Rise and Shine

Hey, it’s this photo’s birthday today: President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama dance during the 2009 Nobel Banquet in the Hall of Mirrors at the Grand Hotel in Oslo, Norway, Dec. 10, 2009 (Photo by Pete Souza)

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Today:

10:50: President Obama departs the White House

12:30: Arrives in Michigan

1:35: Tours Daimler Detroit Diesel plant in Redford, Michigan

2:0: Delivers remarks

2:55: Departs Michigan

4:30: Arrives at the White House

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Detroit News: As President Barack Obama visits a Daimler AG plant in Redford Township today, the company plans to announce the investment of more than $100 million at the facility “in new technology, expanded production and jobs in the United States,” a Daimler official told The Detroit News.

The investment at Detroit Diesel — a unit of the German automaker — will add an unspecified number of new jobs to the 3-million-square-foot plant as it expands beyond diesel engines.

Detroit Diesel has 2,300 employees and builds four major engines, rear axles and 12-speed transmissions.

More here

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Washington Post: The contours of a deal to avert the year-end fiscal cliff are becoming increasingly clear. But progress has been slow, and time is running out for leaders to seal an agreement and sell it to restless lawmakers who so far have been given little information.

With hope still alive for a resolution by Christmas, President Obama and House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) met Sunday at the White House, their first face-to-face meeting in nearly a month and their first one-on-one session since July 2011, when they last tried to forge a far-reaching compromise to tame the national debt.

Neither side would provide details, but White House spokeswoman Amy Brundage and Boehner spokesman Michael Steel released identical statements saying “the lines of communication remain open.”

More here

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The Atlantic: Goodbye, conciliator. Hello, Mr. Tough Love.

…. While Republicans are bemoaning the president’s intransigence in hewing fast to a position he ran and won on in 2012, they might do well to look to their own behavior in setting up this month’s epic power struggle with him – and why he feels he’s now in a strong enough position to stand firm on behalf of his agenda.

…. “The president’s idea of a negotiation is, roll over and do what I ask,” Speaker John Boehner complained earlier this month. But Obama just solidly won reelection after a very nasty race. Why would he forgo pushing hard for his agenda right out of the gate, right after it was reaffirmed by the public?

The bottom line: The odds we go over the cliff are high if the GOP doesn’t come around. Fortunately, it sounds like Republicans are starting to get the message.

More here

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More at ThinkProgress

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Greg Sargent: Leverage remains with Dems on taxes: A new Politico poll confirms it yet again:  The public sides with Dems in the fiscal cliff fight. Sixty percent of likely voters — and 58 percent of independents — want taxes raised on those over $250,000. And there’s also this: Fifty eight percent say raising taxes on the rich won’t have a negative impact on the economy. Only 38 percent support the GOP position that it will. What this data confirms, yet again, is that Dems are the ones who hold the middle ground position in the talks.

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ThinkProgress: President Obama will “begin an all-out drive for comprehensive immigration reform, including seeking a path to citizenship” for 11 million undocumented immigrants, after Congress addresses the fiscal cliff, the Los Angeles Times reports. The revelation comes just as a top Hispanic Democrat, Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-IL), is calling on Obama to step-up his involvement on the issue and engage in discussions with lawmakers.

The Obama administration’s “social media blitz” will start in January and is expected “to tap the same organizations and unions that helped get a record number of Latino voters to reelect the president.” Cabinet secretaries and lawmakers from both parties are already holding initial meetings to iron out the details of the proposal….

More here

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Rolling Stone here

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MooooOOOooooOooooOOooorning everyone.

Rise and Shine

11:0: PBO attends the second G-20 plenary session

1:30: Attends the third G-20 plenary session

2:45: Attends a working lunch

5:20: Attends the closing ceremony of the G-20 Summit

5:45: Holds a bilateral meeting with President Hu of China

7:30: Holds a press conference

8:40: Departs Los Cabos, Mexico

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TPM: A majority of voters agreed with President Obama’s decision to halt deportation of young undocumented immigrants, according to a new Bloomberg Poll out Tuesday … 64 percent of likely voters agree with the new policy, while just 30 percent disagreed.

Along party lines, only Republicans disagreed the move, with 56 percent of likely GOP voters opposed to the policy. Close to 9 in 10 Democrats (86 percent) liked the move. A large majority of independents, 66 percent, backed the decision, while just 26 percent opposed it.

