The Amazing Obama Budget (WSJ)

Federal budgets are by definition political documents, but even by that standard yesterday's White House proposal for fiscal year 2013 is a brilliant bit of misdirection. With the abracadabra of a tax increase on the wealthy and defense spending cuts that will never materialize, the White House asserts that in President Obama's second term revenues will soar, outlays will fall, and $1.3 trillion annual deficits will be cut in half like the lady in the box on stage.  All voters need to do is suspend disbelief for another nine months. And ignore the first four years.  The real news in Mr. Obama's budget proposal is the story of those four years, and what a tale they tell.

• Four years of spending of more than 24% of GDP, the four highest spending years since 1946. In the current fiscal year of 2012, despite talk of austerity, Mr. Obama predicts spending will increase by $193 billion to $3.8 trillion, or 24.3% of GDP.

• Another deficit of $1.327 trillion in 2012, also an increase from 2011, and making four years in a row above $1.29 trillion.

• Revenues at historic lows because of the mediocre recovery and temporary tax cuts that are deadweight revenue losses because they do so little for economic growth. The White House budget office estimates that for the fourth year in a row revenues won't reach 16% of GDP. The last time they were below 16% for any year was 1950.

• All of this has added as astonishing $5 trillion in debt in a single Presidential term. National debt held by the public—the kind you have to pay back—will hit 74.2% this year and keep rising to 77.4% next year.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204883304577221342883636060.html

Four more years of this?

2/1/2009-9/30/2009: $1.2 trillion ("stimulus" spending, with remainder prorated 8/12 months)
10/1/2009-9/30/2010: $1.2 trillion
10/1/2010-9/30/2011: $1.3 trillion
10/1/2011-9/30/2012: $1.1 trillion (budgeted amount)
10/1/2012-1/31/2013: $0.4 trillion (budgeted amount, prorated 4/12 months)
Total = $5.2 Trillion

(Updated 2/14 with corrected figures from the WSJ.)
In four years, we'll make Greece and Portugal look like picnics.

Maine Results

Preliminary Caucus Results
Mitt Romney 2,190 (39.2%)
Ron Paul 1,996 (35.7%)
Rick Santorum 989 (17.7%)
Newt Gingrich 349 (6.2%)
Other 61 (1.1%)
(84% of precincts reporting)

Tentative Delegate Allocation
Maine has 24 delegates (3 RNC, 6 CD, 12 AL), and like Colorado and Minnesota has absolutely no rules indicating how these delegates are allocated.  I've again chosen straight proportional allocation
Mitt Romney 10
Ron Paul 9
Rick Santorum 4
Newt Gingrich 1

Bringing a whole new meaning to the term "scumbag"

New Jersey Education Association Executive Director Vincent Giordano ... was challenged by the host on why low-income families should not have the same options as other families when their child is in a failing school.  "Those parents should have exactly the same options and they do. We don't say that you can't take your kid out of the public school." ... When told some families cannot afford to finance the shift to private school without government help, Giordano said: "Well, you know, life's not always fair and I'm sorry about that."

The Newark Star-Ledger reported in 2010 that his salary was nearly $422,000, and total compensation roughly $550,000 when deferred compensation and other benefits are counted.  NJEA spokesman Steve Baker, though, said those reports are not accurate. He said the director's salary is "in the three-hundred thousands, and the low three-hundred thousands."

Low 300s.  Well, that's alright then.  Our bad.  Sorry about that.  No hard feelings.

Damn right, life's not fair.  Doofus should be making minimum wage based on the value of his work to society.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/02/08/union-chief-with-over-300g-salary-on-voucher-debate-lifes-not-always-fair/

Colorado and Minnesota Results

Santorum sweeps!

It amazes me that neither Colorado nor Minnesota has ANY rules for even the most preliminary allocation of delegates.  The primary results are completely non-binding.  Any delegate is free to vote for any candidate, in complete and utter disregard of the caucus results.  Why bother holding a caucus?  I'm appalled (disgusted is closer to the truth) that there's so little formality attached to the whole process.  I've seen people put more thought into the rules under which they are going to play a game of Monopoly.  Here is the sum total of what the RNC rules state regarding delegate allocation in these two states.
Colorado:
     AL – Delegate election: at State Convention
     CD – Delegate election: at CD Conventions
Minnesota:
     AL – Delegate allocation: n/a unless State Convention votes to bind.
     CD – Delegate allocation: n/a
Lacking even the most rudimentary algorithm for allocating delegates, I've gone with a straight proportional allocation.  I could allocate the 3 RNC members to the winner and the CD delegates by winner in each congressional district, but if the delegates are free to do whatever they want, I hardly see the point of going through all that extra work.  My simplistic proration is not any more likely to be wrong.  If anybody has a different point of view, please let me know.

