President Obama greets Leo Olson, accompanied by his mother Sarah, after arriving at Eastern Iowa Airport in Cedar Rapids
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President Obama speaks with Jason McLaughlin, principal of Center Point-Urbana High School, his wife, Ali, an account manager for a document scanning company, and their 4-year-old son Cooper, as they hold a discussion on middle class tax cuts at their home in Cedar Rapids, Iowa
NYT Editorial: Taxes are supposed to be complicated and contentious. Yet, speaking from the White House on Monday, it took President Obama less than 15 minutes to make a strong and sensible case for letting the high-end Bush-era tax cuts expire at the end of 2012. Citing well-documented facts, he pointed out that tax cuts at the top have failed to promote economic growth and have blown a hole in the federal budget.
Under his plan, Americans who make more than $250,000 a year — the top 2 percent of taxpayers — would see their tax rates go back up next year to the levels from the Clinton years, while those making less than $250,000 — the remaining 98 percent — would have their tax cuts extended through 2013.
…. Unfortunately, it is not a message Congressional Republicans want to hear, committed as they are to preserving tax cuts for the rich at all costs…..
…. The strength of Mr. Obama’s argument is unlikely to sway Republicans. But he’s right on fairness and the facts, and will, we hope, prevail in this debate.
Beyond parody, I give you the Romney fundraiser at David Koch’s house in the Hamptons:
A New York City donor a few cars back, who also would not give her name, said Romney needed to do a better job connecting. “I don’t think the common person is getting it,” she said from the passenger seat of a Range Rover stamped with East Hampton beach permits. “Nobody understands why Obama is hurting them.
“We’ve got the message,” she added. “But my college kid, the baby sitters, the nails ladies — everybody who’s got the right to vote — they don’t understand what’s going on. I just think if you’re lower income — one, you’re not as educated, two, they don’t understand how it works, they don’t understand how the systems work, they don’t understand the impact.”
Greg Sargent: Support for health law rising: One other key Post finding: In the wake of the Supreme Court ruling, voters are exactly split on whether they support the Affordable Care Act, 47-47. That’s a sizable swing from April, when Americans approved of it 39-53.
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Eugene Robinson: Spare us any more hooey about “preventing fraud” and “protecting the integrity of the ballot box.” The Republican-led crusade for voter ID laws has been revealed as a cynical ploy to disenfranchise as many likely Democratic voters as possible, with poor people and minorities the main targets.
Recent developments in Pennsylvania — one of more than a dozen states where voting rights are under siege — should be enough to erase any lingering doubt: The GOP is trying to pull off an unconscionable crime.
The Obama Diary 
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