Posted
Friday, August 31, 2012
Party platform group backing gay marriage
DETROIT — DETROIT The national Democratic Party's platform committee endorsed gay marriage Saturday for the first time and called for the repeal of a federal law that recognizes marriage as only between a man and a woman.The committee, meeting in downtown Detroit, let stand the work of a separate group that drafted the platform two weeks ago in Minneapolis. The platform is a broad statement of the party's priorities on the economy, social issues and national defense and next goes for approval to the national convention in North Carolina in September.Scott Dibble, a committee member and a state senator from Minnesota, said support for gay marriage can attract new voters."Young people are looking for a political home right now," Dibble said. "This has become a defining moral question of our time."The platform says Democrats support "marriage equality" and the "movement to secure equal treatment under law for same-sex couples.""We also support the freedom of churches and religious entities to decide how to administer marriage as a religious sacrament without government interference," the platform says.In May, President Barack Obama said he supported gay marriage."This certainly has been a journey for many people in this country, a journey for our president," Dibble told fellow committee members from across the country.The platform also calls for repeal of a 1996 law, signed by Democratic President Bill Clinton, which recognizes marriage as only between a man and woman. Some federal courts have struck the law down as unconstitutional.Newark, N.J., Mayor Cory Booker, co-chairman of the platform committee, said there are "profound indignities" heaped on people who can't marry someone of the same sex."At the end of the day, it'll maybe repel some and attract others to be more engaged," Booker said. Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.
Most in poll say the rich don't pay enough taxes
WASHINGTON – As the income gap between rich and poor widens, a majority of Americans say the growing divide is bad for the country and believe that wealthy people are paying too little in taxes, according to a new survey.
Karen Bleier, AFP/Getty ImagesKaren Bleier, AFP/Getty ImagesThe poll released Monday by the Pew Research Center points to a particular challenge for Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, whose party's policies are viewed by a wide majority as favoring the rich over the middle class and poor.The poll found that many Americans believe rich people to be intelligent and hardworking but also greedy and less honest than the average American. Nearly six in 10, or 58%, say the rich don't pay enough in taxes, while 26% believe the rich pay their fair share and 8% say they pay too much.Even among those who describe themselves as "upper class" or "upper middle class," more than half — or 52% — said upper-income Americans don't pay enough in taxes; only 10% said they paid too much. This upper tier was more likely to say they are more financially secure now than 10 years ago — 62%, compared to 44% for those who identified themselves as middle class and 29% for the lower class. They are less likely to report problems in paying rent or mortgage, losing a job, paying for medical care or other bills and cutting back on household expenses.The findings come at the start of this week's Republican National Convention and as both Romney and President Barack Obama seek to appeal to a broad swath of financially struggling voters who identify as middle class. Romney supports an extension of Bush-era tax cuts for everyone including the wealthiest 2 percent, and says his policies will benefit the middle class by boosting the economy and creating jobs."The fact that Romney may be viewed as wealthy doesn't necessarily pose problems for his candidacy," said Kim Parker, associate director of Pew Social & Demographic Trends, noting that people see the wealthy as having both positive and negative attributes. "The challenge for Romney lies more in the fact that large majorities say if he is elected president, his policies would likely benefit the wealthy."The results reinforce a tide of recent economic data showing a widening economic divide. America's middle class has been shrinking in the stagnant economy and poverty is now approaching 1960s highs, while wealth concentrates at the top. A separate Pew survey earlier this year found that tensions between the rich and poor were increasing and at their most intense level in nearly a quarter-century.In fact, well-off people do shoulder a big share of the tax burden. Though households earning over $1 million annually comprise just 0.3% of all taxpayers, they pay 20% of all federal taxes the government is projected to collect this year, according to the Tax Policy Center, a nonpartisan group that studies tax policy. The figures included income, payroll and estate taxes. In contrast, households earning $50,000 to $75,000 a year accounted for 12% of taxpayers and contributed 9% of federal taxes, the center's data showed. Some 46% of households pay no federal income tax at all, although they do pay payroll, excise and other taxes.The American income tax system has long been designed to be progressive, meaning higher earners are expected to pay a greater share of their income than those making less.In this year's tax battle in Washington, Obama wants to let the current top rate of 35% for high earners rise to 39.6% next year. Congressional Republicans would reduce the top rate to 25%, while Romney would reduce it to 28%. Romney and GOP lawmakers have said they would eliminate some deductions to pay for the rate reductions, but have not specified which ones.According to Pew's latest findings, about 63% of Americans say the GOP favors the rich over the middle class and poor, and 71% say Romney's election would be good for wealthy people. A smaller share, 20%, says the same about the Democratic Party. More Americans — 60% — say if Obama is re-elected his policies will benefit the poor, while half say they'll help the middle class and 37% say they'll boost the wealthy."The Great Recession was not an equal opportunity disemployer," said Sheldon Danziger, a public policy professor at the University of Michigan who describes the gap between rich and poor as the widest in decades. "College graduates, whites and middle-aged workers had fewer and shorter layoffs than high school graduates, blacks, Hispanics and younger workers. And, only a small percentage of the rich work in the hardest-hit industries, like construction and manufacturing."About 65% of Americans say the gap between rich and poor has gotten wider in the past decade, while 20% believe it has stayed the same and 7% say the gap has gotten smaller. Separately, 57% say a widening income gap is a bad thing for society; just 3% say it is a good thing.Asked to estimate how much a family of four would need to earn to be considered wealthy in their area, the median amount given by survey respondents was $150,000. For middle class, the median amount was $70,000.Many Americans see rich people as more likely to be intelligent (43%) and hardworking (42%) than average Americans. But the rich are also seen as more likely to be greedy (55%). Thirty-four percent of those surveyed say the rich are less likely to be honest than the average person; just 12% say the rich are more likely to be honest.The Pew survey involved telephone interviews with 2,508 adults conducted from July 16 to 26. It has a margin of error of 2.8 percentage points.The AP's Jennifer Agiesta and Alan Fram contributed to this report.Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.
Karen Bleier, AFP/Getty ImagesKaren Bleier, AFP/Getty ImagesThe poll released Monday by the Pew Research Center points to a particular challenge for Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, whose party's policies are viewed by a wide majority as favoring the rich over the middle class and poor.The poll found that many Americans believe rich people to be intelligent and hardworking but also greedy and less honest than the average American. Nearly six in 10, or 58%, say the rich don't pay enough in taxes, while 26% believe the rich pay their fair share and 8% say they pay too much.Even among those who describe themselves as "upper class" or "upper middle class," more than half — or 52% — said upper-income Americans don't pay enough in taxes; only 10% said they paid too much. This upper tier was more likely to say they are more financially secure now than 10 years ago — 62%, compared to 44% for those who identified themselves as middle class and 29% for the lower class. They are less likely to report problems in paying rent or mortgage, losing a job, paying for medical care or other bills and cutting back on household expenses.The findings come at the start of this week's Republican National Convention and as both Romney and President Barack Obama seek to appeal to a broad swath of financially struggling voters who identify as middle class. Romney supports an extension of Bush-era tax cuts for everyone including the wealthiest 2 percent, and says his policies will benefit the middle class by boosting the economy and creating jobs."The fact that Romney may be viewed as wealthy doesn't necessarily pose problems for his candidacy," said Kim Parker, associate director of Pew Social & Demographic Trends, noting that people see the wealthy as having both positive and negative attributes. "The challenge for Romney lies more in the fact that large majorities say if he is elected president, his policies would likely benefit the wealthy."The results reinforce a tide of recent economic data showing a widening economic divide. America's middle class has been shrinking in the stagnant economy and poverty is now approaching 1960s highs, while wealth concentrates at the top. A separate Pew survey earlier this year found that tensions between the rich and poor were increasing and at their most intense level in nearly a quarter-century.In fact, well-off people do shoulder a big share of the tax burden. Though households earning over $1 million annually comprise just 0.3% of all taxpayers, they pay 20% of all federal taxes the government is projected to collect this year, according to the Tax Policy Center, a nonpartisan group that studies tax policy. The figures included income, payroll and estate taxes. In contrast, households earning $50,000 to $75,000 a year accounted for 12% of taxpayers and contributed 9% of federal taxes, the center's data showed. Some 46% of households pay no federal income tax at all, although they do pay payroll, excise and other taxes.The American income tax system has long been designed to be progressive, meaning higher earners are expected to pay a greater share of their income than those making less.In this year's tax battle in Washington, Obama wants to let the current top rate of 35% for high earners rise to 39.6% next year. Congressional Republicans would reduce the top rate to 25%, while Romney would reduce it to 28%. Romney and GOP lawmakers have said they would eliminate some deductions to pay for the rate reductions, but have not specified which ones.According to Pew's latest findings, about 63% of Americans say the GOP favors the rich over the middle class and poor, and 71% say Romney's election would be good for wealthy people. A smaller share, 20%, says the same about the Democratic Party. More Americans — 60% — say if Obama is re-elected his policies will benefit the poor, while half say they'll help the middle class and 37% say they'll boost the wealthy."The Great Recession was not an equal opportunity disemployer," said Sheldon Danziger, a public policy professor at the University of Michigan who describes the gap between rich and poor as the widest in decades. "College graduates, whites and middle-aged workers had fewer and shorter layoffs than high school graduates, blacks, Hispanics and younger workers. And, only a small percentage of the rich work in the hardest-hit industries, like construction and manufacturing."About 65% of Americans say the gap between rich and poor has gotten wider in the past decade, while 20% believe it has stayed the same and 7% say the gap has gotten smaller. Separately, 57% say a widening income gap is a bad thing for society; just 3% say it is a good thing.Asked to estimate how much a family of four would need to earn to be considered wealthy in their area, the median amount given by survey respondents was $150,000. For middle class, the median amount was $70,000.Many Americans see rich people as more likely to be intelligent (43%) and hardworking (42%) than average Americans. But the rich are also seen as more likely to be greedy (55%). Thirty-four percent of those surveyed say the rich are less likely to be honest than the average person; just 12% say the rich are more likely to be honest.The Pew survey involved telephone interviews with 2,508 adults conducted from July 16 to 26. It has a margin of error of 2.8 percentage points.The AP's Jennifer Agiesta and Alan Fram contributed to this report.Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.
