Texas Insider Report: WASHINGTON, D.C. –

“This proposal is exactly why poll after poll shows most Americans have lost confidence in the President’s handling of the economy.

“How can any Texas lawmaker support this proposal after hearing the President is again attacking our state’s energy industry with billions of dollars in new tax hikes?  It makes no sense.

– Congressman Kevin Brady, the Joint Economic Committee’s Senior House Republican, following President Obama’s $50 billion ’stimulus’ announcement Tuesday.   

“Instead of new taxes, let’s end the deepwater and de facto shallow water moratoriums that kill Texas energy jobs & send them overseas,” said Brady

Brady said his belief is that the president’s latest ’stimulus’ proposal taxes Texas jobs, and harms job creators.

By John R. Graham

One of ObamaCare’s first major cash flows was scheduled to start on July 1: $5 billion to bail out states’ so-called “high-risk pools” until January 1, 2014.  Premiums will rise substantially.  A full 22 states want nothing to do with it, a drastic choice in times of broken budgets but nevertheless the right choice.   

In 2014 ObamaCare launches its major takeover of health insurance, previously regulated by state law. As of that date ObamaCare will make it illegal for health plans to use factors other than age, and that only in a limited fashion, to calculate premiums. Obamacare will conscript Americans into health plans chosen by the federal government.

ObamaCare attempts to compensate through a massive program of taxation and subsidization. Unfortunately, ObamaCare’s long-term spending will require significantly higher revenues than will be harvested by its cutbacks to Medicare benefits and tax hikes on employers, individuals, and enterprises in the health sector.

Because Americans are increasingly concerned about the fiscal situation, the Congressional majority had to dupe the media into believing that ObamaCare would reduce the deficit.

The media view the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) as the official “scorekeeper” of anticipated federal taxing and spending. The CBO forecasts legislation’s fiscal consequences for 10 years in the future, so it had to “score” ObamaCare for 2010 through 2019.

By scheduling ObamaCare’s main event to start in 2014, President Obama and the congressional majority were able to get away with pretending that six years of ObamaCare, already costing more than a trillion dollars, was actually 10 years.

They successfully fooled the media into believing it was fiscally responsible.

While this delay satisfied naïve deficit-watchers, it failed to harvest low-hanging political fruit immediately — the promise that everyone would be able to get health insurance, no matter what expensive medical conditions they already have. ObamaCare attempts this “on the cheap” by throwing a relatively small amount of money at so-called “high-risk pools” for four years.

But it’s not enough: The CBO does not believe that the funding will last longer than three years, and estimates that the plan would need $10 to $15 billion through 2013.

“High-risk” pools is misleading because the patients who need them are actually high cost, which explains why the programs are so difficult to manage. Patients, insurers, and governments all know that the costs of high-risk pools are extremely high, which is why 35 states already have trouble managing them.

In the latest National Affairs journal, James Capretta of the Ethics and Public Policy Center and Tom Miller of the American Enterprise Institute figure that two to four million uninsured Americans with pre-existing conditions cannot get health insurance at reasonable premiums, but that only about 200,000 are currently enrolled in high-risk pools.

They note that the Chief Actuary for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services estimates that only 375,000 more will obtain coverage through ObamaCare’s $5 billion. Outbidding even the CBO, Capretta and Miller call for $15 to $20 billion per year, as well as further restrictions on insurers’ increasing premiums for people who leave the employer-based market and seek individual coverage.

The latter would reduce the demand for high-risk pools, they assert.

By seeking to socialize the costs of patients with expensive conditions, however, Capretta and Miller surely invite a mechanism whereby insurers, employers, and individuals would crawl out of the woodwork to lobby continuously for more federal money and expanded eligibility for high-risk pools—just like Medicaid over the last four and a half decades.

A far simpler and more effective reform would be to eliminate employers’ monopoly control of Americans’ health dollars, so that individuals and families could buy their own health insurance that is portable from job to job and state to state.

ObamaCare’s $5 billion bailout for high-risk pools is not the first step in solving America’s health crisis. Rather, it is merely the “gateway drug” to a complete federal takeover of our access to medical services.

The 22 states that said “no” to federal funding of high-risk pools have made a wise first response to ObamaCare.

John R. Graham is Director of Health Care Studies at the Pacific Research Institute. A spokesman for individual choice & limited government control over medicine, he has authored a number of studies, including Taxing Health Insurance: How Much Do States Earn?; and Medicare Advantage or Medicare Monopoly?

By Kate Zernike

By Jonathan Chait

The most striking theme in today’s Washington Post poll is, once again, the extraordinary apathy of the liberal Democratic base.  But among likely voters, the GOP opens up a mammoth 53%-40% advantage.  The enthusiasm gap here is a canyon.  

Registered voters basically split on whether they plan to vote for a Republican or a Democrat in the House, with 47% favoring the former and 45% the latter. 

Here’s another interesting finding from the poll, pointing in the same direction.

One question asks, “Do you think Obama’s views on most issues are too (liberal) for you, too (conservative) for you, or just about right?”

1. 45% say too liberal
2. 45% say just about right
3. Another 9% say too conservative.

Now, saying Obama is too conservative is not the same thing as saying you won’t vote for the Democrats.

The rational left-winger would still vote for the moderate Democrats over the extremist Republicans. But it does show the importance of a sizeable block of dissastisfied liberal public opinion.

Elite opinion usually demands that the president “govern from the center.” But governing from the center is not working (which is not to say Obama had a superior alternative.) He has spent two years pushing a classic moderate Republican health care reform, an economic stimulus program along the lines of what most economic forecasters were calling for, a centrist plan to recapitalize banks, and a popular and mainstream financial reform bill.

But the general political dynamic consists of Republicans decrying socialism, liberals denouncing a sell-out, and moderate deficit hawks clucking that the deficit hawkery doesn’t go far enough.

Some insightful commentary on this poisonous dynamic was provided by Tony Blair:

Ironically, Blair says, activists on the left often assist their right-wing opponents by piling on the pols who lean their way rather than defending them against a conservative onslaught that he says is “vicious” and begins from “the word ‘go.’”

