Washington Extra – ‘Wild ride’ ends
The sharpest debater in the 2012 field of Republican presidential candidates exited the race touting a hodgepodge of initiatives that made his failed race so colorful.
“Suspending the campaign does not mean suspending citizenship,” Newt Gingrich warned in his long-awaited announcement that he was quitting. He then ticked off the vision of America he will continue to pursue as a private citizen:
His fabled U.S. colony on the Moon, holograms in houses, cures for diseases like Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s, not to mention a national energy policy/balanced budget that would free the United States from “radical Islam, Saudi kings and Chinese bondholders.”
The bombastic former Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives brought an element of unpredictability to the Republican presidential nominating contest. His come-from-behind victory in South Carolina in January briefly led some to wonder whether Mitt Romney really could be knocked off.
Not so. As primary defeats began to pile up, Gingrich’s campaign became less about his big ideas and more about the St. Louis zoo penguin who had the nerve to peck at the hand of this notorious animal lover.
“It was a truly wild ride,” a tired-looking Gingrich said as he bowed out, refusing to answer reporters’ questions.
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Washington Extra – Moonshot no more
Earth calling Newt: When the biggest news of your presidential campaign is the penguin biting your hand at the zoo, it’s probably time to pack it in.
Even though Newt Gingrich’s odds of winning the Republican nomination were about as long as those of realizing his dream for a moon colony, the 68-year-old seemed to enjoy himself to the end. “I never got the sense that he was quote-unquote down,” said adviser Charlie Gerow. “I got the sense on a couple of occasions that he was tired. Really tired.” And really in debt. His campaign spent $4.3 million more than it brought in.
For all his offbeat ideas, Gingrich did bring a dose of seriousness to this campaign. With some stellar debate performances and a deep knowledge of politics and history, he probably made Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum study more and work harder to win support.
Members of the media, targets of some of his most vicious attacks, may not miss Newt much. But there’s no denying that, for the world of news, Gingrich was the gift that kept on giving, right up to his encounter with a penguin.
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US high court appears to back Arizona on immigration – Conservative justices who hold a majority on the Supreme Court appeared to endorse Arizona’s immigration crackdown, rejecting the Obama administration stance that the federal government has sole power over those who illegally enter the United States. During 80 minutes of oral arguments, the justices suggested by their questions and comments that states have significant latitude to adopt laws that discourage illegal immigrants from moving to and staying in the country. For more of this story by James Vicini and Joan Biskupic, read here.
Washington Extra – Gift of the gas
After negotiating a tricky stretch of road, the Obama campaign may be easing into the straightaway in the gas-driven presidential race.
News on Monday of a delay in the planned closure of the largest refinery on the East Coast could mean an end to skyrocketing gas prices. And that would effectively take the wind out of a forceful Republican line of attack — that the president is to be blamed for $4 a gallon gas, arguably the most visible price in the American economy today.
The narrative was working against the president, who currently gets some of his lowest poll marks for his handling of energy prices, even though the causes of higher prices are largely beyond his control. Even so, we shouldn’t expect the Republicans to simply drop the rhetoric.
“Until we are at the point where people don’t feel like they’re squeezing their entire paychecks into the gas tank, it’s an issue that Republicans are going to keep talking about,” said a Senate Republican aide.
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Signs of cheaper gas could brighten Obama campaign – New signs of lower gas prices could give a boost to President Obama’s re-election hopes and blunt a potent weapon that Republicans have used to attack him. News of a month long delay in the planned closure of the largest refinery on the East Coast was the latest indication sky-rocketing gasoline prices may have peaked. Industry experts say keeping Sunoco’s Philadelphia refinery open will ease supply concerns and help underpin a gradual decline in gasoline prices during the summer. For more of this story by Alister Bull, read here.
No privilege for most stay-at-home moms -poll
The recent flap over women voters — especially stay-at-home mothers — has sent both Republican and Democratic pundits scrambling and with good reason: many stay-at-home moms aren’t affiliated with either party and are a ripe target for swing votes, a new poll shows.
The survey from Gallup Inc also finds that moms who don’t work aren’t exactly a pampered lot, despite Ann Romney – the wife of a multi-millionaire businessman – being portrayed as their standard bearer. It found most moms who stay home are more economically disadvantaged than their working peers.
Women with more education and those with higher family incomes are far more likely to work after having children than lower-income women and those who have less schooling, the polling firm found.
