The war for women in Missouri’s Senate race

By Diana Reese , Updated: October 29, 2012

KANSAS CITY – The war on women has morphed into a last-minute battle for women’s votes.
In Missouri, both incumbent Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) and Republican challenger Rep. Todd Akin aired new television commercials this weekend aimed squarely at the female voter.

It’s no surprise that the ads are about as different as the views espoused by the respective candidates. McCaskill’s features real Missouri women worried about Akin’s legislative abilities and views because of his infamous “legitimate rape” comment in August, while Akin’s black-and-white commercial includes a shot of a family at the dinner tab, holding hands while saying grace, plus Akin’s own family portrait with his six children and eight grandchildren.

Sexual assault victim Diana Meyer of Liberty, Mo. speaks to a group of supporters for Sen. Claire McCaskill. (Claire McCaskill campaign photo)

McCaskill’s campaign hosted events for “Women with Claire” in Kansas City and St. Louis where the new television commercial, called “Real Words–Scary,” was previewed:

Woman 1: Todd Akin is scary.

Woman 2: His statement about “legitimate rape,” is beyond the pale.

Akin: If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.

Woman 3: He has no idea how it even works and he wants to legislate about it?

Woman 4: I worry about the misinformation he evidently believes.

Woman 1: I am afraid of what he’ll do in Congress.

Woman 5: All women in Missouri need to think what happens to their rights.

At the Kansas City event, I met Diana Meyer, the sexual assault victim from Liberty, Mo. featured in an earlier series of McCaskill’s ads. ”At the end of the day, who I would trust to make the right decision to protect me is painfully evident,” she told me..” Meyer has crossed party lines to appear in the commercial and to speak out in support of McCaskill.

“Don’t boo me out of the room,” Meyer told the crowd when she admitted she was a Republican. “This matter goes beyond party lines, beyond gender.” It deals with “individual and personal freedoms.”

Freedom has been a buzzword of Akin’s campaign, but his new commercial targeted to women focuses on the family. Akin’s ad appeared on television Saturday (I actually saw it while watching the local news). His campaign has been strapped for cash since his “legitimate rape” remark in August when the Republican National Senatorial Committee pulled millions of advertising dollars and big-name Republicans withdrew their support. The Associated Press reported that Akin’s campaign, in an appeal to donors, said McCaskill had outspent Akin 10 to 1.

Akin’s black-and-white ad “Jobs and Paychecks” has a nostalgic feel with a voice-over narration:
The blessings of a good job and a good paycheck can be seen in the joy of every brother, sister, parent, child. Because a strong economy means stronger families. Married 37 years, the father of six, Todd Akin puts our families first in everything he does. That’s why he has a plan to create jobs by cutting taxes, reducing regulations and empowering small business. Better jobs, stronger families.

Akin has two other commercials coming out: One’s an endorsement from former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee calling Akin “as strong as steel” and the other attacks McCaskill’s husband, businessman Joseph Shepard. The ad almost looks like security camera footage but is actually a reenactment; the narrator claims that Shepard cut deals in the U.S. Senate dining room.

The claims were made by a former employee of Shepard’s businesses, Craig Woods, who admitted he had never been in the Senate dining room and was not present when the alleged deals were made. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported that Woods served prison time for stealing $330,000 over a 10-year period from McCall Pattern Co. and for stealing $438,420 from Kellwood Co., a Chesterfield, Mo. clothing manufacturer, in the 1990s.

The “Political Fix” columnist, Nick Pistor, wrote, “The claim about a dining room meeting did not come from an eyewitness account and lacks direct evidence.”

“This is a desperate, 11th hour attack from a failing campaign,” McCaskill spokesman Caitlin Legacki said. “It’s bad enough that Todd Akin would attack Claire’s family, it’s worse that he is now basing his entire campaign on a series of lies. Todd Akin’s attacks have been proven false and he knows it.”

McCaskill’s not in a position to fight back; she suspended her campaign activities last week to rush to the bedside of her ailing mother, who’s in intensive care in a St. Louis hospital.

It may be up to Missouri’s women to cast the deciding votes on who will represent the state for the next six years in the U.S. Senate. That thrills my daughter, who’s voting for the first time for president and who pointed out that women have had the vote for less than a century.

