“We Irish call it malarkey.”

Interestingly, the etymology of the word malarkey is unknown. It’s thought to be someone’s name. It showed up in the early 1920′s as meaning untruthful, to obscure or mislead but the word hasn’t been used much since the term ‘bullshit’ came into fashion. So Biden’s assertion that it is an Irish term is as likely as any.

Malarkey!

Maybe it’s time for ‘Malarkey’ to make a comeback. Ever since Republican Representative Joe Wilson yelled “you lie!” at the President during a state of the union address back in 2009 it’s been open season for disrespect on Capitol Hill. But the term ‘liar’ isn’t something that’s bandied about carelessly. Calling someone a liar tends to shut down the conversation rather quickly. It’s the Godwin’s law equivalent of yelling ‘Hitler’ in a chat room. It’s an accusation that one is intentionally misleading others rather than just misstating facts without malice.

But how else to accuse someone that they are actually lying? In the first Presidential debate, fact checkers pointed out that Mitt Romney made at least 26 factually incorrect statements. Now either Mitt Romney is really dumb or he is intentionally stretching the truth to suit his own purposes. In the Vice Presidential debate Paul Ryan seemed to be on track to repeat Romney’s performance but Joe Biden was having none of that. The minute Ryan stated something untrue Biden called it a bunch of ‘stuff’. Moderator Martha Raddatz asked him to clarify and that’s when malarkey re-entered the popular lexicon.

Joe Biden came away from the debate as a winner precisely because he was ready to call malarkey. Paul Ryan escaped without giving any new details on the Romney / Ryan budget but it wasn’t for Joe Biden’s lack of calling them out for it. So now we have a new, polite way of saying bullshit.

Leave it to Joe to pull the wool off of our eyes.

Vice President Joe Biden and candidate Rep. Paul Ryan

It’s been a week since the first presidential debate and President Obama’s somewhat lackluster performance. Now it’s time for the clash of the number twos. Tomorrow night in Dannville, Kentucky Vice President Joe Biden and VP candidate Paul Ryan square off for the only Vice Presidential debate.

In the past, there generally hasn’t been a great deal of interest in Vice Presidential debates but following Mitt Romney‘s hard tack to the center last week that knocked the President off his game one wonders if Ryan will attempt a similar dodge as Romney.

This election’s debate promises to be one of the most watched VP debates ever. And it will probably be one of the more important ones as well. Previous debates have not really influenced the outcomes of elections but the President’s poll numbers took a dip immediately following the debate last week. Currently the consensus is the President and Governor Romney are tied. 

Joe Biden, often lampooned for making candid, off the cuff statements, is expected to play the role of attack dog in this debate in an effort to stop the level of support seeming to be hemorrhaging from the campaign. Paul Ryan, on the other hand is the Republican’s self professed ‘numbers guy’ policy wonk. When asked in an interview recently how he thought Vice President Biden would approach the debate Ryan quipped, “I think he’ll come at me like a cannonball”. So this debate should have plenty of fireworks.

Vice President Biden has lots of ammunition to work with primarily Ryan’s budget plan. Unlike Romney’s vague ‘trust me I’ll tell you how it’s paid for after I’m elected’ plan, Ryan’s plan is on paper and the Vice President ought to bring a copy and quote from it. In the past when pressed for details on how his budget would reduce the deficit Ryan has replied, “I don’t want to get all wonky on you”, or “It would take too long to go into the math”. That should be Biden’s queue to say, “I’m not going anywhere. I’ll cede you some of my time. Get wonky”. Ryan will probably have anticipated this and actually have some figures that maybe make sense but Joe should probably be able to rebut those figures just in case.

