen, director of the Center for Consumer Information and Insurance Oversight, told a House panel.

      Cohen was among federal officials who testified alongside state health authorities at a hearing of the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health.

      In written testimony, Cohen said that while 15 states have told the administration they will operate exchanges, 11 others have opted for versions that will require major involvement by the federal government.

      Experts say the number of states planning to operate their own exchanges could reach 18, plus the District of Columbia, by the time the deadline arrives Friday.

    • Charles Krauthammer: The right-to-work dilemma – For all the fury and fistfights outside the Lansing Capitol, what happened in Michigan this week was a simple accommodation to reality. The most famously unionized state, birthplace of the United Auto Workers, royalty of the American working class, became right-to-work.It’s shocking, except that it was inevitable. Indiana went that way earlier this year. The entire Rust Belt will eventually follow because the heyday of the sovereign private-sector union is gone. Globalization has made splendid isolation impossible.
    • Get ready for the costs and chaos of Obamacare – Nancy Pelosi was widely mocked when she said of Obamacare, “We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it.” At the time, March 2010, Pelosi’s words accurately described the Democrats’ just-get-it-done approach to passing a national health care bill. But now it turns out Pelosi was wrong. In fact, we have to implement Obamacare so that you can find out what is in it.Amid the other momentous events coming in 2013 — bitter fights over federal spending, debt, entitlements and immigration — the biggest story of the year, and of 2014 as well, will be the arrival of Obamacare in the lives of every American.
    • It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad ObamaCare – For sheer political farce, not much can compete with ObamaCare’s passage, which included slipping the bill through the Senate before dawn three Christmas eves ago. But the madcap dash to get ready for the entitlement’s October 2013 start-up date is a pretty close second.The size and complexity of the Affordable Care Act meant that its implementation was never going to easy. But behind the scenes, even states that support or might support the Affordable Care Act are frustrated about the Health and Human Services Department’s special combination of rigidity and ineptitude.To take one example, for the better part of a year states and groups like the bipartisan National Governors Association and the National Association of Medicaid Directors have been begging HHS merely for information about how they’re required to make ObamaCare work in practice. There was radio silence from Washington, with time running out. Louisiana and other states even took to filing Freedom of Information Act requests, which are still pending.
    • Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-12-13 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-12-13 #tcot
    • MichelleFields.com – Rapper’s fans threaten to rape Michelle Malkin for criticizing his album cover « #tcot
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-12-13 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-12-13
    • Rapper’s fans threaten to rape Michelle Malkin for criticizing his album cover « MichelleFields.com – RT @chasrmartin: Rapper’s fans threaten to rape Michelle Malkin for criticizing singer
    • Obama and Boehner meet again to avert fiscal cliff – President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner met privately Thursday after another day of back-and-forth over tax hikes, spending cuts and efforts to avoid the year-end “fiscal cliff.”Hours earlier, Boehner said that unless Obama makes further concessions on spending cuts, Washington will head over the cliff and into a series of tax hikes and massive budget reductions.”The president wants to pretend spending isn’t the problem. That’s why we don’t have an agreement,” said Boehner, R-Ohio. “Unfortunately, the White House is so unserious about cutting spending that it appears willing to slow-walk our economy right up to — and over — the fiscal cliff.”
    • Obama, Boehner meet at the White House | POLITICO 44 – POLITICO.com – RT @politico: RT @jeneps Obama and Boehner spent 50 minutes meeting at the White House today
    • Earth to Karl Rove and Sheldon Adelson: Do This – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Earth to Karl Rove and Sheldon Adelson: Do This #tcot
    • Rep. Elton Gallegly and Friends Operation Toy Drop 2012 Edition – Rep. Elton Gallegly and Friends Operation Toy Drop 2012 Edition #tcot
    • Top GOP aide: ‘We’ll confirm Hagel, Kerry’ | WashingtonExaminer.com – Top GOP aide: ‘We’ll confirm Hagel, Kerry’ #tcot
    • Where big GOP bucks could matter – Mitt Romney and the GOP lost, but it wasn’t for lack of money. They spent a lot; they just didn’t get enough bang for the buck.Billionaire Sheldon Adelson alone donated $150 million. But Romney lost anyway, especially among unmarried women.Which is why I think that rich people wanting to support the Republican Party might want to direct their money somewhere besides TV ads that copy, poorly, what Lee Atwater did decades ago.

      My suggestion: Buy some women’s magazines. No, really. Or at least some women’s Web sites.

      One of the groups with whom Romney did worst was female “low-information voters.” Those are women who don’t really follow politics, and vote based on a vague sense of who’s mean and who’s nice, who’s cool and who’s uncool.

    • Top GOP aide: ‘We’ll confirm Hagel, Kerry’ – The growing possibility of President Obama naming Democratic Sen. John Kerry as secretary of State and former GOP Sen. Chuck Hagel to run the Pentagon is being embraced by Senate Republicans who predict confirmation.”I think both of them will be questioned vigorously but confirmed,” said a top GOP Senate aide, meaning the GOP won’t put up a fight in the Democratically-controlled chamber. That will be a key selling point as Obama considers his choices.Reports emerged Thursday that Hagel, a Vietnam vet from Nebraska, was the frontrunner to replace exiting Defense Secretary Leon Panetta.
    • EXCLUSIVE: Susan Rice drops out of running for secretary of state; cites ‘very disruptive’ confirmation process – Rock Center with Brian Williams – Susan Rice drops out of running for secretary of state; saddened by partisan politics #tcot
    • Susan Rice drops out of running for secretary of state; saddened by partisan politics – Embattled U.N. envoy Susan Rice is dropping out of the running to be the next secretary of state after months of criticism over her Benghazi comments, she told NBC News on Thursday.“If nominated, I am now convinced that the confirmation process would be lengthy, disruptive and costly – to you and to our most pressing national and international priorities,” Rice wrote in a letter to President Obama, saying she’s saddened by the partisan politics surrounding her prospects.“That trade-off is simply not worth it to our country…Therefore, I respectfully request that you no longer consider my candidacy at this time,” she wrote in the letter obtained by NBC News.

      =========

      Rice would not be confirmed anyway.

    • Latinos didn’t cost Mitt Romney the election – Republicans have a major Latino problem, but it didn’t cost them the 2012 election.According to a Fix review of election results, Mitt Romney would have needed to carry as much as 51 percent of the Hispanic vote in order to win the Electoral College — a number no Republican presidential candidate on record has been able to attain and isn’t really within the realm of possibility these days.Latinos did push President Obama over the top in several key states — including Colorado, Florida, Nevada, New Mexico and Pennsylvania — that he would have lost without them. (Obama also would have lost the popular vote without Latinos.)

      But it was a given that Obama was going to win a higher share of their votes; what mattered was the margin. And in order for Romney to have won the presidency, he would have needed to perform far better than any previous Republican presidential candidate.

    • Feds Raise Hackles Over 5-Hour Energy Drink | The Weekly Standard – RT @DRUDGE_REPORT: FEDS TO INVESTIGATE 5-HOUR ENERGY DRINKS…
    • Day By Day December 13, 2012 – The Big Top – Flap’s Blog – Day By Day December 13, 2012 – The Big Top #tcot
    • Flap’s Dentistry Blog: Just Say No to Magnetic Tongue Studs – Just Say No to Magnetic Tongue Studs
    • The Morning Flap: December 13, 2012 – Flap’s Blog – The Morning Flap: December 13, 2012 #tcot
  • Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: November 28, 2012

    Drudge Screencap of Obama hashtag #MY2K

    These are my links for November 27th through November 28th:

    • Obama: Let’s Get Fiscal Cliff Deal Before Christmas – U.S. Fiscal Cliff – CNBC– President Barack Obama said Wednesday he hoped to reach a deal on the “Fiscal Cliff” before Christmas but insisted that Congress move now to prevent a middle-class tax increase in January. “Let’s approach this with the middle class in mind,” he said.”Our ultimate goal is to get an agreement that is fair and balanced,” the president said in a nationally televised statement from the White House. “My hope is to get this done before Christmas.””But the place where we already have, in theory at least, complete agreement right now is on middle-class taxes,” Obama said. “If Congress does nothing, every family in America will see their taxes automatically go up at the beginning of next year.”And for a typical family of four, he said, that would mean a tax increase of $2,200. “That means less money for buying groceries, less money for filling prescriptions, less money for buying diapers,” Obama said, standing in front of a group of middle-class Americans he had met with earlier. “It means a tougher choice between paying the rent and paying tuition. And middle-class families just can’t afford that right now.”========

      Obama should stop the BS campaigning and grandstanding. Get to work negotiating with the Speaker and House GOP leadership.

    • Romney’s Digital Guru Convenes Election Post-Mortem – Romney’s Digital Guru Convenes Election Post-Mortem #tcot
    • Gallup Poll: American Majority Against Government Healthcare Guarantee – Gallup Poll: American Majority Against Government Healthcare Guarantee #tcot
    • Romney’s Digital Guru Convenes Election Post-Mortem – Romney’s Digital Guru Convenes Election Post-Mortem #tcot
    • Los Angeles Public Television Icon Huell Howser to Retire – Los Angeles Public Television Icon Huell Howser to Retire
    • Political Cartoons / If I only had a brain….. – If I only had a brain….. via @pinterest
    • Flap’s Dentistry Blog: Will Taking Vitamin D Prevent Tooth Decay? – Will Taking Vitamin D Prevent Tooth Decay?
    • Romney’s Digital Guru Convenes Election Post-Mortem – Romney’s Digital Guru Convenes Election Post-Mortem – Going to Be Brutal #tcot
    • Romney’s Digital Guru Convenes Election Post-Mortem – Going to Be Brutal– Mitt Romney’s digital director will be leading an invitation-only postmortem to talk about what worked and what didn’t work for the Republicans in the presidential election.For a lot of Republicans, what didn’t work is the fact that their candidate lost. Whether it’s justified or not, digital director Zac Moffatt has come in for a disproportionate share of heat among Republicans unhappy about the result.On Dec. 6, Moffatt and Republican National Committee digital-strategy director Tyler Brown will have a chance to explain themselves and their strategy before an audience of leading Republican digital practitioners at an RNC event at the Capitol Hill Club in Washington.

    =================

    Going to be brutal and hopefully frank.

    • Looking Forward to the 2012 Las Vegas Half Marathon – Looking Forward to the 2012 Las Vegas Half Marathon
    • Obama public relations effort aims to avoid ‘fiscal cliff’ – Symbolism Over Substance– The White House signaled Tuesday that it will try to marshal the momentum from President Obama’s reelection triumph into another victory at the negotiating table, launching a full-fledged public relations effort to avoid a “fiscal cliff” that could jolt the nation back toward recession.Administration officials said Obama will hit the road this week for a campaign-style series of events with ordinary Americans, including a visit to a toy manufacturer in suburban Philadelphia on Friday. That trip and others will be aimed at increasing pressure on Congress to reach an agreement on heading off a series of automatic spending cuts and tax increases that are scheduled to begin in January

    ==============

    Symbolism over substance

    • Erick Erickson considering challenge to Chambliss– Popular conservative blogger and radio personality Erick Erickson said Tuesday he was considering a primary challenge to Sen. Saxby Chambliss after a host of political bigs had approached him about staging a bid of his own in the days since the incumbent broke with a vaulted no-taxes pledge.“For a week now, I’ve been getting calls to see if I would challenge Saxby Chambliss, once he really got into the whole ‘raising taxes issue,’” Erickson said in the opening segment of his radio show Tuesday. “Well, the pace quickened. I got a lot of people pledging a lot of money in the last couple of days if I did something like this. And I’ve been very adamant, I wasn’t going to do it, but after a few conversations today with a few heavy hitters in Washington, D.C. and some here in Georgia, I should at least consider it.”Erickson, a CNN political contributor and editor-in-chief of conservative haunt RedState, added he was “very flattered” and was in “prayerful consideration” about waging a possible challenge to the two-term Chambliss.Erickson was a one-term city councilman in Macon, Georgia, but resigned when his work–a radio show, television gig and editorship of highly-trafficked blog–became too great to shoulder in tandem with his public service.————-

      A credible campaign against an incumbent U.S. Senator?

      Going to be tough.

    • Obama sells budget plan to middle class, biz leaders– For President Obama, it’s another day of focus on the “fiscal cliff.”Selling his plan to reduce the federal debt in part by raising taxes on the wealthy, Obama meets Wednesday with selected members of the middle class and the business community.Obama will speak during the event with middle class Americans, some of whom responded to an e-mail solicitation from the White House on the looming “fiscal cliff” — a package of tax hikes and budget cuts that kick in if the White House and Congress can’t strike a deal to reduce a federal debt that now tops $16 trillion.Later Wednesday, Obama and Vice President Biden meet with business leaders to “discuss the actions we need to take to keep our economy growing and find a balanced approach to reduce our deficit.”These are the latest steps in an all-out political blitz to sell Obama’s budget plans. On Friday, the president is scheduled to visit a Pennsylvania business — a toy factory near Philadelphia — to discuss the impact of the fiscal cliff.

      ————————————————–

      Obama thinks he is still campaigning.

      America would be better off meeting with the House GOP leaders and cutting a deal.

      Quickly….

