The Same Lie Since 1932

The mean hourly wage in the United States, in 2019, is $24.34.

The daily food intake recommended for the mean weight male... 198lbs... is appx 2180 calories.

100 years ago, in 1919, the mean hourly wage, was appx. $0.56 per hour... appx 1/44th todays wage... which works out to about $0.0093 per minute... less than a penny.

2019s $24.34 average wage works out to about $0.41 a minute.

In 1919, that daily recommended calorie count in say... diner cheeseburgers... would have cost you about $0.45 (not including tax)... or about 49 minutes of work. Honestly... not that bad. Better than one might expect really.

Today, in 2019, the same calorie count in say... Mcdonalds triple cheeseburgers... is about $12 (not including tax), or about 29 minutes...

... Less than half an hour, and only about 60% of the labor it would have taken in 1919.

... But, perhaps cheeseburgers are an anomaly... after all, food prices have actually fallen in relation to income significantly more than say... housing, or energy costs... right?

Well... general consumer pricing adjustment for purchasing power parity...

$1 u.s. dollar of purchasing power in 1919, is equivalent to approximately $15.26 in purchasing power in 2019.

So... parity in wages with 1919 would be $8.55... but the ACTUAL mean wage in 2019 is $24.34... that's 2.85 times as much... Rather a LOT better.

... And yet, somehow,  the left are always claiming that the average american is worse off than they used to be... that only the rich are doing better... that  "the rich get richer and the poor get poorer"... which is utter an complete crap.

... Ok, well... that's 100 years ago... what about say... 50 years ago in 1969?

That's a particularly good example, because it's when the left claims that the poor and middle class started losing ground the fastest. They love calculating the minimum wage from 1968 for example, because 1968 and 1969 are the highest the minimum wage has ever been in terms of purchasing power, and it is the last year of the great post WW2 wealth creation and expansion boom.... and just before the mass inflation of the 70s hit (it actually started in late '68, but didn't really ramp up dramatically until 1971... then went into over drive with the '73 oil crisis).

Ok... mean wage 50 years ago, in 1969... $3.04 usd

$1.00 usd in 1969 purchasing power, is appx. $7.07 in 2019 purchasing power. That would make parity wage $23.26... but the actual wage is $24.34... making 2019s wage about a 5% increase in actual purchasing power.

Not a lot... but remember, 1969 was just off the peak year in the biggest boom in history.

Oh and just for fun... let's compare minimum wage purchasing power, from the literal highest point of purchasing power the minimum wage has ever been... at $1.30 in 1969. 

Parity minimum wage in 2019 would be $9.12... a fairly significant increase over the current minimum wage of $7.25...  

...Except that 1968 and 1968 were massive historical anomalies... Congress had actually just passed a 30% increase in the minimum wage. Only two years before, the minimum wage has been $1.00... which, funny enough, when parity adjusted, is just a few cents less than the minimum wage in 2019. 

If we look at the minimum wage when it was first passed at $0.25 in 1938, the parity minimum wage in 2019 would be $4.49... Just 62% of the actual minimum wage. 

Oh and the mean hourly wage in 1938 was appx. $0.84 an hour... about 3.35 times the minimum. Lessee... $7.25 time 3.35 is $24.29... amazing... just 5 cents less than todays mean hourly wage... Funny how that works out.

... So much for the myth that the minimum wage is supposed to be a living wage. It wasn't under FDR, it never has been, and it was never intended to be...

Ok... well, how about 40 years ago, in 1979?

Mean U.S. wage 40 years ago, in 1979... $5.55 usd

$1.00 usd in 1979 purchasing power, is appx. $3.69 in 2019 purchasing power. That would make parity wage $20.48... but again, the actual wage is $24.34... making 2019s wage an almost 16%  increase in actual purchasing power.

... Ok... 30 years ago?

Mean U.S. wage 30 years ago, in 1989... $9.73 usd

$1.00 usd in 1989 purchasing power, is appx. $2.08 in 2019 purchasing power. That would make parity wage $20.23... but again, the actual wage is $24.34... making 2019s wage an almost 17%  increase in actual purchasing power.

... One more shot at being even slightly true... 20 years ago... 1999.

Mean U.S. wage 20 years ago, in 1999... $14.74 usd

$1.00 usd in 1989 purchasing power, is appx. $1.53 in 2019 purchasing power. That would make parity wage $22.55... but one last time, the actual wage is $24.34... making 2019s wage about an 8%  increase in actual purchasing power.

