I noted in this earlier post that nearly 10 million white voters did not vote in the presidential election and that about a million black voters also did not, compared to their numbers in the 2008 election. What were the ages of the missing voters?
From the CNN exit polls for each election:
2008:
18-29 years old, 18% of voters, 66% voted for Obama, 32% voted for McCain
30-44 years old, 29% of voters, 52% voted for Obama, 46% voted for McCain
45-64 years old, 37% of voters, 50% voted for Obama, 49% voted for McCain
>= 65 years old, 16% of voters, 45% voted for Obama, 53% voted for McCain
2012:
18-29 years old, 19% of voters, 60% voted for Obama, 37% voted for Romney
30-44 years old, 27% of voters, 52% voted for Obama, 45% voted for Romney
45-64 years old, 38% of voters, 47% voted for Obama, 51% voted for Romney
>= 65 years old, 16% of voters, 44% voted for Obama, 56% voted for Romney
So, the only major change in the percentage of voters by age was the decrease in the 30 - 44 year old group who favored Obama in both elections. They favored Obama by 6% in the 2008 election and by 7% in 2012. The 18 to 29 year olds increased from 18% to 19% of the voters, but their preference for Obama fell from a 34% differential to a 23% differential. I expected a sizable decrease here due to the very high unemployment of young adults. Overrall, the changes in these two age groups did not help Obama relative to 2008.
The 47 to 64 year olds increased in percentage of voters from 37 to 38%. They had favored Obama by a 1% differential in 2008, but they favored Romney by a 4% differential in 2012. Those 65 and older were 16% of the voters in both elections. They had favored McCain by 8% in 2008 and they favored Romney by 12% in 2012. The changes for both of these age groups helped Romney do better than McCain did.
It is clear though that there were large decreases in the number of voters in each of these age groups, with the biggest decrease among 30-44 year olds who supported Obama. The relative decrease among 18 - 29 year olds and among 45-64 year olds was slightly less than that for those 65 and over.
There is no simple explanation for the Romney loss based on age. The lower turnout in this election has a much greater racial make-up than it does an age make-up. Insofar as it has an age based effect, the harm to Obama was greater than that to Romney.
By age considerations, the reason Romney lost is because he did not get a high enough percentage of the vote in any age group to win. Yes, the older and wiser the voter, the better Romney did. No question it would have helped him greatly if 18-29 year olds had massively failed to vote relative to older voters. I had expected their percentage of all voters to drop in this election relative to 2008, but that sure did not happen. Apparently, though their absolute numbers dropped greatly, so did those of all of the other three age groups.
As yet, Romney's failure to motivate white voters to vote is still looking like his main, but not his only, problem. The explanation that many are offering that he simply did not seem to differ in policy enough from Obama for voters to get enthusiastic about him and come out to vote for him makes a lot of sense. They decided to stay with the guy they did not like or agree with very much instead of trying someone else they were not sure they liked or agreed with very much.
Showing posts with label 2012 election. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 2012 election. Show all posts
09 November 2012
The Missing Voters, The Missing White Voters
In the 2008 Presidential election, the vote outcome was (ignoring minor parties):
Obama, 69,456,897
McCain, 59,934,814
Total, 129,391,711
In the 2012 Presidential election, the vote outcome was (ignoring minor parties):
Obama, 61,164,405
Romney, 58,159,408
Total, 119,323,813
Difference between the candidates, 3,004,997
There were 10,067,898 fewer votes cast for the two major party candidates in the 2012 election despite a growing population. If the same proportion of the population had voted in 2012 as did in 2008, there should have been about 15.2 million more votes cast in 2012 than in 2008.
The difference in votes for the Democrat and Republican presidential candidates in 2012 compared to 2008 was:
Democrat, Obama, lost 8.29 million votes
Republican, lost 1.76 million votes
Total Lost Votes, 10.05 million votes
According to the CNN exit polls, the vote by race in 2012 was:
White, 72%, down from 74% in 2008
Black, 13%, same as in 2008
Latino, 10%, up from 9% in 2008
Asian, 3%, up from 2% in 2008
The number of white votes can be calculated for each year and we find that there were 9.84 million fewer white voters in 2012 than in 2008.
2008 White Vote:
Obama, 43%
McCain, 55%
2012 White Vote:
Obama, 39%
Romney, 59%
There was a 20% differential in this election of white voters for Romney. If the 9.84 million white voters who stayed home had voted in the same percentages for Romney and Obama as those who voted did, then Romney would have had (0.20)(9.84 million) = 1.97 million more votes. This would have only been two-thirds of the difference in the vote for Obama and Romney, but it would be very interesting to understand why nearly 10 million white voters stayed home. In fact, while white voter numbers are not increasing as fast as are black and Latino numbers, they did increase somewhat, so this analysis understates the Republican problem with potential white voters.
Demographically, Republicans do have a serious need to win Latino votes. But it is just as bad a problem that they could not motivate many white voters to come to the polls and vote and did even worse this time than they did with the very lackluster Senator John McCain. Those who say that the Republican problem is simply that they only got 27% of the Latino vote are missing another critical part of the puzzle. The 1% increase in the Latino voting percentage among about 10 million fewer voters, means there were only about 0.3 million more Latino votes. Obama's 71% portion of that added vote gave him about 0.2 million more votes. As a result, Obama's advantage due to more Latino voters was only about 0.1 times Romney's loss of votes due to not turning out white voters.
To have actually won the election, Romney would still have needed to get a significantly larger percentage of white and/or Latino votes. The percentage of black voters stayed the same and given the lower number of total voters, the actual number of black voters decreased compared to their number in 2008. The actual number was about 1.3 million fewer black voters. Those black voters who voted, voted 91% for Obama. Thus, a lower turnout of black voters may have cost him about 1.2 million votes. So, Latino voters increased very slightly and white voters decreased hugely compared to 2008.
Summarizing the effects of voter turnout by race alone, and recognizing that using percentages only to the nearest 1% causes large errors, we have:
Obama's lost votes, 1.2 million black votes minus 0.2 million Latino votes = 1.0 million lost votes.
Romney's lost votes, 2.0 million white votes
So Romney nominally lost twice as many votes as Obama did due to the changes in numbers of voters choosing to vote, assuming each race voted in the same percentage as those of that race who turned up to vote. Admittedly, that may very well not be a good assumption. Nonetheless, it makes it clear that much more than just changing demographics is responsible for the sorry showing of Romney.
Obama, 69,456,897
McCain, 59,934,814
Total, 129,391,711
In the 2012 Presidential election, the vote outcome was (ignoring minor parties):
Obama, 61,164,405
Romney, 58,159,408
Total, 119,323,813
Difference between the candidates, 3,004,997
There were 10,067,898 fewer votes cast for the two major party candidates in the 2012 election despite a growing population. If the same proportion of the population had voted in 2012 as did in 2008, there should have been about 15.2 million more votes cast in 2012 than in 2008.
The difference in votes for the Democrat and Republican presidential candidates in 2012 compared to 2008 was:
Democrat, Obama, lost 8.29 million votes
Republican, lost 1.76 million votes
Total Lost Votes, 10.05 million votes
According to the CNN exit polls, the vote by race in 2012 was:
White, 72%, down from 74% in 2008
Black, 13%, same as in 2008
Latino, 10%, up from 9% in 2008
Asian, 3%, up from 2% in 2008
The number of white votes can be calculated for each year and we find that there were 9.84 million fewer white voters in 2012 than in 2008.
2008 White Vote:
Obama, 43%
McCain, 55%
2012 White Vote:
Obama, 39%
Romney, 59%
There was a 20% differential in this election of white voters for Romney. If the 9.84 million white voters who stayed home had voted in the same percentages for Romney and Obama as those who voted did, then Romney would have had (0.20)(9.84 million) = 1.97 million more votes. This would have only been two-thirds of the difference in the vote for Obama and Romney, but it would be very interesting to understand why nearly 10 million white voters stayed home. In fact, while white voter numbers are not increasing as fast as are black and Latino numbers, they did increase somewhat, so this analysis understates the Republican problem with potential white voters.
Demographically, Republicans do have a serious need to win Latino votes. But it is just as bad a problem that they could not motivate many white voters to come to the polls and vote and did even worse this time than they did with the very lackluster Senator John McCain. Those who say that the Republican problem is simply that they only got 27% of the Latino vote are missing another critical part of the puzzle. The 1% increase in the Latino voting percentage among about 10 million fewer voters, means there were only about 0.3 million more Latino votes. Obama's 71% portion of that added vote gave him about 0.2 million more votes. As a result, Obama's advantage due to more Latino voters was only about 0.1 times Romney's loss of votes due to not turning out white voters.
To have actually won the election, Romney would still have needed to get a significantly larger percentage of white and/or Latino votes. The percentage of black voters stayed the same and given the lower number of total voters, the actual number of black voters decreased compared to their number in 2008. The actual number was about 1.3 million fewer black voters. Those black voters who voted, voted 91% for Obama. Thus, a lower turnout of black voters may have cost him about 1.2 million votes. So, Latino voters increased very slightly and white voters decreased hugely compared to 2008.
Summarizing the effects of voter turnout by race alone, and recognizing that using percentages only to the nearest 1% causes large errors, we have:
Obama's lost votes, 1.2 million black votes minus 0.2 million Latino votes = 1.0 million lost votes.
Romney's lost votes, 2.0 million white votes
So Romney nominally lost twice as many votes as Obama did due to the changes in numbers of voters choosing to vote, assuming each race voted in the same percentage as those of that race who turned up to vote. Admittedly, that may very well not be a good assumption. Nonetheless, it makes it clear that much more than just changing demographics is responsible for the sorry showing of Romney.
07 November 2012
Economic Stagnation, Unsustainable Debt, Lawless Government Chosen
The majority of voters rejected the American Principle of limited, constitutional government whose purpose is the protection of our sovereign individual right to life, liberty, property, the ownership of our own bodies, minds, and labor, and the pursuit of personal happiness. Socialism and anti-human extreme environmentalism coupled with crony mercantilism and constant, blatant lying were chosen by the majority of voters within the boundaries of America.
I cannot say how unbelievably disappointed I am in half of the people of this country. I cannot even think of them as Americans due to their failure to value the American Principle. I cannot understand how so many could so radically embrace organized thievery, thinly veiled as redistribution in the interest of materialistic equality.
The voters have chosen four more years of such violations of economic rights that economic stagnation is assured. We are assured four more years of very high unemployment and decreased full-time employment thanks to ObamaCare and a weak economy. We are assured of the further destruction of whole industries, such as the coal, oil, and natural gas industries. We can count on continued high gasoline prices. We are assured of a government controlled medical system characterized by fleeing doctors, deteriorating medical service and expertise, aging medical equipment, lengthening waits for critical medical care, and of course much increased costs. Government-run schools will become still greater propaganda factories deceiving the minds of our children and college students with tall tales of how government control will solve most any problem. They will serve blue collar union teachers and not the children who will be deprived of real knowledge about American history and civics. The cost of this hollow education will continue to skyrocket. America's producers will be vilified for another four years and then taxed heavily, not to fill the gap between government spending and tax revenue, but to penalize the productive for being so productive.
Most voters say they want smaller government, but most voted for Obama. This is a total disconnect.
Most voters say they want less national debt, but they chose the debt champion of all Presidents.
The voters also chose to return a Democrat Senate so they could continue the Obama-Reid regime record of no budget for a total of 8 years, in violation of law.
They chose Obama and a Democrat Senate so they would continue to have the unpopular ObamaCare, really ObamaUncaringTax, shoved down their throats by rationing bureaucrats and IRS thugs.
Most voters cared not a wink about the cover-up of the New Black Panthers, Fast and Furious, and Benghazi. Most care nothing that Obama flushed tens of billions of dollars down the toilet of hollow green energy companies with no possible market run by his campaign bundlers to fill their pockets in a race to the company bankruptcy. Most voters did not mind the constant misrepresentations of the truth, the constant lies, and the fallacious arguments. They embraced their celebrity con man.
This con man and the Democrat Senate will not address the fact that the U.S. government spending on ObamaCare, Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, Food Stamps, and the interest on the debt are unsustainable. We are hurtling down the road hacked out by Greece. Collapse of the government is coming. The only hope to avoid that was to free the economy and allow growth in it that exceeded that of the government. Most voters never understood this simple fact. Thanks to Obama and the Democrat Socialist Party and their most unworthy, unthinking supporters, collapsed government is our future.
I cannot say how unbelievably disappointed I am in half of the people of this country. I cannot even think of them as Americans due to their failure to value the American Principle. I cannot understand how so many could so radically embrace organized thievery, thinly veiled as redistribution in the interest of materialistic equality.
The voters have chosen four more years of such violations of economic rights that economic stagnation is assured. We are assured four more years of very high unemployment and decreased full-time employment thanks to ObamaCare and a weak economy. We are assured of the further destruction of whole industries, such as the coal, oil, and natural gas industries. We can count on continued high gasoline prices. We are assured of a government controlled medical system characterized by fleeing doctors, deteriorating medical service and expertise, aging medical equipment, lengthening waits for critical medical care, and of course much increased costs. Government-run schools will become still greater propaganda factories deceiving the minds of our children and college students with tall tales of how government control will solve most any problem. They will serve blue collar union teachers and not the children who will be deprived of real knowledge about American history and civics. The cost of this hollow education will continue to skyrocket. America's producers will be vilified for another four years and then taxed heavily, not to fill the gap between government spending and tax revenue, but to penalize the productive for being so productive.