    • After Close Election, Dems Look Like Sore Winners or Why Ken Burns is a Jerk– Post-election season is a time for healing, for putting aside the rancor of a long campaign and rediscovering what unites us. It has not been that way this year.Prudence, one would think, if not generosity of spirit, should impel Democrats to be magnanimous in victory. Romney did receive about 48 percent of the vote. A little modesty among the winners would seem to be in order.Instead, the gloating has been extravagant. Worse, liberals have gorged themselves on the same junk food they enjoyed during the campaign and cannot seem to resist under any circumstances — slandering their opponents. The smears are so casual and commonplace that we become weary of responding. But we must protest, or someone new to politics may assume that we concede the point.Appearing on “Meet the Press”, documentary filmmaker Ken Burns attributed conservative unhappiness with the election to racism. “Race is always there in America,” Burns opined. “It’s always something we don’t want to talk about. Do you think we’d have a secession movement — a faddish movement — if this president wasn’t [sic] African-American? Do you think the vitriol that came out of some elements of the tea party?”Ken Burns is a fine filmmaker. I met him once, and I found him to be engaging and amiable. It’s painful to see him descend to this kind of defamation. Some disappointed Republicans are talking secession in Texas and elsewhere. This is proof of racism? Is this the standard of evidence Burns employs for his films?
    • Fiction, Poetry and Nonfiction Selected by The New York Times Book Review – NYTimes.com – Untitled (… #tcot
    • Union Leaders Blanket the Hill to Lobby on Taxes, Entitlements – What a surprise RT @nationaljournal Union leaders blanket the Hill to lobby on taxes, entitlements.
    • Obamacare’s Rationers Employ The “It’s Good For You” Defense– Obamacare’s backers have a plan to justify their attempts to ration medicine — by saying that it’s good for you.Through 2019, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act — otherwise known as Obamacare — will allocate some $3.5 billion toward “Comparative Effectiveness Research,” or CER, which pits drug versus drug in tests intended to determine which treatments work best.CER advocates say that it’s designed to correct a “market failure.” Right now, they argue, drug firms need not demonstrate that their product is better than those already on the market — only that it is effective at treating the disease it targets. Drug companies have little incentive to compare their products to those made by other firms — as they may not come out on top.CER sounds innocuous enough. Who could be against research to help doctors make more informed decisions?But the truth is that CER is nothing more than a backdoor route to healthcare rationing. Such research will almost certainly be used to not-so-subtly influence treatment decisions.
    • Retailers confident online sales tax has votes to pass– Retail groups are increasingly confident that they have the votes to pass a federal online sales tax in the final weeks of the 112th Congress if they can secure time on the legislative calendar.With less than five weeks to go in the year, supporters are concentrating most of their efforts on the Senate, where a measure giving states greater latitude to collect sales taxes from online purchases has a powerful backer in Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.).At the same time, retail groups acknowledge that the talks over looming spending cuts and tax hikes could get acrimonious, and that Democrats and Republicans might have little appetite to deal with other measures if their negotiations run deep into December.“I think this is a question of can we get a vote, not if it can pass,” said Jason Brewer, a spokesman for the Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA). “We feel confident about the vote count, but there’s also not a lot of time to push this across the finish line.”“When you end up with a major political situation like the ‘fiscal cliff,’ that overrides everything,” Rachelle Bernstein, tax counsel at the National Retail Federation, told The Hill. “I think we feel that we have a good piece of legislation pulled together, with lots of support. But there’s a decent chance politics could derail it.”
    • Tom Cole: Join with President Obama on quick deal– Republican Rep. Tom Cole urged colleagues in a private session Tuesday to vote to extend the Bush tax rates for all but the highest earners before the end of the year — and to battle over the rest later.The Oklahoma Republican said in an interview with POLITICO that he believes such a vote would not violate Grover Norquist’s anti-tax pledge and that he’s not alone within Republican circles.
    • Poll Watch: Taxing the rich remains popular – Poll Watch: Taxing the rich remains popular #tcot
    • Hope and Exchange – The Feds Blame the States Over ObamaCare– ObamaCare is due to land in a mere 10 months—about 300 days—and the Administration is not even close to ready, so naturally the political and media classes are attacking the Governors and state legislators who decline to help out. Mostly Republicans, they’re facing a torrent of abuse in Washington and pressure from health lobbies at home.But the real story is that Democrats are reaping the GOP buy-in they earned. Liberals wanted government to re-engineer the entire health-care system and rammed the Affordable Care Act through on a party-line vote, not stopping to wonder whether it would work. Now that implementation is proving to be harder than advertised, they’re blaming the states for not making their jobs easier.
    • ‘I want you to leave me alone:’ Gennifer Flowers claims Bill Clinton tried contacting her as recently as 2005 – NY Daily News – Dog! | RT @ByronYork Gennifer Flowers tells NO TV station Bill Clinton called her, wanted to get together, in 2005…
    • Sen. Charles Schumer says Republicans want ‘divorce’ from Grover Norquist – Katie Glueck – POLITICO.com – Nice try Chuckie | RT @politico Sen. Charles Schumer says Republicans want ‘divorce’ from Grover Norquist:
    • Bolling to drop bid for Virginia governorship – CNN Political Ticker – CNN.com Blogs – RT @HotlineReid VA GOV: Bill Bolling drops bid, setting up McAuliffe-Cuccinelli showdown next year
    • Senate Dems divided over cuts to benefit programs– Deep divisions among Senate Democrats over whether cuts to popular benefit programs like Medicare and Medicaid should be part of a plan to slow the government’s mushrooming debt pose a big obstacle to a deal for avoiding a potentially economy-crushing “fiscal cliff,” even if Republicans agree to raise taxes.Much of the focus during negotiations seeking an alternative to $671 billion in automatic tax increases and spending cuts beginning in January has centered on whether Republicans would agree to raising taxes on the wealthy. President Barack Obama has insisted repeatedly that tax increases on the wealthy must be part of any deal, even as White House officials concede that government benefit programs will have to be in the package too.”It is the president’s position that when we’re talking about a broad, balanced approach to dealing with our fiscal challenges, that that includes dealing with entitlements,” White House press secretary Jay Carney said Tuesday.
    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-27 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-27
    • Watch What Warren Buffett Does, Not What He Says– That last point is key: When taxes change, would-be investors will certainly change their decisions about where to direct capital, even “though the companies’ operating economics will not have changed adversely at all.” Buffett saw this clearly in 1986, with respect to Berkshire’s own investment decisions; it’s hard to believe that Buffett no longer believes that today, with respect to private investors.Now, none of this is to say that the capital-allocation effects of tax changes ultimately require the nation to forego tax reforms that would increase certain tax revenues. But it certainly is one consideration that must be kept in mind. When Buffett and others simply assert that tax increases don’t affect investment decisions, they’re whistling past the graveyard.
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-27 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-27
    • CBS News: Rift Opening Between Obama And Liberals Over Fiscal Cliff – YouTube – RT @PounderFile: VIDEO: CBS News: Rift Opening Between Obama And Liberal Democrats Over Fiscal Cliff
    • Image Problem – Republicans have a shot at improving their luck at the polls in 2014, but first they have to find a way to boost their brand appeal– Of the 13 Republican-held seats up in 2014, only one is in a state that Obama carried: Susan Collins in Maine. Indeed, Obama wasn’t even close in any GOP-held seats in other states. Other than Maine, the best Obama performances were minus 13 points in Alabama (Jeff Sessions), minus eight in Georgia (Saxby Chambliss), minus 12 in Mississippi (Thad Cochran), and minus 12 in South Carolina (Lindsey Graham). The other states ranged from minus 16 in Texas (John Cornyn) to minus 32 in Idaho (James Risch) and minus 34 in Oklahoma (James Inhofe).Conversely, Democrats have three seats up in 2014 in states that Obama lost by more than 15 points: minus 17 points in Louisiana (Mary Landrieu), minus 24 in Arkansas (Mark Pryor), and minus 27 in West Virginia (Jay Rockefeller). It should be noted that six-term Rep. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., announced her candidacy on Monday at the State Capitol in Charleston.In three more 2014 Democratic Senate states, Obama lost by at least five but less than 15 points: minus 11 in South Dakota (Tim Johnson) and minus 13 in both Alaska (Mark Begich) and Montana (Max Baucus). Former South Dakota Gov. Mike Rounds started an exploratory committee in September and is expected to challenge Johnson.There are three more 2014 Democratic Senate seats up in swing states, defined as such due to 2012 margins of five points or less: Obama minus two in North Carolina (Kay Hagan), plus three in Virginia (Mark Warner), and plus five in Colorado (Mark Udall).That’s nine Democratic seats that are either in demonstrably swing states or in enemy territory. This also does not take into account some states that were on the bubble: Obama won Iowa (Tom Harkin) and New Hampshire (Jeanne Shaheen) by just six points each.

      The remarkable thing about Senate Democrats in 2012 was their ability to go on the offensive while, by necessity, playing defense. That will be much more difficult to replicate in 2014 given the seats up that cycle.

    • Amazon.com to build third California distribution center– Internet retailer Amazon.com — after years of avoiding having any physical presence in California — is planning to open a third massive distribution center in the Golden State.The new operation is in Tracy, a distant bedroom community for the San Francisco Bay Area south of Sacramento. The facility will be only about 30 miles from a second Amazon center being built in Patterson to the south.Last month, the Seattle company cut the ribbon on a 950,000-square-foot facility in the city of San Bernardino, which started filling orders before the holiday shopping season.
    • The Fiscal Cliff Is A Sideshow: It’s The Economy, Not The Budget, Stupid– Recently, using the comforting, measured and boring tones perfected by Alan Greenspan, Chairman Bernanke in a speech to the New York Economic Club observed that the best of the policy options open to us might lead us back to our economic potential by 2018. Apart from the idea that we can’t have our economy back for maybe six more years, at least three things in his speech are cause for profound worry no matter how analgesic the language is meant to sound.The presidential campaign drove the first and most serious point home. No one seems to have any sense of urgency regarding growth. The “guild” economists who advised both sides focused more on blaming various actors for why the recession won’t end rather than showing any sense of the profound costs of what a lost decade of growth means to America. President Obama’s “George did it” narrative met Mitt Romney’s mantra of “Obama doesn’t know anything about business.” Romney’s feint at growth sure sounded more like “I can manage better.”
    • Red State’s Erick Erickson mulls Chambliss challenge– In a 900-word indictment of Sen. Saxby Chambliss, RedState editor and CNN contributor Erick Erickson described the Georgia Republican Tuesday as “waffling around like a dog off its leash for the first time.”Referring to Chambliss’s recent comment that he is more worried about the fiscal cliff than adhering to his anti-tax pledge, Erickson wrote:Everyone knows that Saxby meant he was happy to raise taxes. Now, under pressure back home, he is waffling. He covets his seat in Washington and is fearful of being primaries. Georgia has primary run-offs, whichs means he can be taken out. He cannot bring himself to say he wants to raise revenue through changing in the tax code that will cause taxes to go up, so he dances around. Behind the scenes, we all know he will work to structure a proposal that increases taxes on Americans, but he’ll cleverly make sure there are enough votes so he can vote against it. He is active and has been actively complicit with Mark Warner (D, VA) and others on raising taxes.
    • Video: When the Democrats Loved the Filibuster – Flap’s Blog – Video: When the Democrats Loved the Filibuster #tcot
    • Untitled (http://www.amazon.com/) – Christmas Shopping Bleg: If you are doing any shopping through how aboutclicking through ? Thanks!
    • Day By Day November 27, 2012 – Hassle – Flap’s Blog – Day By Day November 27, 2012 – Hassle #tcot
    • Political Cartoons / California Governor Jerry “Moonbeam” Brown is a leader for the ages…..Dark Ages…. – California Governor Jerry “Moonbeam” Brown is a leader for the ages…..Dark Ages….
    • Bankrupt San Bernardino cuts $26 million, tries to stay afloat– Saying it had little choice, the San Bernardino City Council voted to cut $26 million in spending in an effort to keep the bankrupt city from dissolving and being governed by the county.The city is already in bankruptcy proceedings and facing a $45.8-million budget shortfall. The $26 million in cuts will help the troubled city stay afloat.The austerity plan is a required step in the federal bankruptcy process. It freezes vacancies in the Police Department even as the city deals with an increase in violent crime. The Fire Department’s overtime budget also was slashed by 35%.
    • President 2012: The New Electoral Math, and What It Means for Polling– The exit pollsters asked which was the most important candidate quality – vision for the future (29%), shares my values (27%), cares about people like me (21%), and strong leader (18%).Mitt Romney won three of the four qualities. Voters who selected vision opted for Romney 54%-45%. Those who picked values preferred Romney 55%-42%. Voters focused on strong leadership opted for Romney 61%-38%. Romney lost 18%-81% among voters who said “cares about people like me” to Barack Obama.Thus, Romney controlled leadership, vision, and values, yet still lost, because he got blown out on the empathy dimension. This may well have been the first Presidential election where the winner on leadership lost the election anyhow. Prior to the election, if you had said that Romney would win among the 74% of voters choosing those three qualities and would still lose overall, you would not have been believed.Also, asked which of four was the most important issue, an overwhelming 59% picked the economy. Romney won those voters 51%-47%. Thus, he won the most important issue, but still lost the election.But the demographics are even more concerning for the GOP down the road. Here are some of the stunning demographic findings from the exit polls about the Presidential election:
      • Mitt Romney won Independents by five points. That’s better than George W. Bush in 2004 by six net points (see more on that below).
      • Mitt Romney won middle income voters ($50-100k) by six points. George W. Bush won them by twelve points in 2004, but there were far fewer voters earning more than $100k in the 2004 election (18%) than in 2012 (28%).
      • Mitt Romney won white women by 56%-42% (the “war on women” is overstated; Romney got crushed with minority women but a fourteen point win is not exactly a decisive defeat with white women).
      • George W. Bush won white women by eleven points in 2004, a net three points weaker than Romney.
      • Mitt Romney won white voters by 59%-39%, which is better than George W. Bush in 2004 by three net points.
      • Mitt Romney won voters age 40+ by five points. There is no direct comparison to Bush in 2004, but Bush did win voters 45+ by five points.

      So, Romney won many of the groups that are generally considered to be the ones to decide elections – Independents, white women (by double digits), middle income, and voters age 40+. Mitt Romney put together a coalition that just eight years ago would have won the presidential election (hence the data comparisons to George W. Bush). However, instead of whites being 77% of the electorate, they were 72% of the electorate. Instead of Republicans and Democrats being equal, Democrats far outnumbered Republicans, and washed out Romney’s advantage among Independents. Bush kept it close with younger voters (under age 40), while Obama won them decisively.

    • Why Republicans should have won the election (and why they didn’t)– The math, according to Bolger, is determinative. There are simply more Democrats than Republicans in the country — as we have noted before, the consistency of Democrats’ party ID edge is striking — and that means that winning independents is no longer the whole shebang for the GOP. Neither is winning the white vote since it’s hard to imagine a Democratic candidate sinking significantly lower than 39 percent among that voting bloc in future elections. (The white vote for Democratic presidential candidates has also been very consistent; since 1992, no Democratic nominee has received less than 39 percent or more than 43 percent of the white vote.)Concludes Bolger: “Thus, to have a chance, Republicans have to appeal to Hispanics. It’s simple math, but it’s hard to do. We have to start today.”He’s absolutely right — on both fronts. (Hell, we devoted an entire chapter in “The Gospel According to the Fix” to Republicans’ Hispanic problem and how it will doom them as a national party unless they can solve it.)
    • How Senate Republicans could get tripped up again in 2014 (and how they are trying not to)– Welcome to the 2014 cycle, where most of the early rumblings in the Senate landscape have involved the prospect of Republican infighting. And, after back-to-back cycles in which flawed nominees in Nevada, Missouri, Colorado, Indiana and Delaware cost Republicans dearly, national strategists are already working to prevent history from repeating itself.The question is how.Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) will be the next chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee and will be faced with the task of recruiting better candidates and cultivating a better relationship with conservative groups.“Unless the party is planning to get behind principled, grassroots conservatives, they’re going to continue to run into a fierce headwind,” said SCF Executive Director Matt Hoskins.One of Moran’s vice chairs will be Sen.-elect Ted Cruz of Texas, the shining star of the conservative grassroots this cycle who overcame the odds to defeat heavily favored Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst (R) in a GOP primary/runoff. Part of Cruz’s role at the committee, according to a Republican familiar with NRSC strategy, will be to act as a go-between with conservative groups like the Club and SCF, both of which backed his candidacy this year.
    • Rand Paul warns GOP ‘in danger of becoming a dinosaur’– Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) urged the Republican party to adopt a more libertarian approach to policy in order to avoid becoming “a dinosaur.”Paul, the libertarian-leaning senator, was speaking in an interview with CNN on Tuesday.”I think my party, the Republican Party, is shrinking. We’re in danger of becoming a dinosaur,” Paul said. “We’re not competitive on the West Coast, we’re not competitive in New England.”
    • GOP lawmakers float immigration reform plan– Saying they want to get the conversation on immigration reform started, top Senate Republicans on Tuesday introduced a version of the so-called “Dream Act” to grant young illegal immigrants legal status in the US, though not giving them a special path to citizenship.GOP Sens. Jon Kyl and Kay Bailey Hutchison said they have introduced a bill that would reward those who take college classes or join the military.“We have got to get this ball rolling,” said Mr. Kyl, an Arizona Republican who is retiring this year. “We have to have a discussion that is sensible, that is calm.”Their bill would be more limited than the proposals Democrats have sought, which would have been more generous with a path to citizenship and broader in the number of immigrants it would apply to. But Ms. Hutchison, Texas Republican, said she and Mr. Kyl have tried to accommodate some Democratic lawmakers’ concerns.
      The legislation would reward students with higher status the further along they are in pursuing their education. Those who earn a four-year college degree or complete military service could apply for a permanent visa that wouldn’t put them on a new path to citizenship, but would allow them to join existing lines by getting married to a U.S. citizen or finding another opportunity to adjust their status.
    • The Afternoon Flap: November 27, 2012 – Flap’s Blog – The Afternoon Flap: November 27, 2012 #tcot
  • Pinboard Links,  The Afternoon Flap

    The Afternoon Flap: November 27, 2012

    Mitt Romney

    These are my links for November 26th through November 27th:

