The video from CNN is a thing to behold.
Lawmaker Accidently Shoots a Teacher
Arkansas state Sen. Jeremy Hutchinson (R), who is leading an effort to give guns to school personnel, accidentally shot a teacher during an “active shooter” drill earlier this year, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reports.
“The experience gave Hutchinson some pause, but he still supports giving schools the authority to decide how best to secure their campuses.”
Too Complex for McCrory Too?
Brad Phillips notes that North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory (R) gave a speech earlier this week during which he accused local journalists of not understanding his fiscal plans because, “This is too complex for the journalists. They don’t have economics degrees.”
But he probably shouldn’t have said that, as WRAL points out: “It may be worth noting that McCrory’s campaign website says he
graduated from ‘Catawba College in Rowan County, where he earned degrees
in Education and Political Science.’ There’s no mention of an economics
degree.”
Ford Says He’s Smoked ‘A Lot’ of Marijuana
Toronto Mayor Rob Ford, still under fire for a purported video that shows him smoking crack cocaine, admitted that he’s smoked marijuana, the Toronto Star reports.
Said Ford: “Oh yeah. I’ve smoked a lot of it.”
Davis Preparing for Statewide Campaign in Texas
“Democratic operatives are scouring Texas to find worthy statewide candidates to run on a 2014 ticket with Sen. Wendy Davis,” the Dallas Morning News reports.
“The recruitment of running mates for the Fort Worth Democrat by the party and associated groups is a clear indication that Davis is indeed preparing for a statewide campaign. In theory, she would benefit from a ticket with competitive candidates for lieutenant governor, attorney general and other offices.”
Who Will Be Next Fed Chair?
Wonk Wire has the latest evidence that it will be Larry Summers.
Corbett Faces Uphill Fight for Re-Election
A Philadelphia Daily News/Franklin & Marshall College Poll in Pennsylvania finds Gov. Tom Corbett (R) in big trouble for re-election next year.
Kye findings: “Just one in five registered voters think Corbett, who faces challengers from his own political party but no primary-election opponent, deserves a second term. It comes as little surprise that just 7% of Democrats want a second term for Corbett. It’s a problem for Corbett that just 22% of independents want him re-elected. It is potentially disastrous that just 38% of Republican voters support his re-election.”
Quote of the Day
“It’s part of a continuing narrative that the party finds itself in with these big deals for minority communities around the country and how they perceive our response to them.”
— Former RNC Chairman Michael Steele, quoted by the Washington Post, on GOP leaders not making appearances at the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s March on Washington.
Booker Cruising Into the Senate
A new Fairleigh Dickinson University PublicMind poll in New Jersey finds Cory Booker (D) crushing Steve Lonegan (R) in their U.S. Senate race, 50% to 22%.
Talking America Into War?
George Will: “Barack Obama’s foreign policy dream — cordial relations with a Middle East tranquilized by ‘smart diplomacy’ — is in a death grapple with reality. His rhetorical writhings illustrate the perils of loquacity. He has a glutton’s, rather than a gourmet’s, appetite for his own rhetorical cuisine, and he has talked America to the precipice of a fourth military intervention in the crescent that extends from Libya to Afghanistan.”
Wonk Wire: Can we afford to attack Syria?
San Diego Special Election Will Cost $6 Million
The special election to replace outgoing San Diego Mayor Bob Filner (D) “will cost roughly $6 million and could force city leaders to tap reserves or make budget cuts in order to pay for it,” the San Diego Union Tribune reports.
“The City Council voted unanimously Wednesday to set the special election for Nov. 19 as the city charter gave the panel zero wiggle room to choose a less-costly option. The voter-approved charter requires a special election if a mayor resigns with more than one year left on his term.”
Pryor Distances Himself from Obama
Sen. Mark Pryor’s (D-AR) “political destiny — and potentially that of the Democratic majority in the U.S. Senate — may come down to which president Arkansas voters most closely associate with him,” Bloomberg reports.
“Republicans are trying to paint Pryor as a Barack Obama Democrat who backed the health-care legislation and 2009 economic stimulus. Pryor is more comfortable being associated with a different president, fellow Arkansan Bill Clinton.”
That Clinton is making a big speech in Little Rock on Obamacare next month is probably an attempt to be helpful to Pryor.
States Find New Ways to Thwart Obamacare
“Several Republican-led states at the forefront of the campaign to undermine President Obama’s health-care law have come up with new ways to try to thwart it, refusing to enforce consumer protections, for example, and restricting federally funded workers hired to help people enroll in coverage,” the Washington Post reports.
“The actions have drawn less attention than congressional efforts to cut off funding for the law, or earlier state decisions to refuse to set up online insurance marketplaces or reject an expansion of Medicaid, which sharply limited the law’s reach.”
“But the moves could impede Obama’s most significant domestic accomplishment, which, despite having withstood a Supreme Court challenge and a presidential election, still faces doubts about its viability. And they could affect implementation at a crucial time, just as some of the major provisions of the law, also known as Obamacare, are set to go into effect.”
Wonk Wire: Affordable Care Act looks less affordable.
Rumsfeld Says Obama Hasn’t Justified Syria Attack
Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, “who ushered the U.S. into wars in Afghanistan and Iraq in 2001 and 2003, said the Obama administration has not clearly justified an attack on Syria,” The Hill reports.
Said Rumsfeld: “One thing that is very interesting, it seems to me, is that there really hasn’t been any indication from the administration as to what our national interest is with respect to this particular situation.”
However, in an interview with the Newhour, Obama cited “America’s core self-interest” as one justification.
Obama Comment Infuriated Putin
The New York Times says that Russia’s suspicion of President Obama “only intensified after his decision to scuttle a planned summit meeting next week in Moscow and to describe Mr. Putin in unusually personal terms at a White House news conference, saying his body language often made him look ‘like the bored kid in the back of the classroom.'”
“Though Mr. Obama went on to say that their interactions were often constructive, the comment infuriated Mr. Putin, according to one Russian official not authorized to be quoted by name.”
Sorority Girls Offered Free Drinks to Vote
The University of Alabama’s Chi Omega chapter was offered incentives to members in exchange for voting in the Tuscaloosa City Board of Education election, the Birmingham News reports.
Top Republicans Declined to Speak on MLK Anniversary
Speaker John Boehner and Majority Leader Eric Cantor, the House’s two most senior Republicans, were invited to speak at the 50th anniversary of the historic March on Washington — but declined, Roll Call reports.
Extra Bonus Quote of the Day
“We don’t face beatings, lynchings and shootings for our political beliefs anymore. Martin Luther King did not live and die to hear his heirs whine about political gridlock.”
— Bill Clinton, quoted by the Washington Post, on the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington.
