Looking for a good bet? Bet on Barack Obama to be re-elected as president of the United States. And yes, you can legally make that wager. Just make sure you’re getting 2-to-1 odds on an Obama victory.

As of this morning, the users who make up the polling/sampling body of prediction-making website Intrade are saying Barack Obama has a 64% chance of winning 2012’s presidential race. Conversely, Mitt Romney’s odds of being this nation’s 45th president are 36%. And given the site’s past success with picking presidents, I wouldn’t dismiss these numbers lightly. No Bookie Needed

Intrade bills itself as “the world’s leading prediction market,” and it truly is a market in the sense that visitors can buy or sell “shares” — and make or lose real money — in a particular event’s outcome. Intrade has facilitated wagers on the size of the box office for a particular movie’s opening weekend, the Supreme Court ruling on whether Obamacare is unconstitutional, and yes, even presidential elections. Read 

Christmas came early for President Obama in the form of the September jobs report, which might as well have been gift-wrapped and tied in a bright red ribbon.

On Friday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that total nonfarm payroll rose by 114,000 in September, about in line with economists’ predictions and really no great shakes by historical standards.

Still, it will be looked on as a major victory for the president, since the unemployment rate — the true headline number — fell to 7.8%. That’s the first time it’s been below 8% since January 2009, and it puts that critically important number slightly below where it was when President Obama took office. Read 

When it comes to 7-Eleven and its coffee drinkers, the choice for president is clear: Barack Obama.

For the fourth straight presidential election, convenience store chain 7-Eleven has allowed customers buying coffee to select a cup based on their preferred candidate — blue for Obama, red for Mitt Romney, or a generic cup for undecideds or unpolitical coffee drinkers. Currently, Obama leads with 60% of the “votes.”

Obama has been in the lead since the first day of the promotion, Sept. 6, where he got 57.2% of the cups. Read 

The verdict is in — from David Brooks on PBS to Charles Krauthammer on Fox News to James Carville on CNN to Chris Matthews on MSNBC:  Mitt Romney won the first presidential debate decisively.

The Republican presidential candidate was sharp, prepared and more specific than he has been so far in the campaign. He responded well to the president’s attacks by upping the ante on issues from jobs to deficits to health care to Medicare.

A focus group of Colorado undecided voters led by Republican pollster Frank Luntz on Fox News — half of whom voted for President Obama in 2008 — said Romney was decisive. On the other hand, they called the president’s performance “flat,” “weak” and “not passionate.” Read 

JetBlue (NASDAQ:JBLU) is offering angry citizens whose preferred presidential candidate loses this November a (temporary) way out of the country: they’re giving away free flights to a select number of those supporters.

The airline announced that it will be giving away 2,012 seats — or 1,006 round trip flights — for customers whose candidate doesn’t get elected president. Travelers just have to visit a website JetBlue set up for the promotion, register who they want to win the election, and select a destination among the various international destinations it services.

These include Colombia, Costa Rica, Mexico, and several Caribbean islands. Winners will be selected among those who supported the losing candidate. Read 

President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney squared off Wednesday night in 2012′s first presidential election debate, set in Denver — and the results were a little bit different than what the majority of Americans were expecting.

Here’s a quick report card breaking down how each of the candidates did, as well as moderator Jim Lehrer, whose … er, performance … set social media on fire:
Mitt Romney: A

Mitt Romney came into the first presidential debate as the underdog, trailing in the polls and widely predicted to lose. He ended up dramatically exceeding expectations. Read