We Shoe’s have become Olympic junkies!   Mrs. Shoe and I like to see the skill required for each event, even the more arcane like trampoline or ping pong.   Thing 1 and Thing 2 have been taking in every minute they are allowed to watch.   This is really the first Olympics they’ve paid attention to.   They  are mesmerized by the sports that they’ve never seen before.

Monday night’s broadcast had an event that we, and many of you, will remember for a long time to come.   Lolo Jones ran in one of the 100 meter hurdle heats.   She was a heavy favorite, expected to take gold in the Event.   While slow out of the block, Jones quickly caught and passed the other competitors.   She was about to blow the field away when at the second to last hurdle, her foot hit the hurdle, she lost stride and finished seventh, out of the finals.

After the event, NBC stuck a camera in  Lolo Jones’  face and asked “How do you feel?”  

Jones was obviously numb from the event.    With her mind reeling, Jones managed a response that applies not only to an Olympic hurdler but to many, many situations in life:

“It’s the hurdles. If you can’t get over all 10, you can’t be the champion.”

Wednesday, Zogby released a poll showing John McCain with a 5 point lead amongst likely voters. The poll shows Barack Obama losing significant ground in all of his core groups; Democrats, under the age of 35, women and voters with incomes under $50K.

After taking body blows for the past two weeks over his response to the Russian invasion of Georgia and his performance at the Saddleback Civil Forum, Barack Obama seeked  maintain the Marquess of Queensberry rules and reassure his acolytes while warning McCain and said that McCain:

doesn’t know what he’s up against!

A month ago Barack Obama was ahead by 7 points and in Germany finishing his “World Tour.” He was the toast of Europe. Today, Barack Obama may need to look over his shoulder just to ensure he gets out of the Democrat convention with the nomination.

Rather than touring Europe as if he was already the President of the United States, Barack Obama could have benefited from Lolo Jones’ wisdom. From here on out Barack should remember:

“It’s the hurdles. If you can’t get over all 10, you can’t be the champion.”

You’re on your way to losing in Minnesota.

A recent SurveyUSA poll shows Barack Obama with a 2% edge over John McCain amongst likely voters in Minnesota.   And that’s the good news for Obama, in the most recent poll.

The bad news, at least for Barack, is that the poll shows that nearly all Republicans and Democrats have made up their minds.  

The stat that should leave Obama concerned is that in early June, Independents broke for Obama 50% to 36%.   In the latest poll McCain has the lead amongst Independents 44% to 42%.   Obama is not just losing the vote of Independents, the Independent vote is running away from him.

The results and direction of movement isn’t particularly surprising to anyone outside of the MSM who wants to pay attention. I wrote waaaaaaay back here that Democrats in Minnesota had overreached and were causing a backlash within the state. What I didn’t guess at that time was that DC Democrats were also going to overreach and give the Republican candidate a “Motherhood and Apple Pie” issue like gas prices.

John McCain is slated to announce his VP pic on August 29th. Intrade  and other rumblings are calling for McCain to pick either Romney or Tim Pawlenty as his running mate. Pawlenty has obvious advantages for carrying McCain over the top in Minnesota. Less known is that Minnesota was one of the few states that Romney won in the primaries and we are a caucus state. None of Barack Obama’s rumored choices are likely to have any impact on his support in Minnesota.

With Independents breaking for McCain, a VP choice that will likely get him some added support and the Democrat party refusing to address any additional oil drilling, look for McCain to make Minnesota a swing state for the 2008 election.

(H/T – The Vintage one)

Politico is reporting that John McCain will give himself a birthday present and announce his VP nominee in Ohio one day after Barack Obama (probably) takes his victory lap around Invesco Field.

Given they’re talking about Tim Pawlenty and Mitt Romney as the “conservative” choices, I’m not very hopeful that the proper timing won’t prove to be the entirety of the “one step forward” half of the “one step forward/one step back” nature of the McCain campaign.

During the Saddleback Civil Forum on Saturday night, each candidate was asked

WHO ARE THE THREE WISEST PEOPLE YOU KNOW IN YOUR LIFE AND WHO ARE YOU GOING TO RELY ON HEAVILY IN YOUR ADMINISTRATION?

