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Obama’s team looked to respond to Romney, who seized the GOP presidential nomination with his primary win in Texas on Tuesday night. That pushed him past the 1,144-delegate threshold he needed to win the nod.

Obama’s advisers have said that, under Romney, the Massachusetts economy lagged in job creation and saw an increase in debt while he was governor from 2003-2007.

Romney’s campaign, in turn, was bringing attention to failed stimulus projects and federal money given to green-energy companies like Solyndra. The solar company received hundreds of millions of dollars from Obama’s administration only to go bankrupt.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP’s earlier story is below.
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Mitt Romney has won the Republican presidential nomination after years of fighting, though his triumph was partially overshadowed by the celebrity businessman who helped him along the way.

As primary voters in Texas on Tuesday pushed him past the 1,144-delegate threshold he needed to win the nod, Romney was raising money in Las Vegas with Donald Trump, the real estate mogul who has stoked doubts about whether President Barack Obama was born in America.

It’s the start of a weeklong push to raise millions of dollars during a West Coast swing as Romney looks to bring in as much cash as possible ahead of a ramped-up campaign schedule later this summer.

“Mr. Trump, thank you for letting us come to this beautiful hotel and being with so many friends. Thank you for twisting the arms that it takes to bring a fundraiser together,” Romney told the approximately 200 people who paid thousands to attend the event at the Trump International Hotel. “I appreciate your help.”

The Trump event and surrounding controversy overshadowed the Texas primary win that officially handed Romney the nomination, a triumph of endurance for a candidate who came up short four years ago and had to fight hard this year as voters flirted with a carousel of GOP rivals. According to the Associated Press count, Romney surpassed the 1,144 delegates needed to win the nomination by winning 105 delegates in the Texas primary, pushing his total to 1,191 delegates.

The former Massachusetts governor reached the nomination milestone with a steady message of concern about the U.S. economy, a campaign organization that dwarfed those of his GOP foes and a fundraising operation second only to that of Obama, his Democratic general election opponent. He outlasted a half-dozen Republican opponents to clinch the nomination later in the calendar than any recent GOP nominee.

Romney must now fire up conservatives who still doubt him while persuading swing voters that he can do a better job fixing the nation’s struggling economy than Obama. In Obama, he faces a well-funded candidate with a proven campaign team in an election that will be heavily influenced by the economy.

Romney will continue his push to raise money with fundraisers this week in wealthy California enclaves like Hillsborough, near San Francisco, and Beverly Hills. He has at least one major fundraising event every day for the rest of the week, as well as a series of smaller events.

But the focus Tuesday was on Trump, who once led polls of GOP primary voters. He endorsed the former Massachusetts governor just before the February Nevada caucuses, offering his support at a morning endorsement event in ballroom in the hotel that bears his name. In the same room Tuesday night for the fundraiser, Trump introduced Romney. He steered clear of the “birther” issue as he spoke to donors, though just hours earlier he had repeated his doubts about the authenticity of the birth certificate that shows Obama was born in Hawaii.

“A lot of people do not think it was an authentic certificate,” Trump told CNN of Obama’s birth certificate. When CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer told Trump he was “beginning to sound a little ridiculous,” Trump responded, “I think you sound ridiculous.”

Such allegations about Obama’s birthplace have been repeatedly proven false. The state of Hawaii recently re-affirmed that he was born there.

Trump’s comments, repeated in several media interviews Tuesday, overshadowed Romney’s attempts to focus on failed stimulus projects and federal money given to companies like Solyndra, the green energy company that received millions from the government only to go bankrupt.

Romney hasn’t condemned Trump’s assertions. On Monday night, he told reporters aboard his campaign plane that Trump is entitled to his opinion. Even as Trump-related criticism from Democrats and Republicans intensified in recent days, Romney showed no sign of distancing himself from the polarizing figure.

“I don’t agree with all the people who support me. And my guess is they don’t all agree with everything I believe in,” Romney said. “But I need to get 50.1 percent or more.”

Trump remains popular among the conservative base and boasts ties to deep-pocketed donors. He has recorded automated phone calls for Romney, hosted a fundraiser with Romney’s wife, Ann, in New York, and pressed the candidate’s case as a television surrogate.

The Obama campaign released a video Tuesday criticizing what it considers Romney’s unwillingness to stand up to Trump and the more extreme elements in his party.

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, once a rival for the GOP nomination and now a Romney supporter, suggested that the Trump issue will not derail Romney’s campaign.

“Gov. Romney’s not distracted. The Republican Party’s not distracted,” said Gingrich, who attended the Trump fundraiser. “We believe that this is an American-born job-killing president. Other people may believe that he was born somewhere else and still kills jobs.”

Gingrich was one in a series of rivals who challenged Romney during the prolonged primary fight.

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Even the entrance to his speech was part of his schtick. The president walked off stage just before he took the podium with an alleged “hot mic,” making fun of getting caught last month on an open microphone with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.

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“What am I doing here,” he asks off stage. “I’m opening for Jimmy Kimmel and telling knock-knock jokes to Kim Kardashian.”

Once on stage, the president revisited last year’s dinner.

“Last year at this time, this very weekend, we finally delivered justice to one of the world’s most notorious individuals,” Obama said, a seeming reference to the capture and killing of Osama bin Laden.

Instead, a picture of Trump appeared on the room’s television monitors. Obama last year delivered a scathing roast of Donald Trump, the real estate mogul who flirted with running for the Republican nomination and claimed he has solved the “mystery” of Obama’s birth certificate.

He took a shot at the Republican congressional leadership, whom he thanked “for taking time from their exhausting schedule of not passing any laws” to attend the dinner.

Four years ago, he recalled, he was locked in a tough primary fight with Hillary Clinton, now his secretary of state. “She can’t stop drunk texting me from Cartagena,” he said, referring to their recent trip to the Summit of the Americas in Columbia.

This year, Obama is the incumbent, but the dinner was far from a campaign-free zone. The president pointed out his similarities with the presumed nominee, Mitt Romney.

“We both think of our wives as our better halves, and the American people agree to an insulting extent,” the president said.

“We both have degrees from Harvard. I have one, he has two. What a snob.”

The crack drew a thumbs up from former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, who dropped out of the presidential primary campaign earlier this month. Santorum had called Obama a snob for encouraging young Americans to attend college.

But Obama touched on serious themes as well, remembering The New York Times’ Anthony Shadid and Marie Colvin of the Sunday Times of London who died while covering the uprising in Syria.

“Never forget that our country depends on you to help protect our freedom, our democracy and our way of life,” Obama said.

Then he returned to the lighter side: “I have to get the Secret Service home in time for their new curfew.”

Among those who attended Saturday night’s dinner were former Secretary of State Colin Powell, the cast of the hit TV show “Modern Family,” singer John Legend, actor George Clooney, Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ray Odierno, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., director Steven Spielberg and actress Zooey Deschanel.

Proceeds from the dinner go toward scholarships for aspiring journalists and awards for distinction in the profession.

The association was formed in 1914 as a liaison between the press and the president. Every president since Calvin Coolidge has attended the dinner. Some of the proceeds from the dinner pay for journalism scholarships for college students.

Several journalists will also be honored at the dinner:

- Matt Apuzzo, Adam Goldman, Eileen Sullivan and Chris Hawley of The Associated Press, for winning the Edgar A. Poe Award for their stories about the New York City Police Department’s widespread surveillance of Muslims after the Sept. 11 terror attacks. It’s the fourth major prize for the series, which has also won the Pulitzer Prize for Investigative Reporting, the Goldsmith Prize for Investigative Reporting and a George Polk Award.

