Wednesday, October 10, 2012

IBD/TIPP Poll: Romney Jumps To 5-Point Lead Over Obama, 48% – 43%…


IBD/TIPP 2012 Presidential Election
Daily Tracking Poll
Day 2: Oct. 10, 2012
Romney: +5.0
  • Romney’s lead widened to 5 points from 2 points on Tuesday, as he continues to chip away at key Obama support.
  • Romney’s edge among independents widened to 20 points from 18 just a day before.
  • Obama’s lead among women narrowed from 10 points to 8 points.
  • Romney also continues to make inroads among middle-class voters, moving from a 6-point lead against Obama with this group to a 10-point lead.
  • The current data include only polls taken after Romney’s resounding debate win over Obama on Oct. 3.
Obama
Romney
Not Sure
OVERALL
43.7%
48.7%
6.1%
REGION
Northeast
49%
42%
9%
Midwest
47%
47%
4%
South
40%
54%
5%
West
43%
46%
9%
AGE
18-44
50%
44%
6%
45-64
40%
51%
7%
65+
37%
54%
5%
GENDER
Male
36%
57%
6%
Female
50%
42%
6%
RACE
White
34%
58%
7%
Black/Hispanic
82%
13%
3%
HOUSEHOLD INCOME
Under 30K
50%
44%
5%
30K-50K
46%
49%
4%
50-75K
41%
48%
11%
75K+
44%
51%
5%
PARTY
Democrats
86%
7%
5%
Republicans
3%
95%
1%
Ind./Other
34%
54%
12%
INVESTOR CLASS
Yes
44%
50%
6%
No
44%
47%
7%
AREA TYPE
Urban
48%
43%
7%
Suburban
47%
46%
6%
Rural
34%
58%
6%
WHITE
White men
28%
64%
6%
White women
39%
52%
7%
BLACK/HISPANIC
Black*
91%
6%
3%
Hispanic*
64%
30%
4%
WOMEN
Single women
58%
37%
5%
Married women
43%
47%
8%
EDUCATION
High School
41%
47%
9%
Some College
42%
52%
5%
College Degree+
46%
48%
5%
IDEOLOGY
Conservative
18%
76%
5%
Moderate
54%
37%
8%
Liberal
89%
4%
5%
HOUSEHOLD DESCRIPTION
Upper/Upper Middle
52%
41%
7%
Middle
41%
51%
5%
Working
40%
50%
8%
Lower*
50%
45%
6%
RELIGION
Protestant
35%
60%
5%
Catholic
43%
46%
6%
Other Christian
40%
56%
3%
Jewish*
47%
25%
28%
Other*
51%
36%
11%
None
67%
27%
5%
UNION HOUSEHOLD
Yes
59%
33%
6%
No
41%
51%
6%
2008 VOTE
Obama
83%
9%
8%
McCain
2%
94%
4%
Polling period: 10/4 - 10/9
Margin of Error: +/- 3.5%
Sample Size: 757 likely voters (identified from 873 registered voters with party affiliation of 39% Dem, 31% GOP, 30% Ind.)
Methodology: Traditional telephone methodology using Random Digit Dial (RDD) landline and cell phone samples

Via: IBD


Continue Reading...

Issa Calls For Classified Briefing On Libya Intel


Fresh off his hearing on security deficiencies at the U.S. mission in Libya, House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) on Wednesday called for a classified briefing on what the Obama administration knew — and when — about the causes of Sept. 11 attack in Benghazi.
“Right now, what we've agreed to, [ranking member Elijah] Cummings [(D-Md.)] and I, is formally asking for a classified briefing so that a lot of what wasn't discussed here, the committee would have knowledge of,” Issa told reporters. “And of course that's not an open hearing.”
He said it would be modeled on Tuesday's hearing for the Republican chairmen of committees of jurisdiction over intelligence and foreign affairs, and should include Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and the FBI. Asked if he would invite the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice, Issa said “not necessarily.”
Republicans on Issa's committee have been chomping at the bit to go after Rice, who told five Sunday shows five days after the attack that killed Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans that initial intelligence suggested an anti-Islam video posted to YouTube had caused the violence. The administration later said the attack was an act of terrorism.
Reps. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), and Mike Kelly (R-Pa.) all told The Hill they think the committee’s next move should be to request Rice to testify before the panel.
“President Obama, Secretary Clinton, and Ambassador Rice have a lot of questions to answer,” said Chaffetz, the chairman of the committee's panel on national security. Chaffetz said it was up to Issa to decide whether to request her for another hearing, but that he’d “love to hear from her sooner rather than later because she’s got a lot to explain.”
Issa himself told The Hill that “someone in Congress will cover some of these ambiguities.”

