By — Domenico Montanaro Domenico Montanaro By — Simone Pathe Simone Pathe By — Rachel Wellford Rachel Wellford Leave your feedback Share Copy URL https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/ebola-final-stretch-campaigning-fan-gate Email Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Pinterest Tumblr Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Ebola, final-stretch campaigning, and “fan-gate” Politics Oct 17, 2014 9:25 AM EDT Today in the Morning Line: Obama opens door to Ebola czar In for a wild last two weeks of the campaign Stay cool, man, especially when you’re in Florida Here comes the czar? Ebola, final-stretch campaigning, and “fan-gate.” It was all part of another wild week in politics. President Obama on Thursday opened the door to appointing an “Ebola Czar,” as “anxiety grew over the air travel of an infected nurse,” the New York Times notes. “Schools closed in two states, hospitals and airlines kept employees home from work, and Americans debated how much they should worry about a disease that has captured national attention but has so far infected only three people here.” The president also said he has no “philosophical objection” to shutting down flights to and from West Africa, but he isn’t calling for that now. Check out the Times photo (on the story linked above) of the protester in front of the White House in full Hazmat suit, calling on the president to “Stop the Flights.” #stoptheflights has become a thing now as well on Twitter. A Reuters/Ipsos poll showed 80 percent of Americans concerned about the Ebola outbreak, so much that almost half (45 percent) are avoiding international air travel and people who had recently traveled to Africa (47 percent), as well as washing their hands more (57 percent). The final stretch: Candidates are in final-stretch mode with LOTS of debates. There’s another one tonight in the Wisconsin governor’s race between incumbent Republican Gov. Scott Walker and Democrat Mary Burke that we are livestreaming on our website here. One of the stand-out moments from a debate this week was Kentucky Democrat Alison Lundergan Grimes, who is in a tough spot in a state that went overwhelmingly for Mitt Romney, refusing to say who she voted for in the 2012 presidential election. That capped off a bad week of PR for Grimes, running against Mitch McConnell, the man who would be majority leader. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee confirmed it hadn’t spent any money in a month for Grimes and wasn’t going to do so through Election Day. VoteVets is up with a $440,000 ad buy today for her. Searching for clarity: With two-and-a-half weeks to go, it’s not at all clear how Election Night will shake out at this point. A Republican majority is maybe a good bet given their strength in Colorado and Iowa right now. But then there are the Kansas and South Dakota wild card and Democrats making strong push in Georgia, having opened, as promised, the “Mitt Romney Playbook” on David Perdue, who has not handled it adeptly. As our friend Reid Wilson at the Washington Post in his “Read In” morning note writes this morning, “If we’d told you six months ago that at this point Democrats would be contesting Senate races in Georgia, South Dakota and Kansas, the logical conclusion would have been that a Democratic wave had developed. If we’d said Republicans would be leading public polls in Iowa and Colorado — and not just one survey but a significant number of them — the logical conclusion would be that a Republican wave is sweeping back the Senate. Today, both premises are true, but neither logical conclusion has been proven.” Still, if Iowa, Colorado, and North Carolina are Democrats’ “firewall” states, and they’re losing in two of them, that’s a bad sign for Democrats. Make sure to tune in tonight to NewsHour for Mark Shields’ and Michael Gerson’s take on it all. Airing it out: And finally, there is the bizarre Florida governor’s race. It may be the most expensive race in the country, but the only thing most people will remember about this race is “the fan.” Incumbent Gov. Rick Scott, R, protested the first five minutes of his debate Wednesday night with former Gov. Charlie Crist, D, because Crist had a plugged-in black floor fan on stage. After booing from the crowd, Scott eventually took the stage. Neither candidate looked good in the situation. Scott looked like he wasn’t focused on the important things, and Crist’s fan became a meme. Buzzfeed listed 25 photos spotting the fan with Crist in public campaign and TV interview appearances. The fan even has its own Twitter handle. So will “fan-gate” make a difference with Florida voters? Hard to say in a state that has “Florida Man.” Daily Presidential Trivia: On this day in 1978, President Jimmy Carter officially restored the full citizenship rights of former Confederate president Jefferson Davis. What job did Davis hold before becoming the president of the Confederacy? Be the first to tweet us the correct answer using #PoliticsTrivia and you’ll get a Morning Line shout-out. Congratulations to anjaroo (@thatdudeanjaroo) for guessing Thursday’s trivia: Who was the lone Republican senator to vote against the congressional resolution that authorized war against Iraq? The answer was: Sen. Lincoln Chafee. LINE ITEMS Retiring Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, has $2.4 million left in his campaign account and he’s planning to give it to charity, instead of to his potential successor Rep. Bruce Braley. With a new NRSC campaign team and outside money, things are looking up for Sen. Pat Roberts in Kansas, Roll Call’s Alexis Levinson reports. The Georgia Senate race was not supposed to be close, but the recent focus on David Perdue’s business record has closed the gap between Perdue and Democrat Michelle Nunn. Even national Republicans have recently acknowledged that Nunn and Perdue are in a tight race. Arkansas tops the list of combined Senate and state race ad spending. Campaigns and political groups are spending $10.14 per person in Arkansas. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee attacks Iowa Republican Senate candidate Joni Ernst on her abortion stance in a new ad featuring a nurse who has worked on sexual assault cases. Republican Thom Tillis claims North Carolina Sen. Kay Hagan personally benefited from the 2009 stimulus in a new statewide ad. Headlining a Democratic fundraiser for New Hampshire’s all-female delegation Thursday, Bill Clinton said,“I’m really quite comfortable being here to campaign for women and taking orders. It’s like being home.” Clinton will campaign for another Democratic woman, Sen. Mary Landrieu, Monday — the day before early voting begins in Louisiana. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is cutting planned spending for Democrat Seth Moulton in Massachusetts’ 6th Congressional District. Moulton defeated Rep. John Tierney in the September primary and faces moderate Richard Tisei, one of two openly gay Republicans running for Congress this year. Meanwhile, two conservative outside groups are announcing a $3 million investment in seven House races Friday, including in deep blue districts. GOP presidential hopefuls are embracing their wives’ influence more publicly. Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach won by 22 points in 2010, but having pushed the state far to the right, as one of the nation’s most conservative voices on voter ID laws, he’s now in a much tougher re-election fight. FBI Director James Comey says Google and Apple “have gone too far” with the development of fully encrypted phones. Georgia Rep. John Barrow’s latest ad is a must watch. Hunter Biden, the vice president’s youngest son, has been discharged from the Navy Reserve after testing positive for cocaine. “I hope to spend a lot more time on the Harley,” Montana Sen. John Walsh told Yahoo’s Chris Moody about his post-Senate plans. Keep an eye on the Rundown blog for breaking news throughout the day, our home page for show segments, and follow @NewsHour for the latest. TOP TWEETS Meet Gordon Kamara, incredibly brave man driving an ambulance in Liberia. @bcsolomon reports. http://t.co/PBTXJl5VOn pic.twitter.com/fO4FLEn4ug — Lydia Polgreen (@lpolgreen) October 16, 2014 Aging plane used to ferry Secretary of State John Kerry breaks down again, forcing him to fly commercial: http://t.co/tYz6dRfh4j — The Associated Press (@AP) October 16, 2014 Stock bargain hunters pounce on panic. "We’re doing way more buying than we have all year." http://t.co/b3YwQ7syJI pic.twitter.com/YRo4fRiX7D — WSJ Markets (@WSJmarkets) October 16, 2014 A Young Jim Henson Working On His First 'Kermit' Puppet Prototype, 1954 pic.twitter.com/l5IgJS7Px6 — Historical Pics (@HistoricalPics) October 16, 2014 A ban on cruise ships is an overreaction I can get behind. — Matt Yglesias (@mattyglesias) October 17, 2014 For more political coverage, visit our politics page. Sign up here to receive the Morning Line in your inbox every morning. Questions or comments? Email Domenico Montanaro at dmontanaro-at-newshour-dot-org or Rachel Wellford at rwellford-at-newshour-dot-org. Follow the politics team on Twitter: Follow @DomenicoPBS Follow @elizsummers Follow @rachelwellford Follow @sfpathe We're not going anywhere. Stand up for truly independent, trusted news that you can count on! Donate now By — Domenico Montanaro Domenico Montanaro By — Simone Pathe Simone Pathe @sfpathe By — Rachel Wellford Rachel Wellford Rachel Wellford is a general assignment producer for PBS NewsHour. @rachelwellford
