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Correct The Record Saturday November 29, 2014 Roundup:
Headlines:
The Guardian: “Former Republican ‘hitman’ vows to put Hillary Clinton in the White House”
“He [David Brock] says Media Matters is already responding to ‘a fair amount of Clinton-related material’, while American Bridge has a group, Correct the Record, that is solely focused on defending her record.”
Des Moines Register editorial: “House finds little in Benghazi”
"This week's record-correcting news comes from the Republican-controlled committee in the U.S. House of Representatives that found nothing much to fault the administration for in the 2012 attacks on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya. U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, a Foreign Service officer and two CIA contractors were killed in the attacks."
Wall Street Journal: “Cuban Embargo Punctuates Florida’s Presidential Politics”
“Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, once dubbed the state’s first Cuban-American governor because of his kinship with the community and fluency in Spanish, is expected to defend the embargo in a speech on Tuesday, marking a contrast with Mrs. Clinton as he nears a decision on a 2016 campaign.”
Associated Press: “Gathering hints at showdown awaiting GOP in 2016”
“In contrast, Hillary Rodham Clinton has spent recent weeks basking in the glows of grandmotherhood and applause at a few public events — without any major challenger for the Democratic nod, should she choose to pursue it.”
“Consider this scenario: Hillary Clinton becomes president in 2017, and sometime later one of the conservative justices retires. Now there would be a liberal majority on the court, a complete transformation in its balance.”
“Mr. Webb, with scarce resources at the moment, would face a steep climb to the Democratic nomination against the overwhelming favorite, Hillary Rodham Clinton (assuming she runs).”
“Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s opposition to a White House Treasury pick has turned an otherwise obscure nomination into a headline-grabbing battle for the party’s soul, as she pushes a populist message that could pull likely 2016 presidential nominee Hillary Clinton further to the left than she wants to be, observers say.”
Politico: “Rick Perry ramps up”
“Texas Gov. Rick Perry is inviting hundreds of prominent Republican donors and policy experts to a series of gatherings next month that are intended to rebuild his damaged national brand and lay the foundation for a potential 2016 presidential campaign, fundraisers and organizers confirmed to POLITICO.”
Articles:
The Guardian: “Former Republican ‘hitman’ vows to put Hillary Clinton in the White House”
By Edward Helmore
November 29, 2014, 10:30 EST
[Subtitle:] Media expert David Brock, once scourge of the Clintons, is now using rightwing tactics to help the Democrats
It’s a case of poacher turned game-keeper. US Democrats, reeling from losses in the midterm elections, are turning to a former Republican media hitman to boost their chances of taking the White House in 2016.
David Brock is the name; his trademark, a silver pompadour and Trotsky-style wire-rimmed glasses; his political ethos, to beat Republicans by using an apparatus of quick-response law, ethics groups and journalism groups, a strategy pioneered, naturally, by the Republicans.
“I know from experience that, over a 30-year arc, rightwing conservatives came to dominate American political discourse in the media, and it needs to be countered,” Brock told the Observer last week. “And I know how something like it would work on the progressive side.”
In the culture wars of the mid-90s, Brock, 52, was a far-right hero. He wrote a book casting doubt on the credibility of Anita Hill, the aide who accused supreme court justice Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment. Then, as part of the conservative-funded Arkansas Project, Brock broke the story of “Troopergate” and identified a woman named Paula, aka Paula Jones, one of a string of Bill Clinton “bimbo eruptions” that would culminate in the Monica Lewinsky-inspired impeachment hearings.
Once so committed that his answering machine message said: “Hello, I’m out trying to bring down the president,” Brock has turned on his deep-pocketed former sponsors with a vengeance. First came his sympathetic biography of Hillary Clinton in 1996, followed a year later by an Esquire magazine essay, Confessions of a Right-Wing Hitman, that announced his break with the right. Brock recalled last week how in the mid-90s he began to have “huge reservations about the character and integrity of the people in the conservative movement”.
Everyone loves a sinner redeemed, and Brock is no exception. What he offers is not an ideological or political solution but a willingness to counteract a Republican political machine calibrated to find and exploiting Democrat weaknesses.
In 2004, Brock founded Media Matters for America, a liberal watchdog that helped to bring down Glenn Beck, a Fox News host given to hysterical outbursts, and later helped to publicise comments about “legitimate rape” made to a Missouri TV station by Republican Senate candidate Todd Akin.
He then established American Bridge, a political action committee that has raised $12m from donors including George Soros over the past two years. With more than 80 staff, a key part of its mission is to assign people called “trackers” to tail Republicans, looking for “gotcha” moments that could derail their political ambitions.
Other weapons in the Brock arsenal include the theoretically non-partisan corruption watchdog, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (Crew); the American Democracy Legal Fund, charged with battling Republicans in the courts; and the American Independent Institute, which provides funds for journalists investigating rightwing activities.
