NYT Editorial: … From the beginning of his run for the Republican nomination, Mr. Romney has offered to transfigure himself into any shape desired by an audience in order to achieve power. In front of massed crowds or on television, he can sound sunny and inclusive, radiating a feel-good centrism. His “severely conservative” policies and disdain for much of the country are reserved for partisans, donors and the harsh ideologues who clutter his party’s base. This polarity is often described as “flip-flopping,” but the word is too mild to describe opposing positions that are simultaneously held.
…. He hasn’t abandoned or flip-flopped from the severe positions that won him the Republican nomination; they remain at the core of his campaign … All he’s doing is slapping whitewash on his platform. The immoderation of his policies, used to win favor with a hard-right party, cannot be disguised.
…. There isn’t really a Moderate Mitt; what is on display now is better described as Convenient Mitt. Anyone willing to advocate extremism to raise money and win primaries is likely to do the same to stay in office.
President Barack Obama greets neighbors outside the home of William and Endia Eason in Cleveland, Ohio, Jan. 4, 2012
(Despite having the latest version, I can’t see these Videopress videos with Firefox any more, but I can with Safari. What’s up with Firefox?!)
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NYT: For the first time in many years, manufacturing stands out as an area of strength in the American economy.
When the Labor Department reports December employment numbers on Friday, it is expected that manufacturing companies will have added jobs in two consecutive years. Until last year, there had not been a single year when manufacturing employment rose since 1997.
David Rothkopf (Foreign Policy): …. the Obama track record on many fronts is much better than the administration gives itself credit for. They could be doing much, much more to tout what is an impressive litany of successes.
While the list of those successes is long and compelling-defeating Bin Laden, getting out of Iraq, helping to oust Qaddafi, restoring our reputation internationally, resetting our international priorities to better coincide with our long term interests (the “pivot” to a focus on Asia), producing meaningful healthcare reform, producing significant financial services reforms, stopping the downward spiral in the economy and laying the foundations of recovery, etc. – let me focus on three areas that deserve much more attention and appreciation ….. ** See article **
…. the president is actually doing remarkably well in the world’s toughest job right now, and he is and has been doing so under truly extraordinarily adverse circumstances. This is one of those circumstances in which the substance is better than the PR – and it’s time for the White House’s political and communications brain trust to get out a clean sheet of paper and begin to make new and better plans for claiming the credit the Obama team deserves.
Jonathan Cohn: Should President Obama use the recess appointment power when Republicans in Congress refuse even to consider his nominees? You better believe it.
Not only are Republicans blocking Obama’s nominations at a record rate. They are doing so in order to impose their own ideological agenda and, in some cases, to undermine duly passed laws they don’t like but can’t repeal.
That’s a modern-day form of nullification … Obama would be derelict in his duties if he did not use every inch of executive branch authority to overcome it.
…. based on a series of conversations today, I think Obama was within his rights after all.
TPM: Mitt Romney’s tax plan is more complex than those of his current and erstwhile primary competitors. But in broad effect it accomplishes the conservative goal of dramatically lowering taxes on the wealthy at the expense of the lower and middle classes.
ABC: President Obama has crossed off 60 percent of his 2008 campaign promises from his to-do list, he told supporters in Los Angeles Monday as he asked them to help him check off the remaining items.
“I keep a checklist in my desk, and I kind of see, all right, I made a bunch of these promises during the campaign and let me see, yes, I got that done and that one, yes. No, that one’s not done yet. So we’ve got about 60 percent done in three years”….
The president listed health care reform, the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” and passing consumer protections among the promises that he has fulfilled.
“A lot of the things that we promised we’d do, we’ve done… we’ve made great progress, but we’ve got so much more work to do” …. Items left on the president’s agenda include comprehensive immigration reform, passing energy policy “that makes sense” and, of course, fixing the economy.
To check off the remaining 40 percent, the president said lawmakers will have to put politics aside. “Obviously, in Washington, the politics that I think people are hoping for is not what they’re getting. It’s still dysfunctional, it’s still perversely partisan. You still have folks who seem to be more interested in the short term and the party and elections than they are in the long term and the future and the next generation”….
Loop 21: Even though they can barely hear over the echo from their empty wallets, unemployed people are still shouting “Yes We Can!” apparently.
The Associated Press has found that President Obama still receives tons of support from the jobless, even as Republicans attempt to blame him for high unemployment and after blocking his jobs bill.
A study conducted by the AP shows that people living in the most economically distraught areas with the highest unemployment rates are still donating money to Obama’s re-election campaign. In fact, they are actually donating more than they were in 2008 during Obama’s first presidential campaign and right before the recession hit.
Detroit for example, even with a 14% unemployment rate, wrote more checks to the campaign than it did in 2007. Even though the amounts are smaller (Obama’s website allows people to donate as low as $10), they all still add up eventually.
….. his plan, like all flat-tax plans, is a gussied-up way of stealing money from the working and middle classes and handing it to the rich…..
…. whether Perry revives his candidacy or not, the real issue here is that a flat tax or something like it is getting ever so closer to becoming GOP dogma. Some years ago, it was just the messianic loons: Steve Forbes. Now the flat tax is mainstreaming within the GOP. Mitt Romney, who used to hate it, has recently opened up to the idea. It’s getting … respectable.
Simplicity is for simpletons: a handy slogan for the ruling class that wants more of your money. Don’t be that simple.
President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama talk with Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny and his wife, Fionnuala Kenny, in the Green Room of the White House before a St. Patrick’s Day reception, March 17, 2011. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)
Irish Independent: US President Barack Obama will touch down in Ireland for a 24 hour visit on Monday morning. College Green, Dublin will now be the venue for a mass rally on Monday evening, where the President will address the crowd and there will be performances from Irish acts…
The President and his wife Michelle will be greeted by Taoiseach Enda Kenny when Air Force One touches down at Dublin Airport at 9.30 am on Monday. He will travel to the Phoenix Park and Aras an Uachtaran where President Mary McAleese will hold a formal reception.
He will then travel across the Park to Farmleigh where he will meet the cabinet. A visit to Monegall in Co Offaly is scheduled for the afternoon and it is thought the President will travel there by helicopter to visit his ancestral home, before returning to the capital for 5 pm and the concert and rally at College Green. President Clinton held a similar rally at the same location during his visit to Dublin in 1995.
The Obama Diary 
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