Thursday, August 30, 2012
Opinionline: Paul Ryan for VP an 'inspired choice'
John Tamny, on Forbes: "After weeks and months of rumors and speculation about whom Mitt Romney would pick as his Election 2012 vice presidential running mate, the suspense ended this morning with the announcement that Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan would fill the role. Media accounts will suggest that the Ryan pick had a bold, go-for-broke quality to it, but in truth Ryan was the safest selection of all. He was the safest because in an election all about the U.S. economy, Ryan is the most suited among the names floated to make a strong case for removing the barriers to economic growth erected by Republican (George W. Bush) and Democratic (Barack Obama) administrations over the last 12 years. Romney himself, though a smashing success as a businessman, has struggled to make a coherent economic argument; his 59 point economic plan all the evidence one needs that the GOP presidential nominee needs help tightening up what should be a very simple economic message. Paul Ryan could make the above arguments in his sleep, and for being able to, he was the only — and once again the safest — choice for Romney."
By Justin Sullivan, Getty Images
By Justin Sullivan, Getty ImagesNew running partners Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney on Saturday in Ashland, Va.
By Justin Sullivan, Getty ImagesNew running partners Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney on Saturday in Ashland, Va.
Fred Barnes, on The Weekly Standard: "Romney, the cautious candidate, wary of being specific, and counting on the bad economy to defeat President Obama— forget all that! The Romney who picked Ryan as his vice presidential running mate is an entirely different person. He's prepared to take the fight to Obama on the biggest bundle of issues — spending, debt, the deficit, taxes, entitlements, and the reversing of America's accelerating decline under Obama. Specifics? There will be plenty. … Romney understands that. Otherwise he wouldn't have chosen Ryan, whose budget is the plan Romney lacks. Sure, Democrats will attack it furiously, especially its reform of Medicare. But where's their plan? Obama doesn't have one; instead, he pretends the country isn't facing a fiscal and economic crisis."Erick Erickson, on RedState: "Picking Ryan must be the beginning of a campaign shakeup, not the end. Consider that in all the polling in August, from Gallup to CNN to Fox News, Obama is ahead. … Part of it is Romney not having a lot of money to spend until officially accepting the Republican nomination. But a good part of it is Romney's team. Several of them have been touting themselves and how awesome they are instead of the candidate. … The Romney camp sent out a talking-points sheet claiming that while picking Ryan, Romney had his own budget plans. This is delusional and not credible spin. You pick Ryan, you defend his budget. It is that simple. That one bullet point sums up a summer of dysfunction. The Romney team seems to be believing its own spin, which can often lead to disaster. Team Romney-Ryan has the chance for a real reboot. But it is one they need to take it. While I am not yet worried, I am concerned by the consistent propensity of Team Romney to not capitalize on Obama's missteps and to trip over their own feet when they get ahead. Ryan is not enough. Romney does need to prune and fertilizer his campaign team."Guy Benson, on Town Hall: "(In his speech introducing Ryan,) Romney emphasized that Obama has slashed more than half a trillion from the program (to fund a new and unpopular entitlement program), and that the Republican plan is geared toward saving and preserving Medicare and Social Security. Expect to hear this theme a lot. Ryan echoed it during his speech, telling the audience that the Romney/Ryan ticket will have the courage to tell voters the truth. This will be the heart of the 2012 campaign, in my opinion. Romney and Ryan will assess America's fiscal picture with clear-eyed realism, then make their very best pitch to the American public about why the status quo is utterly unsustainable. Unsustainable on growth, unsustainable on jobs, unsustainable on debt. They will present their solutions to the public, explain their reasoning and trust the people to make the right choice."Columns
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Nick Gillespie, on Reason: "Commentators will line up quickly to praise or damn the Ryan selection, but it strikes me operationally as a smart choice, especially if Ryan plays the traditional attack-dog role that vice presidential candidates are supposed to. He is in a good, knowledgeable position to rebut claims that capitalism is always at fault. Then again, from a small-government libertarian perspective, he voted for Medicare Part D, No Child Left Behind, TARP, auto bailouts, and all the wars waged by George W. Bush. So even as he makes the 2012 election race more interesting and hotly contested, he underscores the fact that today's GOP is offering an echo of the Democratic Party, not a real alternative."National Review, in an editorial: "Romney has made an inspired choice. Ryan will make an excellent running mate and, if elected, vice president. What is most gratifying about the decision is, however, what it says about Romney himself. Romney could have decided to run a vague and vacuous campaign based on the idea that the public would default to the out party in a bad economy. By selecting Ryan, he has ensured that the campaign will instead to a significant degree be about a conservative governing agenda. … The first question any vice presidential pick must answer is whether he is ready to become president should disaster strike. Fiscal disaster is striking. A mark of statesmanship is to face mathematical reality and make hard choices in its light. Romney has chosen a running mate who is more presidential than the incumbent."For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.
Friday, August 17, 2012
Official: Ohio lawmaker Luckie drops out of race amid inquiry
CINCINNATI — CINCINNATI An Ohio lawmaker withdrew from running for re-election Friday, a day after a prosecutor said he was the subject of an investigation.State Rep. Clayton Luckie, a Dayton Democrat who had been running for a fourth term in office, submitted a letter dropping out of the race to the Montgomery County Board of Elections without giving a reason, said Mark Owens, chairman of the county's Democratic Party.Luckie, who remains a state representative, issued a statement Thursday saying the investigation is related to "errors on some reports that are currently being addressed." "I think it was an emotional thing," Owens said of Luckie's decision. "I think it was a very difficult decision for him to make and a brave one. ? To take this investigation out of the race gives us the best chance of holding that seat and having his constituents be served by someone that would best represent them in Columbus."Owens said that a meeting would be held in Dayton on Sunday to pick a replacement to run for Luckie's seat, adding that two people have expressed interest: former state lawmakers Fred Strahorn and Rhine McLin.Whoever is chosen will run against Iraq War veteran and Republican Jeff Wellbaum, of Kettering.On Thursday, Franklin County prosecutor Ron O'Brien said in a statement that Luckie was under investigation. He didn't specify any allegations.Before becoming a state representative, Luckie was on the Dayton Public School Board from 1996 to 2006.He currently serves on the powerful state controlling board, which oversees capital and operating expenditures by Ohio agencies. Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.
Posted
Letters: Harm in denying Chick-fil-A free speech
As a tolerant, open-minded liberal, I am surprised and disappointed by the anti-liberty stance taken against Chick-fil-A by fellow Democrats such as Chicago alderman Joe Moreno, who has threatened to block a new Chick-fil-A from his community, and Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel ("Editorial: Chick-fil-A food fight leaves pols eating crow"). 
By Ben Earp, AP
By Ben Earp, APShowing appreciation: Customers at a Chick-fil-A in Shelby, N.C., on Aug. 1.
By Ben Earp, APShowing appreciation: Customers at a Chick-fil-A in Shelby, N.C., on Aug. 1.
While it is clear President Dan Cathy and his company are against gay marriage, we must keep in mind that they have a First Amendment right to hold this position. As foolish as they may be, it is not against the law. Therefore, Chicago or any other city cannot use this to withhold business permits.Additionally, by railing against a group's religious beliefs, Moreno, Emanuel and others are doing a great disservice to the Democratic Party in general and to President Obama at the very time they should be doing just the opposite.The best way to fight bigotry in any form is to point it out to all, thereby ostracizing the intolerant person or group. The last thing we should do is fight bigotry with more bigotry as some Democrats have elected to do.Jeff Clauser; ChicagoTolerance goes both waysIn cases like the Chick-fil-A debate, the offended party often acts as if it's the only one with First Amendment rights. Where are mine? Should everyone agree with me when I don't like something? Equality Illinois, a group that protects and defends the rights of gays and lesbians, has the right to voice its opinion. But that opinion cannot be used in an attempt to suppress everyone else's rights, such as President Dan Cathy's right to oppose same-sex marriage ("Challenge Chick-fil-A's practices, Another view). Our great country is being destroyed from within by all the special interest groups.Ollie B. Emerine; Elizabethtown, Ky.Letters to the editor
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Look at other company policiesMicrosoft founder Bill Gates and CEO Steve Ballmer both donated money to a same-sex marriage advocacy organization this year. It would seem only natural that the folks who strutted to Chick-fil-A and stuffed their faces with chicken and waffle fries in support of President Dan Cathy's views on Aug. 1 would go a step further by unplugging their computers and never using them again.But I don't really see that happening any more than I can foresee any Chick-fil-A followers ditching their sneakers from Nike, which, by the way, expressed support for Washington state's same-sex marriage bill. Proving such devotion to a cause is sometimes superseded by one's inclination to simply chicken out.Vin Morabito; Scranton, Pa.Marketplace will be best indicatorMany agree with Chick-fil-A's stand on same-sex marriage, while others disagree. Some supporters choose to voice their opinion by dining at the chain, while others are choosing to boycott Chick-fil-A.That's what the marketplace is all about: being free to voice your opinion and make choices. Likewise, the marketplace is the proper venue for debating this issue. As for Boston Mayor Thomas Menino, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and other politicians who think they have the right to tell a business what to think, they should stay out of the issue and let the marketplace be the place where the issue is decided.Stephen V. Gilmore; Charlotte, N.C.For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.