Liberals, he says, have failed to understand that political campaigns are constant, not only fought during election years, and require long-term funding. “We’ve basically been trying to play catch-up. There was a tendency on the progressive side to dismiss rightwing media like Fox News as not credible and therefore not important, and they were very late in understanding the nature and power of the infrastructure the rightwing had built.”
While there is residual unease among some liberal operatives that Brock’s conversion story fits into a pattern of opportunism and self-promotion rather than ideological transformation, Brock’s war on the billionaire industrialists Charles and David Koch, coupled with rigorous defence of Hillary Clinton, has earned him growing influence in progressive circles.
Brock acknowledges only that his mission is to counter rightwing attacks, though the focus of those attacks – and thus the rapid-response resources of American Bridge – are clearly centred on preventing opponents from defining Clinton during her candidacy-in-waiting. The left-leaning publication the Nation recently described Brock’s political apparatus as designed “to put Hillary in the White House”.
That unnerves some party advisers who fear this kind of surveillance can only harm the political process. Candidates will be forced to the centre of political discourse. Surrendering principles for electoral success could turn out to be a hollow victory – or no victory at all, says a former Kennedy adviser, Andrew Karsch. “Democrats need a statesman who can articulate the issues, not someone who holds their finger to the wind on every issue. Instead of arguing something, you just mud-wrestle? That’s not an answer. It’s a complete capitulation.”
Despite Brock’s expertise, Democrats may be unsuited to adopting the well-honed tactics of Republicans. This month Democrat billionaire Tom Steyer poured tens of millions into candidates promoting climate-change awareness – a counter to Tea Party funders the Koch brothers – and received no electoral return on his outlay.
Earlier this year, Brock was invited to Arkansas to deliver an address, Countering the Culture of Clinton Hating, to the Clinton School of Public Service in Little Rock. He spoke of how conservatives “upended many of our long-held ways of conducting politics” and how, unless those dynamics are challenged, history could repeat itself.
Of course, it was pursuing that very agenda that gave Brock his start. Several years later, Hillary Clinton distributed copies of Brock’s 2002 book, Blinded by the Right: The Conscience of an Ex-Conservative, as proof of the “vast rightwing conspiracy” that had existed against the couple.
In addition to his other groups, Brock serves as an adviser to the grassroots outreach programme Ready for Hillary, and is on the board of Priorities USA, a fundraising operation devoted to a Clinton candidacy. He says Media Matters is already responding to “a fair amount of Clinton-related material”, while American Bridge has a group, Correct the Record, that is solely focused on defending her record. “We’re doing that because there are 10 Republican super PACs [political action committees] out there trying to tarnish her reputation in advance of her making a decision on whether she is going to run,” Brock says. “We already have our hands full in terms of media misinformation.”
He anticipates a silver lining to the Democrats’ recent poor showing at the ballot box. When the newly-elected Republicans start showing their true political colours, his group will be there to document them, and perhaps to influence Republicans’ choice of presidential candidate in 2016. Brock says American Bridge has identified 20 potential Republican candidates for president or vice-president, and put field trackers on them. “We’re way ahead of the curve,” he enthuses. “Based on our research, we’re going to be an important player in how the Republican presidential ticket is defined.”
Des Moines Register editorial: “House finds little in Benghazi”
By The Des Moines Register editorial board
November 28, 2014, 11:06 p.m. CST
Last week in this space we reported how the federal government is making money on green-energy investments despite the much-heralded failure of solar-power company Solyndra, which had caused much heartburn among Obama administration critics.
This week's record-correcting news comes from the Republican-controlled committee in the U.S. House of Representatives that found nothing much to fault the administration for in the 2012 attacks on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya. U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, a Foreign Service officer and two CIA contractors were killed in the attacks.
This was the scandal, it may be recalled, where some Republicans were convinced the administration was guilty of gross negligence and knowingly misled the American public on what really happened. The theorists made every effort to include former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in the conspiracy.
The scandal launched numerous congressional investigations, including a big one by the House Intelligence Committee. The committee released its report last week, concluding that the CIA and U.S. military "responded appropriately to the attacks," according to the Washington Post, and dismissed allegations that the administration "blocked rescue attempts during the assault or sought to mislead the public afterward."
Not all critics were satisfied. Sen. Lindsay Graham, R-S.C., who has been eagerly awaiting the "smoking gun" on Benghazi, said the committee report is "full of crap ... a complete bunch of garbage." Still, while the Benghazigate books may still be open for some diehards, it seems less and less likely there will be much smoke, let alone fire.
Wall Street Journal: “Cuban Embargo Punctuates Florida’s Presidential Politics”
By Beth Reinhard
November 28, 2014, 4:31 p.m. EST
[Subtitle:] Both Parties Traditionally Court State’s Large Cuban-American Community—Now With Heightened Importance
For decades, Democrats and Republicans with sights on the White House have trekked to the heart of the Cuban-American community in Florida to declare their support for the U.S. trade embargo against the island. No candidate has won the state otherwise.
This staple of presidential politics in the nation’s largest swing state is taking on heightened importance as the 2016 presidential field takes shape.
