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SALON Fri, 13 Jan 2012 14:00:00 GMT
In a country unspoiled by centuries of racism and racial stereotyping, Jodi Kantor's "The Obamas" would likely be seen as a sympathetic if gossipy and theatrical portrait of the First Couple, striving to do their best for their country and their family as President Obama wrestled with a broken economy, two wars and a radicalized Republican Party determined to make him fail.
We don't live in that unspoiled world, however, so the book has become a flashpoint, with right-wingers seizing on tiny unflattering tidbits and Michelle Obama herself telling tell Gayle King that it fosters "an image that people have tried to paint of me since the day that Barack announced, that I'm an angry black woman." I'm on record (on "Hardball" Wednesday) saying I wish the First Lady hadn't felt the need to defend herself; she's one of the most admired women in America, just behind Hillary Clinton and Oprah Winfrey, a multiracial feminist troika that itself shows how far we've come. Especially when it.....
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GOOGLE Fri, 13 Jan 2012 17:30:00 GMT
Oh c'mon!
A new ad from the Newt Gingrich campaign called "The French Connection," paints Mitt Romney as a tax-raising, moderate, elitist who will "say anything" to get elected.
Exhibit A? He speaks French. "Just like John Kerry."
"Bonjour, je m'appelle Mitt Romney," Romney says in the ad, a bite from a 2002 video he made to introduce volunteers to the Salt Lake City Olympics, whose official languages are English and French.
This is the second time we've seen Romney's French past used against him this week. In the over-the-top documentary, "When Mitt Romney Came To Town," the pro-Gingrich super PAC Winning Our Future repeats parts of the Salt Lake City clip several times.
But Romney isn't the only one with a French connection, Foreign Policy points out. Gingrich lived in France for a few years as a teenager and knew "enough French to survive." And in 2009, he compared himself to French president Charles de Gaulle.
Gingrich's attacks on Romney's history of "vulture.....
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GOOGLE Fri, 13 Jan 2012 19:36:40 GMT
By the time this election is said and done, Mitt Romney's experience in private equity will have been discussed a million times. And for most Americans, there will STILL be no clarity about what private equity actually is or what Romney did at Bain.
Take, for example, CNBCs recent gaffe. Their correspondent, Eamon Javers, reported that Bain Capital was one of the consulting companies that took part in the auto-bailout, and that the consulting firm recommended that the number of dealerships in the U.S. be reduced.
CNBC has since retracted that report because it was Bain Consulting that was involved in the auto bailouts, and that company has no relationship with Bain Capital.
Unfortunately, there's the internet. That means that conservative blogs like Hot Air and The National Review pounced on the story. Here's the scathing original report on it from Hot Air:
CNBC speculates that this might explain why Obama’s “car czar,” Steve Rattner, ended up slobbering all over Bain in..
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POLITICO Fri, 13 Jan 2012 13:26:02 EDT
POLITICO'S Click reports that Oprah backs the president, but feels no need to officially re-endorse him:
During an interview with CNN in South Africa, the queen of talk gave the president a non-endorsement endorsement by singing his praises without actually saying the words, “I’m endorsing Barack Obama.”
“I don’t need to endorse him because I am a 100 percent supporter of him and I’ve already endorsed him,” Oprah explained. She said that her major presence on the campaign trail in 2008 was to help educate people. “My own friends didn’t even know who he was at the time,” she explained.
Trying to squeeze an endorsement out, the interviewer asked, “You not publicly endorsing him is not a sign of disappointment?” “Oh, absolutely not,” replied Oprah, who is in South Africa to cheer on the first graduating class of the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls.
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POLITICO Fri, 13 Jan 2012 08:06:59 EDT
POLITICO's Morning Score correspondent James Hohmann reports that the Obama campaign is launching a broadside assault on Mitt Romney's record at Bain Capital, keeping the story alive just as some of Romney's GOP opponents are beginning to let up.
Obama deputy campaign manager Stephanie Cutter has written a four-page memo outlining Romney's record at the venture capital firm Bain, writing "Romney’s business record doesn’t reflect the virtues of free enterprise so much as the worst exploitation of it."
"President Obama - who, like Mitt Romney, earned a degree from Harvard and all the opportunities that affords - began his career helping jobless workers in the shadow of a closed-down steel mill. Mitt Romney, on the other hand, made millions closing down steel mills," Cutter writes. "Taking advantage of an uneven playing field, where there was one rulebook for those at the top and another for everyone else, Mitt Romney and his friends made money hand over fist while working.....
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POLITICO Fri, 13 Jan 2012 11:24:14 EDT
Donovan and I report:
Stepping firmly onto Republican turf, President Barack Obama will announce Friday that he will ask Congress for the power to merge agencies to streamline government and improve efficiency.
First up on his list: merging six different independent trade, business and commerce agencies, including most of the functions of the Commerce Department, the Small Business Administration and the Office of the U.S. Trade representative, into a new, unnamed Cabinet agency to create a more efficient experience for entrepreneurs and business managers.
“The government we have is not the government we need. The last reorganization of the whole government was done by Herbert Hoover,” Jeff Zients, deputy director for management and chief performance officer at the Office of Management and Budget, told reporters. “Since then, agencies have been layered on top.”