Colorado

Final Popular Vote Results
Santorum = 26,372 (40.2%)
Romney = 22,875 (34.9%)
Gingrich = 8,394 (12.8%)
Paul = 7,713 (11.8%)
Other = 181 (0.3%)
100% of precincts reporting

Tentative Delegate Allocation Results
Colorado has 36 delegates (3 RNC, 21 Congressional District, 12 At Large), which I've allocated proportionately.
Santorum = 14
Romney = 13
Gingrich = 5
Paul = 4

Minnesota

Preliminary Popular Vote Results
Santorum = 21,436 (44.8%)
Paul = 13,030 (27.2%)
Romney = 8,096 (16.9%)
Gingrich = 5,134 (10.7%)
Other = 140 (0.3%)
95% of precincts reporting

Tentative Delegate Allocation Results
Minnesota has 40 delegates (3 RNC, 24 Congressional District, 13 At Large), which I've allocated proportionately.
Santorum = 18
Paul = 11
Romney = 7
Gingrich = 4

Note that Santorum also won a primary in Missouri (55.2% of the vote), but that's even more meaningless than the results in CO and MN, since Missouri delegates are selected in a caucus that will take place on March 17.

Even the WashPost is forced to acknowledge the obvious

U.S. unemployment data exclude millions who stopped job search
A drop in the U.S. unemployment rate, at its lowest in three years, masks the fact that millions of unemployed people aren't counted because they've given up the search for work. The unemployment rate would be 9.9%, not 8.3%, if official statistics included the 2.8 million people who stopped looking for jobs. (WP)

Good to know

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg of the Supreme Court ... “I would not look to the United States Constitution if I were drafting a constitution in the year 2012.”  She recommended, instead, the South African Constitution, the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, or the European Convention on Human Rights.

Americans recognize rights not widely protected, including ones to a speedy and public trial, and are outliers in prohibiting government establishment of religion. But the Constitution is out of step with the rest of the world in failing to protect ... entitlement to food, education and health care. Only 2 percent of the world’s constitutions protect, as the Second Amendment does, a right to bear arms.

Source: NYT

I don't know how to break this to the NYT, but those (particularly the bolded) are features, not bugs.

And it's definitely good to remember that Justice Ginsburg thinks there's something fundamentally wrong with the US Constitution when trying to understand the backassward judicial opinions she expresses most of the time.

RWR

Please join us in celebrating the anniversary of Ronald Reagan's birth.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Reagan

Question

Why was the Susan G Komen Foundation giving money to Planned Parenthood in the first place?

The Next Shoe to Drop...

...Commercial Real Estate

Atlanta's 55-story Bank of America Plaza, the tallest tower in the Southeast, is set to be sold at an open outcry auction on the steps of the Fulton County Courthouse Tuesday after landlord BentleyForbes missed mortgage payments. It bought the skyscraper in 2006 for $436 million from Bank of America Corp. and Cousins Properties Inc. in the city's biggest property deal.

Nevada Results

Final Caucus Popular Vote Results
Mitt Romney 16,486 (50.1%)
Newt Gingrich 6,956 (21.1%)
Ron Paul 6,175 (18.8%)
Rick Santorum 3,277 (10.0%)
100% of precincts reporting

Tentative Delegate Allocation Results
Nevada has 28 delegates (3 RNC, 12 Congressional District, 13 At Large), all of which are allocated proportionally.
Romney = 14
Gingrich = 6
Paul = 5
Santorum = 3

Note that news outlets have published all sorts of splits such as 12-4-4-2 with 6 unpledged (CNN), 13-5-5-2 with 3 unpledged (MSNBC) and 10-4-3-2 with 9 unpledged (Fox News).  I have no idea what the basis for any of these allocations is.  I note that Green Papers, which is almost invariably the best informed source, matches my breakout.  I don't understand why multi-billion-dollar organizations whose job it is to know this stuff can't get their acts together enough to at least match EACH OTHER.

Florida Results

Preliminary Popular Vote Results 

Jan 31, 2012 (89% of precincts reporting)

Mitt Romney	727,886	46.7%
Newt Gingrich	493,215	31.7%
Rick Santorum	206,906	13.3%
Ron Paul	108,489	7%
Other	20,687	1.3%

Tentative Delegate Allocation Results
Florida has 50 delegates (because they were penalized half their delegates for having an early primary under RNC rule 16).   Because of the penalty, delegates are all at large and are allocated on a winner-take-all basis (per Florida rule 10).
Romney = 50

Gingrich up in FL

Less than two weeks ago, Mitt Romney had a 22-point lead in Florida, but that’s ancient history in the race for the Republican presidential nomination. Following his big win in South Carolina on Saturday, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich now is on top in Florida by nine.

