Ninety Percent Of This Process Is Half Mental

Jim Geraghty comes out in favor of half-measures, especially if paired.

Comments

[MarkO]

I like half and half in free coffee.

[NK]

Be careful TM-- It gets late out there early.

[GMAX]

And this AM the hits just keep on coming. The NYT/CBS poll of RVs just released shows Zero at a 41% approval rating.

Its worth noting that this poll is notorious for oversampling Democrats, and while it does so again, its much less egregious that past polls.

Still 41% approval when you are using a D + 3.2 poll of registered voters ( not screening out folks who have not voted recently or even say they are unlikely to vote ) is horrible.

If I were, say a madhatter in the Middle East, I would be very nervous when I saw this poll...

[Chubby]

TM in your last post you didn't give us a number to call to report a fishy article.

[NK]

GMAX-- that's 2 polls now-- WaPo and CBS/NYT which have reduced D sampling to a +3-4% (rather than +7-8% they had been using). Any thoughts of why WaPo and NYT commissioned polls would be more realistic this month?

BTW--I think come Nov Ds and Rs will be level at 32% and the I-DNKs will be 36% of the electorate. That adds up to 46% of the vote for 'Bam (Mullahs are the wild card.)

[Chubby]

I don't trust NYT/CBS

(especially the "BS" part)

why would they publish such a poll? could they be trying to instill a sense of complacency in the enemy? plotting a wannabe comeback kid narrative?

[Janet]

Here it is Chubby -

report them to [email protected]

[Chubby]

:) Janet

[Danube of Thought]

Minus 14 at Raz today.

Obama leads Romnet by five--a ten-point swing in two days.

Does not compute.

[Sandy Daze]

The last of the lot:

well, errr, one more, for our host, TM:

OMG~ABO,
Sandy

[Chubby]

Sandy, I enjoyed all your links yesterday.

[Jim Ryan]

Does not compute.

It's the "stay the course, NBC says the economy is limping back" vote.

[narciso]

Yes, that doesn't make sense, logic would dictate another direction,

[Sandy Daze]

The last of the lot:

well, errr, one more, for our host, TM:

OMG~ABO,
Sandy

[narciso]

Remember what happened in 'Airplane' when they ran out of coffee, LOL.

[narciso]

'It's a bit of a poser'

http://www.jammiewf.com/2012/media-baffled-as-obamas-approval-among-women-craters/

[Jane]

This">http://www.nypost.com/p/pagesix/cindy_adams/palin_comparison_5WOQXlsOOz2ILhlsbAkLzL#ixzz1p0OPpcId">This is interesting:

At Circo, following HBO’s “Game Change,” an operative involved in Sarah Palin’s heady VP-maybe days, said:

“There are inaccuracies. Julianne Moore as Sarah saying she won’t stand on the stage with anyone who was pro-choice? Please. I was on Sarah’s plane. Small plane. No first-class section or anything. I’d written the women’s rights speech the night before but couldn’t be with her or give it directly to her because, although she was in the next hotel room in Reno, it had first to be faxed to McCain’s people in DC before she even saw it.

“I was paid $50,000 a month to teach her women’s rights and craft the speech. She has a photographic memory. They worried she’d memorize it instantly and say it, whether they’d approved the words or not. She often went dark for four days before a major address. She’d pray over it.

“This 30-minute Henderson, Nev., talk she scanned. It was on YouTube. And that stage held pro-choice women. Sarah carried the whole operation. No venue could hold the crowds — 10,000 trying to get into a stadium for 3,000 people.

“McCain’s keepers, bald, smoking, hating her, couldn’t deal with a woman candidate. A Christian who needs to pray had no one to pray with. Separated from family, she was kept in her room. A runner who does five miles a day locked in a room!”

Besides married aides having affairs and how certain TV interviews were gotten, this operative added: “Sarah hated spokespeople putting out she was proud of Bristol’s pregnancy. She said she’d never say she’s proud an unmarried teenager was having a baby. She wanted that spokesperson gone. That spokesperson was never gone.”

Ask how folderol gets out when it’s not so, the answer comes back: “Whether there’s something to say or not, staffers talk just to save their asses.”

[Jane]

Bad link, sorry. try this

[Jack is Back!]

Just out of curiosity: Why does TM still have that Salahi couple crashing the WH poll up on the sidebar?

Belated HB to Agent J. You cannot use the top step without a waiver and strapped to a harness. And if you are using a chain saw, you must wear steel-toed boots, safety goggles and a hard hat.

