Correct The Record Tuesday October 7, 2014 Morning Roundup
Correct The Record Tuesday October 7, 2014 Morning Roundup:
Headlines:
CNN: “Bill Clinton plays savior for Arkansas Democrats”
“‘This is a very personal election cycle for President Clinton in Arkansas and he knows the districts down to the precincts,’ said Adrienne Elrod, an Arkansas native who cut her political teeth in the Clinton White House and now serves as Communications Director to Correct the Record, doing rapid response to criticism of Hillary Clinton.”
“The people who know Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley the best are far from persuaded he should run for president of the United States in 2016, a new poll shows. A Goucher Poll released Tuesday shows that 65% of Maryland residents don’t believe Mr. O’Malley, a Democrat, should run for president. Only 19% held the view that Mr. O’Malley should mount a presidential campaign."
Associated Press: “Clinton Says Military Action in Iraq is Essential”
“Hillary Rodham Clinton says military action against Islamic militants in Iraq and Syria is ‘essential’ and the U.S. would turn away from the threat ‘at our peril.’”
Politico: “Hillary Clinton on ISIL: Al Qaeda, the sequel”
“Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday discussed the U.S.’s battle against the ISIL, saying she believes a military campaign is needed to stop the terror group because it ‘will try to pick up where Al Qaeda in Afghanistan left off.’”
CNN: “ISIS is neither Islamic nor a state, says Hillary Clinton”
“Hillary Clinton used an appearance in Ottawa, Ontario, on Monday to talk up the work she did to combat ‘violent extremism’ during her time as secretary of state.”
MSNBC: “Hillary Clinton hints at earlier presidential timeline”
“Hillary Clinton hinted at a possibly expedited timeline for her potential presidential plans Monday, saying she would make a decision on a run after the midterm elections.”
Bloomberg: David Weigel: “Wanted: Angel Investors Against Hillary Clinton”
[Subtitle:] “Why just a few rich anti-Hillary progressives could fund a race the media would cover.”
Politico: “Bill Clinton to Arkansans: ‘Vote your heart’”
“Former President Bill Clinton on Monday warned Arkansans to avoid taking a ‘protest vote’ against national Democrats in the midterms, urging them instead to ‘vote your heart’ and back Democrats running at home.”
MSNBC: “Can Bill Clinton save Arkansas Democrats?”
“Can former President Bill Clinton save Arkansas Democrats from President Barack Obama? He came back to his native state Monday to give it a try.”
Politico: “Republicans brace for 2016 free-for-all”
“At least 15 Republicans are weighing campaigns, with no clear front-runner. Contrast that with Clinton, who has solidified her Democratic support to a deeper extent than any candidate in recent memory.”
“To be sure, all sorts of presidential possibilities are playing the guest star game this month, ranging from former Democratic Sen. Jim Webb of Virginia (off to New Hampshire in two weeks) to GOP Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio (in Iowa last week). But as with so much else in politics these past three decades, nobody is working the angles as forcefully or purposefully as someone named Clinton.”
The Nation: “Hillary Clinton’s Midterm Schedule Makes It Clear: She’s Running”
“The best confirmation of Clinton’s candidacy—short of an actual announcement—came with the detailing (via Politico, the gossip gazette of insider positioning) of the presumed Democratic front-runner’s exceptionally busy schedule for the month leading up to the November 4 midterm elections.”
Articles:
CNN: “Bill Clinton plays savior for Arkansas Democrats”
By Brianna Keilar
October 6, 2014, 10:13 a.m. EDT
Bill Clinton and James Lee Witt were walking through the kitchen at the Arlington Hotel in Hot Springs during a recent fundraiser when cooks and servers rushed to shake the former president's hand.
"We went up some stairs and a guy was standing there," recalled Witt, Clinton's former FEMA director who is now running for Congress. Clinton "said to him, 'You know, I met you here 35 years ago.' The guy said 'You sure did.'"
Clinton is drawing on his more than four decades of political experience as he returns home Monday to bolster Democrats who are fighting for survival. Arkansas, like other southern states, is increasingly dominated by Republicans and the November election could decide whether Democrats can hold onto any major office here.