Blair says the politics of the day can leave ostensibly left-leaning leaders like President Obama “in an isolated position,” with right-wing opponents eager to destroy them and the activist left (more often than not) happy to help.

“I love my own politics and progressives and all the rest of it,” Blair told ABC’s Christiane Amanpour in an unaired portion of his This Week interview from Sunday.

“But if we have a weakness as a class, when the right get after us and attack our progressive leaders, instead of defending them we tend to say, ‘Yeah, well, really we’ve got a lot of complaints about them, too.’”

Blair said that the tendency of the left to pile on rather than defend its own leaders can leave their politicians alone to face the right wing attack machine, which Blair says is merciless.

As I’ve stated many times, the overwhelming cause of the Democrats’ perils is that they held overstretched majorities while taking control of government at the outset of a massive economic crisis.

But the inability of the left to handle majority status is an important contributor to the dilemma. It’s not surprising that Democrats would lose independent voters, or that Republicans would be wildly enthusiastic, when they control the government and push agressive reforms during an economic calamity.

But they sheer sullenness of the liberal base does seem to be avoidable and puzzling.

By Michael Barone

If Republicans do well in November, they could shift a significant number of House seats to the GOP.  Seven states, according to projections by Polidata Inc., will gain a House seat, and Texas will gain four.

But that doesn’t necessarily mean Republicans will gain House seats.  

Every ten years, it’s time for reapportionment and redistricting. The framers of the Constitution created the first regularly scheduled national census and required, for the first time that I am aware of, that representation in a legislature be apportioned according to population.

Reapportionment is automatic: A statutory formula takes the census figures and apportions the 435 House districts among the 50 states. Wyoming and six other states will each get one, California will probably get 53, and the rest some number in between.

Nine states will lose a House seat, and Ohio will lose two.

Overall, states carried by John McCain in 2008 will gain a net seven seats (and electoral votes), and states carried by Barack Obama will lose seven.

But that doesn’t necessarily mean Republicans will gain House seats. That depends on redistricting — how the lines are drawn by the politicians in each state (or, in a couple of cases, by nonpartisan commissions).

That’s particularly true in states with large numbers of districts and densely packed metropolitan areas. You can’t do much gerrymandering in a state with only a few districts.

But you can in states with more than four or five.

Eighteen months ago, it looked like Democrats were going to profit from redistricting. An optimistic scenario for Democrats, extrapolating from the 2008 election results, was that if they could gain three governorships and three state senates and otherwise hold what they had, they would control redistricting in 14 states with more than five districts, including:

• California
• New York
• Illinois
• Michigan
• North Carolina, and
• New Jersey.

Those states are projected to have 195 districts, and thus will have 195 House seats following the 2012 elections. Clever redistricting could move between one and two dozen into the Democratic column. That would have been the Democrats’ best redistricting cycle since the one following the 1980 census.

But that scenario now is the stuff of dreams. Democrats are threatened with losing many governorships and legislative chambers, and their chances of taking over many from the Republicans look dismal.

Instead, the optimistic scenario belongs to the Republicans. If they hold what they have and capture a few governorships (Ohio, Tennessee, Wisconsin) and a few legislative chambers (the houses in Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, and both houses in Wisconsin), they will control redistricting in eleven states with more than five House seats, including:

• Florida
• Georgia
• Michigan
• Ohio
• Pennsylvania, and
• Texas.

Those states are projected to have 178 House seats.

This would be an even better redistricting cycle for Republicans than the one following the 2000 census, which was their best in 50 years. It could move one to two dozen House seats into the Republican column.

But a few caveats are in order.

First, optimistic scenarios don’t always come true. If Republican Meg Whitman is not elected governor in California, Democrats will be able to draw the lines of its 53 districts. That could offset Republican gains elsewhere. And it’s not a sure thing that Republicans will make the gains they need to control the process in several states.

Second, redistricting doesn’t lock up seats for one party forever. A few years ago pundits were lamenting that it did — and then Democrats won dozens of seemingly safe Republican seats in 2006 and 2008. This year, Republicans may win many seemingly safe Democratic seats.

The last redistricting cycle came during the period of stable partisan alignments that persisted from 1995 to 2005. Redistricters could pretty well count on voters to vote the same way they had last time and the time before.

Now we seem to be in a period of very unstable partisan alignments. What looks like a safe seat based on 2008 numbers may not look safe under 2010 numbers. And those numbers may not be etched in stone.

No one I know of is predicting confidently how Americans will vote in 2012.

In the end, the voters get a say. But in an otherwise close election, redistricting can determine control of the House. And that can make an enormous difference in legislative outcomes, as it has during the past decade.

The unpopularity of the Obama Democrats’ policies seems sure to hurt the party this year. Redistricting seems likely to extend the pain for several more election cycles.

Michael Barone is senior political analyst for the Washington Examiner.

By Larry J. Sabato

Will 2010 be added to the “slaughter years”?  The general election is a couple months away, but the odds are good that the bar lines in the graphs below will reach reasonably high after November 2.  The Crystal Ball’s predictions are clinical. We are fond of people in both parties. We cheer for no one.  

We’ve been patient and cautious here at the Crystal Ball as a year’s worth of facts has accumulated. We’ve sifted the polls, cranked up the models, and watched the candidates and campaigns closely. 

But a few years bring congressional slaughters, relatively speaking: 1974, 1980, 1982, 1994, and 2006 are the most prominent. One party or the other suffers more in any given year, as the pendulum of public opinion swings back and forth.

All political observers have “gut feelings” about an election year, but feelings make for good songs and lousy predictions. Forecasting is an imprecise art. People who get too far ahead of the facts or are too insistent about what will happen are usually partisans — openly or in disguise.

2010 was always going to be a Republican year, in the midterm tradition. It has simply been a question of degree. Several scenarios were possible, depending in large measure on whether, or how quickly, the deeply troubled American economy recovered from the Great Recession.

Had Democratic hopes on economic revitalization materialized, it is easy to see how the party could have used its superior financial resources, combined with the tendency of Republicans in some districts and states to nominate ideological fringe candidates, to keep losses to the low 30s in the House and a handful in the Senate.

