Interesting articles:
632 Days until Election Day
February 8, 2009
QUOTE OF THE DAY:
“Republicans stand ready to work with reasonable Democrats to do what is right for America. But it will take more than bipartisan words from the President. It will require fair-minded action from Democrats in Congress.”
Michael Steele, Chairman of the Republican National Committee
MORNING UPDATE:
SUNDAY MORNING SHOW…as provided by POLITICO and AP below.
RNC TECH SUMMIT…Chairman Michael Steele asked me to head up the transition Team’s effort on bringing new technologies and tactics to the RNC. We are in the process or reviewing and analyzing the current operation. We also called for a Tech Summit where we are bringing interested parties together to share ideas, make suggestions and present their perspectives of what and how we could do more. If you’re interested, join us. For more details click here.
STIMULUS SCAM….$827,000,000,000.00…in your tax dollars and debt…debt our children and grandchildren will be paying back. Government is completely out of control and spending billions more than we take in.
RNC CHAIRMAN MICHAEL STEELE WEEKLY ADDRESS…so here we are, Republicans aggressively taking our message to the American people. Check it out and share it with your friends.
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FOR THE LATEST NEWS, COMMENTARY & INFORMATION:
Check…out…our…online Articles of Interest………News…you…can…use………
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THE REST OF THE STORY:
THE SHOWS, mostly from AP
ABC’s ‘This Week’ – Lawrence Summers, director of National Economic Council; Republican Party Chairman Michael Steele.
CBS’ ‘Face the Nation’ – Christina Romer, head of the Council of Economic Advisers; Sens. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., and John McCain (R-Ariz..).
NBC’s ‘Meet the Press’ – Sens. John Ensign, R-Nev., and Claire McCaskill, D-Mo.; and Reps. Mike Pence, R-Ind., and Barney Frank, D-Mass.
CNN’s ‘State of the Union’ – Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood; Sens. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., and Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.; South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford.
‘Fox News Sunday’ – Summers; Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas.
TODAY’S TOP STORIES
The following stories and more are available at my Articles of Interest online.
Senate closes in on $780B stimulus
Dems reach compromise with key Republicans as report shows firms cut 600,000 jobs last month.
Gordon Trowbridge / Detroit News Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON — Senate Democrats reached agreement Friday with a handful of Republicans to pass $780 billion in spending and tax cuts to boost the flagging economy on a day of miserable employment news.
Democrats said they had agreed to a compromise negotiated by a bipartisan group of Senate moderates and were confident they could get the Republican support they need to get the required 60 votes. Democratic leaders said Republican Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine, along with Pennsylvania’s Arlen Spector, would vote for the bill. .
“The people of my state don’t care how many Democrats or Republicans vote for this,” said Michigan Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Lansing. “They care about how many jobs this creates.”
Obama bets that we can spend our way to prosperity.
President Obama has started to play the “catastrophe” card to sell his economic stimulus plan, using yesterday’s terrible January jobs report to predict doom unless Congress acts. No doubt he’ll get his way, but the tragedy of this first great effort of the Obama Presidency is what a lost opportunity it is.
Everyone agrees that some kind of fiscal stimulus might help the economy, and that running budget deficits is appropriate in a recession. The stage was thus set for the popular President to forge a bipartisan consensus that combined ideas from both parties. A major cut in the corporate tax favored by Republicans could have been added to Democratic public works spending for a quick political triumph that might have done at least some economic good.
Instead, Mr. Obama chose to let House Democrats write the bill, and they did what comes naturally: They cleaned out their intellectual cupboards and wrote a bill that is 90% social policy, and 10% economic policy. (See here for a case study.) It is designed to support incomes with transfer payments, rather than grow incomes through job creation.
Americans have doubts about plan for economy
Yet poll shows support for government action
By John Marelius
Union-Tribune Staff Writer
2:00 a.m. February 8, 2009
Thirteen years after President Bill Clinton declared that “the era of big government is over,” one of the biggest government spending programs ever conceived is moving through Congress.
And the American people are on board – sort of.
“They’re all over the map,” said Andrew Smith, director of the University of New Hampshire Survey Center.
“The way I would characterize what the public view is they know something has to be done, they’re not quite sure what should be done,” Smith said. “They’ve been told that the economy is in dreadful shape and getting worse. They don’t want it to get worse. So just do something – anything.”
Michigan couple among pairs laid off together
By MELISSA NELSON
Associated Press
February 8, 2009
It is a well-known risk to lack diversity in an investment portfolio. Now, couples employed by the same company are learning a similar lesson, the hard way.
As layoffs mount across the country and in all sectors, couples who are co-workers are increasingly vulnerable to losing their families’ twin sources of income at once.
The lack of variety in job skills can also make it difficult to bounce back, especially in a struggling industry.
Services for Livingston County veterans may fall victim to economy
BY SHARON GITTLEMAN
FREE PRESS SPECIAL WRITER
February 8, 2009
Is the short-term future of veterans services in Livingston County in jeopardy?
That’s the fear of Bob Heinel, retiring Department of Veterans Affairs director.
Financial troubles have spurred the Livingston County Board of Commissioners to consider what would be the elimination of the three-person office by not filling openings and merging its functions with other departments, although the department would likely continue in some lesser form.
