The President's unveiling of new Federal stem cell research guidelines is receiving glowing media coverage, with most reports including lead stories on two out of three network broadcasts casting the move as a significant step away from former President Bush's science policies. Typical of much of the coverage is an AP story that reports, "Researchers said the new president's message was clear: Science, which once propelled men to the moon, again matters in American life."
Along those lines, ABC World News said last night that "in what could only be interpreted as a direct rebuke of...Bush," the President stated that "his Administration would make scientific decisions based on facts, not ideology." The CBS Evening News said Obama is "reversing many of the policies of President Bush, and today perhaps the biggest turnaround yet: To many, a matter of life and death."
The New York Times reports Obama "paired his executive order" on stem cell research "with another document, a presidential memorandum directing the head of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy to 'develop a strategy for restoring scientific integrity to government decision-making.'" The Politico notes "many on the left and in the scientific community believe that, from stem cells to climate change...Bush manipulated or ignored data and research for political purposes." In a similar report, NBC Nightly News said the President "made it clear" that "his Administration would have a new attitude towards all science."
Bloomberg News notes the President said yesterday that the Bush-era policy had created "a false choice between sound science and moral values." McClatchy reports the stem cell research policy "reversal is the latest in a periodic struggle between science and religion or ideology." The Los Angeles Times notes that when Obama "announced early in his speech that he was reversing the Bush ban, the audience erupted in a loud cheer and sustained applause."
On its website, the Washington Post reported that "some Republicans -- including former first lady Nancy Reagan and California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger -- joined medical and scientific associations, research groups and patient-advocacy organizations in supporting it." The Los Angeles Times says it was Obama's "most forceful break yet from his predecessor's controversial scientific agenda." USA Today says "the Bush administration was accused in a number of highly publicized cases of interfering with actions by federal agencies in such areas as global warming and endangered species."
Fox News' Special Report reported Obama "may have set in motion an even more volatile debate by opening the door quite possibly to some form of cloning." The New York Times notes Bush's "defenders see Mr. Obama as just imposing an ideology of his own. They say Mr. Bush did not ignore scientific facts." The Hill recalls that Bush's "policy...permitted the federal government to fund research on 21 stem cell lines that had already been created as of Aug. 9, 2001, but prohibited funding for any lines derived from embryos after that date." The Christian Science Monitor notes that "in his remarks, Mr. Obama himself referred to his predecessor's policy as a 'ban,' a characterization he repeated often during the presidential campaign." The New York Times notes Obama's "support of embryonic stem cell research comes at a time when many advances have been made with other sorts of stem cells."
Obama Reviewing Bush Signing Statements In what the Los Angeles Times terms "another effort to undo acts by the previous administration," President Obama yesterday issued a memo objecting to former President Bush's signing statements. The AP reports that in his "memo to senior government officials," Obama "ordered a review of...Bush's guidelines for implementing legislation passed by Congress, at the same time saying that he would employ his own version of how he wants the government to follow the law." AFP notes "Democratic critics said the unprecedented number of signing statements were a power grab by Bush to subvert the authority of Congress, especially over legislation connected to his 'war on terror.'"
The New York Times, meanwhile, reports Obama "signaled that he intends to use signing statements himself if Congress sends him legislation that has provisions he decides are unconstitutional. He pledged to use a modest approach when doing so, but said there was a role for the practice if used appropriately." The Washington Post says "critics accused" Bush "of using the previously little-known tactic to subvert the intent of Congress, especially on issues of terrorism, torture and domestic surveillance."
Christina Romer, the chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, on Monday said it was too soon to consider a second economic stimulus plan, even though some economists say the Obama Administration's original $787 billion package will not be enough to revive the economy. The Washington Post notes that at a Brookings Institution forum, Romer "defended the Obama administration against criticism that its assumptions about economic growth are too rosy, and said it was too soon to consider additional stimulus." Romer is quoted as saying, "We have to let the medicine work for a while to see if it does the trick."