But conditions have deteriorated badly for Democrats over the summer.

The economy appears rotten, with little chance of a substantial comeback by November 2nd. Unemployment is very high, income growth sluggish, and public confidence quite low. The Democrats’ self-proclaimed “Recovery Summer” has become a term of derision, and to most voters — fair or not — it seems that President Obama has over-promised and under-delivered.

Obama’s job approval ratings have drifted down well below 50% in most surveys. The generic ballot that asks likely voters whether they will cast ballots for Democrats or Republicans this year has moved increasingly in the GOP direction.

While far less important, other controversies such as the mosque debate and immigration policy have made the climate worse for Democrats.

Republican voters are raring to vote, their energy fueled by anti-Obama passion and concern over debt, spending, taxes, health care, and the size of government.

Democrats are much less enthusiastic by almost every measure, and the Democratic base’s turnout will lag. Plus, Democrats have won over 50 House seats in 2006 and 2008, many of them in Republican territory, so their exposure to any sort of GOP wave is high.

Given what we can see at this moment, Republicans have a good chance to win the House by picking up as many as 47 seats, net. This is a “net” number since the GOP will probably lose several of its own congressional districts in Delaware, Hawaii, and Louisiana.

This estimate, which may be raised or lowered by Election Day, is based on a careful district-by-district analysis, plus electoral modeling based on trends in President Obama’s Gallup job approval rating and the Democratic-versus-Republican congressional generic ballot (discussed later in this essay).

If anything, we have been conservative in estimating the probable GOP House gains, if the election were being held today.

In the Senate, we now believe the GOP will do a bit better than our long-time prediction of +7 seats.

Republicans have an outside shot at winning full control (+10), but are more likely to end up with +8 (or maybe +9, at which point it will be interesting to see how senators such as Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut, Ben Nelson of Nebraska, and others react).

GOP leaders themselves did not believe such a result was truly possible just a few months ago.

If the Republican wave on November 2 is as large as some polls are suggesting it may be, then the surprise on election night could be a full GOP takeover.

Since World War II, the House of Representatives has flipped parties on six occasions (1946, 1948, 1952, 1954, 1994, and 2006). Every time, the Senate flipped too, even when it had not been predicted to do so. These few examples do not create an iron law of politics, but they do suggest an electoral tendency.

The seat switches are probably coming in:

1. Arkansas
2. Colorado
3. Delaware (but only if the eventual GOP nominee is Rep. Mike Castle)
4. Indiana
5. North Dakota, and
6. Pennsylvania.

We expect Republicans to pick off at least a couple of these states:

1. California
2. Illinois
3. Nevada
4. Washington, and
5. Wisconsin.

While it is possible that Republicans will lose one or two of their own open seats, the only 50-50 chance of that right now is in Florida — and it might not happen even there.

There can also be unanticipated shockers if a GOP wave develops. While we rate Gov. Joe Manchin (D) the early favorite to fill the late Sen. Robert Byrd’s seat, his Republican opponent, John Raese, is a self-funder in a strongly anti-Obama state.

The inescapable conclusion is that the Senate is on the bubble, with only a slight lean at Labor Day toward Democratic retention.

The statehouses will provide the third leg of the Republicans’ 2010 victory. We have long suggested the GOP would gain a net +6 governorships. We now believe they will win +8.

This boon to the GOP for redistricting will be enhanced by a gain of perhaps 300 to 500 seats in the state legislatures, and the addition of Republican control in 8 to 12 legislative chambers around the country.

Republicans are likely or even certain to gain the governorships in:

1. Iowa
2. Kansas
3. Michigan
4. Oklahoma
5. Pennsylvania
6. Tennessee
7. Wisconsin, and
8. Wyoming.

We believe the GOP candidates also have an edge in Illinois and Oregon—both of these quite surprising. Democrats will also pick up a few statehouses to cut their losses: Hawaii is near-certain, with fair to good shots in Connecticut, Minnesota, and Rhode Island (though we currently retain the last two as toss-ups).

The contests listed only as “leaning” one way or the other are the most vulnerable to shift in the next two months. Unless an unexpected, extraordinary number of these changes are in favor of the Democrats, it is hard to see how Republicans can fail to do very well.

We still have 6 toss-ups for Senate (California, Florida, Illinois, Nevada, Washington, and Wisconsin—seats held by the Democrats in all but Florida ).

The 9 toss-ups for Governor are in California, Florida, Georgia, Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, Ohio, Rhode Island, and Vermont—six currently held by GOP chief executives and three by Democrats.

In the House, the Crystal Ball counts 29 toss-ups, 28 seats held in this Congress by Democrats and just one by Republicans.

As always, the Crystal Ball will make a guess in every contest before Election Day. In some years, our overall seat changes in each category have been exactly on the button, and in 2008 we were a single electoral vote off the Obama-McCain finish of 365-173. But we fully admit here and now that, as always, we’ll get some of them wrong.

We truly believe our website motto: “He who lives by the Crystal Ball ends up eating ground glass.” That’s part of the fun of politics.

In 2006 and 2008 the Crystal Ball was full of good news for Democrats, while this one may cause a run on Prozac among our Democratic readers. Is there any way back for the Democrats in the eight remaining weeks?

We know what we don’t know: Something big and unexpected can always drop from the skies. Naturally, it can work the other way, too—say, a substantial increase in unemployment or negative GDP growth just before Election Day.

If there isn’t a dramatic development that has overarching political implications, then Democrats will have to depend on their financial edge, tested candidates, and leaders finding ways to motivate the troops to a far greater extent than we see today (or witnessed in the 2009 off-year elections).

Any shift will quickly show up in the generic ballot match-up among likely voters. Gallup’s generic ballot question reads:

“If the elections for Congress were being held today, which party’s candidate would you vote for in your congressional district – the Democratic Party’s candidate or the Republican Party’s candidate?”

In a midterm election, only about 40% of the adults will come to the polls (or vote early), compared to 63% in the presidential contest of 2008.