Democrat Hillary Clinton , who backed the trade ban in her 2008 campaign, reversed her position earlier this year, calling for an end to the sanctions. Her potential GOP opponents include Sens. Marco Rubio of Florida and Ted Cruz of Texas, both sons of Cuban immigrants for whom maintaining sanctions against the Castro regime is not just political, but personal.
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, once dubbed the state’s first Cuban-American governor because of his kinship with the community and fluency in Spanish, is expected to defend the embargo in a speech on Tuesday, marking a contrast with Mrs. Clinton as he nears a decision on a 2016 campaign.
While Cuba policy is unlikely to be a major issue in the presidential contest, it has the potential to resonate in Florida in a way not seen since Ronald Reagan’s anti-communist fervor rallied Cuban-Americans in the 1980s.
“Hillary is going to be testing history and political reality in Florida and highlighting a contrast with Republicans that we haven’t seen before,” said Mauricio Claver-Carone, a director of the U.S. Cuba Democracy PAC, the pro-embargo group hosting Mr. Bush in South Florida on Tuesday.
Some allies of Mrs. Clinton are already expressing qualms about how a presidential bid by Mr. Bush would make it harder to lock down the state’s bounty of 29 electoral votes. Those who hoped Democratic gubernatorial candidate Charlie Crist could offer Mrs. Clinton some political cover among Cuban-Americans—he came out in favor of lifting the embargo in February—were disappointed when he lost to Republican Gov. Rick Scott in the Nov. 4 election.
“Hillary will be a formidable candidate, but I think her position on the embargo could heighten the intensity against her,” said former Florida Sen. Mel Martinez, a Republican and longtime ally of Mr. Bush who described him as the first Cuban-American governor when they addressed the U.S. Cuba Democracy PAC in 2006.
To embargo proponents such as Mr. Martinez, who fled Cuba as a child and rose to become the first Cuban-American senator, lifting sanctions would reward a repressive regime that denies basic human rights and civil liberties.
Critics of the trade ban say that after half a century, it’s time to try a different approach. In a June appearance at the Council on Foreign Relations, Ms. Clinton called the embargo “Castro’s best friend,” because, she said, the regime uses it as a scapegoat for the island’s problems.
In her memoir published earlier this year, Mrs. Clinton said that as secretary of state she urged President Barack Obama to consider lifting the embargo. “It wasn’t achieving our goals, and it was holding back our broader agenda across Latin America,” she wrote.
Democrats dismiss the notion that Mrs. Clinton’s position would be a political liability in Florida, should she run for president. They point to changing demographics and public opinion. Support for the embargo has been steadily declining among Cuban-Americans in Miami-Dade County, from 87 percent in 1991 to 48 percent today, according to polling by Florida International University.
“Hillary is never going to get the hardliners to vote for her, but there is a new generation of younger Cuban-Americans who do not have that vitriolic emotion tied to Cuba,” said Democratic consultant Ana Cruz, who helped run Mrs. Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign in Florida, where she overwhelmingly won the Democratic primary.
The state is home to three-quarters of the nation’s estimated 2 million Cuban-Americans. A Pew Research Center analysis of 2013 survey data found that less than half of Cuban voters nationwide lean Republican, down from 64% a decade ago. Over the same period, the share of Cubans who favor the Democratic Party doubled from 22% to 44%.
Exit polling in 2012 showed President Obama winning 49 percent of the Cuban vote, a high-water mark for a Democrat.
“The Cuban-American population is starting to look more like other Latino populations, and that has major implications, because it changes the political calculus for winning the state,” said Mark Hugo Lopez, director of Hispanic research at the Pew Research Center.
No major Republican presidential candidate has yet to come out in favor of lifting the embargo. Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee , who as governor had advocated ending the trade ban to expand opportunities for farmers in his state, changed his mind during his 2008 presidential campaign. Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan had voted against the embargo but as the vice presidential nominee in 2012 talked about having a change of heart. Messrs. Huckabee and Ryan are both viewed as potential candidates in 2016.
One possible wild card in the nascent GOP field on Cuba policy is Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul , who shares many of the libertarian views espoused by his father, former Texas Rep. Ron Paul . The elder Paul spoke out against the embargo during his 2008 and 2012 presidential campaigns. Sen. Paul’s office said he had not recently taken a public position on the embargo, a policy void unlikely to last if he were to visit Florida as a presidential candidate.
Associated Press: “Gathering hints at showdown awaiting GOP in 2016”
By Jill Colvin and Steve Peoples
November 29, 2014, 3:56 a.m. EST
A half-dozen potential Republican presidential contenders spent last week peacocking across the sprawling grounds of a pink-hued luxury resort, schmoozing with donors and sizing up the competition in the party's most fractured field in decades.
They rarely criticized each other in public, but there were subtle jabs.
Within hours of New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie gracing the cover of a magazine in an illustration of him kissing a baby's head, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal suggested the party needs bold leaders, not showmen.
