Good Luck, Joe! VP Debate in Cenreville, Kentucky

I think I speak for many Democrats in writing that I don't really want to turn the TV on tonight to watch the Veep Debate. We can't take anymore gaffes, surprises, under-reactions, or disappointments. I mean, I still have ultimate faith in Joe Biden, as well as Barack Obama, and I'll be the first in line to vote for them when early voting starts, but our national psyche can only take so much. With polls acting like roller coasters, we NEED a smackdown of Ryan, and anything less will be devastating. I'm sure our Vice President knows what he has to do. I just don't know if I'm strong enough to watch it happening live on TV. Maybe I'll watch Project Runway, sneak a peek at Twitter to see if the coast is clear, and watch the debate on YouTube if Joe did okay. We all just need some good news. I don't want to see another meltdown of epic proportions on MSNBC.

There's always bourbon, too, in keeping with the Kentucky location.

From PBS - Our Favorite Vice Presidential Debate Moments

The GOP Campaign to Intimidate Moderator Martha Raddatz

Paul Ryan’s last major speech was called “stunning for its dishonesty.” Tune in to see if he’ll be honest tomorrow: twitter.com/JoeBiden/statu…
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) October 10, 2012

It's on!#Decision2012#NBCPolitics twitter.com/JBoxleyNBC/sta…
— John Boxley (@JBoxleyNBC) October 11, 2012

Here's the scene at Centre College!!! Again, gorgeous day twitter.com/KrystalBall1/s…

— Krystal Ball (@KrystalBall1) October 11, 2012

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Epic Crowd for the President in Madison, Wisconsin

Huge turnout for President Obama in Madison, WI, yesterday. I love to see him with all that adoration in Paul Ryan's backyard, not to mention Scott Walker.

More Pics at BarackObama.com

A few people showed up to see President Obama in Madison. 30,000, to be exact: twitter.com/Obama2012/stat…
— Obama 2012 (@Obama2012) October 4, 2012

Romney Losing in Ohio, Race Tightens in Arizona

This morning Nate Silver on 538 gives Obama an 81.9% chance of winning.

He gives Romney just an 18.1% chance of winning.

His "Nowcast" says that if the election were to be held today, Obama would have a 97.8% chance of winning.

Well, actually the election IS being held today because most states have early voting or absentee voting.

Romney has been on a bus tour of Ohio this week, but they may be pulling their advertising out of Ohio to save money because the push isn't working. When you read about how dreadful the rallies are for Romney in that state, it becomes apparent why it might be a lost cause:

From the New York Times

On Wednesday, the Romney campaign reserved $3.4 million worth of advertising time in eight swing states. Nearly half of that — more than $1.5 million — was for Virginia. The rest was spread across Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina and Wisconsin. His total ad spending for the week is more than $10 million.

Ohio isn't listed. Now it could be that SuperPac money will rush in with more advertising, but at some point the Republicans will shift towards the down-ticket races instead.

When you read about some of his rallies in Ohio its pretty clear why enthusiasm is evaporating. Read, for instance, this devastating snapshot from The Atlantic:

In the Columbus suburb of Westerville, Romney began his day in a high-school gymnasium bedecked with a confounding array of slogans. A whirling "debt clock" raced upward from 16 trillion; video monitors read "Victory in Ohio"; a bright-blue banner professed "We Need a Real Recovery"; and a powder-blue banner stated "We Can't Afford Four More Years." The governor, John Kasich, welcomed him to the stage with a whiplash-inducing mixed message: "Ohio's coming back! Our families are going back to work!" he said, extolling the state's fast-improving and better-than-average unemployment rate. And then, quickly turning dour: "But every day I have to face the headwinds from this president."

Romney's native-son celebrity endorser, golf legend Jack Nickalus, then gave an excruciating 10-minute speech. Nicklaus, now 72 and a Florida resident, is nicknamed "The Golden Bear" after his Columbus-area high-school mascot, and the crowd held signs reading "The Golden Bear for Romney-Ryan." Romney told the crowd he believed Nicklaus to be "the greatest athlete of the 20th century," inviting some ridicule from the sports world, and gave a mostly lifeless 20-minute spiel in which he assured voters he would not lower their taxes. [b]"By the way, don't be expecting a huge cut in taxes, because I'm also going to get rid of deductions and exemptions," he said.

Nancy Pelosi was on MSNBC's Rachel Maddow last night hinting that Obama might have a chance in Arizona now, and AP is reporting the Dems may start to advertise there. That would be huge and would give Obama another path to victory.

AP Story

Signaling confidence, Obama's team is considering competing in Arizona.

Obama looked at competing in Arizona in 2008, but decided against it because of the support there for home state Sen. John McCain, the GOP nominee. Obama still won 45 percent of the vote.

This year, Obama's team talked early on about running in Arizona, which offers 11 electoral votes, but it never did. Now, with an internal Democratic poll showing Obama narrowly leading Romney, Obama's team might make a play for the state that has seen a 160,000 increase in voter registrations by Democratic-leaning Hispanics over the past four years.

