Gallup; Perry Leads Romney 29 to 17 Percent

According to a poll released today Gallup finds Texas Governor Rick Perry to be leading the field of GOP hopefuls. Perry leads Romney 29 to 17 percent. Ron Paul pulls 13 percent while Bachmann is stuck at 10 percent. None of the other candidates get out of single digit range.

So how much HAS Michelle O! spent on vacations?

  The Daily Mail, oh, they of the FLOTUS's fabulously toned thighs, reports that someone supposedly in the White House in circle is claiming that Michelle O! has spent over $10 million of taxpayer money on vacations.
  While the Obamas are paying their own $50,000 per week rental for their farm in the Vineyard, the accompanying entourage and Secret Service assembly is paid by the taxpayers.
  Here's the report from the Daily Mail, for your indigestion:

White House sources today claimed that the First Lady has spent $10million of U.S. taxpayers' money on vacations alone in the past year.Branding her 'disgusting' and 'a vacation junkie', they say the 47-year-old mother-of-two has been indulging in five-star hotels, where she splashes out on expensive massages and alcohol.The 'top source' told the National Enquirer: 'It's disgusting. Michelle is taking advantage of her privileged position while the most hardworking Americans can barely afford a week or two off work.

Media: The Obamas got STYLE!!!!!!!!!!

  Oh, come on. Does the emperor have no new clothes? Or the empress?
  All over the snarky conservative blogs are pictures of Michelle O! in her tight wighty short biking shorts, loose necked t-shirt and bike helmet. 
  Take a look, photo from The Daily Mail:

  In my hood, those are called ham hocks, not "enviably toned thighs."

  This from the same Daily Mail article HAS to be snark, too, right?

Michelle Obama showed off her enviably toned thighs as she powered past the President in tiny purple cycling shorts on the first family's bike ride on Martha's Vineyard today.Wearing a fashionable printed T-shirt and Converse trainers, the First Lady showed that she still has style, even when on vacation.

  THIS is style? Seriously??
  FLOTUS is also described this way:

Super-fit Mrs Obama revealed her smooth thighs on the ride this morning, showing the results of her gruelling exercise regime.

  We know her regime is "gruelling" because she tells us it is. And super fit? Hm. What does this reveal?

   Why do I feel this picture is from a Tyler Perry movie?
  Meanwhile the same article describes her husband POTUS as "goofy" and "tired" and not up to the challenge of beating his wife on their bikes. He's criticized for wearing "hot" blue jeans to bicycle. 
  Most assuredly the Brits have different standards of beauty than in the US; but the whole suck up to the Obamas mentality we can see this in the "ooo lala" article in the Boston Herald on how sexy the skinny POTUS is:

“President Obama, despite his acknowledged smoking, may be one of those men who has become better looking over time,” the Society’s Plastic Surgery News reported.
Plastic surgeons said the prez, who turned 50 earlier this month, maintains his youthful good looks thanks to good genes, a healthy diet and extra-protective skin pigment.

  The plastic surgeon, who has no knowledge of POTUS's personal habits or smoking regularity but feels free to comment about such gushes that POTUS does "everything in moderation."
  We all have different standards of beauty, it's true. Compare the fatty pasty naked females lying on couches that were so popular for painters in previous centuries with the scrawny Photoshopped to look even smaller 95 pound models of today. 
  The sycophantic behavior of the press continues to amaze, however, as even the most naked of emperors is ignored and gushed over.
  Just sayin.'

Marcellus Shale 42 Times Better than 2002 Estimate

Regular readers of this blog will know I am very optimistic about the prospects of the Marcellus Shale formation and its potential contribution to this country's energy needs. Apparently my optimism is not unfounded. The U.S. Geological Survey dramatically increased its estimate of that bounty to 84 trillion cubic feet of undiscovered and recoverable natural gas and 3.4 billion barrels of undiscovered, technically recoverable natural gas liquids. This estimate is 42 times the 2002 estimate! The Marcellus Shale assessment covered areas in Kentucky, Maryland, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia. More.

