[jonottawa]

I think Intrade has it about right. Obama dropped from about 75% to about 2/3. Saying that debates haven't mattered much before is pretty irrelevant since nobody's ever been beaten as badly before. I had to laugh when Rachel Maddow said at the end of the debate "I'm not sure who won the debate tonight." which meant that Obama had gotten trounced.

I'd also add that it's not just about the polls in swing states. It's about the enthusiasm of the respective campaigns. It's about how successful their rallies will be in the coming days. It's about what kind of stories the media will write. It's about the close races that will be lost by Democrats trying to retake the House or keep the Senate. It's about how much clout Obama will be have in January if he does get re-elected. If Barry had had the kind of night that Willard had (and vice versa,) we'd be talking about a Democratic house, we'd be talking about an electoral landslide. Wednesday night was HUGE, perhaps the greatest single failure of the Obama presidency.

[blackshoe]

I saw Newsweek magazine on the stand yesterday. The cover touts Obama as "the Democrats' Reagan".

[billw55]

blackshoe, on 2012-October-05, 09:04, said:

I saw Newsweek magazine on the stand yesterday. The cover touts Obama as "the Democrats' Reagan".

I thought democrats considered Clinton as their Reagan.

[hrothgar]

blackshoe, on 2012-October-05, 09:04, said:

I saw Newsweek magazine on the stand yesterday. The cover touts Obama as "the Democrats' Reagan".

Said article was by Andrew Sullivan who has great big man crushes on both Reagan and Obama

[luke warm]

jdeegan, on 2012-October-04, 21:34, said:

It may be that Romney has too big a deficit to make up in key states like Ohio, et.al. The tide is starting to run in Romney's favor. He seems to know how to channel Reagan.

some new post-debate polls today are showing some surprising results, if they can be trusted... romney is showing ahead in fl, oh, and va... remember, only about 132M voted in 2008, and more than half that number watched the debate... so it's very possible that any bumps will be historically high

[luke warm]

cherdano, on 2012-October-04, 16:35, said:

It was an obvious win for Romney for sure. Still, he may have paid for that somewhat on substance. E.g. the first two CNN headlines right now:
1. "Obama accuses Romney of dishonesty"
President Obama and his campaign accused Mitt Romney of dishonesty over tax policy and other issues, a day after the president's panned debate showing.
2. "Romney's pledge: No tax cut for the rich"
And the story basically saying that nobody knows how that would work with his plan, and that he isn't saying how he would make it work, either.

Other obvious lies ("In fact, I do have a plan that deals with people with pre-existing conditions.") may hurt him as well. And I would be surprised if he has never said anything during the primaries that explicitly contradicts his debate pledge not to reduce taxes on the rich.

Anyway, in case Romney becomes president, I hope it will be the moderate Romney from yesterday, not the primary Romney.

yeah, the obama campaign is taking a mulligan on the debate.. the fact is, there were no lies (that can be proven)... his tax plan is very nearly revenue-neutral... anyone see stephanie cutter on erin burnett's show on cnn last nite? erin got steph to pretty much admit that obama pulled the $5T number out of his ass

[awm]

Mitt Romney's own website says that he wants a 20% cut in marginal rates. The total federal income tax revenue for 2012 is estimated at 1.4 trillion. So a 20% reduction means $280 billion. This is on top of the other proposals from Mitt Romney's site; for example extending the Bush tax cuts is about another $100 billion. And tax revenue tends to rise from year to year (inflation, growing economy) so the overall loss of revenue for ten years (the usual measure for these things) will be more than 10x the loss in 2012. Obama's $5 trillion estimate is looking reasonable, and it matches what non-partisan studies have said.

Of course, Mitt Romney claims he will cut deductions to make his tax policy revenue neutral. Maybe, but what deductions will he cut? He doesn't like to give specifics on that side of the equation, and you can't make a tax cut revenue-neutral by just declaring it to be revenue-neutral.