Most voters say they want smaller government, but most voted for Obama. This is a total disconnect.
Most voters say they want less national debt, but they chose the debt champion of all Presidents.
The voters also chose to return a Democrat Senate so they could continue the Obama-Reid regime record of no budget for a total of 8 years, in violation of law.
They chose Obama and a Democrat Senate so they would continue to have the unpopular ObamaCare, really ObamaUncaringTax, shoved down their throats by rationing bureaucrats and IRS thugs.
Most voters cared not a wink about the cover-up of the New Black Panthers, Fast and Furious, and Benghazi. Most care nothing that Obama flushed tens of billions of dollars down the toilet of hollow green energy companies with no possible market run by his campaign bundlers to fill their pockets in a race to the company bankruptcy. Most voters did not mind the constant misrepresentations of the truth, the constant lies, and the fallacious arguments. They embraced their celebrity con man.
This con man and the Democrat Senate will not address the fact that the U.S. government spending on ObamaCare, Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, Food Stamps, and the interest on the debt are unsustainable. We are hurtling down the road hacked out by Greece. Collapse of the government is coming. The only hope to avoid that was to free the economy and allow growth in it that exceeded that of the government. Most voters never understood this simple fact. Thanks to Obama and the Democrat Socialist Party and their most unworthy, unthinking supporters, collapsed government is our future.
05 November 2012
Last Electoral College Result Prediction on Presidential Election
I believe the most likely outcome of the Presidential election will be:
Of the generally recognized swing states, the only one that I believe is foolish enough to vote for Obama is Nevada. Nevada showed its perfidy by voting for Senator Harry Reid, who has refused to allow the Senate to obey the law and produce a budget ever since Obama occupied the White House. Harry Reid is wily, but a very wrongheaded man. The state that could send him over and over to the Senate has the good judgment of a Las Vegas labor union. In other words, Nevada is too much like California now, with which state it shares both an astronomical unemployment rate and home foreclosure rate. Sometimes, no oftentimes, the people of a given area suffer mass delusions. I know, I live in the Baltimore - Washington corridor, where mass delusion reigns supreme. I do think there is about a 40% chance that Nevada will vote for the much superior candidate, Romney.
There is about a 20% likelihood that one of the three states, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Minnesota will vote for Romney. I believe Romney will win the election with a differential in the percentage total vote of between 2 and 4%. If I am wrong, I think a win by 5% is more likely than one by 1%. A win by 5% will mean that Romney will likely carry at least two of the states Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Minnesota. Both Pennsylvania and Michigan will be very hard hit by Obama's plans to shut down the coal-fired electric power plants and both will be hurt by his plans to discourage hydraulic fracturing to release shale oil and gas.
Most of the polls are underestimating the turnout of Republicans and those Independents who have had more than enough of Obama. They are overestimating the turnout of Democrats. This is even true of Rasmussen polls, which are among the best of the polls. The fact that Romney has a normal Republican lead with men and Obama has much less than the normal Democrat lead with women figures very big in my understanding of how this election will turn out. Another key factor is the fact that Independents are decidedly favoring Romney over Obama. There will also be substantially more crossover Democrats voting for Romney than Republicans voting for Obama in this election. These factors have to generally push all of the swing states, most of which are now mostly Republican at the state level, into the Romney column. The work of the Tea Party Americans in ensuring this is also underestimated. The Evangelicals have also become aroused.
Obama is left only with substantial majorities among young people, blacks, and Hispanic Americans. Each of these groups has suffered just unbelievably high unemployment. Falling incomes and rising prices, such as energy prices, have hit blacks and Hispanic Americans especially hard. The fraction of young Americans who favor Obama is high, but usually these young Americans do not vote in large numbers. We will see that many fewer of them will vote in this election than in 2008 and of those who vote, a very substantially larger fraction will vote Republican. The turnout of black and Hispanic Americans will also be lower. The decrease in the fraction who vote for Obama this time as compared to 2008 will be much smaller than that among the young, though it will be greater for Hispanics than blacks.
Now that Americans have had so much time to get to know Obama and to be angered so many times by his lies and deceptions, I am very disappointed that we are still in a situation in which nearly half of all Americans will vote for this con man and failed President. How anyone could want four years of constant attacks on our individual rights and the resulting economic stagnation, is very much beyond my understanding. Romney should have easily surpassed Obama with well over 300 electoral votes. It appears more likely that there are too many very foolish Americans for that to happen. At this point, it looks to me that Romney will get 295 electoral votes.
I will be heartened if Romney comes very close in Minnesota, my birth state, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, however. Coupling that with wins in Iowa, Wisconsin, Indiana, and Ohio and the continued shift of the Midwest into the Republican column may be a good sign of things to come. We have already seen these states send more Republicans to their state houses and to the House of Representatives. They have been electing Republican governors as well. The private sector unions have been losing power as they have lost membership. More and more Mid-westerners are learning that if they are to have well-paying jobs, it is good that the governments not be anti-business. As Mid-westerners show more respect for economic freedoms, they will align more with the more reality-interested Republican Party than with the socialist Democratic Party. This re-alignment may take a couple more election cycles to be complete, but it sure is important to America's future freedom and prosperity.
There is about a 20% likelihood that one of the three states, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Minnesota will vote for Romney. I believe Romney will win the election with a differential in the percentage total vote of between 2 and 4%. If I am wrong, I think a win by 5% is more likely than one by 1%. A win by 5% will mean that Romney will likely carry at least two of the states Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Minnesota. Both Pennsylvania and Michigan will be very hard hit by Obama's plans to shut down the coal-fired electric power plants and both will be hurt by his plans to discourage hydraulic fracturing to release shale oil and gas.
Most of the polls are underestimating the turnout of Republicans and those Independents who have had more than enough of Obama. They are overestimating the turnout of Democrats. This is even true of Rasmussen polls, which are among the best of the polls. The fact that Romney has a normal Republican lead with men and Obama has much less than the normal Democrat lead with women figures very big in my understanding of how this election will turn out. Another key factor is the fact that Independents are decidedly favoring Romney over Obama. There will also be substantially more crossover Democrats voting for Romney than Republicans voting for Obama in this election. These factors have to generally push all of the swing states, most of which are now mostly Republican at the state level, into the Romney column. The work of the Tea Party Americans in ensuring this is also underestimated. The Evangelicals have also become aroused.
Obama is left only with substantial majorities among young people, blacks, and Hispanic Americans. Each of these groups has suffered just unbelievably high unemployment. Falling incomes and rising prices, such as energy prices, have hit blacks and Hispanic Americans especially hard. The fraction of young Americans who favor Obama is high, but usually these young Americans do not vote in large numbers. We will see that many fewer of them will vote in this election than in 2008 and of those who vote, a very substantially larger fraction will vote Republican. The turnout of black and Hispanic Americans will also be lower. The decrease in the fraction who vote for Obama this time as compared to 2008 will be much smaller than that among the young, though it will be greater for Hispanics than blacks.
Now that Americans have had so much time to get to know Obama and to be angered so many times by his lies and deceptions, I am very disappointed that we are still in a situation in which nearly half of all Americans will vote for this con man and failed President. How anyone could want four years of constant attacks on our individual rights and the resulting economic stagnation, is very much beyond my understanding. Romney should have easily surpassed Obama with well over 300 electoral votes. It appears more likely that there are too many very foolish Americans for that to happen. At this point, it looks to me that Romney will get 295 electoral votes.
I will be heartened if Romney comes very close in Minnesota, my birth state, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, however. Coupling that with wins in Iowa, Wisconsin, Indiana, and Ohio and the continued shift of the Midwest into the Republican column may be a good sign of things to come. We have already seen these states send more Republicans to their state houses and to the House of Representatives. They have been electing Republican governors as well. The private sector unions have been losing power as they have lost membership. More and more Mid-westerners are learning that if they are to have well-paying jobs, it is good that the governments not be anti-business. As Mid-westerners show more respect for economic freedoms, they will align more with the more reality-interested Republican Party than with the socialist Democratic Party. This re-alignment may take a couple more election cycles to be complete, but it sure is important to America's future freedom and prosperity.
30 October 2012
Romney is Going to Win the Election
The outcome of the 2012 Presidential election will be decided in the six swing states in light gray in the electoral map below. It is interesting that four of them are in the Midwest.
Romney only needs 8 more electoral votes to win, since a tie of 269 votes each will be decided by the Republican House of Representatives. I believe that Romney will win at least four of these six swing states. If so, Romney will add between 38 and 64 electoral votes depending on which combination of four states he wins. But Romney needs to win only one of Ohio, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Michigan or both Iowa and Nevada to win the election. There is even a possibility that Minnesota is in play with its 10 electoral votes enough for Romney to win.
If Romney sweeps all of these swing states, which is not highly likely, but is also not out of reach, the situation would be:
This would be a most wonderful reassurance that the American People might occasionally lose their marbles, but they have a tendency to relocate them eventually. The amount of red in the county by county results will then be startling.
As I have noted before, the polls have weighted their results much too heavily toward Democrats by assuming there are either many more of them than Republicans or by assuming they are more likely to go to the polls to vote. I believe that the Rasmussen and more recent Gallup attempts to identify the relative numbers of Democrats, Republicans, and Independent voters are very close to the actual case and the 2008 breakdown of voter affiliations are not applicable. There are more Republicans than Democrats now and they will go to the polls in larger numbers than the Democrats will.
Romney still has a large, typical Republican advantage with male voters and Obama's 2008 advantage with female voters has almost disappeared. Romney has a large advantage with Independent voters. Obama is hoping for more black and Hispanic voters in this election than in 2008. This is not going to happen. In fact, there will be fewer black and Hispanic voters in this election. They have been hit much harder by unemployment and some are concerned with Obama's stances on issues of religious belief. His percentage of black voters voting will be lower. Also, more Democrats than last time and more than usual will crossover and vote for Romney. Republicans have a tradition of less crossover voting for Democrats and fewer than usual will do so this time. 18 - 29 year olds still favor Obama heavily by 55% to 36% of likely voters, but 9% of likely voters in that group are undecided. Only 48% of these young voters say they will definitely vote and those voting for Romney are more likely to vote.
While the economy, ObamaCare, energy policies, the level of government spending, and the deficit will all cost Obama most heavily, the last of the undecided voters are being well pushed toward Romney by the Obama disgrace in failing to protect the Ambassador and others in the Benghazi consulate and then lying about the situation. Those still undecided will almost all vote for Romney. Consequently, it now appears that Romney will win 4 to 6% more of the popular vote than Obama. That will translate into a substantial win in the Electoral College vote.
Romney only needs 8 more electoral votes to win, since a tie of 269 votes each will be decided by the Republican House of Representatives. I believe that Romney will win at least four of these six swing states. If so, Romney will add between 38 and 64 electoral votes depending on which combination of four states he wins. But Romney needs to win only one of Ohio, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Michigan or both Iowa and Nevada to win the election. There is even a possibility that Minnesota is in play with its 10 electoral votes enough for Romney to win.
If Romney sweeps all of these swing states, which is not highly likely, but is also not out of reach, the situation would be:
This would be a most wonderful reassurance that the American People might occasionally lose their marbles, but they have a tendency to relocate them eventually. The amount of red in the county by county results will then be startling.
As I have noted before, the polls have weighted their results much too heavily toward Democrats by assuming there are either many more of them than Republicans or by assuming they are more likely to go to the polls to vote. I believe that the Rasmussen and more recent Gallup attempts to identify the relative numbers of Democrats, Republicans, and Independent voters are very close to the actual case and the 2008 breakdown of voter affiliations are not applicable. There are more Republicans than Democrats now and they will go to the polls in larger numbers than the Democrats will.
Romney still has a large, typical Republican advantage with male voters and Obama's 2008 advantage with female voters has almost disappeared. Romney has a large advantage with Independent voters. Obama is hoping for more black and Hispanic voters in this election than in 2008. This is not going to happen. In fact, there will be fewer black and Hispanic voters in this election. They have been hit much harder by unemployment and some are concerned with Obama's stances on issues of religious belief. His percentage of black voters voting will be lower. Also, more Democrats than last time and more than usual will crossover and vote for Romney. Republicans have a tradition of less crossover voting for Democrats and fewer than usual will do so this time. 18 - 29 year olds still favor Obama heavily by 55% to 36% of likely voters, but 9% of likely voters in that group are undecided. Only 48% of these young voters say they will definitely vote and those voting for Romney are more likely to vote.
While the economy, ObamaCare, energy policies, the level of government spending, and the deficit will all cost Obama most heavily, the last of the undecided voters are being well pushed toward Romney by the Obama disgrace in failing to protect the Ambassador and others in the Benghazi consulate and then lying about the situation. Those still undecided will almost all vote for Romney. Consequently, it now appears that Romney will win 4 to 6% more of the popular vote than Obama. That will translate into a substantial win in the Electoral College vote.
