Happy HUMP day, Everyone! :-) See how the media has latched their eyes on to the next shiny object?
IT’S BAIN, YOU ID-GITS, TRUMP IS A DISTRACTION!
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DNC Chair Wasserman Schultz said national party backs recall
By Bill Glauber and Patrick Marley
May 30, 2012 12:08 p.m.
Racine — Democratic National Committee Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz told 75 Democratic Party supporters Wednesday that the national party was “putting all of our effort into this fight” to help Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett topple Gov. Scott Walker in Tuesday’s recall election.
“Scott Walker has worked hard to make sure that people think that he’s the rock star of the right-wing tea-party extremism that the Republican Party has allowed to take them over,” she said. “And that is not what voters in Wisconsin want to see happen.”
Wasserman Schultz made two appearances in Wisconsin, appearing with Barrett at a fundraiser in Milwaukee and then speaking with campaign volunteers at a Democratic Party headquarters in Racine.
She turned aside suggestions that the DNC wasn’t fully supportive of the recalls.
“To date, we’ve put over $1.5 million into this state to make sure that we could both get the recall on the ballot, help with the signature-gathering effort, coordinate with the grassroots on the ground,” she said.
The Florida congresswoman said the 21 Obama for America offices are fully working on the recall effort.
“We clearly have a lot at stake here in Wisconsin,” Wasserman Schultz said.
She said a Barrett victory in Tuesday’s election would “be the beginning of the downfall of tea party politics that Americans have been rejecting.”
Wasserman Schultz said former President Bill Clinton “is in the process of sorting out his schedule before next Tuesday” to come to Wisconsin.
http://www.jsonline.com/blogs/news/155740275.html#!page=0&pageSize=10&sort=newestfirst
PURE, UNADULTERATED HATE & INTOLERANCE. SHAMEFUL
So glad to see Rev. Al & Politics Nation back are on BAIN. “Bain & Suffering” segment, can’t wait for the video. Dade Behring Company… Hmmm.
Deval Patrick endorses Elizabeth Warren for US Senate
By Noah Bierman, Globe Staff
Governor Deval Patrick announced his endorsement of Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren this afternoon, trying to boost his fellow Democrat as she faces relentless questioning and criticism over her claims to Native American heritage.
Patrick delivered his backing during a joint appearance with the Harvard Law School professor in her Somerville headquarters. Beforehand, the governor wrote in an e-mail to supporters that Warren shares his values of “governing with a view toward our generational responsibility and the politics of conviction as our compass.”
“The reality is that her Republican opponent has made very different choices,” he added. “Time and time again – whether through his votes against summer jobs for our youth, against ending billions of dollars in subsidies to oil and gas companies, or allowing student loan interest rates to increase – Scott Brown has shown he is willing to put the politics of convenience ahead of the people of Massachusetts.”
Warren is heading into the state Democratic convention this Saturday. She has one remaining primary opponent, North Shore immigration attorney Marisa DeFranco.
Patrick and Warren share a chief political adviser, Doug Rubin. Polls have shown the governor is the state’s most popular politician, recently overtaking Brown, the Republican incumbent senator who Warren is trying to unseat.
http://www.boston.com/politicalintelligence/2012/05/30/deval-patrick-endorses-elizabeth-warren-for-senate/8Kv1oAoMntcfebHxftFNPN/story.html
Fox & Friends Guest On Valerie Jarrett’s Influence Over Obama: She’s The ‘De Facto President’
Videoby Alex Alvarez | 10:17 am, May 30th, 2012
On Wednesday, Fox & Friends host Steve Doocy spoke with The Amateur author Edward Klein about senior adviser Valerie Jarrett‘s “mysterious hold” over President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama.
“She had unique power for somebody working inside the White House,” said Doocy.
We haven’t seen anything like this in modern presidential history,” said Klein. “One person who is the best friend of the First Lady and the soulmate of the President, who is the last person to leave the Oval Office after a meeting, goes upstairs to the family quarters, has dinner with the President. Goes on vacation with them. Has his ear. Is de facto president of the United States.”
“Wow, that’s big,” said Doocy. “Well, let’s talk about her resume. Does she have the resume to have this job?”
No, she doesn’t,” replied Klein. “But what she does have is the trust of Michelle Obama, number one, whom she hired in Chicago, and the President, who uses her as his gatekeeper.”
Doocy then noted that, in his book, Klein writes that Jarrett “has also been responsible for much of the incompetence and amateurism that have been the hallmarks of Obama’s time in office.” Referring to the mission resulting in the successful capture and killing of Osama bin Laden, Klein said that “this is the one time that the President, that I know of, didn’t take her advice,” adding that “he did not take her advice that one time and things worked out very nicely.”
“She’s a very, very liberal person,” he continued. “And she, for instance, urged him to put that mandate on church-related organizations that were required to give free health care for contraceptives. This was against the advice of Joe Biden, the vice president, against the advice of Bill Daley. Bill Daley brought Cardinal Dolan into the Oval Office to try to get the President to reverse himself. And when Valerie Jarrett heard that, she went to the President, blew her stack and Bill Daley was shortly ushered out.”
“More powerful than the chief of staff,” said Doocy. “Isn’t that something?”
http://www.mediaite.com/tv/fox-friends-guest-on-valerie-jarretts-influence-over-obama-shes-the-de-facto-president/
LMBAO Of course the Republican women are going to vote for this puppet.
Mitt Romney winning over GOP women, according to new poll
By Jon Cohen and Krissah Thompson, Wednesday, May 30, 12:13 PM
Republican women are rallying to Mitt Romney — their party’s now-certain presidential nominee — boosting him to his best-ever showing on a fundamental measure of personal popularity, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.
Overall, Romney’s favorability rating still trails President Obama’s, but the gap is far narrower than it’s been. In the new poll, 41 percent of all Americans express positive views of Romney; 52 percent do so for Obama. Just over a month ago, the president had a 56 to 35 percent advantage on this score. (The “horse-race” has also dipped back to rough parity over this period.) ,b>
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/mitt-romney-winning-over-gop-women-according-to-new-poll/2012/05/30/gJQAB2Q21U_story.html?wpisrc=nl_pmpolitics
A three-year minimum?
By Steve Benen – Wed May 30, 2012 4:30 PM EDT.
Hoover and Bush were successful in business, but both crashed the economy.
Campaigning in Las Vegas yesterday, Mitt Romney shared an odd anecdote about presidential requirements. I’m still not sure if he was kidding.
The Republican referenced a suggestion from a voter he met recently, who wanted to see a constitutional requirement that presidential candidates “spend at least three years working in business before he could become president of the United States.”
Romney didn’t explicitly endorse the idea, but he seemed fond of the suggestion, telling his audience, “You see, then he or she would understand that the policies they’re putting in place have to encourage small business, make it easier for business to grow.”
If Romney’s serious about this, it’s worth appreciating what we know about history — plenty of well-regarded modern presidents (Clinton, Reagan, JFK, Eisenhower, and both Roosevelts) were not businessmen before taking office. George H.W. Bush and Jimmy Carter were successful in business, but far less so in office.
Similarly, U.S. News noted that the three men “widely considered by historians to be the worst presidents of the modern era [are] Warren G. Harding, Herbert Hoover, and George W. Bush.” All three “were successful businessmen.”
I’m not suggesting there’s a causal relationship here, but the point is it’s foolish to assume that good businessmen make good presidents when there’s so much evidence to the contrary.
Daniel Akst, a columnist for Newsday, consulted with Barbara Perry, a senior fellow at the University of Virginia’s Miller Center, to determine the employment background of every president. His conclusion: “It’s important to know whether a president has worked in business. It’s important because having worked in business is associated with being a lousy president, at least in the modern era.”
I don’t imagine many voters are aware of the historical record at this level of detail, but for those who care about the facts, Romney’s new talking point doesn’t make a lot of sense.
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http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/30/11961881-a-three-year-minimum?lite
More Romney Fibs on the Economy
Looks like the Mitt Romney campaign has found yet another way to manipulate the truth. This time it’s about how his record as a job creator compares to President Obama’s.
First, some background: As you probably know, Romney frequently says that, under Obama’s watch, the country lost jobs. That’s true in the technical sense: Since the end of January 2009, when Obama became president, the country has lost about 850,000 jobs. But the comparison is utterly meaningless. Obama inherited an economy in free-fall. Most of the job losses happened during the first few months, before his legislation passed and took effect.
A more accurate way to judge Obama would be to look past those early losses. Princeton political scientist Larry Bartels, for example, has suggested starting the clock a year after a president takes office. Using that method, the Daily Beast’s Michael Tomasky estimated that the country has actually gained 3.6 million jobs during Obama’s tenure. You can argue that waiting a whole year is too long, that Obama should be responsible for employment changes after only a few months. But that would reduce the extent of job gains, not eliminate them.
Romney, meanwhile, has come under attack for his job creation record. In response, Romney has said that’s unfair: He inherited a sluggish economy and it took a while for Romney’s policies to have an effect. That seems like a totally fair point. (I say “seems” because I haven’t studied the Massachusetts economic situation that closely.) But, as Greg Sargent rightly points out, if that standard applies to Romney shouldn’t it apply to Obama, as well? In other words, if we don’t count the first few months of Romney’s tenure, why should we count Obama’s?
The Obama campaign needs to be careful, too. If they’re going to insist (fairly) that we judge Obama by discounting the first few months, they can’t ask us to judge Romney based on what happened after his first day in office. But Sargent notes, correctly, that Romney’s the one who’s been making these arguments over and over again:
All this is more than just a gotcha. It goes directly to the heart of Romney’s entire case against Obama. The claim that “net” jobs were lost on Obama’s watch is absolutely central to Romney’s whole argument, and the Romney team has repeated it for months and months in every conceivable forum. But the new standard the Romney campaign wants applied to him—i.e., that the focus should be on jobs added after jobs losses were reversed—would seem to completely undercut this entire case.
http://www.tnr.com/blog/plank/103762/romney-obama-economy-job-losses-massachusetts-us
A spectacular failure of self-awareness
By Steve Benen – Wed May 30, 2012 3:30 PM EDT.
As attention shifts from Mitt Romney’s private-sector work to his tenure as a one-term governor, the Republican campaign has a challenge: coming up with a compelling explanation for why Romney struggled so badly when applying his business background to government.
Romney senior adviser Eric Fehrnstrom was asked late last week, for example, about the former governor’s job-creation failures in Massachusetts. He argued Romney inherited a “recession” and an economy that was “losing thousands of jobs every month.”
At this point, you might be thinking, “Wait, didn’t Obama also inherit a recession and an economy that was hemorrhaging jobs?” And if that is what you’re thinking, you’ll love the Romney campaign’s new press release.
