Romney enters GOP race broadsiding Obama
STRATHAM, N.H., June 2 (UPI) -- Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney made his second Republican bid for the U.S. presidency official Thursday with a broadside against President Barack Obama.
"Barack Obama has failed America," Romney said at a chili cookout on a 300-acre farm owned by former New Hampshire House Speaker Doug Scamman and his wife, Stella.
When Obama ran for president, "we didn't know what sort of a president he would make," Romney, 64, said in prepared remarks. "It was a moment of crisis for our economy, and when Barack Obama came to office, we wished him well and hoped for the best. Now, in the third year of his four-year term, we have more than promises and slogans to go by."
If elected, from his "first day in office," Romney's "No. 1 job" would be "to see that America once again is No. 1 in job creation," the candidate said on Bittersweet Farm, whose 300 acres were preserved in part with $1 million in federal money, a report in Seacoast Online indicated.
A Romney White House would also "return responsibility and authority to the states for dozens of government programs -- and that begins with a complete repeal of Obamacare," Romney said, using a pejorative nickname for Obama's healthcare reforms.
Moments before Romney made his declaration, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin -- the subject of speculation about her presidential interests -- attacked Romney on a healthcare plan similar to Obama's that he pushed through as governor.
Palin slams Romney on healthcare
BOSTON, June 2 (UPI) -- Sarah Palin insisted Thursday she didn't want to hurt new GOP U.S. presidential candidate Mitt Romney before criticizing his universal healthcare law.
"More power to Mitt as he mounts his campaign and best of luck to him," the former Alaska governor and 2008 GOP vice presidential nominee told reporters in Boston shortly before Romney, a former Massachusetts governor, made his second Republican bid for the U.S. presidency official with a broadside against President Barack Obama.
"Barack Obama has failed America," Romney said at a chili cookout in Stratham, N.H., where he also said he would repeal Obama's healthcare reform.
Palin attacked Romney for enacting a similar healthcare plan as governor. That plan provided near-universal health insurance access through subsidies and state-level mandates.
Speaking near Boston's Bunker Hill, the site of a famous U.S. Revolutionary War battle, Palin said, "In my opinion, any mandate coming from government is not a good thing.
"Even on a state level and even a local level, mandates coming from a governing body, it's tough for a lot of us independent Americans to accept, because we have great faith in the private sector and our own families, and our own businessmen and women making decisions for ourselves, not any level of government telling us what to do,'' Palin told reporters.
The potential challenger to Romney for the Republican presidential nomination said Romney's championing of the Massachusetts healthcare insurance reform law of 2006 would be one of the reasons Romney would have a "big challenge" gaining support from the populist conservative and libertarian Tea Party movement.
Her East Coast bus tour, which Palin insists seeks simply to highlight America's great historic sites, headed to New Hampshire from Boston for a clambake in the coastal town of Portsmouth, 10 miles from where Romney announced his candidacy.
"Coincidental that we're in the same territory at the same time," The Boston Globe quoted Palin as saying.
Five dead in Arizona shooting spree
YUMA, Ariz., June 2 (UPI) -- An unidentified gunman allegedly killed five people Thursday in a shooting spree in and around Yuma, Ariz., police said.
A sixth person was wounded in the incidents, one of which occurred in the desert city on the California state line and the other four in unincorporated areas of Yuma County.
The Yuma (Ariz.) Sun said police believed the suspect had shot himself as well, although it was not immediately know if the individual was dead.
The incident began Thursday morning with a call about a woman found dead in the yard of a home outside Yuma. The call was followed by reports of other shootings in the area, including one of a self-inflicted gunshot.
The Sun said one of the people slain was reportedly a local attorney. The identities of the other victims or the suspect were not known.
Schools in Yuma were locked down for a period and city workers were urged in an e-mail to use caution. The e-mail from City Administrator Greg Wilkinson said it was believed the shooter was targeting specific people, the Sun said.
China angrily denies ties to Gmail hacking
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., June 2 (UPI) -- China Thursday angrily denied allegations Chinese hackers cracked hundreds of senior U.S. and South Korean officials' Gmail accounts.
The allegations by Gmail owner Google Inc. are "a fabrication out of thin air," Chinese Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said in a statement e-mailed to The Washington Post.
"Any blame against China in this [incident] is groundless and with an ulterior motive," Hong's e-mail said.
The Chinese government "is firmly opposed to any cybercriminal activity, including hacking ... [and] is ready to cooperate with the international community to combat against it," the e-mail said.
The personal Gmail account of at least one unidentified Cabinet-level official was compromised, an official with knowledge of the breach told the Post.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, charged with protecting U.S. territory from terrorist attacks, the FBI and White House National Security Council computer security experts joined Google in investigating the offensive, whose targets also included military personnel, Chinese political activists, officials of other Asian countries and journalists, Google said.
The U.S. Defense Department said it had not been contacted in the investigation.
