Thursday, September 13, 2012
It's the season of book fairs -- and guilt -- Sept. 13, 2012 column
By MARSHA MERCER
In the 21st Century spirit of blabbing personal secrets, I’m going to tell you something.
That book I happily bought last September at the National Book Festival on the National Mall, the one I had to have after listening to the author talk about his years of hard work, the book I stood in line in the sweltering sun for him to sign?
That book I then put on the table next to my reading chair by the window?
It’s still there. Unopened and, yes, unread.
It’s not about him or his 700 well wrought pages. It’s about me. I just wasn’t that into it. I put it on the table with every good intention but after a while had to stack books on top to muffle its reproachful cries whenever I walked past.
Months passed, I read other books, magazines and newspapers but never tackled the one book I’d imagined as my erudite companion through the long, snowy winter. But last winter was mild. Could global warming have stolen my book enthusiasm?
That’s silly. Besides, as an anxiety producer, books-I -haven’t-gotten-to-yet is a large category. But it’s hardly the only one that makes me break out in hives of literary remorse. Earnest interviews with authors on C-SPAN’s Book-TV, books I start and put down, even lists of books everyone ought to read exacerbate my unread-book guilt.
This year, it got so bad that when the Library of Congress in June issued its list of Books That Shaped America, I refused to look, fearing I’d feel worse.
I was wrong.
The library chose 88 books that chronicle a wide range of American history, literature and popular culture. The earliest volume is Benjamin Franklin’s “Experiments and Observations on Electricity” in 1751. The latest: “The Words of Cesar Chavez,” 2002.
Note that the list is not titled THE Books that Shaped America. The library intentionally omitted the article “the” to indicate that the list is a starting point, says Librarian of Congress James H. Billington.
“It is not a register of the ‘best’ American books – although many of them fit that description. Rather, the list is intended to spark a national conversation on books written by Americans that have influenced our lives, whether they appear on this list or not,” Billington said.
Not a list from On High but a list designed to spark a national conversation? That’s refreshing.
The eclectic selection includes the obligatory “Moby-Dick” but also such how-to titles as “The Joy of Cooking” and “Our Bodies, Ourselves.”
“Common Sense” by Thomas Paine and “History of the Expedition Under the Command of the Captains Lewis and Clark,” by Meriwether Lewis made the list, but so did “Gone With the Wind,” “Goodnight Moon” and “Tarzan of the Apes.”
Why 88 titles? The library thought choosing 10 or 25 or 100 would have indicated finality. The list is a work in progress. Plus, 88 books fit in the exhibit space.
The exhibit at the Library of Congress closes Sept. 29, but you don’t need to come to Washington to see Books That Shaped America. It’s online at http://www.loc.gov/bookfest/books-that-shaped-america/
Be sure to take the quick survey and give the library your own suggestions for future lists. Send me your thoughts too. I’d love to hear them.
I have my candidates that didn’t make the list, and many that did I’v e not yet read. It’s nice to know others suffer unread-book anxiety.
A cartoon in the Sept. 3 New Yorker showed two guys at the beach. One, reading a big book, is only a little way into it. The other guy says, “I got tired of ‘Moby-Dick’ taunting me from my bookshelf, so I put it on my Kindle and haven’t thought of it since.”
Aha! Expiation by gadget – perfect.
But wait a minute. There’s no “read-by” expiration date on books. And unlike with e-readers, there are no dying batteries in me-readers. I can take a non-judgmental path, be glad I have the book I haven’t yet read, knowing that when the time is right, I’ll pick it up. I can move on -- to the next National Book Festival.
Yes, more than 100 authors will be at the celebration of reading and books Sept. 22 and 23. About 200,000 people showed up last year, and I plan to be among the crowd on the National Mall this year.
Among the hundred-plus authors slated to speak and sign books are Mario Vargas Llosa, T.C. Boyle, Geraldine Brooks, Robert Caro, Patricia Cornwell and Jeffrey Eugenides.
I’ll be there, guilt-free.
One more thing. The Library of Congress plans next year to issue a list of Books That Shaped the World.
Get ready.
©2012 Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.
30
Thursday, September 6, 2012
Economy: Impossible? -- Can any president fix it? -- Sept. 6, 2012 column
By MARSHA MERCER
On the Food Network’s hit show “Restaurant: Impossible,” Chef Robert Irvine sweeps in and transforms a failing restaurant in just two days with $10,000.
He installs new décor, menu and image, diners flock to the place, the grateful owner beams in amazement, credits roll. Viewers eat all this up; the show is in its fourth season.
We Americans love turnarounds – especially when the miracles come quickly and under budget.
Alas, there’s no TV show called “Economy: Impossible.” Nobody has invented the formula to turn around the economy quickly. Unemployment is stuck above 8 percent, consumer confidence is down, and the presidential race is neck and neck.
The key question in 2012: Will voters fire President Barack Obama and hire former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney to engineer the country’s economic makeover?
And that leads to another question: Does who’s in the White House affect the economy? You’d certainly think so, to hear the politicians.
Romney insists that he has the business savvy to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs, although he hasn’t spelled out details. Obama blames Republicans in Congress for thwarting his plans to rebuild the economy.
Presidents are praised when the economy is going well and blamed when it’s not. Many economists think the world picture is more complicated and that the president actually has little control over economic success or failure.
Here’s Austan Goolsbee, Obama’s former top economic adviser and a University of Chicago Booth Business School professor: “I think the world vests too much power – certainly in the president, probably in Washington in general – for its influence on the economy, because most all of the economy has nothing to do with the government.”
Romney does have business experience, but most presidents don’t. Bill Clinton had none but George W. Bush did – and yet the economy thrived under Clinton and fell under Bush into the worst recession since the Great Depression.
Still, since James Carville tacked up the sign that read “the economy, stupid” in Clinton’s presidential campaign headquarters in 1992, candidates have tried to persuade voters they can work economic miracles.
At the GOP national convention in Tampa, Republicans urged disappointed Obama voters to jump ship. Romney conceded Obama’s popularity four years ago but said, “You know there’s something wrong with the kind of job he’s done as president when the best feeling you had was the day you voted for him.”
His running mate, Paul Ryan, evoked the image of young, jobless Obama voters living in their parents’ basements, staring at fading Obama posters.
In Charlotte, the Democrats tried to put to rest the nagging question of whether we’re better off than we were four years ago. Clinton emphatically said the country is better off with Obama, although nobody is satisfied with the current economy.
Obama “has laid the foundation for a new, modern, successful economy of shared prosperity. And if you will renew the president’s contract, you will feel it. You will feel it,” Clinton promised, adding, “whether the American people believe what I just said or not may be the whole election.”
Affable Clinton rebutted Republican charges one by one, including the frequent knock that Obama doesn’t believe in free enterprise and despises individual success.
