You Have a Pre-Existing Condition? Tough.

MSNBC

Rise and Shine

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Newseum

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Today:

11:15 AM: President Obama and VP Biden honor the 2012 National Association of Police Organizations TOP COPS award winners

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Michelle Obama will deliver the commencement address for North Carolina A&T University’s graduation ceremony – not sure what time this is on. There’ll be live streaming here.

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Two supporters from Montana show their Obama 2012 pride at a base camp on Mt. Everest.

Flickr

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Robert Shrum: Obama’s gay-marriage endorsement is a moral and political win – Pundits are eager to pontificate on how supporting same-sex marriage will cost Obama in November. They couldn’t be more wrong

Forty-nine years ago this spring, as he proposed the landmark civil rights reforms of the 1960s, John F. Kennedy became the first president to declare that ending racial discrimination was a moral issue …. Now Barack Obama has taken the next step in the unfinished journey toward that ideal: He cut through a cacophony of political advice, the calculus of pre-election caution, to become the first president to endorse marriage equality – and thus to affirm that gay rights are fundamental human rights.

It was fitting that this historic moment came, as JFK’s did, from a president who himself had to overcome generations of prejudice to be in the White House in the first place.

…..this president, who has repealed Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, pushed through a hate crimes law, and refused to defend the shameful Defense of Marriage Act has now sealed his legacy as the champion of a 21st century birth of freedom in America.

That should be rewarded, not punished, in November – and I think it will be. Americans are a decent people; sometimes it just takes time.

Full post here

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Cagle

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Morning everyone

rise and shine

OFA

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Today:

12:00: VP Biden attends a campaign event in Santa Barbara, Calif.

12:30: Jay Carney briefs the press.

4:45: PBO welcomes the Wounded Warrior Project’s Soldier Ride to the White House.

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ThinkProgress

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Robert Shrum: As he finally claims the nomination that was his all along, but which was so reluctantly yielded to him, Mitt Romney enters his Etch A Sketch period. He may twist the knobs to try and shift his professed beliefs as easily as the aluminum granules on the screen of one of the last century’s most famous toys. But it’s hard for the epic flip-flopper to reframe himself again – or it should be.

Romney is only doing what comes naturally to a man who once said he was “better” on gay rights than Ted Kennedy, but then later donated $25,000 to the homophobic National Organization For Marriage – through a conduit that was designed to hide his contribution. Romney’s public life across two decades has been a ceaselessly revised Etch A Sketch.

More here

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Quarterback Phillip Sims takes a picture of President Barack Obama as he poses for a photo with members of the BCS National Champion University of Alabama Crimson Tide football team following a ceremony to honor their 14th national championship and their 2011-2012 season, on the South Lawn of the White House, April 19, 2012. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

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Washington Post: LORAIN, Ohio — Just a day after President Obama visited this crucial swing state, Mitt Romney spoke at a shuttered drywall company visited four years ago by then-candidate Obama to make the argument that Obama’s record has yet to live up to his lofty rhetoric.

On an empty warehouse floor, Romney laid the blame for the company’s fate squarely on Obama.

…. The company actually shut down in June 2008, months before Obama took office and his economic policies took effect.

…. Romney campaign aides said that Obama hasn’t delivered on the promise to jump-start the economy.

… But in Ohio, the economy is improving.

With an unemployment rate of 7.6 percent in February, Ohio’s jobless stats are lower than the national average of 8.2 percent. The unemployment rate, which peaked at 10.6 percent in December 2009, has steadily fallen since then — it was at 8.6 percent when Obama took office in January 2009.

More here

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ThinkProgress: If It’s Sunday, It’s Meet The Republican White Men

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ThinkProgress: Yum! Brands, the owner of fast food brands KFC, Taco Bell, and Pizza Hut told Color of Change that they will no longer support the American Legislative Exchange Council, the right-wing front group that, until recently, was a driving force behind state voter suppression and “stand your ground” gun laws. Yum!’s decision means a dozen corporations (plus the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation) have now dropped the conservative group.