[GMAX]

Here is the scoop on sampling. Even the best designed and flawlessly executed poll, has a chance that the sample results will not be within the MOE ( margin of error ) of the actual population being sampled.

That is why you need confirming polls and results over long periods, to smooth out the occasional sample that is a couple of standard deviations from the mean.

When the NYT/CBS ( can you name a more toxic pairing ?) poll starts to reflect reality, the pollster has begun to realize that if he keeps putting out D + 8 to D + 12 garbage, that folks are going to take him for a fool.

They adjusted, not to reality all at once, but will now claiming "movement" in the electorate. BS. This cake has been baked since the HC law passed. Zero decided to go for a polarized electorate and got his wish, but unfortunately for him he gets the smaller of the two pieces. Not much has changed when you look at monthly numbers for Gallup or monthly numbers for RAS.

[GMAX]

Forgot to add that the possibility of an nonreflective sample result is known as confidence level. Most polls are done at a 95% confidence level, which means 1 out 20 perfectly designed and flawlessly implemented polls will be outliers ). Introduce human error and it can climb much higher.

[matt]

moose und schqvuirrel must die....

I just had to say that after seeing the last thread...good morning all!

[Jane]

Anyone here a HLS grad of 1971?

[Jim Ryan]

Muddle in the voting booth this November:

"They say the economy has shown nine straight months of improvement...Don't want to change captains during a storm...steady as she goes...Plus Romney seems like a doofus...But Obama is a complete screw-up...Romney is a turn-around specialist but we've already turned around nine months ago...First black president...."

Etc. There's no predicting the result, unless the MFM spinning of the economy smashes into reality this summer.

[Danube of Thought]

Field grade officers are not required to wear spurs when boarding balloons.

[George]

This is admittedly off topic but I was busy and missed the chance to comment on the CRT posting below. One problem with universal solvents is finding something to store them in. The same thing applies to a universal theory like CRT which posits that all institutions of society are secretly designed to promote white (or in the case of feminism male) supremacy. Professor Bell arrived at a distinquished institution, loaded with honors, etc, etc; at what point did it occur to him that his position at Harvard Law was actually created for and being exploited by the "man" for the purpose of promoting white supremacy. How did he apply CRT to explain his own position? For example, it is clear that Soledad O'Brien serves to make even a Katie Couric look like Einstein.

[GMAX]

Still the NYT being the DNC shills that they are could not resist watering down the depression for their faithful readers. Get a load of this:

Their own poll can’t really be trusted, according to the story covering the poll:

Yet, polls capture only a particular moment in time, and can be influenced by the way questions are asked or the mix of people who are surveyed. In The Times/CBS News poll, the margin of sampling error could mean the president’s approval rating is as high as 44 percent or as low as 38 percent, at a 95 percent confidence level.

Of course, that statement is true, just as it was when President Bush’s approval ratings were suffering. You remember all of those similar disclaimers when the newspaper of record was hammering away at President Bush’s falling approval ratings, don’t you?

[Neo]

I understanding is that if you take on any project that is vast, any half measure will make it "half-vast."

[GMAX]

Toldya! GRIN

[Neo]

The Keystone XL Pipeline is being built.

Even President Obama praised his great efforts to make it happen, at least for the Texas-Oklahoma leg.

My understanding is that they are going to build it right up to Montana (to get the oil sands there). All the environmental etc. studies are complete and it has been approved, except a few routing disputes along the way. The Texas to Montana portion that is all in the US doesn't come under the authority of the President's (actually the State Department's) choice.

Once that leg is in, there will only be a short, a few meters, section to make it cross the border. So what are the environmental impacts of a section of oil pipeline a few meters long ?

The environmental community will shit their pants when they figure it out.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Does not compute.

Remember the outcomes of polls are inherently random. The usual report is the median of the 95 percent confidence range, and they're usually plus or minus 4 points or thereabouts. Sp a swing that big would happen purely randomly about one time in 20 unless my currently uncaffeinated state has confused me.

[Sandy Daze]

Let’s Talk About the Real Issues, Mr. President

The far Left continues to believe American voters are not smart enough to grasp the diversionary tactics it employs to distract us from the issues our President just doesn’t want to talk about – issues that affect us all every day and must be addressed.

[Sandy Daze]

Exhibit A in these diversionary tactics is an absurd new attack ad President Obama has released taking my comments out of context. I’m not running for any office, but I’m more than happy to accept the dubious honor of being Barack Obama’s “enemy of the week” if that includes the opportunity to debate him on the issues Americans are actually concerned about. (Remember when I said you don’t need a title to make a difference?)
.