“This Republican narrative – this alternative universe – says that every one of us in this room who amounts to anything, we’re all completely self-made,” Clinton said.
He quoted one of the all-time great lines in American politics, from Bob Strauss, Democratic Party chairman in the 1970s, “Every politician wants every voter to believe he was born in a log cabin he built himself.”
Clinton insisted that Obama has the values, ideas and direction we need to build a stronger, 21st century economy – “a nation of shared opportunities, shared responsibilities, shared prosperity, a shared sense of community.”
But he also served up a cautionary note. In 1994, although he and his advisers felt their policies were bringing the economy around, voters couldn’t feel it, Clinton said. The result was the Republican takeover of the House for the first time in decades.
As we move through the fall, both campaigns will target the very few voters who are still undecided. Much will depend on whether these voters feel that the economy is moving in the right direction.
© 2012 Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.
On the Food Network’s hit show “Restaurant: Impossible,” Chef Robert Irvine sweeps in and transforms a failing restaurant in just two days with $10,000.
He installs new décor, menu and image, diners flock to the place, the grateful owner beams in amazement, credits roll. Viewers eat all this up; the show is in its fourth season.
We Americans love turnarounds – especially when the miracles come quickly and under budget.
Alas, there’s no TV show called “Economy: Impossible.” Nobody has invented the formula to turn around the economy quickly. Unemployment is stuck above 8 percent, consumer confidence is down, and the presidential race is neck and neck.
The key question in 2012: Will voters fire President Barack Obama and hire former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney to engineer the country’s economic makeover?
And that leads to another question: Does who’s in the White House affect the economy? You’d certainly think so, to hear the politicians.
Romney insists that he has the business savvy to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs, although he hasn’t spelled out details. Obama blames Republicans in Congress for thwarting his plans to rebuild the economy.
Presidents are praised when the economy is going well and blamed when it’s not. Many economists think the world picture is more complicated and that the president actually has little control over economic success or failure.
Here’s Austan Goolsbee, Obama’s former top economic adviser and a University of Chicago Booth Business School professor: “I think the world vests too much power – certainly in the president, probably in Washington in general – for its influence on the economy, because most all of the economy has nothing to do with the government.”
Romney does have business experience, but most presidents don’t. Bill Clinton had none but George W. Bush did – and yet the economy thrived under Clinton and fell under Bush into the worst recession since the Great Depression.
Still, since James Carville tacked up the sign that read “the economy, stupid” in Clinton’s presidential campaign headquarters in 1992, candidates have tried to persuade voters they can work economic miracles.
At the GOP national convention in Tampa, Republicans urged disappointed Obama voters to jump ship. Romney conceded Obama’s popularity four years ago but said, “You know there’s something wrong with the kind of job he’s done as president when the best feeling you had was the day you voted for him.”
His running mate, Paul Ryan, evoked the image of young, jobless Obama voters living in their parents’ basements, staring at fading Obama posters.
In Charlotte, the Democrats tried to put to rest the nagging question of whether we’re better off than we were four years ago. Clinton emphatically said the country is better off with Obama, although nobody is satisfied with the current economy.
Obama “has laid the foundation for a new, modern, successful economy of shared prosperity. And if you will renew the president’s contract, you will feel it. You will feel it,” Clinton promised, adding, “whether the American people believe what I just said or not may be the whole election.”
Affable Clinton rebutted Republican charges one by one, including the frequent knock that Obama doesn’t believe in free enterprise and despises individual success.
“This Republican narrative – this alternative universe – says that every one of us in this room who amounts to anything, we’re all completely self-made,” Clinton said.
He quoted one of the all-time great lines in American politics, from Bob Strauss, Democratic Party chairman in the 1970s, “Every politician wants every voter to believe he was born in a log cabin he built himself.”
Clinton insisted that Obama has the values, ideas and direction we need to build a stronger, 21st century economy – “a nation of shared opportunities, shared responsibilities, shared prosperity, a shared sense of community.”
But he also served up a cautionary note. In 1994, although he and his advisers felt their policies were bringing the economy around, voters couldn’t feel it, Clinton said. The result was the Republican takeover of the House for the first time in decades.
As we move through the fall, both campaigns will target the very few voters who are still undecided. Much will depend on whether these voters feel that the economy is moving in the right direction.
© 2012 Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
How much do you really know about Obama and Biden? -- Aug. 29, 2012 column
The Democratic National Convention opens Tuesday in Charlotte for three days of celebrating -- and selling -- President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden for a second term.
Even though the Democratic Duo is always in the news, how much do you really know about the men asking for four more years? Test your political trivia savvy with our bio quiz on Obama and Biden.
Ten questions and answers are below. You know the rules: No peeking, no Googling and no consulting your favorite Super PAC.
If you missed last week’s quiz on Team Double-R -- Romney and Ryan – take it here.
Here we go.
1. What did Barry Obama, as he was known then, NOT do during his two years at Occidental College in California?
A. Wear stupid hats
B. Captain the cheerleading squad
C. Impersonate Mick Jagger
D. Listen to Billie Holiday
2. Who or what are Beau and Bo?
A. Nicknames Barack Obama uses when signing notes to Michelle
B. Logins Obama has used
C. Middle names of Malia and Sasha Obama, respectively
D. Biden’s oldest son and the Obama dog, respectively
3. A plaque now marks the ice cream shop where Michelle Robinson and Barack Obama first kissed in 1989. How did they meet?
A. Barack bumped into Michelle’s car accidentally on purpose in a parking lot.
B. Michelle spilled champagne on Barack at a wedding.
C. Young attorney Michelle was assigned to mentor Barack at her Chicago law firm.
D. A blind date after Michelle answered a personals ad in the local alternative weekly paper.
4. In third grade, Obama wrote a paper saying he wanted to become … what?
A. Astronaut
B. President
C. Veterinarian
D. Basketball star
5. True or false: Jill Biden, wife of Joe, wrote the book, “Don’t Forget, God Bless Our Troops.”
6. What does Barack Obama have in common with Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton and George H.W. Bush?
A. Skydiving
B. Degrees from Harvard or Yale
C. Left handed
D. Foes of broccoli
7. More voters say Obama is a Muslim and fewer that he’s a Christian now than before his election. What percentage believes Obama is a Muslim?
A. 30 percent
B. 17 percent
C. 10 percent
D. 5 percent
8. Obama played his 100th round of golf as president in June. Has he played more golf than any other president?
A. You betcha.
B. Not by a long shot.
9. Winning the presidency was his second-toughest election, Obama says. What was his toughest win?
A. Harvard Law Review presidency
B. Grammy
C. Michelle’s “vote” as her husband
D. Academy Award
10. Who described then-Senator Obama in 2007 as “the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy,” adding, “That’s storybook, man.”
A. George W. Bush
B. Bill Clinton
C. Hillary Clinton
D. Joe Biden
BONUS QUESTION: In how many languages besides English has Obama’s “Dreams from My Father” been published?