That's where Clinton comes in.
He's launching his biggest push of the midterm campaign season in Arkansas -- a four-city, two-day swing of fundraisers and rallies.
Clinton is especially well positioned to help Democrats here. The Arkansas ballot reads like cards from his 1980's Rolodex.
Gubernatorial candidate Mike Ross was Clinton's driver during his 1982 run for governor.
Incumbent Sen. Mark Pryor, who was 11 when he first met Clinton and whose father, David, was a political mentor to the former president, is one of the Senate's most vulnerable Democrats. He will be at all four Clinton events.
"This is a very personal election cycle for President Clinton in Arkansas and he knows the districts down to the precincts," said Adrienne Elrod, an Arkansas native who cut her political teeth in the Clinton White House and now serves as Communications Director to Correct the Record, doing rapid response to criticism of Hillary Clinton.
Witt first met Clinton when the former president was 27 and running an ultimately unsuccessful bid for Congress. The two supported each other through campaign after campaign.
"He is probably the best in the world," Witt said of Clinton's ability to inspire people to vote.
The former president has already shown a willingness to take on Republicans ahead of the midterms.
"A lot of these Republicans, they've spent all their time dissing the president and dumping on the Senate majority leader, Harry
Reid," Clinton said at the Iowa Steak Fry last month. "If you look at them, half the time, they're not even running against their opponents. They're trying to get you to check your brain at the door, start foaming at the mouth, push some hot button. The last thing they want you to do is think."
Clinton will attend rallies and fundraisers Monday in Conway, at the University of Central Arkansas just outside of Little Rock and at Arkansas State University in Jonesboro. On Tuesday, Clinton will headline events in Conway and the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville, where he and Hillary Clinton both taught law.
Clinton is useful to southern Democrats because he can go to parts of the country where President Obama cannot. A recent NBC News-Marist poll, for instance, shows Obama with a 31% approval rating in Arkansas.
When Clinton ran for president, he carried a number of southern states that eluded Obama, even as he won an historic 53% of the popular vote in 2008. But even Clinton, the native son, would struggle to put Arkansas in his column now.
Mitt Romney bested Obama by almost 24 percentage points in Arkansas in 2012. John McCain beat Obama by nearly 20 percentage points in 2008 and George W. Bush won out over John Kerry by just under 10 points in 2004.
The South is changing, and not in Democrats' favor.
"These states have been transformed in party terms. They are deeply red and that includes Arkansas," said Larry Sabato, Director of the University of Virginia Center for Politics. "Bill Clinton can have an effect in a Democratic primary, but much less in a general election. He is doing his duty and building up chits, presumably for Hillary."
Indeed, Clinton's visits appear to be as much about 2016 as they are about 2014.
Many Democrats think Hillary Clinton -- with her centrist roots and more hawkish stance on foreign policy -- may be competitive in some southern states in a general election.
"A lot of people believe Arkansas could potentially be in play in 2016 if Hillary Clinton decides to run so having Clinton allies in these statewide slots is important," said David Brock, a 1990s nemesis of the Clintons who has since become their chief defender by founding Correct the Record.
Clinton is playing his favorite role -- savior -- in this state where the races he's stumping for show just how close southern Democrats are to extinction.
Pryor leads Republican Rep. Tom Cotton by just two points with 7% of those surveyed still undecided, according to a recent USA Today/Suffolk University poll.
In the governor's race, the same poll shows Ross trailing Republican Asa Hutchinson by two points with 11% still waiting to make up their mind.
Clinton's support for Ross is also a chance to pay back an old enemy. When he was a Reagan-appointed U.S. attorney, Hutchinson prosecuted Clinton's brother, Roger, on drug charges. Hutchinson later played a key role in Clinton's impeachment in the House of Representatives.
"There are scores to settle," said one Democratic operative with Arkansas ties.
By Peter Nicholas
October 7, 2014, 12:01 a.m. EDT
The people who know Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley the best are far from persuaded he should run for president of the United States in 2016, a new poll shows.
A Goucher Poll released Tuesday shows that 65% of Maryland residents don’t believe Mr. O’Malley, a Democrat, should run for president. Only 19% held the view that Mr. O’Malley should mount a presidential campaign.