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POLITICO Fri, 13 Jan 2012 05:31:59 EST
Gingrich drops the Bain bomb (sort of)
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POLITICO Fri, 13 Jan 2012 07:52:43 EST
Obama campaign attacks Romney on Bain
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REALCLEARPOLITICS Thu, 12 Jan 2012 13:02:52 GMT
Obama campaign manager Jim Messina discusses fourth quarter fundraising in this video sent to supporters. He announces that the campaign raised more than $42 million for itself and more than $24 million for the DNC in the last three months of 2011. However, he urges supporters not to be complacent. "Too many Obama supporters think we dont need their money or they dont need to give now. In fact, in the past week Ive gotten emails that say, Oh, you dont need our money now or Youre going to raise a billion dollars. Why do you need my money? Look, I totally get why people would think that, but theyre completely wrong. First, the billion dollar number is completely untrue. And second, we have to build a neighborhood organization on the ground now, not in six months, and that takes your resources and your donations today."
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CNBC Thu, 12 Jan 2012
Robert Costa, National Review has the latest details on the GOP, as the candidates head for South Carolina, and discussing whether the Tea Party will support Mitt Romney, should he become the nominee, with Dick Armey, FreedomWorks co-chairman, and is this now a two-man race: Romney vs. Obama, with Joy Reid, Miami Herald columnist.
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POLITICO Wed, 11 Jan 2012 07:22:29 EDT
Mitt Romney, on the defensive over his record of layoffs and restructuring at Bain Capital, said Wednesday that President Barack Obama, too, was forced to lay off people in the auto industry.
"In the general election, I'll be pointing out that the president took the reins of General Motors and Chrysler, closed factories, closed dealerships, laid off thousands and thousands of workers. He did it to try to save the business," Romney said on CBS's "This Morning."
"We also had the occasion to do things that are tough to try to save a business," Romney said. "We started a number of businesses, invested in many others and, overall, created tens of thousands of jobs."
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POLITICO Wed, 11 Jan 2012 09:29:49 EST
Romney takes on Obama over pump prices.
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GOOGLE Tue, 10 Jan 2012 20:50:00 GMT
Ever since it was announced that Jack Lew, current head of the Office of Management and Budget, would be President Barack Obama's new Chief of Staff to replace the departing William Daley, the media sphere has been abuzz with Lew's stellar political resume—having worked for several Congressmen and under both Bill and Hillary Clinton—and the fact that he is described as a "mild-mannered and steady technocrat," enjoying bi-partisan support.
But the incoming chief has another facet to his work history—he's a former Wall Streeter, and did a stint overseeing hedge funds for Citigroup from 2006 to 2009, and as the Chief Operating Officer of Citi Alternative Investments in his last year there. One of the hedge funds Lew was in charge of at Citi made a windfall in 2008 by shorting mortgage securities, and the the former executive was awarded a $900,000 bonus the year after.
As Alain Sherter at CBS points out, Lew's Wall Street past isn't indicative of how he'll perform in his new.....
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GUARDIAN Tue, 10 Jan 2012 18:30:00 GMT
The former Massachusetts governor is expected to coast to victory on Tuesday, but the race is still likely to run on for months
An estimated 250,000 Republicans and independents are expected to vote Tuesday in New Hampshire, the first primary of the 2012 election.
Mitt Romney remains the clear favourite in the polls despite getting the most sustained battering of the campaign yet over his business record.
One of his Republican rivals, Newt Gingrich, resumed criticism today in a series of television interviews about Romney's time at Bain Capital, which invested in about 80 smaller firms, laying off thousands of workers.
Romney's campaign team has countered that Bain created tens of thousands more jobs than they destroyed, but Gingrich said Romney's record was suspicious.
The last poll of the New Hampshire campaign, by the American Research Group, has Romney on top with 37% of likely voters. Jon Huntsman has moved into second place with 18%, up from 8% in the same poll in........
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Mitt Romney courts South Carolina veterans, goes after Obama
White House Responds to Online Piracy Petitions
Obama set to lure outsourced biz back to U.S.
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Obama challenges Republicans on goal they embrace
FiveThirtyEight: Romney-Obama: No Popularity Contest
House Republicans Fear Another Session of Infighting
Obama Gives Weekly Address On "Hopeful Trend" Of "Insourcing" Jobs
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The Role of Sympathy & Trust in U.S. Politics
Obama Pushes for Authority to Streamline Govt
Why You Have to Care About Inequality
Repealing ObamaCare Should Be Top Priority
Obama Seeks to Revive '08 Enthusiasm
Why Romney Is Very Weak vs. Obama
Mitt Rolls Out the Big Guns in S.C.
U.S. President Obama Focuses on Exports in Proposed Revamping of Government
VIDEO: iCarly's Miranda Cosgrove Dishes on Working, Dancing with Guest Star Michelle Obama
A QUESTION FOR PAUL KRUGMAN, Who Keeps Saying Our Huge Debt Mountain Is Of No Concern
Watch: President Obama Believes in 'Made In America'
Obama wants to fast-track overhaul of agencies
Obama promotes 'insourcing,' government reorg
Santorum: US wrong to condemn Iran scientist death
Obama challenges Republicans on goal they embrace
Romney's newest big-name supporter comes out swinging
President Pitches Jobs Initiatives
Obama fares well against third-party challenge
Bloomberg hearts Obama's plan
Oprah: '100 percent supporter' of Obama
Koch-backed group targets Solyndra
Gingrich, Santorum fight for conservative edge
Poll: Bush, Palin top endorsements
Cheat sheet: Why Super PACs are so controversial
Romney defends Bain work, Obama team joins attack