…. Yesterday, a Latino Decisions poll showed that enthusiasm for Obama among Latino voters jumped significantly after the announcement.

More here

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Eugene Robinson: Sí, se puede. Yes, it can be done.

President Obama showed last week that it’s possible to find a reasonable, humane solution for at least 800,000 young people who were illegally brought into this country as children. All you need is a moral compass and a heart.

Seems to me that Obama’s unilateral decision to let these non-citizens remain here without fear of deportation should have quieted critics who bray and whine about a supposed lack of bold presidential leadership. It didn’t, of course.

Where is Mitt Romney on all of this, you ask? Excellent question…..

…. It’s tiresome having to spend so much time trying to figure out what Romney really believes. If anything, I mean.

Full article here

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ThinkProgress: The 7 Major Issues Mitt Romney Won’t Take A Position On….

1. Romney won’t say whether he would undo Obama’s decision to end deportations of DREAM-eligible immigrants….

2. Romney won’t say whether he’d support the Paycheck Fairness Act…..

3. Romney won’t specify which tax loopholes he’d close….

4. Romney won’t say which federal agencies he’d eliminate….

5. Romney won’t say whether he supports the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act.

6. Romney won’t say whether he’d support full reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act….

7. Romney won’t say whether say whether he’d eliminate the “carried interest” tax break for private equity partners….

Full post here

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Love this from BuzzFeed – ‘Gingrich ditches the press, but no one wants his autograph at the Faith & Freedom Coalition’s meeting in Washington, D.C.’

Look at that line!

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Morning everyone 😉

rise and shine

President Barack Obama boards Air Force One at Bagram Air Field, Afghanistan, as he departs for Washington, D.C., May 1, 2012. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

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President Obama greets hospital personnel in the ICU at Bagram Air Field. The President presented ten Purple Hearts, three in the ICU (Photo by Pete Souza)

More photos here

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Cagle

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Morning everyone, will be back in a while 😉

rise and shine

White House live

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USA Today: President Obama, facing political problems over high gas prices, will announce a plan today “to increase oversight and crack down on manipulation in oil markets,” the White House announced.

“At a time when American consumers are feeling pain at the pump, it is critically important to ensure that illegal manipulation, fraud and market rigging are not contributing to gas price increases,” said the announcement.

Obama, along with Attorney General Eric Holder, is scheduled to discuss the plan at 11:10 a.m.

More here

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Cagle

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ThinkProgress: …. For most women, Romney maintains that a choice to work or to stay at home with the kids should be regarded as equally valid, his campaign made clear last week. But for poor women who receive government assistance, staying home is not an option — they should work….

A passage from Romney’s book, No Apology: The Case For American Greatness, elaborates on this. In it, he argues that children of “nonworking parents” will be conditioned to have “an indolent and unproductive life”…

…. While Romney’s sentiment is understandable and common among conservatives, it doesn’t fit easily with his view that all “all moms are working moms”…. If nonworking mothers on welfare produce “indolent and unproductive” children, then why doesn’t the same hold true for other women?

More here

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First Lady Michelle Obama participates in a Joining Forces event at the Jacksonville Naval Air Station, April 12 (Photo by Lawrence Jackson)

12:00 ET: Michelle Obama delivers remarks at a Democratic National Committee event in Nashville.

3:30: Michelle Obama arrives in Pittsburgh where she will be greeted by service members and their families from the 911th Airlift Wing of the Air Force Reserve Command and the 171st Air Refueling Wing.

4:30: Michelle Obama delivers remarks at a Democratic National Committee event in Pittsburgh.

6:00: Michelle Obama delivers remarks at a Democratic National Committee event in Pittsburgh.

7:45: VP Joe Biden attends a campaign event in D.C.

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Cagle

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NYT: A year ago, few people outside the world of state legislatures had heard of the American Legislative Exchange Council, a four-decade-old organization run by right-wing activists and financed by business leaders. The group writes prototypes of state laws to promote corporate and conservative interests and spreads them from one state capital to another.

The council, known as ALEC, has since become better known, with news organizations alerting the public to the damage it has caused: voter ID laws that marginalize minorities and the elderly, antiunion bills that hurt the middle class and the dismantling of protective environmental regulations.

Now it’s clear that ALEC, along with the National Rifle Association, also played a big role in the passage of the “Stand Your Ground” self-defense laws around the country…..

