With 2011 rapidly drawing to a close, politics and campaigning are due to ramp up in anticipation of the upcoming primaries. The number of potential Republican candidates is bordering on ridiculous and, while there is no challenger to President Obama among the Democrats, there is still a chance that might change before the year is over.
After a long summer resting your brain after Northwestern’s, well, mental marathon, catching up on politics can seem daunting. Never fear. Here we have compiled a timeline of the important political goings-on of the summer to refresh your memory.
June
End of the school year-
There were eight Republicans who had announced their candidacy for the party’s presidential nomination.
June 13-
Summer campaigning kicked off with a debate at Saint Anselm’s College in Manchester, N.H. It was at this debate that Bachmann announced she had filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission to seek the Republican nomination for president. The other participating candidates were Gingrich, Paul, Cain, Pawlenty, Romney, and Santorum.
June 16-
New York Congressman Anthony Weiner resigned after being caught sending lewd pictures of himself to young women via Twitter. He originally denied involvement, alleging his account had been hacked. However, he eventually admitted to sending the pictures after multiple women stepped forward with evidence of similar encounters with Weiner, online and via text message.
June 22-
President Obama addressed the nation regarding the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan. His proposed plan was withdrawal of 10,000 troops by the end of 2011 and a total of 33,000 troops by summer 2012, fully recovering the surge he announced at West Point in November 2009.
June 24-
The New York state senate passed the Marriage Equality Act, giving gay couples the right to marry as of July 24.
End of June-
Two more Republican candidates entered the race.
The potential candidates were:
- Political consultant and gay rights activist Fred Karger
- Former New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson
- Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich
- Texas Congressman Ron Paul
- Businessman Herman Cain
- Former Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty
- Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney
- Former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum
- Former US Ambassador to China Jon Huntsman
- Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann
[pagebreak]
July
July 6-
President Obama utilized social media to host the “first ever White House Twitter town hall.” Twitter users were able to send in their questions, from which the president chose and answered questions regarding jobs and the economy.
July 31-
Overwhelming fear of defaulting on our debt, estimated at $14.3 trillion, created an economic crisis. If the nation were to default, the effects on the global economy could be catastrophic.
The debt ceiling has been raised, extended or altered 78 times since 1960 (49 times under Republican presidents, 29 under Democratic presidents,) but on this occasion Republican members of Congress were adamant in their refusal to do so. In the end, the deal called for a two-stage raise of the debt ceiling, by a total of $2.4 trillion, and a total of $2.1 trillion in deficit reduction over the next decade.
During the course of the month-
Michigan Congressman Thaddeus McCotter and former Louisiana Governor Buddy Roemer both announced their candidacies for the Republican presidential nomination.
August
August 2-
The Senate voted to approve the last minute deal to raise the debt ceiling. The Budget Control Act of 2011 also established a bipartisan committee on Congress that has until late November to propose ways to reduce the deficit.
August 5-
The deal to raise the debt ceiling resulted in a downgrade of the U.S. credit rating by Standard & Poor’s. The rating went from AAA to AA+. The U.S. had maintained its AAA rating for 70 years, indicating an “extremely strong capacity to meet financial commitments,” according to Standard & Poor’s. AA means a country has a “very strong capacity to meet financial commitment.”
August 11-
Fox News hosted a second Republican presidential debate in Ames, Iowa, where Jon Huntsman joined the group from the previous debate. The debate is memorable for Pawlenty and Bachmann attacking one another and for Pawlenty’s continuing criticism of Romney for the healthcare system he implemented in Massachusetts during his tenure as governor. The system was the basis for President Obama’s nationwide healthcare system.
The event was scheduled two nights before the Ames Straw Poll, which Romney chose not to take part in. A straw poll is an unofficial vote used to gauge the possible outcome of an official election.
August 13-
Bachmann won the Ames Straw Poll with .9% over Paul. Pawlenty finished a distant third and withdrew from the race the next day.
Texas Governor Rick Perry announced his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination on August 13, as well.
[pagebreak]
September
There have been two straw polls in September, as well as three more debates. Analysts seem to have picked Romney and Perry as the frontrunners for the Republican nomination, but the winners of the straw polls in California and Florida were Paul and Cain, respectively. In the debates, while much of the focus is on Romney and Perry, other candidates continue to makes themselves heard and garner popular support.
September 8-
President Obama addressed a joint session of Congress to discuss the economy and presented his jobs bill. In his speech, he very specifically pointed at aspects of the bill that had been supported by both Democrats and Republicans in the past. He declared over and over that Congress should “pass this jobs plan right away.”
September 13-
During a debate, Bachmann attacked a 2007 executive order signed by Perry requiring Texas schoolgirls to be vaccinated against the human papillomavirus, which is known to cause cervical cancer. The order was later overturned by the state legislature, but Bachmann claimed he was putting girls’ lives at risk by mandating what she alleged “could potentially be a very dangerous drug.”
There are multiple issues raised by this mandate. The most obvious is the requirement to be vaccinated. Also, the fact that it is spread by sexual activity as opposed to casual contact bothers social conservatives, who believe the vaccine will encourage promiscuity.
While five years of use have shown that the vaccine prevents cervical cancer at little risk, that research was not available in 2007. That Perry has apparently received $30 thousand in campaign donations from Merck since 2000 draws suspicion.
Most recently, Congress avoided yet another looming government shutdown. The disagreement was this time over emergency disaster aid and whether it should be paid for through cuts in the budget elsewhere. Minimum agreements have been reached to keep the government running through November 18.
And so, for now, that is where we stand. But watch out- things can change pretty quickly.