Is There Another Surprise Coming in a New York Special Election?, Obama Administration is Slightly Less Clueless, Mitt Romney Sort of, Maybe, Kinda Taking on Mr. Perry

And Other News with Comments



Sept 13 in New York??



Earlier this year a special Congressional election in western New York state saw a Democrat upset a Republican in a solidly Republican district.  In less than two week another special election will be held in the state, this time in the Queens borough of New York City.  The district is solidly Democratic but one Republican sponsored poll shows the race tied.

Party sponsored polls are biased towards the party sponsoring them.  Still, the fact that the poll shows the race even means that the Republican has a chance.  If he wins or the election is close there is a powerful message being sent to the Obama re-election team.  Anyone think they will hear it?

Politico’s Roger Simon reports that the Obama Administration is furious that House Republicans forced the President to change the time of his jobs speech to a joint session of the Congress.

“It is a big deal that the House said ‘no’ to the president from our end,” a White House source with intimate knowledge of what took place between the House and the president told me Thursday. “This confirms what we all know: They will do anything in the House to muck us up.”

Gosh, we wonder what clued them in, and why they were so clueless as to let this happen in the first place.



Mitt Romney Getting All
Aggressive on Rick Perry



Mitt Romney is taking off the gloves against Texas Gov. Rick Perry.  No, Mr. Romney is not calling out Mr. Perry by name, no he is not contrasting himself with Mr. Perry, no he is not saying he would be a better candidate than Mr. Perry.  What Mr. Romney is doing is campaigning against unnamed  “career politicians.”

Mitt, you’re bringing a knife to a gunfight.

The approval of Mr. Obama’s Presidency reaches new lows.  In a just released CNN poll

Nearly two-thirds — 65 percent — of respondents to a CNN/ORD poll released Thursday said they disapproved of the president’s handling of the economy.  Voters also gave thumbs down to other aspects of Obama’s policies as they relate to the economy.

CNN found that 66 percent of respondents disapproved of Obama’s handling of the federal deficit, and 62 percent disapproved of his handling of unemployment

Is there anyone left now who does not realize what a monumental debacle the deficit reduction/debt ceiling process was for the President?  It is not a sign of political incompetence to make mistakes.  It is a sign of political incompetence not to learn from them.

Jon Huntsman, The Dismal Political Economist’s leading candidate to be the next candidate to drop out of the Republican race is following his fellow candidates into radical Conservative mode.  Mr. Huntsman has released a tax plan that, surprise, calls for massive tax cuts for the wealthy in the name of job creation.  The plan would eliminate taxes on capital gains and dividends (already at historical lows of 15%) and sharply reduce the tax on corporate income. 

The rest of the economic plans look like they were taken word-for-word from every Conservative manifesto ever written. Mr. Huntsman knows he is losing the pandering war, but it looks like he wants to fire a few shots anyway so that he can be considered for a top post in a Romney or Perry Administration.