In characteristic fashion, John McCain gave a specific and to the point answer: General Petraeus, Civil rights leader John Lewis and Meg Whitman the CEO of EBay.

The presumptuous nominee of the Democrats first attempted the “All American” response by saying Angry Michelle and the Grandmother who resides under the Obamessiah’s bus. With the audience sitting on their hands, he tried another well used tactic: attempt an answer without specifics:

THERE ARE PEOPLE LIKE SAM DUNN A DEMOCRAT OR DICK LUKER A REPUBLICAN WHO I LISTENED TO ON POLICY ON DOMESTIC POLICY. I GOT FRIENDS RANGING FROM TED KENNEDY TO TOM COLBERT WHO DON’T NECESSARILY AGREE ON A LOT OF THINGS BUT WHO BOTH, I THINK, HAVE A SINCERE DESIRE TO SEE THIS COUNTRY IMPROVE. WHAT I FOUND IS VERY HELPFUL TO ME IS TO HAVE A TABLE WHERE A LOT OF DIFFERENT POINTS OF VIEW ARE REPRESENTED AND WHERE I CAN SIT AND POKE AND PROD AND ASK THEM QUESTIONS.

One of the last questions asked was:

DOES EVIL EXIST AND IF IT DOES DO WE IGNORE IT, DO WE NEGOTIATE WITH IT, DO WE CONTAIN IT OR DO WE DEFEAT IT?

As he’s wont to do, the presumptuous nominee couldn’t leave with a straight answer. Again he laid out his own country as having no greater moral perspective than the rest of the world:

EVIL DOES EXIST. I MEAN, WE SEE EVIL ALL THE TIME. WE SEE EVIL IN DARFUR. WE SEE EVIL SADLY ON THE STREETS OF OUR CITIES. WE SEE EVIL IN PARENTS WHO HAVE VICIOUSLY ABUSED THEIR CHILDREN AND I THINK IT HAS TO BE CONFRONTED. IT HAS TO BE CONFRONTED SQUARELY AND ONE OF THE THINGS THAT I STRONGLY BELIEVE IS THAT, YOU KNOW, WE ARE NOT GOING TO, AS INDIVIDUALS, BE ABLE TO ERASE EVIL FROM THE WORLD. THAT IS GOD’S TASK. BUT WE CAN BE SOLDERS IN THAT PROCESS AND WE CAN CONFRONT IT WHEN WE SEE IT. NOW, THE ONE THINK THAT I THINK IS VERY IMPORTANT IS FOR US TO HAVE SOME HUMILITY IN HOW WE APPROACH THE ISSUE OF CON FRONTING EVIL, BUT YOU KNOW A LOT OF EVIL HAS BEEN PERPETRATED BASED ON THE CLAIM THAT WE WERE TRYING TO CONFRONT EVIL.

I think I found someone who can help coach Barack on both of his answers next time they come up. I suggest Barack do some “poking and prodding” with Kobe Bryant:

How can this answer be so easy for Kobe and so difficult for the Presumptuous Presidential nominee?

With my apologies to St. Luke….

The disciples went and woke him up, shouting, "Master, Master, we’re in a pickle!"When Barack woke up, he rebuked the Bear and its raging armies. Suddenly the conflict stopped and all was calm.

Obama 8:24

Honestly, what kind of a sycophant must you be to believe that Obama’s contorted response had anything to do with the events in Georgia? Apparently one who has less experience in his current role than the one who’s butt he’s trying to chap.

It appears that McCain’s recent ads portraying Obama as “Big hat, no cattle,” have struck a nerve.   Obama responds with this ad:

The response reminds me of the playground taunt used in a name calling contest…”I am rubber, you are glue. Whatever you say bounces of me and sticks to you!” I don’t remember that reply being very effective on the playground. I don’t suspect it will be any more effective in the campaign ad.

A couple of thoughts:

Obama still doesn’t know his left from his right, both politically and visually. Note in the video where it refers to McCain going right and left, the video actually shows him going left when it says right and vice-versa . Don’t Obama’s folks  know that you refer to directions from the perspective of the person you are assigning them to and not the audience?

OK, that was fun and trivial wasn’t it?

Obama refers to McCain getting all kinds of press and being a celebrity in Washington.