GAI RESPONDS TO OBAMA 'FACT CHECK' OF FRAUDULENT DONATIONS REPORT


The Government Accountability Institute (GAI) on Wednesday called out the Obama campaign for refusing to address the ownership of the Obama.com domain by a campaign bundler who lives and has business interests in China. GAI also alleged that the Obama campaign has not fully addressed its weak online security measures to prevent fraudulent or foreign campaign donations. 

GAI President Peter Schweizer said GAI was “troubled by the fact that the Obama campaign has nothing to say about one of the main concerns we detailed in our report: the mysterious Obama.com redirect website anonymously owned by China-based campaign bundler Robert Roche.” 
“Robert Roche has an unusually close relationship with the Chinese government, to whom he is dependent for the operation of his Chinese-based company, Acorn International,” Schweizer said. “At the same time, he owns this redirect website which sends international web traffic to a contribution page of the president’s campaign.”
The Chinese government has a history of trying influence American elections through campaign contributions, and Roche is not a random figure. He was seated at the head table of the China State Dinner in 2011.
Immediately after the progressive magazine Newsweek published a story, based on a nine-month GAI investigation of how easily foreigners can illicitly donate to President Barack Obama’s campaign due to lax online security measures, the Obama campaignresponded with a purported “fact-check” that tried to dismiss the report as a partisan attack on the Obama campaign.

Hillary Throws Obama Under The Benghazi Bus?


WASHINGTON (AP) -- The State Department now says it never believed the Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, was a film protest gone awry, giving congressional Republicans new fodder for criticizing the Obama administration's initial accounts of the assault.
The State Department's extraordinary break with other administration offices came in a department briefing Tuesday, where officials said "others" in the executive branch concluded initially that the protest was based, like others in the Middle East, on a film that ridiculed the Prophet Muhammad.

That was never the department's conclusion, a senior official told reporters.
The Republican-led House Oversight and Government Reform Committee holds a hearing Wednesday on diplomatic security in the attack that killed U.S. Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens and three other Americans. The attack as become a political football in the final weeks before the election.

The committee's chairman, Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., has accused the State Department of turning aside pleas from its diplomats in Libya to increase security in the months and weeks before the attack in Benghazi. One scheduled witness Wednesday, Eric Nordstrom, is the former chief security officer for U.S. diplomats in Libya who told the committee his pleas for more security were ignored.

Via: AP

Continue Reading...

No White House Press Briefing in Last 15 Days


The White House has not held a press briefing in the last 15 days, according to records on the White House's website. The last one was held on September 24, 2012, by White House press secretary Jay Carney.
However, in that 15 day time period, and including today, there have been 11 press gaggles. Nine have been conducted by Carney, while 2 have been held by principal deputy press secretary Josh Earnest. Campaign surrogates David Axelrod and traveling press secretary Jen Psaki have participated in the gaggles.
But there's a big difference between a gaggle and a press briefing. Gaggles are limited only to those members of the press who are traveling with the president of the United States and are not video taped. Press briefings, on the other hand, are open to credentialed media (who obtain White House approval) and are on camera. 
Gaggles tend to by shorter in length than a normal press briefing, usually being held for approximately 10-15 minutes at a time. And are these days very often held aboard Air Force One to accommodate the frequent campaign stops across the country by President Obama.

The Uncharitable Joe Biden: Better at Giving Away Your Money Than His


Before he became Vice President, Joe Biden was not exactly Santa Claus. So, one thing I think you will not see during the Vice President debates is a discussion on charity—Joe will not want to discuss this at all.

Just when I thought that there was no politician stingier than Barack Obama—who, before he became President, gave as little as .6% of his income to the poor—lo and behold Obama picked as his running mate, a man who gives far less to the poor than he. While Obama’s tax returns prior to his 2008 election reveal a portrait of a man who privately gives very little to the poor—less than any Republican I know—Joe Biden gives even less.

In fact, Biden’s charitable giving is so abysmally poor that he makes even Obama look like Santa Claus. Biden may well have been the stingiest man in the Senate. For two of the most “liberal” senators in Washington, they were embarrassingly conservative when it comes to reaching into their own pockets and helping the poor, whose cause they pretend to champion. If they thought that the public actually knew how little they did privately to help the poor, these two hypocrites would never again spout their populist drivel about Republican “trickle down” economics or criticize the Republicans for not doing enough to help the poor.