"We have enough politicians who try to be celebrities and kiss babies and cut ribbons," Jindal said.
Whether it was an intentional shot at Christie or not, the looming 2016 contest changed the context of every speech, interview and panel discussion at the Republican Governors Association's annual conference. The summit at the oceanside Boca Raton Resort & Club felt like a test run for what is increasingly shaping up to be a brutal showdown for the GOP presidential nomination among more than a dozen potential contenders, including a cluster of governors.
In contrast, Hillary Rodham Clinton has spent recent weeks basking in the glows of grandmotherhood and applause at a few public events — without any major challenger for the Democratic nod, should she choose to pursue it.
While the potential GOP field appears stronger than four years ago, the Republicans are without a front-runner.
"There are, like, 16 people who could run," said former Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, who downplayed the potential risk of so many candidates at each other's throats. "They won't all run, of course, but a lot of quality in there."
The candidates aren't expected to start formally declaring their intentions until the first quarter of next year. But the developing tensions were already apparent as five potential candidates appeared together on stage in a packed, grand ballroom to answering questions from moderator Chuck Todd, the host of NBC's "Meet The Press" — a dress rehearsal of sorts for the looming primary.
Ohio Gov. John Kasich, a former congressman, repeatedly crossed words with Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, challenging Walker's telling of the history of the Bill Clinton administration. On another panel, Walker mentioned that he'd been in high school at a time when Kasich had voted on a piece of immigration legislation.
"Well, you don't look that much younger," Kasich quipped.
Texas Gov. Rick Perry left little doubt that the race is on.
"I think the campaign has engaged. We're talking about issues here that are going to affect the presidential election in 2016," Perry said. "I think we need to have this conversation with America."
The governors who would be president agreed on one thing: their superiority as candidates over their nongubernatorial competition. Those in attendance repeatedly stressed that the party's best hope for reclaiming the White House lies with a chief executive at the top of the ticket.
But they dismissed the idea of any kind of advance pact to ensure they don't inflict too much damage during the primary.
"Um, no, no pacts, at least none that I'm involved in," said Christie, joking that he'd be closely watching Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, another potential contender, to make sure he wasn't forging any deals.
Behind the scenes, however, that's exactly what the contenders were aiming for.
Dozens of the party's biggest donors enjoyed private audiences with prospective candidates. They mingled in hotel corridors, at fancy dinners, on a nearby golf course where basketball great Michael Jordan was spotted, and at fetes, like an oceanside reception decorated with twinkling lights, a clam cake station and ice sculptures.
The guest list included Republican heavy hitters like Paul Singer, Anthony Scaramucci and Foster Friess.
Christie, who arrived with what appeared to be his entire senior team, said he was enjoying spending time with donors "in an atmosphere that's a lot more relaxed, like this one this week."
Indeed, one top consultant who has served as senior adviser on numerous campaigns was spotted walking through the lobby in his bathing suit on the way to the pool between meetings. And at all times, lobbyists from companies like Google hovered, slipping business cards to governors and aides, who left one speed dating-style session with pockets bursting.
Still, the presidential undertones were more subtle at times than in annual retreats of years past when prospective candidates like Mitt Romney, John McCain and Rudy Giuliani held private meetings to craft campaign strategy with key supporters.
"In prior election cycles, the RGA postelection meeting has been the kicking off point for presidential campaigns," said GOP operative Charlie Spies, who led Romney's super PAC in 2012, echoing several other longtime attendees. "This year's event was more low-key."
The event was "not about asking. This is about thanking and congratulating," said longtime Republican adviser and money man Fred Malek. "Part of it also is inspiration so that people will have their mind set on moving ahead in the next cycle."
By Paul Waldman
November 28, 2014
Supreme Court justice and pop culture icon Ruth Bader Ginsburg left the hospital yesterday after having a heart stent implanted and expects to be back at work Monday. Despite various health issues over the years, Ginsburg insists that she is still of sound body at age 81 (her mind isn’t in question) and has no plans to retire before the end of President Obama’s term to ensure a Democratic replacement. If she keeps to that pledge, and presuming there are no other retirements in the next two years, the makeup of the Supreme Court could be a bigger campaign issue in 2016 than ever before. It certainly ought to be.
Ordinarily, the Supreme Court is brought up almost as an afterthought in presidential campaigns. The potential for a swing in the court is used to motivate activists to volunteer and work hard, and the candidates usually have to answer a debate question or two about it, which they do in utterly predictable ways (“I’m just going to look for the best person for the job”). We don’t usually spend a great deal of time talking about what a change in the court is likely to mean. But the next president is highly likely to have the chance to engineer a swing in the court. The consequences for Americans’ lives will probably be more consequential and far-reaching than any other issue the candidates will be arguing about.