Governor Romney Inherited An Economy That Was Losing Jobs Each Month And Left Office With An Economy That Was Adding Jobs Each Month. After taking office at a time when the state was losing thousands of jobs every month, Governor Romney’s focus on fiscal responsibility helped create an environment where job growth returned to Massachusetts. Job growth increased throughout his term….
The same press release takes a cheap shot at a “net” loss in jobs under Obama, which is wildly misleading because it blames the president for job losses that happened before his policies were even tried. But even if we put that aside, if Romney’s to be congratulated for inheriting an economy that was losing jobs and then turning things around, by that identical standard, he ought to be patting Obama on the back for a job well done.
Indeed, Obama’s campaign team could effectively issue the identical press release, after just swapping out the president’s name for Romney’s, and changing “state” to “nation.”
Given that the fight over job creation and economic growth is central to the entire presidential race, Team Romney’s new claim/standard is arguably the most important campaign story of the day. After all, Romney has spent two years arguing that this standard isn’t good enough for the president, but apparently it is good enough for himself.
——————————————————————————–
Greg Sargent had a good take on this:
http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/30/11959683-a-spectacular-failure-of-self-awareness?lite
Mitt Romney Will Not Live by Your Bourgeois Moral Standards
by Steve M.
Wed May 30th, 2012 at 04:22:49 PM EST
I’m fascinated by the way Mitt Romney has become a proud, unabashed moral relativist.
It used to be that politicians dissociated themselves from supporters or staffers who said or did unsavory things because they wanted to be seen as believers in the notion that life requires certain standards of conduct. A lot of this has always been self-serving, of course, but the point has always been to identify oneself with the notion that there really are lines of decency that shouldn’t be crossed.
Mitt Romney, as Byron York reminds us, thinks the morality of one’s associates is irrelevant and calling out improper conduct is nothing but theater. He’s not gonna live by your bourgeois, petty moral standards, maaaan!
Team Romney: Not gonna play repudiation game
Mitt Romney’s refusal to repudiate Donald Trump sends a signal, both to Democrats and the voting public: With the nation’s future at stake in this November’s election, Romney will not accommodate calls that he disown supporters who make ill-considered, unpopular, or sometimes outrageous statements on matters not fundamental to the campaign.
(Let’s stop right there — what if Barack Obama had declared in 2008 that he wouldn’t play the “repudiation game” with regard to “outrageous statements” such as … oh, say, years-old remarks about America made by the Reverend Jeremiah Wright? Would Romney have backed up Obama’s decision? I’m guessing not.)
[One] reason Romney is wary of such concessions is that John McCain tried them, and they didn’t do him any good. For example, in February 2008, a local Ohio radio host, Bill Cunningham, introduced McCain at a rally in Cincinnati. In the introduction, Cunningham referred to Obama three times by his full name, which at the time some Republicans feared would open them up to unspecified accusations of intolerance. “At one point, the media will quit taking sides in this thing,” Cunningham said, “and start covering Barack Hussein Obama.” McCain immediately apologized and disavowed Cunningham’s remarks. Eleven months later, of course, Obama took the oath of office, beginning, “I, Barack Hussein Obama…” In retrospect, the Cunningham episode looked ridiculous.
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And why are McCain’s repudiations the only ones we’re talking about here? Obama repudiated Wright, and Obama won. Why is Romney so certain that repudiation equals perceived weakness? Does he really believe that?
I also wonder if Romney just has a visceral desire to out-macho his predecessor at the top of the GOP ticket the way George W. Bush wanted to out-macho his own father (and, possibly, Romney wants to out-macho his).
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2012/5/30/162249/057
McCotter’s fail opens door for Democrats
By Laura Conaway – Wed May 30, 2012 3:01 PM EDT.
Republican leaders in Congress are lining up to support Michigan Congressman Thaddeus McCotter’s write-in campaign to keep his seat. McCotter turned in a couple thousand nominating signatures for the Republican primary, but only 244 of them were valid. Now Representatives John Boehner, Pete Sessions and Eric Cantor have said they’ll lend their support to his write-in bid.
And then there are the Republicans back home in McCotter’s district, where they sound just disgusted that their incumbent couldn’t get himself on the ballot. From the Detroit News:
“That’s an unforgivable screw-up,” said Oakland County Executive L. Brooks Patterson. “I don’t even know how it happens. It really puts us in a difficult position.”
The details of how it happened are ugly. One state elections official cited an “unprecedented level” of fraud, with McCotter’s nominations petitions showing signs of having been manipulated to show far more signatures than the campaign had. McCotter has said he doesn’t want to speculate on how things went so wrong; he’s encouraging the state to investigate.
All of this leaves the door open for the one Republican who did manage to get his name on the primary ballot, Kerry Bentivolio, right, a Tea Party-backed candidate who couldn’t win the nomination for state senate two years ago — or for a Democrat. On the Democratic side, there’s a primary between Dr. Syed Taj, former chief of medicine at a local hospital, and Bill Roberts, a Lyndon LaRouche supporter who wants to impeach President Obama. McCotter’s district is 55 percent GOP. Republicans have held the district since it was last redrawn, in 1993. (More fun with this on the show tonight.)
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http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/30/11959245-mccotters-fail-opens-door-for-democrats?lite
for Mad Men fans:
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On May 30, 2012 at 11:00 AM
Mad Men’s Christina Hendricks on Joan’s Epic Moral Moment
BY Gwynne Watkins
On Sunday night, Mad Men’s Joan Harris did something unthinkable, and the phrase “indecent proposal” returned to the popular lexicon for the first time since 1993. Prior to the episode’s debut, the title (“The Other Woman”) had fans fervently speculating that Joan and Don Draper might consummate their Christmastime flirtation. Instead, a much darker transgression took place. “What price would we pay, what behavior would we forgive, if they weren’t pretty, if they weren’t temperamental, if they weren’t beyond our reach and a little out of our control?” Don purred at the Jaguar meeting, as Joan relinquished control—the thing she has always prided herself on maintaining—to the least deserving man on the planet, for a once-in-a-lifetime payoff. The emotionally wrenching episode was the best so far this season, and a tour de force for actress Christina Hendricks (whose hourglass beauty gets more press than her considerable acting chops). In an exclusive conversation with GQ, Hendricks walks us through Joan’s fateful decision, reveals why Joan hasn’t hooked up with Don, and explains why kicking that no-good Greg to the curb was so satisfying.
Read More http://www.gq.com/entertainment/tv/blogs/the-stream/2012/05/mad-mens-christina-hendricks-on-joans-epic-moral-moment.html#ixzz1wO7GOVGK
Something Must Be Done
by BooMan
Wed May 30th, 2012 at 01:46:37 PM EST
Fortunately, money isn’t everything, but still…
Republican super PACs and other outside groups shaped by a loose network of prominent conservatives – including Karl Rove, the Koch brothers and Tom Donohue of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce – plan to spend roughly $1 billion on November’s elections for the White House and control of Congress, according to officials familiar with the groups’ internal operations. That total includes previously undisclosed plans for newly aggressive spending by the Koch brothers, who are steering funding to build sophisticated, county-by-county operations in key states. POLITICO has learned that Koch-related organizations plan to spend about $400 million ahead of the 2012 elections – twice what they had been expected to commit.
Just the spending linked to the Koch network is more than the $370 million that John McCain raised for his entire presidential campaign four years ago. And the $1 billion total surpasses the $750 million that Barack Obama, one of the most prolific fundraisers ever, collected for his 2008 campaign.
We have to find a way to survive this. And then he have to find a way to turn off the spigot. I’m indescribably angry about what the Supreme Court did to our democracy with their Citizens United ruling. And if rich billionaires think I’m alone, they’re badly mistaken. This isn’t a threat; it’s a confident prediction. There will be civil unrest in a large scale before long if our elections continue to be little more than pissing matches between rival billionaires and if the Republican Party continues to survive in its current form solely through the use of limitless contributions from the incredibly wealthy and ever-increasing efforts to suppress the non-white vote.
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2012/5/30/134637/408
Yep; posted a thread on the shitload of $$$$ these thugs plan to use and buy the election.
this is for the twitterites- tweet Tara Wall – where the non-White folks in Mitten’s America?
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Wed May 30, 2012 at 09:36 AM PDT.
Mitt Romney’s ‘better America’ sure is white, isn’t it?
So Mitt Romney has a sappy new video out called The Promise of America. His basic message: that he will make America better by returning us to the nation we once were. He doesn’t explain what that means, but if you look at this collage of every closeup shot in the video, one thing is clear: the America Mitt Romney sees is really, really white.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jBxPv8C58dg
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/05/30/1095905/-Mitt-Romney-s-better-America-sure-is-white-isn-t-it-
Yep, IN MITT’S AMERICA…
A-M-E-R-CIA= WHITE FOLKS. Even Romney’s staff can’t find spell check.
May 30, 2012
Mitt Romney’s cosmic ineptitude
As I was saying, which was only what many others have said, and the NY Times says again this morning:
It was supposed to be a day of triumph for Mitt Romney [and so on, and so on]….
Instead, Tuesday was hijacked by Donald J. Trump. Inexplicably to many in his party, Mr. Romney had scheduled an appearance at a fund-raiser in Las Vegas on Tuesday night with Mr. Trump.
It’s not really so inexplicable, though, to either the “many in his party” or to the far many others who so gratefully reside outside of it, when one simply accepts Mitt’s singular oneness with cosmic ineptitude. Somewhere in the Tao Te Ching, I think it is, there is expressed the ancient wisdom of intensely pursued objects possessing the nasty habit of receding faster than one’s eager grasp. Twenty-five hundred years ago the sages advised, “Chill”; 500 years later, Jesus advised, “Chill”; another fifteen-hundred years after that, Montaigne advised, “Chill”; and now, fresh on the philosophical heels of yet another 500 years, this nugget of enlightenment is ubiquitous–it leaps at us from the back of cereal boxes and fast-food fortune cookies and from shelves upon shelves of undigested self-help books: “Chill, you idiot.”
But Mitt can’t “chill.” Mitt is a micromanager; his pockets are stuffed with unearned cash because his head is crammed with lifeless statistics. It makes no difference to Mitt that he’s in organic politics now, as opposed to the necrotic business of what even the brain-dead Rick Perry had the wits to call “vulture capitalism.” To Mitt, it’s all the same– this people and profits stuff–data, numbers, shifting numbers, calculated gambles, acceptable debits, huge rewards, balance sheets and delicately balanced negotiations.
His latest negotiations are, however, unwinnable. He seems to think that if he slithers around with the clownishly malevolent racism of Trump, he’ll make big and permanent gains with the reptilian base. And independents won’t mind. Later, when he’s playing nice with independents, and vaguely disavowing all things Trump, then the base won’t mind.
