The Hill News

The man reportedly took a picture of a Tea Party leader during an ABC special and yelled, "You're dead."

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Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R), a potential presidential candidate, said "you've got to draw some lines in the sand."

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Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.) said the administration should deliver its timeline to establish a protected border to Congress.

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Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) said on Friday that the FCC should reinstate the fairness doctrine for broadcast television.

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But Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) said all the talk of political discourse shouldn't suggest that there was a shooting connection.

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Sen. Mark Kirk said the Senate should have kept working, but Sen. Chris Coons said recess isn't a vacation.

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A filibuster would make it difficult for the Senate to pass the deal by midnight Friday, when government funding expires.

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The president will be specific "in terms of dollar amounts, over what period of years," the White House adviser said.

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The Republican chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee said cuts to port and transit security are “wrong” and “dangerous.”

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Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) said he will come to a final decision in a matter of weeks.

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Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels (R) said Sunday he wouldn't be afraid to tackle entitlement reforms if he runs for president. 

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Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), in Egypt, said the White House needs to give "tangible support."

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Republicans in the House understand that Americans don't want a government shutdown, the House Speaker will say in a speech this evening.

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If accurate, the formation of the exploratory committee would keep with the presidential run timeline the former Speaker had sketched.

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I confess. I have two Donald Trump ties. Bought at clearance prices, before Trump was in his birther and bigot mode. After hearing news reports, I checked the ties. Guess what?

My two Trump ties were both made in China!

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President Obama's administration and his political team are becoming increasingly tone-deaf. Everyday Americans aren’t visiting town halls of Republicans to complain about draconian cuts. They’re coming to gripe the majority party isn’t cutting enough. We've had many tax cuts over the past 20 years but no spending decreases. The lack of discipline created by a broken political system now has us on the verge of bankruptcy.

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The April 19, 2011 letter sent to Mayor Vincent Gray from more than 100 members of Congress regarding reinstatement of the ban on District funding of abortions for low-income women demonstrates why District residents must continue to fight for statehood and free this city from its Congressional shackles. 

I found the letter to be very disrespectful to our Mayor. The tone of the correspondence is condescending and patronizing, and its authors have temerity to suggest that our Mayor would consider breaking the law and continue District funding of abortions for low-income women.

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President Obama on Friday issued major disaster declarations for Georgia and Mississippi after a wave of deadly storms swept through the South on Thursday. The White House had already made the same declaration for Alabama, where the storms did the most damage.

The death toll from the tornadoes continues to rise as emergency response workers dig through the rubble.

By early Saturday morning, emergency management officials tallied 252 deaths in Alabama, 34 in Tennessee, 33 in Mississippi, 15 in Georgia, 5 in Virginia and 1 in Arkansas, CNN reports.

Obama visite! d Alabama on Friday to survey the damage.

“I've never seen devastation like this,” Obama said after touring areas of Tuscaloosa, Ala.

The White House has dispatched Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Administrator Craig Fugate to Alabama to oversee the government's response to the storms.

At the request of the respective governors, FEMA says it has personnel on the ground in Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, Kentucky and Tennessee.

The White House's disaster declarations makes federal funds available to those affected by the storms. In Georgia it covers Bartow, Catoosa, Dade, Floyd, Polk, Spalding, and Walker counties. In Mississippi, it covers Clarke, Greene, Hinds, Jasper, Kemper, Lafayette, and Monroe counties.

Have you tweeted today? Or ever? I bet you have used Facebook today. As a country we fall in love with the unbridled technological progress that the great minds of our country afford us. It can do so much good for us â€" it connects us with long-lost friends, family and otherwise. It allows us to stay up to date, up to the minute in some instances, of events around the corner and around the world. All of this is absolutely fantastic when it helps us out, but we are often remiss in our consideration of the negative ramifications of these very same advances.

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National media outlets have dubbed my legislation the "Don't Say 'Gay' Bill", improperly implying that the legislation is a gag order on a word or words.

In actuality, the legislation specifically limits the introduction of sexuality discussions as part of the official curriculum for children grades K-8, exempting discussions of biology.

The impetus behind my legislation is the case of David and Tonia Parker, the parents of a kindergartner in Massachusetts. The Parker family requested their child be allowed to opt out of homosexual discussions in the classroom, similar to opt-outs available for Jehovah's Witnesses regarding recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance.

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As Congress prepares to return and global markets could crash if the debt-ceiling extension is not passed, Paul O'Neill, former Treasury secretary during the Bush administration, compared congressional Republicans who oppose the debt-ceiling extension to al Qaeda terrorists. O'Neill's warning was reported in an excellent story in The Hill.

Two points. First, I do not make the comparison myself. I am merely quoting a Republican Treasury secretary warning Republicans. Second, if the debt ceiling is not raised, I believe it could cause a global market crash, and would be blamed, correctly, on Republicans who refuse to compromise in good faith with the president and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.).

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Good for Bob Schieffer. He said what all of us know to be true, but dared not say ourselves.

First, ignoring all the evidence that’s been out there for three years, Donald Trump resurrected the old lie about President Obama not being born in the United States â€" and demanded that the president release the “long form” of his birth certificate.

Then, when Obama surprised everybody by doing just that, what does Trump do next? Accept the evidence and apologize? No! Instead, he moves on to a new conspiracy theory, accusing Obama of being a “bad college student” and demanding that the president release the transcript of his grades.

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A phrase recently appeared in the MSM: “anti-establishment conservatives.” Brings to mind that well-worn phrase of the ’60s, “counterculture.” But modeled for a new century and for new generations. Sarah Palin first busted out and today conservatism â€" from Rand Paul and Judge Andrew Napolitano to former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson and Donald Trump â€" brims with creativity. It brings a change of paradigm to American politics and culture and suggests a forceful will and intelligence at work in its desire to become real. Commentator Michael Barone compared the change to that of the ’60s. There are now three elements: Democrats, Republicans and the new conservative counterculture which has no real name yet. By 2012 it could well become the new mainstream.

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The president brought forth his birth certificate not because he was more “adult” than Donald Trump but because the press took Trump’s cue and for two days straight followed up. Where is the long form? Why don’t you deliver? Why didn’t you deliver two years ago when you were required? It was an uh-oh moment. They, the administrators, sensed a sea change in the press. No longer would Nobel Prizes be given out after eight days in office. No longer would the most fawning and accommodating journalists get the Pulitzers. There is even the complaint by a Washington Post columnist that the “journalist prom” on Saturday night â€" hosted by Hollywood celebs and lobbyists and influence-seekers â€" got out of control.

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The Senate needs answers from Gen. David Petraeus and Leon Panetta on Iran. With all the international focus on the Arab spring, what has escaped attention is the power struggle going on inside Iran between President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his erstwhile protector, the supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Right now it looks like Khamenei is circling the wagons. He has slapped down Ahmadinejad, who showed signs of wanting to groom his chief of staff to succeed him as president. In the most obvious sign of displeasure, Khamenei overruled Ahmadinejad, who had sought the resignation of the intelligence chief, Heydar Moslehi. Ahmadinejad’s response was to disappear from public view and in the past week not to show up to chair two Cabinet meetings.

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This week the President elevated the issue of our broken immigration system back to the front burner of our political discourse. Conservatives for Comprehensive Immigration Reform believes that this murky issue gains clarity when eyed through the matrix of the traditional “three legged stool” of conservatism. 

When this issue is examined within the framework of our nation’s fiscal conservative, social conservative and national security conservative value structure, a common sense pathway forward emerges as straightforward and exceptional.