Question: Who made  McCain  a celebrity?
Answer: MSM
Question: Why did they make him a celebrity?
Answer: Because it was a poke in the eye to Republicans to make McCain a celebrity every time he showed he was a Maverick!

Kind of ironic that McCain’s celebrity came from actions that aligned him more closely with Obama…don’t ‘cha think?

I got back late last night (had to move my brother’s new bride to Omaha), but that’s not your problem, just means I didn’t get a chance to find anything interesting to write.   That’s the bad news.

The good news is that Jim Lynch over at bRight & Early has done a fantastic job channeling Dr. Suess as he explains last week’s response from Obama where he told a seven year old that he wanted to run for President because America sucks!.  

I’ll tease you with the first couple of lines.   Go to Jim’s site to see the rest of this Halll of Fame quality piece!

Some kids here in U-ville,
(The U.S. of A)
had invited the Obamessiah to play.

One wanted to know why he wanted the job
of leading a nation of ignorant slobs.

If only we’d have known what John Edwards knew, we too would have been convinced that there are two Americas…..the one where its leadership at least attempts to maintain integrity and the one John Edwards lives in where only other people have integrity issues!

Edwards Admits Sexual Affair; Lied as Presidential Candidate

As Barack Obama flails to find an energy policy that stops his drop in the polls in middle America without completely alienating his Envirowhacko base, he’s offered a solution of providing a $1,000 per family energy credit/refund.   He plans to fund this rebate by increasing the taxes on the major oil companies.

The US has approximately 111Million Households (maybe a few  less but what’s a few million when you’re trying to save the planet?).   $1,000 per household would be $111B of rebates.

The net income of the major oil companies was reported to be $51.5B in the most recently completed quarter.   Their average tax rate is about 42%.   That means they paid about $37B in taxes for the quarter.   The most recent quarter was a 40% increase over the previous year’s earnings so that would mean that last year they earned a pretax income of about $63B and taxes of $27B

Let’s assume for the moment that the “Nasty” oil companies are able to maintain their most recent profit levels for the next year (oil prices have already declined so the assumption isn’t in line with reality but then, what’s reality when you’re taking on the “nasty” oil companies).   That would mean that over the next year, the “nasty” oil companies would have net income of $206B and pay taxes of $149B.

Assuming Barack imposes a windfall profits tax to cover his $111B payout, the oil companies would now pay $260B in taxes and net $95B.

No doubt that $95B is a lot of money.   Funny thing though, $95B is over 1/3 less than the annualized net income of $147B that the same oil companies made a year ago.

Huh?   I thought Barack was after “windfall profits?”   Even if Barack finds a way to cut his plan in half he would still need to take every single incremental penny that the oil companies had made this year versus last year to pay for his program.   Is every penny of additional profit a windfall?

And that’s the problem with “Windfall” taxes….One man’s “windfall” is another man’s confiscation.

You know it has to be bad when the two major press agencies note your rapidly changing position:

From The Agency Who Will Not Be Quoted:

Well, I can’t quote them so let’s just say that they recognized that he now wants to tap the SPRO something he didn’t want to do just a couple of weeks back.

From Reuters:

Barack Obama proposed tapping the strategic oil reserves to help lower gas prices, a reversal of a stance he made just weeks ago.

Even the All Barack Company (ABC) noted his flip:

Last month Obama affirmed his original position to reporters, “I do not believe that we should use this strategic oil reserves at this point,”

If he really is the Messiah, shouldn’t he have seen this change coming?

Every 10, 11 or 12 step program realizes that the first step in any of them is to admit you have a problem.   Without that self realization, none of the remaining steps will be effective because you don’t believe there is any need for change.   That basic and obvious premise is completely missed by the McClatchy folks.

McClatchy  took a look at the McCain “Paris” ad and tried to evaluate whether the ad helped or hurt McCain or Obama.   After viewing the ad, McClatchy reports that viewers had varying responses:

The emotions most felt by Republicans while watching the ad were “disturbing” (35 percent), “skepticism” (16 percent) and “sadness” (10 percent); Democrats reported “skepticism” (44 percent), “anger” (24 percent) and “disturbing” (14 percent); Independents reported “skepticism” (41 percent), “disturbing” (18 percent) and “anger” (18 percent).

