No Runny Eggs

The repository of one hard-boiled egg from the south suburbs of Milwaukee, Wisconsin (and the occassional guest-blogger). The ramblings within may or may not offend, shock and awe you, but they are what I (or my guest-bloggers) think.

Archive for the 'Politics – National' Category

December 7, 2010

Tuesday Hot Read – Daniel J. Mitchell’s “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly”

by @ 11:49. Filed under Politics - National, Taxes.

The Cato Institute’s Daniel J. Mitchell pretty much summed up my initial take on Le Grande Compromise between Obama and the Republicans on tax rates and unemployment benefits:

Compared to ideal policy, the deal announced last night between congressional Republicans and President Obama is terrible.

Compared to what I expected to happen, the deal announced last night is pretty good.

Point of order – there currently is no guarantee that Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, who weren’t exactly involved in the negotiations, are going to let this pass. I believe the applicable term when (I don’t believe it’s a matter of “if) this falls apart and all of the Clinton tax rates return full-force will be “poison pill”. Teh Won will bite his lower lip and whimper out, “I never tried so hard for anything as a middle-class tax cut” (if that sounds familiar, it should – that was what the last Democrat President said).

Even if this is a genuine and doable compromise, it’s essentially a punt into 2012 for everything except the reinstated death tax (at 35% with the first $3.5 million exempt for 2 years, compared to the previously-imminent (and now merely delayed until after 2012) 41%/$1 million exempt to 55%-beyond-$3 million), another 13 months of extended unemployment benefits (it’s still at the 99-week limit instead of 26 weeks), and the 1-year 16% reduction in the FICA tax (a reduction of the employee portion from 6.2% to 4.2%, in exchange for allowing the Make Work Pay tax credit). For the sake of argument, let’s look at the three:

  • The Death Tax returns – The number one killer of family businesses is back. Let me put it this way – that money was already taxed once (or in the case of unrealized capital gains, will be taxed when said gain is realized) – the government has no right to a second taxation that is at a higher marginal rate than the first taxation just because one died.
  • Extending unemployment benefits – Did the POR (Pelosi-Obama-Reid) Economy put you out of work? No problem – your 2011 can be as work-free as 2010 was. We’ll just borrow from the Red Chinese so you don’t have to worry about getting a job until 2012.
  • The 1-year FICA tax reduction – This is actually better than the old Subsidize Low-Paying Jobs welfare plan. If you work, you’ll get 2% more on your paycheck. So what if SocSecurity runs a cash deficit again? It was going to be in the red anyway (seriously, this has a less-than-6-month effect on the SocSecurity fund-exhaustion dates).

November 26, 2010

“Somebody” will profit handsomely from Government Motors

by @ 16:58. Tags:
Filed under Business, Politics - National.

(H/T – Darleen Glick via Allahpundit)

No, it won’t be the American taxpayers that will profit from the ongoing saga that is Government Motors. The Washington Times notes that the big winner of last week’s IPO of GM will be the United Auto Workers, specifically their Retiree Medical Benefit Trust Fund (aka the VEBA that all three domestically-owned auto makers shifted their retiree health costs to). The numbers quoted in that story of $3.4 billion from the IPO and a “break-even sale” price of $36 aren’t quite accurate (they’re both high, the latter far more so), so I’ll walk you through the math:

  • Old GM had, when it went into bankruptcy, $20.56 billion in unsecured liabilities owed to the VEBA.
  • Exiting bankruptcy, Government Motors gave the VEBA:
    • 262.5 million common-stock shares
    • $6.5 billion in senior perpetual preferred stock with a 9% dividend and a 5 1/2-year restriction on buy-back by GM, worth a minimum of $9.72 billion if bought back at the earliest possible date.
    • A $2.5 billion secured note with a 9% annual interest rate and a maturation date in 2017, payable in three $1.4 billion chunks in 2013, 2015 and 2017.
  • VEBA already received $3.65 billion in cash as follows:
    • $0.73 billion in dividends on the preferred stock.
    • $2.92 billion on the stock sold (89 million shares at $32.7525/share – the underwriters took $0.2475/share in underwriting discounts and commissions).
  • Assuming GM survives through the middle of 2017 to pay off that note and buys back the preferred stock at the end of 2014 as soon as it can, it will get an additional $13.19 billion in cash from:
    • The remaining $8.99 billion in future dividends on and buy-back of the preferred stock.
    • $4.2 billion from the principal and interest on that $2.5 billion note.

Assuming the underwriters do exercise their over-allotment option to buy another 13.35 million shares at the discounted IPO price (which would get the VEBA another $437 million), that would leave $3.28 billion to come from the remaining 160.15 million shares. That means the UAW would be made whole if they net a fraction $20.48/share for their remaining holdings. Even if JP Morgan and company don’t come riding in to buy the additional shares now, the UAW will need to only net a fraction more than $21.44/share to be made whole. Everything else is pure profit, or at least a further subsidy of UAW Motors (nee Chrysler).

To put it another way, if they dumped their shares now, they would get a total of $22.12 billion in cash from Government Motors, compared to the $20.56 billion liability that Old GM had going into bankruptcy.

Meanwhile, the remaining unsecured creditors of old GM, mostly the bondholders, will be lucky to get 23 cents on the dollar once the liquidation of GM is complete and they get their pro-rated portions of the 150 million-180 million shares in Government Motors.

November 24, 2010

Domestic enemies lists are coming back, TSA edition

by @ 9:33. Filed under Compassionate Lieberals, Politics - National.

Richard Nixon and J. Edgar Hoover (not to mention Iosif Stalin and various other totalitarians) would be so proud of DHS head Janet Napolitano after she authored an internal DHS memo detailing how anybody who objects to the nekkid scan/crotch grab method of airline security would be put on a “domestic extremist” (DHS’s term, not mine) list. The Northeast Intelligence Network has the details, including how Teh Won fully-supports this.

I’m glad I’m not flying anytime soon, and I won’t be giving up Shoebox’s identity lest we have to reinstitute the Free Shoebox effort.

November 22, 2010

COHICA, BOHICA, or cloaca?

by @ 11:16. Filed under Politics - National, Technology.

