The Commentariat -- January 6, 2012

My column in the New York Times eXaminer is on David Brooks' second love letter to Rick Santorum. The NYTX front page is here. Also, you can contribute to NYTX here. ...

... BTW, today's topic on Off Times Square relates to the "Elections Have Consequences" links below. We had quite a good discussion in the previous thread, so I'm hoping for the same today.

** Elections Have Consequences. Dahlia Lithwick in the Washington Monthly: "If you care about the future of abortion rights, stem cell research, worker protections, the death penalty, environmental regulation, torture, presidential power, warrantless surveillance, or any number of other issues, it’s worth recalling that the last stop on the answer to each of those matters will probably be before someone in a black robe. Republicans have understood that for decades now, and that’s why the federal bench — including the Supreme Court — is almost unrecognizable to Democrats today."

Edward Wyatt of the New York Times: "The new director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau outlined a vigorous oversight and enforcement agenda on Thursday, saying that financial companies that take unfair advantage of consumers would face 'real consequences.' The director, Richard Cordray, who was appointed to the post on Wednesday by President Obama, encouraged consumers to contact the agency through its Web site [www.consumerfinance.gov] with complaints about banks, payday lenders and other financial institutions that they think have sold deceptive products or engaged in abusive behavior."

Floyd Norris of the New York Times: "For the first time in many years, manufacturing stands out as an area of strength in the American economy. When the Labor Department reports December employment numbers on Friday, it is expected that manufacturing companies will have added jobs in two consecutive years. Until last year, there had not been a single year when manufacturing employment rose since 1997."

Jake Sherman of Politico: "A year to the day since Ohio’s John Boehner and 87 eager freshmen took Washington by storm, House Republicans are bruised from battle, irritated with each other and have lost trust in their leadership. The president whose agenda they came to Washington to stop is vowing to spend the year scoring political points against Republicans now, and they don’t have much leverage against him."

Pat Garofalo of Think Progress: "... while corporate profits have rebounded to their pre-recession heights, setting a record in the third quarter of 2011, corporate tax revenue has yet to follow suit.... Corporate tax revenue has plummeted for several reasons, but one of the big ones is the growth of deductions, loopholes, and outright tax evasion that helps companies limit, or entirely eliminate, their income tax liability. 30 major corporations, in fact, paid no corporate income tax over the last three years, while making $160 billion in profits." CW: this story also falls in the "Elections Have Consequences" category. These companies aren't paying their fair share because Congress has decided they don't have to. Another good reason to support Sen. Bernie Sanders' Constitutional Amendment drive.

Ryan Reilly of TPM: "Federal law enforcement officials had been worried about the 'uncertainty' that a provision of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) would create for agents dealing with a terrorist attack.... But the signing statement issued by President Barack Obama on New Year’s Eve appears to indicate that it should be business as usual.... Broadly, the administration will interpret the law in a way that gives them the ability to wave [sic. "waive"] any military custody requirement and enact it in a way that allows counterterrorism flexibility."

Annie Lowrey of the New York Times: "Elementary- and middle-school teachers who help raise their students’ standardized-test scores seem to have a wide-ranging, lasting positive effect on those students’ lives beyond academics, including lower teenage-pregnancy rates and greater college matriculation and adult earnings, according to a new study that tracked 2.5 million students over 20 years."

Julia Preston of the New York Times: "Obama administration officials announced on Friday that they will propose a fix to a notorious snag in immigration law that will spare hundreds of thousands of American citizens from prolonged separations from immigrant spouses and children."

Kevin O'Brien of the New York Times: "The world’s congested mobile airwaves are being divided in a lopsided manner, with 1 percent of consumers generating half of all traffic. The top 10 percent of users, meanwhile, are consuming 90 percent of wireless bandwidth."

Right Wing World

Offensive Quote of the Day. I'm prepared. If the N.A.A.C.P. invites me, I’ll go to their convention, talk about why the African American community should demand paychecks and not be satisfied with food stamps. -- Newt Let-Them-Be-Janitors Gingrich

(CW: I so often have to resist the urge, after quoting one of these jackasses, to type, "Really, I'm not making this up." These bozos are so mired in racist, ethnic, religious & sexist stereotypes that their remarks defy credulity.)

