Gallup is out with their first congressional generic ballot of the season. And it shows the Dems back in a solid if not commanding lead over congressional Republicans.
Here’s the chart for the Gallup poll only going back to November 2009 …
Anti-gay marriage pol muddles his message by offering to pay an 18 year old boy he met on craigslist $80 for a “really good time.”
Wherein Washington gets the vapors over the President planning to throw a few elbows to win re-election.
Addendum: As silly as the mock outrage is, the President’s re-election campaign is letting it get the best of them.
Yesterday a member of the S&P credit rating board said for the first time that politicians suggesting a temporary US default might not be so bad was a key reason in itself for the S&P’s downgrade of US debt. In response congressional Republicans are today pressing the point that they never doubted the seriousness of the US going into default. And some other publications are accepting that claim at face value. But there are actually numerous examples of top congressional Republicans openly doubting whether a temporary US default would really be such a big deal.
The 11th Circuit’s ruling that the health insurance mandate is unconstitutional is important in its own right, but the significance of it is amplified because we now have the 11th Circuit at odds with the 6th Circuit on this issue.
Conflicting legal authority among the federal appeals courts is an additional basis — some might say justification — for the Supreme Court to agree to hear a case. I don’t think there was much doubt the health care reform law would end up before the Supreme Court, but today’s ruling pretty much removes any remaining doubt.
The 11th Circuit didn’t completely uphold the trial court’s decision. It reversed the trial court ruling that, because there was no severability clause in the health care reform law, the unconstitutionality of the mandate rendered the entire law unconstitutional and unenforceable. In other words, the 11th Circuit ruled that the rest of the law still stands. Not a minor issue at all and one worth noting.
Not to get too into the legal weeds, but worth remembering that the ruling by 11th Circuit on the constitutionality of the health insurance mandate was by a three-judge panel of the court. Three-judge panels get the first and usually only stab at most cases on appeal. But in legally and politically significant cases, the entire appeals court may decide to hear the case en banc. The en banc decision trumps the three-judge panel. So this may not be the last word on the matter from the 11th Circuit. Read More
Standard and Poor’s says GOPers dismissing default as no big deal contributed to its decision to downgrade U.S. debt. Republicans now claim to have said no such thing. Which virtually demands that we publish a list of who said it, when they said it, and where they said it. Behold the list.
Did we skip anybody? If so, let us know. Shoot us the quote and a link to where it was reported. Tip line is at the top right of this page.