by Josh Kalven on October 13, 2008 - 11:34am
Politico's Ben Smith has the goods, as well as the above photo:
The beleaguered Democratic-leaning community group Acorn sends over this photograph: John McCain, in March of 2006, sitting beside Florida Rep. Kendrick Meek at an event Acorn co-sponsored in Florida.
by Josh Kalven on October 13, 2008 - 11:27am
The Indianapolis Star is reporting that GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin will be holding an event there this Friday:
Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the Republican nominee for vice president, will hold a rally in the Indianapolis area Friday.
Jennifer Hallowell, regional campaign manager for GOP presidential nominee Sen. John McCain, said Saturday that details for Palin's "Road to Victory" rally are still being worked out. A venue has not been determined, but Hallowell said she expects doors to open at 1 p.m. and the program to begin at 3 p.m.
by Adam Doster on October 09, 2008 - 10:21am
Conservative health care reformers love to bash state regulations. In their estimation, differing regulations keep premiums artificially high in some states by restricting consumer choice. John McCain has railed against these regulations on the stump and in Tuesday's debate. Right-leaning economists claim that as many as 12 million people who are currently uninsured could end up purchasing medical coverage if interstate competition were allowed. The Illinois Policy Institute, a Springfield-based right-wing think tank, argues Illinois families could save a bundle:
With the ability to purchase insurance in Iowa, a downstate family of four could expect to save $200 per year while a Chicagoland family would save over $3,000 per year.
But as Sandy Praeger, the president of the National Association of Insurance Commissioners, told the Tribune's Judith Graham, lifting restrictions on the sale of insurance across state lines opens up an entirely new can of worms.
by Angela Caputo on October 08, 2008 - 12:09pm
After viewing a recent McCain campaign YouTube video, an unsuspecting viewer might walk away thinking Chicago's two biggest Latino neighborhoods -- Pilsen and Little Village -- are hotbeds of anti-Obama sentiment. The six-minute "documentary," titled "Where is Obama?", was paid for by McCain and has been viewed over 40,000 times. It's hosted by Angel Garcia, the Cook County chair of the Republican National Hispanic Assembly. Watch it:
At
the outset, Garcia tells viewers: "We'll go to 26th Street -- La
Villita. We'll go to 18th St. -- Pilsen. And we'll talk to people
that live there -- have lived there their whole life. We'll talk to
voters. And we'll talk to them about what Barack Obama has done for
the Latino community."
While Garcia doesn't identify any of his unanimously critical interviewees, we recognized one: Ramiro Gonzalez, the former Republican president of Cicero (he appears at about the three-minute mark). Apparently, he just happened to be strolling through the neighborhood that day. Imagine that ...
by Adam Doster on October 07, 2008 - 4:46pm
Barack Obama describes John McCain's health care proposal as "radical." Tribune health care reporter Judith Graham and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman concur. McCain himself obviously disagrees. But according to a new study (PDF) by the Economic Policy Institute, the Arizona senator doesn't have much ground to stand on. EPI asserts that his plan will make it radically more difficult for Illinoisans to receive affordable medical care:
At the state level we find that the state of Illinois would see 848,281 people lose employer-sponsored health insurance under the McCain plan, and virtually all of these people would be forced to buy health insurance in the expensive and chaotic private insurance market. This means that 11.1% of people in Illinois who currently have employer-sponsored health insurance.
by Josh Kalven on October 03, 2008 - 5:32pm
Longtime Michigan journalist Jack Lessenberry today offered his thoughts on John McCain's decision to pull out of the Wolverine State:
For John McCain, pulling most of his campaign operations out of Michigan makes a certain kind of sense. On paper, anyway. But then, the Vietnam War made a certain amount of sense on paper.
Just not in reality. My guess is that the McCain camp's decision will turn out to have been an appalling blunder for reasons that stretch far beyond Michigan. First of all, let's look at what happened. [...]
by Josh Kalven on October 03, 2008 - 12:49pm
It looks like John McCain's departure from Michigan may free up some more resources to aid their meager Indiana efforts. From an AP article published this morning:
In Indiana, surveys show a competitive race after Obama spent months pouring money into the state and Republicans resisted countering. Now the Republican National Committee is running TV ads to fight for the state's 11 votes, and McCain senior adviser Greg Strimple said: "We're going to go there."
Contrast that with this McCain campaign quote from a September 20 Time article:
by Josh Kalven on October 02, 2008 - 1:58pm
Wow. Big news today out of Michigan. The McCain campaign has announced that they're pulling all staff out of the state and redistributing them to Wisconsin, Ohio, and Florida.
So taking that into consideration, let's have a look at the current map. What emerges is that McCain is being forced to defend the following Bush states: Virginia, New Hampshire, Colorado, New Mexico, Indiana, Missouri, Iowa, New Mexico, Nevada, North Carolina, Florida and Ohio. Meanwhile, with Michigan abandoned and Pennsylvania looking increasingly out of reach, there are only two Kerry states that stick out as possible GOP pick-ups and they're both in our neck of the woods: Minnesota and Wisconsin.
by Josh Kalven on October 01, 2008 - 5:04pm
We've been carefully tracking Indiana's swing state status, but now it appears the race for Missouri may be just as tight. A CNN poll released today has Barack Obama leading John McCain by one point -- 49-48 percent. The last CNN survey in the state -- conducted three weeks ago -- had Obama down by five. The most recent polls by Survey USA and Research 2000 had Obama trailing by two points and one points, respectively. Both were conducted in the middle of last week.
The new numbers have Electoral College trackers shifting Missouri to the left. CNN moved the state from "lean McCain" to "toss-up." Today, Pollster.com did the same.
by Adam Doster on October 01, 2008 - 12:00pm
When asked what he would do to lead the U.S. out of its financial crisis, John McCain fell back on his bete noir: earmarks. Calling them a "gateway drug" in the first presidential debate, McCain vowed to "veto every single spending bill that comes across my desk," if it contains just one pork barrel project. In what has become a constant refrain, he added: "I will make them famous. You will know their names."
Let's put aside the fact that earmarks had nothing at all to do with the mortgage meltdown, just as they had nothing to do with the Katrina disaster or the Minneapolis bridge collapse. McCain's claim that he will significantly cut spending by eliminating earmarks is simply hogwash.
