Paul Ryan

The State Of The Electoral College 26 Days Before The Election: Obama Wins By More Narrow Margin!

Ronald 2 Comments

There has been a lot of hysteria and panic about Barack Obama, as a result of his sub par performance in the first Presidential debate last week.

But even before the Vice Presidential debate tonight between Joe Biden and Paul Ryan, and next Tuesday’s second Presidential debate between Obama and Mitt Romney, when one thinks clearly and calms down, it is clear that Barack Obama is going to win the election, and that the Electoral College, which elects our Presidents, is favorable to him.

This has been discussed before by this blogger, and certainly the math of the Electoral College is in flux, but still the odds are heavily in favor or Obama winning!

Let’s start with the reality, that Obama has 237 of the 270 electoral votes needed to win, and anyone who hallucinates that somehow, the states that he is seen as having certain in his camp will magically switch to Romney, needs a dose of reality!

Obama will win the entire Northeast (except possibly New Hampshire); Illinois, Michigan and Minnesota in the Midwest; New Mexico; the Pacific Coast; and Hawaii. This is a total of 18 states and the District of Columbia. No money is being spent by the Romney campaign in these states, as Romney alienated Michigan in calling for the bankruptcy of the auto industry, and Minnesota has never been seen as a state that was seriously a candidate to back Romney’s candidacy, although if former Governor Tim Pawlenty had been Romney’s Vice Presidential running mate, Minnesota might have been in play!

Everyone talks about “swing states”, and yes, there are nine of those up for grabs, but in four of them, Obama is favored because the unemployment rate is lower than the national average—New Hampshire, Ohio, Virginia and Iowa–with a total of 41 electoral votes, which if added to the 237 for Obama, becomes a grant total of 278 electoral votes, 8 more than needed.

Iowa is sixth lowest unemployment rate with 5.5%; New Hampshire is seventh lowest with 5.7%; Virginia is tenth lowest with 5.9 %; and Ohio is 20th lowest with 7.2%. Additionally, Wisconsin is 25th lowest with 7.5%—all five of these states under the national rate of 7.8%!

Colorado, Florida, North Carolina, and Nevada have higher unemployment rates, and therefore can be seen as much more difficult for Obama to win, particularly after the “bump” in some polls for Romney after the first Presidential debate.

So let’s assume the latter four states, and even Wisconsin (as the home of Paul Ryan) go to Romney. It still is not enough, as the most he would have then would be 260 electoral votes, ten short of the number needed to win the Presidency!

The Electoral College numbers are still subject to change over the next 26 days, but it is safe to say, that the LOW point is 278 electoral votes for Barack Obama from a total of 22 states and the District of Columbia, with still the potential for Obama to win all nine of the ‘swing states”, rather than four, and a grand high total of 347 electoral votes to 191 for Mitt Romney!

Pew Poll Shows Massive Swing To Romney: Is The Election Lost For Obama?

Ronald 4 Comments

The Pew Research Poll that came out yesterday is an alarming reminder that the Presidential Election Of 2012 is far from over, as Mitt Romney gained massively in many ways, and at least in this poll, is now ahead by 4 points over Barack Obama.

Is it time to panic? No, but it is a sign that Joe Biden MUST do well in the upcoming Vice Presidential debate against Paul Ryan on Thursday, and Obama MUST perform much better than his lackadaisical effort in the first Presidential debate last week, in the remaining two Presidential debates next week and the week after!.

Additionally, more effort must be made to demonstrate that Mitt Romney is a chameleon, which he most certainly is, and that one cannot trust that his sudden move to the middle is the true Romney, after a year of working hard to be considered, as he self described himself, as a “severe” conservative!

The Gallup daily tracking poll shows Obama ahead by five points, 50-45, as he was before the debate, which became a tie for two days after the debate, but then went back to its old numbers after the favorable jobs report on Friday.

