Show Me The Coattails!

The Politico on Obama to some nervous Congressional Dems:

‘Well, the big difference here and in ’94 was you’ve got me.’

The Las Vegas Review-Journal on Harry Reid's Presidential visit:

WASHINGTON -- During his whirlwind visit to Las Vegas two weeks ago, President Barack Obama mentioned U.S. Sen. Harry Reid by name four dozen times, gave him a big hug and talked him up as if he was a long-lost brother.

...

But as Reid faces an uphill path to win re-election to a fifth Senate term, Obama's enthusiastic endorsement does not appear to have improved the Senate majority leader's standing among constituents, according to a new poll conducted for the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

Reid got no bounce from Obama's visit on Feb. 19, when the president spoke highly of him at Green Valley High School and to business leaders at CityCenter, polling indicates.

A larger percentage of voters surveyed (17 percent) said they would be less likely to vote for Reid following the president's visit than said they would be more likely to vote for him (7 percent). Seventy-five percent said Obama's visit would have no effect on how they vote.

Dems are going to carry that weight.  But he ain't heavy, he's my President.

Comments

[Her, too.]

Yes, we'll can him.
============

[Rick Ballard]

‘Well, the big difference here and in ’94 was you’ve got me.’

Another slight misinterpretation - the true meaning is that the Dems are going to long for results as good as they had in '94 by the time BOzo gets done.

[Lonni]

When I read the header about the coattails, I thought Obama had bowed to someone again! LOL

[RichatUF]

And BOzo is still hauling the carcass of Obamacare around like it is a big vote winner (and once he figures out an exit strategy on that he'll pick up the equally popular cap-and-trade and card check). And to go with NV, it seems the Obama magic is working in CA too (via Insty). If it is leaking out that Dems are worried about CA...

[Buford Gooch]

That is the big difference, but he thinks it's on the positive side.

[narciso]

I half expect, Richard DAwson to show up, saying 'Survey says"

[glasater]

Here is the link to Fareed Zakaria's interview with George Soros.

In this interview Zakaria asks him how much Soros is going to have in a PAC or whatever campaign contributions are called after the recent SCOTUS ruling on McCain-Feingold.
Soros said he was adding to a half a billion fund this year.

That should give the R's some real pause in considering taking back the House I would think.

It scares the wee out of me for sure......

[glasater]

In listening once again Soros says "a foundation" to help people.

I'm sure some of the people he wants to help are the democrats.

[pagar]

" as if he was a long-lost brother."

Haven't we seen the saga of Obama and his long lost brother before? Isn't he the one who lived in a hut and had very little income before he was found? After he was found - No change, still lives in a hut with very little income. Knowing Obama doesn't seem to help people much.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

Have you seen the latest cover of Newsweek. They showed it just now on Fox and Friends. It says VICTORY AT LAST, and apparently gives credit to President Bush. Has hell frozen over?

[Stephanie]

Don't know about hell, but I can say with certainty that the south is frozen but good.
And more snow projected for tonight and tomorrow. Plus a golf match... sigh.

[Jane]

They can't bear to actually show all of President Bush, rather he is walking away.

But I guess it's a start.

[Linda M]

From the article: "Obama's enthusiastic endorsement does not appear to have improved the Senate majority leader's standing among constituents...Reid got no bounce from Obama's visit"

What? Does not appear to have improved? No bounce? That's putting it a (false) happy spin on it. Reid received a net -10% impact (7% more likely, 17% less likely to vote for him). That's a bounce, the downward trajectory part of the bounce. A clear negative impact for Reid from Obama's visit. So if Reid was 50/50 before visit (even though he appears to be doing must worse), he is now about 45/55 after Barry's visit.

[bunkerbuster]

Yeah, yeah. Wallow in whatever misfortunes befall Obama while you can, but I'll believe things have turned a corner for the GOP when W starts showing up as a positive for Republican candidates. At the moment, most of them are running against Bush, aren't they?

[sam]

Bunkerbuster:

No.

