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Economist gives Obama ‘F,’ Romney ‘D-minus’ for Economic Literacy

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Donald J. Boudreaux is on a mission to correct economic nonsense.

A professor of economics at George Mason University and a blogger at Cafe Hayek.com, Boudreaux has been writing letters to the editor of various American publications for years in an attempt to correct economic fallacies promoted in articles he read. He has compiled the best of his letters in a new book, “Hypocrites & Half-Wits: A Daily Dose of Sanity from Cafe Hayek.”

While Boudreaux says the ”typical American is quite uninformed about economics,” he doesn’t rate the current major presidential contenders much higher on that score.

“Neither man gives much reason to believe that he is economically literate,” he said. “Judging only by what they say, though, I give the edge to Romney. He’d likely earn a D- in my Intro econ class; Obama likely would earn an F.”

Boudreaux doesn’t shower scorn on every member of the media or politician for being economically ill informed, however. He praises Fox Business Network’s John Stossel, the Wall Street Journal’s Mary Anastasia O’Grady and conservative Washington Post columnist George Will for their grasp of economic issues. As for politicians, he suggests Indiana Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels and Michigan Republican Rep. Justin Amash are the best of the lot.

Read more from this story HERE.

Gloria Allred’s Court Case: Romney Attorney Says, “Have At It”

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As we posted yesterday, Gloria Allred is involved in a Massachusetts court case seeking to unseal testimony Romney allegedly gave to help his friend, founder of Staples, Tom Stemberg.

The court hearing that was supposed to occur yesterday was rescheduled for this morning. According to the Examiner, Romney’s attorney, Robert Jones, isn’t fighting Allred’s application. In fact, he apparently told Judge Jennifer Ulwick that, although he wanted to review the testimony, he “didn’t anticipate objections to its release. Jones also requested the case proceed quickly, to avoid speculation.”

In an interview with Time Magazine, Romney’s attorney went even further stating, “This is a decades-old divorce case in which Mitt Romney provided testimony as to the value of a company. He has no objection to letting the public see that testimony.”

Romney’s friend, however, wants to keep the gag order in place.

TMZ suggests that what Allred is trying to get is evidence that Romney testified falsely about the value of his friend’s company so that his ex-wife would receive less in the divorce:

Multiple sources connected with the divorce tell TMZ … during Tom’s uber nasty divorce case with ex-wife Maureen, Mitt Romney gave a deposition and testified during the trial that Staples was worth virtually nothing. Romney testified that the company was worth very little and Tom was a dreamer and “the dream continues.”

Romney characterized the Staples stock as “overvalued,” adding, “I didn’t place a great deal of credibility in the forecast of the company’s future.”

Partly as a result of Romney’s testimony, Maureen got relatively little in the divorce, but we’re told just weeks after the divorce ended, Romney and Tom went to Goldman Sachs and cashed in THEIR stock for a fortune.

Even if Allred and TMZ’s sources are correct and the court releases the testimony, a decades old case compared to the expanding firestorm over Obama’s lies about Benghazi and his utter incompetency in failing to respond to the American defenders’ pleas for help is likely to offset any damage to Romney.

Romney Colorado Rally “Epic” (+video)

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By far the grandest event of his campaign in Colorado to date, GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney seemed taken aback for a moment when he took the stage to thunderous applause from 10,000 supporters.

Many more were not able to get seats in Red Rocks Amphitheater to see Romney appear with his running mate Paul Ryan.

The entire event seemed to be built specifically to project an image of confidence and control for the Romney campaign.

That theme came through in Romney’s speech. Early on, he belittled President Barack Obama’s campaign.

“Look at the Obama campaign, it’s reduced to talking about smaller and smaller things,” said Romney. “They’re talking about saving characters on Sesame Street. They’re talking about silly word games. Day in and day out there is one attack after the other. Attacks on us, that does not make an agenda for the future.”

The visuals were designed to compliment this image of confidence.

The crowd towered up from the stage, and supporters in colored shirts formed the shape of a Colorado flag as Romney logos in blue light splashed on to the red rocks towering to the sides of the crowds. Read more from this story HERE.

