Beltway Confidential

But instead of reserving the digital network for one presidential candidate, the RNC plans to share it with any Republican running for any office anywhere in the country.

“We’re going to do something even harder than what [Obama] did. Replicating what they did isn’t that hard,” Barkett told the Washington Examiner.

He said he wants to have the technology ready for testing in the 2014 mid-term elections and fully operational by 2016.

The technology is part of the RNC’s efforts to upgrade its voter targeting and mobilization operations, an overhaul ordered by GOP Chairman Reince Priebus after the party’s disastrous showing in the 2012 elections.

Taking a page from Obama’s playbook, the GOP will abandon a voter targeting operation that relies on files that simply identify individual voters and their voting history. The new system will focus more broadly on people, even those who never voted, to identify likely voters, expand the universe of potential voters and provide a more accurate measure of the Republican Party’s strength.

The system is expected to mine relevant information about potential voters through social networks and weave that data into an accessible and regularly updated file.

Barkett’s system will include two innovations. One would collect information from television set-top boxes and show not only individual viewing habits but also whether the voter saw a specific political ad.

The second innovation would collect data from social networks about targeted demographic groups and allow a campaign to deliver customized digital ads to as few as a dozen or so voters.

– David M. Drucker, Senior Congressional Correspondent

OBAMA USES EXECUTIVE POWER TO TAKE NEW GUN-CONTROL STEPS

President Obama used his executive power to announce two minor steps aimed at limiting sales of powerful guns: He stopped the import of military surplus weapons and proposed to close a little-known loophole that allows felons to avoid background checks by registering guns to corporations.

Obama decided to add the executive actions to a list of 23 steps he pledged to take to reduce gun violence eight months after the mass killings at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Conn., and four months after Congress rejected the campaign for more gun control.

“Even as Congress fails to act on common-sense proposals, like expanding criminal background checks and making gun trafficking a federal crime, the president and vice president remain committed to using all the tools in their power to make progress to reducing gun violence,” White House spokesman Joshua Earnest said.

The action would end a government practice that allows military weapons, sold or donated by the U.S. to allies, to be reimported into the country. In the last eight years, the U.S. has reportedly allowed 250,000 of those guns to be reimported, but the new policy would allow only museums and a few other entities to reimport military-grade firearms.

The administration also proposed a federal rule designed to stop people who couldn’t pass a background check from trying to get around the law by registering certain guns to a corporation or trust. People associated with the corporations or other entities would be required to undergo the same type of background checks as all others who want to register guns.

– Susan Crabtree, White House Correspondent

DICK CHENEY TAPS OUT-OF-STATE CASH FOR DAUGHTER’S SENATE BID

Former Vice President Dick Cheney is mining Michigan for campaign cash to boost daughter Liz Cheney’s Wyoming Senate bid, leveraging relationships that date to the 1970s, when he served as President Gerald Ford’s chief of staff.

The two Cheneys are scheduled to headline a Grand Rapids, Mich., fundraiser on Sept. 17, according to GOP sources and information obtained by the Washington Examiner. The event, hosted by Michigan Republican heavyweights Peter Secchia and Rich DeVos, requests a $2,600 donation for a “roundtable” with the candidate and the former vice president, and $1,000 to attend a “luncheon.”

Ford, who died in 2006, was a Grand Rapids native and represented the area in Congress for a quarter century before being appointed vice president in 1973. Cheney served as Ford’s chief of staff from 1975 to 1977, after Ford assumed the presidency.

It is that connection to Michigan and the relationships Cheney has fostered over decades, sources say, that the former vice president has been using to raise money for his daughter, who is challenging Wyoming Sen. Mike Enzi in the 2014 GOP primary.

Not all Michigan Republicans are happy about it, with some grumbling that Cheney’s fundraising is putting at risk their ability to raise the cash needed to compete for an open Senate seat next year. Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., is retiring after six terms, and although the state leans Democratic, some Republicans believe the GOP has a chance to flip the seat if it can recruit a good candidate and raise enough money.

– David M. Drucker, Senior Congressional Correspondent

ECONOMIST ROBERT GORDON: US ECONOMY MAY BECOME MORE LIKE EUROPE

Highly regarded Northwestern University economist and doomsayer Robert Gordon warns in a new paper that the “U.S. economy may have become more like Europe,” with permanently higher unemployment that cannot be addressed with stimulus from the Federal Reserve.

Gordon, who made waves in 2012 for suggesting that the U.S. might be facing a long-term economic slowdown, argues in new study published by the National Bureau of Economic Research that it might not be possible for the Fed to lower the unemployment rate much further without raising inflation, thanks to a “structural shift in U. S. labor markets.”

Gordon estimates that the natural rate of unemployment has risen from 4.8 percent in 2006 to 6.5 percent today. That means that if unemployment falls below 6.5 percent, inflation will eventually start rising. Unemployment stands at 7.4 percent, having risen from under 5 percent before the recession began to 10 percent at its highest in 2010.