Honeymoon over, Obama aides admit mistakes, retrench
Michael D. Shear and Anne E. Kornblut / Washington Post
WASHINGTON — President Obama retreated to the serenity of Camp David for the first time Saturday, stepping back briefly from a presidency that has quickly found itself tested by a loyal opposition and the loss of the pitch-perfect tone that helped sweep him to office.
Beset by criticism of an alleged ethical double standard over some of his Cabinet choices and an intensifying partisan debate over his economic recovery plan, Obama is attempting a return to the campaign-style approach and aggressiveness that echoes the toughest days of his battle with Hillary Clinton.
In a fiery speech before a gathering of House Democrats in Williamsburg on Thursday night that took place even as he was searching out GOP support for his stimulus package, Obama blasted Republican policies that “for the last eight years doubled the national debt and threw our economy into a tailspin.” He then led Democratic members of Congress in a familiar chant: “Fired up!” he declared. “Ready to go!” they returned — voicing a call and response that became a trademark of his campaign.
Obama is stimulating gun sales
If gun owners are like wooly worms — they instinctively fatten up ahead of a harsh winter — then the Second Amendment is in for a rough spell.
Since Barack Obama’s election in November, gun and ammunition sales have soared, as have requests for concealed carry permits, on fears that the new president will clamp down on gun rights.
Business has been so brisk that one California store hung a poster of Obama with the words, “Salesman of the Year.”
“Our sales are up 15 to 20 percent since October,” says Roger Little, owner of Shooter’s Service in Livonia. “It’s not the 40 percent other stores are reporting, but it’s good business.”
How can Republicans repair their brand?
Ernest Istook
Sunday, February 8, 2009
A few years ago we said goodbye to the Oldsmobile. It went the way of the Pierce Arrow, Plymouth and Studebaker.
Some believe conservatives and Republicans will be the next brands doomed to follow into extinction. They forecast death by suicide for the GOP and extinction via political climate change for conservatives.
But let’s not bury either group beside the Whigs and the Mugwumps.
Republicans and conservatives overlap but are not identical. Yet they need each other to flourish because Democrats own the liberal brand. Unless they have a conservative brand, Republicans will have no brand at all.
Obama, Reagan ‘face off’ at Kennedy Center
By PATRICK GAVIN | 2/7/09 10:07 AM EST
You can get members of different parties under the same roof, but that doesn’t mean they’ll get along.
The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts experienced two very different sets of Washington’s political elite Friday night: While the first family attended a dance performance in the Center’s main theater, an impressive showing of Republicans gathered on the top floor to take in the premiere of “Ronald Reagan: Rendezvous with Destiny,” a new film narrated by Newt and Callista Gingrich which paints a glowing portrait of our 40th president.
While Barack, Michelle, Sasha and Malia were treated like rock stars down below, it was Ronald Reagan being toasted up above by such GOP notables as Mr. and Mrs. Gingrich, George Allen, Ollie North, Bob Livingston, Al Regnery, Craig Shirley, David Bossie, Saul Anuzis, Jim Pinkerton and Fred Thompson.
Biden offers olive branch to Iran, Russia
Craig Whitlock / Washington Post
MUNICH — Vice President Joe Biden held out an olive branch Saturday to Iran and Russia, and reassured European allies that the Obama administration would treat them as equals but emphasized that “America will ask its partners to do more as well.”
In a major-foreign policy address Saturday to an international security conference here, Biden told an audience of world leaders that the White House was willing to engage the government in Tehran if it heeded calls to end its nuclear-weapons program and changed its policies in the Middle East.
“This much is clear: We will be willing to talk,” Biden said. But he added a warning to Iran: “continue down your current course and there will be pressure and isolation.”
16 Days until Election Day
October 19, 2008
QUOTE OF THE DAY:
“‘Maverick’ I can do, but ‘messiah’ is above my pay grade.”
- John McCain to Chris Matthews at the ‘Al Smith Dinner’
MORNING UPDATE:
SUNDAY MORNING TALK SHOW SCHEDULE…is printed below under the ‘Rest of the Story’.
TODAY…HOOGENDYK v LEVIN DEBATE… Sunday, October 19, at 7pm. Hosted by WGVU and Grand Valley State University, moderated by Peter Ross. Scheduled to be broadcast live by all seven of Michigan’s PBS stations: WGVU-TV Grand Rapids/Kalamazoo, WCMU-TV Mt. Pleasant, WDCQ-TV University Center, WFUM-TV Flint/Ann Arbor, WDET-TV Detroit, WKAR-TV East Lansing, and WNMU-TV Marquette. It will also be streamed live on www.wgvu.com. A second debate will be held by the Detroit Economic Club on Monday, October 20, at noon at the Detroit Marriott. For more information contact Jack’s campaign at www.jackformichigan.com.
GRASSROOTS VOLUNTEERS NEEDED…as we reorganize Victory Centers and Call Centers around the state, volunteers continue to make calls, knock on doors, and make contributions to fight for Republican candidates up and down the ticket. Please check this link for a Victory Center near you. We need you now, more than ever.
MICHIGAN YOUTH EFFORT GROWS…COLLEGE REPUBLICANS STATEWIDE JUMP IN …our Michigan Youth Counts effort, designed to stop “the brain drain” was in Oakland County this weekend helping 7 key state and local candidates. “Team Brain Drain” to date has made over 12,500 calls, knocked over 4,500 doors, and worked 565 man hours for our Republican candidates. Next week, “Team Brain Drain” will be in Macomb County. For more information please contact Program Director Anthony Markwort at: amarkwort@migop.org.