Dems have run against Bush in NJ, VA and MA.

With excellent results.

[Cecil Turner]

Well, I see Nancy is drifting off message a bit. Pelosi To Fellow Democrats: You Should Be Willing To Lose Re-Election For Health Care Bill

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi urged her colleagues to back a major overhaul of U.S. health care even if it threatens their political careers, a call to arms that underscores the issue’s massive role in this election year.

She and Obama seem to have similar concerns about their compatriots' competitiveness . . . not much.

[ben]

"At the moment, most of them are running against Bush, aren't they?"

Actually no, I don't see any Republicans running against Bush. To the contrary, I see a lot of Republicans comparing Obama's record to Bush's unfavorably.

[ben]

Obama has squandered 35 points in popularity, his Messianic aura has dimmed considerable, Democrats are in disarray and poised to get lambasted in November, but Bunkerbuster (more like Bunkermentality) is still going on about Bush. I love this strategy.

[centralcal]

"I love this strategy."

Me too, ben. It seems like a real winner! Sadly, not a winner for bunky.

[syn]

The Progressive Left is vicious like Islamic Supremacists; by every means necessary Democrats will GLENN FISTER the American public into submission.

Changing Congress in 2010 will not stop Obama's Csar from violating and raping America's Lady Liberty.

Watch out America, Obama's Dominatrix Csar Madam Pelosi is wearing her plastic glove given to her by the Education Csar.

[In Blue Hells the phrase means the Obama of '08.]

Heh, bb, 'Do you miss him yet?' is gaining cachet, and immediate understanding.
==============================

[bunkerbuster]

I'm getting some very mixed messages from the conservative fringe. On the one hand, the country is supposed to be doomed by an all-powerful liberal/secular conspiracy controlling the media, academia, the White House, Congress, the Supreme Court, the legal profession, wikipedia and 7-Eleven.

On the other hand, liberals are feckless morons who have no practical ability to do anything other than arrogantly declare their moral superiority to hard-working, smart, Judeo-Christianly righteous conservatives.

But wait, there's even a third hand: meanwhile, the good, smart, righteous, fair-and-balancedTM, Godly, pragmatic, heroic conservatives are taking control in America, washing away the evil socialist regime on a tide of talkradio wisdom and big business (ahem, "free market") acumen.

[Ranger]

Well, there is a simple beauty to Bunkerbuster's (and his many friends in the "reality based community) view. If everything bad is always Bush's fault, the the catasrophic failure of the Dems can't be laid at the feet of Obama and his pary. It is still all Bush's fault. When the Dems lose 60+ seats in the house this fall, it will be Bush's fault because he is the one who caused the economic melt down in the first place. When Obama loses in a landslide in 2012, and the Rs get a filabuster proof majority in the Senate, it will still all be Bush's fault.

After 2012, when there is robust growth in the economy again under a Republican president and solid R majorities in both houses of congress, the argument you will hear from the Bunkerbusters is that Bush messed things up so bad it was always going to take years to fix, and that Obama was just unlucky in his timing. He should have waited until 2012 to run himself and let the Republicans take all the blame for the "Great Recession."

[Cognitive dissonance be thy name.]

Your first two paragraphs of your 9:25 AM comment illustrate a remarkable contradiction. The solution is simple. It's the press, which has collectively lost it's mind. The crack-up won't be pretty.
====================================

[Captain Hate]

From the UK Guardian on BOzo's physical:

The doctors also recommended "moderation of alcohol intake".

Fat chance of that happening; Exhibit A. Bawack Senior

[Ranger]

Regarding Obama's physical. He is still smoking. If he can't keep a simple promise to his wife, why should we trust a single word he says?

[Well, he was fierce PUMA, too.]

Omigod, Scary is a denialist. Link under name for the most sensible think I've ever seen him write.
========================

[Janet]

Yeah Captain...the smoking and high cholesterol points are also a bit of a problem with Michelle's healthy living schtick.
Food and tobacco police for the rest of us, but not for them....hey, a good You Too item.