So... the left, as is almost always the case, has lied entirely and completely about the economic situation of the American poor and middle class.

Yes, for a few years, starting 50 years ago, purchasing power did fall... from the end of the biggest wealth creation boom in history, through the worst peacetime inflation in U.S. history for 16 years from 1968 to 1984... It fell almost 12% over those years in fact, and stayed mostly flat another 10 years or so, until between 1992 and 1994.

However, from 1994 or thereabouts to today, it has been steadily increasing again (even including the 2009-2012 recession. Wages and purchasing power didn't fall at all in that period... though employment did fall, average wages still increased).

ALL Americans.. poor, middle class, and rich... are better off than they were 100 years ago, better off than 50 years ago, and 40 years ago, and 30 year ago, and 20 years ago... and even 10 years ago... 

... Of course, democrats can't actually win, if they don't convince you that the poor and middle class are worse off, and the rich are gaining at everyone else expense...

It's been the same lie they've been telling since 1932... and probably will be telling for as long as the democratic party continues to exist.

NOverride

Congratulations Republicans, you have a near record majority in the house, and what appears will be 54 seats in the senate (three races were still undecided at this writing. At least one is a near certain Republican victory, one appears likely so, and one is likely a democrat Victory).

Some folks have been saying things like "Well, yeah, Obama's gonna veto everything... but hey at least we'll have a veto proof majority on some things, that a lot of Democrats support".

Don't count on it.

Minority Democratic support for some "Republican issues" was allowed before, because it didn't matter. There was no consequence to it.

I can almost guarantee you, there will not be one single override. No Democrat will be allowed by the leadership to be counted publicly supporting Republicans, against president Obama and the rest of the democratic party... at least not if an override would be successful.

Now, it's an entirely different situation. A Democratic defection will be both a PR and a political disaster. It will hurt and weaken the Democrats even more than this election already has, and crash morale even more than it already has.

Unless a Democrat will lose his seat if he doesn't vote to override a specific veto, it will NOT happen. In that case the leadership MIGHT let them vote for an override, maybe, if there is no chance of an override passing.

If the situation is dire enough, a Dem congresscritter might actually defect without clearance... but that would have to be something pretty dire, because there is just about ZERO chance any Dem who did that would ever be forgiven if the override succeeded. They'd have to switch parties.

Of course, if there's no chance of the override succeeding, most likely there won't even be an override vote (and if there really were such a chance, then Obama wouldn't veto, unless it were something the Dems absolutely could not stand for... in which case, again, there's no way it would get enough Dem support to be overridden).

Even if there is however... Do you really think there will be 12 (presuming the total is 54 as it appears it will be) senators who will lose their seats if they don't override, on any specific issue? There are quite possibly 12 Democrats total who might lose their seats if they didn't override on issues that were very important to their state... but 12 on a single issue?

Of course, they could also put doing the right thing, for the good of their state and the nation, above politics...

... Oh... sorry... can't stop laughing at that thought right now...

PATCO, and the REST of the story...

Ahhh... the joys of growing up in a political family...

So, a number of memes and infographics regarding Reagan, and the PATCO strike of August 1981, have been circulating around blogs and social media the last few weeks. Most are just your basic meme fodder; shallow, not remotely accurate junk... But even among those who know something of the story, it seems that very few really understand the larger picture and context of what happened there and why... and how it relates to the Reagan years as a whole.

What you have to understand, is that as much as people remember them as the "Reagan Revolution" years; in fact, the entire 80s and into the early 90s (summer of 1992 to be precise) were essentially a wonderfully corrupt bargain between the Democrats and Republicans.

People mostly think of it as a time when "Reagan cut taxes", and increased spending on the military, which did in fact happen; but that's less than half the story.

The other half, is how Reagan and the republicans managed to get most of that pushed through a democrat dominated congress, relatively easily.

The answer is actually pretty simple...

For every dollar of new spending initiated by Reagan and the republicans, the Democratic majority under Tip O'Neill, initiated (depending on the year) from 1.2 to 1.8 dollars of new spending...which the Republican minority then generally offered only token ACTUAL opposition to, or even actively helped to pass.

Of course they made a great deal of rhetorical noise, but when it came down to money on the table, the bills got passed, and Reagan signed them.

