Jobs:

As Republicans our first concern is for those waiting tonight to begin or resume the climb up life’s ladder. We do not accept that ours will ever be a nation of haves and have nots; we must always be a nation of haves and soon to haves.

Energy and Jobs:

The extremism that stifles the development of homegrown energy, or cancels a perfectly safe pipeline that would employ tens of thousands, or jacks up consumer utility bills for no improvement in either human health or world temperature, is a pro-poverty policy. It must be replaced by a passionate pro-growth approach that breaks all ties and calls all close ones in favor of private sector jobs that restore opportunity for all and generate the public revenues to pay our bills.

Tax Reform:

That means a dramatically simpler tax system of fewer loopholes and lower rates. A pause in the mindless piling on of expensive new regulations that devour dollars that otherwise could be used to hire somebody. It means maximizing on the new domestic energy technologies that are the best break our economy has gotten in years.

Congressional Gridlock:

It’s not fair and it’s not true for the President to attack Republicans in Congress as obstacles on these questions. They and they alone have passed bills to reduce borrowing, reform entitlements, and encourage new job creation, only to be shot down nearly time and again by the President and his Democrat Senate allies.

General Change in Direction:

No feature of the Obama Presidency has been sadder than its constant efforts to divide us, to curry favor with some Americans by castigating others. As in previous moments of national danger, we Americans are all in the same boat. If we drift, quarreling and paralyzed, over a Niagara of debt, we will all suffer, regardless of income, race, gender, or other category. If we fail to shift to a pro-jobs, pro-growth economic policy, there will never be enough public revenue to pay for our safety net, national security, or whatever size government we decide to have.

Rally Call:

2012 must be the year we prove the doubters wrong. The year we strike out boldly not merely to avert national bankruptcy but to say to a new generation that America is still the world’s premier land of opportunity. Republicans will speak for those who believe in the dignity and capacity of the individual citizen; who believe that government is meant to serve the people rather than supervise them; who trust Americans enough to tell them the plain truth about the fix we are in, and to lay before them a specific, credible program of change big enough to meet the emergency we are facing.

Source: House Speaker, John Boehner

Let’s just hope we  don’t have another Bobby Jindal moment. Mitch Daniels has the potential to go on to bigger things in politics, and I would hate to see it ruined by a bad speech delivery.

There have been many on the left who have been diligently trying to discredit the rapidly growing Tea Party Movement as nothing more than a few angry activists.

Well, I guess in terms of web traffic, these few angry activists are more energized than the ever-so-famous Barack Obama army.

What this link shows is the increase in traffic rank, as calculated by Alexa.com.

Of course, any computer geek will quickly rush in and discredit Alexa’s ranking system. However, if you look at some of the other metrics presented here, TaxDayTeaParty.com comes up strong in every category, bringing to question the real power of the post-election Obama machine.

For those of you who don’t follow this stuff regularly and may be confused, let me just walk you through the more important metrics.

While traffic rank is an interesting number to follow, most techies are more concerned with things like pageviews, as shown on the “pageview” tab here.

Now Alexa doesn’t provide you with the exact number pageviews, but instead displays the data as a percentage of overall online activity.

Even so, TaxDayTeaParty.com comes out strong again.

Using another metric, bounce rate, you can easily see how engaging a particular website is. Basically, bounce rate represents nothing more than a percentage of people who come to a certain page on a site and then leave without clicking to other internal links. This metric is important because if a site has content that isn’t relevant or interesting, they’ll leave.

Looking at the two sties, TaxDayTeaParty.com wins another round. Since this metric is based on a percentage of those who exit the site, it’s better to have a lower a number, which TaxDayTeaParty.com does, with a bounce rate of around 35% versus Obama’s 45%.

Yet they’re still trying to discredit this movement?

While I could easily stop there, I might as well finish this out by examining the “Time on Site” numbers.

This metric is self explanatory, it represents the average amount of time visitors spend browsing a particular website. If you’re a web developer, this is an important metric because the time spent on site will often reflect the quality of your sites content, structure, and interactivity.

So looking at the two sites, once again TaxDayTeaParty.com is the victor, with an average time on site of just under 3 minutes, versus Obama’s, which is right around 1 minute and 30 seconds.

While it’s easy to understand why TaxDayTeaParty.com is doing better than the Obama site at present, it’s important to note that in the weeks following the election, everyone was worried about what Obama was going to do with his “massive grassroots army.”

While he may still have a massive email list and a flashy website, in terms of measured attention, it looks like it’s become a model that can be (and is being) replicated by other organizations and movements successfully.

Just for kicks, here is how TaxDayTeaParty.com does against other sites:

TaxDayTeaParty.com vs. MoveOn.org

Winner: TaxDayTeaParty.com

TaxDayTeaParty.com vs. Democrats.org

Winner: TaxDayTeaParty.com

TaxDayTeaParty.com vs. DailyKos.com

Winner: DailyKos.com (for now)

Yes, alas, it’s Obama’s new dog.

From Sunday’s Washington Post.

The little guy is a 6-month-old Portuguese water dog given to the Obama girls as a gift by that Portuguese water dog-lovin’ senator himself, Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts. The girls named it Bo — and let it be noted that you learned that here first. Malia and Sasha chose the name, because their cousins have a cat named Bo and because first lady Michelle Obama’s father was nicknamed Diddley, a source said. (Get it? Bo . . . Diddley?)

Bo? I guess it could be worse.

My guesses for some other names that were probably considered, but couldn’t make the cut:

• Messiah
• Rush
• Maverick
• Rummy
• Turbo (Tim Geithner’s Pick)
• Blago
• Murdock
• Mary Jane
• Gimmick (this had to be the close second)

Are there any others that I’ve missed?