[luke warm]

i know this might not mean much... these are Ohio absentee ballot/early voting totals today vs. same point in 2008:

• Champaign County: Was +3% GOP, now +23% GOP – 20-point shift
  
• Columbiana County: Was +9% DEM, now +9% GOP – 18-point shift
  
• Crawford County: Was +3% DEM, now +12% GOP – 15-point shift
  
• Cuyahoga County: Was +36% DEM, now +30% DEM – 6-point shift
  
• Erie County: Was +24% DEM, now +7% DEM – 17-point shift
  
• Franklin County: Was +5% DEM, now +5% GOP – 10-point shift
  
• Greene County: Was +4% DEM, now +19% GOP – 23-point shift
  
• Harrison County: Was +22% DEM, now +5% DEM – 17-point shift
  
• Hamilton County: Was +7% GOP, now +13% GOP – 6-point shift
  
• Licking County: Was TIED, now +16% GOP – 16-point shift
  
• Montgomery County: Was +29% DEM, now +5% DEM – 24-point shift
  
• Muskingum County: Was +1% DEM, now +16% GOP – 17-point shift
  
• Pickaway County: Was +12% DEM, now +15% GOP – 27-point shift
  
• Seneca County: Was +1% DEM, now +13% GOP – 14-point shift
  
• Summit County: Was +33% DEM, now +6 DEM – 27-point shift
  
• Wood County: Was +10% DEM, now +1% GOP – 11-point shift

[PassedOut]

awm, on 2012-October-05, 12:40, said:

Mitt Romney's own website says that he wants a 20% cut in marginal rates. The total federal income tax revenue for 2012 is estimated at 1.4 trillion. So a 20% reduction means $280 billion. This is on top of the other proposals from Mitt Romney's site; for example extending the Bush tax cuts is about another $100 billion. And tax revenue tends to rise from year to year (inflation, growing economy) so the overall loss of revenue for ten years (the usual measure for these things) will be more than 10x the loss in 2012. Obama's $5 trillion estimate is looking reasonable, and it matches what non-partisan studies have said.

Of course, Mitt Romney claims he will cut deductions to make his tax policy revenue neutral. Maybe, but what deductions will he cut? He doesn't like to give specifics on that side of the equation, and you can't make a tax cut revenue-neutral by just declaring it to be revenue-neutral.

Hmm. I thought that he had backed away from that during the debate, but I see now that was just an evasion.

If the 20% goes through, it will be bad fiscally. A problem that the US has had, beginning with Reagan, is ballooning deficits created by tax cuts without compensating spending cuts. It's easy to get politicians to vote for tax cuts, but it's like pulling teeth to get them to vote for spending cuts. And politicians won't vote to eliminate the deductions that voters have come to love either, so that 20% cut is another recipe for fiscal irresponsibility. That's why Romney can't be specific.

When George W. Bush ran on restoring fiscal irresponsibility, eveyone knew what they were voting for. And the Clinton years had cleaned things up enough to take the immediate sting out of it. But in the position the US is in today, we just can't afford another round of fiscal irresponsibility. Romney is claiming to be concerned about the US debt even though his policy proposals say just the opposite. This is scary.

We can see from the Bush years that tax cuts won't fix the job growth problem. If you are going to spend $5 trillion, better to rehire teachers and police officers and rebuild schools and highways.

[hrothgar]

luke warm, on 2012-October-05, 12:43, said:

i know this might not mean much... these are Ohio absentee ballot/early voting totals today vs. same point in 2008:

These are requests for ballots, not voting totals
All this means is that the Republicans were relatively late to adopt early voting

[luke warm]

PassedOut, on 2012-October-05, 13:47, said:

Hmm. I thought that he had backed away from that during the debate, but I see now that was just an evasion.

he didn't back away from his 20% statement, he didn't back away from anything but obama's assertion of a $5T cost... as i posted earlier, stephanie cutter looked like a fool on cnn last nite trying to defend that statement... even the study obama referenced made a statement asking him not to misrepresent what they show

Quote

When George W. Bush ran on restoring fiscal irresponsibility, eveyone knew what they were voting for.

what were you voting for with obama? and, if you vote for him again, what do you think you're gonna get?

Quote

We can see from the Bush years that tax cuts won't fix the job growth problem. If you are going to spend $5 trillion, better to rehire teachers and police officers and rebuild schools and highways.

it's actually been proven that cutting taxes can (and does) increase revenues... the problem comes about with increased spending

[jonottawa]

blackshoe, on 2012-October-05, 09:04, said:

I saw Newsweek magazine on the stand yesterday. The cover touts Obama as "the Democrats' Reagan".