The Election Choice: Is Another Human Being a Burden?
If, as the Progressive Elitists say, we are all our brother's, neighbors, and unknown countryman's keeper and that keeping is to be performed by government using mandatory taxation and forced labor, then every newborn baby is an added burden to everyone. In this view, the needs and the wishes of each new person become the command that forces each of us to act to satisfy those needs and wishes. With no regulating principle to limit which needs and wishes will be satisfied, these needs and wishes will make very heavy demands on limited resources. This perhaps heightens the tendency of Progressive Elitists to see each new human as a threat to the Earth, to nature, and to the environment.
Indeed, instead of the effort required by a man to produce what he needs and wants in voluntary cooperation with others in the free market being the limit on the use of resources, the Progressive Elitist is required to find other means to place limits on both the requirements for action on the part of others and upon the use of resources. There are two major such limits:
1) Political power and the jockeying of factions for control of government, whose monopoly on the use of force to compel action by others to satisfy the needs and wants of controlling factions is fought for with warlike intent and ferocity. This vicious fight for power to control always limited resources is rarely acknowledged by more gentle supporters.
2) Claims, commonly exaggerated, that the resources of the Earth are limited justifies limits on demands on the government to compel too much effort from others to satisfy greedy demands. Protection of the Earth, nature, and the environment are to become regulators of greed which the Progressive Elitists refuse to allow free associations for purposes of cooperation in the pursuit of values in the private sector to pursue. This is also used to argue against the efficiency of the private sector and Capitalism in providing for individual needs and wants with the claim that the private sector uses too many of the Earth's resources and violates nature. Nature is seen as excluding mankind. These limits seem more amenable to gentler souls than do those of the raw exercise of government power for special interests or factions, yet these limits become added tools for warlike factions in control of government.
Whatever the limits on efforts to satisfy the needs and wants of each of our countrymen by these two Progressive Elitist principles, each person is an added burden. Each newborn child has a long future of educational expenses from Kindergarten through the 12th grade and then perhaps in college. Any sickness or genetic defect is a burden on everyone else. If the adult does not prove ready to be productive enough to produce a large stream of tax revenues for the governments, then the adult is a burden on all. Inevitably, no matter what, each person is a strain on the Earth and Mother Nature. Each person presents complex needs and wants, with critical differences in the timing of these needs and wants, which lawmakers and bureaucrats cannot understand and provide for. The individuality of each person must be suppressed and modeled out of existence for such a state to function. The problems that result make each individual a sore spot to be resented by the lawmakers, bureaucrats, and voting Progressive Elitists.
In a rich and vibrant private sector with a highly limited government only protecting individual rights, individuals choose their own values based on their own assessments of their needs and wants. They then arrange their voluntary associations with others to make trades of time, effort, money, and favors to pursue their values. These trades are made only as each participant sees some kind of advantage in cooperation for himself. All such relationships contribute to the value we see in one another. Aside from a few murderers and street thieves, everyone has at least some positive value to us as an actual trader, a potential trader, or just someone in the incredibly complex hierarchies of trades and interactions that infuse our society who is almost certainly productive at some level. In such a society, we come to see everyone as a value to us. Those few worthy people down on their luck for a time or really, really unfortunate in the chance of genetic problems or disease, we want to help care for voluntarily because they are still a part of our society of valued individuals.
Not so in the society of the Progressive Elitist. The characteristic ObamaCare program is already rationing medical care in Medicaid and Medicare by refusing operations and expensive drugs to those over 70, who are seen as an excessive burden to society. After all, not only do such people burden society with their medical costs, but they also take Social Security money. They produce little in the way of a tax revenue stream now. Similarly, newborn babies with severe problems are to receive less care in the frank acknowledgment that they will burden society with many years of education expenses before they will be generators of a tax revenue stream. Progressive Elitism robs us of our joy in the lives of others. It rubs the fact of our being forced to serve them in our faces. It forces us to become sullen slaves to their needs and wants. It forces us to become angry combatants for our own needs and wants. Among our own needs and wants is the avoidance of having to provide for the needs or wants of others if only because the hours of our own days and lives are limited. The Progressive Elitist society is suffused with stress and resentment. Everyone else becomes a burden upon us.
In the election on 6 November, we will be faced with many choices to either choose to enthusiastically embrace the Progressive Elitist viewpoint of society as Obama and Biden do, or to make a choice that recognizes at least a substantial part of the value of a limited government and private sector society more consistent with the American Principle put forth in our Declaration of Independence and our Constitution as Romney and Ryan do. We all need to decide whether we want to live in a society that makes nearly everyone else a value to us or one which makes nearly everyone else a burden to us. We need to decide whether we want to cooperate with others or whether we want to fight others for government power or for the limited resources of the Earth. This is the nature of the conflict between government limited to protecting our rights and socialist government which is supposed to provide for everyone's needs and wants. This is the nature of the rich and vibrant private sector choice and the big government choice. We must choose to recognize the fact of a complex and highly differentiated individuality or to refuse to see it. We have to decide whether we are pro-human or anti-human.
Indeed, instead of the effort required by a man to produce what he needs and wants in voluntary cooperation with others in the free market being the limit on the use of resources, the Progressive Elitist is required to find other means to place limits on both the requirements for action on the part of others and upon the use of resources. There are two major such limits:
1) Political power and the jockeying of factions for control of government, whose monopoly on the use of force to compel action by others to satisfy the needs and wants of controlling factions is fought for with warlike intent and ferocity. This vicious fight for power to control always limited resources is rarely acknowledged by more gentle supporters.
2) Claims, commonly exaggerated, that the resources of the Earth are limited justifies limits on demands on the government to compel too much effort from others to satisfy greedy demands. Protection of the Earth, nature, and the environment are to become regulators of greed which the Progressive Elitists refuse to allow free associations for purposes of cooperation in the pursuit of values in the private sector to pursue. This is also used to argue against the efficiency of the private sector and Capitalism in providing for individual needs and wants with the claim that the private sector uses too many of the Earth's resources and violates nature. Nature is seen as excluding mankind. These limits seem more amenable to gentler souls than do those of the raw exercise of government power for special interests or factions, yet these limits become added tools for warlike factions in control of government.
Whatever the limits on efforts to satisfy the needs and wants of each of our countrymen by these two Progressive Elitist principles, each person is an added burden. Each newborn child has a long future of educational expenses from Kindergarten through the 12th grade and then perhaps in college. Any sickness or genetic defect is a burden on everyone else. If the adult does not prove ready to be productive enough to produce a large stream of tax revenues for the governments, then the adult is a burden on all. Inevitably, no matter what, each person is a strain on the Earth and Mother Nature. Each person presents complex needs and wants, with critical differences in the timing of these needs and wants, which lawmakers and bureaucrats cannot understand and provide for. The individuality of each person must be suppressed and modeled out of existence for such a state to function. The problems that result make each individual a sore spot to be resented by the lawmakers, bureaucrats, and voting Progressive Elitists.
In a rich and vibrant private sector with a highly limited government only protecting individual rights, individuals choose their own values based on their own assessments of their needs and wants. They then arrange their voluntary associations with others to make trades of time, effort, money, and favors to pursue their values. These trades are made only as each participant sees some kind of advantage in cooperation for himself. All such relationships contribute to the value we see in one another. Aside from a few murderers and street thieves, everyone has at least some positive value to us as an actual trader, a potential trader, or just someone in the incredibly complex hierarchies of trades and interactions that infuse our society who is almost certainly productive at some level. In such a society, we come to see everyone as a value to us. Those few worthy people down on their luck for a time or really, really unfortunate in the chance of genetic problems or disease, we want to help care for voluntarily because they are still a part of our society of valued individuals.
Not so in the society of the Progressive Elitist. The characteristic ObamaCare program is already rationing medical care in Medicaid and Medicare by refusing operations and expensive drugs to those over 70, who are seen as an excessive burden to society. After all, not only do such people burden society with their medical costs, but they also take Social Security money. They produce little in the way of a tax revenue stream now. Similarly, newborn babies with severe problems are to receive less care in the frank acknowledgment that they will burden society with many years of education expenses before they will be generators of a tax revenue stream. Progressive Elitism robs us of our joy in the lives of others. It rubs the fact of our being forced to serve them in our faces. It forces us to become sullen slaves to their needs and wants. It forces us to become angry combatants for our own needs and wants. Among our own needs and wants is the avoidance of having to provide for the needs or wants of others if only because the hours of our own days and lives are limited. The Progressive Elitist society is suffused with stress and resentment. Everyone else becomes a burden upon us.
In the election on 6 November, we will be faced with many choices to either choose to enthusiastically embrace the Progressive Elitist viewpoint of society as Obama and Biden do, or to make a choice that recognizes at least a substantial part of the value of a limited government and private sector society more consistent with the American Principle put forth in our Declaration of Independence and our Constitution as Romney and Ryan do. We all need to decide whether we want to live in a society that makes nearly everyone else a value to us or one which makes nearly everyone else a burden to us. We need to decide whether we want to cooperate with others or whether we want to fight others for government power or for the limited resources of the Earth. This is the nature of the conflict between government limited to protecting our rights and socialist government which is supposed to provide for everyone's needs and wants. This is the nature of the rich and vibrant private sector choice and the big government choice. We must choose to recognize the fact of a complex and highly differentiated individuality or to refuse to see it. We have to decide whether we are pro-human or anti-human.
10 October 2012
Explanation for the Huge Surge in Part-Time Jobs in September
It has been pointed out that in years past, employment of 18 to 25 year olds has fallen drastically in September as students returned to college and gave up their summer jobs. Not this September. Also not last
September.
I suspect three things are going on here. One is that these last two summers, many fewer students were able to find jobs in the summer, so the student drop in employment in September was much less due to them returning to college. Another effect is that with college expenses having increased much more than family incomes have for many years and the actual loss of real family incomes over the last few years, many more students may have very part-time work-aid assignments at their colleges as part of their student-aid package. Finally, in the past, the BLS was inclined to ignore these very part-time college jobs and not count these students as employed while in college. What if they are now very assiduously counting these work aid students as part-time employed in the household survey? This would account for the strange increase in employment of 18 - 25 year olds these last two Septembers and for the huge increase in part-time jobs precisely in the month of September.
This is a very natural way for the Obama administration to make use of the students to help save his re-election chances. The Democrats have been very assiduous in courting students by forcing their parent's health insurance to allow them to be kept on their parent's policies until they are 26, by ever more heavily subsidizing their student loans, and by carefully indoctrinating them in the beliefs of the Progressive Elitists in dominant control of virtually every college campus. These students are in turn generally very enthusiastic supporters. The Democrats are child molesters, though in this case molesters of their underdeveloped minds. They give a great deal of thought of how to take advantage of them, so it is a natural thing that they thought of using their work-aid as a means to bolster the employment numbers just prior to the election.
Update, Afternoon of 10 October 2012:
That was an interesting idea, but on looking deeper into the BLS numbers in Table A-8 and Table A-9 in the September employment report, it does not hold water. Instead, we find something very different and still disturbing. First let us look at the change in employed by age from Table A-9 in September compared to August using the Not Seasonally Adjusted Numbers:
16-17 years, -130,000
18-19 years, -455,000
20-24 years, +101,000
25-34 years, +291,000
35-44 years, +249,000
45-54 years, +238,000
55 & older, +483,000
College students are mostly 18 - 21, so it is fairly clear that there is a net decrease in employment in those ages, so the work-study part-time work is not the explanation. The explanation is found in Table A-8, where we find that the major change in employment was in government workers. Government workers increased by 934,000!!!!! The more complete story in the Not Seasonally Adjusted numbers is:
Government workers, +934,000
Self-employed workers, unincorporated, +90,000
Agriculture and related industries, -53,000
Private households, +15,000
Other Industries, -221,000
So much as one would expect given the general sorry state of the economy, industry is shedding employees in large numbers and some of the unemployed are setting up their own micro-businesses. What on Earth is going on with this massive hiring of government workers though?
Teachers are mostly government workers and they do massively become employed again in September after being off for the summer. However, any seasonal adjustment should eliminate the annual effect of re-hiring teachers in September. So, we can examine the seasonally adjusted number of government employees and should see this number wiped out to the degree that it is teachers. It turns out that the seasonally adjusted number is only 106,000 lower! Now this makes no sense, since there are clearly many times 106,000 teachers who go back to public school jobs in September. Maybe if the adjustment was formulated over many years, the fact that more teachers may have found summer jobs in the past than could now might make for a smaller adjustment projected from the past onto the present.
The federal government has not been hiring massive numbers of new employees and the state and local governments are having trouble paying the employees they already have. It would appear that there was no adequate seasonal adjustment for the annual return of government-employed teachers to public schools! Whatever the case of the surge in the numbers of government workers, this is not an indication of any sort of recovery in the economy. On the contrary, the numbers indicate a worsening of the economy with the loss of 221,000 more jobs in industry. A gain of 934,000 government workers, even if actual, would not be indicative of an improving economy.
