Subject: Correct The Record Monday August 4, 2014 Afternoon Roundup
From: Burns Strider <[email-masked]>
To: CTRFriendsFamily <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 4 Aug 2014 13:44:56 -0400
List-Id: <CTRFriendsFamily.americanbridge.org>

**

*Correct The Record Monday August 4, 2014 Afternoon Roundup:*

*Tweets:*

*Correct The Record* @CorrectRecord: Clinton was the 1st Secretary of State
to attend an Arctic Council meeting, addressing environmental issues of
Arctic #HardChoices #HRC365 [8/3/14, 6:33 p.m. EDT
<https://twitter.com/CorrectRecord/status/496060578038034432>]

*Headlines:*

*MSNBC: “Hillary Clinton defenders: ‘Desperate’ author self-plagiarized”
<http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/hillary-clinton-defenders-desperate-author-self-plagiarized>*

“Kessler’s cut-and-paste job is another example of the desperate tactics
the cottage industry of anti-Clinton books are willing to take. He recycled
old news, added more anonymous sources, and repackaged it as a new,” Media
Matters President Bradley Beychok told msnbc.

*The Saratogian (Saratoga Springs, N.Y.): “Clifton Park boy chats up an old
friend — Hillary Clinton”
<http://www.saratogian.com/general-news/20140803/clifton-park-boy-chats-up-an-old-friend-x2014-hillary-clinton>*

“Tiffany Torrey was asked how it felt to be with someone who could stop a
book signing by Hillary Clinton. ‘It’s kind of neat to see how down to
earth she is,’ Tiffany Torrey said. ‘When she recognized him, she lit up.
She stopped the whole operation. It was pretty neat to see.’”

*The Daily Beast: “Sanjay Gupta, on the Ebola Front Lines”
<http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/08/04/sanjay-gupta-on-the-ebola-front-lines.html>*

“Should Clinton run for president, and the job [Surgeon General] again be
offered to him, would he accept it now? ‘I could definitely see myself
getting back into public service, no matter who the president might be,’ he
writes in an email…”

*Washington Post blog: The Fix: “How many more white votes did Mitt Romney
need to get elected in 2012? A lot.”
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2014/08/04/how-many-more-white-votes-did-mitt-romney-need-to-get-elected-in-2012-a-lot/>*

“(Worth noting: it's impossible to quantify but there is undoubtedly some
portion of the white vote that went for McCain and Romney due to Obama's
skin color.  If Democrats nominate Hillary Clinton in 2016, that would be
less of an issue.)”

*The Hill: “Kerry sees ‘amazing opportunity for Africa’”
<http://thehill.com/policy/finance/214219-kerry-sees-amazing-opportunity-for-africa>*

“On Tuesday, President Obama and former President Clinton are scheduled to
speak at the U.S.-Africa Business Summit, where they'll be joined by dozens
of African leaders.”

*Articles:*

*MSNBC: “Hillary Clinton defenders: ‘Desperate’ author self-plagiarized”
<http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/hillary-clinton-defenders-desperate-author-self-plagiarized>*

By Alex Seitz-Wald

August 4, 2014, 12:12 p.m. EDT

In a summer packed with books critical of Hillary Clinton, the latest
(until a new one on Benghazi comes out next month), is told from the
perspective of Secret Service agents who have worked for the former first
lady and – according to the book – did not enjoy the experience.

“The First Family Detail,” written by conservative journalist and author
Ronald Kessler, contains juicy tidbits about Bill Clinton’s alleged
assignations and Vice President Joe Biden’s reported skinny dipping that
have been excerpted for maximum impact ahead of its release date – but
Clinton’s defenders are not amused, and they’re hitting back hard and early
to undermine the book and its author.

Media Matters, the media watchdog group founded by Clinton foe-cum-defender
David Brock, accused Kessler of self-plagiarism Monday, pointing to 13
stories he recycles from his other books and repeats using identical or
nearly identical language.

For instance, on page 164 of his new book, Kessler writes: “In contrast to
Hillary, since leaving the White House, Bill Clinton is ‘very friendly to
the agents,’ says one agent. ‘I think he realized once he’s out of office,
we’re pretty much all he’s got, and he does treat the guys really well.’”

