Could drop in black turnout cost Democrats the House?

In next month's gubernatorial races in New Jersey and Virginia -- widely seen as a referendum on the Democrats running the White House and Congress -- one constituency may stay home.

African American voters, crucial to Barack Obama's success in those two states in last year's presidential races, are telling pollsters they don't plan to vote in the off-year elections. In a recent poll in Virginia, the Washington Post found that while African Americans made up 20% of the electorate last year, just 12% are expected to show up this year. 

The poll also suggested a wider problem for Dems -- many white voters who helped lift Obama to the White House last year may also stay home. Call it a backlash against Washington's policies on the economy, healthcare and Wall Street, a massive infusion of government spending that has still left unemployment rates soaring.

But it's the disaffection among black voters -- perhaps a natural falloff from the high turnout levels they posted during the historic election of the first African American president -- that is drawing attention from analysts. Some think it could cost Democrats control of the House in 2010.

“If what looks like is going to happen in Virginia plays out on a national level, I do think Democrats will lose the House,” Tom Jensen of Public Policy Polling told The Hill newspaper. In a recent column, he predicted that in a number of Southern congressional districts "Democrats are going to have a world of trouble ... if black voters aren't engaged to a greater extent than what the Post is finding in Virginia."

David Bositis, an expert on black turnout at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, told The Hill that he doubts Virginia will be a bellwether on the 2010 elections, because results will likely turn on the individual candidates and their outreach to black voters.

"It’s going to be a stretch to say that what happens in Virginia will, in any way, be telling about next year,” he said. “But it definitely is something they are going to be concerned about in terms of 2010.”

-- Johanna Neuman

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Photo: Holly Jackson and 6-month-old daughter, Hollin, and her '"Vote" sticker at a Colorado Obama rally in November 2008. Credit: Ed Andrieski / Associated Press.

What if Obama really wants a fight over gay pajamas?

A little something to think about:

Have you too noticed that very few accidents seem to happen around Barack Obama?

Sure, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright association blew up in his face; that was just a matter of time and came not from Republicans but from fellow Democrats. One day the Harvard-educated, freshman senator from Illinois thought there were 57 states. He didn't know Canada had a prime minister, not a president. And it took some doing for the man to grudgingly give in to that stupid lapel flag pin thing.

The Geithner-Daschle-Solis back-tax deals were also messy.

But those gaffes happened early in the presidential campaign or the administration. He and his team have been touching every conceivable base at every opportunity, from tonight's Latin music fiesta at the White House to marking Leif Erikson Day to earn the Viking vote.

In fact, Obama's devoted so much time cultivating and nurturing these political niches that critics credibly suggest he might profitably invest less effort in the perpetual campaign mode -- flying off to Copenhagen to take an embarrassingly blunt public hit for the Chicago machine and chatting up that serial philanderer on the CBS late show -- and put in a lot more shirt-sleeve time in the Oval Office being the new president at the old desk.

On Saturday night before he was asked about "don't ask-don't tell" Obama told the banqueting but impatient Human Rights Campaign crowd (full text right here) all the Democratically correct things it wanted to hear before the big march for LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) equality the next day.

So it was very surprising -- even jarring -- when on Sunday CNBC's John Harwood, long a respected political journalist, reported a conversation with an anonymous White....

Guest list for Obama's White House Ramadan dinner

(UPDATE: 5:48 p.m. The president's dinner remarks -- sans teleprompter -- have been added to the end of this item.)

The other day President Obama issued a special message to the Muslim world for the annual Ramadan holiday. Tonight, before leaving Wednesday for the rest of his stay-cation at Camp David, the president hosts a White House banquet to celebrate the same holiday.

Invited guests include three Cabinet secretaries, numerous diplomats, five members of Congress including the first Muslim, Keith Ellison of Minnesota, and the chief of the Palestine Liberation Organization mission.

Here is the list of invited guests, as provided by the White House:

Cabinet: Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr., and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius.

Deputy Cabinet secretaries: Commerce Deputy Secretary Dennis Hightower and Education Deputy Secretary Adam Miller.

Congress: Reps. Andre Carson (D-Ind.), John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.), Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), Rush D. Holt (D-N.J.) and Sen. Richard G. Lugar (R-Ind.).

Diplomats: Ambassador Prince Zeid Ra'ad Zeid Al Hussein of Jordan; Ambassador Adel A.M. Al Jubeir of Saudi Arabia; Ambassador Husain Haqqani of Pakistan; Ambassador Erlan A. Idrissov of Kazakhstan; Ambassador His Excellency Said ...