When the conservative solution is measured against the “Restrictionist” approach, the traditional conservative argument demonstrates that our nation is responsible for forging solution’s that adhere to American values. Neither the fiscal, social, or national security conservative value system is served through the Restrictionist’s “attrition through enforcement” agenda.

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Since the National Labor Relations Board announced its complaint against Boeing last week, members of the National Association of Manufacturers have expressed alarm at what the outcome of the complaint would mean for their companies, their ability to create jobs and compete in a global marketplace and our nation's economy as a whole.

They, and all Americans, should be concerned about the impact of a negative outcome in this case. If the NLRB succeeds, no company will be safe from them stepping in at any time to second-guess their business decisions on where to locate and whom to hire.

At the heart of the debate on this issue is whether an employer has the right to consider past work disruptions in decisions about where to expand or locate new operations.

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Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) on Friday doubled down on her opposition to raising the nation's debt ceiling, using an interesting bit of slang to convey her thoughts.

"Hells no. I would not vote to increase that debt ceiling," she said during an interview on Fox News, where she is a paid contributor.

Otherwise it just shows the American public that we aren't serious, yet we are still going to incur more debt. It turns my stomach to hear this assumption articulated that we have to, despite the fact that we are raking in the federal government six billion dollars a day. Take that money and service our debt first and pay down some of that debt. Make sure that we are showing the international financial markets and our lenders that we're serious about getting our debt and our deficit problems under control.”

Yesterday the government released numbers that show first-quarter GDP at only 1.8 percent and jobless claims had risen for the third week in a row above 400,000.

America faces a jobs emergency, but nobody in Washington gives any evidence of giving a damn. Nobody talks about jobs. Nobody proposes jobs programs. Nobody fights for jobs. The debate is now between Democrats who do nothing to fight for jobs and Republicans whose budget would destroy jobs.

I agree with Karen Finney that there is an element of racism in the birther mania, and I have accused Donald Trump of running a campaign for birthers and bigots. But there is a far, far more important issue of jobs that lies at th! e heart of our discontent.

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My mother carried a copy of my birth certificate in her wallet from the time I was about 4 years old until I was almost 21, prompted by an incident with an emergency-room nurse who was shocked and confused to discover that the blond-haired, green-eyed, white woman in front of her was not a camp counselor, as she’d initially assumed, but the actual birth mother to the brown-haired, brown-eyed, brown-skinned child whose bleeding foot she’d just attended to. While my mom was a combination of shocked and confused herself, in that moment she focused on a larger issue: the safety of her child. She was afraid of what would or could happen some other time in some other emergency if she were challenged, and I was somehow denied or delayed needed care. For me, it was the first time I remember thinking how weird it was that anyone would think she wasn't my mom. At 4 years old, the conclusion is easily “Grown-ups are dumb.”

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President Obama met with Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) and her husband at Cape Canaveral, Fla., on Friday, according to a White House official.

The meeting lasted about 10 minutes and came while both Giffords and Obama and his family were at Cape Canaveral for the launch of the space shuttle Endeavour, according to the White House.

The shuttle launch was postponed after Obama and Giffords had arrived because of a mechanical failure.

In January, Giffords was the target of a shooting rampage by a lone gunman that killed six people. Giffords suffered a gunshot wound to the head. She has been undergoing intensive rehabilitation.

At the meeting, Giffords's husband, astronaut and Navy Capt. Mark Kelly updated Obama on Giffords's condition and her progress in recovering from the shooting.

"I bet you were hoping to see a rocket launch today," Kelly said to Obama.

“We were hoping to see you," Obama replied.
The meeting is the first one since Obama visited Giffords in the hospital in mid-January not long after the shooting.

This opinion piece was written in response to "Don't blame the Santa Ana Sucker" by Adam Lazar and Ileene Anderson published on April 18, 2011.

The Endangered Species Act isn’t an either-or proposition. It was developed to respect the needs of both human beings and wildlife. It also requires federal agencies to base their decisions and rulemaking on the best available science.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service failed to follow ESA guidelines on both counts, however, when it recently expanded a critical habitat area for the Santa Ana Sucker to include every water pipeline, treatment plant and groundwater recharge pond along the Santa Ana River and! its tributaries in some of the most heavily populated areas of inland Southern California.

This is a serious problem because the Service’s decision could translate into a net annual loss of enough water for 500,000 Riverside and San Bernardino county residents who need this water now.

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House Minority Whip Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) reminisced on meeting the queen in a series of tweets prompted by the royal wedding Friday.

Hoyer took time to tweet his congratulations to Prince William of Cambridge and Kate Middleton on their wedding, which took place earlier in the day:

Congrats to William & Kate - coverage of #RW2011 reminds me of when I met Queen Elizabeth in 1991 http://bit.ly/klHdN6 #HoyerHistory

Hoyer also shared pictures of his meetings with England’s long-reigning queen, first in 1991 and then in 2007:

Also enjoyed mtg w Queen Elizabeth when she visited 5th District in 2007, toured @NASAGoddard http://on.fb.me/j8t1Rt #RW2011 #HoyerHistory

NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center is located in Hoyer’s district in Maryland.

Campaign finance watchdog groups came out forcefully Friday against two political groups started by former White House aides and pledged to request a federal investigation.

Priorities USA and Priorities USA Action are a pair of new groups led by former White House aides Bill Burton and Sean Sweeney that will support President Obama’s reelection. 

{mosads}One of the groups will be a non-profit 501(c)(4) entity, which will not have to disclose its donors to the public â€" a practice that Obama harshly criticized last year.

Public interest groups, which backed Obama’s push for legislation to disclose political groups’ donors, said the liberal groups would be using the same tactics practiced by Republican-leaning outfits in the last election. 

Fred Wertheimer, president of Democracy 21, said in a statement that, “history has shown us that secret contributions in American elections are a formula for scandal and corruption.”

Wertheim! er noted that his group and others sent a letter to the IRS last year asking for a probe of Crossroads GPS, a political non-profit group that campaigned for Republican candidates.

“We expect to send a similar letter to the IRS in the near future asking for a similar investigation of whether Priorities USA is operating in violation of its section 501(c)(4) tax status because it has a primary purpose of participating in political campaigns in support of, or in opposition to, candidates for public office,” Wertheimer said. 

“Democracy 21 strongly opposes the practice of tax-exempt groups being used as conduits to spend secret contributions to influence federal elections.”

The White House distanced itself from the new political groups Friday. Press secretary Jay Carney said the administration doesn’t “control outside groups.”

“These are not people working for the administration,” Carney said. “The president’s position on disclosure! remains the same.”

Nevertheless, other watchdogs said! Preside nt Obama should condemn the groups, just like he did during last year’s campaign season for other non-profit organization that didn’t disclose their donors.

“I'm worried since various news reports say the White House is beginning to look the other way. I haven't heard that from anyone in the White House,” said Craig Holman, government affairs lobbyist for Public Citizen. “It would be very reassuring for President Obama to come out and condemn it.”

Holman and others mounted a heavy lobbying campaign last year in favor of the Disclose Act.

The bill was in response to the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, which let corporations and unions spend unlimited funds on election activities to advocate for or against a candidate’s election. The legislation had the backing of the White House and would have forced non-profit groups that were sponsoring campaign ads to disclose their donors to the public.

The legislation passed in the House ! but stalled in the Senate. It is unlikely to be taken up again this Congress due to the new Republican majority in the House.

Meredith McGehee, policy director for the Campaign Legal Center, said the establishment of the new Democratic-leaning groups shows that legislation is still needed.

