(Source: hardgrkl)

Voters blame president for gas prices, experts say not so fast

Today’s oil prices are the product of years and decades of exploration, automobile design and ingrained consumer habits combined with political events in places such as Sudan and Libya, anxiety about possible conflict with Iran, and the energy aftershocks of last year’s earthquake in Japan.

“This notion that a politician can wave a magic wand and impact the 90-million-barrel-a-day global oil market is preposterous,” said Paul Bledsoe, strategic adviser to the Bipartisan Policy Center and a former Clinton administration official.

No, gas prices are high because the President is an Anti-American, Socialist, Communist Muslim.

"I also think voters are showing a tendency to turn issues that should be factual or non-factual into opinions. If you show a Tennessee birther Obama’s birth certificate, they’re just going to say ‘well in my opinion he’s not a real American.’ It’s not about the birth certificate; it’s about expressing hatred for Obama in any form they can."

Tom Jensen of Public Policy Polling

(via soupsoup)

Yes, this segment from Bill Maher’s show was made in large part to amuse, but this is very real. According to a recent poll, roughly half the Republican voters in Alabama and Mississippi believe Obama is a Muslim (and that there’s a problem with that), and about one in every four believes his parents’ interracial marriage should have been illegal. 

(Source: gabifresh)

longreads:

The presidential bully pulpit isn’t as effective as one would think. Evidence shows that the louder a president speaks to support an issue or bill, the more committed the opposing party will be to ensure that it won’t pass:

To test her theory, she created a database of eighty-six hundred Senate votes between 1981 and 2004. She found that a President’s powers of persuasion were strong, but only within his own party. Nearly four thousand of the votes were of the mission-to-Mars variety—they should have found support among both Democrats and Republicans. Absent a President’s involvement, these votes fell along party lines just a third of the time, but when a President took a stand that number rose to more than half. The same thing happened with votes on more partisan issues, such as bills that raised taxes; they typically split along party lines, but when a President intervened the divide was even sharper.

“The Unpersuaded.” — Ezra Klein, New Yorker

pewresearch:

The Republican nomination battle is rallying Democrats behind Barack Obama. Currently, 49% of Democrats say that as they learn more about the GOP candidates, their impression of Obama is getting better. Just 36% of Democrats expressed this view in December, before the Republican primaries began.

"If Romney isn’t quite restored to his position as “Mr. Inevitable,” he’s “Mr. Very, Very Likely.” But with Super Tuesday only days away, it is difficult to see how he can change the underlying dynamic of the race, which is slowly but surely dragging him down. What he really needs is an early end to the primary contest, but of that there is still no sight."

John Cassidy

President Obama exempts US citizens from indefinite detainment

shortformblog:

• then On the last day of 2011, President Obama signed the National Defense Authorization Act which, amongst other things, allowed for the indefinite detention of US citizens suspected of terrorism.
• now Obama signed a policy directive today that exempts US citizens from that provision in the bill (Section 1022, if you’re keeping track). Here’s the fact sheet released by the White House. source

» Some nuance: Although the language in the bill as signed did permit for US citizens to be indefinitely detained, it did not mandate this. Obama actually said at the time that he wouldn’t implement the law such that US citizens would face this possibility, so his signing today of this directive is in line with what he’d pledged.

Thank. God.

(Source: shortformblog)

tpmmedia:

Mitt Romney’s unfavorability nationwide has risen, and it’s showing in a potential matchup against President Obama. As you can see from the chart above, Romney has seen independent voters nationally move from his camp to Obama’s as the primary race continues and the economy ticks up.

(Source: inothernews)