Jay Carney at a White House press briefing in March. (Photo: Getty)

Yesterday, President Obama and his team had an 18-and-a-half hour day that included stops in Colorado and California for a commencement speech at the Air Force Academy and several fundraisers. Today, the president headed to Iowa and White House Press Secretary Jay Carney was clearly feeling the effects of the grueling schedule.

En route to Iowa, Mr. Carney held a brief mid-air press gaggle on board Air Force One. He was less than animated when a reporter asked him for details of tonight's campaign rally.

"I’m sure it will be filled with excitement and energy and enthusiasm," Mr. Carney said. "But I don’t have anything else."

The reporter teased Mr. Carney about his rather sleepy answer.

"As much excitement and energy as that answer is?" they asked eliciting laughter from Mr. Carney and the other reporters on the plane.

Mr. Carney admitted he wasn't in top form.

"I don’t know about you guys, but the altitude yesterday or whatever--I am in--and obviously the long day and lack of adequate sleep, but I'm dragging a little bit," he said.

The reporter offered a theory to explain Mr. Carney's malaise.

"Your espresso machine, you're missing it," they said.

Mr. Carney conceded he was in need of a caffeine fix.

"I wish I had that thing this morning," he said. "The coffee in the hotel did not make the grade."

Mitt Romney on the campaign trail. (Photo: Getty)

In recent weeks, the Obama campaign has launched a relentless attack on Mitt Romney for his career with Bain Capital, the private equity firm he co-founded in 1984. President Barack Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and their campaign spokespeople have characterized Bain as a parasitic company that makes money through taking over and bankrupting other businesses. By targeting Bain Capital, the Obama campaign isn't just attacking Mr. Romney's past, they're also demonizing a company that has consistently contributed to Mr. Romney's campaign war chest. According to federal campaign finance reports, which include donations made up until the end of last month, Mr. Romney and the PACs supporting his campaign have received a total of $1,800,500 million in contributions from Bain employees.

During this presidential election cycle, Mr. Romney's campaign has received a total of $119,500 in contributions from Bain Capital staffers. Federal campaign finance regulations cap donations to presidential candidates at $2,500 per person. The main Super PAC supporting Mr. Romney, Restore Our Future Inc., has received $1,681,000 from five different Bain Capital executives during this election. Super PAC's, which were made legal through the 2010 Citizens United Supreme Court ruling and may accept donations of unlimited size. Free And Strong America, which is a political action committee that's backing Mr. Romney, has received $56,000 in donations from Bain Capital employees so far in this election cycle. Unlike Super PACs, standard issue PACs like Free And Strong America cannot except donations of over $5,000 per person.

Mr. Romney also received financial support from Bain Capital employees during the 2008 election. In that campaign, Mr. Romney and Free And Strong America received a total of $145,150 from Bain Capital staffers. Mr. Romney's campaign in that race got $105,150 from Bain employees and Free And Strong America received $56,000. Super PACs were not yet legal in 2008 and Mr. Romney didn't make it out of the primaries, so his total contributions from Bain for that race are far less than the seven figure total he managed to pull in from during this year's campaign.

Though President Obama has gone on the attack against Bain Capital, he has also received contributions from employees at the company, albeit far less than Mr. Romney. So far, in this election cycle, President Obama's campaign has received $7,500 from three Bain Capital executives. In 2008, President Obama brought in $55,720 from Bain.

The scene at today's press conference.

Earlier this afternoon, Charles Barron held what may have been the second press event of his congressional campaign to embrace the endorsement of DC 37, the largest public employees union in the city. And Mr. Barron could not have been more different today in terms of tone and messaging than in the only other public campaign event we're aware of: his campaign launch last November.

"I don't care what they say, I'm still not saluting the flag!" he buoyantly exclaimed back then for what he'd do when in office. "I'm not going to be afraid -- y'all can write this one down, y'all going to like this one -- I'm not going to be afraid speak out against Israel and what they're doing to the Palestinian people. We're going to tell it like it is!"

"They told me when I get up here, don't say nothing about foreign policy Charles, because they're going to use it against you," he continued. "Use it! Because we also going to stand up for Robert Mugabe, who's an African hero. Taking land back from white people who stole the land from us in the first place!"

At today's event, however, he kept his messaging much more subdued, with the sort of rhetoric you'd hear from a lot of New York City Democrats at labor rallies. Instead of calling members of the Congressional Black Caucus "political punks" unafraid to stand up to "right-wing racist conservatives," the most controversial thing Mr. Barron said today was against the "crooks on Wall Street." He proceeded to call for less money to be spent on wars so that more money can be sent on schools and seniors.

"I've been all throughout my district and the people who are interested in things, they're talking about jobs, they're talking about quality education, they're talking about health care," he told us when we inquired about the shift in tone from his campaign launch. "So those are the things people are interested in and I'm going to talk about those things."

"The media is probably more interested in foreign policy than the people in the districts that we will be representing," he added.

