Clinton plans to stump for Carmona

Former President Bill Clinton, a Democratic Party superstar and the last Democrat to carry Arizona in a presidential election, is set to headline a Wednesday rally in Tempe for U.S. Senate candidate Richard Carmona.

The "Get Out The Vote" event is scheduled for 8 p.m. on Arizona State University's Sun Devil Performance Lawn, 650 S. Athletes Place, Carmona's campaign announced Saturday.

Early voting for the Nov. 6 election begins Thursday.

The rally is free but anybody wanting to attend must register online at carmonaforarizona.com/early-vote.

Carmona, a former U.S. surgeon general who is running as a Democrat, is locked in a tough fight against six-term Republican U.S. Rep. Jeff Flake for the retiring GOP U.S. Sen. Jon Kyl's seat.

An automated poll of 595 likely Arizona voters conducted last week by the Democratic company Public Policy Polling indicated the race is still close, but showed Carmona leading Flake for the first time, 45percent to 43percent, with 12percent undecided.

The poll's margin of error was plus or minus 4 percentage points.

The poll has energized the Carmona campaign and his supporters.

Clinton defeated Republican challenger Bob Dole in 1996 to become the only Democrat to carry Arizona since President Harry Truman did so in 1948.

Third-party candidate Ross Perot also was on the ballot in 1996.

In 2006, Clinton stumped in Arizona for Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Jim Pederson, who wound up losing his hard-fought battle to unseat Kyl.

In other developments:

Carmona and Flake are expected to square off several times in the next few weeks.

On Wednesday, the candidates will appear before The Arizona Republic's editorial board for a 1:30 p.m. meeting that will be live-streamed on azcentral.com.

At 5 p.m., they will debate Libertarian candidate Marc Victor on Channel 8's (KAET) "Arizona Horizon" program.

Flake and Carmona will meet again Oct. 15 for a 6 p.m. debate on Tucson's Channel 6 (KUAT); Oct. 17 for an 11 a.m. debate on KJZZ (91.5 FM) radio's "Here and Now" show; and Oct. 25 for a 12:30 p.m. debate in front of an audience at Arizona Western College in Yuma that will air later on local TV and radio.

U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., the 2008 GOP presidential nominee, praised Republican Mitt Romney's performance in his Wednesday debate against President Barack Obama.

Four years ago, McCain, R-Ariz., debated Obama three times.

"The difference is this time he had a record that he had to defend," McCain told The Republic.

Nowicki is The Republic's national political reporter. Follow his blog at azdc.azcentral.com.

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.

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Clinton plans to stump for Carmona

Former President Bill Clinton, a Democratic Party superstar and the last Democrat to carry Arizona in a presidential election, is set to headline a Wednesday rally in Tempe for U.S. Senate candidate Richard Carmona.

The "Get Out The Vote" event is scheduled for 8 p.m. on Arizona State University's Sun Devil Performance Lawn, 650 S. Athletes Place, Carmona's campaign announced Saturday.

Early voting for the Nov. 6 election begins Thursday.

The rally is free but anybody wanting to attend must register online at carmonaforarizona.com/early-vote.

Carmona, a former U.S. surgeon general who is running as a Democrat, is locked in a tough fight against six-term Republican U.S. Rep. Jeff Flake for the retiring GOP U.S. Sen. Jon Kyl's seat.

An automated poll of 595 likely Arizona voters conducted last week by the Democratic company Public Policy Polling indicated the race is still close, but showed Carmona leading Flake for the first time, 45percent to 43percent, with 12percent undecided.

The poll's margin of error was plus or minus 4 percentage points.

The poll has energized the Carmona campaign and his supporters.

Clinton defeated Republican challenger Bob Dole in 1996 to become the only Democrat to carry Arizona since President Harry Truman did so in 1948.

Third-party candidate Ross Perot also was on the ballot in 1996.

In 2006, Clinton stumped in Arizona for Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Jim Pederson, who wound up losing his hard-fought battle to unseat Kyl.

In other developments:

Carmona and Flake are expected to square off several times in the next few weeks.

On Wednesday, the candidates will appear before The Arizona Republic's editorial board for a 1:30 p.m. meeting that will be live-streamed on azcentral.com.

At 5 p.m., they will debate Libertarian candidate Marc Victor on Channel 8's (KAET) "Arizona Horizon" program.

Flake and Carmona will meet again Oct. 15 for a 6 p.m. debate on Tucson's Channel 6 (KUAT); Oct. 17 for an 11 a.m. debate on KJZZ (91.5 FM) radio's "Here and Now" show; and Oct. 25 for a 12:30 p.m. debate in front of an audience at Arizona Western College in Yuma that will air later on local TV and radio.

U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., the 2008 GOP presidential nominee, praised Republican Mitt Romney's performance in his Wednesday debate against President Barack Obama.

Four years ago, McCain, R-Ariz., debated Obama three times.