It is clear that the polls are very volatile, and may reflect doubts by voters about who should be President, but a good performance by both Biden and Obama, along with accelerated efforts to show Romney as the liar that he is, is still likely to lead to the same result, with a majority of “swing” states in Obama’s camp, with only the need to win two to three of them to win the Electoral College majority.

More worrisome is how the Obama decline for now could affect House and Senate races, and possibly give the Republicans control of both houses of Congress in the worst scenario.

For these next four weeks, all those who want to insure an Obama and Democratic victory must put in gargantuan efforts to bring about the desired result!

PBS: $1.35 Per American—Is This Too Much To Promote Knowledge And Education?

Ronald Leave a comment

PBS has been part of American culture since 1965, when it was created under Lyndon B. Johnson as part of the Great Society programs, to promote knowledge and education.

Reaching nearly fifty years of age, and having lots of excellent programming, not just Sesame Street and Big Bird, and being made available in rural areas that have far fewer educational opportunities than metropolitan areas, PBS costs only $445 million annually to taxpayers, less than one thousandth of one percent of the national budget!

It comes down to $1.35 per person in America annually, and yet Mitt Romney, Paul Ryan and the Republican Party and conservatives want to force PBS to survive simply on the contributions of its viewers, which happen to be about 90 percent of the people at some point during the year.

While there are already contributions made by many to keep PBS able to promote its excellent programming, to use PBS as the “whipping boy” for the budget crisis that America faces is the height of hypocrisy, as it is literally a “drop in the bucket”, and it comes across as extremely petty to attack PBS, which offers so much good to the nation, and should not be subjected to becoming part of politics!

Education and knowledge should be our aim, and already, there are indications that the opponents of PBS are losing the battle of public opinion!

Could Joe Biden-Paul Ryan Vice Presidential Debate Be A Forerunner Of 2016?

Ronald 8 Comments

The Joe Biden-Paul Ryan Vice Presidential Debate this Thursday could be a forerunner of 2016!

If Joe Biden performs well, and seals a Barack Obama victory in November, he will be the frontrunner for the Democratic Presidential nomination in 2016.

If Paul Ryan does a reputable performance, and is not harmed by Biden, even if Biden is declared the winner on points, he becomes the front runner for 2016 as the Republican Presidential nominee, presuming a Mitt Romney defeat in 2012.

In theory, both Biden and Ryan could be running against each other–74 year old Biden with 44 years of government experience, the most of any Presidential nominee or winner of the White House in history—and 46 year old Paul Ryan, who will have had 18 years in the House of Representatives by then, assuming he wins his House seat while being on the losing Presidential team!

Certainly, one or the other could very well be on the Presidential ballot in 2016, as Walter Mondale was in 1984, after the Mondale-Bush debate of 1980; as George H. W. Bush was after the debate with Geraldine Ferraro in 1984; and as Al Gore was after the debate with Jack Kemp in 1996.

CORRECTION: I discovered after writing the above that there was no VP debate between Bush and Mondale in 1980, so I stand corrected, and that means twice in VP debate history, one of the candidates was on the Presidential ballot in the following election, not three times!

Vice Presidential Debates: Age And Experience Are Winners Three Times, And Probably Again!

Ronald Leave a comment

With the Vice Presidential debate in Kentucky between Vice President Joe Biden and Congressman Paul Ryan coming up this Thursday, it is worthwhile to look back at other Vice Presidential debates in which there was a much older candidate on one side.

This has happened three times, with the older candidate seen as the winner, including:

1988—Senator Lloyd Bentsen made Senator Dan Quayle look foolish.
2004—Vice President Dick Cheney overwhelmed Senator John Edwards
2008—Senator Joe Biden won over Governor Sarah Palin handily.

The same scenario is likely this time, as Vice President Biden is a skilled debater, and has no problem going on the offensive in a debate.