Schapira stands out in Dem field
(PNI) Democratic Party faithful see triumph and tragedy in the primary race for Arizona's new Congressional District 9.Three of the party's young, bright stars are competing fiercely and, at times, brutally. Each is intelligent, articulate and accomplished. Each has compelling personal stories of perseverance and determination, of American dreams made real.Andrei Cherny, Kyrsten Sinema and David Schapira are winners by many measures. It's such a shame for the party that two leading lights must lose.Voters in the Democratic primary, however, can't lose.We recommend Schapira, a candidate with the leadership skills and political mooring that Democratic and independent voters may want and a natural affinity for the district, which includes central Phoenix, Tempe and Ahwatukee as well as parts of Mesa, Chandler and Scottsdale.Schapira, a small-business owner and faculty associate at Arizona State University, has lived his entire life in District 9. He serves a large portion of it passionately and effectively as a school-board member and minority leader in the state Senate.Schapira, a father of two young children, is genuine, transparent and accessible. What you see is what you get, and it's difficult to not like what you see. His near-centrist politics would translate to pragmatic solutions to issues, particularly in education.It's sometimes hard to see and appreciate that with the firepower Cherny and Sinema bring to the race.If it's a candidate who has an Ivy League education, who has floated near the stratosphere of the Democratic Party apparatus at national and state levels, has some familiarity with Washington from his time as a White House aide and has the blessings of the likes of Bill Clinton and Terry Goddard, the choice is Cherny, a former assistant attorney general, state party chairman and candidate for state treasurer.If it's a candidate with strong liberal values, masterful interpersonal skills, education, and knowledge about Arizona and urban Phoenix, the choice is Sinema, a lawyer with a doctoral degree in justice studies, a long-time grass-roots organizer and community activist, and a state senator before resigning to run for Congress.But we believe voters would be better served with the third choice. We recommend the candidate who trails his opponents in campaign money, post-graduate degrees and book authorship, but who shines in honesty, integrity and commitment to the district: David Schapira.Copyright 2012 The Arizona Republic|azcentral.com. All rights reserved.For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.
Posted
False-report charges requested
The Maricopa County Sheriff's Office has requested that false-reporting charges be filed against an 18-year-old whose claims of abuse at the hands of sheriff's detention officers prompted a candidate for the Sheriff's Office to help bail him out of jail last month.Kolton Brian Clark was arrested July16 on suspicion of aggravated assault and disorderly conduct after getting into two fights at an apartment complex in Phoenix. A Phoenix police report from the arrest notes the head injuries Clark suffered in the fights that landed him in the Fourth Avenue Jail.Within days of his incarceration, Clark began telling family members that detention officers in the jail sprayed him with Mace, shot him with a Taser and beat him in one of the facility's "safe cells," which are barren, single-occupancy cells where the agency holds inmates who are considered a danger to themselves or others.Clark's family admits he was drinking on the night of his arrest. A police report from the incident notes that he blacked out during his time with police and repeatedly asked officers why he was in jail.Earlier this week, Clark said the assault happened shortly after he was placed in the safe cell. According to Clark, detention officers opened a slot in the cell door and sprayed the Mace, and then a group of detention officers rushed into the cell, shocked him with a stun gun and beat him.The Sheriff's Office denies Clark's claim.Video footage from multiple cameras tracks Clark through the entire facility and does not show an assault by deputies or other inmates. The footage shows police officers leading Clark to a sink in a detention cell and taking Clark into the safe cell, where he is stripped and left with a blanket. From about 1:15a.m. to about 10:15a.m. on July17, the tape shows, Clark banged on the cell door, slept and used the bathroom. After 10:15a.m., he was removed from the cell and dressed in standard jail attire.The booking photo of Clark taken shortly thereafter showed the injuries that Clark claims he suffered at the hands of sheriff's deputies.Though the alleged assault occurred nearly three weeks ago, Clark's father, Brian, had not seen the jail footage as of Thursday evening. But Brian Clark insists he is committed to finding the truth and claims that the footage, which is time-stamped, shot from multiple cameras and on a continuous loop, was altered or edited by the Sheriff's Office to cover up the assault."They can submit charges all they want. Kolton was tased by them; they will have to answer how he got tased in custody and why their own staff told Maricopa Medical Center that the 'shower monster' got him in custody," Brian Clark wrote in a text message on Friday. "They are covering up the fact they beat and tased him. If charges are issued we will deal with them. He is not false reporting. It happened."Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery said his office will review the allegations and make a decision within 30 days about charging him. Brian Clark, convinced that his son's life was in jeopardy in the county jail system, reached out to Maricopa County sheriff's candidate John Rowan, who helped the family post Kolton's bail. Rowan has since cited the case, and what he describes as his efforts to save someone from Sheriff Joe Arpaio's detention officers, in at least two speeches, both delivered at a meeting of the state Democratic Party last month in Payson.Rowan did not respond to requests for comment Friday.Copyright 2012 The Arizona Republic|azcentral.com. All rights reserved.For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.
Posted
Thursday, August 16, 2012
SEC filings limited in proof of Romney CEO role
WASHINGTON (AP) – When Bally Total Fitness filed a proxy statement with the federal government in April 2000 identifying its major investors, the list included Mitt Romney as "sole shareholder, sole director, president and chief executive officer" of Brookside Capital Investors Inc., a Bain Capital investment fund that effectively controlled 5% stock ownership in the national health club chain.
By Jose Luis Villegas, The Sacramento Bee via AP
By Jose Luis Villegas, The Sacramento Bee via APMitt Romney speaks to the VFW convention in Reno on Tuesday.
By Jose Luis Villegas, The Sacramento Bee via APMitt Romney speaks to the VFW convention in Reno on Tuesday.
Romney was the undisputed owner of Brookside, a Bain management partnership. It had been used for years to oversee some of the private equity company's expanding investments and takeover deals, including a $1 billion acquisition of Domino's Pizza the same year. But other Bain partners also held voting power in the interlocking investment funds the company used, along with Brookside, to exercise its stock ownership.That complicated business relationship is at the core of the presidential campaign dispute over whether dozens of reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission show Romney's continuing role as CEO in the three years after he left Bain Capital in February 1999 to head Salt Lake City's Winter Olympics. Romney was named at least 39 times in SEC filings as sole shareholder and chief executive of Bain funds used in corporate takeovers and other investment deals, according to an Associated Press review.Former SEC officials and other legal authorities familiar with securities law say such filings were legal formalities that reflected Romney's ownership stakes, not his actual management of the shares. Romney could have kept his management role during that period, they said, but the SEC documents are useful in establishing his "beneficial ownership" — the voting power over stock holdings that he shared with his Bain partners.The SEC's beneficial ownership statements have been required corporate filings since 1968, when a congressional act enforced their use to ward off the threat of surprise takeovers of public companies. The 1968 Williams Act ordered that any individual or company buying up more than 5% of a public company's stock needed to file a 13-D beneficial ownership statement within 10 days of the transaction.The filings are used by the SEC, companies and investors as an early warning system to show the sudden accumulation of large stock stakes, said Brian J. Lane, a partner at the Washington law firm of Gibson Dunn and former director of the SEC's Corporate Finance Division, which oversees corporate filings.After media reports cited Romney's SEC filings last month in raising questions about his role at Bain Capital after leaving for the Olympics in 1999, Democratic Party officials questioned whether those documents were accurate. Stephanie Cutter, President Obama's deputy campaign manager, said Romney was "either misrepresenting his own position at Bain to the SEC, which is a felony, or he was misrepresenting his position at Bain to the American people."The Romney campaign objected to her comments. Cutter later said she was not accusing Romney of committing a crime, but she and other Democratic Party critics have continued to question his SEC filings.Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.
Democrats' convention fundraising hindered by rules, unions
WASHINGTON – With just weeks to spare, the leaders of the Democratic convention are chasing last-minute contributions to fund the political gala aimed at boosting President Obama's re-election bid. Their efforts are hampered, in part, by Obama's decision to limit direct corporate contributions and a refusal by some unions to donate to this summer's event in Charlotte.
By Chuck Burton, AP
Even so, there are ways around the ban on corporate giving. Democrats are accepting in-kind contributions, such as computer and telephone equipment, from for-profit companies for official convention activities.In addition, the host committee is using a parallel fundraising account, New American City Inc., to accept unlimited corporate funds. Organizers say those funds will pay for expenses outside of the official convention events, such as welcoming parties for journalists and convention delegates.Party officials say they have no say over how the host committee raises money through the New American City account. "The Democratic convention has gone further than any convention in history to reform the way conventions are funded," said Joanne Peters, a spokeswoman for the Democratic National Convention Committee. But the host committee "may raise money however it sees fit to promote Charlotte."Conventions — splashy, made-for-TV affairs that kick off the fall presidential campaign — are expensive events, paid for with a combination of public and private funds.Congress has set aside $100 million to provide security for both events. An additional $18 million in public money goes to each convention from the Federal Election Commission to help underwrite salaries, construction, entertainment and other officials convention activities. It's up to the host committees to collect the rest.While an individual is barred from writing a check larger than $5,000 directly to a candidate for the primary and general election, federal law imposes no restrictions on what companies, individuals unions and foundations can give to host committees — which are treated as organizations promoting local communities rather than extensions of the candidates' campaigns.Utility giant Duke Energy has emerged as one of the biggest players in the Charlotte convention. It has provided a $10 million line of credit to organizers and has given free office space to the host committee and the Democratic National Convention Committee. Rogers also has donated $100,000 personally.The utility, which spent more than $6.3 million to lobby Congress and federal agencies last year, doesn't "expect any special treatment" in return for its largesse, said Williams, the Duke spokesman. "We're not in this for that.""This is a way to showcase Charlotte in a way we never have before," he said. "When Charlotte is successful, Duke is successful."Other companies helping underwrite convention include the Charlotte-based Bank of America; Time Warner Cable, a top sponsor of the media party in Charlotte; and Hewlett-Packard, which will provide computers and printers at both conventions, company spokesman Michael Thacker confirmed.While a funding shortfall could force Democrats to divert campaign funds to the convention, it's unlikely to have a big impact on public perception or dampen delegates' enthusiasm, said Peter Ubertaccio, a political scientist at Stonehill College in Easton, Mass."When most people tune in," he said, "they will be completely unaware if the Democrats have not raised as much as they had hoped."For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.