The Romney / Ryan plan calls for a twenty percent tax cut across the board for all income groups and a corporate tax cut for corporations. This will cost 4.8 trillion over the next five years. How do they expect to pay for that? Mitt Romney says by closing loopholes in the tax code but neither he nor Ryan will say which ones. Although Romney has said he won’t touch the estate loophole or the charity loophole. Yet every credible economist has said that the Romney / Ryan budget won’t pay for itself unless it guts government programs that benefit the middle class. Cue Joe Biden again.

Ryan wants to turn Medicare into a voucher system. To be clear, a voucher is a coupon. Which is fine if the costs of health care exist in a vacuum but since the Ryan budget pays for it with the same $716 billion that Obamacare transferred out of Medicare. The only difference is that Obamacare put the onus on health providers, Ryan’s plan would put it on seniors. Obamacare encourages health care providers to control costs. A Ryan voucher isn’t much good if the costs continue to escalate. Which is better? $5.00 off a ten dollar purchase or $5.00 off a $100.00 purchase?

Then there’s Obamacare itself. Both Romney and Ryan want to repeal it. But replace it with what? Get ‘em Joe. Or how about Dodd-Frank, the already weakened bill putting regulations on Wall Street after they caused the financial collapse. Romney and Ryan want to roll that back as well. Let the bankers run wild again. Sic ‘em, Joe. The list goes on.

Ryan should be concerned. It’s possible that Vice President Biden could not only deny Paul Ryan his job, he could cost Ryan is seat as a Wisconsin Representative. One of Ryan’s criticisms of President Obama was that he claims that the President broke a promise to keep the GM plant in Ryan’s district from shuttering its doors (it actually closed at he end of the Bush era). But at the same time, Romney and Ryan have been vocal in their objections to the auto industry bailout.

All the Vice President has to point out is that President Obama saved the company. Shouldn’t it be Paul Ryan’s responsibility to lobby GM to keep the plant open in his own district?

So go ahead and get wonky. We’ll wait.

Related articles

• Vice presidential debate could be a tale of two Ryans (reuters.com)
• Joe Biden May Be Gaffe-Prone, But He’s Still More Likeable Than Paul Ryan (businessinsider.com)

Big Bird drops in on Weekend Update

Of course one of the most memorable lines to come out of the Presidential debate was Mitt Romney’s assertion that one of the ways (in fact the only one he has actually articulated) in which he would offset the costs of his proposed 20% across the board tax cut was to quit subsidizing Public Broadcasting. It didn’t hurt that PBS’ Jim Lehrer was the moderator. Romney said to Lehrer:

“I’m sorry Jim, I’m going to stop the subsidy to PBS. I like PBS, I actually love Big Bird. I like you too, but I’m not going to keep on spending money on things to borrow money from China to pay for.”

Gliding right past the glaring China inaccuracy, The annual budget for Public Broadcasting is one tenth of one percent of the total budget. That’s not likely to make a big dent.

That quote turned out to be the memorable line of the evening and the President made hay with it the next day back on the campaign trail noting that Romney wants to repeal Dodd-Frank and let Wall Street run rampant once again but at the same time he wants to crack down on Sesame Street. The President said it was ‘high time somebody cracked down on Big Bird’.

Predictably, Big Bird has been in the news a great deal as a result. He even made a guest appearance on Saturday Night Live’s Weekend Update saying he was up way past his bedtime. Protestors in Big Bird regalia began showing up at Romney events just like when dogs on top of the car were following the campaign bus around after the Seamus story broke. The large yellow fellow is expected to be a popular Halloween costume this year as well.

Conservatives have been crowing about how ridiculous it is for the President to keep referring to Big Bird while completely missing the point that the President is making in that it’s absurd that he is having to point out that the only budget offset Romney has offered is Big Bird.

Clearly someone needs to tell Romney how to get to Deficit Street.