Mr. O’Malley, a two-term governor whose term expires in January, is considering a run for the Democratic presidential nomination. He has been traveling frequently to some of the states that hold early presidential nominating contests, including Iowa and New Hampshire. He has also dispatched political aides to Iowa, New Hampshire and other states with competitive midterm elections – the sort of gesture that builds good will among Democratic Party activists and elected officials.
Other polls show Mr. O’Malley would be a heavy underdog were he to face former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in a Democratic primary campaign.
Still, Mr. O’Malley may not be deterred by the long odds. Democratic fundraisers have said that in private conversations with Mr. O’Malley, he has told them he would run for president even if Mrs. Clinton gets in the race.
Mrs. Clinton has said she won’t announce her decision on whether to run until next year.
The poll of 708 Maryland citizens was conducted between Sept. 28 and Oct. 2.
The poll was conducted by Goucher College and the margin of error was plus or minus 3.7%.
Associated Press: “Clinton Says Military Action in Iraq is Essential”
[No Writer Mentioned]
October 6, 2014, 4:24 p.m. EDT
Hillary Rodham Clinton says military action against Islamic militants in Iraq and Syria is "essential" and the U.S. would turn away from the threat "at our peril."
Clinton, a potential 2016 presidential contender, gave a speech and took questions in Ottawa at a Canada2020 think tank event on Monday. She says the fight against militants will be a long-term struggle and says an information war on social media is needed, as well as an air war.
Clinton says there is bipartisan agreement on the dealing with Islamic State militants, which is to degrade and defeat them.
Asked about running for president, Clinton she is "thinking hard" but won't make her decision until after the upcoming midterm Congressional elections in November. She previously said she would decide early next year.
Politico: “Hillary Clinton on ISIL: Al Qaeda, the sequel”
By Lucy McCalmont
October 6, 2014, 4:45 p.m. EDT
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday discussed the U.S.’s battle against the ISIL, saying she believes a military campaign is needed to stop the terror group because it “will try to pick up where Al Qaeda in Afghanistan left off.”
“I think the evidence is convincing, at least to me, that this is a group that will try to pick up where Al Qaeda in Afghanistan left off. What we were able to do, at great cost to ferret out and decapitate the leadership of Al Qaeda, severely undermined their capacity, as an organization,” Clinton said during her keynote remarks at Canada 2020 in Ottawa, according to CNN.
The possible Democratic presidential contender said other terror groups such as Boko Haram and Al Shabab, have not shown the same commitment to expansion as ISIL. Echoing President Barack Obama, Clinton said ISIL is neither Islamic nor a state and she refuses to call them the Islamic State, as some do.
“Whatever you call them, I think we can agree that the threat is real,” Clinton said.
“So therefore, I think military action is critical. In fact, I think essential to try to prevent their further advance and their holding of more territory. Because by holding territory, they both gain weapons and they gain revenues,” Clinton said, adding that ISIL is very well funded, well armed and more effective on social media.
While Clinton said the “military piece of this is essential,” she added that “military action alone is not sufficient.”
“There has to be more. You have to combat them of social media, you have to do more to enlist Arab support…to demonstrate this is not some sort of an American/Western effort and it involves significant Arab participation,” she said.
Clinton called going after ISIL in Syria “while we are still in a stand off with the Assad regime” an “incredible dilemma.”
“It is a long game. I think we turn away from it at our peril. Because this is a long term challenge. It is not an overwhelming one. There may be 50,000 to 100,000 hardcore jihadists in the world right now. But it is a very attractive cause for alienated young people both in the region and in places like France or the UK or Canada or the U.S.,” Clinton said. “This is a long-term struggle.”
Clinton’s remarks Monday are the most extensive she’s made since backing Obama’s decision last month to order airstrikes in Syria.
The president gave a “very clear explanation and robust defense of the action he has ordered,” Clinton said at the time at the Clinton Global Initiative. “The situation now is demanding a response, and we are seeing a very robust response,” Clinton said at CGI. “It is something that I think the president is right to bring the world attention to.”