Despite Romer's comments, ABC World News reported that a "second stimulus package might be necessary. A lot of economists saying that Administration officials right now say we've got to give this current stimulus package time to work. They say only about $3 billion has gone into the economy so far. But they are examining this issue" and "the President's top economic adviser, Larry Summers, say all of the major nations of the world need to do more stimulus." The New York Times' Paul Krugman, on MSNBC's 1600 Pennsylvania Ave, said, "There's going to have to be a second round of stimulus. It's just clear now."
On the other side of the political spectrum, Sen. Jim DeMint, on CNBC's The Kudlow Report, said, "I can't be patient with the way" the Obama Administration is "spending money. They've got this idea the government can manage our economy, can centrally manage it. That's a concept that's been proved wrong for years. I don't think the stimulus is going to work. I know it's not going to work."
Meanwhile, USA Today reports, "Tens of thousands of jobs created by the economic stimulus law could end up filled by illegal immigrants, particularly in big states such as California where undocumented workers are heavily represented in construction, experts on both sides of the issue say." Studies "by two conservative think tanks estimate immigrants in the United States illegally could take 300,000 construction jobs, or 15% of the 2 million jobs that new taxpayer-financed projects are predicted to create."
And the New York Times profiles Earl E. Devaney, "the inspector general for the Interior Department and the man President Obama has chosen to police the spending of the $787 billion stimulus package." In "38 years of government service, Mr. Devaney...has been unnerving would-be miscreants. But now the Big Man, as Mr. Devaney's colleagues call him, is taking on an incomparably bigger job, tracking a sum 50 times the agency's annual budget as chairman of the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board - or as the irresistible acronym has it, RAT Board."
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Though the fate of President Obama's legislative initiatives lays with members of his own Democratic Party in Congress, some media reports suggest Hill leaders are imposing their own priorities on his plans. The New York Times reports in a front-page article that what the "the Democratic barons of Congress liked best about President Obama's audacious budget was his invitation to fill in the details. They have started by erasing some of his. The apparent first casualty is a big one: a proposal to limit tax deductions for the wealthiest 1.2 percent of taxpayers." Obama is "taking a gamble in outsourcing the drafting of his agenda's details" to "veteran lawmakers and others in Congress, each with his own political and parochial calculations."
The Washington Post, also in a front-page article, says, "Obama's far-reaching plans for health-care, energy and education reform" still "continue to enjoy broad Democratic support. But as the ideas develop into detailed legislation, they will transform from abstract objectives into a tangle of difficult trade-offs." Some issues "that inflamed Democrats in previous years have yet to even register, including the proposal in Obama's budget plan to 'means-test' the Medicare drug benefit."
White House: Agenda Not Too Big ABC World News reported, "For a couple of weeks now, people have been sort of grumbling that the Obama Administration is taking on too many projects that are too big, too soon. And this seems to be growing in volume." ABC's George Stephanopoulos added, "The phrase is overloading the circuits. It's coming from a lot of different corners, but especially Republicans like John McCain and the White House is pushing back very hard at this criticism. They say the President has said himself that he doesn't have the luxury of focusing on just one problem at a time."
Fox News' Special Report quoted White House spokesman Robert Gibbs as saying, "Which room are you going to put out first? When are you going to call the fire department and ask them to put all of it out?" Fox added, "Critics question the president's priorities. Aside from job losses and the credit squeeze, they say mortgage foreclosure is still out of control. The folks here say they're working on all of those problems and working to make sure that healthcare costs don't become just as urgent." On CNN's Lou Dobbs Tonight, anchor Lou Dobbs harshly criticized Gibbs response to questions about the Administration's perceived lack of focus on the economy saying, "We see the press secretary at the White House act out of some sort of precious, too cute by half personality with absolutely irrelevant nonsense about Warren Buffett's central point, which is the primary issue is an economic crisis that this President spent his first six weeks saying was dire and would lead to catastrophe and now it's worthy of distraction."