By Chuck Burton, APSteve Law works on a luxury box at Time Warner Cable Arena — where the majority of the Democratic National Convention will be held — in Charlotte on July 16.
By Chuck Burton, APSteve Law works on a luxury box at Time Warner Cable Arena — where the majority of the Democratic National Convention will be held — in Charlotte on July 16.
Organizers of the Republican National Convention, meanwhile, say they also are collecting money but are well on their way toward hitting their goal of raising roughly $55 million as companies, such as Hewlett-Packard and Coca-Cola help underwrite the Aug. 27-30 Republican National Convention in Tampa where Mitt Romney will accept his party's nomination.In a sharp departure from previous conventions, Democrats have banned checks from corporations or political action committees for the convention and have imposed a $100,000 cap on donations from individuals.Those restrictions have made it harder to collect contributions, said Ken Eudy, who runs a Raleigh marketing company and serves on Charlotte's host committee. Democrats have set a $36.6 million fundraising goal for the Sept. 3-6 convention.In a year when presidential candidates, super PACs and an array of other politicians down the ballot are scrambling for campaign cash, a convention "is at the bottom of the political food chain," said Eudy, who hosted a convention fundraiser last week attended by North Carolina Gov. Bev Perdue and other top Democrats in the state. "It's very difficult to raise this money."Making fundraising harder: Some labor unions have announced they will not help underwrite the Democrats' gathering in North Carolina, choosing instead to direct their money to get-out-the-vote efforts. Four years ago, unions accounted for five of the top 10 organizational donors to the Democrats' convention in Denver, according to a tally by the non-profit Campaign Finance Institute."We feel that a better use of our members' money would be spent on grassroots mobilization efforts this election cycle," Jim Spellane, a spokesman for International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, said in an e-mail. In 2008, the union donated more than $1 million to help stage the Denver convention.Last month, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka announced the union would not make any "major monetary" contributions to the convention. Instead, the group plans an Aug. 11 rally in Philadelphia to promote labor issues.Officials with both Tampa and Charlotte host committees refuse to say how much they have raised or provide a comprehensive list of donors. They are not required to provide a public accounting to federal regulators until Oct. 15 — more than six weeks after the conventions have ended."We've achieved every milestone we have set," Kenneth Jones, an executive at a Tampa private-equity firm who runs the Republican host committee, told USA TODAY this week. The Republicans have not imposed restrictions on corporate giving."We're on track," said Tom Williams, a spokesman for Duke Energy, whose CEO Jim Rogers serves as co-chairman of the Charlotte host committee. Officials with the Democratic Party tout the decision to limit corporate contributions as evidence of Obama's commitment to limit the influence of special interests. And Dan Murrey, the host committee's executive director, said the emphasis on smaller donations has boosted grass-roots giving. The convention already has received contributions "from nearly 65 times more individuals" than four years ago, he said.Even so, there are ways around the ban on corporate giving. Democrats are accepting in-kind contributions, such as computer and telephone equipment, from for-profit companies for official convention activities.In addition, the host committee is using a parallel fundraising account, New American City Inc., to accept unlimited corporate funds. Organizers say those funds will pay for expenses outside of the official convention events, such as welcoming parties for journalists and convention delegates.Party officials say they have no say over how the host committee raises money through the New American City account. "The Democratic convention has gone further than any convention in history to reform the way conventions are funded," said Joanne Peters, a spokeswoman for the Democratic National Convention Committee. But the host committee "may raise money however it sees fit to promote Charlotte."Conventions — splashy, made-for-TV affairs that kick off the fall presidential campaign — are expensive events, paid for with a combination of public and private funds.Congress has set aside $100 million to provide security for both events. An additional $18 million in public money goes to each convention from the Federal Election Commission to help underwrite salaries, construction, entertainment and other officials convention activities. It's up to the host committees to collect the rest.While an individual is barred from writing a check larger than $5,000 directly to a candidate for the primary and general election, federal law imposes no restrictions on what companies, individuals unions and foundations can give to host committees — which are treated as organizations promoting local communities rather than extensions of the candidates' campaigns.Utility giant Duke Energy has emerged as one of the biggest players in the Charlotte convention. It has provided a $10 million line of credit to organizers and has given free office space to the host committee and the Democratic National Convention Committee. Rogers also has donated $100,000 personally.The utility, which spent more than $6.3 million to lobby Congress and federal agencies last year, doesn't "expect any special treatment" in return for its largesse, said Williams, the Duke spokesman. "We're not in this for that.""This is a way to showcase Charlotte in a way we never have before," he said. "When Charlotte is successful, Duke is successful."Other companies helping underwrite convention include the Charlotte-based Bank of America; Time Warner Cable, a top sponsor of the media party in Charlotte; and Hewlett-Packard, which will provide computers and printers at both conventions, company spokesman Michael Thacker confirmed.While a funding shortfall could force Democrats to divert campaign funds to the convention, it's unlikely to have a big impact on public perception or dampen delegates' enthusiasm, said Peter Ubertaccio, a political scientist at Stonehill College in Easton, Mass."When most people tune in," he said, "they will be completely unaware if the Democrats have not raised as much as they had hoped."For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.
Wednesday, August 15, 2012
Sheriff hopeful bails out inmate <nbsp/>
The tip came in like so many others, with a distraught family member claiming a relative had been beaten by detention officers in Maricopa County's Fourth Avenue Jail.That information was enough to persuade John Rowan, a Democratic candidate for sheriff, to bail 18-year-old Kolton Brian Clark out of jail last week.But the Sheriff's Office denies Clark's claim. And video that captures Clark's entire time in custody raises questions about whether the assault took place. A Phoenix police report shows that the injuries Clark attributes to sheriff's detention officers may have been suffered in the fight that landed him in jail.The same report indicates that Clark blacked out during his time with police and repeatedly asked officers why he was in jail.Clark now faces assault and disorderly conduct charges. He has pleaded not guilty, and a pretrial conference is scheduled for Aug.10, according to court records.For Rowan, a grass-roots candidate with no support from the Democratic Party and scant financial backing, the notion of bailing a Hispanic inmate out of Sheriff Joe Arpaio's jail after the inmate alleged abuse by detention officers was a narrative that was too good to pass up. Rowan was alerted to the allegations after Clark's father contacted him. Rowan faces former Phoenix police Sgt. Paul Penzone in the Aug.28 Democratic primary. The winner will go on to face Arpaio and independent Mike Stauffer in the November general election.The Sheriff's Office denies that any detention officer hit or stomped on Clark, as he alleges, and the County Attorney's Office this week informed the Sheriff's Office that prosecutors would review false reporting charges against Clark if they were submitted."We haven't made that decision yet," said Capt. Brian Lee, a spokesman for the Sheriff's Office. "All the videotape for his whole time in custody was reviewed. They didn't see anything indicating he was assaulted or there was any incident involving our detention officers or another inmate."Rowan's communications director, Terri Woodmansee, said the decision to bail Clark out of jail was not a political ploy but an act of benevolence. However, Rowan twice related the story in speeches last weekend at a state Democratic Party meeting in Payson."We didn't go out to the press with this at all. He did this because a distraught parent contacted him," Woodmansee said. "Given the fact that they're Hispanic, did he make a predisposed decision based on other cases? But again, what side do you err on? It's about the side of taking a human being, given the pattern."Two sheriff's detention officers pleaded guilty last year to aggravated assault and were sentenced to probation for their roles in a 2010 assault where an inmate was punched, kicked and stepped on. Earlier this year, the family of a Phoenix man filed a $20million notice of claim against Phoenix police and the Sheriff's Office, claiming that excessive force and a series of failures by medical professionals contributed to the death of Ernest "Marty" Atencio after a struggle with police and sheriff's officers. Audiotapes of Clark's telephone calls out of the jail indicate he and his family were also aware of prior instances of inmate assault and abuse in Maricopa County jails. The Arizona Republic requested audio and video related to the incident last week after a family member contacted the newspaper to disclose what they believed was an assault on Clark inside the jail.In one audiotape, a woman who identifies herself as Clark's mother tells him of the Rowan campaign's involvement in his case, saying: "They're trying to prove a point. ? You're not the only victim."Clark ended up in jail after Phoenix police responded twice to an apartment complex in the 2000 block of West Indian School Road. According to police reports, Clark was involved in two fights at the complex. The first fight took place between Clark and a man he had been drinking with, according to police. That fight left Clark badly beaten, but the other man did not want to press charges and police left.Phoenix firefighters were unable to treat Clark for his injuries because of his aggressive behavior, according to police, and he was taken to another apartment in the complex where he passed out.A short time later, a friend of Clark's woke him up, prompting another confrontation between Clark, two men and a security guard at the complex. The guard sprayed Clark with mace and police arrested Clark after the other two men requested prosecution and the apartment complex asked that he be cited for disorderly conduct, according to police.Phoenix police also have no record of any officer using force against Clark. Clark's allegations are squarely against the sheriff's detention officers.A police report describes injuries on Clark's head when he was taken to jail."He remained agitated and the officers attempted to calm him and Kolton was telling them he had no idea what had taken place and was asking the officers to explain why he was in jail," according to the report.Video from the Sheriff's Office shows Clark initially being put in an isolation cell where a Phoenix officer directs him to a sink so he can wash his eyes. Clark later refuses contact with medical staff and is put into one of the sheriff's rubberized safe cells with a blanket.Clark's conversations from jail would put the detention officers' assault around that time, but jail video shows no officers making contact with Clark. He remains alone in the safe cell from about 1:15a.m. to about 10:15a.m., when he is let out of the cell and dresses in the sheriff's standard-issue jail attire.During the phone calls Clark made early in his jail stay, audiotapes show, he indicates that the assailant injured his eye and was wearing rings. He also indicates that sheriff's detention officers sprayed him with mace and shot him with a stun gun. Detention officers are required to fill out a use-of-force report when a stun gun is deployed, and there are no use-of-force reports related to Clark, according to the Sheriff's Office.But after a woman named Maria visited Clark, the story began to change. The tapes indicate that Maria told Clark's mother that Clark was assaulted by detention officers. Clark's mother then begins instructing him on how to hold his head when he leaves jail to accentuate his injuries. Clark wonders in the call what Rowan will want in return for securing his release. "He did all this (expletive) for me?" Clark asks. "He must really want to win against Arpaio then."The phone calls also indicate that Clark and his mother were anticipating a large payout for the alleged assault.Clark has yet to file a grievance with the Sheriff's Office or a notice of claim against the county.His stepmother, Kimberly, said Friday that her husband was frustrated when he was trying to find out more information about his son from the Sheriff's Office. Clark did not return several messages left this week about the incident.Rowan did not respond to requests for comment Friday.Copyright 2012 The Arizona Republic|azcentral.com. All rights reserved.For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.