Related articles

• President releases new ad — featuring Big Bird… (thehill.com)
• Sesame Street asks Obama campaign to take down Big Bird ad (thehill.com)
• Mitt to Lehrer: I’ll pull PBS funding (politico.com)

Here’s a budget that screws the middle class

The president was half joking when he compared Mitt Romney to the reverse Robin Hood but truthfully Romney has selected his Sheriff of Nottingham. It should come as no surprise that Mitt Romney chose the Representative from Wisconsin Paul Ryan as his running mate for Vice President. Well, actually, it is a bit of a surprise. Most people thought Romney would choose somebody safe from a swing state. Most thought it would be Rob Portman from Ohio. Ohio is generally thought to be the tipping point state; the state that will likely determine the outcome of the presidential race. 538Refugees has long held that it would be Marco Rubio from Florida.

Why Paul Ryan? Perhaps the Romney camp sought to capitalize on the unsuccessful recall of Governor Scott Walker from last year. Maybe they think Wisconsin is a swing state despite conventional wisdom and polling to the contrary. Maybe they just want another pretty face on the ticket (no offense to Portman).

But maybe, just maybe, Paul Ryan is the perfect fit for Mitt Romney. Paul Ryan is known as a rock star in the Republican party. He has proposed several budgets that essentially make the wealthy richer at the expense of the middle class. Here’s how it works:

Ryan: ‘Here’s a budget that makes us rich and guts Medicare’

Us: ‘No’

Ryan: ‘Okay, here’s a budget that guts other social services and makes us rich’

Us: ‘No’

Paul Ryan: ‘Fine then. How about this plan that makes us rich at your expense?’

Us: ‘No, and stop asking’

Paul Ryan: ‘Alright, here’s an even more outrageous plan to make us filthy rich at your expense’

You get the idea. Paul Ryan is no financial genius. Except, of course, if you’re a Republican conservative in which case Romney’s decision makes perfect sense. Romney has made a fortune off of the sweat equity of others. It only seems right that he choose a money laundering accountant like Ryan as his running mate.

This truly is an unprecedented presidential campaign. Either we choose the person who will govern in our best interests or we choose the team who will sell this country off for their own personal profit.

Related articles

• NBC: 3 sources indicate Romney will pick Ryan (firstread.nbcnews.com)
• Romney-Ryan 2012: The Herman & Eddie Munster Ticket (crooksandliars.com)

John Kerry and his swift boat crew

In the 2004 Presidential campaign the political gloves came off, so to speak, when a group of Vietnam War veterans was enlisted by a Republican special interest group (known as a 527 or the equivalent of today’s SuperPac) released negative campaign ads calling into question the validity of John Kerry’s war record and his subsequent protest against the Vietnam war. They essentially painted Kerry’s service as dishonourable.

None of it was true, of course. Kerry served on river patrol in what was called a ‘swift boat’. And he served admirably going in to attack the enemy when called upon to do so. He was decorated for his service. But Kerry made one mistake in that he failed to defend himself from the attack ads. Whether he didn’t want to accuse fellow veterans of lying or whether he thought it was just an absurd issue that everyone would see through, it didn’t matter. Kerry failed to define himself and in doing so he allowed others to do it for him in the public’s eye. He was what is now called in modern political terms, ‘Swiftboated’ much to the chagrin of veterans who served during that period. And he lost the 2004 election possibly because of it.

Critics have begun to accuse the Obama campaign of doing the same thing to Mitt Romney over the questions about his years and service at Bain Capital. Some are calling it swift boating or ‘Swift-Baining’ or ‘Swiss Boating’ referring to Romney’s Swiss bank accounts. But is it really the same thing that happened to John Kerry?

None of the accusations levied on John Kerry by the Swift Boat Vets has ever been proven to be true. Granted, some of those bets may believe them to be true but there is a big difference between fact and belief. So Swiftboating, for Democrats anyway, will always be synonymous with a personal attack on someone based on lies.