The Editorial Board of the Boston Globe, which is New Hampshire's "big city" paper, endorses Jon Huntsman, Jr., in the GOP presidential primary. You may recall that Mitt Romney was governor of Massachusetts, and just for the edification of Michele Bachmann, Boston is in Massachusetts. Read the endorsement to see why the Globe editors don't trust Romney.

Nate Silver: It's Friday, but the official Iowa Caucus vote is still too close to call.

Rick Ungar in the Washington Monthly on why he's glad he watched the candidates' Iowa speeches, particularly Newt's "kamikaze effort to take down Mitt Romney at any cost," Romney's "boring and barren ... canned repetition of [his] stump speech, and Santorum's "soulful and searing" victory speech:

Romney could hardly discuss his own family lineage, which includes his great-grandfather’s emigration from the United States to Mexico to avoid American anti-polygamy laws. Indeed, while Rick Santorum’s grandfather came to these shores to find freedom and opportunity, Romney’s grandfather returned to the United States to avoid the Mexican Revolution.

Elections Have Consequences. Brian Beutler of TPM: Mitt Romney's tax plan is a fucking disaster: "... the plan constitutes a major tax cut for wealthy Americans. But compared to today’s rates, Romney proposes effective tax increases for people making less than $40,000." Includes an interactive chart that shows the biggest break would be for those earning over a million a year, & the biggest tax increase would be for those earning less than $10,000 a year. And in case you're the last person in Amurrica who thinks Republicans care about the deficit, "The Romney plan would reduce federal tax revenues substantially."

Elections Have Consequences. If you think Mitt Romney will "move to the center" should he become president, as Nicholas Kristof argued in his wishful-thinking column yesterday (see my rebuttal of one aspect of it here), read Jonathan Bernstein's article in the Washington Monthly. Guess what? "Campaign promises set the presidential agenda, even when they don’t tell you which items will pan out and which won’t.... So as you listen to Mitt Romney and the rest of the Republicans..., don’t assume that it’s all meaningless, empty rhetoric that will be dropped once the campaign is over and governing begins. Don’t assume, either, that ... specific pledges made in the primary season will be left behind...." BTW, you can blame Steve Forbes for the deficit. (Read Bernstein to find out why.)

PolitiFact: "The Romney ad claimed that the NLRB told Boeing that it 'can’t build a factory in South Carolina because South Carolina is a right-to-work state.' The NLRB’s complaint started a legal process that could ultimately have resulted in a factory closure, but the NLRB as a whole didn’t tell Boeing anything. What’s more, the legal basis for the action centered on whether Boeing was punishing the union for staging strikes, not that Boeing had opened a factory in a right-to-work state." ...

... What's more Romney knows it's a lie. PolitiFact debunked the same claim when Romney made it in October 2011. CW: I'm not that crazy about PolitiFact, but they're right on this. ...

... Steve Benen has more on Romney's absurd claim that he created more than 100,000 jobs at Bain while President Obama has done little in the way of jobs creation. ...

... AND Paul Krugman devotes his column to Romney's big lies on jobs creation. He adds,

... after the companies that Bain restructured were downsized — or, as happened all too often, went bankrupt — total U.S. employment was probably about the same as it would have been in any case. But the jobs that were lost paid more and had better benefits than the jobs that replaced them. Mr. Romney and those like him didn’t destroy jobs, but they did enrich themselves while helping to destroy the American middle class. And that reality is, of course, what all the blather and misdirection about job-creating businessmen and job-destroying Democrats is meant to obscure.

Mike McIntire & Michael Luo of the New York Times: "As [Rick] antorum’s standing in the race for the Republican presidential nomination has been energized by his strong showing in the Iowa caucus, so too has the scrutiny of his activities since leaving the Senate. When he left office he was not especially wealthy, but records show he wasted little time fashioning a lucrative post-government career based largely on income from businesses that had benefited from his work in Congress." ...