That was apparently the last straw for several prominent corporations that had been financial supporters of ALEC. In recent weeks, McDonald’s, Wendy’s, Intuit, Mars, Kraft Foods, Coca-Cola and PepsiCo have stopped supporting the group, responding to pressure from activists and consumers who have formed a grass-roots counterweight to corporate treasuries. That pressure is likely to continue as long as state lawmakers are more responsive to the needs of big donors than the public interest.

More here

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President Barack Obama and President Juan Manuel Santos of Colombia participate in a presentation of land titles to the Afro-Colombian community at the Plaza de San Pedro in Cartagena, Colombia, April 15, 2012. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

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Charles Pierce: ….. Not to put too fine a point on it, but the Republican party, root and branch, from its deepest grass roots to its highest levels, has become completely demented. This does not mean that it is incapable of winning elections; on the contrary, the 2010 midterms, as well as the statewide elections around the country, ushered in a class of politicians so thoroughly dedicated to turning nonsense into public policy that future historians are going to marvel at our ability to survive what we wrought upon ourselves.

It is now impossible to become an elected Republican politician in this country if, for example, you believe in the overwhelming scientific consensus that exists behind the concept of anthropogenic global warming. Just recently, birth control, an issue most people thought pretty well had been settled in the 1960s, became yet another litmus test for Republican candidates, as did the Keystone XL pipeline, to which every Republican presidential candidate pledged unyielding fealty despite the fact that several prairie Republicans and an army of conservative farmers and ranchers are scared to death of the thing…..

More here

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Cagle

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Morning everyone (again) 😉

evening all

President Barack Obama walks with Prime Minister Stephen Harper of Canada, left, and President Felipe Calderon of Mexico following their joint press conference in the Rose Garden of the White House, April 2 (Official White House Photo by Chuck Kennedy)

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Ed Kilgore: Every day there’s at least one headline coming across the transom that doesn’t make you laugh, cry, cheer, or think, but simply scratch your head in puzzlement. Today’s winner is from Politico’s Lois Romano: “Ann Romney is the Romney Democrats Fear Most.”

…. Huh! Everybody thinks Ann Romney is a “rock star?” I did not know that. The “political arena” is all abuzz about her? Missed that, too; the buzzing must be confined to weekends, when I kinda check out from politics as much as possible.

…. If you read this long piece, however, it begins to appear that most of the buzzing Romano is hearing is coming from busy bees inside the Romney campaign itself….

….. Perhaps the most revealing thing about the Romneys as a team that Romano’s account mentions is that their handlers can’t decide whether Ann is more valuable on the road as a speaker, or behind the scenes as a steadying influence on the candidate. It sounds like Mitt needs a road manager and a psychologist as much as he needs a dazzling opening act. Indeed, he seems to be a very needy dude….

More here

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Nick Anderson

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rise and shine

Don’t forget, the full version of The Road We’ve Traveled is released tonight (8:0 ET) – sign up here (at OFA) to see it first

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Bloomberg: Claims for jobless benefits dropped last week in the U.S., matching the lowest level in four years, more evidence the labor market is improving.

Applications for unemployment insurance payments fell by 14,000 to 351,000 in the week ended March 10, Labor Department figures showed today. Economists forecast 357,000….

Companies have slowed the pace of firings and are expanding their workforces as sales and confidence improve and the threat of financial contagion from a European default diminishes. A Labor Department report last week showed job growth in February capped the best six months since 2006.

More here

See Steve Benen here on the jobs’ news

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CNN: More veterans are coming back from war and getting back to work in the civilian job force, thanks to efforts by both employers and the government, as well as the improving economy.

The jobless rate for Iraq and Afghanistan veterans has fallen to 7.6%, well below the overall U.S. unemployment rate of 8.3%, and nearly five percentage points below the 12.5% rate for veterans a year ago.

More here

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White House live

11:0 AM: Vice President Biden speaks at a campaign event in Toledo, Ohio (CNN live streaming)

12:30: Jay Carney briefs the press

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Charles Blow (NYT): The Republican Party has a big problem. Huge!

Their likely nominee isn’t much liked by the base of the party. Yet even as he loses primaries in the most conservative parts of the country, he continues to stack up delegates. He is Mitt of the Indomitable Math…. but according to some new polls, the primary season is taking a devastating toll on Romney and the Republican brand as a whole, fueling something of a surge for the president.

