Rush Limbaugh thinks the 46 million on food stamps are the U-3 "counted" unemployed, many of whom actually can and do work

Yesterday, here:

"Today, there are 46 million Americans unemployed, and 94 million not working. Now, these 46 million people, these are the counted unemployed. This is the U-3 number. The counted unemployed represent 14% of the population."

Limbaugh somehow gets this convoluted mess from here, which he cites but which clearly states the 46 million are those on food stamps, not the U-3 "counted" unemployed:

"The reason you don’t see huge lines of people waiting in soup lines during this Greater Depression is because the government has figured out how to disguise suffering through modern technology. During the height of the Great Depression in 1933, there were 12.8 million Americans unemployed. These were the men pictured in the soup lines. Today, there are 46 million Americans in an electronic soup kitchen line, as their food is distributed through EBT cards (with that angel of mercy JP Morgan reaping billions in profits by processing the transactions). These 46 million people represent 14% of the U.S. population." 

In the latest Employment Situation Summary from the Bureau of Labor Statistics for September, those actually counted as unemployed are listed at 7.915 million (2.5% of the population) and the not counted as unemployed at 1.9 million:

"In September, the unemployment rate held at 5.1 percent, and the number of unemployed persons (7.9 million) changed little. Over the year, the unemployment rate and the number of unemployed persons were down by 0.8 percentage point and 1.3 million, respectively. (See table A-1.) . . . In September, 1.9 million persons were marginally attached to the labor force, down by 305,000 from a year earlier. (The data are not seasonally adjusted.) These individuals were not in the labor force, wanted and were available for work, and had looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months. They were not counted as unemployed because they had not searched for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey. (See table A-16.)"

U-3 is not a number in millions as Limbaugh says but a rate, the percentage of the labor force which is unemployed (7.915 million / 156.715 million), namely 5.1%.

Limbaugh doesn't understand that lots of employed people get food stamps. Individuals grossing up to $15,312 annually can still qualify for assistance.

Almost 49 million individuals made up to but not more than $15,000 annually in 2014.

The unemployed in Sept. 2015 numbered 7.9 million

U-3 is a percentage

Why Trump is doomed

Ed Rogers, here:

"Clinton can talk about the issues, and Trump can’t."

Democrat debate audience gave Hillary just 17 votes out of 233, coming in third behind Sanders the overwhelming winner and O'Malley

From the story here:

"Not everybody voted, but when it was all over, Bernie was the big winner, with 139 votes. O'Malley came in second with 67 votes."

Democrats win by circling the wagons while Republicans stage circular firing squads

Bernie Sanders rallied around Hillary Clinton tonight over her e-mail problems, admitting it wasn't in his political interests to do so. The two of them almost made love on stage. The crowd went nuts.

Democrats understand the principle: don't help your enemies, help your friends.

The Democrat debate was all about fixing America after two failed terms of a Democrat president

If you don't think FOX and the WSJ are polling to undo Trump then you probably don't believe that Bush and Ayotte planted Batchelder in Trump's audience

Story here.

Only the Rupert Murdoch owned polls show Trump and Carson neck and neck, otherwise Trump averages +8.75 and the libertarian IBD poll is clearly a lying outlier

Conservative news sarcasm alert: 97% of those 94.6 million not in the labor force aren't lazy bums after all

They're the 92 million who are in high school, college, and graduate school full-time, or who are raising the kids at home, or are disabled, or are over 65 years of age, retired and drawing Social Security.

Just 3% don't fit into any of those categories, or about 2.8 million people, that's it.

These are the  truly "marginally attached" who aren't counted as unemployed.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics says about them:

"These individuals were not in the labor force, wanted and were available for work, and had looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months. They were not counted as unemployed because they had not searched for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey."

The BLS estimates they number 1.9 million in September. This analysis puts them about a million higher than that. Both can't be right but the margin of error is only 1%.

The government's estimate is close enough, I'd say.

Trump's success teaches that Republican voters are not libertarian ideologues

So says John Reid, here:

'Yet if the Trump’s enduring success has taught us anything [it] is that Republican voters are not libertarian ideologues. He recognizes that politics is about “Who, whom?”'

Rush Limbaugh sticks up for the traditional family against National Review and Kevin Williamson

And Williamson is stung by it, here.

Rush is right. National Review used to be a conservative magazine. Now it's a libertarian one:

"This all took place [says Williamson] in the context of a discussion of Mississippi governor Phil Bryant’s boneheaded remarks about working mothers. It was conventional-wisdom stuff — that children do better when the mother is at home rather than working outside it — and, as is very often the case, the conventional wisdom is wrong here."

Not alienating potential voters is more important to libertarians than defending what is right.  

