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 It seems that a little whining won't spoil the relationship between John McCain and Phil Gramm.
Columnist Robert Novak reports that Gramm will stay on as a McCain adviser and surrogate. This comes after McCain repudiated his buddy for the former Texas senator's recent impolitic comments about America being "nation of whiners" and in a "mental recession."
The patch-up might come as a surprise to Carly Fiorina, the ex-Hewlett-Packard chairwoman who is a top advisor to McCain. In a damage-control effort, Fiorina on Sunday declared, "I don't think Sen. Gramm will any longer be speaking for John McCain, and I think John McCain was crystal clear about that."
And with McCain and Gramm making up, the Barack Obama campaign was handed another opportunity to go on the attack.
The Obama camp issued a statement that McCain's economic plan "gives nearly $4 billion in tax breaks to the oil companies but doesn't provide any tax relief to more than 100 million middle-class families. But that shouldn't come as a surprise since today we learned that Phil Gramm will continue to advise Senator McCain on economic policy despite calling Americans struggling in this economy 'whiners.' "
-- Stuart Silverstein
Credit: Karin Cooper / Associated Press
No wonder everyone wants to be the candidate of change. In a new Time/Rockefeller Foundation poll, 85% of those who replied believe that the country is on the wrong track.
Among blacks and Latinos, dissatisfaction levels are even higher: the figure among blacks is 96% and among Latinos it's 88%.
The solution? As Time reports, the public seems to want big government. In the poll, 82% favor public works projects and 70% say more government programs should help people now struggling.
In the meantime, families are tightening their budgets. Nearly two-thirds of those surveyed -- 64% -- said they cut entertainment or vacation expenses this year.
-–Stuart Silverstein
ABC's "This Week": California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on the presidential campaign, wildfires and gasoline prices (taped Friday); round table with Richard Sten gel (Time magazine) and Donna Brazile, Cokie Roberts and George Will (ABC News).
CBS' "Face the Nation": (UPDATE: CBS has added Ed Gillespie, counselor to President Bush, to the guest list talk about former press secretary Tony Sunday, who died Saturday of cancer.) Sallai Meridor (Israeli ambassador to the U.S.); Sens. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee; Roger Simon, chief political columnist, Politico. Topics are Iran, Iraq and the presidential campaign.
CNN's "Late Edition": The presidential campaign: Sens. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) and Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), Govs. Mark Sanford (R-S.C.) and Janet Napolitano (D-Ariz.) and Nancy Pfotenhauer (McCain economic advisor) and Jason Furman (Obama economic advisor). Iraq: Iraqi national security advisor Mowaffak Rubaie.
"Fox News Sunday": T. Boone Pickens, on his energy plan.
NBC's "Meet the Press": Carly Fiorina (McCain Victory 2008 chairwoman) and Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.), national co-chair of Obama campaign, on the presidential campaign. Round table with former Rep. Harold Ford Jr., GOP strategist Mike Murphy and Andrea Mitchell of NBC News.
-- Andrew Malcolm
This is another in The Ticket's continuing series of items called In His/Her Own Words, in which we dedicate the entire story to the full text of someone's remarks in politics.
Recent Ticket Word items have included Hillary Clinton speaking about Barack Obama, Obama explaining his view of lapel flag pins and Clinton, Obama and John McCain talking about one another at the end of the primary season.
This one is the complete text of Sen. McCain's first weekly radio address today, intended as a regular feature of his general election campaign to become president -- and to get the chance to give his own weekly presidential radio addresses that not that many people actually listen to but that have become a regular PR tool for White House residents for putting out a particular message they want to be seen/heard talking about.
Here's the text of today's McCain radio remarks:
"Good morning. I'm John McCain, and this week I've been on the road in Colorado, Ohio, Michigan, Minnesota, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. I've been holding town hall meetings to talk over the subject on most everyone's minds these days -- our slowing economy.
"More than 400,000 Americans have lost their jobs since December, and the rate of new job creation has fallen sharply. Americans are worried about the security of their current job, and they're worried that they, their kids and their neighbors may not find good jobs and new opportunities in the future.
"It's a big problem when gasoline, food and other necessities of life carry the price tag of luxury goods, and that's what it feels like to millions of Americans.
"I have a plan to grow this economy, and it starts with getting a handle on the cost of gasoline and regaining America's energy ...
Read more In his own words: John McCain on taxes, earmarks, the economy »
For some reason, we're having trouble shaking the image of a toreador, el toro and a little pas de deux.
While John McCain was focusing on businesswomen in Wisconsin today, Barack Obama made energy the theme in a talk before about 1,300 people at the Stivers School for the Arts in Dayton, Ohio, with our colleague Louise Roug in atten dance.
There wasn't much new in Obama's rhetoric on the subject, but there was one moment that jumped out, and reminded us of earlier speeches in which Obama used the same tactic. It points up a problem facing McCain, who has nurtured an image as a maverick despite spending the last quarter-century -- longer than his military service -- in Congress, first in the House and now in the Senate.
Obama's tactic is to wait for McCain to throw a rock at how Washington works, and the failed policies, and then chain McCain to his own political history. This is how it played out this morning: "Now, a few days ago, Sen. McCain said, and I'm quoting, 'Our dangerous dependence on foreign oil has been 30 years in the making, and was caused by the failure of politicians in Washington to think long-term about the future of the country.' I couldn't agree more. John McCain is exactly right. The only problem is that out of those 30 years of inaction, John McCain was one of the most powerful [men] in Washington for twenty-six of them. And in that time he has achieved little to help reduce our dependence on foreign oil. He voted against raising our fuel mileage standards when it could have made such a difference over the last decades and joined George Bush in opposing legislation twice in the last year that included tax credits for more efficient cars.'