While a recent Gallup poll had the GOP leading the generic ballot by a massive 10 percent, on average Republicans are ahead by about 5 percentage points—still quite high by historic standards.

Overall, though, a strong bet is that 2010 will generate a substantial pendulum swing from the Democrats to the Republicans.

It is not that Republicans are popular — most polls show the party even less liked than the Democrats. Many observers find it amazing that the less-liked party is on the verge of triumphing over the better-liked party.

Nevertheless, in the time-honored American way, voters will be inclined to punish the party in-power by checking and balancing it with more members from the opposition party.

Each week we will update our ratings in each category, all the way to election eve, November 1st. There is a lot of good politics to come in September and October, so stay tuned.

Larry J. Sabato is Director of the U.Va. Center for Politics.  Sabato’s “Crystal Ball” website features detailed and frequently updated analysis for elections across the country. The Crystal Ball keeps tabs on every Senate and gubernatorial race, as well as the tightest campaigns for the House.

Texas Insider Report: WASHINGTON, D.C. – In our book 2010: Take Back America – A Battle Plan, we write: “The prospect we now face is not the intermittent up-&-down fluctuations of unemployment we have had since the Great Depression.  Thanks to Obama’s policies, we’re confronting the possibility of an unemployment rate that never comes down, just as they have in Europe.  If we stay on Obama’s course, lower joblessness in the United States will be a thing of the past.”   

The recent rise in unemployment back up to 9.6% and the loss of 54,000 jobs in August, suggests that our prediction is – dismally – coming true.

The Obama stimulus plan has finally kicked in: The higher spending he brought to our nation and the debt levels that are accompanying it are the result.

Why is unemployment remaining so high?  Because the totality of Obama’s policies are dragging us into a depression.

•  The prospect of dramatically higher taxes next year is freezing consumer spending, particularly in the upper income ranges which spend a third of America’s consumption.

•  The huge changes that are looming in medical care brought about by Obama’s health care legislation are freezing new employment and expansion in the medical sector which accounts for 16% of GDP.

•  The financial reform legislation has so raised the prospect of a federal takeover of any bank that makes “imprudent” loans that financial institutions are afraid to lend, freezing new job creation.

•  The looming possibility of cap-and-tax legislation in the name of halting climate change is freezing any expansion in the manufacturing and energy sectors since these policies will force jobs to move overseas to locations that do not impose such a tax (e.g. India and China).

•  The massive expansion in the deficit and in the resulting debt has so eroded confidence in our nation’s future that Americans are now saving 6% of their income, up from 1% in the past, sapping consumer spending.

•  The threat of new rules for union elections that will spread private sector unionization is freezing business expansion plans.
     
Obama’s rush to spend, regulate, re-engineer, redistribute, and tax have stopped any recovery and are sending us back into recession.  In her wonderful book The Forgotten Man, Amity Shlaes notes how FDR’s policies in the late 1930s did the same thing.  She notes how the imposition of the Social Security tax in 1937 (benefits did not start until 1941) and the rapid wage hikes that accompanied the passage of the Wagner Act (steel worker wages rose 40% in 1937) sent a recovering nation back into a new depression that lasted until the war started in 1939.

In his haste to re-make America and to bring us the “fundamental change” he promised as he campaigned for president in 2008, Obama has torpedoed the recovery and sent us back into a double dip recession.

The answer is to cut spending back to pre-Obama levels, reduce taxes and eliminate the threat of tax increases, zero fund the changes Obama has legislated in health care (and repeal them in 2013), eliminate the threat of cap-and-tax, and lay the basis for solid economic growth.
         
We have left the recession that started in 2007 and entered a new recession caused by Obama’s policies.

Texas Insider Report: AUSTIN, Texas –

“This administration inherited an unemployment rate of 7.7% and promised a peak of no higher than 8% if their policies were followed.

“These policies are not working for the 9.6% of Americans who are out of work, nor for the over16% underemployed.  They are not working for nearly 3 million Americans who have declared bankruptcy in the last two years.”

– Congressman Ron Paul of Texas       

Last week, in the wake of another uptick in the official unemployment rate, the administration continued to claim that their economic policies were working, just not fast enough.

40 million currently on food stamps. Nearly 1 in 6 Americans depend on those and other government anti-poverty programs such as Medicaid and unemployment benefits. 

As more Americans are added to the unemployment rolls, the tax base from which to hand out their benefits is shrinking.  Still, businesses are being taxed and regulated out of the market, adding to the problem. 

What solutions are put forth? 

More government spending – even as each citizen’s portion of the public debt is over $43,000 and expected to increase by $250,000 over the next 40 years.

No, this economy is not working for these people.  But current economic policy does “work” for some people. 

For example, it has worked out very well for certain bankers and large corporations, who took on too much risk and got themselves in hot water, and were declared “too big to fail” which is really a euphemism for “friends in high places”. 

It works well for large, well-connected military industrial corporations, who can always count on perpetual war and conflict to keep them in business. 

It also works for those on the government’s payroll, which is increasing as the tax base is decreasing.

So where does the government get all this money even as its most obvious stream of revenue dries up?  How can it keep spending seemingly indefinitely? 

Once it steals as much from you as it can get away with through taxation, it steals even more from you through what central bankers like to call quantitative easing, which is more or less the same thing as counterfeiting. 

When increasing pressure is put upon them by irresponsible politicians, it is predictable that out of thin air, more money will be created to satisfy the insatiable appetites of those on political spending sprees. 

As money becomes more plentiful, it becomes less valuable, and the average citizen suffers again as the value of their savings evaporates.  It has happened over and over in history, and what usually follows is the total debasement of the currency, hyperinflation and chaos.

Sound economic policy would be to take our foot off the gas and apply the brakes to government spending as the economic cliff approaches. 

We must get back to where our economy produces actual wealth, rather than mere paper wealth.  The road back to fiscal sanity and a strong economy is simple:  Congress just needs to get back to following the Constitution.

Congressman Ron Paul of Texas enjoys a national reputation as the premier advocate for liberty in politics & is the leading spokesman in Washington for limited constitutional government, low taxes, free markets, and a return to sound monetary policies based on commodity-backed currency.