Rick Perry Helped Sink Freedom Flotilla II

Remember Medea Benjamin of Code Pink and her boat, the Audacity of Hope
and the freedom flotilla that was supposed to sail to Gaza but never left Greece? Who was responsible for stopping it? It was a collaborative effort but one of the unsung heroes is none other than Governor Rick Perry.

"I love what you do. It’s amazing what you do. If you ever need help combating Israel’s enemies, I’m here to assist."

Shurat HaDin is an Israeli law group that practices something they call lawfare. As Freedom Flotilla II gathered in Greece in preparation for it voyage to Gaza Shurat HaDin began a series of legal maneuvers to prevent it. First it contacted all of the major maritime insurance agencies and informed them they might be criminally liable for “aiding and abetting” a terrorist organization if they provided insurance. Most of the insurance companies responded positively and the flotilla was without insurance. Next they contacted the satellite providers in the area that would be needed for GPS navigation and, very importantly, communications to facilitate media coverage. Not wanting to be involved in litigation for providing services to an illegal enterprise they refused satellite usage to the flotilla.

Shurat HaDin discovered American flotilla activists were potentially in violation of the Neutrality Act, which prohibits U.S. citizens from taking part in a hostile act against an allied country. They put Attorney General Eric Holder on notice but just to drive the point home asked Governor Rick Perry to write a letter to Holder. Why Rick Perry? Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, who together with her husband founded Shurat HaDin had met Perry in Israel. At a mission Perry told her, "I love what you do. It’s amazing what you do. If you ever need help combating Israel’s enemies, I’m here to assist."

With the US Justice Department on board, the group discovered that Greece also had a Neutrality Act that prohibited boats from leaving Greece to sail to a hostile territory such as Gaza. Again with the lawsuits, Greece complied and began inspecting the boats for safety and other violations. Eventually six or seven boats were deemed not to be seaworthy. By the time Code Pink found out what was going on they were in a box. There was nothing they could do but cancel the flotilla. Undoubtedly a group as shrewd as Shurat HaDin could have made it without Rick Perry's help but they didn't have to thanks to his courage and loyalty. Should Perry face Obama in 2012 it's a safe bet that every conservative Jew in New York and Florida will know this story. See Commentary Magazine for more.

Those free Obama lunches....

  Those free lunches are supposed to do what? Feed hungry children?
  Or hungry egos?
  Establish a pattern of grasping dependent behavior that reaches about the poverty line and into the middle and upper classes?
  Thomas Paine wrote, "What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly."
  This is the very method this progressive government is using to lull the younger generations into complete dependency on outside forces (ie the government) to run their lives.
  Start with the children and gradually make their way of life so entrenched with giveaways and governmental guidance that, when you don't get your free stuff, you burn the streets (eg: London) to show the "conservatives" (that is, those who believe in self government and independence) that you CAN do something on your own. 
  Like burn.
  American Thinker today expands information on the free food programs being charged to the taxpayers in Detroit Schools we discussed in an earlier post:

Here's how the program works: if 40% of students at a school qualify for public assistance, thenevery student in the school will get free food.  That's free breakfast, lunch, and a snack.  If that sounds like arbitrary welfare waste, it is.  Sixty percent of the student body could be above the poverty line, ineligible for welfare, or even upper-class -- it doesn't matter.  Every student magically becomes entitled.
This welfare trap is named the Community Eligibility Option, part of President Obama's Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act.  Three states will be involved in a pilot program starting now, and more states will be phased in over time.  By 2014-15, the option will be available in all states, if this law is kept on the books.

  We need to feed hungry children; the mission of schools, however, is to educate, not to provide 3 squares a day and certainly not to waste federal dollars on people who can afford to feed their own children.
  This leads to several problems, not the least of which is that we're broke. We're borrowing the money to make sure kids don't feel "bad" about free lunches.
  With technology, there is no reason anyone should know who pays and who doesn't. Swipe the card and there you go.
  The other serious issue is that we create a culture of children who do not understand that the best way to live your life is to do as much for yourself as possible.
  Ben Franklin:

Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters.

