2016 Presidential

[Crafty_Dog]

By
Patrick O’Connor
Updated March 9, 2015 11:35 p.m. ET
86 COMMENTS

The two most recognizable figures in the 2016 presidential race start off in very different positions within their own parties, and with Americans overall feeling more positive toward Hillary Clinton than Jeb Bush .

Those findings in a new Wall Street Journal/NBC poll reinforce the view that while the Democrats’ nominating contest now looks like a foregone conclusion, provided Mrs. Clinton enters the race, the Republican contest appears to be wide open, with no clear front-runner.


The survey found that 86% of likely Democratic primary voters say they are open to supporting Mrs. Clinton for the party’s nomination, and 13% said they couldn’t. Those polled view the former secretary of state more favorably than unfavorably, with 44% holding positive views and 36% with negative views of her.

Mr. Bush, an early favorite for the Republican nomination among GOP donors, faces more resistance within his party. Some 49% of people who plan to vote in GOP primaries said they could see themselves supporting Mr. Bush and 42% said they couldn’t, the survey found. Poll participants view him more negatively than positively, with 34% seeing him in an unfavorable light and 23% viewing him favorably.
More than 40% of GOP primary voters could not picture supporting Jeb Bush as the Republican nominee, a new WSJ/NBC News poll finds. WSJ's Patrick O'Connor explains. Photo: Getty

The Journal/NBC poll of 1,000 adults was conducted March 1 through 5, a period when news reports surfaced disclosing Mrs. Clinton’s exclusive use of a private email account to conduct official business as secretary of state. Critics and some fellow Democrats have said the disclosures raise questions about Mrs. Clinton’s commitment to transparency in public office.

The two Republicans who begin the race on the strongest footing in the poll are Florida Sen. Marco Rubio and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker. More than half of GOP primary voters said they were open to supporting Messrs. Rubio or Walker, compared with 49% who said so of Mr. Bush.

Resistance within the party to Messrs. Rubio and Walker is far lower than for Mr. Bush: Some 26% said they couldn’t see themselves supporting Mr. Rubio, and 17% said so of the Wisconsin governor.

The good news for Mr. Bush is that he has nearly a year to reshape his image before voting begins, and none of his likely rivals shows signs of running away with the race.
Poll Methodology

The Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll was based on nationwide telephone interviews of 1,000 adults, including 350 respondents who use only a cellphone. It was conducted from March 1-5, 2015, by the polling organizations of Bill McInturff at Public Opinion Strategies and Fred Yang at Hart Research Associates. Individuals were selected proportionate to the nation’s population in accordance with a probability sample design that gives all landline telephone numbers, listed and unlisted, an equal chance to be included. Adults age 18 or over were selected by a systematic procedure to provide a balance of respondents by sex. The cellphone sample was drawn from a list of cellphone users nationally. Of the 1,000 interviews, 350 respondents were reached on a cellphone and screened to ensure their cellphone was the only phone they had. In addition, 36 respondents were reached on a cellphone but reported also having a landline. The data’s margin of error is plus or minus 3.1 percentage points. Sample tolerances for subgroups are larger.

In fact, he would begin the 2016 campaign in much the same place that former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney began the 2012 race in which he locked up the nomination after a long primary slog. Mr. Romney was viewed positively by 43% of GOP primary voters and negatively by 12% about a year before primary voting began, about the same as Mr. Bush is viewed among GOP primary voters today.

“He still has room to change his image,” Mr. Yang, the Democratic pollster, said of Mr. Bush. He noted that 43% of the public is still on the fence about Mr. Bush or doesn’t know him well enough to form an opinion.

Messrs. Rubio and Walker are the two most acceptable candidates across different segments of the GOP, including very conservative voters and those moderate-to-liberal Republicans who say they would vote in a GOP primary. Of the two, Mr. Walker remains more of an unknown; more than half the country—including a quarter of Republican primary voters—said they didn’t know enough about him to form an opinion.

“We should be cautious about how unformed this race is,” said Republican pollster Bill McInturff, who conducted the survey with Democrat Fred Yang.

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie would start the race in a deep hole, the new survey found, with 57% of likely GOP primary voters saying they couldn’t see themselves supporting his candidacy, compared with the 32% who said they could. Only Donald Trump , the businessman and reality television star, fared worse, with three out of four primary voters doubtful they could support him.

Mrs. Clinton would enter the 2016 race enjoying widespread support across just about every slice of the potential Democratic electorate, with 80% or more of every sub-group-men, women, liberals, centrist, whites and non-whites among them-saying they could see themselves voting for her.

“Sen. Clinton’s numbers are just extraordinary,” said Mr. McInturff. “She is like one of those large naval ships. It will take more than one torpedo to sink the boat.”

One attribute of both Mr. Bush and Mrs. Clinton—their membership in prominent political families—seems to weigh on them to varying degrees. Some 59% of those polled say they are looking for a presidential candidate “who will bring greater changes” over one who is “more experienced and tested.”

Some 51% view Mrs. Clinton, a former first lady and New York senator, more as a return to the past than a candidate for the future, compared with the 44% who say the reverse, according to the new poll.

For Mr. Bush, 60% of the country sees the first-time White House hopeful—the son and brother of the last two Republican presidents—as a figure representing the past, compared with the 27% who agreed with the statement that he would bring “new ideas and vision the country will need for the future.”

“We just seem to be stuck in this rut—the Clintons and the Bushes,” said Isabel Sovocool, a 43-year-old preschool teacher from Quakertown, Pa., who voted for Mr. Bush’s brother, former President George W. Bush, and his father, former President George H.W. Bush, but has no desire to vote for the former Florida governor. “It just seems to go around in circles. And I don’t think things are getting all that better.”

The margin of error for the survey is plus or minus 3.1%, but higher for the Republican and Democratic primary voters.

The survey pointed to a challenge for Republicans in addressing middle-class economic anxieties. Nearly half of all respondents, some 47%, said the GOP doesn’t represent the values of the middle class “very well,” compared with the 33% who said that about Democrats. Similarly, Mrs. Clinton scored much higher on the question than Mr. Bush.

Additionally, those polled are more likely to see improvements in the economy than they were a year ago. Almost half, some 47%, credited President Barack Obama for those gains.

The survey also found that Americans are willing to adopt a war footing against Islamic State. Some 55% of the country would look more favorably on a candidate who supports the use of combat troops to battle the Islamic militants. That includes roughly three-out-of-four Republicans and a plurality of liberal Democratic primary voters.
Popular on WSJ

[ccp]

Every time Bush says he is the grown up in the room I feel like he is insulting me and others who would consider themselves conservative

I think he should be careful who he insults.   He will not get a vote from me if he keeps this up.

I will sit out '16.   

[DougMacG]

This list doesn't add much to what is already posted in this thread.  Hard to take serious anyone listed behind Bernie Sanders, Terry McAuliffe, and others.  But who knows?
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/21-democrats-who-could-maybe-take-hillary-clintons-place-in-2016/article/2561521
...
Here, in roughly ascending order of feasibility, are 21 prominent or semi-prominent Democrats who could step up for a 2016 presidential run:

Dannel Malloy
Malloy was supposed to be headed for a tough 2014 re-election race for governor of Connecticut, but he ended up winning easily. A spokesman said he was not interested in the Oval Office — but also indicated the Washington Examiner is not the first publication to ask. "As the Governor has said repeatedly, he loves his current job as Governor of Connecticut and has no interest in running for President," Malloy's office said. "He believes that should Secretary Clinton become a candidate for President, she has the outstanding credentials, experience and record to be a very strong candidate."

Tom Udall
The son of a Kennedy-era secretary of the interior and nephew of a powerful Arizona congressman, Udall won a senate seat in New Mexico in 2009. He brings no youth at age 66, but he hails from American royalty. Udalls have had starring political roles in the American Southwest for more than a century. Is it time for a President Udall? Udall declined to comment.

Bernie Sanders
Vermont's junior senator is the most prominent (out of the closet) socialist in American politics, a status that makes him a favorite with reporters (because he gives good copy) and the Democratic base (because he's a socialist). Strangely, the usually forthright and garrulous Sanders has turned coy about his previous 2016 talk. Sanders told Politico Friday he was not eager to run "a poor campaign" that was "not well funded," adding that he had not raised much money. The 73-year-old did not respond to Examiner requests for comment.

Jay Nixon
For better or worse, the Ferguson riots made the governor of Missouri a national figure, and he declined to give a flat "No" when Politico asked him about being a potential Hillary replacement in February — before the email story broke. Nixon did not respond to requests for comment.

Bill Nelson
At 72 years young, the senior senator from Florida is a reliable liberal who occasionally finds common ground with Republicans on defense and intelligence votes. He would also be America's first spaceman president, having traveled into the vacuum as a payload specialist on space shuttle Columbia in 1986. A Nelson spokesman told the Examiner his 2016 answer "is a no."

Martin Heinrich
That New Mexico boasts two Democratic senators is a rare success story for the party. Registered Democrats outnumber Republicans by a 3-to-2 ratio in the Land of Enchantment, Democrat hold large majorities in both chambers of the state house, and Republican Gov. Susana Martinez runs moderate to liberal on the GOP spectrum. Nevertheless, Heinrich — though he toes the party line on abortion and environmentalism — is careful to shore up conservative appeal. While he now supports gay marriage, the epiphany that brought his deeply held beliefs into compliance with Democratic Party norms came very late — in 2012 — and only when a primary opponent attempted to flank him on the issue. He opposes the federal "assault weapons" ban. He is just about as handsome and untested as Barack Obama was in 2008. Heinrich declined to comment.

Tom Wolf
A one-time forklift operator with a Ph.D., Wolf successfully ran his family's York-based building materials company for 30 years, before spending a generous chunk of his fortune on a successful 2014 campaign for governor of Pennsylvania. He has assumed office at a time when the Keystone State has nowhere to go but up. GDP growth was anemic under Republican predecessor Tom Corbett, and the city of Chester boasts the second-highest violent crime rate in the country. None of that may add up to a presidential profile for the 66-year-old, but Democrats could use a candidate who has not spent his life seeking one political office after another. Wolf did not comment.

Steve Beshear
Governor of Kentucky since 2007, Beshear has followed a familiar economic-management pattern, with predictable results: A scheme to lure manufacturing of environmentally correct Zap cars went nowhere, as have his efforts to get the Bluegrass State a bigger share of the declining casino gambling business. Kentucky has nevertheless enjoyed reasonable prosperity during his administration, and with two of the Republican Party's most prominent senators, it's the kind of state Democrats need to know how to win. Beshear will be 71 next year, and while fans frequently propose him as a prospective Hillary Clinton running mate, he declined to comment for this article.

Al Gore
What Democrat can ever forget that Al Gore beat George W. Bush in the popular vote in 2000? Like many folks on this list, the two-term vice president is of a certain age. But he has not been idle in his 66 years, having amassed a fortune estimated at $200 million. Various media have quoted anonymous sources saying Gore — whose work history includes honorable service in Vietnam and employment as a journalist, senator and knockabout presidential candidate even before environmentalism made him a Nobel laureate – is interested in a 2016 run. Gore did not respond to requests for comment.

Amy Klobuchar
The senior senator from Minnesota can't quite boast of having appeal in a battleground state: Her colleague Al Franken, also on the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party ticket, snoozed his way to re-election last November. A Republican wave across the great lakes region has failed to reach the Gopher State, where the DFL still holds the governor's office and one house of the legislative branch. Which means at this point, big labor may need a Minnesotan, and Klobuchar does her part, most recently lamenting U.S. Steel's decision to close a major plant by noting that she's in contact with Local 2660 about the matter. She declined to comment and remains an outside bet at best.

Joe Manchin
If the Democrats are interested in again finding the center of American politics, they could ask West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin the way. Republicans have repeatedly tried to lure him to switch parties. Crucially, he is untainted by Obamacare, having come into office after the Affordable Care Act was enacted, and he is generally pro-gun and pro-coal. Although he'd be running from the Senate, Manchin has executive experience as governor of West Virginia. So far he has made no 2016 moves. Nor has he ruled out the possibility of a run. "I'm not serious about running," Manchin told a West Virginia CBS affiliate. "On a national ticket, it would be a pretty far reach probably for me."

John Hickenlooper
The governor of Colorado could put together a coalition of labor, hipsters and louche libertarians. A secession movement during Hickenlooper's administration went nowhere. A concentrated backlash against his extremely broad gun control law cost several Centennial State Democrats their jobs, but Hickenlooper is still around. He declined to comment.

Rahm Emanuel
Emanuel combines the vices of Andrew Cuomo (unions hate him) and Terry McAuliffe (clinging Clinton odor). On the plus side, Chicago's GDP has grown 10.5 percent since he assumed office, and despite widely reported murder spikes, the city's violent crime rate has declined on his watch, according to a database of violent crime statistics from all law enforcement agencies in cities with populations more than 25,000. Wealth in Chicago is highly concentrated, and Emanuel is highly connected there and in Los Angeles. He declined to comment to the Examiner.

Cory Booker
Booker's passion for retail politics gave him a national profile even before he became mayor of Newark, N.J., in 2006 (the 2005 documentary "Street Fight" details his first, unsuccessful attempt to beat the Sharpe James machine). He ran the Brick City with a penchant for colorful — usually unverifiable — tales of hands-on constituent service. Since joining the Senate in 2013, Booker has more than once found common ground with likely Republican presidential candidate Rand Paul of Kentucky. He declined to comment on the 2016 election.

