Why the heavy emphasis by the Obama campaign on mayoral surrogates? “It can be argued that mayors represent the last functioning form of government in the country,” Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak tells TPM. “Maybe I’m putting that too strongly. But mayors have a lot of credibility these days that you don’t find in Congress.” Evan McMorris-Santoro reports.
To its great credit, the family of the late NFL linebacker Junior Seau has agreed to allow researchers to examine his brain for signs of CTE.
The White House has been pushing hard to enlist utilities in a program that will allow households to much more easily monitor and track their own energy usage. But the biggest energy savings are likely to come from giving similar access to small businesses (big industrial customers already have a handle on their usage because it’s such a big expense).
Possible new clues on the fate of the lost Roanoke Colony emerge from a 16th century map being re-examined by the British Museum.
Mitt Romney on the unemployment rate: “Anything over 4 percent is not a cause for celebration.”
Conservative economist Douglas Holtz-Eakin tells TPM that, despite what Mitt Romney said today about any unemployment rate above 4 percent not being worth celebrating, “4 percent is not a realistic target.”
Brian Beutler explains what the labor force participation rate is and why the fact that it’s at the lowest level since 1981 doesn’t say as much about the current weak economic growth as about long term demographics and social policy.
Sen. Dick Lugar (R-IN) to his supporters: “At this point, help.”
TPM Reader NB responds to our piece on the prominence of mayors in Obama’s re-election campaign:
I think the observation about mayoral surrogates is a good one, but
it’s ignoring the basic fact that there aren’t many popular Democratic
governors.Partly that’s because there aren’t many popular governors,
period, but also because there aren’t many Democratic governors,
period. Of the 10 most populous states only four are run by Democrats:
New York, California, Illinois, and North Carolina.