As much as we’ve debated Supreme Court cases in recent years, we haven’t given much attention to the idea of a shift in the court’s ideology because for so long the court has been essentially the same: divided 5-4, with conservatives having the advantage yet liberals winning the occasional significant victory when a swing justice moves to their side. And though a couple of recent confirmations have sparked controversy (Samuel Alito and Sonia Sotomayor were both the target of failed attempts to derail their nominations), all of the retirements in the last three presidencies were of justices from the same general ideology as the sitting president. The last time a new justice was radically different from the outgoing one was when Clarence Thomas replaced Thurgood Marshall — 23 years ago.
Whether a Democrat or a Republican wins in 2016, he or she may well have the chance to shift the court’s ideological balance. Ginsburg is the oldest justice at 81; Antonin Scalia and Anthony Kennedy are both 78, and Stephen Breyer is 76. If the right person is elected and the right justice retires, it could be an earthquake.
Consider this scenario: Hillary Clinton becomes president in 2017, and sometime later one of the conservative justices retires. Now there would be a liberal majority on the court, a complete transformation in its balance. A court that now consistently favors those with power, whether corporations or the government, would become much more likely to rule in favor of workers, criminal defendants and those with civil rights claims. Or alternately: The Republican nominee wins, and one of the liberal justices retires. With conservatives in control not by 5-4 but 6-3, there would be a cascade of even more conservative decisions. The overturning of Roe v. Wade would be just the beginning.
Look at what the Supreme Court has done recently. It gutted the Voting Rights Act, said that corporations could have religious beliefs, simultaneously upheld and hobbled the Affordable Care Act, struck down a key part of the Defense of Marriage Act and moved toward legalizing same-sex marriage, all but outlawed affirmative action, gave corporations and wealthy individuals the ability to dominate elections and created an individual right to own guns — and that’s just in the last few years.
Whether you’re a Democrat or a Republican, there is probably no single issue you ought to be more concerned about in the 2016 campaign than what the court will look like after the next president gets the opportunity to make an appointment or two. The implications are enormous. It’s not too early to start considering them.
By John Guida
November 28, 2014, 10:00 a.m. EST
By all accounts, he is an extreme long shot, but Jim Webb has set up an “exploratory committee” to see about running for president in 2016.
The former senator from Virginia, writer (of, among other books, the 2014 memoir “I Heard My Country Calling” and a critically acclaimed war novel, “Fields of Fire”) and veteran of Ronald Reagan’s administration said in his announcement (the first of what will no doubt be many by both Republicans and Democrats): “Is it possible that our next President could actually lay out a vision for the country, and create an environment where leaders from both parties and from all philosophies would feel compelled to work together for the good of the country, despite all of the money and political pressure that now demands they disagree? I believe it is possible.”
But most political pundits and prognosticators point out the obvious: Mr. Webb, with scarce resources at the moment, would face a steep climb to the Democratic nomination against the overwhelming favorite, Hillary Rodham Clinton (assuming she runs). Even Steve Jarding, who worked on Mr. Webb’s 2006 Senate campaign, told David Freedlander at the Daily Beast that “at this point, you wouldn’t bet on him.”
Mr. Webb’s announcement video — or at least its style — may not inspire legions of new followers, as Mr. Freedlander points out: It “had all the slick production of the instructional video shown before jury duty.”
Yet the style might actually be a deliberate “anti-style” that will find a better reception with voters who these days don’t have much taste for conventional Washington politicians — for them, Mr. Jarding suggests, Mr. Webb might be their stand-in.
Noah Millman at The American Conservative agrees: “He’s a genuinely independent person, the exact opposite of the careerist climber. We desperately need more people like him in our politics.”
Mr. Webb could bring a robust populist message, Mr. Freedlander argues, adding that he talks “about not just curbing the power of big banks but about an inequality agenda that goes beyond raising taxes and the minimum wage in order to help lower middle-class families gain more of a foothold.”
This is one reason Al Hunt, writing at Bloomberg View, says, “Jim Webb could be Hillary Clinton’s worst nightmare.”
Mr. Hunt says that Mr. Webb “has long taken a populist, anti-Wall Street stance” and, noting his well-received 2007 response to President George W. Bush’s State of the Union address, says that Mr. Webb “declared that the health of American society should be measured ‘not with the numbers that come out of Wall Street, but with the living conditions that exist on Main Street.’”
“He pushed a measure to slap a special tax on big bonuses paid out by Wall Street companies that received government assistance during the financial crisis,” Mr. Hunt adds.
Above all, observers also emphasize his foreign policy vision. William Greider at The Nation says, “Given his résumé and valor in war, Webb has the authority (and the guts) to provoke a profound national debate about the nature of U.S. militarism.”
He was against the war in Iraq and, as David Weigel reports at Bloomberg Politics, he’s been making the claim that America has “‘fallen into that Pandora’s box of the killer of empires’ by over-committing and occupying in the Middle East and Arab world.”
Mr. Hunt summarizes this view: “What he does possess is a long-held and forceful opposition to U.S. interventions in Iraq and Libya, and potentially Syria.”