Jerry Brown
A fixture of California politics since the time of Zorro, Jerry Brown will be 77 next year. But he is an American original whose idiosyncratic career includes a serious challenge to candidate Bill Clinton in the 1992 primary (Brown ran on a flat-tax platform) and a lifelong desire to become president. Now in the second term of his second tenure as California governor, Brown has arguably been a more conservative executive than his Republican predecessor Arnold Schwarzenegger. He's also remarkably popular, though claims of a broad California recovery don't bear scrutiny. But he says he's no longer eyeing the Oval Office. "Running against Hillary is like running against Jerry Brown in California," Brown told the Washington Post Friday. "In the Democratic Party, it's not going to happen."

Terry McAuliffe
A gleefully political animal, the current governor of Virginia had the good fortune of following Republican Bob McDonnell, whose recent conviction on corruption charges softens McAuliffe's own reputation for pushing the limits (of good taste if not political ethics). McAuliffe is a longtime Clinton crony, but intriguingly, he said last year he has no intention of helping her campaign. "I've done that," McAuliffe told Richmond's NBC affiliate. "It's been a great part of my life, but to be honest with you, I'm past the politics, I'm now into governing."

Andrew Cuomo
Cuomo wouldn't comment to the Examiner about his presidential thoughts, but he is one of the Democratic Party's most effective fundraisers, and he's the governor of the not-inconsiderable state of New York. The Empire State's dire finances sometimes put him at odds with the labor unions essential to all Democrats. Idealistic leftists — who will be crucial in the primaries — have no passion for him. Last year unnamed Cuomo associates told the New York Post the son of Mario Cuomo is keeping his powder dry for 2020.

Jim Webb
Webb has one of the most impressive résumés in America: Vietnam veteran with a Silver Star, two Bronze Stars and two Purple Hearts; Reagan administration secretary of the Navy; Emmy-winning journalist; inspired author of both fiction and non-fiction; and former Virginia senator who chose to leave office after one term. He told Politico last year he could run a "first-class campaign" reminiscent of his upset over Republican Sen. George Allen. Webb is a Jacksonian Democrat, a type of populism with potentially broader appeal than Warren's professorial jabs at inequality. That could also be his Achilles heel: The Democratic base has moved steadily leftward, and Webb's Scots-Irish candor and emotional patriotism make him a tough sell in the primaries.

Martin O'Malley
O'Malley completed two terms as Maryland governor this year, and his legacy is mixed at best. In a very surprising upset, Old Line State voters elected a Republican over his chosen successor, and painful memories of his "rain tax" and other schemes linger. But he is on record as wanting to run, and "Vote for M.O'M" is a campaign slogan that writes itself. On MSNBC this week he criticized Clinton over the email scandal and said he would decide this spring whether to run.

Joe Biden
The vice president is one of a handful of Democrats who have expressed verbal interest in running for president next year. "There's a chance, but I haven't made my mind up about that," he told ABC in January. "We've got a lot of work to do between now and then. There's plenty of time." Biden is hamstrung by his age, a strong habit of putting his foot in his mouth, and an even stronger habit of putting his hands on uncomfortable-looking women during photo ops. But he is the Democrats' sort-of-lovable uncle, and his current job is a natural — though far from guaranteed — springboard to a presidential run.

Elizabeth Warren
The freshman senator from Massachusetts provided much of the intellectual firepower for Obama-era innovations like the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. More than any other potential candidate (Clinton included), she speaks to the hard economic Left that provides most of the party's grassroots energy these days. When Democrats look in their hearts, it's Elizabeth Warren they see. Warren repeatedly disclaims any interest in a 2016 run, a stance she has maintained through Clinton's current troubles and repeated when asked by the Examiner.

[DougMacG]

We have kind of ignored John Kasich here.  However, he is a two term Governor of a major state and also with big-time Washington experience, especially on the budget. 

Kasich isn't going to go out and compete with Jeb Bush and others for the big donors, but he is sitting there in Columbus with all his ideas, ready to serve.

He is not my first choice, but could be a very acceptable choice.  Goes to show what a deep bench this is for just one side.

Read George Will today:
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/415612/kasich-waits-wings-george-will

[Crafty_Dog]

Kasich is a very good man and I concur on the depth and quality of his congressional experience with regard to budget issues.

That said, intuitively I do not see him resonating well with many major voting blocks or exciting much passion.  The case for him would perforce be rather wonky.

[objectivist1]

This man represents our last, best hope of beginning the hard work of restoring this nation.  The Left is simply telegraphing its abject fear of Cruz with its snarky commentary.  I don't believe anyone is able to avert an inevitable economic collapse at this point, and we may be in for another massive terrorist attack on American soil before long thanks to Obama and Congress's inaction, but I don't see anyone as qualified - let alone better qualified - to take over the helm at this point of crisis than Ted Cruz.  The Left ought to be afraid.  Cruz is the crucifix to the Dracula that they represent.

The Left’s Ted Cruz Freakout

Posted By Matthew Vadum On March 24, 2015 @ frontpagemag.com

Much of the political world went into full freakout mode yesterday as crusading conservative Ted Cruz became the first candidate from either of the major parties to formally announce he is running for president in 2016.

The ritual denunciations of Cruz, the junior Republican senator representing Texas, from all across the fruited plain quickly piled up. Since he assumed office in January 2013, Cruz has come under intense fire from the Left and from a few corners in the GOP. Some of the criticism is well thought out but much of it doesn’t rise above the level of schoolyard taunts. Some consider it a negative that Cruz, like Barack Obama, began running for president soon after becoming a U.S. senator.

His willingness to buck members of his own party –and to openly criticize other Republicans– when his conservative principles require it has won him legions of admirers across America, but few friends in official Washington. GOP leaders don’t like him because he questions what they stand for, tries to force them to honor their promises, calls them “squishes,” and works to derail their legislative priorities. He has even tried to engineer mini-rebellions in the House by whipping House members to vote against GOP leadership. Finding sympathetic lawmakers is like shooting fish in a barrel because Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) disappoints conservatives nearly every day.

To some, Cruz’s strengths are really weaknesses. His brash air of rectitude is arrogance. His eloquence is unctuousness. His unquestioned brilliance is viewed with suspicion.

Cruz put his oratorical gifts to use yesterday. In a moving, headline-grabbing speech at Liberty University in Virginia, unaccompanied by a teleprompter, Cruz talked about “reigniting the promise of America.”

“For so many Americans, the promise of America seems more and more distant. What is the promise of America? The idea that — the revolutionary idea that this country was founded upon, which is that our rights don’t come from man. They come from God Almighty. And that the purpose of the Constitution, as Thomas Jefferson put it, is to serve as chains to bind the mischief of government. The incredible opportunity of the American dream, what has enabled millions of people from all over the world to come to America with nothing and to achieve anything. And then the American exceptionalism that has made this nation a clarion voice for freedom in the world, a shining city on a hill. That’s the promise of America. That is what makes this nation an indispensable nation, a unique nation in the history of the world.”

To the delight of the conservative audience, Cruz promised to repeal Obamacare, abolish the Internal Revenue Service, oppose immigration amnesty, respect First and Second Amendment rights, fight for traditional marriage, repeal Common Core and embrace charter schools, combat Islamic terrorism, and steadfastly support Israel. “I believe in you,” Cruz said.

“I believe in the power of millions of courageous conservatives rising up to reignite the promise of America, and that is why today I am announcing that I’m running for president of the United States. It is a time for truth. It is a time for liberty. It is a time to reclaim the Constitution of the United States. I am honored to stand with each and every one of you courageous conservatives as we come together to reclaim the promise of America, to reclaim the mandate, the hope and opportunity for our children and our children’s children. We stand together for liberty. This is our fight. The answer will not come from Washington. It will come only from the men and women across this country, from men and women, from people of faith, from lovers of liberty, from people who respect the Constitution.”

The speech was well-received, even by many of Cruz’s detractors who acknowledge the former debating champion’s speaking skills.

It is no surprise that Democrat-turned-Republican political strategist Mark McKinnon has dubbed Cruz “the Republican Barack Obama.”

In 2013 Democratic strategist James Carville called him “the most talented and fearless Republican politician I’ve seen in the last 30 years.” Cruz is “perhaps the most influential freshman senator in American history. He’s going to run for president, and don’t be fooled — he is going to wreck [sic] havoc for years to come.”

The reaction to Cruz’s announcement largely mirrored reactions to Cruz’s first few months in the Senate — intense and overwhelmingly negative.

The media and other left-wingers spent all day yesterday mocking Cruz. At least one Republican office holder joined the ridicule fest.

On CNN Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.), who himself is considering running for president, blasted Cruz, calling him a “big mouth” who “basically led the Republican Party over the cliff.”

“We have very, very complex issues facing the country today, and he goes out of his way to oversimplify,” the congressman said of Cruz. “Ted Cruz may be an intelligent person, but he doesn’t carry out an intelligent debate. He oversimplifies, he exaggerates … he doesn’t provide leadership and he has no real experience.”

King released a separate statement on Cruz’s famous talkathon in which he held the Senate floor for 21 hours in a long-shot bid to defund Obamacare.

“Shutting down the federal government and reading Dr. Seuss on the Senate floor are the marks of a carnival barker not the leader of the free world,” King wrote.

Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn, a fellow Texas Republican, didn’t badmouth Cruz but made it clear he won’t be supporting him, at least not initially.

“You know, we’ve got a lot of Texans who are running for president, so I’m going to watch from the sidelines,” said Cornyn when asked if he would get behind Cruz. Cornyn, a member of the GOP establishment Cruz loves to hate, may have been referring to Rick Perry, a former Texas governor, who is also thinking about running for the presidency again.

Cornyn, who has amassed a huge campaign war chest, said “nope,” when asked if he would help Cruz financially. “You got a lot of people involved, and I don’t see any benefit to them or to me.”

A pro-amnesty, open borders group assailed Cruz, going as far as questioning his authenticity as a Latino.

“We reject Ted Cruz, which is sad, because while he is the first Latino to declare his candidacy, he may be the most anti-immigration candidate on stage during the debates,” said Cesar Vargas and Erika Andiola, co-directors of the Dream Action Coalition. “While Ted Cruz has a Latino name and immigration in his past, that’s where the similarities between him and the Latino community end.”

Jonathan Bernstein of Bloomberg News dismissively compared him to the late Sen. Joe McCarthy and labeled Cruz “a loudmouth loser.”

“Fortunately, Tailgunner Ted’s chances of winning the Republican nomination are extremely slim at best,” he wrote.

“The bottom line: Opposition from Republicans who care about winning in 2016 will doom the chances of a senator whose tactics (his role in the 2013 government shutdown, for example, and the recent Homeland Security funding fight) have established him as a loudmouth loser. They might look past the loudmouth part, but not the losses.”

On TV’s “The View,” guest co-host Michelle Collins declared herself a “Ted Cruz birther” and demanded to “see the birth certificate.” Cruz “was not born in America. He was born in Canada. So how can he run — how can he run for president? I actually don’t get it. I know he has to go to court.”

At the New Republic, Danny Vinik ridiculed the Texas senator in a piece titled “Ted Cruz Cannot Be Serious.”

“His positions, regardless of where they fall within the Republican Party, are ill-conceived fantasies,” he wrote.

Then Vinik engaged in what the Internet-savvy call “concern-trolling,” offering dubious campaign advice. Cruz wants to repeal the Obamacare law “and then basically see what happens … [this is] unacceptable as a presidential candidate’s health care agenda,” he pontificated. Repeal and replace is the only sensible route to take, he counseled.

Vinik pilloried Cruz for promising to abolish the IRS and not providing a detailed plan to reporters like him on the very first day of his official campaign. “A Cruz government would eliminate the agency but it would still collect taxes—somehow. Cruz has never said how that would work.”

Well, that’s what a campaign is for.

In a snotty column, John Cassidy of the New Yorker, called Cruz the “Texan terror” and wrote off his candidacy.

“The conventional wisdom is that Cruz hasn’t got a chance, and, as far as the Presidency goes, it’s probably accurate. To many Americans, he is the uppity loudmouth who, in the fall of 2013, less than a year into his first term as a senator, helped bring the federal government to a halt. Noted for railing against President Obama and denying the existence of climate change, he holds views that, according to an analysis by the Web site FiveThirtyEight, make him ‘more conservative than every recent G.O.P. nominee, every ’12 contender and every plausible ’16 candidate.'”

At Gizmodo, Adam Clark Estes implied Cruz was an idiot because he didn’t believe in the leftist fantasy known as manmade global warming.

“‘Ted Cruz is a climate change denier?’ you ask. Yes, he sure is. (Ted Cruz is also, very unfortunately, the overseer of NASA.) And just because the loud-mouthed Texan thinks he’s fit for the nation’s highest office doesn’t mean he’s going to yield his absurdly misled beliefs about the planet Earth.”

A New York Times article knocked Cruz’s performance as senator.

“Cruz has not been much of a law maker: He sponsored or co-sponsored 112 pieces of legislation, only one of which became law. Rather, he has made his mark trying to undo or gut administration policies with which he disagrees.”

But in a column on the same newspaper’s website, Jonathan Martin opined that Cruz has a serious shot at winning the presidency.

