Past News Articles
|
 |
| Entering the homestretch, Barack Obama leads John McCain by 50 to 42 percent and appears to be gaining strength on key issues despite a barrage of criticism from his rival. The first Ipsos-McClatchy poll taken since the third and final debate between the major candidates offered several signs of growing strength for Obama and troubling weaknesses for McCain. On issues, Obama's gained ground among voters across the board, even on issues where McCain still has an advantage and on some where the Republican usually would expect to be ahead. Voters also prefer Obama over McCain to handle jobs and the economy by 16 points and health care by 24 points, both wider margins than earlier Ipsos/McClatchy polls found. |
| George W. Bush rode into Washington almost eight years ago astride the horse of smaller government. He will leave it this winter having overseen the biggest federal budget expansion since Franklin Delano Roosevelt seven decades ago. Not since World War II, when the nation mobilized to fight a global war against fascism and recover from the Great Depression, has government spending played as large a role in the economy as it does today. As a result, Mr. Bush already is the first president in history to implement budgets that crossed the $2 trillion a year and $3 trillion a year marks. His final budget, which comes to an end Sept. 30, conceivably could near $4 trillion, depending on the final tab for the financial rescue. |
| Senator Barack Obama on Sunday captured a forceful endorsement from former Secretary of State Colin L. Powell and announced he had shattered campaign finance records in September, gaining an immense financial edge that will allow him to overwhelm Senator John McCain’s efforts in every corner of the country. Mr. Powell said he was dismayed by the tenor of the campaign, declared that Mr. McCain’s running mate, Gov. Sarah Palin, was not fit to be vice president, expressed displeasure with the direction of the Republican Party and called Mr. McCain scattered on his approach to the economy. “Every day there was a different approach,” he said. |
| THE NOMINATING process this year produced two unusually talented and qualified presidential candidates. There are few public figures we have respected more over the years than Sen. John McCain. Yet it is without ambivalence that we endorse Sen. Barack Obama for president. Mr. Obama is a man of supple intelligence, with a nuanced grasp of complex issues and evident skill at conciliation and consensus-building. At home, we believe, he would respond to the economic crisis with a healthy respect for markets tempered by justified dismay over rising inequality and an understanding of the need for focused regulation. Abroad, the best evidence suggests that he would seek to maintain U.S. leadership and engagement, continue the fight against terrorists, and wage vigorous diplomacy on behalf of U.S. values and interests. Mr. Obama has the potential to become a great president. |
| The latest newsletter by an Inland Republican women's group depicts Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama surrounded by a watermelon, ribs and a bucket of fried chicken, prompting outrage in political circles. The October newsletter by the Chaffey Community Republican Women, Federated says if Obama is elected his image will appear on food stamps -- instead of dollar bills like other presidents. The statement is followed by an illustration of "Obama Bucks" -- a phony $10 bill featuring Obama's face on a donkey's body, labeled "United States Food Stamps." |
| While McCain didn't totally fail to address individual questions offered by Bob Schieffer and even made a couple of good points, it was the overall flavor of the encounter that was decisive. All McCain could do was ratchet up the persona he displayed in the first two debates -- he was more pushy, more agitated, more scripted, more aggressive, and as a result, he got nowhere. The two of them could debate 50 times and the results would be the same: Grumpy old man losses to smart, calm, cool and collected every time. In the debates, Obama is like the player in a squash or racquetball game who plants himself in the middle of the court and can't be budged, winning point after point. McCain desperately tried to get around him, but there was no where to go. |
| Compounding terrible economic news, budget officials announced Tuesday that the federal deficit has soared to a record $455 billion, injecting new urgency into the closing days of the presidential campaign about spending in Washington, including efforts to stem the financial disaster. "The reality is that the next president will be inheriting a fiscal and economic mess of historic proportions -- the legacy of President Bush's failed policies," said Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.), chairman of the Senate Budget Committee. "It will take years to dig our way out." The deficit is likely to be even bigger next year as the country copes with the worst financial crisis since the Depression. |
| President Bush on Tuesday announced a $250 billion plan by the government to directly buy shares in the nation's leading banks, saying the drastic steps were "not intended to take over the free market but to preserve it. Nine major banks will participate initially including all of the country's largest institutions, he announced, in a move that sent stocks soaring on Wall Street. Some of the nation's largest banks had to be pressured to participate by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, who wanted healthy institutions that did not necessarily need capital from the government to go first as a way of removing any stigma that might be associated with banks getting bailouts. |
