Presidential Issues
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2/6/2008 | Presidential Issues
Huckabee Points to Southern Strength
BreitBart.com
WASHINGTON (AP) - Republican presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee said Tuesday he would press on with his White House candidacy, emboldened by wins in the South. "The one way you can't win a race is to quit it, and until somebody beats me, I'm going to answer the bell for every round of this fight," the former Arkansas governor said in an AP interview from Little Rock. Huckabee beat rivals John McCain and Mitt Romney in West Virginia, Alabama and his home state, and early returns showed him leading in a few more Super Tuesday states. He said he would emerge from the virtual national primary contests as the alternative to McCain, the Arizona senator and Republican front-runner. "I've got to say that Mitt Romney was right about one thing—this is a two-man race. He was just wrong about who the other man in the race was. It's me, not him," Huckabee said.
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2/6/2008 | Presidential Issues
McCain Seizes Command of GOP Race
WASHINGTON (AP) - campaign_minute Sen. John McCain seized command of the race for the Republican presidential nomination early Wednesday, winning delegate-rich primaries from the East Coast to California. Democratic rivals Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama traded victories in an epic struggle with no end in sight. Clinton won the biggest state, California, in the Democratic campaign, capitalizing on backing from Hispanic voters. Obama fashioned victories in Alabama and Georgia on the strength of black support. McCain's own victory in the Republican race in the Golden State dealt a crushing blow to his closest pursuer, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. "We've won some of the biggest states in the country," McCain told cheering supporters at a rally in Phoenix, hours before California made his Tuesday Super. An underdog for months, he proclaimed himself the front-runner at last, and added. "I don't really mind it one bit." In the competition that counted the most, the Arizona senator had 525 delegates, more than 40 percent of the 1,191 needed for the nomination—and far ahead of his rivals. Even so, Romney and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee said they were staying in the race.
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2/5/2008 | Presidential Issues
As 24 States Vote, a Grab for Delegates, and an Edge
The New York Times
Brace yourself. Forty-three presidential nominating contests in 24 states. Channel upon channel of the commentators talking about exit polls. The biggest prize of the night — California — being decided well after most viewers have headed for bed. A total of 3,156 delegates allocated under arcane rules on what could be the most significant night of the 2008 campaign to date. This is a guide of things to look for on Tuesday night— key states, trends, interesting demographic developments, campaign-ending or campaign-extending developments — starting from when the first polls close (Georgia at 7 p.m.) to when the voting is completed in California at 11 p.m. Eastern time. The Big Picture There are two ways to approach the results. The first is old-fashioned: which candidates rack up the most states. But this is about more than popular vote totals; the point of these contests is to allocate delegates to the national conventions.
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2/5/2008 | Presidential Issues
Presidential hopefuls make their California Super Tuesday push
The Los Angeles Times
On the final day before the presidential campaign's biggest prize thus far, today's delegate-rich California primary, the candidates called on influential friends and legions of volunteers to rally their faithful one last time before the polls open. Republican candidate Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor, made a quick stop in Long Beach on Monday night. Rival John McCain, the Arizona senator, planned to jet into San Diego today during a cross-county hopscotch. Both are offering their last-gasp appeals to an electorate witnessing one of the most influential and competitive California presidential primaries ever, for Republicans and Democrats alike.
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2/4/2008 | Presidential Issues, Healthcare
Clinton health plan may mean tapping pay
Associated Press
WASHINGTON - Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton said Sunday she might be willing to garnish the wages of workers who refuse to buy health insurance to achieve coverage for all Americans. The New York senator has criticized presidential rival Barack Obama for pushing a health plan that would not require universal coverage. Clinton has not always specified the enforcement measures she would embrace, but when pressed on ABC's "This Week," she said: "I think there are a number of mechanisms" that are possible, including "going after people's wages, automatic enrollment." Clinton said such measures would apply only to workers who can afford health coverage but refuse to buy it, which puts undue pressure on hospitals and emergency rooms. With her proposals for subsidies, she said, "it will be affordable for everyone."