“By virtue of his strong rhetorical skills, biographical appeal and uncompromising conservatism, Mr. Cruz is the most logical nominee in a party that has turned sharply to the right. In a general election, fatigue toward the Obama years and the difficulty any party has in holding the White House for three consecutive terms could vault him to victory.”

Washington Post leftist Greg Sargent was amazingly restrained and thoughtful.

“But how different is Cruz from other Republicans on the issues themselves? How much of an outlier is Cruz in today’s GOP? Those are not rhetorical questions. A Cruz run will be a good thing, because it will bring clarity to them,” Sargent wrote.

“It’s good that Cruz is running,” he concluded. “We’ll hopefully find out soon enough how much of a conservative outlier Cruz really is in today’s Republican Party.”

It was just two years ago that Sargent was calling Cruz a demagogic nutjob.

Cruz “keeps untold numbers of base voters in a state of perpetual delusion,” he wrote soon after Cruz was sworn in as a member of the Senate.

He does this with “the hints about creeping socialism, the suggestions that Dems are anti-American, the notion that Obama’s modest executive actions reveal him as an enemy of the Constitution, etc.”

One of the co-founders of the modern American conservative movement, Richard A. Viguerie, chairman of ConservativeHQ.com, cheered Cruz’s early entry into the presidential contest.

The rest of the candidates will have to “move right to respond to Cruz, or be left behind by a grassroots conservative electorate fed-up with Republican candidates who are merely principle-free messengers for an out of touch Washington elite.”

Is America really ready for a swing to the right, Ted Cruz-style?

After eight years of Obama’s catastrophic presidency, voters just might be.

[ccp]

I like Cruz too.  He was very good on Hannity last night. 

[Crafty_Dog]

Dick gets back in his lane and is the better for it: 

Who Is Jeb's Main Rival?

By DICK MORRIS

Published on TheHill.com on March 24, 2015

Though the GOP nominating process for 2016 is just beginning, CNN/ORC issued a poll
this week that sheds light on how it is unfolding. The survey tested the GOP
candidates in a head-to-head match-up, and with only 14 percent undecided, it shows
the beginning of the makeup of the Republican field.

Jeb Bush garnered 16 percent in the poll, leading the field, with Scott Walker (13
percent) and Rand Paul (12 percent) following closely behind. Mike Huckabee came in
next with 10 percent, and Ben Carson won 9 percent. Chris Christie and Marco Rubio
tied at 7 percent support and were followed by Ted Cruz and Rick Perry, both at 4
percent. Bringing up the rear were John Kasich (2 percent), Rick Santorum (1
percent) and Bobby Jindal (1 percent).

To understand what's going on, you need to put yourself in the place of the typical
Republican primary voter. And the first thing you need to do is decide if you are
for or against Bush.

The former Florida governor been anointed by the media as the front-runner -- he is
the best-known and has the most money. The most notable fact is that Bush is only at
16 percent of the vote in this poll. His name, resources, Florida base and broad
appeal should put him much higher. Among GOP donors and elites, he likely runs much
better. But 84 percent of the primary electorate isn't buying him right now and
wants an alternative. While Bush has not declared, there is no doubt that he is
running. And even though he has not projected his credentials and ideas nationally,
his lack of appeal, despite full name recognition, should be troublesome for his
backers.

Next, you look down the list of candidates and see if there is anyone else you would
vote for -- or, on the other hand, can't support. Paul stands out. You either
support the Kentucky senator's novel brand of economic libertarianism, social
liberalism and neo-isolationism or you don't. Because Paul isn't likely to change
his views or persuade national security or evangelical voters to change theirs, he
is not likely to move up.

Huckabee faces a similar problem. The former Arkansas governor is trapped in an
ecclesiastical ghetto -- he beats the hell (or heck) out of Santorum, but to grow,
he needs to wage a secular campaign on issues like income inequality, Wall Street
deceit and other topics that grow out of his spirituality. He might just do that,
but hasn't done it yet.

Christie, the embattled New Jersey governor, needs Bush to fall for him to gain. Not
very likely.

Setting aside the poll's stragglers, we have to view the candidacies of Walker,
Rubio, Carson and Cruz as a unit, together getting 33 percent of the vote. Some
voters may prefer one or the other, but their support is, at the moment, likely
interchangeable. The winner of this four-way contest will emerge to challenge Bush
-- and the former Florida governor is vulnerable.

Which candidate that will be requires a more subtle calculation.

Walker has a big lead in financial support, seeming to be the favorite of Charles
and David Koch and their allies. But the Wisconsin governor has not yet shown the
depth and grasp of issues necessary for the national stage.

Rubio has a positive image but has flip-flopped on immigration and hasn't motivated
anyone to storm the barricades ... yet. The Florida senator's public appearances
have been too milquetoast and too biographic. He needs to use issues to win.

Cruz turned people off with his stridency on the Senate floor in October of 2013 but
may be capable to motivating the greatest positive passion among the bunch. He's
probably the brightest and best informed. The Texas senator knows how to use issues,
and is currently is the darling of the Tea Party.

Carson is a first-time candidate in an era in which, after our experience with
Barack Obama, we distrust ingenues. He still has to prove himself.

Of course, none of these defects are lethal and all can be overcome. Any of the four
could do it. (And don't count Huckabee out. He's the most likable and articulate of
them all.)

[DougMacG]

Interesting, and mostly right, I think.  Morris is a pollster so I presume this is a pretty good poll for this point in time.  That still means + or - 3 or 4% for all of them.  I like that my pick Rubio is being careful not to peak too early, lol.  He keeps getting just enough support to stay relevant.

The Morris bracket framework of quarter-finals, semi-finals, and finals fits the Republican path to the Presidency pretty well this time around.  The nomination will most likely be wrapped up about 11 months from now unless it goes to the convention.  That leaves some time but it's not that far off either.

Morris' first test, that you are either for or against frontrunner Jeb Bush is a valid one, except that most people don't really know Jeb yet.  He is more likable and more politically skilled than people think so that number should go up some.  And, as mentioned, he will have the money to do that.

I think Morris reads Rand Paul's support correctly.  His fans already know him.  There are a good number of them.  They won't leave him easily, if ever.  Nor will he gain much as the process unfolds.

Scott Walker perhaps is peaking too early.  Based on the 2012 experience with Newt, Michele Backmann, Hermann Cain and others all having big surges that fizzled, it is easy to think that with the scrutiny of being front and center too early, Walker may eventually stumble.  However, he also is an underestimated politician and we don't know how far he can go. 

Morris wrote:  "Setting aside the poll's stragglers, we have to view the candidacies of Walker,
Rubio, Carson and Cruz as a unit, together getting 33 percent of the vote. Some
voters may prefer one or the other, but their support is, at the moment, likely
interchangeable. The winner of this four-way contest will emerge to challenge Bush
-- and the former Florida governor is vulnerable."

Add Kasich and Jindahl's support to that and that bracket reaches 36%, which could become a winner take all.

Of that group, I still see Rubio as the one emerging to challenge Bush and Paul.  Walker is the successful governor of the group, but now they argue his results are no better than the bordering states.  I will refute that, but can he, and can he hold his own on foreign policy and all kinds of other issues that don't come up as Governor of Wisconsin?  Walker appeared on Hugh Hewitt (radio) today and was questioned hard on foreign policy.  He did surprisingly well and will only get better.  He did have to say a couple of times that I agree with Rubio on that.  http://www.hughhewitt.com/governor-scott-walker-talks-foreign-policy/

Carson is great and I wish he was ready for this but he isn't.  No one can be in that short of a time. 

Cruz is Cruz.  He is great but he has crossed too many people to suddenly become well liked.  This is partly a popularity contest, not just how good would you be if elected.  Ted Cruz didn't shut down the government but he did take the rap for it.  It's supposed to work just the opposite, you build up favors and cash in chips to win the nomination.  A groundswell of hundreds of thousands of conservatives won't push Cruz over the top.  He needs tens of millions.

It's going to be exciting; I hope we pick the right one this time.

Bigdog, if you are out there, I am ready to meet up with you in Iowa. 

[DougMacG]

CK made some remark like that and the warning is fair, we should be careful to pick someone ready for the job.  But those with the longest, widest and deepest experience (Kasich?) are not necessarily best for the job either. 

The column I was teeing off on was this one at the Federalist (Cruz thread):
http://thefederalist.com/2015/03/25/9-reasons-ted-cruz-is-exactly-like-barack-obama/
------------------------------------------------

Charles redeems himself here I think.  This is a first look at what he thinks will happen.  He is right that Cruz is a long shot, may break out - especially in the debate setting.  He pick Rubio first, also a first termer and also a long shot at this point.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-gop-racing-form-first-edition/2015/03/26/2c050b4c-d3cc-11e4-a62f-ee745911a4ff_story.html

The GOP racing form: First edition
By Charles Krauthammer  March 27

With Ted Cruz announcing and Rand Paul and Marco Rubio soon to follow, it’s time to start handicapping the horses and making enemies.

No point in wasting time on the Democratic field. There is none. The only thing that can stop Hillary Clinton is an act of God, and He seems otherwise occupied. As does Elizabeth Warren, the only Democrat who could conceivably defeat her.

On to the GOP.

First Tier

1. Marco Rubio. Trails badly in current polls, ranking seventh at 5 percent, but high upside potential.

Assets: Foreign policy looms uncharacteristically large in this election cycle, and Rubio is the most knowledgeable and fluent current contender on everything from Russia to Cuba to the Middle East. The son of Cuban immigrants, he can break into flawless Spanish (so can Jeb Bush) and speak passionately about the American story in a party that lost the Hispanic vote by 44 points in 2012.

Liabilities (in the primaries): His Gang of Eight immigration apostasy, though his current enforcement-first position has wide appeal. Second, after Barack Obama, will voters want another first-term senator with no executive experience? (Same for Cruz and Paul.)

Major appeal: Fresh, young, dynamic persona is a powerful counterpoint to Clinton fatigue.

Goes out at 3-1.

2. Jeb Bush. The consensus favorite (though I remain a bit skeptical). Solid, soft-spoken, serious, with executive experience and significant achievements as governor. What he lacks in passion, he makes up for in substance. And he has shown backbone in sticking to his semi-heretical positions on immigration and Common Core.

Obvious liability: His name. True, it helps him raise tens of millions of dollars, but it saddles him with legacy and dynastic issues that negate the inherent GOP advantage of running a new vs. old, not-again campaign against Hillary.

Odds: 7-2.

Cruz announces 2016 run for president(2:07)
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) announced his intention to run for president in the 2016 election during a speech at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va. (AP)
3. Scott Walker. A fine record of conservative achievement. Has shown guts and leadership in taking on labor unions and winning three elections (five if you count proxy elections) against highly energized Democrats.

Good, rousing speech in Iowa, but has stumbled since, flubbing routine questions on evolution and patriotism, then appearing to compare the Islamic State to Wisconsin demonstrators. Rookie mistakes, easily forgotten — if he learns from them.

Pandered on ethanol and fired a staffer who complained about Iowa’s unwarranted influence. Sure, everyone panders to Iowa, but Walker’s calling card is standing up to pressure.

Most encouraging sign: ability to maintain altitude after meteoric rise. Numbers remain steady. And his speeches continue to impress.

Odds: 4-1.

Second Tier

4. Chris Christie. Some politicians have their one moment. Christie might have missed his in 2012 when his fearless in-your-face persona was refreshingly new. Over time, however, in-your-face can wear badly. That plus Bridgegate cost him traction and dropped him out of the first tier. Biggest problem: being boxed out ideologically and financially by Jeb Bush for the relatively-moderate-governor-with-cross-aisle-appeal slot. 12-1.

5. Ted Cruz. Grand, florid campaign launch with matching rhetoric. Straightforward base-oriented campaign. Has developed a solid following. Could break out, especially in debate. 15-1.

6. Mike Huckabee. Great name recognition, affable, popular. But highly identified with social/cultural issues — how far can that carry him beyond Iowa and evangelicals? 15-1.

7. Rand Paul. Events have conspired against him. Obama’s setbacks and humiliations abroad have created a national mood less conducive to Paul’s non-interventionism. His nearly 13-hour ­anti-drone filibuster would not fly today. Is trying to tack back, even signing the anti-Iran-deal letter of the 47 senators. Strong youth appeal, though outreach to minorities less successful thus far. Bottom line: High floor of devoted libertarians; low ceiling in today’s climate. 30-1.

Longer Shots

8. Carly Fiorina. Getting her footing. Given current societal taboos, she is best placed to attack Hillary and has done so effectively. Can she do a Huckabee 2008 and, through debates, vault to the first tier? Unlikely. But because she’s talented and disciplined, not impossible. 50-1.

9. Ben Carson. Polling high, but is a novice making cringe-worthy gaffes, for example, on the origins of Islam and on gay choice (“a lot of people who go into prison go into prison straight, and when they come out, they’re gay”). And not knowing that the Baltic states are in NATO. Truly good man, brilliant doctor, great patriot. But not ready for the big leagues. Chance of winning? Zero.