How could the BLS fail to make a seasonal adjustment on teachers that would not make their annual return to school look like a boom in hiring? How convenient for Obama that in the last employment report prior to the election they did not make this annual correction? All of those claims that the BLS is staffed with professional and incorruptible people are hard to support now.
I suspect three things are going on here. One is that these last two summers, many fewer students were able to find jobs in the summer, so the student drop in employment in September was much less due to them returning to college. Another effect is that with college expenses having increased much more than family incomes have for many years and the actual loss of real family incomes over the last few years, many more students may have very part-time work-aid assignments at their colleges as part of their student-aid package. Finally, in the past, the BLS was inclined to ignore these very part-time college jobs and not count these students as employed while in college. What if they are now very assiduously counting these work aid students as part-time employed in the household survey? This would account for the strange increase in employment of 18 - 25 year olds these last two Septembers and for the huge increase in part-time jobs precisely in the month of September.
This is a very natural way for the Obama administration to make use of the students to help save his re-election chances. The Democrats have been very assiduous in courting students by forcing their parent's health insurance to allow them to be kept on their parent's policies until they are 26, by ever more heavily subsidizing their student loans, and by carefully indoctrinating them in the beliefs of the Progressive Elitists in dominant control of virtually every college campus. These students are in turn generally very enthusiastic supporters. The Democrats are child molesters, though in this case molesters of their underdeveloped minds. They give a great deal of thought of how to take advantage of them, so it is a natural thing that they thought of using their work-aid as a means to bolster the employment numbers just prior to the election.
Update, Afternoon of 10 October 2012:
That was an interesting idea, but on looking deeper into the BLS numbers in Table A-8 and Table A-9 in the September employment report, it does not hold water. Instead, we find something very different and still disturbing. First let us look at the change in employed by age from Table A-9 in September compared to August using the Not Seasonally Adjusted Numbers:
16-17 years, -130,000
18-19 years, -455,000
20-24 years, +101,000
25-34 years, +291,000
35-44 years, +249,000
45-54 years, +238,000
55 & older, +483,000
College students are mostly 18 - 21, so it is fairly clear that there is a net decrease in employment in those ages, so the work-study part-time work is not the explanation. The explanation is found in Table A-8, where we find that the major change in employment was in government workers. Government workers increased by 934,000!!!!! The more complete story in the Not Seasonally Adjusted numbers is:
Government workers, +934,000
Self-employed workers, unincorporated, +90,000
Agriculture and related industries, -53,000
Private households, +15,000
Other Industries, -221,000
So much as one would expect given the general sorry state of the economy, industry is shedding employees in large numbers and some of the unemployed are setting up their own micro-businesses. What on Earth is going on with this massive hiring of government workers though?
Teachers are mostly government workers and they do massively become employed again in September after being off for the summer. However, any seasonal adjustment should eliminate the annual effect of re-hiring teachers in September. So, we can examine the seasonally adjusted number of government employees and should see this number wiped out to the degree that it is teachers. It turns out that the seasonally adjusted number is only 106,000 lower! Now this makes no sense, since there are clearly many times 106,000 teachers who go back to public school jobs in September. Maybe if the adjustment was formulated over many years, the fact that more teachers may have found summer jobs in the past than could now might make for a smaller adjustment projected from the past onto the present.
The federal government has not been hiring massive numbers of new employees and the state and local governments are having trouble paying the employees they already have. It would appear that there was no adequate seasonal adjustment for the annual return of government-employed teachers to public schools! Whatever the case of the surge in the numbers of government workers, this is not an indication of any sort of recovery in the economy. On the contrary, the numbers indicate a worsening of the economy with the loss of 221,000 more jobs in industry. A gain of 934,000 government workers, even if actual, would not be indicative of an improving economy.
How could the BLS fail to make a seasonal adjustment on teachers that would not make their annual return to school look like a boom in hiring? How convenient for Obama that in the last employment report prior to the election they did not make this annual correction? All of those claims that the BLS is staffed with professional and incorruptible people are hard to support now.
03 October 2012
Overall Impression of the First Presidential Debate
Romney was Chairman of the Board and Obama was a mid-level government bureaucrat.
29 September 2012
Obama: Women, I will give you $18,000 of birth control to vote for me.
Obama is implying that ObamaCare will provide young women with $18,000 of birth control pills and since Romney wants to repeal ObamaCare, women should vote for him. Here is the link to his Obama-Biden election site page with the bribe.
The government most certainly has no constitutional power authorizing it to be the supplier of birth control. For it to do so also creates a clear freedom of conscience or freedom of religion violation. Now, I have no objection at all to women using birth control, but this is not a cost that should be transferred to the general taxpayer.
It is also quite dishonest of Obama to imply that the value of this ObamaCare service is $18,000. A woman on birth control from age 15 to age 50 would in many locales be able to procure generic birth control pills for as little as $9 a month. Almost anywhere in the US the cost can be less than $20/month. This makes the lifetime cost wind up in the range from $3,800 to $8,400. To be sure, one can spend more like $90 a month on some of the newer types of birth control pills, but any effort on the part of ObamaCare to control costs would seem unlikely to provide that option to many women. But, if you are going to offer a bribe for a vote, you might as well try to inflate its value.
The government most certainly has no constitutional power authorizing it to be the supplier of birth control. For it to do so also creates a clear freedom of conscience or freedom of religion violation. Now, I have no objection at all to women using birth control, but this is not a cost that should be transferred to the general taxpayer.
It is also quite dishonest of Obama to imply that the value of this ObamaCare service is $18,000. A woman on birth control from age 15 to age 50 would in many locales be able to procure generic birth control pills for as little as $9 a month. Almost anywhere in the US the cost can be less than $20/month. This makes the lifetime cost wind up in the range from $3,800 to $8,400. To be sure, one can spend more like $90 a month on some of the newer types of birth control pills, but any effort on the part of ObamaCare to control costs would seem unlikely to provide that option to many women. But, if you are going to offer a bribe for a vote, you might as well try to inflate its value.
11 September 2012
Examining the 11 September Washington Post/ABC Poll
The Washington Post/ABC presidential poll of 11 September 2012 says that Obama leads Romney by 50% to 44% among registered voters and by 49% to 48% among likely voters. This is not really the correct result of this poll. In their poll, the respondents broke down by party affiliation as follows:
Democrats, 33%
Republican, 23%
Independent, 37%
Other, 4%
Don't Know, 3%
So the poll result among registered voters is that for which Democrat affiliation exceeds Republican affiliation by 10%! According to a Rasmussen Report of polling in August 2012, the breakdown by party affiliation is actually:
Democrats, 33.3%
Republican, 37.6%
Other, 29.2%
The Republicans have a 4.3% advantage in party affiliation, not the 10% disadvantage of the WP/ABC poll. Consequently, the poll claim that Obama leads Romney by 50% to 44% among registered voters is nonsense. Let us assume that we can at least use the poll results for the percentage of Democrats, Republicans, and Independents who will vote for either Obama or Romney and recalculate the results with a proper weighting by party affiliation. The poll says that:
Democrats will vote 91% for Obama and 5% for Romney.
Republicans will vote 6% for Obama and 89% for Romney.
Independents will vote 46% for Obama and 48% for Romney.
Now, I have a suspicion that just as the poll over-samples both Democrats and Independents, it also over-samples middle roader Republicans, given the higher vote percentage among Democrats for Obama than Romney gets among Republicans. But, let us use these percentages anyway and combine them with the Rasmussen party affiliation results. In addition, let us assume that among the Rasmussen others, about 4% are going to vote for the Libertarian, Green, Socialist Workers, or whatever other micro-party candidates are running. I am taking the Independents to be 25.1% of the voters. The registered voter result is then:
Obama: (0.91)(33.3%) + (0.06)(37.6%) + (0.46)(25.1%) = 44.1%
Romney: (0.05)(33.3%) + (0.89)(37.6%) + (0.48)(25.1%) = 47.2%
Thus by declared party affiliation, Romney leads Obama by 47.2% to 44.1%. This is a Romney advantage of 3.1%. When the WP/ABC poll made likely voter corrections, the big change was due to their assumption that Romney's advantage among Independent voters would increase from 2% to 11%. Applying their expected likely voter percentages to the party affiliation percentages of Rasmussen, one gets the likely voter result:
Obama: (0.94)(33.3%) + (0.06)(37.6%) + (0.43)(25.1%) = 44.4%
Romney: (0.05)(33.3%) + (0.91)(37.6%) + (0.54)(25.1%) = 49.4%
So the likely voter advantage for Romney over Obama is 5.0%! Now, I am not highly confident in the adjustments the WP/ABC poll makes for likely voters, but the Romney advantage in registered voter results of 3.1% will likely grow at the polls due to the likely higher turn-out of Republicans and those Independents favoring Romney.
Of course, if Romney does win the popular vote by 5%, it is extremely unlikely that he will not also win the electoral vote.
Democrats, 33%
Republican, 23%
Independent, 37%
Other, 4%
Don't Know, 3%
So the poll result among registered voters is that for which Democrat affiliation exceeds Republican affiliation by 10%! According to a Rasmussen Report of polling in August 2012, the breakdown by party affiliation is actually:
Democrats, 33.3%
Republican, 37.6%
Other, 29.2%
The Republicans have a 4.3% advantage in party affiliation, not the 10% disadvantage of the WP/ABC poll. Consequently, the poll claim that Obama leads Romney by 50% to 44% among registered voters is nonsense. Let us assume that we can at least use the poll results for the percentage of Democrats, Republicans, and Independents who will vote for either Obama or Romney and recalculate the results with a proper weighting by party affiliation. The poll says that:
Democrats will vote 91% for Obama and 5% for Romney.
Republicans will vote 6% for Obama and 89% for Romney.
Independents will vote 46% for Obama and 48% for Romney.
Now, I have a suspicion that just as the poll over-samples both Democrats and Independents, it also over-samples middle roader Republicans, given the higher vote percentage among Democrats for Obama than Romney gets among Republicans. But, let us use these percentages anyway and combine them with the Rasmussen party affiliation results. In addition, let us assume that among the Rasmussen others, about 4% are going to vote for the Libertarian, Green, Socialist Workers, or whatever other micro-party candidates are running. I am taking the Independents to be 25.1% of the voters. The registered voter result is then:
Obama: (0.91)(33.3%) + (0.06)(37.6%) + (0.46)(25.1%) = 44.1%
Romney: (0.05)(33.3%) + (0.89)(37.6%) + (0.48)(25.1%) = 47.2%
Thus by declared party affiliation, Romney leads Obama by 47.2% to 44.1%. This is a Romney advantage of 3.1%. When the WP/ABC poll made likely voter corrections, the big change was due to their assumption that Romney's advantage among Independent voters would increase from 2% to 11%. Applying their expected likely voter percentages to the party affiliation percentages of Rasmussen, one gets the likely voter result:
Obama: (0.94)(33.3%) + (0.06)(37.6%) + (0.43)(25.1%) = 44.4%
Romney: (0.05)(33.3%) + (0.91)(37.6%) + (0.54)(25.1%) = 49.4%
So the likely voter advantage for Romney over Obama is 5.0%! Now, I am not highly confident in the adjustments the WP/ABC poll makes for likely voters, but the Romney advantage in registered voter results of 3.1% will likely grow at the polls due to the likely higher turn-out of Republicans and those Independents favoring Romney.
Of course, if Romney does win the popular vote by 5%, it is extremely unlikely that he will not also win the electoral vote.
22 August 2012
State Unemployment and Election Consequences
Looking at state unemployment percentages and their changes over the last year for the purpose of trying to envision the effect upon the November presidential election is difficult. This is because the unemployment percentages become meaningless due to people dropping out of the workforce in this interminable Great Socialist Recession. We also know the seasonal adjustments are suspect due to unusual effects in this very long jobs recession. Fortunately, the one really useful table for dealing with election effects in the Bureau of Labor Statistics State Unemployment Report based on July 2012 data is Table 4. This table provides Labor Force Data without Seasonal Adjustment. Unfortunately real employment numbers are not given, but the workforce number is very important in its own right.
Clearly, the people of a state whose civilian labor force is shrinking are likely to feel as their state economy is hurting and are likely by now to hold this against Obama. A shrinking workforce means that the sum of the people employed or considered by the BLS to be actively seeking work has become smaller in the time from July 2011 to July 2012 in Table 4. If the number is shrinking, then employment is not growing and/or discouraged people have given up looking for work. Even when a workforce is growing, this is not necessarily adequate growth for a growing population. We have to remember that from 2000 to 2010, the Census told us that the population grew by 1.0% a year. In normal times, this would mean that unless employment grew by 1% a year, unemployment would go up.
From July 2011 to July 2012, the workforce actually contracted in the following states:
New Mexico, leaning to Obama
Ohio
Oregon, leaning to Obama
The people of these states should be furious at what Obama and the Democrats have done to the economy to keep it from recovering from the recession. Of course the people of Connecticut and Hawaii do not have nearly enough sense to be furious, but there should be numerous people in the other states who will be as they think more and more about how miserable they are in this never-ending recession. The states in red are pretty certain for Romney, while those in blue are certain for Obama. The other states in black should be feeling a substantial desire to turn to Romney to help end their woes as the people of those states think more a and more about who they will vote for in November. Iowa, Ohio, and Nevada are generally thought to be swing states in the election, while New Mexico and Oregon are thought to be leaning to Obama, but may prove unstable with time and may require Obama to spend some time campaigning in them so he will not lose them.
