Indiana has been trending red in polls this year. But it’s beginning to look like Hoosier GOP leaders have been infected with the lemming virus that has driven their Ohio and Wisconsin brethren to the edge of the abyss. Republicans are now preparing to re-introduce so-called “right-to-work” legislation in the upcoming session, according to Mark Guarino’s Monitor report.
Marian Wang explains “Uncoordinated Coordination: Six Reasons Limits on Super PACs Are Barely Limits at All” at Propublica.org.
In his article, “When Did Liberals Become So Unreasonable?,” New York Magazine’s Jonathan Chait wonders if liberal expectations have gotten a little unrealistic, since every Democratic President is a disappointment to progressives. Says Chait: “…Liberals are dissatisfied with Obama because liberals, on the whole, are incapable of feeling satisfied with a Democratic president. They can be happy with the idea of a Democratic president–indeed, dancing-in-the-streets delirious–but not with the real thing. The various theories of disconsolate liberals all suffer from a failure to compare Obama with any plausible baseline. Instead they compare Obama with an imaginary president–either an imaginary Obama or a fantasy version of a past president. ”
Congratulations are in order for Demos, on reaching a milestone — helping one million voters in five states — Ohio, Missouri, North Carolina, Virginia and Illinois fill out voter registration forms since 2007, and implement the oft-neglected section 7 of the National Voter Registration Act of 1993, which requires public agencies to assist voters.
The GOP’s “voter fraud’ follies get their due in Ryan J. Reilly’s “GOP New Mexico Sec of State Finds Tiny Fraction Of The Voter Fraud She Alleged” at Talking Points Memo. According to Reilly, “New Mexico Secretary of State Dianna Duran said earlier this year that her state had a “culture of corruption” and referred 64,000 voter registration records to police that she thought were possible cases of voter fraud. Now a new report from her office proves she was completely right, 0.0296875 percent of the time…”
The Hill’s Bob Cusack has some interesting scorekeeping in his post at The Hill, “Winners and losers emerge from supercommittee’s partisan stalemate‬.” Cusack sees it as particularly good news for President Obama: “Without a doubt, the debt panel’s flop helps his cause…In the coming weeks, Obama and congressional Democrats will go on the offensive on extending the payroll tax cuts and unemployment insurance, two issues that were expected to be taken off the table by the supercommittee.
Gene Robinson isn’t having any of the false equivalency Koolaid regarding the Super Committee’s big flunk in his WaPo column, “Robinson: Republican obstinacy doomed the supercommittee.”
It’s always fun when a Republican strategy memo is published to the dismay of its authors, all the more so when the authors include two former members of Speaker Boehner’s staff now working as lobbyists. The memo in question is essentially a pitch from the Geldug, Clark, Lytle and Cranford lobbying firm to the American Bankers Association. The lobbyists would provide a survey of attitudes towards OWS and big banks and an analysis of OWS leaders and backers, and strategy papers on coalition planning and advertising — all for a mere $850K. MSNBC’s Chris Hayes broke the story (video clip exclusive here), MSNBC has the memo here and John Reed of OpEd news puts it in perspective here. One stated goal in the memo: “to provide cover for political figures who defend the industry.”
Upper of the day: Meg Handley’s “5 Reasons the Economy Will Be Better in 2012” at U.S. News Politics.
Michael Bailey and Forrest Maltzman attempt a data driven analysis to answer the question in their American Prospect post title “Will the Supreme Court Overturn Obamacare?” The theory seems a little dicey, but Dems should like their prediction: “here is ours: 6-3 or 7-2 to uphold the law.”