(H/T – Ed Morrissey)

Wired reports that a very-disturbing item known as CLOAC…er, BOHIC…er, COHICA is fast-tracking its way through the lame-duck Senate, unanimously clearing the Senate Judiciary Committee. Senate Bill 3804 has two parts ostensibly designed to combat digital piracy, but which can be (and probably will be considering the bent of the current administration) used to silence critics of the LeftStreamMedia. Since I am one of those critics, it really hits home.

The first part allows the Attorney General to petition the courts to force domestic hosting companies and DNS servers to block access to any site that the AG deems to have “no demonstrable, commercially significant purpose or use other than…(to) enable enable or facilitate a violation of title 17, United States Code, including by offering or providing access to, without the authorization of the copyright owner or otherwise by operation of law, copies of, or public performance or display of, works protected by title 17, in complete or substantially complete form, by any means, including by means of download, transmission, or otherwise, including the provision of a link or aggregated links to other sites or Internet resources for obtaining such copies for accessing such performance or displays….” That’s right – a thorough fisking isn’t necessary to be shut down; merely linking to a site that does said thorough fisking can get one shut down.

That is bad enough. What’s worse is the Attorney General will be maintaining a list of those domains that he or she didn’t decide to act judicially against, and that any domestic web host or DNS server that decides “on their own” to block access will get the same immunity against action that those ordered to block access by the court does.

As Ed puts it:

Furthermore, the ambiguous nature of the infringements covered and the definition of centrality could make this a bill with much more impact in the blogosphere. Many of us link to media articles and excerpt under the “fair use” provision of copyright law, designed to further debate and discussion without damaging the critical concept of intellectual property. However, it’s no secret that mainstream media organizations are mainly hostile to this process and occasionally threaten bloggers for engaging in it. If an administration decides it doesn’t much like a blogger or an alternate-media site — or a whole bunch of them — it won’t take many complaints from lawsuit-happy media outlets to convince an Attorney General in some administrations to suspend the domains involved, leaving the alternate media no recourse at all and no platform from which to dissent.

In effect, it hands the executive branch a big weapon to silence dissent, or at the very least, to threaten those who engage in it.

Point of order – it actually won’t take any complaints from an administration-compliant media. So, if this passes and this place suddenly becomes “unavailable”, at least you’ll know why.

November 19, 2010

Prospectus quote of the day – Government Motors edition

by @ 8:38. Tags:
Filed under Business, Politics - National.

(H/T – Monty)

David Weidner over at The Wall Street Journal found this little “gem” in the prospectus for Government Motors’ common-stock IPO (emphasis in the original; the emphasized part is quoted in the WSJ article):

We have determined that our disclosure controls and procedures and our internal control over financial reporting are currently not effective. The lack of effective internal controls could materially adversely affect our financial condition and ability to carry out our business plan.

Our management team for financial reporting, under the supervision and with the participation of our Chief Executive Officer and our Chief Financial Officer, conducted an evaluation of the effectiveness of the design and operation of our internal controls. At December 31, 2009, because of the inability to sufficiently test the effectiveness of remediated internal controls, we concluded that our internal control over financial reporting was not effective. At September 30, 2010 we concluded that our disclosure controls and procedures were not effective at a reasonable assurance level because of the material weakness in our internal control over financial reporting that continued to exist. Until we have been able to test the operating effectiveness of remediated internal controls and ensure the effectiveness of our disclosure controls and procedures, any material weaknesses may materially adversely affect our ability to report accurately our financial condition and results of operations in the future in a timely and reliable manner. In addition, although we continually review and evaluate internal control systems to allow management to report on the sufficiency of our internal controls, we cannot assure you that we will not discover additional weaknesses in our internal control over financial reporting. Any such additional weakness or failure to remediate the existing weakness could materially adversely affect our financial condition or ability to comply with applicable financial reporting requirements and the requirements of the Company’s various financing agreements.

I’m shocked, SHOCKED that a government-run enterprise has no effective control over its disclosure and financial reporting. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say it almost looks like Government Motors is lying in order to shift the cost of propping up the UAW and ensuring millions of dollars in donations to Democrats for the couple years Government Motors will survive from the Treasury to the suckers on Wall Street.

Weidner also noted that the prospectus warned that its defined-pension funds are underfunded to the tune of $17 billion. That $4 billion payment to be made from both cash on hand and the sale of the Series B preferred stock won’t make much more than a short-term dent in that.

November 17, 2010

The NRE guide to the GM IPO

by @ 10:28. Filed under Business, Politics - National.

With 478 million of 1.5 billion shares in Government Motors expected to hit the New York Stock Exchange tomorrow under the GM ticker, I thought it would be good to put together a little FAQ on the IPO based on the latest revision of GM’s registration statement at the SEC containing GM’s common stock prospectus, filed early this morning. I can’t stress this enough – This is not a recommendation or solicitation to either buy or not buy shares in any company.