“This result is important news for the Fed,” Gordon writes, warning that “there may be less slack in the U. S. labor market than is generally assumed, and it may be unrealistic to maintain the widespread assumption that the unemployment rate can be pushed down to 5.0 percent without igniting an acceleration of inflation.”

– Joseph Lawler, Economics Writer

HHS WANTS OBAMACARE NAVIGATORS TO ‘SMILE’ WHILE PROMOTING NEW LAW

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius wants her new Obamacare “navigators” to remember to smile when promoting President Obama’s signature health care plan.

The 217-page instruction manual for navigators includes the following tips for dealing with customers:

“2.2.1 Smile – Maintain a Positive Demeanor

“This is the most simple and most powerful tip for consumer assistance (and most interpersonal interactions). Smile. Smiles are contagious; usually when you smile at somebody they will smile back at you.

“Do not pretend to smile, or produce a false smile; these are easy to spot and send the wrong messages. Relax, gain eye-contact, and smile naturally. This will help consumers to feel at ease and welcomed. You will come across as friendly and approachable, setting the scene for positive interaction.

“If you are talking to somebody on the telephone, you can still smile; your voice sounds different when you smile and are happy. Consumers are more likely to want to talk to a cheerful person with an enthusiastic personality and by smiling while you talk you can help to project this.”

– Charlie Spiering, Commentary Writer

LABOR SECRETARY TOM PEREZ: RAISING MINIMUM WAGE IS ‘MORAL AND ECONOMIC IMPERATIVE’

In a posting on the Labor Department’s website, newly appointed Secretary Tom Perez made the administration’s case for a minimum wage increase:

“We are fighting for an honest day’s pay for an honest day’s work. It is a moral and economic imperative that we raise the federal minimum wage. People who work full-time in America shouldn’t live in poverty.

“On Labor Day, we reflect on the men and women whose heads, hearts and hands have made ours the strongest economy the world has ever known. To meet the challenges ahead, we must draw inspiration from their stories. We must emulate their strength and resilience. We must summon their dignity and courage…”

– Sean Higgins, Senior Writer

AFL-CIO PRESIDENT DECLARES FOR YELLEN AS FED CHIEF

AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka has picked Janet Yellen over Larry Summers as labor’s choice to be the next Federal Reserve chairman, saying she is more focused on adding jobs than the inflation-watching Summers.

“History would indicate that she is for a much more balanced approach … than Larry,” said Trumka, weighing in on the heated race to replace outgoing Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke.

With unemployment staying high for years, the labor boss said that the nation needed to break a three-decade-long trend of hiring Fed chairmen who have ignored employment as they focused on keeping inflation down. It’s a trend started by former President Jimmy Carter, during sky-high inflation, when he appointed Paul Volcker in 1979.

Emphasizing that the nation’s largest union hasn’t officially declared for a candidate, Trumka repeatedly cited the “history” of Yellen bringing to the Federal Reserve a “balanced approach” including an equal focus on full employment and inflation while Summers hasn’t.

– Paul Bedard, Washington Secrets Columnist

THE 47 PERCENT IS NOW THE 43 PERCENT

The “47 percent” of Americans who Mitt Romney famously said during the 2012 presidential election paid no income tax and wouldn’t vote for him are now the 43 percent.

The share of Americans who pay no income taxes is falling, the Tax Policy Center reported Thursday. Because of an improving economy and expiring tax credits, the think tank estimates that only 43.3 percent did not pay federal income taxes in 2013, and that number is expect to continue to decline to 35 percent by the end of the decade.

Forty-seven percent became a politically significant number after the Tax Policy Center estimated that 47 percent of tax units had zero or negative tax liability in 2009. Many commentators interpreted the statistic as indicating that nearly half of Americans pay no taxes.

But Americans pay other taxes, such as Social Security and sales taxes, even if they don’t pay income taxes.

This spring, Romney acknowledged that the 47 percent remarks may have damaged his presidential prospects, telling Fox News’ Chris Wallace that “there’s no question that hurt and did real damage to my campaign.”

– Joseph Lawler, Economics Writer

FORMER NAACP HEAD CALLS JFK A ‘DO-NOTHING PRESIDENT’ FOR BLACKS

President John F. Kennedy, considered a friend of Martin Luther King Jr., was uninterested in and naive about civil rights, a weak leader whose death 50 years ago helped pave the way for a surprisingly strong Civil Rights Act from Lyndon Johnson, according to Julian Bond, the former NAACP president.

In a blunt assessment of JFK as a “do-nothing president,” Bond recalled that black leaders in the 1960s “were not enamored of him,” and “he was not our favorite politician.”

Kennedy, he added in a new book of how leaders and celebrities recall JFK, “knew almost no black people and had few associations with them. This was alien territory for them.”

His views are among the harshest of Kennedy in the book, “November 22, 1963: Reflections on the Life, Assassination, and Legacy of John F. Kennedy,” by journalist Dean R. Owen.