CNN: “ISIS is neither Islamic nor a state, says Hillary Clinton”
By Dan Merica
October 6, 2014, 4:28 p.m. EDT
Hillary Clinton used an appearance in Ottawa, Ontario, on Monday to talk up the work she did to combat "violent extremism" during her time as secretary of state.
"We took decisive action against the threat of violent extremism," Clinton said of her four years as America's top diplomat, "certainly most practically from Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda's syndicate of terror."
The line is new for Clinton and comes at a time that some have raised questions whether the Obama administration underestimated ISIS, a terrorist group that has swept into power in areas of Syria and Iraq. President Barack Obama decided during his first term not to help train and arm rebels in Syria, despite urging from Clinton and other top advisers. In hindsight, some of those advisers say not arming Syrian rebels helped lead to the rise of ISIS.
Last month, Obama authorized airstrikes against the terrorist group and training for Syrian rebels. The United States was joined by a coalition of countries, including Arab states, and Clinton backed the action.
On Monday, the former secretary of state called dealing with ISIS a "long-term struggle" in which military action is essential.
The former first lady also refused to call the group by the name it calls itself: the Islamic State.
"Whether you call them ISIS or ISIL, I refuse to call them the Islamic State, because they are neither Islamic or a state," Clinton said. "Whatever you call them, I think we can agree that the threat is real."
Clinton justified military action against ISIS, but not against other terrorist groups, because ISIS' "kind of jihadist extremism is expansionary."
"They believe that it is part of their mission to launch attacks, to infiltrate through foreign fighters into Western societies," Clinton said. "If that were not the case, then we could have a different debate. I think the evidence is convincing, at least to me, that this is a group that will try to pick up where al Qaeda in Afghanistan left off."
Clinton later argued that groups like Al-Shabaab or Boko Haram "have not yet evidenced a commitment to expanding their reach the way that this ISIL group has. So, therefore, I think military action is critical."
But military action is "not sufficient alone."
"There has to be more," Clinton said. "You have to combat them on social media, you have to do more to enlist Arab support ... to demonstrate this is not some sort of an American/Western effort and it involves significant Arab participation."
ISIS has quickly gained sizable attention outside the Middle East because it has beheaded a number of Western aid workers and journalists.
Clinton touted what the Obama administration did to stop al Qaeda in Afghanistan.
"What we were able to do at great cost," Clinton said, "was to ferret out and decapitate the leadership of al Qaeda, (which) severely undermined their capacity, as an organization, continues to threaten the West."
MSNBC: “Hillary Clinton hints at earlier presidential timeline”
By Alex Seitz-Wald
October 6, 2014, 5:35 p.m. EDT
Hillary Clinton hinted at a possibly expedited timeline for her potential presidential plans Monday, saying she would make a decision on a run after the midterm elections.
“I’ve been dodging this question now for a year and a half or more. I’m going to keep dodging it, certainly until the midterm elections are over,” she said during an event in Ottawa, Canada. “I’m thinking hard about it. But I’m not going to really bear down and think hard about it in a way you make a decision until after these elections.”
Previously, during a speech in Mexico, Clinton said she would make a decision “after the first of the year.” Clinton announced her last presidential bid on Jan. 20, 2008. Of course, the first of the year is after the midterm elections, so she could still wait until January, but this is earliest window she has opened yet.
Her comments came during a Q&A with Canadian bank executive Victor Dodig at an event hosted by the progressive think tank Canada 2020 in Ottawa.
As expected, Clinton ducked another question on the controversial Keystone XL Pipeline, which the Canadian government has been pushing Washington to approve. “I can’t really talk about it,” she said, explaining that she doesn’t want to “undermine” the ongoing approval process.
The State Department must approve any pipeline that crosses international boundaries. Clinton oversaw that process as secretary, but she has completely dodged the issue since stepping down.
Clinton said she expects next month’s Senate midterm elections to be “close,” and that the Republican agenda is “woefully inadequate” to solving the problems the country faces today.
“It’s going to be a turnout election, and that’s challenging,” she said. “Because in the second term of any president, with one exception, namely my husband, the party of the president loses seats.”