Conservative news sarcasm alert: 2% of those 94.6 million lazy bums not in the labor force who eat but don't work pursue graduate degrees full-time

Young "journalist" recently making $5,600 a month actually believes it's cheaper to eat out

Seen here:

'Technology has had a hand in widening the wealth gap and eliminating much of the middle-class since this industry shift began decades ago. But with the other hand, tech scoops up and delivers old promises of middle-class life and delivers them to the new poor. It’s cheaper to eat out, to shop, to entertain yourself, and to obtain consumer technology that makes all those things even more convenient, even on just $21,000 a year. A knowledge economy is sometimes referred to as “an economics of abundance, not scarcity.” It’s really an economics of scarcity with the appearance of abundance.'

Uh huh. She spends more time tweeting (14x/day) than researching, thinking or cooking, otherwise she'd know a single person can eat like a king three times a day for less than $3,500 a year simply by shunning food prepared in restaurants, fast food eateries and delicatessens and cooking entirely for oneself at home. Alcohol and toilet paper included. At $12.75 twice a day it costs $9,300 a year to eat out, once a day over $4,600. And you have to use the public sandpaper.

Spending a minimum of 22% of income on food for just one meal a day is crazy, and way too close to the housing component which should never exceed 28-32% of income.

Kids these days.

It's Trump, Carson, CRUZ and Rubio in latest CBS poll, Trump firmly in lead with 23.7% in Real Clear Politics poll average

The Detroit News calls the libertarian Freedom Caucus "brats", wants Boehner back at least temporarily

Here:

"Too many House Republicans have taken their eyes off the prize. Rather than craft a patient strategy to position themselves as the party of adult leadership in a broken Washington, they have become battling brats intent on mounting quixotic fights they can’t win in the interest of proving their conservative cred."

The Freedom Caucus is doing what libertarians customarily do to Republicans in election contests

Keep them from getting elected, and advance Democrats to power. It's their reason for existing.

When are Republicans finally going to say enough is enough and throw them out?

Conservative news sarcasm alert: 13% of those 94.6 million lazy bums not in the labor force who eat but don't work stay home to raise the kids

10.4 million mothers and 2 million fathers stayed home to raise kids in 2012

Conservative news sarcasm alert: 11.5% of those 94.6 million lazy bums not in the labor force who eat but don't work are disabled working-age people

Average age of a car on the road climbs from 11.4 years in 2014 to 11.5 years in 2015

IHS Inc. reported here at the end of July:

SOUTHFIELD, Mich.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The combined average age of all light vehicles on the road in the U.S. has climbed slightly to 11.5 years, based on a snapshot of vehicles in operation (VIO) taken Jan. 1 of this year, according to IHS Automotive, a global provider of critical information and insight to the automotive industry and part of IHS Inc. (NYSE: IHS).

I know. Mine average 13 years old.

floats like a butterfly . . .

. . . stings like a bee, when you stick it

Conservative news sarcasm alert: 12% of those 94.6 million lazy bums not in the labor force who eat but don't work are in college full-time

Conservative news sarcasm alert: 13% of those 94.6 million lazy bums not in the labor force who eat but don't work are high school sophomores, juniors and seniors

Conservative news sarcasm alert: 46% of those 94.6 million lazy bums not in the labor force who eat but don't work are over 65 drawing Social Security

Trump continues to crush it, pulling 27% in PPP poll, rising to 23.2 overall in Real Clear Politics average

Biased polling: Libertarian leaning polls have Trump averaging 20%, the others 25%

IBD 17

WSJ 21

BLOOMBERG 21

Average 20

USAT 23

PEW 25

FOX 26

QUINNIPIAC 25

CNN 24

Average 25

The girly men at National Review still feel like Trump attacked them

Lowry and Ponnuru, here, who think Megyn Kelly, Carly Fiorina and Rosie O'Donnell make a "whole pattern":

'Trump’s discarded wives and his habit of making gross sexual insults of women also make it easier for liberals to campaign against Republicans’ supposed “war on women.” Perhaps one or two of Trump’s comments were not as disgusting as they have generally been taken to be: Maybe he didn’t mean to suggest that Fox anchor Megyn Kelly asked him tough questions because she was menstruating. But look at the whole pattern — his repeated attacks on her as a “bimbo,” his slam of Carly Fiorina’s face, his description of other women as pigs — and it’s clear that these bits of ugliness are not gaffes so much as a way of life.'

What a couple a pussies. No one who goes off on three men automatically becomes a man-hater. Men do it all the time, and so do women. But "discarded wives" gives it all away. They were no more discarded than any other gold digger is discarded. Women always take the side of the women.

Besides, the Megan Kelly and Carly Fiorina examples are weak. In the one case Trump artlessly hunted for the ages old idiom "seeing red" and came up short (and isn't everything he says equally artless?), and in the other the source for the story is as suspect as suspect can be but people who are purportedly conservative are still prepared to buy it? Predisposed to buy it is more like it. Carly Fiorina's success with this fake story among Republicans tells you all you need to know about the Republican Party, and Carly Fiorina.   

Rosie O'Donnell, on the other hand, has a big fat target on her back for a reason, and deserves everything she gets.