But this is a base whose rugged ignorance is surpassed only by its deep-seated contemptuousness and bedouin vengeance. In other words, they don’t forgive. And thinking independents won’t forget.
There is, of course, nothing universal or comprehensive about these observations. Much of the base will turn out for Romney on Election Day, as will many independents. But Romney’s cosmic ineptitude and unsightly staggering from hither to yon should, from my empirical point of view, shave just enough Romney votes in essential swing states to swing the election to President Obama, and rather decisively.
http://pmcarpenter.blogs.com/p_m_carpenters_commentary/2012/05/mitt-romneys-cosmic-ineptitude.html
May 29, 2012
Separating confidence from triumphalism
Andrew Sullivan:
It’s clear enough by now that this election will be a nail-bitingly close one; and that any early triumphalism among the Obamaites is preposterous. Of course he can lose.
Of course “of course he can lose.” The Kansas City Chiefs could play professional football next year. Vladimir Putin could join the Tiny Tim Fan Club. Newt Gingrich could shave some ego and Sarah Palin could read a book and Mitt Romney could force a personal acquisition of some human DNA. A bit more realistically, I could stop giving a rat’s ass about the commentariat’s admonitory prediction, en masse, that “of course he could lose.”
For me, anyway, “Obamaitism” and “blind optimism” are not synonymous. For some they are, and from those folks I keep a safe and intellectually healthy distance. Such rabidly pro-Obama derangement is too spookily reminiscent of the wretched W. years. Yes, I’m pro-Obama, but I can also read an electoral map and I can read (positive) polling data from the critical half-dozen or so battleground states on that map and I can appreciate increasing demographic advantages for Obama as well. And most of all, I can recognize an epic loser–hello, Mitt–from a parsec away.
Could things change throughout the next five months?
Let’s give that some deep thought …
… I’m thinking …
OK, I’m back. Of course they could. But for the moment, at least, to possess a vast confidence in Obama’s reelection isn’t “triumphalist” in a preposterously pollyannish, delusional, or quixotic sense. It’s perfectly logical.
http://pmcarpenter.blogs.com/p_m_carpenters_commentary/2012/05/separating-confidence-from-triumphalism.html
Political AnimalBlog
May 30, 2012 12:35 PM
Artur Davis Goes Upscale
By Ed Kilgore
Having watched former Rep. Artur Davis smoothly assume the always-in-demand role of aggrieved “centrist” Democrat sadly regaling conservative audiences with the perfidy of the Donkey Party, I wasn’t terribly surprised to read this on his blog, in response to rumors that he was going to run for Congress as a Republican in a Northern Virginia district the GOP lost in 2008:
I don’t know and am nowhere near deciding. If I were to run, it would be as a Republican. And I am in the process of changing my voter registration from Alabama to Virginia, a development which likely does represent a closing of one chapter and perhaps the opening of another….
And the question of party label in what remains a two team enterprise? That, too, is no light decision on my part: cutting ties with an Alabama Democratic Party that has weakened and lost faith with more and more Alabamians every year is one thing; leaving a national party that has been the home for my political values for two decades is quite another. My personal library is still full of books on John and Robert Kennedy, and I have rarely talked about politics without trying to capture the noble things they stood for. I have also not forgotten that in my early thirties, the Democratic Party managed to engineer the last run of robust growth and expanded social mobility that we have enjoyed; and when the party was doing that work, it felt inclusive, vibrant, and open-minded.
But parties change. As I told a reporter last week, this is not Bill Clinton’s Democratic Party (and he knows that even if he can’t say it).
You have to appreciate that until 2010 Artur Davis represented one of the poorest congressional districts in the country, in a state where Republicans violently resisted state financial responsibility for public education, considering it a welfare program for African-Americans. You’d hear him talk about the unmet needs of his district, and couldn’t quite
imagine he’d ever become a Republican. But he got the itch to run for governor, and triangulated against his own party so systematically and so unapologetically that it was only a minor surprise when he got trounced in the 2010 Democratic gubernatorial primary, losing his own majority-black district to a white candidate who didn’t spend every other breath distancing himself from every Democrat in sight. Indeed, Davis became a living cautionary tale for any southern Democrat seeking office in hostile territory by ignoring his own base.
Davis could have stayed home and mended fences and had a long career in Alabama politics. But by all accounts, he was bitter about the 2010 results, and he quickly decamped to that familiar limbo of recently defeated Congressmen who are not quite ready to become full-time lobbyists, the DC suburbs. His former pollster, John Anzalone, summed up Davis thusly: “Promised turned into sour grapes.” He’s gone upscale from Alabama, and seems comfortable with his new digs.
Perhaps the Republicans of Northern Virginia will be slightly less atavistic than those he left behind in the Heart of Dixie. But even in NoVa, GOPers do not cotton to anyone with anything good to say about Bobby Kennedy. He’s probably toast in a primary with a True Conservative. And Davis will soon discover his national Republican buddies will find him far less useful as a convert than as an apostate.
If Artur Davis does get elected to Congress, I do wonder how he’ll feel rubbing elbows in the House Republican Caucus with his new friends who don’t bother to hide their disdain for the looters and bums he used to represent, their hostility to the “government schools” he used to care so much about, and their hatred for the president that he endorsed for president just four years ago. It makes me too sad to feel angry.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/political-animal-a/2012_05/artur_davis_goes_upscale037639.php
Hoekstra panders to Birthers in Michigan
By Steve Benen – Wed May 30, 2012 2:10 PM EDT.
Though it’s tempting to think the “Birther” garbage would be fading away, it actually seems to be getting more common in Republican circles. Just over the last couple of months, we’ve seen incidents involving a leading Romney campaign surrogate, the Arizona Secretary of State, and Reps. Mike Coffman (R-Colo.), Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.), and Vicky Hartzler (R-Mo.).
Two weeks ago, Rep. Jeff Miller (R-Fla.) deleted a Birther message from a social media site, and this week, we learned about comments from former Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R), who’s running for the U.S. Senate in Michigan. Though he hasn’t endorsed the ridiculous conspiracy theory, per se, the Republican doesn’t mind pandering on the subject.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dNCpk8AgIjo&feature=player_embedded
Hoekstra made these comments a few weeks ago, but these excerpts weren’t posted by Michigan Democrats until this week. In the clip, Hoekstra is asked at a Tea Party rally for his thoughts on President Obama’s birth certificate.
Sure. I mean, I think — you know, I think, throw something at me if you want, I think with this president, the book is closed, all right?” Hoekstra tells the man. “It’s kind of like, I hate to say it, but I think the debate’s over — we lost that debate, and we lost that debate in 2008, when our presidential nominee said, ‘I ain’t talking about it.’ OK, I’m sorry.
“But I do now believe that I’d like to establish a three-person office in Washington, D.C., OK — knowing it, we’ll go to five. But there’s no reason why we should have this kind of question, you know, for the president of the United States. So that at any future election, all right, that someone would have to walk into that office, and prove that they meet the minimum qualifications to be president of the United States.”
http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/30/11958882-hoekstra-panders-to-birthers-in-michigan?lite
Posted at 12:55 PM ET, 05/30/2012
TheWashingtonPost
The Romney campaign’s surreal arguments about the economy
By Greg Sargent
You really couldn’t make this one up if you tried.
The Romney campaign is out with a new press release blasting Obama for presiding over a “net” loss in jobs. As I’ve been saying far too often, this metric is bogus, because it factors in the hundreds and hundreds of thousands of jobs the economy was hemorrhaging when Obama took office, before his policies took effect.
But this time, there’s an intriguing new twist in the Romney campaign’s argument.
In the same release attacking Obama over “net” job loss, the Romney camp also defends Romney’s jobs record as Governor of Massachusetts by pointing out … that Romney inherited a state economy that was losing jobs when he took office.
Seriously.
Here’s the key bullet point, from the Romney release:
Governor Romney Inherited An Economy That Was Losing Jobs Each Month And Left Office With An Economy That Was Adding Jobs Each Month. After taking office at a time when the state was losing thousands of jobs every month, Governor Romney’s focus on fiscal responsibility helped create an environment where job growth returned to Massachusetts. Job growth increased throughout his term and the state added over 40,000 payroll jobs during his final year in office —the best year of job growth in Massachusetts over the past decade. Household employment grew by nearly 50,000 under Governor Romney and the unemployment rate declined to well under 5%.
As you can see, the Romney campaign is defending itself against the latest Dem attack line — that Massachusetts ranked 47th out of 50th in job creation — by pointing out that Romney should be judged by the job growth that happened after jobs losses were reversed, and even by the number of jobs that were added towards the end of his term.
This is precisely the argument that the Romney campaign is implicitly dismissing as bogus when Obama makes it. Indeed, in the very same release, Romney spokesperson Andrea Saul blasts Obama for his “net negative record on job creation,” which is only a “net negative” if you factor in the jobs losses at the start of Obama’s term. But in its own defense, the Romney campaign is arguing for a focus on the jobs added after the job losses that took place when Romney assumed office.
In other words, if we were to apply to Obama the same standard that the Romney campaign wants applied to itself, Obama has created millions of jobs. (Relatedly, Mike Tomasky tried to apply the same standard to both men’s records, and concluded that if you don’t factor in early job loss for either, Obama’s job growth percentage exceeds Romney’s.)
All this is more than just a gotcha. It goes directly to the heart of Romney’s entire case against Obama. The claim that “net” jobs were lost on Obama’s watch is absolutely central to Romney’s whole argument, and the Romney team has repeated it for months and months in every conceivable forum. But the new standard the Romney campaign wants applied to him — i.e., that the focus should be on jobs added after jobs losses were reversed — would seem to completely undercut this entire case.
Perhaps this, finally, will be enough to draw a bit of scrutiny to the argument that forms the core of Romney’s whole rationale for running for president.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/post/the-romney-campaigns-surreal-arguments-about-the-economy/2012/05/30/gJQAPyI01U_blog.html
GOP groups plan $1 billion blitz
By: Mike Allen and Jim VandeHei
May 30, 2012 04:34 AM EDT
Republican super PACs and other outside groups shaped by a loose network of prominent conservatives – including Karl Rove, the Koch brothers and Tom Donohue of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce – plan to spend roughly $1 billion on November’s elections for the White House and control of Congress, according to officials familiar with the groups’ internal operations.
That total includes previously undisclosed plans for newly aggressive spending by the Koch brothers, who are steering funding to build sophisticated, county-by-county operations in key states. POLITICO has learned that Koch-related organizations plan to spend about $400 million ahead of the 2012 elections – twice what they had been expected to commit.