A close look at his returns reveals the true depths of their hypocrisy.

From 1998 through his election in 2008, Joe Biden’s income varied between $200,000 and $400,000. Where I come from, that is serious money. Yet, amazingly, his reported annual charitable giving—as shown on his Schedule A—varied between a whopping $120 during the lean years and a little less than $400 when he felt extra charitable. [The rare exception was 2007, when he was running for office and gave a less than generous $995 to the poor.] No, I have not missed a decimal place. He does not give in terms of five figures, nor does he give in terms of four figures. At least before he became Vice President.



Tuesday, October 9, 2012

LEAVE ME ALONE OBAMA


Big Bird, it seems, isn’t thrilled about his cameo in the presidential race.
The folks at Sesame Street are asking the Obama campaign to pull down a TV ad released Tuesday that mocks Mitt Romney for vowing to yank the subsidy to PBS.
At the presidential debate in Denver last week, Mr. Romney said he would end the subsidy in view of the nation’s fiscal troubles.
“I love Big Bird,” the Republican challenger said “… But I’m not going to keep on spending money on things to borrow money from China to pay for.”
Up went an ad by team Obama called “Big Bird’’ that suggests Mr. Romney is targeting children’s programming rather than legitimate threats to people’s economic interests.
The ad shows images of Bernie Madoff and others implicated in various financial and corporate scandals. A narrator then intones: “And the evil genius who towered over them?”
A silhouette of Big Bird flashes on screen.
“Mitt Romney knows it’s not Wall Street you have to worry about, it’s Sesame Street,” the narrator said.
The ad is airing on national cable and broadcast TV, in time slots devoted to comedy shows, the Obama campaign said.
Sesame Street isn’t amused. Sesame Workshop, a nonprofit educational organization that produces and owns the show, issued a statement Tuesday saying “we do not endorse candidates or participate in political campaigns. We have approved no campaign ads, and as is our general practice, have requested that the ad be taken down.”

WSJ Economist: No Grounds for Obama's Tax on Wealthy

Wall Street Journal economics expert Stephen Moore tells Newsmax that there is “no case on economic grounds” to heed President Barack Obama’s call for higher taxes on wealthier Americans.

He says raising those rates would simply encourage wealthier taxpayers to hide their money and wouldn’t boost revenues as predicted by “the anti-Clinton” — President Obama.

And he warns that the expiration of the Bush-era tax cuts next year could cause a double-dip recession.

Urgent Poll: Who Won the Presidential Debate? Vote Here!

Moore is a senior economics writer and editorial board member for The Wall Street Journal. He is the founder and former president of the Club for Growth and a best-selling author. He also wrote the cover story for Newsmax magazine’s October issue.

Moore’s new book is “Who's The Fairest of Them All: The Truth about Opportunity, Taxes and Wealth in America.”

In an exclusive interview with Newsmax TV, Moore was asked if Obama and the Democrats are advocating higher taxes on the wealthy to improve the economy or to win over middle-class voters.

“I don’t think anybody thinks that raising tax rates will improve the economy. At least I certainly hope no one does because the history is so unequivocal that that’s not the case,” Moore says.

Read more on Newsmax.com: WSJ Economist Moore: No Grounds Logic for Obama's Tax on Wealthy
Important: Do You Support Pres. Obama's Re-Election? Vote Here Now!

Via: Newsmax

Continue Reading...

Claire McCaskill Camp Rocked By Shocking Allegations


Feds paid $40M to firms tied to McCaskill's spouse 

BY DAVID A. LIEB
ASSOCIATED PRESS
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- Businesses affiliated with the husband of Missouri Sen. Claire McCaskill have received almost $40 million in federal subsidies for low-income housing developments during her first five years in office, though it appears only fraction of that has made it to the family's bank accounts, according to an Associated Press analysis.
McCaskill's Republican challenger, Rep. Todd Akin, says the federal payments should be a cause for concern among voters. He's attempting to portray the Democratic senator's family as a prime beneficiary of government largesse.
"There is a conflict of interest and a breach of trust with the citizens of our state," Akin said in an interview with the AP.
McCaskill campaign spokesman Caitlin Legacki called such assertions "flat-out wrong."
There is no evidence that McCaskill personally routed the money to her husband's businesses. But she voted for some - and against other - bills that funded the federal housing and agriculture departments, which in turn provide subsidies to businesses with federal contracts to provide low-income housing.
The AP reviewed five years' worth of federal personal financial disclosure statements filed by McCaskill, which list more than 300 "affordable housing" businesses in which her husband, Joseph Shepard, had at least a partial ownership during the time she has been in office. At least one-third of those businesses also appear to be listed as recipients of federal payments in an online government database that tracks spending.
VIa: The Miami Herald

Continue Reading....