Others

Bobby Jindal, Rick Perry, Rick Santorum and John Kasich — still below radar. If they surface, they’ll be featured in the next racing form

[DougMacG]

On the Ted Cruz thread, George Will observes correctly that we need someone who can break the electoral ice.  The question is not who is most conservative but who reaches out best from the conservative side to draw new people in?
------------------
Bill Clinton, according to the Times, views [Jeb] Bush — as well as Florida senator Marco Rubio — as the most daunting GOP challenger to his wife.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/04/hillary-clinton-2016-campaign.html

Of those two, the Bush surname helps Hillary to neutralize Clinton fatigue, and Jeb would have more trouble getting the base to turn out.

[DougMacG]

http://www.hughhewitt.com/carly-fiorina-on-iran-deal-president-obama-and-hillary-clinton/

She is WAY better at this than I expected.  I wouldn't be surprised if she moves up to a top tier candidate during the process.  She would make a great VP choice, but also would be a better top of the ticket candidate and better President than Hillary.

There's a transcript at the link, but I would recommend hearing the audio link.  I would prefer to see it, but this is a radio interview.  She doesn't exude excitement but sounds thoughtful, intelligent, knowledgeable, well-prepared and experienced.

My take at this point is that she was too conservative for California so she didn't know how to present herself to a far left state.  She seems more comfortable competing for the Republican nomination and taking on Pres. Obama and Hillary Clinton.

[Crafty_Dog]

With the little I've seen so far, I can picture her as a VP candidate; she'd make a very good "pit bull with lipstick" going after Hillary.

[ccp]

" I can picture her as a VP candidate; she'd make a very good "pit bull with lipstick" going after Hillary"

She would be better than Palin who has no depth beyond what we saw in her Republican Convention speech.

[objectivist1]

The Arabian Candidate

Posted By William Kilpatrick On April 10, 2015 @ frontpagemag.com



In The Manchurian Candidate, the son of a prominent right-wing politician is captured by the Soviets and brainwashed in a secret Manchurian location. His task is to assassinate a presidential candidate, thus ensuring the election of the demagogic vice-president. Hence, the title “Manchurian Candidate.”

The film has several parallels to current events. The main difference is that in those days, Americans had to be brainwashed into serving enemy interests by psy-ops teams. Nowadays, they come self-brainwashed with some indoctrinative assist from the American educational system.

In the film, a scary lady with leftist sympathies who looks vaguely like Hillary Clinton manipulates her husband into high political office. In real life, a scary lady with leftist leanings who looks vaguely like Angela Lansbury (only scarier) manipulates herself into high political office.

In her case, teams of brainwashers are not required, since she has brainwashed herself into believing that foreign governments are dumping truckloads of cash into her family foundation because she’s such a charming and intelligent woman. And also because Arab sovereigns like nothing better than to do their part to improve the lives of the poor, the hungry, the environmentally underserved, and kids who need braces—in short, the very causes for which the foundation was founded.

Another similarity is that in the film, the Angela Lansbury character has some sort of hypnotic power over her son, the unwitting assassin. Whenever it begins to dawn on him that something funny is going on, she flashes a Queen of Diamonds playing card and he falls into a catatonic state of complete obedience. In the present situation the Angela Lansbury look-alike has merely to flash the gender card and, presto, skeptical voters fall back into line.

There are parallels to other movies as well. Today’s Queen of Diamonds has a secret server in her home so that her exchanges with foreign dono—I mean “diplomats”—can’t be traced. I’m not sure if the server takes up only one room of the palatial house, or a whole suite of rooms. And who knows what’s in the cavern-like basement? It’s all faintly reminiscent of those James Bond thrillers in which the villain’s remote island estate sits atop a vast underground military-industrial complex.

At some point the analogy breaks down. You could still convince a sixties audience that leftists were willing to sell out the country. We, on the other hand, have convinced ourselves that we live in a brave new world where such things never happen—at least, not in modern Western societies. No one would dare to pull a fast one on us because we’re just too smart. We’ve grown up watching CSI, we went to schools that taught critical thinking, and our history texts were written by Howard Zinn. We’ve also been nurtured on relativism, so if it were discovered that Arabs controlled the White House, we would shrug our shoulders and say, “at this point, what does it matter?”

The Clinton-Arab connection actually goes back to the time when Bill Clinton was governor of Arkansas and worked to secure a hefty Saudi contribution to a Middle-Eastern studies program at the University of Arkansas. But let’s skip all that and fast forward to relatively recent times when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton appointed her longtime aide Huma Abedin as Deputy Chief of Staff at the State Department. When it was discovered that Abedin’s family was deeply involved in the Muslim Brotherhood in Saudi Arabia, very few eyebrows were raised. After all, even President Obama had relatives in the Muslim Brotherhood. So it would have been silly to make something of it.

It’s probably just a coincidence that while working for the Clintons, Huma herself was the assistant editor of the Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs which—you guessed it—is a Muslim Brotherhood journal. Before that, and while still interning at the White House, she was an executive board member of the Muslim Student Association (MSA) at George Washington University. The MSA was the first Muslim Brotherhood organization in the United States and George Washington was the first Muslim president. Well, the latter hasn’t yet been firmly established, but it’s just a matter of time until those Saudi-funded Mid-East studies professors at the University of Arkansas and the Saudi-funded professors at Georgetown (Bill’s alma mater) discover the prayer rug in the attic at Mount Vernon. It’s also probably a coincidence that, like her boss, Huma conducted State Department business using her own personal e-mail address, connected, one supposes, to the same master server that served her master so well… er, mistress.

Abedin also worked until recently for the Clinton Foundation. Again, this is no doubt a pure coincidence and, as the old saying goes, it has nothing to do with Islam. Although CSI investigators would have a field day with such coincidences, today’s government officials seem curiously lacking in curiosity. In 2012, Michelle Bachmann and four other House members wrote letters to the Inspector Generals of several government agencies asking them to conduct an investigation into Muslim Brotherhood penetration of the government. They were particularly concerned about Human Abedin in view of her family connections and influential position. They noted [1] that the Clinton State Department had “taken actions recently that have been enormously favorable to the Muslim Brotherhood and its interests.”

The request was dismissed by numerous congressmen and senators as “offensive,” “insensitive,” and even “hurtful.” By that time the machinery of the “Islamophobia” industry was already in high gear and it was deemed prudent even by Republicans to defend Abedin and to damn her accusers as McCarthyites.

Still, the case for an inquiry seemed strong. As one McCarthyite, former federal prosecutor Andy McCarthy [2], observed, even if Abedin was innocent of any wrongdoing, the State Departments own guidelines about foreign family connections would disqualify her for a security clearance for such a sensitive position.

But then, again, a lot of people in sensitive positions don’t seem to qualify for a security clearance. For example, if all your closest relatives were leftists or communists, if your chief mentors were, respectively, a member of the Communist Party and a radical left-wing preacher, and if you used to hang out with known terrorists, you probably couldn’t get a job as a night watchman at an auto parts warehouse. On the other hand, if someone with the same background throws his hat into the presidential ring, he can become Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy, and get to set foreign policy.

He also gets to appoint Secretaries of State. It shouldn’t be any surprise if they turn out to be the kind of people who can’t be bothered with security checks. Such people seem to live in an ethereal realm that puts them above suspicion and above conflicts of interest. Normally, when a Secretary of State receives tens of millions in donations from countries that support the spread of a radical ideology, it would be a sign that something is terribly wrong. For an analogy, ask yourself if you would keep someone on at your firm if she had access to sensitive trade secrets and yet received huge gifts from rival corporations while conducting company business on her private server.

You would probably get rid of her pronto. But that’s only if you apply the normal rules of logic—which apparently don’t apply to Secretaries of State appointed by President Obama. If you applied such logic, you might also think there was something awkward about the fact that current Secretary of State John Kerry’s daughter is married to an Iranian who has extensive family ties in Iran. As Kenneth Timmerman [3] points out, the FBI usually won’t grant security clearance to “individuals who are married to nationals of an enemy nation or have family members living in that country, for fear of divided loyalties or, more simply, blackmail.” Of course, you would have to be some kind of conspiracy nut to think that having vulnerable in-laws in Iran would in any way compromise Secretary Kerry’s negotiations with the representatives of a country whose leaders routinely indulge in “death to America” rhetoric.

Undoubtedly, the President consulted with his senior adviser Valerie Jarrett about the matter. Since Jarrett was born in Iran and spoke Persian as a child, she would, by current standards of expertise, be assumed to have deep insight into the Persian mind. She could have assured the president that “Great Satan” and “Death to America” are typical of the rhetorical exuberance that characterizes the rich and vibrant Iranian culture. Moreover, she could have allayed any concerns about blackmail. Anyone who has studied “Cliff Notes on Islam” knows that blackmail runs counter to the deeply held beliefs of the mullahs.

Jarretts’ family left Iran when she was five, but apparently those five years were enough to qualify her as an expert on Iranian affairs. According to Discover the Networks [4], it was revealed in 2012 that for several months, Jarrett “had been leading secret negotiations with representatives of Iran’s Supreme leader… in an effort to normalize relations between the U.S. and Iran.”

The mind spins at the –what’s the word?—the audacity of it all. But the curious thing is not that there are people in high places willing to put self-interest ahead of the national interest. Such people are always with us. The curious thing is that the American people and the American press accept it with such equanimity. During the Obama-Clinton-Kerry-Jarrett-Abedin years, Russia seized the Crimea, ISIS seized large parts of Iraq and Syria, the Taliban re-established itself in Afghanistan, allies stopped trusting us, enemies were emboldened, the Middle East was set on fire, and the Army was drastically reduced. Oh, and the way was cleared for Iran to have nuclear bombs. Future generations—if there are any—will wonder what we were thinking.

What we were thinking, they may discover, goes something like this (in shorthand brain language): “Mustn’t think that! Mustn’t say that! Not nice! What will people think!” You’d have to go back to the Victorian era to find another society with so much concern for propriety of thought and speech. Thomas Sowell put his finger on the phenomenon in a recent editorial [5]. When it comes to matters of survival, he observed, we have “put questions of etiquette above questions of annihilation.”

He’s right. A sort of suicidal etiquette that chokes off common sense has grown up in our society. Under the rules of the new etiquette, we aren’t allowed to say that the Emperor has no clothes. We dare not even point out that the Emperor and his ministers appear to be throwing open the gates to the enemy.

Let’s see: The people of the United States elect as president a man they know very little about. When it becomes obvious that he has deep leftist sympathies combined with deep Islamist sympathies, they elect him again. He, in turn, appoints one Secretary of State who is beholden to Arab largesse, and then, after she steps down, he replaces her with a man who practices folk-song diplomacy and has close family ties with Iran.

The Manchurian Candidate? On one level, the current situation is so full of farce, that a serious drama like The Manchurian Candidate couldn’t do it justice. If you were to make a movie of the current mandarin mess, it might be better to play it for laughs—an Austin Powers-type spoof or something along the lines of Abbott and Costello meet the Manchurian Candidate.

On another level, the situation is so fraught with apocalyptic dangers that only a deadly serious doomsday film—something along the lines of Fail Safe—could bring home the enormity of our current folly. In any event, there’s a title ready made for it. If the first Obama election could be called Death Wish I, and his re-election, Death Wish II, then the election of Hillary Clinton would deservedly merit the title, Death Wish III—The Final Chapter.

[DougMacG]

" I can picture her as a VP candidate; she'd make a very good "pit bull with lipstick" going after Hillary"

She would be better than Palin who has no depth beyond what we saw in her Republican Convention speech.

Palin had the mis-match of her political views not matching the top of the ticket. That McCain needed to reach to the right in the general election was HIS fault.  (DOle/Kemp had this problem too.)  She was not ready but had far more depth than the candidate won that seat. 

She was unprepared for a simple question, what do you read, that she didn't want to answer.  She was probably reading wolf hunter's weekly and a few right wing sites that she didn't want to mention.  She didn't want to embellish and get caught on the followup, so she had a Rick Perry moment instead.  Most of the rest of what was leveled against her was false.  Palin was the most powerful woman in her state before she was governor as head of the energy commission in an energy state. She performed flawlessly in her own gubernatorial debate, highly knowledgeable and articulate on all state-level issues.

But ccp's main point is true.  Carly is showing up readier and with more depth, discussing large concepts and fine details of foreign policy and other things tight out of the gate.  She doesn't have to match her view with a McCain or anyone else. We may not know yet what Carly's blind spots will be.  Her record as CEO of HP was not that highly regarded but she seems able to defend it.

[objectivist1]

I can confirm that Fiorina was NOT well-regarded as CEO of Hewlett-Packard.  She did not lead the company well at all.

[Crafty_Dog]

"Her record as CEO of HP was not that highly regarded but she seems able to defend it."

I share this sentiment.

Also, I was not at all impressed with her as a Senate candidate her in CA.

That said:

a) Presumably she learned from her Senate campaign

b) Being a woman, she can go after Hillary unafraid of feminazi claptrap-- a point which she seems to have grasped quite well.  Thus, regardless of her ultimate merits (and I think she comes up quite short) having her in the race at this point is a big plus for beating Hillary.

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.politico.com/story/2015/04/gops-plan-attack-hillary-clinton-as-mitt-romney-116943.html?ml=tl_5

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/clinton-campaigns-highest-suggested-donation-2700-english-only-250-spanish_918942.html

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/04/21/hillary-clinton-calls-for_0_n_7108026.html

[Crafty_Dog]

Just put Rubio, instead of Walker and it sounds pretty good to me!