Among the swing states and those which may not be solid for either candidate presently which failed to increase their workforce by 1% to keep up with the average national population growth are these states with the percentage increase in the workforce in the last year:
Colorado, 0.4%
Florida, 0.5%
Maine, leaning to Obama, 0.9%
Michigan, 0.3%
Minnesota, leaning to Obama, 0.1%
New Hampshire, 0.3%
North Carolina, 0.2%
Virginia, 0.9%
Wisconsin, 0.3%
Only Maine and Virginia managed to generate workforce growth above 0.5%. The average workforce growth for these critical electoral vote states was only 0.43%.
We find that every one of the swing states or states that are tenuous now for Obama is on one of these two lists. This presents a strong opportunity for the Romney-Ryan ticket to build its electoral vote count enough to win the election. In fact, the people of these states will have to be very disappointingly unobservant if they do not turn strongly toward the pro-private sector Republican ticket with its interest in strong businesses, many more jobs, and a lower cost of living. Romney could well win Iowa, Nevada, Ohio, Colorado, Florida, Michigan, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Virginia, and Wisconsin based on their workforce weakness over the last year. This would give Romney a 317 to 221 electoral vote win over Obama. This is close to my 25 June prediction here.
Clearly, the people of a state whose civilian labor force is shrinking are likely to feel as their state economy is hurting and are likely by now to hold this against Obama. A shrinking workforce means that the sum of the people employed or considered by the BLS to be actively seeking work has become smaller in the time from July 2011 to July 2012 in Table 4. If the number is shrinking, then employment is not growing and/or discouraged people have given up looking for work. Even when a workforce is growing, this is not necessarily adequate growth for a growing population. We have to remember that from 2000 to 2010, the Census told us that the population grew by 1.0% a year. In normal times, this would mean that unless employment grew by 1% a year, unemployment would go up.
From July 2011 to July 2012, the workforce actually contracted in the following states:
Alabama
Arizona
Connecticut
Hawaii
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Missouri
NevadaNew Mexico, leaning to Obama
Ohio
Oregon, leaning to Obama
South Carolina
South Dakota
Tennessee
The people of these states should be furious at what Obama and the Democrats have done to the economy to keep it from recovering from the recession. Of course the people of Connecticut and Hawaii do not have nearly enough sense to be furious, but there should be numerous people in the other states who will be as they think more and more about how miserable they are in this never-ending recession. The states in red are pretty certain for Romney, while those in blue are certain for Obama. The other states in black should be feeling a substantial desire to turn to Romney to help end their woes as the people of those states think more a and more about who they will vote for in November. Iowa, Ohio, and Nevada are generally thought to be swing states in the election, while New Mexico and Oregon are thought to be leaning to Obama, but may prove unstable with time and may require Obama to spend some time campaigning in them so he will not lose them.
Among the swing states and those which may not be solid for either candidate presently which failed to increase their workforce by 1% to keep up with the average national population growth are these states with the percentage increase in the workforce in the last year:
Colorado, 0.4%
Florida, 0.5%
Maine, leaning to Obama, 0.9%
Michigan, 0.3%
Minnesota, leaning to Obama, 0.1%
New Hampshire, 0.3%
North Carolina, 0.2%
Virginia, 0.9%
Wisconsin, 0.3%
Only Maine and Virginia managed to generate workforce growth above 0.5%. The average workforce growth for these critical electoral vote states was only 0.43%.
We find that every one of the swing states or states that are tenuous now for Obama is on one of these two lists. This presents a strong opportunity for the Romney-Ryan ticket to build its electoral vote count enough to win the election. In fact, the people of these states will have to be very disappointingly unobservant if they do not turn strongly toward the pro-private sector Republican ticket with its interest in strong businesses, many more jobs, and a lower cost of living. Romney could well win Iowa, Nevada, Ohio, Colorado, Florida, Michigan, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Virginia, and Wisconsin based on their workforce weakness over the last year. This would give Romney a 317 to 221 electoral vote win over Obama. This is close to my 25 June prediction here.
More Obama Misdirection in Campaign Ad
This last weekend, I saw an Obama ad actually endorsed by him that sought to push Romney to release more tax returns and made the claim that Romney "paid only 14% in taxes -- probably less than you." I believe this was a fallacious and misleading claim, but PolitiFact.com ruled it true by ignoring the context of the ad with a giant switcheroo.
The Obama ad is a discussion of Romney's tax returns, which report on his income taxes. One naturally assumes that the final statement by Obama that Romney probably paid less in taxes than you means that he probably paid less than you in income taxes. So, let us discuss the truth of Obama's claim based on income taxes reported on the income tax forms Obama is demanding Romney add to those already released.
I was stunned because most Americans who pay any attention to politics, government, and the economy are well aware that about 46 - 48% of Americans pay no income tax at all. Immediately this would make one think it is unlikely that half of Americans are paying 14% in taxes on their Adjusted Gross Income (AGI). In fact in 2011, Romney paid a 15.37% average effective tax rate on his AGI and he claims he paid 13% or more in every one of the last ten years. This contradicts Biden's claim that he often paid no taxes in this period of time. Apparently, Biden's unnamed source was rather impeachable, as is Biden's intellect.
The median household income in 2010 was $47,022. According to Table 3.4 of an IRS study of 2010 Individual Income Tax Returns, broken down by tax brackets, one can estimate an upper bound on the average effective tax rate on AGI for a taxpayer with median income. 142.89 million individual tax returns were filed in 2010, we can examine when we reach half this number of tax returns (71,446,026 returns) as we work down the column in the table of tax returns by margin tax rate. Including all returns with a marginal tax rate of 10% or less, we have accounted for 63,744,030 returns. The next group in the table is 42,321,591 returns in the 15% marginal tax bracket without capital gains. Adding this to the lower tax brackets takes us way over the mid-point number on the returns of 71.45 million to 106.07 million returns. The median return is clearly among the first one-fifth of the returns in this large group of returns. Nonetheless, the average effective tax for this entire 15% marginal tax rate bracket group is only 5.1% of AGI. The 10% tax bracket that brought us close to the median return paid an average tax of only 0.7%, so it is likely that the median return paid substantially less than 5.1% of AGI!
So, the Obama ad claim that you probably paid more taxes than Romney is false. But no, according to PolitiFact.com, the Obama claim is true. How do they substantiate this claim? Well they decide that Obama, the context of the remainder of the ad notwithstanding, was talking about the sum of income and payroll taxes. Of course, they choose not to add in property taxes because that is not something the Democrats wish to consider when they talk about comparing the taxes of the rich and the median person. According to our Democrat politicians, the Medicare and Social Security money extracted from our paychecks by unpaid tax collecting employers goes into a lock box and is paid back to us when we retire or reach age 65. They like to call it an insurance premium which will lead to payouts to us in retirement which scale in accordance with the amount of premiums we paid in. But in this context it is convenient to forget all that and treat this payroll extraction as general tax money and forget that Romney gets a worse deal in payback even than the median taxpayer does from these extractions.
Now most people have an employer who according to the government pays half of the Medicare tax and, generally, half of the Social Security tax. So, the employee's share of Medicare is 1.45% and his usual share of Social Security, before the recent 2% reduction of limited duration, was 6.2%. Adding these together would produce an upper bound average tax payment on AGI of 12.75% in normal times, but of only 10.75% in 2011. This is lower still than Romney's effective tax rate.
Oh, but wait. The truth, always suppressed by Democrats otherwise, is that it is a fiction that the 6.2% for Social Security and the 1.45% for Medicare paid by the employer is really paid by the employer. People who are self-employed pay it all and those who work for an employer are actually paid less by that amount because of this extraction. That money would have been paid to the employee in the market for labor if it were not siphoned off by the government instead. This is the argument of the Tax Policy Center of the liberal Brookings Institute. As a result they add in both the employee's and the employer's extractions for Social Security and Medicare and claim that the median taxpayer probably does pay more tax than does Romney.
If the Democrat fiction on employer contributions to Social Security and Medicare were maintained, then Romney could claim his share of those payments as a shareholder in many companies with many employees and show that he paid a much, much larger tax due to his huge employer tax payments! But it does not work that way. Inventive approaches to issues are the province of Democrats only. Republicans are usually too straightforward to make such arguments and if they did, the Progressive media would raise an incredible fuss!
We really ought to also remember that the many companies partially owned by Romney as a shareholder may have paid the world's highest corporate taxes on any profits they made. They also spent a fortune on foolish laws, mandates, and regulations arising from local, state, and federal governments for vanishingly small or non-existent benefits for Americans generally. More and more, these governments delight in moving the expenses of gifts to others, commonly to special interests, to the accounts of businesses in the private sector. The governments are awash in red ink, or they would be if they were forced to do the kind of accounting that businesses are forced to do by governments. So, they force businesses to pick up the tab more and more often without regard to the impact on lower profitability, less hiring, less capital investment, and more bankruptcies for businesses. Not only does Romney pay out huge sums on his investment in many companies making these government mandated payments, but he also pays a capital gains tax on any money earned by him due to sales of appreciating stock. Romney does much more than his fair share in supporting the cost of government.
The Obama ad is a discussion of Romney's tax returns, which report on his income taxes. One naturally assumes that the final statement by Obama that Romney probably paid less in taxes than you means that he probably paid less than you in income taxes. So, let us discuss the truth of Obama's claim based on income taxes reported on the income tax forms Obama is demanding Romney add to those already released.
I was stunned because most Americans who pay any attention to politics, government, and the economy are well aware that about 46 - 48% of Americans pay no income tax at all. Immediately this would make one think it is unlikely that half of Americans are paying 14% in taxes on their Adjusted Gross Income (AGI). In fact in 2011, Romney paid a 15.37% average effective tax rate on his AGI and he claims he paid 13% or more in every one of the last ten years. This contradicts Biden's claim that he often paid no taxes in this period of time. Apparently, Biden's unnamed source was rather impeachable, as is Biden's intellect.
The median household income in 2010 was $47,022. According to Table 3.4 of an IRS study of 2010 Individual Income Tax Returns, broken down by tax brackets, one can estimate an upper bound on the average effective tax rate on AGI for a taxpayer with median income. 142.89 million individual tax returns were filed in 2010, we can examine when we reach half this number of tax returns (71,446,026 returns) as we work down the column in the table of tax returns by margin tax rate. Including all returns with a marginal tax rate of 10% or less, we have accounted for 63,744,030 returns. The next group in the table is 42,321,591 returns in the 15% marginal tax bracket without capital gains. Adding this to the lower tax brackets takes us way over the mid-point number on the returns of 71.45 million to 106.07 million returns. The median return is clearly among the first one-fifth of the returns in this large group of returns. Nonetheless, the average effective tax for this entire 15% marginal tax rate bracket group is only 5.1% of AGI. The 10% tax bracket that brought us close to the median return paid an average tax of only 0.7%, so it is likely that the median return paid substantially less than 5.1% of AGI!
So, the Obama ad claim that you probably paid more taxes than Romney is false. But no, according to PolitiFact.com, the Obama claim is true. How do they substantiate this claim? Well they decide that Obama, the context of the remainder of the ad notwithstanding, was talking about the sum of income and payroll taxes. Of course, they choose not to add in property taxes because that is not something the Democrats wish to consider when they talk about comparing the taxes of the rich and the median person. According to our Democrat politicians, the Medicare and Social Security money extracted from our paychecks by unpaid tax collecting employers goes into a lock box and is paid back to us when we retire or reach age 65. They like to call it an insurance premium which will lead to payouts to us in retirement which scale in accordance with the amount of premiums we paid in. But in this context it is convenient to forget all that and treat this payroll extraction as general tax money and forget that Romney gets a worse deal in payback even than the median taxpayer does from these extractions.
Now most people have an employer who according to the government pays half of the Medicare tax and, generally, half of the Social Security tax. So, the employee's share of Medicare is 1.45% and his usual share of Social Security, before the recent 2% reduction of limited duration, was 6.2%. Adding these together would produce an upper bound average tax payment on AGI of 12.75% in normal times, but of only 10.75% in 2011. This is lower still than Romney's effective tax rate.
Oh, but wait. The truth, always suppressed by Democrats otherwise, is that it is a fiction that the 6.2% for Social Security and the 1.45% for Medicare paid by the employer is really paid by the employer. People who are self-employed pay it all and those who work for an employer are actually paid less by that amount because of this extraction. That money would have been paid to the employee in the market for labor if it were not siphoned off by the government instead. This is the argument of the Tax Policy Center of the liberal Brookings Institute. As a result they add in both the employee's and the employer's extractions for Social Security and Medicare and claim that the median taxpayer probably does pay more tax than does Romney.
If the Democrat fiction on employer contributions to Social Security and Medicare were maintained, then Romney could claim his share of those payments as a shareholder in many companies with many employees and show that he paid a much, much larger tax due to his huge employer tax payments! But it does not work that way. Inventive approaches to issues are the province of Democrats only. Republicans are usually too straightforward to make such arguments and if they did, the Progressive media would raise an incredible fuss!