Trump in first by 5.5 in latest RCP average, IBD poll is first at Real Clear since July which Trump hasn't won

As usual the UK Daily Mail screws it up, shows old Hurricane Sandy loop from 2012 hitting New York, calls it Joaquin

You've got the wrong loop, fellas. Joaquin is headed out to sea, as your own graphic shows.

Video here, where they also report:

"Hurricane Joaquin, however, has become less of a threat to the United States as forecasts show the storm curving into the Atlantic and weakening in the upcoming days." 

Imagine that! Joaquin "has become less of a threat" even though they show video of it slamming into Staten Island! The damn thing's headed toward Bermuda you morons!

You can always count on The UK Daily Mail to cover a story, you just can't count on it to get it right.

I hereby nominate it for A Grauniad.

Grand Rapids, Michigan, September 2015 average temperature anomaly: +4.4 degrees F

September 2015 was 4.4 degrees ABOVE normal on average in Grand Rapids, Michigan, dropping the cumulative anomaly for the year to -18.2 degrees F from -22.6 degrees F through August.

It was a beautiful, warm, dry and very sunny September. Rainful was 2.02 inches below normal at 2.26 inches.

Sean Hannity the hypocrite: Shocked Rand Paul criticizes Ted Cruz while the three of them have ripped fellow Republicans for years

Well, I say "fellow Republican" advisedly. What they are is libertarians, and put three libertarians in a room, or 300, all you'll get is dissension.

Sean Hannity isn't a Republican, by his own admission, but likes to play in its sandbox. Rand Paul is self-consciously "purple", imagining that right and left can be united as libertarians as opposed to remaining separated as conservatives and liberals. And Ted Cruz' behavior in the Senate makes him a RINO, at least from the RINOS' perspective.

Audio here.

The libertarian wing of the Republican Party would rather spend its time eating one other than uniting to fight Democrats.

They can't agree on anything, can't function as members of a party, and will never be able to run a country, except into the ground.

Trump's lead in first is actually up 35% in the last USAT/Suffolk poll

When you compare Trump's performance in the last USA Today/Suffolk poll to the previous one by USA Today/Suffolk in July, he's actually up by 6 points in first place, going from 17% to 23%, or up 35%.

Since the July poll, Bush, Huckabee, Paul, Christie, Santorum, Perry and Walker (who are both out now) have all together given up 22 points to Fiorina, Carson, Kasich, Graham, Rubio and Trump, on top of 11 additional points added to those front runners from fewer undecideds in September.

In the averages in yellow, note that Trump has improved his overall lead in first by 1.2 points, or almost 21%.

In the USA Today poll, Trump's lead in first has gone from +3 to +10, up 233%.

Freedom Caucus cracks up at lightning speed proving they've never had any credibility

• They oust Boehner on Friday but have no one to put forward
• They organize to fire Kevin McCarthy before he even wins the speakership while admitting they have no one to put forward
• They hold Planned Parenthood hearings but aren't prepared for their much better prepared foes
• Kevin McCarthy gives Boehner a B- but gets an F out of the box by handing Hillary a talking point on Benghazi

And it's only Thursday morning

Trump reestablishes the momentum in USA Today poll, in first by 10 points ahead of Carson and Fiorina

A crack in the Trump facade

Donald Trump, quoted here:

“I’m a practical person,” Trump said. "If I see things aren’t going well, like for instance there are people right now in the Republican party who are not doing well I don’t think it’s going to change for many of them, at some point you have to get out. Right now, I’m leading every poll I get the biggest crowds by far. I had 20,000 in Dallas I had 35,000 people in Mobile, Alabama, you know so far it’s looking good…So I will go and if for some reason I think it’s not going to work, I’ll go back to my business.”

Libertarian impotence: Purple PAC suspends raising money for Rand Paul but has spent next to nothing on him all year

Amazing but true.

Reported here:

“I don’t want to raise money for a futile crusade,” [Ed Crane of Cato fame] said. “I still hope to raise money for him, but not until I see a concerted effort to get back to the roots that got him where he was for a while.” . . .

Sergio Gor, a spokesman for Mr. Paul’s campaign, said, “It is untruthful for a story to say that this super PAC stopped supporting Sen. Paul, when in fact they don’t seem to have lifted a finger in the first place.”

The group spent less than $8,000 in the first half of the year.

Purple PAC raised $1.2 million in the first half of the year, $1 million of which came from Jeff Yass, owner of the trading firm Susquehanna Partners. Mr. Crane said he had not consulted with Mr. Yass on his decision to suspend fundraising. The super PAC currently has $1.4 million on hand, which it won’t spend until Mr. Crane feels more positively about Mr. Paul’s campaign, he said.

Neocon insanity: Krauthammer blows a gasket, says Russia trying to expand hegemony in Syria

Oh yeah, like Syria is somehow Ukraine. The USSR is alive and well, but only in the fevered minds of the neoconservatives.

Here:

"This isn't about the Russians taking on ISIS; this is about the Russians taking over Syria and keeping Assad as a client in place."