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FOR THE LATEST NEWS, COMMENTARY & INFORMATION:
Check…out…our…online Articles of Interest………News…you…can…use………
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THE REST OF THE STORY:
SUNDAY MORNING TALK SHOW SCHEDULE:
Mac is back this Sunday, sitting for an interview on “Fox News Sunday.”
Still, John McCain may not be the biggest newsmaker on this Sunday’s shows, what with former Secretary of State Colin Powell appearing on NBC’s “Meet the Press” for what could be a blockbuster interview.
As soon as “Meet” announced its lineup, there was a frenzy of will-he-or-won’t-he speculation over whether the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff who was secretary of state in the first term of this Bush administration will endorse Democrat Barack Obama over Republican McCain in the critical last days of the presidential campaign.
Or will he continue to hold his cards close?
After Powell, host Tom Brokaw leads a discussion on the presidential race with New York Times columnist David Brooks, Newsweek editor Jon Meacham, MSNBC host and former Rep. Joe Scarborough (R-Fla.) and NBC’s Andrea Mitchell and Chuck Todd.
On CBS, “Face the Nation” features interviews with politicos from four swing states: Virginia Democratic Gov. Tim Kaine and Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.); and Republican Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt and former Rep. Rob Portman (R-Ohio).
Afterward, The Washington Post’s Dan Balz offers his take on the race as it enters the home stretch toward the Nov. 4 election.
On CNN, “Late Edition” takes an in-depth look at the key battleground state of Missouri, interviewing Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) and House Minority Whip Roy Blunt (R-Mo.).
And former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who lost his bid for the Republican presidential nomination, spins the race as a top McCain surrogate.
Does he believe Mac can come back again?
Obama confidante Rep. Artur Davis (D-Ala.) also sits for an interview on CNN. And host Wolf Blitzer closes out the lineup with a look at the nation’s troubled economy, incluidng an interview with Ed Lazear, chairman of the White House Council on Economic Advisers.
ABC’s “This Week” goes the roundtable route this Sunday, devoting its entire hour to surveying the presidential race.
Host George Stephanopoulos dissects the race with former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.), New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, pundit David Gergen and Democratic strategist Donna Brazile and ABC’s George Will.
C-SPAN’s “Newsmakers” also focuses on the economy with Rep. Spencer Bachus of Alabama, the top Republican on the House Financial Services Committee, who’ll be interviewed by Sudeep Reddy of The Wall Street Journal and Steven Dennis of Roll Call.
Finally, Bloomberg’s “Political Capital” host Al Hunt interviews Christopher Buckley, who shook up conservative circles last week with his endorsement of Obama.
TODAY’S TOP STORIES
The following stories and more are available at my Articles of Interest online.
F.B.I. Struggles to Handle Wave of Financial Fraud Cases
By ERIC LICHTBLAU, DAVID JOHNSTON and RON NIXON
Published: October 18, 2008
WASHINGTON – The Federal Bureau of Investigation is struggling to find enough agents and resources to investigate criminal wrongdoing tied to the country’s economic crisis, according to current and former bureau officials.
The bureau slashed its criminal investigative work force to expand its national security role after the Sept. 11 attacks, shifting more than 1,800 agents, or nearly one-third of all agents in criminal programs, to terrorism and intelligence duties. Current and former officials say the cutbacks have left the bureau seriously exposed in investigating areas like white-collar crime, which has taken on urgent importance in recent weeks because of the nation’s economic woes.
The pressure on the F.B.I. has recently increased with the disclosure of criminal investigations into some of the largest players in the financial collapse, including Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The F.B.I. is planning to double the number of agents working financial crimes by reassigning several hundred agents amid a mood of national alarm. But some people inside and out of the Justice Department wonder where the agents will come from and whether they will be enough.
House Dem candidates again getting Stryker’s help
10/19/2008, 7:26 a.m. EDT
LANSING, Mich. (AP) – Michigan Democrats running for state House seats look likely to broaden their 58-52 majority on Nov. 4.
A major reason is the influence of Jon Stryker and the Coalition for Progress. In 2006, the Kalamazoo billionaire’s campaign contributions helped at least four Democrats win state House seats and played a role in at least 10 House and Senate contests.
This year, the coalition Stryker founded is spending big money in at least eight districts to help Democrats increase their edge in the state House. And Stryker is the person making it all possible.
Receivership may be the best solution for Big 3′s troubles
Saturday, October 18, 2008 8:36 AM EDT
ROBERT HOISINGTON and PHILLIP LEVIN
Special to The Oakland Press
“If we do not hang together, we shall surely hang separately” … Winston Churchill As you surely know, the global financial meltdown has exacerbated the crisis in the domestic auto industry to create a “perfect storm” that requires drastic measures. The entire U.S. automotive industry is in jeopardy, with unimaginable consequences for our community and our country. This is a modest proposal to help save the industry.
Bold action must be taken to make the industry competitive once and for all! Halfway measures will only delay Armageddon and make it more likely.
While many believe that an automotive company could never emerge from a bankruptcy filing, because buyers would never buy a car from a “bankrupt” car company, a form of bankruptcy now appears to be the only way of making the changes needed for survival.