Here’s the local news report on the Romney campaign event:

Gloria Allred Headed to Court This Morning to Unseal “Explosive” Romney Testimony in Acrimonious Divorce Case

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Presidential hopeful Mitt Romney’s character will be called into question if explosive details of his sworn testimony at the acrimonious divorce hearing of former Staples CEO Tom Stemberg, are released to the public today, it has been claimed.

Celebrity attorney Gloria Allred, who has promised an ‘October surprise’, is due at the 9am hearing in Canton, Massachusetts as the Boston Globe applies to have court records unsealed and a gagging order on the parties involved lifted. Sources close to the case claim the newspaper had received a tip-off that there was ‘juicy information about Romney’ in the sealed documents.

Polls show Romney and President Obama are neck-and-neck two weeks ahead of the election and Allred’s claim may be perceived as latest round in a tit-for-tat battle between supporters of the two candidates.

Yesterday it was reported that business tycoon Donald Trump had unearthed divorce papers of Michelle Obama and the President that would be ‘bordering on gigantic’ and could change the Presidential race.

Mr Stemberg is a key Republican party supporter as well as a close friend and former business partner of Mr Romney’s. Mr Romney reportedly testified about Mr Stemberg’s role as a father to his four sons during his ‘messy’ divorce from first wife Maureen.

Read more from this story HERE.

“Ethicist” Peter Singer Surprises, Calling Abortion the Killing of a Human Being But Supports it Anyway

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Peter Singer’s analysis of abortion surprised me. First of all, he agreed with many pro-lifers that a fetus, even at six weeks, is a “living human being.” He showed us slides of fetuses, because we should not “run away from what abortion is.”

Singer nonetheless believes that abortion is ethical, because even a viable fetus is not a rational, self-aware person with desires and plans, which would be cut short by death; hence it should not have the same right as humans who have such qualities. Abortion is also justified, Singer added, both as a female right and as a method for curbing overpopulation.

Singer further surprised me—and showed his meta-commitment to democracy and reason–when he said that he, like Mitt Romney and his running mate Paul Ryan, disliked Roe V. Wade. That 1973 Supreme Court decision, Singer felt, provides a flimsy rationale for abortion and has corrupted the process whereby Supreme Court Justices are chosen. Ideally, Singer said, voters rather than unelected judges should determine the legal status of abortion. Singer nonetheless acknowledged that if Roe V. Wade is overturned, some states might outlaw or severely restrict abortion. “I’m torn,” he admitted.

Neither Presidential candidate, Singer pointed out, has expressed concern for the more than 1 billion people in the world enduring extreme poverty, defined by the United Nations as an income of less than $1.25 a day. This year almost 9 million extremely poor children will die of preventable causes, including malnutrition, malaria and other treatable diseases.

Singer suggested, a bit ironically, that American taxpayers may be prepared to pay much more to help impoverished children. He cited a poll that asked Americans how much of the federal budget goes to humanitarian foreign aid. Respondents came up with a median guess of 25 percent. Asked how much the percentage should be, respondents said 10 percent.

Read more from this story HERE.

Insecure Obama, Insecure World

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The United States has had good presidents and bad, but it has never had a leader who came to a debate on national security with so much insecurity. It was a small petty man who sat on the other side of the screen, alternately smirking and scowling, grinding his teeth and launching attack after attack instead of finally taking the opportunity to set the record straight with the American people.

Barack Obama came to the debate with a roster of prepared speeches, few of them about foreign affairs and most of them about the economy. Even while his Secretary of Defense has given an unprecedented order to top military officials to stonewall the congressional investigation into Benghazigate, even as it has become known that his administration watched four Americans be murdered in real time and did not lift a finger to save their lives, talking points prepared by highly paid speechwriters fell out of his mouth assuring the American people that everything was going well. There was nothing wrong except for a few non-optimal bumps in the road made up of dead Americans.

Anyone listening to Obama would have to conclude, like Voltaire’s Pangloss, that we truly live in the best of all possible worlds. During the Bush administration, liberal pols like Obama liked to claim that they were part of the reality-based community. But as Calvin of “Calvin and Hobbes” said, “I’m not in denial. I’m just very selective about the reality I accept.” Obama would appear to have joined Calvin’s selective reality community.