This GOP presidential ticket tells liberals to go to hell
Posted on April 23, 2015 by Wayne Allyn Root
Hi, I’m Wayne Allyn Root for Personal Liberty. The GOP keeps bringing a knife to a gun fight. The result is we’re getting killed. We’re getting defeated and humiliated even after we won the most historic landslide in modern history. It’s time to change strategy.
The media tells us to play nice, be “gentlemen” and compromise. Look where it’s gotten us: a bankrupt country with over $18 trillion in debt and income taxes at about the same level as bankrupt, socialist Greece. Worse, the labor force participation rate is at all-time lows. And for the first time in history more businesses fail each day than open.
We are facing the end of the America dream and death of the greatest middle class in world history because we have played nice, acted like gentlemen and compromised. We’re standing around acting like “gentlemen” while Barack Obama turns America into Detroit. Like in that movie “Network,” it’s time to open our window and scream: “I’m not going to take it anymore!”
It’s time for a GOP dream team of street fighters to take on the evil that is destroying America by making us all dependent on big government. It’s time to kick ass and take no prisoners. It’s time to stand up to the evildoers and tell them to go to hell.
It’s time to get behind one nominee and then name our entire team and announce what that team will do to save the U.S. economy, the middle class and the American dream.
It’s time to inspire passion and enthusiasm by showing we stand for something. That something includes smaller government, lower taxes, less spending, paying down the debt and giving more power to the citizens. Let the liberal media try to call that “extreme.” The American people will vote for that vision.
Liberals and the media told us we’d lose if we ran an “extremist” like Ronald Reagan. Instead, he won in two historic landslides. Since then, every milquetoast moderate we’ve run — George H.W. Bush, Bob Dole, John McCain and Mitt Romney — lost.
The key to victory is the passion, energy, intensity and enthusiasm of your base, combined with inspiring independents and undecided voters by painting a picture of hope, prosperity and patriotism. You have to get people excited. Being “moderate” doesn’t excite anyone. Although it’s a little early for me to endorse anyone, here is a look at a potential GOP dream team.
Scott Walker as the GOP presidential nominee
Here’s a man from the Midwest, without a college degree and with a blue-collar mentality. Here’s a man who fought the money and manpower of every union in America and won — not once, not twice, but three times in blue-state Wisconsin. He didn’t do it with kindness. Despite death threats against his wife and children, Scott Walker never gave an inch. He turned a $3 billion deficit into a billion-dollar surplus, and then handed the money back to the taxpayers. That’s a fighter. That’s courage. That’s a leader with a spine, who won’t fold when the biased-liberal media tries to slander and destroy him. Walker’s a man bringing a bazooka to a gun fight.
His choices for vice president are plentiful. The GOP bench is fantastic and diverse, from Latino men like Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, to women like Carly Fiorina, Gov. Susanna Martinez and Gov. Nikki Haley, to libertarian heroes like Rand Paul, to a brilliant African-American brain surgeon like Dr. Ben Carson, to a genius policy wonk like Gov. Bobby Jindal. The list is long.
We’ve been governed by inept political hacks for far too long. It is time for a dream team of experienced, committed adults who will kick ass and never fold when the going gets tough. The GOP presidential nominee needs to name his entire dream team.
Do that and we’ll put the fear of God into liberals and the media. Here is how we differentiate ourselves, paint a picture of hope and inspire our base! Here is how we win 270 electoral votes.
Name our dream team from top to bottom
Attorney General Ted Cruz: Let’s put a true defender of the Constitution in a place where he can do just that. Can you imagine the fear we’ll drive into the heads and hearts of law-breaking liberals and Marxists? No compromise, no mercy.
Treasury Secretary Rand Paul: Put a libertarian in charge of the economy, taxes and the IRS. Watch the U.S. economy enjoy the greatest expansion in history with a true, free-market libertarian in charge. Rand Paul is a fighter. No compromise, no mercy.
Defense Secretary Allen West. Here’s the man born to stand up for the honor of the military and defend the greatest nation in world history. No compromise, no mercy.
Secretary of State (you’re going to love this one) Donald Trump: Rather than weaklings afraid of their shadows, turn the world’s greatest, pit bull negotiator loose on our adversaries like China and Russia. Let him negotiate the nuclear deal with Iran. No compromise, no mercy.
Federal Reserve Chairman Ron Paul: The first father-son cabinet team will stand up to, audit and rein in the Fed before the Fed destroys our economy. Ron Paul’s entire life has been preparation for this. No compromise, no mercy.
Homeland Security Secretary Trey Gowdy: Protect our borders with a pit bull, not a pussycat. No compromise, no mercy.
ICE Director Joe Arpaio: Need I say more?
Health And Human Services Secretary Ben Carson: Here’s the guy born to dismantle Obamacare. No compromise, no mercy.
Labor Secretary Darrell Issa: Here’s a street fighter who will stand up for America’s workers, not union bosses. No compromise, no mercy.
Energy Secretary Sarah Palin. You want jobs? Take off the shackles and drill, baby, drill! No compromise, no mercy.
Commerce Secretary Herman Cain. Here’s a brilliant businessman and unabashed capitalist who will get American working again. No compromise, no mercy.
Special Economic Advisers Mitt Romney, Jack Welsh, Steve Wynn, Carly Fiorina and Donald Trump (doing double duty): Put politics aside and put people who understand business in charge of the economy. No compromise, no mercy.
Education Secretary Bobby Jindal. Here’s the brightest guy in the room, bar none. Put him in charge of taking on the teachers unions with creative ideas to turn around our failing education system. No compromise, no mercy.
(Now, a personal plug) Wayne Allyn Root, in charge of the Small Business Administration: Small business is the economic engine of America. I know how to motivate, inspire and empower the millions of mom and pop businesses on Main Street, not Wall Street. I stand for giving power to small business, not the welfare state or illegal aliens. No compromise, no mercy.
This is how you win an election — by exciting and inspiring Americans with an experienced, all-star GOP dream team that actually stands for something: America first!
And this is how you tell liberals to go to hell.
http://personalliberty.com/this-gop-presidential-ticket-tells-liberals-to-go-to-hell/
******

[Crafty_Dog]

second post


By
Fred Barnes
April 22, 2015 7:06 p.m. ET
356 COMMENTS

The importance of a presidential election depends on what’s at stake. In 1980, a lot was. The economy was stuck with double-digit inflation and interest rates, and Soviet communism was advancing in Africa, Asia and South America. Ronald Reagan was elected president.

Now, as the 2016 presidential race unfolds, the stakes are even higher than 36 years ago. Not only is the economy unsteady but threats to American power and influence around the world are more pronounced and widespread. And those problems are only part of what makes next year’s election so critical.

Like it or not, the next president must deal with the world President Obama leaves behind. It won’t be easy. A Republican president will be committed to reversing a significant chunk of Mr. Obama’s legacy, as most GOP candidates already are. That’s a gigantic undertaking. A Democratic president, presumably Hillary Clinton, will be forced to defend Mr. Obama’s policies, since they reflect the views of her party. That will leave little time for fresh Democratic initiatives.

The most immediate issues confronting the new president are strategic and military. The U.S. role in the world is in retreat. Allies such as Israel and Poland have been alienated. American leadership against Russian intervention in Ukraine and Iran’s dominance of neighboring countries in the Middle East was fleeting. Mr. Obama’s promise of a foreign-policy “pivot” toward Asia turned out to be merely rhetorical.

Ashamed of past American policies, Mr. Obama began his presidency with an apology tour. When the next president takes office a tour of reassurance may be required, along with an effort to persuade the world of America’s intention to stand up to Russia, Iran, China and Islamic terrorists.

Meanwhile, the U.S. military has shrunk to pre-World War II levels in troops and arms. “Our leaders have painted a fictional picture of the state of our military,” said former Texas governor and likely GOP presidential candidate Rick Perry in a speech in early April. “Our armed forces are depleted, our military infrastructure is aging, and our technological advantages are being severely challenged.”

Mr. Perry did not exaggerate. But a military buildup as massive as Mr. Reagan’s in the 1980s would be expensive, take years to complete, and face political opposition. The Democratic Party no longer has a hawkish, internationalist faction. “There is no Scoop Jackson wing,” former United Nations ambassador John Bolton said at a Republican gathering in New Hampshire last Friday. “There isn’t even a Joe Lieberman wing.”

Next in line of importance is the economy, which has not experienced annual economic growth of more than 3% since 2005. Like the diminished military, this has weakened America’s ability to project power and influence outside U.S. borders. Rejuvenating the economy is necessary. Without it, the country will suffer. Politically speaking, so will the president elected next year.

Entitlements—Medicare, Social Security and Medicaid—are eating up the federal budget. Reform is crucial to curbing debt and improving economic growth. Republicans are divided, though, and Democrats want to increase entitlement spending. The new president may be hogtied on this issue.

But a Republican won’t be blocked from altering the ideological balance on the Supreme Court. It’s very much at stake in the 2016 election. Four justices are 76 or older. Two, Ruth Bader Ginsburg (82) and Stephen Breyer (76), are liberals. Antonin Scalia (79) is a conservative. And Anthony Kennedy (78) is a swing vote. The next president’s nominees, assuming there are several, will be pivotal.

And that leads us to the toughest issue of all for a Republican president: rolling back or overhauling Mr. Obama’s policies from ObamaCare to student loans to executive orders protecting up to five million illegal immigrants from deportation and opening diplomatic relations with Cuba. This is a high priority for the entire GOP. But “it will take some time,” says James Capretta of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, a conservative think tank. It will require patience and tenacity.

The history here is not encouraging. When President Dwight Eisenhower arrived at the White House in 1953, he was expected to begin dismantling the New Deal. But some New Deal policies were popular, and the task of uprooting programs in place for nearly two decades was daunting. The New Deal survived almost wholly intact.

That won’t happen with a Republican president and Congress. “If a Republican wins, he’ll almost certainly have both houses of Congress,” says University of Virginia political scientist Larry Sabato. But “GOP ranks in the Senate won’t be at or even near 60 due to the seats that are up for grabs in ’16. Still, it’s an end to extreme gridlock.”

ObamaCare will be first on the chopping block, as well it should, and Republicans have adequate plans to replace it that most Americans will likely welcome. Curbs on oil and natural gas production can be eased or eliminated. Executive orders can be promptly rescinded.

It is the rest of Mr. Obama’s legacy that will be tricky to undo. Should every overreaching initiative of the Environmental Protection Agency be axed? Should the Federal Communications Commission be packed to cancel net neutrality? What about Dodd-Frank, the stepped-up regulation of financial markets? Should it be repealed entirely or just stripped of some of its new rules?

When attacking eight years of Obama policies, Republicans would be wise not to treat Democrats the way Democrats treated them. Mr. Obama did himself no favors by shunning Republicans when ObamaCare, the economic stimulus and Dodd-Frank were passed. Democrats had large majorities in the House and Senate at the time. They spurned even a hint of bipartisanship.

This has come back to haunt Mr. Obama and Democrats. If ObamaCare had been passed with a sprinkling of Republican votes, it would not be as unpopular as it is today. The same is true for executive orders. They were used specifically to deny Republicans a role.

This touches on a tacit but important issue in the 2016 election: the possibility of a “new normal” in the way Washington works. The parties are deeply divided. They don’t like each other. Mr. Obama made things worse. With Mr. Obama and Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid gone, the next president can improve relations. It won’t require an executive order.

Mr. Barnes, executive editor of the Weekly Standard, is a Fox News commentator.
Popular on WSJ

[Crafty_Dog]

The Clinton Foundation Is the Democratic Party . . . and Arguably, the U.S. Government As Well
Jonathan Chait comes to terms with the obvious:
When you are a power couple consisting of a former president and a current secretary of State and likely presidential candidate, you have the ability to raise a lot of money for charitable purposes that can do a lot of good. But some of the potential sources of donations will be looking to get something in return for their money other than moral satisfaction or the chance to hobnob with celebrities. Some of them want preferential treatment from the State Department, and others want access to a potential future Clinton administration. To run a private operation where Bill Clinton will deliver a speech for a (huge) fee and a charity that raises money from some of the same clients is a difficult situation to navigate. To overlay that fraught situation onto Hillary’s ongoing and likely future government service makes it all much harder.
And yet the Clintons paid little to no attention to this problem . . .
The Obama administration wanted Hillary Clinton to use official government email. She didn’t. The Obama administration also demanded that the Clinton Foundation disclose all its donors while she served as Secretary of State. It didn’t comply with that request, either.
The Clintons’ charitable initiatives were a kind of quasi-government run by themselves, which was staffed by their own loyalists and made up the rules as it went along.
This explains a bit about why the 2016 cycle could turn out to be another battle between a Clinton and a Bush. (For what it’s worth, I don’t think it will shake out this way.)
The presidency dominates American political life, making every ex-president the former boss of just about every middle-management or rising star figure in his party. If you’re in politics, if you haven’t worked for a president, chances are you’re one degree of separation away from someone who worked for one.
(This was one of the things that made Barack Obama’s win over Hillary in the 2008 primary so improbable -- she had all the veteran national-campaign staffers, pollsters, strategists, etc.)
George W. Bush casts a long shadow on the 2016 Republican field, far beyond his brother. Among those who worked for George W. Bush: Ted Cruz, who worked on the Bush 2000 campaign and in the Federal Trade Commission; Bobby Jindal, who was an assistant secretary of Health and Human Services from 2001 to 2003; Chris Christie, who Bush appointed U.S. Attorney for New Jersey; Rick Perry was Bush’s lieutenant governor in 1999 and 2000; and arguably Carly Fiorina, who served on CIA and State Department advisory committees during the Bush years.
The Clintons, Inc., make up a big slice of the professional class of the Democratic party. And the Bush Family, Inc., makes up a big slice of the professional class of the Republican party.
And as we’ve seen . . . who in the party can tell a former president what he can and can’t do? Who in the Democratic party was willing to put his foot down and tell the Clintons “no”?
There were people who were trying to say “no” . . .
Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., where Uranium One’s largest U.S. operation was, wrote to President Obama, saying the deal “would give the Russian government control over a sizable portion of America’s uranium production capacity.”
. . . but they were ignored.
Last night on Greta Van Susteren’s program, Barrasso said, “We tried to throw the penalty flag early on . . . We were very concerned from the standpoint of energy security for our country, and national security. Now you see Vladimir Putin owning 20 percent of American uranium, controlling that and we know Russia sends uranium to countries that are not our friends, that are our enemies, including Iran.”
He said he received a letter, three months later, from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that said the commission would keep an eye on the deal. He said that based on his discussions with “people on the ground,” American uranium has left the country and gone overseas, without the company getting the necessary special permissions and permits.

