A Destructive President

President Barack Obama never admits to a mistake. Instead, egregious lawlessness is fluffed away as "not a smidgen of scandal" in relation to the IRS targeting of Tea Party and other conservative groups. Instead of being a great leader, Obama distances himself and lets his appointees hide behind the law or simply exempt themselves from total disclosure. Thus, Lois Lerner can refuse to answer any questions or testify when she is brought before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee and Cindy Thomas, who was in charge of the IRS's Exempt Organization office and who illegally released confidential information about nine conservative organizations, can be promoted.

How else does Obama evade taking responsibility for his actions? Even though the president claimed he had no knowledge of the gun running program known as Fast and Furious, he claimed executive privilege. But one cannot assert executive privilege over documents that one has allegedly never seen. This is just one in the litany of obfuscations by Obama. And instead of taking responsibility for Fast and Furious, Obama falsely attributes the program to President Bush. Operation Fast and Furious began in October 2009, nine months after Obama took office. In fact, under President Bush there was a program known as Operation Wide Receiver, an "entirely separate program that implemented tactics in a profoundly different way;" furthermore, Operation Wide Receiver ended in 2007.

Via: American Thinker
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[VIDEO] Obama: Growing up means grossly overpaying for health insurance, or something

Growing up can certainly be a tough proposition, even without the government forcing young adults to buy comprehensive health insurance that they’ll never use. Paying thousands in premiums while having deductibles that all but guarantee they won’t see any benefits at all from those plans is just part of the maturation process, Barack Obama explained to Charles Barkley in an interview for the cable channel TNT. After all, we older folk have lots of aches and pains — and you can’t expect us to cover the cost of our own risk, can you?

“Folks our age, I mean I wouldn’t call us old yet –” Obama started.

“We’re knocking on the door.”

“We are knocking on the door. So once you are 50, you wake up sometimes — does this happen to you, Chuck? — you wake up and something hurts and you don’t know exactly what happened. Right?”

“Everything hurts when I wake up,” said Barkley.

“When you were young, you know, you had to actually have an injury before something hurts. We’d like to encourage more young people to sign up, partly because since they’re healthier, their premiums are actually generally going to be fairly cheap. They can find good options for less than their cable bill, less than their cell phone bill. And it’s just part of growing up — is making sure you’re taking care of your body, your health. If you have a young family, you have to make sure that your family’s protected with health insurance, as well. This allows you to do it,” said Obama.

Via: Hot Air

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[CARTOON] President Obama’s Seal

Via: California Political Review

Wisdom Abandoned: American Children Thrown to the Wolves

American society is badly damaged by a lack of virtue and the rejection of wisdom--Does not Wisdom Call Out? Does not Understanding Raise her Voice?

A society cannot hope to survive without some recognition and preservation of collective wisdom. It is part of each culture’s duty to the coming generation to collect wisdom. We must instruct upon the difference between success and failure, upon character and virtue, and the difference between good and evil.

And yet we live at a time when anything which smacks of tradition is dismissed out of hand. And simple, common sense values which at one time “went without saying” are treated like sewage—only fit for disposal. Now, even the most basic of contrasts, such as that between men and women are dismissed as an unsophisticated joke.

It’s undeniable that American society has turned its back upon the concept of wisdom, allowing its children to drift in society’s open oceans without restraint, like so much flotsam and jetsam. As US society is in the midst of a radial rewrite of the code of cultural mores, the truths of previous generations passed down through centuries are now treated as a laughingstock, a historical fiction, a nonsense of sexist, racist and homophobic myths.

So what is the antidote to the changes now being seen which will certainly destroy the entire society soon—if not challenged and halted? Wisdom! But recovering wisdom is easier said than done. The Old Testament writers personified Wisdom as a female in such books as the Proverbs of Solomon, celebrated as the wisest man of antiquity. King Solomon wrote in Proverbs 4:5-6,

Get wisdom, get understanding;
do not forget my words or turn away from them.
Do not forsake wisdom, and she will protect you;
love her, and she will watch over you.