McCain, Obama said, also "voted against alternative sources of energy. Against clean biofuels. Against solar power. Against wind power. Against an energy bill that represented the largest investment in renewable sources of energy in the history of this country."
You get the idea. Obama slides into the rhythm that sets him up for the insertion of the rhetorical blade (which may be what got us conjuring up images of a bullfight): "When John McCain talks about the failure of politicians in Washington to do anything about our energy crisis, understand that John McCain should look in the mirror because he has been a part of that failure."
As we've pointed out before, having a relatively limited voting record can be a good thing in the presidential bullring.
(UPDATE: No campaign utterance comes without pushback, in this case somewhat tangential to the point of the post, Obama's tactic of using McCain's statements to propel a counter-offensive. From McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds: "Barack Obama is the quintessential definition of what's wrong with Washington. Today Barack Obama claimed to be for change, while touting his own vote for the Bush-Cheney energy bill, that's just the type of Washington-style spin and empty rhetoric that John McCain has fought against his whole career.")
-- Scott Martelle
Photo by Cesar Rangel / AFP-Getty Images
Well, news on the the mortgage crisis front just keeps getting worse, but there's a bit of a silver lining -- Barack Obama and John McCain agree that mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are in trouble.
Of course, there's a little more space between them on what to do about it.
Reporters asked McCain about Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac during a Thursday avail in Belleville, Mich., west of Detroit, and he repeated his belief that "they must not fail." But a federal bailout? Not so fast: "I will be looking at all the options ... and at this time I don’t think that there is a requirement for a government bailout. So we will have to discuss the options that are available in order to keep it viable. And that’s what I would hope that we could do with various experts and people of knowledge throughout the country."
Obama, whose theme Thursday was the women's vote -- including an appearance with Hillary Clinton -- didn't get that question from his traveling press crew. That's primarily because he didn't take any questions from his traveling press crew (those pesky reporters -- they keep wanting to ask about things that aren't on the daily script).
But Obama advisor Jason Furman issued a statement that Obama believes "the challenges facing Fannie and Freddie are part of the broader weakness in our economy." He blamed President Bush, saying "willful neglect" by the White House of trouble in the housing market and other sectors of the economy let the problems fester to crisis stage. Then he pushed Obama's call for immediate congressional action to help homeowners caught in the bind, and at risk of foreclosure.
But a government bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac? A little closer than McCain -- maybe. "Obama believes we must maintain the flow of capital for mortgages and protect homeowners from foreclosure," Furman said.
Whatever that means. We asked the campaign if Obama thinks a bailout should be in the cards. We'll update when we hear back. And meanwhile, The Swamp takes a look at the foibles of Fannie and Freddie, too. And here are some details on exactly what Fannie and Freddie do.
UPDATE: Obama spokesman Bill Burton just released this statement, which essentially repeats Furman's comment and doesn't address the issue of federal intervention: "Sen. Obama has long believed we should take all necessary steps to ensure affordable home ownership for millions of American families, and that includes an essential role for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Nearly a year ago, Sen. Obama called for a major response to the housing crisis and significant relief for struggling homeowners. It took Sen. McCain three different tries to figure out a real response to the housing crisis, and his current plan does nothing to help more than two million homeowners who are facing foreclosure."
-- Scott Martelle
Lord save the presidential candidates from their allies, Chapter Two.
Last week, it was Barack Obama who saw his carefully crafted speech on patriotism overshadowed because backer Wesley Clark had made a controversial statement about John McCain getting shot  down as a fighter pilot during the Vietnam War.
Today, it was McCain's turn to watch as his recent effort to show he understands the economic hard times that many Americans are experiencing got stepped on by an old friend and top advisor.
In an interview with the Washington Times, former Texas Sen. Phil Gramm termed the current economic slowdown "a mental recession."
He added: "We may have a recession; we haven't had one yet."
And then he showed why his own presidential bid in 1996 quickly crashed and burned, calling the United States "a nation of whiners."
Obama, campaigning in Virginia, recognized the gift that had been handed him. Referencing the "mental recession" remark, he said Gramm "didn’t say this, but I guess what he meant was, 'It’s a figment of your imagination, these high gas prices.' "
He continued: "Sen. Gramm then deemed the United States, and I quote 'a nation of whiners.' "
Milking the moment for all it was worth as his crowd both laughed and booed, Obama delivered a punch line that gave the cable networks one of the day's prime sound-bites: "I want all of you to know that America already has one Dr. Phil, we don’t need another one."
McCain distanced himself from his blunt-spoken supporter at a news conference in Michigan.
"I don’t agree with Sen. Gramm," he said. "I believe the person in Michigan that just lost his job isn’t suffering from a mental recession. I believe the mother ... who is trying to get enough money to educate her children, isn’t whining. America is in great difficulty.
"Phil Gramm does not speak for me," McCain said. "I speak for me. I strongly disagree."
McCain later came up with his own sound-bite. Asked whether Gramm was a contender to head the Treasury Department in a McCain administration, he cracked: "I think that Sen. Gramm would be in serious consideration for ambassador to Belarus, although I’m not sure the citizens of Minsk would welcome that."
Gramm apparently has no interest in another government job, because he ...