This is not to say that Paul Ryan cannot come across as knowledgeable, but Biden can attack Ryan on facts and truth effectively, and the expectation is that Ryan will have problems in that regard with a strong Biden attack, and that Biden will “win” the debate, as much as anyone can be said to “win”!

A Good Week For Barack Obama, Including Debate Performance!

Ronald Leave a comment

The first week of October has been good to Barack Obama!

His Gallup poll rating is at its highest since the fall of 2009, now registering at 54 percent! This is a strong indication of his upcoming victory precisely one month from today!

Many want to believe that his debate performance harmed him, without realizing that while he might not have been at his best, it really does not matter, as incumbent Presidents tend to do poorly on the first debate with a challenger, as indicated in an earlier post. After all, they have more on their mind than the campaign, such as governing and dealing with crises on a daily basis. Meanwhile, Mitt Romney has done nothing for the past six years other than run for President, and he has had a multitude of mistakes and poor performances with his rhetoric and comments!

If Obama had come out charging in this first debate, he would be accused of being an “angry black man”, which terrifies many working class whites and uneducated people, who are accustomed to a different image of blacks, which is an unspoken sign of massive racism! So if he smiles and lets Mitt Romney hang himself as a phony, a chameleon, a liar on a massive scale, he is criticized, but Romney has added to the image that he is untrustworthy by his aggressive performance full of deceit and manipulation! Obama actually handled the situation well, and that will be seen as time goes by!

Now that Romney has proved again that he is a charlatan, Joe Biden will go on the assault against ideologue Paul Ryan, and then Obama will go after Romney in the last two Presidential debates. He will follow Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush in recovering from a theoretical first debate that was unimpressive, to go on to electoral victory!

But also, the victories for voting rights in Ohio and Pennsylvania, and the stopping of voter registration by Republicans in Florida and four other states, due to obvious GOP corruption, will upend the Republican attempt to cut out millions of potential Democratic voters in “swing” states.

And the economic revival that is going on, lowering the unemployment rate below 8 percent for the first time in his term of office, will help Obama, as most sane people will dismiss the conspiracy theories of conservatives and Republicans that the honorable and independent Bureau Of Labor Statistics is corrupt!

And the fact that Obama saved the auto industry; has seen the stock market double during his term; that manufacturing is reviving in America; and that energy production is up domestically without destroying the environment—-all this is further proof that this has been a good week on the road to ultimate victory one month from now!

Barack Obama Ridicules Mitt Romney Day After Debate: Points Out His Contradictions And Lies

Ronald 3 Comments

Barack Obama may have been passive in yesterday’s debate, or just maybe, the goal was to allow Mitt Romney to hang himself with his own chameleon nature, his constantly changing views, his own contradictions!

So today, Barack Obama was in Wisconsin, ridiculing Mitt Romney and pointing out that he was a “new” Mitt Romney, totally talking differently about everything from what he was stating for the past year during the primaries!

So Romney has now been shown to have made 27 lies in his 38 minutes of the debate, enough to indict him as what he is–a damned liar, a phony, an untrustworthy man, who will say anything to be elected President, and seems to think that the American people as a whole are that dumb as to just accept his constantly changing views on a daily basis!

Romney may be cocky at the moment, but Barack Obama is on the attack, and Joe Biden will be, and Paul Ryan had better watch out in next week’s debate, trying to defend a newly moderate Romney, while Ryan himself is an ideological conservative who will squirm when try

Romney has not won the debate as much as people think he has! Instead, he is digging his own political grave with his dishonesty and lack of ethics!

Body Language, And Way Answers Are Given In Debate, Matter More Than What Is Stated!

Ronald Leave a comment

The history of Presidential debates, and really any political debates between candidates, has been shown to declare victory more based on body language, and the way answers are given, than what is actually stated by the candidates!

It has been said that the eyes are the “windows of the soul”, and they do, indeed, reveal a lot about a candidate, and really about anyone one meets and deals with in life.