  Teach: we have no need of masters.

Obama Loses to Bachmann in Florida Poll

Click to enlarge.
There isn't much good news in today's polls for Obama. If there is a silver lining in the ominous cloud drifting out of Florida in the latest Magellan poll it is he only loses to Michele Bachmann by 1 point. Notice the important Hispanic vote. He loses the Hispanic vote to Romney 62-23, to Perry 56-25 and Bachmann 51-30. These are Hispanics of Cuban decent who unlike the Mexican and Puerto Rican Hispanics generally vote Republican. If you want to view the rest of the gory details go here.

Obama at 38% Approval-Gallup

Obama followed his record breaking Rasmussen poll reported earlier today with a further plunge in the Gallup daily tracking poll. He is underwater by 16 points.

Weiner's Congressional Seat May be Lost Because of Same Sex Marriage Law

In an odd way New York's marriage equality (the politically correct euphemism for same sex) law may have repercussions in the special election to replace Anthony (The Tweeter) Weiner. The Democratic candidate David Weprin is an Orthodox Jew who voted for the marriage equality law. A sizable number of voters in the 9th district are also Orthodox Jews and Weprin's vote is not going down well. Fellow New York assembly member Dov Hikind, among the most outspoken opponents of marriage equality in the state legislature, said he would not endorse David Weprin and the New York Post is reporting he may endorse the Republican candidate, Bob Turner. Hikind is also an Orthodox Jew and a Democrat. Former New York Mayor Ed Koch, a Democrat, has already endorsed Turner and has made robo calls on his behalf.

OBama Minus 26 In Rasmussen Poll

In his worst showing to date Obama has plunged to minus 26 in the Rasmussen's daily tracking poll . The Rasmussen Presidential Approval Index is computed by subtracting those who strongly disapprove from those who strongly approve of the president's job performance. In today's index 19% strongly approve of the job Obama is doing while 45% strongly disapprove.

Elizabeth Warren and Wall Street and No Money

Saint Elizabeth of Wall Street has always been something of an enigma, at least to me. She was entrusted with the obligation of keeping track of the TARP monies as they wound their way through places they were never intended to go. Remember TARP money was supposed to purchase tainted securities, take them off the market and restore faith in the banks that had bought the "troubled assets". The money flowed to General Motors, General Electric, European banks and even to bank of Libya with never a word from Warren. Named along with Mary Shapiro of the SEC and Sheila Bear of the FDIC as one of the new sheriffs of Wall Street in a Time magazine article Warren never really accounted for any of the TARP money. Remember the original sheriff of Wall Street was Elliot Spitzer but lets not go there. Always a lawyer Warren championed more law and the creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a regulator that is designed to be beyond the control of Congress. Now as she contemplates challenging Scott Brown for Senator she faces a dilemma Where will she get campaign money? Scott Brown has blithely morphed from Tea Party favorite to establishment RINO at warp speed and is sitting on $9.6 million of campaign cash much of it coming from Wall Street.

What's a woman to do? Ditch that silly bun on the back of your head. You're running for the United States Senate not the Preppy Hall of Fame. Pardon that bit of intemperance. The question is how will Warren, who has displayed nothing but hostility toward Wall Street, fund her campaign? Even if she could shake a few bucks from Goldman Sachs et al does she not step on her prissy, holier than them image? Barney Frank, Chris Dodd, and Barack Obama extracted huge donations from Wall Street but they never tried to create the Joan of Ark caricature that is Elizabeth Warren. In the end it may not matter that Warren may be broke. Running against an incumbent Senator is always an uphill battle especially when the incumbent is as photogenic and charismatic albeit phony as Brown.

The Working Vacation!

