The race for the White House is close and the outcome might not be known until the day after the election. That's the take from Karl Rove, the GOP political strategist whose American Crossroads super PAC and its affiliate, Crossroads GPS, have budgeted more than $300 million on presidential, U.S. Senate and U.S. House races this year.

The Erie Times-News interviewed Rove on Thursday about the election and his upcoming visit to Erie. Rove will speak Nov. 14, at 7:30 p.m., as part of the Jefferson Educational Society's fourth Global Summit. Rove, a former deputy chief of staff to President George W. Bush, predicts that Republican nominee Mitt Romney will win the Nov. 6 election. "I think Romney is going to win this, but it's going to be a very, very close election,'' he said. Rove said in an opinion piece in Wednesday's Wall Street Journal that President Barack Obama's problem remains the sluggish economy. Rove's super PAC is doing its part for Romney, spending money on television commercials, mailings and Internet ads in the key swing states of Nevada, Colorado, Iowa, Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio, New Hampshire, Virginia, North Carolina and Florida. "We've had activity in all those states,'' he said.

Rove's groups are also involved in about a dozen U.S. House and another 12 Senate races, he said. It has not spent money on the tightening U.S. Senate race in Pennsylvania between incumbent Democrat Bob Casey and Republican nominee Tom Smith. Both Obama and Romney are spending a lot of time in Ohio, and the campaigns and PACs are blitzing the state with commercials. But Rove said Ohio -- and its 18 electoral votes -- is not the only key to the White House. And he doesn't agree with the oft-cited argument that a Republican cannot reach 270 electoral votes without Ohio. "It's always easier to win with Ohio, but there are 11 combinations given the current (electoral) map,'' he said. Asked whether he thinks Pennsylvania is out of play for Romney, Rove said he thinks the Republican nominee has a chance. "If you take a look at the public polls, the state has moved in Romney's direction as the country has,'' he said. No money has been spent on the presidential race in Pennsylvania since August, and the state -- traditionally one of the battlegrounds -- has seen few visits from the candidates. But Rove noted that GOP vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan campaigned near Pittsburgh last Saturday. Rove left open the possibility that his super PAC could spend money in Pennsylvania.

Asked about Colin Powell's endorsement Thursday of Obama, Rove called that expected since Powell, a moderate Republican, backed the president four years ago.Rove doesn't think the endorsement from Powell, secretary of state under President George W. Bush, will make much of a difference. "Endorsements are overblown, particularly when they're expected. It had more impact in 2008,'' he said. "It had a man-bites-dog kind of surprise to it.''With less than two weeks until the election, both candidates must work to ''close the sale with the people that are up for grabs,'' Rove said.

President Barack Obama made one candid admission in an interview with The Des Moines Register that originally was off-the-record but subsequently released after some pressure by the publication.

Here's the key quote:

"The second thing I’m confident we’ll get done next year is immigration reform. And since this is off the record, I will just be very blunt. Should I win a second term, a big reason I will win a second term is because the Republican nominee [Mitt Romney] and the Republican Party have so alienated the fastest-growing demographic group in the country, the Latino community. And this is a relatively new phenomenon. George Bush and Karl Rove were smart enough to understand the changing nature of America. And so I am fairly confident that they’re going to have a deep interest in getting that done. And I want to get it done because it’s the right thing to do and I've cared about this ever since I ran back in 2008."

Rome, Italy, Oct 25, 2012 / 04:00 am (CNA/EWTN News).- As the country approaches election day in two weeks, Archbishop Charles J. Chaput of Philadelphia is encouraging Catholic voters to place their faith above their allegiance to political parties.

“I’m always encouraging our people minimally to vote, maximally to run for political office, and make sure that they’re Catholic prior to being Democrat or Republican and that they put that into practice politically,” he told CNA in Rome on Oct. 22.

Archbishop Chaput echoed the calls of other American bishops to have their flocks consider their faith in the voting booth.

“We do believe in the separation of church and state, but we don’t believe in the separation of faith from our political life,” he said.

“It’s very important for Catholics to make distinctions when voting that they never support intrinsic evils like abortion, which is evil in all circumstances. That’s a lot different from different economic policies” that people can reasonably disagree on, the archbishop explained.

His remarks come as an Oct. 22 Gallup poll shows the “economy in general” is the issue rated most important by Americans as the election nears.

“But people who are practicing Catholics cannot have alternate views on abortion,” he stated. “Such foundational issues have a huge impact and it’s important that Catholics make those distinctions.”

“A person (candidate) might be right on a lot of secondary issues but wrong on the foundational issues. And if that’s the case, it would be very difficult for a Catholic to vote for someone who, for example, favors unlimited access to abortion … undermines the meaning of marriage or supports policies that really undermine the foundation of our culture.”

Archbishop Chaput sees Philadelphia as a great example of both Catholic and civic virtue. He noted that it both produced two canonized saints, John Neumann and Katherine Drexel, and was the location of the signing of the Declaration of Independence and the writing of the U.S. Constitution.

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Khazen.org congratulates the Lebanese nation, the Maronites and the Catholic Maronite Church  on the nomination of our Patriarch Cardinal Mar Bechara el Rai.

By Cindy Wooden
Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Four of the six new cardinals announced by Pope Benedict XVI Oct. 24 were participating in the world Synod of Bishops at the Vatican and had to keep their impending appointments secret as they participated in the synod's small-group work that morning. The appointment of new cardinals was not announced to synod members, so those who did not have smartphones or tablets or a friend with one found out only during the synod's lunch break. When they returned to the synod hall in the afternoon -- four hours after the announcement -- the synod hall's foyer turned into a receiving line and photo studio. Synod members congratulated the cardinals-designate, and the cardinals-designate congratulated one another.

The four synod members named cardinals are: Lebanon's Maronite Patriarch Bechara Rai, 72; Indian Archbishop Baselios Cleemis Thottunkal, 53, head of the Syro-Malankara Catholic Church; Nigerian Archbishop John Olorunfemi Onaiyekan of Abuja, 68; and Philippine Archbishop Luis Tagle of Manila, 55. Between slaps on the back and warm handshakes in the synod hall, Cardinal-designate Rai told Catholic News Service he was told at 5 p.m. Oct. 23 of the pope's intention to make him a cardinal, and he was sworn to secrecy until noon the next day. Cardinal-designate Thottunkal started to tell CNS the reasons why his nomination was such an honor, but he was interrupted by Patriarch Rai grabbing both his hands and saying, "Dear, dear brother."

When others began congratulating the patriarch, Archbishop Thottunkal continued his brief interview, saying, "For our church, it's a great honor from the Holy See, recognizing our apostolates as well as our missions in India and all over." The cardinal-designate said the appointment also is an honor for India: "It's great culture and people," and the Vatican recognizes "the great unity in diversity of our country." Cardinal-designate Tagle said a bishop's job often involves keeping secrets, so spending the morning with other synod members and not breathing a word about the news was not a huge challenge. He told CNS that Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, Vatican secretary of state, informed him of the pope's decision just before 5 p.m. the previous evening. "Listening to the text of the pope's letter being read out to me, I also felt like -- here it comes," he said, fighting back tears, -- "it felt like someone far greater than I am is here. Very near." He told Vatican Radio the announcement was "a spiritual experience for me," and that his initial reaction was "to respond with the words of the prayer before Communion: 'I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof,' but I felt that someone greater than me has come to call me."