“The predictable proliferation of these groups from both sides of the aisle is a direct result of court decisions eroding the current campaign finance regime. With the growth of these groups the threat of secret money flooding our elections grows whether its Democrats or Republicans. Congress should act on disclosure legislation for everyone,” McGehee said.

McGehee also said Obama should condemn the new Democratic-leaning groups.

“Should President Obama condemn these groups? The simple answer is yes for any group that doesn't disclose and engages in efforts to influence the outcome of the election,” McGehee said.

Holman said that the president alignin! g himself with any political group that doesn’t disclose its! donors would run counter to his stated position on campaign finance reform.

“The entire concept of this bothers me a great deal,” Holman said. “This is something that Obama and the White House has steadfastly opposed, as they should.”

Contrary to some of the angry scenes at some of his town-hall meetings, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) said Friday that the crowds are "overwhelmingly supportive" of his budget plan. 

Ryan claims that his constituents know him well and appreciate that he is trying to reduce the nation's debt and deficits with his 2012 budget plan, which is strongly opposed by Democrats.

{mosads}"Oh, they are overwhelming supportive. Have you actually attended these meetings? The crowds are overwhelmingly supportive," he said when asked if his constituents back his proposal during an interview with Bloomberg Television.

Ryan is looking to downplay efforts by Democrats and their allies to make him the poster boy of consti! tuent anger over the House GOP's budget proposal.

The House Budget Committee chairman was met with boos at one of his town-hall meetings last week and had to leave another under police escort due to security concerns about a demonstration outside the building where the event was held. 

Democrats and liberal groups have highlighted the incidents, as well as others around the country, as evidence that the public is opposed to the Ryan plan, which would cut ! $5.8 trillion over the next decade and make drastic changes to! popular yet fiscally troubled entitlement programs like Medicare and Medicaid.

Ryan conceded that "people don't like change," especially when it comes to "difficult and thorny issues" like entitlement programs. But he said that he and his colleagues have a "moral obligation" to lay out what their plan means and how it would fix the nation's fiscal woes. 

He expressed confidence that his message is getting through to his constituents.

"So I'm really â€" I'm taking a lot of solace in this. I'm very excited," he said. "They know what I believe in, what I stand for and so they are excited about seeing one of their elected leaders try to tackle these problems."

All political groups need to disclose their donors regardless of ideology, Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) said Friday.

“I think we need a requirement that all groups should be required to disclose their donors,” Van Hollen said on ABC's “Top Line.” “I think if you're a Republican-leaning group or a Democrat-leaning group you should be required to disclose [who your donors are].”

Van Hollen’s comments came the same day that former White House deputy press secretary Bill Burton unveiled two liberal groups â€" Priorities USA and Priorities USA Action â€" meant to mirror conservative groups American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS.

In the 2010 midterm elections, American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS spent millions of dollars of money raised from anonymous campaign donors. In the weeks before the election, the White House demanded that they disclose their donors and suggested, without evidence, that some of the donations could have ! come from foreign sources.

The two new groups on the left are seeking to follow the Crossroads model, but will try to help Obama win reelection. The groups are planning on raising $100 million for Obama’s reelection campaign.

After Burton announced the formation of the new liberal groups, American Crossroads slammed Democrats for hypocrisy.

Van Hollen said the main problem with groups like Americans Crossroads and Crossroads GPS is that they don't have to disclose who their donors are. He blamed Republicans for obstructing reform that would require that all groups, liberal and conservative, have to disclose donor names.

“The way to deal with this in a uniform and effective way is to pass the law, and unfortunately it’s the Republicans that continue to object that all these groups â€" Democrat-leaning and Republican-leaning â€" disclose this information,” Van Hollen said.

If anyone doubts that the presidential campaign season is already in full swing, they need only pick up a newspaper or turn on the TV to witness the political spin, doublespeak, and outright illogical claims about America’s energy policy. And now with gas prices on the rise and the President’s approval rating dropping, an all-out blame game has begun.
 
Two years ago the President and his allies in Congress pushed to raise gas prices with cap-and-trade legislation and EPA regulations. Since then they’ve kept up the pressure, most recently through a “permitorium” that’s thrown up bureaucratic obstacles to domestic energy development.
 
Instead of reversing these mistakes, the President has seized upon high gasoline prices â€" along with a budget deficit caused by record overspending â€" to rally support for dramatically boosting taxes on oil and gas companies. Citing large corporate profits, while ignoring $100 million in daily governme! nt revenue generated by the industry, the President’s rhetorical attack on oil and gas companies is about as far removed from reality as can be. His shortsighted approach would actually have a net negative effect on the debt by eliminating jobs, revenue and growth fueled by American-based energy.
 

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Even politicians aren’t immune to the hype of a royal wedding.

Following the nuptials of Prince William and Kate Middleton at 11 a.m. London time Friday, Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.) tweeted:

Just catching up here. So she wore a Steve McQeen dress? #TheOneHeWoreInBullitt

Weiner riffed off the fact that the bride, along with her sister Pippa as maid of honor, wore gowns by Alexander McQueen designer Sarah Burton.

In fact, neither dress resembled anything actor Steve McQueen wore in the classic car-chase movie "Bullitt."

Meanwhile, Newt Gingrich (R) tweeted that a National Rifle Association convention in Pittsburgh is “better than a Royal Wedding in London,” and Rep. John Carney (D-Del.) retweeted a follower saying, “The married couple I'm interested in today is Shuttle Commander Mark Kelly and Representative Gabrielle Giffords.”

The launch of the shuttle Endeavour is also planned for today, with the still-recovering Giffords (D-Ariz.) expected to attend to say farewell to her husband, the shuttle’s commander. 

A political issue that enjoys broad support is rare, especially during a contentious budget debate occurring in a painfully jobless economic recovery. Even more rare is when said issue has a base of politically active supporters, giving politicians precious capitol to do what is both right and popular in a time when common ground seems like foreign soil. Luckily for today’s legislators, there is such an issue: higher education.
 
A political issue doesn’t develop a swell of organic support unless there is a problem, and access to college is certainly a burden on families nationwide. A vast majority of college students require loans to finance their education and the average borrower now graduates nearly $25,000 in debt. This number has been ballooning exponentially over the years to the point where Americans now owe around $1 trillion in student loan debt - that’s even more credit card debt.

State governments are exacerbating the situation by cutting funding for higher education while Boards of Trustees and Regents are making up the difference by raising tuition, essentially taxing students to close state budget deficits. One of the most notorious examples is in Pennsylvania where 72% of students are in debt, the average load of which is over $27,000. Yet Governor Tom Corbett (R) has proposed a budget that slashes education funding in half, devastating financial aid programs for students who are already hurting more than most. 
 
Draconian policies like these have resulted in students taking action. Over the past two weeks, students at Cheyney University in Pennsylvania organized massive rallies on campus and at the state capitol to oppose the Governor’s budget. On Monday, the Oregon Student Association led hundreds of students to their capitol to lobby state officials for more education funding. Students at Rutgers University are occupyi! ng parts of Old Queens, the historic building that houses university president Richard McCormick’s office, demanding policy reforms that increase college access and affordability and give more rights to campus workers. Students at the University of Wisconsin, Madison have been organizing protests for over month in opposition to Governor Walker’s plan to begin privatizing the University of Wisconsin system. 
 
From the University of Washington to Central Florida University, UCLA to U-Mass. Amherst, the list of student activism goes on. 
 