Posted
Tuesday, August 14, 2012
Sunday Breakfast Menu, Aug. 5
August 07
Political news from today's Times and around the Web, plus a look at the latest happenings in Washington.August 06
President Obama finished an evening of fund-raising with an event at the Connecticut home of the movie mogul Harvey Weinstein.August 06
The president coins a phrase that he hopes will keep voters thinking of Mitt Romney's tax plan.August 06
Mitt Romney will embark on a four-day bus tour on Saturday that will take him to Virginia, North Carolina, Florida and Ohio, his campaign announced Monday.August 06
In the latest installment of The Agenda series, David Leonhardt writes that the income stagnation of the last decade stems, in simplest terms, from the economy's overall sluggishness and the concentration of its modest gains among a small share of the population.
Political news from today's Times and around the Web, plus a look at the latest happenings in Washington.August 06
President Obama finished an evening of fund-raising with an event at the Connecticut home of the movie mogul Harvey Weinstein.August 06
The president coins a phrase that he hopes will keep voters thinking of Mitt Romney's tax plan.August 06
Mitt Romney will embark on a four-day bus tour on Saturday that will take him to Virginia, North Carolina, Florida and Ohio, his campaign announced Monday.August 06
In the latest installment of The Agenda series, David Leonhardt writes that the income stagnation of the last decade stems, in simplest terms, from the economy's overall sluggishness and the concentration of its modest gains among a small share of the population.
Bill Clinton to Have Marquee Role at Democratic Convention
The prominent role of Mr. Clinton, which is scheduled to be announced on Monday, signals an effort by the Obama campaign to pull out all the stops to rally Democrats when they gather for their party’s national convention in Charlotte, N.C. An even more important audience will be the voters across the country who will see the address carried by television networks. “There isn’t anybody on the planet who has a greater perspective on not just the last four years, but the last two decades, than Bill Clinton,” David Axelrod, a top strategist to the Obama campaign, said in an interview on Sunday. “He can really articulate the choice that is before people.” Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. will appear on the final night of the convention, making the case for Mr. Obama before the largest audience of the week during an outdoor speech at the Bank of America Stadium. The vice president and Mr. Obama will appear together on stage before they accept the party’s nomination for a second term in the White House. It is unusual in recent election cycles, although not without precedent, for the vice president not to get the stage to himself during a night at the convention. But in his speech, aides said, Mr. Biden is expected to remind Americans about the last four years and the administration’s accomplishments in a difficult economic climate. The invitation for Mr. Clinton to be center stage at the convention signifies another milestone in the complicated and evolving relationship between the two presidents. At the party’s convention in Denver four years ago, all eyes were on Mr. Clinton as he offered a full-throated endorsement of Mr. Obama in a speech that served as something of a truce after a contentious primary fight with his wife. For Mr. Clinton, who has become one of the most popular figures in the Democratic Party, the speech will be among the most high-profile roles yet that he has assumed for Mr. Obama. The address is intended to offer a strong contrast with the Republican ticket and will be closely watched, particularly given a string of blunt statements — and retractions — that Mr. Clinton has made this year when talking about the Obama administration. For example, Mr. Clinton called for temporarily extending all of the tax cuts set to expire at the end of the year, including the Bush-era rates, which put him at odds with the president. He later apologized for those comments, but not before the Republican National Committee seized on the controversy. Cheney on ’08 Palin Choice Dick Cheney said on Sunday that Sarah Palin was not ready in 2008 to be his successor as vice president and that Senator John McCain’s decision was “a mistake” that Mitt Romney should seek to avoid making in his own choice of running mate. Speaking to ABC News in his first interview since undergoing a heart transplant in March, Mr. Cheney said Mr. McCain’s choice clearly reflected considerations other than Ms. Palin’s ability to serve as vice president. Asked whether a presidential candidate should consider how well a vice-presidential nominee might appeal in a particular state or to a demographic group, Mr. Cheney said, “Those are important issues, but they should never be allowed to override that first proposition.”
Monday, August 13, 2012
Aug. 4: Likely No New Blue States in November
Saturday was a light day for polling, with only the national tracking polls and a South Dakota poll out; our forecast was essentially unchanged.
The South Dakota numbers were not bad for Mr. Obama — putting him down by 6 points, closer than the margin by which he lost the state in 2008 — but look like something of a fluke. In North Dakota, which has been more heavily polled because of the competitive Senate race there, Mr. Obama has consistently trailed by double digits.
Indeed, with the presidential election likely to be much closer than it was in 2008, Mr. Obama is unlikely to paint any new state blue this year. The forecast model gives him a 15 percent chance of carrying Montana, which has been sparsely polled; a 14 percent chance of winning Missouri; and an 8 percent chance of winning Arizona. Fourth on the list is South Dakota, where the model gives Mr. Obama about a 4 percent chance after the new survey, followed by Georgia at 2 percent.
Mr. Obama is an underdog in two states that he won in 2008, Indiana and North Carolina.
An earlier post in this space about poll oversampling was published in error and will be updated and published later this week.
Sunday, August 12, 2012
Record Spending by Obama’s Camp Shrinks Coffers
Since the beginning of last year, Mr. Obama and the Democrats have burned through millions of dollars to find and register voters. They have spent almost $50 million subsidizing Democratic state parties to hire workers, pay for cellphones and update voter lists. They have spent tens of millions of dollars on polling, online advertising and software development to turn Mr. Obama’s fallow volunteers corps into a grass-roots army. The price tag: about $400 million from the beginning of last year to June 30 this year, according to a New York Times analysis of Federal Election Commission records, including $86 million on advertising. But now Mr. Obama’s big-dollar bet is being tested. With less than a month to go before the national party conventions begin, the president’s once commanding cash advantage has evaporated, leaving Mitt Romney and the Republican National Committee with about $25 million more cash on hand than the Democrats as of the beginning of July. Despite Mr. Obama’s multimillion-dollar advertising barrage against Mr. Romney, he is now being outspent on the airwaves with Mr. Romney benefiting from a deluge of spending by conservative “super PACs” and outside groups. While Mr. Romney has depleted much of his funds from the nominating contest, he is four weeks away from being able to tap into tens of millions of dollars in general election money. And many polls show the race to be very close. Mr. Obama’s cash needs — he spent $70.8 million in June alone, more than half on advertising and far more than he raised — have brought new urgency to his campaign’s fund-raising efforts. His advisers have had to schedule more fund-raising trips than originally planned to big-money states like New York, according to donors involved in the effort. The super PAC supporting his campaign, Priorities USA Action, is enlisting former President Bill Clinton as a rainmaker, hoping to counter its conservative counterparts. While Mr. Obama will also have access to general election money in September, he is unlikely to have the same spending advantage over Mr. Romney as he had during the primary season, when Mr. Romney spent much of his money battling Republican rivals. And with August a traditionally slow month for fund-raising, Mr. Obama has bombarded his supporters in recent weeks with increasingly urgent pleas for money, mindful that he will need to drastically raise his cash intake in the coming months merely to equal his record-breaking haul from 2008. “My upcoming birthday next week could be the last one I celebrate as president of the United States, but that’s not up to me — it’s up to you,” Mr. Obama wrote last week as the campaign’s latest fund-raising deadline and his Aug. 4 birthday approached. “This July deadline is our most urgent yet, coming after two consecutive months of being significantly outraised by Romney and the Republicans.” Mr. Obama’s heavy expenditures — and his campaign’s pressure on bundlers to find and groom new donors — have stirred worries among other Democrats, who have long taken Mr. Obama’s financial supremacy for granted. “There is a lot of worry that Romney’s folks are raising so much more,” said one of Mr. Obama’s top fund-raisers, who did not want to be identified as discussing internal campaign business. “I just don’t think there’s a lot of high-dollar money left on the table.” In fact, Republicans insist that Mr. Obama will rue his spending. “Heading into the final laps of the campaign, the Democrats will regret squandering so much of their haul early in the cycle on massive monthly overhead,” said Sean M. Spicer, a spokesman for the R.N.C. But in interviews, party and campaign officials defended the approach of spending money to build out the campaign, saying they believed that the wisdom of Mr. Obama’s strategy would be demonstrated at the voting booth in November. “The earlier the better,” said Adam Fetcher, an Obama campaign spokesman. “Starting a conversation with a persuadable voter months before Election Day allows us to be more effective in responding to that voter’s priorities than if they first hear from us a few weeks out. Building and maintaining our grass-roots foundation takes time and resources, but we believe those early investments will make a difference.” But grass-roots movements do not come cheap.
Kitty Bennett and Derek Willis contributed reporting.