Justice Sonia Sotomayor: 'No words can adequately express what I am feeling'

The first Latino Supreme Court justice was introduced today by the first African American president of the United States at a White House that has seen so many firsts in the last few months historians may some day marvel at the speed of change.

Both of them teared up.

At a reception in the East Room honoring Sonia Sotomayor, the newest Supreme Court justice, President Obama said, "We're here not just to celebrate our extraordinary new Supreme Court justice. We're here to celebrate an extraordinary moment for our nation…. We celebrate the greatness of a nation in which such a story is possible.''

With a host of activists, officials and relatives looking on -- including New York Gov. David Paterson, New York Dist. Atty. Robert Morgenthau and Supreme Court Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and John Paul Stevens -- Obama talked about how Sotomayor has already influenced Americans.

"It's not just about her," Obama said. "It's about every child who will grow up thinking to his or herself, 'If Sonia Sotomayor can make it, then maybe I can too.' "

But it was really the court's new, 111th justice who stole the show.

No longer in the brightly colored jackets of her confirmation hearings but dressed all in black, Sotomayor said that "no words can adequately express what I am feeling." Thanking her family and her colleagues, the president and the Senate, she said, "I am so grateful to all of you for this extraordinary opportunity."

But she gave most of the credit to America. Saying she was "struck by the wonder of my life," Sotomayor added, "I am most grateful to....

Did Skip Gates comment hurt Obama's popularity? Check out these numbers

President Obama's job approval rating is down. The latest Gallup poll shows a drop of three points on the week, to 56%, the largest week-to-week slide in his young presidency and a striking fall from his high of 66% in May.

And the question is, why?

Was it the president's continuing push for healthcare reform? The White House, fearing that it's losing the message war on the issue, has now renamed it "health insurance reform" in hopes the new label will prove more popular.

Or was it his comment that the Cambridge police "acted stupidly" in arresting his friend, Harvard black studies professor Henry Louis Gates Jr.? The comment hurt Obama's reputation as a post-racial figure in American politics and prompted the president to reach out to Sgt. James Crowley and invite him and Gates to visit the White House for a beer Thursday night.

According to Gallup's Lydia Saad, the dropoff started before the president's Gates comment, when he was pitching healthcare reform, and continued afterward. So, hard to measure there.

As for an ethnic breakdown, Obama lost no points with African Americans this past week, while losing four points with whites.

Obama's slide was more marked among Latinos, where his approval fell seven points -- even with the Senate's likely confirmation of Obama nominee Judge Sonia Sotomayor as the first Latina to sit on the Supreme Court.

Gallup is not alone in finding a slide in Obama's popularity. The Rasmussen Report seen in the graphic above makes the same point.

And a CBS News poll released July 13, well before the Gates controversy, measured the president's approval rating at 57%. Half of Americans told CBS they think the recession will last an additional two years or more, 52% think Obama is trying to "accomplish too much," and 57% think the country is on the "wrong track."

What do you think?

-- Johanna Neuman

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Joe Biden update: A long toast in Georgia (the other one)

When we last left the Veeper, Joe Biden had stopped having "private meetings" in favor of "meetings closed to press."

Let it go. No one knows the difference. It's transparently opaque.

But now the very longtime Delaware senator who loves Amtrak is off (by plane) on another foreign foray reaffirming close U.S. ties with places very far away that most Americans don't know we're close to until there's a war there.

Which, not coincidentally, is what happened last year where Biden is right now, in Georgia. Remember the Russians came storming into the new democracy and Republican Sen. John McCain, who knows a little about war, immediately denounced the aggression and the vacationing Democrat Barack Obama initially put out word that both sides should cool it but then he realized how that sounded, and toughened the rhetoric in support of Georgia.

So after lecturing squabbling Ukrainian politicians about tidying up their democratic operations, Biden showed up in Georgia on Wednesday where they threw a big dinner for him at President Mikheil Saakashvili's new $40-million mansion (all part of the trappings of democracy), where the local president gave the visiting vice president the Order of St. George, which is a big deal.

The Georgian president was effusive in his praise for Biden, recalling in his toast a story about dining with the soon-to-be vice president during Russian air attacks last summer. “Joe, my dear friend," he said, "it is such a great pleasure to have you back in Georgia.”

He said as the two men were sitting at a nearby restaurant, “Russian aircraft were flying very low over us and you refused to let the waiter turn off the lights at that restaurant.”