  • Who is offering the common shares in GM? Three of the four current owners of Government Motors are offering some of their shares – the United States Treasury, Canada Holdings (a Canadian government-owned entity), and the UAW Retiree Medical Benefits Trust. The fourth owner, Motors Liquidation Company (on behalf of the bondholders of the former incarnation of General Motors, with the stock to be distributed to the bondholders upon final liquidation of MLC), is not involved in this sale. Further, GM is not offering any new shares for sale.
  • How many common shares are each of the entities offering? The Treasury is putting up 358,546,795 of its 912,394,068 shares (roughly 39.3% of its current holdings). The Canadian government is putting up 30,453,205 of its 175,105,932 shares (roughly 17.4% of its current holdings). The UAW is putting up 89,000,000 of its 262,500,000 shares (roughly 33.9% of its current holdings). In addition, each of the three entities have given the underwriters a 30-day option to buy up to an addditional 71,700,000 shares to cover any over-allotments in the IPO process at approximately the same ratio as the “main” offering (a maximum of 53,782,019 shares by the Treasury, 4,567,981 shares by the Canadian government, and 13,350,000 shares by the UAW).
  • How much of the common stock will each of the 4 current entities hold after the IPO, and how much will be available for the public? Assuming no over-allotment option exercise, the Treasury will hold 36.92% of the stock (down from the current 60.83%), the Canadian government will hold 9.64% (down from 11.67%), the UAW will hold 11.57% (down from 17.50%), MLC (on behalf of the bondholders) will continue to hold 10.00%, and 31.86% will be available for the public. If the over-allotment option is exercised in full, the percentages will change to 33.34% for the Treasury, 9.34% for the Canadian government, 10.68% for the UAW, 10.00% for MLC (on behalf of the bondholders), and 36.65% for the public. Of note, as the single largest shareholder even with full over-allotment exercise, the Treasury will maintain effective control over Government Motors. Also, do note that both MLC and the UAW hold warrants to purchase new-issue common stock.
  • Where can I get the stock? The New York Stock Exchange has approved the listing of stock under the symbol GM. The Toronto Stock Exchange has conditionally approved the listing of stock under the symbol GMM.
  • Who gets the money from the IPO of the common stock, and about how much will each entity get out of it? The current holders of the stock and the underwriters get the money, not GM. Earlier reports suggested that the common stock would be offered at $25/share. Current estimates are that it could be as high as $33/share. At the lower $25/share amount, after the underwriter discount and commissions, and other fees, the Treasury should net approximately $8.74 billion, the Canadian government approximately US$742 million, and the UAW approximately $2.17 billion. At the higher $33/share amount, the Treasury should net approximately $11.53 billion, the Canadian government approximately US$980 million, and the UAW approximately $2.86 billion.
  • What are the prospects of a dividend on common stock? None can be paid until dividends on both Series A Preferred Stock (currently held by mostly the UAW and also the Treasury and Canadian governments) and new-issue Series B Preferred Stock are paid.
  • What’s this Series B Preferred Stock? It’s a new issue being held simultaneously with with the IPO of common stock. 80 million shares will be offered at $50 per share, a mandatory conversion to common stock sometime in 2013 (date and conversion ratio not yet specified), and a yet-to-be-determined rate of dividend based on the $50/share price. Unlike the common-stock IPO, GM will get the money from this as it is a new issue of stock, estimated at $3.9 billion (or $4.4 billion if that offering’s over-allotment option is fully-exercised).
  • I heard something about GM buying back the Series A Preferred Stock from the Treasury. What’s up with that? On October 27, GM and the Treasury entered into an agreement to allow GM to buy back the Treasury’s holdings of 83.9 million shares of Series A Preferred Stock three years (and change) earlier than the terms of that stock allowed. Under the former terms, which still apply to the stock held by the Canadian government and the UAW, the stock earned a 9% annual dividend (based on the liquidation price of $25/share), and the stock could not be liquidated prior to December 31, 2014 at $25/share plus any unpaid dividend. Under the terms of the sale, GM agreed to pay $25.50/share (a premium of $0.50/share), a total of $2.14 billion (a total premium of $41.9 million), and the Treasury agreed to forgo a minimum of $755 million of dividends. That money, as well as a portion of a $4 billion voluntary contribution to US hourly and salaried pension plans, will come from the proceeds of the sale of Series B Preferred Stock.

November 15, 2010

Mandatory Reading Monday – Christian Schneider’s “The Making of a Candidate – Part 1”

by @ 9:07. Filed under Politics - National, Politics - Wisconsin.

(H/T – Charlie Sykes)

The Wisconsin Policy Research Institute’s Christian Schneider embedded himself in the Ron Johnson Senate campaign, and began a week-long series looking at how someone who, this time last year was a successful businessman who was concerned about the storm clouds of PlaceboCare, knocked off the liberal lion of the US Senate, who this time last year, was still seen as a lock for re-election despite a series of testy constituent meetings. I can think of at least 4 Senate candidates who, had they followed what Johnson and his campaign team did, would have at a minimum made a respectable showing earlier this month, which is why it’s a “Mandatory Read” rather than a “Hot Read”. I usually hate to use an extended excerpt for these, but in this case, I must; besides, there’s 4 more parts coming.

One of the times RonJon’s inexperience as a public speaker became most evident occurred in early June, when the new candidate was speaking in front of a conservative group that should have been predisposed to his way of thinking. Johnson was asked a question about illegal immigration, and began giving a good answer.

Johnson was telling the group all about how we need to secure the border and enforce the laws on the books. He could have ended there and been just fine. Then, when he should have stopped talking, he started asking himself rhetorical questions. Johnson, not knowing what was going to come out of his mouth next, said, out loud, “of course, that brings up the question – what do we do with the illegal immigrants that are already here?”

Johnson’s staff was horrified. Clearly, the only reason to ask yourself a hypothetical question out loud is because you probably don’t know the answer. And not knowing things isn’t exactly a strong resume point when applying to be a U.S. senator.

As a result, (Jack) Jablonski (deputy campaign manager), Juston (Johnson, campaign manager), and (Kristin) Ruesch (communications director) began a “candidate boot camp” for the new candidate. They locked Johnson into a room for three days in mid-June, firing questions at him. These quickly became known as the “murder sessions.” Among the questions Johnson was posed:

  • Should British Petroleum (BP) be required to suspend its dividend payouts to ensure set aside for liabilities or put it into an escrow fund?
  • What do you feel caused the financial crash?
  • When is it appropriate to use the filibuster?
  • Who is responsible for preserving and protecting the Gulf of Mexico?
  • Is Obama a Marxist?
  • Are you the tea party candidate?
  • Are you in favor of a Fair or Flat Tax?
  • Should we audit the Fed?

Both Jablonski and Juston acknowledge that RonJon is a smart guy. “He’s said ‘every day I wake up, my goal is not to say something that will completely sink my campaign,’” recounts Juston. “And he’s a very willing learner – he’d sit and study policy papers all day if he could,” he said. “But he’s also very impatient and sensitive to his own vulnerabilities. He can’t stand just saying ‘I don’t know,’ when asked a tough question. It’s our job to teach him that sometimes it’s okay to give a 10 to 15 second answer, then pivot to jobs and the economy.”

Despite Johnson’s willingness to learn, these behind-the-scenes question and answer sessions often got testy. At times, Johnson’s obduracy ground the meetings to a halt. He didn’t think he’d be asked many of the questions his staff posed him. They often had to go back over issues several times.

For instance, staff told him three separate times not to say he’s a better candidate than Dave Westlake because he has more money. Then, at a candidate forum in Brookfield, Johnson answered a question about why he’d be a better candidate by essentially saying he had more money.