Ah, no Charles. This is about a pro-Christian autocrat rescuing an autocrat who used to protect Christians before the Obama policy to disorganize the Middle Eastern community resulted in Christians getting their heads cut off and their communities destroyed.

We should be thanking the Russians, not trying to bury them.

The Tax Foundation says Trump tax plan will blow up the deficit, reducing revenues to 12% of GDP

From Alan Cole, here:

"Looking at these rates, collectively, note that Mr. Trump is frequently cutting rates in half, and sometimes cutting them by even more than that. Taken together, these rate reductions are enough—by my estimates—to reduce tax collections from about 18 percent of GDP to about 12 percent. Under rates as low as these, economic growth—moderate or otherwise—cannot restore federal revenues to current-law levels.

"Tax cuts can do a great deal of good; each of the provisions I outlined above could help a lot of people lead better lives. However, the reductions in federal revenue need to be acknowledged, and likely mitigated through substantial cuts in spending, in order to make this plan feasible."

Larry Kudlow really likes the Donald Trump 15% corporate tax plan, saying he never thought he'd see it

Here:

'Kudlow, who hosts his own syndicated radio show, has long championed a 15 percent corporate tax rate, but "I never thought I'd see a candidate do it. "It'll give us a gigantic advantage. Bring capital and businesses to the U.S., make us the most hospitable place to invest — and that's what Donald Trump has done."'

Zogby poll on September 20th had Trump out front with 33%

Reported here at Forbes:

Trump 33%

Carson 13%

Bush 9%

Fiorina 7%

Cruz 5%

Rubio 4%

Paul 4%

Kasich 4%

Christie 3%

Walker 2%

Huckabee 2%

Ipsos/Reuters poll of core political approval as of September 24th has Trump in the lead with 30%

Seen here:

"After the Wednesday Republican debate, Donald Trump continues to hold the support of 30% of Republicans in our tracking poll, down 5% from last week. Ben Carson remains in 2nd at 18% among Republicans. Jeb Bush is in 3rd with 10%. Carly Fiorina has made significant gains, currently at 8% among Republicans, up from 2% before the debate."

Vladimir Putin tells Obama he's brought nothing but violence, poverty and social disaster to the Middle East

Marco Rubio was for in-state tuition for illegals before he was against it in October 2011

CBS News claims Trump keeps the EITC

Here.

For the current 5-year period 2012-2016 the Joint Committee on Taxation has previously estimated the annual cost of the Earned Income Tax Credit to be about $64 billion.

That's actually less costly than the food stamp program was in 2014: $74.2 billion.

Keeping the EITC means keeping what amounts to a welfare program, but one which rewards only those who work. The transfer payments to such individuals basically rebate the Social Security taxes they pay even though they generally make too little to pay much in the way of federal income taxes, if they pay any at all.

Trump's claim that his plan will be revenue neutral is already taking incoming because of things like this.

Of course we don't know what spending Trump plans to cut. He might go really big and call for shuttering some cabinet level departments entirely. The Department of Education, for example, costs $77.4 billion.

Sean Trende spells out the achievements of John Boehner

Sean Trende notes that:

• federal expenditures on a quarterly basis flatlined beginning in early 2011, right when Republicans took control of the House under Boehner, largely because of sequestration won in the debt ceiling showdown that year despite controlling only one chamber of Congress, "no small feat";

• even "more impressive" was the fiscal cliff deal brokered by John Boehner in late 2012, making the Bush tax cuts permanent, again with control of only the House of Representatives;

• Boehner "managed to kill" the immigration bill that came out of Mitch McConnell's US Senate, despite "substantial internal pressures" all around to pass it.

Much more at the link.

The Detroit News says GOP malcontents weakened John Boehner's hand in dealing with Obama

Rep. Justin Amash, MI-3, a ringleader of the malcontents

Here:

Boehner has been no pushover for the Obama administration. He has staked out tough, rational positions on issues important to conservatives. But his hand has been weakened in negotiating with the White House because he has lacked the full support of such a large portion of his caucus, those members who feel symbolic fights over principle are more important than long-term victories.

Joe Nocera says Trump will be out before Iowa

In The New York Times here.

Washington Examiner has the rare proper assessment of Speaker John Boehner, faced with the unique challenge of a president disloyal to the constitution

Here:

"[R]ight wingers give him an undeservedly bad rap. As a Republican speaker with a Democratic president, he never had a chance to do several of the things they clamored for him to do. Sometimes his most critical Republican colleagues' demands that he get rid of Obamacare or, more recently, defund Planned Parenthood, have suggested a fundamental failure to grasp the mechanics of the system of government in which they work.

"Boehner was not in a position to enact a sweeping, positive agenda. It could not have progressed through the narrowly divided Senate, let alone [have] overridden President Obama's inevitable veto.