Via: Canada Free Press

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Exclusive: Kathleen Sebelius Won't Say Whether Still Fundraising To Promote ObamaCare

First in a series of stories on the Obama administration's outside fundraising efforts to promote Obamacare enrollment.

 

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and other department staff may be continuing to solicit private donations to help an outside group promote the president's health care law as the administration works to boost enrollment figures after a troubled fall rollout.

News last May that Sebelius had asked business executives and nonprofit groups to donate toEnroll America, a nonprofit organization formed to help encourage millions of Americans to sign up for the new Obamacare insurance exchanges, provoked an uproar among Republicans on Capitol Hill.

Two GOP-led House committees launched investigations, and several Republican senators called on the Health and Human Services inspector general to investigate Sebelius' fundraising drive, which watchdogs have described as an unethical shakedown for cash.

Eight months after the news broke, Sebelius' spokeswoman last Friday sidestepped questions from the Washington Examiner on whether her boss has continued to solicit funds from outside groups for Enroll America's efforts.

“The secretary has engaged in a sustained, aggressive outreach campaign to reach as many Americans as possible during open enrollment,” HHS spokeswoman Joanne Peters said in an emailed statement Friday afternoon.

“We're [sic] have been working closely with a range of partners groups across the country to reach the uninsured, and to help get them enrolled in quality, affordable health insurance,” Peters continued.

She did not respond to a follow-up question specifically asking whether Sebelius has continued the fundraising.

Via: Washington Examiner

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SEN. MIKE LEE: OBAMACARE DELAYS 'SHAMELESS POWER GRAB'

Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) blasted President Barack Obama on Sunday for his myriad Obamacare delays designed to circumnavigate the looming midterm elections and the Constitution.

"This is a shameless act, a shameless power grab that is designed to help the president and his political party achieve a particular outcome in a partisan election," Lee said onFox News Sunday.

Lee added, "The solution is for the president to come to Congress and make the case to Congress on the policy merits of this question that Congress needs to act. It is not the president's prerogative to simply make this the law by the stroke of the executive pen."

Rep. Xavier Becerra (D-CA), appearing on the same program, disagreed, saying that if Obama's actions were unconstitutional someone would have sued by now.

"If this were against the Constitution, someone would have sued by now and the president would have to stop," said Becerra.

Via: Breitbart

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Eleanor Roosevelt is top U.S. first lady, survey says

(Reuters) - Eleanor Roosevelt was named the greatest first lady of the United States in a survey of historians released on Saturday, while Michelle Obama, in fifth place, edged out Hillary Clinton in sixth.

Roosevelt, whose husband, Franklin, served as president from 1933 to 1945, has come up No. 1 each of the five times the survey has been conducted by Siena College Research Institute since 1982.

In the top finishers after Roosevelt were Abigail Adams, Jacqueline Kennedy and Dolly Madison.

Least impressive, according to the survey, was Jane Pierce, the wife of 14th U.S. president, Franklin Pierce.

Although historians disagree over exactly when the title of first lady came into common usage, it has traditionally been given to a president's wife and is an unofficial, but potentially powerful, role.

Pollsters asked 242 historians and political scientists to rate 38 presidents' wives in 10 categories such as "courage," "integrity," "value to the country" and "accomplishments."

Current first lady Michelle Obama scored particularly high in the categories of "being her own woman" and "value to the president." Her weakest area was seen to be in her capacity of "being the White House steward."

Rounding out the top 10 after Clinton were Lady Bird Johnson, Betty Ford, Martha Washington and Rosalynn Carter.

Via: Yahoo News

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Your at-a-glance guide to illegal Obamacare revisions

The adjective "historic" has been used to describe Obamacare from the moment it was proposed. Democrats and President Obama himself used the term admiringly, seeing in the 2000+ page bill an "unprecedented" (to use another favorite Obama term) commitment to take care of the health of all Americans. But with more people kicked off their existing health insurance plans than have received new coverage, Obamacare has been a gigantic flow and embarrassment. Even worse for the Democrats, it is an electoral liability going into the next midterm and presidential elections.