So, here we have a major public policy problem: college is getting too expensive and inaccessible for millions of young people. State governments are making things worse by balancing their budgets on the backs of students through tuition and fee hikes, prompting major political action nationwide.  To make the situation even easier for federal legislators, poll after poll shows a vast majority of Americans - ! Democrats, Republicans, and Independents - support government! investm ent in higher education. Here’s just a sample from this year:
 
·      On April 1, CNN found that 63 percent of the public supports increased federal funding for higher education, with only 24 percent of Republicans and 12 percent of Independents believing that education funding should be decreased.
·      In March, a Bloomberg National News poll found that Americans by a nearly four-to-one margin oppose proposals to significantly cut subsidies for college loans.
·      In February, an NBC/Wall Street Journal poll found that by a 55-39 percent margin, Americans believe cuts to college student loans are unacceptable.
·      In February, the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press issued a report in which they asked those surveyed, “If you were making up the budget for the federal government this year, would you increase, decrease, or keep spending the same for [insert program]?”  Education received the highest ! score of all programs, with 62 percent supporting increased funding.
 
There are over a dozen polls, conducted just this year, that offer the same results. Despite today’s ubiquitous messaging around deficit reduction and budget cuts, the American people do not want Congress to cut funding for higher education.
 
The U.S. House of Representatives did not get this message when it passed House Concurrent Resolution 34, Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan’s (R-Wis.) budget bill. Despite an outpouring of young people trying to go to school, Rep. Ryan’s budget devastates the Pell Grant program, which provides funding for low-income students to attend college. Already, the Pell Grant’s purchasing power has plummeted from covering 72% of the cost of college in 1976 to just around 30% today. Access and retention programs such as TRIO, support for minority-serving institutions, loan subsidies, summer school financial aid, and more are all diminished! in the House budget.
 
Where the House failed, th! e Senate now has a golden opportunity to express the crystal clear view of the American people, and especially that of America’s youth. Chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee John Cornyn (R-Texas) seems to be getting the message, saying recently that, “I’ve always supported Pell Grants because education funding is very important.”  

Recognizing the longer-term effects of debt, he went on to say that “a lot of students, they can borrow money, but many students graduate from college with huge loans, and sometimes it’s a real problem to pay it back.” As a top Republican, Sen. Cornyn’s words reflect the reality that investing in college access and success is a bipartisan issue that should not be sacrificed in myopic budget cuts.
 
The evidence is in and the message is clear: Americans are hurting because of high college costs and want the government to do something about it. We are in a difficult time fiscally, but it is the ! priorities we invest in now that will determine if we sink or swing as a nation in the long run.  Rare is the political issue that is politically popular, bipartisan, and the right thing to do. The Senate must pass a budget that takes advantage of this golden opportunity.

Lindsay McCluskey is the president of the U.S. Student Association.

 

Rep. Paul Ryan’s (R-Wis.) 2012 budget plan is selling out the next generation of seniors. His proposal would cap what each state is allocated to spend on Medicare and asks our elderly to figure out how to pay for their treatment with private insurance companies and a voucher with ever-shrinking value.

We can reduce the amount of money we need to spend on healthcare for seniors, and for everyone else, but penalizing our aging adults and raiding Medicare is not the way to do it. The fiscally responsible approach must include policies that keep people healthier now, in order to reduce the demand for medical care throughout their lives.

That approach is prevention.

The Ryan plan doesn’t focus on any of the drivers of health costs, and it doesn’t make anyone less sick. Its magical thinking simply reduces the flow of money available for treatment and care, while failing to address the healthcare costs that will get passed along to families and businesses! . This is detrimental to our nation and the deficit. If, instead, we reduce the number of people injured and ill in the first place, we won’t just save money. We will save lives.

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Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney (R) leads President Obama by seven points among likely New Hampshire voters, according to a poll released Friday.

Romney fares best against Obama in head-to-head matchup compared to other major Republicans, according to a WMUR/Granite State Poll released this morning; Obama leads former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee (R) by four percent and, Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R) trails Obama by seven points.

Fifty percent of likely New Hampshire voters would elect Romney, from neighboring Massachusetts, over Obama, who drew support from 43 percent. Six percent were undecided.

Forty-six percent of voters said they'd pick Obama over Huckabee, who'd win 42 percent in New Hampshire if the election were held today. Nine ! percent were undecided.

Pawlenty, who's still not as well-known in New Hampshire as Romney or Huckabee, fared worst against Obama. Forty-five percent of the state's voters would pick Obama in a matchup against Pawlenty. Thirty-eight percent would elect the former Minnesota governor, while 15 percent were undecided.

Still, the numbers have to be especially encouraging or Romney, who's set to make electability a centerpiece in his bid for the Republican presidential nomination, and has pinned a great deal of his primary strategy on winning the New Hampshire primary.

To that end, New Hampshire Democrats filed a campaign finance complaint against Romney on Friday, a filing the former Massachusetts governor's aides dismissed as "political" and "frivolous." 

The poll also suggests difficulties for Obama in the Granite State since he cruised to victory in the 2008 presidential election with 54 percent of the vote. Democrats had picked up th! e state's two House seats and a Senate seat in the meanwhile, ! before t hose House seats were reclaimed in 2010's GOP wave.

Obama's numbers are upside-down since the days of the 2008 election. Fifty-two percent of New Hampshire voters now say they disapprove of the way Obama's handling his job as president, while 44 percent approve.

The poll, conducted April 15-26, has a 4.4 percent margin of error.

Former White House officials launched a new group on Friday intended to fend off conservative attacks on President Obama's reelection with unlimited campaign cash.

Former Obama deputy press secretary Bill Burton announced the long-expected formation of Priorities USA and Priorities USA Action, twin groups that will take advantage of campaign finance loopholes President Obama had previously decried.

The groups opened up shop on Friday with a website and video attacking the "extreme right," showcasing examples of some Republican presidential candidates' harsh rhetoric toward Obama, as well as the deep-pocketed conservatives that support them.

Th! e groups in many way mirror their counterparts on the right, American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS, the two GOP-boosting groups founded by Bush political guru Karl Rove and another senior Bush aide and longtime Republican figure, Ed Gillespie.

Crossroads GPS took advantage of elements of the tax code to collect unlimited donations from individuals and corporations to spend tens of millions of dollars against Democratic candidates in the 2010 election.

Priorities USA Action will take advantage of the same part of election law, opened by the Supreme Court's "Citizens United" decision, to raise and spend millions in similar, unlimited donations, to defend Obama and go on the attack against the GOP.

The group's opening salvo, posted to YouTube, already takes at a number of Republican presidential candidates; it features clips of former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (implying she's "ill-informed"), former House! Speaker Newt Gingrich, Rep. Michele Bachmann (Minn.) and Dona! ld Trump .

The launch of the group is also tinged with the notion, "If you can't beat 'em, join 'em."

Obama and many of his top White House officials (including Burton, who left the administration to co-found Priorities USA), had decried the unchecked spending by conservative groups in the 2010 election, using the closing weeks of the campaign to launch high-profile attacks against Crossroads and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, in particular.

Priorities USA won't be the only group established by Democrats this cycle, either. Liberal activist David Brock has sought out donors for a similar group, "American Bridge 2012," and alumni of the House and Senate have established efforts to help Democrats running for those bodies in the next election.

Support for Donald Trump's potential presidential candidacy took a hit at the end of April, according to a poll released Friday.

After a month in which Trump had seen his numbers climb in polling of the race for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination, the real estate mogul's numbers declined slightly against other GOP leaders vying for the nomination in a Fox News poll released late Thursday.