... Dan Eggen & Carol Leonnig of the Washington Post: "Rick Santorum has vaulted to the front ranks of the Republican presidential nomination race in part by depicting himself as a religious family man of lowly beginnings who would bring needed change to Washington. But that characterization leaves out two decades in which Santorum was a central and often high-ranking player in Washington politics, with connections to K Street lobbyists and a lucrative consulting career that made him a millionaire. In the Senate, for example, he played a pivotal role in advancing the controversial K Street Project, a highly organized effort to pressure industry groups and lobbying firms to hire Republicans for influential jobs and punish those who brought in Democrats.... After losing a reelection bid in 2006, he capitalized on his congressional experience by beginning a profitable career on K Street as an adviser to industry groups and lobbying firms...." ...

...Michael Shear of the New York Times: Rick Santorum got into a "Socratic exchange" on gay marriage with students in New Hampshire at the College Convention 2012. With video I won't be watching. ...

... Robert Mackey of the New York Times: "Writing in The Jewish Week on Monday, Douglas Bloomfield reminded readers that [Rick] Santorum told a man in Iowa six weeks ago that 'all the people that live in the West Bank are Israelis. They’re not Palestinians — there is no Palestinian — this is Israeli land.' ... Even Israel’s government calls the West Bank a 'disputed territory,' whose future status 'is subject to negotiation.'” With more video I won't be watching.

AND "Herman Cain Is Back and Weirder than Ever." The video below is not a parody. Cain released it himself. He is not stupid:

Local News

Scott Walker's Cronies. Daniel Bice of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: "Three individuals -- including a former top aide to Gov. Scott Walker -- were charged Thursday with felonies as part of the ongoing John Doe investigation into Walker staffers. Tim Russell, a longtime Walker campaign and county staffer, was charged with two felonies and one misdemeanor count of embezzlement.... Also charged Thursday was Brian Pierick, Russell's longtime partner and a staffer at the state Department of Public Instruction, and Kevin Kavanaugh, Walker's appointee to the Milwaukee County Veteran Service Commission."

News Ledes

The President speaks at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. He talks about the jobs reports, too:

New York Times: "The United States added a robust 200,000 new jobs last month, the Labor Department said Friday, in a sign that the long-awaited economic recovery has finally built up a head of steam. The nation’s unemployment rate fell to 8.5 percent in December, from a revised 8.7 percent in November, the government said."

New York Times: "... in an unusual case of intraparty defiance, Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey is holding up President Obama’s nomination of a judge to the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, the only time a Democrat has tried to block one of Mr. Obama’s judicial nominees. Mr. Menendez would not comment. But the nominee, Patty Shwartz, has been in a relationship for more than two decades with the head of the public corruption unit for New Jersey’s federal prosecutor. And that unit investigated the senator during his 2006 election fight, an inquiry Mr. Menendez has long contended was politically motivated.... The connection has led lawyers and judges in the state to speculate that Mr. Menendez is acting out of resentment, rather than any concern about Judge Shwartz’s qualifications."

New York Times: "An explosion tore through a densely populated neighborhood in Damascus on Friday, killing 25 people and wounding dozens more in the second attack in the Syrian capital in two weeks, Syrian television and other state media reported." Guardian liveblog here.

Reuters: "The Muslim Brotherhood won more than a third of the votes in the last stage of elections for Egypt's lower house of parliament, according to partial results on Friday, which show the Islamists are set to dominate the legislature."

Guardian: "Portia Simpson Miller has been sworn in for the second time as Jamaica's prime minister with a pledge to ease poverty, boost the economy, heal political divisions and drop the Queen as head of state."

New York Times: "Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan will be among those elevated to cardinal in the Roman Catholic Church in a Vatican ceremony next month, the Archdiocese of New York announced in a news release on Friday." Related AP story here.

The Commentariat -- January 5, 2012

My column in the New York Times eXaminer is on Mitt Romney, the New York Times' favorite presidential candidate. The NYTX front page is here. And you can contribute to the online paper here.