[DougMacG]

The author of the Clinton Cash book that could very well take down Hillary Clinton says that he has researchers 4 months into a look at Jeb Bush's financial affairs. (Fox News Sunday today) Too early to comment he says but hints that they are finding similar patterns, with the main difference being that the stakes with a Governor are smaller and less global.  Bush seems like a moral, standup and straightforward guy and can probably explain quite well every action he took as Governor.  But somehow these well-connected people stumble into big money quite easily.  The timing of it is that it follows the Hillary scandal and in the context of a little Clinton-Bush fatigue.  It could turn out that his big money advantage for Bush will turn out to be a negative in the campaign. 

That said, I doubt he was responsible for the transfer of our nuclear fuel assets to one of our largest, state enemies.
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Meanwhile, I see that both Cruz and Rubio or up and that Marco Rubio moved into first place (within the margin of error) in the latest two polls:
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/us/2016_republican_presidential_nomination-3823.html

The goal at this early stage is probably just to poll high enough to stay relevant.

[DougMacG]

Daily Caller has a piece debunking the electoral clout of these alleged dynasties.  George HW Bush ran for President 3 times.  Lost in 1980.  Won once, the so-called Reagan 3rd term in 1988.  Got only 37% of the vote in 1992 running on his own record.  Hardly a electoral powerhouse.

Bill Clinton ran and won twice, both with less than 50% of the vote, 43% and 49%.

George W Bush lost the popular vote in 2000 with 49%.  Won as a post 911 war time President with only 50% - over a dolt, and was never popular again.

Hillary was part of Bill 43% win in 1992 and was unpopular by 1994.  She ran and lost in 2007-2008 to an almost unknown in her own party.  (Running unopposed and still floundering now.)

Jeb was a popular Governor, last won an election in 2002, 14 years prior to 2016, (and currently trails Marco Rubio in his home state polling).
------------------------------
http://dailycaller.com/2015/04/26/history-shows-clintons-and-bushes-are-not-electoral-juggernauts/
History Shows Clintons And Bushes Are NOT Electoral Juggernauts

[DougMacG]

Striving for equal time for all the competitors.  )  Thanks to Cato for covering this.

C'mon Dems, are these really the best leaders you can find?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
http://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/martin-omalleys-terrible-fiscal-record

From the article:
He raised just about every tax in Maryland. Governor O’Malley:

Raised the top personal income tax rate from 4.75 to 5.75 percent. With local taxes on top, Maryland’s top rate is 8.95 percent.
Raised the corporate tax rate from 7.0 to 8.25 percent.
Raised the sales tax rate from 5 to 6 percent and expanded the sales tax base.
Raised the sales tax rate on beer, wine, and spirits by 50 percent.
Raised the gas tax by 20 cents over four years, almost doubling the rate from 23.5 cents.
Doubled the cigarette tax from $1 to $2 per pack.
Imposed higher taxes on vehicle registration.
Imposed a stormwater mitigation fee on property owners, or a “rain tax.”
After eight years, O’Malley had hit income earners, businesses, consumers, smokers, beer drinkers, wine drinkers, and drivers, which probably means everyone in the state. He didn’t just punish the top 1 percent often targeted by Democrats — he gave a tax spanking to all 100 percent of Marylanders.

By 2014 Marylanders had finally had enough. In the gubernatorial election, Republican Larry Hogan pulled off a stunning upset over Democrat Anthony Brown. As the Washington Post said, Hogan’s win was powered by “relentlessly promising to roll back tax increases,” and it was a “repudiation of the eight-year tenure” of O’Malley. Hogan is focusing on rolling back some of the tax hikes, starting with the rain tax.
...
Maryland’s pension funding ratio is just 64 percent, below the 50-state average of 71 percent, and much less than the full-funding ratio of 100 percent. That means that Marylanders could face more tax hikes down the road unless bloated state worker benefits are scaled back.

[ccp]

"C'mon Dems, are these really the best leaders you can find?"

Many liberals would prefer a candidate even  *farther* to the left.   

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.dickmorris.com/obama-to-hillary-not-yet-dick-morris-tv-lunch-alert/?utm_source=dmreports&utm_medium=dmreports&utm_campaign=dmreports

[Crafty_Dog]

Second post

I saw Bret Baeir interview ex-Gov. Pataki of NY last night.   Who?  Exactly, but he is the Rep who beat Mario Cuomo and got re-elected.   I was pleasantly surprised at the quality of his answers and at his grounded, self-deprecating sense of self.   He's not likely to go far, but he may add to the quality of the conversation.

[Crafty_Dog]

y
Laura Meckler
May 5, 2015 6:00 a.m. ET
122 COMMENTS

LAS VEGAS—Hillary Clinton, making her first visit to Nevada since she announced her 2016 presidential run, will call for a path to citizenship for some 11 million people in the U.S. illegally, and contrast that position with Republican contenders who stop short of that stance.

In 2013, the Senate passed legislation with some GOP support that offered the chance for citizenship for those who qualified. But that bill died in the Republican-controlled House, and GOP support for the idea has dried up. Mrs. Clinton plans to meet with young people at a Las Vegas high school.

“She will say that the standard for a true solution is nothing less than a full and equal path to citizenship,” said a Clinton aide, previewing her remarks. “She will say that we cannot settle for proposals that provide hardworking people with merely a ’second-class’ status.”

That is a reference principally to former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, the all-but-declared presidential candidate who once supported a path to citizenship but now is promoting the opportunity for a legal status short of citizenship. Even that is unpopular among many GOP primary voters. Critics of a path to citizenship or other legal status say it would reward people who broke the law.

Many Democrats see Mr. Bush as a strong general-election contender in part because of his potential to appeal to Hispanic voters, who overwhelmingly supported Democrat Barack Obama in his two elections. Mr. Bush has long spoken of immigration in welcoming terms, speaks fluent Spanish and is married to a Latina woman.
Negative views of Hillary Clinton have risen in the past month amid news of controversial fundraising practices by her family's charitable foundation, a new WSJ/NBC News poll shows. How should her supporters interpret the new numbers? WSJ’s Jason Bellini has #TheShortAnswer.

Mrs. Clinton has supported a path to citizenship at least as far back as 2006, though she has taken more cautious positions on other immigration issues. She at one point opposed driver’s licenses for illegal immigrants, though an aide recently said that she now supports that policy. Last summer, she upset some immigration advocates when she said that unaccompanied children coming across the border illegally should be sent back to their home countries.

Mrs. Clinton’s appearance on Tuesday is meant to begin laying the groundwork to tell Hispanic voters that Mr. Bush isn’t as supportive of a liberalized immigration policy as Mrs. Clinton and other Democrats are.

“Clinton will talk about her commitment to fixing our broken immigration system by passing comprehensive immigration reform that provides a path to citizenship, treats everyone with dignity and compassion, upholds the rule of law, protects our border and national security, and brings millions of hardworking people out of the shadows and into the formal economy so they can pay taxes and contribute to our nation’s prosperity,” the aide said.

Mrs. Clinton, the leading Democratic candidate for president by a wide margin, will meet with young people who were brought to the U.S. illegally as children. Mr. Obama took executive action to protect these people among other undocumented immigrants from deportation. GOP candidates including Mr. Bush say his move overstepped presidential authority and have said they would roll it back.

She will appear at Rancho High School, which has a student body that is about 70% Hispanic, the Clinton campaign said.

Nevada is one of a handful of states with large Hispanic populations that have been closely fought in recent presidential races.

Write to Laura Meckler at laura.meckler@wsj.com

[G M]

There are a lot of federal laws the Clintons don't want enforced.

[DougMacG]

There are a lot of federal laws the Clintons don't want enforced.

Pardon me?  Pardon Bill.  Pardon Sandy Burglar.  Marc Rich.  Anyone who knows a Rodham brother.  Pardons for sale in the Lincoln Bedroom.  'Prosecutorial discretion'.  Lighten up a little on commodities trading.  Pardon all white collar criminals whose party affiliation starts with a D.  Restore the voting rights of felons.  There are just too many Democrats people incarcerated these days!

There she is, blatantly mixing political gain with executive overreach, on her first stop - without apology.  Besides an extra-constitutional immigration policy, why not add IRS targeting of political opponents to the list of Obama policies she hopes to continue?

No matter your view on taxes, spending or the Middle East, what kind of voter believes the next Attorney General of the United States should report to Hillary Clinton?

[Crafty_Dog]

A mere three U.S. Presidents—Taylor, Grant and Eisenhower—have been elected without previously holding political office. Ben Carson and Carly Fiorina now aspire to be the fourth, and they promise to enrich the Republican field even if they’re long shots.

The 63-year-old Mr. Carson, who declared his candidacy Monday in his native Detroit, rose from poverty to become one of the world’s pre-eminent neurosurgeons. At age 33 he was the youngest doctor appointed director of the Johns Hopkins pediatric neurosurgery unit and performed path-breaking operations such as the first separation of twins conjoined at the head.
Opinion Journal Video
Editorial Page Editor Paul Gigot on Ben Carson and Carly Fiorina joining the race for the Republican presidential nomination. Photo credit: Getty Images.

In 1994 he and his wife started a college scholarship fund that has distributed $700,000 in awards to mostly poor middle- and high-school students. The fund is purely philanthropic—no donations and speaking fees with uranium deals—and predates Mr. Carson’s political activities.

Mr. Carson has long been admired for his Horatio Alger story, and his autobiography “Gifted Hands” has inspired many young people. In 2006 the NAACP accorded him the same honor it has bestowed on Rosa Parks,Oprah Winfrey and Congressman John Lewis. But now that Mr. Carson is running for President as a Republican, and criticizing President Obama, the Washington Post greeted his entry into the race with an odd piece saying he’s diminishing his legacy.

This is a familiar liberal attempt to force the races into partisan boxes, as if no black American should criticize the first black President. This is unfair to Mr. Carson and bad for the country. Mr. Carson’s appeals to individual liberty and personal responsibility echo civil-rights leaders including Martin Luther King Jr. and Frederick Douglass, among others. Race relations would be far healthier if voters divided more by personal philosophy than by racial identity. Civil-rights leaders should want black Republicans to aspire to the highest office.

Mr. Carson’s views such as his support for a flat tax and health-savings accounts are also in the mainstream of the GOP. His weakness is that he’s new to the political game, which makes him a fresh voice but also has caused him to stumble in recent months with some public comments—for instance, comparing the IRS bias against conservative groups to Nazi Germany.

Ms. Fiorina, age 60, also has an impressive resumé and has been a political student since she was a child in a politically active family. She rose from secretary of a real-estate firm to the top of Hewlett-Packard, no small accomplishment. While she was ousted in a boardroom brawl, her strategy that involved acquiring PC-manufacturer Compaq was largely vindicated by later events.

Although Ms. Fiorina lost a California Senate race to Barbara Boxer in 2010, she outperformed Meg Whitman on the Republican ticket despite spending a fraction as much. She has also impressed on the stump this year with her grasp of the issues, including health-care reform, the Export-Import Bank, Iran’s nuclear ambitions and Russian revanchism.

Both candidates can make a contribution to the GOP debate, and they’ll have a chance to test their theory that the party wants a political outsider rather than career politicians. That’s a harder sell after Mr. Obama’s failures from inexperience, but then they aren’t burdened with his bad ideas.