In 2010, Kessler wrote another book on the agency called, “In the
President’s Secret Service.” On page 170 of that book, Kessler wrote: “In
contrast to Hillary, since leaving the White House, Bill Clinton is ‘very
friendly to the agents,’ says one agent. ‘I think he realizes once he’s out
of office, we’re pretty much all he’s got, and he does treat the guys
really well.’”

The new book also repeats stories about Clinton’s curt interactions with an
electrician, a White House household staffer, police officers, and a Secret
Service agent accompanying the family on vacation on Martha’s Vineyard,
among others. A visit to a 4-H club during Clinton’s Senate campaign also
gets reprised, as does a story about Bill Clinton making Air Force One wait
on the tarmac while he got a haircut.

From a 2011 book on the FBI, Kessler borrows a story about how Clinton had
“a standing rule that no one spoke to her” during transit, and another
about the first lady’s relationship with Vince Foster, who committed
suicide while working as a lawyer in the Clinton White House.

The message from Clinton’s defenders: There’s nothing new under the sun
about the former first family.

“Kessler’s cut-and-paste job is another example of the desperate tactics
the cottage industry of anti-Clinton books are willing to take. He recycled
old news, added more anonymous sources, and repackaged it as a new,” Media
Matters President Bradley Beychok told msnbc.

Kessler defended his reporting. Instead of being the hit jobs Clinton’s
defenders claim his book it, he told msnbc his work is “non-partisan,”
noting that it speaks positively of Barack and Michelle Obama’s treatment
of agents assigned to defend them and that it criticizes the Reagan White
House for overruling the Secret Service ahead of John Hinckley’s
assassination attempt.

“Of course I used material from my previous books when I needed to tell a
particular tale that is important or explain how the Secret Service works
in order to present a complete book about the Secret Service. Otherwise, I
would have to make up an account that was not in line with the facts!” he
said in an email to msnbc. “To suggest that using material from your own
books to present relevant background information is plagiarism is a joke.
The fact that Media Matters…shows how desperate the left is to create a
phony issue to divert attention from ‘The First Family Detail.’”

Early tensions between the Clintons and the Secret Service have been
documented elsewhere. In his biography of Clinton, for instance, journalist
Carl Bernstein wrote that Clinton distrusted many of the agents and
household staff who were holdovers from the Bush administration (one
reportedly never removed his “Reelect Bush” bumper sticker) and wanted to
replace them. But Bernstein also reports that some of her fears later
proved justified when agents apparently leaked private conversations to the
press.

Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign turned killing negative books into an
art. The strategy, laid out by Ben Smith in 2007, is being dusted off for
this summer’s round of books. First, express boredom (Then: Clinton
spokesperson Philippe Reines: “Is it possible to be quoted yawning?” Now:
Clinton spokesperson Nick Merrill: “Another book?”). Second, attack –
ideally before the book even comes out.

“The First Family Detail” hits shelves Tuesday.

*The Saratogian (Saratoga Springs, N.Y.): “Clifton Park boy chats up an old
friend — Hillary Clinton”
<http://www.saratogian.com/general-news/20140803/clifton-park-boy-chats-up-an-old-friend-x2014-hillary-clinton>*

By Glenn Griffith

August 3, 2014, 6:37 p.m. EDT

More than a thousand people waited patiently last week for a few seconds
with former U.S. secretary of state and possible presidential candidate
Hillary Clinton at her book signing in Saratoga Springs.

One of those who stood in line that day considers Clinton a good friend —
and he’s only 10 years old.

Clinton has known Brendan Torrey of Clifton Park since he was born. He
vaguely recalls meeting her as a 3-year-old but vividly recalls meeting her
at his grandfather’s wedding three years ago. So when he walked up to the
table where the former first lady was signing books, stuck out his hand and
announced his name, it was no surprise that it brought a smile and warm
response from Clinton.

“She said, ‘Hi Brendan. How are you feeling?’” Torrey said.

Clinton came to Northshire Bookstore in Saratoga Springs July 29 to sign
copies of her latest book, “Hard Choices.” The book signing was a
controlled event with pre-purchase of the book required for admission, a
limited number of tickets released for the signing, and a large show of
security.

Despite all that Torrey, his mother and a family friend,retired Orenda
Elementary School Principal Ann Frantti, took a chance that they could get
their copy of the book signed by Clinton.

