Bill Clinton To Dems: ‘Get Out And Tell The People What You’re Doing’
In an interview with the Associated Press, former President Bill Clinton offered his advice to Democrats in the midterm elections. “Get out and tell the people what you’re doing and what you’ve done and remind them that this is a job,” Clinton told the AP. “I think you have to tell people you know why they are mad and you know why they are frustrated but the question is, What is the most productive thing to do with it?”
Obama’s Day Ahead
President Obama will receive the presidential daily briefing at 9:30 a.m. ET, and a briefing at 10 a.m. ET on the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill. He will meet at 10:40 a.m. ET with small business owners, and he will deliver a statement to the press at 11 a.m. ET on his small business jobs initiatives. He will meet at 11:15 a.m. ET with senior advisers, and meet at 11:45 a.m. ET with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Biden’s Day In South Africa
Vice President Biden and his wife Dr. Jill Biden spent the day in Johannesburg, South Africa. Biden attended a reception with South African leaders, and delivered remarks there. The Bidens represented the United States at the opening ceremony of the 2010 FIFA World Cup at the Soccer City Stadium in Johannesburg.
Menendez Predicts Good 2010 Results for Dems
CQ reports that Sen. Robert Menendez, the chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, is predicting that his party will do better than expected this year, against the convention wisdom that they will face significant losses. “Our candidates [are] focused on jobs, the economy and the issues that matter to people around the kitchen table,” Menendez said. “I think we will do much better than people expect us to moving into the November elections.”
Lobbyists Swarm As Wall Street Bill Talks Start
CNN reports: “As lawmakers began the final push Thursday on a comprehensive Wall Street reform bill, lobbyists also made their final push — in congressional hallways, on BlackBerrys and cell phones, and at restaurants and bars near Capitol Hill.”
NYT: White House Has Plans For Iran Beyond Sanctions
The New York Times reports that the Obama administration has backup plans for dealing with Iran’s nuclear program, on the assumption that the newest sanctions won’t work: “There is a Plan B — actually, a Plan B, C, and D — parts of which are already unfolding across the Persian Gulf. The administration does not talk about them much, at least publicly, but they include old-style military containment and an operation known informally at the C.I.A. as the Braindrain Project to lure away Iran’s nuclear talent. By all accounts, Mr. Obama has ramped up a Bush-era covert program to undermine Iran’s nuclear weapons infrastructure, and he has made quiet diplomatic use of Israel’s lurking threat to take military action if diplomacy and pressure fail.”
GOP Touts ‘New’ Memos Against Kagan
Roll Call reports: “Republicans, hoping to derail the confirmation of Solicitor General Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court, have recently focused on ‘newly unearthed’ documents from her time as a Supreme Court clerk — even though they not only had many of the publicly available documents last year, they also had asked her about them, Congressional transcripts show. Senate Judiciary ranking member Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) has sought to cast the memos as new, potentially devastating evidence that Kagan will use a position on the high court to pursue political goals. The documents, which cover abortion, gun rights and other hot-button issues, detail her work in the 1980s for Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, who retired in 1991.”