[Sandy Daze]

Just off the top of my head, a few of these concerning issues include:
a debt crisis that has us hurtling towards a Greek-style collapse,
entitlement programs going bankrupt,
a credit downgrade for the first time in our history,
a government takeover of the health care industry that makes care more expensive and puts a rationing panel of faceless bureaucrats between you and your doctor (aka a “death panel”),
$4 and $5 gas at the pump exacerbated by an anti-drilling agenda that rejects good paying energy sector jobs and makes us more dependent on dangerous foreign regimes,
a war in Afghanistan that seems unfocused and unending,
a global presidential apology tour that’s made us look feeble and ridiculous,
a housing market in the tank, the longest streak of high unemployment since World War II,
private-sector job creators and industry strangled by burdensome regulations and an out-of-control Obama EPA,
an attack on the Constitutional protection of religious liberty,
an attack on private industry in right-to-work states,
crony capitalism run amok in an administration in bed with their favored cronies to the detriment of genuine free market capitalism,
green energy pay-to-play kickbacks to Obama campaign donors,
and a Justice Department still stonewalling on a bungled operation that armed violent Mexican drug lords and led to the deaths of hundreds of innocent people.
.

[Sandy Daze]

I’m sure I missed a few things, but the list is just for starters. Along with millions of others, I’m willing and free to discuss these issues with the President anywhere, anytime; and I’m sure any of the four patriots currently running for the GOP nomination would also welcome the opportunity to talk about the problems everyday Americans face due to the abject failure of our current administration’s policies. The President will dismiss all of these problems by saying, “Well, uh, ‘change isn’t easy.’” But considering that candidate Obama promised to turn back the waters and heal the planet, the American people had at least a reasonable expectation that, at the bare minimum, he wouldn’t bankrupt our country.
.

[Sandy Daze]

continued. . .

Golly, I wish she were running.

ABO-OMG,
Sandy

[MarkO]

I think what Sarah is doing is exactly her strongest role. In fact, challenging Obama to a debate, arranging a time, showing up and having him not appear would be great theatre and make a wonderful point about him.

[Sue]

The President will dismiss all of these problems by saying, “Well, uh, ‘change isn’t easy.’” But considering that candidate Obama promised to turn back the waters and heal the planet, the American people had at least a reasonable expectation that, at the bare minimum, he wouldn’t bankrupt our country.

Whoa! I think someone just threw down the gauntlet. Will Obama pick it up?

[rse]

I have posted an OT inquiry on the new thread trying to figure out clouds as platforms for digital resources instead of the internet.

Anyone with knowledge of clouds and especially why it would be preferrable or just another industry CC boondoggle or more secure if not downright inaccessible unless authorized, please help.

Good morning Jane. See I found that caps key.

[Rick Ballard]

Jim Ryan,

You might want to do a clenched teeth Muddle vignette as a counterpoint to the MFM smoke being effective. The MFM smoke today is that retail sales are 8% above peak. The reality is that rail car loadings (ex coal and intermodal) are 5% off peak. The Muddle's experiential knowledge reflects the implied 14% inflation PLUS those damned signs on the gas stations PLUS the irritation of having Uncle Bob, Aunt Sally and kids living in the basement rec room.

The Muddle has been ambling away from BOzo for some time and the unreality of the MFM happy-clappy economic reporting isn't going to change the direction of the herd.

[Extraneus]

I think what Sarah is doing is exactly her strongest role.

She should have been doing it as a candidate.

[NK]

RickB-- your and Sarah Palin's summaries are why Barry O loses in November. 2 bottom line reasons: 1. Indy voters regret buying the hype in '08, they see the ugly economic reality and believe Obama's Big Gov't weak Dollar policy is causing the problems; and 2. Conservatives have a BIG reason to GOTV in '12 as opposed to '08 when they stayed home. The reason? ABO! He loses; the only wildcard-- the Mullahs.

[Jim Ryan]

Rick, I have conveyed your suggestion to my muse.

[Clarice]

It is starting to look like a US version of "The Man Who Would be King", doesn't it?

[Ignatz]

--It is starting to look like a US version of "The Man Who Would be King", doesn't it?--

Then I suggest Barry not make any surprise visits to Afghanistan, considering how the story ended.

[narciso]

You know, 'winning the future' where was this person when Newscorp from the esteemed Journal to the Post's Stasi and Rorke, were flogging this crap as if it they had a percentage. And it's anonymous, and the 'narrative' is we still had to teach the 'chillbilly,' I'm not forwarding that story, because it's information that was already known, but you need a crowbar or a wikileaks hack of Stratfor to actually find this out. More and more, I see this as a sick little game, like the Duke and Duke's
played on Valentine, they stand for nothing,
they wreck lives and then move on. I'm an anonymous drone in a blue hell,

Abrams baldfaced lied about Newt, and then conveniently the proof comes out the next day in Powerline, but the impression is made, he was against Reagan in Central America.