We really ought to also remember that the many companies partially owned by Romney as a shareholder may have paid the world's highest corporate taxes on any profits they made. They also spent a fortune on foolish laws, mandates, and regulations arising from local, state, and federal governments for vanishingly small or non-existent benefits for Americans generally. More and more, these governments delight in moving the expenses of gifts to others, commonly to special interests, to the accounts of businesses in the private sector. The governments are awash in red ink, or they would be if they were forced to do the kind of accounting that businesses are forced to do by governments. So, they force businesses to pick up the tab more and more often without regard to the impact on lower profitability, less hiring, less capital investment, and more bankruptcies for businesses. Not only does Romney pay out huge sums on his investment in many companies making these government mandated payments, but he also pays a capital gains tax on any money earned by him due to sales of appreciating stock. Romney does much more than his fair share in supporting the cost of government.
07 October 2010
Repealing ObamaCare and the Senate Races of 2010
Updated 11 Oct 2010: Only changed race is the New York Senate seat becoming Likely DEM, rather than Leans DEM.
If the tyrannical ObamaCare takeover of our lives and very bodies is to be repealed, it is essential to establish a super-majority of Republicans in the Senate by the time of the 2012 election. That super-majority combined with a Republican President will be able to repeal ObamaCare. But, barely more than a third of the Senate seats come up for election every two years, so this 2010 election cycle is absolutely critical for getting halfway to the goal of 60 Republican Senators. Yes, it is possible that 58 Republican Senators and a couple of awakened and fearful Democrat Senators might allow the repeal of ObamaCare, but it never pays to count on the rationality of a Democrat on a political issue. They commonly hold completely nonsensical viewpoints on welfare, spending, the role and size of government, redistribution of income and wealth, minimum wage laws, energy mandates, catastrophic man-made global warming, central planning, and anything to do with the economy and business.
Let us list the current evaluation of the Senate races in play from RealClearPolitics:
Oregon, D, Wyden, Republican Candidate: Jim Huffman
New York, D, Gillibrand, Republican Candidate: Joe DiGuardi
Toss-Up
Leans GOP:
It would be a very good investment in your freedom and that of those you love to contribute as much campaign money as you can to the Republican candidates in the Toss-Up and Leans GOP or Leans DEM races.
If the tyrannical ObamaCare takeover of our lives and very bodies is to be repealed, it is essential to establish a super-majority of Republicans in the Senate by the time of the 2012 election. That super-majority combined with a Republican President will be able to repeal ObamaCare. But, barely more than a third of the Senate seats come up for election every two years, so this 2010 election cycle is absolutely critical for getting halfway to the goal of 60 Republican Senators. Yes, it is possible that 58 Republican Senators and a couple of awakened and fearful Democrat Senators might allow the repeal of ObamaCare, but it never pays to count on the rationality of a Democrat on a political issue. They commonly hold completely nonsensical viewpoints on welfare, spending, the role and size of government, redistribution of income and wealth, minimum wage laws, energy mandates, catastrophic man-made global warming, central planning, and anything to do with the economy and business.
Let us list the current evaluation of the Senate races in play from RealClearPolitics:
Likely DEM:
Delaware, D, High Tax Marxist Running for Open Seat, Republican Candidate: Christine O'DonnellOregon, D, Wyden, Republican Candidate: Jim Huffman
New York, D, Gillibrand, Republican Candidate: Joe DiGuardi
Leans DEM:
Connecticut, D, Open Seat, Republican Candidate: Linda McMahonToss-Up
California, D, Boxer, Republican Candidate: Carly Fiorina
Colorado, D, Bennet, Republican Candidate: Ken Buck
Illinois, D, Open Seat, Republican Candidate: Mark Kirk
Nevada, D, Reid, Republican Candidate: Sharron Angle
Washington, D, Murray, Republican Candidate: Dino Rossi
West Virginia, D, Open, Republican Candidate: John RaeseLeans GOP:
Kentucky, R, Open Seat, Republican Candidate: Rand Paul
Missouri, R, Open Seat, Republican Candidate: Roy Blunt
New Hampshire, R, Open Seat, Republican Candidate: Kelly Ayotte
Pennsylvania, D, Open Seat, Republican Candidate: Pat Toomey
Wisconsin, D, Feingold, Republican Candidate: Ron Johnson
Likely GOP:
Alaska, R, Open Seat, Republican Candidate: Joe Miller
Florida, R, Open Seat, Republican Candidate: Marco Rubio
Indiana, D, Open Seat, Republican Candidate: Dan Coats
Louisiana, R, Vitter, Republican Candidate: David Vitter
North Carolina, R, Burr, Republican Candidate: Richard Burr
Ohio, R, Open Seat, Republican Candidate: Rob Portman
It would be a very good investment in your freedom and that of those you love to contribute as much campaign money as you can to the Republican candidates in the Toss-Up and Leans GOP or Leans DEM races.
04 October 2010
ObamaCare and the Close Races for Seats in the House
1 Nov 2010 Update: DEM Seats: 2 Safe DEM became Likely DEM, 3 Likely DEM became Leans DEM, 9 Leans DEM became Toss-up, 1 Leans DEM became Leans GOP, 4 Toss-ups became Leans GOP, 2 Leans GOP became Likely GOP, 3 Leans GOP became Toss-ups, 2 Toss-ups became Leans DEM; GOP Seats: 1 Likely GOP became Leans GOP. The change is the DEM Seats moved 17 categories toward the GOP advantage, while GOP Seats moved 1 category to the DEM advantage. The shift remains continuous toward the Republicans. I now expect the GOP to pick up 68 seats in the House.
25 Oct 2010 Update: DEM Seats: 2 Likely DEM became Leans DEM, 3 Leans DEM became Toss-ups, 10 Toss-ups become Leans GOP, 1 Leans GOP becomes Likely GOP, 1 Leans GOP becomes Toss-up, 2 Toss-ups become Leans DEM, 1 Leans DEM becomes Likely DEM, GOP Seats: No Changes. The sum of the Safe GOP, Likely GOP, and Leans GOP seats would give the GOP 222 seats, or 4 more than the majority. I expect the GOP to win about 20 of the 34 Toss-up seats given the momentum of more and more DEM seats becoming more and more at risk. The GOP should gain about 64 seats and have 242 seats in the next session of the House of Representatives!
19 Oct 2010 Update: DEM Seats: 2 Likely DEM became Leans DEM, 4 Leans DEM became Toss-ups, 1 Toss-up became Leans GOP; GOP Seats: 1 Leans DEM became Toss-up, 1 Likely GOP became Leans GOP. Mostly Democrat seats continue to move toward being more contested. The situation for GOP seats is more static and it remains true that they are not moving seats into Likely GOP or into Safe GOP.
16 Oct 2010 Update: DEM Seats: 9 Safe DEM became Likely DEM, 3 Likely DEM became Leans DEM, 3 Leans DEM became Toss-ups, 2 Toss-ups became Leans GOP, 1 Toss-up became Leans DEM, 1 Leans GOP became a Toss-up, GOP Seats: 1 Toss-up became a Leans DEM. The change is that fewer and fewer Democrat seats are safe, but that the Republicans cannot lock additional seats as safe. Apparently the People are sending the message they are unhappy with the DEMS but not so sure about the GOP either.
12 Oct 2010 Update: DEM Seats: 3 Safe DEM became Likely DEM, 2 Likely DEM became Leans DEM, One Leans DEM became Toss-up, One Toss-up became Leans GOP, and one Leans GOP became Likely GOP, GOP Seats: One Likely GOP became Leans GOP, The change remains massively in GOP favor!
11 Oct 2010 Update: DEM Seats: 2 Safe DEM became Likely DEM, 1 Likely DEM became Leans DEM, GOP Seats: No changes, The change favors the GOP.
7 Oct 2010 Update: DEM Seats: 2 Safe Seats became DEM Likely, 3 Leans DEM became Toss-ups, 2 Toss-ups became Leans GOP, 1 Leans GOP became Likely GOP, 1 Likely GOP became Leans GOP, GOP Seats: 1 Leans DEM became Toss-up, The change favors the GOP.
The single most egregious act of Obama and the Democrat Congress was the passage of ObamaCare. This act implements the planned theft of every American's body and the imposition of a tyrannical control by bureaucrats over who lives and who dies. The most important outcome of the election in November is to put control of the House of Representatives in the hands of Representatives who will use the power of the House to initiate expenditures to prevent the funding of ObamaCare. Steve King, a Republican Representative from Iowa, has made a motion to discharge a number of committees from considering H.R. 4972 to repeal ObamaCare. Most, but not all, Republican members of the House have signed this motion. Only one Democrat has signed it, that being Gene Taylor, of Mississippi, who is in a tight race to retain his seat. I have put the name of the Republican opponent to those who voted for ObamaCare at the end of the line for each of the tyrannical beasts of the House of Representatives.
RealClearPolitics as of 2 October had the races for the House evaluated as follows:
139 [now 137] [now 135] [now 132] [now 123] [now 121] Seats Safe for Democrats, all of which were Democrat
18 [now 20] [now 21] [now 22] [now 28] [now 26] [now 25] [now 24] Seats Likely Democratic, all of which are held by Democrats now
33 [now 29] [now 30] [now 31] [now 33] [now 30] [now 31] [now 26] Seats Leaning Democrat, all but 3 [2] [3] [2] of which are now held by Democrats
38 [now 39] [now 43] [now 34] [now 40] Seats Rated Toss-ups, all but 1 [2] [1] [2] of which are now held by Democrats
30 [now 33] [now 34] [now 35] [now 37] [now 45] [now 46] Seats that Leans GOP, all but 2 [4] [5] [6] of which are now held by Democrats
14 [now 13] [now 14] [now 15] Seats that are Likely GOP, 9 [8] [7] [6] of which are now held by Republicans
163 Seats Safe for the Republicans
11 races shifted by one category of probability since the original post. 10 of those shifts were favorable to the Republicans. Only Virginia District 5 moved in favor of the Democrats, shifting from Likely GOP to Leans GOP.
Because Nancy Pelosi had votes to spare on ObamaCare, a few of the Democrat majority from much less socialist districts than hers were given permission to vote against the bill. Since what matters in the next session of Congress is the defunding of ObamaCare, there is no point in voting for a would-be member of the House who has not announced his intent to relentlessly attack ObamaCare by signing the discharge motion. For those who want to destroy the tyranny of ObamaCare, it is a very good idea to make campaign contributions to the Republican opponent of the Democrats in close races who either voted for ObamaCare or who have not signed the motion to discharge to indicate they are actual proponents of the repeal of ObamaCare.