The "Let them eat cake" attitude that Obama exhibits has rankled the Tea Party and the right since the inauguration. Now at last, it seems to be too much for the left, the mainstream media and even black voters and politicians. The RNC captures it in this ad.

 

DSK Charges To Be Dropped

She lied about being gang raped, she lied about her whereabouts after the alleged Dominique Strauss-Kahn rape, she worked as a prostitute while living in a hotel paid for the New York DA's office and when confronted with what the NY Post calls layer upon layer of lies she collapsed on floor in a tantrum and cried " "But I wasn't under oath!" In a twenty-five page document filed in court by the prosecution asking for dismissal of the case against DSK the prosecution stated:
"In virtually every substantive interview with prosecutors, despite entreaties to simply be truthful, she has not been truthful, on matters great and small, many pertaining to her background and some relating to the circumstances of the incident itself,"

With a documented history of making false statements the accuser would be the only witness to prove by her testimony the two essential elements of the crime namely force and lack of consent. Charges are expected to be dropped shortly.

Obama Edges Out Paul,Ties Perry Loses to Romeny

Everyone knew Romney and Perry would poll close to Obama but the latest Gallup Poll showing Ron Paul and Michele Bachmann within the margin of error has to be giving loyal Obamaites stomach cramps. The bad news for Paul and Bachmann is they poll poorly among Republicans.

Notice that even against Bachmann, the weakest Republican polled, Obama can only poll 48 percent. It is always portentous when an incumbent doesn't poll at least 50 percent.

Michigan Dems show yet more civility

  Hey, kiddies, here's a great idea.
  If you disagree with someone politically and philosophically, swear at them and call them really bad names. 
  If you are of a different political party, why don't you get together a bunch of signatories who are willing to actually put those nasty things on a card and give it to the person you're all mad at.
  This will help people just, you know, get along.
  The party which shall not be named but who recently called for more civility did just such a thing in Michigan.
  From the Detroit News, here are some of the phrases written on the birthday card for Michigan Governor Snyder:

The state Democratic Party dropped off a giant birthday card for Gov. Rick Snyder Friday at his Lansing offices. It contained messages purported to be collected from Michigan citizens.
They included these high-brow greetings:
"You suck."
"Dumba-- smarten up."
"Some day you will get yours. You are an A--."
"Up your a--."
"Leave the country idot (sic)."

 

Duncan should "feel badly" about all his errors

  Arne Duncan is trashing Texas's educational system, apparently oblivious that the swamp from which he originated, the Chicago Public Schools, has abysmal scores.
  In addition to his inaccurate numbers, Duncan, the Education Secretary of the United States, committed the egregious error of saying he "feel[s] very, very badly" for the children of Texas.
  Uh hum.
  This must mean that 1) his fingers have a mind of their own  2)  his brain is not connected to his fingers and thus he has little control what they do  or   3) he's just not very experienced when it comes to using his hands.
  His quote from Jake Tapper's blog:

“Far too few of their high school graduates are actually prepared to go on to college," Duncan tells Bloomberg TV’s Al Hunt of Texas in an interview set to air tomorrow. "I feel very, very badly for the children there."   

Texas ranks 43rd among states for high school graduation rate, according to the Legislative Budget Board’s 2010 Texas Fact Book.  Slightly more than 61 percent of students graduate each year.   

“You have seen massive increases in class size. You’ve seen cutbacks in funding. It doesn’t serve the children well. It doesn’t serve the state well. It doesn’t serve the state’s economy well. And ultimately it hurts the country,” he says.  

  Even Time Magazine was confused by the figures Duncan cites.
  Hot Air:

So it’s clear that not only does Duncan not know that Texas performs at the national average (whether or not one finds the national average acceptable), Duncan is apparently unaware that the school system he led is significantly worse than the national average.  Let’s not forget that while Perry, as governor, has responsibility for the performance of the state government that has some responsibilities for school systems, Duncan was running the actual school system in Chicago. Despite this, and despite picking this fight himself, Duncan is entirely ignorant of the results of his own work and its comparison to Texas. 

