Michele Bachmann denies benefiting from government aid

latimes.com ^ | June 26, 2011 | Richard A. Serrano

[Berlin_Freeper]

...Bachmann and her staff declined to talk to about the government assistance for the L.A. Times article. But asked about the issue on "Fox News Sunday," she insisted that she and her husband had not benefited at the expense of federal and state taxpayers.

"First of all," she said, "the money that went to the clinic was actually training money for employees. The clinic did not get the money. And my husband and I did not get the money either. That's mental health training money that went to employees."

As for the farm, she said it belonged to her father-in-law. "It's not my husband and my farm," Bachmann said. "And my husband and I have never gotten a penny of money from the farm."

As the Los Angeles Times reported on Sunday, however, in financial disclosure forms, Bachmann reported receiving between $32,503 and $105,000 in income from the farm, at minimum, between 2006 and 2009.

[DoughtyOne]

I don’t disagree with you there. With regard to you liking most of my posts, I think you’re dead on target. ;^)

Okay, okay...

If you begin with my premise that she did not toss the election to McCain, and my premise that she should have known better than to back him against Hayworth, I think it’s not all that big a stretch to understand where I am coming from.

I think there was a 10 to 15 point in the first thirty days. Over the months, I believe she may have accounted for 10% more. That wasn’t going to cause Hayworth to lose by itself.

The question is, how much could she have swayed the vote, if she had endorsed Hayworth and gotten him the Tea Party vote?

You start looking at that variation, and all of a sudden it’s a game changer. Would it have been enough?

When a person like Palin comes in, I think the public who are on the fence trying to figure out what to do, all of a sudden have permission to go to a guy like McCain.

What if that permission had been denied, and Palin caught on fire for Hayworth? Would the public have too? It’s possible.

I’m not saying that’s a given by any stretch, but it is possible.

Can I say that she cost Hayworth the election for certain? No. Can I say that she absolutely couldn’t have swung it to Hayworth. Not absolutely I can’t.

I’m still not going to hold her responsible for that. I just don’t know.

[rabscuttle385]

The rat AZ primary was a contested field of 4 rats, but you believe huge numbers ignored their own primary to vote against JD? Even though the polls showed JD had no shot at beating McCain? Interesting.

See post 183 and get your facts straight.

J.D. was statistically tied with McCain for months. Shucks, when the polls were restricted to Republicans only, J.D. was leading McCain.

[DoughtyOne]

A couple of my posts probably overlapped the post where you held out an olive branch of sorts. I’m am sorry that I didn’t see that post as I worked my way up the list of posts I needed to respond to.

I know my tone can be abrasive, and I wanted to let you know that your post was nice, and let you know that I did find value in it. I appreciated it.

[Fu-fu2]

“Hopefully, we “conservatives” can quickly dispose of Bachmann like we did Palin so we can move on to destroying the next GOP candidate. We need to keep it up so the ‘RATS can lay back munching popcorn, cooling their heels and getting their boy a second term without having to spend too much of the union’s money!

sarc/”

I agree. Sadly.

[dixiechick2000]

YOU...sweet thang...have hit the nail square on the head.

[DoughtyOne]

Thanks DC2K. Once in a while I get one right.

Have a great knight. ;^) Okay, don’t hit me. LOL

[dixiechick2000]

LOL!

Knightey knight. ;o)

[DoughtyOne]

Good night.

[mountainbunny]

I am trying to understand - if a foster parent took care of me for several years and then was running for PRESIDENT, wouldn’t I want to come forward as an adult and share my experience with her and endorse her?

Not if they don't want people to know that they were foster children. Not if they don't want the world to know that they were abused, molested or abandoned and needed foster care.

There is a lot of stigma attached to those things and no one owes that sort of debt to a foster parent. Besides, no decent foster parent would ask that of a child.

Their debt does not extend to having their names plastered all over the news so that someone running for office can get publicity out of it.

Does that make sense?

[Once-Ler]

The rat AZ primary was a contested field of 4 rats, but you believe huge numbers ignored their own primary to vote against JD? Even though the polls showed JD had no shot at beating McCain? Interesting.

See post 183 and get your facts straight.

J.D. was statistically tied with McCain for months. Shucks, when the polls were restricted to Republicans only, J.D. was leading McCain.

When I said polls, I didn't mean polls from 4 months before the primary. Do you have access to polls from late July and August 2010? Find them and then you will understand my statement "polls showed JD had no shot at beating McCain." However I will concede your point that JD polled well before he announced his candidacy in mid Feb 2010...and up to 4-6 weeks after.

I don't know if Palin's endorsement beat JD, but I do believe scandal, hypocrisy, 100+ other endorsements from major GOP and AZ state law enforcement figures, plus $21 million is probably worth more.

Instead of answering my question you pointed me to DoughtyOne's post about the effect of Palin's endorsement 4 months before the primary election so I'll try my question again this way...Do you really think Palin's endorsement convinced rats to ignore their own contested primary and vote against JD? really?

[fightinJAG]

I don’t know how you are reading “zero actual benefit” as something other than “not a penny.”

It’s very common to receive NO MONEY (not a penny, not an actual benefit) from some kind of business arrangement, yet have a disclosable “financial interest” in it that has a value placed on it even though *see above.*

As someone posted on this thread, as a partner in a firm he was imputed to have a financial interest in th firm that was valued at so many dollars, even though he had not received a penny in actual income from the firm.