In her prepared remarks, Clinton praised Canada and its close relationship with the United States, saying she loved visiting the country “before and after I lost my anonymity.” “I used to have a lot of fun when I was anonymous,” she added.
The former secretary of state also gushed about being a new grandmother. “It’s just better than I thought,” she told Dodig. “One of the only experiences in life that is not overrated.”
She even said that being president might not be more “exciting” than being a grandmother. And Clinton plans to let her granddaughter choose a nickname for her – “unless the choice is really unfortunate,” in which case she may have to impose one of her own.
Clinton elaborated on why she believed military action against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) is both “critical” and “essential.”
While she estimated there are 50,000 to 100,000 “hardcore jihadists” on the planet, she said ISIS is the only group so far that wants to pick up the work of the original al-Qaida organization and target victims in the West.
She added that she refuses to call the group the “Islamic State,” because “they are neither Islamic nor a state.”
When she served as President Obama’s secretary of state, Clinton pushed the administration to arm moderate Syrian rebels earlier, but was overridden.
Clinton also took a tougher line on former Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, whom she called “untrustworthy” and accused of turning the Iraqi Army into a “sectarian arm of his leadership.” More has to be done, she said, to make Arab governments inclusive of minorities so they don’t enflame radicals.
Bloomberg: David Weigel: “Wanted: Angel Investors Against Hillary Clinton”
By David Weigel
October 6, 2014, 3:25 p.m. EDT
[Subtitle:] Why just a few rich anti-Hillary progressives could fund a race the media would cover.
Politico's great Ken Vogel is out with a detailed and ambitious story about the "rogue donors" who might be willing to bankroll a challenger to Hillary Clinton. They are few but proud – talking to the media, after all, is their best course of action for the moment. The list: Deborah Sagner (Obama bundler in 2012, now raising for the Draft Elizabeth Warren campaign), Guy Saperstein (part owner of Oakland As, provided seed money for the Warren people), and several donors who gave to Obama and have talked to Jim Webb, Bernie Sanders, and Martin O'Malley.
That's it. That's enough. The very existence of these donors is powerful, and they know that. The press, which desperately wants to cover some Democratic story other than the Clinton Coronation, has largely decided that Clinton will be a Wall Street/Goldman Sachs/Robert Rubin candidate at a moment when the populist left thinks it can drive the party elsewhere. A donor who wants to fuel a campaign from the left is, de facto, a sort of angel investor whose money can only improve politics.
There is a precedent for this, dated (at least) to 1967/1968, when a small group of wealthy liberals gave Senator Eugene McCarthy's campaign the startup capital to run a primary in New Hampshire. Fewer than a dozen people came up with $1.5 million (roughly $10 million, adjusted for inflation). For perspective, the previous cycle's Johnson-Goldwater general election cost less than $45 million.
What would it take to run a credible challenge against Hillary Clinton in 2015?* Not that much, as the threshold for "credibility" is so low. The people who want a primary don't necessarily want to beat Clinton. In an interview with Alex Seitz-Wald, which according to Vogel caused tremors in Clintonland, new Democratic megadonor Tom Steyer suggested that Clinton would benefit from a primary and that "Democrats are in good enough shape that we can handle a little internal discussion without falling apart." He was not calling for a savior. He was calling for some debates. Absent that, there is no reason for Clinton to take questions from the left; there are no competing forces registering and contacting voters in the long primary season.
Progressives don't exactly need or want a Sheldon Adelson of their own to fund a Hillary-slayer. They just want someone willing to take a hit and lose to her, while the press sets up debates that Clinton would look like a coward for dodging. The pincer-attack nature of this means that the donors need only to assure a challenger that he can run a campaign without spending the rest of his life in debt.
*Not a typo. That's when the fun part—debates and early primary state blitzes—takes place. The general assumption is that Clinton will mow down her opponents in early 2016.
Politico: “Bill Clinton to Arkansans: ‘Vote your heart’”
By Katie Glueck
October 6, 2014, 3:25 p.m. EDT
CONWAY, Ark. — Former President Bill Clinton on Monday warned Arkansans to avoid taking a “protest vote” against national Democrats in the midterms, urging them instead to “vote your heart” and back Democrats running at home.