The findings of a Pew Research Center poll released Wednesday show that President Obama has steadily increased his lead over Mitt Romney in a hypothetical head-to-head matchup, which now stands at a whopping 12 points, 54 percent to 42 percent. These results echoed a Reuters/Ipsos poll released earlier this week that showed Obama leading Romney by 11 points, 52 percent to 41 percent. As Reuters pointed out, that is “nearly double the margin from February.”

More here

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AFP: Vice President Joe Biden will Thursday seek to set the contours of the 2012 general election, lauding President Barack Obama as a man with a “spine of steel” who fights for the middle class.

Biden will deliver the first of a series of speeches in the swing state of Ohio …. “Ours is a philosophy that values the role of workers in the success of a business, and values the middle class in the success of the economy,” Biden will say, according to excerpts of his speech released by the campaign.

“Stated simply, we’re about promoting the private sector. (Republicans) are about protecting the privileged sector. We’re a fair shot, and a fair shake. They’re about no rules, no risk. And no accountability”…

Biden will also praise Obama for rescuing the US auto industry with an unpopular $80 billion bailout opposed by many Republicans, but which has nursed the iconic sector back to health. “He said, ‘we are not going to give up on a million jobs, and the iconic industry America invented. Not without a fight’.”

“The President and I have a fundamental commitment to dealing the middle class back in to the American economy. And ultimately that’s what this election is all about. It’s about a choice. A system that trusts the workers on the line, instead of just listening to the folks in the suites. That’s a stark choice. To my mind it isn’t a choice at all.”

More here

11:0 AM: Vice President Biden speaks at a campaign event in Toledo, Ohio (CNN live streaming)

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TPM

Thanks Desertflower

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Michael Tomasky on Mitt’s Months of Misery in the Primaries to Come. How long can this go on? Pretty darn long. Take a look at the calendar …. He’ll have lots of time to fix things up, if he is the nominee. But think back about how your own view of Mitt Romney has changed in the last six months. Half a year ago, I’d say most people thought: successful, smooth, maybe a little too smooth, but formidable. Now? He’s a punch line. And a punching bag. And the calendar shows that he’s going to continue to be both for a while yet.

Full post here

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Greg Sargent: You constantly hear top Democrats and neutral commentators warning that Mitt Romney’s embrace of extreme positions on immigration have effectively dashed his hopes of making inroads among Latinos in the general election …. this sentiment is now being privately voiced to the Romney campaign by top Republicans, who worry his lurches to the right are undoing years of GOP outreach to a consistuency whose share of the vote will only grow in the years ahead.

The worry has been prompted by a recent poll showing only 14 percent of Latinos support Romney over Barack Obama…

More here

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President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama talk with Prime Minister David Cameron of the United Kingdom and Mrs. Samantha Cameron on the Truman Balcony of the White House, March 14, 2012. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

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See the rest of the sequence at Messynessychic, it’s flippin’ hilarious

Thanks Loriah

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Thanks Dotster

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Cagle

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Morning everyone 😉

evening all

C-Span

CNN

White House live (audio only)

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Steve Benen: At the most recent debate for the Republican presidential candidates, Mitt Romney wanted to show off his understanding of international affairs, and told the audience that Syria is Iran’s “key ally” and Iranians’ “route to the sea.”

Iran, of course, has 1,520 miles of its own coastline – and doesn’t share a border with Syria….

Today he has an op-ed in the Washington Post, calling for …. shaping a U.S. policy towards Iran that’s “the same as Ronald Reagan’s.”

Um, Mitt? The Reagan administration sold Iran weapons, in violation of an arms embargo, in order to help illegally finance the Contras in Nicaragua…..

More here

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Members of the American Israel Policy Affairs Committee listen to Mitt Romney address the annual policy conference via satellite link at the Washington Convention Center March 6

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Newt Gingrich Falls Asleep on Screen, Asks for Panel’s Questions, But No Panel Exists:

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Editorial Cartoonists

The Week

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rise and shine

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Comedian Bill Maher announced last night that he will donate one million dollars to President Obama’s re-election campaign.  At the end of his groundbreaking comedy special, “CrazyStupidPolitics: Live from Silicon Valley,” which streamed live on Yahoo!, Bill brought out a check, making a personal donation of one million dollars to Obama’s Super PAC, Priorities USA Action. He explained that having a country governed by Barack Obama rather than any of the Republican candidates is “worth a million dollars” and that in his own financial interests, “this is the wisest investment I think I could make.” He also encouraged other wealthy liberals to do the same and give until it hurts.