Instead of discussing foreign affairs and national security, the Contender-in-Chief did his best to divert the debate with a talking point that he called “Nation Building at Home.” “Nation Building” is usually a term reserved for the reconstruction of backward or broken nations. That Obama insisted on applying it to the United States was telling, but even more telling was that his big idea for the debate was not only a distraction but a call to repeat the same disastrous stimulus and shovel-ready project boondoggles that had dug the country 16 trillion dollars into debt.

Obama’s idea of a foreign policy agenda is to borrow trillions of dollars from China to invest in green energy and teachers unions while calling it nation building. Left unasked was the question of what nation would we be building—America or China?

Read more from this story HERE.

Video: Obama’s Foreign Policy Disasters-He’s In Way Over His Head

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In this exceptional three minute video, Obama’s failed foreign policy is brought into sharp relief. If you have any question about Obama’s failures with al Qaeda and Libya, you must watch this video.

Romney could have taken some talking points from this mini-documentary in last night’s debate.

The producer, Secure America Now, states that:

America was attacked on September 11th, 2012 by Al Qaeda at our consulate in Libya. Our consulate was burned and four Americans including our ambassador were murdered. President Obama and his administration denied it was a terrorist attack for weeks.

Since then, Americans have learned that Obama and his administration knew it was an act of terror all along and chose to tell the public it was because of a Youtube video protest. It’s time for Obama to tell the truth on Libya. We can’t afford more apologies, excuses, and weakness.

Video: Donald Trump Promises Bombshell on Obama on Wednesday that May Change the Election

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Billionaire Donald Trump said on Fox News that he will deliver a bombshell on President Barack Obama on Wednesday, but he refused to reveal details. He assured viewers the news could change the outcome of the presidential election.

Trump has endorsed Mitt Romney after having considered running for president, and he has been one of the most vocal Americans doubting that President Obama was born in the United States, a condition for being president.

The real estate magnate phoned in the news to “Fox and Friends” and said he has “something very, very big concerning the president of the United States. It’s going to be very big. I know one thing; you will cover it in a big fashion.”

Trump wrote on Twitter, “Stay tuned for my big Obama announcement,” and then sent another tweet, “Just wait and see!”

“It’s very big. Bigger than anybody would know.” Read more from this story HERE.

Obama’s Snarky Debate Response About Horses & Bayonets (+video)

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Obama’s approach to tonight’s debate may have misfired on him. Many of his responses seemed snarky and small.

One example was his response to Romney’s concern about the incredibly shrinking size of our nation’s navy. Romney explained that the US Navy will be down to almost two hundred ships in the next presidential term if things continue.

Romney also cited the size and aging character of the US air force. Although he didn’t do so, Romney could have mentioned that the backbone of our strategic bomber force, the B-52 Stratofortress, was originally designed in the 1940’s but is still in service today.

Obama’s response did not effectively confront any of these concerns. Moreover, it was factually erroneous with respect to bayonets — I trained with them at West Point and they are still standard issue to some military units.

Turns out, Obama was even wrong about the horses.

See Obama’s childish (and erroneous) failure to address the contention that the US military’s aging infrastructure will only grow worse under a second Obama term:

Obama, Romney Hit Each Other on Foreign Policy in Last Debate

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President Obama and Mitt Romney painted a bleak portrait of each other’s leadership on the world stage Monday night, using their final debate before a feverish two-week blitz of campaigning to tout their commander-in-chief credentials.

To hear Romney tell it, the president has presided over a steady decline in American influence that has emboldened enemies like Iran. To hear Obama, the Republican nominee would confuse the rest of the world with a foreign policy that is “all over the map.”

The two met for a debate focused on foreign policy, though it often veered to domestic issues like the economy and taxes. In contrast to the last debate where Obama and Romney paced and circled each other throughout, the rivals were seated next to one another onstage in Boca Raton, Fla. It made for a less confrontational setting, but the tone was no less tense.

Obama accused Romney of pushing a foreign policy that’s either flat-out “wrong” or some version of what the president himself has already done, only “louder.” Romney accused the president of projecting “weakness” on the world stage, whether through his so-called “apology tour” overseas or his policy on Iran.

Romney ripped President Obama’s foreign policy at the start of Monday night’s debate, claiming the president’s strategy has not quelled the Al Qaeda threat.

Read more from this story HERE.