I agree with that. They're both overrated, unprincipled, fiscally reckless, brimming with self esteem, not dumb but not terribly quick witted either, favoring style over substance and hailed as able communicators.

[hrothgar]

luke warm, on 2012-October-05, 14:03, said:

it's actually been proven that cutting taxes can (and does) increase revenues...

The Laffer curve my be true in theory. Almost no one takes it seriously in practice, especially with today's marginal tax rates

[dwar0123]

luke warm, on 2012-October-05, 14:03, said:

it's actually been proven that cutting taxes can (and does) increase revenues... the problem comes about with increased spending

Lets cut them all the way to 0 than. Hell, lets make them negative, revenue will rise to infinity!

Look, I understand why revenue might go up after cutting taxes, but you treat it like it is a mathematical certainty when in reality it is a fringe case depending on a very unique set of circumstances.

[lalldonn]

luke warm, on 2012-October-05, 14:03, said:

it's actually been proven that cutting taxes can (and does) increase revenues... the problem comes about with increased spending

Did the Bush tax cuts increase revenues, even if you ignore additional spending?

[PassedOut]

luke warm, on 2012-October-05, 14:03, said:

what were you voting for with obama? and, if you vote for him again, what do you think you're gonna get?

Clinton. Romney = Bush.

[luke warm]

lalldonn, on 2012-October-05, 14:32, said:

Did the Bush tax cuts increase revenues, even if you ignore additional spending?

it depends, like most things, on who you ask... i think after his cuts, revenues hit all time highs... but so did spending, and at a far greater rate

PassedOut, on 2012-October-05, 14:34, said:

Clinton. Romney = Bush.

good luck with that... i know bill clinton... bill clinton is a friend of mine... barack obama is no bill clinton (even tho bill himself is trying to convince you differently)

so what is it that obama is doing that reminds you of clinton? hell, he even effectively undid clinton's welfare reform... i'd really love to see hillary get fed up one day, and she'd be within her rights to do so given how much better a president she'd have been, and just vent the truth about that buffoon obama

and for richard - yes, that's the point i think... the higher the marginal tax rates, especially on those making the most money, the more cutting them helps (to a point - you're familiar with that curve)... this is why when reagan cut from 70% to 28%, revenues to the treasury soared... the trouble started when his expenditures outpaced the growth... laffer stated that tax revenues are not a function of tax rates - it's the gdp itself that's in the driver's seat... i think some mathematician somewhere proved this, but i don't really remember

and to dwarf103 - cutting marginal rates to 0% would have the same practical effect as raising them to 100%... nothing to the treasury (why would anyone work if everything was taken, unless forced to)

[lalldonn]

luke warm, on 2012-October-05, 15:47, said:

it depends, like most things, on who you ask... i think after his cuts, revenues hit all time highs... but so did spending, and at a far greater rate

I guess anything might depend who you ask. For example, the CBO and factcheck.org would tell you that the Bush tax cuts caused revenues to decline. So would the Tax Policy Center. Otherwise, I can locate several liberal sources that claim the Bush tax cuts caused federal revenue to decrease (Citizens for Tax Justice) and conservative sources that say the cuts caused federal revenue to increase (Washington Times).

So yes, it depends who you ask. Ask a conservative source you get one answer, ask a liberal or non-partisan source and you get a different answer. I have observed that phenomenon to be a common theme on a number of issues.

[PassedOut]

lalldonn, on 2012-October-05, 14:32, said:

Did the Bush tax cuts increase revenues, even if you ignore additional spending?

When Clinton left office, spending was about 20% of GDP and tax revenues came in at about 21%, hence the surplus. The Bush tax cuts cratered tax revenues to 16.5% of GDP while spending went up to 24.9%, hence the deficit.

Under Obama, spending is down to 23.4% of GDP, but his additional tax cuts have brought tax revenues even lower, to 15.8% of GDP. Still, the current deficit is a bit smaller than it was for the last Bush year and is headed in the right direction.

[VMars]

luke warm, on 2012-October-05, 15:47, said:

it depends, like most things, on who you ask... i think after his cuts, revenues hit all time highs... but so did spending, and at a far greater rate

If there were big tax cuts and big spending hikes, how do you know which one affected revenues? Just the one that you like?