McClatchy positions to minimize any negative impact on Obama’s numbers by saying:

The study, of 320 Americans, found that a majority of Republicans were “disturbed, skeptical” and “saddened” after viewing the ad and that 61 percent of Republicans had a negative view of the ad.

Of course, they also position the “beware of the boogieman” by suggesting that the ads could back fire on McCain:

How successful the ads will be at turning what are widely perceived as Obama’s strengths into weaknesses won’t be known for some time. Experts have warned they could backfire on McCain, making him seem bitter and petty and emphasizing differences between him and Obama.

After allowing the CEO of the Research company to conclude that McCain received no benefit fromt he ad:

“We are not sure whether the negative emotions expressed by viewers were related to their feelings about either candidate or about the way in which the message was delivered,” said Glenn Kessler, president and CEO of HCD Research. “However, we do know that the ad did not move voters and they expressed negative emotions after viewing the ad.”

McCatchy walked right past the results that shows hope from these ads:

Before viewing the ad, 75 percent of the Democrats said they would vote for Obama. After viewing the ad, that percentage was 72, while undecideds rose from 13 to 15 percent and those favoring other candidates rose from 3 to 4 percent.

The number who said they would vote for McCain, however, remained unchanged at 9 percent.

Similar results were recorded for Republicans and Independents. Republican support for Obama dropped from 8 to 6 percent, while McCain’s percentage remained unchanged at 74 percent. Undecideds rose from 16 to 18 percent, however.

Only among independents did the drop in Obama’s percentage, from 44 to 43 percent, accrue to McCain, whose support went from 33 to 34 percent.

(emphasis mine)
Any multistep program, no matter how many steps they have, really boil down to 3 steps:

1. Recognize you have a problem
2. Determine/analyze why you have that problem
3. Determine steps to fix the problem

The “Paris” and “Messiah” ads were never meant to address Steps 2 and 3, those will be handled by other ads.   The “Paris” and “Messiah” ads were solely focused on Step 1 and based on the results of this study, they did exactly what they were intended to do: sow a seed of doubt into the minds of people who believed the Messiah’s shtick.   In a race as close as this one is expected to be, you only need to remove small percentages to impact the end result.

As a side benefit, it never hurts to feed your base a bit of red meat now and again!

I got back from the John McCain townhall meeting a while ago, and I just got done pulling audio and pics off the voice recorder and camera. It’s a case of 2 steps forward, 1 step back.

Before the fun, a couple of quick notes:

– The batteries in the camera pretty much died just before the McCains entered. I did manage to coax a couple more pics out of them, but they may not be the usual quality.
– I ran into Pete Fanning on my way out, which made things a lot better.

Without further comment, click away for the audio.

Some pics (click for the full-sized version, and be advised that they may not be the usual high quality):

John McCain taking questions from the crowd

The warm-up band

RPW chair Reince Priebus warming up the crowd

Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker and RPW chair Reince Priebus talking

CNN camera; potential Photoshop candidate

Press Row

Obama and McCain have gone back and forth now over Obama’s remarks in which he accused McCain of fear mongering with:

Nobody thinks that Bush and McCain have a real answer to the challenges we face. So what they’re going to try to do is make you scared of me,” Obama said. “You know, `he’s not patriotic enough, he’s got a funny name,’ you know, `he doesn’t look like all those other presidents on the dollar bills.

McCain’s campaign responded by essentially calling Obama a race baiter:

played the race card, and he played it from the bottom of the deck,” McCain campaign manager Rick Davis said in a statement. He called Obama’s remarks “divisive, negative, shameful and wrong.

In an attempt to avoid the notion that he continues to introduce his race into the debate, an Obama spokesman, Robert Gibbs responded with:

What Barack Obama was talking about was that he didn’t get here after spending decades in Washington,” Gibbs said. “There is nothing more to this than the fact that he was describing that he was new to the political scene. He was referring to the fact that he didn’t come into the race with the history of others. It is not about race.”

So Barack is saying that the Presidents on currency were representative of people who had been in Washington for decades? Shall we check?