P.M. Carpenter, writing at his blog, sees any comparison with Hillary in this area as advantageous to Mr. Webb: “Webb has been consistently right about America’s recent wars, and Hillary has been consistently wrong. His theorems: ‘An important caveat on how our country should fight the terrorists if they are a direct threat to our national security is: do not occupy foreign territory,’ and ‘Never get involved in a five-sided argument.’”
Mr. Webb tells Ryan Lizza at The New Yorker, “I’ve said for a very long time, since I was Secretary of the Navy, we do not belong as an occupying power in that part of the world,” and adds, “This incredible strategic blunder of invading caused the problems, because it allowed the breakup of Iraq along sectarian lines at the same time that Iran was empowering itself in the region.”
In sizing up Mr. Webb’s chances, then, on paper, most observers suggest that if his appeal succeeds anywhere, it would be standing on ground to Hillary’s left. Yet Harry Enten, a writer and political analyst at 538, makes a case for a “his moderate credentials” as the path to follow. He notes that Hillary does best with Democratic voters who consider themselves liberal, “but there’s more room on her right than her left” and “anti-Clinton voters prefer a more conservative option.”
Josh Kraushaar at National Journal, in estimating Mr. Webb’s candidacy, suggests that it’s less about where he stands in the party’s spectrum and more about how the party has changed in what it stands for: “That he’s treated more like a fringe figure these days is a testament to how far his party has drifted from its roots,” he writes. “The base of the Democratic Party now finds itself united by cultural issues, not economic ones — and Webb is badly out of step with the changed sentiment.”
Indeed, the most common view of Mr. Webb’s candidacy is a pessimistic one.
Skeptics point to questions about his temperament and taste for retail politics. Rob Garver at The Fiscal Times writes that he “has never been the most enthusiastic of politicians,” and after a distinguished career in the armed forces, “carried that no nonsense military attitude with him into the political arena, which is more typically full of nonsense.”
Aaron Blake, writing for The Fix at The Washington Post, lays out several criticisms against Mr. Webb. “He retired after one term in the Senate and didn’t seem to particularly enjoy being in public life.” He also refers readers to Larry Sabato, a University of Virginia professor commonly referred to as the “dean” of Virginia politics, who said after Mr. Webb’s retirement from the Senate: “He has been an excellent United States senator, but he is a terrible politician. He doesn’t suffer fools gladly, he doesn’t enjoy glad-handing.”
Furthermore, Mr. Blake finds Mr. Webb “very dour,” and adds: “He has negative charisma. The Fix believes that presidential races have a charisma threshold, by which we mean that candidates need to be at least somewhat compelling to a national audience to achieve viability.”
He might also bring cultural baggage, including, as Mr. Blake points out, what some see as him “being insensitive to women.” As an example, he and others point to a 1979 article in The Washingtonian magazine called “Women Can’t Fight,” which argued against women in combat (Mr. Webb apologized for the article in 2006, calling it an “overreach”).
Mr. Blake also notes that “Webb has spoken fondly of his Confederate roots and defended the Southern states’ decision to secede, even citing the ‘Nazification of the Confederacy.’”
Citing Mr. Webb’s call for a greater spirit of cooperation in Washington in his announcement comments, Ed Kilgore at the Washington Monthly blog Political Animal writes: “I really, really don’t think the average potential primary supporter of Webb against Clinton is going to kick out the jams for a candidate who thinks the real problem in Washington is insufficient bipartisanship. Been there, done that, with Obama.”
Mr. Millman, though taken with the idea of Mr. Webb’s candidacy, nonetheless sees its potential shortcomings: “Inasmuch as some Democrats’ big worry about Clinton is that she’s not a particularly good politician, Webb is hardly an attractive alternative. Plus, the current Democratic President is a standoffish writerly personality. Do the Democrats really want to nominate another one?”
Mr. Webb is aware of his status. As Mr. Lizza reports, “I noticed a picture of Don Quixote on Webb’s wall of military treasures. He laughed when I asked about it. ‘The beauty of Don Quixote is not that he dreamed impossible dreams,’ he said. ‘It’s that, because he believed, he caused other people to believe.’”
And given the vicissitudes of primary battles — 2008 is a relevant example — as Mr. Lizza writes, there is still a glimmer of hope: “In every fight for the Democratic Presidential nomination in the past five decades, there has come a moment when the front-runner faltered. ‘Nature abhors a vacuum, and so does politics,’ Anita Dunn, a Democratic strategist, told me. Voters in the early states, perhaps spurred by a sense of civic responsibility, begin to take an interest in candidates they had previously never heard of. Those candidates seize on issues, usually ones that excite the left, that the front-runner, focussed on the general election, has been too timid to champion.”
By Matt Stout
November 29, 2014
Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s opposition to a White House Treasury pick has turned an otherwise obscure nomination into a headline-grabbing battle for the party’s soul, as she pushes a populist message that could pull likely 2016 presidential nominee Hillary Clinton further to the left than she wants to be, observers say.
