From the Wall Street Journal:

The Obama administration is considering a range of new measures to boost economic growth, including tax cuts and a new nationwide infrastructure program, according to people familiar with the discussions…

…in the mix: a possible payroll tax cut for businesses and individuals, as well as other business tax breaks, according to people familiar with the discussions…

A payroll tax cut would be the most useful thing Obama could do immediately for the economy – and for the people. But this also shows the level of desperation Democrats are reduced to – facing big losses in the fall, they are looking for expedients to just hold the line. Their thinking might be that a tax cut with a flourish enacted shortly before election day might give them a boost…might, that is, save the Senate for them, and prevent a complete blow out in the House.

If it works – I’m not so sure it will; given the attitude of the American people, such a move could backfire and be seen for a cynical, political ploy.

But, my fellow Americans, we’ve got them on the ropes – they are considering a dose of Reaganism two months in front of an election to boost their popularity!

From Ed Morrisey over at Hot Air:

Remember when both the Republican and Democratic Parties tried to insist that Arlen Specter was the only path to victory in Pennsylvania? A new poll by Reuters and Ipsos puts a stake through the heart of that argument once and for all. Pat Toomey leads Joe Sestak in the Senate race by ten points, but Arlen Specter would be losing it to Toomey by 12…

Morrisey notes that with the gubernatorial race also slipping away from the Democrats, the votes down ballot for House seats may also crater for the Democrats. Pennsylvania could end up quite red on November 2nd.

More and more, “wheels coming off the cart” describes the Democrats’ predicament.

Just never seen anything like this:

Republicans lead by 51% to 41% among registered voters in Gallup weekly tracking of 2010 congressional voting preferences. The 10-percentage-point lead is the GOP’s largest so far this year and is its largest in Gallup’s history of tracking the midterm generic ballot for Congress…

There is no way to know if this level of support – and the incredible enthusiasm of GOP voters – will hold true until November, but generally what is happening around Labor Day holds true for the remainder of the election season. All signs point to significant GOP gains on November 2nd.

The only question, as noted below, is what the GOP will do with it?

From The Hill:

Democrats are undercutting their campaign message by condemning Republican economic policies while calling for the extension of Bush-era tax cuts.

“It’s hard to say the Republican economic policies were bad, [and] then continue them,” Paul Begala, Democratic strategist and former advisor to President Clinton, told The Hill. “That is a bit of a mixed message.”…

But they also don’t want to have a huge tax increase looming on November 2nd. Some of them are also smart enough to realize that if the tax cuts of 2001 expire, it will kill of what remains of the economy, thereby killing the Democrats’ 2012 chances. Problem is, they spent the last 8 years saying they were “tax cuts for the wealthy” and promising to do away with them – and the left wing base is still insistent that those evil, wicked rich people (but not people like Jay Rockefeller and George Soros) get what’s coming to them.

It is quite a problem, isn’t it? What to do?

I suspect they’ll try to punt – some sort of cosmetic move to extend some tax cuts and allow others to expire and hope to goodness its enough to defuse the issue for November. I doubt it will work – any failure to extend the entire tax cut package will be painted (correctly) as voting for a tax increase. In the end, inability to finesse the issue will likely result in inaction – and so the GOP will still be able to paint the Democrats as tax-increasers.

Now, if the Democrats had only been honest about the tax cuts from the get go, they wouldn’t have this problem. Far from being tax cuts for the rich, they were tax cuts on the productive economy. Absent Democrat hate-mongering, the Democrats would be well placed to just extend the cuts…or, better yet, they cuts would never have had a sunset provision to begin with.

Ah, what tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive!

Because it doesn’t matter how you win, just as long as you do, as far as our Democrats are concerned – from Fox News:

Sens. Russ Feingold of Wisconsin and Michael Bennet of Colorado are just two incumbents locked in tight re-election races in states where local officials have warned they will likely not be able to ship out general election ballots to overseas military voters by the Sept. 18 deadline.

Both Democrats’ race are listed as “toss-ups” by RealClearPolitics.com, and military ballots could make the difference…

A total of 10 States are seeking a waiver and there simply cannot be a reason for such. This isn’t rocket science – its just a matter of mailing the dratted things out. Given that this is military ballots, failure works out to an un-American act…and no person who knows the history of Democrat electoral corruption will be surprised that a lot of the affected States have Democrats locked in tight battles.

