Here's a crucial nugget of info for everyone. Last night our restaurant had more deliveries called in for us totake than the equivalent day two of the GOP convention.  Much of these orders were unrelated to the conventions of course, but last night I did notice a few people watching the convention, the week before I don't remember anyone watching.  Didn't work last Thursday night so I won't be able to compare with tonites numbers.   

    There is so much ridiculous Nazi talk in US policy about someone being "like Hitler" or "like the Nazis" for advocating all sorts of different policies.  One thing thats intrigued me is what the Nazi government did in the matter of taxation, especially in the years before the war.  I'd like to know what happened to income tax rates under their regime.  From a superficial perspective of Nazi= right wing, I'm sure alot of people would guess that the Hitler regime either drastically lowered income tax rates or maybe even abolished the income tax to rely on a sales tax perhaps.  I don't believe this is actually the case.
     Anyway, if anyone knows anything about this I'd love to know more about this. I've looked around the internet but haven't found much.

     I find the politics and implications of immigration into the US fascinating.  To me it seems one issue on which the elites and the political left see eye to eye on.  Basically both the financial/political elite is in favor mass immigration into the US, and so is the political left, by and large.
    Sure there are some differences.  The political left would like more immigration, a broad amnesty etc, etc. and some elements of the elite class isn't quite as in favor of all of this, but basically the elites in general support the overall vision of allowing over one million people to come to the US year after year, for ever and ever.  The political left, liberated from its old ties to unions and the white working class, is justifiably euphoric over this gigantic political gift of voter replacement, seeing whats happening in California as a blue print for the future of the whole country, the transformation of the US into a sort of left leaning Brazil of the north as I like to call it.
    Still, its fascinating that on this fundamental issue, the elites are on the side of the left, or is it the left on the side of the elites?  Either way, to me it calls into question the idea of the right wing as being in the ascendency, and the left on the defensive.  Looks more like the other way around IMHO.  Perhaps I've been studying European politics too much, where issues of race, national identity etc. are much more in the foreground.
   Concerning Romney, I realize that he's been endorsed  by some actual immigration restrictionists, but to my knowledge, he hasn't called for any reduction in overall legal immigration, birthright citizenship reform (hey, how come on that one issue the political left rejects what other countries do in many cases?) or any big fundamental changes that would alter the ongoing Brazilification of the US.  The right wing approach is one championed by Virgil Goode, not Romney.   Also, it is true that about half of the GOP caucus, most of whom would support tax and spending policies that the elite would feel at home with, are in fact immigration reductionists, but the higher up the GOP leadership ladder one goes the convergence with pro-immigration attitudes increases.

I believe Romney held a fundraiser in Israel during his trip there.  Is it common to hold overseas fundraisers? One would think the Obama campaign could use this against him, the idea of Romney specifically going overseas to raise foreign money for the campaign.

Obama is only winning 88-2% among Blacks, and I'd guess after undecideds mostly break toward him, thats about 97 or 98%, so I'm thinking there's still room to grow, to say, 99.5% support, which would be a solid shoring  up of the base.

I like the Blue Dogs, but I actually would have liked to see them in coalition with Republicans, maybe with a Blue Dog elected Speaker of the house in a narrowly divided House with Dems having a small majority.  We still don't know what would happen if the Dems had only a 5 to 10 seat majority in the house, but if and when they win back the House, its likely that some of the new Dems will be Blue Dog types I would think.

I'm fascinated about the subsidy implications, and wonder just what a huge potential fiscal time bomb they will or won't be.  I for one may actually be one of those who ends up dropping my existing bare bones catastrophic coverage and get the bronze level coverage package, with much of the cost getting subsidized.  And yes, I may very well alter my working hours to keep within the sweet spot where my taxes aren't very high at all, and my subsidized mandatory health insurance is still subsidized at a high level.
     For me there may very well be a gigantic disincentive to work past a certain amount of money (around the low 40 k a year or so perhaps) in that at that point federal/state taxes begin to kick in at stronger levels combined with a decline in the subsidy.  Its a double whammy encouraging me personally to work less.  (I work as a delivery driver at the restaurant that I own a small part of and can easily adjust my hours to hit that financial sweet spot).

Lost in all the talk about Obamacare is the fact that about half of the new taxes (not counting mandate/penalties taxes) are from a new 3.8 tax hike on investment income of over 250k, and an increase in the medicare payroll tax of .9% for high earners. Together these measures are projected to raise about 200 billion over the next five years.
    I would argue that such a sum is significant, and flies in the face of those leftist critics who argue that the rich are all powerful, and that one can never increase taxes on them in the current political system of the US, and that Obama would never raise taxes on them because he is a tool of them.
    Also, New York, Illinois, Maryland and Oregon have recently raised taxes, over the last few years on the wealthiest in those states.  California may be poised to enact the mother of all state income tax increases on the wealthiest this November (though its only for 7 years if it passes).  Anyway, all of this tells me that American politics have a bit more give and take and are not so automatically anti-tax, that liberal Democrats do exist and sometimes get their way, and that the rich are not all powerful.

I wonder if the law pertains to polygamous families with one dad and multiple moms.

Assuming you had a GOP president, house of rep, and a tiny majority in the senate, I wonder if the GOP would try to roll back the subsidy going to those forced to buy insurance, and on the other hand, make the individual mandate much less expensive by allowing for a bare bones, very high deductible, catastrophic only plan.  Would such a move require a fillibuster proof majority, or wouldn't it be just part of the annual budget writing process?