"The difference is this time he had a record that he had to defend," McCain told The Republic.

Nowicki is The Republic's national political reporter. Follow his blog at azdc.azcentral.com.

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.

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On Stump, Romney Is Fond of Bill Clinton and Obama Praises Reagan

And for that matter, just for clarity, Ronald Reagan certainly would not be supporting President Obama, either.

To listen to the candidates on the campaign trail these days is a form of political whiplash. Mr. Romney lavishes praise on the very Democratic Mr. Clinton for breaking with his party’s traditional big-government orthodoxy, while Mr. Obama harks back to the very Republican Mr. Reagan for agreement that millionaires should not pay lower tax rates than the middle class.

The inside-out rhetoric, of course, is mainly about scoring points against the opponent in an increasingly fiery election year. When Mr. Romney refers favorably to Mr. Clinton, it is to make the point that Mr. Obama has abandoned the centrist legacy of his Democratic predecessor. When Mr. Obama invokes the spirit of Mr. Reagan, it is to argue that the Republican Party of Mr. Romney has drifted far away from its popular roots.

But the admiration expressed for the two former occupants of the White House also testifies to the fluidity of presidential reputations. Lost to history, it seems, is just how much Democrats loathed Mr. Reagan in the 1980s as an anti-communist zealot who thought that ketchup was a vegetable. Or how much Republicans despised Mr. Clinton in the 1990s as a slick huckster who dishonored the Oval Office. In the space of time, polarizing presidents have become historic statesmen.

“Presidential candidates occasionally seem to recant their onetime political opposition to a recent president of the opposite party,” said the presidential historian Michael Beschloss. “One reason is that with some historical distance, they may sometimes come to genuinely appreciate leadership qualities they didn’t notice before.” But, he added, “more often it’s politics.”

Mr. Beschloss recalled that Gerald R. Ford and the elder George Bush opposed Harry S. Truman in 1948 but after entering the White House themselves cited him, genuinely, as a role model. Richard M. Nixon derided George McGovern for not living up to the legacy of Mr. Truman and Franklin D. Roosevelt. Even Mr. Reagan cited John F. Kennedy in arguing for tax cuts, overlooking his own past criticism of the Democrat’s economic policies as “old Karl Marx.”

Frank J. Donatelli, a former Reagan White House political director, said the flattery had less to do with genuine admiration than calculation. “You want to show that your opponent is at odds with a respected former president from his own party as a way to marginalize him,” Mr. Donatelli said. “It’s a bid for centrist voters who nevertheless admire Reagan and Clinton’s records and results.”

Still, the notion that Democrats could hold out Mr. Reagan as a model or Republicans could do so with Mr. Clinton suggests how passions fade over the years. Both left office with high approval ratings and came to be appreciated for their successes, while failures and scandals have been overlooked. Mr. Reagan today is remembered for restoring national confidence and helping end the cold war. Mr. Clinton is remembered for reforming welfare and balancing the budget. It helped that both presided over periods of economic growth with comparatively little armed conflict overseas.

Mr. Obama began citing Mr. Reagan during the 2008 campaign as a political jab at his primary opponent, Hillary Rodham Clinton. Unlike her husband, Mr. Obama said, Mr. Reagan had been a “transformative political leader.” Now with Mrs. Clinton in the cabinet and Mr. Clinton on the campaign trail alongside him, the president has dropped the comparison, but he still cites Mr. Reagan to make arguments in favor of economic, immigration and nuclear disarmament policies.

He quoted Mr. Reagan just last month as he pushed for a new tax on millionaires. “That wild-eyed, socialist, tax-hiking class warrior was Ronald Reagan,” Mr. Obama said. “He thought that in America, the wealthiest should pay their fair share, and he said so.”

A couple weeks later, Mr. Obama was at it again. “Ronald Reagan could not get through a Republican primary in this election cycle,” he said. “Could not get through it. Here’s a guy who raised taxes. That in and of itself would have rendered him unelectable in a Republican primary.” Standing with him that evening was none other than Mr. Clinton, no longer a poor shadow of Mr. Reagan in Mr. Obama’s rendering but now a president who accumulated a “remarkable record” as he turned around a party that “was a little bit lost.”

Mr. Clinton has become a frequent touchstone for Mr. Romney lately as well. Instead of the president impeached for lying under oath to cover up an affair with an intern, Mr. Clinton in this telling is the apostle of fiscal responsibility as opposed to that “old-school liberal” now in the White House.

“Almost a generation ago, Bill Clinton announced that the era of big government was over,” Mr. Romney said this week. “Even a former McGovern campaign worker like President Clinton was signaling to his own party that Democrats should no longer try to govern by proposing a new program for every problem.

“President Obama,” he went on, “tucked away the Clinton doctrine in his large drawer of discarded ideas, along with transparency and bipartisanship. It’s enough to make you wonder if maybe it was a personal beef with the Clintons, but really it runs much deeper.”

