It’s Tuesday, October 9th, 2012….and before we begin, a brief tale of personal political courage as related to us by our youngest son, Travis.  Some name haves been changed to protect the brave.

Travis, who graduated from Salisbury State with a degree in communications last May, works for a small, family-owned business dealing in hot glue products and application machinery.  The founder, now retired, saw Travis hawking hot/cold gel packs and cutlery in a local Costco, and suggested he call his son, the company’s current owner, who could use a young man of Travis’ energy and salesmanship.

It seems the owner’s wife, who doubles as the company CFO and Accounting Department, recently attended a function where she happened to encounter Nancy Pelosi.  No shrinking violet, particularly when it comes to the truth, she suggested the former Speaker sell her on the current occupant of the Offal Office, whereupon she seized the opportunity to decimate every argument Nancy the Red lamely offered….whereupon she was firmly but politely asked to leave the party.

To which we can only add….

….you GO girl!

Now, here’s The Gouge!

First up, courtesy of Conn Carroll and the Morning Examiner, Phil Klein reports the reality regarding what amounts to….

The McJobs report

 

Not to mention the millions who’ve simply given up, an attitude we frankly cannot understand but which Liberals seem to view with at least tacit approval….provided it means the once-gainfully employed now depend fully on the federal government rather than themselves.

Next up, Michael Barone, also writing at The Washington Examiner, describes how….

Romney’s debate win opens cracks in Obama fire wall

 

Wednesday night’s presidential debate in which Mitt Romney shellacked Barack Obama attracted the biggest audience since the debate between Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan seven days before the 1980 election. About 70 million Americans watched, a little more than half the 131 million voter turnout in 2008. That’s an estimate, because the ratings companies don’t count those watching on C-SPAN, PBS or the Internet.

Did the debates matter? The first state polls, conducted by Rasmussen and We Ask America on Thursday night, suggest the answer is yes. Rasmussen reported that Romney was down 1 point in Ohio. We Ask America had him up 1 there. Rasmussen had Romney up 1 in Virginia. We Ask America had him up 3. And in Florida, We Ask America had Romney up 3.

These states are important because the Obama campaign has spent millions on anti-Romney ads there, to build a fire wall blocking Romney from getting to a 270-vote majority in the Electoral College.

The arithmetic is fairly simple. The 28 states plus D.C. and one Nebraska congressional district that Obama carried in 2008 have 359 electoral votes this year. Subtract Indiana, which has fallen off the target list, and the Nebraska district, and he’s down to 347. Subtract also the 15 electoral votes of North Carolina, which Team Obama hoped to contest but where it hasn’t been spending much money lately, and you’re down to 332.

Obama’s next three closest states were Florida, Ohio and Virginia, which together have 60 electoral votes. In every other state he carried, he ran ahead of his 53 percent share of the national vote. Up to the debate, the tristate strategy seemed to be working. Obama carried Florida by 3 points in 2008, and the realclearpolitics.com average of recent polls going into the debate showed him up 2 there. Obama carried Ohio by 5 points and predebate polling had him up 5 (I’ve rounded off the percentages and rounded .5s to the lower integer). Obama carried Virginia by 7 points, and predebate polling had him up 3.

In contrast, predebate polls had Obama lagging further behind his 2008 showing in five other target states — Colorado, Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and Wisconsin. Not to worry, Obama strategists said. If we hold Florida, Ohio and Virginia, we’ve got 332 electoral votes, way more than 270. We can afford to lose the 35 electoral votes in those other five states.

But what if the fire wall doesn’t hold? If the big three go for Romney, Obama is down to 272. If he loses one more state, he can join Al Gore on Current TV. The Obama strategy didn’t count on a debate performance like the one 70 million Americans watched Wednesday night.

As his dazed spin team pointed out, other incumbent presidents have stumbled in their first debates. But none ever had an instant poll report, as CNN’s did, that the challenger won by a margin of 67 to 25 percent.

The fact is that for all his professions of bipartisan amity, Obama cannot bear to listen to tough questions or well-made counterarguments. He certainly hasn’t had to in the 200-plus fundraisers he’s attended.

