Showing posts with label Election Day. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Election Day. Show all posts

Monday, June 8, 2015

Curtailing Voting Rights vs. Curtailing Vote Fraud

Perhaps to distract attention from her own scandals, Hillary Rodham Clinton charges that Republicans want to curtail young people’s and minorities’ voting rights.  The charge that Republicans engage in vote suppression has been in Democrats’ playbook for years.  (By regurgitating this hoary claim, Mrs. Clinton lends credence to Marco Rubio’s observation that some pols may be antiquated.)


We need to investigate her assertion that GOP concerns about election fraud are overblown.
Given America’s dependence on elections, it is essential to the nation’s well-being that citizens have confidence in elections’ honesty and integrity.  People must be able to assume that candidates and parties declared the winner of an election won honestly.  Vote fraud saps people’s trust and confidence in government itself.
Sadly, the U.S. has a long history of vote fraud. 

Unless efforts to thwart fraudulent voting are successful, Americans should expect even more in future elections.  It is conceivable that, unless preventative action occurs, Americans may endure more contested elections that will make the 2000 fiasco in Florida look like an episode of good government.

Election fraud takes many forms: “voting the graveyard,” stuffing ballot boxes, “repeater” voting – sometimes in separate states – noncitizens casting ballots, preventing citizens from exercising the franchise, and miscounting election results, just to list a few.

In the late 19th century, most states introduced requirements that citizens register in person at designated locations before Election Day in order to prevent, or at least minimize, the kinds of fraudulent practices then in vogue.  Requiring people to register in person and in advance of Election Day had salubrious effects, at least for a time.

Via; American Thinker

Tuesday, November 6, 2012

Judge issuing order to reinstate booted Philadelphia election officials, Republicans say


A Pennsylvania judge is issuing an order to reinstate Republican election officials across Philadelphia who allegedly were ejected or refused entry by on-site Democratic voting chief judges, GOP officials tell Fox News.

One Republican official claimed that "just under 70" Republican election officials were blocked from Philadelphia polling sites Tuesday morning by Democrats on site. One of them, the official claimed, "was shoved out of the polling place." 
"For this many inspectors to be ejected from polling places is rare, even for Philadelphia," the official told FoxNews.com. 

Elsewhere in the city, a representative from the New Black Panther Party was also spotted outside a polling site. The New Black Panthers stirred controversy in 2008 when members appeared outside a polling site, one of them holding a billy club. The representative seen Tuesday morning was not armed. 

The flap over the election judges, though, was widespread. Republicans claim they are obtaining a series of court orders to seat the so-called election "inspectors," and sheriff's deputies will be available to escort them. 

Despite the high number of officials who were allegedly booted, the dispute itself is not uncommon for Philadelphia. Fred Voigt, legal counsel for the city commissioners, said these kinds of face-offs happen "with regularity" in the City of Brotherly Love. 

"It happens all the time," Voigt said. He said court-appointed Republican officials typically show up on Election Day and end up squaring off against stand-in officials at the polling sites filling in the open seats. Part of the problem, he said, is that the Republican inspectors are appointed on relatively short notice, leading to a string of confrontations on Election Day. 

"There are no cool heads here," Voigt said. 

Via: Fox News


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Monday, November 5, 2012

Thousands of Troops May Not Get to Vote


Thousands of military personnel may not get to vote in the presidential election because ballots have been delayed in reaching military voters stationed overseas, according to Republican lawmakers angry over what they call a “serious failure” of the Dept. of Defense to safeguard the voting rights of the military.
Sen. John Cornyn, (R-TX) said thousands of military voters could be disenfranchised as a result of the DoD’s failure to modernize its system of getting ballots to troops.
“DoD’s failure to fix this longstanding problem means that the blank ballots of thousands of overseas service members, as well as some who have recently returned from overseas, could be currently trapped in an archaic and inefficient mail forwarding system,” Cornyn wrote in a letter to Sec. of Defense Leon Panetta. “These ballots are unlikely to reach these service members until after Election Day has passed.”
Via: Fox News Radio

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Sunday, November 4, 2012

The Tip of the Communist Iceberg in the Oval Office

As Tuesday is Election Day, it is extremely important that we get as many voters as humanly possible to the polls to vote for Romney—or against Obama.