[Crafty_Dog]

Hillary Rodham Clinton Gaining Favor, Times/CBS Poll Says
Hillary Rodham Clinton appears to have initially weathered a barrage of news about her use of a private email account when she was secretary of state and the practices of her family’s foundation, an indication that she is starting her second presidential bid with an unusual durability among Democratic voters.
Americans now view Mrs. Clinton more favorably and as a stronger leader than they did earlier in the year, despite weeks of scrutiny about her ethics, a New York Times/CBS News poll has found. And nearly nine in 10 Democrats say the nation is ready to elect a female president.
READ MORE »
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/06/us/politics/hillary-clinton-gains-favor-times-cbs-poll-says.html?emc=edit_na_20150505

[G M]

Hillary Rodham Clinton Gaining Favor, Times/CBS Poll Says
Hillary Rodham Clinton appears to have initially weathered a barrage of news about her use of a private email account when she was secretary of state and the practices of her family’s foundation, an indication that she is starting her second presidential bid with an unusual durability among Democratic voters.
Americans now view Mrs. Clinton more favorably and as a stronger leader than they did earlier in the year, despite weeks of scrutiny about her ethics, a New York Times/CBS News poll has found. And nearly nine in 10 Democrats say the nation is ready to elect a female president.
READ MORE »
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/06/us/politics/hillary-clinton-gains-favor-times-cbs-poll-says.html?emc=edit_na_20150505

Translation : lie, lie, lie.

[DougMacG]

"Hillary Rodham Clinton appears to have initially weathered a barrage of news about her use of a private email account when she was secretary of state and the practices of her family’s foundation ..."

So that's how it works; never answer, apologize or even comply with the law and then go back out and start pandering policies to the downtrodden - like illegal aliens.  Running for President is her defense.  Because she is running, everything against her is partisan no matter how valid.

"nearly nine in 10 Democrats say the nation is ready to elect a female president."

And “4 out of 5 dentists surveyed recommend sugarless gum to their patients who chew gum.”

What do the other dentists recommend?  What voter is not ready for a woman to be President IF SHE HAD ALL THE RIGHT QUALITIES to be President?  What conservative is not ready for an American Maggie Thatcher to emerge?  What Dem would not support Hillary if she had ANY good qualities.  They're going to support her without any.

Yes, lies, noise and deception.  They poll to make news.  Manipulate the timing, questions and sample chosen to get the desired result, then report the phony result as news which makes it tend to come true.  If people are allegedly over the email scandal just because of freshness dating, is that more newsworthy than the fact she hasn't answered for it yet?

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUXwDMqjC-A&app=desktop

[Crafty_Dog]

y
Fred Barnes
May 13, 2015 7:13 p.m. ET
12 COMMENTS

Jeb Bush and Hillary Clinton, the two most prominent candidates for president in 2016, are gambling. Their campaign strategies are risky. Mr. Bush is hovering closer to the political center than his rivals for the Republican nomination are. Mrs. Clinton is moving to the left in her bid for the Democratic nomination.

Their strategies are perilous for different reasons. Mr. Bush wants to avoid sounding too conservative now and thus present a more broadly appealing candidate in the general election later. In doing so, he could lose the race for the GOP nomination.

Mrs. Clinton is an overwhelming favorite on the Democratic side, but she is taking no chances. The energy in her party is on the left, personified by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.). By adopting Ms. Warren’s stance on issues, Mrs. Clinton hopes to keep her out of the race. But this could make Mrs. Clinton seem too left-wing to win the general election.

Oddly enough, these game plans match those of David Cameron and Ed Miliband in last week’s British election. Mr. Cameron, the Conservative prime minister, tacked to the center during the campaign. Mr. Miliband, worried about the appeal of the socialist Scottish National Party, moved Labour to the left. Mr. Cameron’s Tories won overwhelmingly.

This led to speculation that the U.K. outcome has implications for the U.S. presidential race—that the result supports Jeb Bush’s strategy and raises doubts about Mrs. Clinton’s. It has been noted that the election of President Reagan in 1980 followed the emergence of Margaret Thatcher as prime minister in 1979, as if one conservative’s victory led to the other’s.

But politics doesn’t usually work that way. President Bill Clinton and Labour’s Tony Blair were similar in pulling their parties away from the left in the 1990s. But in that case Mr. Clinton’s election in 1992 preceded Mr. Blair’s in 1997.

As governor of Florida from 1999 to 2007, Mr. Bush was a hard-nosed conservative. In Florida “we shifted toward a conservative philosophy,” he told a New Hampshire audience in April. “We cut taxes every year,” totaling $19 billion, he said, and “I vetoed 2,500 separate line items in the budget.”

But there were deviations from conservatism back then, too. Mr. Bush refused to sign the antitax pledge sought by Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform. He has never flinched on that position, recently saying that he opposed such pledges on principle.

For years, Mr. Bush has favored immigration reform to allow illegal immigrants to become legal residents. He doesn’t support a special path to citizenship. In campaigning for governor, he ran an ad with flags of Latin American countries, welcoming immigrants who had legally come to the U.S. from those nations.

Well before running for president, Mr. Bush became an advocate of Common Core, which would set national standards for math and English in schools. The federal government, he said in April in New Hampshire, shouldn’t be involved in Common Core at all. Nonetheless, his backing of Common Core upsets many conservatives.

As a candidate, Mr. Bush can be subtle in his tacking to the center. He spoke last Saturday at Liberty University in Virginia, where Republican Sen. Ted Cruz announced his candidacy for president on March 23. Mr. Bush didn’t mention Mr. Cruz. But his unapologetic defense of Christianity was more persuasive than that of other Republicans. It had few applause lines. He warned against fueling Democratic claims of excessive religiosity in the GOP.

“The mistake is to confuse points of theology with moral principles that are knowable to reason as well as by faith,” he said. “And this confusion is all part of a false narrative that casts religious Americans as intolerant scolds, running around trying to impose their views on everyone.”

Mr. Bush backs traditional marriage but speaks respectfully of proponents of same-sex marriage. “I hope that we can show respect for the good people on all sides of the gay and lesbian marriage issue, including couples making lifetime commitments to each other who are seeking greater legal protections,” he said at the Conservative Political Action Conference in February.

Hillary Clinton’s moves to the left have been both rhetorical and substantive as she echoes liberals like Ms. Warren. “The deck is still stacked in favor of those at the top and there is something wrong with that,” Mrs. Clinton said while campaigning in Iowa a month ago. After a supposedly off-the-record meeting with economists, she was quoted in the New York Times as having said that the economy required a “toppling” of the richest 1% of Americans.

Her boldest step has been to call for expanding President Obama’s executive order legalizing up to five million illegal immigrants. “I would do everything under the law to go even further,” she announced in Las Vegas last week.

On issues that divide Democrats, such as the Keystone XL pipeline and the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade treaty, she has declined to take a position. But her desire to gain labor-union support may force her to publicly oppose both.

Mrs. Clinton seems unmindful of the problem that Democrats can face when they drift too far from the center. They lost the presidential races in 1972, 1980 and 1984, with George McGovern, Jimmy Carter and Walter Mondale, when this happened.

And that, for what it’s worth, is precisely what doomed Labour’s Ed Miliband in the U.K. election. Mr. Cameron, meanwhile, appears to have been helped by “shy Tory” voters who declined to tell pollsters that they would vote for Conservatives.

An American version of that phenomenon may come to the aid of Mr. Bush. He is constantly under attack from noisemakers in the Republican orbit—talk radio, tea party activists, conservative bloggers, critics of political dynasties. And so his soft supporters may have been intimidated. Until voting begins next year, we won’t know how many “shy Bushies” there are.

Mr. Barnes, executive editor of the Weekly Standard, is a Fox News commentator.

[DougMacG]

Somewhere in the archives I said that it was Michelle Obama, not Hillary Clinton, that I fear most as a Republican.

Did anyone see the First Lady's angry, passionate commencement address?

Rasmussen Reports picked up on it.

What If Michelle Obama Challenged Hillary Clinton for the Democratic Nomination?http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/general_politics/may_2015/what_if_michelle_obama_challenged_hillary_clinton_for_the_democratic_nomination

This solves all the Democrats problems.  Hillary and Obama aren't getting along.  Warren and Obama aren't getting along.  The Dem runs with the President's baggage no matter what, and need the support of his political machine to win.  With Hillary, they gain on gender advantage but lose the authentic African American advantage.  Michelle really is an authentic African-American, and really is a woman.  She isn't expected to turn against the incumbent, yet can say she will be her own person.  Anyone who differs with her can be called both racist and sexist.  And Dems still get what they really want, someone totally unqualified to be President who can continue the dismantling of everything that made this nation great.

[Crafty_Dog]

The Reps should already have the act together on the Iraq War, but still struggle.  Some relevant points made here:

Republicans and Iraq
How Jeb Bush could have answered the gotcha question.
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush ENLARGE
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush Photo: Getty Images
May 14, 2015 7:35 p.m. ET
155 COMMENTS

Knowing what we know now, would we have urged President George W. Bush to invade Iraq, as we did at the time? A version of this question was put to Jeb Bush by Fox News’s Megyn Kelly the other day, and, well, oh dear.

The former Florida Governor and presumptive Republican presidential candidate told Ms. Kelly Monday that he would have authorized an invasion, adding “and so would have Hillary Clinton”—a reminder that the Democratic frontrunner is the only person in the 2016 race who cast a vote for the war. But Mrs. Clinton long ago recanted that vote, and Mr. Bush recanted his answer, too, telling an Arizona audience on Thursday that he would not have invaded “knowing what we know now.”
Opinion Journal Video
Best of the Web Columnist James Taranto on the former Florida Governor’s position on the Iraq war. Photo credit: Getty Images.

We’ll leave aside what Mr. Bush’s struggles with the inevitable question say about his preparedness as a candidate—and his team’s as a campaign. The right answer to the question is that it’s not a useful or instructive one to answer, because statesmanship, like life, is not conducted in hindsight. Knowing what we know now, we wouldn’t have been in equities in 2008, or bet on the Green Bay Packers in January. Sigh.

The better question, and one that would better address Mr. Bush’s fitness as a potential Commander in Chief, is what lessons he would draw from Iraq that would inform his own decision-making if confronted with similar circumstances.

Plainly one lesson would be that Presidents cannot take the claims of their intelligence agencies as conclusive. George W. Bush took the country to war in the sincere belief that Iraq’s possession of weapons of mass destruction was a “slam dunk” case, as then-CIA Director George Tenet believed.

Mr. Bush’s critics, both the dishonest and the foolish, called him a liar for the mistake. But as the 2005 bipartisan Robb-Silberman report on the intelligence leading up to the war noted, it was the CIA’s “own independent judgments—flawed though they were—that led them to conclude Iraq had active WMD programs.”

So how to do better? Mr. Bush could cite the experience of his father, George H.W. Bush, who as CIA director in the Ford Administration organized a “Team B” panel of outside experts to question his agency’s estimates of Soviet military power and strategy. Historians still debate the merits of Team B’s conclusions, but the point is that the quality of intelligence, like everything else, improves with choice and competition.

A second lesson Mr. Bush could draw is that when America does go to war it should fight to win—and win fast. The 2007 surge was an act of military genius and political courage, but it came four years too late.

Before then, Iraq policy suffered when military planners and the CIA both failed to anticipate that Saddam Hussein would fight the war as an insurgency after Baghdad fell. It suffered, too, when the White House decided to impose the Bremer Regency on Iraq instead of immediately handing the reins of political power to Iraqi leaders, so they could solve their own problems.

At the same time, Mr. Bush might note that the war in Iraq wasn’t fought simply on account of Iraq’s presumed possession of illicit weapons. It was Saddam himself who was Iraq’s most destructive WMD, a one-man killing machine who had destabilized the Middle East for 25 years while killing hundreds of thousands of people. And there was also the question of what Saddam might have done had no war taken place.

“Saddam wanted to re-create Iraq’s WMD capability—which was essentially destroyed in 1991—after sanctions were removed and Iraq’s economy stabilized,” noted the 2004 report of the Iraq Survey Group. “Saddam aspired to develop a nuclear capability—in an incremental fashion, irrespective of international pressure and the resulting economic risks—but he intended to focus on ballistic missiles and tactical chemical warfare (CW) capability.”

One other lesson is that, just as there are unintended consequences to military action, there are also consequences to inaction. By 2008 al Qaeda in Iraq was a spent force, demoralized and defeated even according to its own internal communications. It came back and transmogrified into the Islamic State only after President Obama had squandered the gains of the surge by withdrawing all U.S. forces from Iraq, against the wishes of his senior advisers, including then-CIA director Leon Panetta and, yes, Mrs. Clinton.

The media love easy retrospective judgments—we specialize in shooting the wounded—and so do political candidates who want to score easy points. But we suspect voters are smarter than to credit the breezy claims of ex-post-facto wisdom by Mr. Bush’s GOP competitors.

What voters should care about is that the next President will have to confront the new global disorder bequeathed by this Administration. The ultimate lesson of Iraq is that there are no easy calls in foreign policy, and that intelligence of the sort generated by spooks can never substitute for the judgment required of statesmen.

[Crafty_Dog]

 May 15, 2015 6:50 p.m. ET
29 COMMENTS

The Washington smart set has all but written off Chris Christie’s presidential chances, but you wouldn’t know it from the way the New Jersey Governor is staking out positions as a conservative reformer. On Tuesday he rolled out a significant tax reform outline as part of a larger agenda for restoring an economic growth rate of 4%.

This follows Mr. Christie’s proposal last month for reforming entitlements for seniors, including an increase in the retirement age and reducing future benefits for the affluent. Perhaps Mr. Christie feels he needs to be out front on policy to overcome the political setbacks in his home state, but his forays are welcome and will help to shape the Republican primary debate if he does formally enter the presidential race.

Mr. Christie puts his policies in the proper context by focusing on faster economic growth as the most important policy goal for the next President. The Obama era has seen the worst recovery since the 1930s despite record federal “stimulus” spending and six years of near-zero interest rates. Without faster growth every problem becomes harder to solve, and the American faith in upward economic mobility will ebb.