On the split screen, we saw the same expression of irritation — as if he smelled something really bad — as we did when he faced tough questions from Fox News’ Bret Baier, when he had to listen to Paul Ryan demolish his health care plan at the Blair House summit, when he was probed on his broken immigration promise by interviewers on Univision.

What we didn’t see is the Obama who is supposedly fascinated by the details of public policy. Sans teleprompter, he repeated the talking points of his television ads, and, when Romney responded sharply, he had nothing to fall back on. We saw the president who found it fitting to jet off to campaign in Las Vegas the day after the first murder of a U.S. ambassador in 33 years.

As you read this, you have more polling information than I do as I write. It’s possible that the trend suggested by the Rasmussen and We Ask America results in Florida, Ohio and Virginia will not be confirmed by other polls. And there’s a whole month till the election. Obama will surely perform better in his next two debates. Romney may not perform as well. But the first numbers suggest the fire wall may be crumbling. We’ll see if it holds.

Not if, as this next item forwarded by Speed Mach details, Andrew Sullivan’s impressions have any bearing on the outcome:

Did Obama Just Throw The Entire Election Away?

 

If he did, he couldn’t have thrown it very far!

The Pew poll is devastating, just devastating. Before the debate, Obama had a 51 – 43 lead; now, Romney has a 49 – 45 lead. That’s a simply unprecedented reversal for a candidate in October. Before Obama had leads on every policy issue and personal characteristic; now Romney leads in all of them. Obama’s performance gave Romney a 12 point swing! I repeat: a 12 point swing.

Romney’s favorables are above Obama’s now. Yes, you read that right. Romney’s favorables are higher than Obama’s right now. That gender gap that was Obama’s firewall? Over in one night:

Currently, women are evenly divided (47% Obama, 47% Romney). Last month, Obama led Romney by 18 points (56% to 38%) among women likely voters.

Seriously: has that kind of swing ever happened this late in a campaign?

Most certainly; and his name was….

….James Earl Carter.  Sleep well, dear Fairy Prince!

Imagine that; the economy is dying….actual unemployment is above 14%….despite annual budget deficits well above $1 trillion, the Dimocratic-controlled Senate hasn’t passed a budget in over three years….and Islamic militants feel comfortable slaughtering Americans at will.  Yet Americans are still ignorant and benighted enough to want a change!

In a related item sent to us by Balls Cotton, the Washington Times‘ Joe Curl details….

The dismantling of Barack Obama

 

The unraveling of President Obama, captured on live television and watched by some 70 million Americans, brings to mind a tale of a proud and pretentious emperor whose only care in life was to dress in elegant clothes. In case you’ve forgotten, two tailors appear with the most extraordinary cloth, invisible to anyone too stupid or incompetent to see. The emperor’s minions all pretend they can see it, so he does, too. When he parades across the kingdom in his new suit, the masses also pretend they see it. But a little boy blurts out, “The emperor is naked.”

And the last line of Hans Christian Andersen’s tale is: “The emperor realized that the people were right but could not admit to that. He thought it better to continue the procession under the illusion that anyone who couldn’t see his clothes was either stupid or incompetent. And he stood stiffly on his carriage, while behind him a page held his imaginary mantle.”

Thus stood Barack Obama at the podium in last week’s debate, feeble, disoriented, withdrawn, petulant, peripheral — and naked. He had come in as the smartest man ever to hold the American presidency, at least according to his water-carrying press corps. He left the stage a man pummeled by a more-prepared — and more articulate — challenger, made a marble-mouthed fool without his precious teleprompters, and with even his most ardent defenders admitting the emperor is naked.

From the very outset of the Denver debate, the president looked like a student who hadn’t prepared for the test — you remember the drill, where you don’t know the answer to the question, so you rephrase the question, talk around it, cite some superfluous statistics to make it seem like you’re answering the question, spout some canned lines and platitudes in the hopes that your teacher will be dazzled into thinking you actually said something.

“Four years ago, we went through the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. Millions of jobs were lost, the auto industry was on the brink of collapse. The financial system had frozen up,” Mr. Obama said in his opening. How many more times can the man who has been president for four years take us back to 2008? And this was his open!