    • Romney’s final share of the vote? You guessed it: 47 percent.– Call it irony or call it coincidence: Mitt Romney’s share of the popular vote in the 2012 presidential race is very likely to be 47 percent.Romney’s campaign, of course, was doomed in large part by comments made on a hidden camera in which he suggested that 47 percent of the country was so reliant on government services that those people would never vote for him.The words ’47 percent’ came to define what was already evident: that Romney struggled to connect with lower- and middle-income voters and with groups such as Latinos. And in the end, it looks like 47 percent also just happens to be the share of the vote that Romney will get.
    • Hillary Clinton’s 2016 run is not inevitable – If I had to bet, I’d bet that she decides to run, if only because she will feel that destiny and circumstance have put her in the right place at the right time. She may feel that she owes it to young women and those who supported her to finish the marathon of American politics. But she might well decide that her legacy is secure, her popularity is intact, her financial prospects are bright, and her future lies with advocacy from the outside and grand-mothering.
    • Ready? Fire Ames! – The Editors – National Review Online – Ready? Fire Ames! – The Editors – National Review Online #tcot
    • Should California Republicans Be Optimistic About 2014? Flapsblog.Org – Should California Republicans Be Optimistic About 2014?
    • Flap’s Dentistry Blog: Another Christmas Toothbrush Gift: Emmi-dent – Another Christmas Toothbrush Gift: Emmi-dent
    • Ready? Fire Ames! – The Editors – National Review Online – Ready? Fire Ames! – The Iowa straw poll is good for little #tcot
    • Will the fiscal cliff break Grover Norquist’s hold on Republicans?– Grover Norquist’s anti-tax pledge has been a sacred and unchallenged keystone of the Republican platform for more than two decades, playing a central role in almost every budget battle in Congress since 1986. But Norquist and his pledge, signed by 95 percent of congressional Republicans, are now in danger of becoming Washington relics as more and more defectors inch toward accepting tax increases to avert the “fiscal cliff.”On Monday, Sen. Bob Corker (Tenn.) became the latest in a handful of prominent Republican lawmakers to take to the airwaves in recent days and say they are willing to break their pledge to oppose all tax increases.
    • Ready? Fire Ames! – The Iowa straw poll is good for little– Iowa governor Terry Branstad, a Republican, has suggested that the days of the Ames straw poll — the Midwest summer spectacle that takes the temperature of an idiosyncratic slice of the Republican party months before the first binding primaries — might be numbered.“I think the straw poll has outlived its usefulness,” Branstad told the Wall Street Journal. “It has been a great fundraiser for the party, but I think its days are over.” Though Branstad will not ultimately decide whether the poll returns in 2015 — that decision is up to the state’s party and the candidates, among others — we hope that he’s prescient. Ames does more damage than justice to the nominating process, and ensures that the country’s first view of the Grand Old Party’s latest presidential crop is through a distorted lens.
    • The Daily Dish | American Action Forum – RT @djheakin I wish Warren Buffett would stop writing op-eds and just write a check to assuage his guilty conscience.
    • Buffett Says Wealthy Avoiding Taxes Among Romney’s 47%- Bloomberg – Jumped the Shark RT @BloombergNews Warren Buffett puts wealthy tax-avoiders in the ‘47%’: “They were the moochers” |
    • What Should the GOP House Do About The Fiscal Cliff? – Flap’s Blog – What Should the GOP House Do About The Fiscal Cliff? #tcot
    • What Should Speaker Boehner Do?– Were the average Republican asked for a succinct statement of his views on taxation, he or she might respond thus:”U.S. tax rates are too high for the world we must compete in. The tax burden — federal, state, local, together — is too heavy. We need to cut tax rates to free up our private and productive sector and pull this economy out of the ditch.”This core conviction holds the party together.Yet today the leadership is about to abandon this conviction to sign on to higher tax rates or revenues, while the economy is nearing stall speed. Yet, two years ago, President Obama himself extended the Bush tax cuts because, he said, you do not raise taxes in a recovering economy.Why are Republicans negotiating this capitulation?
    • How to Approach the ‘Fiscal Cliff’ – Negotiations between congressional Republicans and the White House will intensify this week as the deadline for steering clear of the year-end “fiscal cliff” approaches. Like the 2011 showdown over the debt limit, these talks will be a high-stakes affair for both parties, with the potential for lasting political effects. With so much at stake, how should the GOP approach the talks? The following are a few suggestions for navigating the treacherous political waters that lie ahead.
    • Our Enemy, the Payroll Tax – The payroll tax holiday that passed Congress in the winter of 2010 was a rare exception to this pessimistic rule. Cutting the payroll tax was good short-term politics for both Democrats and Republicans: it was a tax cut that liberals hoped would double as stimulus, and a boost to the middle class that conservatives could support without embracing new federal spending. But more important, it opened the door to what would be good long-term policy as well — because more than almost any feature of the American tax code, the payroll tax deserves to be pared away into extinction.
    • Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-26 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-26 #tcot
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-26 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-26
    • WH: Obamacare ‘reduces the deficit considerably,’ won’t be touched in fiscal cliff deal | WashingtonExaminer.com – WH: Obamacare ‘reduces the deficit considerably,’ won’t be touched in fiscal cliff deal | #tcot
    • Jeb Bush 2016: Is There Any Doubt? – Flap’s Blog – Jeb Bush 2016: Is There Any Doubt? – Flap’s Blog #tcot
    • WH: Obamacare ‘reduces the deficit considerably,’ won’t be touched in fiscal cliff deal– House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, notwithstanding, the White House would rather go over the fiscal cliff than touch any part of Obamacare, President Obama’s spokesman indicated today.“The Affordable Care Act reduces the deficit considerably,” White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters today. “I would simply point out to you that the Supreme Court has spoken, the American people have spoken, congressional leaders of both parties have spoken, and we’re going to continue with implementation.”
    • SCOTUS sends Liberty lawsuit to lower court – Could Open Door for ObamaCare Review– The Supreme Court on Monday ordered the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals to examine the constitutionality of the health care reform law’s employer requirements and mandatory coverage of contraceptives without a co-pay.The move could open the door for President Barack Obama’s health law to be back in front of the Supreme Court late next year. But legal experts say there’s no guarantee that the justices would actually take the case — or that they’d strike down those pieces of the law if they did.
    • Karen Handel vs. Saxby Chambliss? It’s possible– Friends of former secretary of state Karen Handel tell us that Rob Simms, once her chief of staff – now a D.C. media consultant, wasn’t blowing smoke when he said Handel was considering a 2014 challenge to U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss.She is.Simms dropped Handel’s name last week in a Weekly Standard roundup of potential primary rivals to Chambliss – a well-timed piece, given the senator’s decision to renew his fight with Grover Norquist as the Thanksgiving recess began. Other possibilities included U.S. Reps. Tom Price, R-Roswell; Paul Broun, R-Athens; and Tom Graves, R-Ranger. (U.S. Rep. Phil Gingrey sent word to Chambliss and state GOP Chairman Sue Everhart weeks ago that he’s not considering it.)
    • Chris Christie will make 2013 bid for reelection– New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) will run for reelection in 2013, a top political adviser has confirmed to The Fix.Christie political adviser Mike DuHaime said the Republican incumbent filed paperwork earlier Monday to run for a second term. The governor’s decision is not a surprise, though until now, he had not officially said whether or not he would pursue a second term.Christie’s decision was first reported by the AP.Christie, who unseated Democrat Jon Corzine in 2009, is one of the most recognizable faces in the Republican Party. The outspoken governor has been oft-mentioned as a possible 2016 presidential candidate and was reportedly on Mitt Romney’s vice presidential running mate short list earlier this year. Christie was recently tapped to lead the Republican Governors Association in 2014, ramping up speculation that he would run for reelection.
    • Leland Yee to run for California secretary of state– State Sen. Leland Yee, a San Francisco Democrat who has made voter access and open government among his main priorities as a lawmaker, will run for secretary of state when he is termed out of the Legislature in two years.Yee, a former San Francisco supervisor who ran unsuccessfully for mayor last year, plans to announce his candidacy Monday morning. The secretary of state is California’s chief election officer and oversees the state’s campaign disclosure database, maintaining records of all lobbying and election spending in the Golden State.
    • Plunge over fiscal cliff could turn California’s ray of economic sunshine into gloom– The ray of sunshine on the Golden State’s slowly recovering economy could turn to gloom if Congress and President Barack Obama are unable to avert the so-called fiscal cliff, and taxpayers could end up paying the price.Unless a deal is struck, the state’s first projected budget surpluses in a decade could vanish into an $11 billion deficit triggered by a national recession, the state’s nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office said in its annual fiscal outlook.Like states around the country, California would be forced to contend with across-the-board federal tax rate hikes and massive spending cuts, dampening the state’s economic rebound.
    • Feds Say 8 Years in Prison for Convicted Democratic Treasurer Kinde Durkee – Feds Say 8 Years in Prison for Convicted Democratic Treasurer Kinde Durkee
    • Former Mayor Richard Riordan drops his pension ballot initiative – LA Daily News – Former Los Angeles Mayor Riordan pulls pension reform measure under heavy barrage from public employee unions #catcot
    • The Democratic Party’s Problem with White Folks– Demographics cuts both ways. While numerous commentators have skewered Republicans for alienating Latino and other minority voters in 2012, and the GOP is paying a huge price for it, there is another important demographic story: the collapse of the Democratic Party among white voters throughout America’s heartland. That collapse cost Democrats control of the House of Representatives this cycle.President Obama’s Electoral Vote landslide and the surprising surge for Democrats in the Senate were not replicated in the House. While Democrats made modest gains, they fell well short of reversing their 2010 losses that gave Republicans control of the House. If anything, the 2012 results suggest Republicans now have a lock on the House of Representatives.
    • Flap’s Dentistry Blog: The Daily Extraction: November 26, 2012 – The Daily Extraction: November 26, 2012
    • Hillary Clinton 2016: Is There Any Doubt? – Flap’s Blog – Hillary Clinton 2016: Is There Any Doubt? #tcot
    • Sen. Bob Corker: A plan to dodge the ‘fiscal cliff’ – The Sell Out Begins – I have shared with House and Senate leaders as well as the White House a 242-page bill that, along with other agreed-upon cuts that are to be enacted, would produce $4.5 trillion in fiscal reforms and replace sequestration. While I know this bill can be improved, it shows clearly that we can do what is necessary, today, with relatively simple legislation. The proposal includes pro-growth federal tax reform, which generates more static revenue — mostly from very high-income Americans — by capping federal deductions at $50,000 without raising tax rates. It mandates common-sense reforms to the federal workforce, which will help bring its compensation in line with private-sector benefits, and implements a chained consumer price index across the government, a more accurate indicator of inflation. It also includes comprehensive Medicare reform that keeps in place fee-for-service Medicare without capping growth, competing side by side with private options that seniors can choose instead if they wish. Coupled with gradual age increases within Medicare and Social Security; the introduction of means testing; increasing premiums ever so slightly for those making more than $50,000 a year in retirement; and ending a massive “bed tax” gimmick the states use in Medicaid to bilk the federal government of billions, this reform would put our country on firmer financial footing and begin to vanquish our long-term deficit.
    • Charles Murray: Why aren’t Asians Republicans?– Further, there are reasons for Asian Americans not to like Democrats. Asians who became successful because everyone in the family worked two or three jobs (a common strategy behind Asian success) are likely to be offended by the liberal “You didn’t build that” mentality. Unlike every other minority group, Asians owe nothing to the Democrats for affirmative action. On the contrary, Asians are penalized by affirmative action, especially in the universities, where discrimination against Asian applicants (relative to their superb academic qualifications) has been documented in the technical literature.And yet something has happened to define conservatism in the minds of Asians as deeply unattractive, despite all the reasons that should naturally lead them to vote for a party that is identified with liberty, opportunity to get ahead, and economic growth. I propose that the explanation is simple. Those are not the themes that define the Republican Party in the public mind. Republicans are seen by Asians—as they are by Latinos, blacks, and some large proportion of whites—as the party of Bible-thumping, anti-gay, anti-abortion creationists. Factually, that’s ludicrously inaccurate. In the public mind, except among Republicans, that image is taken for reality.
    • Flap’s Dentistry Blog: Using Dental Floss is Worthless? – Using Dental Floss is Worthless?
    • New Senate’s First Task Will Likely Be Trying to Fix Itself– As a result, the first fight of the next Senate, which convenes in January, is not likely to be over a fiscal crisis, immigration, taxes or any issue that animated the elections of 2012. It will instead probably be over how and whether to change a troubled Senate, members and aides say.With his majority enhanced and a crop of frustrated young Democrats pushing him hard, Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the Democratic leader, says he will move on the first day of the 113th Congress to diminish the power of Republicans to obstruct legislation. “We need to change the way we do business in the Senate,” said Senator Tom Udall, Democrat of New Mexico. “Right now, we have gridlock. We have delay. We have obstruction, and we don’t have any accountability.”The pressure leaves Mr. Reid with a weighty decision: whether to ram through a change in the rules with a simple majority that would significantly diminish Republicans’ power to slow or stop legislation.
    • Republicans face unexpected challenges in coastal South amid shrinking white vote– Late on election night, a small melee erupted at the University of Mississippi here when a group of white students frustrated by the reelection of President Obama marched outside and began shouting racial slurs at African American students. Several hundred people gathered to watch as two white students were arrested.“Mississippi still has a lot of work to do in race relations,” said Kimbrely Dandridge, an African American Obama supporter and president of the student body.
    • The Morning Plum: Republicans whitewash history of filibuster – The Plum Line – The Washington Post – Harry Reid – Hands off the Filibuster – in a classic overreach – #tcot
  • Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: November 19, 2012

    Obama Not ImpressedThese are my links for November 16th through November 19th:

    • OBAMA ORGANIZATION TO REMAIN ACTIVE NATIONWIDE – DEMS GETTING DATA JUMP ON 2016– The Obama campaign continues to refine, update and expand its vast database, working the muscle to increase its value for 2014 and 2016. The organization wants to avoid a post-2008 lull, when Obama’s high command was so focused on building a government and staving off a depression that some in the grassroots network felt neglected. This time, supporters are already being asked if they are interested in running for office, and “how many hours per week” they would be willing “to volunteer in your community as part of an Obama organization.”Campaign manager Jim Messina blasted a 24-question email to the campaign’s tens of millions of supporters and eavesdroppers last evening, with the subject line, “Your feedback needed: Take this quick survey.” Participants must enter email address, first and last name, ZIP code, birthdate and gender. This question makes it clear that Obama’s brain trust will keep the machine oiled and cranking: “What would you choose as the top priority for this organizations [sic] in the weeks and years to come?” Choices are: 1) “Passing the President’s legislative agenda”… 2) “Supporting candidates in upcoming elections” … 3) “Training a new generation of leaders and organizers” … 4) “Working on local issues that affect our communities.”
    • Requiem for the Twinkie? – Hostess Brands goes Ding Dong dead, leaps into the Dumpster– Friday’s news that the company making Twinkies, Ding Dongs and Wonder Bread is preparing to liquidate touched off a blame game among Americans shocked that these iconic products are in danger of going away forever.The move follows a strike that began Nov. 9 by the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union. It refused to swallow additional wage and benefit concessions to keep the bankrupt Hostess Brands afloat. Its 5,000 members were nearly unanimous in rejecting the company’s final contract offer.As a result, the company said, most of the 18,500 Hostess employees will lose their jobs. That includes members of the largest union, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, which did agree to the company’s concession demands.The bakery union’s self-defeating refusal to accept financial reality is only part of the story however. For Hostess, the strike was the final blow of many. High commodity costs hurt the company. Not only did it pay a fortune for food ingredients, but also for the energy to run its facilities and fuel its delivery trucks.

      The recession hurt too. Hostess was unprepared to meet difficult business conditions that prevailed in 2009, when it emerged from a previous bankruptcy reorganization in which it obtained big concessions from its workforce. It had been, in fact, a poorly managed company for a long time. A string of short-sighted executives were quick to take money out of the business and slow to make the capital investments it needed to stay competitive.

      Perhaps most damaging, the company failed to innovate in response to changing consumer tastes. Hostess didn’t have to make Ho Ho’s out of tofu to stay relevant. Food companies such as Kraft, Sara Lee and Nabisco have long understood their success depends on sophisticated market research, product development and creative marketing. It doesn’t come cheap.

    • The GOP’s Latino Opportunity– In winning re-election, President Obama carried nearly all the same demographic groups as in 2008, but by smaller margins. The major exception: Hispanics, America’s fastest-growing bloc. Having given Mr. Obama 67% of their votes in 2008, they gave him 71% this time.This has alarmed Republicans. Mr. Obama had offered Hispanics little more than a broken promise to reform immigration in his first term, yet he scored the largest victory among them since Gerald Ford visited Texas in 1976 and tried to eat a tamale without removing its husk.Mitt Romney’s margin of defeat among Hispanics in Nevada (47 points) and Colorado (52 points) made those states unwinnable. In Florida, where Republican winners routinely carry the Hispanic vote, he lost it by 21 points. Mr. Romney carried Arizona but lost Hispanic voters there by an astonishing 55 points. In 2004, George W. Bush lost Arizona Hispanics by only 13 points.Republicans—even outspoken ones like talk-radio and Fox News host Sean Hannity—are now claiming to have changed their views on immigration. Columnist Charles Krauthammer was frank with his prescription: “Yes, amnesty. Use the word. . . . The other party thinks it owns the demographic future—counter that in one stroke by fixing the Latino problem.”