Republicans are heading into the final weeks of the midterm campaign with the political climate highly in their favor, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.  Americans are increasingly frustrated by a lack of economic progress, deeply dissatisfied with the federal government and critical of President Obama’s leadership.

Among all voters, 47% say they would back the Republican in their congressional district if the election were held now, while 45% would vote for the Democrat. Any GOP advantage on this question has been rare in past years – and among those most likely to vote this fall, the Republican advantage swells to 53% to the Democrats’ 40%.

For the first time in more than four years, Republicans run about evenly with Democrats on the basic question of which party they trust to handle the nation’s biggest problems.

Among registered voters, 40 percent say they have more confidence in Democrats and 38 percent say they have more trust in Republicans.

Three months ago, Democrats had a 12-point advantage.

On the economy, 43 percent of voters side with Republicans when it comes to dealing with financial problems, while 39 percent favor Democrats. (Fifteen percent say they trust neither party more.) Although not a significant lead for Republicans, this marks the first time they have had any numerical edge on the economy dating to 2002.

In recent years, Democrats have typically held double-digit advantages on the issue.

The principal obstacles to GOP electoral hopes continue to be doubts that Republicans have a clear plan for the country should they win control of the House or Senate in November. But overall, the poll shows that the party has made big gains in the public’s estimation since earlier this year.

Voters were also asked whether they think it is more important to have Democrats in charge of Congress to help support the president’s policies or to have Republicans in control to serve as a check on Obama’s agenda. Here, 55 percent say they prefer Republicans, while 39 percent choose Democrats. The GOP’s 16-point edge is double what it was in July.

Obama’s overall job rating is at a new low in Post-ABC polling, with just 46 percent of all Americans giving him positive marks and 52 percent negative ones.

On two big issues, disapproval of the president’s performance has reached new highs: Fifty-seven percent now disapprove of his handling of the economy and 58 percent give him low marks on dealing with the deficit.

The survey was taken during a week when Obama marked the end of U.S. combat operations in Iraq. Overall, 49 percent say they approve of his work on the war, while 45 percent disapprove. Those numbers have not changed much from July but represent a large drop from early 2009, when he announced the plan to end combat missions in Iraq.

It’s not just perceptions of Obama’s job performance that have shifted during his presidency as political polarization has stiffened. Today, Americans divide about evenly on whether he understands their problems and shares their values.

Forty-five percent now consider the president’s views on most issues “too liberal,” another new high. In previous polls dating to early 2008, consistent majorities said they found Obama’s positions “just about right” ideologically.

For the first time, a majority – 53 percent – of respondents say the president has not brought needed change to Washington, one of his major campaign promises.

The poll findings highlight one of the most significant problems for Obama and Democrats heading into fall: a steep erosion in support among independent voters. In 2008, Obama won independents by eight percentage points. In 2006, independents broke for Democratic House candidates by an unprecedented 18-point margin.

Independents’ disapproval of the president has reached an all-time high, with 57 percent giving him negative marks. About 61 percent of independents say Obama has not brought change to Washington. Nearly half now consider him “too liberal” ideologically.

Overall, by a 13-point margin, independent voters say they would support Republican over Democratic candidates in their House districts. A majority of independents – 59 percent – say they would prefer to have Republicans in charge of Congress to serve as a check on the president’s agenda.

Just 34 percent of all voters – and 27 percent of independent voters – say most Democrats in Congress deserve to be reelected. Four years ago, a month before Democrats won control of the House, 55 percent of all voters said most Democratic representatives deserved another term.

Still, voters are just as unenthusiastic about Republican incumbents. Barely 31 percent of all voters and independents alike say most GOP lawmakers have earned another term.

Nor do many voters credit the opposition with a distinct message: Forty-five percent say Republicans are offering the country a clear direction that is different from that of the Democrats, while 48 percent say they are not.

Negative views of the federal government have jumped higher this year, with 78 percent of voters saying they are dissatisfied or angry about the way Washington works. That’s more anti-government sentiment than at any point in 1994, when Republicans won back control of Congress, and the most to say so since the fall of 1992.

Deteriorating views of the economy are a prime culprit. Since June, there has been an eight-point jump in the number of Americans who think the economy is worsening and a parallel six-point slide in the number who say things are improving. Fifty-three percent say the economy is in “poor” shape, the first time a majority has said so since early April.

The survey was completed before the release of Friday’s jobs report, which showed the unemployment rate ticking up to 9.6 percent but also somewhat better-than-expected growth in private-sector jobs.

A third of all Americans say Obama’s policies are making things worse economically, up seven points from April to its highest level. And the number who point the finger at Obama for economic stagnation is also on the rise, with 42 percent saying the administration deserves a great deal or a good amount of blame for the state of the economy, up 15 points from a year ago.

Democrats can point to the even higher numbers of people who continue to blame the George W. Bush administration for the country’s economic problems, although that number – 60 percent – is creeping downward.

The poll was conducted by telephone Aug. 30 to Sept. 2 among a random national sample of 1,002 adults. Results from the full sample have a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

balzd@washpost.com cohenj@washpost.com

Assistant polling analyst Kyle Dropp contributed to this report.

Texas Insider Report: WASHINGTON, D.C. – In Milwaukee, Wisconsin, President Barack Obama announced a comprehensive infrastructure plan to expand and renew our nation’s roads, railways & runways. This proposal is among a set of targeted initiatives the President will outline in Cleveland on Wednesday. 

The White House says it is part of the president’s plan “to support our economic recovery & ensure long-term sustainable growth.” 

The plan builds upon the infrastructure investments the President has already made through the Recovery Act, includes principles the President put forth during the campaign, and emphasizes American competitiveness and innovation. 

FACT SHEET: Renewing and Expanding America’s Roads, Railways & Runways

The President today laid out a bold vision for renewing and expanding our transportation infrastructure – in a plan that combines a long-term vision for the future with new investments. A significant portion of the new investments would be front-loaded in the first year.

