Good old North Korean insults. Hasn't gone on as long as Cuba but NK has been an albatross for a while now, wish Obama would do something about them.

I do find it hard to believe that NK has the sophistication and ability to hack into Sony (but was it really a hack or they paid someone off?).

2 of the 3 axis of evil are still around. I think this one really deserves to go and find it incredible that this guy has not been offed yet by someone in his military, inner circle etc.

North Korea Insults Obama, Blames U.S. For Internet Outages - NBC News

Jeb v Hillary (but article didn't mention Romney) should be fun. Political dynasties in the making.

Poll: Bush surges to 2016 GOP frontrunner - CNN.com

Political dynasties aren't "fun" - they're the LAST thing that we as "ordinary people" should be looking forward to.

Around this time four years ago all the way until he announced he wasn't a candidate, Mike Huckabee often led Romney in Republican polls. I don't put a lot of stock in anything at this stage. T-minus 18 months is mostly about getting a campaign structure and funding in place.

My gut says America really doesn't want another Bush. I know I don't.

Eh, at least in the primary stage, I think we just want a candidate we can actually get behind. If the last name is Bush, Reagan, or Rumplestiltskin, fine by me.

For that matter the name could be Hank Clinton, Kwame Roosevelt or Monica Biden ... just be a candidate that doesn't inspire eye rolls, nausea or deep dark depression.

Took the quiz and found that overall, I closest match with Christie at 50%, Obama, Hillary & Jeb at 38%, Rand Paul at 30% and lowest with Ted Cruz at 28%. Romney wasn't listed.

I had the strongest social affinity with Christie (by far) and strongest economic with Ben Carson. Have to start paying attention to Christie.

VoteMatch Quiz

Just for kicks I did the same quiz (hadn't done one in a while, I figured why not)

Highest overall score?
68% total with ... Jeb (70% social, 65% economic)
Ted Cruz got a 58%, no other GOP candidate gets more than a 55%.

Now if I refigure and leave several questions (like abortion) as no opinion (based on eliminating issues that really aren't a factor in my voting) ...

Cruz gets a 58%, Jeb gets a 50% ... and no other candidate even does that well.

See why I don't care what the last name is?

For me, Bernie Sanders is up there, even though I match 0% with him on the economy. Ted Cruz is #1, though around 40%. I don't think Ted Cruz is all that interesting.

In other words, whatever winds up as president, I'm probably unhappy.

I would like better candidates in general. We're recycling names because the process itself eliminates anyone with any integrity.

I was sad Jon Huntsman flamed out so early last time. He was someone I think I could have voted for. In the end, I might well vote for Hillary just because if I'm going to be unhappy policy-wise no matter what, I think it would be cool to have a woman president.

I retook it and left questions that weren't that important to me as no opinion. Christie and Carson came up as my top 2 and Cruz was second from the bottom. I see a pattern here.

The surprise to me on this one was how poorly Carson fared with me, a quick look at the positions they attribute to him suggested that perhaps he may have fallen in the scoring (for me) due to a lack of positions on several issues.

My top matches:
48% Scott Keller (whoever that is)
40% for Bernie Sanders and Rand Paul

Formal "end", not sure if he should used the word "responsibly", it will come back to haunt him if bad things happen.

Given with where things are and with what happened in Iraq, keeping US "support" troops in Afghanistan is the right thing to do.

Not a 100% pullout but still pretty good (at least I would consider this a pledge mostly fulfilled).

Obama marks end of combat in Afghanistan - CNN.com

My top was 58% with Bernie

Obama 78%
(Social 75%, Economic 80%)

Hillary 58%
(Social 65%, Economic 50%)

Biden 55%
(Social 60%, Economic 50%)


Good thing I was already voting Hillary ;). Though Obama wins out big in Social and Economic, surprisingly.

Putin's economic strategy involves:

Putin orders vodka price cap as Russia’s economic crisis escalates - The Globe and Mail

Wonder if Ted Cruz still thinks Putin is a great leader.

Obama 63%
(Social 65%, Economic 60%)

Sanders 53%
(Social 60%, Economic 45%)

Biden 50%
(Social 55%, Economic 45%)

Clinton 48%
(Social 50%, Economic 45%)


Cruz brings up the rear with 5%/5%/5%

In a Biden/Clinton race I'd still probably vote Clinton.

The best thing the U.S. can do about NK is make it China's problem. NK is, after all, basically a client state of China (in that it's dependent on China for everything up to and including its continuing existence).