Matt and I over the years have chronicled the Democrats’ endless attempts to disenfranchise military voters – Democrats don’t like military votes because military personnel tend to back candidates with at least some common sense and some willingness to put country first, and this excludes most elected Democrats. It is simply disgusting that Democrats would do this – but also par for the course.

If we are awarded power by the American people in November, it will be our job to investigate all of the corruption which has gone on under Democrat rule. And finding why military votes keep getting spiked by Democrats will be a top priority.

Yet another once-safe Democrat seat in peril:

New polling in the California senate race has moved that race to Toss-Up status from Leans Democratic in the Rasmussen Reports Balance of Power Rankings. In the latest polling conducted on Tuesday Night Carly Fiorina and Barbara Boxer are virtually tied…

Barbara “Ma’am” Boxer is an entrenched member of the Ruling Class – and is a perfect example of same. Arrogant, out of touch and hopelessly ultra-liberal in outlook, her contempt for common sense is matched only for her disdain for the views of the people. Beating her would be the ultimate signal – even more so than beating Harry Reid – that new times are coming to America.

Those are the numbers, respectively, of Democrat and GOP House seats at risk in 2010 – from Pajamas Media:

…The RCP survey suggests that 108 of the Democrats’ 256 seats are at risk, while only 15 of the Republicans’ 179 House seats are in play. If one removes seats that RCP believes are competitive but likely to be retained by the party currently in control, 86 Democratic-held seats and only seven Republican-held seats are in play. With a net shift of 39 required to give the Republicans control of the House, and the generic ballot polling showing the biggest leads for the GOP in the cycle (several in the 6-7% range, Rasmussen at 12%), it is not hard to see why many analysts are increasing their estimates of the size of the potential Republican gains…

Quite honestly, the Democrats could lose not just all those 108, but even more – it all depends on who turns out. Polling models are dependent upon past election results and the skill of the pollster in reading political tea leaves – in other words, a bit of facts and a bit of guess work. In order not to look like a fool, smart pollsters are very cautious in their guess work. If the polling models being used hold true in November, then we won’t see much difference between the final polls and the actual results – but if things become optimal for the GOP (ie, we get the best turnout we can, Democrats get the worst they can), then the final results could be astounding.

But, best not to work on that assumption. Lots of things can happen over the next 10 weeks – but things are clearly bright, and brightening, for the GOP.

The hardest task for the GOP is in the Senate. The linked article notes that Joe Lieberman might be induced to caucus with a 50 seat GOP, so even a net gain of 9 might do it…but even getting that sort of a net gain is going to require one heck of a good GOP year. We might get it, but nothing is sure.

Naturally:

ShoreBank, a Chicago-area community lender praised by Democrats, was taken over by the government Friday and its assets sold.

Chicago-area Democrats pushed hard for regulators to extend bailout money to the bank from the government’s $700 billion aid program. The bank was praised by President Clinton and numerous other lawmakers and industry players. The bank was started in the 1970s…

Now I’d like there to be a minute examination of the banks books – if Democrats wanted to save this bank, there must be something screwy going on in there. They just don’t do that for any, old bank – always, always Democrats direct their bail out efforts towards those people and institutions which help Democrats. And I am doubly interested because it is a Chicago-area bank…not an area of the country noted for business and political ethics.

From Ramussen:

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of Likely Voters in Arkansas shows Boozman capturing 65% of the vote, while Lincoln earns 27% support. Four percent (4%) like some other candidate in the race, and three percent (3%) are not sure…

Lincoln won 56% of the vote in 2004, in a GOP year in a red State…she’s toast, and so are the rest of her sorry Democrats.

From the Wall Street Journal via NewsAlert:

…Another notable episode occurred during his pursuit (as special prosecutor) of former Vice Presidential chief of staff Scooter Libby in the Valerie Plame affair. At a 2005 press conference, Mr. Fitzgerald implied that Mr. Libby had obstructed his investigation into who leaked the former CIA analysts’s name, even though he knew from the start that the real “leaker” was Richard Armitage.

Then there was the railroading of Conrad Black, the conservative newspaper baron who was convicted in 2007 using the infinitely malleable “honest services” fraud law. The Supreme Court junked much of that law earlier this year, leading to Mr. Black’s release from prison. The jury had earlier dismissed nine of the 13 charges Mr. Fitzgerald filed.