      Such open-mindedness is laudable and probably necessary, but the immigration issue is no silver bullet. And Mr. Krauthammer’s phrase—”the Latino problem”—helps illustrate the real problem. For too long, Republicans have been content to cram Hispanics into gerrymandered Democratic districts and forget about them. Some GOP candidates consciously avoid targeting Hispanics too aggressively, lest they actually turn out to vote.

      In 1983, Republican pollster Lance Tarrance wrote a private memo urging the Republican National Committee to “redouble our efforts to attract the Mexican-American populations. We need to ‘double our budget’ in this area if we stand any chance for the future.” This warning went unheeded.

      In 1999, when I worked in the RNC press shop, Chairman Jim Nicholson told me the GOP deserved an “F” for its outreach efforts to date. Republican presidential contender Bob Dole had won just 21% of Hispanics in 1996. A Univision survey from 1998 had shown that Hispanics overwhelmingly believed the Republican Party either “ignores me” (41%) or “takes me for granted” (22%). This left plenty of low-hanging fruit.

    • Why ObamaCare Is Still No Sure Thing– Champions of ObamaCare want Americans to believe that the president’s re-election ended the battle over the law. It did no such thing. The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act won’t be fully repealed while Barack Obama is in office, but the administration is heavily dependent on the states for its implementation.Republicans will hold 30 governorships starting in January, and at last week’s meeting of the Republican Governors Association they made it clear that they remain highly critical of the health law. Some Republican governors—including incoming RGA Chairman Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, Ohio’s John Kasich, Wisconsin’s Scott Walker and Maine’s Paul LePage—have already said they won’t do the federal government’s bidding. Several Democratic governors, including Missouri’s Jay Nixon and West Virginia’s Earl Ray Tomblin, have also expressed serious concerns.Talk of the law’s inevitability is intended to pressure these governors into implementing it on the administration’s behalf. But states still have two key choices to make that together will put them in the driver’s seat: whether to create state health-insurance exchanges, and whether to expand Medicaid. They should say “no” to both.
    • Can conservatives prevent the U.S. from becoming California?– As bad as last Tuesday night was for the national Republican Party, it was far, far worse for the California Republican Party. Not only did Golden State Democrats maintain control of every statewide elected office; not only did Gov. Jerry Brown’s $6 billion Proposition 30 tax hike pass by solid margins; but Democrats also secured supermajorities in both state legislative chambers. Now, Brown and the Democrats can raise taxes by as much as they want.The California Republican Party is functionally dead. And how is California doing, now that liberals have successfully terminated the state’s remaining conservatives?For starters, it’s still in debt. Despite Brown’s historic tax hike, the California Legislative Analyst’s Office announced this week that the state still faces a $2 billion budget deficit just for the next fiscal year. California’s liberal electorate has already racked up an additional $370 billion in state and local debt over that last decade. That is more than 20 percent of the state’s gross domestic product.According to the California State Budget Crisis Task Force, that comes to more than $10,000 in debt for every Californian. And because the state’s credit rating is so low, California taxpayers must fork over about $2 for every new dollar borrowed. In 2012 alone, the state budget included more than $7.5 billion in debt service — more than most states’ budgets.

      Don’t think for a second that California’s chronic deficits are caused by low taxes. Even before last Tuesday’s tax hikes, California had the most progressive income tax system in the nation, with seven brackets, and the second-highest top marginal rate. Now it has the nation’s highest top marginal rate and the nation’s highest sales tax. And the budget still isn’t balanced.

      The real cause for California’s fiscal crisis is simple: They spend too much money. Between 1996 and 2012, the state’s population grew by just 15 percent, but spending more than doubled, from $45.4 billion to $92.5 billion (in 2005 constant dollars).

    • Gallup Blew Its Presidential Polls, but Why?– Last week’s presidential election has widely been seen as a victory for pollsters who, on balance, saw President Obama as the favorite before Election Day. But that wasn’t the case for the esteemed Gallup Organization. Its polling showed Republican Mitt Romney with a significant lead among likely voters 10 days before Nov. 6 and marginally ahead of Obama on the eve of an election that Obama won by about 3 percentage points.At an event on Thursday at Gallup’s downtown Washington offices, Gallup Editor in Chief Frank Newport told a gathering of fellow pollsters that the organization was reviewing its methodology in light of these inaccuracies. But its fairly consistent Republican bias in 2012 and its overestimation of the white portion of the electorate raise important questions about sampling and the way Gallup determines which respondents are registered and likely to vote.”We don’t have a definitive answer,” Newport said.The day before Election Day, Gallup released data culled from the four previous days, showing Romney with a 1-point lead among likely voters, 49 percent to 48 percent. Before that final survey, Gallup had suspended polling for three days in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, when nearly 10 million Americans were without electricity.

      Immediately before the storm hit, Gallup showed Romney ahead by 5 points, 51 percent to 46 percent, and Romney led by as many as 7 points in mid-October. All the while, most other national polls showed a neck-and-neck race.

    • Are the DREAMers a Special Case? – DREAMERS vs. COMPREHENSIVISTS– Now that the GOP leadership has signaled its eagerness to again support the Democrat drive for amnesty and open borders, a fight has broken out on the other side. This is a revival of the public spitting match between the “comprehensive” amnesty crowd in D.C., who want amnesty for all illegal aliens or nothing, and the DREAMers, illegal aliens who came here as children, who are willing to cut a separate deal for themselves.The fight has resurfaced on NBC Latino’s website (why is there such a thing?), where a professor Stephen Nuno has written that “Immigration reform should not focus on Dreamers” because “I think Dreamers can be detrimental to the goal of immigration reform.”
    • Republicans at a crossroads – Stay the Course?– Republican governors are torn between essentially staying the course in the wake of Mitt Romney’s loss and a more proactive strategy aimed at radically shaking up their party in an effort to reach out to young and minority voters.Some governors believe that Romney’s loss two weeks ago to President Barack Obama was just that — a loss by a single candidate who ran a defensive campaign pummeled by negative ads and lacking in vision. They advocate sticking to a tried-and-true formula of running their own races and hewing to local instead of national dynamics.
    • Tribal America – Mark Steyn on our suddenly race-obsessed politics– To an immigrant such as myself (not the undocumented kind, but documented up to the hilt, alas), one of the most striking features of election-night analysis was the lightly worn racial obsession. On Fox News, Democrat Kirsten Powers argued that Republicans needed to deal with the reality that America is becoming what she called a “brown country.” Her fellow Democrat Bob Beckel observed on several occasions that if the share of the “white vote” was held down below 73 percent Romney would lose. In the end, it was 72 percent and he did. Beckel’s assertion — that if you knew the ethnic composition of the electorate you also knew the result — turned out to be correct.This is what less enlightened societies call tribalism: For example, in the 1980 election leading to Zimbabwe’s independence, Joshua Nkomo’s ZAPU-PF got the votes of the Ndebele people while Robert Mugabe’s ZANU-PF secured those of the Shona — and, as there were more Shona than Ndebele, Mugabe won. That same year America held an election, and Ronald Reagan won a landslide victory. Nobody talked about tribal-vote shares back then, but had the percentage of what Beckel calls the “white vote” been the same in 2012 as it was in 1980 (88 percent), Mitt Romney would have won in an even bigger landslide than Reagan. The “white vote” will be even lower in 2016, and so, on the Beckel model, Republicans are set to lose all over again.
    • White House denies editing talking points on Benghazi attack, contradicting Petraeus– The White House yesterday denied it edited talking points about the terrorist attack that killed the American ambassador to Libya — contradicting remarks made a day earlier by disgraced ex-CIA chief David Petraeus.“The only edit that was made by the White House and also by the State Department was to change the word ‘consulate’ to the word ‘diplomatic facility,’ since the facility in Benghazi was not formally a consulate,” Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes told reporters aboard Air Force One.“Other than that, we were guided by the points that were provided by the intelligence community. So I can’t speak to any other edits that may have been made.”
    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-17 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-17
    • Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-17 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-17 #tcot
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-17 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-17
    • Gregory Flap @ Ronnie’s Diner – Half Marathon training run with L A Roadrunners is finished. Now, some food and USC Trojan football (@ Ronnie’s Diner)
    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-16 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-16
    • Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-16 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-16 #tcot
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-16 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-16
    • Newt Gingrich on Romney’s “Gifts”– The former Speaker in colloquy with the Texas Tribune’s Evan Smith:EVAN SMITH: So Governor Romney said yesterday now somewhat famously, that “the reason that the president won is because he gave gifts to minorities in the form of healthcare or to young people in the form of preferable college loan…”NEWT GINGRICH: I am very disappointed…EVAN SMITH: With Governor Romney saying that?

      NEWT GINGRICH: With Governor Romney’s analysis, which I believe is insulting and profoundly wrong.

      EVAN SMITH: Can you talk about that? Why is that?

      NEWT GINGRICH: Well first of all, we didn’t lose Asian-Americans, because they got any gifts. He did worse with Asian-Americans than he did with Latinos.

      EVAN SMITH: Right, seventy-three percent of Asian-Americans, seventy-one percent of Latinos.

      NEWT GINGRICH: This is the hardest working and most successful ethnic group in America, okay. They ain’t into gifts. Second, it’s an insult to all Americans. It reduces us to economic entities who have no passion, no idealism, no dreams, no philosophy, and if it had been that simple, my question would have been “Why didn’t you out bid him?”

    • Politics with LisaV: California GOP vs. Dem. party registration trends – RT @lvorderbrueggen: California GOP vs. Dem. party registration trends in a cool Google Fusion table. @lvorderbrueggen
    • The Yeshiva World BRINK OF WAR: Israel Taking Steps To Mobilize Up To 75,000 Reservists [PHOTOS] « » Frum Jewish News – The Yeshiva World BRINK OF WAR: Israel Taking Steps To Mobilize Up To 75,000 Reservists [PHOTOS] « » Frum… #tcot
    • The Yeshiva World BRINK OF WAR: Israel Taking Steps To Mobilize Up To 75,000 Reservists [PHOTOS] « » Frum Jewish News – RT @JedediahBila: Israel Taking Steps To Mobilize Up To 75,000 Reservists:
    • An Awakened Giant: The Hispanic Electorate is Likely to Double by 2030– The record number1 of Latinos who cast ballots for president this year are the leading edge of an ascendant ethnic voting bloc that is likely to double in size within a generation, according to a Pew Hispanic Center analysis based on U.S. Census Bureau data, Election Day exit polls and a new nationwide survey of Hispanic immigrants.The nation’s 53 million Hispanics comprise 17% of the total U.S. population but just 10% of all voters this year, according to the national exit poll. To borrow a boxing metaphor, they still “punch below their weight.”
    • California Unemployment Rate Dips To 10.1 Percent « CBS San Francisco – RT @KNX1070: California #Unemployment Rate Dips To 10.1 Percent « CBS San Francisco @knx1070
    • Flap’s Dentistry Blog: The Morning Drill: November 16, 2012 – The Morning Drill: November 16, 2012
  • Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: November 16, 2012

    Union Kills the Twinkie

    These are my links for November 14th through November 16th:

    • Twinkies Maker Hostess Going Out of Business– Hostess, the makers of Twinkies, Ding Dongs and Wonder Bread, is going out of business after striking workers failed to heed a Thursday deadline to return to work, the company said.“We deeply regret the necessity of today’s decision, but we do not have the financial resources to weather an extended nationwide strike,” Hostess CEO Gregory F. Rayburn said in announcing that the firm had filed a motion with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court to shutter its business. “Hostess Brands will move promptly to lay off most of its 18,500-member workforce and focus on selling its assets to the highest bidders.”
    • Details about the GOP’s alternate to the DREAM Act emerge– The Daily Caller has obtained details of an ACHIEVE Act proposal being floated by some Senate Republicans.It appears similar to the conservative alternative to the Dream Act that Sen. Marco Rubio worked on last summer (before President Obama issued his executive order, effectively tabling the issue until after the election).Essentially, the proposal involves several tiers: W-1 visa status would allow an immigrant to attend college or serve in the military (they have six years to get a degree). After doing so, they would be eligible to apply for a four-year nonimmigrant work visa (also can be used for graduate degrees.)Next, applicants would be eligible to apply for a permanent visa (no welfare benefits.) Finally, after a set number of years, citizenship “could follow…”
    • Martinez criticizes Romney comments, points way forward for GOP– New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez, the GOP’s most prominent Latina, chastised Mitt Romney’s rhetoric Thursday and called on the Republican Party to play ball on immigration reform.“We have to start electing people who look like their communities all the way from city council to county commissioners to county clerks all the way through the state and up into national politics,” she told POLITICO and Yahoo News at the conclusion of the Republican Governors Association meeting here.
    • Some Republican governors soften on taxes– Some Republican governors are softening on the party’s hard-line toward tax increases for the wealthy, suggesting that GOP congressmen at least be open to rate hikes in exchange for a comprehensive fiscal agreement on taxes and entitlements.“The people have spoken, I think we’re going to have to be [flexible] now,” said Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell, when asked if his party would now have to be open to taxes on the highest earners. “Elections do have consequences. The president campaigned on that.”
    • Top California pollster says 2012 election could be a turning point– DiCamillo said the overwhelming support for President Barack Obama among ethnic voters was solely responsible for his landslide, 21 percentage-point win in California. While non-Hispanic white voters backed Republican Mitt Romney by an 8 percent margin, he noted, Obama carried Latinos by 45 points, Asian-Americans by 53 points and African-Americans by more than 90 points.”It bodes very poorly for the long-term prospects of the California Republican Party,” he said.Both pollsters agreed with the assessment of numerous national analysts that, to become more competitive among Latino voters, Republicans in Congress must support comprehensive immigration reform that includes a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants who have been working in the United States for a number of years.That policy change alone, however, will not be enough, DiCamillo said.

      “It’s not even the one thing that I would point to as having the most to do with partisan preference,” he said.

      DiCamillo said the issue that most separates ethnic voters from non-Hispanic whites in California is their perception of the role of government. His polling has found that while non-Hispanic whites are essentially divided over the question of whether government should do more to try to improve the lives of residents, ethnic voters by a 2-to-1 margin believe that it should.

    • Political Cartoons / Secede???? – Secede???? via @pinterest #tcot
    • Jobless Claims in U.S. Jumped Last Week After Sandy- Bloomberg – Jobless Claims in U.S. Jumped Last Week After Sandy #tcot
    • Jobless Claims in U.S. Jumped Last Week After Sandy– More Americans than forecast submitted claims for unemployment insurance last week as superstorm Sandy wreaked havoc on the job market.Applications for jobless benefits surged by 78,000 to 439,000 in the week ended Nov. 10, the most since April 2011, the Labor Department said today in Washington. Several states said the increase was due to the storm that hit the Northeastern part of the U.S. in late October, a Labor Department spokesman said as the data were released to the press.The extent of the damage means it may take weeks for the underlying trend in firings to again become clear. Before the storm, the labor market was gaining momentum even as year-end domestic fiscal policy uncertainties raised concern among businesses.“At least a few state labor offices were shut in the prior week so it’s almost as if you have two weeks of claims in one,” said Ryan Wang, an economist at HSBC Securities USA Inc. in New York. “You have a double whammy this week, where people were filing claims they were unable to previously and individuals unable to work for the storm were filing additional claims.”
    • Day By Day November 14 – 15, 2012 – Underwater and Illumination – Day By Day November 14 – 15, 2012 – Underwater and Illumination #tcot
    • The ObamaCare Battlefront Shifts To The States– Throughout the debate over ObamaCare – and back to HillaryCare and beyond – the fundamental question in health reform has always been this: Who will control our choices – government or individuals?Each side has won battles over the last 15 years in the tug of war between those who want a system that empowers the individual and one that cedes more and more authority to the state.Congress created the State Children’s Health Insurance Program to expand publicly-financed coverage to children.But it later created Health Savings Accounts to empower individuals in the free market.

