Blog Posts by Jonathan Karl

Spinners and Winners

Dick Cheney has heart -- specifically, a new heart. And with it comes a fiery and defiant Cheney that had been absent in recent years.

In an exclusive interview with ABC News and Yahoo News, Cheney says he feels "excellent," and reflects on how far he has come since 2010 -- when he was in end stage heart failure and had undergone a grueling operation to have a pump installed in his heart.

"Two years ago this time I was on a respirator, heavily sedated. Just had a pump… installed on my heart because my heart had gotten so weak after six heart attacks and 30-some years of heart disease that it was, you know, it was at the end." he said.

Cheney, 71, weighed in on the 2012 presidential race, wading into an issue that has been plaguing presumptive nominee Mitt Romney: tax returns. Back in 2000, as a potential vice-presidential pick, Cheney released ten years of tax returns. Then Governor Bush at the time also released ten years. Romney has released just two, though

Spinners and Winners

If there were ever a Republican for President Obama to work with, it was Maine Senator Olympia Snowe. She was one of just three Republicans in the entire Congress to vote for his economic stimulus plan in 2009 and even tried to work with him on health care, but in an interview with ABC's Senior Political Correspondent Jonathan Karl, Snowe makes a remarkable revelation:  She hasn't had a face-to-face meeting with President Obama in nearly two years.

Snowe said that if she had to grade the President on his willingness to work with Republicans, he would "be close to failing on that point."  In fact, Snowe, who was first elected to Congress in 1978, claims that her meetings with President Obama have been less frequent than with any other President.

When she announced suddenly in February that she was not going to run for reelection - after three terms in the US Senate and a previous 14 years in the House of Representatives - colleagues and commentators alike were

In a long-forgotten tape from the 2002 Massachusetts governor's race obtained by ABC News, Mitt Romney is seen touting his Washington connections and his ability to get millions of taxpayer dollars from the federal government.

"I am big believer in getting money where the money is," Romney says on the video, "The money is in Washington."

The video, which was surreptitiously shot by Democratic opponents of Romney on Oct. 16, 2002, shows him addressing a group called the New Bedford Industrial Foundation. The Power Point presentation he uses lists ways to improve economic development in Massachusetts, including "boost federal involvement."

"I want to go after every grant, every project, every department in Washington to assure that we are taking advantage of economic development opportunities," Romney tells the group.

And while Romney now often criticizes his opponents for being Washington insiders, in this video he touts his Washington connections.

"I have learned from

Spinners and Winners

In politics, it's what you said — not what you meant to say — that matters.

And Mitt Romney knows as well as anyone that the past can haunt you. His Republican primary opponents have spent the last several months seizing on the words he uttered when he was running for office in Massachusetts.  Quotes like "I'm someone who is moderate, my views are progressive."

But if Romney wins the nomination, there's a whole new set of words that have come out of his mouth this campaign season that the Democrats will surely use again him.

Here are a few — watch our Spinners and Winners video for the full top 5. And see how the context can sometimes really change the meaning. But that all important context may not be what you hear in those ads from Democrats in a few months.

-          "Corporations are people my friend," Romney famously retorted in Iowa to a crowd questioning his corporate tax policies. He went on to explain that "everything corporations earn ultimately goes to