Hillary Is Sealing off Trump's Paths to 270

Hillary Clinton will win, but do not relax

Update: North Carolina's population has been assaulted like no other by the Repulbican Party. The people are fighting back and propelling Hillary Clinton to a likely victory over Trump. See Cohn, NYT.
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Hillary Clinton has taken out ad buys in Wisconsin and other blue states, hence this must mean Clinton is losing ground fast, goes the wisdom of the moment.

It's not wisdom, and such meaning as this line possesses is false or misleading.

Buying ads in northern blue states is common sense because Hillary's goal is to reach 270 electoral votes and block Donald Trump's paths to 270.

Assume a melt-down unprecedented in modern American presidential politics that sees Trump winning Ohio, North Carolina, New Hampshire, and Florida on Election Night.

In this scenario Trump's path forward to 270 goes through Wisconsin and Michigan. Trump's path is blocked in Illinois and Minnesota. By the way, Scott Walker is not going to propel Trump to victory in Wisconsin.

Failing to win Wisconsin and Michigan, then Trump must seek another path and win Nevada and New Mexico, or Colorado, if Trump is to reach 270 electoral votes. The west coast and Hawaii are no-go for Trump.

So increased Democratic Party attention in Nevada, New Mexico or Colorado is also not a sign of impending Clinton collapse. It's another obstruction blocking Trump's path to 270.

As is flipping a red state like Arizona.

Nate Silver's 538.com still shows Clinton blocking Trump in the blue firewall states.

This electoral situation does not suggest complacency; anything but.

It means Clinton will win; or if most put forth a tiny bit of effort then Clinton will win in a landslide.

Writes David Leonhardt today in the NYT: "... through all of the campaign’s ups and downs, Clinton has never trailed, whether you look at state polling or national polling averages. Most of the poll fluctuations stem from people’s waxing and waning enthusiasm about responding to polls, based on the news surrounding their preferred candidate."

So breathe deeply. And do what you can do between now and Tuesday."

Breathe deeply and add to Clinton's immense advantage in the state ground games by doing something.

Then on Election Night, open a bottle of your favorite beverage and know you helped defeat this cretin. For your emotional health, check out VoteCastr on Election Day and watch the live, slow-motion defeat of this fascist lunatic.

In the meantime, go to Hillary's site and do or give something. For an anxiety-blocking bit of news, know the early voting in Florida looks great for Hillary's defeat of Trump. Without Florida, Trump has no path forward to 270.

And if you note the dearth of news assuring a Clinton victory, know this is simply because no one wants to add to people becoming complacent.

Rational Budget Talk from Jonathan Chait

Jonathan Chait injects some reality into the national budget debate—applicable to the Wisconsin budget debate.

Chait, one should note, famously wrote of the early Bush-Cheney budgetary statements: "He's [Bush] lying," and that deficits and mounting debt were sure to follow. Chait was right. And he's right again.

From The New Republic:

A few weeks ago, I wrote a column pointing out how strange it is that President Obama is being blamed for huge budget deficits, when the projected deficits we face are entirely due to policies he inherited. In my column, I cited this paper by the Center on Budget and Policy priorities, which found that Obama's budget would reduce the budget by $900 billion over ten years compared with keeping current policies in place.

Yesterday David Leonhardt of the New York Times took up a similar question. Leonhardt looked at the budget from 2009 through 2012, and tried to figure out what had changed in those years since 2001. He found that the business cycle accounted for 37% of the higher red ink. More than half came from legislation signed by President Bush. Seven percent came from Obama's stimulus bill, and only three percent from his regular budget.

It was an admirable and serious article. A good sense of how serious can be seen in the contrast to a Politico story that ran the same day. Politico concerned itself entirely with the perception that Obama is responsible for the new debt without bothering to explore the merits of the perception. It ran quotes alleging as much (GOP Sen. John Cornyn: 'This was not an inherited situation. This was a matter entirely of this administration’s and this Democratic leadership’s making') without pointing out that the allegation is demonstrably false.

This debate such as it is sounds familiar in Wisconsin political circles with the same malarkey emitting from the GOP and its shills.