The purpose of financial disclosure forms is to show what the person may have an interest in, and what the value of that interest is if it were “income.” That is all.

[fightinJAG]

P.S. Stocks are a perfect example. One can own, or be imputed to own an interest in a company through stocks, yet never receive a penny.

[fightinJAG]

Why are you assuming she gave false, and deliberately false information?

If your FIL owned stocks in which he gave you an interest, but you never received a penny in income from the stocks, would it be a deliberate falsehood to say you never received one penny from those stocks? Yet you’d still have to report them as a “financial interest” for purpose of financial disclosure laws.

[FreeReign]

Fine. Then she shouldn't give false information about it.

Why are you assuming she gave false, and deliberately false information?

I didn't say it was "deliberate". Why did you say that I did?

[stephenjohnbanker]

Excellent!

[DoughtyOne]

Out of the box, let me say I'm no fan of open primaries.  Open primaries allow the Leftists the opportunity to block Conservatives from getting on the general election ballot.  When the subject of open elections was considered in California, you didn't hear hardly a peep out of the Republican leadership.  Par for the course in our state.  The measure passed.

As you have noted, Arizona has open primaries.  I think the contest between McCain and Hayworth is a good case in point.  That isn't to imply that this segment of the vote did swing it to McCain though.

Lets look at the numbers.  Reference

I threw these numbers into an Excel Spreadsheet, and did a work-up.  If you wish to take a look at the PDF, I think you'll note my numbers are accurate.

Conclusions:

1. Hayworth lost to McCain 192,229 votes to 333,744 votes.  McCain received 37.59% of the votes and Hayworth received 21.43% of the votes.  The leading Democrat received 11.3% of the votes.

2. While Hayworth lost to McCain by 16.16%, he would have only had to take 8.08% plus one vote away from McCain to have won the election.

Side note: Primaries in Arizona being open, most polling captures a more valid picture related to the actual election results.  You don't have to guess what the Dems will do.  It's right there in the poll.  This would probably be the only plus, if you can call it that, related to open primaries.  We have a pretty clear picture of what dynamics were in play, that related directly to the election, involving the voting base for both parties.  We have that from prior to January 2010 right through to the primary election day.  Thus the swing subsequent to the March 26th campaign rally looms large in the overall scheme of things.  If the subsequent swing was in the 10% range, that's significant.  There's a very real possibility that it was in the neighborhood of 10%.*

3. Registration figures for Arizona

32.27%  Democrats
00.15%  Green
00.78%  Libertarian
36.08%  Republican
30.73%  Others

Yes, that's 100%.

4. Here's where the data turns a bit dicey.  When it comes to votes cast, it's rather unclear what they mean.  Are they referencing votes cast for Democrats, or are they referencing votes cast by Democrats (and other parties to follow suit)?  I take it to mean votes cast for Democrats (and other parties to follow suit), because there is no showing for 'Other'.  When you break it down by votes cast for, you find that Democrats got a 32.27% showing compared to their registration.  You also find that the Republicans got a 60.02% showing compared to their registration.

The implications of that may be huge.  If you look at the overall showing for Democrats, it's clear none of them stood a chance.  11.3% being their best showing comparted to McCain and Hayworth, it comes into focus that there may have been a massive cross-over vote.  60.02% vs 32.27%?  Did the Republicans get that percentage of their base out, while the Democrats got only 32.27% of theirs?  I doubt it.

It seems to me the 'Others' and even some Democrats moved into the Republican ranks here.  If as I suspect, the Democrats in Arizona are a more moderate beast than in say Los Angeles or New York, the breakdown in votes may not be all that pronounced.  McCain probably got the larger number of them, but it's entirely possible Hayworth got a good portion of them too.  It's seems clear, they all didn't go for McCain.

In the race for Senator...

Republicans received 593,301 votes.  66.83%

Democrats received 289.866 votes.  32.65%

I don't think there's a way to break this down further.

5. I believe it is rational to believe the following.

a. Crossover voting did occur  (66.83% for Republicans and 32.65% for Democrats)
b. McCain likely didn't win because of it  (He didn't win by a 34% plus spread, the lopsided margin of Republican to Democrat votes)
c. It is also likely that the immediate and near term swing after the March 26th campaign rally may have had more impact than even I expected.  If the support had gone to Hayworth instead, that 8.08% plus one would have been easily in reach.  He was only behind by 7% at that point, according to some polls.*

You can look at the numbers all the way through.  The one significant swing that took place, was just subsequent to the March 26th rally.  That swing seems to have been about a 10% swing.*

* It should be noted, the data concerning the post March 26th rally is not provided in this work-up.  I did provide that data higher up in the thread.

I have provided my conclusions, but others are free to look at the data and come to their own.  Those may differ from mine.  Later...

[DoughtyOne]

Thanks SJB. I appreciate it.

[Impy]

Are you Baby Sinclair? How’d you do that?

[DoughtyOne]

Impy, I am not. I do note that post 84 and a half though. When you posted to him, it came to me.

Strange huh.

Posts go from

84.0
84.5
85.0

Haven’t seen that before.

[Impy]

Buford P did you make post 84.5? (seems like you did)

I’ve seen someone do that once before, some HTML trick obviously.

In any case a very funny post.