Archive for the 'Barack Obama' Tag
August 28th, 2009, 1:37 pm by Le Templar
 Rep. Trent Franks, R-Ariz., is managing some damage control after an Arizona newspaper erroneously reported that he was considering a lawsuit to challenge the natural-born citizenship of President Barack Obama. In fact, Franks says in a statement that he did consider a lawsuit last year when the question about Obama’s eligibility was first raised. But Franks’ own research into the matter convinced him that Obama was born in Hawaii and always was eligible to be president:
“…the fact that we found [the evidence that Pres. Obama is a natural-born, American citizen] made it impossible for me in good conscience to go into a big lawsuit.”
Franks explains the flap started when a reporter for the Mohave Daily News misinterpreted his comments at a local town hall meeting. Franks doesn’t beat up the reporter for this “honest mistake” and gives the reporter credit for writing a follow-up story explaining his actual position.
However, the original story was picked up instantly across the nation by news sites and political blogs, in part because the conspiracy theorists known as “birthers” refuse to go away. Politico’s version was one of its top 5 stories on Monday because of the novelty of a member of Congress suggesting that the current president should have been barred by the Constitution from running for election.
But Franks says it’s false, all false. Franks might be “terrified” by Obama’s policies, but he no longer doubts that Obama is a red-blooded American.
Of course, this doesn’t explain why Franks couldn’t communicate his views clearly last week when confronted with a “birther” question, or why he believes Obama still needs to produce a different birth certificate.
Posted in: Journalism • Presidential campaign • "birthers" • Barack Obama • Trent Franks | 5 Comments »
July 15th, 2009, 1:44 pm by Le Templar
 Dean Martin Arizona State Treasurer Dean Martin just sent out a news release saying he had to borrow $130.9 million today to make the required monthly payment to local school districts. Martin said the state didn’t have the cash on hand, primarily because it was counting on up to $433 million in federal stimulus funds.
Martin also suggests President Barack Obama’s administration is playing games with Arizona’s share of the stimulus, which possibly is a continuation of the high-scale assault on comments from Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., about ending the federal stimulus program.
“The Administration needs to either send the money, or repeal the program. It’s becoming clear that the Administration is holding education funding hostage to bully Arizona into submission. This is taxpayer money, not the Administration’s personal piggy bank,” Martin said.
The short-term debt is part of Arizona’s on-going state budget woes. House Republicans are now estimating that all of Gov. Jan Brewer’s vetoes have pushed the projected deficit back up to where it was before the Legislature adopted a budget early on July 1.
The state treasurer’s annoucement assures more gloomy clouds will be hovering when the legislative special session resumes Monday.
Posted in: Arizona Legislature • Arizona government • Congress • Election issues • Governor • Presidential campaign • Barack Obama • Dean Martin • federal stimulus • Jan Brewer | Post a Comment »
July 9th, 2009, 11:30 am by Le Templar
 Sen. Jon Kyl I guess Washington politics must be boring this week, as the Democratic National Committee is trying to rile things up by casting Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., as a blackhearted penny-pincher who wants to shut down jobs in Arizona. Kyl wrote in his weekly column about all of the recent news that President Barack Obama’s massive spending plan to boost the economy isn’t working out so well. Few actual jobs have been created and in many cases, the money hasn’t even been spent yet. In his conclusion, Kyl calls for canceling the rest of the stimulus program and stop adding to that massive federal debt.
The DNC went into a small tizzy, sending out a lengthy news release about the thousands of the jobs that Arizona will “lose” without the federal stimulus, primarily with highway construction contracts. Several politicos will seek to turn up the volume this afternoon with a telephone news conference that scheduled to include state Democratic Party executive director Luis Heredia, State Rep. Lynn Pancrazi, D-Yuma, and two Phoenix councilmen.
It’s unusual to kick over political anthills just because of a senator’s regular column, especially when that senator isn’t up for re-election.