This plan would build on the investments we have already made under the Recovery Act, create jobs for American workers to strengthen our economy now, and increase our nation’s growth and productivity in the future. At the same time, the plan would reform the way America currently invests in transportation, changing our focus to enhancing competition, innovation, performance, and real analysis that gets taxpayers the best bang for the buck, while moving away from the earmarks and formula debates of the past. In prior years, transportation infrastructure was an issue that both parties worked on together, and the Administration hopes the same can be true now.

Some of the tangible accomplishments of the President’s plan over the next six years include:

ROADS: Rebuild 150,000 miles of roads – renewing our commitment to the backbone of our transportation system;

RAILWAYS: Construct and maintain 4,000 miles of rail – enough to go coast-to-coast;

RUNWAYS: Rehabilitate or reconstruct 150 miles of runway – while putting in place a NextGen system that will reduce travel time and delays. The President’s plan would accomplish this through:

•  An up-front investment. The President will work with Congress to enact a new up-front investment in our nation’s infrastructure – an investment that would help jump-start additional job creation, while also laying the foundation for future growth. This initial investment would fund improvements in the nation’s surface transportation, as well as our airports and air traffic control system.
• A vision for the future. The President proposes to pair this with a long-term framework to reform and expand our nation’s investment in transportation infrastructure. Since the end of last year, when the last long-term surface transportation legislation expired, these investments have been continued on a temporary basis, even as the trust fund to finance them has fallen into insolvency. If we are to enjoy the benefits that come from a world-class transportation system, Congress must enact a long-term reauthorization that expands and reforms our infrastructure investments and returns the transportation trust fund to solvency. To jumpstart job creation, this long-run policy front-loads – through a $50 billion up-front investment – a significant share of the new infrastructure resources. As with other long-run policies, the Administration is committed to working with Congress to fully pay for the plan.

The long-term framework includes meaningful reforms:  

• The establishment of an Infrastructure Bank to leverage federal dollars and focus on investments of national and regional significance that often fall through the cracks in the current siloed transportation programs;
• The integration of high-speed rail on an equal footing into the surface transportation program to ensure a sustained and effective commitment to a national high speed rail system over the next generation;
• Streamlining, modernizing, and prioritizing surface transportation investments, consolidating more than 100 different programs and focusing on using performance measurement and “race-to-the-top” style competitive pressures to drive investment toward better policy outcomes.
• Expanding investments in areas like safety, environmental sustainability, economic competitiveness, and livability – helping to build communities where people have choices about how to travel, including options that reduce oil consumption, lower greenhouse gas emissions, and expand access to job opportunities and housing that’s affordable.

Specifically, the President proposes to make the initial up-front investment in the following areas:

• Roads. The nation’s highways serve as the backbone of our transportation system. Many roads and bridges are in need of repair and expansion and many of the Americans who want to do this work face high unemployment right now. Our investments would be focused on modernizing the highway system’s critical assets while providing much-needed jobs.
• Rail. Many parts of transit systems have been allowed to fall into a state of ill-repair. The President’s plan would help address this by making a major new investment in the nation’s bus and rail transit system. The Administration is also committed to expanding public transit systems and would dedicate significant new funding to the “New Starts” program – which supports locally planned, implemented, and operated major transit projects. In addition, the Administration is committed to building on its investments so far in high-speed rail – constructing a system that will increase convenience and productivity, while also reducing our nation’s dependence on oil and cutting down on pollution. The President’s plan would also invest in a long-overdue overhaul of Amtrak’s fleet.  
• Runways & NextGen. The Administration proposes to invest in our nation’s airports by improving their runways and other equipment and facilities. We also propose a robust investment in our effort to modernize the nation’s air traffic control system (NextGen). This investment will help both the FAA and airlines to install new technologies and, among other improvements, move from a national ground-based radar surveillance system to a more accurate satellite-based surveillance system – the backbone of a broader effort to reduce delays for passengers, increase fuel efficiency for carriers, and cut airport noise for those who live and work near airports.
• Infrastructure Bank. The President proposes to fund a permanent infrastructure bank. This bank would leverage private and state and local capital to invest in projects that are most critical to our economic progress. This marks an important departure from the federal government’s traditional way of spending on infrastructure through earmarks and formula-based grants that are allocated more by geography and politics than demonstrated value. Instead, the Bank will base its investment decisions on clear analytical measures of performance, competing projects against each other to determine which will produce the greatest return for American taxpayers.

Texas Insider Report: WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Department of Interior’s own analysis showed the moratorium would cause 23,000 Americans to lose their jobs.  And if it continues, leading energy researchers estimate 300,000 jobs and $147 billion in state and federal revenue could be lost if independent drillers are forced out of the Gulf of Mexico.   

The moratorium on deepwater drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, and the undeniable de facto moratorium in shallow waters, are costing thousands of American jobs & will create grave and permanent harm to workers and businesses if either is allowed to continue.

Director Bromwich, I strongly urge you to restore responsible, timely permitting of rigs in the shallow waters of the Gulf of Mexico and to immediately end the deepwater moratorium.  Let our workers return to work and allow our businesses to again safely explore for and produce affordable energy for American families and companies.

Reinstating the drilling moratorium after the federal courts had struck it down is unacceptable, especially since recent public documents reveal the White House knew in advance it would force over 23,000 American energy workers out of their jobs and into the unemployment line.

I find it equally troubling that President Obama has refused to accept an official congressional invitation to travel to Houston to meet face-to-face with energy workers and businesses in Texas impacted by his moratorium. 

Don’t the jobs of our energy workers matter?  What about the small and independent businesses that will not survive the shallow and deep water moratoriums – isn’t anyone in the White House listening to them?

It is time to stop condemning an entire industry and their workers because of the isolated BP oil spill.  

American Energy
The Gulf supplies a third of our nation’s energy, and while consumers have, so far, been relatively spared from significant price increases, the halt in production will ultimately come to bear.   America will be forced to rely more on foreign sources of oil from unstable regions of the world, after years of slowly decreasing that reliance.