This pattern points to a willful prosecutor who throws an exaggerated book at unpopular defendants and hopes at least one of the charges will stick, even as he flouts due process and the presumption of innocence when the political winds are high…

Indeed – and in the Blago case, I think that Fitzgerald deliberately moved far too soon in order to spare high Obama aides from possible prosecution. It is clear that Blago wasn’t just out there selling a Senate seat all on his lonesome – he had prospective customers and all of them had some sort of Obama connection.

This is enough travesty of justice from one man – it is time for Fitzgerald to go.

But only a little bit – from Yahoo News:

A federal jury found former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich guilty on Tuesday of one count of lying to federal agents, and the judge said he intends to declare a mistrial on the more serious remaining 23 counts…

This is probably the ultimate result of the prosecutor moving on the case before the full scale of the scandal was uncovered…and, of course, before it became close enough to Obama people to result in indictments.

Blago will now probably get a slap on the wrist, and a pardon on January 19th, 2013…and Chicago corruption will continue on its merry way.

HAT TIP: Sister Toldjah

From NRO’s Campaign Spot:

In the most recent Gallup poll, the generic ballot shows Republicans ahead of Democrats, 50 percent to 43 percent.

The GOP’s seven-point margin is the largest they have enjoyed since . . . the dawn of creation, according to Gallup’s chart.

Strangely, the GOP had a five-point margin in July 1994, but the generic ballot remained tied in August and November.

That last bit is very important – in 1994 with the generic ballot tied up, the GOP still scored historic gains. This is because of the oddity of polling – it always understates GOP strength. There are a lot of theories for this, none of them completely convincing – I don’t bother with them any longer: I just always mentally add 2-3 points to the GOP for polls of likely voters, 3-5 points for polls of registered voters and 5-7 points for polls of adults – it works very well.

Right now, with a 7 point lead, if the election were held today, the Democrats would be utterly crushed. Will this polling sustain itself in to November? No way to tell – but unless things turn around very fast for the Democrats, they are looking at some pretty serious losses on November 2nd.

There seems to be serious consideration having Ted’s widow run for his old seat:

Nearly one year after Edward M. Kennedy’s death, prominent Democrats in Washington and Massachusetts are promoting his widow as the party’s best shot at winning back the Senate seat he held for nearly five decades.

Though she has seemed to bat down the idea of challenging Sen. Scott Brown (R) in 2012, Victoria Reggie Kennedy has been in some ways acting the part of a candidate. She has raised her public profile by campaigning for other politicians and appearing at events across the country…

A party so bereft of ideas and candidates that they can’t think of anything else in Massachusetts than to drag out another Kennedy is a party on its way down.

Rep. Paul Ryan, on the scene of the melt down, reports:

Rep. Paul Ryan (R., Wis.), the ranking member of the House Budget Committee, tells National Review Online that Democrats are entering a “panic mode” as November approaches. “They are beginning to get a little unhinged,” Ryan says.

“The Left sees their agenda being rebuked by the voters this fall,” Ryan tells us. As their electoral worries mount, he says, Democrats are scurrying to “nullify any notion that there is an alternative path for America. They want to delegitimize an alternative plan and win the argument by default, making the case that there is no other path for America than what progressives have mapped out for the country, and that any other talk, of any other idea, is just fanciful.”

“That’s what’s troubling,” Ryan says. “They are trying to deny the debate that must happen if we are going to get out of the mess that we’re in.”…

The dream of decades is dying – they thought that McGovern would do it; but he lost. They thought that Carter might pull it off; but he was defeated for re-election. They thought that Clinton would ram it on through; but he betrayed them and tacked to the center to ensure his own political survival. Now comes Obama – and the left was sure they had it in the bag.

And to a certain extent, they did – a hard left ideologue was elected along with a Congress led by the furthest left part of the Democrat party. And President and Congress did start to work – but then something happened the left never expected: the people immediately reacted against it. And then it just got worse and worse – the people started to spontaneously organize and began to exert populist pressure on the GOP to shift towards the people. Capping it all off, the liberal prescription for the economy – which all liberals were convinced would work – crashed and burned.

Now they are facing a complete rejection – not just the normal mid-term losses, but the risk of the sort of losses you spend 20 years recovering from. 20 years in which, of course, the other side can repeal and replace everything you’ve done. Faced with this stark fact, they are getting in a panic – not knowing what to do, they are running around trying one expedient after another to survive.

It won’t work – its too late in the game…

From Kaus (a Democrat, by the way) – Democrats running away from what they thought would be their signature issue:

Democrats’ talking points for summer campaigning don’t even mention health care reform. Wow. … I’m still in favor of the bill that passed. It’s a historic achievement. (We can fix it later if necessary.) But what does it say about the President’s salesmanship that his party doesn’t dare bring up what he spent the first half of his term accomplishing? …

Ramming it through seems to have worked out badly, huh?