And it wasn’t the first time nor would it be the last. Multiple amputee Max Cleland was unseated from his Senate seat in 2002 by ads from his opponent Saxby Chambliss portraying him as unpatriotic and accusing him of voting against the Homeland Security Act (he was opposed to certain measures of the bill). The ads showed Cleland juxtaposed with pictures of Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein. They were taken down after protests including fellow Republicans John McCain and Chuck Hagel, both Vietnam War vets. But the damage was done.

More recently, Republican Representative Joe Walsh of Illinois has accused double amputee and Iraq war veteran Democrat Tammy Duckworth of not being a ‘true hero’ because she makes her military service central to her campaign for his House seat. Duckworth has not made that much of an issue of her service in her campaign yet Walsh, who never served in the military, has mocked her on more than one occasion. The tactic will likely back fire on Walsh. In fact guitar player for the rock group the Eagles, also named Joe Walsh, has publicly endorsed Duckworth in response to the attacks despite the fact that he isn’t from her district.

The Obama Campaign released the now famous ‘America the Beautiful’ ad with Mitt Romney’s off key singing of the song over excerpts of articles pointing out Romney’s unanswered questions regarding his tenure at Bain and his offshore bank accounts. Many think the ad has had a devastating effect on Romney much like the ‘Daisy’ ad had on Barry Goldwater in the sixties.

The ad ran only once during prime time television but it effectively guaranteed Lyndon Johnson the Presidency.

But was the Obama campaign’s strategy of bringing up Romney’s tenure at Bain Swiftboating? Was pointing out the discrepancy of Romney’s claim to not have been involved with Bain while he was working for the 2002 Olympics untrue? Is pointing out that everyone else who has ever run for office including Romney’s own father have released multiple years of tax returns a lie? No, If Romney claims to be qualified for the top job in the nation based on his business record and acumen then he kind of had this coming. The only similarity between Romney and Kerry is that Mitt didn’t seem to see it coming and was unprepared to respond to it. Swiftboating doesn’t seem quite right for Mitt’s situation given that he never served in the military even though his draft number was called (he got a deferrment to do Missionary work for the Mormon Church in France). No, given Mitt’s background ‘Yachtboating‘ seems more appropriate.

Even prominent Republicans both in politics and the political media punditry are lining up to tell Romney to bite the bullet and release the tax returns. George Will, as staunch a conservative as they get, has declared that Romney’s campaign may have suffered irreparable damage by not doing so. Others have said that Romney’s unwillingness to release the returns are indicative of something to hide, whether it be some outrageously low tax rate or other forms of wealth in those offshore accounts. Whether any of that is true is almost immaterial now. The damage has been done.

So was Romney Swiftboated? No. Was he Yachtboated? Yes. Because Swiftboating is when someone else uses lies, falsehoods, obfuscations and other misrepresentations to torpedo your campaign. Yachtboating is when you do it to yourself when someone points out the truth about your own shortcomings, misrepresentations, and obfuscations.

Related articles

• Wayne Anderson: The “Swiftboating” of Mitt Romney (huffingtonpost.com)
• Flying Pig Alert: CNN Accuses Obama of ‘Swiftboating’ Romney [Video] (johnmalcolm.me)
• Sure, Jenn, Obama Is Panicking, Ctd (andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com)
• Keith Boykin: The Swissboating of Mitt Romney (huffingtonpost.com)
• Eric Boehlert: It’s Not “Swift Boating” If It’s True (huffingtonpost.com)
• Walsh hints Duckworth not a ‘true hero’ – Chicago Sun-Times (suntimes.com)

Courtesy MoveOn.org

Some rather enterprising individuals have taken to following the Mitt Romney campaign bus around in A Cadillac Esplenade (in a nod towards Ann Romney) complete with sponsor stickers on the side and with one special feature: a fake dog strapped to the roof. It’s an hommage to Seamus, the late Irish Setter that belonged to the Romney family that Mitt put in a kennel and tied to the roof of the family station wagon for a twelve hour drive to Canada. The now infamous story that Romney originally intended as a humourous anecdote had the unintended consequence of sparking outrage among animal rights advocates.