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2/4/2008 | Presidential Issues
Fewer Want Bill Clinton Back in the White House
The New York Times
The negative coverage of Bill Clinton over the past couple of weeks seems to have hurt his standing with the public. A new survey finds that fewer voters these days like the idea of the former president being back in the White House. Forty one percent of registered voters told the latest Pew Research Center survey that they disliked the idea of Mr. Clinton back at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, which could happen if his wife, Senator Hillary Clinton, is elected president. In October, 34 percent of voters disliked the idea.
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2/4/2008 | God and Government, Healthcare, Presidential Issues
NewsGuests.Com will be at CPAC
NewsGuests.Com representatives, Debbie Hamilton and Felicia Horton will be attending CPAC 2008. Clients available for media interviews: Colin Hanna, President of Let Freedom Ring, and Moderator for CPAC's seminar, A Conservative Approach to Health Care Reform. Ralf Augstroze, Executive Director of The Providence Forum, a non-profit corporation whose mission is to re-instill and promote a Judeo-Christian worldview within American culture and to advance faith, ethics and moral values. Contact Information: Debbie Hamilton (215)815-7716 Felicia Horton (484)653-8787 NewsGuests.Com, (800)486-0176
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2/1/2008 | Presidential Issues
McCain, Romney spar before Super Tuesday
CNNPolitics.com
SIMI VALLEY, California (CNN) -- Front-runners John McCain and Mitt Romney attacked each other's conservative credentials as they fought for their party's top spot during the final showdown before the Super Tuesday contests. The sharpest exchange in the debate came when Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts, was asked about the McCain campaign's charge that he once said he favored a strict timetable for removing troops from Iraq. Romney has consistently denied ever having backed a timetable and said McCain was taking a small portion of a quote out of context. "It's simply wrong," Romney said. "By the way, raising it a few days before the Florida primary, when there was very little time for me to correct the record, falls in the kind of dirty tricks that Ronald Reagan would have found reprehensible."
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1/31/2008 | Gender Issues, Presidential Issues
Clinton Says She Can Control Her Husband
ABC News
ABC News' Eloise Harper Reports: Senator Hillary Clinton, in an interview with ABC News' Cynthia McFadden for ABC News' Nightline, was asked about President Clinton’s controversial comments about race and Senator Obama in the past weeks. Clinton apologized for her husband. “I think whatever he said which was certainly never intended to cause any kind of offense to anyone,” Clinton said, “if it did give offenses then I take responsibility and I’m sorry about that.” "Can you control him?" asked McFadden. “Oh of course,” Clinton replied.
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1/31/2008 | Presidential Issues
Obama Calls Clinton Divisive Figure
MyWay.Com
DENVER (AP) - Democratic Sen. Barack Obama said Wednesday a Hillary Rodham Clinton presidency would be a step back to the past, turning her husband's image of a bridge to the future against her. The former first lady decried the tenor of his comments in an interview with The Associated Press. "I know it is tempting - after another presidency by a man named George Bush - to simply turn back the clock, and to build a bridge back to the 20th century," the Illinois senator said in Denver. "... It's not enough to say you'll be ready from Day One - you have to be right from Day One," he added in unmistakable criticisms of Clinton, who often claims she's better prepared to govern, and her husband, who pledged during his own presidency to build a bridge to the 21st century.
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1/30/2008 | Presidential Issues
Giuliani to Exit Presidential Race Today
MyWay.Com
ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) - Following his third place finish in Florida, former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani is expected to drop out of the presidential race today and endorse Sen. John McCain. Last night, Giuliani stopped short of announcing he was stepping down, but delivered a valedictory speech that was more farewell than fight-on. The former mayor finished a distant third to the winner, McCain, and close second-place finisher Mitt Romney. Republican officials said Giuliani would endorse McCain on Wednesday in California. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity in advance of the public announcement. "I'm proud that we chose to stay positive and to run a campaign of ideas in an era of personal attacks, negative ads and cynical spin," Giuliani said as supporters with tight smiles crowded behind him. "You don't always win, but you can always try to do it right, and you did."