The 4% goal is ambitious, and some might say politically injudicious if Mr. Christie happens to be elected. Critics would throw back the target as a rebuke if it wasn’t met. But voters understand it’s not a guarantee but an aspiration, and having such an overriding growth goal makes it easier for a White House to judge every policy by whether it helps meet it. If not, don’t do it.

One of President Obama’s tragic mistakes has been putting social-policy goals—health care, climate change, income redistribution—above faster growth. This has consequences, not least that growth hasn’t exceeded 2.5% in a single year of his Presidency. By contrast, the U.S. averaged more than 4% growth from 1983-1988 and did it again from 1997-2000. Those were periods of rapid poverty reduction and rising wages for all income groups, and we should be able to do it again.

The centerpiece of Mr. Christie’s proposal is a tax reform that would simplify the code by cutting rates in return for fewer deductions. The Governor proposes an individual income tax with three rates and a top rate of 28%. He’d also cut the corporate rate to 25% from 35%, including a one-time rate of 8.75% for businesses that repatriate capital they have parked overseas.

Mr. Christie’s focus on tax rates is crucial for growth and important politically. The Washington fashion these days is to believe that tax reform with substantially lower rates is all but impossible. You know, so 1980s.

But the economic evidence is substantial that lower marginal tax rates provide the biggest growth bang. Mr. Christie’s reform is thus superior to Florida Senator Marco Rubio’s reform plan, which pegs the top individual rate at 35%. Mr. Rubio devotes $1.6 trillion over 10 years to tax credits for families with children, which does nothing for growth.

Mr. Christie tells us he hasn’t decided how to treat dividends and capital gains, which are now taxed at a top rate of 23.8%. But those preferential rates become less important economically if the overall income tax rate is low enough. Mr. Christie also says his reform would be “a net tax reduction, or in the worst case deficit neutral.” But he tells us he’d also want revenue scoring to account for the positive impact on growth “because that’s what happens in the economy when things are going in the right way.” He’s right.

As for deductions, Mr. Christie preserves them for charitable contributions and mortgage interest “at least for a first home.” This is a bow to the popularity of these two deductions among middle-income Americans, though they have little economic justification. The better news is that Mr. Christie says every other deduction would be up for negotiation, including the costly and politically sensitive breaks for state and local taxes and employer-sponsored health insurance.

Mr. Christie’s plan has many other planks, some worthier than others, but as important as the details is how a candidate sells them. One reason Mitt Romney failed in pitching his tax reform in 2012 is that he never seemed to believe it. At some level he internalized the Democratic critique that he lacked credibility because he was rich.

Mr. Christie has never suffered from such self-doubt, and it will be fascinating to see the New Jersey brawler make the populist case for a pro-growth reform. He is putting down a marker for other candidates to meet.

[DougMacG]

"The centerpiece of Mr. Christie’s proposal is a tax reform that would simplify the code by cutting rates in return for fewer deductions. The Governor proposes an individual income tax with three rates and a top rate of 28%. Mr. Christie’s reform is thus superior to Florida Senator Marco Rubio’s reform plan, which pegs the top individual rate at 35%. "

True.

Mr. Rubio devotes $1.6 trillion over 10 years to tax credits for families with children, which does nothing for growth.

Also true. 

Omitted by critics is that Rubio's plan eliminates all capital gains and estate taxes allowing people to at least accumulate after-tax wealth.  Not much of an analysis or comparison if you skip that.

The candidate has to get elected for the tax plan to matter, and a campaign tax plan is a starting point for negotiation with congress, not an actual, future law.

Last time around all of the R's had great plans, right down to Huntsman, Pawlenty, even Romney!  No one made the sale and what we got was 4 more years of Obama-Alinsky-Marx.

[Crafty_Dog]

Good comments on the tax proposals Doug.

I think Bush has made what will turn out to be a fatal error with his failure to assert the ultimate success of Iraq due to the surge.  Obama was handed a winning hand, and threw it away.

Rubio has missed a big opportunity in not taking the initiative here.

Instead, the Reps are accepting the meme that "Iraq was an error".   

It might be politically scary, but IMHO asserting the defeat of AQ and the success of establishing a democratic government and that leaving troops was no different than what we did in Germany, Japan, and Korea is the way to go.  As the fustercluck in the Middle East continues to spiral out of control, this doubling down on our part would prove to be politically wise as well.

[Crafty_Dog]

Really? We Can Pencil It In Already? Clinton-Castro 2016?
If you were a clear-thinking Democrat, this is the sort of news that would make you burst into tears of despair:
Hillary Clinton’s campaign is likely to choose Secretary of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Julián Castro or another Hispanic politician to be her running mate, former HUD Secretary Henry Cisneros said in an interview that will air Sunday.
“What I am hearing in Washington, including from people in Hillary Clinton’s campaign, is that the first person on their lists is Julián Castro, the . . . Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, who use[d] to be the Mayor of San Antonio,” he said in an interview with Univision’s “Al Punto.”
“They don’t have a second option, because he is the superior candidate considering his record, personality, demeanor and Latin heritage.”
“I think there is a very high possibility that Hillary Clinton may choose Julián Castro,” he said.”
A one-option veep list? That Democratic bench isn’t just thin, it’s anorexic. And do Democrats really want to put the 40-year-old Castro a heartbeat away from the presidency? If this pans out, we’ll get to watch Democrats and the media insisting that Castro’s time as mayor of San Antonio and two years at HUD represented some sort of American policy renaissance and an era of bold leadership.
Back in 2012, when Castro was giving the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention, I pointed out that San Antonio hadn’t gotten much better on his watch, particularly in the areas he claimed to emphasize, education and crime. By 2014, as he was joining HUD, his record as mayor included a few more local political scandals and a barely-budging poverty rate, even as the area economy soared from the shale boom. Castro left San Antonio in roughly the same shape as it was before he became mayor – and yet somehow became one of the Democratic party’s biggest stars and, if Cisneros is right, the only serious option to be Hillary’s running mate.
As I summarized last year:
Castro leveraged his rise-from-humble-roots narrative and the occasional wacky joke into national press coverage that most senators and governors would envy — major national-magazine profiles, a TED talk, an appearance on Meet the Press, a six-figure memoir deal. It’s fair to wonder whether Castro would get the same attention if he were not a member of a demographic increasingly important for national politics.
Cisneros’s appearing on the ticket would demonstrate that identity politics is to Democrats like that old quote about winning is to sports coaches: It’s not everything, it’s the only thing.

[G M]

Surprised it wasn't Fidel.

[ccp]

I have held out that Clinton the First was the worst President we ever had by dumbing down the integrity of the office of Presidency. 

Now Clinton the Second is even far worse.   What a criminal organization!

It's a total shake down of the entire business industry.

Reminiscent of minions laying tributes down at the feet of the emperors to gain favor or avoid their wrath.

This is exactly what our founders wanted to avoid.

The corruption is astounding and up front for all of us to behold what a terrible world we live in.

Very sad.   As GM says why bother to play by rules, be an honest person, or do good in the world.   A world that is ruled by such scum.

With all the immigrants invited in by the Democrat party and the inside Republicans for cheap labor or because they are afraid to offend them - as soon as they start voting - legally or illegally - the game will be over.

Almost there. 

And with the continued chip driven world controlled by select companies and the government cronies the future for freedom and liberty looks doomed.

Many people my age feel as I do.  Glad they will not be around much longer.

The newer generations have no clue.

[DougMacG]

Yes, it will be interesting to see who she picks if she wins the nomination.  I knew Castro was on the short list; I didn't know he was the only one on it!

The way the process and calendar is set up, Democrats will have their convention in late July, immediately after they see what the Republicans do, although its possible that these selections are made before then.

There are so many scenarios.  If it is Rubio and the attack planned on him is that he is too young and too inexperienced, do you pick someone younger yet and even less experienced? 

Shouldn't she pick a woman if the argument is that they are a better choice?  What if the Republican picks a woman and Hillary doesn't.  Who is looking out for women then?

Untested and unvetted is high risk.  Let's assume she is risk averse, shouldn't she pick Joe Biden?  He already knows how to do the job, how to sit still in the chair behind the State of the Union speech, and to grope the families of the federal officials being sworn in.

The strategy is to double down on leftist and genitalianism, why not pick Elizabeth Warren?

[DougMacG]

Look for Rand Paul to win the Iowa straw poll this August.  He won the CPAC straw poll 3 times.  The Pauls know how to turn out activists in the smaller settings.

https://www.predictit.org/home/SingleOption?contractID=633#sthash.DU09L4sK.dpbs

[DougMacG]

Jindal isn't getting traction yet but this is a long campaign and having a two term Governor speak out with wisdom on foreign poicy is a very good thing for the process.

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/418634/iran-isnt-iraq-and-isnt-2003-bobby-jindal

Instead of rehashing the Iraq War, let’s face today’s much more serious threat from Iran. You have to give the media credit for trying. Last week saw a manufactured debate about a manufactured subject — whether our country should have invaded Iraq in 2003 based on what we know in 2015 about the course of events in the Middle East. But there’s a reason why the phrase “hindsight is 20/20” contains more than a kernel of truth — because Monday-morning quarterbacking, however nice it might make others feel, doesn’t change the past one whit.

In the real world, presidents have to play the hand of cards they are dealt. President Bush did just operating off the information he had, and he did it well. Unlike President Obama — who decided to withdraw our forces in Iraq precipitously, endearing himself to war-weary voters but creating a vacuum for terrorists — President Bush kept our country safe after 9/11, and Americans appreciate him for it. I supported his decision to get rid of Saddam Hussein, and I will not second-guess him now even for one minute.

But if the media are going to play these games, then let me add a few. I’m pretty sure that President Roosevelt would have increased patrols around Oahu on the morning of December 7, 1941. I don’t think King Philip II of Spain would have sent his Armada into the English Channel in the summer of 1588. And I’m fairly certain that Red Sox owner Harry Frazee would not have sold Babe Ruth’s contract rights to the New York Yankees.

But the more important question is not how Hillary Clinton and others have changed their minds on Iraq; it’s how she and the president she worked for have learned the wrong lesson from that conflict. Because this decade’s answer to an Iraqi regime that did not in reality possess large numbers of chemical and biological weapons is not to leave Iran within easy striking distance of a nuclear bomb. RELATED: Iran: Isolated No Longer

Consider for a moment the October 2002 remarks of a then-unknown state senator named Barack Obama. Prior to the Iraq conflict, the future president said he did not oppose all wars, just “dumb wars.” He believed that “Saddam [Hussein] poses no imminent and direct threat to the United States or to his neighbors, that the Iraqi economy is in shambles, that the Iraqi military [is] a fraction of its former strength,” and that the international community could contain what he considered a “petty dictator.”

Contrast his comments about Iraq then to the situation in Iran now. Iran refuses to recognize Israel’s right to exist; its leaders have talked about “eliminating” the state. Just last week, President Obama himself called Iran a “state sponsor of terrorism” for fomenting rebellion within the Middle East and elsewhere. The Wall Street Journal reported that “Iran could receive somewhere between $30 billion and $50 billion [just for] signing the agreement” — an economic boon and a funding source for more new munitions. Yet as it is, Iran has not lacked for military strength: The Russian military just sold Iran a passel of new missiles — belying the belief that this rogue regime can be easily contained. Iran is much more of a threat now than Iraq was then. But President Obama seems ready to pay any price to get a deal — any deal — out of Iran.

In short, Iran is much more of a threat now than Iraq was then. But President Obama seems ready to pay any price to get a deal — any deal — out of Iran. So unwilling to contemplate a military engagement in the Middle East is he, he appears scared of his shadow. Yet if the shadow of Barack Obama circa 2002 were around today, he would not call Iran a “dumb war.” To the contrary, he might even consider taking the military option off the table to be, well, dumb.

I don’t relish this criticism, nor the thought of armed conflict with Iran. I deprecate war in all its forms and consider it the ultimate last resort. But a last resort it must always remain.

It’s possible to over-learn the lessons of history.  In retrospect, it’s easy to argue that Britain, France, and the United States should have fought German and Italian aggression in Europe well before Hitler invaded Poland. But after the horrors of Verdun, Passchendaele, and the Somme, Neville Chamberlain and his contemporaries so feared the outbreak of another Great War that for years they handsomely rewarded aggression in their midst — setting the stage for an even bloodier global conflict.

That’s why the media hype of the past week hasn’t just been irrelevant; in many respects, the Iraq obsession is dangerous. Every minute we spend arguing about what should, could, or would have happened in Iraq a dozen years ago is a minute our nation is not talking about what must happen about Iran now. We ignore the current threat — and the greater threat — at our peril.

A generation ago, Bill Clinton campaigned in 1992 using the Fleetwood Mac song “Don’t Stop Thinking About Tomorrow.” The ongoing parlor game over Iraq now echoes a song remade during that era: “It’s So Hard to Say Goodbye to Yesterday.” But our country needs to stop fixating over the debates of the past — and the candidates of the past. The better question is whether we have learned the right lessons from the past, and how they affect the policies of the present. Because if we fail to stop the Iranian regime now, a nuclear arms race in the Middle East could greatly darken our children’s future.

— Bobby Jindal is the governor of Louisiana.