Allen West plays a darn good game of chess

Politics is a chess game.

Having a winning campaign strategy means not just planning your next move, but anticipating what your opponent's moves will be in response. The more accurately you can predict - or, better yet, influence - your opponent's actions, the more likely you are to win.

I don't know if Allen West plays chess in real life, but he's running his reelection campaign like a Grandmaster.

Oooh, Tierney's attack ad has scary words! And Sarah Palin!

Congressman John Tierney (D, MA-6) is in the reelection fight of his life, partly because his Republican challenger, state senator Richard Tisei, enjoys decent approval ratings and name recognition from his decades-long political career, and partly because people in his family keep ending up in jail.

Was Elizabeth Warren practicing law without a license?

Wow. Professor William Jacobson has a knock-your-socks off exposé of what appears to be repeated instances of unlicensed practice of law by Massachusetts Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren at his blog, Legal Insurrection, this morning:

Obama is running for WHAT, exactly?

Barack Obama is the current American president, if Wikipedia can be believed. He's also running some sort of campaign right now, but for what exact office is he running?

Let's review the facts:

Is the UPS Store using "You Didn't Build That" as a theme in their new ad?

I noticed this UPS Store ad about a week ago, and it stuck in my mind for some reason, a reason which didn't really make sense at first. 

Watch the ad yourself, and see if you notice the same interesting thing that I did about the ad:

Rubio in new Romney ad: "That's not politics, it's math" [VIDEO]

My Senator, Marco Rubio, is the star of a new Romney campaign ad on the subject of Medicare:

Gators for Romney

Here's my new favorite logo:

"What do you think would happen?"

Jon Lovitz asked a really good question on Twitter last night:

Obama is better than the previous 11 presidents combined!

Oh yes, I am absolutely serious about that post title. Barack Obama is better than the eleven presidents who held the office before him. In fact, he's better than all eleven of them combined.

The unfortunate thing for Obama is the category where he is better than his predecessors:

Romney gets real about the "War on Women"

Here's a great new ad from the Romney campaign, striking right at the heart of the Democrats' "War on Women" attack:

Enough.

Sadly, yesterday was not only a day for Americans to remember those we lost in the terrorist attacks eleven years ago, but also a day of violence in the Middle East, violence directed towards Americans. 

Our embassy in Egypt was overrun by protesters, who tore down our flag and ripped and burned it, then replaced it with their own banner. Even worse, in Libya similar protests resulted in our ambassador being killed. 

Embassies are legally treated as the sovereign soil of the countries that operate them, so I can't see how yesterday's violence in Egypt and Libya was anything other than an act of war against the United States. 

More on Joe Kennedy's Ignorance about Israel

Last week, I wrote a post about how the Democratic candidate for Massachusetts' Fourth Congressional District, Joe Kennedy III (yes, one of those Kennedys), had taken the the unacceptable position that the capital of Israel was Tel Aviv. 

Video of Kennedy's ridiculous statement made the rounds of the blogosphere (see Moe Lane's RedState post here), but Kennedy has not attempted to clarify his words (or, more likely, his handlers haven't let any journalists close enough to ask him any real questions). The fact that delegates at the DNC were caught on video loudly booing a vote to reinstate language in the Democratic platform that affirmed Jerusalem as Israel's capital further adds to the growing criticism that the Democrats are not as supportive of Israel as they claim.

Today, Seth Mandel has an excellent, "must-read" post at Commentary regarding Kennedy's statement and some broader related issues pertaining to the MA-4 election:

More on the polling...

Just wanted to follow up on the detailed Romney campaign memo I just posted regarding recent poll results...

Peter "DaTechGuy" Ingemi has a detailed analysis at his blog specifically looking at Public Policy Polling's recent Ohio poll. Basically, although PPP shows Obama up by 5, the numbers seem, well, less than reliable when you look at the underlying figures.

Romney pollster: "Don't get too worked up about the latest polling"

Several recent polls claim to show Obama enjoying a post-convention bounce, and back on top over Romney. There are a lot of reasons to be skeptical of what RedState's Erick Erickson characterized yesterday as "the cymbal clashing wind up monkeys of the Gang of 500," as certain sympathetic media outlets attempt to declare the election a done deal before a single voter has cast a ballot.

After we move past distracting nonsense from nationwide polls (when it's the electoral college results that matter), and polls of adults or registered voters (as opposed to likely voters), there are a number of external factors that will affect the vote in November that are not fully reflected in the polls from the past few days. The Romney campaign released a memo this morning from their pollster, Neil Newhouse, on the current state of the race. Newhouse makes a number of points that should give Republicans hope:

Paul Ryan: "This is not even close to what a recovery looks like"

Paul Ryan gave an interview earlier this morning in response to today's jobs report, which he slammed as "the result of failed leadership in Washington [and] bad fiscal policies coming from the administration:"

Romney: "If last night was the party, this morning is the hangover."

The Democratic National Convention started as our national debt crossed the $16 trillion threshold, and the morning after it ended, we have yet another depressing jobs report.

Unemployment fell to 8.1% from 8.3%, but that number is not actually a measure of new jobs created (or "saved or created," as the Obama administration likes to say), but rather how many Americans have given up looking for work.

In fact, as Reuters reported, "the labor force participation rate, or the percentage of Americans who either have a job or are looking for one, fell to 63.5 percent -- the lowest since September 1981."

Mitt Romney released a statement in response to the latest jobs report, calling it the "hangover" after the "party" of the Democratic National Convention:

Nonsense in the Ninth: Adam Chaprales needs to come clean

In my time up in Massachusetts, I've had the privilege of getting to know Chris Sheldon, who's running for Congress in the Republican primary for District 9.

Sheldon's primary opponent, Adam Chaprales, has made a number of...odd...statements over the past few years, and continued that pattern during this election cycle. 

Bumper sticker of the day

Saw this on my friend Tom Reynold's Facebook page (follow him on Twitter @Beregond) last night:

Charlie Crist is inspirational!

Oh, yes, the World's Tallest Oompa Loompa is indeed an inspiring man. Our former governor's latest round of backstabbing political opportunism has driven the Republican Party of Florida to ever-higher pinnacles of creativity.

After last week's "letter" to DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz mockingly congratulating them on their choice of speakers, the RPOF has followed up with a new video "previewing" Crist's speech to the DNC:

Obama proves again that his own words make the best RNC ads

Yesterday, our national debt officially went over the $16 trillion mark. (You can watch the numbers dizzily spin along for yourself at USDebtClock.org.)

Appropriately, we hit this nausea-inducing milestone on the day that the Democrats kicked off their national convention, hoping to reelect Barack Obama, the guy who led the way in creating a large chunk of that debt.

Never one to pass up an opportunity, the RNC released another web ad, again using Obama's own words against him to make their point:

Unacceptable: Kennedy says capital of Israel is Tel Aviv [VIDEO]

In a recent television debate with his Democratic primary opponents, MA-4 Congressional candidate Joe Kennedy III was asked about the capital of Israel.

Shockingly - especially for a candidate who professes to support Israel - Kennedy replied that the capital was Tel Aviv, and even confirmed his answer when the host questioned him on it:

EXCLUSIVE PHOTO: Obama welcomes Crist to Charlotte

In this exclusive photo, President Obama welcomes former Florida Governor and former Republican Charlie Crist to Charlotte, North Carolina for the Democratic National Convention:

New RNC ad uses Obama's own words against him [VIDEO]

This new ad from the RNC makes devastatingly effective use of Barack Obama's own words: