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TOLEDO, Ohio — Mitt Romney, while campaigning in Ohio on Wednesday, highlighted the healthcare law that he passed while governor of Massachusetts as proof of his empathy for people. “I think throughout this campaign as well, we talked about my record in Massachusetts, don't forget — I got everybody in my state insured,” Romney told NBC News in an interview before he headlined a rally here. “One hundred percent of the kids in our state had health insurance. I don't think there's anything that shows more empathy and care about the people of this country than that kind of record.”

"I've been across this country, and my heart aches for the people I've seen," Romney told a crowd of several hundred people here. "There are so many in our country that are hurting right now. I want to help them....I care about the people in America," he said. "And the difference between me and President Obama is I know what to do, and I will do what it takes to get this economy going."

NEW YORK (AP) — Republican White House hopeful Mitt Romney is unlikely to win Bill Clinton's vote, but that doesn't mean he can't soak up a bit of the popular former president's luster. The two men stood side by side Tuesday as Clinton introduced Romney before the GOP candidate's speech to Clinton's annual global conference in New York. Clinton recalled working with Romney to save AmeriCorps, and praised the former Massachusetts governor's efforts to persuade fellow Republicans to support the national service program. Romney, taking the podium, returned the compliment. "If there's one thing we've learned in this election season,...

Mitt Romney's comments about 47 percent of Americans being dependent on government and locked in to vote for President Obama highlight a fundamental reality in American politics today: The gap between the American people and the political class is bigger than the gap between Republicans and Democrats in Washington, D.C. Romney's remarks are the GOP equivalent of Obama's notorious comments about small-town Pennsylvania voters bitterly clinging to their guns and religion. Both Romney and Obama highlighted the condescending attitude that political elites hold of the people they want to rule over. A National Journal survey found that 59 percent of...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: You know, I could be wrong about this, but here's Bill Kristol, who is saying that Romney... Let me get this quote in front of me. I always put this stuff the bottom of the Stack. Bill Kristol says Romney was "stupid and arrogant," and every Democrat under the sun is retweeting it. On the tape, talking about the 47%, Kristol says Romney was "stupid and arrogant." Every Democrat under the sun's retweeting that all over the place, Donna Brazile and others. You know what struck me about this? During the primary, all these people -- not...

By itself, the state of the economy is enough to guarantee a close election, and every national survey during the past two weeks has put Obama and Romney in a statistical tie. Now another key factor points in the same direction—the shifting balance between the political parties. This matters because party preferences and voting patterns are more closely linked today than they have been in several generations—and two recent in-depth surveys of the party system document that a clean Democratic victory, of the sort the party enjoyed in 2008, is exceedingly unlikely. The surging Democratic tide of four years...

Exclusive: Jane M. Orient, M.D., says political demagoguery is replacing science “From what I understand from doctors, that’s (conception as a result of rape) really rare. If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down. But let’s assume that maybe that didn’t work or something, I think there should be some punishment, but the punishment ought to be of the rapist, and not attacking the child.” – Rep. Todd Akin, R-Mo. All decent people, including U.S. Senate candidate Todd Akin, agree that forcible rape is a heinous crime. Almost all would...

August 24, 2012 Rep. Todd Akin will hold news conference Friday afternoon ST. LOUIS, MO (KCTV) - U.S. Rep. Todd Akin will hold a news conference at 4:15 p.m. Friday. The event will be in St. Louis County. KCTV5.com will livestream the news conference and KCTV5 News at 4 p.m. will carry it...

http://hotair.com/archives/2012/08/23/huckabee-second-look-at-todd-akin/

Akin was not even the clear choice of conservatives. In the primary, John Brunner was endorsed by both Missouri Right to Life and the National Right to Life. Sarah Steelman was endorsed by Sarah Palin. Akin was endorsed by the Democratic Party. The Democrats carefully nurtured Akin with millions of dollars in campaign money because he was the candidate they most wanted to run against. (Akin thinks all those Democrats voting for him in the primary merely shows that he's got tremendous crossover appeal!) There's no rehabilitating this guy. It's a waste of money. His comments are going to cost...

Tampa, Florida (CNN) -- Facing pressure from Republican heavyweights in Washington to abandon his Missouri Senate bid, Rep. Todd Akin is huddling with top conservative activists in Tampa to assess whether to move forward with his embattled candidacy. Akin spent Wednesday night and Thursday in a series of private meetings at the two-day summit of the Council For National Policy (CNP), a secretive group of conservative leaders who are meeting in Florida before next week's RNC. -snip- Multiple sources at the CNP conference told CNN that Akin is being encouraged by leading figures in the conservative movement to remain in...

Todd Akin hasn't had many high-profile supporters with him in the trenches this week, but Mike Huckabee became an important and emphatic exception Thursday afternoon, sending a message to his own supporters accusing Republican elites of trying to drum a good man out of a winnable Senate race. Here's what Huckabee said in an email to his list this afternoon: Party’s leaders have for reasons that aren't rational, left [Akin] behind on the political battlefield, wounded and bleeding, a casualty of his self-inflicted, but not intentional wound.

State Senator and U.S. Senate candidate Michael Baumgartner issued an apology Tuesday, then retracted it after apparently sending a profane email to a reporter for the political blog Publicola. "Let me just say, Josh had it coming in this email, and I don't apologize," Baumgartner told KIRO 7's Graham Johnson on Tuesday afternoon. "Look, it's a naughty word. It doesn't amount to a whole lot." The email, which Publicola writer Josh Feit published on his blog, featured a photo of Baumgartner holding a gun and included the text, “Josh, this is Pat Feeks, a Navy SEAL killed last week in...

Another Missouri Republican consultant suggests that Representative Jo Ann Emerson, the Republican who has represented Missouri’s eighth district since 1996, could be a top contender to replace Todd Akin if he quits. Her name has been making the rounds among party insiders, thanks in part to the fact that she’s currently the longest-serving House member in Missouri. Missouri GOP executive director Lloyd Smith used to be her chief-of-staff. UPDATE: A colleague points out that Emerson is a member of the moderate-leaning Republican Main Street partnership, and generally less rightward than the three — Akin, Sarah Steelman, and John Brunner —...

An NRSC source just confirmed to me what various outlets have been reporting: if Todd Akin remains the senate candidate, NRSC will invest no financial resources into the Missouri senate race. Previously, NRSC had planned to spend $5 million. And Crossroads has already taken some TV ads off the air, reports Politico. If Akin does remain in the race, he’s going to be relying, it appears, virtually exclusively on whatever his campaign raises, without any financial help from outside groups.

If one of Mitt Romney's goals in choosing a running mate was to mine the same mother lode of conservative excitement that John McCain tapped by picking Sarah Palin four years ago, there's one additional dilemma for Romney to address: Palin is still around. A day after Romney unveiled House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan as his vice-presidential pick, Palin suggested in a statement posted by her Fox News colleague Greta Van Susteren that she would not speak at the 2012 Republican National Convention in Tampa.(snip) For this reason, it was notable when she initially offered only a lukewarm reaction...

Palin will not speak at Republican conventionWASHINGTON | Sun Aug 12, 2012 7:36pm EDT WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin will not speak at the Republican nominating convention in Tampa later this month, she said in statement on Sunday. "This year is a good opportunity for other voices to speak at the convention and I'm excited to hear them," Palin, who was Senator John McCain's running mate in the 2008 election, said in a statement on Gretawire, the blog of Fox News's Greta Van Susteren.

<p>In a move that serves as a capstone to Rep. Ron Paul’s colorful career, the House on Wednesday approved a bill that would let Congress’s chief investigators conduct a full audit of the Federal Reserve’s shrouded decision-making process.</p> <p>The overwhelming 327-98 vote sends the bill to the Senate where Majority Leader Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat, has previously expressed support for an audit — though it’s unclear he’ll carve out time for the legislation this year.</p>

Several senior House Democrats warned that passing a bill from Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) requiring a full audit of the Federal Reserve Board's monetary policy decisions will allow Congress greater leverage to put political pressure on these decisions, which they said would cause serious problems in the U.S. and global financial markets. The Federal Reserve Transparency Act, H.R. 459, was expected to come up for a vote Wednesday, and seemed poised for passage given its 270 co-sponsors, including nearly four dozen Democrats. Nonetheless, many Democrats used the Tuesday floor debate to warn about the chances that Congress might use the...

Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska) has endorsed Rep. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) in her Senate bid, a surprising move since the seat could be in play for Republicans this fall. Young praises Hirono for working across the aisle in the lighthearted Web ad, in which he repeatedly jokes about criticizing House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) before hugging Hirono at the end. "While Mazie and I don't see eye to eye on everything, we've done something too many people in Washington refuse to cross the aisle and do: We've worked together," Young said in the ad, and praises Hirono for working with...