The AP reports members "of both parties Monday voted to keep their cherished home-state projects as the Senate resumed debate on a spending bill covering foreign aid and domestic agency budgets. By a 63-32 vote, lawmakers rejected a bid by" Sen. John McCain "to effectively strip about 8,000 of those earmarks from the $410 billion measure."
The AP reports, "Barring last-minute changes, the bill contains 8,570 such pet projects for lawmakers' home states and districts worth $7.7 billion, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense, a conservative group that abhors the practice."
William McGurn, in his column for the Wall Street Journal, writes, "The worse the omnibus spending bill now before Congress gets, the more likely that Congress will pass it -- and that Barack Obama will sign it into law." What the "public does not understand is that the more earmarks there are in a bill, the harder it will be to vote against it."
Meanwhile, The Politico notes that while passage of the bill "was supposed to be a perfunctory, pro forma task," it has "become a congressional CT scan, diagnosing some serious maladies afflicting Senate Democrats and complicating House-Senate relations." The Politico notes that bill stalled Thursday when Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid "came up short of the 60 votes he needed to move the bill forward. That led to an 'ugly' late-night, closed-door meeting between" Reid, Senate majority whip Dick Durbin and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi "-- aides in the hall heard yelling and swearing - and it has fanned House Democrats' anger over Reid's inability to move bills without granting major concessions to marginal members of both parties."
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The Minneapolis Star Tribune reports Norm Coleman (R) "had hoped an inspection of hundreds of secrecy envelopes holding rejected absentee ballots would yield enough additional votes to help him cut into DFLer Al Franken's 225-vote lead" but "it turned out that only 89 of them had valid registrations." Writing in 'The Fix' blog on the website of the Washington Post, Chris Cillizza discusses the ongoing Coleman-Franken battle, saying, "What's clear is that the average Minnesotan is growing tired of the back and forth. ... That weariness makes the eventual decision by the three-judge panel all the more important as there isn't likely to be much of an appetite for another appeal regardless of the outcome."
The New York Times reports New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine (D) has seen his poll numbers "deteriorate" as he prepares to run for reelection this year, and Republicans are "optimistic" they can take the governor's mansion for the first time since 1997. And Corzine "is unlikely to win many new friends on Tuesday, when he is expected to propose a series of difficult steps to help the state close a $7 billion budget deficit: raising income taxes among the wealthiest residents, demanding that state workers agree to a wage freeze and take 12 unpaid days off, and reducing spending by billions
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The AP reports that NC11 Rep. Heath Shuler (D) announced yesterday that he will not challenge North Carolina Sen. Richard Burr (R), joining NC13 Rep. Brad Miller (D) in declining to take on a top target of the Democrats. The Asheville (NC) Citizen-Times adds that UNC Asheville political scientist Bill Sabo says it is possible Shuler "thinks 2010 is not going to be a good year for Democrats."
The Hill reports that whether or not Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn (R) will seek "a second term in 2010 remains one of the biggest unanswered questions of the election cycle," though "there are signs that he is prepared to run again." The Hill adds that the Democrats could have a shot at the seat if Coburn does not run.
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Jay Leno: "Hey, did you see this on the news? I thought this was nice. Over the weekend in Washington, DC, First Lady Michelle Obama was at a homeless shelter serving food to the homeless. ... Wasn't that nice? Reaching out to the middle class. I thought that was fantastic."
Jay Leno: "President Obama today came out against human cloning," but "I think he might be a little hasty here" because "there should be exceptions. For example, let's say Obama can find a nominee who has paid his taxes. Clone that guy."
Jimmy Fallon: "Republicans are attacking Barack Obama because he now wants to negotiate directly with the Taliban. Obama responded, 'Hey, right now I'd rather deal with the Taliban than with Republicans.'"
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