Read more Phil Gramm's 'whiners' comment causes John McCain a headache »
Tom Petruno, The Times' ace business reporter and editor, recently wrote: "The debate over whether we are, or aren't, actually in a recession will go on, but to some analysts there's no question anymore. Merrill Lynch & Co. economist David Rosenberg says the lesson from history is that 'you don't have six consecutive monthly declines in payrolls and not be in an outright recession.' "
John McCain, like the fellow Republican he's seeking to replace in the White House, has been reluctant to use the R-word, even as he increasingly focuses on topic No. 1 for most Americans -- the sputtering economy.
Today, McCain pretty much threw in the towel when asked on MSNBC whether these are recessionary times.
"I would imagine that, technically, there is some question amongst economists about that, but the fact is Americans are hurting, they are hurting badly,'' he said.
He continued (a bit awkwardly), "If we're technically in a recession or not, I would imagine that we are, but the major thing is that Americans are hurting and Americans don't like it and they think America is in the wrong direction.''
Mark Silva has more on McCain's appearance in this item on The Swamp.
-- Don Frederick
As Barack Obama and John McCain take their sweet time settling on running-mate choices, one result is that the net cast in the inevitable guessing game gets wider and wider.
As The Times' Doyle McManus aptly put it in a recent overview on the plethora of vice-presidential prospects: "Never in modern memory have so many eminent people been mentioned for a job that has been compared -- unfavorably -- to a bucket of warm spit."
In the spirit of such speculation, veteran political journalist Paul West this weekend spotlighted two possibilities -- one for Obama, the other for McCain -- who definitely would be surprise picks.
For the Democrats, West offered up Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island.
In a definite understatement, West writes that Reed "isn't flashy, and he wouldn't upstage the star." But here's the core of the case he makes for the lawmaker with virtually no national profile: "He's a Catholic with working-class roots (his father was a school janitor) and could enhance the ticket's appeal to those swing voters. He has expertise on issues at the center of the campaign debate: economics and the housing crisis.
"More important, he would offset Obama's lack of national security experience. Reed, 58, has a reputation as a serious thinker and is a respected voice on defense matters. He's a West Point graduate and Army Ranger with views that are right in line with Obama's. He voted against the 2002 Iraq war resolution and became an early critic of the way the war was fought while working to increase the size of the Army."
For the Republicans, West goes one better in the obscurity department -- dropping the little-known name of Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. He notes: "On a personal level, Huntsman and McCain both have adopted children from Asia. (Huntsman's are from China and India; McCain's is from Bangladesh.) Their moderate-conservative political views are in sync, and Huntsman has gone out of his way to praise McCain's stance on immigration reform."
West's complete piece, in which he also says that Bill Clinton's 1992 selection of Al Gore "is widely regarded by strategists in both parties as the best vice-presidential pick in at least 20 years," can be read on The Swamp blog.
--Don Frederick
New job numbers out today evidence more pain -- some of it to be felt around here -- with companies cutting 62,000 payroll slots in June, the sixth consecutive month the economy has shed jobs. The cuts were slightly more than the 60,000 economists had expected, and the unemployment rate held steady at 5.5 %.
The Labor Department announcement elicited dueling statements from John McCain and Barack Obama, pasted in full after the jump. But in a nutshell, McCain says the federal government must "enact policies to create jobs today. To get our economy back on track, we must enact a jobs-first economic plan that supports job creation, provide immediate tax relief for families, enact a plan to help those facing foreclosure, lower health care costs, invest in innovation, move toward strategic energy independence and open more foreign markets to our goods."
Obama cited the 438,000 jobs lost this year and similarly called for immediate action, but a different prescription: "I'm calling on Congress and the President to enact real, immediate relief with energy rebates for working families this summer, a fund to help families avoid foreclosure, extended benefits for the long-term jobless, and assistance to states that have been hard-hit by the economic downturn."
McCain is in Mexico today, and apparently will be unveiling a new "Jobs First" agenda in Denver on Monday, an ironic confluence the Democrats have been working hard to spotlight,including an email from the Democratic National Committee's Brad Woodhouse to reporters suggesting "maybe for his own sake [McCain] should stop going to places like Michigan and telling folks their jobs aren't coming back while going to Mexico and promoting Jobs First - just a thought."
-- Scott Martelle
Read more John McCain and Barack Obama agree: Act now on job losses »
The Republican National Committee has spun off its own independent expenditure committee and plans an initial $3 million ad buy targeting Barack Obama in Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, Politico reports.
Why the separate group?
Brad Todd, who will run the effort, blamed Obama in a statement to Politico: "Following Barack Obama's decision to become the only major party presidential candidate in history to not adhere to campaign spending caps, the Republican National Committee has begun an independent expenditure campaign in accordance with FEC regulations."
Under federal law there are no limits on how much the group can spend, though it cannot coordinate efforts with John McCain's campaign or the RNC. Still, both have helped to raise some of the funds that will launch the new effort.
So now we know where the RNC will be funneling some of its cash advantage over the Democratic National Committee to try to compensate for the record-breaking fundraising Obama has enjoyed. And the decision to target those Rust-Belt states underscores the GOP view that Obama is vulnerable in that part of the nation. Three of the four -- Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin -- went Democratic in the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections.
Lot of white working-class men and women in those states, which account for 68 electoral votes.
-- Scott Martelle
Further evidence that the economy is taking a severe beating: Starbucks is closing 600 outlets and could cut 12,000 jobs as customer visits have declined. True addicts see Starbucks coffee as their lifeblood but for most people it's a luxury, and with the economy moribund and a gallon of gas costing more than a la tte, people are deciding it's a luxury they can do without.
Now we're sure there will be snarky comments posted here about Barack Obama supporters going into withdrawals, shaking behind the wheel of their Volvos. But 12,000 cut jobs is a big hit, and judging by the staffs you see at the stores, it will put a lot of college kids, or young adults in that general age group, out of work. Add them to the already unemployed construction workers, auto workers -- just fill in the blank ________.