Just the spending linked to the Koch network is more than the $370 million that John McCain raised for his entire presidential campaign four years ago. And the $1 billion total surpasses the $750 million that Barack Obama, one of the most prolific fundraisers ever, collected for his 2008 campaign.
http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=0F866DCD-F8DC-436E-B46D-504340FEB315
Drowning in a sea of GOP campaign cash
By Steve Benen
Wed May 30, 2012 8:00 AM EDT
Campaign fundraising in the 2008 presidential election was thought to have reached dizzying heights. Republican nominee John McCain raised $370 million for his presidential bid, while Democrat Barack Obama shattered records en route to a $750 million haul. The totals, at the time, seemed staggering.
Four years and a Supreme Court ruling later, the 2008 fundraising figures will very likely appear puny by the time the 2012 dust settles.
Republican super PACs and other outside groups shaped by a loose network of prominent conservatives — including Karl Rove, the Koch brothers and Tom Donohue of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce — plan to spend roughly $1 billion on November’s elections for the White House and control of Congress, according to officials familiar with the groups’ internal operations.
That total includes previously undisclosed plans for newly aggressive spending by the Koch brothers, who are steering funding to build sophisticated, county-by-county operations in key states. POLITICO has learned that Koch-related organizations plan to spend about $400 million ahead of the 2012 elections — twice what they had been expected to commit.
Karl Rove’s Crossroads operation alone is expected to collect $300 million — nearly as much as McCain’s entire campaign total in the last election.
Indeed, it’s important to realize that the playing field has changed in fundamental ways. In the traditional model, we’d see two major-party candidates, each backed by their respective national party. In 2012, President Obama’s campaign team will effectively have two extremely well-financed opponents: Mitt Romney and the RNC, which are projected to raise at least $800 million, as well as a $1 billion outside attack operation.
Obama, in other words, is going to face a far-right wall of at least $1.8 billion between now and Election Day. To say this is without precedent in a major democracy is a dramatic understatement.
http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/30/11954290-drowning-in-a-sea-of-gop-campaign-cash
The Paycheck Fairness Act to put GOP on the spot
By Steve Benen – Wed May 30, 2012 11:20 AM EDT.
Two years ago, Democrats brought the Paycheck Fairness Act to the Senate floor, and thought they had a credible shot at passing the bill. Ultimately, 58 senators supported it and 41 opposed it — which, thanks to the way the modern Senate operates, means the bill failed. (The chamber’s GOP “moderates” — Scott Brown, Susan Collins, and Olympia Snowe — all joined the filibuster that killed the bill.
This year, Democrats are giving it another try, with a vote slated for next week.
Given the larger context, and the Republicans’ “war on women” in 2012, is there any chance the proposal might get the supermajority needed to overcome GOP obstructionism? It’s a long shot, though the legislation clearly makes Republicans, including their ostensible leader, nervous.
Business groups are opposed to the new legislation, saying it would create a legal morass — but Mr. Romney, the GOP’s presumptive presidential nominee, has been silent.
His campaign didn’t respond to five messages left over the past week seeking his stance on the Paycheck Fairness Act.
Keep in mind, the Washington Times is a conservative paper — roughly the print equivalent of Fox News — that can usually get its calls returned by Republican candidates.
But Romney, who also refused to state a firm opinion on the Violence Against Women Act, is suddenly shy once more. If he sides with Democrats in support of the measure, Romney undercuts his allies on Capitol Hill, as well as friends at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which is lobbying to kill the bill. If he sticks with this party, Romney risks exacerbating the already-large gender gap, taking yet another position that’s hostile towards women’s interests.
So he refuses to respond to the Washington Times’ phone calls.
——————————————————————————–
For those unfamiliar with the substance behind the legislation, the bill would “enhance the remedies available for victims of gender-based discrimination and require employers to show that wage differences are job-related, not sex-based, and driven by business necessity. The measure would also protect employees from retaliation for sharing salary information, which is important for deterring and challenging discriminatory compensation.
The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act was an important step forward when it comes to combating discrimination, but it was also narrowly focused to address a specific problem: giving victims of discrimination access to the courts for legal redress. The Paycheck Fairness Act is a broader measure.
President Obama is a strong supporter of the legislation.
With women still only making 77 cents for every dollar men earn in similar jobs, the question may soon become why the Republican presidential candidate seems indifferent to the problem.
.
http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/30/11956898-the-paycheck-fairness-act-to-put-gop-on-the-spot?lite
Romney’scampaign didn’t respond to five messages left over the past week seeking his stance on the Paycheck Fairness Act. In April, when he was fending off questions about his stance on women’s compensation, his campaign would only say he “supports pay equity” but would not say any more about the new legislation.
“Governor Romney only says that he wouldn’t change existing law, raising questions about why he feels the need to parse his words on issues that are so significant to the security of women and families,” said Ben LaBolt, President Obama’s campaign spokesman. “Would he sign a veto of Lilly Ledbetter? Why won’t he express support for the Paycheck Fairness Act?”
The Paycheck Fairness Act would close loopholes in existing pay equity law and give additional funding toward programs that help women close the gender pay gap. President Obama has come out strongly in favor of the legislation, as have several prominent Democrats, but many Republicans claim that it would be a hindrance to businesses.
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/05/dems-escalate-battle-for-women-voters-with-equal-pay-bill.php
http://dailycaller.com/2010/11/13/business-community-opposes-paycheck-fairness-act/
Equal pay bill puts Romney on the line on women
Vote next week spotlights issue
Mitt Romney survived an April skirmish over women’s pay, but he and fellow Republicans are about to face a tougher test as the Senate takes up the Paycheck Fairness Act — the next big fight in pay equality between the sexes.
Democrats call the legislation the logical follow-up to 2009’s Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which granted women more time to file discrimination lawsuits. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has scheduled a vote on the new bill next week, when the upper chamber returns from its Memorial Day holiday.
Business groups are opposed to the new legislation, saying it would create a legal morass — but Mr. Romney, the GOP’s presumptive presidential nominee, has been silent.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/may/29/equal-pay-bill-puts-romney-on-the-line-on-women/?page=all#pagebreak
Here are five things you need to know about the Paycheck Fairness Act:
1. The Paycheck Fairness Act is not new: Democrats, however, have struggled to get it passed. Last time it came up for a vote, the House passed it with very little bipartisan support. Then Senate Republicans unanimously voted against the bill. Even if they had passed it, though, then-President George W. Bush vowed to veto it.
2. Pay equity is a real problem: Nearly half of all workers in the United States are women. But women tend to hold lower-paying jobs overall, and even when they have the exact same title as men, they make significantly less. Overall, women make 77 cents to a man’s dollar, and in some professions, specifically high-paying careers, that disparity is much higher. The Paycheck Fairness Act would help close the gap more quickly by providing incentives for employers not to discriminate.
3. Lost earnings have serious consequences: The amount of money an average woman loses to the pay gap could feed a family of four. And while the wage gap is slowly shrinking, at its current rate it won’t actually disappear for 45 years. Still, more women are becoming the primary breadwinners or dual-earners in their family, with nearly 40 percent of women out-earning their husbands and a larger number of women with high degrees entering the job market.
4. Existing law doesn’t go far enough: The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act ensured that a woman has the proper window of time to sue for pay discrimination. The Paycheck Fairness Act takes significant steps to close loopholes in the original pay discrimination law, the Equal Pay Act, and to ensure that women can investigate whether they are being discriminated against. It also makes stronger penalties so that employers don’t violate pay discrimination laws. Included in the bill, too, is a grant for a salary-negotiation training program for women, who tend to be reluctant to negotiate.
5. Mitt Romney has not taken a position on the bill: After a very awkward moment over the Lilly Ledbetter Act, a spokesperson for his campaign said that Romney “supports pay equity and is not looking to change current law.” But it’s unclear whether this means Romney would support a new piece of legislation that protects women who don’t have full pay equity.
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2012/05/24/489656/5-things-paycheck-fairness-act/
John Heilleman, (sp) you and everyone who is saying the president is going negative can go have a seat. PBO is up against PURE EVIL. GTFOH
AFP fails the straight-face test
By Steve Benen – Wed May 30, 2012 10:50 AM EDT.
The gubernatorial recall election in Wisconsin is now less than a week away, and polls show a tight race between Gov. Scott Walker (R) and Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett (D). With this in mind, the Wisconsin chapter of the Koch-financed Americans for Prosperity is launching a 10-city bus tour this week, which will feature AFP national president Tim Phillips rallying conservatives in the state.
That’s not exactly a surprise — the Koch brothers, like so many far-right figures, consider Walker’s race critically important — but the amusing part is Americans for Prosperity’s explanation for this week’s bus tour.
Given the tour’s timing and billing, any reasonable person would view it as a statewide drive to get out the vote for Walker and his GOP allies in the June 5 election. Not AFP.
AFP’s Wisconsin director, Luke Hilgemann, says the bus tour has nothing to do the recall elections. “We’re not dealing with any candidates, political parties, or ongoing races,” Hilgemann told the Hudson, Wisconsin, Patch news site.
Got that? Just days before a closely-watched statewide election in which Scott Walker’s job is on the line, an allied group is launching a 10-city bus tour — and the group wants you to believe this has nothing to do with Walker’s recall race. Seriously.
It’s simply a remarkable coincidence. AFP’s leaders just happened to have some free time on their hands, stumbled upon an available bus, and thought they’d make 10 carefully-selected campaign stops visits around Wisconsin. And wouldn’t you know it, the Illinois chapter of Americans for Prosperity also happens to be busing in conservative activists to Wisconsin this week for pre-election canvassing, but we’re supposed to believe that’s unrelated to the recall election, too.
——————————————————————————–
As Andy Kroll explained, AFP doesn’t have much of a choice — the far-right interest group, which launched a “Stand With Walker” campaign last year, is technically a nonprofit organization, and has to be very careful about intervening on Walker’s behalf.
But if there’s anyone, anywhere, who seriously believes the group’s pre-election bus tour this week is unrelated to any “ongoing races,” I’d like to meet him or her. I can offer them a great deal on a lovely bridge.
.
http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/30/11956475-afp-fails-the-straight-face-test?lite
Romney Dodges Repeated Media Inquiries, Refuses To Say If He Supports Paycheck Fairness
By Annie-Rose Strasser on May 30, 2012 at 10:20 am
Despite repeated media inquiries from a conservative-leaning newspaper, Mitt Romney remains stubbornly silent on the Paycheck Fairness Act, a bill that would bring up to date the 70s-era Fair Pay Law.
Congressional Democrats are gearing up for another legislative effort to ensure that women and men receive equal pay for equal work and are renewing their push for the Paycheck Fairness Act. But as with many ongoing political fights, Romney is not taking a decisive position.