What I hope is happening is that the Obama Administration is using NK to troll the Chinese (diplomatically, of course). As in "I dunno, guys, now Kim is saying XXXX. We may have no choice but to do $thingchinadoesn'twant."

Remember, NK represents an existential threat to no one, not even South Korea, although SK would be heavily overrun in an initial invasion before NK was pushed back. And in such a worst-case scenario, China comes out far, far worse on the world stage than the U.S. for a) not keeping its client in line, b) from suffering the inevitable economic impact from the disruption in the area and c) having to rebuild/support NK once the hostilities died down.


As I recall from the news over the years since he took over, he actually proactively got rid of his likely challengers. And the ruling regime has always taken care of its top brass. Anyone still left with the werewithal to take out Kim is probably 110% loyal at this point.

I wonder how many of the newly insured can afford their deductibles.

Probably more than could afford the cost of medical services while uninsured. Just guessing.

I wonder how much of that is due to the improving economy. That graph starts after the economy was in the tank.

I'm sure the economy is part of it, but the significant drop just as the Exchange Plans (and Medicaid Expansion) roll out seems a bit causal, too.

Edit: Here's the unemployment rate, for comparison:



As you can see, unemployment was steadily improving through the same period, while uninsured rates continued to rise. They only started to drop as the above mentioned ACA provisions took affect.

In other news: Boehner maintains House Speaker post despite biggest revolt in a century | US news | The Guardian


There's a lot of talk about how the GOP's going to have a pitched battle with Obama over the next 2 years, but with a thin majority in the Senate and robust dissident groups in both chambers it seems likely that there'll be more fireworks in their own caucus than with the President.

Will Republicans bar Obama from State of the Union address? - MarketWatch

I'm sure the President is not going to be thrilled to walk into a Republican controlled House and give a speech that will fall on mostly deaf ears anyway...

It would literally be one of the the stupidest things the Republicans could possibly do. It would make the shutdown look like genius.

Though thankfully it's just moronic talking heads and not actual Congresspeople saying so.

Yeah, it would be a 100% political win for the President and have no impact whatsoever on anything policywise.

The discussion is some nice free red meat for the base, but the GOP leadership is way too smart to actually do it.

dola:

Though if I were the President, I might not pass up the opportunity to tweak Boehner a bit with the Tea Party. Before he starts his speech, he can specifically thank Speaker Boehner for the invitation to come present the speech. "It means a lot to me, John, that you invited me here and provided me with this platform to discuss the state of our union with Congress and the American people."

I like it as an investment if the costs are not prohibitive. Not sure if community is same as vocational but would support vocational as well. Let's see the nos.

Obama To Propose Free Community College Program

It's pretty clearly a preview for the State of the Union. Because it's Obama's idea, it won't get through Congress.

This is essentially the kind of thing for which I'm hoping over the next two years (plus a SCOTUS replacement or two). The GOP aren't going to let him do anything anyway, and indications are they're going to fight amongst themselves almost as much, so why not just spend two years trolling them and making them even angrier at each other? :D

Romney 2016 is apparently a thing.

It was so fun the last time!

Like Hillary, he'd be the 2nd oldest president ever at inauguration. Still pretty damn handsome though!

Romney was someone I could have supported other than his backing away from his own/similar healthcare reform legacy. So I'll look forward to any updated positions as Obamacare is reality now.

The Romney vs Bush battle will be entertaining. I guess this puts everyone else as a distant third or worse.

Romney to GOP donors: ‘I want to be president.’ - The Washington Post

I'm obviously anti-Mitt, but I think the legacy of being the first Mormon president is very important to him.

Romney wants it to be one way. But it's the other way

Useless malleable git on the first go-round, usless malleable git now.

If he's the nominee, what's the fucking point?

I think everyone is a malleable git one way or another. Don't think that should exclude him. I don't think his record is bad as governor and his record as businessman is great. His view on the "little people" may be questionable.

Was Mitt Romney a Good Governor? - The Atlantic

CENTCOM Twitter account hacked, suspended - CNN.com

This inspires a lot of confidence in our cyber-defense.

Unless the Pentagon is hosting the Twitter and YouTube servers, which I doubt.

Of course not - but it does sort of make our whole cyber-security setup (private and public) look like amateur hour IMO.

Like...Twitter and YouTube don't spend enough on cyber-security to defeat a bunch of ____________ (insert whatever term you want to use here).