- ABC’s Jake Tapper and Politico’s Glenn Thrush, Carrie Budoff Brown, Manu Raju and John Bresnahan, for winning the Merriman Smith Award for excellence in presidential coverage under pressure. Tapper won in the broadcast category for breaking the news that rating agency Standard & Poor’s was on the verge of downgrading the federal government’s triple-A credit rating because of concerns over political gridlock in Washington. In the print category, Thrush, Budoff Brown, Raju and Bresnahan of Politico won for their report on the deal between Obama and congressional Republicans to raise the U.S. debt ceiling.

- Scott Wilson, of The Washington Post, for winning the Aldo Beckman award. Wilson was recognized for his “deeply reported and nuanced stories, his evocative writing and his clear presentation of complex issues, particularly on the foreign policy front.”

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Gingrich had pinned his hopes on a surprise showing in Delaware but fell short.

He had been hinting in recent days that his campaign was nearing an end. His decision to officially shut down the effort comes as Romney has a lock on the GOP nomination.

Gingrich’s advisers spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity given the sensitivity of the situation.

Only around 210,000 taxpayers – a bit over 1 of every 1,000 – would face higher federal taxes if the measure were enacted, according to an estimate by one respected bipartisan research group.

In addition, while Republicans say the plan would be a job killer, only a small proportion of businesses would potentially be subject to the tax, according to data from a 2011 Treasury Department study. These firms make disproportionately large amounts of money, but many of them don’t employ any workers.

Republicans, calling the Buffett rule a political sideshow designed to distract voters from the economy’s problems, seem certain to round up enough votes to block the bill when the Democratic-run Senate votes on it Monday. But Democrats are eager to hold repeated votes on it this election year to demonstrate that they favor economic equality while Republicans prefer coddling the wealthy, so it’s unlikely to disappear soon.

Following are some questions and answers about the proposal and its potential impact:

Q: What would the Buffett rule do?

A: Citing complaints from billionaire Warren Buffett that he pays a lower tax rate than his secretary, Obama says everyone earning at $1 million a year or more should pay at least 30 percent of their income in taxes. He has been vague on details.

Monday’s Senate vote will be on legislation by Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., who would impose the 30 percent tax on people making at least $2 million annually and phase it in gradually for those earning at least $1 million.

Q: Isn’t the top income tax rate already 35 percent?

A: Yes, that is the rate owed this year on salaries over $388,350. Yet very few people pay that rate because they get to subtract credits and deductions. In addition, some sources of income like certain dividends and capital gains – more common among upscale earners – are taxed at a lower, 15 percent rate.

As a result, households making more than $1 million in 2011 owed an average of around 25 percent of their earnings in federal income taxes and payroll taxes for Social Security and Medicare, according to the Tax Policy Center, a nonpartisan group in Washington that studies federal taxes.

Q: How does that compare to lower earners?

A: On average – and that is the key – the rich pay higher rates. The center computes that families earning $30,000 to $40,000 owed an average 6 percent of it in income and payroll taxes last year. People making $50,000 to $75,000 owed an average 12 percent, while those making $75,000 to $100,000 paid an average 13 percent.

Q: Then what’s the problem?

A: The White House says it’s not the averages that bother them. It’s that thousands of individual million-dollar earners pay lower rates than millions of middle-income workers.

Citing Internal Revenue Service data, the White House says 22,000 households making more than $1 million paid less than 15 percent of their earnings in federal income and payroll taxes. That includes 1,470 such families who paid nothing in federal income taxes.

Q: So where does Obama’s 30 percent figure come from?

A: White House officials said last week that they want no household earning more than $1 million a year paying a smaller portion of its income in taxes than the middle class. While the term “middle class” is imprecise, IRS data show that the administration would come very close to that target by imposing a 30 percent tax on the highest earners. Out of around 27 million taxpayers who earned $50,000 to $100,000 in 2009, only around 2,000 ended up paying income tax rates of 30 percent or more.

Q: Overall, how many taxpayers would have to pay more if the Buffett rule becomes law?

A: The Tax Policy Center projects that there will be 438,000 households earning $1 million or more annually in 2015, the year they examined to give presidential candidates’ tax plans time to be enacted and take effect. Of those taxpayers, the center expects around 210,000 to face higher taxes if legislation like the Senate Democratic bill becomes law. That is just over one-tenth of one percent of all 169 million taxpayers.

Q: What impact would the Buffett rule have on businesses?

A: The Buffett rule would apply to individual income tax rates. It would not apply to the taxes that corporations pay, although Obama has separately proposed to increase taxes on some corporations including some that do work abroad.

Yet the proposal would still affect thousands of companies, from the local bakery to hugely profitable law firms, whose owners pay individual income taxes on the earnings, not corporate taxes. Republicans say taxing these companies would snatch away money they could otherwise use to create jobs – a damaging move with the economy still laboring to recover from the recession.

Q: Are there many of these companies?

A: In a paper last August, Treasury researchers analyzing tax data found that around 35 million individual tax returns reported some business income but just 331,000 of them – about 1 percent – were for earners making $1 million and up.

Out of those 331,000 business taxpayers earning at least $1 million, just 200,000 were employers, the study found.

Those 200,000 high-income employers accounted for just 5 percent of all employers filing business earnings on their individual returns. But they reported $189 billion in business income – a disproportionately huge 50 percent of all business earnings reported by such employers.

Republicans say it would inhibit job creation to tax away those large firms’ earnings. Democrats argue the figures show how few high-earning taxpayers actually hire people.

The Treasury figures were for the 2007 tax year, the most recent available.

Romney told the National Rifle Association convention Friday in St. Louis that he will stand up for the rights of hunters and those seeking to protect their homes and families. He said Obama fails to do so, but he didn’t offer any specifics.

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Obama’s re-election campaign said the president supports and respects gun rights.

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Romney said Obama is among those who see the Constitution as a living and evolving document rather than as a timeless one. He said Obama is trying to browbeat the Supreme Court on the major health care decision pending before th HTML

Visual e nine justices.

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From CBS News:

Romney dismissed a question posed to him in an interview on Fox News about the perception that he doesn’t understand the problems of average Americans. “The campaign started yesterday – the general election campaign,” he said, arguing that voters would get to know him better over the next seven months while also taking a closer look at the president.

“They’ll look at his record, which ultimately is the record upon which a campaign is going to be waged. But the person I’m out of touch with is Barack Obama,” Romney said. “I’m in touch with the American people. They want to see good jobs and rising incomes.”

Romney has made several references to his wealth that have been interpreted poorly, including remarks about his friends who own sports teams and his wife’s two Cadillacs. Mr. Obama, meanwhile, scores higher than Romney on poll questions about who better understands people’s problems.

Imagine that.

You can read more at CBS News.

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The Academy Award-winner will welcome the president and approximately 150 guests into his Los Angeles home for the event scheduled for May 10. The event is not cheap, though. It will cost attendants $40,000 per ticket to have the opportunity to hobknob with Obama, Clooney, and all their fancy friends. Proceeds will go to the Obama Victory fund, a joint fundraising committee of Obama for America, the Democratic National Committee and several state Democratic parties. Clooney told ET, ”I’m proud to do whatever I can to support the President… as long as no one asks me to sing.”

