- Romney denies the leading theory among speculators that he paid no taxes in 2009.
- Horse race update: uh huh, still close.
- The case against “you didn’t build that” in context.
Must Reads
Morning Must Reads: Trade
- Congressional Republicans and Democrats begin their fiscal cliff gambits.
- Pressure builds on the right for Romney to release more tax returns.
- He says he doesn’t want to be attacked for what’s in them.
Morning Must Reads: Cautionary
- The Bain story puts Romney at risk of over-correction.
- The Obama carpet-bombing continues apace:
[youtube=http://youtu.be/uMo5pykT4uw]
Morning Must Reads: Clear
- Romney says two tax returns are enough, he won’t disclose more.
- Pawlenty is getting a serious look for vice president, and the decision may already have been made.
- Adviser Ed Gillespie swoops in to clear up the Bain timeline: Romney “retired retroactively.” Oh.
- Horse race update: Yep, still close.
Morning Must Reads: Returns
- I’ll accept this premise and its coinage: Swift-Yachting is mostly about getting at Romney’s tax returns.
- Bain documents back up the story that he ceded management in 1999.
- Obama’s above-board favorability ratings may help neutralize disapproval of the job he’s doing.
- He says his biggest mistake in his first term was caring too
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Morning Must Reads: Outsourced
- Romney stayed longer than he claimed at Bain.
- His answer to Obama’s outsourcing attacks: The President is a liar.
[youtube=http://youtu.be/L6b9F9IiAZw]
- Michael Kinsley sticks up for outsourcing.
Morning Must Reads: Limits
- Presidential horse race update: Its still close.
- Tom Junod considers the moral implications of Obama’s lethal foreign policy.
- Republicans continue to look for the limits of the rule barring campaign-super PAC coordination, and have yet to find any.
- Texas’ conservative Senate candidate now marred by
Morning Must Reads: New York
- Outside Romney’s fabulous weekend fundraiser in the Hamptons, the donors speak their minds. (So do the protesters.)
- Obama will propose extending all but the top-tier of the Bush tax cuts for one year, seek contrast with Romney.
- A sequel to the big Supreme Court leak story: Conservative Justices, still angry!
Morning Must Reads: June
- The economy adds an anemic 80,000 jobs in June.
- Romney and the RNC raise $100 million for the month, an all-time record for Republicans.
- He’s preparing one of the those big summer foreign tours.
Morning Must Reads: Backflip
- Romney attempts a double back flip with one leg behind his head: A federal insurance mandate is a tax because John Roberts says so, but a state insurance mandate is not.
- Obama will announce an unfair trade complaint against China at a campaign rally today, an answer to Romney’s sino-aggression and another way for the President to
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Morning Must Reads: Repeal
- The most consistent theme in polling on health reform is bafflement: 45% of Americans don’t know the Supreme Court upheld it.
- Here are some more enlightening numbers (pdf).
- How Republicans can repeal the law.
Morning Must Reads: Ruling
- Decision day: How to read the Supreme Court’s health care ruling, which you’ll find here shortly after 10 a.m.
- Obama has three speeches prepared.
- This could be a messy, complex decision that doesn’t fit neatly in those boxes.
Morning Must Reads: Fortune
- The Fast and Furious truth: a Fortune investigation finds “gun walking” was never intentionally part of the ATF operation, politics and revenge inflamed the case.
- With talks failed and NRA-friendly Democrats aligning against him, Holder hurtles toward a contempt vote Thursday.
- Doing what it does best, Congress prepares to kick the
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