He followed with: “I think we’ve got to invest in education and training. I think it’s important for us to develop new sources of energy here in America.” Are those really the solutions to finding jobs for 23 million unemployed and underemployed Americans? And haven’t they been tried for the last four years to no avail?

After Mr. Romney laid out his specific five-point plan — “a different path, not the one we’ve been on” — Mr. Lehrer followed up, asking the president to “respond directly” to the challenger. “Well, let me talk specifically about what I think we need to do. First, we’ve got to improve our education system. … So now I want to hire another 100,000 new math and science teachers,” he said, reprising his 2008 campaign.

And on and on it went. The Republican had an answer for every lie Mr. Obama spouted. To the president’s charge that Mr. Romney wants a “trickle-down” economy, the challenger shot back that Mr. Obama wants a “trickle-down government.” When Mr. Obama alleged that Mr. Romney would slash education funds, he shot back: “Mr. President, you’re entitled as the president to your own airplane and to your own house, but not to your own facts. I’m not going to cut education funding.” When Mr. Obama lied that his opponent plans a $5 trillion tax cut — with most going to the very wealthy — Mr. Romney didn’t look to the moderator for help, he simply shot it all down himself. “‘I’d like to clear up the record and go through it piece by piece. First of all, I don’t have a $5 trillion tax cut.”

In a shocking post-debate interview, illustrating that even top Obama officials are clueless without a teleprompter, deputy campaign manager Stephanie Cutter accidentally spoke the truth. Reminded that Mr. Romney plans to close hundreds or thousands of loopholes as part of his tax-cut plan, a CNN host said the cost “won’t be anywhere near $5 trillion.” “Well with — OK stipulated, it won’t be near $5 trillion,” Miss Cutter said. (Then again, who should believe anything Stephanie Cutter says….?!?)

Perhaps most telling was what happened after the debate: Miss Cutter immediately blamed a 78-year-old man — Jim Lehrer, a journalist for 50 years moderating his 12th president debate (the liberal left preaches tolerance above all things, unless you dare to disagree or cross the mighty emperor). Other Chicago thugs blamed mock-debate foe Sen. John Kerry, saying he was no match for the brilliant mind of the president, who grew so bored during the prep work that he took the afternoon off to sightsee at the Hoover Dam.

More, the president took two days — and two teleprompters — to think of cogent responses to all Mr. Romney had said on that Denver stage (like an insulted dullard coming up with a witty rejoinder — 48 hours later). “Gov. Romney plans to let Wall Street run wild again, but he’s going to bring down the hammer on Sesame Street.” Zing! “So for all you moms and kids out there, don’t worry — somebody is finally getting tough on Big Bird.” Double zing!

After months and months of misdirection, distortion, distraction, Mr. Obama was exposed on the debate stage as an emperor with no clothes. He’s left speechless when forced to run on his pathetic record of the last four years — his economic policy has been proved a disaster and, in a later debate, so will his foreign policy. He has no vision for the future, no plan that differs from what he pledged four years ago (hiring 100,000 teachers just won’t cut it). And he has no ammunition left on which to falsely attack Mr. Romney; Americans have taken a measure of the man and find him suitable for office (which is why Team Obama tried so hard to get its hands on 20-years-worth of its opponent).

Yet things are about to get ugly. Like a cornered dog, the president has only one option — strike out, attack. Forget the “hope and change” of 2008, 2012 will be “slash and burn,” blame whoever you can. On Wednesday, Americans got their first view of their two options on Election Day: One, a man with a plan — and not the failed plan of the past four years — the other, an emperor with no clothes who thinks it “better to continue the procession under the illusion that anyone who couldn’t see his clothes was either stupid or incompetent.”

With no due respect, this panel of idiots’ opinions notwithstanding,….

….what would YOU call a sitting President who, mere days before handing his opponent a decisive debate, took an afternoon off for a dam sightseeing tour….missed more national security briefings than he made immediately prior to the assassination of four individuals it was his sworn duty to protect….took his family on more vacations than Leona Helmsley in the midst of an economic downturn his policies helped perpetuate….and played more rounds of golf in the last 3-1/2 years than Tiger Woods?!?