Clooney has been a staunch advocate for the president and consistently vocal about his support. Last fall, Clooney told an ABC News reporter, ”I’m disillusioned by the people who are disillusioned by Obama, quite honestly, I am.” He went on: ”If he was a Republican running, because Republicans are better at this,” and then added, “they’d be selling him as the guy who stopped 400,000 jobs a month from leaving the country. They’d be selling him as the guy who saved the auto-industry. If they had the beliefs, they’d be selling him as the guy who got rid of ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,’ who got Osama bin Laden. You could be selling this as a very successful three years.”

And Buzzfeed reported that the Obama campaign had to refund Clooney on some of his donation after he maxed out on the legal limit last year.

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While describing his campaign, the man who almost uprooted Romney’s “inevitable” securing of the Republican presidential nomination claimed, “We have tried … to provide a positive vision, not a negative campaign.” Though he is bowing out, Santorum stressed the importance of taking the White House and seizing control of Congress in November. Santorum quipped: “I know a lot of folks — even at the White House — are gonna write ‘game over,’ but this game is a long, long, way from over.”

Santorum also claimed: “We need a hopeful, positive vision for the country that does more than turns around the economy.”

Santorum’s decision to suspend his campaign effective today all but confirms that Mitt Romney will seize the GOP nomination. Though former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Congressman Ron Paul (R-TX) remain in the race neither has a viable chance of obtaining the 1,144 delegates needed to net the nomination.

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That’s the growing consensus among Republican National Committee members who will automatically attend the party’s national convention this summer and can support any candidate they choose.

Even some members who support other candidates begrudgingly say the math doesn’t add up for anyone but the former Massachusetts governor.

“I would be surprised if Romney doesn’t get the number he needs,” said Jeff Johnson of Minnesota, who supports former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.

Bob Bennett of Ohio was more blunt.

“Look, Gov. Romney’s going to be the nominee, and he’s going to have enough votes,” said Bennett, who is publicly neutral but said he supported Romney four years ago.

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Romney’s chief rival, former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, is pledging to stay in the race, hoping a victory in his home state’s primary April 24 will give his campaign new life. But Santorum has fallen far behind Romney in the race for convention delegates, and RNC members are taking notice, even though most are publicly staying neutral, preferring to let primary voters decide the nominee.

The Associated Press has polled 114 of the 120 superdelegates, party members who can support any candidate for president they choose at the national convention in August, regardless of what happens in primaries or caucuses.

In the latest survey, conducted Tuesday to Friday, Romney has 35 endorsements, far more than anyone else but a modest figure for the apparent nominee. Gingrich has four endorsements, Santorum has two and Texas Rep. Ron Paul got one.

RNC members have been slowly embracing Romney. He picked up 11 new endorsements since the last AP survey a month ago, after the Super Tuesday contests. Over the course of the campaign, however, Romney methodically has added endorsements from every region of the country. In the U.S. territories, where voters help decide the nominee but can’t vote in the general election, Romney has dominated.

Romney has endorsements from all three RNC members in Guam, American Samoa, the Virgin Islands and the Northern Mariana Islands. He was endorsed by two of the three members in Puerto Rico.

Romney may be struggling among voters in the South, but he was endorsed by two of the three committee members in Mississippi, Henry Barbour and Jeanne Luckey. Romney even has support from Robert Asher of Pennsylvania.

Santorum’s only endorsements are from members in Iowa and Alabama. In Pennsylvania, state GOP chairman Robert Gleason is publicly neutral.

“I talked to Rick the other day,” Gleason said. “He didn’t even ask me to support him.”

Texas GOP chairman Steve Munisteri said he talked to Santorum for about 20 minutes on Tuesday, when Santorum was in the state for a fundraiser.

Santorum told him “what I already believed, which is we’re only a little over the halfway mark and that he thinks he’ll do really well in the Southern states,” said Munisteri, who has yet to endorse anyone.

“He should go into those states as the front-runner,” Munisteri said. “If he can win Pennsylvania, he’d then be able to put a streak of five or six wins together based on all the Southern states holding primaries.”

Seventy-two RNC delegates said they were either undecided or not ready to make a public endorsement. Many said they are eager for the nomination fight to end so the party can focus on defeating President Barack Obama in November.

But most said they are reluctant to ask Santorum to quit.

“The decision to get in or get out of a race is an extremely personal decision,” said John Ryder of Tennessee, who is neutral. “He’s got to decide when he thinks it is no longer politically valuable to continue.”

“It is very hard to see any path for Sen. Santorum to the nomination. It is very hard to see any path for Speaker Gingrich to the nomination,” Ryder said. “But they and their supporters have to make that final call.”

In the overall race for delegates, Romney has 660 and Santorum has 281, according to the AP count. Gingrich is even farther behind, with 135, followed by Paul with 51.

Romney has won 58 percent of the caucus and primary delegates so far. At that pace, he would reach the number of delegates needed to clinch the nomination, 1,144, on June 5, when five states, including delegate rich California and New Jersey, hold contests

Santorum met privately Thursday with conservative activists to work on plans to stop Romney’s march to the nomination. The group decided to pressure Gingrich to leave the race, believing that would help unite conservatives behind Santorum.

Gingrich, however, has already scaled back his campaign to the point that he schedules few public events. In the three primaries last Tuesday, all won by Romney, Gingrich got 11 percent of the vote in both Maryland and the District of Columbia and 6 percent in Wisconsin.

Even if Santorum had picked up every vote for Gingrich, Romney still would have won all three primaries.

“It’s over with,” said Bennett, the RNC member from Ohio. “And if Romney carries Pennsylvania, that completes it. He’ll be the presumptive nominee before the end of the month.”

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The four-day convention, beginning Wednesday, April 11 at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center, is free and open to the public.

The Rev. Al Sharpton, President and Founder of NAN, has been particularly active this year in the wake of the Trayvon Martin tragedy. The convention’s “Criminal Justice” session, featuring President Barack Obama’s former professor at Harvard Law School Dr. Charles J. Ogletree, will likely focus on Martin and other issues of injustice facing African-Americans. Alfred C. Liggins III, Chief Executive Officer of Radio One, will be featured in the “Media: Race & Politics” session along with Washington Post staff writers Jonathan Capehart and Nia-Malika Henderson, and other leading media professionals. [EDITOR'S NOTE: Radio One is the parent company of NewsOne.]

U.S. Secretary of Labor Hilda L. Solis and Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius will lead back-to-back plenary sessions. With African-Americans ranking highest among the unemployed and those experiencing healthcare disparities, both sessions will give attendees the opportunity to hear from Obama’s top advisors. Six current cabinet members in total will participate in the convention.

While the Rev. Sharpton has enjoyed a close relationship with the President and his administration — Obama having kicked off his re-election campaign at last year’s NAN convention — Sharpton says that this year’s gathering isn’t meant to be a cozy get-together where Obama’s team can address convention attendees unchallenged.

“Otherwise, we’re just having a soundbite forum,” Sharpton said. “We determined when we started making the movement three years ago to stop the soundbites where everyone sits on the stage, give their best lines, and nothing happens. Our people need accountability and concrete progress.

“We do not need just… people with soundbites,” Sharpton continued, adding that if speakers were coming to simply spout platitudes, that “they ought to be in the rap industry not in civil rights work.”

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The Washington Post reports that Barry told his supporters that Asian businesses  should leave his ward during a celebration party for his landslide in the Democratic primary race for the D.C. Council seat on Tuesday.

Here is the exact quote:

“We’ve got to do something about these Asians coming in, opening up businesses, those dirty shops. They ought to go, I’ll just say that right now, you know. But we need African-American businesspeople to be able to take their places, too.”

