truesee's Blog

Dems who can't risk Obama visit welcome Clinton to campaign

With Obama's campaign schedule featuring recent stops in solidly Democratic states like California, Delaware and Maryland, it's Clinton who is helping Democrats trying to win over centrists and independents in states like West Virginia, Kentucky and Arkansas.

The former president has planned stops in all three of those states next week, stumping for both House and Senate candidates. According to the latest NBC/Wall Street Journal poll, Clinton is one of the most popular political figures in the country, winning approval from 55 percent of voters.

That number stands in stark contrast to President Obama, whose approval ratings in some battleground states continue to fall.

Perhaps nowhere is the popularity contrast between Clinton and Obama greater than in West Virginia, where Clinton on Monday will campaign for Gov. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.).

Manchin finds himself in an unexpectedly tight Senate race thanks in large part to a litany of attack ads tying the Democratic governor to Obama. Republican businessman John Raese leads Manchin by 6 points in the latest Rasmussen poll, which had the president's approval rating in the state below the 40 percent mark.

Raese has spent millions of his own money to hammer Manchin with TV ads labeling the popular governor "a rubber stamp" for Obama, and it's working. Raese has steadily eroded what was once a double-digit Manchin lead.

Ahead of Clinton's visit, Manchin is doing just about all he can to separate himself from the current president. In an interview on Fox News Friday, Manchin called the president "dead wrong" when it comes to cap-and-trade and earlier in the week the state sued the EPA over new coal mining regulations.

"President Clinton understands West Virginians and this is a great opportunity for me to continue to share my vision for West Virginia and how I will continue to stand up and fight for what is best for our state and nation," Manchin said in a statement Friday.

Raese's campaign hit back at Clinton's planned visit by pointing to an interview Manchin gave to MSNBC in which the governor said he didn't anticipate a campaign visit from Obama because, "I've never had people come and campaign for me."

Democratic congressional candidate Mike Oliverio will also be at Monday's Manchin-Clinton rally. Oliverio faces Republican David McKinley this fall after defeating Rep. Alan Mollohan (D-W.Va.) in a primary earlier this year.

In a statement Friday, Oliverio praised Clinton as the president who "presided during the last time our federal budget was under control and our economy was thriving." Oliverio's campaign also noted that he was among the first West Virginia legislators to back Hillary Clinton in her 2008 presidential bid.

Later Monday, Clinton will campaign for Democratic Senate nominee Jack Conway in Kentucky -- a state where Republicans have tried to make President Obama a central issue, too.

Republican Rand Paul has worked to tie Conway to Obama. His latest campaign ad features an Obama impersonator who says, "I know I can count on Conway to vote for more spending and debt, bigger government and higher taxes."

For Conway, the former president might be the only national Democratic figure who could help given the current political dynamic there. Clinton won the state of Kentucky twice, a feat for a Democratic presidential candidate. Then-Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton also defeated Obama soundly in that state's Democratic primary in 2008.

The Paul campaign dismissed the visit from Clinton, labeling him "an out-of-state liberal" and offering to "pay for President Obama's plane ticket" to travel to Kentucky to rally for Conway.

Later in the week, Clinton will head to Arkansas for a joint rally with Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) and congressional candidate Chad Causey. Lincoln trails big in her race against Rep. John Boozman (R-Ark.), but Causey's race for the seat of retiring Rep. Marion Berry is considered a tossup.

"He's going to make a huge impact out here," said Arkansas Democratic Party spokesman Joel Coon, who noted that Clinton still has a tremendously strong base of popularity in states like Arkansas with a high concentration of conservative Democrats.

"I don't think that's a reflection on our current elected officials in Washington," he said. "It's just that he has his own fan base out here and it's strong."

Arkansas is one state where Clinton has already made a difference this election cycle, helping Lincoln best Lt. Gov. Bill Halter (D) in a tough Democratic primary. Another is Pennsylvania, where a last-minute Clinton visit for Rep. Mark Critz (D-Pa.) helped him hold off Republican Tim Burns.

Clinton has already campaigned for Rep. Joe Sestak (D-Pa.) in Pennsylvania's Senate race, but embattled House Dems like Rep. Paul Kanjorski (D-Pa.) are eager for the former president to make another pre-election swing through the state.

Kanjorski's website features video clips from a campaign speech Clinton gave for Kanjorski just days before the 2008 election, which the incumbent won in a squeaker.

"We'd love to have fresh clips and a fresh appearance in 2010," admits Kanjorski consultant Ed Mitchell. "But we know the former president is very busy."