Through the murder sessions, Jablonski says he became convinced Johnson was smart and well-read enough to pull this off. But Johnson was clearly a neophyte, while Feingold has been at the political game for over 30 years now. “For eighteen years, taxpayers have been paying Russ Feingold to know everything there is to know about the federal government,” Jablonski says. “And Ron has to learn it all in, like, two weeks. Can you name anyone in the state who would be able to step into a situation like that?”

A bonus item from today’s piece deals with the raw, naked attempt by Feingold to keep somebody like Johnson from being able to effectively challenge his large warchest by putting the since-struck-down “Millionaire’s Exception” into the McCain-Feingold Liberal Protection Act.

November 11, 2010

RWN poll – looking back at the 2010 elections

by @ 6:54. Filed under Politics - National.

John Hawkins once again took the temperature of a bunch of right-of-center bloggers, this time on the just-concluded (for the most part, at least) 2010 elections. Since I was one of those who participated, and some of the answers require an explanation beyond just a checkmark in one of a few pre-worded answers, I’ll explain my answers. Some of them aren’t exactly the most-popular among the other 69 people who answered the call, some of them are; you’ll have to go over to Right Wing News to find out how many of us said what:

  • Out of the following people and groups, which do you think was the most valuable player in the election cycle? The NRCC – This one is pretty much by default because the Republican State Leadership Committee, which had the biggest day in gaining a unified majority of state legislatures, wasn’t on the list. Out of the rest, only the NRCC managed to meet (non-inflated) pre-election expectations without having at least one significant (non-inflated) clunker.
  • Out of the following people and groups, which do you think did the most disappointing job during the election cycle? The NRSC – See Charlie Crist, Arlen Specter, Liza Murkywater…er, Lisa Murkowski, Carly Fiorina,…. The Republicans that won, almost to a person, won in spite of the NRSC, and in several cases, to spite the NRSC.
  • How would you rate the impact of the Tea Party during the election cycle? Generally positive – Yes, there were a couple clunkers of candidates that came out of the Tea Party Movement (cough…Christine O’Donnell…cough), but for every clunker, there were several winners (Ron Johnson, Marco Rubio, Scott Walker). Further, without the Tea Party Movement, it certainly would have been possible-to-likely for the Democrats to hang onto the majority in the House and deny the Republicans clear control of the majority of the state legislatures.
  • Do you think the Tea Party and/or Sarah Palin and/or Jim DeMint cost the GOP the Senate? no – Face it, folks – we weren’t going to get to a net gain of 10 in the Senate this time around. Harry Reid had the casino union vote locked up in Nevada, California, Connecticut and New York are all too far gone (despite what Jazz Shaw thinks for the latter), and not even Mike Castle was going to win in Delaware if the exit polls were right. The only places I can think of where the Republicans could have won with proper NRSC support are Alaska (where the soon-to-be-turncoat Murkowski managed to run what appears to be a successful write-in campaign with effectively no NRSC opposition), West Virginia (where the NRSC, frankly, fucked up royally with the “hick” ad), and Washington (you think the $8 million in NRSC money that went to Fiorina could have been better spent for Dino Rossi?).
  • Which of the following would you say is a more apt description of the Democrats’ historic election losses? People voted against the Democrats – Had this been a WisPolitics temperature check rather than a RWN one, I would have gone with the second option of people voting for the Republicans. However, unlike Wisconsin’s Republicans, I cannot honestly say that Republicans on a national level realize they need to be the Party of Reagan.
  • Do you think Michael Steele should be retained as the Chairman of the RNC?Not sure – What matters more, results or gaffes? Vince Lombardi once said, “Winning isn’t everything; it is the only thing.”
  • Do you think John Cornyn should be retained as the head of the NRSC? No – See the answer to the second question.
  • Do you think Pete Sessions should be retained as head of the NRCC? Yes – It’s kind of hard to argue against the largest pickup in 62 years.
  • Do you think John Boehner should be the next Speaker of the House or should he be replaced? Replace him Let me put it this way – the one time Republican House members could have actually derailed a plank of the POR Agenda, 8 of them caved to let Cap-and-Tax pass. Fortunately, it was one of the few times Mitch McConnell didn’t need to keep more than 35 of his caucus together in the Senate to derail things (more on him in the next question).
  • Do you think Mitch McConnell should continue on as the Senate Minority Leader or should they replace him? Replace him – If I’m going to out John Boehner as a failure of a leader, how much more should I out McConnell as a failure of a leader? Even before we found out Stuart Smalley stole the Minnesota Senate election, Shoebox said that there was no difference between 57 Democrat Senators and 60. Guess what – he was right!

November 3, 2010

The Morning After

by @ 7:30. Filed under Politics - National.

I wasn’t able to stay up for all of the fun last night. East coast living isn’t very conducive to following west coast politics.

Going into the elections I was touting 60+ House seats and a Senate that would be 51/49 but unsure of which party would have 51. It looks like my House prediction will hold but my Senate prediction will fall 1 or 2 seats short. All in all, not a bad night.

While the euphoria of the night is still hanging on me I think it’s worth jotting down a few thoughts about what we learned last night.