Though calls for an immediate apology came soon as the story on his comments broke, Barry has yet to say sorry. And it doesn’t appear that he will:

Rather, he said, in an interview, he suggested his critics “get to know Marion Barry and his stellar record on civil rights.””I’ve spent the last 50 years of my life fighting for justice and equality of all people,” he said. “Those five people don’t know Marion Barry at all. They know my name; they don’t know my record.”

It seems like a clear case of race-baiting on Barry’s part. But it is doubtful that his comments will end his career. If the crack pipe or time in the slammer couldn’t keep him down, a few racist statements aren’t likely to tank him, either.

Check out the rest of the story and video of Barry making his comments here.

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CBC chair Emanuel Cleaver sponsored the resolution.  Corrine Brown, Alcee Hastings and Frederica Wilson are co-sponsors.  It is a non-binding resolution “urging the State of Florida and others to repeal the ‘Stand Your Ground‘ law, and admonishing involved parties to pursue full investigations into all homicides, regardless of defenses asserted by the offender.”

The Washington Times has more:

“His death is a tragedy that should not have happened, and it speaks to the reality that racial profiling still exists in America,” said Rep. Frederica Wilson of Florida, who is listed as one of four principal sponsors of the resolution.

Trayvon, 17, who was black, was shot and killed Feb. 26 while walking through a gated community in Sanford, Fla. His accused killer, George Zimmerman, who has a Hispanic mother and a white father, told police he acted in self-defense and hasn’t been arrested or charged.

Black Caucus members blamed Florida’s “Stand Your Ground Law,” which gives people wide latitude to use deadly force rather than retreat during a fight.

Thing is, the resolution may not make it to the House floor for a vote because Republicans are in the majority.
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White House press secretary Jay Carney says Obama’s “personal opinion is that women should be admitted” to the golf club.

Carney was asked about the issue Thursday. He says it’s “up to the club to decide” but he also said that Obama told him he personally thinks women should be welcome.

One of the club’s longtime sponsors, IBM, has a new female CEO, Virginia Rometty. The last four CEOs at IBM, all male, have been invited to be members.

The chairman of Augusta National this week has said the club will decide for itself whom to allow in its ranks.

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Though many of them would be thinking this anyway, now they’re seeing their interest fueled by staples in the Democratic Party.

Longtime Clinton family political advisor James Carville kicked off talk when he said of the prospect of Hillary for president in 2016, “I always assume that if people run, they will run again.” Then came former New York Mayor Ed Koch, who told the New York Times about a conversation he had with Secretary of State Clinton in March. “I said, Everybody’s running you for president again — count me in!” Koch said. “And there were other people there who applauded.”

Yeah, I bet.

Not long after, Clinton protégé, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, who was appointed to Hillary’s vacated seat, told BuzzFeed, “I’m going to be one of the first to ask Hillary to run in 2016.” She went on, “I think she would be incredibly well-poised to be our next Democratic president. I think she’s extremely well-prepared. I think her experience as Secretary of State has not only elevated her stature and experience, but she’s proven she’s someone who can get things done, and I think she’d be an outstanding candidate.”

And former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi has publicly expressed her thoughts on another potential Clinton presidential bid. She didn’t bring it up herself, though. She was asked to chime in by political correspondent during an appearance in the 92nd Street Y in New York City Sunday night.

Nevertheless Pelosi said, “I would love to see Secretary Clinton become the nominee for President in 2016.” She went to say, “I do think the Secretary should entertain the thought of running in 2016. Hasn’t she been a magnificent Secretary of State?”

That’s been a common assessment among many, but talking about a presidential election four years away seems like overkill – especially since we’re still in the midst of one now in its very early stages.

I suppose this new wave, which is the two-year presidential campaign, can quickly spur people to grow tired of what’s going on in the moment. But c’mon now, folks: focus. Those Hillary-is-so-grand talking points will remain usable when it’s the appropriate time to use them.

I understand that her supporters are still pining on a dream, but in the interest of the here and now, can we give Hillary Clinton for president talks a rest until at least 2014? Or if some people are that anxious, at least until President Obama begins his second term. I’m sure somewhere Vice President Biden – who has yet to mention a potential run – agrees.

If he doesn’t, at the very least, Hillary’s husband does. When asked about the way-too-early presidential scenario, former President Bill Clinton said: “I believe she’s being absolutely honest with you when she says she doesn’t think she’ll go back to politics. If she comes home and we do this foundation stuff for the rest of our lives, I’ll be happy. If she changes her mind and decides to run, I’ll be happy. But I think that’s light years away.”

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Michael Arceneaux is a Houston-bred, Howard-educated writer currently based in Los Angeles. You can read more of his work on his site, The Cynical Ones. Follow him on Twitter: @youngsinick

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She also announced plans to mark the Joining Forces campaign’s first anniversary with a two-day, four-state swing next week that will include stops in election battleground states Pennsylvania and Florida and a chat with comedian Stephen Colbert on his show “The Colbert Report.”

The Joining Forces organization said it has lined up commitments for more than 15,000 jobs in the coming years. Most will come from telemarketing and customer support companies and will enable the spouses and veterans to work from home.

Mrs. Obama noted these jobs are especially helpful to military families because they move so often across state lines – about 10 times more often than the typical U.S. family.

“We’re trying to meet these spouses where they are,” she said in a conference call with reporters. “This will make such a huge difference. … When the next set of orders comes in for these families and they have to move across the country, they’ll be able to move these jobs with them.”

Ahead of the Joining Forces anniversary, the first lady visited Walter Reed National Military Medical Center to distribute Easter treats from the White House pastry shop to military families staying there.

Mrs. Obama was joined by family dog Bo, briefly wearing bunny ears, as she greeted the families and children who were decorating Easter cards with stickers, cotton balls and crayons. She introduced the Portuguese water dog as “my only son.”

The first lady carried a basket full of Easter cookies- decorated with pastel colors and images of Bo and hatching eggs.

Mrs. Obama also brought tickets for the families to attend the White House Egg Roll on Monday.

“Come ready to play,” she told the kids about the annual event held on the South Lawn.

Next week, after a White House celebration, she and Jill Biden, the vice president’s wife and her partner in Joining Forces, will make stops at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia to meet with nursing industry leaders; New York for Mrs. Obama’s Colbert taping; Shreveport, La., to mark the 50,000th veteran or service spouse hired under the campaign; and the Naval Air Station at Jacksonville, Fla.

So far, Mrs. Obama told reporters, the jobs component of Joining Forces has exceeded expectations. “The country is stepping up in ways both large and small,” she said.

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The likely GOP nominee was set Wednesday to take the same Washington stage that the president had used a day earlier to criticize Romney in a speech to newspaper editors in Washington. The former Massachusetts governor planned to address an audience of the Newspaper Association of America and the American Society of News Editors, a day after Obama spoke to the annual meeting of The Associated Press.

“There is a basic choice before us,” Romney said Tuesday night as he spoke to cheering supporters in Milwaukee. “Our different visions for America are the product of our values and our life experiences.”

Romney’s victories in Wisconsin, Maryland and the District of Columbia widened his delegate lead and all but handed him the title of presumptive Republican nominee. Despite pressure to leave the race, rival Rick Santorum vowed to fight on, urging voters in the next-up Pennsylvania primary to vote for “someone whose views are forged in steel, not on an Etch A Sketch.”

Romney didn’t mention Santorum on Tuesday night. Instead, Romney sought to cast Obama as an “out of touch” liberal whose personal background is hostile to a free economy.

