Politics Blog

And you’d better hold on real tight to a big, big pile of your wife’s money, Jack. Otherwise, you’re liable to get . . . blown away . . .

Heh.

Ahem.

The over/under for this coming Friday’s job market report is 300,000 net additions to payrolls.

The nominees for the most preposterously-biased “news story” concerning the report are:

1. USA Today
2. CNN.com (CNN/Money)
3. The Associated Press (San Fran Chronicle or Seattle Post)
4. Reuters
5. _________ (write in a candidate of your own choosing)

Holler if you hear me, people.

-- Jayson

For Democrats, that is.

Consumer Spending

Up 1 percent in May, Jack. That’s the largest increase since right after the 9/11 atrocities.

Personal Income

Up in May by more than half a percent; both nominally and after-taxes.

Oil and Gas Prices

They’re down sharply, Virginia. Why? Repairs to Iraqi pipelines that previously were sabotaged by terrorists, the end of a ridiculous strike in oil-laden Norway, and the early transfer of power in Iraq.

Brother, can ya’ spare a nickel??

UPDATE: See here for additional “bad news” from the gasoline prices quagmire.

-- Jayson

Remember the Roe Effect, the theory that abortion costs Democrats votes? Larry L. Eastland ran the numbers and came up with startling conclusions about the large - and growing - impact legalized abortion is having on the political landscape:

More than 40 million legal abortions have been performed and documented in the 30 years since the U.S. Supreme Court declared abortion legal.

…

Betsy’s Page has links to some excellent assessments of what is going on in Iraq and how our efforts there compare to past conflicts. This should be required reading for every “journalist” reporting on Iraq.

-- Lorie Byrd

The AP reports that:

The U.S.-led coalition transferred sovereignty to an interim Iraqi government two days early Monday in a surprise move that apparently caught insurgents off guard, averting a feared campaign of attacks to sabotage the highly symbolic step toward self-rule.

What an incredibly smart move. I am sure the violence will continue for some time, but the fact that the terrorists were not able to prevent the transfer from taking place at a time of our choosing, is definitely a victory.

-- Lorie Byrd

Well, it’s Monday, and over the weekend, I heard a lot about opinion and polls. At least one of the Sunday talking-head shows devoted a full hour to discussion of the political polling for the fall Presidential Election, showing that for many people, polls have moved from reflecting reactions to the news, to making the news themselves.

So, I wrote up a little primer on polls, over at Bill Roggio’s site, TheFourthRail, and at the risk of sounding a bit happy with myself, I recommend “the Poll Vault” to anyone curious about how a poll’s numbers are really driven. There is a line about people not really wanting to know how sausage or laws are made. The same can be said for opinion polls.

Read the whole thing, as they say…

-- DJ Drummond

If you know anyone who’s planning to buy Bill Clinton’s 957-page book, point them to this PowerPoint summary instead.

-- PoliPundit

So, the evil George Bush has now gone on record to prod the ultra-sophisticated and enlightened members of the European Union to admit into their stead . . .

The predominately-Muslim nation of Turkey.

What a racist!

P.S. - A warning is in order. If you click the link to read the “article,” you’ll have to slog through a veritable swamp of partisan-liberal bias before you reach the salient points about Turkey and the EU. You might want to put on some boots.

-- Jayson

As this post at Rantingprofs points out, the statement by Daniel Okrent in response to criticism of the NYT’s coverage of the 9/11 staff report findings is “probably too gentle to satisfy many critics", but it is a start.

-- Lorie Byrd

Earlier this week I linked to this piece by Debra Burlingame, whose brother was piloting the 9/11 plane that crashed into the Pentagon. She is a Democrat who now stands up for Bush against those wishing to use their 9/11 victim status as a weapon in the presidential campaign. You see, Ms. Burlingame wants to know the truth about what happened on 9/11 so that steps will be taken to prevent it from happening again – no more, no less. It is good to see some in the media are finally giving her point of view some attention now, instead of all of it going to the “Jersey Girls". Shame on you, Chris Matthews and The Today Show.

Please read the Telegraph piece. It contains some information I had not read elsewhere:

According to Ms Burlingame, discussions over future memorials to victims have been constrained by demands from 9/11 activists for “politically correct” mourning. “The Ground Zero memorial will list all the names of those who died,” says Ms Burlingame. “There was a suggestion made that the firefighters who died heroically doing their job should be acknowledged by stating their unit or engine. What was the response from the 9/11 groups? They said there can be ‘no hierarchy of heroes’! Why can’t we acknowledge what the firefighters did in trying to save lives? It’s just nutty.”

-- Lorie Byrd