But Obamacare has been "historic" and "unprecedented" is another way: never before has a president unilaterally re-written a law passed by Congress and duly signed into law. The entire commitment to the rule of law, fundamental to our system of government, is being undermined.  And all of this is on-th-fly, in response to unanticipated problems shwoign up and causing political problems for the president and his party.

Because of the sheer complexity of Obamcare, it is difficult to get a handle on all these changes. But the RNC, to its credit, has produced an infographic that charts all of the 27 changes (so far)  imposed cuadillo-style by Barack Obama, contrary to the rule of law. Hat tip: Katie Pavlich, Townhall)

Via: American Thinker

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In first, Minnesota poll finds Obama unpopular

Half of the residents of Minnesota now disapprove of President Obama’s performance, according to a new poll.

Results of The Star Tribune survey represent the first time that his approval rating has turned negative in the state since the president took office in 2009.

Obama’s job approval rating in the poll has fallen to 43 percent.

Men had an especially unfavorable opinion of the president. According to the poll, 60 percent of Minnesotan men disapproved of his job performance, compared to 40 percent of women in the state.

People under 34 had the highest approval rating for Obama, with 59 percent saying they thought he was doing a good job in office.  

The statewide poll reflects a broader disapproval of the president that has been swelling across the country. Current national polls show Obama’s approval rating is among the lowest it has been while he has been in the White House.

Gallup’s daily tracking poll has shown that the American public’s approval of the president has waned since a recent peak shortly after the 2012 election. According to that national poll, 53 percent of the nation disapproved of Obama's performance, while just 41 percent approved.

Obama easily won Minnesota in both the 2012 and 2008 elections. He won 53 percent of the vote against former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney (R) in 2012, and got 54 percent in state in 2008, against Republican nominee Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.).

Via: The Hill

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People with serious pre-existing diseases, precisely those the president aimed to help with ObamaCare, could find themselves paying for expensive drug treatments with no help from the health care exchanges.

 

Those with expensive diseases such as lupus or multiple sclerosis face something called a "closed drug formulary."

Dr. Scott Gottlieb of the American Enterprise Institute explains,"if the medicine that you need isn't on that list, it's not covered at all. You have to pay completely out of pocket to get that medicine, and the money you spend doesn't count against your deductible, and it doesn't count against your out of pocket limits, so you're basically on your own."

The plan had claimed it would rescue those with serious pre-existing conditions.

"So it could be that a MS patient could be expected to pay $62,000 just for one medication," says Dr. Daniel Kantor, who treats MS patients and others with neurological conditions near Jacksonville, Florida. "That’s a possiblity under the new ObamaCare going on right now."

In fact, one conservative group, Americans for Prosperity, is running an ad on exactly this subject, featuring a woman with lupus, an auto-immune disease.

She starts by saying, "I voted for Barack Obama for president. I thought ObamaCare was going to be a good thing."

But Emilie Lamb says she later got a letter saying her insurance was canceled because of ObamaCare, pushing her premiums from $52 to $373 a month.

"I'm having to work a second job, to pay for ObamaCare,” she adds. “For somebody with lupus, that's not an easy thing. If I can't afford to continue to pay for ObamaCare, I don't get my medicine. I don't get to see my doctors."

Via: Fox News

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The Golden ‘Hillary Papers’ Egg

The school of literary criticism known as reception theory holds that a text should be studied in light of its effect on its contemporaries, that a reader should be aware of the “horizon of expectations” in which a text is produced. I was reminded of this the other day as I observed, in amusement, fascination, and occasional pity, the reaction of the so-called mainstream media to Alana Goodman’s lengthy and rock-solid report on “The Hillary Papers.” This trove of previously unexamined transcriptions of conversations between Hillary Clinton and her best friend Diane Blair had been collecting dust at the University of Arkansas for years. Not anymore.