His remarks came just hours after Obama delivered a combative campaign speech in Washington, where he attacked House Republicans’ budget plan as “thinly veiled social Darwinism” that “is antithetical to our entire history as a land of opportunity and upward mobility for everybody who’s willing to work for it.”

Obama called it “a prescription for decline.”

After his speech Wednesday, Romney planned to head to a campaign event in the Philadelphia suburbs. He was to campaign in the state Thursday as well. Obama planned to attend an Easter prayer breakfast at the White House.

For Romney, the end of the contested primary campaign could hardly come soon enough.

“I want to have our nominee start raising money, start organizing a national campaign and focus on President Obama and his agenda because this is time for us to start focusing on him rather than standing and focusing on one another in these primary contests,” he told radio host Sean Hannity on Tuesday. “I think we’ve had, as of tonight, we will have had almost 35 or more state or territorial contests for the nomination. Maybe it’s time to get going.”

Obama has gained in the polls in recent months, particularly among women, as Republicans vie among themselves for support from a conservative party electorate. Santorum has devoted more time to social concerns – including birth control – than Romney, who has generally stayed focused on economic issues.

Surveys indicate Americans are growing more optimistic about the overall state of the economy. Unemployment has fallen in recent months, but it is still at a relatively high 8.3 percent of the work force.

Already, the early outlines of a general election ad war are visible. Obama’s re-election campaign is airing commercials in a half-dozen battleground states that accuse Romney of siding with Big Oil “for their tax breaks, attacking higher mileage standards and renewables.”

The ads are a rapid response to $3 million in commercials aired by an outside group, American Energy Alliance, blaming the president for rising gasoline prices.

In his campaign for the Republican nomination, Romney has collected endorsements from former President George H.W. Bush; Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, a tea party favorite; and Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, author of a conservative budget that Republicans pushed through the House last week.

Romney won at least 83 delegates in the three races Tuesday, with 6 yet to be allocated.

That pushed his total to 655 of the 1,144 needed to clinch the nomination. Santorum has 278 delegates, Newt Gingrich 135 and Ron Paul 51.

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In a blistering election-year critique, Obama sought to present himself to voters as the protector of the middle class and the leader of a Democratic Party that is willing to compromise in Washington. He singled out the front-runner for the GOP presidential nomination, Mitt Romney, for criticism and more broadly said Republicans had shifted from any reasonable debate on health care, debt reduction and the environment.

Republicans “will brook no compromise,” Obama told news executives at the annual meeting of The Associated Press.

He cited a Republican presidential debate late last year when the entire field rejected the prospect of $10 in spending cuts for every $1 in tax increases as a means to lower the debt.

“Think about that. Ronald Reagan, who as I recall was not accused of being a tax-and-spend socialist, understood repeatedly that when the deficit started to get out of control that for him to make a deal he would have to propose both spending cuts and tax increases,” Obama said. “He did it multiple times. He could not get through a Republican primary today.”

Republicans called Obama’s remarks a partisan attempt to cover up broken pledges to cut the federal deficit in half, curb spending and make tough choices to reform Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

“The president has resorted to distortions and partisan potshots and recommitted himself to policies that have made our country’s debt crisis worse,” said House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio.

Andrea Saul, a Romney spokeswoman, said that after the past three years, “the last thing President Obama is qualified to lecture on is responsible federal spending.”

Making his case for re-election, Obama said the nation must restore a sense of security for hard-working Americans and stand for a government willing to help those in hard times. The Democratic president blasted Republicans by name and said the choice between the parties is “unambiguously clear.”

Stirring anew the themes of his State of the Union speech, Obama said the central issue for the country is deciding whether it wants to give everyone a fair chance – with government as a tool to help do that – or whether it is content to let only the wealthy succeed.

Obama used his speech to paint his Republican rivals as protectors of a trickle-down economic philosophy that does not work. He spoke on the day that GOP presidential front-runner Romney was expected to move closer to seizing his party’s nomination as voters went to the polls in Wisconsin, Maryland and the District of Columbia.

Obama directly challenged Romney for embracing a $3.5 trillion budget proposal led by Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin that was approved by the House last week. Ryan’s proposal aims to slash the federal deficit and reduce the size of government. It stands little chance in the Democratic-controlled Senate, yet Obama targeted it as a symbol of the Republican vision.

Obama even poked fun at Romney’s word choice. “He even called it `marvelous,’ which is a word you don’t often hear when it comes to describing a budget,” Obama said. “It’s a word you don’t often hear generally.”

The president said that instead of moderating their views even slightly, the Republicans running Congress have “doubled down” and proposed a budget so far to the right it makes the “Contract With America” look like the “New Deal.”

The Contract with America was the policy document that helped Republicans win the House in 1994 and propelled Newt Gingrich into the speakership. The New Deal was President Franklin Roosevelt’s plan for pulling the nation out of the Great Depression.

Yet Obama also sought to buffer himself from criticism that he is a supporter of big government.

Speaking to publishers and editors, Obama said: “I believe deeply that the free market is the greatest force for economic progress in human history.”

Obama went into a lengthy, point-by-point critique of the Ryan budget, showing what he said would be a perilous future for senior citizens, college students, people with disabilities and many other Americans. He condemned the GOP plan as a “prescription for decline.”

“It’s antithetical to our entire history as a land of opportunity and upward mobility for everybody who’s willing to work for it, a place where prosperity doesn’t trickle down from the top but grows outward from the heart of the middle class,” he said.

Obama made a separate call for economic fairness encapsulated by the “Buffett Rule,” arguing the wealthy shouldn’t pay a smaller share of their income in federal taxes than middle-class taxpayers. He said maintaining current rates or more tax breaks for the wealthy would mean “higher deficits” or “more sacrifice from the middle class” that would force seniors to pay more for Medicare and lead to college students losing some financial aid.

Republicans have said the new tax on the wealthiest Americans would push investors into sending money overseas where it would be taxed less. The GOP also points to congressional analysts who note the new revenue would be only a small amount compared with the projected budget deficits.

Obama’s focus on tax change has come as Democrats seek to bring attention to Romney’s business background and wealth. Romney is a millionaire who is paying 15.4 percent in federal taxes for 2011 on income mostly derived from investments. The top rate for taxpayers with high incomes derived from wages is 35 percent.

Asked about the fate of his health care reform law, his signature legislative achievement, Obama said his administration was “not spending a whole lot of time planning for contingencies” in the event that the law is struck down.

Obama said the nation’s high court has exercised “restraint” and “deference” to Congress in economic cases in the past and he expected the court “to recognize that and to abide by well-established precedents out there.”

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Clinton tells ABC’s “Good Morning America” he believes likely Republican nominee Mitt Romney will have a difficult time reconciling positions he’s taken during the primary season with what he’ll say against Obama in the fall.

Clinton was asked if Obama can argue that Americans are better off than they were four years ago, as he argued in winning re-election in 1996.

He replies that if Obama can’t make that case, “it is only because of the financial collapse that occurred in September 2008″ before Obama took office.

Clinton says Obama can assert that “we put a floor under the recession and kept it from becoming a depression.”

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Biden says in an interview taped for CBS’s “Face the Nation” that “we think the mandate and the law are constitutional and we think the court will rule that way.”

Asked about the chances it would be overturned, he replies, “I don’t believe it will happen.” Biden says “I think we should focus on what is the law doing for people now and what would happen if Republicans should repeal it.”

Biden has started taking on a greater role in arguing President Barack Obama’s case for re-election, making an appearance on his behalf in the Midwest earlier this week. Excerpts of his Sunday interview were aired Friday on “CBS This Morning.”

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Romney spokeswoman Gail Gitcho says the two will appear together and speak to reporters.