Romney was originally unclear about his position on another fair pay bill, the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act and he has not spoken about this specific legislation — despite repeated requests for comment from the Washington Times:
His campaign didn’t respond to five messages left over the past week seeking his stance on the Paycheck Fairness Act. In April, when he was fending off questions about his stance on women’s compensation, his campaign would only say he “supports pay equity” but would not say any more about the new legislation.
“Governor Romney only says that he wouldn’t change existing law, raising questions about why he feels the need to parse his words on issues that are so significant to the security of women and families,” said Ben LaBolt, President Obama’s campaign spokesman. “Would he sign a veto of Lilly Ledbetter? Why won’t he express support for the Paycheck Fairness Act?”
The Paycheck Fairness Act would close loopholes in existing pay equity law and give additional funding toward programs that help women close the gender pay gap. President Obama has come out strongly in favor of the legislation, as have several prominent Democrats, but many Republicans claim that it would be a hindrance to businesses.
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2012/05/30/492009/romney-refuses-to-say-if-he-supports-paycheck-fairness/
rikryah, please check your email. thanks!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sxl05HYTCZ0&feature=player_embedded
WE’RE STILL WAITING, MITT.
REPOST
Fox & Friends Drops The Veil, Produces Four-Minute Anti-Obama Attack Ad
May 30, 2012 9:26 am ET by Justin Berrier
While Fox & Friends has long been a home for some of the most vicious, misleading, petty, and dishonest attacks on President Obama, they crossed a new ethical line today by producing and airing what is essentially a four-minute anti-Obama attack ad.
The video – opening with the text “Fox & Friends Presents” — played lines from Obama’s past speeches mixed with commentary from unidentified speakers and graphics purporting to show that Obama has broken the promises he’s made since his 2008 campaign. The graphics were accompanied by loud, epic, scary music played over grainy video footage. Watch:
But while the video could be mistaken for a campaign ad on behalf of GOP candidate Mitt Romney, it wasn’t. It was a segment produced by a show on a network that bills itself as “fair and balanced.” The network has continued to push the limits of its outright promotion of conservative politicians and policies, and Fox & Friends has been at the forefront. The show regularly acts as the communications arm of the GOP, attacking Democrats, promoting Republicans, and broadcasting GOP talking points, sometimes word for word. Co-host Gretchen Carlson has repeatedly advised GOP candidates how to promote their ideas in order to defeat their Democrat opponents.
Fox devoted 4,644 minutes of free airtime over eight months to the GOP presidential candidates during the Republican primary, a situation that led New York Times television critic Alessandra Stanley to note: “All the networks, broadcast and cable, are closely covering the campaign, but Fox News practically owns and operates it.” Former New York Times executive editor Bill Keller recently wrote that “the Fox News Primary probably did more to nominate Mitt Romney than New Hampshire or Michigan.” Fox’s regular violations of journalistic ethics led Keller to conclude thatFox is “[Rupert] Murdoch’s most toxic legacy.”
On the morning after Mitt Romney clinched enough delegates to officially claim the Republican presidential nomination, Fox has launched its first anti-Obama attack ad of the presidential campaign
http://mediamatters.org/blog/201205300001
FOX= CLEAR CHANNEL-OWNED-CLEAR CHANNEL=BAIN CAPITAL OWNED.
THE END!
‘A personal attack campaign’
By Steve Benen – Wed May 30, 2012 10:17 AM EDT
.Mitt Romney told Fox News yesterday that President Obama is waging “a personal attack campaign,” adding, “He’s going after me as an individual. Look, I’m an American, I love this country.”
I have no idea if the Republican nominee actually believes this or not, but if Romney is going to keep pushing the line, it’s worth taking a moment to apply definitions to some of these terms. A “personal attack campaign” involves a candidate being attacked on purely personal issues that are unrelated to policy or official duties. If there was an effort to question Romney’s patriotism or smear him over his Mormon faith, that would constitute a “personal attack campaign.”
Obama is doing the exact opposite, routinely telling his own supporters, “Gov. Romney is a patriotic American. He’s raised a wonderful family. He should be proud of the great personal success.” To the extent that the president is “going after” Romney, he’s doing so by focusing on his rival’s background and experience, not “personal” issues.
Romney, apparently feeling sorry for himself, is either lying or he’s confused about what a “personal attack” is. To question a presidential candidate’s record is not to go after him or her “as an individual.”
Indeed, if Romney felt unfairly put upon by Bain Capital criticism, Obama’s new offensive will really have him reaching for the fainting couch.
The Obama campaign is opening a new front in its war against GOP rival Mitt Romney, ABC News has learned, with planned attacks to begin this week on Romney’s record as governor of Massachusetts and the campaign promises Democrats say he left unfulfilled.
Team Obama will point to Romney’s rhetoric on job creation, size of government, education, deficits and taxes during the 2002 gubernatorial campaign and draw parallels with his presidential stump speeches of 2012. The goal is to illustrate that Romney has made the same promises before with unimpressive results, officials say … the latest line of attack will be a major focus from now through the election.
As Greg Sargent noted, “The point the Obama campaign needs to drive home is that Romney has already tried to bring his private sector experience to bear on the public sector, even if he isn’t eager to talk about it.”
It’s a compelling message, arguably more potent than the Bain criticisms.
——————————————————————————–
As I’ve been arguing, Romney’s basic pitch is that he was successful in the private sector, so he’ll be successful in the public sector. But we already know that when Romney tried to apply his corporate know-how in government, he largely failed — which is why the former governor tends to ignore his one term in Massachusetts altogether.
Indeed, we’re looking at a campaign dynamic without a modern precedent, especially for a governor running for the White House. In 2000, George W. Bush said, “Look at what I did in Texas.” In 1992, Bill Clinton said, “Look at what I did in Arkansas.” In 1980, Ronald Reagan said, “Look at what I did in California.”
And in 2012, Mitt Romney is saying, “Look at what I did at Bain Capital.”
It’s an untenable approach, and it makes sense that Obama’s team will make an effort to exploit the weakness. And the more this becomes the subject of debate, the more it will be incumbent on Romney to explain why he failed to impress much of anyone when he tried to lead.
http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/30/11956109-a-personal-attack-campaign?lite
THANK YOU, DU!
HEY MITT, ROMENY: You can’t spell “Amercia” without the CIA
Governor Luthor Is Supremely Unconcerned With Your Democracy
By Zandar May 30th, 2012
Expanding on the LuthorCorp Rick Scott voter purge in Florida that Betty mentioned, it seems that the GOP in the Ironically Named Sunshine State will see your “mass disenfranchisement” thing and raise you a giant vat of “Go screw yourselves.”
Chris Cate, a spokesman for the state Division of Elections, defended the state’s actions. “It’s very important we make sure ineligible voters can’t cast a ballot,” he said in an email to the Herald on Tuesday.
He said the state continues to identify ineligible voters, saying the state Division of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles has agreed to update information using a federal database that the elections division couldn’t access directly.
“We won’t be sending any new names to supervisors until the information we have is updated, because we always want to make sure we are using the best information available,” Cate wrote. “I don’t have a timetable on when the next list of names will be sent to supervisors, but there will be more names.”
Of course there’s going to be more names. There are still people voting for the Blue team. That’s a problem they can fix, you know.
Moreover, the entire process of database matching to remove voters is problematic. The Fair Elections Legal Network, which is challenging the purge, noted that database matching is “notoriously unreliable” and “data entry errors, similar-sounding names, and changing information can all produce false matches.”
The first list was also created with information accessible to the state motor vehicle administration, which the former Secretary of State Kurt Browning considered so unreliable he refused to release. Browning resigned in February.
So yeah, at this point Florida is basically daring Eric Holder’s boys to do something about it. I really wish they would. Gotta purge them undesirables, ya know. Next thing you know, they’ll want things like “representation” and “equality” and before you know it, BOOM.
After all, you don’t have to rig an election if you can’t lose in the first place.
http://www.balloon-juice.com/2012/05/30/governor-luthor-is-supremely-unconcerned-with-your-democracy/#comment-3296774
First lady: Daughters need thick skin in politics
By admin3 on May 30, 2012
Michelle Obama says her daughters are learning that even the kids of politicians have to have a thick skin.
“Politics is tough,” the first lady said Tuesday. “That’s just sort of the nature of the beast.”
But she said daughters Sasha and Malia, at ages 10 and 13, also know that no matter what happens in the November election, “their life is good either way.”
Mrs. Obama chatted about family life, this year’s re-election campaign and what’s not ahead for her — a career in politics — during a round of interviews promoting the release of her new book on the White House garden.
As for the personal attacks that swirl around her husband in a campaign year, the first lady said: “You just sort of have to have a thick skin in this thing. And your kids do too.”
Malia and Sasha “understand that their world is secure no matter what,” Mrs. Obama said on ABC’s “The View.” ”They’ve grown to understand that home is wherever we are. … And Dad is always going to be Dad. So they’re good.”
The first lady left no doubt on the question of a political future of her own.
“Those are other people’s rumors,” she said. “I have no interest in politics. Never have. Never will.”
She added: “The one thing that is certain: I will serve. I will serve in some capacity.”
Mrs. Obama said her work to support military families “is a forever proposition. They will always need a voice out there.”
http://blackpoliticsontheweb.com/2012/05/30/first-lady-daughters-need-thick-skin-in-politics/
Malia & Sasha are being raised to KNOW THEMSELVES.
Kirk has some explaining to do
By Steve Benen – Wed May 30, 2012 9:39 AM EDT.
Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) suffered a major stroke earlier this year, and has been on the long road to recovery ever since. By all indications, the Republican senator’s health is improving, and he will eventually be able to return to his official duties on Capitol Hill.
When he does, Kirk will apparently have some uncomfortable questions to answer.
Soon after Mark Kirk’s ex-wife announced she would no longer support his 2010 run for the U.S. Senate, he brought her onto his campaign team, then quietly paid her after his victory.
But Kimberly Vertolli, a lawyer who received $40,000 from the campaign, again is at odds with her ex-husband, filing a complaint with the Federal Election Commission alleging that Kirk and his then-girlfriend may have broken campaign finance law.
The girlfriend, Dodie McCracken, who works in public relations, has acknowledged receiving more than $143,000 in fees and expenses for her campaign work.
The story may seem a little complicated — campaign-finance allegations often are — but Kirk is effectively being accused of hiding campaign funds he directed to his then-girlfriend, after paying his ex-wife.
According to Vertolli (the ex-wife), the Republican funneled money through a company working for his campaign in order to give funds to McCracken (the girlfriend.) McCracken’s name did not appear on Kirk’s campaign finance disclosure forms because he did not pay her directly.