Olive Garden And Red Lobster To Cut Workers Hours In Advance Of Obamacare…


Prepping for Obamacare, Chain Cuts Workers' Hours

The owner of Olive Garden and Red Lobster restaurants is putting more workers on part-time status in a test aimed at limiting the impact of looming health coverage requirements.

Darden Restaurants [DRI  54.74    -0.36  (-0.65%)  ] declined to give details but said the test is only in restaurants in four markets across the country. The test entails increasing the number of workers on part-time status, meaning they work less than 30 hours a week. Under the new health care act, companies will be required to provide health care to full-time employees by 2014. That would significantly boost labor costs for businesses.

About 75 percent of Darden's employees are currently part-timers.
Bob McAdam, who heads government affairs and community relations for Darden, said the company is still learning from the tests, which was first reported by The Orlando Sentinel.

"We're not at a point where we have results," he said. McAdam also noted that Darden is not alone in looking at ways to keep labor costs in check, with companies industry wide prepping for the new regulations to take effect.

Darden, based in Orlando, Fla., has made cost cutting a priority in recent years as sales growth and traffic have stalled at its flagship chains. In the most recent fiscal quarter, the company's restaurant labor costs were 31 percent of sales. That's down from 33 percent three years ago.

The reduction was driven by several factors. Given the challenging job market, Darden has been able to offer lower pay rates to new hires. Bonuses for general managers have been reduced as sales have stagnated. Servers at Red Lobster are handling four tables at a time, instead of three.


Report: NY, NJ, CA Worst Business Tax Climates


CNSNews.com) -- Wyoming, South Dakota, and Nevada, in that order, have the "business-friendliest" tax climates, according the Tax Foundation in its report, the 2013 State Business Tax Climate Index, which was released today.
Those three states held the same top three  “business-friendliest” rankings as last year, according to the Tax Foundation.
The 2013 State Business Tax Climate Index measures the components of an individual state's tax system, such as the corporate tax index, individual tax index, Sales Tax Rank, unemployment insurance tax rank, and property tax rank.
Six states are tied for first in the individual tax index rank. However, three states –Wyoming, South Dakota, and Nevada – ranked first, second, and third respectively in the “overall” business tax climate index category. The top ten rankings in that “overall” category are as follows:
  1. Wyoming
  2. South Dakota
  3. Nevada
  4. Alaska
  5. Florida
  6. Washington
  7. New Hampshire
  8. Montana
  9. Texas
  10. Utah
At the bottom of the list were New York (50th), New Jersey (49th), and California (48th).

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.

REPORT: NEARLY HALF OF CONGRESS VULNERABLE TO FRAUDULENT, FOREIGN ONLINE DONATIONS


A startling report by the Government Accountability Institute finds that almost half (47.3%) of congressional campaign donation websites lack basic anti-fraud credit card security systems common on most e-commerce websites. That, says Government Accountability Institute President Peter Schweizer, leaves federal House and Senate elections vulnerable to illegal foreign or fraudulent credit card contributions.

“Fraudsters and foreign governments have long sought to illegally influence U.S. elections,” Schweizer said in an interview with Breitbart News. “From the Shah of Iran funneling money to Richard Nixon’s campaign, to Johnny Wong and Charlie Trie shuttling funds to Bill Clinton’s election coffers, campaign donor fraud is a bipartisan problem with a long history. But in the Internet age, the threat is now just a click away.”
There are 380 members of the House of Representatives seeking reelection that have active donation pages on the web, and 194 have campaign websites that require donors to enter their credit card security code, known officially as the Card Verification Value (CVV). Of the remaining 186 members of the House of Representatives who lack basic anti-fraud protections, 125 are Democrats and 61 are Republicans.  
In the Senate, 25 senators’ campaign donation websites were found to lack basic credit card protections; four are Republicans, 20 are Democrats, and one is an Independent. 
The Government Accountability Institute report, titled America the Vulnerable: Are Foreign and Fraudulent Online Contributions Influencing U.S. Elections?, also investigated the donation websites of the two major presidential candidates. Gov. Mitt Romney’s website requires donors to enter the credit card security code.  President Barack Obama’s website does not.   
“Here’s the good news: it’s a one click solution,” says Schweizer. “Federal candidates simply need to tell their webmasters to do the right thing and turn on CVV protection. The FEC should also require candidates to use basic anti-fraud protection and make publicly available all campaign donations, including those under $200 that are currently kept private.”
To find out if your senator or congressperson is vulnerable to foreign or fraudulent online donations, visit the Government Accountability Institute’s interactive map at www.campaignfundingrisks.com.