Torrey is the son of Barry and Tiffany Torrey and the grandson of Marty
Torrey, chief of staff for former U.S. Rep. John Sweeney. Clinton met Marty
Torrey in Washington when he was working for Sweeney. They have remained
friends ever since.

“We lined up around 1:30 p.m.,” Brendan Torrey said. “By then, the line was
moving pretty fast. I wasn’t sure how I should address her. Then I walked
up, stuck out my hand, and told her who I was and she said ‘Hi’ and we
talked a little bit.”

Torrey said with the recognition Clinton stopped the line and the two
chatted for about three minutes. The conversation focused on his health and
his schooling. Torrey was one of the very few in line allowed a photograph
with Clinton.

Clinton’s interest in Torrey’s health was not just idle chit chat. The
question was that of a mother not a politician. She was well-aware that the
young man had been diagnosed at birth with Langerhans Cell Histiocytosis.
He started chemotherapy treatments when he just was 6 weeks old. After
battling the disease for many years, he is now in remission.

“The medical community is still arguing whether it’s a cancer or an
auto-immune disease,” said Torrey’s mother, Tiffany Torrey. “Once he
started the chemo, he would get it regularly for 2-1/2 to three years. At
one point, he was getting three or four different types at once.”

Brendan Torrey has been in remission since he started kindergarten. In May,
he received word that he would only need one checkup per year.

“We talked about my health and my school and she told me to keep my poppa
(grandfather) in line,” Brendan Torrey said of his chat with Clinton. “It
felt good to be one of the few people to get a photo with her.”

Torrey is a fifth-grade student at the Saratoga Academy of the Arts and
Sciences in Halfmoon.

Though he is just 10, Torrey is fully aware of Clinton’s public roles as
first lady to President Bill Clinton, senator from New York and secretary
of state in the Obama administration.

“I see her on TV a lot,” he said. “I think she’s going to run for
president. If she does, I want her to win.”

Tiffany Torrey was asked how it felt to be with someone who could stop a
book signing by Hillary Clinton.

“It’s kind of neat to see how down to earth she is,” Tiffany Torrey said.
“When she recognized him, she lit up. She stopped the whole operation. It
was pretty neat to see.”

Brendan Torrey agreed. The trip to Saratoga Springs and the wait in line to
get the autograph had been well worth it.

“I had a good time,” Brendan Torrey said about the meeting with his friend.

*The Daily Beast: “Sanjay Gupta, on the Ebola Front Lines”
<http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/08/04/sanjay-gupta-on-the-ebola-front-lines.html>*

By Tim Teeman

August 4, 2014

[Subtitle:] CNN’s chief medical correspondent on his plan to talk to
Ebola-struck Dr. Kent Brantly in his isolation unit, his determination not
to succumb to hype, his pinup status, and whether he wants the job of
surgeon general.

Between live broadcasts from outside Emory University in Atlanta, where the
first of two U.S. Ebola patients has been taken, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN’s
chief medical correspondent, is constantly being approached by passers-by.

“They say, ‘So, doctor, give me the real scoop. Do I need to be worried?’,”
Gupta tells me on the phone from Atlanta.

These off-camera interactions neatly encapsulate the unique place of the TV
doctor today: Telegenic and urbane, they are supposed to be a collective
ur-doctor for us all and at this moment—when people fear a mass viral
outbreak—one of the conduits the watching public trusts to convey the facts
of a scary, complicated situation. CNN has such international reach, Gupta
is the Ebola crisis’s global voice.

More crudely, the virus—especially with it being conveyed on to American
soil for the first time with the arrival of the two patients at Emory—is
what a swaggering 24-hour news operation like CNN, along with the likes of
missing or downed airliners and the crisis in Gaza, likes to
authoritatively own. Gupta has to entertain, as much as inform, around a
gruesome situation.

Gupta, who joined CNN in 2001, has already reported from tsunami-hit Haiti
and flooded Pakistan (2010), and earthquake- and tsunami-hit Japan (2011).
While reporting from Iraq and Kuwait in 2003 he performed brain surgery in
a desert operating room. In 2011, Forbes named him one of the “ten most
influential celebrities.”

Expect to see a lot of Gupta in the coming days, especially as the
44-year-old neurosurgeon is also an assistant professor of neurosurgery at
Emory’s School of Medicine. Being a member of staff and faculty there has
fortuitously given Gupta a major “in” on one of the biggest medical stories
of the year.