Women have come a long way; let’s not lose the progress that’s been made. As the Springfield (Mo.) News-Leader, said in its endorsement for McCaskill: “While McCaskill has been a role model and advocate for women’s rights, Congressman Akin would be a throwback to attitudes that prevailed decades ago. And it’s not just for his ignorant remarks on women being able to avoid pregnancy in cases of “legitimate rape.” 

The Republican candidate’s views on a host of other issues — Social Security, student loans, school lunches and even the Federal Reserve — put him well outside the mainstream.”

Diana Reese is a freelance journalist in Kansas City and a former editor of Missouri Life magazine. Follow her on Twitter at @dianareese.

© The Washington Post Company

Obama comes out swinging after debate - in swing states

By Mark Felsenthal

MOUNT VERNON, Iowa | Wed Oct 17, 2012 5:12pm EDT

(Reuters) - President Barack Obama hit rival Mitt Romney hard on women's issues as he headed back on the campaign trail on Wednesday after a spirited debate performance that re-energized his bid for a second term.

A day after a much-improved performance in the second of three presidential debates, a revitalized Obama continued sparring with his Republican opponent, making fun of Romney's comment that he had received "binders full of women" to consider for cabinet positions when he was governor of Massachusetts.

"I've got to tell you, we don't have to collect a bunch of binders to find qualified, talented driven young women ready to learn and teach in (science, technology and engineering) right now. And when young women graduate, they should get equal pay for equal work," Obama, relaxed and smiling in shirt sleeves and a loosened tie, told 2,000 people at Cornell College in Iowa.

With 20 days to go until the election, Obama campaigned in Iowa and Ohio while Romney was in Virginia - all important "swing states" that can go to either candidate on November 6.

In Chesapeake, Virginia, Romney said Obama has failed to help women get well-paying jobs and also accused the president of failing to produce a second-term agenda.

"Don't you think it's time for them to finally put together a vision for what he'd do in the next four years if he were re-elected?" Romney asked about 3,500 supporters outside a community college.

Romney scored points of his own during Tuesday night's debate when he focused on middle class economic struggles and listed promises he said Obama failed to keep from his 2008 campaign.

Both sides claimed victory, but most polls gave a badly needed edge to Obama, who saw his lead in polls contract sharply after a lackluster performance in the first debate October 3.

Voters said Obama outperformed Romney by a substantial margin on Tuesday night, according to a post-debate Reuters/Ipsos survey: 48 percent to 33 percent.

"This will give the president a bit of a bounce and a little bit of an edge, but it's going to be quite close right down to the wire," Notre Dame University political science professor Michael Desch said.

The final presidential debate is scheduled for Monday in Boca Raton, Florida.

OBAMA HOLDING SLIM POLL LEAD

Obama leads Romney by 47 percent to 44 percent among likely voters, according to Wednesday's Reuters/Ipsos daily online tracking poll. His 3-point lead was unchanged from Tuesday, with most of the interviews done before the latest debate.

A Rasmussen Reports tracking poll of 11 swing states had Obama leading Romney by 50 percent to 47 percent on Wednesday.

Obama needs strong support from women voters if he hopes to beat the Republican, and he made sure to appeal to them during the debate by bringing up contraceptive rights and his push to ensure pay equity.

Analysts said Obama did particularly well on women's issues, boosted by Romney's awkward "binders" statement, which lit up social media. The mock Twitter account @RomneyBinders amassed more than 33,000 followers, and a Facebook page "Binders Full of Women" attracted more than 303,000 "likes."

Romney, a former private equity adviser, hit back by contending his business experience will help women, and all Americans, by bolstering the sputtering economy.

His campaign also released new television advertisements directed at women.

One outlines Romney's stance on abortion and contraception, which is more moderate than that of many Republicans. In the ad, a woman directly faces the camera and talks about Romney's support for contraception as well as abortion in cases of rape, incest or a threat to a mother's life.

A second, called "Humanity," features women who worked for Romney when he was governor of Massachusetts talking about his sensitivity to women employees.

Analysts also said Romney bungled on foreign policy when he mischaracterized - and was corrected by the debate monitor - Obama's initial remarks on last month's deadly attacks on diplomatic facilities in Libya.

Obama took advantage of the moment to accuse Romney of politicizing the deaths of four Americans.

Polls show the economy is an area in which voters view the two candidates similarly, or give the Republican an edge. But Obama has been helped recently by some positive economic news.

