McCain Blasts Obama for Using a Canadian Bus for American Jobs Tour

ABC News(WASHINGTON) -- Senator John McCain, R-Ariz., Monday responded to President Obama’s criticism of the recently released Republican jobs plan in the Senate by throwing back a fiery criticism of Obama’s jobs bus tour this week.

“I’ve never seen an uglier bus than the Canadian one he’s traveling around on – a Canadian bus touting American jobs. So — and one of the reasons why Americans and I and my colleagues are a bit skeptical, because we’ve seen this movie before,” McCain said on the Senate floor Monday afternoon.

McCain questioned whether it is appropriate for Obama to be traveling on the taxpayers' dime, saying the president is “clearly campaigning,” because he’s visiting areas of the country “that have a lot to do in the view of many with the upcoming electoral calendar.”

In Asheville, N.C., Monday, the first stop of a three-day bus tour that will bring the president to Virginia as well, Obama said the Senate Republicans’ jobs plan amounted to little more than a plan to “gut regulations…to let Wall Street do whatever it wants...to drill more....(And) to repeal health care reform. That’s their jobs plan.”

Responded McCain, “I was somewhat taken back since the president and his spokesperson had billed his trip as a taxpayer-paid visit. And in his remarks, the president was very strongly condemning of the plan that we have put forward. In fact, remember, my colleagues and friends, the president made these remarks on a taxpayer-paid-for, riding in a Canadian bus, visit for the next three days.”

McCain defended the Republicans’ plan, released last Thursday, saying it is a “commonsense alternative” to the Democratic plan. He called President Obama’s plan just another stimulus.

“It didn’t work. It added to our debt and deficit, and we lost jobs,” McCain said.

During the 2008 presidential campaign, McCain’s famous “Straight Talk Express” bus also bore the imprint of Prevost, the same Canadian company that designed the shell/chassis of Obama’s government-owned bus.

In August the U.S. Secret Service said it selected Prevost because it’s the only company that made a bus large enough for its security needs. The agency then had it built out and outfitted by the American company Hemphill Bros.

Copyright 2011 ABC News Radio

Obama Stops for BBQ in North Carolina

JIM WATSON/AFP/Getty Images(MARION, N.C.) -- On the road from Asheville to Millers Creek, President Obama stopped for some Southern comfort food at Countryside Barbeque in the small town of Marion, N.C.

After placing his order at the front counter -- a barbeque platter and a large sweet tea -- the president got down to business, shaking hands and posing for pictures.

According to the pool reports, the president spent just over half an hour snapping pictures and greeting diners in the packed restaurant, speaking with a member of the City Council, uniformed paramedics and a group of older women dressed in matching Native American costumes, complete with “war paint” on their faces. The women are reportedly members of the McDowell County Senior Line Dancers and had just participated in a performance earlier in the day.

Working his way through the banquettes, the president also met a little boy named Jack Nicholson and spent some one-on-one time with a little baby boy.

“You know most of your meal is on the floor? Yes it is…It’s on the floor,” the president told one-year old Dakota in a pseudo baby voice.

The menu at the roadside restaurant boasts chopped pork barbeque, fried chicken and country ham, among other Southern favorites. There are also a few salads on the list for good measure.

Copyright 2011 ABC News Radio

Obama Tops One Million Campaign Donors

Obama for America(WASHINGTON) -- More than one million people have donated money to help President Obama win a second term, his campaign announced Monday.  A giant ticker on the campaign’s website, BarackObama.com, surpassed the milestone shortly after 4 p.m. ET.

In an email ahead of the mark, Obama praised his supporters for helping to set his financing apart from that of his Republican challengers.

“No matter what our opponents do, and however many people end up becoming a part of this campaign -- this first million will always be the group that put this movement in the best position possible for the fights ahead,” he said.  “None of us can do this alone. We've always relied on each other, not Washington lobbyists or corporate interests, to build our campaign.”

Obama does not accept campaign contributions from registered lobbyists or political action committees.

During the 2007-2008 campaign cycle, an estimated three million Americans opened their wallets in support of Obama.  

Obama aides say topping one million donors by this point in the 2012 campaign puts them well ahead of the record pace for donor engagement they set four years ago.