More at Mediaite

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Washington Post (Editorial): Run to the extreme in the primary, move to the center in the fall: That’s expected. But moving from the cartoon world the Republican presidential candidates have constructed back into three dimensions might prove more difficult.

In their debate Wednesday night, the remaining candidates seemed to be continuing their drift from reality – the reality of a center-right electorate they propose to woo and govern, and of the complexities of the problems they promise to solve.

…. From his perch of thorough hypocrisy – Paul is a master earmarker who preserves his purity by voting against appropriations bills he knows will pass – the Texas congressman declared: “I don’t accept that form of government.”

And, of Santorum, “He is a fake.” No, what’s fake is the two-dimensional canvas they’re presenting to voters.

Full editorial here

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TPM: Mitt Romney’s got a problem. Purple Strategies released their “Purple Poll” on Thursday, data from twelve swing states … “His favorable ratings are just atrocious,” Doug Usher, a managing partner at Purple Strategies said. “You can’t be sitting on 27 percent favorability in the general,” the level Romney is at in their new numbers.

“The best thing that Mitt Romney could actually do is actually run a campaign that said something,” Bruce Haynes, one of the founding partners of Purples Strategies and a veteran of GOP campaigns, told TPM. “It’s a Seinfeld campaign. It’s a campaign about nothing….”

More here

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Robert Shrum: Mitt Romney is pandering so desperately to the far-right fringe that he’s become all but unelectable in November …. As he demonstrated in this debate, he’s so desperate to pander his way to the nomination that he’s making it increasingly worthless.

This may do for the primary – it may be essential – but it’s a disaster in the making for the fall campaign. Romney’s cynical hope has to be that his shape-shifting will convince voters he doesn’t really mean this stuff. He can pray that his character weakness is his saving grace – that his reputation for lying about his beliefs will pull him back from the edge of a gender gap that will otherwise pose an unbridgeable barrier to the White House. The longer the primaries drag on, and the more he has to profess his hostility to women’s rights, the less likely it is that he can ever convince the majority who are women to take a chance on him.

…. From Oklahoma to Ohio, which both vote on March 6, and then onto Wisconsin and across the Midwest, Romney is well behind Santorum in the polls. He will have to keep pandering – and above all, right now, he has to win Michigan.

In the Arizona debate, he may have staunched his bleeding in the primaries, but he opened his veins for November.

Full article here

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Martin Bashir: “Newt Gingrich said he’s going to take oil prices down to $2 or $2.50 – the only thing that Newt Gingrich is very skilled at doing is taking his underpants down in the form of the number of adulteries that this man commits.”

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Steve Rattner (NYT): …. As a presidential aspirant, Mr. Romney evidently hasn’t felt a need to be consistent or specific as to what should have been done to address the collapse of the auto industry starting in late 2008. But the gist is that the government should have stayed on the sidelines and allowed the companies to go through what he calls “managed bankruptcies,” financed by private capital.

That sounds like a wonderfully sensible approach – except that it’s utter fantasy. In late 2008 and early 2009, when G.M. and Chrysler had exhausted their liquidity, every scrap of private capital had fled to the sidelines.

I know this because the administration’s auto task force, for which I was the lead adviser, spoke diligently to all conceivable providers of funds, and not one had the slightest interest in financing those companies on any terms. If Mr. Romney disagrees, he should come forward with specific names of willing investors in place of empty rhetoric. I predict that he won’t be able to, because there aren’t any.

Full article here

Thanks Africa

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A source tells National Confidential that 26 American cars will be arranged by the United Auto Workers to echo Mitt Romney’s infamous “let Detroit go bankrupt” op-ed when he visits Ford Field on Friday. The cars will be on top of a parking garage right across from Ford Field where Romney will be giving a speech to the Detroit Economic Club.

More here

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The Week

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Morning everyone 😉

rise and shine

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Steve Benen: The general trend on initial unemployment claims over the last few months has been largely encouraging, despite occasional setbacks, and most analysts expected this morning’s report to show a modest uptick in filings.

The good news is, that didn’t happen. In fact, initial jobless claims reached a four-year low last week, and the new totals were unchanged this week.