      It expanded Medicare to create a new prescription drug benefit.

      But it also boosted participation by private plans in Medicare through the Medicare Advantage program.

    • Doc Shortage Could Crash ObamaCare Health Care– The United States will require at least 52,000 more family doctors in the year 2025 to keep up with the growing and increasingly older U.S. population, a new study found.The predictions also reflect the passage of the Affordable Care Act — a change that will expand health insurance coverage to an additional 38 million Americans.”The health care consumer that values the relationship with a personal physician, particularly in areas already struggling with access to primary care physicians should be aware of potential access challenges that they may face in the future if the production of primary care physicians does not increase,” said Dr. Andrew Bazemore, director of the Robert Graham Center for Policy Studies in Primary Care and co-author of the study published Monday in the Annals of Family Medicine.Stephen Petterson, senior health policy researcher at the Robert Graham Center, said the government should take steps — and quickly — to address the problem before it gets out of hand.

      “There needs to be more primary care incentive programs that give a bonus to physicians who treat Medicaid patients in effort to reduce the compensation gap between specialists and primary care physicians,” said Petterson, who co-authored the study with Bazemore.

      But such changes may be more easily said than done.

      The problem does not appear to be one of too few doctors in general; in fact, in 2011 a total of 17,364 new doctors emerged from the country’s medical schools, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC). Too few of these doctors, however, choose primary care as a career — an issue that may be worsening.

    • California Vehicle license fees would triple under measure planned by state Sen. Ted Lieu– Touted as a test of the new Democratic supermajority in Sacramento, South Bay state Sen. Ted Lieu plans to introduce a measure to triple vehicle license fees.The constitutional amendment would restore the 2 percent vehicle license fee slashed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger after he won office partly on that pledge.The 1.35 percent transportation system user fee increase would generate an estimated $3.5 billion to $4 billion annually for roads and public transit in yet-to-be-decided proportions, Lieu said.Buoyed by the Democratic supermajority achieved just last week, Lieu, D-Redondo Beach, plans to introduce the legislation in either December or January. He envisions the Legislature will approve the amendment and place it before voters in November 2014.

      “It would be a test to see what the two-thirds (majority) Legislature means,” Lieu told the editorial board of the Los Angeles News Group. “The best way for us to lose the supermajority is to overreach.

      “I’m not saying it would be an easy sell,” he added of the proposal. “I’m aware of the fact I may be attacked for it.”

    • THE IMMIGRATION AMNESTY FANTASY– The networks had barely called the election for President Barack Obama before GOP elites rushed to embrace an amnesty for illegal immigrants.Getting killed by almost 3-to-1 among Latino voters understandably concentrates the mind, but it’s no reason to lose it. The post-election Republican reaction has been built on equal parts panic, wishful thinking and ethnic pandering.It’s one thing to argue that amnesty is the right policy on the merits. It’s another to depict it as the magic key to unlocking the Latino vote. John McCain nearly immolated himself within the Republican Party with his support for amnesty and did all of 4 percentage points better among Latino voters in 2008 than Mitt Romney did in 2012, according to exit polls.What is the common thread uniting McCain, the advocate of “comprehensive” immigration reform, and Romney the advocate of “self-deportation”? They are both Republicans supporting conservative economic policies. Surely, that had more to do with their showing among Latinos than anything they did or didn’t say about immigration.

      According to Census Bureau data, among native-born Hispanics, 50 percent of all households with children are headed by unmarried mothers. About 40 percent of all households receive benefits from a major welfare program. This doesn’t mean that the GOP shouldn’t try to appeal to voters in these households. It does mean that they aren’t natural Republican voters.

      Latinos tend to have liberal attitudes toward government. Take health care. An ImpreMedia/Latino Decisions poll of Latinos conducted on the eve of the election found that 61 percent of Latinos support leaving Obamacare in place. Sixty-six percent believe government should ensure access to health insurance. This might have something to do with the fact that 32 percent of nonelderly Latinos lack health insurance, about twice the national average.

      In California, Heather MacDonald of the Manhattan Institute noted in the aftermath of the election, “Hispanics will prove to be even more decisive in the victory of Gov. Jerry Brown’s Proposition 30, which raised upper-income taxes and the sales tax, than in the Obama election.”

      These are facts that never intrude upon Wall Street Journal editorials scolding Republicans for supposedly turning their backs on new recruits. In the Journal’s telling, if it weren’t for Republican intransigence on immigration, Latino voters would be eagerly joining the fight for lower marginal tax rates and free-market entitlement reforms.

    • John Cornyn on Senate races: GOP bungled it– Texas Sen. John Cornyn, the incoming Republican whip who led his party’s Senate campaign efforts this year, candidly acknowledged the GOP bungled a prime opportunity to take control of the chamber through a combination of poor polling, poor candidates and a poor job of selling its message.While claiming Democrats “got lucky” in gaining two Senate seats, the Texas Republican admitted his party had an image deficiency with women, minorities and disaffected voters — one that needs to be immediately addressed before suffering the consequences in the next election cycle.
    • Gallup Poll: Economy, Entitlements, Iran Are Americans’ Top Priorities– Solid majorities of Americans in the Nov. 9-12 USA Today/Gallup poll also put heavy emphasis on significantly reducing the United States’ dependence on fossil fuels, making college education more affordable, making major cuts in federal spending, and simplifying the tax code by lowering rates and eliminating deductions and loopholes.Not only do at least seven in 10 Americans rate all of these goals as extremely or very important, but majorities of Republicans as well as Democrats agree on their importance. In other words, there is bipartisan consensus that these goals are important.On the reverse side of things, relatively few Americans, including fewer than four in 10 Republicans or Democrats, consider making major cuts to military and defense spending a high priority for Obama.
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-14 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-14
    • Romney Blames Loss on Obama’s ‘Gifts’ to Minorities and Young Voters– Saying that he and his team still felt “troubled” by his loss to President Obama, Mitt Romney on Wednesday attributed his defeat in part to what he called big policy “gifts” that the president had bestowed on loyal Democratic constituencies, including young voters, African-Americans and Hispanics.In a conference call with fund-raisers and donors to his campaign, Mr. Romney said Wednesday afternoon that the president had followed the “old playbook” of using targeted initiatives to woo specific interest groups — “especially the African-American community, the Hispanic community and young people.”“In each case, they were very generous in what they gave to those groups,” Mr. Romney said, contrasting Mr. Obama’s strategy to his own of “talking about big issues for the whole country: military strategy, foreign policy, a strong economy, creating jobs and so forth.”Mr. Romney’s comments in the 20-minute conference call came after his running mate, Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, told WISC-TV in Madison on Monday that their loss was a result of Mr. Obama’s strength in “urban areas,” an analysis that did not account for Mr. Obama’s victories in more rural states like Iowa and New Hampshire or the decrease in the number of votes for the president relative to 2008 in critical urban counties in Ohio.
    • LA Governor Bobby Jindal rejects Mitt Romney’s ‘gifts’ theory– Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal forcefully rejected Mitt Romney’s claim that he lost because of President Barack Obama’s “gifts” to minorities and young voters.Asked about the failed GOP nominee’s reported comments on a conference call with donors earlier Wednesday, the incoming chairman of the Republican Governors Association became visibly agitated.“No, I think that’s absolutely wrong,” he said at a press conference that opened the RGA’s post-election meeting here. “Two points on that: One, we have got to stop dividing the American voters. We need to go after 100 percent of the votes, not 53 percent. We need to go after every single vote.“And, secondly, we need to continue to show how our policies help every voter out there achieve the American Dream, which is to be in the middle class, which is to be able to give their children an opportunity to be able to get a great education. … So, I absolutely reject that notion, that description. I think that’s absolutely wrong.”

      He reiterated the points for emphasis.

      “I don’t think that represents where we are as a party and where we’re going as a party,” he said. “That has got to be one of the most fundamental takeaways from this election: If we’re going to continue to be a competitive party and win elections on the national stage and continue to fight for our conservative principles, we need two messages to get out loudly and clearly: One, we are fighting for 100 percent of the votes, and secondly, our policies benefit every American who wants to pursue the American dream. Period. No exceptions.”

    • Gregory Flap @ Crown & Anchor – Having a birthday lunch with my son and soccer/football (@ Crown & Anchor) [pic]:
    • Twitter / Dodgers: Our followers to retweet this … – RT @Dodgers: Our followers to retweet this tweet are eligible to win a @CochitoCruz autographed jersey tee! #DodgersTY
    • California Legislators Take Off for Hawaii and Australia – (500) … #tcot
    • Will the Senate GOP Filibuster the President’s Next Nominees? – Yes, they will if it is Rice and Kerry | Will the Senate GOP Filibuster the President’s Next Nominees? #tcot
    • Obama to open ‘fiscal cliff’ talks with call for $1.6T in new revenues – So 2009– President Obama is taking a tough opening stance in talks over deficit reduction, pushing Republicans to accept a plan that calls for $1.6 trillion in new tax revenue over the next ten years, according to reports.The figure is double the $800 billion last discussed by the White House and House Speaker Boehner (R-Ohio) during their 2011 negotiations on raising the debt-ceiling limit.The president’s plan is based on his most recent budget proposal, which sought the $1.6 in new revenues by targeting the wealthy and corporations.  The president and congressional lawmakers are set to meet at the White House on Friday as both sides begin hammering out a deficit-cutting plan that helps the nation move past the “fiscal cliff” of rising tax rates and automatic spending cuts set to take effect in January 2013.Both sides say they hope to avoid the fiscal cliff, but are at an impasse over taxes, with the president insisting that the wealthy pay more.

      House Republicans on Wednesday were incredulous at the president’s opening bid.

      “That is so 2009. It’s like he is still in charge of this place,” said Rep. Tim Huelskamp (R-Kan.), referring to the last time Democrats had a majority in the House.

    • Look Who’s Refusing To Compromise To Avoid Going Off The Fiscal Cliff – The LEFT– Budget Talks: If President Obama wants to get a deficit deal done to avoid the fiscal cliff, his biggest challenge won’t be Republicans, but his own hard-core left-wing supporters.Two days after the election, Obama’s favorite economist, Paul Krugman, set the tone for the intransigent left in a column titled: “Let’s not make a deal.” Boiled down, his advice to Obama was this: Don’t give in to any Republican demands, even if doing so would “inflict damage on a still-shaky economy.” After all, Obama would be better positioned to “weather any blowback from economic troubles.”Krugman’s advice may be disturbingly cold and calculating, but he has plenty of company on the left.Robert Kuttner, co-founder of the liberal American Prospect magazine, suggests Obama should just sit it out, let all the Bush tax cuts expire, the automatic spending cuts kick in and expect public pressure to force Republicans to give in entirely.

      The left-wing Daily Kos called any kind of “grand bargain” between Obama and the GOP a “Great Betrayal.”

    • Maps of the 2012 US presidential election results – Maps of the 2012 US presidential election results
    • Don’t cry now | WashingtonExaminer.com – Don’t cry now – The GOP Will Have a Better Candidate in 2016 #tcot
    • Immigrants and the GOP – Debunking some talk radio myths– The GOP’s Presidential election defeat is opening up a debate in the party, with more than a few voices saying they are willing to rethink their views on immigration. This is good news, which means it’s also a good moment to address some of the frequent claims from the anti-immigration right that simply aren’t true, especially about Hispanics.One myth is that Latino voters simply aren’t worth pursuing because they’re automatic Democrats. Yet Ronald Reagan was so eager to welcome Latinos to the GOP that he described them as “Republicans who don’t know it yet.”Recall that between 1996 and 2004 the GOP doubled its percentage of the Hispanic vote to more that 40%, culminating in the re-election of George W. Bush, who won Colorado, Iowa, New Mexico and Nevada—states with fast-growing Hispanic populations that Mitt Romney lost. The notion that Hispanics are “natural” Democrats and not swing voters is belied by this history.
    • The Morning Flap: November 14, 2012 – Flap’s Blog – The Morning Flap: November 14, 2012 #tcot
  • Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: November 14, 2012

    Secession Movement Explodes

    These are my links for November 13th through November 14th:

    • Don’t cry now – The GOP Will Have a Better Candidate in 2016– Yes, it’s all sad — and grim, and depressing — but is Election 2012 truly the end of the GOP universe? Perhaps. But before giving way to unseemly hysterics, here are some thoughts to peruse:* Timing is everything: This year, the Republicans needed new and appealing young talents to take on Obama, and that, as it happened, was just what they had. The upside was that in 2009 and 2010 they had a crop of new stars, all born to run on a national ticket. The downside was that they would be ready to start running in 2014 at the earliest. And so the most crucial of all nominations would go to one of a number of has-beens or retreads, whose experience was either old or irrelevant, and whose talent at best underwhelmed.Mitt Romney, the best, left office six years ago, and had a liberal past, a financial career that had netted him millions, and, as the son of another ex-governor, seemed the image of white and upper-class privilege, minus the military heroics, medical problems, or personal tragedies that humanized the Roosevelt cousins, the Kennedy brothers and the elder George Bush.

      Near the end, Romney became a good candidate, but he was always less than a good politician; a speaker in tongues that were not his first language, and a technocrat in a profession in which visionaries tend to win the big prize. His loss deprives the country of an effective executive, but it allows the next generation of the GOP, which would have been pushed aside for eight years or more if he had triumphed, to step forward now and make over the party — a moment that can’t come soon enough.

      * The country has changed, but the next Republican ticket will have at least one, and possibly two, brownish-skinned children of immigrants, with inspiring stories of rising from nowhere to live the American dream. He and/or she (and “she” must be seen as a real possibility) will never have fired hundreds of people, will not be rich, will not be dogged by multiple changes on issues, will understand modern conservatism from having run and won on it, and also will be a career politician, unlikely to make the unforced verbal errors that haunted this campaign just ended. There are few such “diverse” stars in the Democrats’ stable. Hillary Clinton, if she runs in 2016, will be 69, and unlikely to get the nation’s young in a tizzy. In the next cycle, the dynamic that worked this year in the Democrats’ favor — race, youth and gender — may be turned on its head.

    • White House ‘secede’ petitions reach 660,000 signatures, 50-state participation– Less than a week after a New Orleans suburbanite petitioned the White House to allow Louisiana to secede from the United States, petitions from seven states have collected enough signatures to trigger a promised review from the Obama administration.By 6:00 a.m. EST Wednesday, more than 675,000 digital signatures appeared on 69 separate secession petitions covering all 50 states, according to a Daily Caller analysis of requests lodged with the White House’s “We the People” online petition system.A petition from Vermont, where talk of secession is a regular feature of political life, was the final entry.

      Petitions from Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, North Carolina, Tennessee and Texas residents have accrued at least 25,000 signatures, the number the Obama administration says it will reward with a staff review of online proposals.

      The Texas petition leads all others by a wide margin. Shortly before 9:00 a.m. EST Wednesday, it had attracted 94,700 signatures.

      But a spokesperson for Gov. Rick Perry said Tuesday afternoon that he does not support the idea of his state striking out on its own. “Gov. Perry believes in the greatness of our Union and nothing should be done to change it. But he also shares the frustrations many Americans have with our federal government,” according to a statement from the governor’s office.

      A backlash Monday night saw requests filed with the White House to strip citizenship rights from Americans who signed petitions to help states secede.

    • Krauthammer: White House ‘Held Affair Over Petraeus’s Head’ For Favorable Testimony On Benghazi– Syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer on Tuesday said the White House used David Petraeus’s affair to get the CIA director to give testimony about the attacks on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, that was in line with the administration’s position on the matter.Appearing on Fox News’s Special Report, Krauthammer said, “The sword was lowered on Election Day”
    • Greetings from the Single-Party State of California! – Dental Care for the Poor– Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg is already putting his wish list together. Note the sheer lack of much to do with fiscal solvency:Steinberg talked of using the supermajority to reinvest in public schools and colleges, restore adult dental care for the poor, and alter the initiative process in a way that makes it harder for millionaires to impose their will by spending vast sums qualifying a measure for the ballot.The Senate leader said he might be willing to consider overhauling the state’s income tax structure to lower rates but broaden the base, and to consider a constitutional amendment laying the groundwork for same-sex marriage.