Yes, the Iraq war is a crucial issue for the nation, and the world. But poll after poll shows that at least for now, four months away from election day, it's the economy that has people's attention. And news like this will keep it alive until the picture improves.
The question for Obama and John McCain is who can forge the better -- or at least more convincing -- policy proposals.
-- Scott Martelle
John McCain has been trying hard of late to link Barack Obama with Jimmy Carter in the public consciousness, hoping that the "ineffectual" label that many voters affix to the former president will prove transferable.
 But Grover Norquist -- the conservative activist who specializes in promoting an anti-tax agenda and, more generally, revels in the role of agent provocateur -- is offering a different comparison.
Norquist dropped by The Times' Washington bureau today and, as part of his negative critique of Obama's liberal stances on economic issues and other matters, he termed the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee "John Kerry with a tan."
Since Norquist isn't running for anything, he can get away with such remarks; we doubt McCain will be incorporating the line into his speeches anytime soon.
Norquist's clout on the right is such, however, that McCain and his aides will pay attention to his thoughts on who would fit well in the second spot on the GOP's presidential ticket. And in his chat with Times' reporters and editors, he was especially high on Bobby Jindal, the recently elected governor of Louisiana.
Norquist touted Jindal's success in pushing through tax-cut and ethics reform legislation during his short tenure as Louisiana's chief executive (no mention was made of the flap surrounding the governor for failing, so far, to live up to a promise to block a pay raise for state legislators).
Nominating Jindal for vice president also would generate a mother lode of contributions for Republicans from Americans of East Indian descent, Norquist predicted.
Another recipient of kind words as a veep prospect was Gov. Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota; Norquist praised his record on taxes save for one "mistake" -- approving a hike in state cigarette taxes in years past.
Norquist's most recent book is entitled "Leave Us Alone," which makes the case that Republicans can put together a post-Ronald Reagan governing coalition by appealing to voters who want government to stay out of their affairs.
Along those lines, he predicted that one reason conservative radio talk show hosts will rally behind McCain -- who many of them have been cool toward -- is that some Democratic leaders are advocating a return of the "fairness doctrine." That's the abandoned federal rule that required broadcasters to give equal time to opposing political viewpoints.
[UPDATE: John Kartch, Norquist's director of communications, e-mailed Friday with "two concerns" about the post. "One, it suggests that Grover was singling out Kerry. The entire statement was that Obama had no policy differences with Carter in 1980, [Walter] Mondale, [Michael] Dukakis, [Al] Gore or Kerry. 'Kerry with a tan,' was simply Kerry was the latest of the string. Two, to be fair to Kerry, Grover pointed out that even Kerry's reputation as a snob never went as far as Obama's contemptuous comment on middle America "clinging" to its guns and faith.]
-- Don Frederick
Photo credit: Associated Press
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer today defended a California Democrat facing ethics questions over her personal finances, while appearing to downplay his involvement in a fundraiser for her this week.
Rep. Laura Richardson's Sacramento house was sold in a foreclosure last month, according to news reports, and she has gon e into default on properties in San Pedro and Long Beach. She still owed $9,000 in county taxes on the Sacramento house.
The Long Beach Press-Telegram reports that in 1995 Richardson stiffed a local mechanic on a $735 bill to repair her heavily damaged BMW, and then had it towed to another body shop and abandoned it. Then a member of the Long Beach City Council, she began using a city-owned car, according to the Press-Telegram, which she continued to drive for five days after joining the California State Assembly.
The watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington has called on the House Ethics Committee to investigate.
Hoyer, known in political circles as a prodigious fundraiser, is hosting a Capitol Hill event on Wednesday to help Richardson retire her campaign debt. Matthew Hay Brown has the rest of the story over at the Swamp.
-- Andrew Malcolm
* With a nod to the late Bo Diddley.
A new Diageo/The Hotline poll today again reinforces just how closely divided the national electorate is between John McCain and Barack Obama -- it has Obama up by 2 points -- but also has a couple of other nuggets to digest on a Friday morning.
First is the favorable/unfavorable rating. Obama tops McCain 57% to 52% in the favorable ratings, and similarly has lower unfavorable ratings, 33% to 37% for McCain. Both gaps are within the margin of error, yet suggest what we're likely to see as the campaign evolves -- efforts by the Republicans to whittle away at the gap and by Democrats to widen it.
Also, the poll found unity in at least one area among voters -- concerns about the economy, jobs and unemployment, with 31% of Democrats and Republicans both saying it should be the top priority for whoever wins in the fall. Independents? A little higher at 35% -- and those are the folks both sides need to woo.
Curiously, though, Democrats and Republicans split when asked what they thought was the most serious issue facing the country, with with 41% of Democrats saying the "economy in general," but only 27% of Republicans saying so. Second place for both was gas/fuel/oil prices, but with 21% of Republicans and 13% of Democrats. Add 'em together: 54% of Democrats said the economy and fuel prices, and 48% of Republicans.
But those crucial independents? The economy got 32% and fuel prices 21% for a combined 53%. And that's why you see both campaigns hammering away at those issues, with Obama trying to tie McCain to the Bush administration policies and McCain trying paint Obama as pushing higher taxes on people already feeling pinched.
The war in Iraq? Only 5% of Republicans listed it as the nation's most pressing issue, compared with 15% among the Democrats. But only 3% of the independents placed it highest. So as James Carville once famously said, "It's the economy, stupid." At least for right now.