What it boiled down to, was that for the most part (with a few notable exceptions) Reagan and the republicans could spend as much as they wanted on what they ACTUALLY wanted; so long as the republicans didn't actually meaningfully try to stop O'Neill and the dems, from spending as much as THEY really wanted on whatever THEY really wanted.

... note how I am repeating "really" and "actually" several times here. That's important. Rhetoric was one thing, reality was another thing entirely.

Most of the big, loud, noisy spending fights you may remember from the mid and late 80s were, shall we say... full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. Most of the time, the minority and majority leadership had worked out what was going to pass, how much was going to be spent, and what if any amendments would be allowed, before anything ever hit the floor, or even got out of committee. The rest of the show was just electioneering and fundraising.

Under this cozy modus vivendi, Reps and Dems could pursue "red meat" issues, and pay back favors for their respective sides, while at the same time acting as each others boogeymen; so each side could look good for their base, get out the vote, work up the faithful, and raise a lot of money.

It was a near perfect system for the parties... Not so much for the people of course, but great for the DNC and RNC.

The mid 80s through mid 90s, were when semi-permanent single party incumbency for most seats became not just the rule (it had been such for many districts since the war already), but the near certainty; both sides making sure that everyone who played for the team, stayed with the team; and anyone thought to be leaving the reservation was replaced with someone who would keep the game going according to plan.

Pretty much the only time an incumbent lost their seat was when they had to be replaced with a more compliant congresscritter; or when they had screwed up bad enough, and botched the spin on the screwup bad enough, that they had to be sacrificed to protect the rest of congress from further investigation into bad behavior (Rostenkowski anyone?).

Oh... actually there was one other exception... The last of the southern ideological realignments.

The south and west voted overwhelmingly democrat up until 1960, and most states still voted majority democrat excepting for president, up until the late 70s or early 80s (the first time the south voted entirely majority Republican, both for president and for new congresscritters, was 1984).

From 1960 on, the south started voting more republican, and the north started voting more democrat. This pattern accelerated dramatically in 1968, 1972, and 1976 with an explicit southern strategy being followed by Republicans to unseat southern democrats; and then a mass turnover of 35 seats in the 1980 election, with the "Reagan revolution" (which was pretty much entirely reversed in 1982 by the way, and the democrat majority was never actually under threat).

After the 1976, and particularly after the 1980 elections, most of the less powerful and shorter serving southern democrats, and pretty much all the northeastern Republicans outside of a few upper class all white districts (the Rockefeller districts basically), were out. Those remaining, generally had safe overwhelmingly urban and university districts;  a powerful machine behind them (missouri for example); were independently wealthy and very popular at home; had a very high national profile; or had a great deal of power in congress (or some combination thereof).

Over the years from 1976 to 1996, almost all of those old line southern democrats died, retired, resigned, moved over to the senate, or switched to the republican party.

During most of those years (particularly from '82 to '92), there was a tentative and tacit understanding, that when the democrats vacated a southern seat that wasn't a safe dem seat, or was demographically trending Republican, so long as it didn't greatly impact the leadership balance or threaten the majority, the party would not fight too hard for it (there were exceptions of course, particular when a states governor or statehouse were dem controlled). The RNC would then hand pick one of their guys who they wanted to be a congressman, put enough money and talent behind him to make a show of it, and the dems would run a no-hoper (an old guy, a lefty woman, a nobody local party ticket puncher, a radical lefty etc...) against him (and yes, it was always a him).

This soft and largely unspoken arrangement worked out to everyones benefit... Or at least to congress and the governments benefit. Again, not so much for the people.

Which brings us back to the original subject...

The PATCO strike was just another one of those red meat issues.

On the one hand, Reagan got to make a big show of being "strong" on domestic issues early in his presidency, and firmly stake out the conspicuously "anti-left" position.

On the other hand, the democrats and the AFL/CIO (who had wanted to bring PATCO to heel since it's formation in 1968) got to pay PATCO back for generally not falling into line with the rest of labor and  specifically for supporting Reagan, and dropping support for some democratic congressional candidates in the 1980 election (and by the way, to explicitly strongarm the Teamsters - who had voted with PATCO - back into line as well); without actually being seen to be against a union (and in fact, to loudly "support" that same union, while helping to ensure it's destruction).

And of course, they both got to posture and grandstand, rallying the base and raising money.