Winning Florida (which like SC is winner-take-all) could give Gingrich a commanding early lead.

More Islamist Terrorism

Islamist sect Boko Haram kills at least 178 in Kano, Nigeria. (Source: FoxNews)

So, is this murderous violence also (if liberal and libertarian anti-"interventionist" logic is to be believed) because the people of Nigeria are interfering in the affairs of Muslims who just want to be left alone?

Nice

Do you remember GWB's version of this book? Me neither. Must have something to do with only liberals being disgusting enough to propagandize elementary school kids.

South Carolina Results

Preliminary Popular Vote Results
Newt Gingrich 210,611 (40.4%)
Mitt Romney 140,961 (27.0%)
Rick Santorum 90,637 (17.4%)
Ron Paul 69,947 (13.4%)
Other 9,072 (1.7%)
(89% of precincts reporting)

Tentative Delegate Allocation Results
South Carolina has 25 at large delegates (because they were penalized half their delegates for having an early primary under RNC rule 16).  Delegates are allocated on a winner-take-all basis but are unbound if the candidate does not receive 30% of the vote. 
Gingrich = 25

Late, yet still timely...

Europe is facing an ‘existential crisis’ that could end in violent revolution and war, the French foreign minister warned last night. In the bleakest assessment yet of the euro crisis, Alain Juppe, a former French prime minister, said the spiralling debt crisis could trigger ‘the explosion of the European Union itself’.

I missed this when it first came out on Dec 1st, but there are a lot of smart European power-brokers (not talking kooks or fringers) who think war is a distinct possibility. For example, the PM of Poland made very similar comments back in September.

Perry Out

Not sure why he didn't wait until after SC at this point, but I don't think he was going to place anyway.  I've removed his unpledged Iowa delegate from my counts.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/01/19/perry-to-drop-out-gop-presidential-race/

Looks Like One More is Dropping ...

And Then There Were Four: Rick Perry to Drop Out

(per Politico, via Townhall)

And then there were five...

Huntsman Ends Bid, Backs Romney

Enough about Bain Capital

I'm really disappointed in my fellow Republicans harping on Romney's record at Bain Capital.  The analysis of the now infamous "77 cases", and the attack ads based on it, is badly flawed.

The WSJ reports that 17 either filed for bankruptcy reorganization or closed their doors by the end of the eighth year after Bain first invested.  Many of these bankruptcies were long after Bain had left, and in several others Bain was only a minor investor.  In fact, Bain was in charge at just 5 of the bankruptcies.  A failure rate of  6.5% is well ahead of the industry average for private equity firms.  An additional 6 firms ran into so much trouble that most or all of the money Bain invested was lost.  I guess that's evidence that Bain wasn't looking to raid the companies.

But all of this analysis misses the main point -- Bain's strategy was to invest in failing companies.  The question isn't how many went bust; the question is how many would have gone bust more quickly and more completely without an injection of cash from Bain.  There's no question that Bain saved thousands of jobs.  The alternative to a slimmed down firm with fewer employees is not a bigger firm with more employees, it's a bankrupt firm with no employees. 

And of course Bain recapitalized Staples, Domino's and Sports Authority, all of which have been complete successes resulting in over 100,000 extra jobs.  Other success stories are Steel Dynamics, Experian and VisionCare.  So Gingrich, and Perry (and Obama and Axelrod) need to STFU.

Something to think about

As we start working on our taxes

(and this is based on AGI, so it doesn't include transfer payments to that bottom 50%)

Laffer has it right, as usual

If the "Buffett Rule" were applied as President Obama proposes, then Mr. Buffett's federal tax bill would have been $14.4 million, rather than the $6.9 million he actually paid. As a fraction of his true income, his effective tax rate would only have risen from 6/100ths of 1% to 12/100ths of 1%.

[...]

Mr. Buffett also stated in his op-ed that in his 60 years working with investors he has yet to see anyone "shy away from a sensible investment . . . even when capital gains rates were 39.9% in 1976-77." Mr. Buffett's choice of 1976-77 is prescient because the economy in 1977 was a basket case. The official Bureau of Labor Statistics unemployment rate was 7.1%, consumer price inflation was 6.7%, and the S&P 500 dropped a whopping 17% after adjusting for inflation. Indeed, 1977 is a good illustration of the type of economy Mr. Buffett's policies would deliver.

[...]