-- Scott Martelle
Photo: Eric Leonard
Whatever it is Barack Obama has going in Wisconsin, his campaign would be well advised to bottle it and ship it.
The state, with its 10 electoral votes, is a mainstay on lists of this year's battlegrounds because of the results there in the 2000 and 2004 presidential races.
Eights years ago, Al Gore carried it over George W. Bush by 5,708 votes out of almost 2.6 million cast. Four years ago, John Kerry did slightly better, winning it in his matchup with Bush by 11,384 votes out  of almost 3 million cast.
How could it not be achingly close again?
But if a new poll is to be believed, it won't be.
The survey, a joint venture by the University of Wisconsin and WisPolitics.com conducted Sunday through Tuesday, gave Obama a 13-percentage-point lead over John McCain, 50% to 37%.
Perhaps it isn't to be believed. A poll earlier this month by Rasmussen Reports showed the contest more in line with the past barnburners -- Obama led by only 2 percentage points, 45% to 43%.
The Obama camp could be excused for having faith in the more recent numbers, given that Wisconsin already has come through for him. The state gave him one of his most impressive primary wins: He thumped Hillary Rodham Clinton by 17 percentage points in the Feb. 19 contest.
Exit polls showed that he walloped Clinton among male voters, held his own among female voters and carried the lower-income voters that proved so elusive for him in the primaries that closed out the Democratic race.
The new poll served as a welcome mat for Obama: It was released as he traveled Thursday to Kaukauna, Wis., where he attracted about 1,500 people for a town-hall meeting (pictured above) on a topic he currently is dwelling upon, the struggling economy.
-- Don Frederick
Photo credit: Getty Images
On this, the first anniversary of our Top of the Ticket blog, we are reminded of the mercurial, unpredictable nature of U.S. politics -- part of what makes what we do so fascinating.
Our goal -- one of us on the East Coast and the other on the far more important or at least less humid West Coast -- was to write about Campaign '08 virtually around the clock.
Our second-ever posting, 12 months ago today, previewed an upcoming L.A. Times/Bloomberg Poll; later in the day, we detailed the results of the nationwide survey. The findings were in line with other polls of the time.
In the Republican presidential race, which then seemed the most likely to last deep into the primary season, Rudy Giuliani was perched in first place. His lead wasn't overwhelming, but it was strong enough that he appeared certain to remain a major contender.
His liberal record on social issues loomed as an obvious liability within his party, but his tough-on-terrorism message was attracting substantial support from moderates and GOP-leaning independents.
His major headache among rivals last June was an as-yet-undeclared candidate who was riding a wave as the great conservative hope -- Fred Thompson. He ran a strong second in the poll.
Lagging far behind were John McCain and Mitt Romney, each barely with double-digit support. In our preview posting, we were especially scornful of McCain, noting sarcastically (and foolishly, as it turned out) that in the poll, he found himself "in heated competition with the 'Don't Know' category."
Meriting no mention from us was Mike Huckabee, one of several back-of-the-pack candidates barely earning any support across the country.
The Democratic race, at that point, seemed so much more cut-and-dried.
Hillary Clinton was the clear front-runner; Barack Obama was just as clearly ...
Read more Top of the Ticket, the start of Year Two »
Having Hillary Clinton get behind his presidential candidacy may have been the easy part for Barack Obama, as he now moves to both buttress his campaign's brainpower and unite the notoriously fractious Democratic Party.
The two tasks aren't necessarily complementary, as Obama discovered Tuesday when labor leaders and others expressed surprise and chagrin over his choice of Jason Furman as his chief economic advisor.
For the presumptive presidential nominee, Furman's selection is part of a process of tapping into heavyweights who weren't part of his initial band of loyalists but whose talents he can now call upon. Furman, 37, served a similar advisory role for the party's 2004 White House nominee, Sen. John Kerry, and has worked closely in recent years with Robert Rubin, the guiding force behind President Bill Clinton's economic agenda.
There's the rub, for the union officials and some liberal activists.
As The Times' Tom Hamburger reports, criticism of Furman includes the charge that, as a promoter of the benefits of economic globization, he overlooks the trend's negative effects.
Marco Trbovich, a top aide to the head of the Steelworkers Union, told Hamburger: "We are very much taken aback that Furman has been put at the head of this team. ... He is a very bright fellow but he is an unalloyed cheerleader for the trade policies that have been very destructive to manufacturing jobs in this country."
That's not exactly ...
Read more A new Barack Obama aide draws fire from labor, liberals »
With the Democratic presidential race finally settled, there's been a "modest bump" for Barack Obama in the Gallup organization's continual nationwide survey of voter preferences.
Today's report showed Obama leading John McCain by 6 percentage points, 48% to 42%.
The pollsters write that Obama "has consistently held a lead of 5 to 7 percentage points each night since it was reported that Hillary Clinton intended to suspend her campaign. These represent Obama's strongest showing versus McCain to date" in the daily tracking poll.
Obama's forces no doubt are heartened by that; McCain's strategists will be heartened if the margin stays roughly at that level over the next few days and doesn't escalate to double digits.
Both campaigns, though, appreciate that in our electoral college system the national figures, which are indicative of a general trend, aren't nearly as useful to them as readings from certain key states, such as those from the University of Cincinnati's Ohio Poll, which released some new results today.
The survey questioned more than 1,300 state residents -- a large sample group -- from mid-May through early June. It eschewed candidate matchups, focusing instead on two other matters: attitudes toward President Bush and the state's governor, Democrat Ted Strickland (assumed to be on Obama's starter list of veep prospects).