A. 10
B. 18
C. 26
D. Who can count that high?
ANSWERS
1. B. Hats, Jagger, Holiday – yes, yes, yes. Cheerleader? Nope.
2. D. Joseph Robinette “Beau” Biden III is attorney general of Delaware. Bo is the Obamas’ Portuguese water dog.
3. C. Harvard law grad Michelle, 25, had completed her first year at the firm when she was assigned to mentor Barack, 27, a Harvard law student hired for the summer. “So we had lunch…and I thought, ‘Oh here you go. Here’s this good-looking, smooth-talking guy. I’ve been down this road before,’” she told author David Mendell.
4. B. Young Barry wrote that his mom was his idol and he hoped to be president someday.
5. True. The children’s book tells the story of a family’s experience with military deployment through the eyes of the Bidens’ granddaughter during the year her dad was deployed to Iraq.
6. C. Lefties are only 10 percent of the population, but eight of our 44 presidents have been left handed.
7. B. In October 2008, just 12 percent of voters thought Obama was a Muslim, the Pew Research Center reported last month. About half those surveyed now say he’s a Christian, down from 55 percent in 2008.
8. B. While he has played far more golf than George W. Bush’s 24 games, Obama isn’t close to Woodrow Wilson’s reported record of 1,200 or Dwight Eisenhower’s 800 presidential golf games.
9. A. In 1990, when Obama became the first black student elected president of the Harvard Law Review, the Review's 80 editors deliberated 17 hours.
10. D. Gaffe-prone Biden issued a statement, saying, "I deeply regret any offense my remark…might have caused anyone. That was not my intent.”
BONUS: C. You can read “Dreams” in Arabic to Vietnamese, including Marathi, Tamil and Urdu.
SCORING -- 10 points for each correct answer and five points for bonus.
85 to 100 – Congratulations! You’re so savvy you could be family.
70 to 85 – Political pro. Angling for a job in the second Obama administration?
55 to 70 – Author, author. You could write a book.
40 to 55 – No slacker, your knowledge exceeds that of most bloggers.
25 to 40 – Tweet away. You certainly have 140 characters’ worth of insight.
Below 25 – Too busy leading your own life for politics? You have time to brush up.
--Compiled by Marsha Mercer
SOURCES: ABC News, “Barack Obama: The Making of the Man” by David Maraniss, biography.com, CNN, www.indiana.edu, New York Times, “Obama: From Promise to Power” by David Mendell, Pew Research Center, Washington Post, whitehouse.gov, WorldCat.org.
(c) 2012 Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.
30
Even though the Democratic Duo is always in the news, how much do you really know about the men asking for four more years? Test your political trivia savvy with our bio quiz on Obama and Biden.
Ten questions and answers are below. You know the rules: No peeking, no Googling and no consulting your favorite Super PAC.
If you missed last week’s quiz on Team Double-R -- Romney and Ryan – take it here.
Here we go.
1. What did Barry Obama, as he was known then, NOT do during his two years at Occidental College in California?
A. Wear stupid hats
B. Captain the cheerleading squad
C. Impersonate Mick Jagger
D. Listen to Billie Holiday
2. Who or what are Beau and Bo?
A. Nicknames Barack Obama uses when signing notes to Michelle
B. Logins Obama has used
C. Middle names of Malia and Sasha Obama, respectively
D. Biden’s oldest son and the Obama dog, respectively
3. A plaque now marks the ice cream shop where Michelle Robinson and Barack Obama first kissed in 1989. How did they meet?
A. Barack bumped into Michelle’s car accidentally on purpose in a parking lot.
B. Michelle spilled champagne on Barack at a wedding.
C. Young attorney Michelle was assigned to mentor Barack at her Chicago law firm.
D. A blind date after Michelle answered a personals ad in the local alternative weekly paper.
4. In third grade, Obama wrote a paper saying he wanted to become … what?
A. Astronaut
B. President
C. Veterinarian
D. Basketball star
5. True or false: Jill Biden, wife of Joe, wrote the book, “Don’t Forget, God Bless Our Troops.”
6. What does Barack Obama have in common with Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton and George H.W. Bush?
A. Skydiving
B. Degrees from Harvard or Yale
C. Left handed
D. Foes of broccoli
7. More voters say Obama is a Muslim and fewer that he’s a Christian now than before his election. What percentage believes Obama is a Muslim?
A. 30 percent
B. 17 percent
C. 10 percent
D. 5 percent
8. Obama played his 100th round of golf as president in June. Has he played more golf than any other president?
A. You betcha.
B. Not by a long shot.
9. Winning the presidency was his second-toughest election, Obama says. What was his toughest win?
A. Harvard Law Review presidency
B. Grammy
C. Michelle’s “vote” as her husband
D. Academy Award
10. Who described then-Senator Obama in 2007 as “the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy,” adding, “That’s storybook, man.”
A. George W. Bush
B. Bill Clinton
C. Hillary Clinton
D. Joe Biden
BONUS QUESTION: In how many languages besides English has Obama’s “Dreams from My Father” been published?
A. 10
B. 18
C. 26
D. Who can count that high?
ANSWERS
1. B. Hats, Jagger, Holiday – yes, yes, yes. Cheerleader? Nope.
2. D. Joseph Robinette “Beau” Biden III is attorney general of Delaware. Bo is the Obamas’ Portuguese water dog.
3. C. Harvard law grad Michelle, 25, had completed her first year at the firm when she was assigned to mentor Barack, 27, a Harvard law student hired for the summer. “So we had lunch…and I thought, ‘Oh here you go. Here’s this good-looking, smooth-talking guy. I’ve been down this road before,’” she told author David Mendell.
4. B. Young Barry wrote that his mom was his idol and he hoped to be president someday.
5. True. The children’s book tells the story of a family’s experience with military deployment through the eyes of the Bidens’ granddaughter during the year her dad was deployed to Iraq.
6. C. Lefties are only 10 percent of the population, but eight of our 44 presidents have been left handed.
7. B. In October 2008, just 12 percent of voters thought Obama was a Muslim, the Pew Research Center reported last month. About half those surveyed now say he’s a Christian, down from 55 percent in 2008.
8. B. While he has played far more golf than George W. Bush’s 24 games, Obama isn’t close to Woodrow Wilson’s reported record of 1,200 or Dwight Eisenhower’s 800 presidential golf games.
9. A. In 1990, when Obama became the first black student elected president of the Harvard Law Review, the Review's 80 editors deliberated 17 hours.
10. D. Gaffe-prone Biden issued a statement, saying, "I deeply regret any offense my remark…might have caused anyone. That was not my intent.”
BONUS: C. You can read “Dreams” in Arabic to Vietnamese, including Marathi, Tamil and Urdu.
SCORING -- 10 points for each correct answer and five points for bonus.