On Wednesday, the Commerce Department said groundbreaking on new homes surged in September to its fastest pace in more than four years, a sign the sector's budding recovery is gaining traction and supporting the wider economic recovery.

(Additional reporting by Steve Holland in Chesapeake, Virginia and Jeff Mason, Alina Selyukh, Andy Sullivan, Debbie Charles, Susan Heavey and Patricia Zengerle in Washington; writing by Patricia Zengerle; editing by Marilyn W. Thompson and Doina Chiacu)

Supreme Court gives Obama camp a win in Ohio early voting tussle

By Dan Burns

Tue Oct 16, 2012 5:31pm EDT

(Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday denied Ohio's request to curtail early voting in the state, a victory for President Barack Obama's re-election campaign which had battled Republican efforts to scale back in-person balloting in the days leading up to Election Day.

Ohio, critical to the election hopes of Obama and his Republican challenger Mitt Romney, began early in-person voting earlier this month but planned to cut it off on November 2, the Friday before the election, except for members of the military.

The Obama campaign, the Democratic National Committee and the Ohio Democratic Party had sued Ohio officials to restore early voting right up to the eve of election day. Republicans opposed their efforts, saying a cutoff was needed to reduce voter fraud and ease the burden on election officials.

In states that allow voters to cast ballots before election day, early voting and extended voting hours are thought to benefit Democratic candidates because lower-income people, who tend to vote for them, are more likely to work odd hours.

According to a Reuters/Ipsos national survey, about 10 percent of likely voters have already cast ballots. And of those who have voted, Obama holds a sizable lead over Romney - 56 percent to 35 percent. The poll has a credibility interval, a measure of accuracy, of plus or minus about five percentage points.

That contrasts with a much closer race according to polls of likely voters. There, the president holds just a slight edge of 46 percent to 43 percent in Tuesday's Reuters/Ipsos daily tracking poll.

Earlier this month, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a U.S. District Court order that reinstated early voting in the final days before the election. The state had appealed that ruling to the Supreme Court.

'END OF THE ROAD'

In a one-sentence order on Tuesday, the high court denied the state's petition for a stay of the appeals court decision.

"This action from the highest court in the land marks the end of the road in our fight to ensure open voting this year for all Ohioans, including military, veterans, and overseas voters." Obama campaign General Counsel Bob Bauer said in a statement.

Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted, the state's top elections official, called the 6th Circuit's decision an unprecedented intrusion by federal judges into state elections that was illegal and impractical.

"Despite the court's decision today to deny our request for a stay, I firmly believe Ohio and its elected legislature should set the rules with respect to elections in Ohio, and not the federal court system," Husted said in a statement. "However, the time has come to set aside the issue for this election."

The appeals court's decision did not require polls to be open on the final three days, leaving it up to the discretion of the state's 88 individual county election boards.

Following the Supreme Court ruling, however, Husted directed all state polling places to adopt the same hours for the balance of early voting.

"Today I have set uniform hours statewide, giving all Ohio voters the same opportunities to vote in the upcoming presidential election regardless of what county they live in," Husted said.

For the final three days before the election, Ohio voters may cast ballots between 8 a.m. and 2 p.m. on Saturday, November 3; from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. on Sunday, November 4; and from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m on Monday, November 5.

A coalition of 15 states, including Colorado, Wisconsin and Virginia, filed a supporting brief for Ohio on Friday, encouraging the court to block the 6th Circuit's ruling. They said Ohio had not placed a burden on citizens' ability to vote by eliminating the three early voting days.

(Editing by Will Dunham and Cynthia Osterman)

Pakistan sends girl shot by Taliban to UK for care

ISLAMABAD — Pakistan airlifted a wounded teenage activist shot by the Taliban to the United Kingdom on Monday for more specialized medical care and to protect her from follow-up attacks threatened by the militants.

The attack on 14-year-old Malala Yousufzai as she was returning home from school in Pakistan's northwest a week ago has horrified people across the country and abroad. It has also sparked hope the government would respond by intensifying its fight against the Taliban and their allies.

Malala was targeted by the Taliban for promoting girls' education and criticizing the militant group's behavior when they took over the scenic Swat Valley where she lived. Two of her classmates were also wounded in the attack and are receiving treatment in Pakistan.

The Taliban have threatened to target Malala again until she is killed because she promotes "Western thinking."