The findings on Bush delineate the challenging environment for McCain in Ohio, currently considered an absolute must-win for him in his White House quest. The president's favorable/unfavorable rating in the state is slightly better than it was a month ago, but it still represents a stiff wind McCain must overcome.
In an April survey, 74% of Ohioans disapproved ...
Read more New polls -- one national, one from Ohio -- have glad tidings for Obama »
John McCain, campaigning in Louisiana, simultaneously is making a play for Latino voters in Nevada and New Mexico -- likely battleground states in the fall. The campaign just released a Spanish-language radio ad to air in both states.
What's interesting that while his national focus seems to be national security, the targeted ads are all economy -- which he has acknowledged isn't exactly his strong suit. Here's the ad in Spanish, and the campaign-provided English translation is below: "ANNOUNCER: When we are buying groceries, we don't have a political party. When we are filling up the gas tank, we are not Republicans, Democrats or Independents. We are Hispanics, and we all are hurting together in this uncertain economic time. We need someone that has a good economic plan, and that is John McCain. His plan is a realistic plan, not a political one, and it will help jump-start the local and national economies.
"He proposed to Congress a federal gas-tax holiday for the summer months. He wants middle-class families to pay less taxes so we can have more money in our pocket and less in Washington. And he wants to help families hurt by the housing crisis under his HOME Plan.
"He is optimistic and knows that we all, 'unidos,' together, Republicans, Democrats, and Independents, can find a better way to fill up our tanks, our shopping carts, and our dreams.
"That's why in (Nevada/New Mexico), 'Estamos Unidos con John McCain.'
"JOHN MCCAIN: I'm John McCain and I approve this message."
-- Scott Martelle
Photo credit: Mark Boster/ Los Angeles Times
The political drama of the day seems to be when will Hillary Clinton quit, but the real issue facing the Democrats now is how to retool themselves for the fall showdown with John McCain. And as our colleague Doyle McManus points out in today's paper, Barack Obama has some clear strengths, and some decided weaknesses, to wo rk on -- many of them exposed by the same primary and caucus process he narrowly survived to claim he has enough delegates to win the nomination at the August convention. Writes McManus: "Even
while celebrating his improbable achievement Tuesday night, Obama faced stinging reminders of challenges he has yet to overcome.
"He lost the primary election in South Dakota, as senior citizens and working-class white voters defiantly stuck with a fading Hillary Rodham Clinton, exit polls showed. Both voter groups are considered crucial to victory in November.
"After controversies over his former pastor and other issues, Obama has lost ground among the independent voters who are important in any presidential election. In February, 63% of independents said they had a favorable impression of the Illinois senator; last month, that number was down to 49%, the Pew Research Center said."
It's worth taking a moment to recall what's happened so far, because sometimes the full weight of history is hard to feel when you're in the midst of it. With the nation at war and the economy teetering on recession, a white woman -- a former first lady no less -- and a biracial man were the l ast two serious nomination contenders in a Democratic primary battle that lasted five months, burned through $400 million and shattered state voter-turnout records for primary elections and caucuses.
On the Republican side, we could well have witnessed the end of the dominant influence of social conservatives within the party, a role that has had a deep effect on national policies going back to the rise of Ronald Reagan a quarter-century ago.
And the fall general election could well be just as historic, as the Vietnam War generation squares off against those for whom that war exists in textbooks rather than personal memory. It also will likely be a fight over class -- the white working-class -- as well as Latinos, and independent and moderate Democratic women.
And, after eight years of an increasingly unpopular administration, and with Congress already shifted from Republican control to Democratic, the Fall could complete a realignment that began with the 2006 midterms -- a shift just as radical as the change between Jimmy Carter and Reagan, and between Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.
History unfolds, and as Walter Cronkite used to intone, "You are there."
-- Scott Martelle
Obama photo: Rick Loomis/Los Angeles Times
McCain photo: Mark Boster/Los Angeles Times
Based on the presentations (and presenters) at the annual Computers, Freedom and Privacy conference in New Haven, Conn., today, one could easily conclude that the two leading presidential candidates had taken the roles of the two guys in the Apple commercials.
Both Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama sent surrogates to the confab.  For Obama, it was Daniel J. Weitzner, far right in photo, from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who is a member of the campaign's technology, media and telecommunications committee. Weitzner, who helped draft the campaign's tech policy positions, looked Steve Jobs-cool in his light tan blazer and open-collared pink shirt. And he had his Mac laptop with him on the lectern.
Carrying water for McCain was campaign special counsel Chuck Fish, far left. An intellectual property lawyer by trade, he took a more buttoned-down, corporate approach: dark gray suit, white shirt and tie. And no obvious sign of any Apple products.
The Mac/PC comparison really jumped out...
Read more Is Barack Obama a Mac and John McCain a PC? »
Rep. Ron Paul is a presidential candidate who supports a return to the gold standard, among many other things. Although he's got no sympathy for Burma's cyclone victims.
Now, we know that Paul puts his personal money where his personal mouth, and public policy, are -- in precious metals.
Paul complied with federal law by filing his personal public financial disclosure statement with the Federal Election Commission by the deadline the other day. The Times' conscientious Dan Morain pored over it.
Turns out, the old doctor (he's even older than Sen. John McCain) is a millionaire, a few times over.
An Air Force veteran and ob-gyn who often champions the cause of the little guy, Paul disclosed 41 separate financial holdings that have a combined value of between $2.29 million and $5.3 million. The disclosure statements require officeholders and candidates to disclose a range of values for their holdings.
The 72-year-old Texas Republican, who leans libertarian, wants to abolish the Federal Reserve and issues warnings about....