[Clarice]

Kafiristan, especially. (But that means the land of the nonbelievers, the blasphemers.)

[narciso]

You think our frontrunner will buy a clue, dream on, his chief aide, Murphy, likely one of Strong's putative sources, counseled accomodation. Like Cassandra, she saw the ruin, but was powerless to stop it. This is not an academic discussion for her, her oldest is 'walking the walk' in Afghanistan, set ablaze because of the President's careless words,her youngest, may yet be subject to the death panels, that Luntz, and the Minnesota wonder, say
they wouldn't have described. They never
say, what is the appropriate description
for turning the Hippocratic Oath upside down.

[pagar]

Sandy, thanks for your posts.
Jane,thanks for the NY Post link.

May God bless Sarah Palin. Bring her to the attention of America may have been McCain's greatest political accomplishment, IMO.

From Jane's 10:02

"“McCain’s keepers, bald, smoking, hating her, couldn’t deal with a woman candidate. A Christian who needs to pray had no one to pray with. Separated from family, she was kept in her room. A runner who does five miles a day locked in a room!”

Unbelievable!

“I was paid $50,000 a month to teach her women’s rights and craft the speech."

The amount of money in these campaigns is obscene, IMO.

[NK]

The Man Who Would Be King-- Starring 2 of my 4 all-time favorite actors (AND Mrs. Micheal Caine-- stiil married 39 years later), my personal favorite line:

"She's not a wife... she's a going concern."

Movie was filmed in the breathtaking mountains of Morocco. Barry O was 13-14 when the film was released-- I hope he didn't take Kipling's clever little story too seriously.

[pagar]

Narciso, can you go back to the Fish thread and check my last post? Thanks!

[Jane]

Hey RSE!

[narciso]

Well Pagar, some of the latter of Drury's post
Advise series, ending with Come Nineheh come Tyre, see if there is a familiar character.
As for McCarry, consider the Better Angels (written more than 30 years ago, yet anticipated many of the current trends,) and add Shelly's Heart.

[Jack is Back!]

Neo,

Where did you get your information regarding Keystone going ahead with a Montana to Oklahoma spread only? Its counter to TransCanada's Presidential Approval Application for 2012.

[centralcal]

Clarice: You need to blog an update at AT on your wonderful Leni Riefenstahl piece, the following:

By 21-Point Margin, Americans Oppose Birth Control Mandate

There's a lot of talk that Obama's dive in in the CBS/NYT and the ABC/Washington Post polls is due to high gas prices. That seems plausible. But why couldn't the contraception/abortifacient mandate--the biggest news story for the past month--also play a part in Obama's sinking numbers?

[Clarice]

Heh. I think by Sunday that story might be played out. Maybe Leni will show up to advise Michelle how to lead the athletes at the Olympics. ore Leni's style anyway.

[Danube of Thought]

Chevy Volt.

[Danube of Thought]

Remember the outcomes of polls are inherently random

Yeah. I suspected the sample of 2-3 days ago might be an outlier.

[centralcal]

Well, I meant just a quick blog in the side bar, not your actual Sunday column. But, I am loving your idea about Leni advising Michelle!!!!

[narciso]

Don't look at the blip, look at the trend, Frau Blucher has approved this message.

[Clarice]

It's hard for Leni to talk to me cause of the extreme heat so she doesn't like short blogs.

[centralcal]

ha ha

[pagar]

"A Christian who needs to pray had no one to pray with."

This is happening more and more throughout the world.

http://weaselzippers.us/2012/03/13/pakistani-christian-woman-charged-with-blasphemy-after-refusing-to-convert-to-islam/

[Porchlight]

But why couldn't the contraception/abortifacient mandate--the biggest news story for the past month--also play a part in Obama's sinking numbers?

Unpossible. I was told that this was a stupid distraction that the GOP fell for, that we were idiots for talking about it, that it would hurt us with independents, and that only the economy and the Middle East could move the needle with voters.

[Jack is Back!]

Is Horst Kettner still alive? Perhaps he can get more than a few minutes of her time out of her for you Clarice.

[Clarice]

If you ever forget the perfidy of Powell, Armitage, Schmidt and Wallace, may your right hand lose its cunning.

[pagar]

Thanks Narciso, I'm off to find them. Your knowledge amazes me many times each day.