Indeed his next aim, he reveals to The Daily Beast, is to film the first
U.S. patient, Dr. Kent Brantly, in the isolation unit he is in. “Yes, I
would like to follow this every step of the way. To actually see it is
really important.” Talks are underway to see if and when Gupta can report
from the isolation unit, and speak to Brantly, who contracted Ebola in
Monrovia, Liberia, in July.

“Think of him being inside a glass box within a glass box,” Gupta says.
“There is a space between the boxes where people in protective garb can go
in and out from. We would be outside the outer glass box and talk to him
via an intercom system. Viewers will be able to see him and hear what he
has to say.” Gupta has “no worries” for his own health. “Ebola is not
airborne.” One would be safe “even if you are 10 feet away and there were
no barriers.”

Brantly’s family seem on his side already. Representatives of Samaritan’s
Purse, the Christian relief organization for whom Brantly and the second
infected U.S. patient, Nancy Writebol, were both working, told Gupta on
Saturday that Brantly’s family was watching the correspondent’s live
reports from outside Emory as Brantly walked from the ambulance into the
hospital.

“They’ve been watching you all day long,” Gupta was told. “They didn’t know
how he was, so what a dizzying thing to see on CNN that he was all right.
They were watching with the rest of the world. Only a few hours before they
didn’t know if he was going to live or die.”

If he speaks to Brantly, Gupta would first ask—naturally—how is he doing,
then how he got infected. “He’s a health-care worker, he trained well, so
what went wrong? He made a decision to isolate himself, so I would ask did
he think he was going to die when he realized he was exposed? I would ask
him if he would go back to Liberia. He doesn’t know, I am told, what a big
deal this all is in the media.”

There is also the 14-year-old boy who survived Ebola thanks to Brantly’s
care, and who returned to the hospital to donate his own blood; as a
survivor it is thought his blood had antibodies in it, which might have
proved key to Brantly’s own survival.

Gupta’s job is in some ways a tricky balancing act: He must appear
authoritative and approachable, winning the confidence of the leading
speakers within the medical community while communicating as honest a
picture of a complicated situation to the watching millions. On Sunday, he
told his colleague Fareed Zakaria on Zakraia’s CNN show, GPS, that “we are
going to see Ebola around the world.” However, he thinks that in developed
Western countries, like the United States and Britain, the methods of
treatment should be enough to contain it.

“There’s a little bit of compulsion around these things,” Gupta
acknowledges of the demand to feed the news furnace. “But I’m a pretty
compulsive person with my medical training. You want to make sure you have
the story straight, so it’s not misunderstood, which means being right and
being clear.”

Explaining the story on CNN is akin to talking to residents at Emory,
“except to a larger audience. I’m comfortable in the role—I’ve spent a lot
of time preparing for it. It’s OK to acknowledge people are fearful. You
have to acknowledge it. Very thoughtful people can still have fears. But
I’m a scientist, and facts do matter.”

The Emmy Award-winning Gupta “feels good” to bring a measure of objectivity
to a story with such hoopla attached to it. “I can present it in a bit of a
novel way to the audience. There’s a scientific layer to this story and a
deeply personal one. The risk is really, really low. But it’s a fair point
to say that the risk would be even lower if it [Ebola] had not been bought
to the U.S.”

Gupta, who is also associate chief of neurosurgery at Grady Memorial
Hospital in Atlanta, denies there is a demand, even implicit, for drama on
the part of his producers. “Obviously you want people to watch. I feel a
real sense of history with the viewers. There are a lot of remarkable
things to explain, instead of hyping up a fear which is not well-grounded.
You have to give people a reason to watch, but you can’t fall into the trap
of losing your scientific credibility.”

There’s a “lot of pressure” in the news business, he says, “a lot of
opinions, but maybe I’m fortunate. In 13 years, I can’t remember an
incident of a producer saying to me, ‘Nudge, nudge, wink wink, let’s hype
this story.’ I pitch my stories like anyone else, with a pretty good sell,
without the need to hype.”

The mood at Emory is one of excitement, Gupta says. “Within the medical
field there is a sense of ‘Yeah, this is what we know how to do.’ Having an
Ebola patient in the U.S., they want to be part of it. Two intensive-care
nurses were due to be on holiday and canceled it. Others have too. Instead
of screaming and running out, the staff want to be there.”