President Obama appointed Richard Cordray to direct the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau yesterday. It is a recess appointment, bypassing the Senate, where Republicans refused to allow Cordray an up-or-down vote:

... David Dayen of Firedoglake: "There’s plenty of reason to believe that the whole pro forma session strategy is a sham.... For all the posturing and posing on the right, I’m not seeing any legitimate threats of court action over this. One problem with suing the White House over recess appointments would be standing. It’s unclear whether the courts would want to get involved in this at any level. And that may be why you just hear people like Mitch McConnell and John Boehner yelling about this being 'unprecedented' without saying that the lawyers have been called or anything like that.” ...

... Greg Sargent: "Here’s a pretty clear sign of which way the politics are moving in the fight over Obama’s decision to employ a recess appointment to install Richard Cordray as head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Senator Scott Brown — who’s facing a stiff populist challenge from Elizabeth Warren, the creator of the agency — has now come out in support of the move." ...

Via Mother Jones... Adam Serwer of Mother Jones: "Few presidents have seen their appointments subject to as much obstruction as Obama, and few have been so timid about taking advantage of recess appointments.... during their time in office President Ronald Reagan made 240 recess appointments, President George H. W. Bush made 77 recess appointments, President Bill Clinton made 140 recess appointments, and George W. Bush made 171. Obama's first term has seen a paltry 28."

Amanda Bronstad of the National Law Journal: "Rejecting a landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision giving corporations the right to make independent campaign expenditures, the Montana Supreme Court has ruled that banning such spending is justified given Montana's long history of businesses corrupting the state's political process. The state high court ruled on Dec. 30 that the U.S. Supreme Court's decision last year in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission did not apply to Montana's Corrupt Practices Law, which prohibits corporations from using general funds to make political contributions." Thanks to a reader for the link.

More from Lynn Sherr in the New York Times on "America the Beautiful" Sherr literally wrote the book on it. See also yesterday's Commentariat.

Right Wing World

Natalie Wolchover of Live Science: "Presidential candidate Mitt Romney received eight more votes than candidate Rick Santorum last night in the Iowa caucus, 'eking out a victory' on the path to winning the Republican nomination for president — or so officials and the media are saying. But according to academics, Romney and Santorum actually tied. 'From a statistical point of view, you can't say Romney won anymore than you can say Santorum won,' said Charles Seife, a professor of journalism at New York University who studies election error." ...

... Derek Thompson of The Atlantic posts this handy chart of what the GOP candidates spent for each caucus vote they got in Iowa:

Peter Wallsten & Philip Rucker of the Washington Post: "... Mitt Romney landed [in Manchester, New Hampshire] Wednesday and immediately faced intense attacks from Republican presidential rivals who vowed to challenge him more aggressively. Newt Gingrich held a news conference in Concord to say that Romney is a liberal and a political chameleon, willing to change positions to suit his needs. Jon Huntsman Jr. dismissed Romney’s newfound support from Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), saying that 'nobody cares' about his backing.... And Rick Santorum ... said in an e-mail to supporters that Romney is a 'bland, boring career politician who will lose to Barack Obama.'”

Dave Weigel of Slate: Rick Santorum wants the Senate to sue President Obama over his recess appointments. And everything else pisses him off, too.

Matthew Mosk & Brian Ross of ABC News: "Rick Santorum's powerful finish in the Iowa caucus is bringing fresh attention to his tenure in Congress, including ethics questions that dogged him about a preferred mortgage he received from a bank run by campaign donors, and federal funds that went to a real estate developer who backed his charity. One of the top donors to Santorum's charity was also the beneficiary of an $8 million Santorum-sponsored federal earmark...."

Romney's 25 Percent Solution. Massimo Calabresi of Time: "An eight-vote, 25% victory may look weak, but Mitt Romney’s narrow win in the Iowa caucuses Tuesday has his campaign charting a plan for ultimate victory by the time Florida Republicans hold their primary on Jan. 31. The strategy: use a dominating win in New Hampshire to cast weak victories in Iowa and South Carolina as a sign of Romney’s inevitable nomination."