[bunkerbuster]

``It's the press, which has collectively lost it's mind.''

Hmmmm. If liberals are so dumb and feckless, how in the world did they get control of the press. It's a free country, one of the most free on the planet, so there's nothing stopping conservatives from displacing liberals in the press.
Are conservatives too dumb, too poor or too lazy to create they feel is better for the country?

[Ranger]

BTW, remember when ABC news asked during the campaign if Obama had really quit smoking, and the campaign ripped them a new one for creating a story that questioned Obama honesty without any evidence?

Well, it looks like ABC was right. Obama's been lying about everything, from the largest issues (Net Spending Cuts) to the smallest personal things (quiting smoking). The man is simply a pathological lier.

[bunkerbuster]

make that: Are conservatives too dumb, too poor or too lazy to create a news media they feel is better for the country?

[Explicit, it were.]

Did I read the report from the physical to say that Obama has been self-medicating himself? And that he should lay off the booze, too?
==============================

[Rob Crawford]

From the UK Guardian on BOzo's physical:

The doctors also recommended "moderation of alcohol intake".

So the left spent years screeching that Bush was a "dry drunk", only to elect themselves a sopping wet one.

Well, at least he's not a Kennedy.

[Rick Ballard]

C'mon now, let the man finish his gin soaked waffle.

[Good press drives out bad press. Just you wait.]

Good question. 'How did they get control of the press?'. Very good question. But you admit it is not a free press. Heh.
=============================

[Sue]

I wondered about that when I read the report. Have other presidents been advised to moderate their alcohol intake?

[Janet]

The microscopic size article about Obama's health in the WaPo didn't mention the alcohol recommendation. Hmmmmm

[Pofarmer]

so there's nothing stopping conservatives from displacing liberals in the press.

Look Doofus, what's Fox news and Talk Radio?

[bb, you're marinated in toxic sludge.]

Heh, I remember the old joke, that with Fox Murdoch found a niche market; half of America.
================================

[Rob Crawford]

Look Doofus, what's Fox news and Talk Radio?

The oppressive voice of corporate fascism.

Duh.

[Your press, bb, still believes in AGW.]

I can't find it now, but apparently Obama has been self-medicating in an attempt to help him quit smoking.

Hey, where's your free press on this one, bunkerbuster. Overseas, hah.
=============================

[Janet]

C'mon now, let the man finish his gin soaked waffle.
LOL! Soylent Red once did a sign off..."Until then, there are waffles to be eaten and tee times to make.". We can change it to ..."Until then, there are gin soaked waffles to be eaten, cigs to smoke, and tee times to make.". Haha

[Pofarmer]

The oppressive voice of corporate fascism.

Duh..

Ah, I forgot I need a sooper dooper decoder ring.

Thanks.

[narciso]

This feels like that episode in Star Trek, where the crewmen kept hearing these buzzing
noises, otherwise no other evidence of their existence

[jimmyk]

Hey, bunky, you're projecting again. Wasn't it the liberals who were always laughing about how dumb Bush was, while at the same time claiming that he was surreptitiously taking control of our lives, and tricking the Democrats in Congress into going along with his agenda? Or was that all Cheney's doing?

[Janet]

From the UK Guardian article - LUN

He told reporters last year he had quit but still had an occasional cigarette, without specifying how many.

According to Obama's standard, I have also quit smoking. I have quit smoking, but I still smoke. That was easy.

[Thomas Collins]

Keith Hennessey does the heavy lifting in explaining the mechanics of a possible Reid-Pelosi plan to Rahm ObamaCare through. See LUN (via Instapundit).

[narciso]

This might explain why he is 'back on the wagon' in the LUN

[Ignatz]

--I'm getting some very mixed messages from the conservative fringe.--

None of those messages are mutually exclusive.
The country is doomed by the groups you mention who are feckless morons.
And the good, smart etc folks will, we hope, take control before it's too late.