Not good. When I first read about AG representing the US, I was thinking that can't be right, too low level. Kerry or Biden would have been the minimum. What a mess.

http://www.cnn.com/2015/01/12/politi...sis/index.html

Did Romney really create the healthcare reform legacy, or was it passed by a Democratic-controlled Massachusetts Legislature?

Would need more details on what Obama is thinking here, but at face value, would this focus on skills/trades training, or just a path to college?

If it's the latter, it's a terrible proposal. We already have too many people in college as it. If it's the former, wouldn't it be better to adopt an intense apprentice program that is incorporated into high school-similar to something along the lines of what Germany does?

Government-run community colleges could work, but this half-and-half stuff just leads to more cost inflation, doesn't it? The government so generously made cheap education loans available for everyone, so guess what, tuition costs just shot up and created the student loan debt generation, where even the middle and upper middle class kids start out life in a huge hole, which I think contributes to wealth disparity so much more than other things that are blamed like tax rates. Even with "free money", schools will just go after all that money that was saved some other way - more expensive textbooks, charging more for people who don't qualify for the program for whatever reason.

Or continue to add more and more administrators while enslaving the academic faculty in part-time poverty.

That said, I think the free community college program is worth looking at, and is an interesting idea.

What would be the objective though? I mean, if everyone goes to at least community college (and beyond), you still have the same problems.

Very much agree. Working at San Jose city college for last 9 years I have seen this in action. Most students do not make it, about 80% won't have a degree in 6 years. A large reason is they have to take college level math and English, when they are most likely at a 10th grade level (called English 92 here, by far most impacted course). Not tuition costs.

The big problems I see is textbooks still costs about 5 times tuition. California has cheap tuition, but still this is where the real expense is. So much so, I wouldn't be surprised if it is the textbook lobby that is pushing this bill.

IMHO. I think tuition and materials should be a tax deduction. Once a year, only completed units qualify.

I have hope in the growing vocational movement. My school has a great cosmetology, emt, hac, dental and (amazingly) butcher programs, all without much prerequisites.

And you can't outsource these jobs! We need electricians, plumbers, carpenters--all jobs that pay very well. I think teaching kids to be more entrepreneurial would go a long way as well, because we are moving towards an economy that is going to depend on that mindset.

As much as I have advocated vocational training, the downfall is in the placements. I am leaning more towards companies (public and private) sponsoring courses/degrees at colleges, vocational training and school partnerships, as well as internships. For example, there is an acute shortage of trained electric linemen. So my company set up a vocational school to do just that. Employers know what they need, they can't depend upon educational entities to meet their needs. Now if we can solve the single biggest problem in healthcare : the shortage of physicians...

Some news on what Obama will say on his address.

Obama to call for tax increases on wealthy in State of the Union address | Fox News

Enslaving?


Why?

By this question, I mean this has no chance of happening from just a political standpoint. Is it just to push the rhetoric?

Starting point for negotiations.

Any thoughts on the SCOTUS gay marriage cases? It looks like we'll finally get a direct resolution. The questions presented are:

1) Does the Fourteenth Amendment require a state to license a marriage between two people of the same sex?

2) Does the Fourteenth Amendment require a state to recognize a marriage between two people of the same sex when their marriage was lawfully licensed and performed out-of-state?

This, plus trying to change Dem messaging going forward.

Honestly, I'm no fan of the cuts as they are too gimmicky for me. I love the financial transaction tax. Something needs to be done so that skimming isn't the country's biggest industry.

The speech will also call for higher taxes on the wealthy.

I don't mind tax cuts (I'm a Fair Tax/consumption-tax guy, but that's another debate), but they won't mean anything unless you have spending reforms/cuts to go along with them. The financial transacition tax...I'm all for it. The thing I like about it is that it's gets the public markets back to it's original purpose, and not a scheme based on high-frequency trading and algorithms, and it's almost like a consumption tax--not forced.

What is the change in the message going forward with this? Hasn't this been the message all along?

Obama's message. Why earn it when you can just take it?

That's an interesting way for a conservative to frame tax cuts.

Always the argument. Always. It's always ok if money moves up from the bottom, never for it to move down in any fashion.

Money begets money. When you have it, you can make it easy to take from those who are trying. When you don't, you're pretty much fucked.

Obama already moved that bracket from 15% to 24% under this same argument just a couple of years ago. Did that not have any positive effect? Because all I keep hearing about is how much the people in that tax bracket are bunch of selfish assholes. So if it didn't, what good will this do? We move it to 28% and then what? We like those rich people now? Of course not. It's an easy steal, which is my point.