Obama turns race card on McCain
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Let me get this straight. A couple of agitated yahoos in a rally of thousands yell something offensive and incendiary, and John McCain and Sarah Palin are not just guilty by association — with total strangers, mind you — but worse: guilty according to the New York Times of “race-baiting and xenophobia.”
But should you bring up Barack Obama’s real associations — 20 years with Jeremiah Wright, working on two foundations and distributing money with William Ayers, citing the raving Michael Pfleger as one who helps him keep his moral compass (Chicago Sun-Times, April 2004) and the longstanding relationship with the left-wing vote-fraud specialist ACORN — you have crossed the line into illegitimate guilt by association. Moreover, it is tinged with racism.
UTICA, New York – Republican John McCain continued a slow advance on Democrat Barack Obama in the race for President, moving back within three percentage points as the race begins to head down the stretch run, the latest Reuters/C-SPAN/Zogby daily tracking poll shows.
McCain now trails Obama by 2.7 points, down from the 3.9 point deficit he faced 24 hours earlier.
Seven-point-one percent of the likely voters surveyed said they remain undecided.
Barack Obama vows to ‘change the world’
By Toby Harnden in Londonderry, New Hampshire
Last Updated: 6:42PM BST 18 Oct 2008
The supremely confident demeanour and exalted rhetoric of the Democratic nominee at a New Hampshire event betrayed that he is a man convinced he is poised to make history.
While his Republican opponent John McCain, trailing in the polls, is pursuing a strategy of eking out a victory in traditional swing states, Mr Obama is transferring resources to conservative strongholds like Georgia, West Virginia and even Kentucky in pursuit of a landslide victory.
McCain suggests Obama tax policies are socialist
By GLEN JOHNSON, Associated Press Writer Glen Johnson, Associated Press Writer – Sat Oct 18, 11:59 am ET
CONCORD, N.C. – Republican presidential candidate John McCain on Saturday accused Democratic rival Barack Obama of favoring a socialistic economic approach by supporting tax cuts and tax credits McCain says would merely shuffle wealth rather than creating it.
“At least in Europe, the Socialist leaders who so admire my opponent are upfront about their objectives,” McCain said in a radio address. “They use real numbers and honest language. And we should demand equal candor from Sen. Obama. Raising taxes on some in order to give checks to others is not a tax cut; it’s just another government giveaway.”
McCain, though, has a health care plan girded with a similar philosophy. He proposes providing individuals with a $5,000 tax credit to buy health insurance. He would pay for his plan, in part, by considering as taxable income the money their employer spends on their health coverage.
Obama Attacks McCain on Health Care and Medicare, in Some Ways Inaccurately
By KEVIN SACK
Published: October 18, 2008
In a coordinated air and ground attack, Senator Barack Obama is charging that his Republican rival for the presidency, Senator John McCain, would make $882 billion in “drastic cuts to Medicare” to pay for his health care proposal.
That assertion, which could resonate among elderly voters in swing states like Florida, is being angrily disputed by the McCain campaign. Mr. McCain’s top domestic policy adviser, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, said Friday that the Democrat’s latest assault on the McCain health plan capped the “worst and most sustained distortion of policy in this entire campaign.”
In fact, the Obama campaign’s new television advertisement, which Mr. Obama reinforced on the stump in Virginia on Friday and again in Missouri on Saturday, may mischaracterize Mr. McCain’s plan by making assumptions that are stitched together from news reporting and rough back-of-the-envelope calculations by a partisan policy group.
Liberals declare war on Joe the Plumber
Six-term Sen. Joe Biden’s got some nerve going after citizen Joe the Plumber. But the entrenched politician from Delaware, who fancies himself the nation’s No. 1 Ordinary Joe, had no choice. Obama-Biden simply can’t tolerate an outspoken citizen successfully painting the Democratic ticket as socialist overlords. And so a dirty, desperate war against Joe Wurzelbacher is on.
The left’s political plumbers are attacking the messenger, rummaging through his personal life and predictably wielding the race card once again. It’s standard operating procedure for the Obama thug machine.
Wurzelbacher, in case you’ve been in hibernation, is the small-business man from Ohio who questioned Obama about his tax plan during a Toledo campaign swing last weekend. The revealing exchange was caught on tape and broadcast widely across the Internet and TV airwaves.
‘Joe’ wildly received on Fox News show
Already in the national spotlight, Samuel “Joe the Plumber” Wurzelbacher last night strode onto the set of Fox News Channel’s Huckabee program to thunderous applause.
Host Mike Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor and presidential candidate, began by saying that if John McCain wins, he’ll largely have Mr. Wurzelbacher to thank.
The Springfield Township resident, invoked repeatedly as “Joe the Plumber” during Wednesday’s presidential debate, demurred.
52 Days Until Election Day
September 14, 2008
MORNING UPDATE:
GRAND RAPIDS…McCAIN & PALIN…join us Wednesday, September 17 at Grand Rapids Community College at 4:30 for a “Straight Talk Town Hall Meeting”. For more information and to reserve tickets click here:
PALIN CONTINUES TO IMPRESS…her next interviews were great. She answered them directly, you can tell she became more comfortable and confident interview after interview…. not only is she ready for prime time…look out Washington!
MICHIGAN’S ECONOMY…. If you like what Jennifer Granholm has done for Michigan, you’re going to love what Barack Obama is going to do to America…so who’s picking up on the message…see the Wall Street Journal for just that point!