More here

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Cagle

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Cagle

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Morning everyone 😉

rise and shine

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Robert Shrum: Will a Tea Party Supreme Court guarantee Obama a second term? The court’s conservative wing appears ready to engage in some despicable judicial activism on ObamaCare….

Recall the scorn toward health reform dripping from the lips of Injustice Antonin Scalia. Or think of the tight-lipped Clarence Thomas, who could send a mannequin to sit in his place at the court’s oral arguments for all the difference his brooding presence makes… Some observers, and administration officials, hold out hope that Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Anthony Kennedy will decide to save health reform from the revanchist claims of right-wing constitutionalism. I’m pessimistic because I lived through Bush v. Gore, when the court acted like a political ward committee…

…. Largely missing from the coverage of the health reform case are the most important consequences of nullifying the law: The tragedy of tens of millions who would again be left without insurance… It took a hundred years to remedy all of this by passing health reform; it could take decades to pass it again….

…. The president certainly doesn’t want to see his landmark achievement, unequaled since the New Deal and the civil rights revolution of the 1960s, left in the judicial dust. But ironically, such a result could rebound to his benefit…. So far, Republicans have been able to demagogue health reform without providing any real plan of their own …. Romney and his party would have to say something more, but they have nothing coherent to offer….

…. I hope my pessimism about a right-wing revolution dressed in judicial robes will be proved wrong …I hope that John Roberts, who at President Obama’s swearing-in couldn’t remember the Oath of Office, at least remembers his own….. I hope for this, but I fear the alternative, a decision that would live in infamy….

…. Perhaps the GOP presidential candidates are right about the boilerplate echoing off the walls at their rallies — that this is “the most important election of our lifetime.” And unless they draw back from the brink, a slim Republican majority on a debased Supreme Court will help Obama win it.

More here

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Cagle

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Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-VT, talks with President Barack Obama onboard Air Force One enroute to Burlington, Vt., March 30, 2012. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

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Link

Link

Woot, Collegekay’s still leading!

Midnight tonight is the deadline for donations, if you can help push Collegekay over the line here’s the link (if you could donate in $3 increments that would be perfect)

Thanks everyone – and good morning 😉

rise and (st patrick’s day) shine

At the Tyler Perry Studios in Atlanta, March 16

See Perry’s introduction here

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The Hill: President Obama will embark on a four-state tour next week to highlight his energy plan amid intensifying GOP attacks on the White House over soaring gas prices.

…. Obama will travel to Nevada, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Ohio on Wednesday and Thursday, and will deliver remarks in all four states. On Wednesday, the president will visit a solar facility in Boulder City, Nev. …. later Wednesday, he will tout the administration’s efforts to expand domestic oil-and-gas production at oil fields in Carlsbad, N.M.

Obama will travel to Cushing, Okla., Wednesday, where he will underscore the administration’s support for a major portion of the Keystone XL pipeline …. Lastly, Obama will speak about energy research at Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio.

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USA Today: St. Patrick’s Day is coming late to Washington this year. The actual “holiday” is Saturday but the White House announced today that President Obama will host Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny on Tuesday.

“The president looks forward to commemorating his fourth St. Patrick’s Day in the White House with the Taoiseach and Mrs. Kenny, and to reciprocating the warm hospitality the Irish people extended to the president and Mrs. Obama during their visit to the Emerald Isle in May 2011,” the White House announcement said.

Also Tuesday, Obama will meet with First Minister Peter Robinson of Northern Ireland. House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, announced he will host Obama, Kenny and other officials at the speaker’s annual Friends of Ireland luncheon, also Tuesday.

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Robert Shrum: Republican voters are now the political equivalent of Mitt Romney’s famously abused dog Seamus. Mitt has put voters on the roof of his car, and he’s driving for the nomination whether they like it or not. More accurately, he’s sputtering toward the nomination as the roof-bound electorate periodically poops on his parade…..

Full post here

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Pic of the week?

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Read Liberal Librarian’s post on The Road We’ve Traveled at The People’s View

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Cagle

The Week

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Morning everyone 😉

rise and shine

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Robert Shrum: ….. unrequited love has transformed Romney’s progress toward the Tampa convention into a rough and rutted road, steadily weakening him for the contest with President Obama, and almost certainly strengthening Democratic chances not just in 2012, but in 2016.