But what is so silly about this is Kyl voted against the stimulus package to begin with, so his column really is a “I told you so” piece. He points to political polls that show more Americans are turning sour on the whole idea.
Democrats are just blowing hot air on this issue because Arizonans already know where Kyl stands, and that position is probably more popular today that it was back in January.
Update: Wow! The Democrats are putting some real energy in this. Now they have rushed out a video as well.
Posted in: Congress • Arizona Democratic Party • Barack Obama • Democratic National Party • Jon Kyl | 6 Comments »
July 2nd, 2009, 10:21 am by Le Templar
 U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano (far left) was part of a White House meeting in February with President Barack Obama in this photo posted at whitehouse.gov by the Obama administration. With the state budget crisis on hold until Monday, I can take a moment to mention other tidbits that have happened in the past week or so. Here’s a few items that caught my eye:
- Janet Napolitano, one-time governor and now U.S. Homeland Security secretary, was named by President Barack Obama to be his lead negotiator with Congress on immigration reform policies. Obama revealed this after a high-level June 25 meeting at the White House intended to jump-start an effort to finally resolve the nation’s broken immigration system. Napolitano received a huge amount of media attention when the swine flu pandemic was first identified. She seemed to be on my television news every day for weeks. Now, she it’s likely she’ll be back in the spotlight this fall on an issue that, until the economy collapsed, had been one of hottest domestic topics especially among talk radio and television and certainly here in Arizona.
- Have you taken the Tribune’s Fourth of July quiz yet? And you passed, right? Of course you did, that’s why you read this blog! But if you are, say, under 30, you are likely to be in a shrinking minority who actually understand basic American civics. Tribune writer Mandy Zajac used questions from the official test given to all immigrants seeking to become U.S. citizens. The Goldwater Institute used the same test when it recently surveyed 1,350 Arizona public high school students and found nearly 97 percent couldn’t pass the exam! The institute’s Matthew Ladner suggests high schools should require the citizenship test for graduation, or colleges should require it for admission. I’ve got to say, if we expect foreigners in this country to have this knowledge, how we can fail to demand it from everyone else?
- The Associated Press reported on a Republican candidate for Maine’s governor who appears to have “borrowed” the Obama campaign logo from last year. I’m detecting a pattern here, as we noticed a similar concern in April with John Paul Mitchell, a Republican candidate for Arizona governor.
Posted in: Election issues • Immigration • Journalism • Presidential campaign • Barack Obama • Goldwater Institute • Independence Day • Janet Napolitano • John Paul Mitchell | Post a Comment »
June 23rd, 2009, 5:01 pm by Le Templar
Phoenix Republican Jim Deakin believes he represents the real mainstream of his party, and so he’s aiming to upset Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., in next year’s state primary. But I hope most party activists understand our country’s geography and history better than Deakin apparently does.
In a news release today, Deakin seeks to weigh in on racial politics and President Barack Obama’s nomination of appellete judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court. Deakin goes about it in an odd way, by suggesting Sotomayor’s family is from the foreign country of … Puerto Rico.
First off, Sotomayor was born in the Bronx, as in New York City, as in the first national capital of the United States. So any attempt to somehow taint her homegrown nationality by tossing around the word “emigrate” is in of itself insulting.
Yes, her parents were from Puerto Rico. While not one of the 50 states, Puerto Rico has been a fully functioning U.S. territory or commonwealth since 1917. Every native is a full-blooded U.S. citizen and moving to or from Puerto Rico is nearly as easy as spending the summer in San Diego.
Sure, in prior centuries, Puerto Rico was subject to the rule of several foreign countries and Spanish is prominently spoken on the island. But that’s the history of more than one U.S. state as well.
Republicans are debating this summer among themselves just hard to challenge Sotomayor’s appointment, given her easy confirmations to the federal bench in the past and the fact that Obama will insist on liberal credentials for any potential replacement.
Deakin’s comments (as you can see below) add little that’s constructive to that debate:
If Jim Deakin were the Senator from the great State of Arizona he would have one question for Judge Sonia Sotomayor.