King aide and Rep. John Lewis, who also offered Owen his remembrance of Kennedy, added that the former president was concerned that the March on Washington would bring violence to the city. Lewis added that Kennedy was “reluctant to take action” on civil rights “because he was concerned about the next election, about holding on to some of the Southern states.”

Bond, who in the early 1960s started the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, said blacks were inspired by Kennedy’s campaign in 1960. But after the election, “he had not done most of the things we had wanted him to do. He seem disinterested in civil rights. He was not our favorite politician.”

– Paul Bedard, Washington Secrets Columnist

CHRIS CHRISTIE: I ‘KICKED THE PRESIDENT’S ASS’ IN FOOTBALL

On his “Ask the Governor” radio show, Gov. Chris Christie, R-N.J., recalled the time he beat President Obama in a football carnival game during Obama’s visit to the Jersey Shore in May.

During the show, host Eric Scott of New Jersey 101.5 asked Christie to name his favorite boardwalk carnival game.

“Well, obviously it’s the football thing,” Christie said, “because I kicked the president’s ass in the football throw, didn’t I, Eric?”

“He threw it three or four times, the president, poor guy didn’t get it through the tire.” Christie recalled. “I on the other hand, on the Point Pleasant boardwalk threw one, put it through the tire, declared victory and gave the president my prize.”

Christie said that after his event with Obama he spotted a football game where the contestant had to throw the football in a garbage can.

Christie said he considered trying it, but his son, Andrew, advised against it because it would “hurt his average.”

“So, yeah, I took his advice,” Christie admitted.

– Charlie Spiering, Commentary Writer

ONLY 58 PERCENT OF UNINSURED PLAN TO USE OBAMACARE

Obamacare will spend almost $1.8 trillion over the next 10 years providing health insurance to more Americans, but, according to a new Kaiser Health Tracking poll, only 58 percent of those currently uninsured plan to obtain health insurance through the program.

According to the Congressional Budget Office, the federal government will spend $1.798 trillion over the next 10 years on Obamacare health insurance provisions, including $710 billion expanding Medicaid, $1.075 trillion on subsidies for private insurance companies, and $14 billion on small business tax breaks.

Despite all this spending, the CBO estimates that 31 million Americans will still be uninsured under Obamacare. Just 25 million people will gain insurance, on net, through the Affordable Care Act.

Twelve million Americans are expected to lose their current health care because of Obamacare, but 13 million will gain coverage through Medicaid and another 24 million will gain coverage through the Obamacare exchanges.

– Conn Carroll, Senior Writer

OBAMA ADMITS HE ‘TEARED UP’ WHILE WATCHING OPRAH IN ‘THE BUTLER’

President Obama admitted that he “teared up” during his private screening of “The Butler” – a film starring Oprah Winfrey, Forrest Whitaker and Cuba Gooding Jr.

Obama made his comments during an interview with with radio hosts Tom Joyner and Sybil Wilkes in the Oval Office.

“Before we get out of here, did you see ‘The Butler,’ and did you cry?” asked Joyner.

“You know, I did see ‘The Butler,’ and I did tear up,” Obama said. “I teared up just thinking about not just the butlers who have worked here in the White House, but an entire generation of people who were talented and skilled, but because of Jim Crow, because of discrimination, there was only so far they could go.”

Obama said his favorite part of the movie was some of the jokes told by Gooding which he couldn’t repeat on the air.

“But all of the acting was terrific, and I thought Forrest Whitaker was wonderful,” Obama added. “And Oprah, my girl, she can act … She’s just a wonderful actress. So I’m glad they did it.”

– Charlie Spiering, Commentary Writer

HOUSE OVERSIGHT DEMANDS NAPOLITANO HAND OVER INFORMATION ON ASYLUM REQUESTS

House Republicans are demanding information from the Department of Homeland Security about immigrants who win access to the U.S. by falsely claiming they are asylum-seekers afraid to return to their home countries.

In a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, a copy of which was obtained by the Washington Examiner, Rep. Jason Chaffetz, a top Republican on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, questioned whether illegal immigrants were being instructed on how to beat the immigration system by falsely claiming they are in the U.S. to seek political asylum.

Immigrants are allegedly learning to claim they face a “credible fear” of persecution at home so that U.S. officials cannot immediately expel them. Thousands of such cases have been reported along the U.S.-Mexico border, New York City and other parts of the U.S.

Homeland Security is expected to receive nearly 29,000 asylum requests this year from immigrants arriving from Mexico, El Salvador, Honduras and elsewhere, a House Oversight subcommittee revealed in July. That’s a 434 percent increase over the past five years, said Chaffetz, R-Utah, who is chairman of that subcommittee.

Chaffetz asked Napolitano to provide the number of asylum cases being investigated for fraud as well as the number of lawyers successfully prosecuted for aiding asylum fraud.

– Susan Ferrechio, Chief Congressional Correspondent