| With global markets in a state of panic, with the world talking about the end of American capitalism, with ordinary citizens watching in despair as their savings vanish, we could all use some reassurance. But today all Bush gave us was limp cheerleading, vaguely assuring us he's doing everything possible. The president seems checked out. His approval ratings are in the toilet. His credibility is shot. He's arguably responsible for this mess in the first place. And his presence and his words have led to more fear and panic, not less. |
| It is the question on the minds of New Yorkers, once they stop pondering the fate of their 401(k)’s: If the city’s economy sinks to depths not seen in decades, will crime return with a vengeance? Expert opinions differ, but the question is hardly illogical. The last time stocks on Wall Street fell hard, in 1987, crime was exploding, and the city saw historic highs in murders in the following years. Before that, the fiscal crisis of the 1970s helped lead to the abandonment of neighborhoods, failing schools and startling crime rates: robberies built through those years to a high in 1981, when there were 107,495 of them, for an average of 294 a day. (Last year’s total reported robberies, 21,787, was the lowest figure in modern history.) |
| It is perfectly legitimate to call attention, as McCain has done, to Obama’s lack of conventional national and international policymaking experience. We, too, wish he had more of it. But office-holding is not the only kind of experience relevant to the task of leading a wildly variegated nation. Obama’s immersion in diverse human environments (Hawaii’s racial rainbow, Chicago’s racial cauldron, countercultural New York, middle-class Kansas, predominantly Muslim Indonesia), his years of organizing among the poor, his taste of corporate law and his grounding in public-interest and constitutional law—these, too, are experiences. And his books show that he has wrung from them every drop of insight and breadth of perspective they contained. |
| 1. MCCAIN PROPOSING NEW HOUSING PLAN. McCain today said he had a new plan to allow the Treasury to purchase and restructure mortgages. The truth is that this is not a new proposal and is already part of the rescue plan that was signed into law. It was Obama, not McCain who called for this move two weeks ago. -- 13. JUDGMENT ON IRAQ. McCain said that he had “the judgment” to make national security decisions, ignoring his record of misguided statements during the course of the Iraq war. In 2005 he said the war would be over within 18 months. In 2003 he said “we will be welcomed as liberators,” and that “we will win it easily.” |
| America's youngest voters are mindful of history and the impact on their own lives as they prepare to cast ballots on Nov. 4. Among 18- to 29-year-old registered voters surveyed for a USA Today/MTV/Gallup poll, 61% support the Obama-Biden ticket, versus 32% who prefer the McCain-Palin ticket, with Obama's voters being far more likely to be certain about their vote than McCain's. Obama's strong appeal to younger voters is apparent in that he outperforms McCain by double digits on every single character dimension tested in the poll of more than 900 18-29 year olds nationwide, conducted by Gallup for USA Today and MTV Sept. 18-28, 2008. |
| 46 percent of the uncommitted voters surveyed say Democrat Joe Biden won the debate, compared to 21 percent for Republican Sarah Palin. 36 percent said it was a tie. 18 percent of previously uncommitted percent say they are now committed to the Obama-Biden ticket. 10 percent say they are now committed to McCain-Palin. Seventy-one percent are still uncommitted. Although Palin made some gains on the question of whether she could serve as president if needed, she rose just 9 points on that measure. Now 44 percent say the Alaska governor could be an effective president. 91 percent said Biden could be effective as president, up from 66 percent before the debate. |
| U.S. employers cut payrolls at the steepest rate in 5-1/2 years in September, slashing an unexpectedly large 159,000 jobs as employment contracted for a ninth straight month, suggesting the economy may be in recession. The unemployment rate was unchanged from August at 6.1 percent, the highest rate in five years, as 121,000 people left the workforce, the Labor Department reported on Friday. September's job losses were much more severe than predicted by Wall Street economists surveyed by Reuters, who had forecast 100,000 jobs would be cut. |
| The Senate strongly endorsed the $700 billion economic bailout plan Wednesday, leaving backers optimistic that the easy approval, coupled with an array of popular additions, would lead to House acceptance by Friday and end the legislative uncertainty that has rocked the markets. In stark contrast to the House rejection of the plan on Monday, a bipartisan coalition of senators — including both presidential candidates — showed no hesitation in backing a proposal that had drawn public scorn, though the outpouring eased somewhat after a market plunge followed the House defeat. The Senate margin was 74 to 25 in favor of the White House initiative to buy troubled securities in an effort to avoid an economic catastrophe. |
|