      Adult dental care for the poor! Exactly what we need with a cash deficit somewhere around $20 billion, according to the state controller.

      There are two races in Orange County and Sacramento County that are very close, and the GOP is not willing to concede as yet. There is a possibility that the ability to keep the Democratic legislature from overruling the Democratic governor rests in the hands of two Republicans.

    • Hooray! Bankrupt California Is Now a One-Party State!– I might dislike the state GOP even more than Harold Meyerson does, but there are some other numbers that prevent me from celebrating what Meyerson hails as “the political transformation of California.” For instance:The last Republican turned off the lights* Democrats have controlled all eight statewide executive offices since 2011, for only the second time since the 19th century.* Democrats have a 28-12 edge in the state Senate, tied for its largest advantage since the 19th century. The party has held a majority there since the late 1950s.

      * Democrats have a 54-26 edge in the state Assembly, its largest advantage since 1978. The party has run the Assembly since 1997.

      * California has been represented in the U.S. Senate by Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer for two decades.

      * That 38-15 congressional delegation advantage, if it indeed holds, will be by far the largest spread in state history, and almost the largest percentage advantage as well (there was that 3-1 moment in the 1870s). Republicans last held more California congressional seats than Democrats in the late 1950s.

      So what has all this enlightened Democratic governance produced? Here’s one way of looking at it: The last month that California had an unemployment rate of less than 10% was January 2009. The last month its unemployment was lower than the national rate was April 1990. The 2010 Census marked the first time California didn’t gain a seat in the House of Representatives since basically ever. For the first time since the Gold Rush, a majority of California residents were born in the state. The ultimate migration-magnet in a nation of immigrants is just no longer so, however strange that may be to accept.

    • California to GOP: Adios– here are many ways to illustrate the descent of the California Republican Party into oblivion. A starting point is the demographic breakdown of the members of Congress elected last week in the state.Assuming the leaders in the few remaining close races hold their leads, there will be 38 Democrats and 15 Republicans representing California in Congress come January. Of those 38 Democrats, 18 are women, nine are Latinos, five are Asian Americans, three are African Americans, four are Jews and at least one is gay. Just 12 are white men. Of the 15 Republicans, on the other hand, all are white men — not a woman, let alone a member of a racial minority or a Jew, among them.The composition of the state’s new Democratic congressional delegation merely reflects the state’s demographic changes. Latinos (72% of whom backed Obama) were 23% of the California electorate in 2012, up from 18% in 2008. The share of Asian voters (who voted for Obama at a 79% rate) doubled, from 6% to 12%, between those two elections. Voters under 30 increased their share of state ballots cast from 20% in 2008 to 27% in 2012, and backed Obama at a 71% rate. The state’s proportion of white voters, meanwhile, fell from 65% in 2004 to 63% in 2008 to just 55% last week.

      More sentient Republicans now say the party needs to modify its position on immigration. But a deeper look into the politics of the increasingly young and multicolored electorate suggests that the GOP is estranged from this new America on more issues than just immigration. The exit polling on Proposition 30, the tax hike on the wealthy promoted by Gov. Jerry Brown to keep the state’s schools and universities from further disastrous budget cuts, shows key elements of the Democrats’ new majority consigning the old Howard-Jarvis-no-tax-hike California to history’s dustbin. Voters under 30 supported Proposition 30 at a 67% rate, and Asian Americans gave it 61% support.

    • Majority Supports Path to Citizenship; Greater Division on Other Social Issues – ABC News– Most Americans support a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants, an issue that may be high on the agenda of newly re-elected President Obama and the 113th Congress, given the increased importance of nonwhites – including Hispanic voters – in the nation’s political equation.On two other prominent social issues in last week’s voting, a bare majority continues to support legalizing gay marriage, and this ABC News/Washington Post poll finds a new high, 48 percent, in support for legalizing small amounts of marijuana for personal use.A PATH – Fifty-seven percent of Americans in this survey, produced for ABC by Langer Research Associates, support a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants, with 39 percent opposed. That’s virtually identical to results of a similar question last asked in mid-2010, with support up from its earlier levels, as low as 49 percent in late 2007.

      Debate on the issue was heightened by restrictive immigration policies enacted in Arizona in 2010 and Alabama in 2011, and, in June, when Obama moved in another direction, granting immunity from deportation to many undocumented immigrants who arrived in the country as children.

      Hispanics accounted for 10 percent of voters in Tuesday’s presidential election, reaching double-digits for the first time, and Obama won them by 71-27 percent, improving on his 2008 margin in this group. In the exit poll, voters overall, by more than 2-1, said illegal immigrants working here should be offered a chance to apply for legal status rather than being deported.

      In this survey, support for a path to citizenship peaks at 82 percent among Hispanics, 71 percent among Democrats and liberals alike and 69 percent among young adults, all key Obama groups. Support’s at 68 percent among nonwhites overall, compared with 51 percent among non-Hispanic whites. Obama lost white voters by 20 points last week, but won nonwhites — who accounted for a record 28 percent of the electorate – by 61 points. It was a record racial gap.

    • The Fiscal Cliff: Will Obama and Congress Cut a Budget Deal?– Five people will gather Friday inside the White House to begin making decisions that could affect the pocketbooks of 315 million Americans.When President Obama sits down with the Republican and Democratic leaders of Congress, only 46 days will remain before the nation risks plunging over the “fiscal cliff” — a pileup of scheduled tax increases and spending cuts that threaten to drain $560 billion out of the economy next year and derail the recovery.It will be high-stakes poker, holding the promise of great rewards for an economic rebound if Washington succeeds and the peril of another recession if it fails.

      Promise or peril, some Americans are going to feel the pinch. Should Obama get his way, those with annual incomes above $250,000 will face higher tax bills. If Republicans come out on top, tax rates and defense spending will remain the same, but social programs will face budget cuts.

      A compromise portends discomfort, most likely in the form of reduced paychecks, jobless benefits and business tax breaks. And a stalemate means higher taxes and reduced federal spending across the board, including at the Pentagon.

    • Hard questions await Obama at news conference– This is not what the White House wanted for President Barack Obama’s first news conference of his second term.He won’t be able to dwell much on his stronger-than-expected victory or even press his agenda for the next four years. Instead, he’ll be diverted by a Washington sex scandal.
    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-13 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-13
    • Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-13 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-13 #tcot
    • for-2012-11-13&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-13
    • Petraeus and Broadwell attempted to conceal affair using Gmail drafts | The Verge – RT @verge: Petraeus and Broadwell attempted to conceal affair using Gmail drafts
    • Michael Ramirez: Free Stuff is Not Overrated – Flap’s Blog – Michael Ramirez: Free Stuff is Not Overrated #tcot
    • Day By Day November 13, 2012 – Dive, Dive! – Flap’s Blog – Day By Day November 13, 2012 – Dive, Dive! #tcot
    • Broad Concern about ‘Fiscal Cliff’ Consequences | Pew Research Center for the People and the Press – Pew Poll: Broad Concern about ‘Fiscal Cliff’ Consequences – Blame Congressional GOP More #tcot
    • Video – Austan Goolsbee says that there is no way the fiscal cliff can be avoided. – WSJ.com – RT @WSJ: Can the fiscal cliff be avoided? Here’s what three of the top economic professors in the U.S. think: VIDEO
    • Pew Poll: Broad Concern about ‘Fiscal Cliff’ Consequences – Blame Congressional GOP More– As the president and congressional leaders begin negotiations to avoid the “fiscal cliff” deadline at the end of the year, there is widespread public concern about the possible financial consequences. More say the automatic spending cuts and tax increases scheduled to take effect in January would have a major effect on the U.S. economy than on their own finances. But nearly identical majorities say the effect of the changes would be mostly negative for the economy (62%) and their personal financial situation (60%).The public is skeptical that President Obama and congressional Republicans will reach an agreement by the end of the year to avoid the fiscal cliff. About half (51%) say the two sides will not reach an agreement, while just 38% say they will. If no deal is reached, more say that congressional Republicans would be more to blame than President Obama (53% vs. 29%).
    • Pew Poll: Hispanic Household Wealth Fell by 66% from 2005 to 2009– Median household wealth among Hispanics fell from $18,359 in 2005 to $6,325 in 2009. The percentage drop—66%—was the largest among all racial and ethnic groups, according to a new report by the Pew Research Center’s Social & Demographic Trends project. During the same period, median household wealth declined 53% among black households and 16% among white households.The Pew Research report provides the first look at how the Great Recession impacted household wealth. It finds that plummeting house values were the principal cause of the erosion in wealth among all groups. However, because Hispanics derived nearly two-thirds of their net worth in 2005 from home equity and a disproportionate share reside in states that were in the vanguard of the housing meltdown, Hispanics were hit hardest by the housing market downturn.The Pew Research analysis also finds that the median wealth of white households is 18 times that of Hispanic households and 20 times that of black households. These lopsided wealth ratios are the largest in the quarter century since the government first published such data, and roughly twice the size of the ratios that had prevailed between these three groups for the two decades prior to the Great Recession.
    • Public Opinion Strategies: Three Keys From the Exit Polls– Given the demographics of the 2008 and 2012 elections, the Republican Party is in danger of becoming the “Win In Off Years Only Party” unless we make a full-throated improvement with Hispanic voters. And, we have to admit it is us, not them.Want proof? That’s easy – as of this writing, Mitt Romney is getting 48.7% of the vote, while House Republicans are getting 48.4% of the vote. The House majority for 2014 (and beyond) is not built on winning the vote, but on fabulous drawing of the congressional district lines. So even the battleground we won on (congressional) was tilted for us, which we may not be able to count on in ten years.
    • Republican polling firm explains what went wrong– On Election Day, Mitt Romney had a victory speech prepared — but not a concession. He believed he would win. His confidence was based in part on internal polls showing an electorate that favored Republicans. Many Republican Senate candidates also got false optimism from their numbers.In a memo, the firm of Romney pollster Neil Newhouse, Public Opinion Strategies, explains its mistakes and suggests how to fix them going forward.As a part of the Republican polling community, our prescription includes doing at least one-third of the interviews with cell phone respondents going forward, adjusting as required, ensuring that we include enough younger voters in our sampling, and (in many cases) polling until the final weekend of the campaign. This is going to cost campaigns and organizations more money on polling, but it is necessary to have a more accurate representation of the electorate.
    • President 2012: Gallup defends itself– Gallup’s Frank Newport posted a memo online defending the organization’s 2012 polling, which gave Mitt Romney the lead in the presidential race from mid-October to the end of the month.Newport notes that the final pre-election Gallup poll, taken after a hiatus due to Hurricane Sandy, showed a dead heat, not so far off the final popular vote results.“In the end, Gallup’s national popular vote estimate was that the popular vote was too close to call, a statistical tie — 50% for Mitt Romney, 49% for Barack Obama,” Newport wrote. “When the dust settled, Romney got 48% of the popular vote and Obama received 50%, meaning that Gallup’s percentage-point estimate was within two percentage points for Romney and within one point for Obama.” (Further counting has boosted Obama’s total closer to 51 percent.)

      However, he added, “it is clear that voting today is subject to new pushes and pulls” and that changes to the pollsters’ likely voting model might be necessary.

      Newport also takes what appears to be a veiled shot at The New York Times’s Nate Silver, who argued that a mid-October Gallup poll showing Romney ahead was likely wrong.

      “It’s not easy nor cheap to conduct traditional random sample polls,” Newport writes. “It’s much easier, cheaper, and mostly less risky to focus on aggregating and analyzing others’ polls.”

    • Upcoming 5K,10K and Other Ventura County Area Running and Fitness Events! – Welcome! – Conejo Valley Guide – RT @ConejoJoe: Upcoming Ventura County area 5Ks, 10Ks and other running events
    • 2012 Malibu Marathon Yesterday Was My 30th Marathon – Marathon Training Blog – Conejo Valley Guide – Congratulations Joe – see you at LA! RT @ConejoJoe: My 30th marathon on Sunday was not my best one but happy to finish
    • Kathy Sullivan: For NH Republicans, some advice from the winning side | New Hampshire OPINION02 – RT @CPHeinze: Former New Hampshire Dem party chair gives state GOP some post-election advice: “Retire John H. Sununu.”
    • Who’s who in the Gen. Petraeus scandal – Photos – 1 of 5 – POLITICO.com – RT @politico: PHOTOS: Who’s who in the Gen. Petraeus scandal:
    • Flap’s Dentistry Blog: Fake California Dentist Esteban Campos Pleads Guilty – Fake California Dentist Esteban Campos Pleads Guilty
    • 53% Favor Bush Tax Cuts For All But The Wealthy – Rasmussen Reports™ – Boehneer will cave – earlier the better RT @RasmussenPoll: 53% Favor #Bush Tax Cuts For All But The Wealthy… #taxcuts
    • The Morning Flap: November 13, 2012 – Flap’s Blog – The Morning Flap: November 13, 2012 #tcot
  • Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: November 13, 2012

    The David Petraeus Sex ScandalThese are my links for November 9th through November 13th:

    • David Petraeus sex scandal: FBI agent who began probing disgraced spy chief allegedly sent shirtless photos of himself to whistleblower Jill Kelley– David Petraeus’stunning downfall took another salacious turn Monday as it was revealed the FBI agent who began investigating the disgraced spy chief allegedly sent shirtless photos of himself to the woman who sparked the probe.The unnamed agent was a friend of Jill Kelley, the raven-haired knockout whom Petraeus biographer Paula Broadwell jealously suspected of having the hots for the former CIA director, The Wall Street Journal reported.Broadwell bombarded Kelley with anonymous, threatening emails accusing her of having a relationship with the spy chief, with whom she had previously had an extramarital affair. In one email, Broadwell “claimed to have watched Ms. Kelley touching ‘him’ provocatively underneath a table,” according to the paper.The get-away-from-my-man emails so unnerved Kelley that she complained to an FBI pal of hers. But as the investigation gained momentum, the FBI agent who knew Kelley was taken off of the case by superiors who were worried “he might have grown obsessed with the matter,” the paper reported.

      And it appeared their concern was justified.

    • Jerry Brown delivers with Proposition 30– Voters approved Jerry Brown’s $6billion tax hike last week because California has changed and Brown hasn’t. Lots of help from organized labor didn’t hurt.First, give the governor his due. In a state that spawned the tax revolt 34 years ago, Proposition 30’s passage by what could end up being 10 percentage points is an extraordinary turn of events.Issues win and lose for many reasons. In this instance, the right salesman made the right pitch, and the opposition stumbled. The governor and his consultants understood the electorate and gave voters what they wanted.Brown’s message, ultimately, was simple: Government has made cuts. School kids have suffered. A “yes” vote would allow California to begin restoring public education and other services, and bring the budget into balance.
    • GOP Grapples With Embarrassing Polling Failures– In the weeks before Election Day, both Republicans and Democrats were nervous about their poll numbers. Both sides of the aisle have smart pollsters, they reasoned, so how could the numbers that Democrats were seeing diverge so sharply from the numbers the Republicans were seeing? Deep down, I wrote at the time, both parties secretly worried that their side was missing the boat.Now we know which side needed its polls unskewed. Before Election Day, Republicans confidently predicted they would pick up seats in both chambers of Congress, and that Mitt Romney would win the White House. The results shattered those predictions, and with them any sense of security in the numbers coming out of some of the best-regarded polling firms on the right.”Everyone thought the election was going to be close. How did [Republicans] not know we were going to get our ass kicked?” lamented Rob Jesmer, head of the National Republican Senatorial Committee. “I don’t understand how we didn’t know. That’s the part that’s most puzzling and frustrating and embarrassing.”The underlying causes of the errant numbers are the assumptions that the pollsters made about the nature of the electorate. Most pollsters believed the electorate would look something like the voters who turned out in 2008, just with slightly lower numbers of African-Americans, younger people, and Hispanics heading to the polls.

      But exit polls actually showed a much more diverse electorate than the one forecast. Black turnout stayed consistent with 2008, Hispanic turnout was up, and younger voters made up a higher percentage of the electorate than they had four years ago. White voters made up 72 percent of the electorate, according to the exits, down 2 points from 2008 and a continuation of the two-decade long decline in their share of the electorate.