Hell, it's 2014, and the Democrats are STILL raising money and support off the "union busting" of the PATCO strike.

So, democrats, union people... in case you didn't know, it wasn't actually Reagan that busted PATCO, it was Tip O'neill, and the AFL-CIO (who by the way OFFICIALLY crossed the PATCO picket line, and encouraged workers to scab).

Both "sides" (there's really only one side in washington... the government side. We the people don't even rate a side... we're just the floor) got exactly what they wanted, and neither sides ACTUAL vital interests or powerbases were threatened.

Was it a "big conspiracy"?

No, not at all...

It was just a few hundred people, who liked their jobs, acting in their own best interests in trying to keep them. It was basic political economics.

Defunding, Debt Limits, Shutdowns, Oh My!

Welcome to the sideshow folks...

Step right up and enjoy the posturing, rhetoric, and antics of our congressional clown crew...

Over to your right you'll see the amazing vocal endurance of Republican Senator from Texas Ted Cruz as he tosses red meat to the base...

... To be serious, there are a large group of people, who don't understand why the rest of us consider what Ted Cruz did (a 21 hour "filibuster" of a motion in relation to items within a continuing resolution for funding the federal government for the next six months), both harmful to the country, and nothing more than grandstanding.

For them, it looks like Cruz was (in the composite words of many Americans on the right):

"Taking a brave and principled stand against the funding of a bad law that will harm our country."

In reality, he was doing no such thing.

Cruz is being maligned by his own party because he was being a clown. This "filibuster" was nothing but a clown show.

It may be viscerally satisfying, but it's idiotic. It will do absolutely NOTHING for the Republicans, of for those against Obamacare, except throw red meat to the stupider side of the base.

This is underpants gnomes strategy.



Step one: "Non-filibuster a piece of already passed legislation that I can't stop by doing this... but that's OK I wasn't really trying to, really I was just trying to get media attention and attract donations from the less intelligent and aware side of my political base".

Step two: ... uh....

Step three: Electoral Victory?

"But, one brave man, standing up for what he believes in, can do amazing things. A small group of patriots can change the world, just look at the American revolution."

No, they can't. No guns involved in this one. No big foreign war distracting the occupying power. No actual fight going on among the actual fighters... just a series of bargaining and trading; while the rhetorical fight goes on among the spectators.

It may be emotionally satisfying rhetoric, but that's all it is, rhetoric.

You are not a member of the patriotic few, bravely standing up against the despotic elite, risking all for freedom.

In fact, unless you support drug legalization, getting the state out of marriage...and almost everything else... giving up legislating morality and goodness entirely... You AREN'T EVEN ON THE GOODGUYS SIDE.

You're just another guy on the badguys side, who wants the badguys to tax the tea a little differently.

Oh and as "just another guy", you actually aren't on their side at all...

You're a spectator rooting for your team from... not even the stands... from the comfort of your own home; with the game streamed lived via satellite into your living room.

"But what would you have us do? Just give up, let the Democrats run the country into the ground"

Nope... Not at all...

I'd have you stop assuming the rhetorical mantle of revolutionary patriot because it makes you feel good; and stop supporting things which reinforce that feeling, without actually DOING anything.

If you buy Ted Cruz's stunt, you are perpetuating this crap.

If you want to actually do something... ACTUALLY DO SOMETHING. Get involved with your political party on a local level. Get onto policy committees. Become a subject matter expert for the party on something you know, and use that position to help steer the party, and the politicians in the party, in the right direction.

That's actually doing something. This thing with Cruz? It's just something you can say you supported so you can feel morally vindicated while not actually doing anything.

"You'll see... Cruz was right, this is bad law and we must stop it. Cruz will be vindicated, time will tell"

Well of COURSE he's RIGHT, we all know that... it's AWFUL law... even Jon Stewart thinks it's bad law... but that doesn't mean he was doing any good... or even try to for that matter.

Vindicated how?

Sure he's increasing his own fundraising, and certainly he's right about Obama care... but to be vindicated you have to have done or said something substantive, and then been proven right later.

How has he done that?

He's hurt the Republican party badly with the center, and provided yet another target for mockery and ridicule... and to scare those who think this sort of thing is either stupid or crazy...

Yes, he's increased his own fundraising... and tripled that of everyone on the left.