Somehow, the terms “hardworking” and “burning the midnight oil” just don’t come to mind.  Then again, we long accepted our reactionary, xenophobic, homophobic, misogynistic tendencies.

And in the Education Section, brought to us today by the WSJ, Jay Greene lends substance to what has long been our contention regarding….

The Imaginary Teacher Shortage

Forty years and a million more teachers later, student performance is unchanged. Yet Obama and Romney both say schools need more staff.

 

Tell us again how putting 16% more money in your pockets helps Chicago’s schoolchildren?!?

Last week’s presidential debate revealed one area of agreement between the candidates: We need more teachers. “Let’s hire another hundred thousand math and science teachers,” proposed President Obama, adding that “Governor Romney doesn’t think we need more teachers.”

Mr. Romney quickly replied, “I reject the idea that I don’t believe in great teachers or more teachers.” He just opposes earmarking federal dollars for this purpose, believing instead that “every school district, every state should make that decision on their own.”

Let’s hope state and local officials have that discretion—and choose to shrink the teacher labor force rather than expand it. Hiring hundreds of thousands of additional teachers won’t improve student achievement. It will bankrupt state and local governments, whose finances are already buckling under bloated payrolls with overly generous and grossly underfunded pension and health benefits.

For decades we have tried to boost academic outcomes by hiring more teachers, and we have essentially nothing to show for it. In 1970, public schools employed 2.06 million teachers, or one for every 22.3 students, according to the U.S. Department of Education’s Digest of Education Statistics. In 2012, we have 3.27 million teachers, one for every 15.2 students.

How did they do it? Significantly lower funding per pupil, larger classes; and plenty of success….rather than sex!

Yet math and reading scores for 17-year-olds have remained virtually unchanged since 1970, according to the U.S. Department of Education’s National Assessment of Educational Progress. The federal estimate of high-school graduation rates also shows no progress (with about 75% of students completing high school then and now). Unless the next teacher-hiring binge produces something that the last several couldn’t, there is no reason to expect it to contribute to student outcomes.

Most people expect that more individualized attention from teachers should help students learn. The problem is that expanding the number of hires means dipping deeper into the potential teacher labor pool. That means additional teachers are likely to be weaker than current ones.

Parents like the idea of smaller class sizes in the same way that people like the idea of having a personal chef. Parents imagine that their kids will have one of the Iron Chefs. But when you have to hire almost 3.3 million chefs, you’re liable to end up with something closer to the fry-guy from the local burger joint.

There is also a trade-off between the number of teachers we have and the salary we can offer to attract better-quality people. As the teacher force has grown by almost 50% over the past four decades, average salaries for teachers (adjusted for inflation) have grown only 11%, the Department of Education reports. Imagine what kinds of teachers we might be able to recruit if those figures had been flipped and we were offering 50% more pay without having significantly changed student-teacher ratios. Having better-paid but fewer teachers could also save us an enormous amount on pension and health benefits, which have risen far more than salaries in cost per teacher over the past four decades.

Then there is the trade-off between labor and capital. Instead of hiring an army of additional teachers, we could have developed and purchased innovative educational technology. The path to productivity increases in every industry comes through the substitution of capital for labor. We use better and cheaper technology so that we don’t need as many expensive people. But education has gone in the opposite direction, making little use of technology and hiring many more expensive people.

Educational technology is still in its infancy, but some amazing innovation has already happened, especially in higher education. Coursera allows students to take free classes from the best professors in the world. In K-12, charter schools such as Rocketship Academy in California and Carpe Diem in Arizona “flip” the classroom so that computers do much of the teaching and teachers are primarily tutors, problem-solvers, and behavior managers. This model could allow for much more individualized instruction with many fewer teachers.

Of course, this productivity-enhancing substitution of technology for labor is occurring outside of the public-school monopoly. Without choice and competition such as from vouchers and charter schools, there is little incentive for the traditional public school system to innovate or economize.