Formal backing from the 41st president is another sign that the Republican Party is uniting behind Romney as pressure builds on challengers Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich to leave the race.

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The elder Bush has offered encouraging words to Romney throughout the primary season but had withheld a formal endorsement. Former first lady Barbara Bush has formally backed Romney. She recorded automated telephone calls for him during the primary in Ohio.

Their son, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, endorsed Romney last week.

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The son of one president and the brother of another, Bush had stayed out of the race for months. Some party elders publicly had urged him to jump into the race when it looked like Romney was having trouble closing the deal. On Wednesday, a day after Romney won Illinois by 12 points, Bush signaled that was no longer the case.

“Now is the time for Republicans to unite behind Governor Romney and take our message of fiscal conservatism and job creation to all voters this fall,” Bush said in a written statement that suggested the race is all but over. He congratulated the other Republican candidates “for a hard-fought, thoughtful debate and primary season.”

Romney had emailed his supporters Tuesday night that his Illinois win “means we are that much closer to securing the nomination, uniting our party, and taking on President Obama.” He urged the party to fall in line behind his bid, saying “We are almost there.”

The former Massachusetts governor and his allies spent hundreds of thousands of dollars more than Santorum and his backers in Illinois, and it showed in the results: Romney was beating Rick Santorum by 47 percent to 35 percent.

Campaign finance reports released Tuesday showed that big donors to a GOP political organization founded by political strategist Karl Rove have boosted their financial support for Romney in recent weeks.

For all that money, though, Romney’s Illinois win was a victory without an electrified electorate: Turnout seemed likely to be among the lowest in decades: Officials in several election districts said turnout hovered around 20 percent.

“You could draw a bigger crowd at a Green Bay Packers rally in downtown Chicago than what Mr. Romney delivered to the polls,” Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois said on CBS’ “This Morning.”

Romney was the clear favorite among Illinois Republicans who were most concerned about picking someone who is capable of taking on President Barack Obama in the fall. Romney’s wife, Ann, suggested earlier this week that it was time for the party to coalesce behind him. And in an appeal to the centrist independents who will decide the general election, Romney pledged Tuesday to work with Democrats or “die trying.”

“Tonight was a primary, but November is a general election. And we’re going to face a defining decision as a people,” Romney said during a victory speech to supporters. “We know what Barack Obama’s vision is. We’ve been living it these last three years. My vision is very, very different.”

Romney picked up at least 41 delegates in Illinois, according to initial results, adding to his delegate lead and making it that much harder for any of his rivals to deny him an opportunity to take on the president in November.

Obama, for his part, headed West on Wednesday to Nevada, New Mexico and Oklahoma City on a trip aimed at answering critics of his energy policies, sure to be a key issue in the fall campaign. His first stop was a plant in Nevada that uses solar panels to power homes, part of an effort to highlight the president’s programs to expand renewable energy sources.

The president’s GOP critics poked back at him before Obama was even on the plane out of Washington: Newt Gingrich issued a statement saying Obama was answering a real-world problem with a “solution that is totally disconnected from the practical realities of the world and has little chance of success.” Crossroads GPS, the nonprofit arm of a Republican super PAC, launched an ad on TV stations in the areas that Obama was to visit and on national cable channels faulting the president for “bad energy policies” that are driving up gasoline prices.

Romney was moving on to Maryland, but opened Wednesday by tweeting a “Happy Anniversary” message to his wife, Ann, complete with a wedding photo from 1969. His campaign released a web video in which Ann Romney recounts the details of their dating-to-marriage story.

Polls show Romney has the advantage heading toward Maryland’s April 3 primary. But the South, where Louisiana votes on Saturday, has proven less hospitable to Romney.

Santorum, who hopes to rebound in Louisiana, sounded like anything but a defeated contender Tuesday night as he spoke to supporters in Gettysburg, Pa. He said he had outpolled Romney in downstate Illinois and the areas “that conservatives and Republicans populate.”

“We’re very happy about that and we’re happy about the delegates we’re going to get, too,” he said before invoking Illinois-born Republican icon Ronald Reagan, the actor turned president. “Saddle up, like Reagan did in the cowboy movies.”

Gingrich didn’t speak to supporters Tuesday, instead issuing a written statement. Texas Rep. Ron Paul has yet to win a state.

Romney triumphed in Illinois after benefiting from a crushing 7-1 advantage in the television advertising wars, and as his chief rival struggled to overcome self-imposed political wounds in the marathon race to pick an opponent to Obama.

Most recently, Santorum backpedaled after saying Monday that the economy wasn’t the main issue of the campaign. “Occasionally you say some things where you wish you had a do-over,” he said later.

Romney has 563 delegates in the overall count maintained by The Associated Press, out of 1,144 needed to win the nomination. Santorum has 263 delegates, Gingrich 135 and Paul 50.

After the Louisiana primary, a 10-day break follows before Washington, D.C., Maryland and Wisconsin hold primaries on April 3.

Santorum is not on the ballot in the nation’s capital. Private polling shows Romney with the edge in Maryland, and the pro-Romney super PAC Restore Our Future launched a television ad campaign in the state during the day at a cost of more than $450,000.

Wisconsin shapes up as the next big test between Romney and Santorum. Republican politics there have been roiled recently by a controversy involving a recall battle against the governor and some GOP state senators who supported legislation that was bitterly opposed by labor unions.

Already, Restore Our Future has put down more than $2 million in television advertising across Wisconsin. Santorum has spent about $50,000 to answer.

Neither Gingrich nor Paul campaigned extensively in Illinois. Gingrich has faded to near-irrelevance in the race, but remains defiant.

“To defeat Barack Obama, Republicans can’t nominate a candidate who relies on outspending his opponents 7-1,” he said in a statement Tuesday night. “Instead, we need a nominee who offers powerful solutions that hold the president accountable for his failures.”

Gingrich said his campaign will spend the time leading to the party convention “relentlessly taking the fight to President Obama.”

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Out of a dozen states where voters in the GOP contest have been polled, most Romney voters have said they strongly favor him in just five of them. A majority of Santorum voters felt that committed to him only four times out of 11 states where he was on the ballot and voters were surveyed.

Each man is struggling to consistently spark the intensity that could separate him from the pack.

Consider that Arizona is the only state where Romney had a higher proportion of voters expressing strong feelings about him than his rivals did. And Santorum hasn’t had that edge in any state yet, despite an animated campaign style and passion for hot-button social issues like contraception that have contrasted with Romney’s stiffer, more analytic manner.

On average, 50 percent of Romney voters and 49 percent of Santorum’s say they strongly favor their candidate, with the rest expressing reservations about their man or a greater dislike for his rivals, according to entrance and exit polls of voters in 12 states.

When it comes to winning fervent devotion from his own supporters, both men trail former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Texas Rep. Ron Paul. Those two GOP presidential campaigns are lagging but 58 percent of Gingrich’s backers and 53 percent of Paul’s, on average, say they strongly favor their candidate. Analysts say higher percentages of devoted supporters are common with candidates whose lesser backing leaves them with only the most committed followers.

Republican operatives express concern about Romney and Santorum. They say the figures raise questions about how quickly the GOP will be able to end its drawn-out slugfest and begin generating voter enthusiasm for a nominee to challenge President Barack Obama in November.

“At this point in the game, you should be drawing the troops toward you. The intensity about you should be pretty strong,” said Mike McKenna, a Republican consultant not working for any of the contenders.

Political professionals generally consider intensity of support a key ingredient to a winning campaign. Such enthusiasm can help pave the way for everything from yard signs to campaign contributions to voters who show up on Election Day.