Copyright 2011 ABC News Radio

Herman Cain's Immigration Policy Is Met with Outrage

Scott Eells/Bloomberg via Getty Images(COOKEVILLE, Tenn.) – Republican candidate Herman Cain told a campaign audience last weekend what his ideas were in order to secure the U.S. border with Mexico. Cain said that he believed the federal government should erect an electrified, 20-foot border fence in order to stem the flow of illegal immigration. His plans were met with much outrage, especially from one of the top Hispanic lawmakers in Congress.

Rep. Charles Gonzalez, the chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, slammed the GOP hopeful for “a staggering lack of sensitivity” and called on other candidates seeking the nomination to reject Cain’s proposal.

Saturday in Cookeville, Tenn.,  the candidate detailed his solution to the country’s illegal immigration trouble.

“First, secure the border for real,” Cain explained. “It's common sense. Part of [the solution] would have a real fence. Twenty feet high, with barbed wire – electrified - with a sign on the other side that says it can kill you. It'll be in English and Spanish.”

Those comments drew a sharp rebuke from Gonzalez, who warned Cain against using his popularity irresponsibly to stoke public opinion.

“Words have consequences, both in shaping ideas and inspiring actions,” Gonzalez, D-Texas, wrote in a statement Monday. “Whether or not he made his comments in jest, Mr. Cain’s words show a lack of understanding of the immigration issues our country is facing and a staggering lack of sensitivity. Surely, Mr. Cain understands the duty that candidates have to offer responsible policy proposals.”

Even before Gonzalez could react to Cain’s comments, the candidate preemptively dismissed critics who believe his rhetoric is insensitive.

“Then I get criticized: ‘Mr. Cain, that's insensitive,’” Cain said. “What do you mean insensitive? What's insensitive is when they come to the United States across our border and kill our citizens and kill our border patrol people. That's insensitive and I'm not worried about being insensitive to tell people to stop sneaking into America.”

Gonzalez, a 7-term lawmaker representing the San Antonio area, also called on the other Republican candidates to distance themselves from Cain’s commentary.

“Mr. Cain has said that America ‘needs to get a sense of humor,’ but I see nothing funny about killing other human beings.  Leave the comic routines to the professional comedians,” Gonzalez stated. “The most pressing question is how the other Republican candidates respond to this ‘policy position’ by Mr. Cain. I urge these candidates to immediately repudiate Mr. Cain’s comments and to show strong disapproval of even so-called jokes about killing human beings.”

Gonzalez said that considering Cain’s past experience as an executive in the restaurant industry, a labor force that is 22-percent Hispanic, he and other members of the Hispanic caucus “hope [Cain] would follow the responsible path taken by the National Restaurant Association” in calling for comprehensive immigration reform.

Copyright 2011 ABC News Radio

Senate Dems Announce First Piece of Jobs Bill to Be Taken Up

ABC News(WASHINGTON) -- Senate Democrats on Monday announced the first piece of President Obama’s jobs bill that they will take up – a $35 billion aid package to help state and local governments provide funding for teachers, police officers and firefighters. They say the package would create or save approximately 400,000 jobs.

Thirty billion dollars of that total would be invested to help avoid teacher layoffs and hire more teachers in schools.

“Nearly 300,000 teacher jobs...are at risk and so is the quality of our education system,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-NV., announced on the Senate floor Monday. “Unless school districts get a helping hand, many more will be forced to make more difficult choices, between laying off educators, going without school books, paper and other supplies. Democrats will pursue the president's plan to keep teachers and support staff where they belong, in the classroom.”

The rest of the money -- $5 billion -- would be invested to retain police, firefighters and first responders.

“Our communities cannot afford to lose the men and women who keep us safe and secure, and our nation cannot afford to lose the competitive edge the world-class education system gives us in a constantly changing world,”  Reid said.

The measure would be paid for by the 0.5-percent tax on millionaires. Reid indicated each next piece taken up on the jobs bill would also be paid for by the millionaires surtax.

Reid will introduce the bill on the floor Monday and will decide in the next day or two when voting will happen.

Reid says he will take up one piece of the jobs bill per week.

