Obama's Candidacy

There have been only 4 presidents who could have beeen reelected (Johnson, Ford, Carter, and Bush #1) but were not. Johnson chose not to run for relection, and both Carter and Bush faced strong and charismatic opposition. This leaves only Ford. The statistic is meaningless.

Miss this?

http://thehill.com/video/administrat...-and-kentucky-

http://thehill.com/blogs/floor-actio...ons-says-reid-

Nice try - some additional info on the Brent Spence Bridge.

http://www.brentspencebridgecorridor.com/

Voters thought it was going to be a beneficiary of the Stimulus Bill. From the campaign of Josh Mandel - regarding comments by Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH).
http://www.politifact.com/ohio/state...ed-ohio-river/

"Don’t buy their promises.

One particular bridge spanning the Ohio River comes with a claim of a broken promise that Josh Mandel’s camp is pressing as an election issue.

"Sherrod Brown promised that the first stimulus bill would fund the Brent Spence Bridge … and now he is embarrassed to stand there with the president after both of them broke their promise," Mandel’s campaign said in a news release.

Mandel, currently Ohio’s treasurer, is a Republican who wants to oust Brown, a Democrat, from his U.S. Senate seat in the 2012 election. The news release, distributed Sept. 28,2011, by Mandel campaign spokesman Joe Aquilino, criticized Brown on several fronts.

The reference to the Brent Spence Bridge, which carries traffic for Interstates 71 and 75 across the Ohio River, refers both the federal stimulus package Congress approved two years ago and to a recent visit President Barack Obama made to promote a second stimulus bill. Brown was not present, saying he had congressional business to attend to in Washington.

Before Congress passed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, better known simply as the stimulus act, lawmakers across the country were discussing whether the federal government should funnel billions of dollars into bridge, road and sewer projects. Brown believed so, saying that by funding "shovel-ready projects," the government could begin filling the country’s extensive infrastructure needs while putting Americans back to work.

Among Browns comments then was one that referred to the Brent Spence Bridge. Transportation planners say the 48-year-old bridge needs to be replaced. It is cramped, has poor visibility and carries more than twice the 80,000 vehicles a day it was designed for, according to the Cincinnati Enquirer. But coming up with the estimated $2.4 billion is a problem that has has dogged local and state governments in Ohio and Kentucky.

Enter Brown. In an appearance on MSNBC’s "Morning Joe" program on Jan. 28, 2009, Brown said that "we do need to do direct spending on job creation. That means shovel-ready projects for water and sewer systems, whether it's the Brent Spence Bridge in Cincinnati that will put a lot of people to work and help with economic development, or whether it's a water and sewer system in Defiance, Ohio or in Nashville. It's pretty clear to me that we need direct spending on projects that are ready to go, particularly, green projects that put people to work immediately but also help longer term and economic development.""



further down in the article


"Facing questions about the bridge, a White House spokesman stressed the same day as Obama’s speech that the Brent Spence project is merely "an example" of the kind of project that could get funding in Obama’s new $447 billion stimulus proposal.

Many details remain to be worked out, including how a particular component, a $10 billion infrastructure bank, would work. It is not clear whether this -- or a bigger infrastructure bank that Brown proposes -- could be used toward the eventual Brent Spence project.

So let’s stipulate: Brown said in 2009 that the Brent Spence Bridge was the kind of project the first stimulus could pay for, using it as an example of a shovel-ready project. He clearly suggested that the bridge could be built with stimulus money.

It didn’t happen. And the project was not shovel-ready."

Does this make it a broken promise? PolitiFact Ohio discussed this with the National Republican Senatorial Committee, whose spokesman, Jahan Wilcox, says that Brown certainly made a strong suggestion that a casual listener might equate to a promise.

We agree. That’s an element of truth that that factors into why we are not ruling Mandel’s claim about a broken promise to be entirely False.

But Mandel used a strong word: promise. He did not say Brown broke his suggestion. He said Brown broke a promise. Brown never made a promise, which is a critical difference. It is why Mandel’s claim gets a rating of Mostly False.

You forgot the rest of the article from Politifact (my bold).

In the news - IMO - you couldn't make this stuff up if you tried.

http://campaign2012.washingtonexamin...t-10000/415346

"Obama promotes proposed $10,000 Volt tax credit"

"According to the White House, Obama will proposes that the tax credit is "available at the point-of-sale by making it transferable to the dealer or financier, allowing consumers to benefit when they purchase a vehicle rather than when they file their taxes."

The president first proposed an update to the tax credit in February.

Last week, General Motors announced plans to temporarily suspend production of the Volt and the layoffs of 1300 employees due to sluggish sales.