Meanwhile, the top 1% of earners saw their tax payments climb to 3.3% of GDP in 2007 from 1.5% of GDP in 1978, while the bottom 95% saw their tax payments drop to 3.2% of GDP in 2007 from 5.4% of GDP in 1978. Why would Mr. Buffett want to reverse these numbers?  Of course, cynics and die-hard progressives might object to the above evidence on the grounds that it was driven by an explosion of income gains. But that's largely the point.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203462304577138961587258988.html

I've provided the highlights, but as with everything Art Laffer writes, it's best to go read the entire column for yourself.

New Hampshire Results

Preliminary Popular Vote Results
Romney = 96,488 (39.4%)
Paul = 56,105 (23.0%)
Huntsman = 41,370 (16.9%)
Gingrich = 23,158 (9.5%)
Santorum = 22,976 (9.4%)
Perry = 1,735 (0.7%)
Other = 2,821 (1.2%)
(293 out of 301 precincts reporting)

Tentative Delegate Allocation Results
New Hampshire has 12 at large delegates (because they were penalized half their delegates for having an early primary under RNC rule 16).  Delegates are allocated proportionally to popular vote, subject to a 10% threshold.* 
Romney = 7
Paul = 3
Huntsman = 2
Gingrich and Santorum missed the 10% cutoff.
(*) The NYT website makes reference to the 3 RNC delegates; not surprisingly the NYT is wrong. When RNC rule 16 is invoked to remove delegates, the ones removed are the RNC delegates and the Congressional District delegates. All remaining delegates are at large.

Observations
-- You may recall that NH has an open primary. Huntsman won the Democratic vote. Draw your own conclusion.
-- Paul came in second ... in the D primary as well as the R primary.
-- Paul won the independent vote and the under 30 vote (neither is a surprise). Romney won males and females, conservatives and moderates, Republicans, and the over 30 vote.
-- Perry is done. He barely beat Michelle Bachmann and Buddy Roemer. I predict a press conference in the morning.
-- In an unreported story, Obama got as little as 76% in some counties in the D primary.  So much for energizing the base.

Daley Out, Lew In

Obama's chief of staff William Daley quit yesterday. His tenure was shorter than Kim Kardashian's marriage. OMB Director Jack Lew will take over.

Proof that Krugman is lying scum

In a recent column Paul Krugman argued that since Wisconsin has unionized schools (true), Texas has non-unionized schools (true), and educational achievement scores are higher in Wisconsin than in Texas (true), it must be that teacher unions are good for schools.

The conclusion is false even though each supporting fact is true. White Anglos in Texas do better than white Anglos in Wisconsin. Hispanics in Texas do better than Hispanics in Wisconsin. Blacks in Texas do better than blacks in Wisconsin.

How can this be? Simple. Whites on average do better than Hispanics and blacks, and Texas has a much higher proportion of blacks and Hispanics.

This is the well-known Simpson paradox, which is discussed in elementary statistics textbooks. One could argue that Krugman is just an idiot of monumental proportions, but nobody gets a PhD in economics or wins the Nobel Prize in economics without understanding Simpson's paradox.

The conclusion is that Krugman understood all this and decided to use it in his column anyway because he's the lying partisan scum we all suspected him to be.

Obama Cuts Budget

Where?  Where else?  The military.  I am so sick of uber-liberals who can't stomach anything less than 10% annual growth in entitlement spending deciding that they are fiscal conservatives when it comes to the military, which after all is one of the few things we spend money on that is actually permitted by the constitution.  Why isn't military spending Keynesian stimulus?

Bachmann Suspends Campaign

Registering the first casualty from Iowa - Bachmann has "suspended" her campaign.

http://nbcpolitics.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/01/04/9946872-after-dismal-iowa-showing-bachmann-suspends-campaign

http://www.newsmax.com/InsideCover/bachmann-ends-presidential-campaign/2012/01/04/id/423001

(I'm throwing her delegate back in the unpledged column in my count.)

Iowa Results

Final Popular Vote Results
Romney = 30,015 (24.55%)
Santorum = 30,007 (24.54%)
Paul = 26,219 (21.4%)
Gingrich = 16,251 (13.3%)
Perry = 12,604 (10.3%)
Bachmann = 6,073 (5.0%)
Huntsman = 745 (0.6%)
Other = 341 (0.3%)
(100% of precincts reporting)

Delegates at stake
* 13 At Large (AL) delegates
* 12 Congressional District (CD) delegates [4 districts x 3 delegates/district]
* 3 RNC Automatic Delegates

Delegate Allocation Estimated Methodology

There is no formal system applied in the precinct caucuses to relate the presidential preference of the caucus participants to the choice of the precinct's delegates to the Republican Convention of the county in which the precinct is located. The participants at each precinct caucus alone determine if presidential preference is to be a factor in such choice and, if so, how it is to be applied.  (CD delegates will be formally allocated at the Congressional presidential caucus on 4/21/2012. AL delegates will be formally allocated at the state convention on 6/6/2012.) 

