Boston Herald – 911, police tapes key in Gates case
The next chapter in the saga of Henry Louis Gates and President Barack Obama vs. Sgt. James Crowley and the cops of America will likely be the release of the 911 tapes and police radio recording surrounding the arrest. If Gates is heard behaving in a way that most reasonable people find objectionable, it could make the president’s attempts to climb down from his “stupidly” remarks more difficult. If the cops sound like goons and bullies, it will get Obama off the hook.
So far, the police lodges in Cambridge and across the country are sticking together and doing a good job of making Obama sound like a disconnected constitutional law lecturer who cultivates racial grievances rather than a law and order president.
Writers Richard Weir, Laurel Sweet and Benjamin Bell explain that the local police are weighing the 911 tape move very carefully. At the center of it all is Crowly, who Obama said was an “outstanding officer” in his climb down Thursday, could still be made into the villain:
“In a radio interview yesterday morning with WEEI’s John Dennis and Gerry Callahan, Crowley, a 42-year-old father of three, said he hasn’t heard the tapes.
“One of my first transmissions was to slow the units down and I’m in the residence with somebody I believe resides here, but he’s being very uncooperative. So, that’s in real time,” Crowley told the sports-talk hosts.
“I’m not really sure how much you could hear from Professor Gates, you know, in the background. I, I don’t know. I haven’t heard the tapes.”
[Commissioner] Haas did not share with reporters what can be heard on the tapes, but commented, “I don’t believe Sgt. Crowley acted with any racial motivation at all.”
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Wall Street Journal — Senate Won’t Hit August Deadline
President Obama says it was no big deal that Congress blew off his health care deadlines and will head home for a month to listen to constituents complain about an increasingly unpopular push for a government health overhaul.
The president also said that he is satisfied with the diligent work of lawmakers despite the fact that much of Thursday was devoted to bickering and blame shifting between moderate and liberal Democrats and the House and Senate.
So the new LBJ has returned to being the commenter in chief after one bad press conference. But writers Janet Admay and Jonathan Weisman explain that the White House will keep the president in the public eye during the congressional recess.
“The year-end deadline for a final bill passage has always been part of Mr. Obama’s equation, but until recently, he was also citing an interim deadline of August for each chamber of Congress to pass its own bill. That way, it would be harder for opponents to pick apart the legislation over the monthlong break, and the hard work of reconciling the two approaches could begin immediately upon their return. Now, the president and his allies hope he can use the bully pulpit to keep up momentum while Congress is out of town.
‘Reform may be coming too soon for some in Washington, but it’s not soon enough for the American people. We can get this done,’ Mr. Obama said.”
New York Times — Obama Complains About the News Cycle but Manipulates It, Worrying Some
Aside from making the Gates gaffe, the president’s fourth prime-time pressure continues to be dubbed a flop across the political spectrum. Liberals feel his defense of universal health care was ineffective and moderates and conservatives have accused the president of being facile and dishonest about his programs in glib answers.
The damage the president did to his cause is a prime example of the dangers of overexposure, especially with a supremely confident politician such as Obama who feels able to wade into any issue.
Writer Peter Baker looks at the problems that come from having a star-driven offense in the White House:
“About 24.7 million viewers tuned in Wednesday, according to Nielsen ratings, some 4 million fewer than watched his last evening news conference in April and 25 million fewer than saw his first in February. Mr. Obama’s focus on health care produced what Chuck Todd of NBC described as a ‘snoozer conference,’ a line the Republican National Committee happily adopted.
‘I’m really perplexed. It’s unbelievable,’ said Karen Hughes, Mr. Bush’s White House counselor. ‘They’ve taken his greatest political asset — his gifts as a communicator — and totally diluted them. It’s been especially notable in the last couple weeks.’
Some Democrats said Mr. Obama should worry about frittering away the novelty of his presence. ‘It’s a risk of overexposure,’ said Joe Trippi, a political consultant. ‘If you use it all up on health care, you may not be able to use it on something else. But if you’re going to risk using it all up, this is the one to risk it on.’”
Wall Street Journal — Massachusetts Firms Pare Costs Elsewhere to Pay for Coverage
Massachusetts has expanded health care coverage since the state began mandating insurance for individuals and employers and offering a state health program. But the costs continue to mount and lawmakers are considering big cuts on health spending to be achieved through limiting procedures.
The individual mandate has had mixed results, but as writer Raymund Flandez explains, the employer mandate – similar to the one being considered by the House that would require all companies with payrolls of more than $250,000 to offer health care – has caused economic disruption for those on the lower rungs of the career ladder. As fines for not covering rise above the current $750-per-employee, disruptions could be greater.
“In Massachusetts, coverage has increased since the law was enacted. The percentage of firms in the state with 11 to 50 workers offering coverage rose to 92% last year from 88% in 2007, according to a study released in October by the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago. The center doesn’t have data on how many small companies offered coverage before the state requirement but estimates that it was about seven out of 10.
At the same time, some 1,023 employers opted out of providing health coverage, instead paying a total of $9.8 million in the year ended June 30, 2007, the latest data available, according to the Massachusetts Division of Health Care Finance and Policy.
More businesses could choose to pay the penalty as the weak economy erodes their ability to afford health premiums, said Rick Lord, president and chief executive of Associated Industries of Massachusetts, a lobbying group.”
Washington Post — Palin Favorability Rating Dips As She Nears Exit, Poll Finds
A new Post/ABC News poll shows trouble for Sarah Palin if she has aims at a presidential run, with independents and Republicans losing confidence in her abilities and her favorability dropping in the wake of her sudden resignation.
There are still a few million Americans who will follow her into hell, leaving open the chance for her to be a GOP kingmaker and shaper of attitudes.
But even accounting for possible bias in the Post poll, the “redeployment not retreat” argument from team Palin seems not to have taken root in the middle of the political spectrum.
“Perhaps more vexing for Palin’s national political aspirations, however, is that 57 percent of Americans say she does not understand complex issues, while 37 percent think she does, a nine-percentage-point drop from a poll conducted in September just before her debate with now-Vice President Biden. The biggest decline on the question came among Republicans, nearly four in 10 of whom now say she does not understand complex issues. That figure is 70 percent among Democrats and 58 percent among independents.
‘She just, to me, lacks substance and dedication,’ poll respondent Barbara Jamison, 59, a data-entry worker at a publishing company, said in a follow-up interview. Jamison, an independent from Killingworth, Conn., added that Palin ‘strikes me as being more interested in celebrity than in actually doing political work.’”
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