Obama launches pre-emptive strike ahead of Romney’s foreign policy speech


LEXINGTON, Va. — President Obama’s re-election campaign on Monday launched a pre-emptive strike ahead of Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s planned foreign policy address, arguing that Mr. Romney has failed the the commander-in-chief test on the global stage — in part by staking out positions to the right of former President George W. Bush.

The Obama camp released a new television advertisement and issued a memo on Monday criticizing Mr. Romney’s bumpy overseas trip this summer as well as his response to the assaults on the U.S. diplomatic post in Libya — highlighting how a national security adviser to GOP Sen. John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign called Mr. Romney’s stance on Libya the “the worst possible reaction."

Mr. Romney is set to give a broad-scale attack on Mr. Obama’s handling of foreign policy and national security issues in a speech this morning here at the Virginia Military Institute.

In the memo, two former top Obama national security advisers — Michele Flournoy and Colin Kahl — say the former Massachusetts governor’s “latest effort to reboot and re-set the Romney foreign policy” cannot hide the fact that he pushes positions “outside of the mainstream and often to the right of even George W. Bush.”

That, they say, is not surprising because Mr. Romney has surrounded himself with the same ex-Bush advisers who embraced what they called the “with-us-or-against-us approach” that led to “some of the worst foreign policy failures in American history, including the Iraq War.”

The Obama camp also challenged Mr. Romney “to move beyond swagger and slogans” and spell out how exactly his foreign policy approach would differ from the current occupant of the White House.

Via: Washington Times


Continue Reading...

BATTLEGROUND POLL: ROMNEY UP 16 WITH INDEPENDENTS, UP 13 IN ENTHUSIASM


In 2008, President Barack Obama won the independent vote over John McCain by a margin of eight points, 52-44. This morning, a new Battleground Poll has Mitt Romney massacring Obama among indies by a whopping 16 points, 51-35.

That's a 24-point swing among independents since 2008, a group that makes up anywhere from a quarter to a third of voters, and yet Battleground still has Obama in the lead 49-48…?
But if I'm skeptical of those bottom-line numbers, our journalist overlords who have chosen to palace guard instead of question will declare me a "truther."
The Battleground Poll also shows a 13 point enthusiasm gap in Romney's favor. Only 73% of Obama's supporters are "extremely likely" to vote, compared to 86% of Romney's supporters.
But again, don't question Battleground's 49-48% outcome. In fact, don't questionanything anymore -- or the media will question you and mock you as a "truther. " This includes questioning our government about the release of counter-intuitive unemployment statistics very helpful to the president just 30 days out from the election.
Though the media hasn't yet decided it's time for a Romney Comeback Narrative, and probably never will, even if he wins -- there's no question Romney is rebounding in every national and swing state poll.
Nationally, Gallup has it all tied up among registered voters -- with the president dangerously below 50 at 47%. Rasmussen uses the more reliable likely voter screen and has Romney up 49-47%.
In the Real Clear Politics poll of polls,  nationally Romney is only down .09%. A week ago he was down over 4 points.
In Ohio, according to RCP's poll of polls, Obama's Ohio lead has shrunk to three --  Virginiahas Obama only up by 0.3. Florida and Colorado are tied.  
The good news for Romney is that we are now seeing polls from each of these states with the GOP nominee in the lead. The bad news for Obama is that in most of these swing state polls, he is not hitting 50.
Well, actually the worst news for Obama is 85% of the calls made for this new Battleground Poll were made prior to Obama humiliating himself in last week's debate. 
Via: Breitbart
Continue Reading...