We Americans are far more insular than we like to admit.  We have, all along, felt more that this election is for—and about—America and the people of America.  But that is only half of the story.
You see, without a free America, the western world is F I N I S H E D ! 

Many of us have wondered and some even questioned openly Obama’s allegiance.  We’ve asked:  “WHO IS this guy?  WHERE did he come from?  For WHOM is he REALLY working?  To WHOM—or to WHAT—does Obama owe his loyalty?”

All of the above are legitimate questions the answers to which have been covered up for over four years now.

We have posited—often—that Obama is a socialist/communist.  I believe that.  The evidence is there in his background and in his policies as President of the United States. 

I have been bedeviled by the fact that I could not get a clear picture of the greater plan, the ultimate end game, if you will.  Eventually, it occurred to me that the reason was, actually, rather simple.  You see, Obama is only a piece of the puzzle—only a part of the picture. Integral? Yes, no question about it.

America’s enemies are dead set upon bringing America down, forcing her to give up her leadership role on the world stage.  When you investigate Obama’s early life as a child, and then as a student, a college student, a state senator, a US senator and finally, President of the USA, it becomes clear that he has been groomed for this exact purpose.  And he has been eagerly exercising all the anti-American lessons taught him by his communist mentors throughout his life.

“Leading from Behind” is only the tip of the communist iceberg in the US Oval Office.

Via: Canada Free Press

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Report: Obama Supporters Stepping Up Riot Threats


AP
A few weeks ago, Twitchy reported on Twitter users threatening to riot if President Obama loses to GOP rival Mitt Romney. With four days to go until Election Day, we decided this is a topic worth revisiting.  The results of our Twitter searches are not pretty:
@TattooedPretty
If Romney win , me obama and 2 chainz going to start a riot and shoot his ass !—
   
Dimz @turn2two
If Obama lose it's going to be the biggest riot in history… Beacause, I'm going to start it!
  
K.dot @BanitaApplebumm
If Romney were to win, I feel like ppl are gonna riot the streets..
Click on the link below to read more
Via: Twitchy

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Saturday, November 3, 2012

Poll: Romney Up 6-Points In Florida, 51%-45%…


Florida continues to look good for Mitt Romney. The Republican holds a 6-point lead in the state essential to his hopes of defeating President Barack Obama, according to a new Tampa Bay Times/Bay News 9/Miami Herald poll.
The poll shows slight tightening, with Romney's 51-45 lead down 1 percentage point from the Times'statewide poll a month ago. Other Florida surveys show a tighter contest and both campaigns are blanketing the state with appearances geared toward scraping together every last vote.
Still, nearly every key indicator in theTimes' pre-Election Day poll reveals Romney's advantage in a state Obama won four years ago.
Florida voters trust Romney more to fix the economy and give him an edge, 50 percent to 48 percent, on who will look out more for the middle class — a stark turn from past months when Obama and his allies unleashed a barrage of TV ads portraying Romney as an out-of-touch corporate raider.
Romney even has a slight advantage on foreign policy, with 2 percent more voters saying they trust him over Obama, who has faced criticism over the fatal attack on a U.S. consulate in Libya.
"Florida typically is a little bit more Republican than the rest of the country," said Brad Coker of Mason-Dixon Polling and Research, which conducted the poll for the Times and its media partners.
In 2008, Sen. John McCain "only lost by 3 points here and he lost by 7 nationally," Coker added. "Three points is not a lot of ground to make up in Florida for a Republican, particularly when the president's popularity is mixed, at best."