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1/30/2008 | Presidential Issues, Pro-Family
NY Feminists Accuse Kennedy of Betrayal
BreitBart.Com
NEW YORK (AP) - The New York chapter of The National Organization for Women accused Sen. Edward M. Kennedy of betraying women with his endorsement of Barack Obama, prompting the organization's national office to come to the Massachusetts senator's defense. "Women have just experienced the ultimate betrayal," NOW's New York State chapter said in a scorching rebuke. "Senator Kennedy's endorsement of Hillary Clinton's opponent in the Democratic presidential primary campaign has really hit women hard." On Monday, Kennedy, D-Mass., his son Patrick and his niece Caroline Kennedy announced their support for Obama. Edward Kennedy said the country needs a leader who can bring people together and create change. But the move angered the state chapter of NOW, which called Kennedy's decision the "greatest betrayal." "We are repaid with his abandonment!" the statement said. "He's picked the new guy over us. He's joined the list of progressive white men who can't or won't handle the prospect of a woman president who is Hillary Clinton." The group said it was our obligation to "elect, unabashedly, a president that is the first woman after centuries of men who 'know what's best for us.'"
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1/29/2008 | Presidential Issues
Kennedy Endorses Obama 'Change in Air'
MyWay.Com
WASHINGTON (AP) - Summoning memories of his brother the slain president, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy led two generations of the First Family of Democratic politics Monday in endorsing Barack Obama for the White House, declaring, "I feel change is in the air." Obama is a man of rare "grit and grace," Kennedy said in remarks salted with scarcely veiled criticism of the Illinois senator's chief rival for the presidential nomination, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, as well as her husband, the former president.
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1/28/2008 | Presidential Issues
Ted Kennedy embraces Obama
Politico
Rejecting a personal entreaty from President Bill Clinton, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) plans to endorse Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) for president in a joint appearance on Monday, Democratic sources said. The embrace provides a dramatic rocket for Obama to ride into the frantic, nationwide campaigning ahead of the spate of Super Tuesday primaries on Feb. 5, the biggest day for nominating contests in U.S. history. Caroline Kennedy, the senator's niece and the daughter of President John F. Kennedy, will also appear at the rally, the sources said. Democrats said the endorsement will help Obama with traditional Democratic groups where Clinton has been strong — union households, Hispanics and downscale workers. Also, the nod by the far more experienced member of the Senate adds significant standing to Obama, who is working to prove he has the experience necessary to be president.
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1/28/2008 | Presidential Issues
The Billary Road to Republican Victory
The New York Times
IN the wake of George W. Bush, even a miracle might not be enough for the Republicans to hold on to the White House in 2008. But what about two miracles? The new year’s twin resurrections of Bill Clinton and John McCain, should they not evaporate, at last give the G.O.P. a highly plausible route to victory. Amazingly, neither party seems to fully recognize the contours of the road map. In the Democrats’ case, the full-throttle emergence of Billary, the joint Clinton candidacy, is measured mainly within the narrow confines of the short-term horse race: Do Bill Clinton’s red-faced eruptions and fact-challenged rants enhance or diminish his wife as a woman and a candidate?
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1/25/2008 | Presidential Issues
Breaking Up Is Hard to Do
The Wall Street Journal
We begin, as one always must now, again, with Bill Clinton. The past week he has traveled South Carolina, leaving discord in his wake. Barack Obama, that "fairytale," is low, sneaky. "He put out a hit job on me." The press is cruelly carrying Mr. Obama's counter-jabs. "You live for it." In Dillon, S.C., according to the Associated Press, on Thursday Mr. Clinton "predicted that many voters will be guided mainly by gender and race loyalties" and suggested he wife may lose Saturday's primary because black voters will side with Mr. Obama. Who is raising race as an issue? Bill Clinton knows. It's the press, and Mr. Obama. "Shame on you," Mr. Clinton said to a CNN reporter. The same day the Web site believed to be the back door of the Clinton war room unveiled a new name for the senator from Illinois: "Sticky Fingers Obama." Bill Clinton, with his trembly, red faced rage, makes John McCain look young. His divisive and destructive daily comportment—this is a former president of the United States—is a civic embarrassment. It is also an education, and there is something heartening in this.