Malala was flown out of Pakistan on Monday morning in a specially equipped air ambulance provided by the United Arab Emirates, said the Pakistani military, which has been treating the young girl at one of its hospitals.

Video footage handed out by the military showed Malala being wheeled out of the hospital on a stretcher, covered in a white sheet and surrounded by uniformed army officers. She was placed in the back of an ambulance and driven to the airport, where she was put on a plane.

A panel of doctors recommended that Malala be shifted to a center in the United Kingdom that has the ability to provide "integrated" care to children who have sustained severe injuries, said a military statement.
"It was agreed by the panel of Pakistani doctors and international experts that Malala will require prolonged care to fully recover from the physical and psychological effects of trauma that she has received," the military said.

The plane stopped for several hours in the Emirati capital of Abu Dhabi on the way to the United Kingdom, said the Pakistani Ambassador to the UAE Jamil Ahmed Khan. The ambassador visited Malala during the stop and said she appeared to be in stable condition. Her parents were not on the plane with her, he said.
Malala will be treated at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham in central England, a center which has specialized in the treatment of troops wounded in Afghanistan, said British Prime Minister David Cameron's office.

"The UK stands shoulder to shoulder with Pakistan in its fight against terrorism," said British Foreign Secretary William Hague in a statement sent to reporters. "Malala's bravery in standing up for the right of all young girls in Pakistan to an education is an example to us all."

Pakistani doctors at a military hospital earlier removed a bullet from Malala's body that entered her head and headed toward her spine. The military has described her recovery as satisfactory and said she was able to move her legs and hands several days ago when her sedatives were reduced. They have not said whether she suffered any brain damage or other permanent damage.

On Monday, the military said damaged bones in Malala's skull will need to be repaired or replaced, and she will need "intensive neuro rehabilitation." The decision to send the girl abroad was taken in consultation with her family, and the Pakistani government will pay for her treatment.

Pakistanis have held rallies for Malala throughout the country, but most have only numbered a few hundred people. The largest show of support by far occurred Sunday when tens of thousands of people held a demonstration in the southern party city of Karachi organized by the most powerful political party in the city, the Muttahida Quami Movement.

Late Sunday night, over 100 Taliban militants attacked a police station in the small town of Matni, 20 kilometers (12 miles) south of the main northwest city of Peshawar. The heavily armed militants killed six policemen, including two who were beheaded, said police officer Ishrat Yar.

The police engaged the militants in a gunbattle that lasted for several hours, but the insurgents escaped after burning the police station and four police vehicles, said Yar.

One of the policemen who was beheaded was a senior official who commanded several police stations in the area and was leading reinforcements against the attack, said Yar. Another 12 policemen received gunshot wounds.

A Pakistani Taliban spokesman, Mohammad Afridi, claimed responsibility for the attack, saying the police were targeted because they had killed several militants.

The Taliban have carried out hundreds of attacks throughout Pakistan but the attacks rarely include such a high number of militants as in the assault on the police station in Matni.

By SEBASTIAN ABBOT, AP

Khan reported from Peshawar, Pakistan. Associated Press writers Asif Shahzad in Islamabad, Ishtiaq Mahsud in Dera Ismail Khan, Pakistan, Riaz Khan in Peshawar, Pakistan, and David Stringer in London contributed to this report.

Mom gets 99 years in prison for gluing tot's hands

By NOMAAN MERCHANT, AP

FILE - In a Thursday, Oct. 11, 2012 file photo, Elizabeth Escalona, 23, brea...

DALLAS — A Dallas woman who beat her 2-year-old daughter and glued the toddler's hands to a wall was sentenced Friday to 99 years in prison by a judge who described his decision as a necessary punishment for a brutal, shocking attack.