Helene Cooper & Mark Landler of the New York Times: "The day after Mr. Romney squeezed out a razor-thin victory in the Iowa caucuses, Mr. Obama’s political brain-trust trained most of its fire on him, painting him as both a Wall Street 1 percent type and an unprincipled flip-flopper. How long the Obama campaign can condemn Mr. Romney ... on both counts is not clear, given that independent voters may view his protean tendencies as evidence of pragmatism." CW: This is Frank Bruni's argument. I don't buy it.

Holly Bailey of Yahoo! News: "While [Sen. John] McCain and [Mitt] Rommey never became close friends, their relationship has gradually become less chilly over the years — enough so that McCain backed off his pledge to stay neutral in this year's Republican presidential race and endorsed Romney on Wednesday." ...

... Dana Milbank: Romney isn't enjoying his victory in Iowa. "The day after his impossibly thin eight-vote victory, the front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination flew here [to Manchester, New Hampshire] for a town hall meeting at Manchester High School Central, where he was to bask in the endorsement of his 2008 arch rival, John McCain. But the senator grimaced when he was introduced, and as Romney delivered his own stump speech, an increasingly impatient McCain pulled up his sleeve and checked his watch." Then some Occupy reps asked questions. ...

... How to Win in Vegas. Or Anyplace. Always. Paul Krugman and others are looking for some straight talk from the Romney camp on what figures he used to make his claim that he was a jobs creator and Obama was a jobs destroyer. No luck on the 2nd, but on the first, the Romney campaign produced figures for Bain Capital from the periods during and after Romney worked there. Krugman sums up the Romney rationale: "So if something good happens, even if it’s long after Romney was at Bain, it’s Romney’s achievement. If something bad happens, even if it’s in a company that Bain took over when Romney was there, never mind. By that standard, everyone who’s spent a lot of time with slot machines is a big winner, since only the pluses count." ...

... Jeremy Holden of Media Matters: Wait, wait. It was 100,000 jobs Romney created, as he claimed. It was 150,000, according to Fox "News." They are not, however, showing their homework.

News Ledes

President Obama spoke on the Defense Strategic Review today:

     ... The New York Times story is here.

Bloomberg News: "Companies added more workers than forecast in December, a sign that the U.S. labor market was gaining momentum heading into 2012, according to a private report based on payrolls." ...

Bloomberg: "Fewer Americans filed claims for unemployment insurance payments last week, showing the labor market is starting 2012 on better footing than a year earlier."

New York Times: "Insurgents unleashed a fierce string of bombings against Iraq’s Shiites on Thursday, attacking pilgrims marching through the desert and neighborhoods in Baghdad in an attempt to stir sectarian violence amid a political crisis that has brought the government to a halt. At least 60 people died and at least 138 were wounded, security officials said, in the second devastating and apparently coordinated attack in Iraq in less than a month." Al Jazeera story here.

Haaretz: "Former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and 17 others were indicted on Thursday in the so-called Holyland case, for allegedly giving or receiving bribes to advance various real estate ventures. Almost two years after one of the largest corruption scandals in Israel's history first erupted, indictments in the case are due to be filed on Thursday."

Guardian liveblog: the euro hits a 15-month low against the dollar.

The Commentariat -- January 4, 2012

My column in today's New York Times eXaminer is on David Brooks' "Real America." The NYTX front page is here. Also, please consider making a contribution to NYTX, which is doing a very good job of keeping 'em honest over at the Times. ...

... Case in Point: Mike Elk: "The New York Times Company gave departing CEO Janet Robinson a nearly $15 million severance package while demanding that its current employees take benefit and pay cuts."

Prof. Amar Bhidé, in a New York Times op-ed, writes "bring back boring banks" with "radical, 1930s-style measures.... If the average examiner can’t understand it, it shouldn’t be allowed." Bhidé reminds us that "Deposit insurance was also a long shot in 1933 — President Franklin D. Roosevelt, the Treasury secretary, the comptroller of the currency and the American Bankers Association opposed it. Somehow advocates rallied public opinion."

