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January 12, 2012 | | MARKED MAN At Bain Capital, Romney didn’t just fire thousands of working -class people, he amassed an unimaginable fortune doing it. “I simply cannot imagine a worse narrative for a candidate in this climate, or a politician whose skills are singularly incapable of responding to the story in any persuasive way,” says The Daily Beast’s Andrew Sullivan. “I suspect once the potency of this line of attack is absorbed by the GOP establishment, there will be some full, if concealed, panic.” NOT SO FAST Mississippi’s attorney general said Thursday that the state may order a nationwide manhunt to find the four convicted murderers pardoned by outgoing governor Haley Barbour on Tuesday. “We’ll catch ‘em,” said Attorney General Jim Hood. “It’s just a matter of time.” The four were freed in one of Barbour’s last acts as governor—pardoning more than 200 convicted criminals. Late Wednesday night, a Mississippi judge halted the 21 pardons issued after Hood, a Democrat, filed to halt some of the reprieves based on a provision in the state Constitution that insists pardons must be published at least 30 days in advance. But four convicted murders and a convicted armed robber had already been released, and Hood said the state cannot issue arrest warrants and the pardoned prisoners are required to contact prison officials only on a daily basis, but their whereabouts are unknown. WHISTLE-BLOWER An investigating officer in the case against Bradley Manning, the Army private accused of handing over nearly 1 million war logs and diplomatic cables to WikiLeaks, has recommended that Manning face court-martial on multiple criminal charges. The officer said Manning should be charged with theft, computer violation, aiding the enemy, and other crimes. The recommendation will now be reviewed by higher levels of the military. Manning’s defense lawyer questioned the propriety of the officer’s recommendation on the grounds that he is also currently working on the Justice Department’s criminal case against WikiLeaks. It’s On After several days of attacks on his record at Bain Capital, Mitt Romney is readying a defense. That defense starts with a series of ads featuring Bain employees speaking positively about the company, a direct response to a 28 minute Bain movie Newt Gingrich released featuring people laid off by Bain. One adviser admits the Romney campaign was caught off guard by the attacks on Romney’s private equity firm, but that now they’re preparing to defend it more aggressively. “Being in favor of capitalism is always a major positive in the Republican primary,” said Kevin Madden, one of Romney’s advisers. Despite reports that quoted Gingrich as saying he’d crossed a line, he now says he isn’t backing down. At a news conference in Greer, South Carolina Thursday, Romney addressed the attack ads head on, insisting that the “few thousand jobs” that were lost when certain enterprises failed is nothing compared to the more than 100,000 jobs that were created with Bain’s help. ATOM BOMB CHAT Iran is ready for “serious” talks about its controversial nuclear program, according to Ali Larijani, the speaker of Iran’s Parliament. He explained that Iran has agreed to an offer that Turkey made last week to host talks between Iran and the members of the U.N. Security Council. “The negotiations can yield results if they are serious and not a game.” However, Catherine Ashton, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, said that Iran has yet to formally respond to her offer to return to talks, which she sent in October of last year. | | 
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