Elizabeth Escalona did not immediately react as State District Judge Larry Mitchell pronounced the sentence at the end of a five-day hearing. Prosecutor Eren Price, who originally offered Escalona a plea deal for 45 years, had argued that she now thought the 23-year-old mother deserved life.
Mitchell said his decision came down to one thing.
"On Sept. 7, 2011, you savagely beat your child to the edge of death," Mitchell said. "For this you must be punished."
The beating left Jocelyn Cedillo in a coma for a couple of days.
Escalona's other children told authorities their mother attacked Jocelyn due to potty training problems. Police say she kicked her daughter in the stomach, beat her with a milk jug, then stuck her hands to an apartment wall with an adhesive commonly known as Super Glue.
Jocelyn suffered bleeding in her brain, a fractured rib, multiple bruises and bite marks, a doctor testified. Some skin had been torn off her hands, where doctors also found glue residue and white paint chips from the apartment wall.
Escalona pleaded guilty in July to one count of felony injury to a child.
Price said Escalona would be eligible to apply for parole in 30 years.
Mitchell could have sentenced Escalona to anywhere from probation to life in prison. A sentence as long as 99 years is rare for felony injury to a child cases in Texas, but not unheard of. According to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, about 2,100 inmates are serving prison sentences for felony injury offenses involving a child, elderly or disabled victim. Just fewer than 5 percent of those inmates are serving sentences of 99 years or more, including life.
Defense attorney Angie N'Duka said afterward that the sentence was "way too harsh" and suggested the widespread attention her client's case had received contributed to the sentence.
"It's a lot of pressure, a lot of pressure on the parties," N'Duka said.
Price said prosecutors decided to ask for a longer sentence after receiving more evidence they wouldn't have had if Escalona had taken a deal for 45 years.
"We feel like the judge listened very carefully to a very difficult week of testimony, and we feel like he did exactly what the evidence called for," Price said.
Throughout the hearing, Price sought to portray Escalona as a liar, a monster and an unfit mother. She forced Escalona Thursday to look at enlarged photos of the bruises her attack left on Jocelyn.
Price argued Friday that if a stranger had beaten Jocelyn the same way, no one would hesitate to give that person life in prison. Escalona had mishandled a "beautiful gift" of a daughter and failed to recognize what she had done, Price argued.
"The 45-year recommendation was for somebody who was going to take ownership of what she did, appreciate what she caused," Price said.
Sending her to prison for decades would protect her children's future, Price argued.
"You can give Jocelyn and her brothers and sister peace," she said. "You can give them peace, so that when they're sitting around the dinner table at Thanksgiving with their big family, they're not worried that their mother is going to come walking through the door."
Defense attorney Angie N'Duka asked for probation or a prison sentence shorter than 10 years. N'Duka argued that her client was a "train wreck" waiting to happen before the attack, the product of a broken home, abuse and a childhood that included illegal drugs and hanging out with gang members.
N'Duka repeated that she did not want to minimize the injuries from the attack.
"They are despicable, but then the question is, `What is justice for Jocelyn?'" she said, adding later: "Giving Elizabeth the opportunity to be a better mother, giving her the opportunity to get counseling services, will be justice for Jocelyn."
Escalona's five children, including Jocelyn and a baby born after the attack, are in the care of their grandmother, Ofeila Escalona.
Mitchell listened to both lawyers and took a short break before delivering his sentence.
The judge said he believed many of the allegations that Escalona was abused as a child. "And again, outside of the context of this trial, I think even the state would find you to be a sympathetic figure, because they prosecute people for what was done to you," Mitchell said. "But I can't consider that evidence outside of the context of this trial."
He then announced the sentence. A family member of Escalona began sobbing and screaming, "No!"
N'Duka told reporters that Escalona had asked afterward, "What about my children?"
Ofelia Escalona had asked for leniency for her daughter. After the sentencing, she left the courtroom with a solemn expression, ignoring reporters' shouted questions.

ATMs dispense laughable phony cash

By Claes Bell · Bankrate.com

Thursday, October 11, 2012

Posted: 6 am ET

Next time you visit the ATM, you might want to take a closer look at the cash it dispenses. Last week, ATMs in New York owned by JPMorgan Chase & Co. and serviced by NCR were loaded with $110,000 in fake bills, some of which were dispensed to customers.
The funny part: The counterfeit bills were really, really bad. Printed on regular paper stock with images only on one side, they may have been created by a rogue employee specifically to fool ATMs.

While it wasn't true in this case, counterfeit cash can often be hard to spot. (photo by Eric Skiff)

From Joseph Goldstein and William K. Rashbaum at The New York Times:

The counterfeit bills did not appear intended to fool customers so much as to trick the ATMs into believing they were carrying a full complement of cash. However, in most instances, the machines appeared to have been able to distinguish the fake bills from the real ones, and separate them. A Chase bank official said that the canisters designed to snare bogus bills for this purpose in the ATMs were full of them.

But at least two of the counterfeit bills got through on Monday.

A customer at each of the two Chase branches alerted bank employees that they had received a fake bill, the bank official said. In one case, the customer had made a withdrawal for $20, while the other customer's withdrawal was for $100, the official said.

