Taking a quick look at political developments from outside Georgia . . .
Both before and after he took office, President Barack Obama has been bombarded by an unending stream of attacks from Republican congressmen, political operatives, and talk radio ranters. They have accused him of illegally holding office because he was really born in Kenya, blamed him for the financial crises that he inherited from the Bush administration, called him a socialist and a fascist (which is comparable to being pregnant and not pregnant at the same time), and compared his wife to a gorilla. And those were some of the more polite criticisms.
How has the negativity affected Obama’s approval ratings? According to a recent set of polls, not much. In a poll conducted for NBC/Wall Street Journal, 46 percent cited the Bush administration as being more responsible for the size of the deficit while 21 percent blamed the Democrats in Congress, 7 percent said the Republicans in Congress, and 6 percent said the Obama administration. Additionally, 72 percent believe that the current state of the economy is something Obama inherited rather than created.
A poll by the Pew Research Center put Obama’s approval level at 61 percent, while 65 percent expressed optimism that his policies will improve the economy. A New York Times/CBS News poll had the president’s approval rating at 63 percent.
“The public has responded with what might be described as cautious approval,” political analyst Charlie Cook said. “The Gallup Organization’s national nightly tracking poll recently put the president’s job approval rating at 61 percent, with 32 percent disapproving. By comparison, this is not as strong as Presidents Kennedy (72 percent), Nixon (63 percent), Carter (63 percent) and George H.W. Bush (70 percent) were at this point, but better than Presidents Reagan (59 percent), Clinton (39 percent) and George W. Bush (55 percent) were in mid-June.”
Obama hit back at critics of his healthcare reform proposal during a speech to a congressional fundraiser this week: “To those who simply criticize without offering new ideas of their own, I have to ask, What’s your answer? . . . Don’t tell me that all you’re offering is meager tax cuts to uninsured Americans. Don’t present that as a new idea. That’s the same idea that’s been proposed for the last eight years.”
I’ve said all along that the Virginia governor’s race between Republican Bob McDonnell and Democrat Creigh Deeds will be one of the closest, hardest-fought campaigns this year. A Research 2000 poll commissioned by the Daily Kos website shows how close it already is: McDonnell had a 45-44 percent lead over Deeds, with 11 percent undecided.
Nevada Sen. Harry Reid is not highly regarded as a Senate majority leader by some of the factions within his own party, but he has been extremely lucky so far as a potentially tough reelection campaign approaches. Despite Reid’s weaknesses, Republicans have been unable to find a credible opponent for him. The latest disappointment was the declaration by former GOP congressman Jon Porter that he won’t run against Reid in 2010.
In next year’s Pennsylvania Senate race, Democratic voters will have a choice between a former Republican party-switcher, incumbent Arlen Specter, and U.S. Rep. Joe Sestak, who was elected as and remains a Democrat. Specter leads Sestak in early polls of Democratic voters, but that could change if Sestak can boost his name recognition a little more. No matter who gets the Democratic nomination, however, either candidate would be a favorite over Republican Pat Toomey, a former GOP congressman. A Rasmussen poll in the Keystone State shows Specter leading Toomey by 50-39 percent and Sestak leading by 41-35 percent.
In the media frenzy that has engulfed admitted adulterer Sen. John Ensign of Nevada, Ensign’s colleague, Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, made this comment to a reporter: “I think he will be welcomed back by his colleagues and go back to being a good senator. Most Americans look at this as a personal situation. I’ve got plenty of sins that I’m not going to share with anyone else.” That’s an interesting choice of words by Graham, who is nearly 54 and has never been married, but we’ll leave it at that.
The Louisiana Democratic Party has called on Republican Sen. David Vitter, an admitted patron of the infamous DC madam, to follow Ensign’s example and resign from his party leadership post. Among Senate Republicans, Vitter is the deputy whip (which is not the same kind of whip, we presume, that was used by employees of the DC madam).
The official statement from Louisiana Democrats:
The Louisiana Democratic Party is today calling on Sen. David Vitter to resign his leadership position in the Republican Party after Sen. John Ensign stepped down from the chairmanship of the Republican Policy Committee, the fourth ranking spot in Senate leadership. Sen. Ensign resigned after confessing to an extramarital affair with a campaign staffer. Sen. Vitter confessed to a “very serious sin” involving illegal activity after his name was mentioned in the federal investigation of the D.C. Madam prostitution ring, and the Louisiana Democratic Party is calling on him to resign his Deputy Whip position in the Senate.
“Senator Ensign’s admission that he was involved in an extramarital affair serves to remind Louisiana voters of the embarrassment that Senator David Vitter brought on the people of Louisiana when he acknowledged his involvement in a multimillion dollar prostitution ring,” said Louisiana Democratic Party Chairman Chris Whittington. “But at least Senator Ensign understood the embarrassment he was causing to his own state. Sen. Ensign did the right thing today, and it is up to Sen. Vitter to do the same. Senator Vitter not only violated the public trust, but he broke the law. He should immediately resign as Deputy Whip of the Senate Republican Caucus.”
The owner of a voter-registration company that was often retained to gather signatures for Republican causes has pleaded guilty to voter registration fraud in California, according to the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office. Mark Jacoby of Laguna Beach pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor and was sentenced to three years’ probation and 30 days of service with the California Department of Transportation. Jacoby, who is the owner of Young Political Majors (YPM), registered to vote at Los Angeles addresses that were not his own. State law requires petition circulators to be qualified voters.
Blogger Brad Friedman provided additional details:
Jacoby and Young Political Majors were hired by the California Republican Party to head up their voter registration efforts in the state. Jacoby had been arrested for Voter Registration Fraud last October, smack dab during the media’s orgasmic heights of last year’s phony GOP ACORN “Voter Fraud” hoax, even as Fox “News” (and the other news outlets who similarly fell for the scam) was going wall-to-wall with unsupported insinuations about voter fraud by ACORN, Democrats, and Obama.
. . . though Jacoby pleaded guilty to the most benign offense, in fact, his company is alleged to have changed thousands of registrations from Democratic to Republican, assuring that those voters would not be able to vote, as expected, in the Democratic primary. When they didn’t outright fake voter signatures on change of registration forms, they used tricks to get voters to give their signature, fooling them into thinking they were signing a petition against child molesters or for cancer hospital funding.
From the Los Angeles Times account:
Jacoby’s arrest by state investigators and the Ontario Police Department late Saturday came after dozens of voters said they were duped into registering as Republicans by people employed by YPM. The voters said YPM workers tricked them by saying they were signing a petition to toughen penalties against child molesters. The firm was paid $7 to $12 for every Californian it registered as a member of the GOP. . . YPM has been accused of using bait-and-switch tactics across the country. Election officials and lawmakers have launched investigations into the activities of YPM workers in Florida and Massachusetts. In Arizona, the firm was recently a defendant in a civil rights lawsuit.
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