In the Wednesday Morning Jolt, a look at the effort to recall Scott Walker in Wisconsin, George Lucas?s response to his critics, and then this suggestion that the season of Republican debates may be coming to an end?

Will Mitt Romney Start Vetoing More Debates?

The part of me that would like my evenings back is okay with the concept of debate season coming to an end. The part of me that hates seeing the likely 2012 Republican nominee back down from anything is not okay with the appearance that Mitt Romney has had enough of this.

Byron York: ?After a debate in which Republican frontrunner Mitt Romney faced attacks from all sides, the Romney campaign says it has not yet accepted invitations to participate in two high-profile debates leading up to the January 31 Florida primary, and a key Romney adviser is expressing fatigue and frustration over what he sees as a never-ending series of GOP debates. ?There are too many of these,? Romney strategist Stuart Stevens said after Monday night?s Fox News debate at the Myrtle Beach Convention Center.? ?We have to bring some order to it.? We haven?t accepted Florida?It?s kind of like a cruise that?s gone on too long.??

?Given?the news?this week, I?m not sure a ?cruise? analogy is a good choice,? quips Ed Morrissey.

Ace doesn?t think Romney will go through with this? yet: ?I don?t suppose that anyone can disagree too much that there have been too many debates. I wish he had skipped earlier ones, though, because most debates are about him, and you rarely get to hear other people except?vis a vis?Romney. Maybe his thinking is that, given an apparently wide lead?in Florida (Romney 46, Gingrich 20, Santorum 12),?he?s got Florida wrapped up and can afford to coast. The problem with that rationale is that the field may not be five-strong when he gets to Florida. Perry or Gingrich or Santorum may drop out by then, and the remaining candidates will get a bump from that. Prediction: He goes to both debates or at least one. Maybe he?ll skip one to make the point that he?s not required to attend every single one of them.?

At Hot Air, Ed Morrissey says that on the question of whether to continue holding them ?that is going to be out of Romney?s hands.? He might not like getting beat up on stage, but at least he?s there to defend himself.? The media will cover the debates whether Romney is there or not, so the only way he could successfully shut down the debates is if he gets the other Republican candidates to also withdraw.? They?re practically on life support as it is, so they are certainly not going to pass up an opportunity for national and state-wide coverage in Florida for free. If they show up, Romney has to participate as well, if for no other reason than to keep playing defense and push back a little himself.?

Bruce McQuain says he?s had enough, at least in the current format: ?I?m personally tired of the debates.? For the most part they?ve delivered more entertainment than information. They?ve devolved into scorekeeping about who got the best shot in on Romney.? This is something like the 15th Republican debate and we?re no more enlightened about the serious topics we should be addressing than we were after the 1st.

If we have to go through more of this debate nonsense, can we have one solely focused on jobs, the economy and the proposed policies each of the candidates would try to have implemented to turn this mess around??? Can we hear an intelligent discussion of what the European mess portends and how it will effect us?? ?And can we give them more than 90 seconds to answer??? I?m tired of hearing the same old stump speech for the umpteenth time, the usual fall back when there are time limits on answers.?? If the debate is 2 hours and that means only 2 to 3 questions get asked, but each candidate gets, say 5 to 7 minutes to answer, I?m fine with that.?

Eh, I?m not so certain that some candidates this cycle had a good five to seven minutes worth of thoughts to share on all topics.

To everything there is a season, including ?a time to keep silence, and a time to speak.?

Source: http://www.nationalreview.com/campaign-spot/288406/gop-debate-season-about-end-should-it

day of the dead rocksmith blackbeard widespread panic widespread panic richard stallman richard stallman

Share With Friends: | | Politics – Top Stories News, RSS and RSS Feed via Feedzilla.

Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/106790761?client_source=feed&format=rss

leann rimes cowboys and aliens daniel tosh avalon mantra my morning jacket canopy

Posted by Mike Hill | Filed under Uncategorized

Q: My daughter and her husband-to-be, who are both 21, are trying to buy a house and have put many offers in on various homes. They already are preapproved for the amount they need.

Every time they put an offer in, even on houses that have no other offers, and that have been on the market for a long time, all of a sudden many offers come in ? sometimes within 24 hours!