"The best accomplishments Boehner could hope for were mostly defensive and negative. The beginning of the his speakership marked the end of Obama's legislative agenda, although sadly the president took this as a cue to exceed his proper powers and bypass Congress, governing by fiat. ...

"Boehner did his job well, and with the sort of patience that conservatives may not appreciate until he is gone."

Trump's tax plan released to the public today is ambitious and pro-growth

The Trump tax plan can be reviewed here.

Notable features include exemption from federal income taxation entirely for up to about 73 million households who make up to either $25,000 individually or $50,000 jointly.

This is in the spirit of the original income tax law, which for its first few years, that is until the demands of World War I and the bureaucratic state came into play, taxed the incomes of no one except the very wealthiest.

It is unclear whether the plan retains the child tax credit or the earned income tax credit, two programs which effectively transfer welfare to lower income families who pay no income tax anyway and who receive through these two vehicles what is effectively a rebate of Social Security taxes they pay as employees, eliminating its regressivity.

For the rest there are just three tax brackets of 10%, 20% and 25%, kicking in at joint incomes up to $100K, up to $300K and beyond $300K. Presumably, but not stated, short term capital gains are taxed at these ordinary rates. Long term capital gains tax rates are 0% up to $100K of joint income, then 15% and 20% up to $300K and beyond $300K of joint income.

Business taxes are slashed to 15% no matter the size, which is YUGE for American competitiveness.

The AMT is eliminated entirely, along with the marriage penalty and . . . the death tax. It's going to be unbelievable!

Deductions are capped for the richest Americans, but deductions for charity and mortgage interest are retained.

We'll see what the dynamic scorers will have to say about it for revenues, as time goes by.

And they say liberals have a death wish: Why Republicans fail

Republicans fail because instead of attacking Democrats, they would rather attack and eat their own.

And it's not like both sides in the Party haven't done this, or that conservatives don't have a case against the leadership. The long history of establishment attacks against conservatives goes back to the George Romney failure to endorse Goldwater in 1964, book-ended most recently by the Mitt Romney campaign's vicious attack of the totally hapless Todd Akin of Missouri, a mere pimple on the butt of the elephant. The kinder gentler conservatism of the Bush clan was, after all, a repudiation of the Reagan era. Kinder and gentler it wasn't, nor conservative.

Pressuring their own Speaker of the House John Boehner to resign last week, however, marks a new low in the history of Republican politics. And this morning Laura Ingraham is endorsing the "frenzy" to get rid of the Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell. People caught up in this have more in common with the Jacobin Club than they do with the men who prevented the revolution against the rights of Englishmen in 1776.

Conservatives now find themselves in the ignoble position of doing the job the voters didn't do in 2014. And they say liberals have a death wish. 

What goes around comes around, but for the faction which drapes itself in the US Constitution there is nothing conservative, or wise, about any of this. Conservatives should ask themselves whether the citizens of the state of Kentucky and Ohio are entitled to the representation they have or not. And if not, then why are conservatives entitled to theirs?

NBC/WSJ poll pulls Trump back to earth, still first in Real Clear Politics poll average with 23.4%, 6.4 ahead of Carson

Trump in the middle of summer was +4 in the NBC/WSJ poll

Trump starts autumn at +1 in the NBC/WSJ poll

Trump's poll average hasn't changed much in the last eight weeks, indicating he's stopped persuading people to join him, while the average spread of his lead has dropped by 39% in the interim. This is because support is firming for candidates below him. 

While the names have changed in second and third, the level of support has improved for the person in second by 33% and remained more or less the same for the person in third over the period. Ben Carson is the most benefited, going from fifth to second, even as Fiorina rocketed up 1060% to take third, replacing Walker who dropped out.

Similarly the persons occupying fourth and fifth have improved their levels of support on average by 42%, but their names have changed, too. Marco Rubio in fourth has improved his support by 85% over the period, but Jeb Bush is the most hurt, going from second to fifth.

Ted Cruz is notably stuck in sixth in both snapshots, with the same average of support. He's persuading no one, either, except maybe so-called values voters to shift their votes around, unaware that they are just rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

Ted Cruz' true calling is stand-up comedy: The president of China is in town, meeting with the world's most powerful communist

The Don and Ted Show: "You're fired!" "No I'm NOT!"

Seen here:

"And today, the president of China, President Xi, is in town. Media all over the world are reporting on this historic meeting of the world's most powerful communist... And the President of China."

The endorsement of Ted Cruz by so-called values voters means little, except for Ben Carson and Donald Trump

From the story at The Hill, here:

Sen. Ted Cruz won the Values Voter Summit straw poll for the third year in a row on Saturday, a strong showing of support from evangelical voters for his 2016 presidential bid. The firebrand Texas senator won a whopping 35 percent in the poll of summit-goers, ahead of runner-up Ben Carson’s 18 percent. That margin is significantly wider than last year, where he edged out Carson by just 5 percentage points. Former Gov. Mike Huckabee (Ark.) took third with 14 percent, followed by Sen. Marco Rubio (Fla.) with 13 percent. Real estate magnate Donald Trump finished a distant fifth with 5 percent.