On this we see an important difference between the presidential candidates. Mr. Romney favors voucherizing federal education funds so that parents can take those resources and use them to send their children to schools of their choice. He also favors a decentralized approach that leaves policy decisions to state and local governments. Without federal mandates and subsidies, state and local governments are unlikely to drive over the financial cliff by hiring more teachers.

Mr. Obama, on the other hand, has a Solyndra-like solution. He’s happy to have the federal government pick the “winning” reform strategy of hiring another army of teachers by devoting federal resources to that approach. If it once again fails to improve student outcomes while stifling innovation, taxpayers will be stuck paying the bill.

Here’s the bottom line: if money could buy a scholastic excellence, America would have the best-educated children on the planet.  Unfortunately, it can’t….and we don’t!

Albert Shanker, almost as great an enemy of children as Rachel Carson, said it best:

On the Lighter Side….

And in another sordid story ripped from the Crime Blotter, yet one more example of how The Obamao’s class warfare is dividing the “Haves” from the “Have-Nots”….

San Antonio Woman Arrested For Hitting Girl Over Ice Cream

 

A woman has been arrested for allegedly hitting a 10-year-old girl who refused to share ice cream with her daughter. The San Antonio Express-News reported Sunday that the 10 year old bought ice cream Saturday and began playing with nearby children. A 4 year old asked the older girl for her ice cream, and when she refused, tried to grab it. Police say the 10 year old then slapped her hand away.

The older girl began walking home but the mother of the 4 year old, Talysa Herron, approached and hit her in the face. She then followed her home in her car. The 10-year-old’s mother, Cyndi Lafontaine, confronted Herron but was herself punched and beaten until police were called.

Herron has been charged with injury to a child.

….or in this case, the “Haves” from the “Half-Brains”!

Since we’re on the subject of the intellectually challenged, we take you to the City of Brotherly Love and this news flash detailing how….

Man dies during massive brawl between wedding receptions in Philadelphia

 

Police say a man died of a heart attack during a massive wedding brawl between two receptions in Philadelphia. Wedding guests told My Fox Philly that two brothers got into a fight at a hotel in the Society Hill Sheraton around 2 a.m. before something was thrown that hit another guest. Fighting then broke out among dozens of people who were attending the receptions.

Police say a 57-year-old guest suffered a fatal heart attack outside the reception, but they don’t know if he was involved in any of the fights. Relatives identified the man as Vincent Sannuti, an uncle of one of the brides, My Fox Philly reports. It was Sannuti’s 57th birthday, they added.

Dozens of people were involved in the altercations and police arrested three people; at least one man was subdued with a stun gun. Two people were charged with disorderly conduct and another for assaulting an office, My Fox Philly reports.

Police say they don’t know what started the brawl, but that alcohol was involved.

Like….this is different from just about every Eagles game….

….or almost any other activity in Philadelphia….how?!?

Finally, since we’re on the subject of cities with higher casualty rates than Afghanistan, here’s the latest from the Motor City, Murder Capital of the United States:

‘Enter Detroit at your own risk,’ police tell Tigers fans

 

Police officers greeted Detroit Tigers fans before their team’s win Saturday night with an urgent message: “Enter Detroit at Your Own Risk.” The message, relayed in the form of a flier, was delivered by about 400 off-duty police officers before the Tigers won the first game of their division series against the A’s, My Fox Detroit reported.

As they poured into Comerica Park, fans were given the fliers reading: “Attention: Enter Detroit at Your Own Risk.”  It warned that Detroit is America’s most violent city and that the city’s police force is grossly understaffed. (What the flier DIDN’T mention is Detroit is also flat-ass BROKE!)

“We’re not discouraging people from coming, I love the city, I want them to realize we don’t have enough man hours,” police union president Joe Duncan told the station. “I don’t think the city is going to get same officer 8 hours a day as you do for 12 hours a day.”

According to My Fox Detroit, fans also were urged to vote yes on Proposal 2, which would guarantee collective bargaining rights.

Ahhh; “guaranteed” collective bargaining rights for the police union.  Yeah….that ought to take care of Detroit’s crime problem.  Any chance the unions are offering any sort of a money-back guaranty?  No….we thought not!

Magoo