When asked later if he regretted sharing the story Mitt responded that he probably wouldn’t have told the story because of the negative publicity. Not the welfare of Seamus, but how the publicity made Mitt look bad. This is just one of many examples that are indicative of how Mitt Romney would govern as President.

Willard M. Romney has a whole host of negatives as a candidate. His record as a job cremator at Bain Capital. His record as Governor of Massachusetts where he was 47th in job creation in the nation (and even then only because Louisiana was under water from Katrina), his offshoring of money in bank accounts in countries with lax tax laws but tight non-disclosure laws. The list keeps growing. More recently, Mitt been caught in a lie about his tenure at Bain. He claims he left the company in February of 1999 to go manage the 2002 Olympics in Utah. But documentation has arisen that indicates otherwise. He is listed as CEO and primary shareholder of Bain Capital through 2002 and received a $100,000 a year salary during those years. This raises the question: what is it that happened at Bain during those years that Mitt doesn’t want known? Mitt has also refused to release his tax returns before 2010 (his 2011 return is also still pending and may not be done before the election). The fact that other Presidential candidates have provided theirs, including his father George Romney when he ran for president in 1968, would seem to indicate he has something to hide there as well.

The Romney camp repeatedly says everything about Mitt’s finances is legal. But that’s not really the point. The primary reason that people have offshore accounts (and Mitt is the first person running for president to do so) is to evade taxes. We already learned from his 2010 tax return that he and his wife paid a 13.9% tax rate, more than half that of most Americans. This was largely due to the fact that most of the Romney’s money is in the form of capital gains. So while legal, the ethics of a multi-millionaire paying such a reduced rate doesn’t sit well with working class Americans given the manner in which that money was earned.

But there are other troubling things about Mitt Romney that occurred in his past. The Bullying incident at his prep school where he organized a gang of his friends to physically pin down a suspected gay student with an unusual hairstyle of the time and cut his hair off while the student was screaming for help. This would likely constitute an assault today but Romney shrugs it off as a youthful indiscretion. In an attempt to head reports of the incident off, Ann Romney came out before the article regarding the bullying and defended Romney saying he was quite the prankster back then.

Mitt Romney’s behaviour and actions today still have questionable implications as to how he would handle the presidency. His decisions at the equity firm he started (or was started for him to run) are the single most alarming indicator. Bain Capital financed several companies, some successful and some not. But regardless of their success or failure, Bain always made money. Governor Rick Perry called Romney a ‘vulture capitalist’ accusing Bain of larding companies with debt then taking their fee and forcing the companies into bankruptcy while leaving a trail of lost jobs and pensions. The most damning testimonial is from a man who was asked to build a platform at his factory not knowing its purpose. Then, with the indifference of casual Gods, Bain used the stage to tell everyone that the factory was shutting down and everyone was losing their jobs. This added insult to injury because the  gentleman said it was like he was building his own coffin.

There are other telling signs. During a debate Rick Perry once again pointed out that Romney had employed illegal immigrants to do his yard work. Romney defended himself by saying that when he discovered the contractor was using illegals he discontinued their use saying, “I can’t have illegals working here. I’m running for office for Pete’s sake!”. Like the incident with the dog on the car, Romney was more interested in how it affected him and not that hiring illegals was wrong.

Romney repeatedly says he has policy plans yet he is reluctant to divulge the details. His only plan so far seems to be that Obama is a failure and he’ll be a better president. He does endorse the Ryan economic plan which is just tax breaks for the wealthy and paying for them by dismantling the social safety nets that many Americans, both conservative and liberal rely upon.