“Motivation is the name of the game in trying to get people to the polls,” said Josh Putnam, a political scientist at Davidson University. “It makes campaigns’ work easier if they can bank some votes, so to speak.”

Though Romney and Santorum attract similar amounts of passion, there are different reasons why many of their voters are tepid, the polls show. For Romney, the chief explanation seems to be doubts about his empathy.

Among Romney’s staunchest supporters, 80 percent say the former Massachusetts governor and Bain Capital executive understands average Americans better than the other candidates, the combined surveys show. That figure falls to just 44 percent among those who support him more tenuously.

Opponents of the wealthy Romney have at times derided him as being out of touch with typical voters, an image fed by remarks like saying his wife owns two Cadillacs.

Questions about Romney’s credentials as a conservative also seem a liability. While hardly any of his most committed voters say he’s not conservative enough, around 2 in 10 of his less passionate voters say so.

For Santorum, his intensity of support falls off among voters who are less religious and more moderate.

While 63 percent of his strong backers say sharing religious beliefs with a candidate is very important, just 35 percent of his less loyal voters say so, the combined polls show. Santorum voters who ardently back him are also significantly likelier than his less committed supporters to favor making abortion completely illegal, to be born-again or evangelical Christians, or to be tea party backers.

“I also have conservative values,” said Patricia Moran, 71, of Pensacola, Fla., who said in an Associated Press-GfK poll last month that she backs Santorum with qualms. “But his whole women’s issues and contraceptives thing has diminished my enthusiasm for him.”

Santorum has said contraceptives conflict with his Catholic beliefs and states should be free to ban them.

Romney campaign pollster Neil Newhouse says that while Romney voters may not all exhibit fervor, they are attracted by more important qualities.

“His ability and focus on fixing the economy and his perceived ability to beat Barack Obama really overwhelm everything else in the data,” Newhouse said.

Hogan Gidley, Santorum’s communications director, said he didn’t believe the polling data and contrasted its findings with the excitement he said he sees at the candidate’s campaign events.

“Even if I believed that, what does that say about Mitt Romney,” who has had the advantages of running for president longer and far outspending his rivals, Gidley said. “It says a whole lot more about Mitt Romney’s supporters than ours.”

Some Republicans expressed surprise that Santorum’s support wasn’t more passionate than Romney’s, attributing it in part to the lesser familiarity that many voters have with him.

Several said it probably also reflected a desire by many Republicans to find a contender who can oust Obama. In the exit polls, Romney dominates among voters seeking that quality in a candidate.

“Santorum has become the vehicle to register your rejection of Romney,” said Matt Mackowiak, a GOP consultant who had worked for one-time GOP presidential candidate Rick Perry. “But a lot of folks don’t think necessarily that Santorum can either win the nomination or beat Obama.”

Romney supporters say their candidate’s focus on the economy accounts for the tempered enthusiasm of his supporters.

“He’s not the guy who uses red hot rhetoric,” said Sen. Robert Portman, R-Ohio, who has campaigned with Romney. “He’s a thoughtful conservative who wants to roll up his sleeves and fix our problems. That may lead to less enthusiasm in some of the primaries, but I think it will serve him really well in the general” election.

The data comes from surveys of voters conducted for The Associated Press and the television networks by Edison Research in 12 states that have held GOP primaries or caucuses: Alabama, Arizona, Georgia, Iowa, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, Ohio, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Vermont and Virginia.

Exit and entrance polls in those states in

March is Women’s History Month, a time to look at the many contributions women have made throughout history.  But lately, there have been a number of studies examining the lives of Black women, from their body sizes in comparison to White women to assessing that they’re more likely to get swept up in a tsunami than to get married.

The latest survey comes from “The Washington Post” and the Kaiser Family Foundation and, surprisingly, they found that contrary to popular belief, Black women are doing just fine.

Krissah Thompson, national staff writer for “The Washington Post”; Rahiel Tesfamariam, founder of urbancusp.com; and Dr. Tricia Bent-Goodley, Howard University professor, joined Roland Martin on Washington Watch to talk about this new survey.

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This past week, we saw the reenactment of the Selma to Montgomery march. Singer-actor Tyrese joined the march, and made an interesting comment. He challenged all of his celebrity friends by saying, “Why don’t y’all jump on y’all private planes, like y’all do to the All Star* game, and come down here and march for votes?” He also called upon them to step up and say something about voter suppression and the need for Black folks to get registered.

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Earlier, Santorum won Alabama’s GOP primary with a slightly wider margin. Evangelicals played a key role in both states. Nearly 4 of 5 voters surveyed in exit polls called themselves born-again or evangelical.

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Exit pollsters had such few votes from the Black voting base that it couldn’t be determined who was the preferred candidate among the group. Even states like Georgia, where Black voters make up 31 percent of the voting pool, only made for 3 percent of the total. Similarly, in Michigan, where Black voters make up 15 percent, only 2 percent of Blacks pulled levers for the GOP candidates.  South Carolina and Florida both clocked in with about 1 percent of the total GOP vote.

The GOP has been largely out of touch with Black voters, further marked by the ascension of President Barack Obama to the White House. In much of the GOP debates and discussions, the candidates have largely turned a blind eye toward race or have made disparaging comments about African Americans. All three candidates have put the lion’s share of attention, though, toward the game of one-upmanship. On Tuesday, Mississippi and Alabama residents can vote on the GOP primaries. Both states have large African-American residents, but it is expected that the trend of inactivity will continue.

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WASHINGTON — This is the economy election, right? Tell that to the world.

President Barack Obama is getting another dose of the reality of his job: the out-of-his-control events that shape whether he will keep it.

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He is lobbying Israel not to launch on attack on Iran that could set the Middle East on fire and pull the United States into another war. He is struggling to get world powers to unite on halting a massacre in Syria. He is on the defensive about staying in Afghanistan after a U.S. soldier allegedly went on a killing spree against civilians.

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And back home, where the economy is king, everyone is talking about the price of gasoline. Which, as Obama can’t say enough, no one can control right now.

The Republican presidential candidates don’t have to worry as much about all this because they don’t have the responsibility of governing – a luxury Obama likes to note, although he enjoyed the same when he was the challenger. The Republicans, though, are being drawn into events beyond their preferred message of the day.

For Obama, whose re-election bid looks rosier with every good month of job creation, the political risk in the least is that he gets knocked off message. That happened Monday when Obama and the White House spent a lot of effort trying to focus on energy, but the dominant news was the horrific rampage in Afghanistan.

The bigger worry for Obama is that all the outside events conspire to sour the public mood, give people more to worry about and create an opening for Republicans to challenge his leadership. Just because presidents may not be able to control problems does not mean they don’t get blamed for them.

“There are so many of them now, and dire ones,” said Barbara Perry, a scholar of the American presidency at the University of Virginia’s Miller Center.

“People may not care much about what Israel is doing, or even what Iran is doing, but given American dependence on Mideast oil, that has a direct impact on the pocketbook. Do these things inevitably have an impact on the campaign? Absolutely, because they will be the questions put to the presidential candidates.”

As one example, the price at the pump carries political risk for Obama, who is taking a pounding over the issue in the polls.

The average price for a gallon of gasoline is now about $3.80, the highest ever for this time of year. The White House says anyone suggesting a quick fix is lying to voters. Instead, Obama pushes energy exploration across the board and reminds folks he championed a payroll tax cut that kept money in their pockets.

That doesn’t offer as much election-year satisfaction for the typical commuter.