Today in the Morning Line: Obama opens door to Ebola czar In for a wild last two weeks of the campaign Stay cool, man, especially when you’re in Florida Here comes the czar? Ebola, final-stretch campaigning, and “fan-gate.” It was all part of another wild week in politics. President Obama on Thursday opened the door to appointing an “Ebola Czar,” as “anxiety grew over the air travel of an infected nurse,” the New York Times notes. “Schools closed in two states, hospitals and airlines kept employees home from work, and Americans debated how much they should worry about a disease that has captured national attention but has so far infected only three people here.” The president also said he has no “philosophical objection” to shutting down flights to and from West Africa, but he isn’t calling for that now. Check out the Times photo (on the story linked above) of the protester in front of the White House in full Hazmat suit, calling on the president to “Stop the Flights.” #stoptheflights has become a thing now as well on Twitter. A Reuters/Ipsos poll showed 80 percent of Americans concerned about the Ebola outbreak, so much that almost half (45 percent) are avoiding international air travel and people who had recently traveled to Africa (47 percent), as well as washing their hands more (57 percent). The final stretch: Candidates are in final-stretch mode with LOTS of debates. There’s another one tonight in the Wisconsin governor’s race between incumbent Republican Gov. Scott Walker and Democrat Mary Burke that we are livestreaming on our website here. One of the stand-out moments from a debate this week was Kentucky Democrat Alison Lundergan Grimes, who is in a tough spot in a state that went overwhelmingly for Mitt Romney, refusing to say who she voted for in the 2012 presidential election. That capped off a bad week of PR for Grimes, running against Mitch McConnell, the man who would be majority leader. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee confirmed it hadn’t spent any money in a month for Grimes and wasn’t going to do so through Election Day. VoteVets is up with a $440,000 ad buy today for her. Searching for clarity: With two-and-a-half weeks to go, it’s not at all clear how Election Night will shake out at this point. A Republican majority is maybe a good bet given their strength in Colorado and Iowa right now. But then there are the Kansas and South Dakota wild card and Democrats making strong push in Georgia, having opened, as promised, the “Mitt Romney Playbook” on David Perdue, who has not handled it adeptly. As our friend Reid Wilson at the Washington Post in his “Read In” morning note writes this morning, “If we’d told you six months ago that at this point Democrats would be contesting Senate races in Georgia, South Dakota and Kansas, the logical conclusion would have been that a Democratic wave had developed. If we’d said Republicans would be leading public polls in Iowa and Colorado — and not just one survey but a significant number of them — the logical conclusion would be that a Republican wave is sweeping back the Senate. Today, both premises are true, but neither logical conclusion has been proven.” Still, if Iowa, Colorado, and North Carolina are Democrats’ “firewall” states, and they’re losing in two of them, that’s a bad sign for Democrats. Make sure to tune in tonight to NewsHour for Mark Shields’ and Michael Gerson’s take on it all. Airing it out: And finally, there is the bizarre Florida governor’s race. It may be the most expensive race in the country, but the only thing most people will remember about this race is “the fan.” Incumbent Gov. Rick Scott, R, protested the first five minutes of his debate Wednesday night with former Gov. Charlie Crist, D, because Crist had a plugged-in black floor fan on stage. After booing from the crowd, Scott eventually took the stage. Neither candidate looked good in the situation. Scott looked like he wasn’t focused on the important things, and Crist’s fan became a meme. Buzzfeed listed 25 photos spotting the fan with Crist in public campaign and TV interview appearances. The fan even has its own Twitter handle. So will “fan-gate” make a difference with Florida voters? Hard to say in a state that has “Florida Man.” Daily Presidential Trivia: On