Our job, as Republicans, is to just keep reminding the people of what the Democrats have done – they did ObamaCare; they did Stimulus; they botched the oil spill response; they are suing Arizona…just keep hammering them with their own actions. They are unpopular and trying to hide – turn the lights on ‘em and watch them scatter!

Its almost as if they are trying to scare us: Vote Republican and we’ll do our worst!

Carol Browner, the White House’s top energy and environmental adviser, refused on Sunday to shut the door on passing climate change legislation this year — even though Senate Democratic leaders have conceded they lack the votes and have punted on the volatile issue.

Browner said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that President Barack Obama is still committed to pushing the bill through the Senate, and that there was “potential” for the bill to come up in a post-election, lame-duck session of Congress…

Careful there, Ms. Browner, you don’t want to spark a revolution – and trying to ram through Congress a series of bills which were essentially just rejected by the voters would cause a wave of outrage and revulsion in the United States. Wait for the votes to be cast – if Democrats retain a full Congressional majority, then no harm/no foul in using a lame duck session…but if either or both houses go GOP, then in propriety no major issue should be taken up until the new Congress is sworn in.

Larry Kudlow lays out some possibilities – all of them bad:

…Already there are rumors of an August surprise (to use the phrase of business columnist Jimmy Pethokoukis) where Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac forgive underwater mortgages held by millions of Americans. And with state and local government jobs having fallen 169,000 year-to-date, perhaps the Democratic Congress and the White House will seek an even bigger spending plan for teachers and Medicaid workers — on top of the $26 billion plan that just passed the Senate.

Or maybe the Democrats will come up with a new infrastructure-spending bill, perhaps for green technologies and whatnot. Or maybe they’ll extend unemployment benefits even more. My liberal friend Robert Reich is even talking up the New Deal’s Works Progress Administration (WPA), where the government employed millions during the 1930s…

All of which is possible for two reasons:

1. Democrats haven’t figured out that the Keynesian economic model is flat wrong. It doesn’t work – it can’t work; you can’t print, borrow and spend your way in to wealth. But, Democrats remain wedded to it.

2. Democrats don’t conceive of any policy move which doesn’t have them dispensing taxpayer money in return for votes. If there isn’t an immediate and direct benefit to Democrats, why do it?

So, the sort of policies which would save the day – even at this late a date – simply won’t be tried. And thus we’re stuck with the very real prospect of the Democrats doing all or some of what is listed above – and all of that would simply make matters worse.

Fundamentally, only a change of government can allow us to start the economic recovery – Step One in that comes in November, but it must be kept in mind that the actual levers of power will remain in Obama’s hands until at least January 20th, 2013. This could get very ugly.

From Zombie:

Combined, the new 2010 allegations and the original 1974 allegations accuse Shirley and Charles Sherrod of:

• Paying farm workers as little as 67¢ per hour, far below minimum wage for the era.
• Employing underage children to perform hard labor.
• Compelling their employees to work in unsafe conditions, including getting sprayed with pesticides.
• Firing any workers who acted as whistleblowers.
• Forcing employees to work overtime in the fields at night with practically no advance notice.
• Having a capricious payscale under which employees doing the exact same jobs were paid different amounts according to the whims of the managers.
• Being unwilling to address the abuse even after it was raised by union representatives.
• Seriously mismanaging the farm to such an extent that it went bankrupt…

I saw the original article over at Counter Punch (certainly one of the most entertaining hard-left websites around, but never take everything they say at face value), but held off on talking about it. I tried to get the author of the original article to clarify a few things for me (I wanted to know if government money was used, as well as a few other things), but I received no reply. It is a searing indictment of the Sherrods – and this latest update just makes it more so.

It is a sad fact that while liberals often talk a great game of helping the poor they often end up being the most ruthless exploiters of the poor out there. And this is for both political and economic exploitation. Liberals have always had this problem of not being able to take the poor as they are – as people who have their own ideas, dreams, fears and needs. The Sherrods wanted to help – and the people would be helped, no matter how much it hurt, it would seem.

Such is the long, sad tale of liberals who are always trying to create a utopia for others. Shirley Sherrod is more than just a face on a video, it would seem – she’s a hard-left operator who has a trail of troubles running out behind her. The big question now is: just how did she get hired for anything, given her record?