85 to 100 – Congratulations! You’re so savvy you could be family.
70 to 85 – Political pro. Angling for a job in the second Obama administration?
55 to 70 – Author, author. You could write a book.
40 to 55 – No slacker, your knowledge exceeds that of most bloggers.
25 to 40 – Tweet away. You certainly have 140 characters’ worth of insight.
Below 25 – Too busy leading your own life for politics? You have time to brush up.
--Compiled by Marsha Mercer
SOURCES: ABC News, “Barack Obama: The Making of the Man” by David Maraniss, biography.com, CNN, www.indiana.edu, New York Times, “Obama: From Promise to Power” by David Mendell, Pew Research Center, Washington Post, whitehouse.gov, WorldCat.org.
(c) 2012 Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.
30
Thursday, August 23, 2012
How much do you really know about Romney and Ryan? -- Aug. 23, 2012 quiz column
The elephants are coming! The Republican National Convention opens Monday in Tampa with the official job of ratifying the GOP’s choice of Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan as the 2012 presidential ticket.
The donkeys won’t be far behind. The Democratic National Convention will convene Sept. 3 in Charlotte in hopes of renewing the White House lease for Barack Obama and Joe Biden.
They’ve been around seemingly forever, but how much do you really know about the men who want to run the country? Test your political trivia savvy with our presidential bio quizzes.
Today, check yourself on Team Double-R -- Romney and Ryan. Ten questions and answers are below. No peeking, Googling or consulting your favorite Super PAC.
Next week, come back to gauge your knowledge about Democratic Duo Obama and Biden.
Let’s get started.
1: A poll earlier this year found that 2 percent of people thought Mitt Romney’s real first name was Mittens. (Wrong.) What is Romney’s real first name?
A. Mitchell
B. Milton
C. Willard
D. William
2. Mitt Romney may have inherited his love for politics from his dad, George Romney, three-time governor of Michigan and unsuccessful presidential candidate, and his mom. Lenore Romney lost her one bid for public office. What office did she seek?
A. City school board
B. City Council
C. U.S. House of Representatives
D. U.S. Senate
3: What is Mitt Romney’s Chicago connection?
A. His was born in Chicago.
B. His uncle played for the Chicago Bears.
C. He attended the University of Chicago.
D. He lived next door to Barack Obama.
4: What was Mitt Romney’s college major?
A. English
B. Political science
C. French
D. Finance
5: How many sons, daughters and grandchildren in all do Mitt and Ann Romney have?
A. Three sons, two daughters and 25 grandchildren
B. Three sons and 12 grandchildren
C. Five sons and 18 grandchildren
D. Who can count that high?
6: What do Paul Ryan and Romney’s eldest son have in common?
A. They are married to sisters.
B. They are both members of Congress.
C. They are the same age.
D. They co-wrote a sequel to Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged.”
7: Paul Ryan is known to sleep on a cot in his Washington office. What else is true?
A. He’s a fan of P90X workout program.
B. He was a physical trainer after college.
C. He has said he has 6 percent to 8 percent body fat.
D. All of the above.
8. Romney shuns alcohol and caffeine. What did Ryan say was his worst habit?
A. Tosses back a six pack a night
B. Addicted to love
C. Drinks two cups of coffee every morning
D. Smokes cigarettes
9. The political roots of Janna Ryan, wife of Paul, run deep. What are they?
A. She ran unsuccessfully for Congress.
B. Her grandfather ran for president and her cousin is a U.S. senator.
C. Her grandfather ran for governor, her uncle was governor and a U.S. senator, and her cousin is a U.S. House member.
D. Her grandmother helped form the American Party supporting George Wallace and later ran for governor.
10. A constituent offered Paul Ryan something special if he’d run for president in 2012. Was it:
A. A chain of fitness centers to be named Paul Ryan’s Extreme Experience
B. Free colonoscopies for members of Ryan’s family for life
C. A McDonald’s lifetime coupon good for one free burger, fries and shake every day
D. Unlimited free coffee for a year
BONUS QUESTION: Name the five Romney kids.
ANSWERS
1: C. Romney was named after family friend and hotel magnate J. Willard Marriott.
2. D. When Lenore Romney ran for Senate in 1970, women senators were rare and she would have been only the third woman ever elected to serve a full Senate term. “It was disappointing to find so many people closed their minds just because I was a woman,” she said.
3. B. Romney’s middle name honors his uncle, Milton “Mitt” Romney, star quarterback for the Bears in the 1920s.
4. A. An English major at Brigham Young University, class of ’71, Romney advises today’s English majors to plan on graduate school. He earned dual degrees from Harvard Law and Harvard Business School.
5. C. If elected, Romney will be the first president since George H.W. Bush to have sons. Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama have only daughters.
6. C. Ryan and Taggart “Tagg” Romney are both 42. Mitt Romney is 65.
7. D. A fitness buff, Ryan, 6-feet 2 and 163 pounds, leads morning sessions of the P90X muscle-building program on Capitol Hill.
8. C. Ryan admits coffee is his vice. Romney has indulged in coffee ice cream.
9. C. Janna Ryan’s grandfather, Reuel W. Little, helped form the American Party in Oklahoma in the 1960s to support former Alabama Gov. George Wallace’s presidential bid. Little ran for governor on the American Party in 1970. Janna Ryan’s uncle, David Boren, a Democrat, served as senator and governor of Oklahoma. Her cousin is Rep. Dan Boren, D-Okla.
10. B. A gastroenterologist in Ryan’s congressional district offered Ryan’s family free colonoscopies for life if Ryan would run for president. “That seals it,” Ryan deadpanned, the National Review Online reported.
BONUS: Tagg, Matt, Josh, Ben and Craig. One point for each correct answer.
SCORING: 85 to 100 – Congratulations! You’re so savvy you could be family.
70 to 85 – Political pro. Angling for a job in the Romney White House?
55 to 70 – Author, author. You could write a book.
40 to 55 – No slacker, your knowledge exceeds that of most bloggers.
25 to 40 – Tweet away. You certainly have 140 characters’ worth of insight.
Below 25 – Too busy leading your own life for politics? You have time to brush up.
--Compiled by Marsha Mercer
Sources: Associated Press, ABC News, biography.com, Boston Herald, CBS News, CNN, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, mittromney.com, NBC News, National Review Online, New York Times, paulryan.house.gov, Politico, The Atlantic Wire, The Oklahoman, Tulsa World.
© Marsha Mercer 2012. All rights reserved.
The donkeys won’t be far behind. The Democratic National Convention will convene Sept. 3 in Charlotte in hopes of renewing the White House lease for Barack Obama and Joe Biden.
They’ve been around seemingly forever, but how much do you really know about the men who want to run the country? Test your political trivia savvy with our presidential bio quizzes.