Eight percent of Republicans said they wool like to see Trump win the GOP nomination, down from 11 percent who said the same in an early April poll. That puts Trump fourth, behind former Govs. Mitt Romney (19 percent), Mike Huckabee (17 percent) and Sarah Palin (eight percent).

The Fox poll was conducted between through Wednesday, the day on which Presiden! t Obama released his "long-form" birth certificate. Trump gained a great deal of traction as a Republican candidate by questioning the legitimacy of Obama's birth certificate, and the president's release on Wednesday confirmed that Obama was born in Hawaii, despite Trump's suspicions.

Other numbers in the poll didn't bode particularly well for the host of TV's "The Apprentice."

Sixty-two percent of Americans said they would be "not at all" proud of Trump as their president, a number that far eclipses the distaste for other Republican presidential candidates. Fifty-seven percent of adults said they had an unfavorable opinion of Trump, versus 33 percent who have a favorable opinion of the billionaire.

Moreover, Americans were split, at 47 percent apiece, over whether they like Trump's "straight talk" during his flirtations with a potential presidential candidacy.

The poll, conducted April 25-27, has a three percent overall margi! n of error, and a six percent margin of error among Republican! s.

Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry (D-Mass.) on Thursday applauded President Obama for selecting Leon Panetta and Gen. David Petraeus to lead the Pentagon and CIA, saying he expects both will easily be confirmed.

“Leon Panetta and Gen. Petraeus are first-rate public servants whose reputations and records transcend party, and I expect broad approval and swift confirmations,” Kerry said in a statement hours before Obama will formally announce his selections.

By shifting Panetta, the current CIA director, to the Pentagon and Petraeus from his post as U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan to the intelligence agency, Obama is ensuring “continuity of leadership, policy, and philosophy and keeps a strong national security team in place,” Kerry said.

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The New Hampshire Democratic Party filed a campaign finance complaint on Friday against former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney (R), a filing Team Romney dismissed as purely political.

New Hampshire Democrats accused Romney, in a complaint filed with the Federal Election Commission (FEC), of raising money through his state-based political action committees (PACs) in five states in support of his presidential campaign in violation of federal campaign finance laws.

Specifically, the complaint alleges that Romney took money from PACs in excess of the federal limits at the state level, only to use that money in turn to support his nascent presidential campaign.

Romney's exploratory committee dismissed the complaint as politically ! motivated.

"This is totally political," said Andrea Saul, a spokeswoman for Romney. "For those wondering what the Obama jobs plan entails, it apparently involves hiring more lawyers at the FEC to handle frivolous complaints filed by his minions."

New Hampshire Democrats' essentially complained that the money donated to Romney's state PACs was essentially commingled with his presidential campaign to such an extent that federal rules on donations should apply to his state-level PACs.

“Romney’s funneling of campaign contributions from his array of state political action committees to fund his presidential campaign reeks of an Enron-style accounting scheme,” said New Hampshire Democrats' communications director, Holly Shulman. “Mitt Romney just wants to be President â€" plain and simple - and he’ll take any position, say anything or do anything to get there."

Potential candidates for president typically establish the state ! committees and PACs to collect donations and distribute financ! ial supp ort in key primary states. New Hampshire hosts the first-in-the-nation primary in the 2012 campaign, and Romney's pinned a great deal of his political strategy to win the Republican presidential nomination on the New Hampshire primary.

Romney established state PACs in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina -- the three first, major nominating states -- as well as Alabama and Michigan. Democrats claim that by accepting soft money through those PACs, Romney was able to finance his campaign through those, rather than through a federal PAC, donations to which would have been limited by federal campaign finance laws.

The birther episode, culminating with the president of the United States releasing his birth certificate as Donald Trump claimed credit in a split-screen on television, was as shameful as it can get.
 
I hope.
 
The birthers themselves, who never had any evidence Obama was lying about the origin of his birth certificate, will thrive on a new green piece of paper and the conspiracy will live on and on. But fortunately the 2012 presidential field can now focus on the real issues. Trump's megaphone will no longer have the influence it would have. For that, likely presidential contenders like former Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R-Minn.), former Gov. Mitt Romney (R-Mass.), former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) should thank Obama.

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I begin with this: Except for CNN, which makes an honest effort to report real news, cable news in America has let the nation down. If Joe McCarthy had a reality television show on NBC, I wonder if NBC would have promoted McCarthy then the same way it promotes Donald Trump and his campaign for birthers and bigots now?

Cable news in general has turned American democracy into a freak show, where bigots and nuts receive a free megaphone, where shills and hacks parade to the cameras to treat the audience like idiots dishing out spin that many of them don't even believe, where serious issues are not treated in serious ways while celebrity fluff is force-fed to small audiences who often turn elsewhere for news and information.

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Regulations require regular review. When I talk with business owners in Maine and elsewhere, the single most cited barrier to job growth is the uncertainty about federal regulations. The cost of ensuring compliance with the evermore complex web of mandates and regulations is choking employers’ ability to innovate and create jobs. Regulators owe it to all Americans to ensure the rules and regulations they enforce are efficient, effective, and meeting their goals in the best way possible. That is why all federal regulations need thoughtful and regular review. Unfortunately, too few regulations receive such attention.
 
That is why I joined with Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) to introduce the Small Business Regulatory Freedom Act. This would require common-sense regulatory reform to help ensure that small business concerns are taken into consideration when Federal agencies promulgate or review regulations.

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Arizona and Wisconsin may seem like a world apart. But they have more in common than you think. In these states and many others, working people â€" immigrant and native-born alike â€" are under fierce attack by corporate-backed politicians.

From Arizona laws that mandate racial profiling to Wisconsin laws that strip workers’ rights to collectively bargain for a middle class way of life, working families everywhere are under assault. Corporate CEOs and the politicians they finance benefit from creating a toxic environment where immigrants, public employees and working men and women are scapegoated for all the problems we face. They tell us immigrants steal our jobs â€" hoping we forget the millions of American jobs they ship overseas. They say firefighters and policemen are overpaid â€" hoping we ignore Wall Street’s colossal bonuses, million-dollar salaries and endless corporate greed. They say immigrants don’t pay taxes â€" hoping we don’t notice tha! t corporations like GE and Exxon Mobil rake in billions in profit and pay nothing in taxes.

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The Clearwater Paper Corp. in Lewistown, Idaho chose the king cobra to symbolize its workplace safety program. A cobra. One of the deadliest snakes on the planet.

Every day on his way to and from work at Clearwater, John Bergen III drove past a billboard in the company parking lot sporting a picture of a king cobra and the explanation that it represented the company’s behavior-based safety program â€" Changing Our Behavior Reduces Accidents â€" COBRA.

Bergen, a devoted father, a gifted artist and a conscientious worker who urged everyone to observe safety rules, died last summer after inadvertently stepping through a gaping opening in the floor of the Clearwater Paper mill.

Behavior-based workplace safety programs like COBRA are attempts by corporations to shirk responsibility to eliminate hazards by blaming workers instead. When workers die, behavior-based programs disrespect the deceased by blaming them for their own deaths. These! safety programs say to Bergen’s young son, “Your daddy’s dead because he wasn’t careful enough.” 

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A top economic aide to President Obama blamed reductions in government spending for a slowdown in U.S. economic growth in the first quarter.

Austan Goolsbee, the chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, said that a slowdown in government spending was mostly responsible for the 1.8 percent growth in gross domestic product (GDP) between January and March, down from 3.1 in the fourth quarter of 2010.

"It was an expected slowdown," Goolsbee said in an interview on Bloomberg television. "The biggest driver was a reduction in government spending at the federal level, a big negative from defense spending."

The slowdown had largely been predicted by outside observers, and the Commerce Department, which released the first-quarter statistics, blamed a variety of factors â€" chiefly higher consumer prices, along with reduced spending.

Still, observers who predicted a slowdown are more optimistic about the chances of a recovery in l! ater quarters â€" something the Obama administration is counting on as it begins the president's reelection effort.

"Nobody likes a growth slowdown," Goolsbee said. "We've got to have faster growth, but 2011 and 2012 are still looking fairly positive."

With the FY11 budget finally in the bag and a little spring break, Congress returns to Washington next week to begin negotiations for next year’s budget. All federal spending will be scrutinized through the lenses of economic impact and maximum effectiveness, and this is good news for foreign aid.

Foreign aid has a long history of boosting the American economy:  11 of the 15 largest importers of American goods and services are countries that graduated from U.S. foreign assistance. When poor countries put policies in place that promote equitable and inclusive growth, they start to become consumers of U.S. goods, which then creates American jobs.

Foreign aid is also getting a boost in effectiveness: the Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network (MFAN), which I am a founding member, released today ! some clear, practical recommendations for how policymakers can build on already significant reform progress to make U.S. foreign assistance more effective at alleviating poverty, eradicating disease, and driving sustainable economic growth in developing countries.

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Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) praised President Obama's decision to nominate CIA Director Leon Panetta to be the next secretary of defense and Gen. David Petraeus to be the next CIA director.

In a statement released while Obama was formally making the announcement of his selections at a press conference on Thursday, McConnell said that the country faces "myriad challenges" and that Obama should be "commended" for choosing Panetta and Petraeus.

"In preparing to face these challenges the President is to be commended for choosing competence and continuity in asking General Petraeus to serve as Director of the Central Intelligence Agency and Leon Panetta as Secretary of Defense," McConnell said. "I have valued working with both of these leaders.”

The decision to name Panetta and Petraeus was made known before the formal announcement, according to an administration official in a conference call with reporters Wednesday.
!

Panetta will succeed Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Petraeus will be Panetta's replacement.

Petraeus had previously served as the top commander of coalition forces in Afghanistan.

At the press conference Thursday Obama said Petraeus would retire from the Army to head the CIA.

Secretary Gates said June 30 would be his last day on the job.

Gasoline prices are rising extremely fast, and everyone is feeling the pain at the pump. Today, we’re suffering because for too long we haven’t had a national energy policy. While there’s no quick fix, we must lift harmful regulations contributing to the rise in cost and allow more domestic gas and oil production. This will move us towards energy independence and ensure these prices are not a permanent fixture.
 
Gasoline prices peaking at $5 per gallon in some areas of our country is certainly cause for concern. According to a recent poll in the Washington Post, 70 percent of Americans say high gas prices are causing ìseriousî financial hardships in their everyday lives. High gasoline prices in 2008 contributed to our nation’s deep recession, and our nation still hasn’t fully recovered economically.
 
In 2008, with fuel prices above $4 per gallon, then-candidate Obama promised to improve our nation’s ability to produce energy that wo! uld ease the price at the pump. To date, the only policies President Obama has implemented are moratoriums on drilling in the Gulf, and increased regulations on carbon emissions through cap-and-trade and on natural gas production. All of his energy policies have a common theme â€" they raise, rather than lower, the cost of energy and further burden small businesses and families.
 

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House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Thursday praised President Obama's nominees to his national-security team, including Leon Panetta, the CIA director with whom she's clashed.

Pelosi welcomed Obama's selection of Panetta to become the next secretary of Defense, replacing outgoing Secretary Robert Gates. The Democratic leader similarly welcomed Obama's selection of Gen. David Petraeus to lead the CIA, the nomination of Ryan Crocker as the next ambassador to Afghanistan and the choice of Lt. Gen. John Allen to lead U.S. troops in Afghanistan.

"In appointing experienced and committed public servants to key national-security posts, President Obama has acted to strengthen our country’s defenses and the safety of the American people," she said.

Pelosi offered praise for each of the nominees individually â€" especially noteworthy because of her two-year-old spat with the likely future Defense secretary.

"Director Pan! etta’s experience in Congress, the White House and the CIA provide him with the judgment and background to serve as a strong secretary of Defense," Pelosi said in support of Panetta.

The Panetta nomination comes roughly two years after Pelosi and the CIA director were locked in a public war of words about the agency's briefing of lawmakers on harsh interrogation tactics.

Pelosi accused the CIA of "misleading" members of Congress during briefings on interrogation tactics, including waterboarding, against suspected terrorists.

Panetta shot back at the time by disputing the Speaker's charge, saying the CIA's briefings for lawmakers were truthful and accurate.

"It is not our policy or practice to mislead Congress," he wrote at the time.

Panetta had served with Pelosi as a member of California's congressional delegation until 1993, before going on to serve as chief of staff in the Clinton administration.

Democrats went on the attack against New Hampshire Rep. Frank Guinta (R) for attending a fundraising luncheon this week at which Donald Trump was the keynote speaker.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) sought to link Guinta, a first-term Republican from a competitive district, with Trump, the bombastic real estate mogul and TV star who's flirting with running for the GOP presidential nomination.

Trump, who's surged in the polls in part due to his open questioning of President Obama's stated birthplace, visited the first-in-the-nation primary state on Wednesday.

Guinta attended one of the fundraising events at which Trump spoke, according to the New Hampshire Union Leader. The congressman paid $1,000 to attend, but the event was not a fundraiser for Trump, who hasn't filed the paperwork to allow him to begin raising money for a campaign.

But the DCCC sought to link the two with an email release entitled "Guinta Picks Trump for President," and an accompanying statement.

“Over the last few weeks, New Hampshire voters have seen Representative Frank Guinta’s vision of the future, an America where seniors are left without Medicare and Donald Trump sits in the White House,” said DCCC Northeast Press Secretary Josh Schwerin. “As if his vote to give millionaires like Donald Trump massive tax cuts wasn’t enough, Representative Frank Guinta further showed his disconnect from the middle class by paying $1,000 for an exclusive lunch.”
!

A Medicare reform idea that could be included in likely GOP presidential candidate Tim Pawlenty's forthcoming budget proposal has run into opposition from a key House Republican. 

House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) on Thursday dismissed Pawlenty's recent suggestion that Medicare costs could be cut by implementing "payment reforms" that would direct money to doctors and hospitals for better healthcare outcomes.

{mosads}The congressman said that the idea hews too closely to the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB) proposed in President Obama's healthcare law, which both Pawlenty and Ryan oppose. IPAB is tasked with lowering Medicare costs without affecting the quality of coverage.

"Medicare has yet to do this successfully," Ryan said during an interview with the conservative Weekly Standard. "The president wants his IPAB to do essentially the same thing."

Ryan's comments represent yet another split between the former Minnesota governor and House Republicans as both gear up for an election year in 2012. 

House GOP leaders were annoyed with Pawlenty for opposing the spending compromise they brokered with President Obama and Senate Democrats.

Ryan, whom some believe could mount a dark-horse run for president, is not afraid to go after potential GOP presidential candidates: he took a shot at the healthcare plan Mitt Romney implemented as governor of Massachusetts. Ryan has said he is not interested in running for president in 2012.