TALK SHOW UPDATE BELOW…. Sunday’s schedule of the various show below.
MICHIGAN MATTERS…taped “Michigan Matters” with Carol Cain, which will air this weekend. “Michigan Matters” airs Saturday on CBS Detroit at 11 a.m. and is repeated on Sunday on CW 50 at 11:00 a.m. Dem Chair Mark Brewer and I will be regular guests over the next few weeks. This week’s guest also include Oakland County Executive L. Brooks Patterson, Wayne County Executive Robert Ficano and Macomb County Chair Bill Crouchman will tee it up and join Cain as they weigh in on the impact of outgoing Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick and incoming Mayor Ken Cockrel Jr. on the region.
VOLUNTEERS NEEDED…we are opening up new Victory Centers daily and need more and more volunteers to make phone calls, knock on doors and put up lawn signs. The response has been overwhelming, but Michigan will be the key battleground state and we need EVERY person willing to help in anyway they can. Thanks again for all you do! For more info go to:
LEVIN REFUSES TO DEBATE HOOGENDYK…the Levin campaign has promised nothing more than to “negotiate” a schedule and terms of a debate. What is he afraid of…Jack? It’s a shame and a disgrace that Carl Levin is not willing to face an opponent and debate the issues…it appears both Obama and Levin fear or are embarrassed by their positions and don’t want to fact Michigan’s voters????
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FOR THE LATEST NEWS, COMMENTARY & INFORMATION:
Check…out…our…online Articles of Interest………News…you…can…use………
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THE REST OF THE STORY:
SUNDAY’S TALK SHOW LINEUP:
ABC’s ‘This Week’ – Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo.; Carly Fiorina, adviser to John McCain; former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan.
CBS’ ‘Face the Nation’ – Gov. Janet Napolitano, D-Ariz.; Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas; Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla.; former acting Gov. Jane Swift, R-Mass.
NBC’s ‘Meet the Press’ – Former Mayor Rudy Giuliani, R-N.Y.; Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y.; Bob Woodward, associate editor for The Washington Post and author of a new book on the Bush administration.
CNN’s ‘Late Edition’ – R. David Paulison, administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency; Govs. Tim Pawlenty, R-Minn., and Bill Richardson, D-N.M.; Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.; Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn.; Linda Douglass, adviser to Barack Obama; Nancy Pfotenhauer, adviser to McCain. ?’Fox News Sunday’ – Former Gov. Tony Knowles, D-Alaska; Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell, R-Alaska; Jim Laychak, president of the Pentagon Memorial Fund.
TODAY’S TOP STORIES
The following stories and more are available at my Articles of Interest online.
If You Like Michigan’s Economy, You’ll Love Obama’s
By PHIL GRAMM and MIKE SOLON
September 13, 2008; Page A13
Despite the federal government’s growing economic dominance, individual states still exercise substantial freedom in pursuing their own economic fortune — or misfortune. As a result, the states provide a laboratory for testing various policies.
In this election year, the experience of the states gives us some ability to look at the economic policies of the two presidential candidates in action. If a program is not playing in Peoria, it probably won’t work elsewhere. Americans have voted with their feet by moving to states with greater opportunities, but federal adoption of failed state programs would take away our ability to walk away from bad government.
GOP ticket to campaign in Grand Rapids this week
9/13/2008, 3:51 p.m. EDT
The Associated Press
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (AP) – The Republican presidential ticket is returning to Michigan for the second time this month.
Sen. John McCain of Arizona and running mate Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin will appear Wednesday at a “Straight Talk Town Hall Meeting” at Grand Rapids Community College.
The campaign has told supporters in an e-mail that the doors at the Gerald R. Ford Fieldhouse will open at 4:30 p.m. Tickets will be required.
Cindy McCain says her husband would bring jobs to Michigan
Oralandar Brand-Williams / The Detroit News
PONTIAC — Cindy McCain, wife of Sen. John McCain, the Republican presidential nominee, said her husband would be the right man for the White House and the right person to help Michigan’s troubled economy.
“He is not a man for all times but a man for these times,” said McCain Saturday evening during a 15-minute speech at the 119th Annual Lincoln Day Dinner. “He is someone we need right now.”
McCain spoke during the dinner, which was held at the Centerpoint Marriott.
5 reasons why McCain has pulled ahead
By DAVID PAUL KUHN | 9/14/08 7:24 AM EST
John McCain’s surge in the polls comes even as Barack Obama has inherited the most favorable Democratic environment since the Watergate era-an unpopular Republican president, an unpopular war and a flagging economy.
Suddenly, though, Democrats have found themselves in a world turned upside down, where Republicans have the momentum from running on change-and the latest wunderkind of presidential politics.
Below are five trends showing up in polling that help explain the change.
Obama and McCain v. Ivy League
September 13, 2008; Page A12
On their 9/11 day of campaign truce, Barack Obama and John McCain went to Columbia University and talked earnestly about public service. The Presidential candidates managed to perform a service as well, by calling out their host to welcome the Reserve Office Training Corps back on the Morningside Heights campus.
The suggestion was met with boos from the audience when offered by the Republican hopeful and retired Naval officer, and silence when crowd favorite Mr. Obama (Columbia ’83) called the ban “a mistake.” The contempt for military service, alas, runs deep at our so-called elite academic institutions.