This is not some brave heroic last stand. This was a foregone conclusion. Obamacare would never, under any circumstances, be defunded. This wasn't a filibuster. This wasn't moral courage.

If it was a serious attempt to stop Obamacare, fine, that would be great. Even if it were a futile attempt, if it were even structurally capable of stopping it, sure... it wasn't and isn't.

It wasn't really even a symbolic gesture.

It was pandering, to the lowest common denominator. It was Ted Cruz setting himself up to be the poster boy for the low information voters of the right.

And he knew EXACTLY what he was doing... By all accounts Cruz is a brilliant man.

"It doesn't matter if he was doomed to fail, it was the right thing to do anyway. Standing up for what's right is never wrong"

If that's what he was actually doing, I wouldn't be so irritated by this.

I'm irritated because this is what they do instead of something useful. "I supported Ted Cruz's fillibuster but those nasty democrats and RINOs passed it anyway"...

The people who believe this, don't seem to understand that what Cruz did actually hurt us. Us being those of us who really fight against government overreach, and bad law.

It gave cover to the people who wanted to do nothing anyway, it encouraged a few whackjobs to make spectacles of themselves, and it INCREASED the morale and assumed moral authority of the other side.

Do you not realize how stupid and ridiculous this makes anti-obamacare people to the middle? How hysterical it makes them appear to the other sides donors? How this is a permanent harmful soundbite/video clip?

It's idiots like this that made them able to paint Mitt Romney as an ultraconservative ultra right damn near American Taliban...

When in fact, he wasn't conservative enough for a lot of people to bother even coming out, and they just stayed home rather than vote.

This is NOT a dedicated small group of principled people fighting against government overreach... That would be excellent.

This is the Republican equivalent of a college student "sticking it to the man" by wearing Che Guevara t-shirt an shouting about oppression and justice, out in front of the admin building.

"You don't understand... Cruz is different... he's the only one of the Republicans with the guts and the principle to stand up and do something".

If he had actually done that, I would more than agree... I'd be cheering him on too.

But he didn't.

If he were actually different... I'd be 100% behind him... Hell, I think he's a good man, and in general he will probably be a good senator, though it's a bit early to tell. If nothing else, he's a LOT smarter than most Senators.

But really... other than that... he's not much different than any other professional politician.

I've read the mans bio, read some of his speeches, hell I was even on a conference call with him and Marco Rubio at some party event during the campaign last year.

Yeah, he's accomplished, and he's got a hell of a back story (great family tale), but... what is it you think makes him so special?

He's a smart guy, apparently a great legal mind, clerked for Rehnquist, editor of the Harvard law review... which are great things sure... but but I don't see what you seem to see that makes him particularly exceptional among senators. He's been a politician basically since law school; either full or part time.

He spent less than a year in private practice before going into an administration job, then less than 4 years out of the fedgov, where he ran for office twice, before going back to the fedgov.

He's a professional politician.

I think he's probably going to be a good senator (kinda hard to tell 9 months in), but I don't see anything there that says anything other than professional politician... He's a smart man and seemingly a good man... and those are great things... but he's still a professional politician, and has never been anything but a professional politician.

I mean... he actually voted... in fact the senate voted unanimously 100-0... for the motion he was supposedly filibustering... 

How can you even call it a filibuster if you're going to vote for it?

So... In the next show, we have the "Government Shutdown".

As of right now, the Republicans in congress have refused to sign any continuing appropriations bills that require the raising of the U.S. federal debt ceiling, and which fund Obamacare.

Therefore, the Republicans are trying to pull a repeat of 1996 and "shut down the government"; again to foster the illusion that they are taking a principled stand against excess spending and government waste etc... etc...

They aren't.

"Why can't they just balance the budget, instead of raising the debt ceiling again... That's not a solution, that's just making the problem worse?"

That's the question of a well meaning, intelligent person, looking at this problem from a rational perspective...

So it's completely irrelevant to anything they do in Washington of course.

First thing, the whole "Defund Obamacare" spiel is, and always has been, a sham. It's more redmeat for the base. It's not going to stop Obamacare, never was going to, never could; and even if it could, the republicans couldn't get it past the senate, or a presidential veto, or an override etc... etc...

It's just PR.

The Republicans saw what happened to Mitt Romney. They know that a large portion of the electorate doesn't think they're conservative enough and so won't bother to vote for them... This is how they're trying to address that issue. Nothing more substantive than that.