Copyright 2011 ABC News Radio

GOP Gets More Positive Press than Obama, Pew Study Finds

Official White House Photo by Pete Souza(WASHINGTON) -- Of all the candidates running for president in 2012, President Barack Obama has received the most negative portrayal in the news media, according to a new study by the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism.

Researchers found that “negative assessments of Obama have outweighed positive by a ratio of almost four to one” across 11,500 news media outlets they tracked for 23 weeks, between May 2 and Oct. 9.

Only 9 percent of news stories and blogs related to Obama over the period were identified as positive, compared with 34 percent negative and 57 percent neutral, or “straight news accounting of events,” the report concluded.  

Pew used a “trained” computer algorithm to analyze coverage of political candidates, including the president, in newspapers, cable channels, radio and broadcast networks and thousands of blogs, tagging statements within each as either positive, neutral, or negative based on criteria determined by researchers.

Coverage of Obama was never more than 10 percent positive, the study found.  Moreover, negative coverage of Obama always exceeded positive coverage by at least 20 percentage points.

While the study did not examine reasons for the findings, the intense critical spotlight on the presidency and the country’s persistent economic woes that have plagued the administration are likely two factors that influenced results.

Meanwhile, Texas Gov. Rick Perry has received the most coverage and most positive coverage than any other Republican candidate, Pew found.  Thirty-two percent of statements or assertions related to Perry were positive, while just 20 percent were negative.

Tea Party-aligned candidates – Perry, Palin, Bachmann and Cain – all received more positive than negative coverage, the study found.

Current GOP frontrunner and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has been subjected to less flattering but more consistent news coverage, with 26 percent of Romney references taking a positive tone and 27 percent taking a negative one.

Copyright 2011 ABC News Radio

Obama: ‘Maybe Congress Couldn’t Understand’ Jobs Bill

JEWEL SAMAD/AFP/Getty Images(ASHEVILLE, N.C.) -- On the tarmac of an airport badly in need of repair, President Obama on Monday launched his second bus tour since August, and formally announced that his jobs bill would be broken up into parts, taking an even more combative tone with -- even insulting -- Congress.

“Maybe they couldn’t understand the whole thing at once,” the president said to laughter. “We’re going to break it up into bite-sized pieces, so they -- they can take a thoughtful approach…We’re going to give members of Congress another chance to step up to the plate and do the right thing.”

He said he hoped the first provision would provide funding for states and localities to continue to keep teachers, police officers, and firefighters on the job.

The president has been faulted by congressional Democrats for not focusing enough on the economy in the first two years of his term, a criticism he tried to re-focus Monday. “Once you escape the partisanship and the political point-scoring in Washington, once you start really listening to the American people, it’s pretty clear what our country and your leaders should be spending their time on,” he said.

“Jobs! Jobs! Jobs! Jobs! Jobs!” chanted the crowd.

“We should be talking about jobs,” the president agreed. “When you hear what’s going on out in the country, when you take the time to listen, you understand that a lot of folks are hurting out there.”

The Asheville appearance was the first on a three-day bus tour through two highly competitive battleground states that the president won in 2008 but may not in 2012: North Carolina and Virginia.

A recent poll of North Carolina voters by Elon University found 57 percent disapprove of President Obama’s handling of the economy, with 37 percent approving. A Quinnipiac University Poll found that 51 percent say President Obama does not deserve re-election, with 44 percent saying he does.

Unlike previous appearances when he faulted the Republicans in Congress for not having a jobs plan, the president acknowledged that the other party had introduced a bill called the “Real American Jobs Act.”

But he challenged that title, saying the GOP legislation amounted to little more than a plan “to gut regulations...to let Wall Street do whatever it wants...to drill more...(And) to repeal health care reform. That’s their jobs plan.”

“I’ll let you decided which plan is the real American jobs act,” the president said.

When the supportive, modestly-sized group of just a few hundred gathered on the tarmac began chanting “Four more years! Four more years!” the president said “I appreciate the ‘Four more years,’ but right now I’m focused on the next 13 months.”

The president said he was giving the opposition another chance to embrace his bill. Last week, 51 Senate Democrats voted to bring the bill up for debate, not enough to block a threatened Republican filibuster.