      That meant that even though Mitt Romney scored 59 percent of the white vote — a higher percentage than George W. Bush won in 2000 and 2004, higher than Ronald Reagan in 1980 and matching George H.W. Bush’s 1988 score, when he won 426 electoral votes in 40 states — it wasn’t enough to overcome the 80 percent support that Obama scored among nonwhite voters.

    • How the Republican party How the Republican party can rebuild — in 4 not-so-easy steps – How the Republican party How the Republican party can rebuild — in 4 not-so-easy steps #tcot
    • Petraeus helps whistleblower’s ‘unstable’ twin in nasty custody fight – Petraeus helps whistleblower’s ‘unstable’ twin in nasty custody fight #tcot
    • David Petraeus mired in custody fight on behalf of friend in mistress flap – NYPOST.com – RT @NewYorkPost Petraeus helps whistleblower Jill Kelley’s ‘unstable’ twin in nasty custody fight EXCLUSIVE!
    • Exit polls skip Texas, missing key demographic data | Mobile Washington Examiner – Exit polls skip Texas, missing key demographic data #tcot
    • Jindal, Paul call for populist, smart GOP– Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul told Politico in separate interviews Monday that the Republican Party must be the Party of the people, with the aim of increasing freedoms, not the other way around.“We’ve got to make sure that we are not the party of big business, big banks, big Wall Street bailouts, big corporate loopholes, big anything,” Jindal said. “We cannot be, we must not be, the party that simply protects the rich so they get to keep their toys.”He asserted the GOP doesn’t have to retreat from the matters of abortion and gay marriage, though he advised them to ease their tone and rhetoric.“It is no secret we had a number of Republicans damage our brand this year with offensive, bizarre comments — enough of that,” Jindal said. “It’s not going to be the last time anyone says something stupid within our party, but it can’t be tolerated within our party.”

      An injection of intelligence and specificity is in order, instead of “dumbed-down conservatism,” he added, urging “the party of ideas, details and intelligent solutions” to end the tactic of “reducing everything to mindless slogans, tag lines, 30-second ads that all begin to sound the same.”

      “We need to stop being simplistic, we need to trust the intelligence of the American people and we need to stop insulting the intelligence of the voters,” Jindal said.

      He added: “Simply being the anti-Obama party didn’t work. You can’t beat something with nothing. The reality is we have to be a party of solutions and not just bumper-sticker slogans but real detailed policy solutions.”

    • Congress starts lame duck session | Jamie Dupree Washington Insider – RT @jamiedupree QUACK QUACK – The Lame Duck Congress convenes today, needing a deal on taxes & budget cuts #tcot
    • Exit polls skip Texas, missing key demographic data– Everyone is looking for bipartisan agreement in the aftermath of the election, and we’ve found a rare example of it. Sen.-elect Ted Cruz, a Republican, recently said this to the New Yorker about his state of Texas: “If Republicans do not do better in the Hispanic community, in a few short years Republicans will no longer be the majority party in our state.” And President Obama, a Democrat, put it this way at a Texas fundraiser in May: “You’re not considered one of the battleground states, although that’s going to be changing soon.”Unfortunately, the news media evidently don’t agree that big changes are underway in Texas. Ahead of last week’s election, the National Election Pool — which does exit polls for the Associated Press and the news networks — announced it would not be conducting full state-level surveys in 19 states, including Texas.Certainly, there are many states where this money-saving omission makes sense. But by omitting Texas, even while polling in politically settled states like Illinois, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey and New York, the exit pollsters pre-emptively missed the biggest story of the election — the continued shift of Hispanic voters back toward Democrats since the George W. Bush era.
    • Who Is Jill Kelley, The Second Woman In The Petraeus-Allen Sex Scandal – Business Insider – RT @businessinsider What We Know About Jill Kelley, The Florida Woman Whose Inbox Took Down Two Four-Star Generals
    • GOP and Immigration: The Grover Plan: More Cowbell!– We’ll dilute our way out of it! Republicans did poorly among Hispanics last week. How to address that problem? The answer, they’re told by Washington savants, is to back an immigration reform that … increases the number of Hispanics! It’s a plan so crazy it just might be crazy.Joshua Culling, who works for Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform, elaborates on the plan elsewhere on this site. It turns out the idea–let’s call it the Grover Plan, just to be annoying–isn’t as wacky as I you might think. It’s wackier.Suppose Republicans conspire with Dems to bring amnesty to the 10 or 11 million unauthorized immigrants who are already here. Eventually they become citizens. Will they be ready to wipe the slate clean and vote Republican? Or will the Dems figure out new ways to gin up their ethnic base at election time? Cullings denies they’ll be able to do that–at least by “promising direct subsidies to immigrants or an expanded welfare state:”
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-12 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-12
    • Greensboro News and Weather | Winston-Salem, NC – High Point, NC – Piedmont Triad | digtriad.com – FBI Agents Raiding NC Home Of Woman In Petraeus Scandal | #tcot
    • Photo by katieharbath • Instagram – Happy Birthday, Katie! RT @katieharbath: Birthday dessert.
    • FBI Agents Raiding NC Home Of Woman In Petraeus Scandal | digtriad.com – Ahhh Yes….RT @janewells: Certainly glad the FBI is all over domestic terrorist Paula Broadwell…
    • The Doobie Brothers 1996 #6-South City Midnight Lady – YouTube – Yup! RT @DanRiehl: The Doobie Brothers 1996 South City Midnight Lady: via @youtube
    • Own It: Comcast’s NBCUniversal unit lays off 500 employees– Comcast Corp’s NBCUniversal entertainment unit is laying off about 500 employees at cable channels, Jay Leno’s late-night TV show and the Universal Pictures movie studio, a person with knowledge of the matter said on Monday.The cuts add up to about 1.5 percent of the company’s workforce of 30,000 employees, the source said.A large portion of the layoffs occurred at the G4 cable channel, a network about video games and the gaming culture, the source said. Two of the network’s shows were recently canceled.
    • Day By Day November 11, 2012 – Bread & Circuses – Flap’s Blog – Day By Day November 11, 2012 – Bread & Circuses #tcot
    • No Meat on Mondays in Los Angeles = Meatless Mondays to Save the Planet– The Los Angeles City Council is urging all residents to observe “meatless Mondays” from now on.A resolution adopted on Oct. 24 reads: “Be it resolved, that the Council of the City of Los Angeles hereby declares all Mondays as ‘Meatless Mondays’ in support of comprehensive sustainability efforts as well as to further encourage residents to eat a more varied plant-based diet to protect their health and protect animals.”Councilwoman Jan Perry, who introduced the resolution, also wants to ban new fast-food restaurants in South Los Angeles.”While this is a symbolic gesture, it is asking people to think about the food choices they make. Eating less meat can reverse some of our nation’s most common illnesses,” press reports quoted Perry as saying.
    • Sarah Westwood: Advice From a Lonely College Republican– If the election results told us anything, it’s that the GOP has some serious soul searching to do. On paper, Mitt Romney’s history of accomplishment towered over President Obama’s train wreck of a record, so his loss seemed nearly inexplicable. But Mr. Obama carried his key groups so easily that Republicans should give him props for such a feat— and start taking notes.In politics, as in life, perception is key. The Chicago machine and the Democratic National Committee as a whole have perfected the art of marketing, even when they’ve got nothing to sell. They’re like a used-car salesman who pushes lemons on unsuspecting drivers and never gets caught. Democrats can home in on Latinos, blacks, single women, young voters—and have them chanting “Four more years!” before they know what hit them.I happen to be one of the latter, a college student at a time when youth is a hot political commodity. Most kids my age bristle at the word “conservative,” and I don’t blame them. The right has done nothing to welcome young people.If Republicans hope to win in 2016 and beyond, they need to change everything about the way they sell themselves. They’re viewed by the 18-24 set as the “party of the rich” and as social bigots. That harsh, flawed opinion could be rectified if Republicans started presenting their positions in a different way. The GOP is like a supermodel who has been doing photo shoots under fluorescent bulbs without any makeup. But fix the lighting, dab on some foundation and highlight her good side, and she can take the most attractive picture.
    • The Republican Party’s Candidate Problem in Two Charts– Two days after a wholly disappointing election for the National Republican Senatorial Committee that saw the party not only fail to gain the majority but actually lose seats, a soul-searching of how it happened has begun.The blame, as it often is, has been thrust on the candidates. And, at least in this case, for good reason. After all, Richard Mourdock and Todd Akin essentially gave away seats with their comments on rape and pregnancy.But the trouble for the GOP wasn’t just in Indiana and Missouri.In fact, as the chart below details, Republican Senate candidates under-performed GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney in most of the important races of 2012.
    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-11 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-11
    • Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-11 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-11 #tcot
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-11 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-11
    • California’s Liberal Supermajority – Taxpayers are going to get all the government they ever wanted– For Republicans unhappy with Tuesday’s election, we have good news—at least most of you don’t live in California. Not only did Democrats there win voter approval to raise the top tax rate to 13.3%, but they also received a huge surprise—a legislative supermajority. Look out below.The main check on Sacramento excess has been a constitutional amendment requiring a two-thirds majority of both houses to raise taxes. Although Republicans have been in the minority for four decades, they could impose a modicum of spending restraint by blocking tax increases. If Democratic leads stick in two races where ballots are still being counted, liberals will pick up enough seats to secure a supermajority. Governor Jerry Brown then will be the only chaperone for the Liberals Gone Wild video that is Sacramento.
    • Gregory Flap’s Badges – Mall Rat – I just reached Level 2 of the “Mall Rat” badge on @foursquare. I’ve checked in at 5 different malls!
    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-10 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-10
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-10 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-10
    • The PJ Tatler » FBI Probe of Petreaus Triggered by Threatening Emails Sent by Mistress – RT @PJTatler FBI Probe of Petreaus Triggered by Threatening Emails Sent by Mistress #tcot
    • GOP Collapses in California – RT @politicalwire The Rep. party has essentially collapsed in California as Democrats now control just about everything
    • Bonus Quote of the Day – Ha! 1 month RT @politicalwire Hillary Clinton on what she’ll do next: “I would like to see whether I can get untired.”
    • Rep. Allen West is apparently defeated – He should RT @TheFix Final vote tally shows Rep. Allen West lost by 2,000 votes. He still hasn’t conceded.
    • Utah News, Sports, Weather and Classifieds | ksl.com – RT @JoeTrippi Whoa – AP story points to Huntsman Jr. as Secretary of State candidate |
    • AP story points to Huntsman Jr. as Secretary of State candidate | ksl.com – RT @JoeTrippi Whoa – AP story points to Huntsman Jr. as Secretary of State candidate |
    • 2012 Florida Election Watch – Federal Offices – RT @jamiedupree Obama officially wins Florida with 50.01% of the vote to 49.13% for Romney
    • Gregory Flap @ Ronnie’s Diner – 12 miles of LA Marathon training done. Now, some repair at Ronnie’s. (@ Ronnie’s Diner)
    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-09 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-09
    • Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-09 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-09 #tcot
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-09 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-09
    • Romney Failed to Make Sizeable Gains in Swing States – So why did Romney underperform in these swing states? It is hard to say for sure. The Obama team may have utilized more effective television ads. They may also have enjoyed a superior get-out-the-vote operation. There may have been idiosyncratic factors that limited Republican gains in these states. However, there is a good chance that this group of eight states will prove pivotal in future elections. As such, the Republicans party would do well to identify strategies for both mobilizing Republican voters and expanding the Republican base in these states.
    • Where Obama did better in 2012 than in 2008 (in one map)– President Obama was reelected on Tuesday, but he won by significantly smaller margins across the entire country — except for a handful of places.One of those places just happens to be the Eastern part of New Jersey, which was rocked by Hurricane Sandy a week before the election.Voters up and down the counties along the Jersey Shore and in the New York City area voted for Obama by more than they voted for him in 2008. Obama did better in 2012 in Ocean County, Middlesex County, Union County and Passaic County, along with nearby Richmond County, N.Y. — a.k.a. Staten Island.Here’s the map showing where Obama did better and worse
    • Gen. David Petraeus resignation letter (full text) – POLITICO.com – Something smells rotten here! RT @politico: Text of Gen. David Petraeus’s resignation letter: #tcot
    • California Democrats amass control over unruly state – California Becomes a One Party State– Governor Jerry Brown and his Democratic allies on Tuesday won a mandate that might be the envy of President Barack Obama, turning the nation’s bluest state into one in which Democrats will likely have all but complete political control.Voters approved a tax hike championed by Brown and soundly rejected a measure that would have gutted union political power. Perhaps most importantly, if initial vote totals hold in several very close legislative races as the final absentee ballots are counted, they will have handed Democrats supermajority control of both houses of the state legislature for the first time in 79 years.rown, who largely failed to gain cooperation from Republicans over the last two years, now owns the field. He has the opportunity to overhaul the tax code, reform the Byzantine governmental processes that have hobbled Sacramento for decades, and even potentially touch the “third rail” of California politics, the low-property-tax measure known as Proposition 13.”I guess you might say it’s our time,” Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg told a news conference.

      The ascendance of Democrats and their union backers may give more than a little pause to businesses and wealthy individuals, who now face higher taxes and the prospect of even more new taxes and regulations.

      The state’s top personal income tax rate was already the second highest in the nation at 10.3 percent before Tuesday’s vote, and will now rise to 13.3 percent for the next seven years.

    • Obamacare Forever? – What Barack Obama’s second term means for the president’s signature health law– Since debate about health care reform began, voters have been consistently wary of the law that has become known as Obamacare; as of today, Pollster.com’s aggregate shows that 47.8 percent of the public opposes the law while just 39.2 percent approve. Yet in voting to give President Barack Obama a second term yesterday, America also implicitly voted to keep the health law that bears his name in place. So is Obamacare here to stay?Yes, at least for now. But big questions still remain. We know we’ll keep Obamacare on the books, at least for the foreseeable future. What we don’t know is whether it will work.That’s because the law still faces huge legal and logistical hurdles. Tops on the list are challenges to the law’s insurance exchanges, starting with a lawsuit filed by Oklahoma’s attorney general. That case, which revolves around legal problems examined in a paper by Case Western Reserve law professor Jonathan Adler and Cato Institute Health Policy Direct Michael Cannon, may decide whether employers in states that do not set up their own health insurance exchanges can be taxed under the law, as well as whether it is legal for the federal government to offer insurance subsidies through exchanges it runs in states that opt out. The law, which taxes employers that don’t offer insurance in order to fund those subsidies, states that subsidies are only available in state-run exchanges.If Oklahoma’s suit prevails, states will have a large incentive to opt out of creating exchanges in order to protect employers from the tax penalty. And the federal exchanges will be largely useless. “No one would go to those exchanges. The whole structure created by the health care reform law starts to fall apart,” Gretchen Young, senior vice president-health policy at the ERISA Industry Committee told Business Insurance.
  • Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: November 5, 2012

    Romney campaigning in Virginia

    Mitt Romney campaigning in Virginia today

    These are my links for November 2nd through November 5th:

    • How Romneyworld sees Mitt winning the White House on Tuesday– The more difficult case to make is how Romney’s vote is lifted so that on the spectrum of Obama states to capture (the order in terms of confidence seems to be Indiana, North Carolina, Florida, Virginia, Iowa, Ohio, Colorado, Wisconsin, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Nevada and Michigan) it is a tide that rises above the Ohio threshold.Senior Romney advisers insist that although the popular vote will be close, in the electoral college the Republican nominee will win by more than 300 – something the adviser quoted here had predicted for several months.For that, several things have to happen: the battleground polls have to be wrong; undecideds have to vote for Romney; Romney’s turnout has to be very high; Obama’s vote has to be depressed.

      Can so many polls be wrong? The short answer is yes. It is worth remembering that in January 2008 virtually no one in the political world believed that Hillary Clinton could win the New Hampshire primary over Obama, fresh off his Iowa victory. But win it she did.

      This year, apart from Gallup and Rasmussen, pollsters have consistently over-sampled Democrats compared to Republicans. The Romney adviser said: ‘The samples that they’re using are geared towards 2008 results. So you get Democrats plus four on Pew, you’ve got Democrats plus eight on PPP.