This still leaves the debt ceiling issue... and of course, incurring yet more federal debt is a bad thing. We are already at more than 105% of GDP (of course, that's far lower than most other nations, but it's still quite bad).

The debt ceiling thing is a sham too though... always has been, as is all the grandstanding surrounding it:



The Republicans can point and shout all they want, and "refuse to be a party to" etc... etc...

However, since it is quite literally impossible for any continuing appropriation to be passed that doesn't require increasing the debt ceiling... In fact, even without a continuing appropriation the debt ceiling will need to be increased (because of credit payments, entitlements, and other already legislated spending); the debt ceiling is GOING to be raised.

Either that, or an accounting trick will be used to do the same thing.

It's not a solution. It's a requirement of the circumstances.

Balancing the budget... that's a joke; given that we haven't actually PASSED a budget or OPERATED under a budget , since 1997. From 1998, the government hasn't been funded with a passed budget, it's been funded with omnibus spending and special appropropriation bills, and continuing resolutions.

In fact, since Obama was elected, we haven't even managed to pass an omnibus spending bill, and have exclusively funded the government with special appropriations and continuing resolutions.

The reality of the "debt ceiling" is, the U.S. is NOT going to default on its credit payments, under any circumstances.

In the first place, a U.S. credit default would trigger a world wide economic collapse and long term depression the likes of which have not been dreamed of outside of dystopian fiction.

So yeah... that's bad... let's not do that.

Even if that weren't true,  the politicians in this country are not going to let people miss entitlement payments... which is the whole reason why we don't have a budget in the first place...

Every politician in America knows that if they get blamed for their constituents missing a social security check, they are done... dead... never to be elected to anything, even dog catcher, again.

So, any threat not to raise the debt ceiling, or to have a true and complete government shutdown, really is just grandstanding.

Until we make serious cuts to entitlements, we are not going to have anything close to a balanced budget. No politician in this country who has actually managed to get elected and wants to be re-elected is going to EVER under any circumstances, vote to cut entitlements. Therefore we are never going to have a balanced budget again... or at least not until there is a real unavoidable crisis, where they can cover themselves by saying "we had to do it to save the country", and their opponents can only look like irresponsible liars if they try to say otherwise...

Of course, if this country weren't filled with economically and politically ignorant "citizens", then perhaps the electorate as a whole would understand that we've long past the point at which such a crisis could be avoided, and that something really needs to be done right now...

Unfortunately, what looked like it was going to be the first major group of voters working for entitlement cuts in this country, the "tea party"; was quickly overrun by a huge number of these idiots who, completely un-self aware were saying, with complete sincerity "get the government out of healthcare and welfare... but don't touch my social security and medicare".

The politicians noticed this... Particularly the smart ones... Like, say, Ted Cruz.

Obama gets a lesson in just how much delivery matters

At this point, no matter how far in the tank they may be, pretty much everyone has to acknowledge that Romney CRUSHED Obama in Oct 3rd debate.

Beyond crushed actually... Lefties are literally crying about the beating their guy took. And the thing is... They have no idea why.

Well, some do; but from the general commentariat I'm hearing a lot of "why didn't he go after him on his evil foul lies" etc... etc...

That is definitely NOT getting it.

Romney didn't win on the facts; though he certainly had those far enough in his favor. Romney won on his attitude, and his delivery.

 Obama dictated to you... Everyone who disagrees with him is wrong. Everything he says is right. All of his failures are just because you didn't do what he told you to do... and all your failures are either because you didn't follow his advice, or because some big bad greedy businessman did it to you.

Romney was trying to have a conversation with you. He was asking you to listen. He was saying "look, maybe I'm wrong, maybe I'm right... I don't care about being right, I just want to do what works".

Obama was the college professor neighbor you don't like, because he's always telling you how you're doing everything wrong, and how if you'd just follow his advice, you'd be just as good as he is at everything.

Romney was your smart, successful, nice neighbor, who coaches the baseball team, and is on the schoolboard trying to get the local high school back on track.

Obama stayed on message, hardcore, repeating his talking points to the point of irritating the entire country.

The message wasn't working.

He should have realized that talking points weren't going to work, and he should have gone extemporaneous... Though after what we've see the last four years, that may be as close to it as he gan get.

 Now, let's see how they try to spin this for Obama. Should be fun.