Read more Ron Paul, the little guy's champion, turns out to be a millionaire »
Three months ago, Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, made a calculated decision to begin painting a not-so-pretty picture of Sen. Barack Obama, now the presumptive Democratic nominee.
Although Sen. Hillary Clinton was -- and still is -- battling Obama for the Democratic nomination, McCain began preparing his case against the Illinois senator early. McCain's advisors, like other obs ervers, concluded Obama was the likely nominee and wanted to begin shaping Obama's image while the Democrat was still consumed with fighting Clinton.
Defining one's opponent is a key task of any campaign, and simply put, McCain has had a long head start. As early as Feb. 12 -- the day McCain and Obama each won primaries in Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C. -- the Arizonan suggested Obama was guilty of hollow promises and a messianic self-image.
"To encourage a country with only rhetoric, rather than sound and proven ideas that trust in the strength and courage of free people, is not a promise of hope," McCain said, alluding to Obama's speaking skills and campaign theme.
And in another jab he added, "I do not seek the presidency on....
Read more John McCain's been free to fire at Barack Obama for weeks, now comes the response »
We've learned from the start of his campaign cycle that the presidential polls have not been a reliable predictor of votes, and we offer this with the usual shroud of skepticism. Fresh poll aggregates on Real Clear Politics show solid support for Barack Obama in North Carolina, and strong reason for hope for Hillary Clinton in Indiana.
Which would make Tuesday yet another draw, with neither candidate likely to mount more than an incremental change in the delegate count. This begins to sound a bit like a broken record, but what else can you call this but a stalemate? There aren't enough delegates left in the remaining contests for either to seal the nomination.
Superdelegates -- let's just call them SuperDs, shall we? easier to type -- are watching, at least those who haven't committed. The SuperDs (imagine them in tights and capes) also have to be getting concerned that all that good mojo from the start of the campaign cycle, when everybody got along and made nice, might be gone for good.
The Democrats are very anxious to win the White House in the fall. But is all this discord setting them up for something akin to political self-immolation? From the pragmatic outside perspective, the nation's in the midst of an unpopular war and is dragged down by a dicey economy. The Republicans hold the White House and their presumptive presidential nominee, John McCain supports the war and has admitted economics isn't his strong suit.
If the Democrats can't turn that into a victory, then it might be time for little intervention. And a very large mirror.
-- Scott Martelle
It feels sometimes like there is no news item that can't draw a prepared statement from a political candidate. And the new jobless numbers prompted John McCain and Hillary Clinton -- or, at least, some enterprising members of their staffs -- to toss out statements this morning.
We'll warn you right now there's not a whole lot of innovation here, mostly just using the moment to score already familiar points. And while Barack Obama's campaign didn't issue a statement, he wove the jobs report into a prepared speech in Indianapolis this morning. It's interesting to line them all up. First, McCain: "Today's job numbers are another clear indication of the economic challenges facing our country. With Americans hurting, we must act to strengthen our economy for families and small businesses. We must help Americans now through gas tax relief, which provides immediate relief from rising energy prices. We must also help those facing home foreclosure by enacting a HOME plan. At the same time, we need to act to lower taxes, streamline regulation, lower health care costs, ensure energy independence and open foreign markets. To help those who have lost jobs, we must focus on promoting effective worker re-training programs.
"The wrong course for our country would be to follow Senators Obama and Clinton and their siren songs of higher taxes, bigger government, greater isolationism and a government-run health care system."
Mind you, the new numbers show fewer people out of work than analysts expected, and the unemployment rate fell a tick from 5.1% in March to 5% in April ...
Read more John McCain, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama talk jobs »
John McCain took a look at the price on the neighborhood gas pump (OK, somebody probably looked for him) and decided a little relief is in order -- so he's introduced legislation in the U.S. Senate that would suspend the federal gas tax for the summer. This is no small thing -- 18.4 cents per gallon for the unleaded most people use, and 24.4 cents per gallon for diesel, on which the nation's trucking industry runs (think strawberry prices). The potential consumer savings are huge -- assuming they'd get passed along.
Of course, in the Democratic-controlled Senate the chances of the bill getting through in an election year are slight -- about the same, we'd guess, as the chances of gas falling below $3 a gallon. But this is where it gets fun. Come fall, McCain will be able to say that he tried to do something and the Democrats wouldn't cooperate. He even sent a letter to Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama -- his colleagues in the Senate before they were his rivals for the White House -- asking them to join him.
Shrewd move, that. Lovely placing of the piece on the chess board while Obama and Clinton are still squabbling over who gets to play their side of the board. And the counter-move, if there is one, will likely be pressing McCain on the financing. McCain says he'll replace the lost revenue to the Highway Trust Fund from the general fund -- which is already facing a massive budget gap.
A footnote of interest: One of the cosponsors of McCain's bill is Joe Lieberman, the former Democratic vice presidential nominee and former Democrat. Technically, he's an independent senator from Connecticut now but is usually included in the vote count that determines the Democrats control the Senate. He endorsed McCain in December, so that bridge is already burned. But it has to be galling to some in the halls of Congress to have their former veep nominee -- Al Gore's running mate -- stumping for the other guy.
-- Scott Martelle
This is, after all, Tax Day, and many of you are probably in line at the Post Office, or still printing out your tax returns and planning the 11:55 p.m. drive to the drop-off box. But John McCain is thinking about you, and wants you to know that if a Democrat is elected president, "you can be certain your tax rate will increase across the board," according to a fund-raising pitch that went out this morning.