“It does appear that stay-at-home mothers are more economically disadvantaged than working mothers, rather than more advantaged. And this may be directly related to education,” Gallup said in its poll released this week.
The dust-up over whether women who don’t work and instead stay home with their children are privileged arose last week when Democratic pundit Hilary Rosen made comments that seemed to criticize Ann Romney, whose husband Mitt is one of the wealthiest people to ever seek the U.S. presidency and who has never been employed outside her home.
According to Gallup, which interviewed more than 45,000 U.S. adult women over three months earlier this year, most mothers with children under age 18 work outside the home — 63 percent. Thirty-seven percent stay home.
The survey found 84 percent of moms with young kids who have postgraduate-level education also have a job along with 75 percent of college graduates and 66 percent of those with just some college coursework. That compares with 48 percent of those who have at most a high school education.
Washington Extra – The Romney Doctrine?
When it comes to U.S. presidents and foreign policy, it’s always been a matter of what they do during crises, rather than what they say on the campaign trail.
Running for president in 2000, George W. Bush campaigned against “nation building.” But the terror attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, changed everything, and Bush wound up launching an invasion of Iraq that led to a decade-long war and redefined U.S. foreign policy.
Now, likely Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney is talking tough on foreign policy – and seeking to cast Democratic President Barack Obama as naïve and soft. Romney is promising a “more aggressive” approach toward China, Russia and the Middle East. He says he would swiftly brand Beijing a currency manipulator, refuse to concede to Moscow on nuclear issues and put more emphasis on defending Israel from a potential attack by Iran.
Romney says he would ratchet up the financial pressure on Iran through sanctions, while leaving the option of military action on the table. His campaign clearly wants to give the impression that he might prove more willing than Obama to take military action against Iran’s nuclear program.
So would an attack on Iran really be more likely under a Romney administration? That’s unclear.
What is clear is that this is the campaign season, and that Romney’s rhetoric is an effort to diminish Obama’s foreign policy accomplishments, which – as Democrats will remind you – include killing al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. And while Romney is defining a decidedly hawkish foreign policy, it remains uncertain how he would tackle what his own website calls a “bewildering array of threats and opportunities.”
Bush ran on rhetoric and nation building. Once elected Bush did what was always his plan and that was pre-emptive attack. Obama ran on nation building and has proven that is his foreign policy. Romney has since the beginning of his run this time surrounded himself by Bush advisors, operatives, etc. Romney’s foreign policy of the Romney doctrin is the same as GWBush Doctrin and that is pre-emptive attack. Pre-emptive attack also pre-emptively increases the size of government, increases the deficit, un-justified costs as they are pre-emptive, and increases the defense budget with outside contractors. Romney’s domestic policy also mirrors GWBush policy. Trickle down economics no matter how you cut it. It also focuses solely on cuts and not revenue building. Cuts to the safety net, cuts to most domestic programs. Investments all in defense or defense related areas. I didn’t deem Romney qualified as the GOP nominee in 2008 and I do not now.
Washington Extra – Tea Party poopers
All that Tea Party support in 2010 for the 87 House Republican freshmen seems to have come with a price — and now it’s time to collect.
Representative Michael Grimm found his office filled with activists wanting to know why he hadn’t done more to slash government spending and why he had voted to raise the U.S. debt limit. He too is frustrated, the former Marine told them, but you just can’t shut down government and stop paying the soldiers.
There is Tea Party talk that the freshmen have become corrupted by Washington and part of the bureaucratic fabric that they very much despise. By one account, two-thirds of the freshmen have compromised while only 20 or so have maintained the zero tolerance Tea Party line on spending.
Alas, the Tea Party could end up giving the Republican freshman class of 2010 more grief than the Democrats heading toward the November elections. If 2010 was the year the Tea Party emerged as a political force in Washington, 2012 will be the year that determines whether the movement can live with itself on Capitol Hill.
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Lawyer behind Super PAC ruling launches his own
The conservative lawyer who helped end political spending limits for corporations has now taken advantage of new campaign finance rules that allow “Super PACs” by launching one of his own.
Republican James Bopp, who advised Citizens United in its case to eliminate restrictions on campaign contributions by companies and unions, filed paper work last week with the U.S. Federal Election Commission to create his USA Super PAC.
The move opens the door for the Republican National Committee vice chairman to help boost Mitt Romney just as he solidifies his lead in the party’s primary fight.