Friday, November 2, 2012

Last jobs report before election shows economy in 'virtual standstill'


The final monthly jobs report before Election Day offered a mixed bag of economic evidence that quickly became political putty for the presidential candidates, with the unemployment rate ticking up to 7.9 percent but the economy adding a better-than-expected 171,000 jobs. 

At the same time, the number of unemployed grew by 170,000, roughly the same amount -- to 12.3 million. 
The October numbers allow President Obama to argue the economy is technically growing under his watch. But they also allow Mitt Romney to argue that the new jobs are not making much of a dent in the unemployment problem. Both campaigns quickly set to work putting their spin on data that, if nothing else, underscores the slow pace of the recovery. 
"That's 9 million jobs short of what (Obama) promised," Romney said at a rally in Wisconsin shortly before noon. "Unemployment is higher today than when Barack Obama took office." 

The rate was 7.8 percent the month Obama took office. "Today's increase in the unemployment rate is a sad reminder that the economy is at a virtual standstill," Romney said in a separate written statement. "When I'm president, I'm going to make real changes that lead to a real recovery, so that the next four years are better than the last." 

Former Bureau of Labor Statistics chief Keith Hall told Fox Business Network that at this rate, "we're still talking nine or 10 years" before the economy gets back to normal. 

But Obama, speaking in Hilliard, Ohio, pointed to the report as another sign the economy is moving in the right direction, despite the challenges remaining. 

Via: Fox News


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Wednesday, October 31, 2012

GOP COULD SEE 'TSUNAMI' OF VOTERS ON ELECTION DAY


In many battleground states, Republicans traditionally outperform Democrats at the polls on Election Day, and some analysts believe there will be a GOP "tsunami" at the polls on next Tuesday's Election Day.

Over the last two weeks, GOP political operatives have noted Democrats have been turning out "high-propensity voters" -- or voters who normally vote on Election Day -- for early voting, while Republicans have been turning "low propensity voters" -- or voters who traditionally do not vote on Election Day. This means Democrats have fewer voters to draw from their universe on Election Day while Republicans have more.

One Republican analyst said "Democrats are cannibalizing their high-propensity voters in advance of election day to get stories that they are winning," which is amounting to "stealing from Peter, or Election Day, to pay Paul, or early voting."

As the Examiner noted, "in Ohio, the Democrats have turned out 43 percent of the most loyal supporters to vote, compared to just 27 percent of the GOP. In Iowa, the difference is 43 percent to 29 percent."
Although Democrats have touted their early voting strength, a Gallup poll found Romney with a seven-point lead among voters who have already voted, and even a Pew Research survey found Romney already has a "turnout advantage over Obama, which could loom larger as Election Day approaches." 


Tuesday, October 30, 2012

GALLUP: OBAMA'S EARLY VOTE ADVANTAGE COLLAPSES 22-POINTS OVER 2008

My pal Guy Benson found a juicy nugget that helps to bring more clarity to the news from Gallup yesterday that shows Romney leading Obama in the early vote by a full seven points, 52-45%. Almost exactly four years ago (October 28, 2008),  according to Gallup, Obama was massacring John McCain among early voters with a fifteen-point lead, 55-40%. That means, at least according to Gallup, that Obama's early vote advantage has dropped 22 points when compared to '08.
Benson also notes that the percentage of voters who have or intend to vote early was 33% in 2008 and remains at 33% today. As Don Surber said in this tweet, "People don't wait in line to vote for the status quo[.]"
In his email to me, Benson makes The Point: "Obama had a 55/40 lead on McCain with early voters in '08, but only led by 3 pts with the election day crowd.  He ended up winning by 7 overall."
In other words, among those who actually voted on Election Day, Obama's advantage over McCain was only three points. Obama won by seven overall because of the early vote margins he had accumulated. If Gallup is correct about 2012 and Romney being ahead by seven with early voters, that means Obama's in very deep trouble. Even polls that show Obama with a small lead in states like Ohio confirm Romney will win among those who vote on Election Day.
Like me, Benson is skeptical of Gallup because, like its daily tracker that gives Romney a five point lead over Obama nationally, this early voting poll defies the CorruptMedia's conventional wisdom. But there are a few things you have to keep in mind.