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1/25/2008 | Presidential Issues, Pro-Family
Campaign Frustrates Some Gay Activists
My Way News
NEW YORK (AP) - Few constituencies are as eager for the Republican Party to falter this political season as gay-rights activists. Yet as they observe the Democratic presidential campaign and the rest of the electoral landscape, their high hopes often are mixed with frustration. Even as they expect to support whichever Democrat gets the presidential nomination, many activists are disappointed that the three leading contenders rarely mention gay-rights topics unless responding to a question. "They don't want to broach civil unions, marriage, equalizing benefits for same-sex couples," said Jennifer Chrisler, head of the Family Equality Council, which supports gay and lesbian families. "The vast majority of politicians don't lead, they follow." There are other frustrations as well. Activists were dismayed that the Democratic-led Congress failed to approve two much-anticipated bills late last year - one defining anti-gay assaults as a federal hate crime, the other prohibiting anti-gay job discrimination.
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1/24/2008 | Presidential Issues
RNC chairman provides numbers, strategy to defeat top Democrats
The Hill
Republican National Committee (RNC) Chairman Mike Duncan believes Republicans can beat either of the two top Democrats racing for their party’s nomination. For Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.), Duncan says it comes down to trust. Sen. Barack Obama’s (Ill.) weakness, on the other hand, is his experience, according to Duncan. Duncan continually brought up Clinton and Obama during a Wednesday morning breakfast with reporters sponsored by The Christian Science Monitor. Pointing to internal poll numbers, the RNC chairman repeatedly insisted that no matter who Republicans nominate, the Democratic candidate can be defeated in November. Internal RNC polls show Clinton has significant trust issues with voters, who also worry Obama has too little experience to be president. “With Sen. Clinton, it comes down to trust,” Duncan said. “She’s a lifelong liberal politician with some political baggage.” The RNC’s polling on Clinton found that less than 50 percent of respondents see her as “honest and trustworthy.” Sixty-five percent say she “will say or do anything to get elected” and 68 percent “agree that Sen. Clinton will raise their taxes.”
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1/24/2008 | Presidential Issues
Romney Leads in Ill Will Among G.O.P. Candidates
The New York Times
TAMPA, Fla. — At the end of the Republican presidential debate in New Hampshire this month, when the Democrats joined the candidates on stage, Mitt Romney found himself momentarily alone as his counterparts mingled, looking around a bit stiffly for a companion. The moment was emblematic of a broader reality that has helped shape the Republican contest and could take center stage again on Thursday at a debate in Florida. Within the small circle of contenders, Mr. Romney has become the most disliked. With so much attention recently on the sniping between Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama on the Democratic side, the almost visceral scorn directed at Mr. Romney by his rivals has been overshadowed. “Never get into a wrestling match with a pig,” Senator John McCain said in New Hampshire this month after reporters asked him about Mr. Romney. “You both get dirty, and the pig likes it.” Mike Huckabee’s pugilistic campaign chairman, Ed Rollins, appeared to stop just short of threatening Mr. Romney with physical violence at one point. “What I have to do is make sure that my anger with a guy like Romney, whose teeth I want to knock out, doesn’t get in the way of my thought process,” Mr. Rollins said. Campaign insiders and outside strategists point to several factors driving the ill will, most notably, Mr. Romney’s attacks on opponents in television commercials, the perception of him as an ideological panderer and resentment about his seemingly unlimited resources as others have struggled to raise cash.
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1/23/2008 | Abortion, Presidential Issues, Race in America
Huckabee Gains Black Support
Associated Press
ATLANTA (AP) — Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee paid tribute to Martin Luther King Jr. at a lengthy memorial service Monday at King's old church and was endorsed by several black religious leaders. After leaving the King ceremony, Huckabee was endorsed by three dozen African-Americans, most of them connected to conservative religious organizations. Huckabee's strong opposition to abortion and gay marriage matches the "high moral values" of many black Americans, said William Owens, founder of a group called the Coalition of African American Pastors.
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