Given that there are no rules, all I could do was perform a VERY rough estimate. I allocated the the 13 AL delegates in proportion to the popular vote.  I allocated the 12 CD delegates to the winners of each Congressional district - 6 (2 districts) to Romney and 6 (2 districts) to Santorum (but did not allocate the RNC delegates to the overall state winner).  I have seen some really stupid allocations in the media, such as the SF Gate claiming that Paul "was shut out of" delegates because he didn't win any of the congressional districts.  I've also seen some reasonable approaches, such as The Green Papers allocating all 25 delegates proportionally but subject to a 10% threshold that many states use, but my approach seems at least as good as anything I've found up to now in the press.

SOFT Delegate Allocation Results
Bachmann = 1
Gingrich = 2
Huntsman = 0
Paul = 3
Perry = 1
Romney = 9
Santorum = 9
Unpledged = 3

Who cares?

The Iowa caucus is today.  I don't particularly care.  Iowa doesn't have the best record of picking the eventual nominee, on either the R side* or the D side, but that's not what I'm talking about.  What troubles me is that I don't understand why the media turns this into a feeding frenzy when the delegates aren't even pledged.  Let me be perfectly clear ... the caucus results are completely non-binding meaningless; the delegates are free to vote for whomever they want.

* In 2008, McCain (4th) didn't win a single county.  Huckabee (1st) won 74 counties, Romney (2nd) won 24 counties, and Paul (5th) won 1 county.  Fred Thomson came in 3rd.

On Intellectual Complainers

I ran across a great explanation of the Occupy crowd...

As society gets richer, education expands and the number of "intellectuals" begins to grow.  These are people who have gone through college and believe that they are really the smartest people, but they go out into the market and find that they can't get a job and they don't actually have any skills.  They get discontented with their lives.  They begin to feel like life is unfair to them.  After all, they're the educated ones; they should have good jobs.  They begin to get resentfual and they say capitalism must be at fault.  Under a just system, smart people like them would be in control and they could run things.

You might think that this isn't particularly insightful, that you've thought these exact same thoughts yourself.  Well, you'd be right except for one little fact.  The punchline is in the comments.

100 years ago...

The election of 1912 was a choice between:

• Woodrow Wilson, the first liberal Democrat president
• William Taft, the last liberal Republican president
• Theodore Roosevelt, who ran as a third-party candidate because Taft wasn't liberal enough

And 1913, probably the single worst year in the history of freedom in this country, gave us:

• The federal income tax
• The direct election of senators, destroying our federalist balance
• The Federal Reserve Act

Let's make sure we do a better job this year.

Romney Beats Obama

Mitt Romney has now jumped to his biggest lead ever over President Obama in a hypothetical Election 2012 matchup. It’s also the biggest lead a named Republican candidate has held over the incumbent in Rasmussen Reports surveying to date.  The latest national telephone survey finds that 45% of Likely Voters favor the former Massachusetts governor, while 39% prefer the president.  Ten percent like some other candidate in the race, and six percent are undecided.

GOP Delegate Selection Schedule

January 3, 2012
Iowa (caucus) - 28 delegates

January 10, 2012
New Hampshire (primary) - 12 delegates

January 21, 2012
South Carolina (primary) - 25 delegates

January 31, 2012
Florida (primary) - 50 delegates

February 4, 2012
Nevada (caucus) - 28 delegates

February 7, 2012
Colorado (caucus) - 36 delegates
Minnesota (caucus) - 40 delegates

February 4–11, 2012
Maine (caucus) - 24 delegates

February 28, 2012
Arizona (primary) - 29 delegates
Michigan (primary) - 30 delegates

March 3, 2012
Washington (caucus) - 43 delegates

March 6, 2012 (Super Tuesday)
Alaska (caucus) - 27 delegates
Georgia (primary) - 76 delegates
Idaho (caucus) - 32 delegates
Massachusetts (primary) - 41 delegates
North Dakota (caucus) - 28 delegates
Ohio (primary) - 66 delegates
Oklahoma (primary) - 43 delegates
Tennessee (primary) - 58 delegates
Vermont (primary) - 17 delegates
Virginia (primary) - 49 delegates

March 6-10, 2012
Wyoming (caucus) - 29 delegates

March 10, 2012
Kansas (caucus) - 40 delegates
U.S. Virgin Islands (caucus) - 9 delegates
Guam (caucus) - 9 delegates
Northern Marianas (caucus) - 9 delegates

March 13, 2012
Alabama (primary) - 50 delegates
Hawaii (caucus) - 20 delegates
Mississippi (primary) - 40 delegates
American Samoa (caucus) - 9 delegates