Watch today's event below and his campaign launch beneath that:

According to the president, Mr. Romney,  "Gave her an answer right out of an economic textbook. "He said, 'Our productivity equals our income.' And the notion was that somehow the reason people can't pay their bills is because they're not working hard enough. If they got more productive, suddenly their incomes would go up."

Asked about that remark during a friendly appearance on "Fox and Friends," this morning, Mr. Romney chuckled and said, "I am afraid he doesn't understand what productivity means."

As he would tell, the Massachusetts governor was referring to productivity in an economic sense--the notion that how much a worker works can be measured by how much he makes of a given product in a given period of time, and how much that product sells for.

"Gosh, this is quite a revelation," Mr. Romney continued. "If you have the President of the United States that doesn’t understand that productivity is a measure of output per person in  the nation as a whole and that it's driven by such things as the level of automation in the society, the extent  to which government encourages output and productivity."

Mr. Romney then shifted to say that nobody questions how hard Americans works, noting that they work harder than Europeans and "even" the Japanese.

"We are a hard working people," he added.

Mr. Romney was then asked about comments Rush Limbaugh made that Mr. Obama is planning to "run against capitalism."

Mr. Romney said he agreed.

"It sounds like that is what he is doing. No question. He is attacking capitalism. In part it's because I think he doesn't understand how the free economy works. He has never had a job in the free economy, neither has Vice-President  Biden."

You can watch the full video here.

Mark Zuckerberg (Photo: Facebook)

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg gave a $100 million grant to the public school system in 2010. Now, according to CBS News, officials are considering using some of that cash on buyouts to get rid of poorly performing teachers. 

Newark's public schools are currently dealing with a financial crisis and the city estimates the school system currently has 300 more teachers than it needs because the number of students has declined.

Superintendent Cami Anderson doesn't want to lay off teachers because tenure rules would require her to fire the least senior staff rather than the poorest performers. Mayor Cory Booker described the situation on Friday at a meeting of the Education Writers Association in Philadelphia.

"If we could fire the 300 or 400 lowest-performing teachers, she wouldn't have a financial crisis," Mr. Booker said of Ms. Anderson's situation. "But her crisis right now is based on the fact that she can't get rid of teachers that way."

As of this writing, neither Mr. Zuckerberg or Mr. Booker have responded to requests for comment on this story.

"Republicans revolted. Some Democrats wavered," the headline reads. "NYDIA VELÁZQUEZ STOOD STRONG."

The other things on the front page of the mailer are a New York Times headline on the health care legislation passing and a statement declaring, "THE REST IS HISTORY."

The rest of the ad is fairly simple and direct as well, emphasizing the positive attributes of the bill and showing a large photo of Ms. Velázquez with President Barack Obama, clearly a sign that she wouldn't mind being associated with the president's brand.

View below:

President Obama (Photo: Getty)

A few hours after the release of Mitt Romney's latest commerical this morning, Obama campaign spokeswoman Lis Smith fired back with a "fact check" of the ad. In her statement, Ms. Smith describes Mr. Romney's commercial as full of "empty promises."

"Contrary the claims made in his latest ad, on Day One, Mitt Romney would blow a hole in the deficit with $5 trillion worth of budget-busting tax cuts weighted towards millionaires and billionaires. And we know Mitt Romney can’t be trusted to stand up to China because in 2010 he criticized President Obama for acting to protect the American tire industry, calling it 'decidedly bad for the nation and our workers.’ If Mitt Romney had had his way, more than one thousand American workers’ jobs would have been on the chopping block," Ms. Smith said.

Ms. Smith also listed what she sees as President Barack Obama's accomplishments in the areas Mr. Romney claims he would improve.

"President Obama has proposed a balanced plan to reduce the deficit by more than $4 trillion, taken unprecedented action to protect American products and workers from unfair Chinese trade practices, and initiated an overhaul of the regulatory system that cuts red tape and will save businesses $10 billion over the next five years," said Ms. Smith.

Ms. Smith concluded her statement by reiterating what has become one of the main messages of the Obama campaign--that Mr. Romney's economic plans would be a return to the policies that caused the financial crisis.

"We can’t afford to go back to the same policies that crashed our economy and devastated the middle class in the first place," she said. "America can’t afford Romney Economics."

The scene from yesterday's candidate forum.

"Is the empty seat for the other person who's running?" an audience member asked the moderator before the candidates running against Congressman Charlie Rangel introduced themselves in Washington Heights last evening.

"Since you asked it now, I'm happy to tell you now," the moderator responded. "Hudson Heights has called Congressman Rangel's office repeatedly and we were told a few days ago, and again today, that the congressman would be unable to be here."

Mr. Rangel himself contested this explanation, insisting that he had never been invited, but regardless, the four challengers to Mr. Rangel in this year's Democratic primary discussed federal policy issues without the sitting incumbent they are hoping to unseat.