Sen. says Palin sank ‘Bridge to Nowhere’
Stephen Dinan
Saturday, September 13, 2008
Sen. Tom Coburn, the chief foe of the “Bridge to Nowhere,” said Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin deserves credit for killing the project, which became the symbol of Washington pork-barrel spending.
“The bridge didn’t get built because Sarah Palin had the guts to say it wasn’t going to get built,” said Mr. Coburn, Oklahoma Republican, who was the fiercest critic of the bridge and tried but failed to have Congress strike it. He said he sees an ally in Mrs. Palin.
By Charles Krauthammer
Saturday, September 13, 2008; A17
The New York Times got it wrong. And Charlie Gibson got it wrong. There is no single meaning of the Bush doctrine. In fact, there have been four distinct meanings, each one succeeding another over the eight years of this administration — and the one Charlie Gibson cited is not the one in common usage today. It is utterly different.
He asked Palin, “Do you agree with the Bush doctrine?” She responded, quite sensibly to a question that is ambiguous, “In what respect, Charlie?” Sensing his “gotcha” moment, Gibson refused to tell her. After making her fish for the answer, Gibson grudgingly explained to the moose-hunting rube that the Bush doctrine “is that we have the right of anticipatory self-defense.”
Wrong.
I know something about the subject because, as the Wikipedia entry on the Bush doctrine notes, I was the first to use the term. In the cover essay of the June 4, 2001, issue of the Weekly Standard entitled, “The Bush Doctrine: ABM, Kyoto, and the New American Unilateralism,” I suggested that the Bush administration policies of unilaterally withdrawing from the ABM treaty and rejecting the Kyoto protocol, together with others, amounted to a radical change in foreign policy that should be called the Bush doctrine.
Going After Charlie Rangel
Trying times for the chairman of Ways and Means
Sunday, September 14, 2008; Page B06
THESE HAVE not been pleasant times for Rep. Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.). For the third time in as many months on Wednesday, the dean of the New York congressional delegation had to face the media to answer questions about questionable practices.
In July the New York Times revealed that a New York City developer let Mr. Rangel lease four apartments in a Harlem building at below-market rents. One of the apartments was used as a campaign office. That’s a no-no under New York State law, which requires rent-stabilized apartments to be used for primary residences only. Mr. Rangel dumped the campaign office. Then came the revelation in The Post that Mr. Rangel was using his congressional stationery to request meetings with deep-pocketed New York powerbrokers to discuss a school of public service named after him in his district. House rules prohibit using stationery for solicitations. No, he didn’t make outright requests for cash in those letters. But when a note arrives from the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, it’s bound to get extra attention.
Quit Doling Out That Bad-Economy Line
By Donald Luskin
Sunday, September 14, 2008; Page B01
“It was the worst of times, and it was the worst of times.”
I imagine that’s what Charles Dickens would conclude about the current condition of the U.S. economy, based on the relentless drumbeat of pessimism in the media and on the campaign trail. In the past two months, this newspaper alone has written no fewer than nine times, in news stories, columns and op-eds, that key elements of the economy are the worst they’ve been “since the Great Depression.” That diagnosis has been applied twice to the housing “slump” and once to the housing “crisis,” to the “severe” decline in home prices, to the “spike” in mortgage foreclosures, to the “change” in the mortgage market and the “turmoil” in debt markets, and to the “crisis” or “meltdown” in financial markets.
93 Days until Election Day
August 3, 2008
MORNING UPDATE:
SUNDAY’S TALK SHOW LINEUP…below.
OUTRAGE…America should remember that House Democrats shut down debate on energy policy that would have helped lower gas prices and took a 5 week vacation instead. There IS a difference between Democrats and Republicans.
Please check out the article below from The Hill newspaper, as well as this article from Politico.
POWERLINE BLOG ON OBAMA’S ENERGY PLAN…TO KEEP US STUPID…see details below.
A TIME FOR CHOOSING… The WSJ reports…’the Republican Party is facing what Ronald Reagan called “a time for choosing.” A real argument is raging over how much it should turn its back on the bad habits that cost it control of Congress in 2006′.
BARACK OBAMA…THE ONE?!?…this is a video you have to see. Again, in his own words…it should raise some “doubts” in your mind.
OBAMA…CELEBRITY #1…Beating out all the semi-porn videos and some Miley Cyrus riff, John McCain’s ‘Celeb’ ad was the most viewed video on YouTube this week. The tally as of Saturday at 7:25 p.m. was 1,405,356 views.
OBAMA….he’ll say…and has said ANYTHING to get a vote. Politics as usual…or even worse. See, in his own words…how he will take any and every position he thinks will be politically expedient.
GOP TOOLBAR…download it, use it, it’s free…and every time you use the Yahoo search on a sponsored site, the Michigan Republicans pick up a contribution. It’s easy and costs you nothing. Please check it out.
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FOR THE LATEST NEWS, COMMENTARY & INFORMATION:
Check…out…our…online Articles of Interest………News…you…can…use………
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SUNDAY’S TALK SHOW LINEUP…
ABC’s “This Week” – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and former Gov. Tom Ridge, R-Pa.; David Gergen, former White House adviser.
CBS’ “Face the Nation” – Former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin; Carly Fiorina, adviser to John McCain’s campaign.