March 17, 2012
Missouri (caucus) - 52 delegates

March 18, 2012
Puerto Rico (primary) - 23 delegates

March 20, 2012
Illinois (primary) - 69 delegates

March 24, 2012
Louisiana (primary) - 46 delegates

April 3, 2012
District of Columbia (primary) - 19 delegates
Maryland (primary) - 37 delegates
Texas (primary) - 155 delegates
Wisconsin (primary) - 42 delegates

April 24, 2012
Connecticut (primary) - 28 delegates
Delaware (primary) - 17 delegates
New York (primary) - 95 delegates
Pennsylvania (primary) - 72 delegates
Rhode Island (primary) - 19 delegates

May 8, 2012
Indiana (primary) - 46 delegates
North Carolina (primary) - 55 delegates
West Virginia (primary) - 31 delegates

May 15, 2012
Nebraska (primary) - 35 delegates
Oregon (primary) - 28 delegates

May 22, 2012
Arkansas (primary) - 36 delegates
Kentucky (primary) - 45 delegates

June 5, 2012
California (primary) - 172 delegates
Montana (primary) - 26 delegates
New Jersey (primary) - 50 delegates
New Mexico (primary) - 23 delegates
South Dakota (primary) - 28 delegates

June 26, 2012
Utah (primary) - 40 delegates

Total delegates = 2286, of which 1783 are bound and 503 are unbound

http://www.demconwatchblog.com/upload/2012%20RNC%20Delegate%20Summary.pdf

2012 Senate Elections

Really good news today.  Ben Nelson (Nebraska) is retiring.  This looks to me to be a likely R pickup.

With 2010 done, it's time to turn our attention to 2012. Looks like it could be a very good year for the GOP, with lots more D seats than R seats on the line. Same as with the 2010 cycle, I will update this post periodically as additional information becomes known. I hope to build a more encyclopedic analysis of (some of) the races than I did for 2010. Looks like I might have my work cut out for me keeping this post updated; incumbents are dropping like flies.

What seats are up for election?

Democrat incumbents

1) Dianne Feinstein of California
* Took office November 10, 1992
* Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 9%
* Won in 2006 with 59% of the vote

2) Tom Carper of Delaware
* Took office January 3, 2001
* One of 17 senators to vote against repeal of Obamacare's 1099 requirement
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 12%
* Won in 2006 with 70% of the vote

3) Bill Nelson of Florida
* Took office January 3, 2001
* Voted against the 2008 bank bailout
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 36%
* Won in 2006 with 60% of the vote
* Republican primary candidates: Mike McCalister, Mike Haridopolos, Alexander George

4) Ben Cardin of Maryland
* Took office January 3, 2007 (won 54% of the vote against Michael Steele)
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 5%

5) Debbie Stabenow of Michigan
* Took office January 3, 2001
* Democrat Policy Committee Vice Chair
* Voted against the 2008 bank bailout
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 9%
* Won in 2006 with 57% of the vote
* Republican primary candidate: Chad Dewey

6) Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota
* Took office January 3, 2007 (won 58% of the vote)
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 11%

7) Claire McCaskill of Missouri
* Took office January 3, 2007 (won 50% of the vote)
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 19%
* Democrat challenger: Samuel Lipari
* Republican primary candidates: Sarah Steelman, Ed Martin

8) Jon Tester of Montana
* Took office January 3, 2007 (won 49% of the vote)
* Voted against the 2008 bank bailout
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 16%
* Republican primary candidate: Denny Rehberg

9) Bob Menendez of New Jersey
* Took office January 18, 2006
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 8%
* Won in November 2006 with 53% of the vote

10) Kristen Gillibrand of New York
* Appointed to office January 26, 2009; successfully ran in 2010 to finish out the 2006-2012 term (won 63% of the vote)
* One of 17 senators to vote against repeal of Obamacare's 1099 requirement
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 10%
* Democrat challenger: Scott Noren

11) Sherrod Brown of Ohio
* Took office January 3, 2007 (won 56% of the vote)
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 8%
* Played the Hitler/Stalin card on his own state's governor

12) Bob Casey of Pennsylvania
* Took office January 3, 2007 (won 59% of the vote)
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 9%
* Republican primary candidate: Marc Scaringi

13) Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island
* Took office January 3, 2007 (won 53% of the vote)
* One of 17 senators to vote against repeal of Obamacare's 1099 requirement
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 3% (second lowest in the Senate)

14) Bernie Sanders of Vermont
* Took office January 3, 2007 (won 65% of the vote)
* One of 17 senators to vote against repeal of Obamacare's 1099 requirement
* Voted against the 2008 bank bailout
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 7%

