Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

It's good to know that The Arizona Republic(an) editors do not care about the temperament, character and judgment of the candidates they endorse. How else could they endorse the shameless shapeshifter and pathological liar, Willard "Mittens" Romney? And what does that say about the character and judgment of the editors?

The Washington Post's fact checker Glenn Kessler takes a look at the new Romney ad "The Obama Plan" and captions his fact check A ‘greatest hits’ of misleading Romney claims:

As we enter into the final weeks of this bruising presidential campaign, we expect to hear all sorts of poll-tested, factually-challenged messages again and again — simply because the campaigns have data that shows these claims resonate with votes.

In that vein, a new ad released by the Romney campaign is almost a “greatest hits” version of claims that have been thoroughly debunked by fact checkers, including this column. Let’s spin the record once again!

The Facts

“The debt will grow from 16 trillion to 20 trillion dollars”

Here, the Romney campaign is using “gross debt,” which includes U.S. Treasury bonds held by Social Security and Medicare. Generally, what matters for the federal budget is the publicly held debt, particularly the percentage of debt compared to the overall economy (gross domestic product.) The House GOP budget plan authored by Romney’s running mate, Rep. Paul Ryan, for instance focuses on its impact on publicly-held debt, no gross debt.

Even taking the Ryan budget plan at face value, it would do little better than the Obama plan over four years — gross debt would rise to $19 trillion in four years. Moreover, as we have often noted, a good chunk of the increase in the deficit under Obama was due to the Great Recession.

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

I told you months ago that it did not matter whom the Republicans selected as their nominee. The nominee could be caught with a dead hooker or a live boy and The Arizona Republic(an) would still endorse the GOP nominee, just as it has always has.

The Arizona Republic(an) is, after all, the media arm of the Arizona Republican Party. This greatly diminishes the value of its endorsements. Its endorsements are not based upon thoughtful, reasoned consideration of the policy positions of the candidates nor which candidate posesses the best temperament, character and judgment to lead.

True to form, The Arizona Republic(an) endorsed Willard "Mittens" Romney on Sunday. You're shocked, I'm sure (not!) Romney can lead economy forward. The editors' reasoning is pure Robert Robb Goldwater Institute and Chamber of Commerce Ayn Rand "invisible hand of the free market place" utopian nonsense:

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

Steve Benen today reminds us of a GOP talking point from the past that the GOP would just as soon have everyone forget in an Emily Litella moment — "Never mind." Worst. Socialist. Ever.:

In 2004, a Bush cabinet official said job creation and GDP numbers matter, but "the stock market is … the final arbiter" of economic success.

If that's true, eight years later, Republicans ought to be awfully impressed with President Obama.

Through Friday, since Mr. Obama's inauguration — his first 1,368 days in office — the Dow Jones industrial average has gained 67.9 percent. That's an extremely strong performance — the fifth best for an equivalent period among all American presidents since 1900. The Bespoke Investment Group calculated those returns for The New York Times.

The best showing occurred in Franklin D. Roosevelt's first term, when the market rose by a whopping 238.1 percent. Of course, that followed a calamitous decline. When his term started, the Dow had fallen to one-fourth of its former peak. In 2008, the year before Mr. Obama took office, the Dow declined by roughly one-third.

In the last half-century, the president who's overseen the strongest performance on Wall Street was Bill Clinton. The second best? Barack Obama, easily.

As we talked about in April, this also suggests Obama is the worst socialist of all time. A soaring stock market, record high corporate profits, private sector job growth … it's almost as if the president didn't listen to Karl Marx at all.

All joking aside, I don't consider major Wall Street indexes a reliable metric when it comes to measuring the health of the economy. Indeed, it's not even close.

But here's the kicker: Obama's detractors do consider major Wall Street indexes a reliable metric when it comes to measuring the health of the economy.

Posted by AzBlueMeanie: The Voices & Choices series of lectures continues this week with "Win, Lose or Draw: Cartoon Humor in Campaigns," featuring the Arizona Daily Star's cartoonist David Fitzsimmons, and conservative cartoonist Steve Kelley, moderated by UofA Communication Professor Kate Kenski.  

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

The Obama campaign is up with a new ad today entitled "Rebuilding." Description:

Voiceover:

"A decade of war that cost us dearly and now for president a clear choice. President Obama ended the Iraq war. Mitt Romney would have left 30,000 troops in Iraq and called bringing them home tragic. Obama's brought 30,000 soldiers back from Afghanistan and has a responsible plan to end the war. Romney calls it Obama's 'biggest mistake'. It's time to stop fighting over there and start rebuilding here."

Video below the fold.

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

As I have been posting about for some time, the foreign policy advisers to Willard "Mittens" Romney are the very same Bush-Cheney regime Neocon war mongers responsible for the greatest intelligence failures in U.S. history and for propagandizing this country into an unnecesary and illegal war in Iraq. Romney is getting the boys in the band back together for another tour, this time in Syria and Iran.

Ari Berman at The Nation writes Mitt Romney's Neocon War Cabinet:

Romney is loath to mention Bush on the campaign trail, for obvious reasons, but today they sound like ideological soul mates on foreign policy. Listening to Romney, you’d never know that Bush left office bogged down by two unpopular wars that cost America dearly in blood and treasure. Of Romney’s forty identified foreign policy advisers, more than 70 percent worked for Bush. Many hail from the neoconservative wing of the party, were enthusiastic backers of the Iraq War and are proponents of a US or Israeli attack on Iran. Christopher Preble, a foreign policy expert at the Cato Institute, says, “Romney’s likely to be in the mold of George W. Bush when it comes to foreign policy if he were elected.” On some key issues, like Iran, Romney and his team are to the right of Bush. Romney’s embrace of the neoconservative cause—even if done cynically to woo the right—could turn into a policy nightmare if he becomes president. […]

I hope Parker doesn't look too dark in this picture, so I am not accused of racism by the GOP… By Michael Bryan I recently took a close look at the CD9 Congressional Debate between Vernon Parker and Kyrsten Sinema (and some obnoxious Libertarian perennial candidate), and one exchange really stood out for me: Kyrsten … Read more