This weekend, Gupta himself was supposed to be at a wedding in Colorado. “I
didn’t go. My wife (Rebecca Olson Gupta) said, ‘I get it, you need to be
here.’ And I heard they’ve been watching CNN at the wedding.”

To those people questioning him between shots on what he really thinks,
Gupta tells them, “Do you really think I would go home every night to my
wife and three kids if I thought there was any danger of giving it to them?
There is virtually no chance that Ebola will affect you. Ebola doesn’t
behave like Avian flu or SARS. It doesn’t jump between human and human in
the same room. You’re in no way affected unless you make contact with their
bodily fluid in some way. It’s such a profoundly interesting topic to
explain in terms of science and physiology: how the disease is spread, what
Ebola does to your body.”

Of Nancy Writebol, Gupta says he only knows that she is “stable, and
‘stable’ is a very generic term: it can mean stable-good, or stable-bad.
She’s in good enough shape to take the flight.”

Gupta describes his life as “half-media, half-medicine,” juggling both
broadcast and medical responsibilities. He grew up in Michigan; his
parents, Subhash and Damyanti Gupta, had moved from India to America in the
1960s to work as engineers at Ford, where his mother was the company’s
first female engineer. “I love medicine,” he says. "I wanted to be a
neurosurgeon ever since I was 14. My wife will tell you I’m much more
animated talking about medicine. If I had to give up one, I would stay with
medicine. I get very excited about it still.”

No one in his family was a doctor, Gupta says, “but my grandfather had a
stroke when I was 12. I spent a lot of time in the hospital with
neurosurgeons. I remember they opened the carotid artery to his brain, and
that’s when I first got hooked.”

He has three daughters, Sage, Sky, and Soleil (ages 9, 7, and 5
respectively). Sage runs around the family’s Atlanta home wearing his
surgical masks, shouting, “Paging Doctor Sage.” The girls have only ever
known him being a doctor and TV journalist, so when they meet other medical
colleagues or friends of his, they assume all doctors have their own TV
shows, and ask them, “What time is your program on?”

Gupta seems comfortable with fame if people approach him with “real
questions about things I cover.” But it’s harder on his family if they are
out; he and his wife keep their children at home “more than they might” if
Gupta wasn’t as well known, he says.

He is also extremely good looking. In the tradition of Arthur Kent and
Rageh Omaar, who were christened the “Scud Studs” of the Gulf War and Iraqi
conflicts, Gupta is--hmm--let’s call him the “Outbreak Beefcake.” In 2003
he was named one of People magazine’s “Sexiest Men Alive,” and the
intervening 11 years haven’t dented his looks much. “When I was single that
was the headline, now I am married with three children,” he demurs,
laughing. “TV is a funny thing. I don’t think of myself as a pin-up. I
don’t think I’m better looking than anyone else. It’s the magic of TV. I
work to look presentable, but I’m not vain—it’s antithetical to my nature.
My stock in trade is to be the trusted doctor who does his homework and
presents the news.”

A past adviser to Hillary Clinton, in 2009 Gupta was offered the post of
Surgeon General by President Obama but withdrew his name from
consideration, saying, “This is more about my family and my surgical
career. I think, for me, it really came down to sense of timing more than
anything else. I just didn’t feel I should do that now.”

Of that decision, he told The Daily Beast: “I was quite honored. I had
worked in public service before, and it was one of the most rewarding times
in my life. I didn’t know that I wouldn’t be able to continue to practice
surgery if I took the job. It was a bit ironic, given the job is ‘surgeon’
general. Regardless, leaving surgery for four years would have likely meant
not being able to practice again in my life. I wasn’t ready to stop
practicing medicine.”

Should Clinton run for president, and the job again be offered to him,
would he accept it now? “I could definitely see myself getting back into
public service, no matter who the president might be,” he writes in an
email, adding in another that it’s all “very speculative, in terms of job,
timing, etc. I haven’t had any more discussions since the ones with
President Obama. Not sure if it would be surgeon general or something else
within HHS (Health and Human Services). There are no specific plans around
this issue right now.”

Gupta has faced criticism, most notably over his backing of Gardasil, a
vaccine for HPV. Critics questioned his backing of the drug, as it was made
by Merck, then a sponsor of a show he presented called Accent Health.