Both customers discovered the fake bill right away, the official said.

In a statement issued by Chase, the company said: "We are working to get all the facts and don't want to come to any conclusions too early. Obviously, all of our customers who withdrew money will be made whole."

It was not immediately clear whether any other ATMs had dispensed counterfeit bills.

While these counterfeit bills probably won't present much of a problem because they can be spotted right away, more sophisticated fakes are a rare but real scourge for consumers, especially those who rely on cash heavily for day-to-day banking transactions. In a 2006 report, the U.S. Treasury estimated that there is about $75 million worth of counterfeit bills circulating in the U.S. at any given time, or about 1.5 counterfeits for every 10,000 bills.
If you should have the bad luck to receive a counterfeit bill, you're essentially out of luck. It's illegal to knowingly pass counterfeit money on, so the only place the bill should go from there is into the hands of law enforcement.
What do you think? Are banks helpless when it comes to counterfeiting? Have you ever been passed a counterfeit bill? How did you know it was fake? Tell us your story.

Read more: ATMs dispense laughable phony cash | Bankrate.com http://www.bankrate.com/financing/banking/atms-dispense-laughable-phony-cash/#ixzz292DdwFc3

Joe Biden Readies for Vice Presidential Debate

By Arlette Saenz
@ArletteSaenz
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Oct 10, 2012 6:00am

Veteran Debater Joe Biden Readies for Vice Presidential Debate

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Nati Harnik/AP Photo

With 40 years of debating experience under his belt, Vice President Joe Biden hunkered down for several days of intensive preparation in his hometown of Wilmington, Del. this week ahead of his duel with Rep. Paul Ryan in Danville, Ky., this Thursday.

The vice president has been studying and watching videos of Ryan’s interviews and speeches, and he has read a book co-authored by Ryan and Reps. Eric Cantor and Kevin McCarthy. Biden has incorporated portions of the book he disagrees with into speeches on the campaign trail.

Biden has held mock debates against Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., the ranking member of the House Budget Committee, with Biden’s communications director and former Washington Post reporter Shailagh Murray playing the role of the debate moderator, ABC News’ Martha Raddatz.

Tune in to ABCNews.com on Thursday for live streaming coverage of the 2012 Vice Presidential Debate in Danville, Ky. Coverage kicks off with ABC News’ live preview show at noon, and full debate coverage begins at 8 p.m. 

Accompanying Biden at debate prep this week are long-time advisers like former Sen. Ted Kaufman and Mike Donilon. David Axelrod, senior adviser to the Obama campaign, is also attending the debate prep sessions, a decision which was made weeks ago.

Van Hollen has served alongside Ryan on the budget committee and has said he hopes to give Biden an understanding of how the Wisconsin congressman will argue his case.

“I know the way Paul Ryan likes to present his arguments.  The vice president, as you know, is very familiar with the key issues, and I hope I can help him get a sense of how Paul Ryan likes to present it,” Van Hollen said in an interview on MSNBC last month.

At the time, Van Hollen predicted Biden would “kick my butt” in the mock debates.

By ABC News’ count, Biden has participated in 23 debates over his career as a senator, presidential candidate, and vice presidential candidate.  During the 2008 election, he appeared at 14 debates as a Democratic presidential contender and sparred with Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin at the lone VP debate of the cycle.

Biden also took part in two presidential debates when he ran for the Democratic nomination as president  in 1988. Ryan has debated eight times in the 13 years he’s been a congressman.

While a campaign official told ABC News Biden’s team is “not re-inventing the preparation wheel,” the approach Biden takes at Thursday night’s debate may differ from the way he handled his debate against Palin.  In the 2008 vice presidential debate, Biden focused most of his attention on attacking Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain, with only making passing references to Palin.  But in this year’s debate, Biden will likely target Ryan, who he says has given more definition to Romney’s campaign, and his programs head on.

“Like President Obama, Vice President Biden will use the upcoming debate as an opportunity to speak directly to the American people about what’s at stake for the middle class in this election,” a campaign official said.  “He will continue to drive home the specific plans he and the president have to keep strengthening our economy and the middle class.”

After President Obama’s lackluster performance in the first presidential debate last week, the stakes for Biden have heightened, and the campaign hopes the vice president can capitalize on his connection to the middle class.