The cap gains rate will still be lower than the top rates on earned income and this will return the rate to the level during the great socialist Reagan admin.

Ronald Reagan = theft from the wealthy!

Oh trust, me, I understand why that was placed in the article. But how is Hillary supposed to top this 28% tax that Obama just handed out? 33% in the first term. 38% in the second. Am I right? And the Democrat that takes her spot? 43% in the first term....48% in the second? Am I right again?

No. We liberals will only be happy with 110% tax rate!!!!

DEATH TO CAPITALISM!!!

Exactly my point, nobody has an answer to this, but it's an easy steal.

There's no point in having a rational discussion when your argument is 28% will inevitably lead to 50% and the death of the American economy. If you want to discuss why 28% is clearly worse than 20% I'll listen. Personally I think capital gains should be at or close to the rates on earned income.

But none of this will happen, so neither of us should spend too much time on it.

What confuses me is there is no focus on real spending reforms and cut. Government can't, and shouldn't keep spending like a drunken sailor and trying to take care of every little need/

If half of Americans don't pay any federal income taxes, once credits kick in (which can pay back more than what people paid in), and the top 10% of income earners paid over 70% in federal taxes, with the to 20% paying 93% of all federal income taxes, how do you continue this argument?

"Buried inside a Congressional Budget Office report this week was this nugget: when it comes to individual income taxes, the top 40 percent of wage earners in America pay 106 percent of the taxes. The bottom 40 percent...pay negative 9 percent."

http://www.cnbc.com/id/101264757#.

I guess the question is, and it's more philosophical, is should government--one that is about democracy-treat everyone the same in terms of "fairness"? With all of the credits available, should government be about playing favorites with all of these credits? Yes, we need to get lobbying and donations out of politics (and both sides aren't willing to do this), and introduce the financial transaction tax to reward investment and not gambling, but that's half of the battle.

Didn't we have the same argument and you have the same point when we went from 15% to 24%? The only real solution is a flat tax--and I understand the problems associated with that-but benefit is that it affects all voters each and every time. Not just Democrats picking on Republican voters and vice-versa...although, as you pointed out, looks like Reagan picked on his own voters too.

You can't ignore other taxes. The federal system is still progressive, but when you look at all taxes it isn't anything like what you point out for income taxes.

I'll agree that the difference between marginal and effective rates should be narrowed.

You can continue it by pointing out the growing gulf between the haves and the have nots. Fairness is more than just absolute numbers. Before the reductions in the top income tax rate in the early 1980s, the top 0.1% of wage earners received 8% of the total income. Now that figure is 18%. Meanwhile the bottom 20% of wage earners had their share of the total income drop by 1/3rd.

Money is like oxygen to the economy. You have to keep it circulating.

Would you apply this to all forms of income or just earned income?

The problem with a flat tax is that when you add state and local taxes you'd end up with a fairly significantly regressive tax system. The income tax is the one place where progressivity balances the system.

I've bolded the parts to help people better understand what you are talking about here. :)


Tax rate - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I'm not sure, what I would like is a vision for taxes needed and apply it fairly across all spectrums. And this may need an honest discussion of what services we can provide as a baseline. I'm okay with less taxes for the poor and more for the rich, but I'm not a fan of Democrats hiking Republican taxes and Republicans hiking Democrats taxes.

When it comes to taxes, philosophically, our political extremes are clearly not in the best interest of our nation.

Pres. Obama seems to finally be embracing his liberal side to some degree. He is proposing a series of tax breaks for the middle class, paid for by closing tax loopholes and increasing taxes on the very wealthy. Of course, he only proposes this after the Democrats lose any control in Congress and, therefore, his proposals will have no chance whatsoever of even being debated, let alone enacted.

If he were serious about this, he would have proposed it when the Dems had some power in Congress. As it is now, it is empty rhetoric and red meat for the Daily Kos crowd.

Both parties have abandoned the middle class in favor of their wealthy donor class. At least the Republicans admit that. The Dems still lie about who they are and what they represent.

Apparently part of the cost is going to be covered by taxing 529 college savings plans. What a load of crap.

Nothing in here about Obama's state of the union address.

Is that a sign of FOFC's decline or the lame duck-ness of his presidency?

Best moment is when the President zinged the Republicans when he said he won't be running for office anymore and they cheered him. Then he told them he won them both :) R's stop cheering.

