The latest national survey by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, conducted July 16-26, 2012, among 2,508 adults, including 1,956 registered voters, finds that, in keeping with his favorability advantage, Obama continues to hold a sizable lead over Romney in the election contest. Currently, 51% say they support Obama or lean toward him, while 41% support or lean toward Romney.

Except….

Sample Size

459 Republicans

813 Democrats

599 Independents

In the best election season Democrats have enjoyed since Nixon resigned, 2008, the Democrat advantage was only D+8, but Pew is now attempting to hustle us into believing the turnout this  year is going to be D +19.

and then there's this:

Barack Obama is leading Mitt Romney by 3 points, 49 percent to 46 percent, in North Carolina, according to Public Policy Polling. The partisan breakdown for the poll is 45 percent Democrat, 33 percent Republican, and 21 percent independent. In 2008, exit polls showed that N.C. voters were 42 percent Democrat, 31 percent Republican, and 27 percent independent. I’m not seeing any 2010 exit polls, so it’s hard to know exactly how different to expect the N.C. party demographics to be from 2008 this year, with GOP enthusiasm high and Democrat enthusiasm more tepid than in 2008.

No way the Donks are +12 at this point!

And then there's CNN:

CNN does at least test an Obama-Romney match-up among registered voters. It trumpets across its news page that, among registered voters, Obama is leading Romney 52-45. Looking deeper into the poll, however, we learn that these numbers include "leaners." In other words 52% of registered voters either support Obama or are "leaning" towards him. Now, there is nothing wrong with documenting voters who are "leaning" towards a candidate. But, you know, you have to document it! Knowing the percentage of voters who support a candidate and those who are currently "leaning" towards that candidate is what we call relevant information. 

For example, if 50% of voters say they support Obama while 2% are leaning towards him that tells us one thing. If, however, 45% support him and 7% are leaning, that is kind of something else entirely, right? If you are going to combine two different numbers to get a final result, you kind of have to show your math. CNN obviously has this information, so why didn't they publish it?

as stated before, this line of thought is NOT new with POTUS.  You want context?  David Maraniss provides it.

B.I. represented a holding pattern, a place where he could earn some money before moving on to his future,but it was also a convenient setting for his internal story. In what his mother characterized as ‘a rather mumbled telephone conversation’ with him over the long-distance lines between New York and Jakarta, he described his job to her. He calls it working for the enemy because some of the reports are written for commercial firms that want to invest in [Third World] countries; Ann reported in a letter to her mentor back in Honolulu, Alice Dewey. Later, when he wrote those few paragraphs about B.I. in his memoir, he repeated that idea: Like a spy behind enemy lines, I arrived every day at my mid-Manhattan office and sat at my computer terminal, checking the Reuters machine that blinked bright emerald messages from across the globe.’” (David Maraniss, Barack Obama: The Story, 2012, pp. 487-488)

Obama also expressed a "distaste" for the corporate world:

Obama wrote a letter to his former girlfriend, Alex McNear, during that period, the last he would write to her. As in his telephone conversation with his mother, he expressed a distaste for the corporate world. He wrote Alex on Business International stationery, but crossed out the logo on the envelope and scribbled in his own address on West 114^th Street.” (David Maraniss, Barack Obama: The Story, 2012, p. 488) 

So, yes, by all means, let's put Obama's speech in the proper "context." He described his short stint in the private sector as "working for the enemy." He was a "spy behind enemy lines." That certainly adds some perspective to his infamous "you didn't build that" line.

from a GREAT piece by Mike R over at the Originalism Blog.

intro:

For the majority, Chief Justice Roberts concludes it is not a direct tax, but perhaps not too persuasively.  Here is all he says:

Even when the Direct Tax Clause was written it was unclear what else, other than a capitation (also known as a “head tax” or a “poll tax”), might be a direct tax. See Springer v. United States, 102 U. S. 586, 596–598 (1881).Soon after the framing, Congress passed a tax on owner­ship of carriages, over James Madison’s objection that it was an unapportioned direct tax. Id., at 597. This Court upheld the tax, in part reasoning that apportioning such a tax would make little sense, because it would have re­quired taxing carriage owners at dramatically different rates depending on how many carriages were in their home State. See Hylton v. United States, 3 Dall. 171, 174 (1796) (opinion of Chase, J.). The Court was unanimous, and those Justices who wrote opinions either directly asserted or strongly suggested that only two forms of taxation were direct: capitations and land taxes. See id., at 175; id., at 177 (opinion of Paterson, J.); id., at 183 (opinion of Iredell, J.).