As far as Bill and Hillary Clinton are concerned, the media’s horizon of expectations is stunningly narrow. It encompasses on the one hand the belief that the “secretary of explaining stuff” is a national treasure beyond reproach, and on the other hand the expectation that the former secretary of state will be our next president. Stories that fall outside of this horizon are problematized, scrutinized, ascribed to partisanship, and read with the sort of incredulity reporters are supposed to apply to public figures such as the Clintons.

When the Free Beacon published “The Hillary Papers” last Sunday night, we knew the story would have to cross a high bar. The piece was scrupulously fact-checked. All of the documents we cited were loaded onto the Internet. Every effort was made to present as straightforwardly as possible the contents of the papers, which show Hillary Clinton as hardheaded, calculating, and, yes, ruthless. (Re-read the part where she axes a Supreme Court appointment out of spite.)

Via: NRO

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Spinning Obamacare Realities

Via: California Political Review

California Gun Case Sets Stage for Second Amendment Showdown at Supreme Court

The overturning of a San Diego law restricting residents’ right to carry a firearm outside their homes for self-defense is a clear win for gun-rights advocates and sets up a showdown on the issue before the U.S. Supreme Court, a Heritage Foundation legal analyst says.

“This is the fifth federal appellate court to rule on the scope of the Second Amendment outside the home, and with a split among the federal courts, it looks like this issue may be heading to the Supreme Court,” Elizabeth Slattery, Heritage’s senior legal policy analyst, told The Foundry.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled yesterday that the city’s “good cause” requirement impermissibly infringes on the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms.

“The Second Amendment clearly contemplates something beyond simply stowing firearms in the home,” Slattery said, “particularly since the right to self-defense would seem to follow the individual—‘whether in a back alley or on the back deck,’ as the Ninth Circuit panel noted.”

The U.S. Supreme Court has recognized that the Second Amendment protects an individual’s “right to keep and bear arms,” and self-defense is the central component of that right. But the high court’s most recent Second Amendment cases — District of Columbia v. Heller and McDonald v. Chicago — dealt with an individual’s ability to possess a handgun at home. It has yet to rule on the scope of the right to carry a firearm outside the home.

California law prohibits the open or concealed carry of handguns in public, but allows counties and cities to issue licenses for  persons to carry concealed weapons if they establish “good cause.” When San Diego County required applicants to show specific circumstances warranted their doing so and to demonstrate a “unique risk of harm,” a group of residents challenged the “good cause” requirement.

Via: The Foundry

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CNN Touts Obama's 'Victory Lap' on ObamaCare Numbers, But Ignores Concern From Insurers

CNN gave a prime exhibition of lazy journalism on Friday's The Situation Room when it touted Obama's "victory lap" because of "new ObamaCare enrollment numbers" without fact-checking to see if his optimism is warranted.

"President Obama is taking something of a victory lap I guess you could say," reported host Brianna Keilar. "At a meeting with House Democrats he praised his party for sticking it out on the debt ceiling fight and touted his administration's new ObamaCare enrollment numbers." [Video below the break. Audio here.]

Correspondent Athena Jones simply passed along what Obama told his own party:

"Now, the President pointed to positive enrollment numbers this week, saying it showed his administration had, quote, 'slightly exceeded' its targets for January. In January, 1.1 million people signed up for health insurance on the state and federal exchanges, and that brings the total since October to 3.1 million people."

Unlike CNN, CBS went beyond the White House's "rosy portrait" and found that the insurance industry is quite concerned about low enrollment, and that far fewer young people have signed up for insurance than is "necessary under a successful business model."

And at least Politico saw, when the administration released the numbers, that "key data is still missing," namely just how many have even paid their premiums. Well according to the New York Times, one in five new enrollees hadn't paid their initial premium in January.

Via: Newsbusters

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WH: Don't tax Olympians on medals

The White House said Thursday that President Obama still believes American Olympians shouldn’t have to pay income taxes on the medals they win.

“The president believes we should support efforts to ensure that we’re doing everything we can to honor and support our Olympic athletes who have volunteered to represent our nation at the Olympic Games,” White House spokesman Bobby Whithorne told Yahoo News. “We still support this effort.” 