From Mr. Romney’s perspective, it does not hurt to remind centrist Democrats of the past tensions and disagreements between Mr. Obama and the Clintons.

Not that every president from another party becomes suddenly acceptable. Mr. Romney has implicitly compared Mr. Obama to Jimmy Carter, while Mr. Obama routinely links Mr. Romney to the policies of George W. Bush. When Mr. Bush endorsed Mr. Romney before ducking into an elevator this week, Mr. Romney made little note of it, but the Obama camp eagerly spread the news.

To guardians of the former presidents’ legacies, the latest campaign-trail tributes ring hollow. John D. Podesta, a former Clinton chief of staff who now leads the liberal Center for American Progress Action Fund, said it was “ironic that Romney is so exuberant in embracing Clintonomics” since Mr. Clinton raised taxes on the wealthy, invested in education and technology, and balanced the budget. “Maybe Romney was too busy firing people in the ’90s to have noticed,” Mr. Podesta said.

Craig Shirley, a conservative consultant and Reagan biographer, likewise said that Mr. Obama’s invocations of Mr. Reagan were off base. “At first blush, I would say good for him,” he said. “But deeper, I would say Obama is profoundly misinformed if he thinks Ronald Reagan would agree with any of his policies. The fundamental difference is Reagan believed in people while Obama believes in government.”

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The Obamas Give First Stump Speeches of the 2012 Campaign (The Atlantic Wire)

The Obamas delivered 2012 stump speeches at Democratic National Committee fundraisers in Miami and and Los Angeles Monday, reminding supporters that "We are not done," as the first lady said. President Obama is working to win back the Democratic donors who've soured on him since 2008, reminding them that "Big changes don't happen overnight.... The reason we're here today is because our work is not done."

Barack Obama's first stop was at a $10,000-a-plate dinner at the home of Samsonite's former CEO Steven Green, who also served as Clinton's ambassador to Singapore. Then he hit the "Obama Victory Fund 2012 Kick-Off Reception," which cost between $250 and $2,500 a ticket. Then he moved on to a dinner event at the home of J.P. and Maggie Austin, which cost attendees $35,800 per person, CBS4 reports. Meanwhile, Michelle Obama went on her first fundraising trip without the president, speaking at two fundraisers, filming a guest spot on the Nickelodeon show iCarly, and sitting on a panel with Second Lady Jill Biden and J.J. Abrams and urged Hollywood to portray the military in a more positive light.

Related: Is Nancy Pelosi Getting Sidelined by Steny Hoyer?

Both Obamas' addresses sounded like stump speeches. They ticked off the president's accomplishments on health care and financial regulatory reform. "Oh, and along the way," Barack Obama reminded donors, "we did a few other things" like repeal Don't Ask Don't Tell and appoint two women to the Supreme Court. Some liberals are pretty frustrated with the president, and both Obamas insisted the president had faced an uphill battle. "It’s going to be long," the first lady said. "It is going to be hard. I joke, did you ever think Barack Obama was going to be easy? Was there ever anybody here who just thought he’d just trounce in and fix everything, Barack Obama?"

Related: Dems Form Group to Rake in Secret Donations

The Obamas have some work to do in reassuring donors, The Wall Street Journal's Carol E. Lee and Jonathan Weisman report. Hillary Clinton supporters, especially, are reluctant to bundle contributions from friends, and even reelection adviser David Axelrod acknowledges donors have been neglected. "I don't think we have been particularly attentive to the so-called care and feeding of donors," Axelrod told The Journal. "I think it was largely a function of the fact that the president and everybody around him was absorbed in dealing with some fairly significant challenges."

Related: Here Comes the Government Shutdown

But rekindling donor romance has not always been easy, The Journal says. Take this incident, for example:

At a recent gathering of major donors here, former National Economic Council Director Larry Summers, who headlined a breakout session on the economy, got into an exchange with a donor that resulted in the man walking out of the session, according to people at the event.

The donor told Mr. Summers that he'd had trouble getting approved for a loan, according to people present. After the man repeatedly returned to his personal troubles, Mr. Summers said that no one at the conference--where attendees were asked to raise $350,000--was experiencing the kinds of financial difficulties faced by ordinary Americans. The man got frustrated and left the room, people at the event said.

Tuesday Obama will be in Puerto Rico for another fundraiser. Puerto Ricans gave $4 million in federal campaign donations in 2008, $354,000 of them to Obama, ABC News' Devin Dwyer reports. Obama is the first president to honor the island with an official visit since John F. Kennedy went in 1961. Dwyer writes,

The symbolism of the trip might hold the greatest significance for Obama and Democrats, however, generating goodwill with the booming Puerto Rican population living inside the United States, particularly Florida, where they can cast presidential ballots next fall.

Fewer grumpy donors there, perhaps.

Related: Obama: I Don't Have Horns

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