  • I don’t have the hard data but it struck me that there were numerous House Democrats turned out last night who voted against health care before they voted for it.  I don’t think there is any doubt that part of the election results was a repudiation of the Obamacare bill and the egotistical hubris that Congress showed in ignoring their constituents and passing it despite overwhelming public opposition
  • Good, conservative candidates can win – OK, admittedly Rubio was easy (not that he had it easy) because he was a nearly perfect candidate who ran a nearly perfect campaign.  However, Rand Paul certainly wasn’t that.  Paul had the family name to get beyond and also his own fumbles i.e. saying he would eliminate farm subsidies for large corporations and then naming large, small farmer owned cooperatives as examples.  I don’t think this is a one time event.  I hope the Republican establishment had their eyes opened a bit and cast their net further than the “good ol’ boys club” they fish from for candidates.
  • On the flip side, we’ve also learned that flawed candidates are flawed candidates.  If there was ever a Senator more despised by his constituents, I can’t think of it.  Harry Reid was ripe for being picked off.  Harry Reid should have been picked off.  Except for the flawed candidate in Sharron Angle, Harry Reid might have picked off.  Am I arguing that Angle shouldn’t have run?  No, that’s Monday morning quarterbacking and I’ll leave that to you Packers folks who can’t get past the whole Favre thing :).  No, what I’m suggesting is that with the results of this election, the Tea Party has established some legitimate, political credibility.  Like all newbies, the Tea Party needs to learn from their actions and improve.  With their success, they should have a much better time of attracting better, stronger, conservative candidates.  The Tea Party needs to improve on their candidate selection and they will. O’Donnell was also a flawed candidate.
  • While there is a growing portion of the nation that is understanding the Country’s economic reality, there is still a large portion that doesn’t.  Long time Dems were turned out in House seat after House seat.  Names like Skelton and Oberstar, fixtures in the House, will not have thier cushy jobs come January.  On the other hand, California, what the hell?  California reelects a failed Governor and a failed leftist Senator. I think it’s time for the big quake that separates California from the rest of us. California and its government unions, will be a drain on the rest of the country for decades to come.
  • Incumbency is a powerful force and like gravity, requires an amazing amount of energy to overcome.  We’ve already talked aobut Harry Reid winning so I won’t rehash that one.  However, it looks like Alaska will retain their back stabbing Senator as well.  It’s harder to call what happened in AK.  I suspect that once all is reviewed, there is a combination of some flaws in Miller and some incumbency benefit.  I also think (I can’t prove a bit of this) that the vote had at least a tinge of anti Palin response.  I say this because Palin always was an outsider in the R’s of Alaska and she drove that stake home with her support of Miller.  There is a big rift in the R party in Alaska and I think the establishment won out this time.

Well, it’s the morning after and I’m sure there are Democrats who feel like their world has just been turned upside down.  For those folks and others, I leave you with this:

November 2, 2010

Election Night 2010 liveblog

by @ 14:26. Filed under Politics - Kentucky, Politics - Minnesota, Politics - National, Politics - Wisconsin.

I will eventually be at Ron Johnson’s Election Night party in Oshkosh, but the races will start closing well before 8 pm. With that in mind, we at No Runny Eggs, or at least those of us who are not at Drinking Right, will be kicking off election night live coverage at about 6 pm Central.

Depending on who is here when, comments may take a while to show up. Because this will be picked up by FreedomWorks, please keep it clean.

Election Day Hot Read – R.S. McCain’s “Final Warning: Polls Are Not Elections”

by @ 9:16. Filed under Politics - National.

The Winning McCain unleashes an invective or two to remind us that we need to run through the tape at the close of polling places today (that’s right, there’s a language warning on a McCain post, and it’s not from Meggie Mac):

Polls don’t win elections, and regression analysis sure as hell doesn’t win elections. Politics is not a science, and trying to reduce elections to trends, polls and mathematical formulae is one of those situations where when the only tool you’ve got is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail.

If you’re a thousand miles away from a district and don’t actually know anything about what the candidates and their campaigns are doing, it is tempting to look at poll numbers, examine past voting trends, and start making assumptions about what the result will be. But when we yield to that temptation, we ignore the Hayekian insight: Information is diffused throughout society in such a way that no one — not even the best-informed “expert” — can know everything.

So Jay Cost doesn’t know everything, Charlie Cook doesn’t know everything and Michael Barone doesn’t know everything, either. Yet their status as political experts requires them to make predictions and we mere mortals . . . well, we don’t know nothing about winning no elections.

In short – until and unless you, and those you know, vote, the Democrats are still in charge.

The MacIver Institute presents an Election Day Live Blog

by @ 7:48. Filed under Politics - National, Politics - Wisconsin.

The MacIver Institute has launched an Election Day live-blog, with reports from both the MacIver News Serivce and various bloggers. From the announcement:

Contrbutors can merely read the various posts or submit their own original content.The MacIver Institute’s History as it Happens Election Day Live Blog will record information, anecdotes and analysis on:

  • The most hotly contested local races
  • Voting experiences at polling places across Wisconsin
  • Turn out levels throughout the day
  • Final GOTV activities by candidates
  • Local referenda across the state
  • Any incidents of voting irregularities

The forum will be moderated by the team at MacIver. Promotion of individual candidates or political parties, promotion of any organization or cause, innuendo, rumor and name calling will be prohibited.

Since I’m one of those who was invited, I’ll simulcast the event here.

November 1, 2010

The Bob Etheridge Memorial Constituent Relations Award goes to…

by @ 22:46. Filed under Politics - National, Politics - Wisconsin.

(H/T – Jon Henke)

…Congressman Ron Kind (D-La Crosse), who attempted to grab the video camera of a blogger for La Crosse WatchDog who dared confront him on PlaceboCare.

[youtube width=”560″ height=”340″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-WjCU6yNs9o[/youtube]

If the voters in the 3rd Congressional District needed another reason to retire Kind, he just delivered.

Egg’s ballot – Fall 2010 edition

by @ 17:11. Filed under Politics - National, Politics - Wisconsin.

With the election tomorrow (7 am-8 pm in Wisconsin, check with your local election officials for times and poll locations), it’s as good a time as any to tell you who I’ll be voting for and who I would be voting for if I were in various districts other than my own:

Races I will be voting on

  • Wisconsin governor/lieutenant governor – Scott Walker/Rebecca Kleefisch – In case you missed that little graphic on your right (or you’re viewing this place on a mobile phone), I’ve been an early backer of Scott Walker. Do I really need to repeat what I said in September?
  • US Senator from Wisconsin – Ron Johnson – Going back to the September ballot explanation, I said that I trust someone whose “gut” was in the right place. Johnson has learned how effectively voice his “gut conservatism”, and how to avoid the types of mistakes that other first-timers have made.
  • 1st Congressional District – Paul Ryan – There is a runaway fiscal train coming down the tracks, and despite what certain “libertarians” think, Ryan is one of the few willing to work on rerouting the train away from the derailing curve at the bottom of the hill.
  • Attorney General – J.B. Van Hollen – There is a reason Van Hollen was the only Republican to win a major statewide/Congressional office held by a Democrat in 2006; he is a law-and-order type who runs a lean department.
  • State treasurer – Kurt Schuller – Schuller sold me on his candidacy in an interview he did shortly after the primary. I’m still not entirely convinced that the state treasurer’s office should go away entirely, but until/unless it does, he will fill the job in a fiscally- and constitutionally-responsible manner.
  • Secretary of state – David King – I’ll go back to an interview he did back at the RPW convention.
  • Milwaukee County Sheriff – David Clarke – Simple; he has professionalized the Sheriff’s office while streamlining the costs.
  • 7th Senate District – Jess Ripp – The Milwaukee Democrats made a big mistake in removing Jeff Plale in the primary in favor of someone who, if elected, would be the most-liberal Senator in the next session of the Legislature. Ripp, and my fellow voters, are just the people to explain to them just how big.
  • 21st Assembly District – Mark Honadel – Honadel took a district that had been a Democrat stronghold for 80 years during southeast Wisconsin’s precursor to the TEA Party. Now that he’s about to finally be in a government-limiting majority, it’s time to make sure he’s there to make it happen.