The MSRP for a Chevy Volt is estimated at $39,145. But even with a $10,000 tax credit, you could own a Chevy Impala full size car for $25,760, $4000 cheaper than the subsidized Volt."

my bold
This isn't a tax credit - it's a rebate paid at the point of sale by the Government?

Obama urges shift to new energy technologies
By ANNE GEARAN, Associated Press – 3 hours ago

President Barack Obama on Wednesday made his most urgent appeal yet for the U.S. to wean itself from oil, calling it a "fuel of the past" and demanding that the country broaden its approach to energy.

Mindful of the political dangers of high gas prices, he said shrinking demand for oil must drive the solution.

Obama, promoting his energy policies in a politically prominent state that will host the Democratic National Convention, called on Congress to provide $1 billion in grants to local communities to encourage greater use of fuel-efficient technologies. The administration's goal is to make electric vehicles as affordable and convenient as gasoline-powered vehicles by 2020.

The president also proposed greater tax incentives to encourage the purchase and use of more fuel-efficient vehicles.

Obama's $1 billion incentive for local communities is designed to promote use of advanced technologies such as more charging stations for electric vehicles. Obama has called for 1 million plug-in vehicles on American roads by 2015.

Obama also was calling for increasing a tax incentive to $10,000 from $7,500 for people who purchase certain advanced vehicles.

I'm missing how the AP article contradicts the Washington Examiner article? Both state that Obama is calling for a raise of the tax incentive on EV's such as the Volt to $10K.

Then WhoWee stated it wasn't a tax credit, it was an instant rebate at point of sale, yet he furnished no proof of this and I find no proof of it.

I've seen that corroborated (I use that loosely, I can't be sure they're independent sources) by another source: http://wot.motortrend.com/obama-asks...ks-177641.html

Because the article WhoWee posted, which is not mainstream, more or less skewed the truth to make it seem that Obama was wanting the government to pay people to specifically buy the Volt. That's absolutely false.

Starting with the false headline It is not a "Volt" tax credit.

Then WhoWee stated it wasn't a tax credit, it was an instant rebate at point of sale, yet he furnished no proof of this and I find no proof of it.

The President is proposing to transform the existing $7,500 tax credit for electric vehicles into a rebate that will be available to all consumers immediately at the point of sale.

The headline was incomplete, misleading perhaps, but not absolutely false. There are exactly 11 EV's currently for sale in the US that qualify the credit. Of these, only the Chevy Volt (~6000) and Nissan Leaf (~8000) have annual sales above one thousand units per year.

Obama urges shift to new energy technologies
By ANNE GEARAN, Associated Press – 3 hours ago

President Barack Obama on Wednesday made his most urgent appeal yet for the U.S. to wean itself from oil, calling it a "fuel of the past" and demanding that the country broaden its approach to energy.

Mindful of the political dangers of high gas prices, he said shrinking demand for oil must drive the solution.

Obama, promoting his energy policies in a politically prominent state that will host the Democratic National Convention, called on Congress to provide $1 billion in grants to local communities to encourage greater use of fuel-efficient technologies. The administration's goal is to make electric vehicles as affordable and convenient as gasoline-powered vehicles by 2020.

The president also proposed greater tax incentives to encourage the purchase and use of more fuel-efficient vehicles.

Obama's $1 billion incentive for local communities is designed to promote use of advanced technologies such as more charging stations for electric vehicles. Obama has called for 1 million plug-in vehicles on American roads by 2015.

Obama also was calling for increasing a tax incentive to $10,000 from $7,500 for people who purchase certain advanced vehicles.

Regardless of what the government reports, Gallup's unemployment and underemployment measures show a sharp deterioration in job market conditions since mid-January. This is consistent with a similar decline in Gallup's Job Creation Index to +13 in the second week of February, from +16 for January. It is also consistent with an economy that continues to struggle with modest growth, particularly as gas prices surge. Further, it suggests that it is premature to assume the condition of the economy will not remain a major issue for Americans both financially and politically in 2012.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Employment grew solidly for a third straight month in February, a sign the economic recovery was broadening and in less need of further monetary stimulus from the Federal Reserve.

Employers added 227,000 jobs to their payrolls last month, the Labor Department said on Friday, while the unemployment rate held at a three-year low of 8.3 percent - even as more people returned to the labor force.

Economists polled by Reuters expected payrolls to increase 210,000 last month and the jobless rate to be unchanged.

It marked the first time since early 2011 that payrolls have grown by more than 200,000 for three months in a row - bolstering President Barack Obama's chances for re-election.

Figures from Reuters today.



http://finance.yahoo.com/news/februa...060614362.html

Understand roughly that many jobs need to be created for the employment rate to cover population growth (i.e. immigration) and just stand still. Remember that 2.6 million jobs were lost in 2008; substantially stronger growth will be required to gain them back.