Today, check yourself on Team Double-R -- Romney and Ryan. Ten questions and answers are below. No peeking, Googling or consulting your favorite Super PAC.
Next week, come back to gauge your knowledge about Democratic Duo Obama and Biden.
Let’s get started.
1: A poll earlier this year found that 2 percent of people thought Mitt Romney’s real first name was Mittens. (Wrong.) What is Romney’s real first name?
A. Mitchell
B. Milton
C. Willard
D. William
2. Mitt Romney may have inherited his love for politics from his dad, George Romney, three-time governor of Michigan and unsuccessful presidential candidate, and his mom. Lenore Romney lost her one bid for public office. What office did she seek?
A. City school board
B. City Council
C. U.S. House of Representatives
D. U.S. Senate
3: What is Mitt Romney’s Chicago connection?
A. His was born in Chicago.
B. His uncle played for the Chicago Bears.
C. He attended the University of Chicago.
D. He lived next door to Barack Obama.
4: What was Mitt Romney’s college major?
A. English
B. Political science
C. French
D. Finance
5: How many sons, daughters and grandchildren in all do Mitt and Ann Romney have?
A. Three sons, two daughters and 25 grandchildren
B. Three sons and 12 grandchildren
C. Five sons and 18 grandchildren
D. Who can count that high?
6: What do Paul Ryan and Romney’s eldest son have in common?
A. They are married to sisters.
B. They are both members of Congress.
C. They are the same age.
D. They co-wrote a sequel to Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged.”
7: Paul Ryan is known to sleep on a cot in his Washington office. What else is true?
A. He’s a fan of P90X workout program.
B. He was a physical trainer after college.
C. He has said he has 6 percent to 8 percent body fat.
D. All of the above.
8. Romney shuns alcohol and caffeine. What did Ryan say was his worst habit?
A. Tosses back a six pack a night
B. Addicted to love
C. Drinks two cups of coffee every morning
D. Smokes cigarettes
9. The political roots of Janna Ryan, wife of Paul, run deep. What are they?
A. She ran unsuccessfully for Congress.
B. Her grandfather ran for president and her cousin is a U.S. senator.
C. Her grandfather ran for governor, her uncle was governor and a U.S. senator, and her cousin is a U.S. House member.
D. Her grandmother helped form the American Party supporting George Wallace and later ran for governor.
10. A constituent offered Paul Ryan something special if he’d run for president in 2012. Was it:
A. A chain of fitness centers to be named Paul Ryan’s Extreme Experience
B. Free colonoscopies for members of Ryan’s family for life
C. A McDonald’s lifetime coupon good for one free burger, fries and shake every day
D. Unlimited free coffee for a year
BONUS QUESTION: Name the five Romney kids.
ANSWERS
1: C. Romney was named after family friend and hotel magnate J. Willard Marriott.
2. D. When Lenore Romney ran for Senate in 1970, women senators were rare and she would have been only the third woman ever elected to serve a full Senate term. “It was disappointing to find so many people closed their minds just because I was a woman,” she said.
3. B. Romney’s middle name honors his uncle, Milton “Mitt” Romney, star quarterback for the Bears in the 1920s.
4. A. An English major at Brigham Young University, class of ’71, Romney advises today’s English majors to plan on graduate school. He earned dual degrees from Harvard Law and Harvard Business School.
5. C. If elected, Romney will be the first president since George H.W. Bush to have sons. Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama have only daughters.
6. C. Ryan and Taggart “Tagg” Romney are both 42. Mitt Romney is 65.
7. D. A fitness buff, Ryan, 6-feet 2 and 163 pounds, leads morning sessions of the P90X muscle-building program on Capitol Hill.
8. C. Ryan admits coffee is his vice. Romney has indulged in coffee ice cream.
9. C. Janna Ryan’s grandfather, Reuel W. Little, helped form the American Party in Oklahoma in the 1960s to support former Alabama Gov. George Wallace’s presidential bid. Little ran for governor on the American Party in 1970. Janna Ryan’s uncle, David Boren, a Democrat, served as senator and governor of Oklahoma. Her cousin is Rep. Dan Boren, D-Okla.
10. B. A gastroenterologist in Ryan’s congressional district offered Ryan’s family free colonoscopies for life if Ryan would run for president. “That seals it,” Ryan deadpanned, the National Review Online reported.
BONUS: Tagg, Matt, Josh, Ben and Craig. One point for each correct answer.
SCORING: 85 to 100 – Congratulations! You’re so savvy you could be family.
70 to 85 – Political pro. Angling for a job in the Romney White House?
55 to 70 – Author, author. You could write a book.
40 to 55 – No slacker, your knowledge exceeds that of most bloggers.
25 to 40 – Tweet away. You certainly have 140 characters’ worth of insight.
Below 25 – Too busy leading your own life for politics? You have time to brush up.
--Compiled by Marsha Mercer
Sources: Associated Press, ABC News, biography.com, Boston Herald, CBS News, CNN, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, mittromney.com, NBC News, National Review Online, New York Times, paulryan.house.gov, Politico, The Atlantic Wire, The Oklahoman, Tulsa World.
© Marsha Mercer 2012. All rights reserved.
Thursday, August 16, 2012
Waiting for 'stop-the-presses' moment in voter ID saga -- Aug. 16, 2012 column
By MARSHA MERCER
As Republican state legislators around the country pressed for strict voter ID laws, insisting they’re needed to combat widespread voter fraud, I wished for a “stop-the-presses” moment.
You know, the scene in old movies when a courageous soul breaks with his pals, comes clean and speaks the truth. In this case, the protagonist would shock fellow Republicans by saying, voter ID laws won’t stop fraud and besides there’s not much of it anyway.
That almost happened in a state court in Pennsylvania this week. Almost.
Commonwealth Court Judge Robert Simpson, a Republican, said after a six-day trial with two dozen witnesses and 50 exhibits challenging the state’s new photo ID law that the parties to the lawsuit were unaware of any incidents of fraud perpetrated by people who impersonate voters in Pennsylvania or anywhere else.
The state offered no evidence of such fraud, Simpson said. Nor did the state argue that fraud was likely to occur in the November elections without the new law that requires voters to show a government-picture ID.
And then Simpson upheld the law anyway. What?
He refused to grant a preliminary injunction to block the law, known as Act 18, as requested by several civil rights groups. He said the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania and other groups had failed to establish that disenfranchisement was “immediate or inevitable.”
Simpson focused on a 2008 U.S. Supreme Court decision that upheld a nearly identical voter ID law in Indiana, even though there was no evidence of voter impersonation fraud.
He was not convinced that hundreds of thousands of qualified Pennsylvania voters could be disenfranchised, as challengers claimed, he said. Rather, he thought not one qualified voter would be turned away. That’s because state agencies have the time and the procedures to fully educate every voter in Pennsylvania about the requirement and to supply the IDs needed before Election Day.