15) Maria Cantwell of Washington
* Took office January 3, 2001
* Voted against the 2008 bank bailout
* One of two Democrats to vote against financial "reform"
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 10%
* Won in 2006 with 57% of the vote

16) Joe Manchin of West Virginia
* Took office November 15, 2010, to finish out the 2006-2012 term (won 54% of the vote)

Open Democrat seats

1) Connecticut (Joe Lieberman retiring)
* Democrat primary candidates: Susan Bysiewicz, Rep. Chris Murphy

2) Hawaii (Daniel Akaka retiring)

3) Nebraska (Ben Nelson retiring)
* Republican primary candidates: Pat Flynn, Jon Bruning

4) New Mexico (Jeff Bingaman retiring)
* Republican primary candidates: Bill English, Greg Sowards
* Democrat primary candidate: Hector Balderas

5) North Dakota (Kent Conrad retiring)
* Republican primary candidate: Brian Kalk

6) Virginia (Jim Webb retiring)
*Republican primary candidates: Former Senator George Allen (who lost to Webb in 2006 by a margin of 0.6%), Jamie Radtke (head of the Virginia Tea Party Patriots)

7) Wisconsin (Herb Kohl retiring)
* Democrat primary candidate: Ben Masel
* Republican primary candidate: Tommy Thompson

Republican incumbents

1) Richard Lugar of Indiana
* Tied for longest service GOP senator; took office January 3, 1977
* Republican Ranking Memberon the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 77%
* Oldest GOP Senator, will be 80 on election day 2012
* One of five Republicans to vote for confirming Kagan to SCOTUS
* One of eight Republicans to vote against a ban on earmarks
* Won in 2006 with 87% of the vote
* Republican challenger: Richard Mourdock

2) Olympia Snowe of Maine
* Took office January 3, 1995
* Republican Ranking Member on the Senate Small Business Committee
* One of five Republicans to vote for confirming Kagan to SCOTUS
* One of three Republicans to vote for financial "reform"
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 48%
* Won in 2006 with 74% of the vote
* Republican challengers: Scott D'Amboise, Andrew Ian Dodge

3) Scott Brown of Massachusetts
* Took office February 4, 2010, to finish out the 2006-2012 term (won 52% of the vote)
* One of three Republicans to vote for financial "reform"
* Democrat primary candidate: Bob Massie

4) Roger Wicker of Mississippi
* Took office December 31, 2007 (won 55% of the vote)
* Voted against the 2008 bank bailout
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 91%

5) Dean Heller of Nevada
* Appointed May 9, 2011

6) Bob Corker of Tennessee
* Took office January 3, 2007 (won 51% of the vote)
* Republican Ranking Member on the Senate Committee on Aging
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 83%
* Featured in 1/17/2011 Weekly Standard article "Knowledge is Power"

7) Orrin Hatch of Utah
* Tied for longest service GOP senator; took office January 3, 1977
* Republican Ranking Member on the Senate Finance Committee
* Will be 78 on election day 2012
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 89%
* Won in 2006 with 62% of the vote

8) John Barrasso of Wyoming
* Took office June 22, 2007 (won 73% of the vote)
* Republican Ranking Member on the Senate Indian Affairs Committee
* Senate Republican Conference Vice Chair
* Voted against the 2008 bank bailout
* ACU Lifetime Conservative Rating = 99% (highest in the Senate)

Open Republican seats

1) Arizona (Jon Kyl retiring)
* Republican primary candidate: Rep. Jeff Flake

2) Texas (Kay Bailey Hutchison retiring)
* Republican primary candidates: Michael Williams, Roger Williams, Elizabeth Ames Jones, Glenn Addison, Andrew Castanuela, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, Ted Cruz
* Democrat primary candidate: John Sharp

What Democrat seats might be in actual play?

Some pollsters are already rating seats as safe D/R, likely D/R, leans D/R or tossup. For now, I will limit myself to looking at high-level vulnerability of D seats.

Very Vulnerable:
* Tester (MT) - First term senator who won in a landslide D year with only a plurality of the vote in an at best slightly purple state. Smart money has to be against him in what will be a lot less favorable conditions in 2012.
* NE and ND - mostly red states without incumbent Ds running are most definitely at risk
* VA - held by a retiring first term D senator who won his seat with only a plurality and had a lifetime ACU rating of 15% in a swing state in which the GOP won the governor's mansion by 18 points

Fairly Vulnerable:
* McCaskill (MO) - First term senator who won in a landslide D year with only a plurality of the vote in an at best slightly purple state. Moving to the center to position herself better for 2012.
* Klobuchar (MN), Brown (OH), Casey (PA) - Relatively unknown first term senators with uber-liberal voting records in swing states are seldom safe.
* NM - not a solid blue state; without an incumbent D running it is probably at risk

Potentially Vulnerable:
* Cantwell (WA) - If Rossi came within 5 points of Murray, I have to think he has some sort of shot.
* Nelson (FL) - Perhaps LeMieux will challenge him.
* WI - If Finegold fell, this seat has to be in play, especially if Thompson runs.