And, as they were all progressive Democrats, there were very few disagreements that emerged. One of the candidates, Clyde Williams, critiqued State Senator Adriano Espaillat's explanation for rising gas prices, insisting that larger geopolitical concerns were at fault in addition to regulatory issues. Mr. Williams also disputed Mr. Espaillat's argument that the Northern Manhattan Empowerment Zone lacked significant resources to spend in the community.

Another candidate, Craig Schley, had even harsher criticism for Mr. Espaillat, accusing him of voting against rent regulations. Mr. Espaillat contended that he actually voted the complete opposite and his spokesman pointed us to an article about the candidate's strident efforts supporting rent regulations.

The only audience member to engage the candidates in a critical fashion questioned a fourth candidate, Joyce Johnson, over her stated opposition to overregulating the financial industry. The individual accused Ms. Johnson of engaging in "meaningless platitudes" on the issue, to which Ms. Johnson clarified she definitely still supported additional regulations over the status quo.

The most notable disagreement of the night, oddly enough, might have been an intentionally lighthearted question about whether pennies and nickles should be eliminated. Mr. Williams immediately supported the concept while Ms. Johnson and Mr. Espaillat opposed it.

Mr. Schley had the most creative solution to the problem, asking, "Why don't we just make a two-headed coin, right?"

Watch these moments, in addition to the candidates' closing statements below:

Bill Clinton (Photo: Getty)

Former President Bill Clinton is participating in an event with the Obama campaign where donors are entered in a chance to meet with him and President Barack Obama in New York. Mr. Clinton sent an email to Obama supporters this morning encouraging them to pay up for a chance to spend the night with the pair of presidents and explaining why he thinks Mitt Romney must be defeated.

"If our opponent succeeds, so much of what we've fought so hard for will be rolled back. Health care reform--which many presidents, including me, tried to pass and couldn't--will be gone. Same goes for the opportunity for millions more Americans to afford to go to college, and a growing economy that works for middle-class families," he wrote. "Our opponent is actually advertising a more extreme version of the policies that got us in trouble in the first place: policies that will leave us with more debt, weaker regulations on risky investments, and fewer jobs."

Mr. Clinton also criticized the Super PAC spending in the race.

"We're facing a tidal wave of anonymous, unlimited spending. The other side has pledged to throw more than 1 billion dollars into tearing down our president," he said.

Read Mr. Clinton's entire email below.

"I've been in President Obama's shoes before -- less than six months to go before an election to let you finish what you started. It was tough enough back then, but this election is going to be tougher.

We're facing a tidal wave of anonymous, unlimited spending. The other side has pledged to throw more than 1 billion dollars into tearing down our president.

It's unprecedented.

Fortunately, so is the grassroots organization you're building.

Pitch in what you can today to strengthen the campaign -- and you'll be automatically entered to join me and President Obama in New York City, with the campaign covering transportation and accommodations.

If our opponent succeeds, so much of what we've fought so hard for will be rolled back. Health care reform -- which many presidents, including me, tried to pass and couldn't -- will be gone. Same goes for the opportunity for millions more Americans to afford to go to college, and a growing economy that works for middle-class families.

Our opponent is actually advertising a more extreme version of the policies that got us in trouble in the first place: policies that will leave us with more debt, weaker regulations on risky investments, and fewer jobs.

All of that's at stake between now and November, but here's why I'm feeling good about our chances: I know people like you have the President's back.

And I can't wait to meet you. I hope you'll give it a shot:

https://donate.barackobama.com/Presidents

Thanks, and good luck,

Bill Clinton"

"The Super Jewish Candidate for The Super Jewish District," the ad declares, with all of its subsequent points in Yiddish.

With significant help from Jacob Kornbluh, here's my rather rough impression of what the Yiddish text reads:

1. The first Haredi candidate with decades of experience in business and real estate.
2. The first candidate that has his own money, and is not looking for a political career, but rather to help the community.
3. The first candidate with no political background.
4. The first candidate with no connections to big companies or organizations, who's looking to help each individual.
5. The first candidate who helped individuals, mosdos and organizations for over 30 years.
6. The first candidate that will lay out political, business and economic plans for how to help the community in these struggling times that will be both detailed and practical.
7. The candidate that will, with God's help, represent our interests, our housing, our businesses and our bread and butter.

 
Interestingly, the arguments here all seem aimed at the likely Democratic candidate, former City Councilman Simcha Felder, rather than Mr. Caller's possible primary opponent, David Storobin. Mr. Storobin, of course, is currently the leading candidate in a recount for a partially overlapping state senate district and may assume office sometime next month. As Mr. Storobin was a political neophyte who worked in the private sector until his most recent special election, he wouldn't seem to be the intended target for arguments against career politicians and the like.

And, although Mr. Felder declared his candidacy at a "Super Jewish Press Conference," he has since shown skepticism over the term, telling the Brooklyn Daily, “Calling it a majority Jewish district is correct, but a ‘super Jewish’ district is something for the comic books.”

Orthodox Pundit, who beat me to writing about the ad, has additional observations.