Monday, October 29, 2012

COMPLETE LIST OF WHERE U.N. POLL WATCHERS WILL BE STATIONED




Oct 25, 2012 169 Comments Pat Dollard
Excerpted from THE HILL: United Nations election monitors from Europe and central Asia will be at polling places around the U.S. looking for voter suppression activities by conservative groups, a concern raised by civil rights groups during a meeting this week. The intervention has drawn criticism from a prominent conservative-leaning group combating election fraud. The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), a United Nations partner on democratization and human rights projects, will deploy 44 observers around the county on Election Day to monitor an array of activities, including potential disputes at polling places.
Liberal-leaning civil rights groups met with representatives from the OSCE this week to raise their fears about what they say are systematic efforts to suppress minority voters likely to vote for President Obama.
The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, the NAACP and the ACLU, among other groups, warned this month in a letter to Daan Everts, a senior official with OSCE, of “a coordinated political effort to disenfranchise millions of Americans — particularly traditionally disenfranchised groups like minorities.”
The request for foreign monitoring of election sites drew a strong rebuke from Catherine Engelbrecht, founder and president of True the Vote, a conservative-leaning group seeking to crack down on election fraud.

Friday, October 26, 2012

AP POLL: ROMNEY ERASES OBAMA LEAD AMONG WOMEN


Less than two weeks out from Election Day, Republican Mitt Romney has erased President Barack Obama's 16-point advantage among women, a new Associated Press-GfK poll shows. And the president, in turn, has largely eliminated Romney's edge among men.
Those churning gender dynamics leave the presidential race still a virtual dead heat, with Romney favored by 47 percent of likely voters and Obama by 45 percent, a result within the poll's margin of sampling error, the survey shows.
After a commanding first debate performance and a generally good month, Romney has gained ground with Americans on a number of important fronts, including their confidence in how he would handle the economy and their impressions of his ability to understand their problems.
At the same time, expectations that Obama will be re-elected have slipped: Half of voters now expect the president to win a second term, down from 55 percent a month earlier.
For all of the good news for Republicans, however, what matters most in the election endgame is Romney's standing in the handful of states whose electoral votes still are up for grabs. And polls in a number of those battleground states still appear to favor Obama.
As the election nears, Romney has been playing down social issues and trying to project a more moderate stance on matters such as abortion in an effort to court female voters. The AP-GfK poll, taken Friday through Tuesday, shows Romney pulling even with Obama among women at 47-47 after lagging by 16 points a month earlier.
But now his campaign is grappling with the fallout from a comment by a Romney-endorsed Senate candidate in Indiana, who said that when a woman becomes pregnant during a rape "that's something God intended."
Romney quickly distanced himself from the remark by Republican Richard Mourdock. But Obama campaign spokeswoman Jen Psaki said the incident was "a reminder that a Republican Congress working with a Republican President Mitt Romney would feel that women should not be able to make choices about their own health care."


Thursday, October 25, 2012

FL GOP Senate Candidate Connie Mack: “United Nations Should Be Kicked Off Of American Soil”…


Florida GOP Senate candidate Connie Mack had harsh words for the United Nations while on the campaign trail on Tuesday.

Mack, who is running to unseat Democratic incumbent Sen. Bill Nelson, stressed his conviction that the U.N. should be defunded and "kicked off of American soil,"according to The Tampa Tribune.
Mack made the remarks while making an appearance alongside Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz). It's also not the first time the Senate candidate has leveled strong criticism against the United Nations.

The Miami Herald relays background on Mack's posture toward the U.N., which he made no secret of in taking aim at the organization earlier this week.
The incident that sparked his outrage was an announcement by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe that it will send 44 observer to polling places around the country on Election Day to monitor potential disputes at polling places. The organization is registered as an NGO with United Nations but the U.N. is not involved in monitoring elections in the U.S.