During the 2012 presidential campaign, the White House said those who medaled in the summer games should be exempt from taxes on their winnings.

“If it were to get to his desk, he would support it," White House press secretary Jay Carney said of proposed legislation.

But a bill by Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) never moved in the Senate.

"Our tax code is a complicated and burdensome mess that too often punishes success, and the tax imposed on Olympic medal winners is a classic example of this madness," Rubio said in 2012. "Athletes representing our nation overseas in the Olympics shouldn't have to worry about an extra tax bill waiting for them back home."

U.S. athletes are paid cash prizes when they place in Olympic events: $25,000 for a gold, $15,000 for a silver and $10,000 for a bronze.

How much athletes pay back to Uncle Sam will depends largely on what other income they report for the year. But according to an analysis by the anti-tax group Americans for Tax Reform, gold-medal winners in the top tax bracket could see nearly $10,000 of their $25,000 winnings taken by the government. 

Even athletes in the lowest tax bracket could fork over as much as $2,500 on a gold medal prize, $1,500 on a silver and $1,000 for a bronze.

Via: The Hill
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UAW Crushed. What Comes Next? UAW Crushed In Vote Attempting To Unionize At VW Plant In Tennessee, Despite Obama Intercession

No wonder they wanted card check:  I remember, toward the end of the last Bush administration,  whippersnappers all the confident young Dem policy warriors repeating labor’s talking points about the need to allow the secret ballot in union recognition elections to be replaced by “card check,” a system in which workers sign cards in the presence of union organizers. Without card check, management would “coerce” workers by pointing out the downside of unionization in mandatory propaganda meetings.

Wasn’t it possible that workers who turned down unions simply looked at what Wagner Act unionism had done, say, to Detroit, and decided for themselves that this wasn’t what they wanted to happen to their company? Nah.

Now we know different: At Vokswagen’s Chattanooga factory, the UAW was actually welcomed by the employer. No union-busting propganada sessions. VW, which already has a powerful union back home in Europe, wanted to set up German-style “works councils,” where rank and file employees could have a say in production decisions. But, according to many U.S. labor lawyers, it needed a union partner — otherwise, under the Wagner Act the works councils would be considered an illegal “company union.” The UAW seemed ready to be that partner. UAW organizers were allowed in the plant to make their case. Management didn’t argue back.**

And the workers still said no. In the secret ballot election that concluded Friday, VW’s Chattanooga employees voted against unionizing by a margin of  712 to 626. The UAW couldn’t even win an election it had been handed on a silver platter by management.

The most interesting part comes next: If Volkswagen now goes ahead and starts its works councils anyway, without the UAW, will organized labor sue to have them declared illegal? That would give the Roberts Court a precious opportunity to interpret the Wagner Act in a way that actually allows non-legalistic, non-adversarial forms of worker participation in management (despite the “company union” prohibition). In effect, the courts could help VW create what those on the left have been (correctly) demanding of the right: a reasonable alternative to traditional unionism, giving workers a “voice” without subjecting every management decision to a war of bargainers and lawyers and (ultimately) the formalized pitched battle of a strike.

Now that would be a threat to Big Labor. Which is why they might not sue.

Via: Daily Caller

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'Evil' Koch brothers just 59th on top political donation list

Sometimes, if you listen to some Democrats, they're running against the "Evil" Koch brothers rather than a specific Republican candidate.

The brothers that liberals like to hate are often trotted out as prime examples of why campaign finance reform is necessary. They are often portrayed as one of the biggest contributors to political candidates, their evil money financing evil Republicans.

The group OpenSecrets.com has compiled a list of top donors to candidates and, to the left's surprise, the Koch brothers are far down the list.

Washington Examiner:

Charles and David Koch are the two most evil people in American politics, right? We know that because Jane Mayer proved it with her landmark "Covert Operations" tour de liberal force in 2010.

Well, it turns out that Mayer's aim was off just a little, by like 58 slots on the all-time biggest donors in American politics list, as compiled by OpenSecrets.org.