“One part of the criticism was people saying vaccines caused autism,” Gupta
says. "I looked at the scientific evidence as anyone should and concluded
they didn’t. Would I get my children vaccinated? I did.”

Gupta also strenuously denies that there was any financial incentive for
him to back Gardasil. There was “no connection” between Gupta and the
company that makes Gardasil, he says emphatically. “I had nothing to do
with it. I understand that people will think this way about these things,
but the TV screens in the studio go blank during commercial breaks. (He
means, presumably, he is not aware of which companies are advertising
during the program.) I listen to criticism and if there’s any degree of
truth to it, I fix it. If there’s nothing to it, like with Gardasil, if
there’s no truth to it, there’s nothing to change there.”

We’re interrupted by a colleague of Gupta’s. He’s needed for another live
report. He knows the public have seen movies like Outbreak and Contagion,
that whatever the facts of Ebola transmission and methods to contain it,
people worry it will somehow mushroom, and become a severe public health
crisis.

“A vacuum of knowledge breeds fear,” Gupta says, adding that it is his job
to fill that vacuum with knowledge people can understand. You can’t reach
or convince everyone, he says, “but look, this is not about reassurance for
reassurance’s sake. There are things about this that are terrifying. Ebola
is a deadly disease in West Africa. But we know how it transfers from one
person to another.”

His role, Gupta says in farewell, is to provide “as clear and complete
information as possible” to CNN’s viewers—and, of course, to those
passers-by sidling up to him outside Emory, wanting the scoop when the
cameras are off.

*Washington Post blog: The Fix: “How many more white votes did Mitt Romney
need to get elected in 2012? A lot.”
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2014/08/04/how-many-more-white-votes-did-mitt-romney-need-to-get-elected-in-2012-a-lot/>*

By Chris Cillizza

August 4, 2014, 12:45 p.m. EDT

Today in my Monday Fix newspaper column, I wrote about a new study from
Marisa Abrajano, an associate political science professor at the University
of California, San Diego, making the case that the consolidation of the
white vote behind the Republican party could actually help the GOP
electorally in the near term.

Here's the essence of Abrajano's argument:

“Given that whites still make up about three-quarters of the voters in the
nation and will likely be the clear majority for decades to come, there is
every reason to believe that whites will have a real say in who governs.
Indeed the white population’s growing allegiance to the Republican Party
points to a very different short term future — one that might more likely
be highlighted by Republican victory than by Democratic dominance.”

That got me to thinking about just how much more of the white vote Mitt
Romney would have needed to win in order to beat President Obama in 2012.
So, I did the math. (Before I get started, huge thanks to David Wasserman's
terrific popular vote counts and CNN's state by state exit polls.)

First of all, there were 129,075,629 votes cast in the 2012 election. (That
was two million fewer than were cast in 2008.) Of that total, 72 percent
were cast by whites. That's 92,934,452 votes. By comparison, Hispanics cast
12,907,562 votes and African Americans cast 16,779,831 votes.

Now, of the 92,934,452 white votes Romney won 59 percent -- or 54,831,326.
Obama won 39 percent or a total of 36,244,436.  Romney's winning margin
among whites was 18,586,890.  Nationally, Obama won 65,915,934 votes
compared to Romney's 60,933,657; Obama's margin was 4,982,277 over Romney.
That means that Romney would have had to increase his margin over Obama by
roughly five million votes among whites to have won the race -- if all of
the other demographic breakouts stayed the same.

So, what percentage of the white vote would Romney have had to win -- and
is it feasible to think that the next Republican presidential nominee could
get to that marker?  (Before I get too deep into this, I worked off the
premise that Romney and Obama were the only candidates in my white vote
projections.  That means I eliminated the handful of third party candidates
who took a pittance of the white -- and overall -- vote.)

I started with Romney winning 61 percent of the white vote, a slight
improvement on his actual showing but not out of the realm of the
possible.  Romney would have increased his margin from 18.6 million to 20.4
million, not nearly enough for him to have won the popular vote. So, I
bumped up Romney to 65 percent of the white vote. (Reagan won 66 percent of
the white vote in 1984 while he was blowing out Walter Mondale, the highest
percentage of the white vote for a Republican in modern presidential
history.)  If he had won two thirds of the white vote, Romney's margin over
Obama among whites would have been almost 28 million -- providing him a
comfortable five million vote popular vote victory.