More here

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Greg Sargent: At yesterday’s debate, Mitt Romney and the other candidates went all in on birth control – sorry, “religious liberty” – in blasting President Obama over the contraception controversy…. But some new polling out this morning from Quinnipiac illustrates the risk Republicans are taking with this latest reprise of the culture wars:

President Obama recently announced an adjustment to the administration’s health-care rule regarding religiously affiliated employers providing birth control coverage to female employees. Women will still be guaranteed coverage for birth control without any out-of-pocket cost, but will have to seek the coverage directly from their insurance companies if their employers object to birth control on religious grounds. Do you approve or disapprove of President Obama’s decision?

Approve: 54

Disapprove: 38

Independents approve 56-36; women 56-34.

More here

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Steve Benen: …… Romney added that Obama is “requiring the Catholic Church to provide for its employees and its various enterprises health care insurance that would include birth control, sterilization and the morning-after pill. Unbelievable.”

It is, in fact, literally “unbelievable,” since that’s not at all what the administration is doing.

It was painful enough to have so much of the debate focus on opposition to birth control, but Romney’s dishonesty managed to make a mind-numbing discussion even worse.

Full post here

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TPM (Thanks Desertflower)

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Washington Post

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Ronald Brownstein (National Journal): ….. Some of Romney’s answers could come back to haunt him, not in the primary but in a general election, if he gets that far.

At a time when some Republicans are already concerned that he has narrowed his potential support among Latinos with an unflinching embrace of conservative positions on immigration (like “self-deportation”), Romney doubled down by insisting that on “day one” as president he would drop the federal legal challenge to Arizona’s tough state statute against illegal immigration.

And on the same day that an NBC/Marist poll already showed Romney trailing President Obama by 18 percentage points in Michigan, a state Republicans once hoped to contest this fall, Romney likewise doubled down on his criticism of the auto rescue engineered by Bush and Obama – and sprinkled in some especially sharp rhetoric against the United Auto Workers union for good measure.

More here

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TPM

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ThinkProgress (Thanks Ladyhawke)

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E.J. Dionne: They say that President Obama is a Muslim, but if he isn’t, he’s a secularist who is waging war on religion. On some days he’s a Nazi, but on most others he’s merely a socialist….

Whatever our president is, he is never allowed to be a garden-variety American who plays basketball and golf, has a remarkably old-fashioned family life and, in the manner we regularly recommend to our kids, got ahead by getting a good education.

Please forgive this outburst. It’s simply astonishing that a man in his fourth year as our president continues to be the object of the most extraordinary paranoid fantasies … And now that the economy is improving, short-circuiting easy criticisms, Obama’s adversaries are reheating all the old tropes and cliches and slanders.

….. As for Obama as a socialist, ponder two numbers: 13,005, which the Dow Jones average hit this week, up from a low point of 6,547 in March 2009. Some socialist.

We are blessed with the freedom to say whatever we want about our president. But those who cast Obama as something other than one of us don’t understand him and don’t understand what it means to be American.

Full article here

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The Week

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Nick Anderson

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10:45: PBO departs the White House

1:25 Arrives in Miami, Florida.

1:45: Tours the Industrial Assessment Center at the University of Miami.

2:25: Delivers remarks to University of Miami students and faculty members.

4:20: Delivers remarks at a campaign event at the Biltmore Hotel, Coral Gables, Florida.

5:55: Delivers remarks at a campaign event.

7:00L Departs Miami, Florida en route Orlando, Florida.

8:15: Arrives in Orlando, Florida.

8:55: Delivers remarks at a campaign event.

10:30: Departs Orlando, Florida en route Joint Base Andrews.

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Morning everyone 😉

rise and shine

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Steve Benen: We talked yesterday about why the 2002 Olympic games, run by Mitt Romney, has become an awkward political story for the Republican presidential hopeful. To help drive the point home, consider this clip, uncovered by the estimable James Carter, of Romney discussing the role of taxpayer money to support the games.

….. Not surprisingly, he concluded that the “massive investment” is absolutely worth it. Indeed, in the same clip, Romney went on to thank Utah’s congressional delegation – which was made up entirely of Republican lawmakers at the time – for being “enormously helpful” in securing so many tax dollars for the 2002 Olympics.

More here

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Greg Sargent: Another day, another Romney truth-stretch: Glenn Kessler knocks down the ubiquitous Romney-GOP talking point that Obama pledged that his stimulus plan would hold unemployment below eight percent.

Special bonus dissembling: As Kessler notes, the info to disprove this one is actually available on the Romney Web site…

More here

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McClatchy

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Morning everyone