      ‘It’s going to be a Republican plus one or Republicans plus two election. It’s not 2008, it’s not 2004, it’s not 2000. It’s a new election. It’s 2012 and a completely different dynamic. Every election we re-write history on turnout.

      ‘Gallup looked at it a week ago and decided it was going to be a more Republican electorate and they had it right.’

      The closer you get to an election, the more likely undecideds are to break against the incumbent. Romney will also have voter enthusiasm on his side. Whether that’s enough, remains an open question but the Romney campaign thinks so.

      ‘What’s going on here is when you have intensity and momentum,’ said the Romney adviser.

    • All Over But the Vote Counting– After four nationally televised debates, two political conventions, hundreds of speeches, one devastating hurricane, and the expenditure of an estimated $2 billion — most of it on nasty, negative, and mendacious television ads — the 2012 campaign finally comes to a close Tuesday.Going into the final day, independent surveys still show the race to be close, with little recent movement — and few undecided voters left.Nonetheless, President Obama’s top advisers and like-minded pundits are openly confident, even haughty, in their certitude that a slight advantage in the public opinion polls will translate into a comfortable Electoral College victory Tuesday night. By contrast, the attitude at Mitt Romney’s headquarters might best be described as cautiously hopeful.
    • 2012 Election: Poll: Mitt Romney ran better than John McCain– Americans are far more satisfied with Mitt Romney’s campaign than they were with John McCain’s effort four years ago, according to a poll released Monday.Only four-in-ten were happy with McCain’s 2008 campaign, according to Gallup, while 54 percent are satisfied with the race Romney has run. Satisfaction with President Barack Obama’s campaign has dipped from 66 percent — the highest Gallup has ever recorded — in 2008 to 58 percent in 2012.
    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-04 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-04
    • Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-04 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-04 #tcot
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-04 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-04
    • Arizona group plans appeal to U.S. Supreme Court in funding case– The Arizona nonprofit behind a controversial $11-million donation plans to take its case to the U.S. Supreme Court in a last-ditch bid to avoid turning over records to California’s campaign finance watchdog.The California Supreme Court ordered the nonprofit to comply with an audit by 4 p.m. Sunday. Lawyers for the nonprofit asked for an extension, saying it was impossible from “a logistical perspective.”That request was denied by the state justices, and the nonprofit’s lawyers filed another letter outlining its plan to continue appealing the case.

      In the letter, San Francisco attorney Thad Davis said the case raises “novel and pressing issues” that need a full vetting before the nonprofit can be forced to turn over records.

      Davis wrote that the case “raises critical First Amendment issues regarding the ability of an organization to freely associate and speak on vital election-related matters without reprisal by government officials opposed to their view.”

    • Poll: Rehberg holds edge over Tester in Montana Senate race – CNN Political Ticker – CNN.com Blogs – RT @PoliticalTicker: Poll: Rehberg holds edge over Tester in Montana Senate race #tcot
    • A Staten Island Run For Relief | newyorkcitymarathon.runnersworld.com – RT @runnersworld: A firsthand account of today’s run for relief on Staten Island, via @exerscience #NYCMarathon
    • California Supreme Court orders nonprofit to face FPPC audit– Update (4:50 p.m.): Americans for Responsible Leadership did not submit information to the FPPC by 4 p.m. as ordered and instead has asked the state court for more time as it asks the U.S. Supreme Court for review, according to FPPC chairwoman Ann Ravel.The California Supreme Court this afternoon ordered an obscure Arizona nonprofit to submit donation records immediately to state regulators related to an $11 million contribution the group gave in October.The state’s highest court issued its unanimous 7-0 decision at 3 p.m. after a telephone conference and gave Phoenix-based Americans for Responsible Leadership until 4 p.m. to comply.

      The state Fair Political Practices Commission had asked the Supreme Court to force ARL to turn over e-mails and transactions data behind the donation, whose specific donors the group has never disclosed. The group gave $11 million to a business campaign committee established to oppose Gov. Jerry Brown’s tax initiative, Proposition 30, and support a measure that would restrict union dues collection, Proposition 32.

    • Ontario Teachers Said to Near $1.3 Billion Heartland Dental Care Deal– Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan is nearing a deal to buy Heartland Dental Care Inc. that values the company at about $1.3 billion, outbidding traditional leveraged- buyout funds, said people with knowledge of the matter.The Canadian retirement fund may be prepared to announce an agreement with Effingham, Illinois-based Heartland as soon as tomorrow, said the people, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the talks are private. KKR & Co. (KKR), Madison Dearborn Partners LLC, and Apax Partners LLP had also pursued an acquisition of Heartland, one of the people said.Founded by Chief Executive Officer Richard Workman, Heartland is one of the largest U.S. dental practice management companies. It manages 370 practices in 19 states, helping dentists with personnel and back-office support, according to its website. CHS Capital, a Chicago-based private equity firm, bought a stake of undisclosed size in Heartland in 2008.

      Calls to Deborah Allan, a spokeswoman for Ontario Teachers’, and Ashley Buehnerkemper, of closely held Heartland, weren’t immediately returned. Representatives of the private- equity firms declined to comment.

      In addition to investing in private equity funds managed by others, Teachers, with C$117.1 billion under management as of Dec. 31, makes its own direct investments in private equity, usually alongside a buyout firm. Teachers has disclosed only two acquisitions worth more than $1 billion without a co-investor, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

      Those were the 2007 acquisition of marine container terminals in Canada and the U.S. from Oriental Overseas International Ltd. for about $2.35 billion, and the 2000 purchase of Cadillac Fairview Corp., a commercial real estate developer, for C$2.3 billion ($1.56 billion at the time).

    • AD-38: The Signal Scolds Endorsee Edward Headington – AD-38: The Signal Scolds Endorsee Edward Headington
    • Running / Perfect Conditions – Perfect Conditions
    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-03 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-03
    • Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-03 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-03 #tcot
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-03 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-03
    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-02 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-02
    • Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-02 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-02 #tcot
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-02 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-02
    • President 2012: Nine Electoral College Forecasts – Ryan Teague Beckwith rounds up electoral maps from nine political prognosticators, all of which see President Obama winning re-election with anywhere from 281 to 332 electoral votes.
    • Reid to Romney: Senate Dems Won’t Work With You– If Mitt Romney wins the presidency, he will not win cooperation from Senate Democrats, Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said Friday in his latest and perhaps final shot at a candidate who aides say Reid personally disdains.In a statement reacting to what he said are Romney’s claims that Senate Democrats will work with him on his agenda, Reid calls Romney a “severe conservative” whose “far-right agenda” Democrats reject.

      “Romney’s fantasy that Senate Democrats will work with him to pass his ‘severely conservative’ agenda is laughable. In fact, Mitt Romney’s Tea Party agenda has already been rejected in the Senate,” Reid says, listing GOP policies Romney has embraced that the Senate has voted down, including the budget plans offered by vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan, R.-Wis.

      Democrats look set to retain control of the Senate. Reid’s statement, while aiming to aid President Obama’s reelection, is a reminder that should Romney win, Senate Democrats will pose a major hurdle to his plans and that Reid’s dislike of Romney, more specifically, would be a problem.

    • Is the California Death Penalty Toast? – Flap’s California Blog – Is the California Death Penalty Toast?
    • AD-48: Why Would Roger Hernandez Resign? – Flap’s California Blog – AD-48: Why Would Roger Hernandez Resign?
    • The Case of the GMO Papaya – This story ends in the same way it begins—with conflict. The disagreements in California, fortunately, have not resulted in physical altercations or property damage. Ultimately, however, both those who support and oppose GMOs should take the time to discuss each side’s viewpoint. As Davidson notes, scientists need to make themselves more available to answer questions the public undoubtedly has, and to illustrate that genetic modification is more than an issue of simple economics. Sometimes, as in the case of the papaya, the ability of future generations to partake in a highly nutrient-dense crop may be at stake. An open, transparent forum of ideas will do much to alleviate the concerns of more moderate GMO activists and allow all of humanity to reap the benefits of this technology.
    • Trooth.Com: The Dr. Wisdom Teeth Radio Ad – Flap’s Blog – : The Dr. Wisdom Teeth Radio Ad #tcot
    • Dr. Heath Hendrickson (Dr. Wisdom Teeth) radio ad – YouTube – Dr. Heath Hendrickson (Dr. Wisdom Teeth) radio ad – YouTube #tcot
    • Dr. Heath Hendrickson (Dr. Wisdom Teeth) radio ad – YouTube – I uploaded a @YouTube video Dr Heath Hendrickson radio ad
    • California Proposition 37: A Belligerent Genetically Modified Banana? – California Proposition 37: A Belligerent Genetically Modified Banana? #tcot
    • Trooth.Com – The Picketers Return to Dr. Heath Hendrickson’s Dental Office – Flap’s Blog – – The Picketers Return to Dr. Heath Hendrickson’s Dental Office #tcot
    • Marathon Runners Stop Aging Out of the Race – WSJ.com – Marathon Runners Stop Aging Out of the Race –
    • The Morning Flap: November 2, 2012 – Flap’s Blog – The Morning Flap: November 2, 2012 #tcot
  • Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: November 2, 2012

    Obama and Romney

    These are my links for November 1st through November 2nd:

    • The Mystery Election — and Its Uncertain Aftermath– The presidential election between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney is so close that pollsters and political analysts can’t predict the outcome. But an equivalent mystery is how the winner will confront the nation’s on-rushing potential fiscal calamity.After three presidential debates we still have few clues about how either Obama or Romney would prevent a plunge off what Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke calls “the fiscal cliff” at year’s end. That’s when across-the-board income tax cuts enacted during the George W. Bush presidency will expire, as will a “holiday” on payroll withholding taxes.These tax increases would coincide with previously approved federal budget cuts of more than a trillion dollars and the end of extended unemployment insurance. Combined, these actions would subtract roughly 5 percent from the U.S. economy, almost certainly plunging the nation into recession.It’s widely assumed in Washington and on Wall Street that Obama and the lame-duck Congress will find a way to avoid such a devastating outcome. But neither presidential candidate has hinted at compromise, and the solutions floated in the media by a bipartisan group of U.S. senators would require concessions that neither side appears willing to make.

      Obama insists firmly on raising taxes on the rich, and Romney is equally adamant about retaining all Bush-era tax cuts. It seems unlikely that Obama would abandon his most frequent campaign promise before a second term even begins and perhaps even less likely that a Republican-controlled House would approve a tax increase. If Romney wins, the lame-duck Congress might kick the can down the road until he takes office, but a new Republican president who agreed to a tax boost could soon be anathema to his party.

      Stuart K. Spencer, a key political strategist for Ronald Reagan and Gerald Ford, is pessimistic about post-election compromise. He notes that the race has been both personal and ideological and believes the losing side is more likely to be confrontational than conciliatory. “It’s not just the politicians either,” Spencer said. “The American people are evenly divided and have strong feelings”

    • On Polling Models, Skewed & Unskewed – Obama is Still Toast– We can’t know until Election Day who is right. I stand by my view that Obama is losing independent voters decisively, because the national and state polls both support that thesis. I stand by my view that Republican turnout will be up significantly from recent-historic lows in 2008 in the key swing states (Ohio, Wisconsin, Colorado) and nationally, because the post-2008 elections, the party registration data, the early-voting and absentee-ballot numbers, and the Rasmussen and Gallup national party-ID surveys (both of which have solid track records) all point to this conclusion. I stand by my view that no countervailing evidence outside of poll samples shows a similar surge above 2008 levels in Democratic voter turnout, as would be needed to offset Romney’s advantage with independents and increased GOP voter turnout. And I stand by the view that a mechanical reading of polling averages is an inadequate basis to project an event unprecedented in American history: the re-election of a sitting president without a clear-cut victory in the national popular vote.Perhaps, despite the paucity of evidence to the contrary, these assumptions are wrong. But if they are correct, no mathematical model can provide a convincing explanation of how Obama is going to win re-election. He remains toast.
    • In Shift, Romney Campaign Makes Push in Pennsylvania– In a striking last-minute shift, the Romney campaign has decided to invest its most precious resource — the candidate’s time — in a serious play to win Pennsylvania.Mr. Romney’s appearance here on Sunday could be a crafty political move to seriously undercut President Obama, or it could be a sign of desperation. Either way, his visit represents the biggest jolt yet in a state that was until recently largely ignored in the race for the White House.Over the last several days, with polls showing Mr. Obama’s edge in the state narrowing, Republicans have sprung into action and forced the Democrats to spend resources here that could have gone toward more competitive battleground states.
    • President 2012: Iowa State of the Race– The thrill is gone. And in Iowa, the Obama firewall is burning. Today’s headline on Politico said it all: Obama to End Campaign In Iowa.Mitt Romney is going to win Iowa on Tuesday, and the state that launched Barack Obama’s historic run for the White House will politely ask to have its vote back.With a clean sweep of major newspaper endorsements, Iowans woke up this past week to an unexpected unanimity among editorial boards. And while two of the four newspapers switched from Barack Obama, they’re not alone. Thousands upon thousands of voters have switched their votes as well. It shows up in polling, early-voting metrics, and enthusiasm on the ground.And although polling shows a tight race in Iowa, it’s important to note that, in 2008, Obama held a 14-point lead in the final Des Moines Register Iowa Poll published the Sunday before the election. He won by fewer than 10 points. He will again under-perform his Iowa polling, where he has yet to come close to the 50 percent mark in any survey of polling averages.
    • Poll: Mia Love opens up big lead – Katie Glueck – POLITICO.com – RT @politico Poll: Mia Love opens up big lead: #tcot
    • Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-01 – Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Digest for 2012-11-01
    • Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-01 – Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Flap’s Blog @ Flap Twitter Daily Digest for 2012-11-01 #tcot
    • President 2012: Latest Key Battleground State Polls for November 1 – President 2012: Latest Key Battleground State Polls for November 1 #tcot
    • Two-thirds of jobs go to immigrants during Obama’s four years – Washington Times – Two-thirds of jobs go to immigrants during Obama’s four years – Washington Times #tcot
    • Two-thirds of jobs go to immigrants during Obama’s four years – Washington Times – Two-thirds of jobs go to immigrants during Obama’s four years – Washington Times #tcot
    • My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-01 – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – My Daily Twitter Digest for 2012-11-01
    • Two-thirds of jobs go to immigrants during Obama’s four years – Washington Times – Two-thirds of jobs go to immigrants during Obama’s four years – Washington Times #tcot
    • Two-thirds of jobs go to immigrants during Obama’s four years – Washington Times – Two-thirds of jobs go to immigrants during Obama’s four years #tcot
    • Two-thirds of jobs go to immigrants during Obama’s four years– Two-thirds of those who have found employment under President Obama are immigrants, both legal and illegal, according to an analysis that suggests immigration has soaked up a large portion of what little job growth there has been over the past three years.The Center for Immigration Studies is releasing the study Thursday morning, a day ahead of the final Labor Department unemployment report of the campaign season, which is expected to show a sluggish job market more than three years into the economic recovery.That slow market, combined with the immigration numbers, could explain why Mr. Obama and Republican nominee Mitt Romney have struggled to find a winning jobs message in some of the country’s hardest-hit postindustrial regions.“It’s extraordinary that most of the employment growth in the last four years has gone to the foreign-born, but what’s even more extraordinary is the issue has not even come up during a presidential election that is so focused on jobs,” said Steven A. Camarota, the center’s research director, who wrote the report along with demographer Karen Zeigle
      His numbers are stark: Since the first quarter of 2009, the number of immigrants of working age (16 to 65) who are employed has risen 2 million, from 21.2 million to 23.2 million. During the same time, native-born employment has risen just 1 million, to reach 119.9 million.
    • AD-48: Baldwin Park Councilwoman Calls for Roger Hernandez Resignation – AD-48: Baldwin Park Councilwoman Calls for Roger Hernandez Resignation
    • Shouldn’t California Politicians Emulate the Oakland A’s? – Shouldn’t California Politicians Emulate the Oakland A’s?
    • Flap’s Dentistry Blog: Kristen Uniforms: A Review – Kristen Uniforms: A Review
    • The Morning Flap: November 1, 2012 – Flap’s Blog – The Morning Flap: November 1, 2012 #tcot