It really didn't matter too much what he said-Repblicans won't allow him to fulfill any of his promises or plans except through executive action, and they are looking to find a way to take even that away legally.

And then to rub it in, Boehner announced that the Israeli PM would be speaking to Congress next month...telling the President minutes before-not asking, telling. So that PM can tell Americans how wrong the President's plans for Iran are...which is exactly the way The R's see it.

So in other words, just another day in Washington.

A sign of the times. I streamed Transparent that night and checked blog reactions later that night.

Also, the Patriots played a football game with footballs that contained less air than normal. So that kind of [pun]took all of the air out of the room.[/pun]

{shrug}

I haven't watched one in years, in part they seem to be made even more pointless by how much of their content is out there days ahead of time.

Well, to kick off the new season the republicans canned a bill they were going to vote on because they could not agree amongst themselves. The vote was on an anti-abortion bill that they had previously passed last session that went nowhere because of the same reasons it did not advance today. So, in other words, business as usual no matter what Obama says. If he proposes a tax cut, they'll oppose it because they want the credit. The tone of his speech was actually not as fiery as Fox News suggested, but rather scrap the shit they can't agree on (i.e. Healthcare) and do something on the stuff where they may be common ground.

Yeah I don't see the point in watching them. They are all available online. Most of the speeches are filled with "feel-good" soundbites and overly rehearsed.

Blah blah middle class hurting...blah blah working two jobs. He doesn't give a shit about most of that stuff and certainly isn't going to change anything.

I was reading something yesterday about the history of the state of union addresses. Amazingly, the state of the union always tends to be "strong" if you listen to these speeches. Has there every been a president who said that the state of union sucked? I know Jimmy Carter had a pretty negative one.

Edit: Ah, here's the list I was looking for:

Why is the State of the Union Always 'Strong'? | Acton PowerBlog

Reagan started the "strong" gimmick, everyone has followed it since then. And good 'ole Gerald Ford keeping it real, things were "not good" in 1975

Wants to tax withdrawals on 529 contributions which are already post-tax contributions. Good luck with that.

529 college plans: Just for the rich? - Yahoo Finance

It may already be post-tax contributions, but the 529s have special tax breaks to begin with. Before 2001, withdrawals from 529s were treated as ordinary income. It is literally a tax loophole (as are tax breaks for employer sponsored health care). You may think its a good loophole, but its a loophole, none the less.

So I don't think this would pass, and even if it did, it would likely only be for new accounts and deposits made after the bill passed.

But let's say it passed against all accounts. Would you rethink retirement accounts like Roth IRAs? There's a lot more money to tax in those.

I'd think you'd want to keep Roth IRA's as incentives to investment for retirement - the income limits allow for taxing those who may have less need for incentivizing investment.

I suggested eliminating this to some liberal-leaning people a while back at a get together, and they were outraged at such a suggestion. It doesn't bother me that it's not taxed or taxed--just that it is a tax break that plays with the insurance/health care costs.

I'm not necessarily opposed to eliminating the filibuster for SCOTUS, but the incredible hypocrisy of Alexander's quote is shameless.

I get that Bibi needs to do what he thinks is best for his country but I don't understand the rationale for being so disrespectful to a sitting president. He could have told Obama that he was coming at the invitation of the GOP regardless of any Obama objections, why hide it?

There's probably been some earlier incident where he thought this was payback.

Netanyahu snub takes relations with White House to a new low - CNN.com

Netanyahu's been disrespectful of Obama since day one. This isn't out of character.

Boy, you'd think it would take more than four months for this statement to look bad. From the President last September.........


Today, the U.S. Embassy in Yemen has basically told everyone they're on their own and to exit ASAP.

Obama Tonight: Yemen and Somalia Are Models of Success (!) | The Weekly Standard

Yemen's previous government is obvious not our partner on the front lines anymore... since, you know, they've been overthrown in a coup. Sooo... what's the big deal?

Well, to be fair (lol) he was probably saying things like that in 2006 when the words "nuclear option" first entered the lexicon. It's just that after 2008, the filibuster was a useful tool to try to prevent President Obama from appointing "liberal" judges.

Now they're looking ahead to 2016 and going "we have the House and the Senate and everything's going to be Republican forever let's get rid of the SCOTUS filibuster."