“The Vice President has throughout his career spoken passionately about middle-class families and the need for government to take action to ensure that the middle class is strengthened, that middle-class security is enhanced,” White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, who also served as Biden’s communications director, told reporters aboard Air Force One Tuesday.

“The Vice President speaks passionately about these issues because they reflect where he comes from and what he believes and what his values are.  And I expect anytime he stands before the American people to talk about the President’s record on these issues he’ll do so in a forceful and compelling way,” he said

But the campaign also realizes the debate is as much about Biden’s performance as it is about Ryan’s.

“The question here is which Paul Ryan is going to come to the debate later this week.  Is it going to be the Paul Ryan who has been misleading about everything from his marathon time to details and specifics he included in his convention speech?  Or is it going to be the Paul Ryan who has eagerly embraced voucherizing Medicare and tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires?” Jen Psaki, a spokesperson for the Obama campaign, told reporters aboard Air Force One Tuesday.

Thursday night’s showdown in Kentucky could be the final debate of Biden’s political career if he decides against running for president four years from now, but a strong showing could elevate his status among 2016 prospects.

However, Biden’s propensity for gaffes, which Republicans have aggressively pushed in recent weeks, could prove to be a liability for the vice president if he slips up.  Biden told reporters outside a Hy-Vee supermarket in Council Bluffs, Iowa, last week that he’s mindful of getting the facts straight on the debate stage.

“I don’t want to say anything in the debate that’s not completely accurate,” he said.

Biden ran into some trouble with the facts in a 1987 Democratic presidential debate during which he used portions of speech by Neil Kinnock, a leader of the Labor Party in Britain, without giving credit to Kinnock.  Biden had incorporated portions Kinnock’s speech at various campaign appearances before the debate, but he always credited the Briton for his remarks.  The incident, coupled with news of Biden’s plagiarism while in law school, eventually drove the Delaware senator to drop out of the race.

But Biden has also had some memorable debate moments that didn’t involve blunders.  In his 2008 debate against Palin, Biden choked up when he talked about caring for his two young sons as a single father after his wife and daughter were killed in a car crash a month after he was elected to the United States Senate.

After moderator Brian Williams noted Biden’s “gaffe prone” narrative during the first Democratic debate of the 2008 cycle, he asked the normally verbose Biden if he could “reassure voters in this country that you would have the discipline you would need on the world stage.”

“Yes,” Biden responded as the audience laughed.

Obama close to raising $1 billion after near-record September tally

By Dan Eggen

President Obama’s reelection campaign, which only two months ago fretted that it was losing the money race to Republican challenger Mitt Romney, said Saturday that it was on the cusp of raising $1 billion for the 2012 election after posting its strongest fundraising month of the year.

The Obama campaign and the Democratic National Committee raised $181 million last month, easily eclipsing the $114 million that they had raised together in August. The number falls just shy of the all-time monthly record of $193 million, however, which was set by Obama in September 2008.

Campaign manager Jim Messina wrote in an e-mail to supporters that Obama’s fundraising efforts in 2012 mark “a historic record for grass-roots politics.” The campaign says it has collected more than 10 million individual donations so far this year.

The September haul caps a turnaround in Obama’s financial status since May. He fell behind his Republican opponent in monthly fundraising through July, but he edged out Romney in August, $114 million to $112 million.

Obama has raised nearly half his money through small donations with aggressive solicitation programs targeting e-mail, social media and cellphone texting services. Last month’s fundraising also included the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, N.C., and a notable bump in the polls for the president in subsequent weeks.

The impressive fundraising total comes on the heels of Obama’s widely panned performance at the first presidential debate in Denver. Romney’s campaign has not announced a September fundraising total yet but said it had a surge in donations this week after the debate.

The September tally means Obama is close to surpassing his total fundraising for 2008, when the campaign and the DNC jointly brought in just under $1 billion overall. He and his allies, including super PACs, had raised about $780 million through August, Federal Election Commission data show. Romney and his supporters had raised about the same, but much more of it has come from well-funded super PACs that are not bound by political contribution limits.

The Obama campaign said Saturday that out of 1.83 million individual donors in September, nearly 570,000 had never given before in 2012 or 2008.

Even with the good numbers, the president’s reelection campaign is still pushing for more.

“There is exactly one month left to go until Election Day,” Messina wrote in his e-mail. “The stakes are too high for us to take our foot off the gas now. Chip in . . . and let’s go win.”