But the one most compelling argument that no one in the media will point out; Mitt Romney is the guy who lost to John McCain who lost to Obama in 2008. If Mitt was the wrong choice against John McCain, how is it that, with the exact same message, has he suddenly become a better candidate? Did he take night classes on how to be presidential?Yet even in light of all this evidence that Mitt Romney as an out-of-touch, elite, Gordon Gekko corporate raiding, job outsourcing, say anything he thinks you want to hear, stretch the truth until it breaks, Etch-a-Sketch bully who cares nothing about regular Americans and only about maximizing profits at the expense of others for himself and the uber-rich corporate fat cats on Wall Street; much of conservative America is poised to vote for him.

When vetting a candidate for office, people look not only at the resume but they look at the character of the candidate. We heard all manner of unsuccessful attempts to discredit President Obama with character flaws through guilt by association; Reverend Wright, Bill Ayers, etc. But these were indirect associations that did little to prove that the President lacked the personal qualities required to hold the office. Mitt Romney’s words and actions betray a direct mirror of his character and yet we’re asked to ignore that as youthful indiscretion or momentary bad judgement. But they are not momentary lapses of reason. They are indicative of how Mitt Romney thinks. They are indicative of his priorities.

President Obama has pointed out that being president isn’t like running a business. You just can’t outsource the Department of Education or lay off New Jersey if it isn’t turning a profit. Your shareholders are all Americans. Not just the lucky ones who own stock (or land; as in landed gentry). Mitt Romney has demonstrated repeatedly over the course of his life that the decisions he makes will benefit he and his shareholders before all others.

The dog on the roof incident may seem like a footnote to the whole campaign but it foreshadows just what is in Mitt Romney’s soul. What will it take for his supporters to recognize that they (and the rest of Americans who aren’t voting for him) are the dog on top of the car?

Related articles

• Op-Ed Columnist: Mitt’s Political Vortex (nytimes.com)
• George Will: Mitt Romney Is ‘Losing’ Argument On Bain Capital, Personal Finances (VIDEO) (huffingtonpost.com)
• Video: Fmr. Bain partner: ‘Legally’ Romney was CEO of Bain until 2002 (msnbc.msn.com)
• 35 Questions Mitt Romney Must Answer About Bain Capital Before The Issue Can Go Away (forbes.com)
• How Mitt Romney and Glenn Kessler Swift-Yachted Themselves (delong.typepad.com)
• Mitt Romney’s ‘Own’ Dog Campaigns Against Him (fora.tv)
• Seamus Romney Makes Cameo Appearance In Gas Mileage TV Ad (huffingtonpost.com)

An electric electoral conundrum in Omaha

It’s a tight race. President Obama has maintained the lead but surprisingly, for an incumbent, not by very much. Conservatives have wistfully hoped that there would be some watermark that would propel Mitt Romney into the lead but it has never materialized. In fact, it seems that every time Romney opens his mouth he does more damage to his campaign than any external criticism.

But most pollsters and our own Godparent site Five Thirty Eight at the New York Times list several states as swing states that Mitt Romney has to win in order to get to 270 electoral votes. Nate has calculated the ‘tipping point’ state or the state Romney must win in order to have a chance at victory. We here at 538Refugees have called Virginia as the tipping point state but as the race tightens before November that state could be Ohio.

Of course there are a number of potential outcomes that could play out including an electoral tie. For example if Mitt Romney wins Ohio and Michigan but not Iowa the electoral count would be 269 to 269. In the event of a tie the House of Representatives would call the winner as Aaron Burr found out in 1800 when the outgoing House voted Thomas Jefferson into office. For the sake of argument we’ll consider a tie a Romney victory based upon the make-up of the House of Representatives.

Underlying such a scenario is an oft overlooked electoral vote. Nebraska and Maine both allocate their electoral votes by district rather than by winner-take-all. In 2008 Nebraska’s 2nd district (essentially Omaha) went for President Obama while the rest of the state went for John McCain. The President got one electoral vote from Nebraska. It’s not out of the question that he could get that vote again. That one vote would be just enough to break an electoral vote tie in the aforementioned scenario.

