U.S. Senate leader at risk in healthcare battle

Other than President Barack Obama, perhaps no one's political future is riding more on the U.S. Senate battle to revamp the healthcare system than the chamber's Democratic majority leader, Harry Reid.

With Reid already in danger of being unseated in next year's congressional election, the fight over the Democratic president's top domestic priority gives him a chance to prove his clout to voters in his home state of Nevada.

If Reid helps pass what proves to be a popular bill, he will earn new power and respect, and increase his prospects for winning a fifth, six-year Senate term in November 2010.

But if the bill fails or draws public contempt, the Senate leader will be pinned with much of the blame, increasing chances that Republicans will unseat him and perhaps other Democrats next year.

Reid effectively raised the bar with recent campaign ads that describe him as "the most powerful senator Nevada's ever had," said Jennifer Duffy, who tracks Senate races for the nonpartisan Cook Political Report.

To be sure, all of the Senate's 100 lawmakers have much riding on the healthcare outcome.

"No matter how they vote, a portion of their constituency is going to be angry," Duffy said.

"In some ways, Democrats are damned if they do and damned if they don't," said Paul Light of New York University's Center for the Study of Congress. "If they don't pass it, it's a failure of achievement. If they pass it, they will have to deal with implementation, which could be problematic."

Round one of the Senate floor fight starts on Saturday when Reid and his fellow Democrats will seek to clear the first procedural hurdle -- mustering 60 votes to begin debate on the legislation.

Republicans, led by Senator Mitch McConnell, are also at a crossroads.

If they stop the bill, they will be hailed by their party's conservative base, which has denounced the plan as an excessive federal reach into the private sector. But if Republicans fail to block it -- and some of them cross the aisle and back it -- they will be pilloried by members of their party's increasingly vocal right wing.

Last year, they blasted McConnell and others for backing a $700 billion bailout of Wall Street. They have also accused Republicans of letting Democrats increase federal spending and the size of the U.S. government.

'TOUGH SPOT'

"McConnell is in a tough spot," said Ethan Siegal of the Washington Exchange, a private firm that tracks Congress for institutional investors. "He has to deliver on something -- stopping the bill -- that may be undeliverable" if Democrats stick together, Siegal said.

If the Senate passes a bill and the measure eventually drives down costs and extends coverage to millions of uninsured Americans, Obama and his fellow Democrats will bask in a historic achievement.

But if Obama signs legislation into law and it backfires, complicating the relationship between patients and their doctors or costing far more than expected, the president and his fellow Democrats could feel the heat for years.

And that could help Republicans pick up seats in Congress, beginning in next year's election, though key elements of the measure would not go into effect until 2014.

Defeat of the legislation could further erode public support for Obama, whose approval rating has fallen since taking office in January from above 60 percent to about 50 percent.

A politically wounded Obama would undermine Democrats' chances to retain their robust majorities in the Senate and House of Representatives in the 2010 election as well as dim his chances for a second term.

Socialist Obama & Democrats Destroying America

This article is from speaknowamerica.org and always makes me laugh. The contact information is in the body of the article if you e-mail this person. They seem pretty level-headed.

Socialist Barack Hussein Obama, Comrade Pelosi, Harry Reid, and the Democrats want to destroy the American economy. By destroying the economy they get more power and control. For these socialist it’s all about power and control. Socialist Obama has been President for less than 75 days. With the help of Comrade Pelosi and Reid the socialist Obama has amassed more debt for America than all previous Presidents combined. In conjunction with this drunken spending binge the Federal Reserve has cranked up the printing press and is turning out 100’s billions of dollars.

Every day the socialists come up with more spending plans. What has all of this spending and proposed spending done for America and the economy? For America it has put our children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren so deep in debt they’ll never be able to pay it all off.

The economy with trillions of dollars already spent is in a steep downward spiral. Unemployment is going up each day. Manufacturing is declining daily. The socialists Obama, Reid, and Comrade Pelosi have a new solution every day. It’s simple they come up with another spending plan. More money America doesn’t have.

There is only one answer to the crazy socialist actions. They want to destroy America. The socialists want to destroy the American economy, they want to destroy democracy and the capitalist society. Socialist Obama, Reid, and comrade Pelosi want to make America socialist.

To help pay for these stimulus bills and the pork these socialists are selling America to foreigners. Foreigners are buying American property sight unseen. Even worse the Chinese have lent America more than a trillion dollars so far and now China is already starting to tell the socialists what to do.

The socialists are destroying America. They are eliminating the chance for our children to have a chance at the American dream. The socialists’ bailouts and stimulus bills are destroying this great country. Socialist Obama, Reid, Comrade Pelosi, and the Democrats want to destroy America.

America don’t let the socialist behavior of President Barack Hussein Obama and the socialist Democrats destroy America. Join with SpeakNowAmerica.org today! We are ready to defend our rights and tell the truth the socialist main stream media won’t tell you. Join us America to protect your rights, your country, and your money. Comment here and email us at YourVoice@speaknowamerica.org. Help us and be part of bringing our Great country back.

Liberals smarter than conservatives, Republicans smarter than Democrats

The General Social Survey includes a ten item vocabulary test, coded WORDSUM, which is likely strongly correlated with intelligence. This is an opportunity for us to determine whether liberals and Democrats are smarter than conservatives and Republicans.

For the purpose of this comparison, I consider a high vocabulary score to be 9 or 10 correct answers on the vocabulary test (WORDSUM 9-10).

LIBERALS ARE SMARTER THAN CONSERVATIVES

Of those who consider themselves “liberal” or “extremely liberal” (POLVIEWS 1-2), 20.8% had high vocabulary scores.

Of whose who consider themselves “conservative” or “extremely conservative” (POLVIEWS 6-7), only 13.8% had high vocabulary scores.

REPUBLICANS ARE SMARTER THAN DEMOCRATS

Of those who identify as Republican (PARTYID 5-6), 15.6% had high vocabulary scores.

Of those who identify as Democrats (PARTYID 0-1), only 11.9% had high vocabulary scores.

ANALYSIS

This is an extremely surprising result. Because there is a strong correlation between liberal and Democrat, and between conservative and Republican, I would have assumed that if something were true for liberals it would also be true for Democrats, and the same for conservatives and Republicans.

My hypothesis is that people consider many factors when determining if they are liberal or conservative, including leftist or rightist orientation (leftist being liberal), religiosity (religious being conservative), and attitudes corresponding to what’s considered “Openness” in the Five Factor personality model (with Openness being liberal).

But when people decide which party to vote for, a major factor is how much money they make and/or what social class they consider themselves a part of. People who are of a higher social class or make more money (both of these factors correlating with higher intelligence) are more likely to vote Republican.