The request for voting day monitoring came from the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, the NAACP and the ACLU, among other groups. They warned in a letter to the OSCE of “a coordinated political effort to disenfranchise millions of Americans — particularly traditionally disenfranchised groups like minorities.”
Addressing the issue in a statement released earlier this week, Mack said, "The UN’s actions and intentions toward the United States have been nothing short of reprehensible."

As for the state of the Florida Senate race, the latest polls show Mack running behind Nelson in the contest. Check out the numbers from HuffPost Pollster.


Friday, October 19, 2012

Obama: ‘Who’re you gonna believe; me or your lyin’ eyes?’

While President Obama appeared much less comatose in Tuesday night’s debate than he was during the first, he certainly played fast and loose with his facts. His constant claim that his administration has created in excess of five million private sector jobs since taking office has little to no supportive evidence.


If indeed there were five million private sector jobs created over the past four years, then why is the unemployment rate so much higher today than it was when he first took office?

The most recent jobs report issued by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) showed the unemployment rate in the US dropping below 8% for the first time in 3 years. What the BLS failed to acknowledge was that this drop in the unemployment rate was a statistical aberration, in large part due to one state’s failure to make its unemployment statistics available. This is the final BLS report before Election Day and isn’t it convenient that this one state’s failure to provide unemployment data would make the unemployment rate appearing to be lower that it actually is? Expecting that the unemployment rate has dropped by .3% in an economy that’s at or below 1.3% GDP growth is in the same ballpark as believing that pigs can fly. For a real look at how Obama’s economic policies have worked, the graph released by the BLS is a visual telling of the President’s failures.

Saturday, October 13, 2012

AS ELECTION DAY NEARS, ROMNEY CROWDS ARE SURGING


SIDNEY, Ohio (AP) -- The crowds tell the story. As Election Day nears, Mitt Romney is drawing large and excited throngs.

Look to dusty Iowa cornfields, rain-soaked Virginia parks, the muddy fields of the Shelby County Fairgrounds, where a crowd of 9,500 - almost half of this western Ohio town - gathered among the barns and stables on a frigid October evening this week to glimpse the Republican presidential contender.

"Where else would we want to be?" said one of the shivering faithful, Judy Cartwright, a 71-year-old nurse from Sidney. "I want to see the next president of the United States."

Romney's debate performance against President Barack Obama last week - and his energetic appearances following it up - have fueled a rise in enthusiasm on the campaign trail. Whether or not it will translate into votes, polls do suggest that Republicans are fired up. It's a welcome development for the Republican businessman, who is hardly a natural politician and has long struggled to match Obama's ability to inspire excitement.

In Virginia, for example, Republican leaning counties appear to be getting the fastest start on absentee voting ahead of Election Day. State Board of Elections data analyzed by the Virginia Public Access Project, a nonprofit and nonpartisan tracker of money in state politics, shows that of the 25 localities where absentee voting is busiest, 21 voted Republican in the 2008 presidential race. And of the 25 localities where absentee balloting is the slowest so far, 16 supported Obama.

Romney seems to be feeding off the energy pumping through his now-sprawling crowds, even as aides downplay the newfound momentum among the GOP base
.
"I'm overwhelmed by the number of people here," he exulted while scanning the sea of supporters packed beyond the fairgrounds fences here. "There are even people out there - that's another county over there."

Via: AP

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Tuesday, October 9, 2012

Ouch: Ann Romney Compares Obama To A Petulant Child For His Post-Debate Temper Tantrum…


Mitt Romney's wife, Ann, equated President Obama's campaign to a petulant child during an interview Tuesday after being asked about charges from the president's campaign that her husband had "lied" during last week's debate.
“I mean, lied about what? This is something he’s been saying all along. This is what he believes.  This is his policy, these are his statements," Ann Romney said in an interview set to air Wednesday on Fox News. "I mean, lie — it’s sort of like someone that’s, you know, in the sandbox that like lost the game and they’re just going to kick sand in someone’s face and say, ‘you liar.’ I mean, it’s like they lost, and so now they just are going to say, OK, the game, we didn’t like the game. So to me, it’s poor sportsmanship.”