And why not? In a country that is pretty evenly divided along political lines, Omaha sits in pretty much the geographical center of the country. Perhaps they represent the political center as well.

There are other states that could break an electoral tie. The previously mentioned state of Maine could be a tie breaker although most polls indicate that Obama will take Maine easily. There are other areas that Republicans could exploit on the margins. Oregon has been mentioned as a sleeper red state for example. And no one ever really knows what’s on New Hampshire’s mind.

A cascading cacophony of circumstances is likely needed to fall into place for Mitt Romney to win but it has happened before as in Bush v. Gore in 2000. And Republicans seem cognizant of this as they continue to implement voter registration regulations in fourteen states that are designed to impede voters who typically vote democratic. But it’s unlikely that Ohio, Michigan, or Iowa will turn red. Still, anything can happen in four months and if history is any indicator, stuff often happens.

Several sites offer interactive electoral maps where data can be manipulated to experiment with different outcomes. We’ve used 270towin.com in our examples. 538Refugees still predicts a 303 electoral vote win for the President but if Omaha votes the same way again, it’ll be 304.

Related articles

• The hunt for Neb.’s electoral vote (politico.com)
• Chris Weigant: Popular Vote Speculation Interlude (huffingtonpost.com)
• IHT Rendezvous: The Electoral College and Winning the U.S. Election (rendezvous.blogs.nytimes.com)
• Electoral deadlock between Romney, Obama not so far-fetched this year – Los Angeles Times (latimes.com)
• Obama on track for electoral victory…for now (economy.money.cnn.com)

I like Tacos. Did you know you can pull your car up to this place and order tacos and then drive up to the window and they have them ready for you?

538Refugees predicted back in April why Marco Rubio would be the VP pick because of Romney’s lagging support amongst the latino/hispanic community. There was also the perception that it wouldn’t hurt Romney’s chances to carry the swing state of Florida despite evidence to the contrary that shows that historically VP picks rarely result in the home state guarantee.

Romney, of course, hasn’t helped himself in the matter by publicly declaring that he would reject the DREAM Act. Whether hispanics think immigration is a priority issue or not, it’s got to speak volumes to them about how a Romney administration values their cohort.

Then came the Obama administration’s historic announcement this past Friday and the ensuing maelstrom of criticism that its timing was merely for political gain. Well, yeah. But not for the reasons Republicans think. The Obama immigration policy wasn’t some ‘come to Jesus’ moment like the shift on gay marriage was. This has been in the administration’s quiver ever since Senate Republicans rejected the DREAM Act back in 2010. Several hispanic congressmen have been on President’s heels about it ever since. And the timing? The President was about to jet off to a G20 summit in Mexico.

Marco Rubio had been working on what would essentially be DREAM Lite ™ and the Romney campaign was probably going to use that in order to get back in the good graces of the latino community. Couple that with a VP nomination and poof, instant Mexican karma. But this morning, ABC News reports that Rubio isn’t being vetted for the job. He hasn’t been asked to fill out any questionnaires or submit any financials in the two months since Romney instituted the search process.

In the wake of the President’s announcement, Rubio has shelved his immigration plan saying that the President ‘tossed a grenade’ into the plans. Critics say that President Obama stole Rubio’s thunder. Obama can’t steal what was never yours to begin with. Senate Republicans tried that back in December of 2010 when they filibustered it 55-41 for the purely political reason of not giving the President a perceived victory.

By forcing the President’s hand, that decision has come back to haunt them. Was the timing of the President’s announcement fortuitous? Probably not. But it’s hard to believe that had Rubio finished DREAM Lite that Romney would not have been all over the airwaves accusing the President of not having an immigration policy. In fact he has been on the airwaves saying Obama hasn’t had an immigration policy in 3 1/2 years while ignoring the fact that Obama tried to champion the original DREAM Act which, ironically, was a Republican idea in the first place. Romney claims to have a solution to the immigration issue but has been mum on the details. He has refused repeatedly to answer the question of whether or not he would overturn the President’s policy if elected.