But according to the folks at the Gallup Poll, only about half of Americans feel they pay too much in taxes, raising questions about whether banging the tax drum will help McCain (though it could help pry a few more dollars from the hands of antitax supporters). The details are on the Gallup site, but this summary graph wraps it all up: "Notably, the 10-point rise in the percentage saying their taxes were too high from April 1994 (56%) to December 1994 (66%) coincided with the 1994 midterm congressional campaign and election, in which the Republican Party championed an antitax theme in its successful 'Contract With America' strategy. Dissatisfaction with taxes remained high until January 2003 -- after the 9/11 terrorist attacks and just before the start of the Iraq war -- when it dipped to 47%. It has continued to remain relatively low (with no more than 53% saying their taxes are too high) in each subsequent year. However, whether that is because of the impact on public attitudes of 9/11, of the U.S. involvement in Iraq, or of recent tax policies is unclear."
The "recent tax policies" likely refer to the Bush tax cuts, which McCain initially opposed (as do both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama) but that he now wants to make permanent. But the poll also reports that only 43% of respondents thought the middle class paid too much in taxes -- suggesting Clinton's and Obama's promises to lighten the middle-class tax burden might not resonate that well, either.
Overall, 60% thought that the amount of tax they were paying this year was fair, and 35% said it was not fair. So while the economy will likely be an issue through the fall election, it doesn't look like taxes will take up much debate time.
-- Scott Martelle
"I'm tired of playing defense all the time," Barack Obama said this morning. "I want to play some offense."
It's a line he has used many times in speaking to labor groups. But it resonated a bit differently today.
Obama has spent the last few days back on his heels, absorbing furious punishment from the campaigns of Hillary Clinton and John McCain over his "bitter" remarks in San Francisco.
Today, Obama spoke to about 3,000 union members, gathered in Washington for the Building & Construction Trades Department's annual legislative meeting. Clinton appears before the group Wednesday.
Obama spent much of his speech focused on labor-friendly issues that elicited extended applause: opposing "right-to-work" laws, encouraging union organization and expressing skepticism about global trade deals.
But eventually he addressed the tempest of the moment, his statements regarding small-town America. In Obama's most recent equation, road-tested Monday night in Pennsylvania, "bitter" now means "angry," which when coupled with "hope" equals "Obama."
"I said people were bitter," Obama said. "People seemed to misunderstand. Yes, people are angry. If you've been filling up your gas tank, you're angry.
"You've got to feel some frustration. You've got to feel some anger," he said, "when you get the sense that the ...
Read more Barack Obama tries to turn the page »
Much as Desi Arnaz often demanded of Lucille Ball on their famed sitcom, Barack Obama has some 'splainin to do.
Relative quiet on the political news front became anything but as word spread Friday of an item on the Huffington Post concerning comments Obama made at a private fundraiser Sunday in San Francisco. Blogger Mayhill Fowler was there with her tape recorder and, after setting up the payoff to her item with her own observations about Pennsylvania, related this quote from Obama as he sought to give his Bay Area crowd some perspective about a different part of the country: "You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania, and like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations."
Here's the entire post, which includes audio of Obama's mini-spiel. And that's the part that resonated -- and how.
Hillary Clinton campaign aides sought to stir up interest in it -- and then pounced when reports it started to seep into the mass media, clearly seeing the potential contretemps as ...
Read more Barack Obama's "small town" critique: Is this a game changer? »
Top advisors to Hillary Clinton, particularly the now-sullied Mark Penn, long have counted not only on a bedrock of support for her from women not only in the Democratic presidential primary -- which has held firm -- but from both parties in the general election.
Perhaps. But a new poll solely of women voters -- of all political stripes -- commissioned by Lifetime  Networks shows that as the campaign has slogged on, her image has suffered among her gender.
The survey was conducted by two respected pollsters -- Kellyanne Conway (a Republican) and Celinda Lake (a Democrat). We talked to the polling director for the L.A. Times, Susan Pinkus, and she was struck by this finding: 26% of women polled said that since January, their opinion of Clinton had declined, compared with 15% who said it had improved.
Pinkus noted that looking more deeply into the poll, much of the drop in Clinton's standing was attributable to negative attitudes expressed by Republican women.
Still, no comparable trend was found for either Barack Obama, Clinton's rival in the Democratic race, or John McCain, the presumptive GOP presidential nominee.
Among the women interviewed, 15% said they now had a more favorable view of McCain, and exactly the same number reported a less favorable view. The findings for Obama also ...
Read more What women voters think about McCain, Clinton and Obama »
Barack Obama's top economic advisor has taken a lower profile in recent weeks following a furor over a conversation he had with Canadian officials in Chicago over the North American Free Trade Agreement.
But there is no question that Austan Goolsbee remains deeply involved with the Democratic presidential candidate, based on an e-mail sent out by Obama's campaign today.
The e-mail was a copy of the Illinois senator's remarks, as prepared for delivery, for a town hall meeting in Gary, Ind., that focused on the economy. Near the end was an accidental cut-and-paste of an earlier internal campaign message when a draft of the speech was being prepared.
In that message, Goolsbee was listed first among a lengthy list of Obama aides and advisors.
As Obama settled in for his campaign appearance at a site just 30 minutes from his house in Chicago, Obama confessed that he was thinking about busting out.
"This is the closest I've been to home in five days," he told his audience at a high school. "I was thinking about making a break for it."
Showing his local acumen, he mentioned the South Shore Line train that would have him home in less than an hour. "But we've got some work to do right here," Obama said, returning his focus to Indiana's May 6 primary -- a contest shaping up as an especially crucial faceoff between him and | |