Driftglass on Glenn Greenwald & Andrew Sullivan: "Mr. Greenwald and Mr. Sullivan both exist quite comfortably in a parallel dimension made up of dorm rooms debates bolted together with abstractions, and where the ugly specter of imperfect political reality does not intrude. It is a fine place, safely above it all, where you can fire in all directions with impunity, and impugn the motives of anyone who disagrees with you with all the righteous fury of the perfectly pure."

David Kirkpatrick & Steven Lee Myers of the New York Times: "With the Muslim Brotherhood pulling within reach of an outright majority in Egypt’s new Parliament, the Obama administration has begun to reverse decades of mistrust and hostility as it seeks to forge closer ties with an organization once viewed as irreconcilably opposed to United States interests."

Right Wing World

Borowitz Report: "Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney was overjoyed today after finishing the Iowa caucuses in a virtual tie with a walking joke who wears sweater vests. 'The eight people have spoken!' exclaimed Mr. Romney, who was joined by supporters celebrating his .0006% margin of victory." Thanks to Haley S. for the link.

Andy Rosenthal, New York Times editorial page editor: "There has been a racist undertone to many of the Republican attacks leveled against President Obama for the last three years, and in this dawning presidential campaign."

Art via or by Driftglass.Melinda Henneberger in the Washington Post: "Have you ever seen a glummer or grouchier bunch of presidential aspirants than the current GOP crop? You’d be working those frown lines, too, I guess, if you thought, as Rick Santorum does, that this year’s race will decide “whether we will be a free people.” Or believed, as Michele Bachmann told Sean Hannity on Monday, that Iran might go nuclear before Inauguration Day. Of course, Ron Paul is as cataclysmic as ever...."

... Philip Rucker of the Washington Post: "There was a dark side to Mitt Romney’s close finish in the Iowa caucuses. After first approaching Iowa with reservation and then scrambling hard in the final weeks to win, he leaves here with about the same share of votes he snagged four years ago in the Republican presidential caucuses.... His Iowa showing — finishing just eight votes ahead of former senator Rick Santorum (Pa.) — highlighted the big problems that still dog Romney: suspicions about his avowed conservatism, struggles to connect with voters and an inability to rally more Republicans around his candidacy." ...

... Dave Weigel of Slate with some lessons Republicans should learn from Iowa. ...

... Main lesson, from Philip Klein of the Washington Examiner: "Though turnout was up from the 2008 caucuses, it was only up by a few thousand votes, even as GOP voter registration grew, more candidates were contesting the state and more Democrats and independents voted on the Republican side because there was no competitive Democratic race this time. Romney actually got six fewer votes this time than he did four years ago...."

... Jim Rutenberg of the New York Times: "All year long the story of the Republican race for president was Mitt Romney and a rotating cast playing the role of Someone Else. On Tuesday night, Someone Else was played by two candidates: Rick Santorum, the longtime champion of social conservative issues that were supposedly taking a backseat in this jobs-centric presidential race, and Ron Paul, the noninterventionist Texan who represents an almost 180-degree turn from the Republican Party’s direction." ...

... David Firestone of the New York Times: "It is jarring, in an age of irony and nuance, to hear Mitt Romney conclude his stump speeches with a riff on the hymn, 'America the Beautiful.' ... He sees its vision as matching his, and that is where he makes a serious mistake.... The lyrics were written in 1894 by the Massachusetts poet Katharine Lee Bates, an ardent feminist and lesbian who was deeply disillusioned by the greed and excess of the Gilded Age. Her original third verse was an expression of that anger:

America! America!
God shed his grace on thee
Till selfish gain no longer stain
The banner of the free!

      ... Bates’ revulsion at the inequality and corruption she saw around her ... became the core of the Progressive Movement. President Obama ... has a better claim to the spirit of the song than does Mr. Romney, who appears to have no problem with inequality." Thanks to Bill C. for the link.

