The House of Representatives Thursday passed overwhelmingly a masure to repeal a planned government withholding on contractor payments, a bill considered particularly important to the small business community.
And it was a piece of President Barack Obama's job package, albeit a small one.
Under current law, federal, state and local governments are to withhold 3 percent of funds going to its contractors. Critics argued the provision, which is scheduled to go into effect in 2013, would yield little revenue, but become a burden on business.
Lawmakers from both parties agreed, as the House voted 405 to 16 to back the provision.
There was less enthusiasm, though, for the legislation that would pay for the repeal. The House passed, 262 to 157, curbing eligibility for some government health programs.
The measures now go to the Senate.
Mitt Romney is ahead, or in a statistical tie, for the lead over his Republican rivals in the four key early voting states.
A new CNN/Time/ORC International poll shows Romney, the former Massachusetts governor, in a commanding position in Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Florida.
Some details:
--Iowa, the nation's first caucus state. Romney has 24 percent, followed by businessman Herman Cain at 21 percent. Texas Rep. Ron Paul is next at 12 percent.
--New Hampshire, the nation's first primary state. Romney has long led in polls, and has 40 percent. Next is Cain, at 13 percent.
--South Carolina, the nation's first Southern primary. Romney has 25 percent, Cain has 23 percent, and Paul is at 12 percent.
--Florida, the first big state primary. Romney leads with 30 percent, trailed by Cain at 18 percent. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Texas Gov. Rick Perry are tied at 9 percent each.
The polls were taken Oct. 20-25. The methodology:
In Florida, a total of 1,184 adults were interviewed by telephone. All respondents were asked questions concerning their registration status and basic demographics, and the entire sample was weighted to reflect statewide Census figures for gender, race, age, education and region of the state. 401 respondents reported that they were registered voters who were registered with the Republican party; results for Questions 1 and 2 were based on answers provided by those 401 Republican voters. Only registered Republicans can participate in the Florida presidential primary.
In Iowa, a total of 1,294 adults were interviewed by telephone. All respondents were asked questions concerning their registration status and basic demographics, and the entire sample was weighted to reflect statewide Census figures for gender, race, age, education and region of the state. 405 respondents reported that they were registered voters who were registered with the Republican party; results for Questions 1 and 2 were based on answers provided by those 405 Republican voters. Only registered Republicans can participate in the Iowa presidential caucuses.
In New Hampshire, a total of 881 adults were interviewed by telephone. All respondents were asked questions concerning their registration status and basic demographics, and the entire sample was weighted to reflect statewide Census figures for gender, race, age, education and region of the state. 211 respondents reported that they were registered voters who were registered with the Republican party; another 189 reported that they were registered as "Undeclared" and also reported that they had voted in the New Hampshire presidential primary in 2008, for a total of 400 potential Republican primary voters. Results for Questions 1 and 2 were based on answers provided by those 400 respondents. Registered Republicans and registered independents (undeclared) can participate in the New Hampshire presidential primary.
In South Carolina, a total of 861 adults were interviewed by telephone. All respondents were asked questions concerning their registration status and basic demographics, and the entire sample was weighted to reflect statewide Census figures for gender, race, age, education and region of the state. 287 respondents reported that they were registered to vote and described themselves as Republicans; another 113 respondents reported that they were registered to vote and described themselves as Independents who lean Republican, for a total of 400 Republican voters. Results for Questions 1 and 2 were based on answers provided by those 400 Republican voters. South Carolina has no party registration.
To read more about the poll:
Her New Hampshire campaign staff walked out en masse last week. But that hasn't gotten in the way of Rep. Michele Bachmann's plan to run in the Granite State's Republican presidential primary.
The three-term GOP congresswoman from Minnesota filed papers today to appear on the New Hampshire ballot in January.
"I'm thrilled to take this important step on the road to securing the Republican nomination for president," Bachmann said in a statement. "The people of New Hampshire are a vital part of the process."
Her staff in the state quit in a dispute with Bachmann's national campaign.
Ohio voters strongly support repeal of the Ohio law that curtailed public employees’ right to collective bargaining, according to a new poll.
Voters by a margin of 57-32 say they favor repeal on election day of the law that was a centerpiece of Republican Gov. John Kasich’s agenda. That 25-point margin is almost double the 13-point margin measured against the law last month.
At the same time, Ohio voters are turning thumbs down on Kasich, sometimes mentioned as a possible vice presidential running mate for the 2012 Republican presidential nominee. Voters disapprove of his work by a margin of 52-36, according to the Quinnipiac University survey.