The explosion on the Deepwater Horizon and oil spill were tragedies.  Eleven men lost their lives and my prayers go out to their families.  I commend you for thoroughly investigating the cause of that disaster and defining what lessons there are to learn.  

Yet as tragic as the spill was, it was BP’s spill, not an entire industry’s.   Energy companies in this country have been safely producing American oil in the Gulf for half a century and have drilled 40,000 thousand wells safely.   We can do both, and through these forums, we have seen America’s energy industry demonstrate that capability. 

Jobs
The moratorium has lead to another disaster:  economic devastation for many residents in Gulf Coast states, including in Texas where 1.7 million jobs rely on the energy industry — a quarter of our state’s economy.

Nationwide, unemployment is rising toward 10 percent.  In many areas surrounding the Gulf, it’s even higher.  The truth of the matter is too many Americans have simply stopped looking for work.  On one hand, Washington has spent hundreds of billions of dollars in a futile attempt to create jobs, while on the other, has enacted policies that knowingly kill them.  

The Department of Interior’s own analysis showed the moratorium would cause 23,000 Americans to lose their jobs.  And if it continues, leading energy researchers estimate 300,000 jobs and $147 billion in state and federal revenue could be lost if independent drillers are forced out of the Gulf of Mexico. 

And others, including Dr. Michelle Foss of the University of Texas Energy Economic Center, have testified before Congress that retaining a moratorium on oil and gas exploration could have significant negative effects on our economy.

It costs about half a million dollars to maintain a rig — per day.   Few are going to sit idle for long; they will move to where the work is, and once they are gone, they are gone for years on long-term contracts, taking American jobs and capital with them.  Two rigs, the Ocean Endeavor and the Ocean Confidence, have left so far, one to Egypt and the other to the Congo. 

Roughly 1,400 jobs are tied to each rig, and thousands more benefit indirectly.   These jobs do not all represent “big oil.”  They are small and medium sized businesses fighting to survive. 

Ninety percent of the wells drilled in this country are drilled by independent companies.   And thousands more vendors support that production. 

Blackhawk Specialty Tools had to lay off 20 percent of its workforce in just the first month following the moratorium.  The next month it was 50 percent.   Their president said to me, what company can go six months without revenue and expect to survive?  

Production
America cannot afford to sit idle in the Gulf.  We are still decades away from being able to fuel our country with renewable sources of energy, and we must invest in traditional sources of energy to carry through the transition.  

Prior to the BP accident, President Obama had opened some new offshore areas for development.  He did so because two years ago we faced $150 per barrel oil – and more than $4 a gallon gas.  The forces that caused that price spike still exist. 

Russia and the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, including Saudi Arabia and Venezuela, account for 75% of the world’s proven oil reserves (OPEC 70%, Russia 4.4%). 

The only other substantial proven oil reserves are in North America (15%).  The oil price spike two years ago occurred because China and other industrializing countries demanded more oil and OPEC largely refused to increase production.  Price volatility increased because the market saw the increasing trend in demand with no clear understanding of how supply would respond.

Eighty percent of the Gulf’s oil and 45% of its natural gas production come from wells in more than 1,000 feet of water.  Since 1986, 65 oil and gas discoveries occurred in water depths exceeding 5,000 feet.  In 2008, the Gulf of Mexico’s outer continental shelf had the largest number of U.S. crude oil discoveries, which increased its proven reserves while reserves fell for the nation as a whole. 

Before the spill, expected deepwater Gulf oil production increases essentially represented the entire net growth in U.S. oil supply and 4% of global oil supply growth to 2015.

The price of oil is back near $80 per barrel, despite a weak world economy, as OPEC has substantially cut its oil production.  Deepwater development was a promising source of incremental oil among otherwise anemic growth in non-OPEC supply. 

We cannot afford to treat the Gulf spill solely as an environmental disaster and not as a threat to the economy. 

Safety

History proves we can produce oil in the Gulf safely.  Fifty thousand wells have been drilled in the Gulf of Mexico since 1947. 

We have also seen significant advances in drilling technology over that time.  Before BP, no substantial oil spills had occurred in the Gulf’s “Hurricane Alley,” even from storms as devastating as Katrina and Rita, which destroyed 113 offshore drilling platforms in 2005.   Almost 4,000 wells have been drilled in water of more than 1,000 feet.  

Experts agree there is little need for a moratorium.  Eight of the 13 experts that had reviewed your department’s May report on the spill, before it included a drilling moratorium, have since publicly rejected the need for one.

Even federal courts have rejected the moratorium, ruling the Administration has produced insufficient evidence that each rig is unsafe in order to justify such an across-the-board ban on production.

Director Bromwich, no one argues the health of the Gulf coast environment isn’t vitally important to our welfare and the lives of millions along the Gulf coast who rely on the waters to fish, or to welcome tourists.  

No one feels this more directly than the people of the Gulf.   But you must also balance safety with economic reality.  

There are going to be risks every time a worker sets foot on an oil rig, as there are risks when a passenger steps on an airplane or family sets off on a road trip.  

The job of the federal government is to effectively manage and minimize those risks – not to eliminate them altogether. 

Thank you for the opportunity to submit my testimony.

Texas Insider Report: WASHINGTON, D.C. – ”I say it’s time for the likes of Fauntroy, Morial & Sharpton to defend their rhetoric. Over the years, I have quietly offered to debate these types — now I throw down the gauntlet and publicly challenge them,” said Mychal Massie, the chairman of the Project 21 black leadership network.   

Massie has formally challenged the Reverend Al Sharpton, National Urban League CEO Marc Morial and Pastor Walter Fauntroy to a debate over their extremist comments and racist allegations against the tea party movement.

“Among the comfort of their admirers, these men are brave attackers. But I am challenging Al Sharpton, Marc Morial and Walter Fauntroy to come out in the open to see if they have the collective backbone to face me in a debate about their tea party allegations,” said Massie.

“It’s easy to throw stones from behind a fence, but I want to see them step up and defend themselves publicly. I want them to explain themselves under the microscope of debate.”