The President has boxed Romney into an uncomfortable corner. Either he he rejects President Obama’s position altogether and risk losing a key demographic that could be the deciding factor in the election or he flip flops on his original stance against the DREAM Act and alienates the hardcore Tea Partiers. But then Mr. Etch-a-Sketch has been no stranger to flip flops. He’s done it so much that it’s probably his footwear of choice. Easy on, easy off.

Whether political or not, President Obama’s decision was done for all the right reasons. Given the intransigence in congress he really had little choice. That it had favourable political benefits is just gravy.

What’s sauce for the goose, eh Mr. Romney?

Related articles

• Romney’s what-Rubio-says immigration stance (miamiherald.com)
• Marco Rubio may help Mitt Romney win over just the right amount of Hispanic voters (ireport.cnn.com)
• Rubio: Obama Derailed DREAM Act (commentarymagazine.com)
• Romney dodges immigration questions (politico.com)
• Obama’s immigration trap (politico.com)
• Marco Rubio Not Being Vetted to be Mitt Romney’s Running Mate (ABC News)
• Rubio to shelve GOP immigration plan (politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com)

Excuse me, sir. It’s not the time for questions!

(Note: That translation may be a butchered Internet search but hopefully it gets the point across)

President Obama just delivered a proclamation that amounts to an abbreviated version of the DREAM Act that Republicans in Congress refused to pass. The House passed with most Republicans abstaining but even with a 55 vote majority, Senate Republicans blocked the DREAM Act with a filibuster.

The DREAM Act was a bi-partisan bill that Republicans actually favoured. It was designed to provide guidelines for immigrants who were in the country through no fault of there own to help them become legal immigrants. It was not an amnesty program but it would keep people who had been brought to this country when they were babies, grew up and went to school here, and even served in the military from being deported to a country they had never known and perhaps didn’t even speak the language.

So the President directed the Department of Homeland Security to create a means to provide temporary relief to those people who live under fear of deportation until such a time as Congress decides what to do about the immigration issue.

I’m not here to argue with you about it

During the speech, in the spirit of Joe Wilson, a heckler interrupted the President with a question. The heckler was a first time reporter from a conservative blog The Daily Caller, started by former news and commentary critic, Tucker Carlson. This was a serious breech of decorum and the President reacted accordingly and forcefully. He shut down the reporter and wouldn’t answer his question while he was talking. This was possibly the maddest the President has ever looked (which he actually only looked extremely annoyed by most people’s standards).

After the President finished his remarks, he took the unprecedented step of addressing the reporter’s question when the press corps knew that no questions were going to be taken and the reporter interrupted him again. The President said he wasn’t going to argue with the reporter, answered his question and ended the briefing.

Hopefully this reporter enjoyed his fifteen minutes of infamy as he will unlikely be allowed to return. The tweets and the notoriety for The Daily Caller had better been worth it.

We’re doing this because it’s the right thing to do for America

Predictably, the conservative networks and blogs have been caterwauling all day that this is a purely political move designed to secure the latino vote in November. Whether that’s true or not, it was a bold move in that it shows leadership in the face of obstruction. In the words of Mitt Romney, “What’s sauce for the goose, is sauce for the gander”.

Will it have an effect on the latino vote? It’s quite likely. It will also force Mitt Romney to justify his stand on the DREAM Act and his comments about self-deportation. He’ll either have to defend those remarks or flip flop on them, Most pundits agree that this looks like a win for the President. Polling is likely to reflect the support of not only latinos but after the comments on gay marriage and the repeal of DADT, the gay vote. He already has 90% approval among the black vote and as Republicans keep meddling in the sexual health care issues of women he’s likely to have a solid majority there as well.

Polls will be interesting in the next few days.

(Photos were captured from a screen grab of the briefing on an iPhone)

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