Visual cues really tell us a lot, including type of hand movements; whether someone is nervous or jittery; the tone of voice; whether anger or emotion show through, whether someone comes across as genuine and caring; and a sense of compassion and humanity.

Going by this reality, Richard Nixon in 1960 and George H. W. Bush in 1992 were harmed by visual cues a great deal, and they both lost their elections, even though it could be argued that both were better qualified than John F. Kennedy and Bill Clinton!

This is something to keep in mind as one watches the Obama-Romney debates, and the Biden-Ryan debate, over the next few weeks!

Romney “47 Percent” Comment And Ryan “30 Percent” Statement Are “Nails In Their Coffin!”

Ronald Leave a comment

No matter how well Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan do in their debates this month, when we look back after the election, it will be clear that the “nails in their coffin” will be Mitt Romney’s “47 percent” comment in May, and Paul Ryan’s “30 percent” comment in 2011, newly revealed, declaring that 30 percent of the country is satisfied to get a welfare check.

By Romney labeling and condemning nearly half the population, and Ryan characterizing almost one third of the population, the Republican nominees have alienated senior citizens, military veterans, college students, single mothers, and those struggling to live on the minimum wage!

Romney-Ryan cannot win a majority of the following groups:

African Americans
Latinos-Hispanics
Women
Catholics
Jews, except Orthodox
Senior Citizens
Labor Union members
College Students
White working class, in the Midwest and Northeast
Military Veterans
Environmentalists
Gays and Lesbians
Middle Class
Poor and Working Class, Except in the South
Single Mothers
Northeast and New England
Middle West, except maybe Indiana and Missouri
Mountain States, except Idaho, Utah, Wyoming and maybe Montana and Arizona
Pacific Coast
Liberals and Progressives
Self described Independents

Who will support Romney-Ryan as a majority?

Evangelical Christians
Orthodox Jews
Southern voters other than Virginia and Florida, and possibly North Carolina
Great Plains–North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma
Border States–Kentucky, West Virginia
Mountain States other than Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada
Wealthy Top Two Percent–Corporations, Wall Street, Inherited Wealth
Cuban Americans, particularly in Florida
Conservatives

The debates will NOT change the equation enough to save Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan!

Chris Christie Raises The Ante For Mitt Romney, Creating A Massive Problem Bound To Lead To Disappointment!

Ronald Leave a comment

New Jersey Republican Governor Chris Christie loves to be bombastic, to be loud and outspoken, to the point that he loses all credibility to any sane observer!

Christie’s claim that Mitt Romney is going to have such an outstanding performance in Wednesday night’s first Presidential debate puts such a massive burden on the former Massachusetts Governor. Christie’s statement that the whole nature of the Presidential campaign will be totally different by Thursday morning is totally preposterous!

Even if Romney does well in the debate, it is not going to, overnight, transform anything, as Romney must not just do well for one period of 90 minutes, but he and his running mate, Wisconsin Congressman Paul Ryan, must perform well in the remaining three debates, and stop making blunders and miscues that undermine the campaign!

So far, the Romney-Ryan campaign has been one massive disaster after another, and Romney is running behind in all of the swing states, and many people have already started to participate in early voting.

To believe that one debate will transform the election is to believe in the tooth fairy, and Christie’s mouth is going to make him look foolish, and undermine any plans for the New Jersey Governor to run for President in the future.

Being a braggart, a loudmouth, a egotist, an obnoxious person who loves to get in your face, is not a set of personality characteristics that propels someone into serious consideration for President, and just imagine a President Christie dealing with foreign leaders and Congressional leaders in the same bombastic manner that he uses now!

Christie will be harmed by his overly optimistic assertions, and that is to the good, as imagining a President Christie in the future is literally to be embarrassed and apologetic for his outrageous bully nature, and his behavior fits him better for a wrestling match or a boxing match than a responsible leader of a state government, or the American government!