Buying television time in Phoenix, the state's largest city, is expensive and Obama advisers are closely watching their finances.

That's not to say that competing in Arizona would be all about winning: going up on the air in the state — or sending the president in to campaign there, could force Romney to spend valuable resources defending a state he should be able to count on in the quest to reach 270 Electoral College votes needed for victory.

If any other red states begin to move into blue territory, then it's over for Romney. I think lots of Republicans here in Tennessee are going to vote for Obama, we may actually go 50-50 this time.

John Kerry Zings Mitt Romney with Delicious Snark

Complete Transcript of John Kerry's Speech





We’ve all learned Mitt Romney doesn’t know much about foreign policy. But he has all these ‘‘neocon advisors’’ who know all the wrong things about foreign policy. He would rely on them - after all, he’s the great outsourcer.

But I say to you: This is not the time to outsource the job of commander in chief.

~~~

Despite what you heard in Tampa, an exceptional country does care about the rise of the oceans and the future of the planet. That is a responsibility from the Scriptures - and that too is a responsibility of the leader of the free world. The only thing exceptional about today’s Republicans is that - almost without exception - they oppose everything that has made America exceptional in the first place.

~~~

It isn't fair to say Mitt Romney doesn't have a position on Afghanistan. He has every position.

He was against setting a date for withdrawal—then he said it was right—and then he left the impression that maybe it was wrong to leave this soon. He said it was "tragic" to leave Iraq, and then he said it was fine. He said we should've intervened in Libya sooner. Then he ran down a hallway to duck reporters' questions. Then he said the intervention was too aggressive. Then he said the world was a "better place" because the intervention succeeded.
Talk about being for it before you were against it!

~~~

"Ask Osama bin Laden if he's better off now than he was four years ago."

~~~

"For Mitt Romney, an overseas trip is what you call it when you trip all over yourself overseas. It wasn’t a goodwill mission - it was a blooper reel."

But a Romney - Ryan foreign policy would be anything but funny.

~~~

“[Romney] even blurted out the preposterous notion that Russia is our “number one geopolitical foe.”Folks: Sarah Palin said she could see Russia from Alaska; Mitt Romney talks like he’s only seen Russia by watching Rocky IV.”

~~~

Mitt Romney: out of touch at home, out of his depth abroad and out of the mainstream.

~~~

No nominee for president should ever fail in the midst of a war to pay tribute to our troops overseas in his acceptance speech. Mitt Romney was talking about America. They are on the front lines every day defending America, and they deserve our thanks.

Bill Clinton Rocks the House

Gifs via Atlantic
He was fabulous! The crowd was riveted on his every word, and good thing - his speech was much longer than expected because he ad-libbed part of it.

Some quotes:

"I want to nominate a man who's cool on the outside but who burns for America on the inside."

"Though I often disagree with Republicans, I actually never learned to hate them the way the far right that now controls their party seems to hate our president and a lot of other Democrats."

“When Congressman Ryan looked into that TV camera and attacked President Obama’s Medicare savings as quote ‘biggest coldest power play,’ I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Because that 716 billion dollars is exactly, to the dollar, the same amount of Medicare savings that he has in his own budget. It takes some brass to attack a guy for doing what you did.”


"President Obama started with a much weaker economy than I did. Listen to me now. No president, not me, not any of my predecessors, no one could have fully repaired all the damage that he found in just four years."

The auto industry restructuring worked. It saved more than a million jobs, not just at GM, Chrysler and their dealerships, but in auto parts manufacturing all over the country. That’s why even auto-makers that weren’t part of the deal supported it. They needed to save the suppliers too. Like I said, we’re all in this together.
Now there are 250,000 more people working in the auto industry than the day the companies were restructured. Governor Romney opposed the plan to save GM and Chrysler. So here’s another jobs score: Obama 250,000, Romney, zero.”

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Michelle Obama's Spectacular Speech

pic via erosum on tumblr
Take that, Mitt Romney!!!

"When you walk through that door of opportunity, you do not reach back to slam it shut"

. . .  "You see, even though back (when) Barack was a senator and a presidential candidate, to me, he was still the guy who'd picked me up for our dates in a car that was so rusted out, I could actually see the pavement going by in a hole in the passenger side door. He was the guy whose proudest possession was a coffee table he'd found in a dumpster, and whose only pair of decent shoes was half a size too small."

"Well, today, after so many struggles and triumphs and moments that have tested my husband in ways I never could have imagined, I have seen firsthand that being president doesn't change who you are. No, it reveals who you are."

"Barack knows the American Dream because he's lived it, and he wants everyone in this country to have the same opportunity, no matter who we are, or where we're from, or what we look like, or who we love."

Speech Transcript Here




FLOTUS Like a Butterfly, Sting Like a Bee   ~ Headline on The Atlantic






First Family Watching DNC via Flickr

"Elect Obama Now" Song Catchy and Old-Timey!

This is a cute, catchy and pleasantly old-fashioned election song for Obama! And a nice inspirational video to get you jazzed for the election. :)