White House

Happy Thanksgiving from The Blotter

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Posted by Corey Anderson at November 24, 2005 7:31 AM | Comments (0)

 

The lights go on for POTUS

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From NBC anchorman Brian Williams' blog, via Talking Points Memo:

"I am duty-bound to report the talk of the New Orleans warehouse district last night: there was rejoicing (well, there would have been without the curfew, but the few people I saw on the streets were excited) when the power came back on for blocks on end... The motorcade route through the district was partially lit no more than 30 minutes before POTUS drove through. And yet last night, no more than an hour after the President departed, the lights went out. The entire area was plunged into total darkness again, to audible groans. It's enough to make some of the folks here who witnessed it... jump to certain conclusions."

Posted by Corey Anderson at September 16, 2005 10:34 AM | Comments (0)

 

Katrina: Bush boosts reconstruction boodlers, GOP squeezes bankrupts

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The president has suspended prevailing wage rule for Katrina rebuilding contractors:

Some Houstonians who plan on moving to Louisiana and points east to get work in the Katrina rebuilding effort may discover their wages won't be as high as they might have expected. That's because President Bush signed an executive order last week rescinding the rule [under the Davis-Bacon Act] that contractors on projects receiving federal money pay the prevailing wage in areas damaged by the hurricane.

--Houston Chronicle, L.M. Sixel

And he wants to suspend prevailing wage rules for service workers, too:

But the Bush folks face a problem in suspending the Service Contract Act. Davis-Bacon has a specific provision allowing the President to suspend it during a national emergency. The Service Contract Act does not, and its suspension may be unprecedented, labor experts say.

--TPM Cafe, Nathan Newman

Meanwhile, House Judiciary Committee chair James Sensenbrenner has quashed a proposed bankruptcy bill moratorium for Katrina victims:

The new, more stringent bankruptcy law will not harm people left "down and out" by the storm, Wisconsin Republican Rep. James Sensenbrenner said. He said he would not hold a hearing in his committee on a bill by the panel's ranking Democrat, Michigan Rep. John Conyers, and 31 other Democrats who want to exempt Hurricane Katrina victims from parts of the new bankruptcy law. A chairman's decision not to hold a hearing usually prevents a House bill from advancing.

--Reuters

Posted by Steve Perry at September 15, 2005 8:24 AM | Comments (0)

 

Bush poll numbers: dropping much faster than the water level in New Orleans

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The results of two national polls released today suggest that the Katrina catastrophe is seriously weakening President Bush's popularity.

The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press found that Bush's approval rating has dropped to 40 percent--down 10 points since January. Meanwhile the percentage of citizens who disapprove of the job he's doing has climbed to 52 percent.

The correlation between Bush's puny approval ratings and the administration's handling of Katrina is unmistakable: 67 percent of those polled thought the President could have done more to bolster relief efforts, while just 28 percent said that the President was doing all he could. Even among Republican respondents, 40 percent indicated that Bush's efforts were insufficient.

The results were no better for Bush in a Zogby poll released today. His approval rating sank to 41 percent--the lowest ever recorded for W. by the polling organization. By contrast, 59 percent of respondents judged Bush to be doing a fair or poor job.

What's more, 53 percent of those polled deemed the country to be headed on the wrong track. Perhaps most strikingly, only 46 percent of respondents in the south--the region where Bush's base has traditionally been strongest--judged the country to be on the right track.

But the most provocative numbers in the Zogby poll show how Bush would fare against other recent presidents. The results indicate that Bush would lose a head-to-head contest with each of the last four presidents--even Jimmy Carter.

The only (would be) president that Bush could beat today? John Kerry! Which just proves once again what an absolute dog of a candidate the Democrats nominated last year.

Posted by Paul Demko at September 8, 2005 3:53 PM | Comments (0)

 

Bush to Pelosi: "What didn't go right?"

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Pelosi recounted a conversation with Bush, during which she called for the resignation of Michael Brown, head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency who has been under fire since the outset.

"He said, 'Why would I do that?' " Pelosi said. "I said, 'Because of all that went wrong, of all that didn't go right last week.' And he said, 'What didn't go right?' "

"Oblivious, in denial, dangerous," she said.

--Scripps Howard wire report

Posted by Steve Perry at September 7, 2005 4:19 PM | Comments (1)

 

Bush caught on live TV feed meeting Katrina survivors

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This morning I've been watching the WDSU live stream online, and for most of the past hour they've been patched over in error from their broadcast to their raw satellite feeds. One feed of about five minutes or so in length showed George W. Bush walking down a road--in Mississippi, I'm guessing--and greeting a pair of survivors, a woman and (seemingly) her daughter. The mother was nearly hysterical as she described losing her boyfriend. The president hugged them, encouraged them to leave and go to a shelter. When the woman persisted, the president hugged her again. Shutters could be heard snapping, and no doubt the pictures are already hitting the wire.

And here were his parting words of counsel, comfort, leadership, and hope to this absolutely distraught woman, picked up clearly on the satellite feed:

"All right. Hang in there."

Posted by Steve Perry at September 2, 2005 12:34 PM | Comments (66)

 

The sound of one man dropping

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If it quacks like a lame duck and is accompanied by the deafening sound of a slide whistle, it means a new survey on President Bush's job rating has been released. According to a recent poll by SurveyUSA, Bush's nationwide public-approval rating has dipped to a scanty 41 percent. This makes Bush even less popular than when he snared the title of the least-popular second-term president ever a few months back, when a Gallup Poll found Bush's approval rating at a mere 45 percent. Of course Bush has steadfastly maintained that Americans don't want a president who relies on focus groups and polls to make decisions, so it's not entirely surprising that his stubborn "resolve" and lack of grasp of the word "democracy" has caused the continual plummet.

Here in Minnesota, Dubya's approval rating fell to 39 percent, down ten points from last month. Our blue state gave the president his biggest drop of the 50 states, just one point ahead of New Mexico. Surprisingly, Bush's lowest approval ratings aren't in the neon-blue Twin Cities (39 percent), but the southern region of the state, where only 36 percent of people surveyed support Bush.

Posted by at August 18, 2005 9:30 AM | Comments (0)