NBC’s “Meet the Press” – Sens. John Kerry, D-Mass., and Joe Lieberman, I-Conn.
CNN’s “Late Edition” – Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo.; former Rep. Rob Portman, R-Ohio; Kenneth Blackwell, former Ohio secretary of state; Ron Kirk, former Dallas mayor; Maj. Gen. Mark Hertling, the commander of U.S. forces in northern Iraq; Tzipi Livni, Israeli foreign minister; James K. Glassman, undersecretary of state for public diplomacy and public affairs; Laura Tyson, adviser to Barack Obama; Nancy Pfotenhauer, adviser to McCain.
“Fox News Sunday” – Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and former Sen. Tom Daschle, D-S.D.; Ashley Judd, actress.
POWERLINE BLOG…Barack Obama — fighting to keep us stupid…It’s unfortunate that, at least until this Friday, Barack Obama opposed off-shore drilling. Still, this is a policy issue on which reasonable minds probably can differ and certainly could before gasoline prices skyrocketed. But, as I set forth below, Obama has also led a one-man crusade to keep the American people ignorant about what’s at stake in the debate over off-shore drilling. This, it seems to me, is almost criminal.
Here’s the background. In 2005, Congress considered energy legislation that included an off-shore inventory. Obama voted to kill the off-shore inventory provision. So, unfortunately, did John McCain. However, the effort to kill the inventory failed, and the first inventory report was issued in February 2006.
Obama, though, did not give up in his efforts to keep the public ignorant. In January 2007, he proposed legislation to eliminate the authorization to conduct the inventory, as established in the 2005 law. Obama’s bill is S. 115. The key provision is section 101(a)(5). It provides that “Section 357 (42 U.S.C. 15912) (relating to comprehensive inventory of OCS oil and natural gas resources)” is “repealed as of the date of enactment of this act.”
Ironically, Obama called his legislation “The Oil SENSE Act.” How audacious a label for an act that would deprive the public of key information relevant to deciding whether off-shore drilling makes sense. As far as I know, Obama’s legislation is still pending.
It’s wonderful that Obama now thinks it might be ok to drill off-shore, provided that such drilling is part of an “overarching really thoughtful” energy package. Perhaps now, as part of the package, Obama will stop opposing an inventory of our off-shore energy assets. After all, if Obama is prepared to support drilling, he no longer needs to keep voters in the dark about what we are losing by not drilling.
Posted by Paul at 4:45 PM |
TODAY’S TOP STORIES
The following stories and more are available at my Articles of Interest online.
Renier and Schauer campaigns argue about Big Oil
Nick Schirripa • The Enquirer • August 3, 2008
“Last week, Tim Walberg received another check from big oil. It happened to be a $1,000 thank you check from Exxon Mobil’s political action committee,” Schauer said on the show. “I have never received a contribution from these folks.”
Michigan Republican Party Chairman Saul Anuzis called Schauer out for the “I never” part of that statement.
“Mark Schauer flat-out lied to the public about receiving campaign contributions from the oil industry,” Anuzis said in a news release. “Although he has accepted tens of thousands of dollars in the past, he has the audacity to criticize his opponent for receiving far less. Schauer’s hypocrisy and dishonesty on this issue should raise serious questions for south-central Michigan voters as to what kind of congressman Schauer would be.”
Who’s winning in the MI-7: Schauer or Walberg?
Posted by Susan J. Demas | Capitol Chronicles | Analysis August 03, 2008 01:14AM
Who’s winning? Who knows?
That’s the real story in the 7th Congressional District, the hottest race in Michigan, not counting the U.S. Senate battle. (Will sacrificial lamb state Rep. Jack Hoogendyk (R-Kalamazoo) manage to break 40 percent against Carl Levin? Stay tuned.)
In an interesting development, both U.S. Rep. Tim Walberg (R-Tipton) and state Sen. Mark Schauer (D-Battle Creek) have released their internal polling.
Tough labor climate isn’t helping state
BY TOM WALSH • FREE PRESS COLUMNIST • August 3, 2008
BATTLE CREEK — From May 6-8, about 30 high-powered people from around the world, all involved in the secretive Project Polar Bear, gathered at the Yarrow Golf and Conference Resort.
Their mission: To hear and analyze the state of Michigan’s pitch for why German auto giant Volkswagen AG should locate a new auto assembly plant and 2,000 jobs in Marshall, a small town near Battle Creek.
Michigan had been competing against six southern states for the VW plant, code-named Project Polar Bear, and had made the cut as one of three finalists, along with Alabama and Tennessee.
Time offers a sad perspective on Kilpatrick’s words
BY RON DZWONKOWSKI • FREE PRESS COLUMNIST • August 3, 2008
That was Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick on Jan. 4, 2002, after being sworn in for his first term. Sounded good then. Sounds different now, since we know that “personal” apparently meant personal gain, personal power and personal privilege as this “Son of the City” started acting like its prince.
Many of Kilpatrick’s words take on a different meaning in the glare of the text message scandal that has engulfed the administration and led to eight felony charges against him.
On Debates, Obama Backs 3 With McCain
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: August 3, 2008
WASHINGTON (AP) – Backing away from Senator John McCain’s challenge for several Lincoln-Douglas-style debates, Senator Barack Obama agreed Saturday to the three standard meetings proposed by the Commission on Presidential Debates.