“The reality is that the oil prices and the gas prices that we pay here in the United States are set on the global market,” Interior Secretary Ken Salazar told reporters Monday. “We don’t set them, and we don’t control them. This president and this Congress can’t control those prices.”

Clearly. Obama has gotten used to this dynamic.

Good news has come before on the economy, only to be suffocated by outside events. Just a few months ago, Obama attributed a slowing economy to the Japanese tsunami, the Arab Spring and the European debt crisis (not to mention his ugly showdown with Congress over a near-government default).

Now sizable job growth has taken hold by the month, but that pattern is hardly assured through Election Day. Obama still has a wary eye on Europe’s economic stability, a slowdown in China could undermine the United States, and the turmoil surrounding Iran and Israel that could further jolt gas prices and, perhaps, lead to war.

It was a telling sign when Obama held his first news conference of the year last week and got not one question on the economy writ large. The focus was on the threat of a preemptive Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear sites. Now the attention is back on the Afghanistan war as Obama warns against a hasty retreat.

So it goes for presidents.

The big problems of the day are covered by the media, evaluated by pollsters and viewed within the election context.

Still, the general election campaign is expected to come down to which contender has better answers for people looking for a job, a better career, a way to keep their house, a sense of security.

“The three most important issues of the election are the economy, the economy and the economy,” Obama campaign adviser Robert Gibbs said.

Indeed, an Associated Press-GfK poll of issues last month found 91 percent of people said the economy was highly important to them. Obama’s team says the choice for voters is about restoring American security for all or going back to a free-for-all approach that led to the crisis. Republicans say he’s failed to lead.

The White House isn’t out to make this election about foreign policy, but Gibbs said “I don’t think it hurts” if the conversation turns that way.

Obama has a story to tell on the killing of Osama bin Laden, the ending of the war in Iraq, the squeezing of Iran through sanctions.

The direction of the war in Afghanistan has been on that list too. But now it’s a question, and Obama has to answer.

Afghanistan is raging with anti-Americanism after U.S. troops burned Qurans last month and, over the weekend, a soldier allegedly killed 16 Afghan civilians and burned many of the bodies.

Obama was questioned about the horrific incident by television reporters from around the nation. They had been invited to the White House to talk about energy, but they pushed him on when the U.S. will be getting out of Afghanistan too. Obama said the United States must not rush to the exits.

So the timetable remains: the end of 2014, at the latest, for Americans to get out of a combat role in Afghanistan.

And this one: a little under nine months left for any issue in the world to rock Obama’s re-election bid.

SEE ALSO: Why Mitt Can’t Wrap It Up

Super Tuesday was the day that the Republican Party was supposed to celebrate an end to the back-and-forth that has undermined its ability to prepare for the seemingly impossible task of defeating President Barack Obama.

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But that just didn’t happen last night.

Although Mitt Romney walked away as the strongest Republican in the field, the fact is that his opponents simply aren’t going anywhere: After winning three states, Rick Santorum, had at least another thousand reasons to stay in the race.

Romney has gone deep into his bankroll to defeat Santorum, outspending him 4 to 1. His well-oiled political machine seems as powerful as the Obama Administration itself, but he only defeated Santorum in Ohio by a measly one percentage point. So although Romney clearly walked away with more delegates than his competitors, he ended up looking like a sports team that spends all the money in the world to barely win half their games.

Southerners, super conservatives, and working class voters don’t like Mitt Romney. He has a hard time appealing to those who think that education or open-mindedness is some kind of liability.  This perception of leading Republicans has pushed the Republican Party to a place where it is becoming dangerously out of touch with the rest of America. Everyone knows that Romney is going to eventually get the nomination, but most Americans don’t have a clue about when that is expected to happen.

So until the Republicans get it together, President Obama is going to continue to prepare for political war.  When the last man standing arrives to the general election bloody and bruised, President Obama will simply beat him over the head with a sledge hammer and declare himself the victor.  Yes, this will be another example of how “keepin it real, radical, and racist” has simply gone wrong.

Dr. Boyce Watkins is a Professor at Syracuse University and founder of the Your Black World Coalition. To have Dr. Boyce commentary delivered to your email, please click here.

Romney narrowly won in pivotal Ohio, seized a home-state victory in Massachusetts, triumphed in Idaho, Vermont and Alaska, and won easily in Virginia – where neither Santorum nor Newt Gingrich was on the ballot.

Romney was forced to share the attention with Santorum, who won contests in Oklahoma, Tennessee and North Dakota.

“This was a big night tonight,” Santorum said. “We have won in the West, the Midwest and the South, and we’re ready to win across this country.”

The results padded Romney’s delegate lead in the nomination fight, but they also refreshed questions about his appeal to conservatives in some of the most Republican states in the nation. The best-funded and best-organized of the four Republican candidates, Romney vowed to press on.

“Tomorrow, we wake up and we start again,” he told supporters. “And the next day, we’ll do the same. And so we’ll go, day by day, step by step, door by door, heart to heart.”

The man they are angling to face in the general election chose the busiest day of the GOP race to speak from the presidential bully pulpit, where he dismissed the Republicans’ almost constant criticism of his administration.

“Those folks don’t have a lot of responsibilities,” President Barack Obama said during a White House news conference earlier in the day. “They’re not commander in chief.”

Gingrich won his home state of Georgia, his first victory since he captured the South Carolina primary on Jan. 21. The former House speaker said it would propel him on yet another comeback,

Texas Rep. Ron Paul, still in search of his first victory of the nomination battle, had pinned his hopes on winning Idaho and Alaska but fell short in both.

Ohio was the marquee matchup, and for good reason. No Republican has won the presidency without carrying the state in the general election. It was a second industrial-state showdown in as many weeks between Romney and Santorum and drew the most campaigning and television advertisements of the 10 Super Tuesday states.

Romney trailed much of the night but rallied near midnight. With 99 percent of the precincts reporting, he had 38 percent to Santorum’s 37 percent, an uncomfortably close margin for a candidate who had spent nearly four times as much money as his rival in the state.

Romney spent $1.5 million in television advertisements and Restore Our Future, a super PAC that supports him, spent an additional $2.3 million. Santorum and Red, White and Blue, a super PAC that supports him, countered with about $1 million combined, according to information on file with the Federal Election Commission.

There were primaries in Virginia, Vermont, Ohio, Massachusetts, Georgia, Tennessee and Oklahoma. Caucuses in North Dakota, Idaho and Alaska rounded out the contests. In all, 419 delegates were at stake across the 10 states. Romney picked up at least 212 delegates during the night; Santorum got 84, Gingrich 72 and Paul at least 22.

That gave the former Massachusetts governor 415, more than all his rivals combined. Santorum was second with 176 delegates, Gingrich had 105 and Paul had 47. It takes 1,144 delegates to win the nomination at the Republican National Convention in Tampa, Fla., this summer.

In interviews across all of the primary states, Republicans said the economy was the top issue and a candidate’s ability to defeat Obama was what mattered most as they cast their votes.

Ohio Republicans were sharply divided, according to the popular vote and interviews with voters as they left polling places. Santorum triumphed over Romney among Ohioans with incomes under $100,000, while Romney won among those with six-figure incomes and up. Romney won among working women; Santorum won among women who do not work.

Santorum also was preferred by the half of the electorate that is born-again, while Romney was the favorite among those who were not.

The race moves to contests in Kansas, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, Alabama, Hawaii, Mississippi and Missouri. Voting in Puerto Rico, Illinois and Louisiana rounds out the nomination schedule for March.

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