They only thing mixed is your addled pate, my boy.

[Porchlight]

At the moment, most of them are running against Bush, aren't they?

No. They are quite explicitly running against Obama's agenda. Perhaps you missed a certain Senate race in Massachusetts. It's okay, lots of your colleagues are still in denial about it.

And you know what? Pretty soon Obama's fellow Democrats are going to be running against him, too. Bank on it.

[Appalled]

bunkerbuster:

Read Democratic Underground circa 2007. You'll find the same contradiction at work.

If your read any blog comments section closely, you will find that the other side are brilliant machiavellian incompetents who govern from the Laurel & Hardy playbook, but are even more brilliant than Lao Tzu in marsahlling forces of ignorant lemmings from (flyover country, effete coasts) against the forces of truth, justice, and the American Way.

[Cecil Turner]

Read Democratic Underground circa 2007. You'll find the same contradiction at work.

What contradiction? That lefties control the press (and the journo schools, and most other schools)? Is that news to somebody? Are righties slitting their wrists over it? Sorry, not seeing it.

[ben]

I find it fascinating when liberals try to "explain Republicans". EJ Dionne takes a stab at it in his column:

"The point is not that Republicans are heartless and Democrats are compassionate. It's that Democrats on the whole believe in using government to correct the inequities and inefficiencies the market creates, while Republicans on the whole think market outcomes are almost always better than anything government can produce."

Where to start? First, the second part is really an non-sequitur to the first, the word "while" fails to connect two separate sentences.

The devil is in the details, of course, and it's HOW government is going to correct the"inefficiencies" that Republicans are concerned with, rather than the objective itself.

[narciso]

Well that's 'blind squirrel finding the nut,'
for Dionne

[Mike Myers]

Somewhere out there (actually in many places in the country) there is a Democrat congress critter desperately hoping that neither Obama or Pelosi will show up in their district to "help" them this year. They don't worry much about Biden because they figure Biden's too dumb to find his way out to their particular patch.

[Ignatz]

Appalled,
Bunky, being a little slow, was not making the typical argument you describe which I agree can infect both sides, ie;
So and so is an idiot, who has outsmarted us at every turn.

He said the messages he was receiving from conservatives were;
1) the left controls the government, media, etc
2) the left are morons dooming the country
3) the right will fix the mess if given the chance.

Unlike your example, there is no contradiction or even uncomplimentary irony in those three messages.

[Clarice]

This weekend at a table of 6 (four of whom had left the Dem party for good)I heard a bright mansay he disliked the tea party because they wanted to deprive his Crohn's disease afflicted son and cancer ridden sister of health care. It didn't help that he is bright, that we explained that the tea party had never said such a thing and that the issue was how to efficaciously and economically provide for people with pre-existing conditions. Like many he had decided that the good to be derived from doing away with any restrictions on coverage was more important than the details.

I simply do not know how to get around such emotional reactions to things.

He and his wife, besides having such notions of the tea party also believed that Rush was a divisive, hateful figure though you can be sure neither has ever listened to him.

[Jane]

I have a question about "pre-existing conditions". I've been buying health insurance since I graduated HS and was no longer on my mothers policy precisely because she always warned me that if I got sick and wasn't insured I could get no insurance, but as long as I had a policy I was safe.

I've never been sick, but I have also never known anyone booted out of a policy because they got sick.

So is that now the norm? Since when? Or are we talking about people who were uninsured when they got sick.

[Clarice]

As I understand it, Jane, they were uninsured when they got sick and then tried to buy insurance ..and that could be because (1)they never were insured or(2) because they let previous policy lapse/lost it somehow and didn't take COBRA or any other gap insurance and then tried to buy a new policy.

[JM Hanes]

Thomas Collins:

I read Hennesey's column, and the reconciliation process he outlines just doesn't make sense to me. I commented on his post this morning here at the tail end of the Sunday thread.

[matt]

clarice;

another example of the emotional/id-ite thinking of most Democrats. They are wired for the sob story based in fantasy.