Maybe you had to be there that night to fully grasp the moment.

Anyway, Biden was equally effusive in his reciprocal praise. So while we await another mind-numbing presidential town hall on healthcare (this one in Cleveland, which has been specially reopened for Obama's visit today), we're sharing the V-man's speech. It's a little confusing in a couple of places as he gets rambling, but pretty short by Biden standards.

-- Andrew Malcolm

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The following is an unedited transcript:

Vice President Biden's remarks at dinner hosted by President Saakashvili in Tbilisi, Georgia, July 22, 2009

VICE PRESIDENT BIDEN:  Well, thank you very much, Mr. President. What a great honor. We say, Mr. President, the greatest honor is to be back in the presence of all of you -- and under not ideal circumstance, but better circumstances than when I was here last. 

Mr. President, friends, colleagues -- particularly to your grandmother and to your mother and your beautiful wife -- I say thank you for the hospitality you extended to me when I was here last. And thank you today. 

I accept this honor bestowed on me. Quite frankly, I accept it not only with a great deal of . . .

Sen. Ensign drops his GOP leadership post after admitting affair

For those who demand accountability in public officials, take heart. There is one area, even in these permissive times, that always leads to political trouble and it is spelled s-e-x.

Republican Sen. John Ensign of Nevada, mentioned as a possible contender for the GOP’s big prize in four years, found that out the hard way. He announced this morning he was stepping down from his party leadership post, a day after admitting that he had an extramarital affair.

It is hard to imagine that sex is as powerful an issue in 2009 as some people thought it was in the past. (Those who think sex in government began with Bill Clinton really should go take a good American history course in summer school -- if you can find one that hasn’t been closed because of funding cuts.)

Still, in the world of Republicans, pro-family and generally religious (hence, pro-fidelity), an extramarital affair can be a problem. Especially when it comes to campaigns and raising money from the conservative base.

Ensign was head of the Republican Policy Committee, the fourth-ranking spot in the Senate leadership pantheon. Combining rugged good looks, a distinguished head of gray hair and a focused, conservative outlook, Ensign was a possible contender for the GOP presidential nod in four years.

On Tuesday, he said he had a “consensual affair” from December 2007 to August 2008. There has been no indication of why the senator decided to announce his infidelity when he did, prompting media speculation about a motive.

Ensign can take heart, however, America loves someone who can claim to be the comeback kid. There are worse political platforms.

--Michael Muskal

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Obama's German roots: Our diverse president is related to everyone!

As President Obama does Dresden with German Chancellor Angela Merkel today, a genealogical study in Utah reports that the first African American president in U.S. history is actually German.

Well, partly.

Provo-based Ancestry.com has found that Obama's lineage -- on his mother's side -- can be traced to Germany.

Using online sources and microfilm from the Family History Library owned by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, genealogists found a document that went back to Obama's eighth great-grandfather, Conrad Wolflin, who served as mayor of Orsingen, Germany for 30 years.

"One of the things that I love about this find is it really illustrates what you can find out about your family history," Anastasia Tyler, lead genealogist on the project, told the Salt Lake Tribune. "World history is our history."

Obama's sixth great-grandfather, Johann Conrad Wolflin, was born on Jan. 29, 1729 in Besigheim, Wuerttemberg, Germany and in 1750 resettled in Pennsylvania. changing his name to Wolfley. Told of the Obama connection, current officials in Besigheim, tourist dollars dancing in their heads, jumped for joy.

Besigheim Deputy Mayor Klaus Schremps, whose town is photographed above, told the Associated Press Television Network he tracked down a copy of the parish record himself, and located Wolflin's name.

"If this turns out really to be the case," he said, "we will extend an invitation to Mr. Obama and if he would come and visit at some stage, it would be a great joy for the city and for the people."

This of course is through Obama's mother side, she of Irish and Kansas roots. His father was Kenyan.

If that were not enough to make the president feel welcome, relatives of survivors of Buchenwald Concentration Camp are also calling Obama family.

It seems the president's great-uncle (also on his mother's side), Charlie Payne, 84, helped liberate a sub-camp there when he was an infantryman fighting in World War II.

"The survivors see President Obama almost like a grandson of theirs," Volker Knigge, director of the Buchenwald memorial, told CNN. "The president is related to one of the brave men who came here and saw the Nazi horror firsthand."