Pawlenty initially praised Ryan's 2012 budget proposal after he released it in early April, but said last week that he would release his own budget that will depart from Ryan's plans to reform entitlements like Social Security and Medicare. 

Ryan's budget would tr! ansform Medicare benefits into so-called "premium support" for future seniors that would subsidize private healthcare coverage. Democrats have attacked the plan as a voucher system that would lead to the privatization of the popular, yet fiscally-troubled program.

The Wisconsin Republican said that Pawlenty's idea, which is based off reforms he implemented in Minnesota, would rely too heavily on centralized bureaucracy to be effective.

"It’s very difficult for a centralized bureaucracy to do that.... When they get these targets, like the president is giving them, you know a half a trillion dollars, they just sort of do indiscriminate cutting across the board, lowering reimbursement to providers, causing providers to drop out of the program altogether," he said.

Pawlenty's presidential exploratory committee did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Freshman Rep. Michael Grimm (R-N.Y.) faced one of the rowdy town-hall audiences popping up across the country at his constituent event Wednesday evening.

Grimm, who could face a tough reelection, faced numerous interruptions from the crowd of about 100 in Brooklyn, N.Y., as he discussed the GOP's budget plan, Medicare and the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy.

"You want to make Medicare into a voucher program," said one female audience member.

"Get it all out, get it all out. It's good to get it out. Get it out of your system," Grimm could be heard saying amid jeers.

The event was yet another example of town-hall anger Democrats are looking to use against Republicans with the hopes that they will de! fine the debate over entitlements and the 2012 budget. During the summer of 2009, Republicans used similar incidents at Democrats' town halls to pin them down during healthcare debate.

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), the author of the House GOP's budget plan, has been the primary target of Democrats and their allies, and he has faced the music at his meet-and-greet events. 

Other incidents have popped up in Florida, Pennsylvania and Montana. 

Grimm has also been the target of scrutiny after an article in the New Yorker was published that stemmed from allegations that the co! ngressman abused his power and engaged in racial discriminatio! n during his time as an undercover FBI agent in 1999. Grimm has denied the allegations.

VIDEO

The incoming chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) will stop taking money from political action committees for her personal campaign account, her spokesman said Thursday.

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the Florida congresswoman tapped by President Obama to next lead the DNC, swore off PAC money in order to be consistent with DNC rules against PAC contributions.

The Sunlight Foundation first reported that Wasserman Schultz's last fundraiser from which she'll accept PAC money was Monday, coinciding with the end of this month.

It's not clear what the shift means for Wasserman Schultz's own PAC, the "Democrats Win Seats" (after her initials, "DWS") PAC, which itself relies largely on contribut! ions from other PACs in order to help Democratic campaigns. The DWS PAC took in more than $66,000 in donations last month alone, according to its Federal Election Commission (FEC) filing, most of which came from PACs.

The DNC issued a rule barring donations from PACs shortly after Obama won the presidential nomination in 2008, a move praised by watchdogs as a step toward transparency and diminishing lobbyist influence.

The pivot by Wasserman Schultz also underscores the dual functions she'll serve for the next year and a half or so, both as a congresswoman who'll have to fight and win her own reelection battle (though she represents a relatively safe district), while serving in a higher-profile capacity as leader of the DNC.

Updated 2:19 p.m.

John McCain, the top Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, on Thursday indicated that he supports President Obama's new picks to head the Pentagon and CIA. 

The Arizona senator appeared to be satisfied with Obama's decision to move CIA Director Leon Panetta to the Defense Department to replace Robert Gates and appoint Afghan commander Gen. David Petraeus to replace Panetta, even though he preferred another position for the general.

{mosads}"I think so," he said when asked by France24-TV if they are wise moves. "I think especially Gen. Petraeus is very highly qualified. I would have liked to see him as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, but the president has the prerogative as how to choose his team."

McCain's committee will oversee Panetta's nomination to become Defense secretary. The White House on Wednesday said they would like to see him in his new position by July 1, pending full Senate confirmation.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) one of McCain's top allies on the committee, applauded the moves on Wednesday, saying he "could not be more pleased with these selections."

Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, has also prais! ed the shake-up. 

Obama also selected Ryan Crocker, former U.S. ambassador to Iraq, as the next U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan, and chose Marine Lt. Gen. John Allen, a deputy chief at U.S. Central Command, to replace Petraeus in Afghanistan.

President Obama addressed supporters in a video message on Thursday, saying that their frustration with his progress in office is a reason to redouble efforts on behalf of his reelection.

Obama acknowledged the impatience sometimes of his liberal supporters with the administration's ability to follow through on some of Obama's 2008 campaign promises.

"I know that a lot of you who were involved in the campaign earlier, over the last two years, you've probably felt some frustration," Obama said in a web video posted Thursday to his campaign account. "There's been some times where you wanted Washington to change a lot more quickly than it has, and it keeps on slipping into those same old bad habits."

Liberals in particular had expressed some frustration with Obama's compromises with Republicans to extend the expiring Bush-era tax cuts for two years, and on a 2011 budget that slashed tens of billions in spending from the budget. Obama also re! versed himself on his pledge to close the terrorist detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; his administration relented to GOP opposition earlier this month, and agreed to hold military tribunals for suspected terrorists, instead of criminal trials on the continental U.S.

The president's faced down some of those disenchanted supporters as he begins his reelection campaign. Protesters interrupted one of his speeches last night at a fundraiser in New York City, complaining of his work to address HIV/AIDS.

Obama said his supporters' frustration should give them cause, though, to work even harder for him and Democrats in the 2012 elections.

"If you've been feeling impatient -- and I understand that -- if you're feeling frustrated sometimes, that shouldn't be a reason to pull back," he said. "That's a reason for us to get even more involved."

President Obama should "state unequivocally" that Syrian leader Bashar al Assad should step down from power, Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) said Thursday. 

The trio ramped up pressure on Obama to take a stronger stance against the Assad regime, which has violently cracked down on anti-government protesters demanding reforms.

"We urge President Obama to state unequivocally -- as he did in the case of Qaddafi and Mubarak -- that it is time for Assad to go," the senators said in a statement referring to the leaders of Libya and Egypt. "The President should take tangible diplomatic and economic measures to isolate and pressure the Assad regime, including through targeted sanctions against Assad himself and other regime officials who are responsible for gross human rights abuses."

The administration took part in air strikes against Libya Col. Moammar Gadhafi's regime, and pressured Hosni Mubarak to ste! p down as Egypt's president. 

The administration has been sharply critical of the Syrian government's crackdown against protesters, and White House press secretary Jay Carney said Wednesday that the president was considering a variety of options to punish the Assad government.

"What I would tell you is that, as I did yesterday, we’re pursuing a range of possible policy options, including targeted sanctions, to respond to the crackdown and make clear that this behavior by the Syrian government is unacceptable," Carney said. "We strongly oppose the Syrian government’s treatment of its citizens and we continue to oppose its continued destabilizing behavior, including support for terrorism and terrorist groups. We call on President Assad to change course now and heed the calls of his own people."

Obama has faced criticism from lawmakers in both parties for his administration's response to a similar situation in Libya, in which the U.S. joined NATO fo! rces to launch targeted military strikes against Gadhafi. But ! the admi nistration's been loath to add military might to back other efforts to overthrow longstanding leaders in the region.

McCain, who toured the region, including Libya, in the past week, has said he doesn't favor military action in the region.

In many states on Thursday, the most important news is about the weather.

Severe weather that swept the United States over the past week and killed or injured hundreds in the southern states Wednesday night prompted several politicians to tweet their thoughts and prayers to the victims.

Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour (R), dealing with damage on the ground in his state, tweeted Thursday:

Declared a State of Emergency in 39 MS counties and for the Choctaws. Pray for those who have lost loved ones.

Rep. Robert Aderholt (R-Ala.), who represents DeKalb county, where 30 people were killed, tweeted earlier on Wednesday:

As tornadoes continue to hit AL, my thoughts & prayers are w/ those affected. For up to the min weather updates visit http://ow.ly/4I565

Rep. Spencer Bachus (R-Ala.), who represents another of the hardest-hit districts including portions of tornado-ravaged Tuscaloosa, Alabama, also tweeted Thursday:

Our thoughts and prayers are with our tornado victims in Alabama. http://www.bachus.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1109

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), whose state is dealing with power outages due to the storms, tweeted:

My thoughts and prayers for those killed, injured, or who suffered loss from tornadoes and storms throughout the South

Potential Presidential contender and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) tweeted:

My thoughts and prayers are with those impacted by the tornadoes in Georgia and Alabama last night.

Earlier this week, possible presidential candidate Mike Huckabee (R) also tweeted that he was “Praying for those in the pa! th of these dangerous storms.”

Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) both tweeted their “thoughts and prayers” to those in the storms’ path and directed followers to FEMA and the Red Cross.

Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) tweeted:

Thoughts and prayers with all who have been affected by the terrible storms. Be careful today as storms move ac! ross MD

Deaths in Alabama numbered more than 100 by Thur! sday mor ning after several tornadoes touched down Wednesday. Deaths due to weather were also reported in Mississippi, Georgia, Tennessee and Virginia. Storm warnings continued for the East coast on Thursday morning.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) on Thursday took a swipe at billionaire businessman Donald Trump, demanding to see his "Republican registration."

While speaking at a breakfast with New Hampshire Republicans one day after "The Donald" visited the Granite State, Paul riffed off of the potential GOP presidential candidate's "birther" questions.

{mosads}“I’ve come to New Hampshire today because I’m very concerned,” said Paul, according to The New York Times. “I want to see the original long-form certificate of Donald Trump’s Republican registration.”

Paul's comments follow up on some GOP-aligned groups' effort to discredit Trump as a conserva! tive. The free-market Club for Growth has accused Trump of being a liberal for his previous support of universal healthcare and his desire to raise tariffs on China. 

Trump, who is near the top of some polls, appeared in New Hampshire on Wednesday and spoke directly after President Obama released a copy of his long-form birth certificate to prove he was born in Hawaii, while calling people who question his citizenship "carnival barkers."

"Today I am very proud of myself, because I've accomplished something that nobody else was able to accomplish," Trump said. 

Paul, a Tea Party favorite, said ! it would serve the GOP better to get behind a candidate who has better conservative credentials.

“Let’s look to Republicans who not only talk the talk, but walk the walk,” he said. “If we find the right candidate, I see no reason why we can’t win in 2012.”

Paul, whose father Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) is almost certain to run for president, has questioned Trump's potential candidacy before.

Asked by CNN in February about Trump's chances, the younger Paul said: "I think his chances are less than my father's."

President Obama tried to keep answers about his newly released long-form birth certificate light on Wednesday.

"Can I just say? I was there, so I knew that â€" I knew I had been born," Obama said while taping an interview with Oprah Winfrey on her talk show in Chicago. "I remembered it,” he said, prompting laughter from the live audience.

At a Democratic National Committee event at former New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine's (D) house in New York, Obama began his remarks in a similar fashion.

“Today was a fun day,” he said. “Nobody checked my ID at the door.”

Earlier on Wednesday Obama released his long-firm birth certificate hoping to once and for all quell charges by so-called "birthers" that he wasn't born in the United States and thus is ineligible to be president.

Real estate mogul and reality TV show star Donald Trump, who is considering running for president, has been among the most prominent birthers, despi! te the fact that Obama had previously released the short form of his birth certificate.

Trump took credit for the long-form document's release Wednesday morning.

Obama appeared to be jabbing Trump indirectly in response throughout the day.

“But it was also a serious day because part of what happened this morning was me trying to remind the press, and trying to remind both parties, that what we do in politics is not a reality show," Obama said. "It’s serious.”

Watch the clip of Obama with Winfrey below. The entire interview airs May 2.

President Obama tried to keep answers about his newly released long-form birth certificate light on Wednesday.

"Can I just say? I was there, so I knew that â€" I knew I had been born," Obama said while taping an interview with Oprah Winfrey on her talk show in Chicago. "I remembered it,” he said, prompting laughter from the live audience.

At a Democratic National Committee event at former New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine's (D) house in New York, Obama began his remarks in a similar fashion.

“Today was a fun day,” he said. “Nobody checked my ID at the door.”

Earlier on Wednesday Obama released his long-firm birth certificate hoping to once and for all quell charges by so-called "birthers" that he wasn't born in the United States and thus is ineligible to be president.

Real estate mogul and reality TV show star Donald Trump, who is considering running for president, has been among the most prominent birthers, despi! te the fact that Obama had previously released the short form of his birth certificate.

Trump took credit for the long-form document's release Wednesday morning.

Obama appeared to be jabbing Trump indirectly in response throughout the day.

“But it was also a serious day because part of what happened this morning was me trying to remind the press, and trying to remind both parties, that what we do in politics is not a reality show," Obama said. "It’s serious.”

Watch the clip of Obama with Winfrey below. The entire interview airs May 2.

Saif al-Islam Gadhafi said the regime wasn't rattled by Obama's unilateral sanctions or calls for his dad to step down.

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Americans for Tax Reform President Grover Norquist said he's not expecting former  Govs. Mike Huckabee (Ark.) or Sarah Palin (Alaska) to run for president in 2012.

Norquist, the anti-tax activist whose opinions could shape the field of Republicans vying to challenge President Obama next year, said he doesn't plan to formally endorse any candidate, but also expressed doubt that two big names, Huckabee and Palin, would ultimately enter the race.

"I don't think Huckabee's running ... And I don't think the lady from Alaska's running," Norquist told The Hill in a sit-down interview on Wednesday.

Both Palin and Huckabee "appear to be thinking about it," the longtime conservative activist said, but neither is staffing up in such a way to suggest that they'll eventually run.

Both former governors might be better-suited to keep their name in the running and maintain their influence in the GOP by keeping their name in the race for 201! 6, Norquist suggested, even if they pass on a race next year.

The ATR president isn't the only observer to doubt Huckabee's plans. RedState founder Erick Erickson tweeted Wednesday afternoon that Huckabee wouldn't be running, though it wasn't clear from where that information came. (Huckabee's aides sought late Wednesday to shoot down that rumor.)

Still, conservatives and political observers alike have murmured that neither Palin not Huckabee would run, though advisers to both have done their best to keep those names among the group of candidates considering a run.

Of the other candidates, Norquist said that he didn't expect to make an endorsement, especial! ly if they all signed his group's Taxpayer Protection Pledge. ! Norquist mused that former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney (R) has the advantage of having placed highly in 2008's primaries, and he suggested that Romney could still easily explain the Massachusetts healthcare law he signed as governor, which conservatives now decry for its similarities to Obama's healthcare law.

Norquist did seem to lament Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour's (R) to withdraw from the race, and suggested that Barbour, a Republican widely-respected for his strategic vision, serve as chief of staff to the next president, if he or she is a Republican.

"I have re-formed the Barbour-for-chief-of-staff draft committee," Norquist said. "None of our candidates are national in the way Haley Barbour was."