  It costs slightly less to educate a student in Texas than Chicago, unbeknownst to the Education Secretary.
  In addition, even Politifact identifies as FALSE the allegation that Perry's funding cuts have caused class sizes to swell:

For example, kindergarten classes averaged 19.3 students in 2005-06, bumped up to 19.5 students in 2006-07, then dipped to 18.9 students in 2007-08 before averaging 19 students in 2008-09 and 19.3 students in 2009-10.
Among the grades affected by the 22-1 class-size mandate, fourth-grade classes were the biggest in 2009-10, at 19.9 students. Over the previous four years, fourth-grade classes ranged in size from 19.3 students in 2005-06 to 20.2 students in 2006-07.
Fifth- and sixth-grade classes averaged 21 to 22 students over the five years, while mixed-grade classes averaged up to 25.7 students, in 2005-06.
In 2009-10, high school class sizes ranged from an average of 17.8 students in English/language arts to 20.4 students in social studies. Over the four previous years, the size of the classes averaged 19.6 students to 22.5 students.
So, there was no massive ballooning, the figures suggest, with early elementary classes remaining smaller than required by law.

  Class sizes this low are not even seen here in Perrysburg. Imagine. A high school English class that averages between 18 and 20 students, where here in Perrysburg English class sizes swell to 28 and 29.
  This appalling inaccuracy by Duncan, a blatant partisan attack, has not gone unnoticed in Texas at the Dallas Morning News where they may be considering treating him "ugly" if he ever comes down there:

We shouldn't hear lies come out of the mouth of the nation's top education official (photo at right) when he discusses the record of millions of students and dedicated educators.
People work too hard to have their work dismissed with his pathetic statement about feeling "very, very badly for the children there."

  Texas educates more minority non-English speaking students than most states, yet their numbers are still good as far as graduation rates and national test scores go. Hot Air:

– In 2009, Texas ranked 7th in a 26 state comparison of the only states reporting four-year on-time graduation rates. That year Texas’ on-time graduation rate was 80.6%. The Texas on-time graduation rate for 2010 is now 84.3%, an amazing 3.7 percentage point increase in a single year on the dropout indicator that you are now requiring all states to report to the Department.

  And from NRO:

But by this standard, Secretary Duncan should feel “very very badly” — if not horribly — for the children of Chicago, where he served as school chief from 2001 to 2009. According to a 2009 America’s Promise Alliance study, the high-school graduation rate in Chicago Public Schools was 51 percent. When Arne Duncan was in charge, the average student in the Windy City had only a fifty-fifty chance of even graduating, let alone going to college. 

And back to Time:

And with a high school graduation rate of about 73%, Texas may be slightly below the national average, but it's doing a lot better than Chicago, which only graduates about 56% of its students. 

  So why do people use the phrase "I feel badly" when they mean "I feel bad"? Some people simply attribute it to exposure to bad grammar. 
  But why would someone who represents education in the highest office of the United States do it? Obviously it isn't intentional. No one wants to look like an ass.
  The truth is that for an educator, this usage smacks of laziness and pretentiousness, of someone trying to sound authoritative, proper and elegant, without bothering to educate oneself adequately.
  In short, a phony.
  But then, that seems to be a hallmark of Chicago Public Schools too.
  How about that.

  Just remember. It's all about the cash chillens.

Republicans Hold 6 Point Edge In Generic Congressional Poll

The Democratic spin on the debt ceiling fight is while it hurt Obama Congress has its lowest approval since God knows when. Well Congress is not on the ballot and among Congressional members the Republican have jumped to a 6 point advantage over Democrats. When asked how they would vote for the person running for Congress in their district 44 percent chose Republican and 38 percent chose Democratic. The Democrats enjoyed a 7 point lead when Obama took office in January 2009. The Republicans took the lead in June in 2009 and have held that advantage ever since- by as little as 2 and as much as 12. Rasmussen has more here.