OpenSecrets.org tallied the top donors in federal elections between 1989 and 2014. Koch Industries -- privately owned by the Evil Koch Bros -- is on the list, to be sure, but doesn't appear until the 59th slot, with $18 million in donations, 90 percent of which went to Republicans.

Unions, unions, unions

So who occupies the 58 spots ahead of the Evil Koch Bros? Six of the top 10 are ... wait for it ... unions. They gave more than $278 million, with most of it going to Democrats.

These are familiar names: AFSCME ($60.6 million), NEA ($53.5 million), IBEW ($44.4 million), UAW ($41.6 million), Carpenters & Joiners ($39.2 million) and SEIU ($38.3 million).

In other words, the six biggest union donors in American politics gave 15 times more to mostly Democrats than the Evil Koch Bros.

Via: American Thinker

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IMMIGRANTS FACING DEPORTATION WINNING CASES AT HIGHEST RATE IN 20 YEARS

Since last October, almost half of the immigrants facing deportation are winning cases they have brought before an immigration judge according to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University. This is the highest rate of victories for immigrants in more than 20 years.

Every year since 2009, the U.S. government has lost more deportation cases. If the government wants to appeal the ruling, it can appeal it to the Board of Immigration Appeals, part of the DOJ.

Judges in California, New York, and Oregon have been most likely to side with the immigrants recently, while judges in Georgia, Louisiana, and Utah have taken the side of the government.

Some are accusing Obama of deporting too many people, and others aver that he is too lenient on immigrants. The Obama administration has issued policy orders telling immigration authorities to exercise discretion when ascertaining if illegal immigrants should be deported, and one-time Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano echoed that illegal immigrants who were not a threat to national security or public safety should also be treated with discretion. 

In 2012, Obama created the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which allowed thousands of illegal immigrants to apply to remain in the U.S. for up to two years and obtain a work permit. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) has said that the huge number of losses by the government in the deportation cases is the result of the Obama administration's immigration enforcement policies.

In 2011, a backlog of over 300,000 cases forced the government to review them. Tens of thousands of cases were dismissed, but over 360,000 cases are still pending.

Via: Breitbart

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Poll shows swing voters hating everything Obama

A Fox News poll shows that most swing-voters think President Barack Obama is overstepping his legal authority by selectively enforcing Congress’ laws, such as the 2010 Obamacare law.

Sixty-six percent of independents, and 90 percent of Republicans said they disapprove of “Barack Obama going around Congress and using executive orders.”

Only 15 percent of independents, and 7 percent of conservatives, think Obama’s efforts to bypass Congress are “the way our government is supposed to work.”

The lopsided results in the February poll of 1,006 registered voters is a loud warning signal for Obama, who is relying on his extensive use of executive orders, regulations and unilateral actions to boost his policies and his supporters’ morale in the run-up to the November election.

The election is important because Republicans could win a narrow majority in the Senate, and help the GOP to develop a governing agenda to offer voters in 2016.

The poll also showed swing-voters are wary of Obama’s big-government agenda.

Sixty-two percent of independents, and 81 percent of Republicans, said the federal government is providing too many services to too many people. Ten percent of Republicans and 18 percent of independents believe government is not offering enough services.

Sixty-seven percent of independents, and 64 percent of Republicans, said the federal government’s policies have increased the wealth gap between rich and poor.

Meanwhile, Obama’s low ratings are threatening to drag Democratic candidates to defeat this fall, if the GOP avoids splits on immigration and the budget.

Fox News reported that Obama’s approval rating stands at a terrible 42 percent approval, 53 percent disapproval rating.

The top-line numbers hides a sharp partisan split and a terribly low level of support among decisive swing-voting independents. The independents give him only 29 percent approval, but 65 percent opposition.

Obama’s ratings are being held above 40 percent up by strong support from his core constituency of minorities.

For example, Democrats give him a 75 percent approval rating, and African-Americans give him an 84 percent approval rating.

Via: Daily Caller
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