Using Twitter, California Politicians Join Chick-fil-A Debate
As Congress wrangles over tax cuts and agricultural assistance heading into the August recess, Representative Nancy Pelosi, Democrat of California, took sides in a different fight Thursday.
“What I tweeted was I’m a Kentucky Fried Chicken fan,” the House minority leader told reporters with a grin.
Jim Lo Scalzo/European Pressphoto AgencyRepresentative Nancy Pelosi of California.Ms. Pelosi, who was referring to a preference she expressed on Twitter last week, is one of the many politicians who have joined the recent debate about same-sex marriage, sparked when the president and chief operating officer of Chick-fil-A said the fast food chain supports “the biblical definition of the family unit.”
Among the politicians who have weighed in is Ed Lee, the mayor of San Francisco, who wrote on Twitter last Thursday that he was “very disappointed” in Chick-fil-A’s stance.
“Closest #ChickFilA to San Francisco is 40 miles away & I strongly recommend that they not try to come any closer,” Mr. Lee wrote.
Ms. Pelosi, whose congressional district includes most of San Francisco, said, “I believe in freedom of expression, but I believe the mayor of San Francisco has freedom of expression as well.” The issue is ultimately up to local officials, she said.
Using social media, thousands of people are planning a “same-sex kiss day” at Chick-fil-A locations Friday.
As liberals expressed their displeasure with Chick-fil-A and threatened to boycott, conservatives rallied to the chain’s defense. Hundreds of thousands poured into locations all over the country Wednesday to show their support at the suggestion of Mike Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor.
No word on whether Ms. Pelosi prefers her KFC chicken Original Recipe or Extra Crispy.
Saturday, August 11, 2012
In Missouri Senate Race, Ads Beset Incumbent Democrat
As the three Republican candidates have battled it out, Ms. McCaskill has had to buckle down as well. Karl Rove’s Crossroads GPS, David and Charles Koch’s Americans For Prosperity, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the 60 Plus Association have dumped as much as $15 million into the state since July 2011 to keep her on her heels. In their advertisements, Ms. McCaskill’s face is sometimes bloated, sometimes goofy, sometimes exhausted. She is usually joined at the hip with President Obama. And she is always almost single-handedly to blame for Missouri’s economic travails, the nation’s skyrocketing debt, the Democrats’ health care law and a scandalous level of duplicity. “As one guy said to me in rural Missouri, ‘Don’t worry, they’re trying to tenderize you before they pick a candidate,’ ” Ms. McCaskill said Thursday. The sustained campaign could become a textbook for future efforts in a new era of anything-goes campaign financing, both Ms. McCaskill and her opponents say. Most of the spending is coming from tax-exempt 501(c)(4) organizations like Crossroads GPS, which may accept large corporate and individual donations without disclosing donors’ identities. And the outcome could show that third-party advertising from these organizations and from “super PACs” — like Now or Never, which works on behalf of Sarah Steelman, one of the Republican candidates — could tip the balance to a larger degree in a statewide or Congressional race than in the presidential contest. In other states with contested Republican primaries, like Arizona, Indiana and Wisconsin, outside money flowed in to take sides in the primaries themselves, leaving the Republican contenders wounded and the Democrat in better shape. In Missouri, it flowed in largely to take down the Democrat, providing vital air cover while the Republicans fought each other below the radar. The three Republican candidates may be lesser known and less dynamic than Ms. McCaskill, a mainstay of Missouri politics, but she is possibly the most endangered incumbent in the Senate. A Mason-Dixon poll published on July 28 in The St. Louis Post-Dispatch found her trailing all three of her potential opponents, John Brunner, a businessman; Ms. Steelman, a former state treasurer; and Representative Todd Akin. “When you have a late primary like in Missouri’s, the ability to keep a sustained message-fire on the incumbent is going to be important to whoever the nominee is going to be,” said Kenneth Goldstein, president of the Campaign Media Analysis Group, which tracks campaign television spending. Republicans are reluctant to give the outside groups too much credit. They say Ms. McCaskill’s uphill climb to a second term is due to her fealty to Mr. Obama’s legislative agenda in a state where he is unpopular. “Certainly the outside spending has reminded voters why they might not like her much,” said Todd Abrajano, an aide to Mr. Brunner. “But if there was no outside money, she’d still be in the predicament she is in today.” But when pushed, Republicans do not deny that the groups have helped. “They are keeping the pressure on McCaskill,” Mr. Akin said. “And that’s making any of us think, ‘We can do it, we can do it.’ ” Senator John Cornyn of Texas, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, allowed, “I can’t deny it’s had some impact.” The Missouri Senate race has drawn outside money from more than a half-dozen groups: two Democratic outfits, the Majority PAC and Patriot Majority USA; and five Republican allies. The Campaign Media Analysis Group tallied $5.2 million in ads since June 1, compared with $4.8 million in Ohio, $2.9 million in Florida, $1.5 million in Montana and $1.1 million in North Dakota, where other contested Senate campaigns have drawn outside attention. The Majority PAC has spent $722,000 since June to help Ms. McCaskill. Crossroads GPS has spent $857,000 against her, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce $190,000. Democratic strategists say those numbers understate the impact. Crossroads GPS’s first ads ran in early July 2011, and since then, nine separate ads have come in a rolling barrage. When Crossroads GPS eased up in June, the chamber peaked in July. By the Democrats’ count, anti-McCaskill spending has already reached $15.2 million, with an additional $18 million in advertising slots reserved for the fall. “People will look back at Missouri and look back at the money that’s been spent by outside forces and say this is an election that shows whether or not these anonymous masters of the universe can buy these elections,” Ms. McCaskill said. “If it works in Missouri, then I think we’re in for a rough ride in this country.” Her opponents dismiss that. Since Ms. McCaskill’s narrow Senate victory in 2006, her state has drifted right. Mr. Obama lost Missouri in 2008 by fewer than 4,000 votes out of nearly three million cast. But in a 2010 Senate race, Roy Blunt, then a Republican representative, crushed Robin Carnahan, a Democratic scion of Missouri political royalty, by nearly 14 percentage points. Some Missouri Republican strategists said the outside groups knew that Ms. McCaskill could not win and flooded the state to claim a scalp to take to their donors. Others said they saw her weakness and decided they could not forgive themselves if they let her off the mat. For her part, Ms. McCaskill has made the outside money the main opponent of the campaign. One McCaskill advertisement says: “They just keep coming back. Secret money attacking Claire McCaskill. These big oil and insurance companies don’t want you to know who they are.” As a stream of televisions showing her competitors’ ads moves across the screen, it continues: “Claire McCaskill will fight them. Always has, always will.” Republicans say her effort has proved to be a major strategic error. Ms. McCaskill’s focus on the money has only intensified awareness of the campaign’s national importance, made her look defensive and increased the resolve of the outside groups to stay in, they say. But Ms. McCaskill said that once her opponent was chosen, she could shift gears and try to move the race from a referendum on her to a choice between her and her opponent. “I’ve had to tread water,” she said, “while they have been pounding me with certainly more per capita than anybody else in the country.”
Friday, August 10, 2012
Romney Team Outpaces Obama in Fund-Raising Again
Mr. Romney and the Republican National Committee took in $101.3 million in July, his campaign announced Monday, as Republican donors rallied behind their presumptive nominee with the national convention only a few weeks away. The president’s campaign announced on Twitter on Monday morning that his July fund-raising with the Democratic National Committee topped out at about $75 million — the third month in a row they have brought in less than the Republicans. Mr. Obama’s team appears to have all but conceded the money race, deluging the president’s grass-roots supporters this summer with fund-raising e-mails and warning supporters of the financial advantage that the Republicans will hold going into the final months of the campaign. “Make no mistake, we will be outspent,” a senior campaign official said during a conference call with reporters last month. More detailed information about the July fund-raising, including how much the candidates themselves raised and how they spent their money, has not yet been released by the two candidates. All campaigns are required to report their fund-raising to the Federal Election Commission by Aug. 20. But the Republican figure keeps Mr. Romney and his party on pace to bring in $800 million for the cycle, the target set by Mr. Romney’s team in April. Roughly a quarter of the Republicans’ haul, $25.7 million, came in donations under $250, as Mr. Romney worked to increase his appeal among small donors. “Americans are clearly looking for a change in the White House,” Reince Priebus, the chairman of the R.N.C., said in a statement. “While President Obama claims that his economic plan ‘worked,’ the American people know that his policies haven’t worked and he has failed to fix our economy.” Because Mr. Obama easily outraised Mr. Romney all of last year and early this year, the president does not need to beat Mr. Romney in the months ahead to bring in the roughly $750 million his team has said they wish to raise in this cycle. But heavy spending on field organizers, technology and advertising — more than $400 million through the end of June — appears to have cost Mr. Obama the impressive cash advantage he once had. And Democratic-leaning “super PACs” have raised far less money than their Republican counterparts, forcing Mr. Obama to spend heavily on attack advertisements against Mr. Romney, even while conservative groups pummel him on the airwaves. The Republicans have used the cash surge of the last two months to begin trying to match Mr. Obama’s field advantage, opening about 250 offices around the country, recruiting volunteers and hiring more than 600 staff members for the fall campaign. On Saturday, the R.N.C. announced that organizers had made their one millionth voter contact of the election cycle. The committee has also begun running general election advertisements, as Mr. Romney began doing in May. The campaign, the Republican National Committee and a joint fund established by the Republicans to raise presidential campaign cash ended July with $185.9 million in cash on hand. They did not disclose what part of the money would end up in Mr. Romney’s campaign coffers, which can accept only $5,000 from each donor every election cycle, and how much would go to the R.N.C., which can accept more than 10 times that amount from each donor. Mr. Obama did not disclose how much money his campaign and the D.N.C. have on hand. The strong fund-raising puts renewed pressure on Mr. Obama to bring in more cash and suggests certainty that Mr. Romney will remain financially competitive with an incumbent whose fund-raising prowess has long been a hallmark. Underscoring the campaign’s changed fortunes, Mr. Obama’s campaign is no longer announcing its fund-raising totals in lush videos featuring his senior staff or field workers. Instead, on Monday, not long after Mr. Romney made his announcement, Mr. Obama’s campaign put out its total in a brief message to his Twitter followers, thanking them for their money. “Every bit helps,” the campaign wrote.