Clinton also has campaign appearances planned for former Gov. Jerry Brown in California and Rep. Kendrick Meek in Florida's Senate race.

Even though President Obama isn't likely to show up in some of the toughest 2010 battlegrounds during the campaign's final month, he is using his fundraising prowess across the country to help fill the coffers of the national party and Democratic candidates in contested races.

The president is also planning a campaign swing out West ahead of Election Day where he is expected to stump for Democrats in key Senate contests in California and Washington state.

Women toting 77 cats stopped, face charges

Cats are removed from one of two vehicles seized Friday during an investigation.

BENNINGTON -- Local police, after finding 77 cats in two separate vehicles, issued civil citations for animal cruelty to two Troy, N.Y., women Friday afternoon that could be upgraded to criminal charges following a review by the Bennington County State’s Attorney’s office.

Regina Millard, 54, and Bertha Ryan, 61, both of Troy, were issued civil citations that carry $300 fines. Bennington Police Chief Paul Doucette said a criminal affidavit will be filed by police and reviewed Monday by prosecutors, who may choose to upgrade the charges to a criminal act.

A total of 77 cats were found inside the two vehicles, including one found dead in a trunk. Doucette said police originally thought 50 cats were in the cars -- 27 in one car and 23 in the other. The cats were of varying ages, he said. Each car had two passengers, Doucette said, and one contained a litter box. Both vehicles had a strong odor emanating from windows opened by police to provide the cats with air.

"The stench is nauseating," Doucette said.

Plates of food were in the vehicles. Some of the cats had fecal matter matted to their fur, according to Doucette. Police began investigating the cars after a complaint was made from the Aldi grocery store around 1 p.m. Bennington Police Sgt. Lloyd Dean said someone reported people sleeping in the vehicles with the cats.

Police had both vehicles towed to the town’s highway garage on Depot Street.

Officers used plastic suits and air packs to perform a cursory search of the vehicles while awaiting a search warrant. "They refused to voluntarilyrelinquish ownership of the cats," Dean said.

It took police until 9 p.m. to remove all of the animals, according to Dean.

Doucette said just two of the cats are owned by occupants in the vehicles. The rest, including stray and feral cats, were picked up in various places, he said. Millard and Ryan were apparently looking for homes for the animals, Doucette said. "They were driving from shelter to shelter trying to give some of the cats away for adoption," he said.

Doucette said the town’s animal control officer would seek shelters to house the cats while the case is pending.

Obama says GOP wants to 'cut education by 20 percent'

President Obama pitched education initiatives and funding as key to preparing kids for the jobs of the future, and accused congressional Republicans of standing in the way of goals to graduate more students from college.

In his weekly address, Obama began by saying he was fighting to create jobs and rebuild the economy as American families are struggling. But he said that kids need to be better prepared for the jobs of the future in a global economy. "China and India aren’t playing for second," he said. "South Korea and Germany aren’t playing for second. They’re playing for first – and so should America." 

 

He touted the Skills for America's Future initiative introduced earlier in the week intended to connect students with employers, and the Race to the Top program that aims to graduate more students from college per capita than any other country by 2020. 

"And yet, if Republicans in Congress had their way, we’d have a harder time meeting that goal," Obama said. "We’d have a harder time offering our kids the best education possible. Because they’d have us cut education by 20 percent – cuts that would reduce financial aid for eight million students; cuts that would leave our great and undervalued community colleges without the resources they need to prepare our graduates for the jobs of the future."

The president said he was prepared to make "some tough choices" to get "our fiscal house in order."

"But what I’m not prepared to do is shortchange our children’s education," he said. "What I’m not prepared to do is undercut their economic future, your economic future, or the economic future of the United States of America."

Republicans fired back at Obama's assertion that Republicans want to cut education by 20 percent.

"What threatens our children’s future is not the Pledge to America, but rather the reckless spending spree being carried out on the backs of future generations by President Obama and his allies," Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), chairman of the recently unveiled Pledge to America, said. 

"Democrats in Washington have been asking our kids and grandkids to pick up the tab for their wasteful stimulus spending that has done nothing to create a more stable economic environment for their future," McCarthy said. "While the President is spending his time engaging in scare tactics, Republicans are offering America’s children a renewed opportunity for prosperity with a plan for economic growth and concrete steps to begin reining in Washington spending.”

