Taegan Goddard's Political Wire
Political news, polls and buzz
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Conyers Blasts Obama for Health Care Strategy
In a radio interview with Bill Press, Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) ripped into President Obama and White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel saying they are caving in to "nutty right-wing" proposals just to get a health care bill passed. Said Conyers: "I'm getting tired of saving Obama's can in the Whi …
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Giuliani Not Running
Rudy Giuliani (R) "has decided not to run for governor of New York next year after months of mulling a candidacy," the New York Times reports. "His decision is a blow to many Republican leaders, who had viewed Mr. Giuliani as the strongest potential candidate in a year in which voter anger and an …
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Most Republicans Think Obama Stole Election
A new Public Policy Pollling survey finds that 52% of Republican voters nationally think that ACORN stole the Presidential election for Barack Obama last year, with only 27% granting that he won it legitimately. Is that just delusional? Probably. But it now makes sense that Doug Hoffman is playi …
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Rubio Surges in Primary Race with Crist
A forthcoming DailyKos/Research 2000 poll in Florida shows Marco Rubio (R) surging in his race with Gov. Charlie Crist (R) for the Republican Senate nomination. Crist now leads Rubio, 47% to 37%. In January, Crist led 57% to 11.
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Deep Divisions on Obama
Public Policy Polling asked voters nationally to give President Obama a letter grade on his job performance. "Overall Obama's 'GPA' comes out to a 2.1, somewhere between a C and a C+. That's a middle ground grade, but when it comes to individual evaluations of Obama there is little of that middle …
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Whitman Surges in California
A new Rasmussen Reports survey in California finds next year's race for governor now a dead heat with Jerry Brown (D) and Meg Whitman (R) tied at 41%. In other match ups, Brown leads Steve Poizner (R), 43% to 32%, and tops Tom Campbell (R), 42% to 33%.
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Palin Photographer Breached Contract
Daily Finance reports that the photographer who shot the controversial picture of Sarah Palin in running shorts for Runner's World magazine, violated his contract by reselling them to Newsweek for use on this week's cover.A spokeswoman for the magazine confirms that the contract "contained a clause …
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Hutchison Goes On Air
Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) "will launch the first broadcast ad of the hotly contested 2010 campaign for governor today," reports the Dallas Morning News. "At the same time, Hutchison is placing automated calls to potential Republican voters explaining her decision to stay in the Senate whil …
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Losing the Stimulus Spin War
First Read: "While the final history on the stimulus hasn't been written, it's clear, as we've said before, that the White House is losing the P.R. war over it. The latest embarrassment was a GAO report noting that more than 50,000 jobs the White House said had been 'created or saved' due to the sti …
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Johnston Rejects Palin's Invite
Sarah Palin's "could-have-been-son-in-law Levi Johnston likely won't be sitting down with the family for the Thanksgiving feast," reports People magazine. Though she extended the invitation while appearing on the Oprah Winfrey Show, Johnston dismissed it saying it was "a nice gesture, but she did …
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Another Clinton Talent
A Vogue profile shares a little known detail on how Secretary of State Hillary Clinton keeps up such a frenetic pace: "Turns out Clinton is a champion sleeper: She naps on command; she is impervious to jet lag."
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Terrorist Suspects Will Remain in Prison Even if Acquitted
Newsweek: "Attorney General Eric Holder acknowledged a previously unspoken proviso to the controversial decision to try alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four co-conspirators in a federal court in New York: even if the defendants are somehow acquitted, they will still stay behind ba …
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Do Republicans Trail in Using Technology?
At the Republican Governor's Association meeting, former Rep. John Kasich (R-OH) blasted his party for not embracing the newest communication tools, the Washington Post reports. Said Kasich: "I think Republicans need to learn to communicate with the tools of the 21 st century. The women in Iran h …
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Democrats Favored to Retain Control of Senate
Larry Sabato looks at next year's races and concludes Democrats will "almost certainly" retain control on the Senate. "The Democrats will automatically retain 41 seats and Republicans 21 -- that is, these 62 seats aren't on the 2010 ballot. Given Vice President Biden's tie-breaking vote, Democrat …
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Palin Hits the Trail
Sarah Palin may call it a book tour, but Politico says her first day on the road looked more like a presidential campaign. "The stop in Grand Rapids felt like a political campaign event, not a book tour. For a woman written off as a disorganized celebrity on a tour run by monomaniacal book publi …
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Hoffman Accuses Democrats of Election Fraud
With his prospect of winning the NY-23 special election "now almost zero," Doug Hoffman (C) suggested in a letter that "ACORN, the unions and the Democratic Party" had "tampered" with results to deny him victory, the Watertown Daily Times reports. Hoffman also claims he was "forced to concede" on …
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Senate Health Care Bill Unveiled
The full text of the Senate health care bill is now online -- all 2,074 pages.
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Leading with the Numbers
Ezra Klein: "The Senate [health care] bill, we now know, costs a smidge under $850 billion during its first 10 years, cuts the deficit by $127 billion, and covers 31 million people. In the second decade, it cuts the deficit by an improbably large $650 billion. But we don't know anything else. We hav …
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Pawlenty Couldn't Win His Home State
A new St. Cloud State University poll finds that President Obama would handily beat Minnesota Gov. Time Pawlenty (R) in his home state, 49% to 40%, if they were to face off in the 2012 presidential race.
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Reid's Bill Scored Well
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's (D-NV) health care reform proposal will cost $849 billion over 10 years but cut the deficit by about $127 billion, Roll Call reports. The CBO cost estimate also concluded that the health care reform bill would help more than 94 percent of Americans get health i …
Taegan Goddard's Political Wire