The Decline of the Academic Elite

Relative to the post earlier today "The Impending Collapse of the Student Loan Program" as college cost increase at some point prospective students will refuse to take on debt that cannot be recovered by higher income. Maybe this isn't understood by parents and politicians yet but James D. Miller writing in Inside Higher Education does understand.

Tenure won’t save us from a higher education collapse. Start making alternative career contingency plans now because this collapse could be sudden and catastrophic.Among middle- and upper-class Americans, almost every intelligent, hard-working person attends college. Knowing this, many employers use college as a cheap and efficient sorting device and consider only college graduates when hiring for professional positions.Not having a college degree sends a negative signal to employers. Unfortunately for professors, this signal could dissipate. To see why, consider an extreme example in which students go to college only because of signaling concerns. If something happened to cause fewer highly capable high school graduates to attend college, the stigma of not attending college would slightly decrease. But as this stigma fell, fewer people would pay for college, which would cause the stigma of not going to college to fall further, which in turn would reduce the percentage of highly capable people who went to college which would…. In a world in which college functioned purely as a signal of quality of the graduate, the percentage of people who attend college could quickly plunge.

He then goes on and explains Peter Thiel's experiment where the technology developer is searching for bright young people under age 20 to pay them to drop out of school . Lest you think Thiel got lucky once and made a fortune consider he was a major financial backer of both FaceBook and LinkedIn. He then goes on to explain Moore's law which says in effect that the amount of computing power you can buy per dollar approximately doubles every year. So what will online classes look like in the future? How will brick and mortar institutions look in the future for that matter. Miller points out that Republican frequently consider higher education to be a tool of the left so many Republican governors would gladly replace high paid faculty members with cheap online classes especially if facing a tight budget. Private colleges with big endowments won't stand in the way of progress either. Miller notes;

If you have tenure and therefore think that your college would never get rid of you, consider what would happen if most of your school’s peer institutions replaced expensive tenured faculty with cheap online courses and used the savings to cut tuition by 50 percent. Even if your school has a healthy endowment, many members of your Board of Trustees or Regents probably have business backgrounds and would consider it financial malfeasance for the school to bear costs that the majority of its competitors had shed.

Miller is writing to professors and predicting their decline. The article is a warning to them to consider other employment options. Either by the collapse of the student loan program as I examined in my post or through the implementation of computer technology into education in Miller's article, higher education will change and that change is apt to be quick and dramatic.

The Lemonade Police Strike Again

Some years ago Merle Haggard had a song that asked "Where's all the freedom that we're fighting for?" The lemonade police strike again. Obviously this was a demonstration and a peaceful one but the Capital police were not very professional. The protesters at the White House protesting the oil pipeline were treated much more civilly. Maybe you should send this link to your Congressman and don't let him tell you there is nothing he can do about it.

The Impending Collapse of the Student Loan Program

The is another crisis on the horizon that only the willfully ignorant can't see. Student loan debt has increased from $440 billion to $550 billion since 2008. That's an increase of 25 percent in just 3 years! Contrast that to mortgage or credit card debt that has shrunk during the same period. From the Huffington Post:

The problems of student-loan delinquency and default are only expected to get worse. Salaries and employment rates for recent college graduates have dropped: The median starting salary for a member of the class of 2009 or 2010 is only $27,000, down from $30,000 a couple of years ago. A recent report from Moody’s Analytics predicted that over the next few years, “many students will be unable to service their loans as income growth falls short of borrowers’ expectations.”

If one were both smart and brave he might do quite well with only high school diploma but that option probably wouldn't work for the majority of students. Before this problem reaches catastrophic proportions it would be nice if Congress would act. Suppose Congress would set a $50,000 limit on what could be loaned for an undergraduate degree. After the outrage died down most institutions would find ways to offer a bachelor of science program for $50,000. They would have to shut down whole departments, reduce faculty size, contract curricula but they could indeed do it. The alternative is to allow colleges and universities to charge $100,000 a year to train our next generation of dog walkers.