The Official 2012 Presidential Election Thread

[The Mad Monk]

CHRIS MATTHEWS: I am so proud of the country. To reelect this president and overcoming -- not because of the partisanship or even the policies. Here's an African-American guy with an unusual background -- part immigrant background, part African-American background -- with all this assault on him from day one. From Mitch McConnell, from the clowns out there that will never be elected, never will be to anything.

And the way he took it, as someone said, with coolness and charm and dignity and took it and took it and kept moving forward and doing his job. And the American people, and I know we look at these percentage, 40% of white vote. Fine. That's about right among Democrats in the last couple cycles, three cycles or four. Good work for them. Good work for him. A good day for America.

I'm so glad we had that storm last week because I think the storm was one of those things. No, politically I should say. Not in terms of hurting people. The storm brought in possibilities for good politics.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2012/11/07/chris_matthews_im_so_glad_we_had_that_storm_last_week.html

Ima killim.

[MRT144]

Real Inflation via Shadow Stats is the best part of that chart.

[Ben Kenobi]

AFAIK employees of the catholic church in germany (not sure about priests ... talking about normal employees like teachers or administration employees) aren´t forced to get a contract with a catholic insurance agency but are free to keep the health insurance contract they have (even if it is one from a national insurance agency).

Not sure about that, I'm just going on what some other German Catholics have told me. I have a good friend who's now a priest in the Lake Constanz area. I do know the priests are covered by the Church itself and your system is a bit different from many others.

Cannot say anything about Obamacare of course, but doesn´t it provide employers with the choice to either provide their employees with a sufficient health insurance (meaning that is also can be from a private company) or pay for Obamacare?

No, it doesn't give them that option. That's the problem.

[Ben Kenobi]

The DJIA averaged less than 11,000 in the year 2000 and is now at around 13,000 which is a 18% increase. Assuming blue chips give you a quarterly dividend of around .4% (guessing it's higher) and you reinvest those dividends over the past twelve years that's an extra 20% return on investment for a total of ~40%. Consumer price index is around 30% higher now than it was in 2000. If this is in an IRA it doesn't look like a loss of money to me.

Dow peak in 2000 was 11722, whereas it's just 13k today. Which is an 11 percent increase over 12 years, growth of under a percent a year. Using CPI since 2000, I get 34 and change percent inflation, so inflation has outpaced the Dow over the last 12 years. You'd have lost 23 percent of your money not counting dividends.

http://www.usinflationcalculator.com/

http://www.google.com/finance?cid=983582

[Lorizael]

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2012/11/07/chris_matthews_im_so_glad_we_had_that_storm_last_week.html

Ima killim.

Yeah. That's pretty disgusting on multiple levels.

[DinoDoc]

Few people watch his show anyway.

[rah]

Hey ben, since you said,

My argument is exactly what I said - that someone who invested in a DOW JONES index fund in 2000,

Isn't it kind of dishonest to use the peak in all of 2000 for your comparison.? What percentage of people do you think invested at the exact moment of that peak?

[SlowwHand]

I'm going to pass this conversation on to you all, with the full expectation that there will be unkind and obnoxious remarks. That's OK.

My daughter's birthday is today. She's now 32. She went to bed crying last night and woke up crying this morning, because she's scared. She's afraid about Israel and Iran and our government sitting back while the world explodes. When I found this out, it made me furious. So I thought about it for a while and called her back. This is what I told her, what I'm telling myself and what I'll tell anyone willing to listen. Don't put so much faith in Romney, or in any man or woman. She should be able to put her faith in me, but who she really needs to put her faith in is God. I'll do my best to never let her down again in my life, but God most definitely won't let her down. Keep the faith. Ya gotta believe.

[Imran Siddiqui]

I'm going to pass this conversation on to you all, with the full expectation that there will be unkind and obnoxious remarks. That's OK.

My daughter's birthday is today. She's now 32. She went to bed crying last night and woke up crying this morning, because she's scared. She's afraid about Israel and Iran and our government sitting back while the world explodes. When I found this out, it made me furious. So I thought about it for a while and called her back. This is what I told her, what I'm telling myself and what I'll tell anyone willing to listen. Don't put so much faith in Romney, or in any man or woman. She should be able to put her faith in me, but who she really needs to put her faith in is God. I'll do my best to never let her down again in my life, but God most definitely won't let her down. Keep the faith. Ya gotta believe.

Good advice

Though, I wonder why you were furious. Because the election made her react that way or because your 32 year old daughter was acting so over-the-top? I guess its a mark of just how crazy things have gotten in this country where people have those type of reactions to a Presidential vote. Both sides have been telling themselves that the other person is the anti-Christ and thus, stuff like this happens.

[SlowwHand]

It makes me furious that the country has lost her confidence. She's hardly the only one, Imran. Throw in that she has a 4 year old son and it's not about her scared about her.
Someday you'll know about that feeling.

[dannubis]

I'm going to pass this conversation on to you all, with the full expectation that there will be unkind and obnoxious remarks. That's OK.

My daughter's birthday is today. She's now 32. She went to bed crying last night and woke up crying this morning, because she's scared. She's afraid about Israel and Iran and our government sitting back while the world explodes. When I found this out, it made me furious. So I thought about it for a while and called her back. This is what I told her, what I'm telling myself and what I'll tell anyone willing to listen. Don't put so much faith in Romney, or in any man or woman. She should be able to put her faith in me, but who she really needs to put her faith in is God. I'll do my best to never let her down again in my life, but God most definitely won't let her down. Keep the faith. Ya gotta believe.

That, or you could be wondering why she was afraid so much she cried herself to sleep.

[-Jrabbit]

I'm still struggling with the concept that an insurance plan offering contraception is sufficient to rouse the ire of God and cause rejection of the entire package. My health insurance covers all kinds of elective things that I want no part of; doesn't mean I have to partake, and it certainly doesn't mean I support them. But there are people who need and/or prefer those treatments, so they are part of the standard plan. And I'm OK with that.

And it should be pointed out, there are totally legitimate medical uses for birth control pills that have nothing to do with preventing conception.

--------

I also want to point out that Ben's claim that the had such a great year financially in 2008 is especially interesting and/or disingenuous in light of the fact that he lived in Canada at the time.

[Imran Siddiqui]

It makes me furious that the country has lost her confidence. She's hardly the only one, Imran. Throw in that she has a 4 year old son and it's not about her scared about her.
Someday you'll know about that feeling.

To be frank, it seems like a complete overreaction to me. I mean I knew people who were in a similar state when George W. Bush won his second term. I think we all need to step back and see the forest for the trees and realize that these elections aren't as life or death as some people make them out to be. Even if you think the resident of the Oval Office is horrid, the country bounces back. The Office of the Presidency and this country are far more than one man.

[MrFun]

To be frank, it seems like a complete overreaction to me. I mean I knew people who were in a similar state when George W. Bush won his second term. I think we all need to step back and see the forest for the trees and realize that these elections aren't as life or death as some people make them out to be. Even if you think the resident of the Oval Office is horrid, the country bounces back. The Office of the Presidency and this country are far more than one man.

Besides, the Republicans in US Congress can still keep on obstructing economic recovery bills, like they have the past four years. I'm surprised Slowwy's daughter is not upset with those Republicans.

[MrFun]

The polls provided by Huffington Post shows that Obama not only won 300+ electoral votes, but he also won the majority of the popular vote.