Finally, I split the difference, giving Romney 63 percent of the white
vote. His margin under that scenario would have been 24 million votes as
compared to his actual 18.6 million.  That's a 5,575,066 vote difference,
which would have given Romney a nearly 600,000 popular vote margin
nationally over Obama.   So, if Romney had won a shade under 63 percent of
the white vote -- or about 5 million more votes than he received among
whites -- he would have won the popular vote.

Then I started to think about how much more of the white vote would have
had to move to Romney for him to have won the electoral college. I picked
four of the swingiest states -- Florida, Ohio, Virginia and Iowa -- which,
if Romney had swept them (he lost all four), would have given him 272
electoral votes and the presidency. (Obama won 332 electoral votes to 206
for Romney.)

In Florida, 67 percent of the vote was white and Romney won 61 percent of
it -- good for 3,463,396 votes. His margin over Obama among white voters in
Florida was 1.36 million; he lost the state by 74,309 total votes. Had
Romney done 1.5 points better -- 62.5 percent of the white vote -- he would
have won.

In Ohio, 79 percent of voters were white and Romney won 57 percent of them.
That amounted to 2,513,052 votes and a 705,419 vote margin among whites
over Obama.  Obama won the state by 166,277 votes. To have overcome Obama
in the state, Romney would have had to win almost 61 percent of the white
vote.

In Virginia, seven in ten voters were white. Romney took 61 percent of the
white vote, good for 1,645,866 votes.  His margin over Obama among whites
was 647,554; he lost statewide by 149,298 votes.  Romney would have had to
bump his winning percentage among whites all the way to almost 65 percent
to have knocked off Obama statewide.

In Iowa, 93 percent of voters were white. Obama actually won the white vote
with 51 percent -- a margin of almost 59,000.  He won statewide by almost
92,000. For Romney to have won statewide, he would have had to win more
than 53 percent of the white vote in Iowa.

An electoral college victory for Romney built on an increase in his white
vote margins then would have been far more difficult than a popular vote
one.  And that highlights Republicans' problems in 2016 -- and beyond.
(Worth noting: it's impossible to quantify but there is undoubtedly some
portion of the white vote that went for McCain and Romney due to Obama's
skin color.  If Democrats nominate Hillary Clinton in 2016, that would be
less of an issue.) Unless the white vote heavily consolidates -- up to and
perhaps beyond Reagan's 66 percent in 1984 -- the party will be hard
pressed to get to an electoral college majority in 2016 unless it can find
ways to win more of the Latino vote.

*The Hill: “Kerry sees ‘amazing opportunity for Africa’”
<http://thehill.com/policy/finance/214219-kerry-sees-amazing-opportunity-for-africa>*

By Kevin Cirilli

August 4, 2014, 12:23 p.m. EDT

Secretary of State John Kerry kicked off the U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit on
Monday, declaring that "this is a moment of amazing opportunity for Africa."

Kerry urged businesses and African leaders to tap into the continent’s
commodities and human resources, noting that six out of ten of the world's
fastest-growing economies are in Africa.

"Africa has the resources, and the resources are not defined by oil and
gold and what's in the ground," Kerry said during his Washington speech.

"The resources are the people, the know-how, the capacity, the desire and
if that is harnessed properly there is no limit to the rapidity with which
growth can take over in Africa and a different set of possibilities and
opportunities will be known," he added.

More than 50 African leaders, top U.S. officials and dozens of CEOs of
international companies are attending the three-day conference in
Washington, the first of its kind in America.

On Tuesday, President Obama and former President Clinton are scheduled to
speak at the U.S.-Africa Business Summit, where they'll be joined by dozens
of African leaders.

"This is a moment of amazing opportunity for Africa. ... This is not
something that is over the horizon. This is here now," Kerry said.

He urged African leaders to adopt democratic systems of government with
free and fair elections, though he noted that "democracy is hard work."

"Trust is the heart of governance and that trust begins and ends with a
strong, and vibrant and inclusive, independent civil society," Kerry said.

"In the end, our most enduring relationships — our most consequential
relationships — are not with one particular government at one moment in
time. It's not with those who are in power in the short run, legacy is
really shaped by the people of the country, the people of the continent,
the people of Africa who stand on principle for the long haul and who are
increasingly connected to the world around them," Kerry added.