In several of your speeches over the years you have said that a Latino Woman would make better decisions than an Old White Man.
Your family emigrated to the United States of America from Puerto Rico.
Why did your family migrate from a country where the laws are written by Latino Men and Women to the United States of America where the US Constitution was written by a bunch of OLD WHITE GUYS?
Jim Deakin is a candidate for US Senate from Arizona in the 2010 Elections.
For the record, the U.S. Constitution generally is in effect in Puerto Rico as well. And many Puerto Ricans moved to the New York and other American cities shortly after U.S. annexation because the island was dirt-poor with few jobs early in the 20th century, sort of like what happened in the 1930s in Oklahoma.
Posted in: Courts • Election issues • Barack Obama • Jim Deakin • John McCain • Puerto Rico • Sonia Sotomayor | 2 Comments »
April 16th, 2009, 10:56 am by Le Templar
Crowd members stand on landscape rocks holding flags and signs during the anti-tax TEA Party rally in front of the Gilbert Municipal Complex on April 15, 2009 (Ralph Freso/Tribune).
I was impressed by the enthusiastic turnout and general attitude of Wednesday’s TEA parties across the U.S., which included a noontime crowd of more than 1,000 people in Gilbert and up to 5,000 people at the state Capitol later that afternoon. Sure, what started as a truly grassroots protest against excessive federal spending under President Barack Obama was co-opted by various radio talk show stations and political action groups. But that’s the beauty of freedom of speech and of peaceful assembly. Those rights work together to establish the power of like-minded people coming together to seek change in-person and through mass media as well as the latest social networks.
At least some of the energy at the protests were fueled by the disclosure earlier this week that U.S. Homeland Security had distributed a memo that “right-wing extremism” is likely to rise because of the bad economy and our first black president. A lot of people are angry that this terrorism risk assessment seems to be a sweeping indictment of conservative values such as limited government and pro-life.
The real question is, will Wednesday’s mass protests make a difference? It’s clear to me that Obama is somewhat worried. If you listen closely to his Tuesday speech on the economy at Georgetown University, he devotes a lot of time directly answering all of the criticism. If you didn’t watch it live, here’s another opportunity to see how the president tries to defend that massive buildup of federal debt.
http://www.vimeo.com/4156541
Posted in: Libertarian values • Barack Obama • KFYI • TEA Party | 4 Comments »
April 15th, 2009, 11:12 am by Le Templar
A collection of wild-eyed dreamers already have emerged with the hope of challenging Gov. Jan Brewer in the 2010 elections. No, I’m not talking about Terry Goddard or Jim Pederson or Andrew Thomas or J.D. Hayworth. The first official candidates are real longshots, the kind that media pundits have traditionally called political gadflies.
The best known of this group would be Roy Miller, a political blogger who helped to found the Goldwater Institute and is a frequent Tribune letter writer. Others who have filed with the secretary of state include church pastor Tim Willis, insurance agent Janelle Wood and business accountant Hugh Kealer.
But the candidate with the catchiest name and best campaign Web site to date has to be John Paul Mitchell, who is just 30 and a manager at a Phoenix credit card call center. He also has self-published a book which lays some groundwork to explain how we can run modern government in America without collecting any taxes (the ultimate libertarian dream!).
I am most intrigued by Mitchell’s “self-designed” campaign logo. Take a look.
It is pretty good. But Mitchell claims he came up with the logo “from scratch” after teaching himself how to use Adobe Illustrator. Really? There isn’t anything out there that might have inspired this design? Nothing that looks remarkably similar and has been seen around the world for the past year?
Mitchell told me others have noted the same similarity since he unveiled his logo earlier this month. While “partially inspired” by the Obama campaign logo, Mitchell gives more credit to the Arizona state flag and its sunrise colors.
“I wanted to choose a circular logo because anything with a circle represents wholeness,” Mitchell said.
So, do you think Mitchell’s logo is a flattering imitation or is he simply a copycat? You decide.
