Jennifer Rubin isn't buying it:
First, public opinion, unlike punditry, is not instantaneously changed. People in a national poll (registered, not even likely, voters), most of whom are not in early primary states, get drips and drabs of the scandal. Until they get all the facts, talk to friends and family, watch the late-night comedians and soak up the coverage, they really can’t be expected to pronounce on the subject.
The WaPo looks at GOP voters' second choices.
"People are too hung up on people's baggage. Everybody has baggage! Let it go! This country is starved for leadership. Being able to manage the public perception is absolutely critical," – Herman Cain in 2007.
In one respect at least: the ACA is fast getting the under-26's – the least insured, most healthy segment of the population – into the system:
The provision of the law that permits young adults under 26, long the largest uninsured demographic in the country, to remain on their parents’ health insurance program resulted in at least 600,000 newly insured Americans during the first quarter of 2011. Wellpoint, the nation’s largest publicly traded health insurer with some 34 million customers, reports adding 280,000 new members in the first three months of 2011. Add in the results of some of the other large health insurers including Aetna, who added just short of 100,000 newly insured to their customer base, Kaiser Permanente’s additional 90,000, and Highmark’s 72,000 new customers, and we begin to sense our health insurance pools are filling up with some badly needed young blood.
The health insurance companies also had a bumper first quarter this year. Then this:
According to a Kaiser survey, there has been a 46% uptick in businesses with less than 10 employees offering health benefits as compared to last year.
I remain of the view that health insurance under the ACA is a plus for Obama next year. It truly baffles me why he and so many others in his useless excuse of a party seem incapable of defending their signature achievement.
Gallup's latest numbers somewhat minimize one of his strongest arguments. In two-way match-ups, Romney's lead over Obama is well within the margin of error, and Obama's lead over Cain is the same. Even with Perry, Obama's lead is only 5 points, just outside the margin. If Cain can show he has as much general election appeal as Romney, then one of Mitt's key primary arguments evaporates.
The other factor the poll brings to the fore is the enthusiasm gap. Republican hostility to Obama currently outpaces Democratic excitement in the election. Which is why, I suspect, some truly nasty, populist negative ads will be unleashed to damage Mitt if he gets the nod. And not from the Obama campaign directly.
"I've been as consistent as human beings can be," – Mitt Romney.
"A year ago the unemployment rate was 9.7 percent. During this time, nonfarm jobs have grown at an average monthly rate of 152,000 while civilian employment has grown at a rate of 140,000 per month. In other words, we don’t need 150,000 jobs per month just to keep the unemployment rate steady. Because of the aging of the labor force, 150,000 jobs per month is more than enough to push down the jobless rate.
Very quietly, without fanfare, private-sector payrolls have grown by 1.8 million in the past year, while the work week has lengthened and hourly cash wages are up 1.8 percent.
Total hours worked are up 1.7 percent in the past year. A 9 percent unemployment rate means the labor market is still far from operating at its full potential, but it is moving in the right direction as are other data. October chain store sales were up 3.7 percent versus a year ago, according to the International Council of Shopping Centers. This includes luxury department store sales (up 4.5 percent) and wholesale clubs, excluding fuel (up 7 percent). Meanwhile, compared to a year ago, core railcar loadings are up 5.8 percent, steel production is up 10.3 percent, and hotel occupancy rates are up 6.8 percent.
Again, there are no signs of recession. Instead, plenty of signs of continued growth," – Bob Stein, National Review.
Now the boy scouts jump on the hairy bandwagon?
Tod Kelly makes a key distinction:
The media treats sexual harassment cases similarly to the way they treat stories about secret mistresses. After all, it’s the sex that sells the story, right? … But sexual harassment isn’t the same as infidelity. Sexual harassment, at the end of the day, is about the abuse of power. What’s more, it’s about a particularly denigrating and malicious abuse of power. I would go so far as to say that if someone has a pattern of perpetrating sexual harassment, he is the last person you want in power over others – and you should vote accordingly.
My view entirely. We have contemporaneous eye-witnesses to one alleged victim's distress:
The sources describe how the woman recounted her allegations against Cain to two members of the restaurant association’s board – sources who include an acquaintance of the woman’s and a person who attended the restaurant association meeting at which the woman lodged her complaint. The sources say the woman told them Cain invited her to his hotel room at the event, and that both the context and the way Cain phrased the invitation made her feel extremely uncomfortable, even incensed.
Either he invited an employee to his hotel room at a social event, or he didn't. If he did, and she felt she had to leave her job subsequently because of how her complaint altered the workplace environment, then it matters. We need to lift the woman's gag-order, and get to the bottom of this.
The new jobs report finds that unemployment rate dropped a hair, to 9.0%. Felix Salmon is relatively upbeat:
No one’s opening any champagne this morning: the levels here are still atrocious. But at least there’s reason for hope that the economy is still above stall speed; I, for one, am much more sanguine about the prospects for a double-dip recession than I was a couple of months ago. If the jobs situation isn’t getting worse, that means America’s still growing, and that the recession’s still over. And it’s a lot easier to accelerate a recovery than it is to turn around a decline.
In the month of October, nonfarm payroll employment rose by 80,000 jobs—less than economists expected. The report was less disappointing than might be imagined given that number, however. The initial zero-job figure from August has now been revised up to an increase of 104,000, and September's total has also been revised up, to 158,000. That pace is scarcely enough to keep up with population growth, but it's considerably better than the economy managed in the early summer.
Hiring continues at a snail's pace. The economy is adding jobs, but it is doing so relatively slowly. At this rate, it would take about 4.5 years to get the unemployment rate back down to 5%. Although the nation does not appear to be headed back into recession, it also doesn't appear poised to enter a robust recovery.
[For a] reminder of why [high unemployment] is so alarming, the Hamilton Project has released a study looking, once more, at the heavy long-term toll that unemployment is taking on American workers. The numbers are grim: Two years after losing his or her job, the average worker will earn 48 percent less than previously. Even workers who do find new jobs end up making about 17 percent less, and based on history, those lower wages will likely persist for years to come
Chart from Calculated Risk.
The Dish 