So "values voters" have finally figured out one thing: Ben Carson's values may be traditional, but they are rooted in a crackpot religion which was born of a failed prediction of the end of the world in 1844.

Now if they could only figure that out about their own religion.

What's happening here is that the evangelical base is clearly choosing a Southern Baptist over a Seventh-day Adventist, and distancing itself dramatically from the mainline Protestant in the race, Donald Trump.

Meanwhile Ted Cruz isn't going to be the nominee, not as long as he garners just 27% of the support enjoyed by the frontrunner.

The anatomy of an ideologue: Right winger Ace of Spades is a manipulative hope peddler, just like Obama

But dumber than Obama because he comes right out and admits it, here:

One of the things that political movements offer its [sic] adherents, similar to religious movements, is hope. The fecklessness, failures, and flat-out betrayals of the current GOP leadership has [sic] destroyed all hope in the GOP. And a political movement without hope is not a political movement at all; it is simply an advocacy organization for getting a very small number of people cush jobs in the federal government. If there is to be any hope permitted to the rank and file of the Republican Party, then we need big changes that permit us the illusion and fantasy of hope, without which we are nothing at all, just dejected former Republican voters. ... Hope requires a change -- Kevin McCarthy, Steve Scalise, and Cathy McMorris-Rogers are no change at all; they are simply John Boehner's less accomplished inferior employees. ... And if you want to entice the alienated back into the fold, you have to at least let us dream of the possibility of actual change. That requires allowing us hope -- and not simply doubling-down on the current crop of failures and fainthearts we are obligated, sourly, to call our "leadership." Hope is a silly illusion, but it is a necessary, sustaining silly illusion.

Textbook George W. Bush that, trying to fight ideology with a better ideology, except the right doesn't have a better ideology. Better ideology is an oxymoron because you can't just bottle up and export what it took 500 years to develop on these shores and expect it to work elsewhere, or even here the same way it used to. Nor can you tell your fellow Americans that the people they are happy to keep reelecting don't represent them when they do and hope to succeed in getting them to follow you instead. We had the government we deserve and 30 malcontents just got rid of our leader who gave us $3.25 trillion reasons to be pretty happy with him.

I predict the president who was reduced to playing the tyrant to get his way as John Boehner gently strung him along will act more boldly now that he's gone and Republicans are in disarray and are about to crack up. Obama has nothing left to lose.

The Mark Levin wing of the Republican Party is unhappy the American people got only $3.25 trillion in tax relief from John Boehner

WaPo, grossly underestimating Boehner's achievement, calls Boehner's opponents in Congress "conservatives" but what they are is ideologues, fanatics for whom anything less than everything they demand is unacceptable, and for whom the good is the enemy of the perfect, here:

"Boehner could never please his most conservative members. Fiscal deals negotiated with President Obama produced more than $2 trillion in savings and made the GOP’s tax cuts permanent for 99 percent of workers, but the far right painted both deals as sellouts."

Conservatives give thanks for the achievements of John Boehner, libertarians, the ignorant and the stupid just snarl

• Saved taxpayers $762 billion over ten years by making the Bush tax rates permanent for 98% of all filers beginning at the dawn of 2013
• Saved taxpayers $1.8 trillion over ten years by finally fixing the Alternative Minimum Tax for all victims of bracket-creep
• Saved taxpayers $339 billion over ten years by maintaining the 15% capital gains tax rate for incomes below $450,000
• Saved families $354 billion over ten years by maintaining the child tax credit
• Cut average annual federal deficits of $1.3 trillion 2009-2012 by 57%, to $556 billion on average 2013-2016 by ending the emergency Social Security Tax reductions and instituting the sequester spending cuts
• The S&P 500 immediately responded with total returns in 2013 of 32.39%, the fifth best year since 1970  
• The moribund US Dollar rose 19%, from below 80 to 95 today as overall fiscal rectitude improved
• Causing oil prices to plummet from an average of $95/barrel 2011-2014 to $52/barrel on average in 2015 
• Causing average US gasoline prices to fall from $3.34/gallon one year ago to $2.28/gallon today
• Helping to keep the all-items consumer price index year-over-year nearly flat, rising just 0.2%

Politico lies about what John Boehner and Barack Obama accomplished together

Here:

"But [Boehner's] tenure will also be remembered for his complicated relationship with President Barack Obama. He and Obama tried — but repeatedly failed — to cut a deal on a sweeping fiscal agreement."

Boehner got the Bush tax cuts made permanent, and under a Democrat president no less, something Bush couldn't do while he himself was president. If I were Politico I wouldn't mention it, either.

Boehner also got the fix to the Alternative Minimum Tax made permanent, something which eluded Republicans for decades, again under a Democrat president.

Passed at the very opening to 2013, the stock market boomed as a result, tax revenues recovered and the dollar soared from 80 to 95ish today, helping to tank oil prices, for which each and every American should be grateful everytime he fills the gas tank.