“There are various ways to influence politics and policy, and one of them is to be like a magnet and pull people into your orbit. In a sense, I think that’s what Warren is aiming to do,” Democratic consultant Peter Fenn said, referring to the dust-up over the nomination of investment banker Antonio Weiss for under secretary of the Treasury for domestic finance.
“Who really cares about a nominee for a second-level position in a Cabinet department? Not many people,” Fenn said.
“But she is doing what she believes in, and I will say, that after this election, when a lot of Democrats felt that there wasn’t a strong narrative, there wasn’t a strong message and there wasn’t a strong theme for fighting for the middle class, they are very much looking toward candidates and officeholders who can make that case.”
Warren’s stance against Weiss — first disclosed more than two weeks ago — continues to grab attention, including this week when her camp hit back against a critical New York Times column. The week prior, she wrote a 1,300-word op-ed for the Huffington Post rapping the White House for the pick and calling on the Obama administration “to loosen the hold that Wall Street banks have over economic policy making.”
“The objective, I think, is to move the party,” Fenn said, “and I think you can even see with some of the comments over the last few weeks of Hillary Clinton.”
Clinton, who is slated to speak at the Massachusetts Conference for Women in Boston on Thursday, has had to pitch herself to the party’s more progressive wing that’s loudly called for Warren’s own candidacy.
In a speech here last month, the former first lady claimed that corporations don’t create jobs, a gaffe she later walked back and many attributed to her attempt to parrot Warren’s progressive message on the senator’s home turf.
That same week, Clinton tried to stake out more progressive territory in an appearance with Minnesota Sen. Al Franken, saying, “There’s a lot of unfinished business to make sure we don’t end up once again with big banks taking big risks and leaving taxpayers holding the bag.”
Political observers say Warren’s growing power to push her agenda, especially now that she’s in a Senate leadership post, could put her progressive stamp on Democrats’ message in the 2016 election.
“Ever since she announced for the seat, she’s been trying to pull the party left,” said University of Massachusetts Boston professor Maurice “Mo” Cunningham.
“She is one of those politicians uniquely positioned that when she speaks, particularly on issues that have to do with Wall Street, people have to pay attention. And she uses it skillfully.”
Politico: “Rick Perry ramps up”
By Kenneth P. Vogel
November 28, 2014, 6:51 p.m. EST
[Subtitle:] Texas governor invites GOP donors to December sessions to discuss 2016.
Texas Gov. Rick Perry is inviting hundreds of prominent Republican donors and policy experts to a series of gatherings next month that are intended to rebuild his damaged national brand and lay the foundation for a potential 2016 presidential campaign, fundraisers and organizers confirmed to POLITICO.
The small-group sessions kick off Tuesday and Wednesday in Austin with a pair of lunches and dinners held in the governor’s mansion wedged between policy briefings at the nearby office of Perry senior adviser Jeff Miller. In all, Perry’s team expects he will meet in person with more than 500 major donors and bundlers from around the country in December as well as a slew of operatives, Republican National Committee members and policy experts.
Perry’s intensive month of foundation-building comes as other prospective Republican presidential candidates – notably former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz – are engaging with the wealthy Texans who for years have been among the GOP’s most significant sources of cash. As the heir to a political dynasty with deep Texas ties, Bush in particular could seriously cut into Perry’s financial base. Bush over the last few months has met with major Texas donors.
Perry has long enjoyed support from Texas’s biggest wallets for his state campaigns, but some of the donors remain skeptical of his presidential viability as a result of his bumbling 2012 run, during which some abandoned him in favor of eventual nominee Mitt Romney.
Perry had entered the race to much fanfare as the most formidable GOP foe to Romney. But his debate performances induced cringes, his anti-establishment tough talk prompted grumbles in the business community and he had only limited success expanding his fundraising base beyond Texas. When he dropped out not long after finishing fifth in the Iowa caucuses, Perry further alienated his party’s business wing by snubbing Romney and backing the long-shot rival campaign of Newt Gingrich.
While some in the party wonder if his star dimmed even further this summer when he was indicted on public corruption charges, Perry has nonetheless tried to remake his public image over the past year. In a series of high-profile interviews, the governor, sporting trendy new glasses that give him a more studious look, has admitted that he bungled 2012. He’s said the experience “humbled” him, and admitted he erred by jumping into the race without sufficient preparation and just six weeks after back surgery that left him in pain and unable to sleep.
Things would be different if he ran again, say sources who have interacted with the three-term governor, who is leaving the office after having held it longer than any other person in Texas history. They describe his health as “tip-top” and his policy expertise as light years ahead of where it was in the last presidential cycle — all of which he intends to highlight in his December donor meetings.
“If Gov. Perry is going to run, he’s going to be better prepared, and he’s going to have the resources necessary to compete,” said Henry Barbour, a Republican national committeeman who is helping plan for a Perry 2016 campaign and organizing next week’s donor sessions.
After next week, there will be an additional four or five sessions throughout the month, as well as an array of briefings held at Miller’s office with policy experts from leading conservative think tanks, such as the American Enterprise Institute and the Hoover Institution, according to those familiar with the planning.