Then the bank goes with the higher offer, which confuses them because their agent told them there were no other offers. This has been very depressing for them.

They are getting married in June and would like to purchase a home before then, so they have a home to move into after the wedding (they both still live with their parents). Is there anything they can do to resolve this problem?

A: Being a buyer in today?s market is nearly as frustrating as being a seller. You read and hear all day long about what a strong buyer?s market it?s supposed to be and what great deals there are to be had via foreclosures and short sales.

But when you start making offers on properties, you find that the banks are nowhere near as willing to negotiate as you expected, and that many of the bank-owned homes cannot be bought without prevailing over a sea of other offers.

Depressing and frustrating ? yes. But there are some strategies they can and should put into play to better their chances going forward.

With an individual seller, you can minimize the chances of being outbid unawares in a couple of ways. You can put a very, very short time frame on your offer, eliminating a window of opportunity for other buyers to swoop in on the property.

Also, most listing agents in ?regular? sales want their clients to get the highest possible price for their home, so it?s common for them to ring up any previous offerors to let them know when additional offers have come in, to give them an opportunity to increase their offers or otherwise make them more competitive.

You can?t force a bank to respond to your offer in a very short time frame, or in any time frame at all, for that matter.

But what your daughter and future son-in-law can do is go into these transactions with the lessons they?ve learned thus far.

Whatever it is that caused them to be interested in this property at this point in time could very well be inspiring other buyers to make an offer at the same exact time. So, even when their agent is told that there are no other offers at the time they make theirs, they need to do several things.

First, they need to enlist their agent to stay in very close contact with the listing agent ? as often as two or three times a day is not overkill ? once their offer is submitted.

Your daughter?s agent should not only be calling the listing agent frequently to check and see whether other offers have come in ? they should also be asking the listing agent upfront to notify them if additional offers come in. That way, your daughter and her fianc? may at least get the chance to try to compete with the other offers.

Additionally, your daughter should consider changing her approach to formulating the price she offers for a home. She will have a better shot at getting a home if she offers a price more in line with the recent sales in the area, versus just offering something below or even at whatever the list price is on the assumption that she has no competition.

Every time she wants to make an offer, she and her mate should sit down with her agent and get an analysis of the recent sales of similar properties in the area. If she?s making an offer on a bank-owned property, she should look at those sorts of sales. It?s critical that she not only look at the recent comps? list price, or sale price, but their list-price-to-sale-price ratio.

For example, if a home?s list price is $100,000 and it sells for $110,000, the list-price-to-sale-price ratio is 110 percent.

From what you?ve said, it seems that it?s pretty common for these homes to sell over asking. If she can work with her agent to determine how much, on average, over asking these homes typically sell for, then she can apply that ratio to the list price of the home for which she wants to place an offer.

So, for example, if the other homes are selling for 107 percent of their asking price and she is seriously interested in buying a home that is listed for $125,000, she would multiply $125,000 by 107 percent and consider an offer price of $133,750.

Yes, that may mean that she goes in with an offer over the asking price, even in a situation where she has been told there are no other offers. But if the recent comparable sales justify that value, and it is within the price range she can afford to pay, that may be necessary to avoid being chronically overbid and secure the home in which to start her family.

Some buyers get hung up on the idea that they are ?overpaying? if they make an above-asking offer, but the reality is that the list price is not the actual price of the home ? it?s a starting point for upwards or downwards negotiations, depending on the local market dynamics and how the list price was set vis-?-vis the fair market value of the home.

Getting a great deal is not necessarily the same as paying at or below asking; just think ? if the list price is set too high, then offering to pay it isn?t a better deal than if you offer above-asking on a place where the list price is set way too low. This is why it?s so critical to rely heavily on an analysis of recent comparable sales to drive your offer price, rather than just on the list price or what the listing agent tells you.

Further, no house is a good deal if you don?t get it, which may be the learning that your daughter and her fianc? are experiencing. And given that prices have rolled back to 2003 levels in many areas, whatever they pay will undoubtedly be a great deal, from that perspective.

Source: http://www.northstaterealestate.net/2011/06/04/buying-and-selling-homes-in-oroville-paradise-chico-durham-biggs-gridley-live-oak-and-yuba-city-ca/

hyundai sonata barclays premier league white house correspondents dinner tina turner papaya