The Chicago Tribune quoted experts who wondered why the campaign didn’t simply hire McCracken or her firm directly: “One Washington lawyer who handles election law said that generally speaking, ‘intentionally obscuring the actual payee of a campaign expenditure is a violation'” of the law.
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As for Vertolli, she claims she was paid $40,000 in part to keep her silent about her concerns regarding the money going to McCracken.
One assumes the FEC investigation will be delayed until Kirk’s return to the Senate, but it looks like a mess that will be on his desk, awaiting his return. For its part, the Republican’s aides are characterizing Vertolli as an aggrieved ex-wife making “groundless” complaints.
.
http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/30/11955611-kirk-has-some-explaining-to-do?lite
In Florida, Scott Administration Vows To Accelerate Voter Purge: ‘There Will Be More Names’
By Judd Legum on May 30, 2012 at 9:13 am
The massive voter purge order by Governor Rick Scott in Florida has been plagued with errors, resulting in election officials notifying hundreds of eligible U.S. citizens that they are ineligible to vote.
In response, the Scott administration has vowed to intensify their efforts to remove registered voters from the rolls.
Initially, the state created a list of over 180,000 purported “non-citizens” by comparing their list of registered voters to the state motor vehicle database. The state forwarded about 2700 names from that list to local officials to remove from the rolls. Yesterday, in the face of mouting problems with the limited effort, Scott administration officials made it clear they were just getting started:
Chris Cate, a spokesman for the state Division of Elections, defended the state’s actions. “It’s very important we make sure ineligible voters can’t cast a ballot,” he said in an email to the Herald on Tuesday.
He said the state continues to identify ineligible voters, saying the state Division of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles has agreed to update information using a federal database that the elections division couldn’t access directly.
“We won’t be sending any new names to supervisors until the information we have is updated, because we always want to make sure we are using the best information available,” Cate wrote. “I don’t have a timetable on when the next list of names will be sent to supervisors, but there will be more names.”
It’s unclear how the new procedures alluded to by Cate will solve the systemic problems with the voter purge list. There have been several individuals targeted by the list that have been citizens their entire lives. Therefore, there seems to be a major problems beyond outdated citizenship information.
Moreover, the entire process of database matching to remove voters is problematic. The Fair Elections Legal Network, which is challenging the purge, noted that database matching is “notoriously unreliable” and “data entry errors, similar-sounding names, and changing information can all produce false matches.”
The first list was also created with information accessible to the state motor vehicle administration, which the former Secretary of State Kurt Browning considered so unreliable he refused to release. Browning resigned in February.
http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2012/05/30/491997/in-florida-scott-administration-vows-to-accelerate-voter-purge-there-will-be-more-names/
Rikyrah, you’ve got mail. :-)
Signature count makes a Maryland vote on same-sex marriage a near certainty
By Aaron C. Davis, Published: May 29
A referendum on Maryland lawmakers’ decision to legalize same-sex marriage moved from the realm of the likely to a near certainty on Tuesday as opponents turned in what they said were over 113,000 signatures — more than twice the number needed to qualify the law for the November ballot.
A coalition of religious leaders and conservatives organized to oppose gay marriage said weeks ago that they would easily beat Maryland’s first deadline on Thursday to file more than 18,000 signatures.
But with two days to go, opponents said that President Obama’s recent announcement that he supports same-sex marriage appeared to have had the effect of not only invigorating supporters but also those opposed.
The Maryland Marriage Alliance, the group leading the charge to overturn the state’s same-sex marriage law, said that since Obama’s pronouncement — and since leaders of the NAACP followed suit — opponents in Maryland have seen a surge in the number of residents seeking to put gay marriage to a statewide vote.
“When President Obama and the NAACP come out and they wanted to support this issue, well, great, we appreciate that because you help energize our [side],” said Derek McCoy, the group’s executive director
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/md-politics/signature-count-makes-a-maryland-vote-on-same-sex-marriage-a-near-certainty/2012/05/29/gJQAz6HD0U_story.html?wpisrc=nl_headlines_Wed
Tue May 29, 2012 at 11:10 AM PDT.
Congressman Darrell Issa: Subpoenas are for thee, not me+
*by Meteor Blades
IOKIYAR (It’s Okay If You Are Republican) has a number of subsets. Sex scandals ought to make people unfit for public office, but IOKIYAR. Having avoided the military draft ought to disqualify a person for the presidency, but IOKIYAR. Discovery that one used drugs as a youth should make a candidate at any level of government suspect, but IOKIYAR. Rep. Darrell Issa now qualifies as his own subset. He has filed a 47-page motion to quash a subpoena requiring his testimony in the perjury trial of retired baseball star Roger Clemens. The subpoena was first reported by Roll Call May 15.
For the past seven months, as the chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, the California Republican has been tsk-tsking Attorney General Eric Holder for supposed failure to comply with a subpoena in regards to the “gunwalking” sting botched by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. The committee drafted a contempt citation for Holder over the matter early this month. The attorney general responded by noting his office has provided 7,600 pages of testimony about the sting, which ATF called “Fast and Furious.” He has also testified to Congress on the matter seven times, and other officials in the Justice Department have been made freely available.
Issa was subpoenaed to testify and provide committee documents early in May by Clemens’s lawyers. As Kevin Robillard reported:
It’s clear why Team Clemens wants Issa to testify: the congressman believes the case against the former Cy Young award winner is a manufactured one. “I don’t believe that his false testimony when he gave it was anything other than Henry Waxman trapping him into perjury,” Issa told The Hill last year, referring to the California Democrat who formerly chaired the oversight committee.
Issa’s motion to quash the subpoena argues that the chairman is too important:
“Compliance with the subpoena would interfere with Chairman Issa’s official government responsibilities,” the document reads. Past legal cases have ruled that “the practice of calling high officials as witnesses should be discouraged” because “high ranking officials have greater duties and time constraints than other witnesses.”
As can be seen in his slimy record as a liar and thief, with ethical lapses the sanctimonious Issa has always considered himself too important to comply with the rules which apply to everyone else. How this perch affects his work on the Oversight committee can be seen by the fact that members of the team he has assembled to investigate others is, according to the Investigative Newsource of Southern California, friendly to some industries that could benefit from those investigations.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/05/29/1095617/-Congressman-Darrell-Issa-Subpoenas-are-for-thee-not-me
Drowning in a sea of GOP campaign cash
By Steve Benen – Wed May 30, 2012 8:00 AM EDT.
Getty Images
Campaign fundraising in the 2008 presidential election was thought to have reached dizzying heights. Republican nominee John McCain raised $370 million for his presidential bid, while Democrat Barack Obama shattered records en route to a $750 million haul. The totals, at the time, seemed staggering.
Four years and a Supreme Court ruling later, the 2008 fundraising figures will very likely appear puny by the time the 2012 dust settles
Republican super PACs and other outside groups shaped by a loose network of prominent conservatives — including Karl Rove, the Koch brothers and Tom Donohue of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce — plan to spend roughly $1 billion on November’s elections for the White House and control of Congress, according to officials familiar with the groups’ internal operations.
That total includes previously undisclosed plans for newly aggressive spending by the Koch brothers, who are steering funding to build sophisticated, county-by-county operations in key states. POLITICO has learned that Koch-related organizations plan to spend about $400 million ahead of the 2012 elections — twice what they had been expected to commit.
Karl Rove’s Crossroads operation alone is expected to collect $300 million — nearly as much as McCain’s entire campaign total in the last election.
Indeed, it’s important to realize that the playing field has changed in fundamental ways. In the traditional model, we’d see two major-party candidates, each backed by their respective national party. In 2012, President Obama’s campaign team will effectively have two extremely well-financed opponents: Mitt Romney and the RNC, which are projected to raise at least $800 million, as well as a $1 billion outside attack operation.
Obama, in other words, is going to face a far-right wall of at least $1.8 billion between now and Election Day. To say this is without precedent in a major democracy is a dramatic understatement.
Won’t Romney also have to face two comparable entities? So far, that seems unlikely — Obama is having some fundraising success, and labor unions will play a role, but a super PAC supporting the president, Priorities USA Action, has so far struggled to keep up.
There are two related angles to this to keep in mind.
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First, unlike previous elections, the Supreme Court has cleared the way for “dark money” contributions — right-wing gazillionaires can invest heavily in destroying the president, but can now legally keep their donations secret. We can see the results of folks trying to buy the keys to the White House for Mitt Romney, but we won’t be able to see who’s writing all the checks (or what they’ll expect in return for their investment).
Second, the prospect of a $1 billion far-right operation suggests conservative heavyweights believe they have a real shot at success. If the Kochs and their cohorts were convinced Obama is likely to win, they could easily start buying congressional and gubernatorial races; the fact that they have their eyes on the most sought after prize tells us they have confidence they can succeed.
On a related note, Tim Dickinson has a great piece in the new issue of Rolling Stone, highlighting each of the wealthy Republicans lining up to get Romney elected.
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http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/30/11954290-drowning-in-a-sea-of-gop-campaign-cash?lite
Coffee is for Closers
By mistermix May 30th, 2012Josh Marshall on why Romney is sticking with Trump:
My best guess is that they didn’t figure Trump would continue to be so nuts when they scheduled the mega-blowout fundraiser. And now that they’re here, they’re just figuring, whatever, let’s just get through tonight and it’ll be behind us.
The alternative is some high profile rebuke of Trump which is probably too frightening a prospect for the campaign.
The implicit assumption here is that Romney’s people don’t want anything to do with birtherism. I think that’s wrong – they want to send a clear signal to the 27% that they’re not quite satisfied with the kerning on Obama’s birth certificate, and what better way to do it than what happened yesterday. Granted, it would have been better if Donald had kept a bit lower profile, but these guys know their docile media. Here’s the Times:
That and other statements left the Romney campaign to fend off questions about the candidate’s views on that long-discredited accusation and whether he was willing to tolerate extreme views for his own political gain.
And the Post:
The provocative real estate magnate used the spotlight to promote his long-debunked contention that Obama was born in a foreign country. Romney aides admitted that this was an unhelpful distraction. At a moment when they wanted to put the president on the defensive, it was Romney who found himself in that position, leaving it to his aides to assert that he disagrees with Trump — while Obama’s aides said his refusal to publicly condemn his surrogate showed poor moral leadership.
When the DC media can say that it’s not true that Obama was born in a foreign country, and when someone in the press has the guts to ask Romney the obvious question “Do you think President Obama was born in Kenya?”, then I’ll think that the Romney campaign has a problem on their hands. I’m not holding my breath—my only hope is that some local TV reporter gets a one-on-one with Romney and asks him that question, and that he bobbles it in a way that makes him look as bad as he should for giving Trump any oxygen.
http://www.balloon-juice.com/
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
A Long Bout With Chronic Suppression
Posted by Zandar
Both the Congressional Black Caucus and the NAACP are finally doing something about the GOP suppression of African-American votes through the barriers of “Voter ID” and the removal of early voting laws by starting a massive campaign to register new voters and to help voters get the IDs they now have to have in dozens of states. They key: reaching potential voters through black churches.