    • Races I wish I could be voting on

  • 5th Senate District – Leah Vukmir – She is, simply, one of the brightest people who ever went into the Capitol to serve, and the Capitol hasn’t corrupted her.
  • 21st Senate District – Van Wanggaard
  • 31st Senate District – Ed Thompson
  • 6 of the other 7 Congressional races – Chad Lee (2nd), Dan Kapanke (3rd), Dan Sebring (4th), Jim Sensenbrenner (5th), Sean Duffy (7th) and Reid Ribble (8th) – It’s about the spending. Sensenbrenner is a proven spendthrift, and the other 5 are running as the same. A couple of them won’t win just because the districts (2nd and 4th) are just that rigged for Democrats, but this time last year, everybody thought Dave Obey was safe in the 7th. In case you were wondering where Tom Petri is, see the open.
  • 25th Assembly District – Bob Ziegelbauer – Sink the other part of the Democrat Party Purification to bear at least some fruit this cycle. The Democrats and AFSCME went so far as to insert a faux “Republican” into the race (finally succeeding after some nomination signatures were found well after the deadline and after the Government “Accountability” Board threw out enough signatures to deny the stalking horse a ballot spot); don’t let them oust the last moderate Dem to see where the party is headed.
  • Racine County advisory referendum on new taxes for KRM – No – KRM should be dead and buried in the new year, but it’s best to drive this stake through it.

Guest post from Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) – Support Sean Duffy in Wisconsin’s Seventh Congressional District

by @ 14:16. Filed under Politics - National, Politics - Wisconsin.

Note – Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) is the Deputy House GOP Whip and recruitment director of the NRCC, and he’s been covering various candidates on RedState the past few weeks.

Tomorrow is Election Day, and I’m excited for the Republican House candidates who have worked so hard over the last several months. Momentum is on our side, and tomorrow, Americans can make a bold statement to change our country’s direction.

One who I am excited about is Young Gun candidate Sean Duffy, who is running in Wisconsin’s Seventh Congressional District. If Sean looks familiar, it’s because he was on MTV’s Real World. But in the actual real world, Sean is a former prosecutor who stepped forward to run for Congress when he saw the Democrats’ failed policies hurting the country.

Sean Duffy
Just like he chops logs as a competitive lumberjack, Sean wants to chop down the federal budget deficit. He would do that by freezing non-discretionary federal spending to 2008 levels and canceling unspent stimulus money.

Sean is also on a mission to get the economy going to create jobs. Instead of the Democrats’ tired idea of more stimulus spending, Sean believes in releasing the energy of small businesses. That means stopping the Democrats’ tax increases coming on January 1, 2011, abandoning a cap-and-trade energy tax, and reducing regulations on small businesses.

Some of those new regulations are found in the Democrats’ government takeover of health care. Sean rejects that Big Government approach and will work for real solutions like letting consumers buy insurance across state lines and lawsuit abuse reform.

Check out Sean’s website and follow him on Twitter.

Thanks,

Rep. Kevin McCarthy

Eggs on the road and on the air – Election Day edition

by @ 11:41. Filed under Politics - National, Politics - Wisconsin, The Blog.

Revisions/extensions (1:55 pm 11/1/2010) – I wasn’t anticipating on going on TEMS today, but I will be on at 3 pm.

There’s a few places I will be tomorrow (and today):

Soon-to-be-Elected Candidate Hot Read – Erick Erickson’s “An Open Letter to the Freshman Republican Victors”

by @ 7:05. Filed under Politics - Kentucky, Politics - Minnesota, Politics - National, Politics - Wisconsin.

RedStae head Erick Erickson has a reminder for the soon-to-be-freshmen Congresscritters and Senators that, while focused on them, is also a very good read for those about to be sent to Madison, St. Paul and Frankfort:

When you get to Washington you will be told you need a professional staff of lobbyists, careerists, etc. to help guide you. You will be told that “you just don’t understand” or “you are naive” or “the School House Rock version of how a bill becomes a law is too simplified for the real world.”

The people telling you this are the people the voters hate and you should not trust. Largely they will be people in leadership, particularly staffers, who will soon depart for K Street where they hope to profit off their relationship with you. They will work with people like Trent Lott to try to co-opt you.

Fight.

Fight them.

Fight the idea that you must yield to their ways instead of them yielding to your ways. You, after all, have not been driven from power like these men have….

If you fight them you will be rewarded. If you succumb, the tea party will come for you in just a few short years.

October 31, 2010

Rejection? How About Repudiation?

by @ 20:03. Filed under Politics - National.

Arianna Huffington says the upcoming election results does not mean America is rejecting Democrats.

You mean like Obama’s election wasn’t a mandate?

Reading Smoke Signals

by @ 19:30. Filed under Politics - National.

I shared with you a week ago that Barbara Ma’am Boxer’s success was likely tied to the success of Proposition 19, the pot legalization referendum. In what will likely be the last poll on the Proposition, The Field Poll shows mixed results for California.

Indeed, Proposition 19 now looks like it will go down in defeat. At least via a referendum, there will be no pot legalization in California. I’m sure that will be a relief to President Obama who could have been caught between popular support for weed and his ego crying “I’m the law here!” Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like Proposition 19 is going to go down by a wide enough margin to benefit America as a whole.

The most recent polling on the Boxer/Fiorina race was done by Rasmussen. The poll showed Boxer with a 3 point lead but still within the margin of error. The most recent Rasmussen poll shows little change from a poll by Rasmussen a week prior and from SurveyUSA about 10 days ago. Both of these earlier polls also had Boxer in low, single digit leads.