Drawing rousing applause in a fiery speech here at the University of Central Arkansas, the beloved former governor of this state urged the crowd to vote “for what you are for, not for what you are against.”
He said that since the civil rights tumult of his childhood, he has been “sick and tired of people trying to stir people up, make them foam at the mouth and vote for what they’re against instead of what they are for. How many times have we seen people do something they knew better than to do just ‘cause they were in a snit?”
Clinton spoke on behalf of candidates including Sen. Mark Pryor, who is locked in one of the closest Senate races of the cycle against Republican Rep. Tom Cotton; former Rep. Mike Ross, who is running for governor; and House candidate Patrick Henry Hays. He was joined at the podium by popular Arkansas Gov. Mike Beebe, also Democrat.
“They want you to make this a protest vote,” Clinton said of Republicans. “…They’re saying, ‘You may like these guys, but hey, you know what you gotta do, you gotta vote against the president. After all, it’s your last shot.’ It’s a pretty good scam, isn’t it?”
“Vote your heart,” he urged the crowd. “Don’t vote for what they tell you you have to be against. Vote for what you know you should be for.”
Arkansas has tacked sharply right over the last several years of President Barack Obama’s administration, becoming one of the last states in the South to turn red. Clinton is seeking to counteract that trend in the midterms this year through fundraisers, campaign appearances, and this week’s intense, two-day swing through four cities.
Clinton said Cotton is asking voters to “give me a six-year job for a two-year protest.”
Offering an impersonation of the Republican congressman, Clinton ran through a litany of positions Cotton has taken, and concluded, dripping with sarcasm: “‘No, I’ll never vote for equal pay for equal work. Are you kidding? Would I vote to raise the minimum wage? No way. But I’ll give you one more protest vote. But you gotta give me six years for a protest that will be irrelevant in two.’”
The former president said that Ross’s opponent, Asa Hutchinson, is making the same argument for a “four-year job that doesn’t have a lick to do with Washington, D.C., so you can have one more protest.”
Clinton slammed the role outside groups have taken this election cycle and the millions of dollars spent by conservative groups on ads designed to influence the races. He went on to mock voters explaining that they couldn’t vote in their best interests because of what “all this out-of-state money buying television ads tells me to.”
“‘I’d like to think about Arkansas, I’d like to think about our future, I’d like to think about what would be best for our children and grandchildren,’” he said. With his voice dropping to a whisper, the impersonation continued: “‘But I just can’t do it.’”
Despite the unpopularity of the national Democratic Party here in Arkansas, Bill Clinton maintains major cache in the state. His presidential library is here, he and his wife Hillary Clinton —a possible 2016 Democratic presidential frontrunner — frequently visit, and he has taken a deep personal interest in many Arkansas for months, people close to him say.
His fans note that in 2012, Clinton gave a highly effective speech at the Democratic National Convention, explaining the new health care law in such an accessible fashion that Obama joked he should have the title “Secretary of Explaining Stuff.”
Clinton tapped into that mode on Monday, outlining the various ways the country and the economy have improved over the last several years.
“I don’t expect anybody to vote on that” because not everyone has seen evidence of that yet, he said. “But I’m telling you the truth.”
Clinton will also visit universities in Jonesboro and Fayetteville and stop by the northwest city of Rogers to stump for the candidates during his two-day swing.
Republicans see Arkansas as a major pick-up opportunity in their quest to reclaim the Senate. Pryor, the son of Arkansas legend David Pryor, a former governor and senator, is working to keep the race as locally focused as possible.
Pryor, who spoke ahead of Clinton, asked the former president — who has just become a grandfather — to take a “selfie” with him.
Clinton told reporters after the speeches that he would be “surprised” if Pryor didn’t win “if we get good turnout,” and he praised the incumbent senator for “trying to work with everybody, be fair to everybody.”
“Now, that’s not what the outside ads say, but that’s what the real facts are,” Clinton said, before going on to take selfies with students — even admonishing one to move an arm out of the picture — and thank soldiers for their service.
MSNBC: “Can Bill Clinton save Arkansas Democrats?”