….. Romney is a recurringly hard sell in a political party that has morphed, as one GOP strategist privately puts it, into a sectarian religious party….. The long contest, the constant pandering, and his own tendency to sound like a political incarnation of Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous have taken their toll on Romney as a general election candidate … As the economy improves, Romney’s rationale wanes: Why do we need an out-of-touch, unlikeable, asset-stripping ex-CEO to secure a recovery that’s already underway?

Full article here

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TampaBay.com: Vice President Joe Biden slipped into the bay area for a fundraiser Wednesday, where he cheered for the spirited Republican presidential primary to continue for as long as possible. “God love them, as my mother would say. I hope they have another 20 debates,” Biden told more than 200 people gathered at the Renaissance Vinoy Resort in downtown St. Petersburg.

“…. I have never seen a time in my lifetime when Republicans haven’t tried to hide the ball, to use a sports metaphor – when they said they were ‘compassionate conservatives. We care about health care. We must preserve Medicare,’ etc. They’re not hiding the ball any more at all, guys. God bless them, they’re saying exactly what they believe. This is going to be the starkest choice the American public is going to make in a long, long time.”

….. It may be one of the few times where a candidate walked into a fundraiser wearing one tie and left wearing another. In the $1,000 photo line, one man admired Biden’s red tie. The VP returned the compliment about the man’s purple tie and suggested they trade. They did.

….. Democrats have long complained they can’t distill their campaign theme to a simple bumper sticker phrase. Biden offered one for 2012: “Osama Bin Laden is dead, and General Motors is alive.”

More here

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Cagle

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Morning everyone 😉

evening all

President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden talk following a meeting in the Oval Office, March 2 (Pete Souza)

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A gazillion thank yous to HZ for her wonderful comment (turned-in-to-a-post today at Tien Le’s excellent suggestion) – it was a joyful, constructive, positive breath of fresh air in the middle of all today’s madness. You’re a gem, HZ.

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ThinkProgress

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Don’t miss:

The Atlantic

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Robert Shrum: After Mini-Mitt’s diminutive three-point Michigan “triumph,” which was a little like a Roman general being hailed for a near defeat, how important is Ohio? To put it in Santorian terms, it could be apocalypse two; once more, as in Michigan, Mitt will have to avert the sun darkening and the sky falling on his presidential campaign.

Full article here

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OFA

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Thank you Jenny

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The Week

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President Barack Obama is introduced by Sec. of Interior Ken Salazar before delivering remarks at a conservation event at the U.S. Dept. of Interior in Washington, March, 2

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President Barack Obama walks across the South Lawn upon his return to the White House after visiting wounded service members at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland

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Mitt Romney holds up a baby from the audience at a campaign rally at Cleveland State University, March 2

Just sayin’

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Rick Mania:

Rick Santorum speaks during a campaign stop at Chillicothe High School on March 2, 2012 in Chillicothe, Ohio

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First Lady Michelle Obama embraces members of the Johnson C. Smith ladies’ basketball team during a “Let’s Move!” physical fitness promotion between games at the CIAA basketball tournament in Charlotte, N.C.

Thanks CTGirl

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TOD is up and running on YouTube again after today’s little, eh, setback. Just click the YouTube logo third from the top in the right sidebar and it’ll take you to the channel. I’ll add more of the old videos over the next few days. Hey, this YouTube channel might disappear too …. if it does, well, we’ll just start up another one 😉

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

Thank you Video Queen Donna 😉

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President Barack Obama sits in the cockpit of a 787 Dreamliner during his tour of the Boeing Plant production facility in Everett, Wash., Feb. 17, 2012. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

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President Barack Obama arrives on the South Lawn of the White House after a three day West coast trip, early February 18

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The week ahead:

Monday: No public events.

Tuesday: The President and First Lady will invite music legends and contemporary major artists to the White House for a celebration of Blues music and in recognition of Black History Month as part of their “In Performance at the White House” series.

Wednesday: The President will deliver remarks at the construction site of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture.

Thursday: The President will travel to Miami, Florida, to participate in an official event.