Copyright 2011 ABC News Radio

Is the US Primary System Flawed?

Comstock/Thinkstock(WASHINGTON) -- It’s the time of year when the battle between states for primary dates begins.

First, it was Florida that defied the rules of the Republican National Committee and announced it would hold its primary on Jan. 31.

Now, Nevada is joining the race by moving up its caucus to Jan. 14, a date that New Hampshire politicians fear could diminish their state’s influence.

Only four states -- New Hampshire, Iowa, South Carolina, and Nevada -- are allowed by the national party committees to hold their primary or caucus before March 6, a tradition that began in the early 20th century.

But given the soft penalties, the rules have been increasingly broken in recent years, resulting in a catfight over which states should go first.

“It’s tradition. That’s really all that it amounts to,” said Larry Sabato Jr., political scientist and director of the University of Virginia Center for Politics. “No one’s happy with the status quo. The amazing thing is that most people just shrug their shoulders and say nothing can be done...The parties don’t have the tools needed to really punish individual states.”

Supporters of the current system, however, argue that it forces candidates to put their boots on the ground and talk to real people, a connection that’s important to build credibility.

“I think the primary system, broadly speaking, works. It allows candidates to emerge. It allows the voters over time to measure and judge people. I think it is very important that it be a multi-month process,” 2012 contender Newt Gingrich said in 2008. “The current process both allows unusual candidates without great resources to emerge in Iowa and New Hampshire and, at the same time, it gives enough time to test everyone extensively.”

The early primaries bring influence and visibility to the states, and in some elections they have determined the course of the race. They can help a strong candidate like Mitt Romney, who is leading in the polls, gain more attention, but can hurt underdogs like Jon Huntsman, who are less visible.

The four states are hardly representative of the country, in general, when it comes to population and demographics, and critics say they get undue advantage. But there’s little impetus to change the system. Doing so would require a congressional mandate or a Constitutional amendment.

New Hampshire and Iowa are the first two states to hold a primary and caucus, a tradition that began in the early 20th century. Until 1972, the New Hampshire primary was held on the second Tuesday in March and it was followed by a flurry of primaries and caucuses until June.

But the system has been challenged recently as other states realize the monetary benefits of holding early primaries and the media attention that they garner.

That, in turn, has resulted in more early primaries. In 1972, the first primary was held in February. By 2004, that date had moved back to January.

For the first time ever, the New Hampshire primary could be held in December, which could translate into an even longer campaign season for candidates, an idea that Sabato dubs “absurd.”

“People should be interested in politics, but not every day of the year, not during the holiday season. It doesn’t serve the system. It doesn’t serve the parties,” he said.

Huntsman is boycotting the Las Vegas debate and is threatening to boycott the Nevada caucus because of the early schedule. Such a move would give an additional nudge to front-runners such as Romney and Cain.

But experts caution against lending too much credence to early primaries. After all, neither Bill Clinton nor Barack Obama won the New Hampshire primary and both nabbed the Democratic nomination and, eventually, the presidency. Republican presidential candidate John McCain placed fourth in the Iowa caucus in 2008, but he went on to nab the GOP nomination.

Copyright 2011 ABC News Radio

Which GOP Candidate Is Winning at Social Media?

Comstock/Thinkstock(WASHINGTON) -- Can a presidential candidate win an election 140 characters at a time? In this digital age, they sure are trying.

Whether it is a promoted tweet, a YouTube video or a Google search ad, presidential campaigns have infiltrated social media in unprecedented ways this election cycle.

“It would be crazy for a campaign, speaking in general terms, not to have a Twitter account,” said Zach Moffatt, the digital director for Mitt Romney’s campaign. “It’s just become the way campaigning has to be.”

For the first time in presidential campaign history, candidates can buy ads that run before YouTube videos and pay to put their tweets at the top of users’ news feeds and search results on Twitter.

The micro-blogging site’s new political ad features were launched in mid-September and the YouTube “pre-roll” ads, which are more expensive, became available during the 2010 midterm elections.

Romney’s team has jumped at these opportunities and was the first presidential candidate to buy Twitter’s “promoted tweets” so more people would see his 140 character messages more often.