Princeton Economist: Obama Campaign Is Misrepresenting My Study on Romney's Tax Plan


Last night, the Obama campaign blasted out another email claiming that Mitt Romney's tax plan would either require raising taxes on the middle class or blowing a hole in the deficit. "Even the studies that Romney has cited to claim his plan adds up still show he would need to raise middle-class taxes," said the Obama campaign press release. "In fact, Harvard economist Martin Feldstein and Princeton economist Harvey Rosen both concede that paying for Romney’s tax cuts would require large tax increases on families making between $100,000 and $200,000."
But that's not true. Princeton professor Harvey Rosen tells THE WEEKLY STANDARD in an email that the Obama campaign is misrepresenting his paper on Romney's tax plan:
I can’t tell exactly how the Obama campaign reached that characterization of my work.  It might be that they assume that Governor Romney wants to keep the taxes from the Affordable Care Act in place, despite the fact that the Governor has called for its complete repeal.  The main conclusion of my study is that  under plausible assumptions, a proposal along the lines suggested by Governor Romney can both be revenue neutral and keep the net tax burden on taxpayers with incomes above $200,000 about the same.  That is, an increase in the tax burden on lower and middle income individuals is not required in order to make the overall plan revenue neutral. 
You can check the math that shows Romney's plan is mathematically possible here.

Axelrod: Romney Trying to Buy Election


A top Obama campaign official accused the Romney campaign of trying to buy the election.
“Listen, I’ll be blunt,” wrote David Axelrod in an email to their supporters. “They are trying to buy this election, and we’re the only ones who are standing in their way. Don’t wait any longer to take ownership of this campaign.”
Axelrod blasting the Romney campaign for taking out television advertisements.
“That’s been the other side’s strategy from the beginning: slamming the airwaves with ads trashing the President and his record,” he wrote.

Number Of Americans On Food Stamps Hits Another Record High


While the lowest unemployment rate of President Barack Obama’s tenure dominated weekend economic news, a less-welcome statistic for the White House — a record number 0f food-stamp recipients — slipped by with barely a notice.
About 46.68 million Americans received food stamps in July, the government said in a report released late on Friday afternoon before a holiday weekend, a traditional time for dumping bad news. The report for July, the most recent month that data was available, showed participation up by 11,532 from June and 2.9 percent higher than a year earlier.
The number rose partly because of weather disasters in Ohio, Maryland and West Virginia, the USDA said. In essence, it was little changed from the previous month or even the recent past, since participation — more than one in seven Americans — has topped 46 million since September 2011.
Still, any jump in food-stamp rolls pushes a button with Republicans who argue hat the program breeds dependency and its growth shows both an unhealthy economy and wasteful spending.
“When the president took office, 32 million people on food stamps — 47 million on food stamps today,” Republican Mitt Romney said in last week’s presidential debate. “Going forward with the status quo is not going to cut it for the American people who are struggling.”
Monthly spending on food stamps in July reached $6.26 billion, also a record and 2.9 percent more than a year earlier.
The program’s cost more than doubled in four years to a record $75.7 billion in the 12 months ended Sept. 30, 2011, and is the USDA’s biggest annual expense.
A USDA spokesman was unable to provide comment on the timing of the report, when contacted on the federal Columbus Day holiday. The report normally comes early in the month, although there is no set date or time.

More polls: Romney now within three points in Michigan,


In case there was any lingering shred of doubt that Romney helped himself considerably last week, this ought to finish it off. Michigan:
Obama’s 10 percentage point lead (47%-37%) in a poll conducted last month by EPIC-MRA of Lansing dropped to 3 points (48% to 45%), according to the poll of 600 likely voters conducted by EPIC-MRA of Lansing. The gap between Romney and Obama was within the poll’s margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points…
“Romney has come back like gangbusters,” said EPIC-MRA President Bernie Porn. “Whether or not it’s long-lasting, only time will tell, but probably the remaining debates will be key.”
Conducted in the three days following the Wednesday debate, the poll showed more than five times as many Michiganders interviewed named Romney, not Obama, as the debate’s winner. Romney’s numbers improved most dramatically among independent and undecided voters.
Worth noting: Per the article, Romney’s closing the gap on O in Michigan even while other prominent Dems are expanding their leads. Debbie Stabenow went from being 11 points up on Pete Hoekstra last month to 20 points up now. That’s in line with Obama’s 2008 margin in Michigan of 16.5 points. Fast forward four years and she’s keeping pace with that advantage while he’s … now statistically tied with his Republican challenger. Must be a lot of left-leaning independents thinking of splitting their ballot to produce a result like that.

Popular Posts