"Repeatedly failed"?

Utter nonsense.

John Boehner to resign at the end of October

Story here.

Better to resign than face the mutiny?

German Americans still the largest ethnic group in 2013 at 46 million

The Economist reported here in February:

German-Americans are America’s largest single ethnic group (if you divide Hispanics into Mexican-Americans, Cuban-Americans, etc). In 2013, according to the Census bureau, 46m Americans claimed German ancestry: more than the number who traced their roots to Ireland (33m) or England (25m). In whole swathes of the northern United States, German-Americans outnumber any other group (see map). Some 41% of the people in Wisconsin are of Teutonic stock.

That figure is down from 51 million before 2009 and from 50 million in 2009, so evidently the German American population is declining by about 1 million per year. 

Walls work: The pope's Vatican has a population of 8 people per acre, Manhattan 109

People who live in walled states shouldn't throw stones, even if they have plenty.

Trump's critics of his investment success need to get a new calculator, and some brains

This morning on the Chris Plante Show on WMAL a caller complained that Trump inherited $200 million and that anyone could have $10 billion after 30 years, too, just by investing in a CD.

Chris Plante said "that's some CD"!

This meme is now ubiquitous in the media critical of Trump, and while not as obviously silly as this morning's example the critics nevertheless display remarkable investment ignorance.

Grant for a moment that Trump inherited $200 million, and keep in mind that that is the upper end of the estimates, which go as low as $40 million. Also keep in mind it's mostly real estate, not cash, not stocks, not bonds, a completely different business.

$200 million invested in the S&P 500 for 30 years from 1985 to 2015 yielded $4.2 billion, or just 42% of the net worth Trump claims to have accumulated over the period. The actual average nominal rate of return for the S&P 500 was 10.75% per annum, dividends fully reinvested. The $10 billion net worth claim, on the other hand, represents an annual net rate of return of 13.93%, again assuming the investment of $200 million, almost 30% better every year than what the S&P 500 actually yielded. But again, the S&P 500 return is not net. You still have to deduct taxes, inflation and expenses from that, which is an individual calculation and highly variable, and in New York can be quite onerous. 

On the other end of the scale, the investment of $40 million becoming $10 billion is the equivalent of a net return of 20.21% per annum, 88% better than the S&P 500 nominal return every year on average.

The truth probably lies somewhere in between, but no matter how you cut it, Donald Trump capitalized on what he was given in a way which has been exceptionally more successful than what most people ever experience.

He's Yuge.

Mark Penn strategy memo from 2007 shows Hillary Clinton campaign wanted to exploit Obama's "lack of American roots"

The Atlantic has the memo here.

Trump has held first place in the Real Clear Politics poll average since July 19th, over two months

Trump in first in Real Clear Politics poll average with 24%, 7.7 points ahead of Carson, 12.2 ahead of Fiorina

Trump, Carson, Rubio and Fiorina all rise in latest FOX poll, Trump still in first with 27.5% in Real Clear Politics poll average

FBI successful at recovering e-mails from "wiped" Hillary private server used while she was Secretary of State

Bloomberg originally reported here:

The FBI has recovered personal and work-related e-mails from the private computer server used by Hillary Clinton during her time as secretary of state, according to a person familiar with the investigation. ... Internal government watchdogs have determined that classified information ended up on the system. Their findings sparked the FBI inquiry. ... There has been some question as to whether Clinton deleted her messages or took the more thorough and technical step of “wiping” the server. [Andy] Boian said Tuesday that Platte River [Networks] had “no knowledge of it being wiped.”

Is Hillary worried we'll find the birther e-mail on her server?

Hillary's vigorous denial of the birther story only lends more credence to the charge that she started the birther movement. If it's so ludicrous, why give it this credibility?

Hillary throwing up the smokescreen here, never mentioning that Politico reported, not the right wing, that the anonymous birther e-mail (!) circulated in the Clinton campaign in early 2008:

HILLARY CLINTON: That is – no. That is so ludicrous, Don. You know, honestly, I just believe that, first of all, it’s totally untrue, and secondly, you know, the President and I have never had any kind of confrontation like that. You know, this is such a bad example of what’s wrong with, you know, instantaneous reactions and Americans getting all worked up and people feeding prejudice and paranoia like Donald Trump. And obviously all of us have to stand against it. And, you know, I have been blamed for nearly everything, that was a new one to me, but you know, I’ll just keep going and talking about what I want to do to get income risings and making college affordable and making all of the positive changes that we have to be worried about.

Ben Carson shifts a little, allows a Muslim who forswears Sharia could be president

You mean like Obama?

Ben Carson, quoted here:

"If they embrace our Constitution and are willing to place that above their religious beliefs, I have no problem with that. ... I think anybody, regardless of their religion, if they are willing to embrace the values and principles of America and our Constitution and subject their beliefs to the Constitution, I have no problem with that at all. And that's perfectly reasonable."