The sources said Perry has been receiving twice-a-week briefings on different policy areas for months, including one on health care this past week in Austin featuring leading Obamacare critic Avik Roy of the Manhattan Institute. Perry also has been briefed – both in Austin and over the phone – by Lanhee Chen, the highly regarded policy director for Romney’s 2012 campaign, who authored a 172-page job-creation outline for Romney and likely would have played a leading role in a Romney White House.
Miller – who has overseen Perry’s post-2012 reemergence, and who many expect would run a Perry presidential campaign – added that full preparation means “not just on policy, but also with the necessary relationships in both the early states and with major donors around the country.”
Several major donors and bundlers who supported Perry’s last White House run – including some who have been invited to the Austin sessions – were cautious or even skeptical when asked this week if they’d back a Perry 2016 campaign.
“I’m a huge fan of Gov. Perry’s and would do whatever I could to help, but other stars have emerged in the party, and I want to hear what they have to say,” said Matt Keelen, a GOP lobbyist who rallied Capitol Hill support for Perry’s 2012 campaign. Keelen specifically cited Sens. Rand Paul of Kentucky and Marco Rubio of Florida as intriguing presidential prospects.
Fort Worth investor and GOP bundler Hal Lambert supported Perry in 2012. He described the governor as “very good at working crowds and talking to people, but he’s really going to have to pick it up on the debate side. Those debates really ruined his chances last time.” While he said he wasn’t ready to commit to Perry – or anyone else – in 2016, Lambert said he’ll bring an open mind when he attends a dinner with Perry at the governor’s mansion on Dec. 17.
“I’d need to hear what the overall strategy would be for victory,” he said.
A Washington lobbyist who supported Perry last time but has since cooled on him was more blunt, asserting that Perry “ran a crummy campaign in 2012” and hasn’t demonstrated that he’s figured out how to do things differently. Donors also are concerned about the unresolved corruption indictment hanging over Perry’s head, said the lobbyist. Perry has adamantly asserted his innocence in that case, and many across the political spectrum have rallied to his defense, calling the prosecution a witch hunt.
“None of the D.C. lobbyist crowd who were supporting Perry in 2012 are planning to support him this cycle,” said the lobbyist, who is considering supporting Govs. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana or Scott Walker of Wisconsin should either run in 2016. “He is a good guy, but Perry’s time has passed.”
One prominent GOP bundler who was invited to Austin for one of the Perry sessions in December said, “I admire Perry, but my first commitment is to Jeb Bush and until Jeb makes up his mind, I and a lot of other folks in the Bush extended family are kind of frozen.” If Bush doesn’t run, the bundler said, “I think it’ll be time for a new generation.”
Some major bundlers for George W. Bush’s presidential campaigns — including Wayne Berman and Dirk Van Dongen — have been supportive of Rubio. But the Florida Senator, who has not said whether he’s going to run, could face a difficult financial path if Bush ran, since the fellow Floridian has deeper ties to many of Rubio’s home-state benefactors, as well as the Bush family’s vaunted national money network.
Perry’s Texas network overlaps slightly with the Bush network. But there’s also been tension between the camps, stemming partly from the Bush crew’s support for then-Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, a longtime Bush family ally, in her unsuccessful challenge to Perry in the 2010 Texas GOP gubernatorial primary.
A GOP fundraiser who has worked with Texas donors said some of the richest among them have been meeting with Jeb Bush in Texas, and that his brother, the former president — and former Texas governor — George W. Bush has been talking up Jeb to rich Texans. “Perry is responding to that, and a lot of these donors are caught in the middle,” the fundraiser said of Perry’s Austin meetings.
Lambert, however, said Jeb Bush’s primary reason for visiting Texas was supporting the successful campaign of his son, George P. Bush, for Texas land commissioner.
“I don’t think it’s necessarily been about meeting donors. He’s not going to have any problem there,” said Lambert, who conceded that Texas donors could have divided loyalties in 2016.
“Ted Cruz could compete as well,” Lambert said of the junior senator from Texas. Cruz is a favorite of the conservative grassroots, but he has struggled to win over GOP establishment donors, who view him as an impractical ideologue.
“There will definitely be a difference in the donor base, but I think he’s right in the mix,” said Lambert, who praised Cruz and added, “It will be a tough decision.”
Calendar:
Sec. Clinton's upcoming appearances as reported online. Not an official schedule.
· December 1 – New York, NY: Sec. Clinton keynotes a League of Conservation Voters dinner (Politico)
· December 1 – New York, NY: Sec. Clinton hosts fundraiser for Sen. Mary Landrieu (Times-Picayune)
· December 4 – Boston, MA: Sec. Clinton speaks at the Massachusetts Conference for Women (MCFW)
· December 16 – New York, NY: Sec. Clinton honored by Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights (Politico)
· February 24 – Santa Clara, CA: Sec. Clinton to Keynote Address at Inaugural Watermark Conference for Women (PR Newswire)