Posted in: Arizona government • Governor • Presidential campaign • Barack Obama • Campaign logos • John Paul Mitchell | 6 Comments »
April 13th, 2009, 11:26 am by Le Templar
I have to hand it to Arizona State University President Michael Crow. He needed something innovative and meaningful for President Barack Obama, and Crow needed it quick, as the initial criticism for refusing Obama an honorary degree had escalated into a national avalanche in just 24 hours.
And Crow managed to come up with an honor for Obama when the president speaks to ASU graduates on May 13 that will matter more than in the long run. It will just take a while for Crow and the rest of the ASU administration to remove the egg on their faces.
As Tribune writer Ryan Gabrielson reported Saturday, Crow decided to rename one of ASU’s biggest scholarship programs for Obama. Currently called ASU Advantage, the state-funded scholarships covers most of the costs of attending the university (tuition and fees, text books, room and board) for every freshman from Arizona whose family makes less than $25,000 a year. The scholarships are funded, in part, by those tuition hikes that ASU and the Arizona Board of Regents have approved in the past few years.
The mission of these scholarships, tapping the dollars of wealthier residents to support the education of those with fewer means, certain fits Obama’s governing philosophy. My guess is Obama will be rather pleased with the notion of hundreds or thousands of ASU students associating their free-ride college years with his name. It’s an honor far better than a pretend doctorate that would be tossed into a trunk with all of those other pieces of fancy paper he’s likely to receive from various groups in the next four years.
Of course, it would be far easier to see the scholarship renaming as an honor if ASU had made such an announcement before The Associated Press disclosed that an academic committee had decided Obama doesn’t deserve an honorary doctorate because he hasn’t been in office long enough.
Crow had to rush out the decision over the weekend after the AP story inspired the Tribune editorial on Thursday, which in turn was picked up by political blogs across the country that just skewered Crow and ASU. By Friday morning, Crow already was working on some way to stop the furor before it irretrievably damaged local enthusiasm about Obama’s May appearance.
By Friday evening, the Arizona Guardian web site was quoting Board of Regents member Fred DuVal as saying Obama would get an honorary degree after all. But I found that hard to believe, as that move would been a huge insult to the academic committee and would have detracted from whatever credibility this type of honor usually offers.
So Crow came up with a better alternative. I expect someone will question why a prominent scholarship program is to be permanently named for someone who has no direct ties to ASU or Arizona. But Obama supporters can no longer claim he’s been slighted by ASU.
Posted in: Arizona State University • ASU Advantage • Barack Obama • Michael Crow | Post a Comment »
February 9th, 2009, 5:52 pm by Le Templar
Photo by the Associated Press
My blog has been on hiatus for a week or so as I adjust to the demands of my new post as opinion page editor at the Tribune, and I handled some of my volunteer work for local journalism groups. But I’m back, with a post I’ve been waiting to write for more than two years: Republicans should be immediately and eternally grateful that Sen. John McCain shut down the “nuclear” option when it comes to Senate approval for judges appointed to the federal bench.
Last week’s news that Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg underwent surgery for pancreatic cancer reinforced widespread belief that she will be the first liberal jurist to leave now that Barack Obama is president. Speculation on possible replacements already is rampant. Even a certain former Arizona governor is getting lots of attention.
While the next Supreme Court justice appointment probably will come from Ginsburg’s legal perspective, that person won’t be as wildly liberal as many in the Democratic Party would like. That’s because Obama will have to deal with a potential Senate filibuster from Republicans if he steps too far out of the mainstream. And Republicans are in a position to influence Obama’s judicial choices only because of John McCain and the so-called Gang of 14.
A quick recap: Almost from the beginning of former President George Bush’s first term in 2001, Senate Democrats who were in the minority used the threat of a filibuster to delay or block appointments of federal judges that were deemed to be too conservative. Time and again, Bush tried but failed to persuade enough Democrats to relent to get the 60 Senate votes needed to stop a filibuster.