Washington – on the $1
Washington didn’t exist before Washington was President….nope, Barack, not this one.
Thomas Jefferson – on the $2
Jefferson was Secretary of State for 4 years and VP for for years before he became President…less than a decade…nope Barack, not this one.
Abraham Lincoln – on the $5
Lincoln was not in Washington prior to being President…nope, Barack, not this one.
Alexander Hamilton – on the $10
Never was President….nope, Barack, not this one.
Andrew Jackson – on the $20
Jackson was a US Representative for 1 year and a Senator for about 2 years before being elected President….nope Barack, not this one.
Ulysses S. Grant – on the $50
No elected office prior to President…not Barack, not this one.
Benjamin Franklin – on the $100
Never was President….nope, Barack, not this one.

Not one of the men, on currently traded paper currency, fits the description that Barack tried to use…NOT ONE, NOT CLOSE!   So Barack, what was it you were actually trying to say? Are you that ignorant of facts that you will make statements that any 4th grader would know to be false, in a vain attempt to deflect your obvious and continual introduction of race baiting into your campaign?

Memo to David Plouffe:

If you are interested in having Obama elected, make sure that he no longer gets put into situations where he has to speak extemporaneously, especially when he has his dander up. Fill his pocket with a bunch of note cards that say “Um,” “Ah,” or “I mean”. That seems to qualify as great insight and news worthy for the MSM…He need say no more!

Update: (Thanks Headless, I need to do a better job of putting as much into proofreading as fisking!)

Barack Obama’s solution for our energy crisis….Inflate your tires!

Let’s see…

The average US car gets approximately 20 MPG.
A quick look has some articles saying properly inflated tires could increase your fuel economy by 3%.
Similar look says about the same for engine tune up.
So…we get 6% improvement by implementing Obama’s suggestion
We now get 21.2 MPG
Average annual passenger miles for a car are 12,500

12,500 miles / 20 MPG = 625 gallons @ $4/gallon = $2,500
12,500 miles / 21.2 MPG = 590 gallons @ $4/gallon = $2,358
12,500 miles / 20 MPG = 625 gallons @ $3/gallon = $1,875

I’ll take the lower fuel price, thank you!

How about another look:
Last report, there were about 251M vehicles on the road in the US

251M * 35 gallon/year savings = 8.785B gallons of gas.
There are about 42 gallons of gas/barrel of oil.
8.785B gallons / 42 = 209.2M Barrels/365 days = 573,000 barrels/day, even the extremely conservative estimate by the EIA says ANWR alone would produce 780,000 barrels/day. Other estimates run as high as 1.4M barrels/day.

I can’t wait for the McCain/Obama debates. Once Obama gets forced off generalities and platitudes and is required to talk specifics, he’s lost…that is when he isn’t filling air time with “Ah,” “Um,” or “I mean.”

The Washington Post  thinks Barack Obama may have a problem with hubris.

In a meeting yesterday with House members Obama was reported to have said:

“This is the moment . . . that the world is waiting for,” adding: “I have become a symbol of the possibility of America returning to our best traditions.”

What wasn’t reported on were Barack’s comments following that:

Once more Barack addressed the crowd. he said, I am the Light of the world. He who follows Me will not be walking in the dark, but will have the Light which is Life.

Whereupon Republican skeptics told him, you are testifying on your own behalf; your testimony is not valid and is worthless.

Barack answered, Even if I do testify on my own behalf, my testimony is true and reliable and valid, for I know where I came from and where I am going; but you do not know where I come from or where I am going.

You [set yourself up to] judge according to the flesh (by what you see). [You condemn by external, human standards.] I do not [set myself up to] judge or condemn or sentence anyone.

Yet even if I do judge, my judgment is true [my decision is right]; for I am not alone [in making it], but [there are two of Us] I and the Angry Michelle, Who sent Me.

In your [own] Law it is written that the testimony (evidence) of two persons is reliable and valid.

I am One [of the two] bearing testimony concerning myself; and Angry Michelle, who sent Me, she also testifies about me.

Then they said to him, Where is this Angry Michelle of Yours? Barack answered, you know my Angry Michelle as little as you know me. If you knew me, you would know my Angry Michelle.

(Read John 8:12-19 if you don’t quite get it)

Obama left hubris behind long ago. I’m beginning to think he needs an intervention of some kind to reattach him to reality.