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2010/10/steve-lopez-the-real-outrage-behind-the-whitman-whore-remark.html

Father of groom sues bride's dad after couple splits

Two fathers-in-law are in a bitter dispute in Broward small claims court over money one says the other owes for a wedding held two years ago. Wilma Pierre Louis, left, the defendant and father of the bride, Judge Martin Dishowitz, attorney for the plaintiff Michael Styles, Montel Nelson, the plaintiff and father of the groom, and the groom Jerster Nelson. MIKE STOCKER/SUN SENTINEL

The marriage lasted about a year but the bitterness continues.

http://www.myfoxphoenix.com/dpp/health/superglue-eyedrops-mistake-10-4-2010

John Blanchard

Some might say that smoking meth with a blowtorch near a container of gunpowder is ill-advised. Some will try anyway.

John Blanchard, 65, is among them, San Mateo County sheriff's deputies say.

Deputies called to a fire Friday afternoon in a storage yard in the unincorporated community of Princeton near the Half Moon Bay Airport found Blanchard standing outside a camper that he had parked there illegally, sheriff's Lt. Ray Lunny said.

Investigators determined that the fire on the 200 block of Yale Avenue had been started by a defective propane blowtorch that Blanchard had been using to smoke methamphetamine, Lunny said.

Blanchard left the blowtorch on a dryer, causing a nearby container of gunpowder to explode, said Steve Wagstaffe, chief deputy district attorney.

Besides the blowtorch, deputies found a loaded rifle, ammunition, a container of black powder and an unopened safe containing more than 300 feet of detonation cord, Lunny said.

Blanchard, who has a previous drug conviction, pleaded not guilty Monday to drugs and weapons violations. He is being held on $30,000 bail.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/crime/detail?entry_id=73845#ixzz11lJDQkWT

MICHELLE OBAMA: I'VE HAD ENOUGH!

National Enquirer

Mississippi judge frees Oxford attorney jailed over not reciting Pledge of Allegiance

The Associated Press

October 7, 2010

Biden: 'You’re the dullest audience I’ve ever spoken to'

He continued, saying, “You’re the dullest audience I’ve ever spoken to," at which point he got applause and laughs. "Do you realize how many jobs Wisconsin lost? It’s staggering!" 

Biden and President Obama have made frequent campaign stops in recent weeks in an attempt to jolt Democrats who are lagging Republicans in voter enthusiasm measures, in part due to the slowing pace of the economic recovery under the administration's watch. 

Biden's appearance Thursday was in the state capital of Madison, which hosted a crowd of 26,000 to see President Obama speak at rally targeted at young voters the week prior.

Obama, Biden to make first 2010 joint campaign appearance

The vice president has argued at previous events that Democrats have begun to reverse the momentum that had them sliding to large losses on Election Day. He has also taken several pointed shots at the GOP, jokingly saying this week that he would "strangle" Republicans who talk about the deficit. 

On Thursday, he took a jab at the House GOP's "Pledge to America," governing agenda.

“The pledge half baked … folks, we’ve been in that oven before," he said. "This pledge is a threat to America."

Thursday October 7, 2010

 

 

Cities and suburbs occupy well-defined roles within the discussion of poverty, opportunity, and social welfare policy in metropolitan America. Research exploring issues of poverty typically has focused on central-city neighborhoods, where poverty and joblessness have been most concentrated. As a result, place-based U.S. antipoverty policies focus primarily on ameliorating concentrated poverty in inner-city (and, in some cases, rural) areas. Suburbs, by con­trast, are seen as destinations of opportunity for quality schools, safe neighborhoods, or good jobs.

Several recent trends have begun to upset this familiar urban-suburban narrative about poverty and opportunity in metropolitan America. In 1999, large U.S. cities and their suburbs had roughly equal numbers of poor residents, but by 2008 the number of suburban poor exceeded the poor in central cities by 1.5 million. Although poverty rates remain higher in central cities than in suburbs (18.2 per­cent versus 9.5 percent in 2008), poverty rates have increased at a quicker pace in suburban areas.

Watch video of co-author Scott Allard explaining the report's findings

(video courtesy of the University of Chicago)

http://news.uchicago.edu/news.php?asset_id=2119

 

This report examines data from the Census Bureau and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), along with in-depth interviews and a new survey of social services providers in suburban communities surrounding Chicago, IL; Los Angeles, CA; and Washington, D.C. to assess the challenges that rising suburban poverty poses for local safety nets and community-based organizations. It finds that:

http://www.nydailynews.com/money/galleries/forbes_list_of_most_powerful_women/forbes_list_of_most_powerful_women.html

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/10/04/rachel-maddow-bill-oreill_n_748877.html

Passersby scoop up cash dropped by armored truck

10:29 AM, Oct 6, 2010  Indy Star 

911 call reporting bundles of cash in street

http://www.indystar.com/assets/pdf/BG165031106.WAV