In an interview Sunday with CBS News, Obama adviser David Axelrod said Romney's debate positions were "uprooted" from what he had said on the campaign trail.
"I think [the president] was a little taken aback at the brazenness with which Gov. Romney walked away from so many of the positions on which he's run, walked away from his record,” Axelrod said.

Ann Romney said she "knew right away" that her husband was winning the first presidential debate.

"I knew after the first question," she said. "I turned to my son after 50 minutes, and I gave him a nudge, and I said it’s 100 to zero right now. "

She added that she hoped his performance would attract the support of more female voters, a crucial demographic headed into Election Day and one that the president has thus far dominated.

"I had been waiting for a very, very long time for people to see my husband how I see him. And I think that people got a chance to do that at the debate," Ann Romney said.

Thursday, October 4, 2012

AARP Bashes Obama For Using it to Promote Himself in Debate


Denver, CO— Earlier this evening the Presidential candidates discussed AARP, Social Security and Medicare during the first Presidential debate of the 2012 general election.  AARP, a sponsor of activities at all four of the 2012 Presidential and Vice Presidential debates, released the following statement in response.  AARP Senior Vice President John Hishta said:
“We’re grateful that this evening the candidates engaged in a more robust conversation with regard to Medicare.  We’re also pleased Social Security was included in tonight’s debate. But America’s voters deserve more than talking points and 30-second sound bites. Our members and older Americans want to hear how the candidates would strengthen Social Security, Medicare, and financial security, and we encourage the candidates to offer more specifics about their plans before Election Day.
“Across party lines, older voters say that getting more information on the candidates’ plans on these crucial economic security programs will help them determine their vote. We know that our members vote, and they want the candidates to tell them how they’ll fix Medicare and Social Security for them, their kids and their grandkids.
“Earlier this year, we launched You’ve Earned a Say, a national conversation on the future of Social Security and Medicare, to engage people in communities across the country so they have the pros and cons of proposals currently on the table in Washington and on the campaign trail. 
“While we respect the rights of each campaign to make its case to voters, AARP has never consented to the use of its name by any candidate or political campaign. AARP is a nonpartisan organization and we do not endorse political candidates nor coordinate with any candidate or political party.  
“We remain focused on providing voters with balanced information on where candidates stand on the key issues, so they can make their own decisions on Election Day.  For more information on where the candidates stand on premium support and other Medicare topics discussed tonight, see AARP’s Voters’ Guides at www.earnedasay.org.”

Via: AARP Blog


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Saturday, September 29, 2012

It's Over


Give up -- Barack Obama has won.  With the election only weeks away, it is clear from recent swing state polling that Mitt Romney has lost this election.  According to the Quinnipiac numbers, in the battleground states of Ohio, Florida, and Pennsylvania, the president is ahead by 10%, 9% and 12%, respectively.
Romney can't win.  Just ask any journalist or newscaster.  He is toast -- stick a fork in him.
Bull...
If anything, the closer we get to Election Day, the more apparent it is that Obama is not only losing, but losing big.  The Obama campaign, and by "campaign" I mean members of the media and polling organizations, is trying to convince prospective Romney voters to believe that all is lost -- in which case, they hope, we will stay home.
But just because they say so, that doesn't make it true.
Everyone knew from the outset that Obama, with his sad record of continuous failure on almost every front, was going to air out his inner bitterness and envy, and campaign negatively.  But did anyone suspect that his sole hope for victory would rest on trying to suppress the vote of his opponent with naked media bias and polling -- most of which assumes a higher Democrat turnout than in 2008, when the electorate, many Republicans included, swallowed whole Obama's vision of "hope and change"?