-- Johanna Neuman

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Photo: A fountain figurine in front of the historic city hall of Besigheim, near Stuttgart in southern Germany, where Obama's sixth great-grandfather lived. Credit: Daneil Maurer / Associated Press

What Barack Hussein Obama told Muslims in speech from Egypt (text)

 

President Barack Hussein Obama, born to a Muslim father and educated in a Muslim country, won a rousing response in Cairo today with an outreach to a Muslim world that reviled his Republican predecessor George W. Bush.

The Democrat won a gasping cheer at the start, greeting a packed audience at Cairo University with words of Arabic: "I am also proud to carry with me the goodwill of the American people, and a greeting of peace from Muslim communities in my country: assalaamu aleikum." (Note: An earlier version of this post said Obama greeted a packed audience at Al Azhar University.)

And toward the end of the speech, when someone shouted, "We love you!" Obama replied, "Thank you."

He thrilled them with a recitation of Muslim countries' contributions to world civilization -- algebra, the compass, pens and printing, medical treatment of disease, architecture, poetry, calligraphy, music.

He used the speech to teach as well, reminding the Egyptian audience that the first nation to recognize the United States was an Islamic country, Morocco, and that recently, when Keith Ellison became the first Arab American elected to Congress, he took the oath of office on a Koran that had been in the personal library of founder Thomas Jefferson.

Turning to the thorniest problems in his foreign policy portfolio, with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in the audience, Obama promised that American troops sought no territorial gains in Afghanistan but were there only to protect U.S. interests.

"Make no mistake: We do not want to keep our troops in Afghanistan. We seek no military bases there. It is agonizing for America to lose our young men and women. It is costly and politically difficult to continue this conflict.

We would gladly bring every single one of our troops home if we could be confident that....

Sotomayor's big sell on Capitol Hill: Reid calls her 'the whole package'

They are called courtesy calls, highly scripted visits by a Supreme Court nominee to the offices of the senators who will vote on his or her nomination. The White House usually schools the nominee to make a good impression but commit no news. The senators, both supporters and potential opponents, try out their lines, testing their political instincts about a nominee's assets or liabilities against the live person.

But the visits are no tea party and have been known to torpedo a nomination.

As Roll Call reminded us this morning, White House counsel Harriet E. Miers, President George W. Bush's pick for the Supreme Court, bombed during her courtesy calls, leaving both Democratic and Republican senators dubious that she had the "intellectual weight or experience to merit a lifetime appointment to the high court." Chief Justice John G. Roberts, on the other hand, was a hit with senators when he made the rounds in 2005 -- particularly with Judiciary Committee Ranking Democrat Patrick J. Leahy, who threw his weight behind the nomination.

So it was more than empty palliatives today (though you'd be forgiven for reaching that conclusion) when Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid welcomed federal appellate court Judge Sonia Sotomayor --  President Obama's first nominee to the Supreme Court and the first Latina nominated.

After a half-hour meeting, Reid ushered the judge into his anteroom, where two chairs had been set up for the benefit of reporters. Among his talking points: He was "terribly impressed" by her academic background (Princeton summa cum laude, editor of Yale Law Review) and "very impressed" by her judicial experience and her life story, "so compelling that America identifies with the underdog."

When a reporter shouted a question to the judge about how she was feeling today, Sotomayor smiled and said nothing, merely following Reid back into his office. Smart cookie, as any White House worth its political stripes coaches judicial nominees to be silent publicly until after they are confirmed.

The judge has a full schedule today -- meeting with Vermont Sen. Leahy, now chairman of the Judiciary Committee, 
appointments with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Illinois Democrat Sen. Dick Durbin, Utah Republican Sen. Orrin G. Hatch and Arizona Republican Sen. Jon Kyl and lunch with her two home-state Democratic senators -- veteran Charles E. Schumer and freshman Kirsten Gillibrand.

But perhaps the most interesting meeting today is between Sotomayor and Republican Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions, the ranking Republican on the Judiciary Committee.

Sessions was himself rejected as a judicial candidate during the Reagan administration after reports surfaced that he had called the American Civil Liberties Union and the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People "un-American" and had once told a colleague that they "forced civil rights down the throats of people." But Sessions, perhaps bruised by his own judicial scarring 23 years ago, has called on fellow Republicans to stop calling Sotomayor a racist.

That hasn't stopped former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who's running for president, or conservative icon Rush Limbaugh, who likes to fire up the troops. But it might win her more votes.

 -- Johanna Neuman

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Photo: Susan Walsh / Associated Press