Ducking The Donald
To be The Donald is to possess The Confidence. It’s to revel in your own appeal. That hair, that birtherism — who could resist? Certainly not the Republican Party, at least not in The Donald’s objective estimation. So when the first round of speakers for the party’s late August convention leaked out Sunday and he wasn’t on it, he fretted not a whit. In due course he would surely get his summons to participate. “I know they want me to,” he said on Monday on “Fox and Friends.” “I’ll see what happens.” So will we. The giddy excitement of Convention Season is here. The Republicans go first, in Tampa, while the Democrats follow a week later, and just as humidly, in Charlotte. In the matter of convention sites, neither party gave much thought to global warming. But the lineups of speakers: that’s an issue of the utmost deliberation and sometimes consternation and enormous, epic consequence. All party stalwarts agree on that, until they think about it a bit longer and realize that, well, they’re really not so sure. On Monday I talked to two prominent Republican strategists in a row who said that Mitt Romney’s choice of keynote speaker, not yet determined, was essential. Then they tried to recall who that essential choice from the 2008 Republican convention was, and came up blank. I myself had to Google it: Rudy Giuliani. There are some things you really do force yourself to forget. One of the strategists asserted that Romney’s greatest mistake would be to emulate the Democrats in 2004, when the keynoter, a certain Barack Obama, shone brighter than the nominee, John Kerry, perhaps making him look duller in contrast. The strategist did not admit per se that Romney had a luminescence problem. There are some things you really needn’t say. He recommended that Romney take a page from the Republican grand master of stagecraft, Ronald Reagan, and select a keynote speaker of restrained wattage. “Do you know who did the 1980 keynote for Reagan?” he asked. I said I was mortified that I didn’t. I wasn’t being entirely truthful about the mortification part. “Guy Vander Jagt,” he said. “Guy who?” “Exactly,” he said. “Reagan understood what it meant to be the star, and he had seen ‘All About Eve.’ ” Has Romney? And does Eve ride in an Escalade with Florida or New Jersey plates? Those are the home states of the other strategist’s suggested keynoters, Marco Rubio and Chris Christie. This strategist said that a real dynamo was just what the convention and Romney needed, and that Rubio and Christie qualified. Bear in mind that everything is relative, and that the dynamo yardstick includes Mitch McConnell and Roy Blunt. The conventions indeed speak volumes about each party’s anxieties and stratagems, two words that fittingly bring us to Bill Clinton. He was among the first speakers confirmed for a prime-time slot during the Democratic convention, proving that all is forgiven when everything’s on the line. And he’s meant, clearly, to remind Americans of the sustained prosperity during his administration, a Democratic one. Another confirmed speaker, Elizabeth Warren, symbolizes the party’s supposed taming of Wall Street, while the chosen keynoter, Mayor Julián Castro of San Antonio, underscores the importance Obama places on the Latino vote. Over recent presidential elections, that vote has grown while the Republican share of it has shrunk. George W. Bush got 44 percent in 2004, John McCain just 31 in 2008. According to a recent poll, Romney is poised to get 23. That’s a dismal projection and disastrous trend line. And Republicans will try to counter or at least camouflage it with convention staging. The first list of confirmed speakers includes Susana Martinez, the New Mexico governor. There’s not an iota of doubt that Rubio will be added to the roster, and there’s a chance that Ted Cruz, the Republican nominee for the Senate from Texas, will be, too. Will that help? “Well,” said one Republican strategist, “Bob Dole chose Susan Molinari as his keynote speaker and proceeded to lose the women’s vote by 16 points.” That was in 1996, the year of Clinton’s re-election, when the health care debacle was receding from memory and Monica Lewinsky had not yet sidled into view. I’m less heartened by whom the Republicans have included than by whom they haven’t, at least so far: Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann, Herman Cain. It suggests a limit to the party’s enthusiasm for carnival barkers. And it doesn’t bode well for The Donald. He may have to make do with the “Statesman of the Year” award that he’s inexplicably receiving from the Republican Party of Sarasota County a day before the convention and an hour’s drive down the road. Though if he re-emerges as El Donald, with fluent Spanish, all bets are off.
Fear of ‘Fiscal Cliff’ Has Industry Pulling Back
Executives at companies making everything from electrical components and power systems to automotive parts say the fiscal stalemate is prompting them to pull back now, rather than wait for a possible resolution to the deadlock on Capitol Hill. Democrats and Republicans are far apart on how to extend the Bush-era tax breaks beyond January — the same month automatic spending reductions are set to take effect — unless there is a deal to trim the deficit. The combination of tax increases and spending cuts is creating an economic threat called “the fiscal cliff” by Ben S. Bernanke, chairman of the Federal Reserve. Until recently, the loudest warnings about the economy have come from policy makers and economists, along with military industry executives who rely heavily on the Pentagon’s largess and who would be hurt by the government reductions. But more diversified companies like Hubbell Inc. in Shelton, Conn., have begun to hunker down as well. Hubbell, a maker of electrical products, has canceled several million dollars’ worth of equipment orders and delayed long-planned factory upgrades in the last few months, said Timothy H. Powers, the company’s chief executive. It has also held off hiring workers for about 100 positions that would otherwise have been filled, he said. “The fiscal cliff is the primary driver of uncertainty, and a person in my position is going to make a decision to postpone hiring and investments,” Mr. Powers said. “We can see it in our order patterns, and customers are delaying. We don’t have to get to the edge of the cliff before the damage is done.” The worries come amid broader fears that the economy is losing momentum — the annual rate of economic growth in the second quarter fell to 1.5 percent from 2 percent in the first quarter, and 4.1 percent in the last quarter of 2011. On Thursday, the Commerce Department reported that factory orders unexpectedly fell 0.5 percent in June from the previous month, while data on the labor market released Friday showed job creation still falling short of the level needed to bring down the unemployment rate. All told, the political gridlock in the United States, along with the continuing debt crisis in Europe, will shave about half a percentage point off growth in the second half of the year, estimates Vincent Reinhart, chief United States economist at Morgan Stanley. More than 40 percent of companies surveyed by Morgan Stanley in July cited the fiscal cliff as a major reason for their spending restraint, Mr. Reinhart said. He expects that portion to rise when the poll is repeated this month. “Economists generally overstate the effects of uncertainty on spending, but in this case it does seem to be significant,” he added. “It’s at the macro- and microeconomic levels.” Unless Congress acts to extend the tax provisions and comes up with a budget deal that averts the planned reductions in military spending and other government programs, taxes will rise by $399 billion while federal government spending will fall by more than $100 billion, according to an analysis by the Congressional Budget Office. The end-of-year battle comes after Democrats and Republicans have failed over the last year to reach long-term agreements on how to tackle the budget deficit. Last week, Congressional leaders did manage to agree tentatively to keep the government financed through next March, extending a deadline that had been set to expire Oct. 1, but that deal did not address the extension of the tax cuts or spending reductions. All together, the fiscal cliff’s total impact equals slightly more than $600 billion, or 4 percent of gross domestic product, and if no action is taken, the Congressional Budget Office projects the economy will shrink by 1.3 percent in the first half of 2013 as a result. With many Fortune 500 companies now setting budgets and planning for 2013, chief executives say they cannot afford to hope for the best. Wall Street is also paying more attention: over the last few weeks, chief executives of companies like Honeywell, U.P.S. and Eaton all cited the uncertainty as a threat to earnings in the second half of 2012.
Thursday, August 9, 2012
Romney Calls Reid's Tax Claims a Diversion From Jobs Report
6:26 p.m. | An updated version of this article can be found here.
NORTH LAS VEGAS, Nev. — Mitt Romney on Friday said that he had paid “a lot of taxes” every year and accused the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, of falsely claiming that he had not — saying the senator did so as a tactic to draw attention away from lackluster employment and economic numbers under President Obama.
Mr. Romney also suggested that either the White House or Obama campaign officials could be behind what he characterized as false accounts of him not paying taxes for years.
“Harry Reid really has to put up or shut up,” Mr. Romney said. “So Harry, who are your sources? Let’s have Harry explain who that is.”
Mr. Reid, a Nevada Democrat, said in a statement on Thursday that “I was told by an extremely credible source that Romney has not paid taxes for 10 years.” But the senator has provided no evidence to back up the assertion.
Mr. Romney has said he is likely to pay a total of $6.2 million in taxes on $45 million in income over the two tax years of 2010 and 2011; he has released his 2010 return and says he will release his 2011 return when it is completed.
But he declined again on Friday to disclose more than those two years, a refusal that has drawn attacks from Democrats — who argue he must be hiding something — and criticism from many Republicans who fear his unwillingness to adhere to a more detailed and customary tax disclosure is distracting from the Romney campaign’s message.
Mr. Romney said that Mr. Reid’s attacks and the call for more of his tax returns was really an effort to divert attention away from poor jobs numbers and the unemployment rate, which has ticked up to 8.3 percent, according to a new government report on Friday.
“By the way Harry, I understand what you are trying to do here,” Mr. Romney said. “You are trying to deflect the fact that jobs numbers are bad, that Americans are out of work, and you’re trying to throw anything up on the screen that will grab attention away from the fact that the policies of the White House haven’t worked to put Americans to work, and the policies of the Senate haven’t even got a budget in place.”
“Now let me also say categorically: I have paid taxes every year, and a lot of taxes, a lot of taxes,” Mr. Romney added. “So Harry is simply wrong, and that’s why I’m so anxious for him to give us the names of the people who have put this forward.”