So conservative activists came up with an alternative route for Bush to get the judges he wanted. They argued a filibuster of judicial appointments violates the Constitution because that document says nothing about needing more than a simple majority of senators to give their “advice and consent.” The idea was to have Vice President Dick Cheney (as Senate president) declare a filibuster as out of order so the Republican majority could ignore the Democrats and approve Bush’s appointments. The Senate loves its traditions and the filibuster is one of the oldest. Revoking it in this manner would have caused endless rancor and pushed partisan politics to a whole new level in Washington. Thus the reference to the “nuclear” option.
Republicans were ready to reach for the nuclear option in 2005, when Democrats were trying to block the appointment of John Roberts as chief justice. But many senators greatly feared chaos would result because most Senate work depends heavily on lawmakers getting along. Otherwise, the rules as written on paper could be used to prevent any business from getting done.
So a bipartisan collection of 14 senators met privately for days to find a way to avert the nuclear option. The result was enough Democrats withdrew their filibuster threats for Bush to get his nominees.
John McCain received much of the credit for the Gang of 14 agreement, so he should have been widely praised by fellow Republicans for protecting tradition but without bowing to the will of the minority. Instead, McCain was roundly criticized for his role, as GOP activists argued he had somehow betrayed the party by not steamrolling the Democrats.
However, McCain had enough experience and wisdom to envision a day down the road when Republicans would be in the minority and a Democratic president would be eager to put his stamp on the Supreme Court. That day is here, and if Republicans had invoked the nuclear option in 2005, the 57 Democrat votes in the Senate now would be free to completely ignore the GOP side of the aisle.
That’s not to say Republican will be able to prevent appointments of pro-choice jurists. But Obama will have to win at least few Republican votes. Or maybe just one, that of Arlen Specter, the ranking Republican (and former chairman) of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Specter’s support of an Obama appointment will swing enough Republican votes to avoid any filibuster.
But at least the Republicans won’t be completely ignored.
Posted in: Congress • Courts • Uncategorized • Arlen Specter • Barack Obama • Gang of 14 • John McCain • John Roberts | Post a Comment »
November 20th, 2008, 12:06 pm by Le Templar
ARIZONA GOV. JANET NAPOLITANO (left) AND JAN BREWER, THE NEXT CHIEF OF STATE? (Capitol Media Services file photo)
The national media are acting like they are engaged in a massive competition to get the first news scoop on specific, top-level appointments to the incoming Barack Obama administration. But have you noticed the remarkable regularity in which these stories are coming to light? One person or office each day, with one media outlet posting the news first and then most of the other print and broadcasters quickly confirming the rumor with two or more anonymous sources.
My guess is the Obama team is deliberating leaking names and positions on a set schedule. Each potential appointment gets around 24 hours of focused news attention, providing an opportunity for key lawmakers, Washington insiders and the public at large to react to the choice without Obama publicly putting his credibility on the line. If some problem with the potential nominee’s background emerges that the transition team didn’t uncover, another person’s name will suddenly pop up and the previous candidate will be dismissed as unfounded speculation by the media.
Pretty clever, actually, if you think about it.
Granted, Wednesday night’s news that Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano is the leading contender to be secretary of Homeland Security came out only several hours after former Sen. Tom Daschle was “rumored” to be the choice for Health and Human Services. But that could be easily explained as a slip up in timing, with the Obama transition team intending for the public to learn about Napolitano this morning.
Let’s see if this pattern continues for the next few days, shall we?
Posted in: Governor • Presidential campaign • Barack Obama • Homeland Security • Janet Napolitano • Tom Daschle | Post a Comment »
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Rep. Trent Franks, R-Ariz., is managing some damage control after an Arizona newspaper erroneously reported that he was considering a lawsuit to challenge the natural-born citizenship of President Barack Obama. In fact, Franks says in a statement that he did consider a lawsuit last year when the question about Obama’s eligibility was first raised. But Franks’ own research into the matter convinced him that Obama was born in Hawaii and always was eligible to be president:
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