I don’t think I’ve see anything like this before, but it’s not bad:

Click here to view the embedded video.

While this video is different, I have to say that it’s definitely catchy, memorable, and probably one of the better political web videos I’ve seen.

For more information on Charlie Wheelan, click here.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

From Rides Magazine:

Were the t-shirt, button and decorative plate not enough for you? Well if you live in Illinois and operate a fully registered vehicle, now’s your chance to Ba-rock an official (albeit temporary) Obama license plate. Proceeds from the sale of the license plates (which can be purchased at the Chicago Auto Show this week) benefit the Illinois Library Association.

The tags are valid between February 17 and April 17, 2009. After that, expect to see them garnering even more change on ebay.

I guess the Volvo full of bumper stickers isn’t enough for some people.

Obama’s winning line up:

First was Bill Richardson who had been nominated as Commerce Secretary but pulled out because he is facing a grand jury investigation (remember when he was running for President? Oh how things can change…)

Next up was Tim Geithner for Treasury Secretary. He wants to lead the United States out of its overwhelming economic crisis, but he can’t figure out how to pay his taxes. He paid $34,000 in back income taxes and we confirmed him because his late payment gave our economy a boost – thank you Mr. Secretary!

In the middle we have Nancy Killefer who wanted to be Obama’s Chief Performance Officer, or “Performance Czar” as the Obama Administration likes to call the position. The Performance Czar does not require a Senate Confirmation, but Deputy Director of the OBM does, and when everyone discovered that Nancy doesn’t pay her “help” at home, she withdrew her name and crawled back to McKinsey & Co.

Batting clean up was the left’s shinning star Tom Daschle. Daschle had lost his South Dakota Senate seat to John Thune in 2004 (49% to 51%) and was looking for a way to redeem himself in national politics, his plan was to hand out “free” health care to everyone and just charge the bill to America’s credit card. How hard is it to take a former Senate Majority Leader down? Apparently it’s pretty easy, especially when he doesn’t pay $130,000+ in taxes. My question is what is Daschle so afraid of? Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said that “[Daschle] is like a brother to me,” and Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee Max Baucus said he was “shocked” to hear that Daschle was dropping out.

Apparently there is more to the story because with Reid and Baucus backing him, Daschle should have been confirmed despite his tax blunder. Senator Ensign has said Daschle’s situation “doesn’t pass a smell test,” and I agree. Senator Thune’s seat is up for re-election in 2010 – maybe Daschle will get back in the race then.

And wait, we just went into extra innings – pinch hitter Judd Gregg maybe in trouble. Senator Obama’s pick to replace Richardson as the Commerce Secretary, has some trouble brewing of his own.

A former congressional aide to Commerce Secretary-nominee Judd Gregg, Kevin Koonce, is now caught up in an investigation into a Capitol Hill lobbying scandal involving notorious lobbyist Jack Abramoff. How close was Koonce to Senator Gregg? He was his Legislative Director (that’s the #2 job) for Gregg’s Senate office from 2002-2004. Koonce is accused of taking tickets to hockey and baseball games from Abramoff’s former deputy Todd Boulanger in exchange for “received favors” in spending legislation. Now it’s up to Obama to ask Gregg if he’s a sports fan.

Read more about the possible Gregg scandal here: http://www.koat.com/politics/18640535/detail.html

Let’s hope Gregg didn’t resign that Senate seat just yet.

From Politifact.com

Promise No. 234:Barack Obama Campaign Promise No. 234:

Allow five days of public comment before signing bills

To reduce bills rushed through Congress and to the president before the public has the opportunity to review them, Obama “will not sign any non-emergency bill without giving the American public an opportunity to review and comment on the White House website for five days.”

with corresponding video from CNN.com:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Was this just a slip up, or the first of many broken campaign promises?

To be honest, I don’t think there has ever been a politician who has kept all (or even most) of their campaign promises, so I wouldn’t expect anything different from President Obama.

It’s easy to be idealistic when you’re looking at the job of President as an outsider, but once you’re inside you realize the stark realities (both political and personal) that go along with the job. Even the most honest President is destine to be put in a position where they’ll have to change their positions simply due to the climate in Washington, often on multiple occasions.

Photo of yesterday's snow - Washington Post

As a native Wisconsinite, I’ve always found the reaction of those in DC to insignificant amounts of snow humorous, and sometimes even pitiful.

However, this morning was a bit different. After a few inches of nice snow, followed by a few hours of sleet, capped off with an overnight shower of freezing-rain, the entire DC-metro area is now one giant sheet of ice.

While ice storms aren’t new winter occurrences, I couldn’t help but chuckle at the timing of this storm.

Not only will thousands of DC-metro area residents face near-death experiences while slipping on their walks to the Metro, but today is also the day that the House is to vote on the $825 billion stimulus package:

From this morning’s Huffington Post:

President Barack Obama’s expansive and expensive plan to jump-start the economy is all but certain to clear its first hurdle when the Democratic-controlled House votes on a $825 billion version that melds new spending and tax cuts.

While I do find it funny that DC has literally become a “slippery slope” on the day that the Democrats are going to exhibit their biggest usage of political capital since they took control a few weeks ago, this is even better:

From this morning’s Politico:

Former Vice President Al Gore is joining President Obama’s push for a $900 billion economic stimulus, heading to Capitol Hill on Wednesday and e-mailing his list of more than 2 million to urge pressure on Congress.

The former vice president arrived by Amtrak in the icy, snowy capital to testify on the topic of, “Addressing Global Climate Change.”

That’s right! The same day that Al Gore throws his support behind this massive package, citing the need to address climate change, DC is hit by a significant (yet common) winter storm.