After announcing New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s endorsement, the Romney campaign promoted a tweet about it. About 18,000 people clicked on the tweet’s link and almost 600 people retweeted it.

But the Romney campaign did not stop at Twitter. It also ran ads before videos on YouTube about the endorsement and bought the Google search words “Chris Christie” so every time someone Googled the governor’s name, a Romney ad appeared on the search page.

But despite the Romney campaign’s widespread reach on social media web sites, his rival as front-runner, Herman Cain, is taking the crown in the online realm, according to Patrick Ruffini, a digital strategist with the Republican political consulting agency Engage.

“Cain is new so people are trying to find out about him,” Ruffini said. “The problem [with Romney] is he’s been around awhile. He’s the establishment candidate and he’s probably not going to get a tremendous amount of support online.”

Ruffini said in order to inspire online chatter, a candidate has to “say and do interesting things,” which Cain is currently excelling at.  Over the past week on Facebook, for example, 80,000 were talking about the former Godfather’s Pizza CEO each day, according to an analysis by Engage.

Comparatively, about 36,000 Facebook users mentioned Romney throughout the week. About 34,000 people were talking about Ron Paul and about 23,000 posted about Michele Bachmann.

But, Ruffini noted, that “could change on a dime” because of the sheer speed of information sharing that takes place online.

“If you’re losing momentum and you’re losing steam, people are going to drop you like a hot potato,” he said. “The online audience especially is extremely finicky.”

And social media buzz does not necessarily translate into Election Day votes, Ruffini said in a blog post about the Facebook findings.

“Any measure of Internet buzz -- be it tweets, Facebook posts or searches -- will reward the most controversial and talked-about public figures, and these aren’t always the highest vote getters,” Ruffini wrote. “That’s probably why Cain, with his 9-9-9 plan and his recent surge in the polls, leads, and why Michele Bachmann and Ron Paul place strongly.”

Since his official candidate page was created in 2006, Paul has gained more than 20,000 subscribers and 2.2 million video views. More than 4,000 people subscribed to Paul’s YouTube account over the past month, more than every other presidential candidate, including President Obama, combined.

But in the 2 months since Perry’s YouTube page launched, the Texas Governor has already surpassed Paul’s online video popularity, drawing 2.4 million video views almost all of which came from his second campaign ad which calls Obama “president zero” and slams him for creating “zero jobs.” Nearly 2 million people have watched the ad on YouTube since it launched Sept. 20.  

And speaking of going viral, 1.9 million people have watched one of Cain’s YouTube videos in the mere two weeks that the former Godfather’s Pizza CEO created his channel. In fact Cain’s 9-9-9 plan video was the number one viewed political video this past week, according to the YouTube Politics page rankings.

“Cain frankly I think just needs to be in a position to capitalize on his current moment and momentum to raise a lot of money online,” Ruffini said. “He really doesn’t have another shot. This is his moment right now to use this moment to effectively kind of cash in.”

Copyright 2011 ABC News Radio

Ron Paul to Propose $1 Trillion in Spending Cuts

Jason Merritt/Getty Images(LAS VEGAS) -- Republican Presidential Candidate Rep. Ron Paul is set to deliver a major announcement Monday in Las Vegas where he will unveil his economic plan.

Paul’s plan involves $1 trillion in spending cuts, the bulk of those cuts coming from the elimination of several cabinet level departments, including Energy, Housing and Urban Development, Commerce, and Education.

Paul will also wring out more savings through the elimination of all foreign aid and wars, and dial back spending to 2006 levels.

The plan also calls for a full audit of the Federal Reserve.

Paul also proposes taking a symbolic salary of $39,336 which the campaign says is about equal to the salary of the average American worker.

The proposals are nothing new for Paul, who has long advocated for a more limited government.

In the latest ABC News poll, only eight percent of likely Republican voters mentioned Paul’s name as the one best to handle the economy -- compared with Romney and Perry, who both topped the poll with 22 percent.

At a recent campaign stop in New Hampshire, ABC News asked Paul what he planned to do to change those numbers.

“I’m not changing a thing,” said Paul.

Copyright 2011 ABC News Radio