“With two weeks until Election Day, the opponents of SB 5 have strong reason to be optimistic,” said Peter Brown, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute.
“The opponents had seen their 24-point margin in July close over the summer and early autumn. As we enter the home stretch, however, they have once again taken a commanding lead. Except for Republicans, just about every demographic group favors repealing the law.”
Next year is an especially auspicious year for female political candidates to run -- and win -- seats, says the Center for American Women and Politics. Whenever presidential elections overlap with redistricting. women candidates see their chances dramatically improve, according to analysis by The 2012 Project, a non-partisan campaign to elect more women to office with the catchphrase "Don't get mad. Get elected."
"The election of 1992 – known as 'The Year of the Woman' – was not an accident," said Mary Hughes, founder and director of The 2012 Project, which is affiliated with the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey. "Voting patterns unique to presidential elections, combined with new and open seats resulting from redistricting, created a perfect storm for women candidates. It’s about to happen again, and we need to make the most of it."
They’ve found that new candidates, including women, are historically more likely to win newly drawn seats and open seats created by term limits or retirements. In 1992, 22 of the 24 new women elected to Congress won open seats, according to The 2012 Project. Also, in presidential election years, more people vote.
The 2012 Project, a campaign of the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University, says it will take advantage of these opportunities by "educating and inspiring women to run for Congress and state legislatures." It has launched a statewide initiative in Florida along with Illinois, Alabama, Texas, Pennsylvania, California, Iowa, Nevada, Missouri, South Carolina, Washington, Georgia and Arizona.
"We’re helping to set off an unprecedented level of collaboration around the country," said Debbie Walsh, director of CAWP. "Our campaign is marking the one-year countdown to Election Day with this urgent message: State candidate filing deadlines begin in December and go through next summer. Women considering a run for office should do it now."
Women now make up 17 percent of Congress and 24 percent of state legislatures. But the 2010 elections saw the first significant decline in women state legislators in decades, and the first drop in the number of women in Congress in more than 30 years.
Skip Alston is highlighted on the front page of the N&R this morning. It was reported that he called the Tea Party racist; and extended that accusation to Conservatives for Guilford County.
Of course, this gentleman is the chairman of our Board of County Commissioners. He has now slandered numerous Guilford County citizens who feel part of C4GC, and who feel represented by the political values that group espouses.
Doug Clark has correctly spoken out against Alston's remarks. However, the damage is done. When the paper chose to publish this story on its front page, it was given wide circulation.
As we consider the upcoming Greensboro City Council elections, we should point out that a number of candidates are essentially allied with Skip Alston's "team". Many of them will be receiving a coveted endorsement from the Simkins PAC. Skip serves as one of the PAC's key bosses.
The candidates we can presume to be on Skip's team include Robbie Perkins, Nancy Vaughan, Yvonne Johnson, Marikay Abuzuaiter, Wayne Abraham and Nancy Hoffmann.
There are lots of problematic things about the way Facebook is run, and many more serious than the one I’m going to complain about. For instance, Facebook is apparently letting your applications track your browser activity even after you sign off the site. It is being sued for essentially wiretapping its customers in this way.
But while I’m of course dismayed and incensed by that story, the thing I’m complaining about today is more of an annoyance that comes out of bad internet manners. Mark Zuckerberg and his colleagues have set things up so that anyone on Facebook can create a “group,” and can sign you up to the group without asking your permission. You then get the discussions at the group by email, and if you want to opt out, you have to go to the group page and ask to be removed or adjust the settings so that you don’t get email from it.
This is horrible
It should never be the case that any company on the internet with groups should allow someone to be signed up all unawares. The default should always be that you actively join, not that you have to resign after being shanghaied in. Mr. Zuckerberg assures us that only friends can add us to a group, but if you have thousands of friends then that is not actually a relevant point. He also justifies the practice by pointing out that you can also be tagged in a photo against your will (I object to that, too, especially if the photo generates dozens of email messages).
This new feature could even be used against you to ruin your reputation. Let us say someone starts a racist Facebook group. And they sign you up for it. Your enemies could say, “Tim once belonged to ‘So-and-so Race is Pond Scum” on Facebook, a clear sign of bigotry.”
Here is a Facebook page protesting this new practice of Mr. Zuckerberg’s. It only has about 1500 ‘likes.’ Please, friends, let us increase that number substantially. Let us send a message to Facebook that this practice is completely unacceptable.