Bopp had been the legal muscle for a Super PAC for Romney’s main rival Rick Santorum, called Leaders for Families, but threw his support behind the wealthy former businessman in February. Santorum suspended his campaign on Tuesday.
The Indiana lawyer represents a number of conservative clients including the National Right to Life Committee and Focus on the Family, so his PAC could help steer donations from the more Evangelical wing of the Republican Party. It might also attract former Santorum supporters.
Still, it’s not clear who will donate to one of the latest PACs to emerged since the 2010 Supreme Court ruling on Citizens United vs. FEC or how Bopp will use its funds. Calls to his law firm were directed to his cell phone, which did not allow a voicemail. He did not respond to an e-mail seeking comment.
Hat tip to Reuters reporter Alexander Cohen.
And so we continue to have the best government money can buy. What ever happened to People who went into politics to serve their country.
Now they simply go into Politics to get rich.
Washington Extra: Sayonara Santorum
It began and ended at a kitchen table in Pennsylvania. Rick Santorum’s improbable and surprisingly long run for the White House is over. But the Republican Party will feel the effects of this game-changing gambit cooked up in a kitchen for some time to come.
Santorum offered disgruntled voters true conservative credentials. He brought social issues and religious freedom to the forefront of the national debate. He made Mitt Romney work much harder for the nomination than expected, and lurch to the right in the process. His supporters may not go away quietly or fall behind Romney in lockstep.
Tony Perkins, head of the Family Research Council, already put his demands out there: “If the Republican establishment hopes to generate this same voter intensity in the fall elections, Santorum voters must see it demonstrate a genuine and solid commitment to the core values issues.”
Santo said he was suspending his campaign – which could be interpreted as suspending it until 2015. Surely, he’ll be back. And meanwhile, he needs help covering his campaign debt. He asked today for “one more contribution of $25, $50, or $73.10.”
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The tunnel to political prominence
A new report on the controversy that helped launch New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie to national prominence – and make him a vice-presidential contender – has reignited debate over one of the country’s most popular and polarizing Republicans.
A General Accounting Office report on Tuesday examined the impact of Christie’s decision in October 2010 to cancel a multibillion-dollar rail tunnel linking commuters in his state of New Jersey to midtown Manhattan.
Though the report didn’t reveal any secrets, it gave Christie’s supporters and opponents a new opportunity to define him: as either a maverick fiscal conservative fighting wasteful government, or as a political opportunist willing to trample working people for his political ends.
Christie backs Republican presidential frontrunner Mitt Romney and is frequently mentioned as a possible vice-presidential candidate who could possibly move a Democratic-leaning state into the Republican column in November.
The $8.7 billion Hudson River tunnel project, also known as ARC, would have dug a new rail tunnel under the Hudson river, creating tens of thousands of jobs and meet growing demand for mass transit in the nation’s largest metropolitan area. New York, New Jersey and the U.S. government would have shared the costs.
But the potential for billions of dollars in cost overruns hung over the massive project, and New Jersey taxpayers would have been responsible for most of them.
Estimates varied for much the tunnel would ultimately cost. Christie assumed the most costly estimate in the report to justify its cancellation – and rounded up from $13.7 billion to $14 billion. In short, after the report, the facts remained the same, as did the political spin.
Skipping Super PAC, Santorum backer Friess spends on his own
By Alina Selyukh and Alexander Cohen
Republican Rick Santorum’s main financial backer has gone rogue on the pro-Santorum “Super PAC” with his own, personal spending in support of the U.S. presidential hopeful.
Wyoming millionaire investor Foster Friess has given $1.6 million to the independent political action committee (PAC) backing Santorum – the Red, White and Blue Fund – as its largest donor.
Now he has bypassed the Super PAC and spent $1,176 on a pro-Santorum radio ad entirely on his own, according to a report with the Federal Election Commission posted online on Thursday.
The radio spot went up in Friess’ hometown of Rice Lake in Wisconsin, a state that’s hosting the next contest in the race for the Republican party nomination.
“It’s not a Super PAC, it’s just me doing an independent expenditure,” Friess told Reuters. “I wanted to tell my hometown folks what I know about Rick Santorum and my lawyers said I should report it.”
He said the move did not mean he would stop supporting the Red, White and Blue Fund, calling that financial connection “open-ended.”