That narrow view of what a direct tax might be per­sisted for a century. In 1880, for example, we explained that “direct taxes, within the meaning of the Constitution, are only capitation taxes, as expressed in that instrument, and taxes on real estate.” Springer, supra, at 602. In 1895, we expanded our interpretation to include taxes on personal property and income from personal property, in the course of striking down aspects of the federal income tax. Pollock v. Farmers’ Loan & Trust Co., 158 U. S. 601, 618 (1895). That result was overturned by the Sixteenth Amendment, although we continued to consider taxes on personal property to be direct taxes. See Eisner v. Macom­ber, 252 U. S. 189, 218–219 (1920).

in one joke, as told by Obama: 

Jim Messina tells this story, my {Obama's} campaign manager. He was in some event, and this young couple who was there with their adorable four-year-old son, and I guess there was a picture of me somewhere, and so they were very excited. 

"They said, 'Sammy, who’s that?' And he said, 'That's Barack Obama.'  'And what does Barack Obama do?' And the boy thinks for a second and he says, 'He approves this message.'"

Talk about a surprise.  Missed two days running this week due to weather, family crap, etc.  Next w/o was supposed to be a 600/300/100 time trial.  Instead I opted for a 3 mile run. 

First mile went in 8:13.  WAY too fast.  But it was cool and I felt pretty good evein if it was 9s faster than I'd BEEN going

Second mile in 9:20 for a 17:33 2m.  30s faster than I'd been going.  And I still felt pretty good.  Third mile in 9:54.  Total over 27:29!  Almost three minutes off what I'd been doing.  Pushes my vO2 max over 42 ml/kg/min which is excellant.

Still need to take a few ticks off my 600m time to justify the flip to speed work, but it could happen today.  In a "normal" season I'd be racing outdoors in August.  September would be a recovery month and October would start things over again.  Since I'm NOT racing and would like to next season, I'll start my October w/o's now, to allow for the impending bad weatheer and crap that I know is on the way.  Wonder if I can sneak into the Cap field house after my classes downtown?

<edit - deleted speed work schedule since tie trials not up to par: 1:13.7/57.2/16.7.

another week of distance work.

THE HILL: ‘You didn’t build that’ remarks won’t change Obama’s strategy. Good.

Throughout history, poverty is the normal condition of man. Advances which permit this norm to be exceeded — here and there, now and then — are the work of an extremely small minority, frequently despised, often condemned, and almost always opposed by all right-thinking people. Whenever this tiny minority is kept from creating, or (as sometimes happens) is driven out of a society, the people then slip back into abject poverty.

This is known as “bad luck.”

ROSS DOUTHAT:

It may seem strange that anyone could look around the pornography-saturated, fertility-challenged, family-breakdown-plagued West and see a society menaced by a repressive puritanism. But it’s clear that this perspective is widely and sincerely held.

It would be refreshing, though, if it were expressed honestly, without the “of course we respect religious freedom” facade.

If you want to fine Catholic hospitals for following Catholic teaching, or prevent Jewish parents from circumcising their sons, or ban Chick-fil-A in Boston, then don’t tell religious people that you respect our freedoms. Say what you really think: that the exercise of our religion threatens all that’s good and decent, and that you’re going to use the levers of power to bend us to your will.

There, didn’t that feel better? Now we can get on with the fight.

Interesting to see this in the New York Times.

“Schools who change uniforms a lot are like teenage girls with bright blue hair: they’re suffering from severe inferiority issues, and their desperate cry for attention is just a sad plea for love. The exception to this is Oregon, who’s like the nice, shy girl who falls for a cocky dude on a motorcycle. he gives her lots of money, and tells her she’s pretty, and gets her to “do things.” Eventually, he’s going to leave her, pregnant, living in a trailer on the edge of town, but for now, she’s enjoying the ride and ignoring the whispers from respectable folk.”

–Cort McMurray

I'm afraid this are going to get more frequent over the next 3-4 months

TERRORISM: Animal activists’ terror tactics drive staff out of laboratories. Punch back twice as hard. And it’s a disgrace that these people are getting suspended sentences. Perhaps we need some pro-science groups to turn the tables.