African-American churches, historically at the forefront of the nation’s civil and voting rights efforts, are grappling this election year with how to navigate through the wave of new voting-access laws approved in many Republican-controlled states, laws that many African-Americans believe were implemented to suppress the votes of minorities and others.
Members of the Congressional Black Caucus and several hundred clergy leaders from the Conference of National Black Churches are scheduled to hold a summit Wednesday in Washington to discuss the new laws, their potential impact on African-American voters and how churches can educate parishioners, help them register and help get them to the polls on Election Day to prevent any significant drop-off from 2008.
“We will have attorneys there who are well-equipped to provide the guidance to the clergy members,” said Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, D-Mo., the Congressional Black Caucus chair and a United Methodist pastor. “They will understand, before they leave, about some of the new laws in certain states designed – as we interpret them – to reduce the turnout. The day is over when they could just stand in the pulpit and say ‘Go vote. It’s your duty.’ They’ve got to now be equipped with some sophisticated information to help inspire a turnout and protect parishioners from some of the schemes that are out there.”
Since last year, at least 15 states have passed a wide array of laws that they say are aimed at reducing voter fraud. Up to 38 states, including some of those 15, are weighing legislation that would require people to show government-approved photo identification or provide proof of citizenship before registering or casting ballots.
That’s excellent news to hear, and I only wish it had begun sooner. And hopefully the Congressional Hispanic Caucus can conduct a similar effort. The Latino vote is only going to become more and more important for progressives as the elections wear on, but the GOP is doing everything they can to displace minority voters in order to maintain power.
No matter how you feel about GOP or Democratic party policies, the notion that we have to limit voting to only certain groups should greatly disturb all Americans. Throughout our history, many have given their lives to help secure the right for citizens to vote. Working now to reverse that trend is simply repugnant and an affront to their sacrifice.
It’s good to see the CBC and the NAACP rejoin this fight. Sadly, it seems that even in 2012 that fight will never end.
http://zandarvts.blogspot.com/2012/05/long-bout-with-chronic-suppression.html
Wrong message, wrong place, wrong time
By Steve Benen – Wed May 30, 2012 8:46 AM EDT.
How does Romney argue the economy is getting worse? It’s simple: he doesn’t.
Mitt Romney appeared in Craig, Colorado, to deliver the same message he repeats at every campaign stop: the people in the area are “hurting right now under this president.” The traditional Democratic response is that blaming President Obama for the economic crisis he inherited is ridiculous.
But yesterday in Northern Colorado was a little different: the small town of Craig isn’t really hurting at all. The community’s economy is faring pretty well, it weathered the recession better than most, and locals are pretty optimistic about the future.
Romney’s rhetoric, in other words, conflicted with Americans’ reality. Indeed, it’s a problem the Republican candidate continues to struggle with. Consider this line from his speech in Colorado:
“Now [the president’s] campaign these days is trying to find a twig to hang on to, some little excuse they can grab and say, ‘Look, things are getting a little better, aren’t they?’ And the answer is yeah, things are getting a little better in a lot of places in this country, but it’s not thanks to his policies. It’s in spite of his policies.”
Nearly every day for over a year, Romney has said Obama made the economy “worse.” Slowly but surely, unable to push the claim with a straight face, Romney is conceding that the economy has improved under Obama — but no one should give the president credit.
This is a losing argument. His pitch is, in effect, “Sure, Obama inherited a global crash, took steps to turn the economy around, and on the president’s watch, the economy has improved. But vote against him anyway.” It’s not hard to imagine the Obama campaign simply taking all of the times Romney has touted America’s economic comeback, stringing them together, and creating ad in which the Republican nominee seems to be endorsing the president’s re-election.
So, what’s the GOP candidate to do? Left with few options, Romney relies on dishonesty.
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From yesterday’s appearance:
Romney also continued his attack on Obama’s 2009 stimulus package, saying that he will seek to assist private sector employment at the expense of public sector jobs.
“That stimulus he put in place, it didn’t help private sector jobs, it helped preserve government jobs and the one place we should have shut back — or cut back was on government jobs,” Romney said. “We have 145,000 more government workers under this president. Let’s send them home and put you back to work.”
I’m reasonably certain Romney is smart enough to know he’s blatantly lying. As the above chart shows, after the stimulus, private-sector job growth quickly improved. Conversely, public-sector layoffs have soared, making Romney’s claims the exact opposite of reality.
For that matter, why the former governor believes mass public-sector layoffs will “put you back to work” is a mystery.
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http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/30/11954928-wrong-message-wrong-place-wrong-time?lite
Romney Gives The “All Clear” to Birthers
Posted on 05/29/2012 at 2:30 pm by JM Ashby
Brave Sir Romney has no plans to confront Donald Trump or any other high-profile birthers supporting his campaign. He implied as much during an interview with CNN yesterday wherein he said he isn’t concerned about what his supporters believe as long as they support him.
Mitt Romney said Monday he wasn’t concerned about Donald Trump’s commitment to the “birther” conspiracy, one day before the GOP presidential candidate hosts a fund-raiser alongside the celebrity business magnate.
Asked on his charter plane whether Trump’s questioning of President Barack Obama’s birthplace gave him pause, Romney simply said he was grateful for all his supporters.
“You know, I don’t agree with all the people who support me and my guess is they don’t all agree with everything I believe in,” Romney said. “But I need to get 50.1% or more and I’m appreciative to have the help of a lot of good people.”
Romney doesn’t care what you believe as long as you vote for him, for Pete’s sake.
You can’t make it any more clear than Romney just did himself.
http://bobcesca.com/blog-archives/2012/05/romney-gives-the-all-clear-to-birthers.html
Romney’s unsubstantiated quote from union leader
Posted by Josh Hicks at 06:02 AM ET, 05/29/2012
TheWashingtonPost
“The teachers unions are the clearest example of a group that has lost its way. Whenever anyone dares to offer a new idea, the unions protest the loudest. Their attitude was memorably expressed by a longtime president of the American Federation of Teachers: He said, quote, ‘When school children start paying union dues, that’s when I’ll start representing the interests of children.’ ”
— Mitt Romney in an education speech at the Latino Coalition’s Annual Economic Summit in Washington, D.C, May 23, 2012
Mitt Romney veered from his standard talking points about the sluggish economy Wednesday to talk about education reform, a subject he said would be the top issue of the 2012 election if it weren’t for the housing crisis and the state of the economy. The presumptive GOP presidential nominee claimed that President Obama has bowed to powerful teachers unions, which he blamed for maintaining the status quo with failing schools.
The quote Romney cited could represent a serious indictment of teachers unions and their priorities, but only if the Republican candidate is correct in saying that it came from a longtime president of the American Federation of Teachers. We searched for evidence that a former head of that educators’ group, the second-largest of its kind in the United States, had really made such a statement.
For what it’s worth, the quote has appeared on a Madison, Wis.-area billboard sponsored by the self-proclaimed nonpartisan group Reforming Education And Demanding Exceptional Results in Wisconsin (READER-WI), according to a blogger for the left-leaning site Daily Kos.
The Facts
A search on Wikipedia reveals that the quote in question appears in an entry for the late Albert Shanker, a teachers union icon who served as president of the American Federation of Teachers for more than 20 years. The statement is listed under the heading “Disputed quote,” which should have been an immediate red flag for the Romney campaign.
A footnote on the Wikipedia page attributes the quote to an article in the monthly magazine the Atlantic, but that piece was written by Joel Klein, a former New York City schools chancellor who later became executive vice president of News Corp. Klein inevitably would have butted heads with teachers unions while heading the Big Apple’s school system, since he had to negotiate employee contracts and implement higher student-achievement standards.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/romneys-unsubstantiated-quote-from-union-leader/2012/05/28/gJQAhbOxwU_blog.html
Romney to claim, against evidence, that stimulus cost jobs. Will press call him on it?
By Zachary Roth – Tue May 29, 2012 10:23 AM EDT.
As Mitt Romney prepares to roll out his latest misleading attack on President Obama’s economic record—this one charging that the stimulus actually cost jobs—The Washington Post’s Greg Sargent has some great questions that the press should be asking the Romney camp.
Sargent notes that the campaign is counting hundreds of thousands of jobs lost before the stimulus went into effect, and wonders whether reporters will ask the campaign about this obvious problem with the charge.
But it’s worth pointing out that, even if you set that issue aside, the attack still doesn’t hold up. It’s impossible to say definitively exactly how many jobs a piece of legislation worth over three quarters of a trillion dollars created or subtracted—and the Romney campaign’s claim is designed to take advantage of that uncertainty. But there have in fact been numerous studies of the issue, and by surveying the best of them, we can get reasonably close to an answer.
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That’s exactly what The Washington Post’s Wonkblog did last August. It found that six of the nine most authoritative studies showed that the stimulus created a significant number of jobs, while the other three found a negative effect, or no effect. “[T]he preponderance of evidence indicates the stimulus worked…” the Post concluded.
It’s not surprising that the Romney campaign’s rhetoric isn’t constrained by this type of empirical evidence. But the press’s response should be. Rather than simply reporting Team Romney’s charge and the Obama campaign’s response, reporters should be ready to say clearly that the claim that the stimulus subtracted jobs is belied by the evidence.
http://leanforward.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/29/11936828-romney-to-claim-against-evidence-that-stimulus-cost-jobs-will-press-call-him-on-it?chromedomain=ed&lite
Why the Kid Gloves for Team Romney?
Jamelle Bouie
May 29, 2012
The core claims of Mitt Romney’s campaign are false, but he has yet to receive any scrutiny for it.
With regards to Mitt Romney’s renewed attack on President Obama’s economic stewardship, all of the focus seems to be on his assertion that “President Obama has never managed anything other than his own personal narrative.” There’s a little hypocrisy in the blow, given Romney’s complaint that Obama is waging a personal attack against him, but it’s far less important than what follows—-“[Obama] has never created a job and never run a business.”
As Greg Sargent points out, this is a sign that Romney has gone back to the claim that the economy has lost jobs under Obama as a result of the stimulus:
The Romney camp’s claim is that we can calculate that the stimulus destroyed jobs overall with a metric that factors in all the jobs destroyed before the stimulus took effect.