Via: American Thinker


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Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Quinnipiac Pollster Admits: ‘Probably Unlikely’ That Electorate Will Feature Massive Dem Skew


Quinnipiac Pollster Admits: ‘Probably Unlikely’ That Electorate Will Feature Massive Dem Skew
By Matthew Sheffield
With no manufactured outrage to hammer Mitt Romney at the moment, liberal journalists are now eagerly touting a series of polls which appear to show President Obama pulling away from the GOP nominee in several key states.
Unfortunately, these polls are relying on sample sizes which are skewed tremendously leftward with far more Democrats than Republicans and as such, they are unlikely to be good predictors of actual Election Day turnout. Do the pollsters themselves actually believe in their own sample sizes though? At least one appears not to.
Interviewed last month by conservative talk show host Hugh Hewitt, Peter Brown, assistant director of the Quinnipiac polling operation was particularly squeamish about sampling under tough questioning from Hewitt about a poll which Quinnipiac had released showing Democrats with a 9 percentage point advantage in the state of Florida.


Monday, September 24, 2012

SHHH… OBAMA’S APPROVAL RATING TANKS TO DANGEROUS NEW LEVEL


Shhh… Don’t tell the biased Obama media.

Obama’s approval rating sank to a dangerous new level this month. The president has an approval rating at 46 percent and a disapproval rating at 48 percent.
Business Insider reported:
Obama’s approval rating in Gallup’s rolling survey has plunged 6 percentage points in two weeks, a troubling sign that puts him on shaky historical ground for re-election.
Obama’s approval rating is down to just 46 percent, down from a high of 52 percent after the Democratic National Convention. His disapproval rating, meanwhile, now stands at 48 percent, up from 42 percent after the DNC. Altogether, that’s a 12-point swing in two weeks.
Recall why the 50 percent threshold is important, per Gallup managing editor Jeffrey M. Jones:
The 50% approval mark is significant because post-World War II incumbent presidents who have been above 50% job approval on Election Day were easily re-elected. Presidents with approval ratings below 50% have more uncertain re-election prospects. Historically, two presidents below 50% in their final approval rating before the election — George W. Bush and Harry Truman — won, and three, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, and George H.W. Bush, lost.
Don’t expect this to make any headlines.

Sunday, September 23, 2012

FLOTUS: Voting rights are the new sit-ins


First lady Michelle Obama likened citizens flexing the right to vote to the marches, sit-ins and struggles of the civil rights movement in a speech before the Congressional Black Caucus.
"We cannot let anyone discourage us from casting our ballots.  We cannot let anyone make us feel unwelcome in the voting booth.  It is up to us to make sure that in every election, every voice is heard and every vote is counted," Obama said in Saturday remarks.
Recalling the struggles of the civil rights movement, Obama said that it was imperative for ordinary citizens to flex their right to vote.
"This is the march of our time -- marching door to door, registering people to vote.  Marching everyone you know to the polls every single election," the first lady said. "This is the sit-in of our day -- sitting in a phone bank, sitting in your living room, calling everyone you know — your friends, your neighbors, that nephew you haven’t seen in a while, that classmate you haven’t spoken to in years —making sure they all know how to register, where to vote -- every year, in every election."
"This is the movement of our era -- protecting that fundamental right not just for this election, but for the next generation and generations to come," Obama said. "Because in the end, it’s not just about who wins, or who loses, or who we vote for on Election Day. It’s about who we are as Americans. It’s about the democracy we want to leave for our kids and grandkids."
"It’s about doing everything we can to carry on the legacy that is our inheritance not just as African Americans, but as Americans -- as citizens of the greatest country on Earth," Obama said.
Obama also bemoaned the level of apathy in the the country at large.
"How many of us have asked someone whether they’re going to vote, and they say, no, I’m too busy -- and besides, I voted last time; or, nah, it’s not like my vote is going to make a difference? See, after so many folks sacrificed so much so that we could make our voices heard, too many of us still choose not to participate," she said.

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