Carly Fiorina is a Dreamer, supports citizenship for the children brought here by illegal aliens

From the story here:

“Following her town hall at Iowa State University in Ames, Fiorina said she would be open to passing a version of the Dream Act to grant citizenship for young undocumented immigrants who came to the U.S. as children,” reported NBC News.

WaPo rips papal visit to Cuba's Castro, concluding "it takes more fortitude to challenge a dictatorship than a democracy"

The editorial is here, which I was able to see without a paywall.

When WaPo rips the church for hypocrisy, it makes sure you know it.

Someone should ask Ben Carson to swear to place the Constitution above the writings of Ellen G. White

Ben Carson, quoted here:

BEN CARSON: Now if someone has a Muslim background and they are willing to reject those anti-democratic] tenets [of some Islamic theocracies] and will swear to place our Constitution above their religion, then of course they will be considered infidels and heretics, but I would be quite willing to support them...

Hey Reince Priebus! Show us Scott Walker's signed Pledge to Support the Nominee!

Gov. Scott Walker has large personal debt problems, consistent with reports of his negative net worth

Reported here:

"The Re­pub­lic­an pres­id­en­tial can­did­ate has cast him­self as both a fisc­al con­ser­vat­ive lead­er and a penny-pinch­ing every­man on the cam­paign trail, of­ten tout­ing his love of Kohl’s, the dis­count de­part­ment store. His newly pub­lished fin­an­cial dis­clos­ure shows that, like many Amer­ic­ans, Walk­er has few as­sets, some ma­jor debts (in­clud­ing more than $100,000 for stu­dent loans for his chil­dren), and a pun­ish­ing in­terest rate on his cred­it-card ob­lig­a­tions. Walk­er in­curred one cred­it-card debt with Barclays in 2014, ac­cord­ing to the fin­an­cial dis­clos­ure form, and owed between $10,000 and $15,000 at a 27.24 per­cent in­terest rate as of Ju­ly 2015. ... One of Walk­er’s cred­it-card debts, to Bank of Amer­ica, dates back to 2011, his first year as gov­ernor, ac­cord­ing to the dis­clos­ure form. Walk­er cur­rently owes between $10,000 and $15,000 on that one, with an in­terest rate of 11.99 per­cent."

Flip-flopping Scott Walker ends campaign for president, declares war on Trump

Scott Walker's entire political career comes to an ignoble end, lashing out at the man who seized the issue of the time, illegal immigration, from his hands.

Watch Walker triangulate again in the near future and moderate his position on amnesty back to what it was just a couple of years ago. Walker never really opposed amnesty. He just wanted the Republican base to think he did, and now proves it.

The Guardian had the money quotes, here:

“Today, I believe that I am being called to lead by helping to clear the field in this race so that a positive conservative message can rise to the top,” Walker said. “With this in mind, I am suspending my campaign indefinitely.” Walker encouraged other candidates to do the same, “so that voters can focus on a limited number of candidates who can offer a positive, conservative alternative to the current frontrunner.”

A small man was he, not ready for prime time.

With 99% of the vote counted in Greece, Syriza retakes power as before while Popular Unity at 2.86% of the vote gets NOTHING

Why George W. Bush was wrong not to kill everybody and break everything in Afghanistan

Kill 'em all, let Allah sort 'em out.

Alexis Tsipras and Syriza consolidate power in Greece without the anti-austerity rebels

At this hour with 75% of the vote counted, Alexis Tsipras and Syriza are set to return to power and head the Greek government for the next four years with 145 seats and a coalition with the Independent Greeks as before, but without the Syriza rebels who left to form Popular Unity. The latter isn't polling even 3% and will not win one seat, meaning there is no viable party representing anti-austerity or a return to the drachma. Turn out at 56% hasn't been this low since 1946 when only 53% turned out when leftists boycotted the election.

US House voted Friday to defund Planned Parenthood 241-187, Justin Amash joins the party

The Roll Call vote is here.

Justin Amash of Michigan, the formerly "consistent" conservative, decided this time to vote to defund, whereas in 2011 he voted "present".

There is no explanation up on his Facebook page as far as I can tell at this hour, his usual claim to fame being that he explains every vote there.

Estimated net worth of Democrats for president in 2016

Chafee $43 million

Clinton $21.5 million

Warren $6.69 million

Webb $4.6 million

Biden $600,000

Sanders $330,506

Estimated net worth of Republicans for president in 2016

Trump $10 billion

Fiorina $59 million

Carson $10 million

Bush $10 million

Santorum $5 million

Huckabee $5 million

Christie $4 million

Cruz $3.17 million

Perry $3 million (out already)

Jindal $2.7 million

Kasich $2.5 million

Paul $1.33 million

Graham $1.02 million

Rubio $443,500

Walker ($71,500), that's right, he's in the hole

Trump loses significant ground in CNN poll, still in first at 24%, Walker Jindal and Graham get goose eggs, Trump retains lead in Real Clear Politics poll average with 28.5%