I have a sneaking suspicion that more Democrats than Republicans respond to Nigerian e mail scammers as well. It would be interesting to also analyze what the political affiliations of charitable contributors are.

They are always willing to believe something that is too good to be true and the worst about their political opposition.

[Clarice]

I guess, matt. If I could only find a way to persuade them that thinking rationally results in a kinder, gentler result than not thinking and acting on emotion.

I think we have to so utterly discredit the practice of relying on sib stories like the dead sister's dentures, that we can force attention on what is really at stake.

[Clarice]

*SOB* STORIES (THOUGH IN CONTEXT "SIB STORIES" IS MORE AMUSING..........

[Thomas Collins]

JMH, in Hennessey's first scenario, there is no House/Senate conference needed on the Bill the Senate passed. The House passes it, and it goes to POTUS. Hennessey refers to that as Bill 1. The House and Senate then pass Bill 2, which may or may not need a House/Senate conference depending on whether Bill 2 is passed in the same form by the House and Senate. In any event, once the same Bill 2 gets passed by the Senate and House, Obama signs Bill 1 and then signs Bill 2 (which presumably has whatever fixes to Bill 1 that were deemed necessary).

[Jane]

As I understand it, Jane, they were uninsured when they got sick and then tried to buy insurance

Then I say tough toenails. Their kids won't make the same mistake.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

For bunker:

I'm not going to say these are all the reasons the left has such control, but here are some.

First, as women hit the workforce in ever greater numbers, it meant that ever greater numbers of children were being raised by strangers, starting with pre-school and going right through college. They became indoctrinated by PBS with the Muppets and other programs that substituted for parents, they were indoctrinated by all those grad students getting their child development degrees, they were indoctrinated by teachers, etc. etc.

I remember way back in the Reagan years being cautioned that you were risking your children by allowing them to be raised by people who might not share your values.

Then we had the feminists who convinced men and women alike that a free-wheeling sexuality-based society was preferable and that gives us today all kinds of sex sells shows, just look around at the Paris Hiltons, Kardashians, Jersey Shores, etc. Men were told that somehow it was insulting for them to see their role as breadwinner and protector, no fault divorces, no morality in taking care of their children. It wasn't long before everything was expected to be regulated to protect us from ourselves, which meant protecting us from any mention of God's hand or traditional value-based schools and organizations.

There was no swing of the pendulum to the middle, it swung all the way to the far left, leaving us with it being thought normal to allow little boys to use the same restrooms as little girls if they declared they were confused about their sexuality.

You couldn't have real conversations for fear of offending someone. Politically correct language, soon became politically correct ideas, until today it has degenerated into criminality if you try to talk sensibly about race, religion, orientation, etc.

Of course, the majority on the right were never part of the far right religious right anymore than everyone on the left (at first) wasn't part of the far left extremists. Now lines in the sand have been drawn and there are no middle grounds, you are on one side or the other.

In the meantime, journalism and media, who came of age during the so-called Camelot years, the Vietnam protesters of yesteryear grew up and took the paths of least resistance into the schools and into the press. They were egged on by the idea of being the next Woodward and Bernstein, and then soon they reached professor status and started training whole new generations in their idiotic and very immature positions that had been cemented during their protest days.

As Bill Ayers made clear, get the children and indoctrinate them and you have the generations to come.

Text books were scrubbed of any material that might show that founders were God-fearing men or that this country was built by independent rugged individuals and replaced with pap. Just as one example, I bet there are few kids today who understand it was a Republican who abolished slavery, it was Republicans who passed the Civil Rights Act, and that it is Republicans who think that opportunity for minorities is more important than short term (that turn into lifetime) entitlements that keep the minorities enslaved.

Obama was raised by Communists and taught that America was the cause of all that is bad in the world. Hence we have an affirmative action president who goes around apologizing for American exceptionalism as if being exceptional is somehow a bad thing. In a lefty mind, of course it is. Everyone needs to be lowered to the lowest common denominator, hence everyone wins, no losers in junior sports, no grades in school, etc.