In a letter to the commission, the Obama campaign manager, David Plouffe, said the short period between the Republican convention that ends Sept. 4 and the first proposed debate made it likely that the commission-sponsored debates would be the only ones.
“We’ve committed to the three debates on the table,” said Jen Psaki, a campaign spokeswoman for Mr. Obama. “It’s likely they will be the three appearances by the candidates this fall.”
McCain vetting Va. congressman as possible veep
BOB LEWIS
Originally published 12:39 a.m., August 3, 2008, updated 12:30 a.m., August 3, 2008
RICHMOND, VA. (AP) – John McCain’s campaign has asked Virginia Rep. Eric Cantor for personal documents as the Republican presidential candidate steps up his search for a running mate, The Associated Press has learned.
Cantor, 45, the chief deputy minority whip in the House, has been mentioned among several Republicans as a possible running mate for McCain. A Republican familiar with the conversations between Cantor and the McCain campaign said Cantor has been asked to turn over documents, but did not know specifically what records were sought.
The individual spoke on the condition of anonymity because neither the McCain campaign nor Cantor’s office wishes to discuss the running mate selection process.
McCain chides Obama over school vouchers
BETH FOUHY ASSOCIATED PRESS
Originally published 12:40 a.m., August 2, 2008, updated 12:31 a.m., August 2, 2008
ORLANDO, FLA. (AP) – John McCain, the father of private school students, criticized Democratic rival Barack Obama on Friday for choosing private over public school for his kids.
The difference, according to the Arizona Republican, is that he _ not Obama _ favors vouchers that give parents more school choices.
“Everybody should have the same choice Cindy and I and Sen. Obama did,” McCain told the National Urban League, an influential black organization that Obama will address on Saturday.
Bush rips Democrats for opposing offshore drilling
Aug 2, 11:26 AM (ET)
By H. JOSEF HEBERT
WASHINGTON (AP) – President Bush chastised Democrats on Saturday for refusing to allow a vote on whether to lift the federal ban on offshore oil drilling before lawmakers departed for their summer recess.
“To reduce pressure on prices, we need to increase the supply of oil, especially oil produced here at home,” Bush said in his weekly radio address. It was the fourth time this week that he has called for Congress to end the drilling restrictions off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts and in the eastern Gulf of Mexico.
Some of the drilling moratoriums have been in place since 1981 for environmental reasons and concerns that energy development might harm coastal tourist industries.
Pelosi harms planet on drilling
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi opposes lifting the moratorium on drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and on the Outer Continental Shelf. She won’t even allow it to come to a vote. With $4 gas having massively shifted public opinion in favor of domestic production, she wants to protect her Democratic members from having to cast an anti-drilling election-year vote. Moreover, given the public mood, she might even lose. This cannot be permitted. Why? Because as she explained to Politico: “I’m trying to save the planet; I’m trying to save the planet.”
A lovely sentiment. But has Pelosi actually thought through the moratorium’s actual effects on the planet?
Consider: 25 years ago, nearly 60 percent of U.S. petroleum was produced domestically. Today it’s 25 percent. From its peak in 1970, U.S. production has declined a staggering 47 percent. The world consumes 86 million barrels a day; the United States, roughly 20 million. We need the stuff to run our cars and planes and economy. Where does it come from?
Tom Coburn or Ted Stevens
By JOHN FUND
August 2, 2008; Page A11
The Republican Party is facing what Ronald Reagan called “a time for choosing.” A real argument is raging over how much it should turn its back on the bad habits that cost it control of Congress in 2006.
Just after that debacle, Alaska’s Sen. Ted Stevens, the father of the infamous “Bridge to Nowhere,” encountered Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn, the antipork crusader who had held up many of the projects so many members believe are the key to their re-election. Mr. Stevens said, “Well, Tom, I hope you’re satisfied for helping us lose the election.” Mr. Coburn replied, “No, Ted, you lost us this election.”
PG DeFreese: BBK Prophecy: The Newt Phoenix will rise from Santorum's ashes as the primary fire transforms cheerleaders into realists. #RSRH
Victoria Coates: The question then becomes what is it worth to us to secure Syria's chemical weapons? http://t.co/Uf1rEqIX #rsrh
Moe Lane: MoeLane: #rsrh Walp, that was a debate. http://t.co/bZNG4gVl
Moe Lane: MoeLane: #rsrh US Government looking to shut down Cindy Sheehan over taxes? http://t.co/kS71ADii
Victoria Coates: Dead Iranian nuclear scientist's wife brags her husband's goal was "the annihilation of Israel." Charming. http://t.co/G2qQc91N #rsrh
Daniel Horowitz: nothing new or particulalry bold with Romney's new "bold" tax plan http://t.co/uCUKk2Lj It's the baseline for any reform #rsrh
Moe Lane: MoeLane: #rsrh The only people wondering whether the Occupy movement... http://t.co/wv7wJoSR
Dan Spencer: Scorned by GOP electorate Roemer to go all Nader and continue his Quixotic presidential quest as an Independent. http://t.co/ePvruHMB #RSRH
Moe Lane: MoeLane: #rsrh Annnnnnd Wisconsin has not sunk into the earth's mantle. http://t.co/PeL4Vexr
Moe Lane: MoeLane: #rsrh Tina Korbe wins "Best Headline of the Day." http://t.co/5gCj8qXF