In other words, the Romney campaign wants to make Obama responsible for all jobs lost as result of the economic collapse, despite the fact that it was well underway by the time he entered office. The reality, as I noted earlier, is that the economy has seen 26 months of consecutive private sector job growth. If you exclude the jobs lost before Obama’s policies took effect—which only makes sense—then 4.25 million jobs have been created under the president’s watch:
This isn’t good enough, but it’s a far cry from Romney’s claim that Obama has been a uniquely destructive president for job creation. Which brings me to this point—if there’s anything remarkable about the Romney campaign, it’s the extent to which the core arguments for his candidacy are either false or impossible to substantiate. The claim that Obama is responsible for net job loss? False. The claim that Obama has gone on an unprecedented spending spree? False. And the claim that Romney created 100,000 jobs at Bain Capital? Impossible to prove.
Despite this, the press continues to treat Romney with kid gloves. The question is why? What does Romney need to do to receive any scrutiny for the mendacity that has defined his quest for the presidency?
http://prospect.org/article/why-kid-gloves-team-romney
Posted at 09:00 AM ET, 05/30/2012
TheWashingtonPost
The Morning Plum: The Obama campaign’s next attack on Mitt Romney
By Greg Sargent
Some polls have shown that more Americans think Mitt Romney would be better on the economy than Barack Obama has been. Are voters already proving willing to accept the premise of Romney’s candidacy — that his business background has left him equipped to turn around a whole country faster than Obama has? I’ve theorized as much.
But another possibility is that many voters still see Romney as just a generic economic alternative to Obama — their willingness to accept that Romney can turn around the economy is rooted in their disillusionment with Obama for failing to do so as fast as they’d hoped.
Either way, Job One for the Obama campaign is to undermine what appears to be a widespread presumption of Romney’s economic competence, and ABC News reports that the Obama team is redoubling their efforts on this front, by launching a new and aggressive campaign targeting Romney’s economic tenure as Massachusetts governor:
The Obama campaign is opening a new front in its war against GOP rival Mitt Romney, ABC News has learned, with planned attacks to begin this week on Romney’s record as governor of Massachusetts and the campaign promises Democrats say he left unfulfilled.
Team Obama will point to Romney’s rhetoric on job creation, size of government, education, deficits and taxes during the 2002 gubernatorial campaign and draw parallels with his presidential stump speeches of 2012. The goal is to illustrate that Romney has made the same promises before with unimpressive results, officials say…the latest line of attack will be a major focus from now through the election.
This again points to Obama’s core challenge. Romney wants the election to be all about the President. As Steve Kornacki put it recently, Romney’s pitch is: “If you don’t think the economy’s in good shape, don’t ask questions – just vote the guy in charge out.” Obama needs to persuade voters to do more than simply accept Romney as an alternative to the economic status quo who’s worth taking a flyer on. He needs to get them to look past general impressions of Romney’s competence and to realize that Romney is offering an actual set of policies and ideas about the economy that have been tried before. His “Mr. Fix It” aura — which is rooted in the pitch that he can translate private sector know-how to the public sector — is belied by his actual record as a public official.
The point the Obama campaign needs to drive home is that Romney has already tried to bring his private sector experience to bear on the public sector, even if he isn’t eager to talk about it. Hence the broadening of the case against Romney that we’re about to see.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/post/the-morning-plum-the-obama-campaigns-next-attack-on-mitt-romney/2012/05/30/gJQAfR3T1U_blog.html
Dana Milbank
Opinion Writer
A new conspiracy theory: Is Romney a unicorn?
The time has come for Mitt Romney to prove it once and for all: Is he or is he not a unicorn?
Let me stipulate that I have no proof that Romney is a unicorn, and indeed I want to believe that he is not. But I have not seen proof of this because he has not released the original copy of his long-form birth certificate.
There are many others who feel as I do — 18,000 people to be precise. I first began to consider the possibility that Romney might be a unicorn when I heard that LeftAction, an online petition operation created by Democratic PR guy John Hlinko, was campaigning to get the Arizona secretary of state to certify that the presumptive Republican nominee is not a mythical beast before allowing his name to be on the presidential ballot.
“There has never been a conclusive DNA test proving that Mitt Romney is not a unicorn,” the group wrote last week. “And if Mitt Romney is or may be a unicorn, he is not Constitutionally qualified to be president.”
The mittromneyisaunicorn.com campaign came about because Arizona Secretary of State Ken Bennett, citing allegations that the birth certificate President Obama released is a fraud, threatened to take the incumbent off the ballot.
Obviously, the likelihood that Romney is a fanciful equine is no more plausible than the claim that Obama was born in Africa. So why is the unicorn fair game? Because Romney has made it so.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/mitt-romney-a-unicorn-fighting-birthers-with-their-own-ploy/2012/05/29/gJQAvNDRzU_story.html?hpid=z2
Mitt Romney’s losing gamble on Donald Trump
Posted by Chris Cillizza at 01:45 PM ET, 05/29/2012
Late last week Mitt Romney’s campaign unveiled its latest fundraising gambit: Donate just $3 and you are eligible to have dinner with reality star Donald Trump — and, oh, yeah, the former Massachusetts governor will be there, too.
Donate today and you are eligible for a chance to win: Airport transportation in the Trump vehicle;” a “stay at the Trump International Hotel & Tower New York;” a chance to “tour the Celebrity Apprentice Boardroom;” and an opportunity to “dine with Donald Trump and Mitt Romney,” reads the message on the Romney campaign Web site.
But wait, there’s more! Romney will also join Trump tonight in Las Vegas at a fundraiser.
All of this Trump talk begs a simple question: Why is Romney associating himself with a man who is the public face of the debunked idea that President Obama wasn’t born in the United States and, perhaps more importantly, a man whose sole principle in life is self-promotion?
The Obama campaign quickly sought to make political hay out of the Trump-Romney connection.
“Mitt Romney’s continued embrace of Donald Trump and refusal to condemn his disgraceful conspiracy theories demonstrates his complete lack of moral leadership,:” said deputy campaign manager Stephanie Cutter. .”If Mitt Romney lacks the backbone to stand up to a charlatan like Donald Trump because he’s so concerned about lining his campaign’s pockets, what does that say about the kind of President he would be?”
The Romney team tried to downplay the Trump tie. “Governor Romney has said repeatedly that he believes President Obama was born in the United States,” said spokeswoman Andrea Saul. “The Democrats can talk about Donald Trump all they want — Mitt Romney is going to talk about jobs and how we can get our economy moving again.”
The argument forwarded by defenders of the Romney-Trump alliance is centered on two ideas: money and the base.
On the money front, these defenders argue that Trump’s celebrity brings in a different kind of donor — including precious small dollar givers — that Romney might not otherwise attract. (The fact that the donation point — $3 — is so low is indicative of the belief within Romney finance world that Trump does have appeal among these small dollar donors.)
In regards to the base, Christian Broadcasting Network’s David Brody laid out the argument this way:
“Associating with Donald Trump gives Mitt Romney a way of being brash without being brash. Trump is popular with a certain portion of the GOP, the portion that Romney doesn’t connect with. Trump’s bravado is not necessarily a bad thing for Romney because it connects him to a flamethrower and his audience without having to throw the flames himself.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/post/mitt-romneys-losing-gamble-on-donald-trump/2012/05/29/gJQADBO1yU_blog.html
Poll: Michelle Obama Still Popular
A new poll shows that Americans widely view Michelle Obama positively, a continuation of the First Lady’s high favorability ratings that have spanned her husband’s entire first term.
In the latest nationwide survey from Gallup, 66 percent have a favorable view of the First Lady, while only 27 percent view her unfavorably. According to Gallup, her favorability ratings have remained above 60 percent since January of 2009, when President Barack Obama entered office.
http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entries/poll-michelle-obama-still-popular
Child Gets Shocking Birthday Visit from Tuskegee Airmen (Video)
The Tuskegee Airmen’s heroic placement in the annals of American history was revived for a new generation when the movie Red Tails hit theatres this year. Some children had never heard of them before and now that they have the tale, they have new heroes.
Four and a half year old Quinn Thorne, is a new fan of the Tuskegee airmen after seeing the movie with his dad, Glen Thorne, who is a Navy veteran. Little Quinn had plenty of questions on his birthday for everyone in the room, but when he saw the decorated African American elders in the room he made a bee line to them to find out if they were the famous fighter pilots of World War II.
Leonard Yates, 88, is an Original Tuskegee Airman and only one of 40 to 50 documented Tuskegee Airmen still alive today. He heard of the little boy and how much he loved the Tuskegee Airmen and flew from Sacramento, California to Twin Falls, Idaho to meet the boy.
Check out their beautiful meeting.
http://www.eurthisnthat.com/2012/05/27/child-gets-shocking-birthday-visit-from-tuskegee-airmen-video/#more-23620
7:59 PM EDT, Tuesday May 29, 2012
Former Dem Rep. Artur Davis Officially Switches To GOP
Former Rep. Artur Davis (D-AL), who has become a vocal critic of the Democratic Party ever since he lost his 2010 campaign for governor of Alabama in the Democratic primary, announced Tuesday that he would make any future attempts for public office as a Republican instead, and in his new home state of Virginia.
Davis posted on his Web site:
While I’ve gone to great lengths to keep this website a forum for ideas, and not a personal forum, I should say something about the various stories regarding my political future in Virginia, the state that has been my primary home since late December 2010. The short of it is this: I don’t know and am nowhere near deciding. If I were to run, it would be as a Republican. And I am in the process of changing my voter registration from Alabama to Virginia, a development which likely does represent a closing of one chapter and perhaps the opening of another.
As to the horse-race question that animated parts of the blogosphere, it is true that people whose judgment I value have asked me to weigh the prospect of running in one of the Northern Virginia congressional districts in 2014 or 2016, or alternatively, for a seat in the Virginia legislature in 2015. If that sounds imprecise, it’s a function of how uncertain political opportunities can be—and if that sounds expedient, never lose sight of the fact that politics is not wishfulness, it’s the execution of a long, draining process to win votes and help and relationships while your adversaries are working just as hard to tear down the ground you build.
http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entries/former-dem-rep-artur-davis-officially-switches-to
Mitt Romney: Little to Like
‘American Grown’: Michelle Obama Triumphs Over ‘Lying’ Conservative Critics
In Teaming Up With Trump, Romney Courts 100% of The RACIST Vote
LIAR Mitt Romney Tries To Rewrite ‘Civil Rights’ & His History of Cowardice
‘Prostitute’ Mitt Romney Will DO ANYTHING To Get Elected
Matthews NAILED it. Especially if this slug gets into the WH.Can you say Cheney & Bush.
Lawrence O’Donnell on Willard trying to lecture anyone about what is a ‘civil rights’ issue.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45755883/vp/47608591#47608720
Good Morning, Everyone :)
Good Morning, rikyrah. You’ve been busy, I see. :-)