“this is a man without a core”

December, 2011

“I ran against him in ‘07 and ‘08, I have never seen a guy change his positions on so many things, so fast, on a dime, everything.”

“What will Barack Obama do to that? ….. This is a man (Mitt Romney) without a core, this a man without a substance, this is a man who will say anything to become President of the United States. I think that is a great vulnerability.”

Today?

Guiliani endorsed Romney.

rise and shine

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10:30: The President is interviewed by regional television outlets.

11:25: The President delivers remarks at a campaign event.

12:45 Jay Carney briefs the press.

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Michael Tomasky: Could Obama Be Headed for a Landslide?

Obama’s approval rating is soft, but new polls of South Carolina and Florida show him ahead of Gingrich and Romney. Michael Tomasky asks: could the GOP be headed for disaster?

How can Barack Obama, as this new NBC/Marist poll has it, be beating Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney in South Carolina, of all places? …. Is it conceivable that 10 months and three weeks from now, Obama could actually win the state? If it happens, we will know that the Republicans are headed off the cliff. And that is precisely where we should all hope they go.

…. now let’s look at the Florida numbers from the NBC/Marist poll. There Obama is beating both Romney and Gingrich by outside the margin of error. He leads Romney 48-41 and Gingrich 51-39.

…. if Obama holds Florida, he can afford to lose Ohio, North Carolina, Virginia, Indiana, Nevada, New Mexico, and either Michigan or Pennsylvania, and still rack up a winning 270 electoral votes. But of course, if he’s winning Florida, he’s likely not losing any of those other states, with the exception of Indiana….

Ten months and three weeks is a long, long time. But today’s poll suggests that a wipeout of such proportions is not unimaginable….

Full post here

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Washington Post: Against the backdrop of a tightening Republican presidential contest, much of the hierarchy of President Obama’s campaign is decamping from Chicago to Washington on Tuesday for a high-profile debriefing on the the state of the president’s reelection effort.

…. At the top of the list is an erratic Republican presidential field roiled by the ascent of Newt Gingrich, whom the Democrats view as a weak challenger to the president. They also take some credit for the Gingrich surge, because it appears to have partly been a result of a devastating video attack on Mitt Romney produced by Obama’s longtime admaker.

A speech by Obama last week in Kansas – a searing attack on GOP economic policies – was hailed by one liberal critic as the “most important economic speech of his presidency.” This week, Obama is celebrating the end of the U.S. war in Iraq, making good on one of this central campaign promises. Even the unemployment rate has dipped.

….. senior Obama advisers and supporters are cautiously pointing to signs that perhaps the president’s fortunes have turned a corner. Among their favorites: the laundry list of politically tricky statements that front-runners Romney and Gingrich have made during the Republican race….

Full article here

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Politifact

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NY Daily News: Julianne Moore didn’t bring her research on Sarah Palin home with her ….. the flame-haired actress told us she “read every single thing” she could about the Grizzly Mama and “watched every interview” in order to prepare for her role as the former Alaska governor in next spring’s HBO mini-series, “Game Change.”

But when we asked Moore if she’d developed a newfound respect for Palin after delving deeper into her life, the actress, 51, raised an eyebrow and sighed deeply. “No,” she said quietly.

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Rudy Giuliani to Piers Morgan: “My gut tells me right now as I look at it that Gingrich might actually be the stronger candidate, because I think he can make a broader connection than Mitt Romney to those Reagan Democrats…You won’t have this barrier of possible elitism that I think Obama could exploit pretty effectively.”

Poor Mitt 😆

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Morning everyone 😉

still ‘soft on terror’?

You have to love John McCain wondering out loud if “this is a man who has what it takes to protect America from Osama bin Laden”?

2008:

2011:

loss

Robert Peraza, who lost his son, Robert, pauses by his son’s name at the north pool at the 9/11 memorial site

Paul Krugman: ….. What happened after 9/11 – and I think even people on the right know this, whether they admit it or not – was deeply shameful. The atrocity should have been a unifying event, but instead it became a wedge issue. Fake heroes like Bernie Kerik, Rudy Giuliani, and, yes, George W. Bush raced to cash in on the horror. And then the attack was used to justify an unrelated war the neocons wanted to fight, for all the wrong reasons.

A lot of other people behaved badly. How many of our professional pundits – people who should have understood very well what was happening – took the easy way out, turning a blind eye to the corruption and lending their support to the hijacking of the atrocity?

The memory of 9/11 has been irrevocably poisoned; it has become an occasion for shame. And in its heart, the nation knows it.

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What do you think of Krugman’s views?

night everyone

A very, very, very big thank you again to Henry VIII (!) for visiting us today (here) – thrilled to have you here, Mr Healy!

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Bye bye Muppets, hello the Living Dead…..

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Worried about Huntsman?

Nate Silver: …. polling worse than Mr. Gingrich was Mr. Huntsman. About half of the views Republicans expressed about Mr. Huntsman were negative, producing an Unacceptably Index of 51 percent.

Thank you Suzanne

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See you tomorrow 😉

the laughs just keep on coming…..

CBS: Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani is considering a bid for the Republican nomination for president and could make an announcement soon…The conservative Weekly Standard cites “two reliable sources” who tell editor William Kristol that Giuliani sees parallels between his 1989 mayoral race loss and victory in the next election with his loss in 2008 and the current race.

…Kristol says this time Giuliani would go head to head with New Hampshire front-runner Mitt Romney and then try to garner enough electoral votes in delegate rich states like New York, New Jersey and California. “It seems implausible that Rudy Giuliani could win the nomination. But it’s an implausible year,” Kristol wrote.

muppet show update

Steve Benen: … former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, whose 2008 presidential campaign was remarkable in its ineptitude, hasn’t ruled out trying again. “My major goal is to elect a Republican in 2012,” he said over the weekend. “If it turns out that I’m the best one to do that, I can probably be talked into doing it or convince myself to do it.”

Washington Post: Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich will announce his plans to pursue the presidency in 2012 on Wednesday, according to spokesman Rick Tyler.

President Obama reacts to the news:

new york

Ground zero is seen from the north side of the site, May 5

President Obama boards Air Force One at the Andrews Air Force Base en route to New York

JFK

Marine One lands with President Obama at the Wall Street Landing Zone in New York

A Coast Guard boat patrols near the landing zone as President Obama arrives in New York

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President Obama and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani meet with firefighters and first responders at Engine 54, Ladder 4

President Obama views a memorial honoring deceased members of the FDNY at Engine 54 Fire House

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A poster in tribute to New York City Fire Fighters hangs on a phone booth outside the World Trade Center site, May 5

President Obama meets with police officers and first responders at the First Precinct

President Obama walks with, from left, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Port Authority Chairman David Samson, as they arrive for a wreath laying ceremony at the World Trade Center site

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President Barack Obama meets with Avery Wall, left, and Payton Wall, whose father died in the attacks at the World Trader Center

President Obama hugs Diane Wall, whose husband Glen Wall perished in the twin towers on September 11

President Barack Obama’s motorcade heads across Barclay St after his visit to Ground Zero