I believe it was conservative legal analyst John Eastman who called Roberts a creature of the Washington Administrative State.  Looks like Roberts is on his way to becoming a new swing vote and might now be joining Kennedy in creating a new 3-4-2 conservative, liberal, swing vote breakdown.
Alright all you young post-age 26 slacker hipsters out there, time to start insurance shopping, and remember go for the gusto on coverage if its subsidized.

I wonder how this will effect liberal's attitude of George W Bush, since it was one of his appointees who was pivotal in saving the mandate, and apparently the whole act.

No, I can't have Kennedy as a loser on an important vote. My main premise that the court is arbitrary, random and capricious hinges on the fact that whatever Kennedy wants he gets.

I'm starting to wonder if the immigration issue will be as big going forward as it is now, if our economy continues in the "jobless recovery mode", and thus attracts fewer illegals, and if the Mexican birth rate continues to drop.  If these trends continue, we might see a drop in illegal immigration and a greater percentage of US immigrants in the future would be from the legal column, which, IIRC, is much less hispanic.  And of course, my other megatrend obsession which is that as a greater and greater percentage of US hispanics are US born, (regardless of immigration trends) other issues start to outweigh the whole immigration issue.

Anyone have a nice chart or site info on what percentage of US total hispanic residents are native born, and also of voters (i.e. how many hispanic voting citizens are native born).  I'm interested in this because my theory is that all the commotion about  bi-lingual ballots, political ads on univision etc etc is overblown, because the more likely someone is to vote the less likely they are to be in a Spanish speaking linguistic ghetto so to speak, and the more likely they are to speak English first, and Spanish second, or only barely.

Yeah, I figure I'd like to have about 250k in stock/bonds/reit accounts and then I'd be all the way there, or if I could ever buy more shares of the restaurant.  Still, its nice that my wife and I work a total of about 33 total hours a week (me 28, her 5) and thats so much less than most people in our area.  This gives me free time to do important work for the community such as broaden my knowledge about why the Correze area in France votes Socialist, or who won last nights Latvian legislature by-election.
   Concerning taxes, last years went smoothly and am still waiting on this years K-1 business income form. 

I've been working as a delivery driver for the a pizza, pasta, grill type establishment for 13 years, and saved a lot of my income over those years, as I'm thrifty and find it pretty easy to save.  After years of asking, the restaurant owner finally agreed to sell me some shares of the restaurant, and I now own 10% of the stock.  Now, I'm still a delivery driver, but also an owner, so I'm kind of a hybrid person, both part of the working class and ownership class.
    It looks like my ownership stake is covering about 50% of my family's basic income needs, so the nice thing is that I really only need to work very part time as a driver to cover our other needs. I'm still working more than that to have a nice monthly cushion and extra savings, but its nice to have a foot in both economic camps.   To further my role as an honorary member of the capitalist caste, I'm pumping most of my savings into stock index funds.  Anyway, I'd be intrested to hear others on this board who are both workers and owners of their workplaces.

Objectiv, thanks for list.  Looks like the UMP did ok in the close head to head matchups, with the left getting lucky with a few  victories over two right wing candidates in the dreaded three way runoffs. 

I think Marin county will be the most interesting test.  I suppose looking at the vote by precinct level will be the best test, and perhaps the wealthiest Bay Area spots aren't the most Democratic, but my bet is that those wealthy  areas  are some of the most liberal, wealthy parts of the country.

Over the last two decades its been fascinating to observe how the SF Bay Area is so liberal in its voting, not just the inner urban core (San Francisco and Oakland), but the whole area, from Marin county in the north, to Santa Clara in the south, plus the East Bay of course.  In November we will have Governor Browns tax increase on the ballot, with most of the increase hitting those making over 200k or thereabouts.  It will be fascinating to see how wealthy Bay Area liberals vote on this measure, which will raise California's state income tax up to three percent for some wealthy earners.  
In the SUSA poll of the state, support for the plan is 13% higher in the Bay Area than the state as a whole, but lets see if this keeps up.
 One nice thing about it, is it finally gives a bunch of California wealthy liberals who in the past have been upset about tax cuts on the federal level, a chance to vote for some taxes for themselves to pay.  Hopefully they appreciate Governor Browns efforts on their behalf.

Has Mursi said anything about the court invalidating the parliamentary elections?  Can he do anything about it once he's president?

Has anyone seen a list of all the close second round elections and who won them.  It seems to me as if there were alot of close ones. 

It seems like alot of European countries that directly elect a President do it seperately from the legislative elections, such as Ireland, Austria, Slovakia etc, and only in the case of France is it scheduled a month before the legislative elections, but yes it must be weird to be constantly voting, kind of like many parts of Germany in 1932, where many people voted five different times.

FWIW, the combined total vote of leftist leaning parties was 48.62, that of the divided right 47.87, (I know, I know I'm not supposed to be adding the FN vote to that of the UMP and its allies, but I'm doing it for an overall read of the total left/right ideological result), Modem and others the rest.  With a left wing majority likely emerging out of this, I'm wondering if Hollande and others in the PS will rethink their support for proportional representation.

I find it amusing that the left is excited at the FN doing a little bit weaker than portrayed in the last polls, and that its calling for a Republican Front against 1st place FN candidates when, correct me if I'm wrong here, President Hollande called for bringing back proportional representation to parliamentary elections.  Just imagine dozens of FN candidates actually getting elected without any drama, but rather as a matter of course. Such would be the case with PR, as was shown in the 1986 elections of course.