Generally speaking, there will be very few Democrats who will ever be useful allies in the critical cause of overturning centrally planned and controlled medical care in the United States, which the pretended fiscal conservativism of the Blue Dog Democrats has proven. I have indicated which Democrats are in the Blue Dog Caucus, which mostly just means that they pretend to their constituents that they are fiscally conservative and says very little about how they vote in Congress. In addition, I have identified those who are members of the Democratic Socialists of America Caucus. Of the 70 socialist Representatives, only 10 are in close races, despite Americans general turn-away from socialism. These socialist Representatives should be especially targeted. The closely contested races by state are:
Alabama
Bobby Bright, D, 2nd District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
Parker Griffith, R, 5th District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare
Arkansas
Marion Berry, D, 1st District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
Mike Ross, D, 4th District, Likely DEM, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
Vic Snyder, D, 2nd District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare
Arizona
Gabrielle Giffords, D, 8th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Jesse Kelly
Raul Grijalva, D, 7th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Ruth McClung, Was Safe DEM, Was Likely DEM, Was Leans DEM
Ann Kirkpatrick, D, 1st District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Was Toss-up, Opp. Paul Gosar
Harry Mitchell, D, 5th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. David Schweikert
John Shadegg, R, 3rd District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge, Was Likely GOP
California
Mary Bono, R, 45th District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge
Dennis Cardoza, D, 18th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Mike Berryhill
Jim Costa, D, 20th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Andy Vidak, Was Toss-up
Daniel Lungren, R, 3rd District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge
Jerry McNerney, D, 11th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. David Harmer, Was Toss-up
Loretta Sanchez, D, 47th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Van Tran
Colorado
Betsy Markey, D, 4th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Cory Gardner
Ed Perlmutter, D, 7th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Ryan Frazier
John Salazar, D, 3rd District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Scott Tipton
Connecticut
Joe Courtney, D, 2nd District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Was Safe DEM, Opp. Janet Peckinpaugh
Jim Hines, D, 4th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Dan Debicella, Was Leans DEM
John Larson, D, 1st District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Was Safe DEM, Opp. Ann Brickley
Christopher Murphy, D, 5th District, Toss-Up, Yes on ObamaCar, Was Leans DEM, Opp. Sam Caligiuri
Florida
Allen Boyd, D, 2nd District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Steve Southerland, Was Toss-up
Mario Diaz-Balart, R, 25th District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge, Was Likely GOP
Alan Grayson, D, 8th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Dan Webster
Ron Klein, D, 22nd District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Allen West, Was Toss-up
Suzanne Kosmas, D, 24th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Sandy Adams
Adam Putnam, R, 12th District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge
Georgia
John Barrow, D, 12th District, Likely DEM, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
Sanford Bishop, D, 2nd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Mike Keown
Jim Marshall, D, 8th District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Toss-up
Hawaii
Charles Djou, R, 1st District, Toss-up, Special Election after ObamaCare Vote, Was Leans DEM
Idaho
Walt Minnick, D, 1st District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Likely DEM
Illinois
Melissa Bean, D, 8th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Joe Walsh
Bill Foster, D, 14th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Randy Hultgren, Was Toss-up
Phil Hare, D, 17th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Bob Schilling, Was Toss-up
Deborah Halvorson, D, 11th District, Likely GOP, Yes on ObamaCar, Was Leans GOP, Opp. Adam Kinzinger
Mark Kirk, R, 10th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Running for Senate, Was Toss-up, Was Leans DEM
Indiana
Joe Donnelly, D, 2nd District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Jackie Walorski, Was Leans DEM
Brad Ellsworth, D, 8th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Larry Bucshon
Baron Hill, D, 9th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Todd Young, Was Toss-up
Iowa
Leonard Boswell, D, 3rd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Brad Zaun, Was Toss-up
Bruce Braley, D, 1st District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Ben Lange, Was Leans DEM, Was Toss-up
David Loebsack, D, 2nd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Mariannette Miller-Meeks
Kansas
Dennis Moore, D, 3rd District, Likely GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Kevin Yoder, Was Leans GOP
Kentucky
Ben Chandler, D, 6th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Leans DEM
John Yarmuth, D, 3rd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Todd Lally
Louisiana
Joseph Cao, R, 2nd District, Leans DEM, No on ObamaCare
Charlie Melancon, D, 3rd District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
Chellie Pingree, D, 1st District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Dean Scontras, Was Leans DEM
Maryland
Frank Kratovil, D, 1st District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
Barney Frank, D, 4th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Sean Bielat, Was Likely DEM
John Tierney, D, 6th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Bill Hudak
Niki Tsongas, D, 5th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Jon Golvick
Michigan
John Dingell, D, 15th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Rob Steele
Gary Peters, D, 9th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Rocky Roczkowski
Mark Schauer, D, 7th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Tim Walberg, Was Leans GOP
Bart Stupak, D, 1st District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Retiring, Opp. Dan Benishek
Minnesota
Michele Bachmann, R, 6th District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge
James Oberstar, D, 8th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Was Safe DEM, Opp. Chip Cravaack, Was Likely DEM, Was Leans DEM
Timothy Walz, D, 1st District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Randy Demmer
Collin Peterson, D, 7th District, Likely DEM, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Safe DEM
Mississippi
Travis Childers, D, 1st District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare
Gene Taylor, D, 4th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Leans DEM
Benny Thompson, D, 1st District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Bill Marcy
Missouri
Russ Carnaham, D, 3rd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Ed Martin, Was Likely DEM
Emanuel Cleaver, D, 5th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Jacob Turk, Was Safe
Ike Skelton, D, 4th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare
New Hampshire
Paul Hodes, D, 2nd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Charlie Bass, Was Toss-up
Carol Shea-Porter, D, 1st District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Frank Guinta
New Jersey
John Adler, D, 3rd District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Was Toss-up
Rush Holt, D, 12th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Scott Sipprelle
Frank Pallone, D, 6th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCar, Was Safe DEM, Opp. Anna Little
New Mexico
Martin Heinrich, D, 1st District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Jon Barela, Was Toss-up
Ben Lujan, D, 3rd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp Tom Mullins
Harry Teague, D, 2nd District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Was Toss-up
Brian Higgins, D, 27th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Lenny Roberto, Was Safe DEM
Maurice Hinchey, 22nd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America, Caucus, Opp. George Phillips, Was Safe DEM, Was Likely DEM
Steve Israel, D, 2nd District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. John Gomez, Was Safe DEM
Daniel Maffei, D, 25th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Ann Marie Buerkle, Was Leans DEM
Michael McMahon, D, 13th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare
Carolyn McCarthy, D, 4th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Francis Becker, Was Safe DEM
Scott Murphy, D, 20th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Chris Gibson, Was Leans DEM
Bill Owens, D, 23rd District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Matt Doheny, Was Leans DEM,Was Toss-up
North Carolina
Bob Etheridge, D, 2nd District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Renee Ellmers, Was Leans DEM
Larry Kissell, D, 8th District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare
Mike McIntyre, D, 7th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Leans DEM
Brad Miller, D, 13th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Bill Randall, Was Safe DEM
David Price, D, 4th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. B. J. Lawson
Heath Shuler, D, 11th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
Ohio
John Boccieri, D, 16th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Jim Renacci
Steve Driehaus, D, 1st District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Steve Chabot
Mary Jo Kilroy, D, 15th District, Likely GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Steve Stivers, Was Leans GOP
Dennis Kucinich, D, 10th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Peter Corrigan, Was Safe DEM
Zachary Space, D, 18th District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Toss-up
Betty Sutton, D, 13th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Tom Ganley
Pat Tiberi, R, 12th District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge
Charles Wilson, D, 6th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Bill Johnson, Was Likely DEM
Oklahoma
Dan Boren, D, 2nd District, Likely DEM, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
Oregon
Peter DeFazio, D, 4th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Art Robinson, Was Likely DEM
Kurt Schrader, D, 5th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Scott Bruun
David Wu, D, 1st District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Rob Cornilles
Christopher Carney, D, 10th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Tom Marino
Mark Critz, D, 12th District, Toss-up, Special Election since ObamaCare Vote
Kathy Dahlkenper, D, 3rd District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Mike Kelly
Charles Dent, R, 15th District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge
Jim Gerlach, R, 6th District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge
Tim Holden, D, 17th District, Likely DEM, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Leans DEM
Paul Kanjorski, D, 11th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Lou Barletta, Was Leans GOP
Patrick Murphy, D, 8th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Mike Fitzpatrick
Allyson Schwartz, D, 13th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Carson Adcock, Was Safe DEM
Joe Sestak, D, 7th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Senate Candidate, Opp. Pat Meehan, Was Leans GOP
Rhode Island
Patrick Kennedy, D, 1st District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Retiring, Opp. John Loughlin, Was Likely DEM, Was Leans DEM
South Carolina
John Spratt, D, 5th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Mick Mulvaney, Was Toss-up
Tennessee
Jim Cooper, D, 5th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. David Hall
Lincoln Davis, D, 4th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Leans DEM
Bart Gordon, D, 6th District, Likely GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Diane Black
John Tanner, D, 8th District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Leans GOP
Texas
Lloyd Doggett, D, 25th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Donna Campbell, Was Safe DEM
Chet Edwards, D, 17th District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare, Was Leans GOP
Rube Hinojosa, D, 15th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Eddie Zamora, Was Safe DEM
Solomon Ortiz, D, 27th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. R. Blake Farenthoid, Was Safe DEM, Was Likely DEM
Ciro Rodriguez, D, 23rd District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Francisco Canseco
Utah
Jim Matheson, D, 2nd District, Likely DEM, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
Virginia
Rick Boucher, D, 9th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare
Gerald Connelly, D, 3rd District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Keith Fimian
Glenn Nye, D, 2nd District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Toss-up
Tom Perriello, D, 5th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Was Likely GOP, Opp. Robert Hurt
Washington
Brian Baird, D, 3rd District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Jaime Herrera, Was Leans GOP
Norman Dicks, D, 6th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Douglas Cloud, Was Safe
Rick Larsen, D, 2nd District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. John Koster, Was Leans DEM
David Reichert, R, 8th District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Was Likely GOP
Adam Smith, D, 9th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Dick Muri, Was Leans DEM
West Virginia
Alan Mollohan, D, 1st District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. David McKinley
Nick Rahall, D, 3rd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Elliott "Spike" Maynard
Wisconsin
Steve Kagen, D, 8th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Reid Ribble
Ron Kind, D, 3rd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Dan Kapanke
David Obey, D, 3rd District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Retiring, Opp. Sean Duffy
If you are a Winter Soldier for the equal, sovereign individual rights to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness, then you will join this desperate fight to kill this brutal, totalitarian threat by ObamaCare to our lives and liberties. Defunding and then repealing this monstrosity of socialism may very likely save your life or that of some of your loved ones. There is no better use for the money your work has earned you than to turn it into a fatal weapon against tyranny in this epic battle for American freedoms. Please give to your fullest possible extent so that we can replace Pelosi as Speaker of the House and proceed to dismantle and repeal ObamaCare. The dismantling can begin in 2011, though the repeal will require the addition of many more Senators committed to repeal in 2012 and the replacement of Obama with a Republican committed to repealing ObamaCare.
25 Oct 2010 Update: DEM Seats: 2 Likely DEM became Leans DEM, 3 Leans DEM became Toss-ups, 10 Toss-ups become Leans GOP, 1 Leans GOP becomes Likely GOP, 1 Leans GOP becomes Toss-up, 2 Toss-ups become Leans DEM, 1 Leans DEM becomes Likely DEM, GOP Seats: No Changes. The sum of the Safe GOP, Likely GOP, and Leans GOP seats would give the GOP 222 seats, or 4 more than the majority. I expect the GOP to win about 20 of the 34 Toss-up seats given the momentum of more and more DEM seats becoming more and more at risk. The GOP should gain about 64 seats and have 242 seats in the next session of the House of Representatives!
19 Oct 2010 Update: DEM Seats: 2 Likely DEM became Leans DEM, 4 Leans DEM became Toss-ups, 1 Toss-up became Leans GOP; GOP Seats: 1 Leans DEM became Toss-up, 1 Likely GOP became Leans GOP. Mostly Democrat seats continue to move toward being more contested. The situation for GOP seats is more static and it remains true that they are not moving seats into Likely GOP or into Safe GOP.
16 Oct 2010 Update: DEM Seats: 9 Safe DEM became Likely DEM, 3 Likely DEM became Leans DEM, 3 Leans DEM became Toss-ups, 2 Toss-ups became Leans GOP, 1 Toss-up became Leans DEM, 1 Leans GOP became a Toss-up, GOP Seats: 1 Toss-up became a Leans DEM. The change is that fewer and fewer Democrat seats are safe, but that the Republicans cannot lock additional seats as safe. Apparently the People are sending the message they are unhappy with the DEMS but not so sure about the GOP either.
12 Oct 2010 Update: DEM Seats: 3 Safe DEM became Likely DEM, 2 Likely DEM became Leans DEM, One Leans DEM became Toss-up, One Toss-up became Leans GOP, and one Leans GOP became Likely GOP, GOP Seats: One Likely GOP became Leans GOP, The change remains massively in GOP favor!
11 Oct 2010 Update: DEM Seats: 2 Safe DEM became Likely DEM, 1 Likely DEM became Leans DEM, GOP Seats: No changes, The change favors the GOP.
7 Oct 2010 Update: DEM Seats: 2 Safe Seats became DEM Likely, 3 Leans DEM became Toss-ups, 2 Toss-ups became Leans GOP, 1 Leans GOP became Likely GOP, 1 Likely GOP became Leans GOP, GOP Seats: 1 Leans DEM became Toss-up, The change favors the GOP.
The single most egregious act of Obama and the Democrat Congress was the passage of ObamaCare. This act implements the planned theft of every American's body and the imposition of a tyrannical control by bureaucrats over who lives and who dies. The most important outcome of the election in November is to put control of the House of Representatives in the hands of Representatives who will use the power of the House to initiate expenditures to prevent the funding of ObamaCare. Steve King, a Republican Representative from Iowa, has made a motion to discharge a number of committees from considering H.R. 4972 to repeal ObamaCare. Most, but not all, Republican members of the House have signed this motion. Only one Democrat has signed it, that being Gene Taylor, of Mississippi, who is in a tight race to retain his seat. I have put the name of the Republican opponent to those who voted for ObamaCare at the end of the line for each of the tyrannical beasts of the House of Representatives.
RealClearPolitics as of 2 October had the races for the House evaluated as follows:
139 [now 137] [now 135] [now 132] [now 123] [now 121] Seats Safe for Democrats, all of which were Democrat
18 [now 20] [now 21] [now 22] [now 28] [now 26] [now 25] [now 24] Seats Likely Democratic, all of which are held by Democrats now
33 [now 29] [now 30] [now 31] [now 33] [now 30] [now 31] [now 26] Seats Leaning Democrat, all but 3 [2] [3] [2] of which are now held by Democrats
38 [now 39] [now 43] [now 34] [now 40] Seats Rated Toss-ups, all but 1 [2] [1] [2] of which are now held by Democrats
30 [now 33] [now 34] [now 35] [now 37] [now 45] [now 46] Seats that Leans GOP, all but 2 [4] [5] [6] of which are now held by Democrats
14 [now 13] [now 14] [now 15] Seats that are Likely GOP, 9 [8] [7] [6] of which are now held by Republicans
163 Seats Safe for the Republicans
11 races shifted by one category of probability since the original post. 10 of those shifts were favorable to the Republicans. Only Virginia District 5 moved in favor of the Democrats, shifting from Likely GOP to Leans GOP.