In the days before Glenn Beck’s August 28 “Restoring Honor” rally at the Lincoln Memorial, progressive black leaders viciously attacked the apolitical event in particular and the tea party movement in general as opposing civil rights gains in America and disrespecting the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

In particular, Fauntroy — a former congressional delegate from the District of Columbia — compared tea parties to the Ku Klux Klan, saying, “you have to use [the names] interchangeably.”

Morial said the Beck event “hijack[ed] the imagery and symbolism of August 28 and the Lincoln Memorial to promote an agenda of intolerance.” Sharpton claimed the event would “distort what Dr. King’s dream was about.”

In his WorldNetDaily commentary, Massie rebutted the civil rights establishment’s allegations of racism and political extremism:

“The tea party is a joining together of persons from all political parties. It epitomizes the very thing Fauntroy readily acknowledged that the 1963 [March on Washington] did — it brings together people of conscience of the every race, creed and color to march for jobs and the restoration of constitutional freedoms.”

Added Massie: “I will personally secure a venue to debate any one — or all of them together — pursuant to the legitimacy of their comments… I call upon the media to assist me in my effort. The media are quick to parrot every word these so-called civil-rights leaders say that is antagonistic and divisive. In the interest of fair reporting, let them be equally quick to insist that they accept my challenge.”

All three men will be contacted by Project 21 via certified mail to set the terms of the debate.

“Are these men going to step up, or are they cowards who only say things for the sake of fomenting discord,” said Project 21’s Massie.

Project 21, a leading voice of black conservatives since 1992, is sponsored by the National Center for Public Policy Research.

The Justice Department says Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio failed to turn over documents it its investigation into whether his department discriminated against Latinos while pursuing illegal immigrants.

Reporting from Denver – The U.S. Department of Justice on Thursday sued a controversial and popular Arizona sheriff, alleging that his department was refusing to cooperate with an investigation into whether it discriminated against Latinos while trying to catch illegal immigrants.

The Justice Department said that Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio was the first local law enforcement official in 30 years to refuse to provide documents in a federal civil rights inquiry. The federal government could withhold $113 million in funding from Maricopa County if Arpaio can’t produce records demonstrating that he avoids racial discrimination.

“The actions of the sheriff’s office are unprecedented. It is unfortunate that the department was forced to resort to litigation to gain access to public documents and facilities,” said Thomas E. Perez, assistant attorney general for the department’s Civil Rights Division.

Arpaio contended that the lawsuit was a political move by the Obama administration, which filed another high-profile lawsuit against Arizona this summer to stop a tough new immigration law from taking effect.

“These actions make it abundantly clear that Arizona, including this sheriff, is Washington’s new whipping boy,” Arpaio said in a statement. “Washington isn’t playing fair and it’s time Americans everywhere wake up and see this administration for what it really is – calculating, underhanded at times and certainly not looking out for the best interests of the legal citizens residing in this country.”

Arpaio, who calls himself “America’s toughest sheriff,” has drawn praise and criticism for his aggressive attempts to enforce immigration laws. Most prominent are operations in which his deputies fan out across immigrant neighborhoods, stopping people for sometimes minor violations, such as jaywalking, and asking their immigration status.

Critics contend that the operations amount to racial profiling. Arpaio says his deputies only look for people breaking the law, an assertion he reiterated at a televised news conference Thursday in Phoenix. “I’m very confident that my deputies don’t racially profile,” he said.

The Obama administration last year revoked Arpaio’s authority to enforce federal immigration laws on the streets, a move that had little practical effect because the sheriff said state law allows him to continue his operations. But his battle with the federal government predates the Obama presidency.

In the summer of 2008, under President George W. Bush, the Justice Department launched a preliminary investigation into the allegations of racial profiling. In March 2009, after President Obama had assumed office, the department expanded the inquiry into a full-fledged probe.

The investigation started with what federal officials contended was a routine document request – 51 categories of material. According to the lawsuit filed Thursday, the department received only 11 pages.

The last time the Justice Department had to sue to obtain documents in a civil rights probe was during a 1978 investigation of employment practices of a sheriff’s department in Virginia.

For the last 18 months, Arpaio has publicly said he would not give federal investigators access to his jails or other facilities and dismissed the inquiry as politically motivated. His lawyer met with Justice Department lawyers in Washington last week and contended that the material the federal government requested was outside its scope of investigation.

This is not Arpaio’s first battle over documents related to possible civil rights abuses. His department faces a lawsuit from an array of civil rights groups for allegedly racially profiling. A federal judge this year found that Arpaio’s department improperly destroyed immigration-related paperwork that was evidence in that case, and approved sanctions against the agency.

Arpaio’s stance has made him popular in Arizona, the main point of entry for migrants illegally crossing the Mexican border. He was one of the most prominent backers of SB 1070, the aggressive state law mandating that police verify the status of people they stop and suspect are illegal immigrants. The main parts of the law were placed on hold in late July by a federal judge in response to the Obama administration’s suit, and the matter is expected to end up in the Supreme Court.

Legal experts said that, despite the combustible backdrop of racial politics, a brash sheriff and local defiance of Washington, Thursday’s lawsuit will turn on narrow legal matters such as what the federal government can request under the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

Arpaio’s stance is “more your standard, hardball litigation than it is a challenge to the authority of the federal government,” said G. “Jack” Chin, a law professor at the University of Arizona.

Both sides in the contentious immigration debate were quick to seize on Thursday’s lawsuit.

“Unless a judge can put some serious sanctions [on him], Arpaio will continue to thumb his nose at the entire justice system,” said Lydia Guzman, president of the immigrant rights group Somos America, or We Are America, which is a plaintiff in the racial profiling case against the sheriff’s office.

Arizona state Sen. Russell Pearce, appearing next to the sheriff at his news conference, said the lawsuit shows that federal civil rights investigators have not been able to turn up any evidence of misconduct by Arpaio’s department. “It’s simply a witch hunt,” he said.

As he usually does when challenged, Arpaio promised to forge ahead with his operations. “I’m going to continue, maybe tomorrow, to enforce all the illegal immigration laws,” he said. “I’m not going to be intimidated by the Justice Department.”

nicholas.riccardi@latimes.com