“I wouldn’t be at all surprised to hear the names are people from the White House or the Obama campaign, or who knows where they are coming from,” he said.
Wednesday, August 8, 2012
Democrats Draft Gay Marriage Platform
The move would place the party in line with the beliefs of President Obama, who in May became the first sitting president to declare that gay men and lesbians should be able to marry. Democratic Party officials had squabbled over the issue in the past. But at a platform-drafting meeting over the weekend in Minneapolis, they approved the first step to amend their platform, placing the amendment on track for adoption. In two weeks, the entire platform committee will vote at a meeting scheduled in Detroit. Then, if approved as expected, it would go before convention delegates in Charlotte, N.C., for final passage in early September. According to Democrats who were briefed on the vote in Minneapolis, there was no objection when the issue came up. Though the language that was voted on could still be revised, party officials do not anticipate any major obstacles going forward. The platform language approved over the weekend also reiterated the party’s disapproval of the Defense of Marriage Act, which prohibits the federal government from recognizing legal same-sex marriages. The 2008 platform had a similar section. The Democratic Party’s move comes more than two months after President Obama personally backed the rights of same-sex couples to wed. The president’s reversal — he had said previously that while he could not support same-sex marriage, his views on the issue were “evolving” — was a significant move, though it carried no legal weight. The Democrats would become the first major party to embrace same-sex marriage. But as historic as the platform would be, the president’s position makes it decidedly less controversial. News of the platform amendment was first reported by The Washington Blade. Gay rights supporters praised the Democratic Party’s vote. “Like Americans from all walks of life, the Democratic Party has recognized that committed and loving gay and lesbian couples deserve the right to have their relationships respected as equal under the law,” said Chad Griffin, president of the Human Rights Campaign. “I believe that one day very soon the platforms of both major parties will include similar language on this issue.” The Democratic Party platform that was drafted four years ago, when Mr. Obama was first running for president, called for “full inclusion of all families, including same-sex couples, in the life of our nation,” and for “equal responsibility, benefits and protections.” But the platform stopped short of endorsing same-sex marriages, in part because Mr. Obama had said he remained opposed. Despite the growing acceptance of same-sex marriage, the issue remains a difficult one for some Democrats, particularly those in the midst of hard-fought re-election campaigns in conservative-leaning states. Those include Tim Kaine, the former Democratic National Committee chairman who is running for Senate in Virginia, and Senators Claire McCaskill of Missouri and Jon Tester of Montana. And while an increasing number of Republicans are coming around to support marriage rights for gays and lesbians, the Republican Party as an institution is still far from declaring that marriage is for anyone but heterosexuals. Peter S. Sprigg, a senior fellow at the Family Research Council, predicted that Democrats will regret their decision to include the marriage plank in their platform. “There are many places in the country where Democratic candidates will not want to be identified with the gay-marriage party,” Mr. Sprigg said. “I think this is more politically correct than it is politically smart.”
July Jobs Report Likely to Preserve Status Quo
The government reported that 163,000 payroll jobs were created in July. But the unemployment rate — which is calculated through a separate survey — ticked up to 8.3 percent from 8.2 percent.
The payrolls number taken alone is a decent one; it beat the market’s expectations of about 100,000 jobs being created.
But it is important to take the number in context. Forecasts of the payrolls numbers are quite inaccurate; they miss, on average, by 68,000 jobs in one direction or another. In this case, the miss was to the upside — and better for job-seekers than the other way around.
Still, it is hard to calculate the number of jobs in the economy at any given time, let alone to forecast it accurately. That is why, as Jonathan Bernstein advised on Thursday, and as I suggested on TimesCast, we ought to have a fairly high threshold for what qualifies as a newsworthy jobs report.
Mr. Bernstein argued that any payrolls number between 50,000 and 150,000 jobs was not likely to have much effect politically. The actual gain of 163,000 jobs sits right on the brink of that.
So it is worth looking toward tiebreakers. For instance, were there substantial revisions to the previous numbers? In this case, they were a wash; the May jobs number was revised up, but the June figure was revised down.
And you can certainly look at the unemployment rate. The survey from which those numbers are calculated is subject to more statistical noise than the payrolls numbers, but that does not mean that it is meaningless. In this case, the unemployment numbers were poor.
So I think this report ought to mostly reinforce pre-existing impressions about the economy: that the recovery is slow, but that the nation is probably not on the verge of a double-dip recession.
Politically, the status quo appears to favor President Obama. If the election were held today, he would have a 77 percent chance of winning the Electoral College, according to our forecast model’s “now-cast,” although the victory would almost certainly be by a slim margin — possibly even a victory in the Electoral College that is not reflected in the national popular vote.
By November, Mr. Obama is less certain to win, since there is more uncertainty about the economy, and other factors come into play. Our model figures that there is about a 70 percent chance that he does so.
The July jobs numbers might reduce that uncertainty slightly. Whatever impressions Americans had about the economy are likely to be reinforced by the report; Democrats will cite the relatively favorable payrolls numbers, and Republicans will trumpet the increase in the unemployment rate. There are just three more jobs reports between now and the election.
The number is favorable for Mr. Obama in the sense that no news qualifies as good news for him if he is ahead right now. But the report is not a game-changer, economically or politically.
Tuesday, August 7, 2012
Germany’s Olympics Talk Centers on Rower’s Boyfriend
The athlete, Nadja Drygalla, a rower on the German Olympic team, volunteered to leave the Olympic Village last week after a discussion with officials about her boyfriend’s extreme right-wing political activities. But instead of heading off a potential controversy through her quiet departure, Ms. Drygalla has become the focus of a national debate, her romantic choices dissected in leading newspapers and on television broadcasts. Ms. Drygalla’s boyfriend, Michael Fischer, himself a former competitive rower, was a candidate last year in a regional election for the far-right National Democratic Party and is part of an extremist group known as the Rostock National Socialists. “I have no connection to his circle of friends and this scene, and I reject it completely,” Ms. Drygalla, 23, said in an interview with dpa, a German news agency. She said that his politics were a burden on their relationship and that she had considered breaking up with him over it. She quit her career as a police officer last year after her superiors learned about the relationship. Her premature departure from the Olympic Games came only after she had competed, but the attention has raised questions about her future participation in the national team. She left the Olympics, she said, because some of her teammates “were still competing and they should be able to concentrate on that.” Both Ms. Drygalla and Mr. Fischer say that he quit the National Democrats in May. But questions remain as to how German Olympic officials could have been caught unaware on such a sensitive issue, especially after she left the police force. So while the rest of the world talks about the sprinter Usain Bolt and the swimmer Michael Phelps, Germany debates the past and future of a single rower on the women’s eight that did not even make the finals. The case is making “big waves,” as Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich put it on Monday. A parliamentary committee will discuss the controversy in a hearing next month, according to Dagmar Freitag, the sports committee chairwoman. The daily Tagesspiegel newspaper said Ms. Drygalla must have been “either unbelievably naïve or dumb or herself infected with the brown demons,” referring to the Nazi ideology. Even as many questioned the athlete’s choice of a boyfriend, a backlash quickly formed over Ms. Drygalla’s presumed guilt by association and the intensity of the news media scrutiny of her. Thomas de Maizière, Germany’s defense minister, said that while he welcomed Ms. Drygalla’s statement distancing herself from right-wing views, he believed some people had “crossed the line” in screening the friends and associates of athletes. Ms. Drygalla appeared shaken and vulnerable, fighting back tears as she tried to explain herself in the interview. “I’m not doing well,” she said, “the last few days have been pretty stressful and pretty surprising.” One young athlete’s personal choices would seem to have little to do with the highest levels of politics, but when that young woman is representing Germany at the Olympics, and her choices involve extreme right-wing politics, it becomes difficult to separate the two. Ms. Drygalla hails from Rostock on the Baltic Sea, once part of East Germany and a center of right-wing political activity. In 1992 the city was rocked by days of rioting against foreigners. Residents by the hundreds cheered as a building housing Vietnamese guest workers was firebombed. Recriminations over neo-Nazi activities, long a feature of German public discourse, have grown particularly acute this summer. There have been a series of resignations by senior law enforcement officials over the failure to stop a decade-long crime spree by the extreme-right National Socialist Underground, whose members have killed 10 people and robbed numerous banks. Investigators never caught up with the group. Instead, the two leading members died at their own hands, and a third gave herself up last year in the wake of a failed bank robbery. Embarrassing investigative failures during the group’s active years have been compounded by reports of bungled efforts to cover up miscues through shredded and misplaced documents. The head of the federal criminal police will retire at the end of the year as a result. The chief of Germany’s domestic intelligence agency stepped down last month. “There’s greater vigilance since then,” said Hajo Funke, an expert on rightist extremism at the Free University in Berlin. That also contributed to the intense glare of the spotlight that was riveted on Ms. Drygalla, he said.
Victor Homola contributed reporting.
House Reprimands Richardson
After hearing Representative Laura Richardson speak in her own defense, the House of Representatives on Thursday briskly approved a report by its Ethics Committee to reprimand her for compelling her Congressional staff to do campaign work. The resolution, which imposes a fine of $10,000 and which she had agreed to accept, passed on a voice vote.
In remarks that reflected a detailed statement that she had submitted earlier to the committee, Ms. Richardson, a California Democrat in an uphill fight to retain a seat in the House, said that she had never told staff members that they would have to work for her campaign office or lose their government jobs.
But leaders of the committee said they had already taken her version of events into account. Their scathing report, adopted unanimously by the bipartisan committee and released on Wednesday, roundly rejected her assertions.
The committee chairman, Representative Jo Bonner of Alabama, noted that members of her staff had continued for the past two years to complain to the committee about their treatment. One, he said, was a war veteran who said it would be better to deploy to Afghanistan than to work for a corrupt legislative office.
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