You could ask me why I even maintain a Facebook page. Well, you can no longer be in the blogging/ journalism/ public intellectual realm without it. Though the company does keep switching things around to make it less useful for those purposes. Most recently, they’ve set things up so that users have to “subscribe” so as reliably to see posts in their feed. So if you are a Facebook friend of mine and you signed up so that you would automatically see the blog postings, you have to go back now and “subscribe” to me all over again. The one good thing is that you can subscribe to Informed Comment posts without necessarily befriending me, if what you mainly want is to get the postings. Apparently this feature is designed to compete with Twitter. (My IC Twitter account is here, and has been much less trouble for me than has Facebook. People can also subscribe to IC by email.)
Actually I have four Facebook pages, because the service limits you to only 5000 friends. This number is more than enough for most people, but for those of us using it for bigger purposes it is tiny. This is the Facebook page of mine that currently has room for new friends. The first one filled up at 5000, the limit. But occasionally it falls to 4,999 and someone applies to it. But then it goes back up to 5000 and the software won’t let me add anyone. I don’t have a good quick way to tell the couple hundred applicants that it is full except writing them individually.
I made a fan page for Informed Comment, and it has about 4000 members. There is a question of how reliably the fans see the IC blog postings in their feed now. They probably have to subscribe again to it, too.
Facebook has been useful to me and I don’t mean only to slam it. It lets you keep up with people in a way that was impossible in the old days, and I’ve recovered friends from it. It has also sometimes helped a blog post of mine go viral. Though there is a real question as to how often people actually click to go to the article at my blog website, having seen it in the feed.
I made a little Facebook page for people I actually see in the flesh frequently, including family and friends. Again, there is no way to warn IC fans off it, so it gets applicants for whom it is not intended. Why not set the software up so that it is more user friendly? We’re not all Harvard undergraduates anymore.
More importantly, why not stop using this service to spy on us, and why not avoid violations of netiquette by making sure we’re asked about and assent to joining something, not just allowing us to be shanghaied?
Check out my article on our Books page tomorrow on "Touring the Western North Carolina Backroads" by Carolyn Sakowski.
It not only maps some scenic byways through our beautiful mountains, it's a well-researched guide to the history and culture along the way.
DARPA (the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency which already created the Internet) is looking to crowd source the development of the next generation of miniature military drones.
Former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman has less than $328,000 in his campaign account, and his White House bid is leaning heavily on his own deep pockets, according to filings with the Federal Election Commission on Friday.
The campaign has raised about $2.2 million in contributions since May. But as it went on to spend more than $4 million, Mr. Huntsman, the scion of a wealthy family, chipped in $2.25 million of his own money.
Not including the loans from the candidate, the campaign is nearly $900,000 in debt.
It’s the latest sign that Mr. Huntsman’s profile as a moderate Republican has failed to draw broad support during a time of tea party ferment. Last month, Mr. Huntsman moved his campaign headquarters from Florida to New Hampshire, part of an all-in push to gain momentum in the nation’s first primary state.
The campaign could still benefit from an independent campaign group, or “Super PAC,” created by Huntsman allies. The entity can raise and spend unlimited sums.
By Michael F. Cannon
It turns out, the U.S. government cannot run a voluntary insurance scheme. Who knew.
The Washington Post reports that the Obama administration has officially scuttled ObamaCare‘s long-term care entitlement program, known as the CLASS Act. Note the time stamp:
Obama pulls plug on troubled long-term care program in new health law, citing design flaws
By Associated Press, Updated: Friday, October 14, 4:57 PM
WASHINGTON — The Obama administration says it is unable to go forward with a major program in the president’s signature health care overhaul law—a new long-term care insurance plan.
Officials said Friday the long-term care program has critical design flaws that can’t be fixed to make it financially self-sustaining.
Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius told Congress in a letter that she does not see a viable path forward at this time. By law, implementation of the program was contingent on Sebelius certifying it financially sound.
The program was supposed to be a voluntary insurance plan for working adults regardless of age or health. Workers would pay an affordable monthly premium during their careers, and could collect a modest daily cash benefit if they became disabled later in life.
The problem all along has been how to ensure enough healthy people would sign up.
One ObamaCare entitlement program down, one more to go.
The Friday Bad News Dump: CLASS Dismissed is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog
With the economy in the ditch, North Carolina voters are down on just about all their major elected officials, Democrat or Republican.
Republican Sen. Richard Burr, who was re-elected in a landslide last November, has an approval rating of 32 percent and a disapproval rating 43 percent, according to a survey by Public Policy Polling, a Democratic leaning firm based in Raleigh.