In looking at the partisan splits, I see the same questions and issues regarding the California polls that have been raised elsewhere; will the turn outs look like previous elections or will it look like something different?

in 2008, the California partisan split was 30% Republican, 42% Democrat and 28% Independent. The Field Poll split supposed a turnout of R, D, I as 39%, 44% and 17% respectively. Finally, the SurveyUSA poll show the split as 34%, 42% 21%.

Given the “historical” nature of the 2008 election (I kid you not, I heard an African American describe the reason for his Obama vote that way on Hannity the other night), it would seem like a larger Dem turnout this year would be unlikely. Of course, the pot proponents will argue that the turnout is due to the referendum. However, I find it hard to believe that the pot referendum would pull a greater percentage of Dems than the Gay Marriage referendum combined with “historical” voting opportunities.

If I had to guess, and this is only a gut, I believe that both Field Poll and Survey USA have Dems over represented in their polls, that’s the good news. The bad news is that even if I adjust the Dems back to the party split of 41% of the 2006 race, the Senate race does not tip toward Fiorina.

It looks to me like the only way for Fiorina to win is if the Republicans and Independents out GOTV the Dems. How will we know? The Dems, and especially the young Dems, are strongly tied to support of the Pot Proposition. If you see reports on election night that Proposition 19 is going down by at least 10% it means the potheads haven’t turned out or that those opposed to the referendum have overwhelmed those who support the referendum. In either event, 10% will be the smoke signal to indicate whether Ma’am Boxer will return for another session or whether California will join the rest of the Union and send President Obama a rebuke “from sea to shining sea!”

October 29, 2010

Poll-a-copia – Last call for PPP

by @ 13:32. Filed under Politics - National, Politics - Wisconsin.

I really should have waited one more day to do a poll-a-copia because Public Policy Polling released their last pre-election poll taken of 1,372 likely voters between 10/26 and 10/28 this morning. On the other hand, there’s a few results in the identical 53%-44% leads Scott Walker and Ron Johnson enjoy over Tom Barrett and Russ Feingold (respectively) that bear longer looks than I could afford in a month-long “wrap-up” post.

The first item of note is the partisan split. PPP’s split in this poll was 37% independent, 34% Republican and 30% Democrat. I do have to note that Wisconsin does not have state-monitored party registration, and differeing polling firms have different screens for who is a Republican versus who is a Democrat. It is remarkable how even the topline likely-voter results are between the 4 different non-St. Norbert pollsters that took polls this month even as they had significantly different partisan splits.

PPP noted that there is a rather significant “enthusiasm gap” in Wisconsin, at least as it is measured by those who admitted to voting for Barack Obama in 2008 versus who actually voted for him in 2008. Obama carried Wisconsin by a 56.2%-42.3% margin over John McCain, but among the likely voters this year, only 49% admitted to voting for Obama while 46% said they voted for McCain.

PPP further noted that Obama’s job approval really slipped. Among all the likely voters, it was down to 37% approve/54% disapprove. That compares rather darkly to Rasmussen’s essentially-contemporaneous 48% approve/51% disapprove/-16 Approval Index (strong approve less strong diapprove, with no equivalent in PPP’s polling) statewide, and a national rolling average of 44% approve/55% disapprove/-20 Approval Index taken the same 3 days as PPP’s poll. Worse for Obama, his approval rating among those who admitted to voting for him was only 70% approve/18% disapprove. Perhaps that is why Obama has decided not to head to Wisconsin one more time (H/T-Ed Morrissey).

Meanwhile, both soon-to-be-ex-governor Jim Doyle’s and Russ Feingold’s job approval ratings were in negative territory, and worse than Rasmussen’s equivalent numbers (Rasmussen used favorability for Feingold rather than job approval). There also is a troubling trend for Herb Kohl in the PPP poll – his job approval index was barely above water at 41% approve/40% disapprove.

October 28, 2010

Poll-a-copia – Closing on the end

by @ 19:17. Filed under Politics - National, Politics - Wisconsin.

I’m sorry that it’s been a while since I did one of these. Outside the outliers of the St. Norbert’s Senate poll and various Democrat-sponsored internal polls, not much had really changed in the aggregate since the end of September until now. To make up for that lack of attention, I’ll expand the look to cover the two Congressional races in the northern part of the state, the 7th and 8th Congressional Districts.

Before I really begin, I may as well explain why I’m completely discounting the St. Norbert’s polls, even though their gubernatorial poll appeared to confirm what everybody else has. They have a long, bipartisan history of being outliers, likely due to the extended length of time covered by the polls and the fact that it’s conducted by college students just learning how to do polling.

Senate/Gubernatorial polls

First up for review in both the gubernatorial and Senate races is the Reuters/Ipsos poll (crosstabs courtesy RealCleaPolitics), taken between 10/8 and 10/11 among 600 registered and 451 likely voters. On the likely-voter end, Republican nominee Ron Johnson had a 51%-44% lead on Democrat incumbent Russ Feingold in the Senate race, and Republican nominee Scott Walker had a 52%-42% lead on Democrat nominee Tom Barrett in the gubernatorial race. On the registered-voter end, Johnson’s lead almost completely evaporated to 46%-45%, while Walker’s lead shrunk by less to a 48%-41% lead. Of note in this poll is the partisan split; while the registered voter partisan split was 46% Democrat-38% Republican, the likely voter partisan split was 45% Republican-42% Democrat.

Ipsos did not break down the likely-voter numbers by party. Among the 9% of registered voters who identified themselves as independents in this poll, Johnson had a 38%-30% lead, with a significant part of Feingold’s support coming from those who were merely “leaning” toward him (the “firm-committment” numbers were 37%-25% in favor of Johnson). Meanwhile, Walker had a 41%-15% lead among the independents with leaners and a 36%-15% lead among independents who expressed a “firm committment”.

Next up is the Time/CNN/Opinion Research poll, taken between 10/8 and 10/12 among 931 likely voters. Johnson and Walker both had identical 52%-44% leads over Feingold and Barrett respectively. While the partisan split was not released, based on the margin of error, independents were a substantial plurality, while Republicans and Democrats were roughly equal in representation. Both Johnson and Walker had roughly 20-point leads among independents.

