The Republican ticket is flooding the airwaves with commercials that develop two themes designed to turn the presidential contest into a racially freighted resource competition pitting middle class white voters against the minority poor.
Ads that accuse President Obama of gutting the work requirements enacted in the 1996 welfare reform legislation present the first theme. Ads alleging that Obama has taken $716 billion from Medicare — a program serving an overwhelmingly white constituency — in order to provide health coverage to the heavily black and Hispanic poor deliver the second. The ads are meant to work together, to mutually reinforce each other’s claims.
The announcer in one of the Romney campaign’s TV ads focusing on welfare tells viewers:
An update from city authorities reveals that the tragedy by the Empire State Building this past Friday consisted of a disgruntled man murdering his former boss, followed by NYPD officers shooting nine bystanders. CNN reports the jaw-dropping details:
On a busy Friday morning in Manhattan, nine pedestrians suffered bullet or fragment wounds after police unleashed a hail of gunfire at a man wielding a .45 caliber pistol who had just killed a former co-worker.
The officers unloaded 16 rounds in the shadow of the Empire State Building at a disgruntled former apparel designer, killing him after he engaged in a gunbattle with police, authorities said.
Three passersby sustained direct gunshot wounds, while the remaining six were hit by fragments, according to New York Police Commissioner Ray Kelly. All injuries were caused by police, he said Saturday.
For what it’s worth, the New York Post and their “sources” claim that Chris Christie rejected a spot on the Republican ticket with Mitt Romney because he thought they’d lose. Two interesting points were made, though. My favorite, of course, is that Gov. Christie refused because he thought President Obama would beat them.
Gov. Chris Christie wasn’t willing to give up the New Jersey statehouse to be Mitt Romney’s running mate because he doubted they’d win, The Post has learned.
TAMPA — After tea partiers packed an east Hillsborough megachurch to standing-room-only Sunday night, after they were told jeering, heckling and animal noises were encouraged, after they heard an emcee call Secretary of State Hillary Clinton a WINO — "wife in name only" — they heard from the people they were there to see:
Michele Bachmann and Herman Cain.
"Welcome to TheTeaParty.Net Unity Rally!" Bachmann said. "Who's proud to be a tea partier now? I'm so proud of you. You have even braved a hurricane to come to Tampa."
According to Huffington Post, Mitt Romney's 2010 tax returns include more than a half-million dollars in "trade and business expense" deductions derived from Bain-related income—a tax reduction strategy that is only legal if Romney had an active role in Bain. What does "active" mean in this context?
[url=http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/08/27/1124651/-HuffPost-Romney-asserted-active-role-in-Bain-to-claim-half-million-dollar-tax-deduction-in-2010?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+dailykos%2Findex+(Daily+Kos]Read Full Story[/url]
A communications director for Mitt Romney's campaign, Ciara Matthews, has been demoted after prohibiting reporters from asking the GOP presidential candidate questions about Todd Akin or abortion. Matthews was recently communications director for Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker's recall campaign and has long been an anti-abortion advocate -- and even wrote last year that Republicans should be speaking more about abortion.
Last week, at the height of controversy over Missouri GOP U.S. Senate candidate Todd Akin's comments about "legitimate rape" and abortion, Matthews instructed a Denver TV reporter that she could only interview Romney if there were no questions about the issue. The journalist was reportedly told, "Well he’s said all he’s going to say about it. He doesn’t have anything more to say, you won’t be getting any new information so we don’t want to talk about that." On Friday, the Romney campaign announced Matthews would be demoted and no longer be allowed to spea
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A court in Brazil has ordered Nestlé to impose mandatory labelling for all its products in the country highlighting more than 1% genetically modified (GM) ingredients.
Things got awkward on the "Morning Joe" set this morning, with liberal host Chris Matthews launching into a fiery rant at Republican National Committee Chair Reince Priebus.
Matthews charged Republicans with injecting race into the campaign against President Barack Obama, criticizing Mitt Romney's birth certificate joke from Friday and his welfare ads that many have debunked as misleading.
"It is an embarrassment to your party to play that card," Matthews said of Romney's joke, drawing an awkward, dismissive laugh from Priebus. "This stuff about getting rid of the work requirement for welfare is dishonest — everyone's pointed out it's dishonest.
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