Friday: The President will host Prime Minister Thorning-Schmidt of Denmark for a meeting in the Oval Office.

Thanks Meta

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John McDonough (Boston.com): I’ve written before about the Obama Administration’s breakthrough efforts to fight health care fraud and abuse. Now there’s more, $4.1 billion more.

Earlier this week, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced that the federal government recovered $4.1 billion in taxpayer dollars from individuals and corporations attempting to steal Medicare and Medicaid payments to which they were not entitled.

What’s $4.1 billion? It is the largest amount of money ever recovered, by far, in the history of the programs since they were established in 1965. Here are the numbers from the most recent years….

More here

Thanks amk

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Robert Shrum: The unholy alliance between Catholic bishops and the GOP

Catholic leaders are self-righteously trying to infringe on the liberty of all Americans. And head-in-the-sand Republicans are cheering them on

The Episcopal Church used to be described as the Republican Party at prayer. Today’s GOP has moved far right, and suddenly the Catholic bishops are now the Republican Party in the pulpit.

For many Catholics — and I intermittently try to be part of the church I was raised in — this is a betrayal of their beliefs about the place of faith in public life….

Full post here

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The Week

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Morning everyone – will be back later 😉

evening all

President Barack Obama talks on the phone with British Prime Minister David Cameron in the Oval Office, Feb. 13, 2012. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

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ThinkProgress

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The week ahead:

Tuesday: PBO and the Vice President will meet with Vice President Xi Jinping of the People’s Republic of China at the White House.

Wednesday: PBO will travel to Master Lock in Milwaukee, Wisconsin to continue to discuss his blueprint for an economy built to last based on American manufacturing and the importance of companies insourcing and investing in America. He will then travel to Los Angeles, California where he will attend campaign events. He will spend the night in Los Angeles.

Thursday: PBO will attend campaign events in Corona del Mar, California before traveling to San Francisco, California to attend campaign events. He will spend the night in San Francisco.

Friday: PBO will travel to the Seattle where he will continue to discuss his blueprint for an economy built to last. He will also attend campaign events in the Seattle area before returning to Washington, D.C. later in the evening.

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Business Insider

Thanks Loriah

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TPM

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PoliticalWire: Obama campaign manager Jim Messina rallied local volunteers in Arizona over the weekend by assuring them that Obama intends to compete in Arizona, according to the Arizona Republic.

Said Messina: “People said last time, ‘Oh, you can’t win Virginia,’ until we did. ‘You can’t win Florida,’ until we did. ‘You can never win North Carolina,’ until we did. And so a whole bunch of people are saying, ‘Can he win Arizona? Can he not win Arizona?’ The fact is you all are the secret weapon we have.”

The campaign will soon have four offices in the state.

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The Week

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ThinkProgress

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😆

Thanks Jeremy!

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Pew Research: Barack Obama now holds an eight-point lead over Mitt Romney in a general election matchup, and he has gained significant ground among independent voters. A month ago, 40% of independents said they would back Obama over Romney – today 51% say they would, while the number expressing support for Romney has slipped from 50% to 42%.

More here

Thanks Loriah

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Paul Krugman: Mitt Romney has a gift for words – self-destructive words. On Friday he did it again, telling the Conservative Political Action Conference that he was a “severely conservative governor.”

As Molly Ball of The Atlantic pointed out, Mr. Romney “described conservatism as if it were a disease.” Indeed. Mark Liberman, a linguistics professor at the University of Pennsylvania, provided a list of words that most commonly follow the adverb “severely”; the top five, in frequency of use, are disabled, depressed, ill, limited and injured.

That’s clearly not what Mr. Romney meant to convey. Yet if you look at the race for the G.O.P. presidential nomination, you have to wonder whether it was a Freudian slip. For something has clearly gone very wrong with modern American conservatism.

Full post here

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DCCC

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Thanks What is Working

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The Week

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For newcomers here – welcome! – I’ve added a new section explaining how to comment on the blog. Check the sidebar on the right. Thank you.

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CNN iReport sits down with first lady Michelle Obama to discuss the second anniversary of her Let’s Move initiative.

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Oh go on, one more time……