Finally, the Rasmussen polls taken on 10/25 among 750 likely voters. Johnson had a 53%-46% lead on Feingold, while Walker had a 52%-42% lead on Barrett. Democrats had a 39%-37% advantage in the poll over Republicans, but Johnson held a 21-point advantage and Walker held a 27-point advantage among independents.

Going back over the numbers from RealClearPolitics, in the Senate race, outside the St. Norbert outlier, Johnson has been above 50% since the September primaries and Feingold has been at or under 46% against Johnson since polling started including him in May. On the gubernatorial side, outside of a late-September Fox News/Pulse Opinion Research poll, Walker has been at or above 50% since the primaries, while Barrett has been at or below 45% for the entire year including that Fox News/Pulse Opinion Research poll.

Revisions/extensions (1:34 pm 10/29/2010) – I should have procrastinated a bit longer because Public Policy Polling released a poll this morning with Johnson and Walker holding identical 53%-44% leads. Fuller discussion is above.

8th Congressional District

Publicly-available polling has been rather sparse in this district, with only two polls that RealClearPolitics noted, one from The Hill/Penn, Schoen and Berland taken between 10/12 and 10/14 among 415 likely voters and one from DailyKos/Public Policy Polling taken between 10/23 and 10/24 among 1,419 likely voters.

In The Hill’s poll, Republican nominee Reid Ribble had a 45%-44% lead on Democrat incumbent Steve Kagen. There were two items in the crosstabs (courtesy WisPolitics’ DC Wrap) that do not match up with most other polls taken nationwide; the partisan split, and the independent voter result. The split was listed as 38% independent-32% Republican-25% Democrat, while Kagen held a 3-point lead among independents.

The DailyKos poll is far more interesting, not the least of which is the size of the poll. Ribble had a 40%-37% lead on Kagen, with 23% undecided. Meanwhile, Johnson had a 52%-45% lead on Feingold in the district, while Walker had a 52%-44% lead on Barrett.

The demographic percentages at the bottom of the crosstabs seem to have been fouled up, but the partisan split appears to be roughly 38% independent, 31% Democrat and 30% Republican. Among independents, Ribble had a 41%-31% lead, while Johnson had a 16-point lead and Walker a 18-point lead among those same independents.

7th Congressional District

Like the 8th Congressional, publicly-available polling is hard to come by, with the added handicap of no crosstabs from the two outfits that polled the district. The Hill/Penn, Schoen and Berland polled 400 likely voters between 10/2 and 10/7, and found Republican nominee Sean Duffy up on Democrat nominee Julie Lassa 44%-35%. The Hill noted Duffy held a 17-point lead among independents (no partisan split given) and a 2-point lead among women, with Lassa’s only demographic lead being among voters over 55 years old.

An outfit called We Ask America polled 1,150 registered voters on 10/18. They found Duffy up 46.00%-38.61% (yes, they reported to the nearest hundredth of a percent), a bit of a tightening from their 8/4 poll of 1,002 registered voters that had Duffy up 41.83%-33.09%. The partisan split was 39% independent-32% Democrat-29% Republican, and Duffy held a 49.10%-29.95% lead among independents.

October 26, 2010

What To Say About This…

by @ 18:09. Filed under Politics - National.

Vice President Biden was at it again today.

He’s been out stumping for a whole host of Democrat candidates. Today, while spreading propaganda for Democrat Tim Bishop, Biden told the audience:

“Every single great idea that has marked the 21st century, the 20th century and the 19th century has required government vision and government incentive,”

Biden has proven himself to be the Master of Gaffe. Combine that with his ability to speak completely ignorant of facts of any kind and in a way, he’s become boring. I mean, gaffes are funny when you know that the person know better than the words that just came out of their mouth. In Biden’s case, I no longer believe that any of his verbal gaffes are unintentional. I’m more inclined to believe that Biden is willfully ignorant of the facts of the world around him.

When read the above quote, my initial reaction was to put up a post describing how Biden’s comment was typical of leftists who think the world can’t accomplish anything without Mama Government telling it to. I’d then follow that with a list of inventions that prove Biden ignorant. Instead, I think a two word answer will suffice to respond to Biden:

Liquid Paper

Nevada, North Carolina electronic voting machines preset for straight-D votes

by @ 14:42. Filed under Politics - National, Vote Fraud.

(H/T – Drudge)

Somebody cue Capt. Louis Renault – Democrat election officials are up to the newest versions of their old tricks in trying to steal elections in both Nevada and North Carolina.

Las Vegas’ KVVU-TV reports that voters in Boulder City found that before they had voted for the United States Senate race, Harry Reid’s name was already checked on the touch-screen voting machines. Meanwhile, the New Bern Sun Journal reports that voters who attempted to select a straight-Republican ballot had a straight-Democrat ballot selected by the touch-screen voting machines.

October 25, 2010

Monday Hot Read – P.J. O’Rourke’s “They Hate Our Guts”

by @ 13:01. Filed under Politics - National.

(H/T – Ed Driscoll, who also explains there is a perpetual undergrad in the White House)

P.J. O’Rourke nailed the Democrat philosophy in the current issue of The Weekly Standard:

They don’t just hate our Republican, conservative, libertarian, strict constructionist, family values guts. They hate everybody’s guts. And they hate everybody who has any. Democrats hate men, women, blacks, whites, Hispanics, gays, straights, the rich, the poor, and the middle class.

Democrats hate Democrats most of all. Witness the policies that Democrats have inflicted on their core constituencies, resulting in vile schools, lawless slums, economic stagnation, and social immobility. Democrats will do anything to make sure that Democratic voters stay helpless and hopeless enough to vote for Democrats.

I can’t do better than his close either:

This is not an election on November 2. This is a restraining order. Power has been trapped, abused and exploited by Democrats. Go to the ballot box and put an end to this abusive relationship. And let’s not hear any nonsense about letting the Democrats off if they promise to get counseling.

Zucker hits Senator Ma’am hard

by @ 10:19. Filed under Politics - National.

Shoebox highlighted Senator Barbara Boxer’s (D-CA) Achilles heel (namely, the inability of dopers to concentrate for very long) yesterday, so I thought I’d bring in David Zucker to deliver the hard-working coup de grâce.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixiYZ9DPk8o[/youtube]

It’s time to call her Ma’am again.

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