Political observers have spent the last four years marveling at President Obama’s fundraising might. But now even Democrats are admitting that former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney — and his allied party and outside groups — may very well outspend the current occupant of the White House between now and the Nov. 6 election.

Should American citizens who have been convicted of crimes and served their time have their right to vote restored?

The question is a political issue, part of a voting-rights debate that is being fought in the states and among political candidates. To ex-felons, it can be a personal challenge, as well: Will their votes matter, and why should they care?

President Obama this week is holding two events in Iowa -- a state that he won four years ago by 10 percentage points, due in large part to the enthusiasm of newly-registered voters.

This time around, can the Obama camp reprise its 2008 success? We take a look at the battle for the Hawkeye State:

“The back-and-forth about Bain Capital, Mitt Romney’s old company, is part of something larger. So is the inquest into the implications of multibillion-dollar trading losses at JPMorgan Chase. Capitalism can produce wonders. It is also capable of self-destruction, and it can leave a lot of wounded people behind. The trick is to get the most out of what capitalism does well, while containing or preventing the problems it can cause,” writes Brookings’ E.J. Dionne. (Washington Post)

President Obama will wrap up the NATO summit in Chicago on Monday, then head to Joplin, Mo. to speak at a high school commencement as the city prepares to mark the first anniversary of the deadly tornadoes that struck it in 2011.

In Washington, there’s an old cliche: A gaffe is when a politician is accidentally honest.

That’s what happened to Newark (N.J.) Mayor Cory Booker during an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday. Booker, who is widely regarded as a fast riser in Democratic politics, veered badly off message when he defended Bain Capital — the longtime employer of former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney — and described the negative tone of the campaign as “nauseating”.

“The ideas that [Republicans are] putting forward have been tried. We tried them between 2000 and 2008, and it resulted in the most sluggish job growth that we’ve ever seen, resulted in all kinds of phony financial profits and debt, and resulted in the worst financial crisis and economic crisis we’ve seen since the 1930s.”

Historically, the House and Senate take their Memorial Day recess around the same time, but this year they’re keeping different schedules. The Senate is in Washington this week, and lawmakers from the House are on break. Next week the House returns to Capitol Hill, and the Senate plans to take a week-long hiatus.

On the wildflower-studded slopes of the Ozarks, where memories run long and family ties run thick, a little-known and long-ago chapter of history still simmers.

On Sept. 11, 1857, a wagon train from this part of Arkansas met with a gruesome fate in Utah, where most of the travelers were slaughtered by a Mormon militia in an episode known as the Mountain Meadows Massacre. Hundreds of the victims’ descendants still populate these hills and commemorate the killings, which they have come to call “the first 9/11.”

Republican Rick Santorum ended his presidential campaign with $2.3 million in debt while Newt Gingrich owed $4.8 million, new federal filings show.

Santorum bowed out in early April, owing $763,000 to top adviser John Brabender’s firm for television commercials and $640,000 to Arlington technology company Emotive LLC. His campaign had $1 million in the bank at the end of April, meaning he’ll need to raise an additional $1.3 million to settle his accounts, according to a filing with the Federal Election Commission made Sunday night.

CHICAGO —NATO leaders began a two-day summit here Sunday that will finalize plans to turn control of Afghanistan over to its own security forces by the middle of next year, a milestone on the way to concluding the alliance’s combat role by the end of 2014.

Before 9 a.m., a group of lobbyists began showing up at the White House security gates with the chief executives of their companies, all of whom serve on President Obama’s jobs council, to be checked in for a roundtable with the president.

Despite his newfound status as the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, Mitt Romney’s campaign saw its fundraising fall off slightly in April, it spent more than it raised, and it still has less than one-tenth as much cash on hand as President Obama.

Cher is a household name. Grover Norquist is not.

Cher, the singer, actress, activist and gay icon, never holds back. She has often come under fire for her outspokenness, and her boldness is no different on Twitter, where she has more than 600,000 followers.

Mayor Cory Booker of Newark, a close ally of President Obama in the upcoming election, slammed the president’s campaign Sunday for ads attacking Mitt Romney’s work for the private-equity firm Bain Capital.

Has anything changed in the world of campaign finance that might give pause to the five members of the Supreme Court who decided Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission exactly 28 months ago Monday?

Here’s a scary thought for Democrats: It’s entirely possible that former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney and the Republican National Committee will outraise President Obama and the Democratic National Committee in the seven-month sprint to the general election.