The infirm and elderly can vote absentee, and those who do show up at the polls without the proper ID can cast provisional ballots and prove their eligibility within six days so that their votes are counted, he wrote in a 70-page opinion.
The ACLU other groups will appeal the ruling to the state Supreme Court, but legal analysts say the law likely will be on the books in November.
The six-member state Supreme Court is currently divided evenly between Democrats and Republicans. The state justices are unlikely to break along party lines, Rick Hasen, a law professor at the University of California at Irvine, wrote on the Election Law Blog, but a tie will leave the lower court opinion in place. He expects either that there won’t be another ruling on the merits before November or that the result will be unchanged.
And so the outcome of a crucial presidential battleground hinges on whether a judge’s trust in state bureaucrats is well-founded. This is ironic because Republicans have fueled distrust in the electoral process and government in general by insisting that only photo IDs will make elections fair and honest.
Requiring voters to produce a certain kind of picture ID will crack down on the armies of Fidos, Fluffys, non-citizens and the dead who cast ballots. Except that they don’t.
You are more likely to get hit by lightning than to encounter someone impersonating a voter, the Brennan Center, a progressive think tank, has observed.
Critics contend that voter ID laws are a deliberate way to deter and even block eligible voters who tend to vote Democratic -- seniors, the poor and the homeless who may not have the necessary paperwork to obtain IDs.
State Rep. Mike Turzai, Republican majority leader of the Pennsylvania legislature, bragged to a Republican group in June, “Voter ID, which is going to allow Governor Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania -- done.”
Turzai’s comment was disturbing and tendentious, Judge Simpson said, but there was no evidence that other state legislators shared Turzai’s partisan goal. Even so, the judge said, that would not “invalidate the interests” of the law.
Oh, really? I don’t hear anybody yelling, “Stop the presses!”
Let’s hope the judge is correct that all voters can get the ID cards they need. If qualified voters give up or are turned away, a law passed to solve a non-existent problem will create a real one.
© 2012 Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.
30
As Republican state legislators around the country pressed for strict voter ID laws, insisting they’re needed to combat widespread voter fraud, I wished for a “stop-the-presses” moment.
You know, the scene in old movies when a courageous soul breaks with his pals, comes clean and speaks the truth. In this case, the protagonist would shock fellow Republicans by saying, voter ID laws won’t stop fraud and besides there’s not much of it anyway.
That almost happened in a state court in Pennsylvania this week. Almost.
Commonwealth Court Judge Robert Simpson, a Republican, said after a six-day trial with two dozen witnesses and 50 exhibits challenging the state’s new photo ID law that the parties to the lawsuit were unaware of any incidents of fraud perpetrated by people who impersonate voters in Pennsylvania or anywhere else.
The state offered no evidence of such fraud, Simpson said. Nor did the state argue that fraud was likely to occur in the November elections without the new law that requires voters to show a government-picture ID.
And then Simpson upheld the law anyway. What?
He refused to grant a preliminary injunction to block the law, known as Act 18, as requested by several civil rights groups. He said the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania and other groups had failed to establish that disenfranchisement was “immediate or inevitable.”
Simpson focused on a 2008 U.S. Supreme Court decision that upheld a nearly identical voter ID law in Indiana, even though there was no evidence of voter impersonation fraud.
He was not convinced that hundreds of thousands of qualified Pennsylvania voters could be disenfranchised, as challengers claimed, he said. Rather, he thought not one qualified voter would be turned away. That’s because state agencies have the time and the procedures to fully educate every voter in Pennsylvania about the requirement and to supply the IDs needed before Election Day.
The infirm and elderly can vote absentee, and those who do show up at the polls without the proper ID can cast provisional ballots and prove their eligibility within six days so that their votes are counted, he wrote in a 70-page opinion.
The ACLU other groups will appeal the ruling to the state Supreme Court, but legal analysts say the law likely will be on the books in November.
The six-member state Supreme Court is currently divided evenly between Democrats and Republicans. The state justices are unlikely to break along party lines, Rick Hasen, a law professor at the University of California at Irvine, wrote on the Election Law Blog, but a tie will leave the lower court opinion in place. He expects either that there won’t be another ruling on the merits before November or that the result will be unchanged.
And so the outcome of a crucial presidential battleground hinges on whether a judge’s trust in state bureaucrats is well-founded. This is ironic because Republicans have fueled distrust in the electoral process and government in general by insisting that only photo IDs will make elections fair and honest.
Requiring voters to produce a certain kind of picture ID will crack down on the armies of Fidos, Fluffys, non-citizens and the dead who cast ballots. Except that they don’t.
You are more likely to get hit by lightning than to encounter someone impersonating a voter, the Brennan Center, a progressive think tank, has observed.
Critics contend that voter ID laws are a deliberate way to deter and even block eligible voters who tend to vote Democratic -- seniors, the poor and the homeless who may not have the necessary paperwork to obtain IDs.
State Rep. Mike Turzai, Republican majority leader of the Pennsylvania legislature, bragged to a Republican group in June, “Voter ID, which is going to allow Governor Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania -- done.”
Turzai’s comment was disturbing and tendentious, Judge Simpson said, but there was no evidence that other state legislators shared Turzai’s partisan goal. Even so, the judge said, that would not “invalidate the interests” of the law.
Oh, really? I don’t hear anybody yelling, “Stop the presses!”
Let’s hope the judge is correct that all voters can get the ID cards they need. If qualified voters give up or are turned away, a law passed to solve a non-existent problem will create a real one.
© 2012 Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.
30
Thursday, August 9, 2012
Still learning from Julia Child on her 100th -- Aug. 9, 2012 column
By MARSHA MERCER
I remember my first Julia Child meal the way some people remember their first kiss -- in vivid, cringing detail.
In the early 1970s, I was a grad student in English at the University of Virginia. A young, almost-handsome professor more interested in reading Yeats than in marching on Washington invited me to coffee, lunch and then dinner at his place.
There would be no pot of spaghetti steaming up the windows. No strands flung against the kitchen wall. No cheap red. No Rolling Stones on the turntable.
The prof had a favorite recipe from “Mastering the Art of French Cooking” by Julia Child. I suppose I knew about her and her popular TV cooking show, but he was a devotee.
Julia, he said, as if she were a personal friend, was changing the way Americans cook and think about food.
On his kitchen counter were fine beef filet from the fancy butcher shop, whipping cream, real butter, fresh mushrooms. Mushrooms didn’t have to come from a can. On the stereo: Wagnerian opera.
He whipped up his culinary specialty, Sauté de Boeuf `a la Parisienne, the French version of beef Stroganoff with fresh instead of sour cream. It’s “good to know about,” Julia says, “if you have to entertain important guests in a hurry.” He poured a good red Bordeaux, just as Julia advises. Dining, even at home, should be a pleasure and an event, he said.