this day in 1978, President Jimmy Carter officially restored the full citizenship rights of former Confederate president Jefferson Davis. What job did Davis hold before becoming the president of the Confederacy? Be the first to tweet us the correct answer using #PoliticsTrivia and you’ll get a Morning Line shout-out. Congratulations to anjaroo (@thatdudeanjaroo) for guessing Thursday’s trivia: Who was the lone Republican senator to vote against the congressional resolution that authorized war against Iraq? The answer was: Sen. Lincoln Chafee. LINE ITEMS Retiring Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, has $2.4 million left in his campaign account and he’s planning to give it to charity, instead of to his potential successor Rep. Bruce Braley. With a new NRSC campaign team and outside money, things are looking up for Sen. Pat Roberts in Kansas, Roll Call’s Alexis Levinson reports. The Georgia Senate race was not supposed to be close, but the recent focus on David Perdue’s business record has closed the gap between Perdue and Democrat Michelle Nunn. Even national Republicans have recently acknowledged that Nunn and Perdue are in a tight race. Arkansas tops the list of combined Senate and state race ad spending. Campaigns and political groups are spending $10.14 per person in Arkansas. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee attacks Iowa Republican Senate candidate Joni Ernst on her abortion stance in a new ad featuring a nurse who has worked on sexual assault cases. Republican Thom Tillis claims North Carolina Sen. Kay Hagan personally benefited from the 2009 stimulus in a new statewide ad. Headlining a Democratic fundraiser for New Hampshire’s all-female delegation Thursday, Bill Clinton said,“I’m really quite comfortable being here to campaign for women and taking orders. It’s like being home.” Clinton will campaign for another Democratic woman, Sen. Mary Landrieu, Monday — the day before early voting begins in Louisiana. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is cutting planned spending for Democrat Seth Moulton in Massachusetts’ 6th Congressional District. Moulton defeated Rep. John Tierney in the September primary and faces moderate Richard Tisei, one of two openly gay Republicans running for Congress this year. Meanwhile, two conservative outside groups are announcing a $3 million investment in seven House races Friday, including in deep blue districts. GOP presidential hopefuls are embracing their wives’ influence more publicly. Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach won by 22 points in 2010, but having pushed the state far to the right, as one of the nation’s most conservative voices on voter ID laws, he’s now in a much tougher re-election fight. FBI Director James Comey says Google and Apple “have gone too far” with the development of fully encrypted phones. Georgia Rep. John Barrow’s latest ad is a must watch. Hunter Biden, the vice president’s youngest son, has been discharged from the Navy Reserve after testing positive for cocaine. “I hope to spend a lot more time on the Harley,” Montana Sen. John Walsh told Yahoo’s Chris Moody about his post-Senate plans. Keep an eye on the Rundown blog for breaking news throughout the day, our home page for show segments, and follow @NewsHour for the latest. TOP TWEETS Meet Gordon Kamara, incredibly brave man driving an ambulance in Liberia. @bcsolomon reports. http://t.co/PBTXJl5VOn pic.twitter.com/fO4FLEn4ug — Lydia Polgreen (@lpolgreen) October 16, 2014 Aging plane used to ferry Secretary of State John Kerry breaks down again, forcing him to fly commercial: http://t.co/tYz6dRfh4j — The Associated Press (@AP) October 16, 2014 Stock bargain hunters pounce on panic. "We’re doing way more buying than we have all year." http://t.co/b3YwQ7syJI pic.twitter.com/YRo4fRiX7D — WSJ Markets (@WSJmarkets) October 16, 2014 A Young Jim Henson Working On His First 'Kermit' Puppet Prototype, 1954 pic.twitter.com/l5IgJS7Px6 — Historical Pics (@HistoricalPics) October 16, 2014 A ban on cruise ships is an overreaction I can get behind. — Matt Yglesias (@mattyglesias) October 17, 2014 For more political coverage, visit our politics page. Sign up here to receive the Morning Line in your inbox every morning. Questions or comments? Email Domenico Montanaro at dmontanaro-at-newshour-dot-org or Rachel Wellford at rwellford-at-newshour-dot-org. Follow the politics team on Twitter: Follow @DomenicoPBS Follow @elizsummers Follow @rachelwellford Follow @sfpathe We're not going anywhere. Stand up for truly independent, trusted news that you can count on! Donate now