Because Nancy Pelosi had votes to spare on ObamaCare, a few of the Democrat majority from much less socialist districts than hers were given permission to vote against the bill. Since what matters in the next session of Congress is the defunding of ObamaCare, there is no point in voting for a would-be member of the House who has not announced his intent to relentlessly attack ObamaCare by signing the discharge motion. For those who want to destroy the tyranny of ObamaCare, it is a very good idea to make campaign contributions to the Republican opponent of the Democrats in close races who either voted for ObamaCare or who have not signed the motion to discharge to indicate they are actual proponents of the repeal of ObamaCare.
Generally speaking, there will be very few Democrats who will ever be useful allies in the critical cause of overturning centrally planned and controlled medical care in the United States, which the pretended fiscal conservativism of the Blue Dog Democrats has proven. I have indicated which Democrats are in the Blue Dog Caucus, which mostly just means that they pretend to their constituents that they are fiscally conservative and says very little about how they vote in Congress. In addition, I have identified those who are members of the Democratic Socialists of America Caucus. Of the 70 socialist Representatives, only 10 are in close races, despite Americans general turn-away from socialism. These socialist Representatives should be especially targeted. The closely contested races by state are:
Alabama
Bobby Bright, D, 2nd District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
Parker Griffith, R, 5th District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare
Arkansas
Marion Berry, D, 1st District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
Mike Ross, D, 4th District, Likely DEM, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
Vic Snyder, D, 2nd District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare
Arizona
Gabrielle Giffords, D, 8th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Jesse Kelly
Raul Grijalva, D, 7th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Ruth McClung, Was Safe DEM, Was Likely DEM, Was Leans DEM
Ann Kirkpatrick, D, 1st District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Was Toss-up, Opp. Paul Gosar
Harry Mitchell, D, 5th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. David Schweikert
John Shadegg, R, 3rd District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge, Was Likely GOP
California
Mary Bono, R, 45th District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge
Dennis Cardoza, D, 18th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Mike Berryhill
Jim Costa, D, 20th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Andy Vidak, Was Toss-up
Daniel Lungren, R, 3rd District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge
Jerry McNerney, D, 11th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. David Harmer, Was Toss-up
Loretta Sanchez, D, 47th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Van Tran
Colorado
Betsy Markey, D, 4th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Cory Gardner
Ed Perlmutter, D, 7th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Ryan Frazier
John Salazar, D, 3rd District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Scott Tipton
Connecticut
Joe Courtney, D, 2nd District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Was Safe DEM, Opp. Janet Peckinpaugh
Jim Hines, D, 4th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Dan Debicella, Was Leans DEM
John Larson, D, 1st District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Was Safe DEM, Opp. Ann Brickley
Christopher Murphy, D, 5th District, Toss-Up, Yes on ObamaCar, Was Leans DEM, Opp. Sam Caligiuri
Florida
Allen Boyd, D, 2nd District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Steve Southerland, Was Toss-up
Mario Diaz-Balart, R, 25th District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge, Was Likely GOP
Alan Grayson, D, 8th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Dan Webster
Ron Klein, D, 22nd District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Allen West, Was Toss-up
Suzanne Kosmas, D, 24th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Sandy Adams
Adam Putnam, R, 12th District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge
Georgia
John Barrow, D, 12th District, Likely DEM, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
Sanford Bishop, D, 2nd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Mike Keown
Jim Marshall, D, 8th District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Toss-up
Hawaii
Charles Djou, R, 1st District, Toss-up, Special Election after ObamaCare Vote, Was Leans DEM
Idaho
Walt Minnick, D, 1st District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Likely DEM
Illinois
Melissa Bean, D, 8th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Joe Walsh
Bill Foster, D, 14th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Randy Hultgren, Was Toss-up
Phil Hare, D, 17th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Bob Schilling, Was Toss-up
Deborah Halvorson, D, 11th District, Likely GOP, Yes on ObamaCar, Was Leans GOP, Opp. Adam Kinzinger
Mark Kirk, R, 10th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Running for Senate, Was Toss-up, Was Leans DEM
Indiana
Joe Donnelly, D, 2nd District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Jackie Walorski, Was Leans DEM
Brad Ellsworth, D, 8th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Larry Bucshon
Baron Hill, D, 9th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Todd Young, Was Toss-up
Iowa
Leonard Boswell, D, 3rd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Brad Zaun, Was Toss-up
Bruce Braley, D, 1st District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Ben Lange, Was Leans DEM, Was Toss-up
David Loebsack, D, 2nd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Mariannette Miller-Meeks
Kansas
Dennis Moore, D, 3rd District, Likely GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Kevin Yoder, Was Leans GOP
Kentucky
Ben Chandler, D, 6th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Leans DEM
John Yarmuth, D, 3rd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Todd Lally
Louisiana
Joseph Cao, R, 2nd District, Leans DEM, No on ObamaCare
Charlie Melancon, D, 3rd District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
Maine
Michael Michaud, D, 2nd District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Jason Levesque, Was Leans DEMChellie Pingree, D, 1st District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Dean Scontras, Was Leans DEM
Maryland
Frank Kratovil, D, 1st District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
Massachusetts
William Delahunt, D, 10th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Retiring, Opp. Jeff PerryBarney Frank, D, 4th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Sean Bielat, Was Likely DEM
John Tierney, D, 6th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Bill Hudak
Niki Tsongas, D, 5th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Jon Golvick
Michigan
John Dingell, D, 15th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Rob Steele
Gary Peters, D, 9th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Rocky Roczkowski
Mark Schauer, D, 7th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Tim Walberg, Was Leans GOP
Bart Stupak, D, 1st District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Retiring, Opp. Dan Benishek
Minnesota
Michele Bachmann, R, 6th District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge
James Oberstar, D, 8th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Was Safe DEM, Opp. Chip Cravaack, Was Likely DEM, Was Leans DEM
Timothy Walz, D, 1st District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Randy Demmer
Collin Peterson, D, 7th District, Likely DEM, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Safe DEM
Mississippi
Travis Childers, D, 1st District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare
Gene Taylor, D, 4th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Leans DEM
Benny Thompson, D, 1st District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Bill Marcy
Missouri
Russ Carnaham, D, 3rd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Ed Martin, Was Likely DEM
Emanuel Cleaver, D, 5th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Jacob Turk, Was Safe
Ike Skelton, D, 4th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare
Nebraska
Lee Terry, R, 2nd District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to DischargeNevada
Dina Titus, D, 3rd District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Joe Heck, Was Toss-upNew Hampshire
Paul Hodes, D, 2nd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Charlie Bass, Was Toss-up
Carol Shea-Porter, D, 1st District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Frank Guinta
New Jersey
John Adler, D, 3rd District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Was Toss-up
Rush Holt, D, 12th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Scott Sipprelle
Frank Pallone, D, 6th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCar, Was Safe DEM, Opp. Anna Little
New Mexico
Martin Heinrich, D, 1st District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Jon Barela, Was Toss-up
Ben Lujan, D, 3rd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp Tom Mullins
Harry Teague, D, 2nd District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Was Toss-up
New York
Michael Arcuri, D, 24th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Leans DEM
Timothy Bishop, D, 1st District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Randy Altschuler
John Hall, D, 19th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Nan Hayworth, Was Toss-upMichael Arcuri, D, 24th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Leans DEM
Timothy Bishop, D, 1st District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Randy Altschuler
Brian Higgins, D, 27th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Lenny Roberto, Was Safe DEM
Maurice Hinchey, 22nd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America, Caucus, Opp. George Phillips, Was Safe DEM, Was Likely DEM
Steve Israel, D, 2nd District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. John Gomez, Was Safe DEM
Daniel Maffei, D, 25th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Ann Marie Buerkle, Was Leans DEM
Michael McMahon, D, 13th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare
Carolyn McCarthy, D, 4th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Francis Becker, Was Safe DEM
Scott Murphy, D, 20th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Chris Gibson, Was Leans DEM
Bill Owens, D, 23rd District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Matt Doheny, Was Leans DEM,Was Toss-up
North Carolina
Bob Etheridge, D, 2nd District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Renee Ellmers, Was Leans DEM
Larry Kissell, D, 8th District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare
Mike McIntyre, D, 7th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Leans DEM
Brad Miller, D, 13th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Bill Randall, Was Safe DEM
David Price, D, 4th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. B. J. Lawson
Heath Shuler, D, 11th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
North Dakota
Earl Pomeroy, D, At-Large, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Rick BergOhio
John Boccieri, D, 16th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Jim Renacci
Steve Driehaus, D, 1st District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Steve Chabot
Mary Jo Kilroy, D, 15th District, Likely GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Steve Stivers, Was Leans GOP
Dennis Kucinich, D, 10th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Peter Corrigan, Was Safe DEM
Zachary Space, D, 18th District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Toss-up
Betty Sutton, D, 13th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Tom Ganley
Pat Tiberi, R, 12th District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge
Charles Wilson, D, 6th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Bill Johnson, Was Likely DEM
Oklahoma
Dan Boren, D, 2nd District, Likely DEM, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
Oregon
Peter DeFazio, D, 4th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Democratic Socialists of America Caucus, Opp. Art Robinson, Was Likely DEM
Kurt Schrader, D, 5th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Scott Bruun
David Wu, D, 1st District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Rob Cornilles
Pennsylvania
Jason Altmire, D, 4th District, Leans DEM, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog PretenderChristopher Carney, D, 10th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Tom Marino
Mark Critz, D, 12th District, Toss-up, Special Election since ObamaCare Vote
Kathy Dahlkenper, D, 3rd District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Mike Kelly
Charles Dent, R, 15th District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge
Jim Gerlach, R, 6th District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Signed Motion to Discharge
Tim Holden, D, 17th District, Likely DEM, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Leans DEM
Paul Kanjorski, D, 11th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Lou Barletta, Was Leans GOP
Patrick Murphy, D, 8th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Mike Fitzpatrick
Allyson Schwartz, D, 13th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Carson Adcock, Was Safe DEM
Joe Sestak, D, 7th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Senate Candidate, Opp. Pat Meehan, Was Leans GOP
Rhode Island
Patrick Kennedy, D, 1st District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Retiring, Opp. John Loughlin, Was Likely DEM, Was Leans DEM
South Carolina
John Spratt, D, 5th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Mick Mulvaney, Was Toss-up
South Dakota
Herseth Sandlin, At-Large, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Was Toss-up
Tennessee
Jim Cooper, D, 5th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. David Hall
Lincoln Davis, D, 4th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Leans DEM
Bart Gordon, D, 6th District, Likely GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Opp. Diane Black
John Tanner, D, 8th District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Leans GOP
Texas
Lloyd Doggett, D, 25th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Donna Campbell, Was Safe DEM
Chet Edwards, D, 17th District, Likely GOP, No on ObamaCare, Was Leans GOP
Rube Hinojosa, D, 15th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Eddie Zamora, Was Safe DEM
Solomon Ortiz, D, 27th District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. R. Blake Farenthoid, Was Safe DEM, Was Likely DEM
Ciro Rodriguez, D, 23rd District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Francisco Canseco
Utah
Jim Matheson, D, 2nd District, Likely DEM, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender
Virginia
Rick Boucher, D, 9th District, Toss-up, No on ObamaCare
Gerald Connelly, D, 3rd District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Keith Fimian
Glenn Nye, D, 2nd District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Blue Dog Pretender, Was Toss-up
Tom Perriello, D, 5th District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Was Likely GOP, Opp. Robert Hurt
Washington
Brian Baird, D, 3rd District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Jaime Herrera, Was Leans GOP
Norman Dicks, D, 6th District, Likely DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Douglas Cloud, Was Safe
Rick Larsen, D, 2nd District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. John Koster, Was Leans DEM
David Reichert, R, 8th District, Leans GOP, No on ObamaCare, Was Likely GOP
Adam Smith, D, 9th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Dick Muri, Was Leans DEM
West Virginia
Alan Mollohan, D, 1st District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. David McKinley
Nick Rahall, D, 3rd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Elliott "Spike" Maynard
Wisconsin
Steve Kagen, D, 8th District, Toss-up, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Reid Ribble
Ron Kind, D, 3rd District, Leans DEM, Yes on ObamaCare, Opp. Dan Kapanke
David Obey, D, 3rd District, Leans GOP, Yes on ObamaCare, Retiring, Opp. Sean Duffy
If you are a Winter Soldier for the equal, sovereign individual rights to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness, then you will join this desperate fight to kill this brutal, totalitarian threat by ObamaCare to our lives and liberties. Defunding and then repealing this monstrosity of socialism may very likely save your life or that of some of your loved ones. There is no better use for the money your work has earned you than to turn it into a fatal weapon against tyranny in this epic battle for American freedoms. Please give to your fullest possible extent so that we can replace Pelosi as Speaker of the House and proceed to dismantle and repeal ObamaCare. The dismantling can begin in 2011, though the repeal will require the addition of many more Senators committed to repeal in 2012 and the replacement of Obama with a Republican committed to repealing ObamaCare.
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