The narcotics cop and Big Bird.

If you are a criminal lawyer you can understand where I am coming from with this next issue that I have when I am doing my (second) day job. 

So you are asking a veteran narcotics officer some questions at a preliminary hearing. He is sitting in the witness box and you know that he is lying through his teeth, but you can't call him on it, because...well, he is a veteran narcotics officer. He is good at it, because he has been prepped by the District Attorney's office, and he has been doing it a long time. So what do you do? You call him on it. You tell him that you know he is lying over the objections of opposing counsel. The Judge will sustain the objection of course, but then you tell him again that he is lying, just to let him --and everyone in the room-- know how incensed you are that an officer of the law would lie under oath.

Poor President Obama was not a trial lawyer; he was a law professor, and it showed last night. When Mitt was telling lie after lie in the thin air of Denver, (28 and counting) all he could do was stare at him like a deer caught in the middle of the night on a country road. And, to his credit, the more Mitt got away with it, is the more he lied. The shady narcotics cop had the law professor on the run.

Now,unlike my man Chris Matthews, I don't think President Obama's performance was all that bad. Yes, Flipper beat him, but only time will tell if his Mel Gibson on steroids act played well with sane moderate voters.

Folks are saying that President Obama could have closed the deal and that he failed to do it. This, of course, is ludicrous. The American chattering class and their media bosses wasn't going to allow this deal to close quite so early. There is still money to be made from advertising dollars. We need people to watch these next three debates, and listen to all the chattering that leads up to them. I suspect that even if President Obama had given a good performance last night the main stream media would have declared him the loser. 

Honestly, other than the fact that Mitt wants to take Big Bird's job, I didn't get anything from last night's debate. (Big Bird??!!WTF?) The talking points and the usual back and forth was typical and to be expected. I expected Mitt to tell us how is going to fire people, and I expected President Obama to let us know what a disaster of a country he inherited. I wasn't disappointed on either front.

President Obama talked a good game on the stump again this morning, but we all have to wonder where his fire was last night. He said that there was a different Mitt on stage with him. Well, some of my Obamaholic friends would argue that President Obama wasn't on that stage, either.

The good news for President Obama is that he has two more bites of the apple.(And he only has one wedding anniversary every year.) The bad news for president Obama is that he has never been in a court room staring down a shady narcotics cop.   

Article Source:  http://field-negro.blogspot.com/

Posted at 12:06 AM ET, 10/04/2012

Obama was there in body, but in spirit?

By Eugene Robinson

DENVER — This election had better be about more than tonight’s debate, because Mitt Romney won.

I should say, he appeared to win, not because of denial or wishful thinking but because of experience. Voters often don’t see debates the way pundits see them, although snap surveys by CNN and CBS News gave a big edge to Romney over President Obama. We’ll know for sure in a few days, when we have more rigorous polling data, just how good a night it was for Romney. My guess is that he might well have done what he needed, which was to convince persuadable voters to give him another look.

President Obama was well informed, as usual, but he seemed almost disengaged. His body language was that of a man who wanted to check his watch but knew he couldn’t. Romney had to be the aggressor and spent the evening on the balls of his feet. The split-screen shot often showed Obama looking down, apparently taking notes, while Romney was looking at Obama, trying to decide where to aim the next punch. The punches themselves were weak jabs, for the most part; annoyances that made Obama frown as if under assault by mosquitos. He was never staggered. But nothing was going to stand in Romney’s way, certainly not formalities like time limits. Or facts. Or the moderator.

Don’t blame Jim Lehrer, though. From the beginning, he made it clear that if the candidates wanted to take control and go after each other, he wasn’t going to try to stop them. Both candidates had the opportunity to filibuster, disown previously avowed positions, distort the opponent’s record and generally try to hijack the debate and turn it into a lengthy campaign ad. Only Romney accepted the invitation.

Obama did point out that Romney’s math doesn’t add up. He called him once on a flip-flop, saying, “Now, five weeks before the election, he’s saying that his big, bold idea is ‘Never mind’?” But the president never seemed to be the aggressor, never seemed to be setting the agenda for the encounter. Obama was there in body and mind, but you had to wonder if he was fully there in spirit.

Debates seldom decide elections. For this fact, Obama World must tonight be grateful.

By Eugene Robinson  |  12:06 AM ET, 10/04/2012