It's a dangerous play. If you look at the 2016 Senate map, Republicans have 24 seats to defend, including one in Vermont, one in Wisconsin, one in Illinois, one in Ohio and one in Pennsylvania. None of those are certain to flip, of course, and Wisconsin in particular has been weird. They voted Johnson in over Feingold in 2010, then voted to re-elect Barack Obama and to elect Tammy Baldwin before voting to re-elect Scott Walker. Don't ask me to predict whether the Democratic Party in this state will be able to evict Johnson from office.

The point is, it's a Presidential election year. All five of those states voted for Barack Obama in 2012 and 2008. Yes, Ohio and Pennsylvania are swing states, Vermont's kinda independent-minded, and Wisconsin, as I said above, has been fucking weird the last six years or so. But those states represent opportunities all the same.

The Republican nightmare? Nuking the SCOTUS filibuster and then waking up on November 9, 2016 to a Democratic President-elect who also has a 52- or 51-seat majority in the Senate. Yes, there'd be time to re-impose the filibuster because OH SHIT WE LOST but it's just as possible that the incoming Democratic Senate says 'nope. you made that bed, fuckers. We'll be removing the SCOTUS filibuster again.'

That's a move I'd expect to see from the Republicans if their candidate for President won the election in 2016, not just because in 2015.

The pattern seems to be Democrats are strong in Presidential election years, making Johnson vulnerable in 16. Then again, WI Democrats have been putting up some weak candidates. Ron Kind is about the only name I can think of that would be a good bet to unseat Johnson. I'd say Kind was the only person that could've challenged Walker but he is smarter than I am and knew Walker was beating anybody that was put out there.

Kind would probably get some crap from the netroots in the primaries for having voted to weaken the Wall Street reforms, though.

Here's the thing with Johnson, though: does Wisconsin really have wood for Walker, or is he just benefiting from the timing of his three elections (two off-year, one in June of a Presidential year)? That matters, because if Walker's electoral success in Wisconsin is built on an actual base and not just the off-year malaise of the Democrats, he could have coattails for Johnson if he wins the Republican Presidential nomination.

If it's just that Walker got elected in 2010 when Democrats were pouting about Republican obstructionism, avoided recall in 2012 because the election was in June and not November, and got re-elected in 2014 because it was another down midterm for Democrats, then Johnson is probably in trouble next year.

Either way, Wisconsin is goofy and until/unless a Republican Presidential ticket emerges that doesn't have Scott Walker on it, I won't feel comfortable predicting what Wisconsin is going to do in 2016.

IIRC, Wisconsin's basically a red state except for Madison & Milwaukee. If key voting blocs (young people in Madison, poor people in Milwaukee) don't turn out for the Democrats, the state easily goes Republican. lungs - correct me if I'm wrong here.

When you have big concentrated pockets of votes you can easily handle elections if your GOTV is good (see: Obama 2008) or crater if they stay home en masse, which they are more likely to do as homogenous voting blocs (see: 2010 & 2014).

My perception is that the filibuster has become little more than a tool for parliamentary games, at this point. When was the last time it was used to stop legislation for actual ideological purposes? I don't think they even used it for the last actually unqualified SCOTUS nominee (Miers). I could be wrong, though, so correct me if I am.

Given that, the non-partisan part of me (yes, it's small), says just eliminate it (even if just for SCOTUS, on top of federal judgeships) and get on with business. This back-and-forth "will they, won't they" is just annoying and counter-productive.

I suppose the partisan part of me says keep it so Democrats can block truly unqualified candidates, but I think even the GOP (I'll probably regret this) won't let someone like Miers through in the future. And as much as I dislike Roberts and Alito, they're qualified, and you win the Oval Office you get to put those guys on the bench.

Basically. Far north along Lake Superior tends to be blue but the population is pretty low. Western Wisconsin between Madison and the Mississippi River is the bellweather region. Obama took every county along this corridor while in the governor election only a few counties went blue. Racine and Kenosha also went for both Obama and Walker.

The Milwaukee suburbs up through Green Bay and the rural central parts of the state are pretty solidly red. That region just sent Glenn Grothman to the House for pete's sake. I think if JimGA gets to know Grothman, he'd probably rank among his more liked House Reps :)

edit: Forgot to say Sack is absolutely right about the Walker coattails in a Presidential year if he's on the ticket.

Madison and Milwaukee are also two of the three biggest cities in the state though, and the overall state population isn't terribly large. Saying that if you exclude those two cities (when cities tend to be Democratic strongholds), the state is pretty solidly Republican?

Shit, son, that's probably true of most states in the country. "If Democratic blocs don't turn out in Los Angeles and San Francisco..."