Anyway just some of the more blatant and subtle changes that have completely indoctrinated all of us and especially our younger generations.

I hold out great hope with new media since kids now can be exposed to someone(s) other than their moonbat teachers, who themselves were indoctrinated in the nanny-state system.

[Extraneus]

Made my eyes glaze over, JMH, but the more I read Hennesey's scenario, the more convinced I became that there ain't no way in hell they'll be able to do that.

[bunkerbuster]

I'm still waiting for an explanation as to how liberals got to run the world if they're so dumb and feckless.

Either liberals are actually smart or they don't really run the country, since it's pretty obvious that you have to be smart to take control of a wealthy, well-educated, free country like America.

It's also hilarious to hear how much conservatives despise their own country's educational system, culture and politics. They don't seem to notice that America's universities remain the envy of the world and still attract many, if not most, of the entire world's top brains. Nor have they noticed that our pop culture thrives in every single corner of the world that doesn't aggressively ban it.

America is the worlds' freest, wealthiest, best higher-educated country and if you want to believe that liberals dominate the institutions that produced that, you can't really believe liberals and their ideas are dumb or ineffective.

[bunkerbuster]

And Sara, LBJ was a Democrat. Look it up.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

See bunker, you don't know that LBJ couldn't get the Civil Rights legislation passed until the Repubs stepped in and got the job done. I'm on my way out to do first of the month errands, but if you are interested in a couple of hours I'll give you all the links to bring your education up to speed.

I had an excellent secondary education as did most of my generation, but when all those hippie dippy college perpetual students became grad students and then began the climb up the academic ladder they brought their immature attitudes and political mindset with them.

My son went back to school as an adult and I was typing his papers for him and I couldn't believe the junk they were teaching about events that I had lived through first hand and knew the facts about. When he made some waves in class he was told that his Mom's first hand accounts were nothing but right wing propaganda lies. For instance, he was told that there was NEVER a documented case of garbage being thrown at returning VN Vets. Yet my husband had a trash can of raw sewage dumped on him by protesters outside the Navy base and my son witnessed this event at the age of 5. Don't even get me started on some of the political BS they are imparting.

If you try to solve the problems of minorities with common sense solutions, you are cut off as a racist and you can be kicked out of college or at least disciplined if you dare bring it up. It doesn't take long for this to permeate and pretty soon it consumes society.

Look at how they are trying to call the Tea Partiers terrorists and racists. But, the new media is now here and those who have been terrified into silence for fear of repercussions at their schools, their jobs and even their churches are now able to communicate and low and behold, the back of the left wing media is being broken and maybe even the hold of the nanny-state democrats might finally be broken.

Anyway, I don't have time to go into all the other things that the left is ignorant about due to the pc educations they've received and then bring to the public square, but when I get back I'll be glad to continue.

[Ignatz]

Sara, I believe Saint Jude is the patron saint of lost causes.
Suggest you appeal to him if your mission is educating bunky.

[JM Hanes]

bunkerbuster:

"Either liberals are actually smart or they don't really run the country"

Lucky is the man who has had nary a jerk for a boss.

"America is the worlds' freest, wealthiest, best higher-educated country."

I'm trying to remember the last time I heard a liberal touting American exceptionalism with such enthusiasm.

[bunkerbuster]

Sara, I wonder why you see conservatives a such feckless, inactive, powerless victims. Many conservatives I know are quite powerful with lots of money, lots of powerful business, political and legal connections -- the kind of people who make things happen.
I'm wondering where you are getting this narrative of political victimhood. Perhaps, you as an individual feel victimized because your individual views are not taught at this or that school, but I can't see how that translates to the experiences of most conservatives.
I guess in some ways, it makes me feel good as a liberal to hear so many conservatives portraying themselves as feckless victims of liberal politics. It's a sure sign of intellectual inertness -- an inability to see the world outside one's own feelings of powerlessness...