I felt pampered, mature, and elegant in the candlelight. Until I got the hiccups. These were not dainty, hide-behind-the-napkin hiccups. These were raucous, shoot-me-now hiccups. I fled the table and his apartment, red-faced.
But I got my own copy of “Mastering” and made the beef sauté. It was surprisingly easy but so rich. I took up running and put Julia on the shelf, favoring cookbooks that promised low-fat recipes fast. Food was for fuel, not for pleasure.
I became a reporter in Richmond, Va. Julia Child came to town to demonstrate cooking at a department store, but the editor gave someone more experienced the plum assignment. I was crushed. The reporter met Julia and her husband Paul in their hotel suite, and Julia, ever the ebullient hostess, poured cocktails. At the time, this was the height of sophistication.
Learning that the reporter had missed lunch, Julia produced a ham she’d received as a gift at her last stop and crackers and turned the interview into a party.
Julia mastered not only the art of French cooking but also of living.
And that’s why 100 years after her birth and eight years after her death, she’s still is teaching us about the pleasures of food.
In honor of her centennial this week – she was born Aug. 15, 1912 -- chefs around the country will host Julia-inspired meals. On Wednesday the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History plans an all-day Julia Child festival. There will be book-signings, showings of “The French Chef” TV show, and the reopening of Julia’s reconstructed kitchen from her Cambridge, Mass., home. The kitchen has been closed while the museum prepares an exhibition on American food and wine.
“Julie and Julia,” the movie written by the late Nora Ephron and starring Meryl Streep as Julia, inspired a new generation. “Mastering” shot to the top of The New York Times how-to bestseller list for the first time in 2009, nearly 50 years after it was first published. Julia’s Facebook page has more than 62,000 “likes.” And, of course, there’s an app for “Mastering.”
I rediscovered Julia this summer. At the library, I came across her autobiography, “My Life in France,” which she started writing with her Alex Prud’homme, her late husband’s grand-nephew. He finished the book after her death – two days before her 92nd birthday -- in 2004.
It’s a wonderful story of Julia’s long and happy marriage, her experiences at the Cordon Bleu school in Paris, her life’s work creating the two volumes of “Mastering” and several other cookbooks, and her boundless enthusiasm for entertaining. Testing and retesting, she showered friends and family with variations of each recipe as she sought perfection.
I took down my old copy of “Mastering,” a slip of paper still marking the beef sauté. I’ll make the recipe this week to celebrate Julia and the art of living.
As Julia liked to say, Bon Appetit!
Hiccups and all.
(c) 2012 Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.
30
I remember my first Julia Child meal the way some people remember their first kiss -- in vivid, cringing detail.
In the early 1970s, I was a grad student in English at the University of Virginia. A young, almost-handsome professor more interested in reading Yeats than in marching on Washington invited me to coffee, lunch and then dinner at his place.
There would be no pot of spaghetti steaming up the windows. No strands flung against the kitchen wall. No cheap red. No Rolling Stones on the turntable.
The prof had a favorite recipe from “Mastering the Art of French Cooking” by Julia Child. I suppose I knew about her and her popular TV cooking show, but he was a devotee.
Julia, he said, as if she were a personal friend, was changing the way Americans cook and think about food.
On his kitchen counter were fine beef filet from the fancy butcher shop, whipping cream, real butter, fresh mushrooms. Mushrooms didn’t have to come from a can. On the stereo: Wagnerian opera.
He whipped up his culinary specialty, Sauté de Boeuf `a la Parisienne, the French version of beef Stroganoff with fresh instead of sour cream. It’s “good to know about,” Julia says, “if you have to entertain important guests in a hurry.” He poured a good red Bordeaux, just as Julia advises. Dining, even at home, should be a pleasure and an event, he said.
I felt pampered, mature, and elegant in the candlelight. Until I got the hiccups. These were not dainty, hide-behind-the-napkin hiccups. These were raucous, shoot-me-now hiccups. I fled the table and his apartment, red-faced.
But I got my own copy of “Mastering” and made the beef sauté. It was surprisingly easy but so rich. I took up running and put Julia on the shelf, favoring cookbooks that promised low-fat recipes fast. Food was for fuel, not for pleasure.
I became a reporter in Richmond, Va. Julia Child came to town to demonstrate cooking at a department store, but the editor gave someone more experienced the plum assignment. I was crushed. The reporter met Julia and her husband Paul in their hotel suite, and Julia, ever the ebullient hostess, poured cocktails. At the time, this was the height of sophistication.
Learning that the reporter had missed lunch, Julia produced a ham she’d received as a gift at her last stop and crackers and turned the interview into a party.
Julia mastered not only the art of French cooking but also of living.
And that’s why 100 years after her birth and eight years after her death, she’s still is teaching us about the pleasures of food.
In honor of her centennial this week – she was born Aug. 15, 1912 -- chefs around the country will host Julia-inspired meals. On Wednesday the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History plans an all-day Julia Child festival. There will be book-signings, showings of “The French Chef” TV show, and the reopening of Julia’s reconstructed kitchen from her Cambridge, Mass., home. The kitchen has been closed while the museum prepares an exhibition on American food and wine.
“Julie and Julia,” the movie written by the late Nora Ephron and starring Meryl Streep as Julia, inspired a new generation. “Mastering” shot to the top of The New York Times how-to bestseller list for the first time in 2009, nearly 50 years after it was first published. Julia’s Facebook page has more than 62,000 “likes.” And, of course, there’s an app for “Mastering.”
I rediscovered Julia this summer. At the library, I came across her autobiography, “My Life in France,” which she started writing with her Alex Prud’homme, her late husband’s grand-nephew. He finished the book after her death – two days before her 92nd birthday -- in 2004.
It’s a wonderful story of Julia’s long and happy marriage, her experiences at the Cordon Bleu school in Paris, her life’s work creating the two volumes of “Mastering” and several other cookbooks, and her boundless enthusiasm for entertaining. Testing and retesting, she showered friends and family with variations of each recipe as she sought perfection.
I took down my old copy of “Mastering,” a slip of paper still marking the beef sauté. I’ll make the recipe this week to celebrate Julia and the art of living.
As Julia liked to say, Bon Appetit!
Hiccups and all.
(c) 2012 Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.
30
Friday, August 3, 2012
Obama's Clinton gamble -- Aug. 2, 2012 column
By MARSHA MERCER
As his adoring fans cheer, the country’s most beloved Democrat strides onstage at the Democratic National Convention and delivers a prime-time speech that makes all the difference come Election Day.
Nah, I’m not imagining Barack Obama’s big night in Charlotte.
It’s Bill Clinton I see. Clinton is more popular and potentially more powerful in motivating Democrats this fall, something Obama conceded when he tapped Clinton for the high-profile role of formally nominating Obama for a second term.
