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| Mitt Romney faces more questions on gay marriage - US politics live | Mitt Romney faces more questions on gay marriage - US politics live |
| (about 1 hour later) | |
| 11.09am: Polling guru Nate Silver ponders the impact of President Obama's gay marriage conversion: | |
| The truth is, I don't think we really know. That's not quite the same thing as saying that I don't think it will have any impact – although I do think that, in general, the news coverage you read in major coastal newspapers tends to overstate the degree to which social issues affect presidential voting behavior. | |
| Clear as mud, thank you Nate. | |
| 10.43am: There's a defence for Mitt Romney from the New York Times in its follow-up to yesterday's Washington Post: | |
| Some friends and associates of Mr Romney, including several who are gay, said they had a hard time reconciling the seemingly insensitive younger man with the tolerant, considerate one they have known as an adult. | |
| It quotes a former campaign director for Romney, Jonathan Spampinato, saying: "I have no idea what he was like as an 18-year-old, but that is not the Mitt Romney I worked for." | |
| 10.35am: John Lauber – the student who was the subject of the alleged bullying by Mitt Romney and his friends – died in 2004, but members of his family have been speaking to ABC News. | |
| Lauber's elder sister says she has no memory of the event – but was away at college at the time, and that her brother would probably not have told her in any case: | |
| Christine Lauber, who is a few years older than John Lauber, was at college when the alleged incident happened, and said the brother and sister were "doing our own thing" at the time. | |
| When ABC News showed her the story, Christine Lauber's eyes welled up with tears and she became agitated. | |
| She also corrected the story, saying her brother was a boarder, not a day student. | |
| She described her brother as a "very unusual person." | |
| "He didn't care about running with the peer group," Christine Lauber said. "What's wrong with that?" | |
| Betsy Lauber, one of John Lauber's three sisters, spoke with ABC News Tuesday night regarding the accuracy of the story. | |
| "The family of John Lauber is releasing a statement saying the portrayal of John is factually incorrect and we are aggrieved that he would be used to further a political agenda. There will be no more comments from the family," she said. | |
| So far we haven't yet seen the Lauber family's statement. | |
| 10.09am: Today's teacup-sized storm comes via a remark that Barack Obama made at an event in Seattle on Thursday – fresh from the George Clooney event – in which he describes the financial and economic crisis that hit the US in 2008: | |
| So it was a house of cards, and it collapsed in the most destructive, worst crisis that we've seen since the Great Depression. And sometimes people forget the magnitude of it, you know? And you saw some of that I think in the video that was shown. Sometimes I forget. In the last six months of 2008, while we were campaigning, nearly 3 million of our neighbors lost their jobs; 800,000 lost their jobs in the month that I took office. And it was tough. But the American people proved they were tougher. So we didn't quit. We kept going. Together we fought back. | |
| A BuzzFeed Politics reporter then boiled this down to: | |
| Obama on recession: Sometime people forget the magnitude of it…sometimes I forget it. | |
| Republicans promptly picked it up and ran with it, to make a case that Obama has "forgotten" the recession. | |
| In short order this relatively restrained video hit was out from the RNC. And all of this happened in less than 24 hours. | |
| The full text of Obama's speech is here if you want to see for yourself. | |
| 9.45am: Reports of bullying from Mitt Romney's school days remain at the top of the news agenda, after yesterday's Washington Post article. Feverish activity on the part of Republicans and Romney supporters to unravel the story have yet to succeed. As ABC's Michael Falcone notes: "The story could leave a permanent stain on the former Massachusetts governor." | |
| Meanwhile, here's a summary of the morning from Ryan Devereaux. | |
| • Mitt Romney is likely to face further awkward questions over gay marriage and a school bullying incident as he makes an ill-timed visit to North Carolina. The state voted in favor of a constitutional amendment banning same-sex unions this week; with Barack Obama's endorsement of gay marriage on Tuesday and the Washington Post story about how Romney led the harassment of an apparently gay student at high school, the issue is likely to dog him. Romney said yesterday he did not recall the Lauber incident but did not deny that it happened. | |
| In other apology-related news, vice president Joe Biden said sorry to President Obama for expressing his support for same sex marriage publicly, bouncing the president into his announcement. Biden's apology was delivered in the Oval Office on Wednesday, shortly before the president took a historic stance on the issue, and said that he too believes same sex couples should have the same rights as heterosexual couples. President Obama reportedly accepted Biden's apology, saying he knew the vice president was speaking from his heart. | |
| • Romney will be in Virginia on Saturday where he will appear at Liberty University, the institution founded by the Reverend Jerry Falwell. The pastor was perhaps best known for his anti-homosexual, bigoted views, who argued that 9/11 was a punishment from God for society's embrace of homosexuals and once said: "Aids is not just God's punishment for homosexuals, it is God's punishment for the society that tolerates homosexuals." | |
| • Obama, meanwhile, has been riding high on his gay marriage announcement. Yesterday the president attended a fundraiser at the home of Hollywood star George Clooney. While he didn't mention same sex marriage specifically, Obama said, "Obviously, yesterday we made some big news." Same sex marriage has been a key issue among wealthy Hollywood donors and the president was warmly greeted at Clooney's home and is said to have raised $15m from the appearance. | |
| • Obama will be addressing potential supporters in Nevada today. The state ranks second in the nation for foreclosed homes and has the highest unemployment rate in the country. The president will be detailing his housing policies to help homeowners avoid foreclosure in Reno. Four years ago Obama carried Nevada but that state's persistent economic struggles has made a repeat of that success far from certain. |