Probably Safe:
* Gillibrand (NY) and Manchin (WV), unfortunately, are probably safe after winning their respective 2010 special elections in blue states.
* Carper (DE) - Perhaps Castle could mount a credible challenge, but Delaware seems likely to stay blue for the time being.
* Stabenow (MI) - I'd like to think Michigan is in play, but I don't know any specific GOP candidates.
* Menendez (NJ) - Before last year I would have said safe, but Christie has set quite the precedent.
* CT and HI - Open seats are always at risk, but these are reliably blue states.

Safe:
* Cardin (MD), Whitehouse (RI) and Sanders (VT) were all elected in 2006 but all are very safe blue seats.
* Feinstein (CA) - long-serving senator in a very blue state.

What Went Wrong?

(Compliments of the Cato Institute.)

You can see that the above chart has two well defined parts.  First, poverty rates dropped sharply from 40% around the start of the 20th century all the way to around 13%.  Then thee graph goes flat with only very up-and-down fluctuations and ends the 20th century right around 13%, where it remains today (actually, it's 14.3% today, but let's not quibble).  So what was that inflection point?  1965.  Perhaps something important happened that year?  Oh, that's right ... that's the year we decided to fight a war on poverty.  Clearly, we lost.

It's often said that unemployment is higher than it would otherwise be because we pay people not to work through unemployment insurance.  Well, likewise, the poverty rate is otherwise higher than it would otherwise be because in 1965 we started paying people to be poor.  Can you imagine how much lower the poverty rate would be if we'd instead continued the trend that had obtained through the previous six decades.  This is no longer an issue of budgets or economics.  It's a human tragedy of epic proportions.  One seldom sees a more obvious demonstration of the power of bad liberal ideas and misguided socialist policies to cause real devastation to millions of lives.

It's Official

As of today,
US Debt = $15,182,800,000,000
US GDP = $15,180,900,000,000

US Debt to GDP = 100.01%. 
We have joined a very exclusive club.

Second of many

Sequel to a post made almost exactly one year ago.

Retired police and firefighters from Central Falls RI have agreed to sharp pension cuts, a step thought to be unprecedented in municipal bankruptcy and one that could prompt similar attempts by other distressed governments.  If approved by the bankruptcy court, the agreement could be groundbreaking, said Matthew J. McGowan, the lawyer representing the retirees.  “This is the first time there’s been an agreement of the police and firefighters of any city or town to take the cut,” he said, referring to those already retired, who are typically spared when union contracts change. “I’ve told these guys they’re like the canary in the coal mine. I know that there are other places watching this.” [...] Central Falls had little choice. For years, its government failed to contribute enough to its police and firefighters’ pension fund, and the fund effectively ran out of money this fall. The city, which had also promised the retirees comprehensive health benefits, could not cover the pension and health payments out of its general revenue.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/20/business/pension-deal-in-rhode-island-could-set-a-trend.html
(Thanks to MPC for the link.)

BIH Kim Jong Il

North Korean leader reported dead. It will be interesting to see what happens next.

Insider Trading by Congresscritters

Sen. Joe Lieberman, I- Conn., chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Government Reform Committee, set the goal of Dec. 15 for a committee markup, or drafting session, on a bill to prohibit members of Congress and staffers from using knowledge gained from their jobs to trade in securities or to tip off others.

[...]

The House Financial Services Committee has set a hearing for next Tuesday on a parallel bill to outlaw congressional insider trading.

I have to confess my ignorance, but when I saw this headline my first thought was "you mean it isn't already illegal?"

Fed, central banks slash dollar borrowing costs

Global central banks announced coordinated action this morning to shore up liquidity in the financial system as Europe’s banking system showed growing signs of stress. The moves were announced in statements issued simultaneously by the US Federal Reserve, the European Central Bank, the Bank of England, the Bank of Japan and the Swiss National Bank. “The purpose of these actions is to ease strains in financial markets and thereby mitigate the effects of such strains on the supply of credit to households and businesses and so help foster economic activity,” the banks said. The central banks agreed to lower the pricing on existing temporary US dollar liquidity swap arrangements by 50 basis points.

Translation: We are making moves to save Europe.

Alternate translation: Europe and the US are using the game book created by Japan in 1990.