Two in three Americans now have a favorable opinion of Bill Clinton, about the same as at his first presidential inauguration in 1993. Even the haters have mellowed. Only 28 percent of people have an unfavorable opinion of Clinton, an all-time low.
Obama, who desperately needs goodwill, had a respectable 54 percent favorable rating in the same Gallup poll, released July 30.
Bill Clinton has triumphed. A dozen years after Al Gore treated him like a bad smell throughout the 2000 campaign, Clinton is the go-to guy for Obama. The Clintons must love that. Hillary Clinton – whose favorable rating is the same 66 percent as her husband’s – will be a no-show at the Democratic convention. As secretary of state, she is not in campaign mode. Not this year.
If anyone can breathe life into flagging Democrats, Bill Clinton can. And yet, his words can and will be held against Obama. Four years ago Clinton compared voting for Obama to a roll of the dice, and he recently said Romney had a “sterling” business career and was qualified to be president.
Even if Clinton curbs his independent streak and speaks persuasively for Obama, his presence inevitably invites comparisons. Newt Gingrich, hardly an impartial judge, predicted Clinton’s convention speech would “shrink” Obama.
Putting Clinton front and center reminds voters that he worked successfully with a Republican Congress. The rejoinder of course is that Clinton did not have a Senate majority leader who said from Day One that holding the president to one term was his top priority. Would Clinton have found a way to work around that obstacle? No one knows.
A few weeks before Clinton was nominated for a second presidential term. he signed into law bipartisan welfare reform, a minimum wage increase and health insurance portability. Clinton didn’t get everything he wanted, but he was a pragmatist. He infuriated liberals, but at the convention and into the fall he could point to fresh accomplishments on behalf of the middle class.
At the August 1996 signing ceremony for the welfare reform law, Clinton said welfare would no longer be a political issue and politicians would not be able to attack each other or the poor. At the time, many thought that wishful thinking. But he was right.
Welfare stayed largely off the table for many years. A disturbing report by the General Accountability Office in 2005 riled Democrats and Republicans with its finding that some states were counting toward the work requirements such activities as getting a massage and writing in a journal.
Overall, welfare rolls declined, though, until the recession hit and the ranks of children living in poverty started to rise. And then last month the Obama administration sparked a Republican rebellion by announcing more flexibility for states in how they run their welfare programs. The administration said it would grant waivers to allow states to experiment with their welfare-to-work programs without filing paperwork.
Even though more than two dozen Republican governors had signed a letter asking for more flexibility, Republican leaders reacted angrily. They accused Obama of gutting the law’s work requirements and, in effect, killing welfare reform. House Speaker John Boehner called the change a “partisan disgrace.” Romney said it was “completely misdirected.”
Yes, these same Republicans usually want states to have more power to create programs that meet their residents’ needs – not less. And no state has to apply for a waiver. It’s voluntary.
An official in the federal agency that administers welfare said, “Many states report that their caseworkers are spending more time complying with federal documentation requirements that helping parents find jobs.” The White House press secretary called the complaints “hypocritical.”
Ah, but it’s campaign season. Politics overrides everything.
By putting Clinton onstage, Obama can remind voters that a Democratic president once got things done and gamble that they will think he can do the same. That’s Obama’s big gamble.
©2012 Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.
As his adoring fans cheer, the country’s most beloved Democrat strides onstage at the Democratic National Convention and delivers a prime-time speech that makes all the difference come Election Day.
Nah, I’m not imagining Barack Obama’s big night in Charlotte.
It’s Bill Clinton I see. Clinton is more popular and potentially more powerful in motivating Democrats this fall, something Obama conceded when he tapped Clinton for the high-profile role of formally nominating Obama for a second term.
Two in three Americans now have a favorable opinion of Bill Clinton, about the same as at his first presidential inauguration in 1993. Even the haters have mellowed. Only 28 percent of people have an unfavorable opinion of Clinton, an all-time low.
Obama, who desperately needs goodwill, had a respectable 54 percent favorable rating in the same Gallup poll, released July 30.
Bill Clinton has triumphed. A dozen years after Al Gore treated him like a bad smell throughout the 2000 campaign, Clinton is the go-to guy for Obama. The Clintons must love that. Hillary Clinton – whose favorable rating is the same 66 percent as her husband’s – will be a no-show at the Democratic convention. As secretary of state, she is not in campaign mode. Not this year.
If anyone can breathe life into flagging Democrats, Bill Clinton can. And yet, his words can and will be held against Obama. Four years ago Clinton compared voting for Obama to a roll of the dice, and he recently said Romney had a “sterling” business career and was qualified to be president.
Even if Clinton curbs his independent streak and speaks persuasively for Obama, his presence inevitably invites comparisons. Newt Gingrich, hardly an impartial judge, predicted Clinton’s convention speech would “shrink” Obama.
Putting Clinton front and center reminds voters that he worked successfully with a Republican Congress. The rejoinder of course is that Clinton did not have a Senate majority leader who said from Day One that holding the president to one term was his top priority. Would Clinton have found a way to work around that obstacle? No one knows.
A few weeks before Clinton was nominated for a second presidential term. he signed into law bipartisan welfare reform, a minimum wage increase and health insurance portability. Clinton didn’t get everything he wanted, but he was a pragmatist. He infuriated liberals, but at the convention and into the fall he could point to fresh accomplishments on behalf of the middle class.
At the August 1996 signing ceremony for the welfare reform law, Clinton said welfare would no longer be a political issue and politicians would not be able to attack each other or the poor. At the time, many thought that wishful thinking. But he was right.
Welfare stayed largely off the table for many years. A disturbing report by the General Accountability Office in 2005 riled Democrats and Republicans with its finding that some states were counting toward the work requirements such activities as getting a massage and writing in a journal.
Overall, welfare rolls declined, though, until the recession hit and the ranks of children living in poverty started to rise. And then last month the Obama administration sparked a Republican rebellion by announcing more flexibility for states in how they run their welfare programs. The administration said it would grant waivers to allow states to experiment with their welfare-to-work programs without filing paperwork.
Even though more than two dozen Republican governors had signed a letter asking for more flexibility, Republican leaders reacted angrily. They accused Obama of gutting the law’s work requirements and, in effect, killing welfare reform. House Speaker John Boehner called the change a “partisan disgrace.” Romney said it was “completely misdirected.”
Yes, these same Republicans usually want states to have more power to create programs that meet their residents’ needs – not less. And no state has to apply for a waiver. It’s voluntary.
An official in the federal agency that administers welfare said, “Many states report that their caseworkers are spending more time complying with federal documentation requirements that helping parents find jobs.” The White House press secretary called the complaints “hypocritical.”
Ah, but it’s campaign season. Politics overrides everything.
By putting Clinton onstage, Obama can remind voters that a Democratic president once got things done and gamble that they will think he can do the same. That’s Obama’s big gamble.
©2012 Marsha Mercer. All rights reserved.
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