Quote of the Day. I don't want to make black people's lives better by giving them somebody else's money. I want to give them the opportunity to go out and earn the money and provide for themselves and their families. -- Rick Caucasian Santorum

Steve Benen: when Newt Gingrich called Mitt Romney a liar on CBS, the hosts Nora O'Donnell & Bob Schieffer were visibly "shocked." And that's the really shocking story: that Newt did what the media will not: regularly call out candidates for lying. ...

... Benen on Mitt Romney's lies about jobs -- with charts. ...

... Paul Krugman on Mitt Romney's lies about jobs -- with charts. Seriously, read both posts. CW: If you thought Willard was a benign Ken doll, you may want to change out your toy collection for a Willard voodoo doll. He is just one smarmy, hateful liar.

Paul Krugman on "Wingnut Welfare." Why are Republicans willing to take far-out, radical-right positions that could cost them elections? Because there is always a far-out, radical-right special-interest "think tank" jobs waiting for them.

News Ledes

Gut-sy! The White House announces NLRB appointments: "President Obama announced today his intent to recess appoint four individuals to fill key administration posts that have been left vacant.

• Richard Cordray, Director, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
• Sharon Block, Member, National Labor Relations Board
• Terence F. Flynn, Member, National Labor Relations Board
• Richard Griffin, Member, National Labor Relations Board"

President Obama will speak about the economy in Cleveland, Ohio, at 1:15 pm ET. There are hints afloat he may make a recess appointment of Richard Cordray, former Ohio AG, as head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Wall Street Journal: "White House attorneys have concluded they have the legal authority to make a recess appointment despite Republican efforts to block the move, Democrats said Tuesday, and administration officials say they reserve the option to install Richard Cordray as head of the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau without Senate approval." ...

     ... New York Times Update: "President Obama will challenge Republican foes of the newly created Consumer Financial Protection Bureau by naming Richard Cordray as its director while Congress is out of town." ...

     ... Washington Post Update: "In a bold act of political defiance, President Obama installed Richard Cordray as head of a new consumer watchdog agency Wednesday, bypassing Republican opposition in the Senate that derailed his nomination last month. Obama cast the move as an effort to protect the interests of middle-class Americans who have suffered as a result of the Great Recession, which stemmed in part from abuses in the financial system."

Washington Post: "Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney and former senator Rick Santorum (Pa.) were deadlocked for the lead in the Iowa caucuses late Tuesday night, ahead in a splintered and increasingly fractious field as the GOP presidential primary race moves to New Hampshire, South Carolina and Florida. With all but two precincts reporting at 1:20 a.m. Eastern, former senator Rick Santorum (Pa.) was in a virtual tie with Romney, leading him by just 18 votes. Both hovered around 24.5 percent of the total. Rep. Ron Paul (Tex.) was headed for a close but disappointing third-place finish...." ...

... Update: On MSNBC at 1:50 am ET, Chris Hayes said Santorum's lead over Romney had been reduced to 4 votes. ...

... Update 2: at 2:30 am ET, the Iowa Republican party leader announced that Mitt Romney won by 8 votes. No link. (Both he & Santorum will get 11 delegates, whom the party will choose later.) ...

... The New York Times has the final numbers here. ...

... Arlington, Texas Star-Telegram: "Gov Rick Perry was heading back to Texas today after his fifth-place finish in the Iowa caucuses, and aides said he could decide as early as Thursday whether to remain in the 2012 presidential race." ...

     ... San Francisco Chronicle Update: "After perhaps the shortest presidential campaign reassessment on record, Texas Gov. Rick Perry bounded out of Iowa on Wednesday saying he will continue his run for the White House, convinced he can still emerge as the leading conservative in the GOP race."

... AP: "Presidential candidate Michele Bachmann has cancelled her South Carolina trip and will hold a press conference at 11AM ET according to NBC News." ...

     ... New York Times Update: "Mrs. Bachmann said on Wednesday morning that she would not continue her campaign for the Republican presidential nomination."

New York Times: the NYPD has arrested a man who has admitted to making five firebomb attacks in Queens.