By Kasie Hunt
October 6, 2014, 5:17 p.m. EDT
Can former President Bill Clinton save Arkansas Democrats from President Barack Obama?
He came back to his native state Monday to give it a try.
“They want you to make this a protest vote” of Obama, Clinton told students at the University of Central Arkansas. “It’s a pretty good scam, isn’t it?”
“Give me a six-year job for a two-year protest, that’s Mark Pryor’s opponent’s message,” Clinton said.
Clinton is trying to boost gubernatorial candidate Mike Ross, who was his driver on the former president’s first campaign for governor, and embattled Sen. Mark Pryor, who is locked in a tough race against Republican Rep. Tom Cotton. The question is whether Clinton’s unquestioned legendary status here is enough to help them in in a state that has become dramatically more Republican since Obama took office.
“The president’s unpopular in Arkansas,” Clinton acknowledged. But he made a pitch for unity, saying his home state was the place “where I was taught not to turn away from anybody because of their race or their income or their political party or just because they disagreed with me on something.”
But even in a state that boasts the Bill and Hillary Clinton International Airport, President Clinton Avenue and the Bill Clinton Presidential Library, the man himself might not translate into votes for other Democrats that Republicans are trying to tie to the president. In 2008, Arkansas’s congressional delegation had just one Republican. Now, it’s flipped, making Pryor literally the last Democrat standing in federal office. And Ross is in a close race with former Republican Rep. Asa Hutchinson, who played a key role in prosecuting Clinton during his impeachment, to replace outgoing Democratic Gov. Mike Beebe, who’s one of the most popular governors in the country.
“Ladies and gentleman, the 42nd governor of Arkansas, Bill Clinton,” Beebe said as he introduced the former president.
But if anyone can lift Democrats here, it’s Clinton. He maintains close ties to his home state. He called out friends in the crowd by name at the top of his speech. He mentioned that he’d known Ross, the Democratic gubernatorial hopeful, “since he was a teenager.” Clinton said he’s been back for three funerals and will soon be returning for his 50th high school reunion.
And he was defensive of the place that sent him on to become the most powerful man in the world.
“I love my native state. Without you, I never would have had a chance to do anything,” Clinton said at a rally at the University of Central Arkansas in Conway, the first of four rallies planned across the state in the next two days.
“And I didn’t come back to the briar patch, I’m here, I came back to the future, the future of Arkansas and the future of America,” Clinton said.
The Clinton name is so good here that even Cotton, the very-conservative congressman running against Pryor, wouldn’t touch it. He praised Clinton’s presidency, arguing that his governing style was significantly different from President Obama’s.
“I think a lot of Arkansans, like a lot of Americans, look back on the Clinton years compared to the Obama years and view them very favorably,” Cotton said in an interview Monday. “The economy was forming better, wages were going up, we had a balanced budget, enacted welfare reform. It was all a result of President Clinton working with the Republican Congress after he lost the Congress the second year.”
And Cotton even declined to criticize Hillary Clinton, the presumptive Democratic frontrunner in 2016.
“We’re only 29 days from this election and that teems like a lifetime to me,” Cotton said when asked about the upcoming presidential contest. “I’m going to focus on one election at a time and not get ahead of myself.”
Pryor spent most of his brief speech Monday attacking Cotton for voting to cut federal student loans and rejecting minimum wage hikes, among other points of contention.
But they seemed to agree on Clinton. Pryor treated him like a rock star.
“Grandpa,” Pryor said to Clinton as he concluded his speech, “can I get a selfie?”
Politico: “Republicans brace for 2016 free-for-all”
By Maggie Haberman and Jake Sherman
October 7, 2014, 5:01 a.m. EDT
The message from Republican officials has been crystal clear for two years: The 2016 Republican primary cannot be another prolonged pummeling of the eventual nominee. Only one person ultimately benefited from that last time — Barack Obama — and Republicans know they can’t afford to send a hobbled nominee up against Hillary Clinton.
Yet interviews with more than a dozen party strategists, elected officials and potential candidates a month out from the unofficial start of the 2016 election lay bare a stark reality: Despite the national party’s best efforts, the likelihood of a bloody primary process remains as strong as ever.
The sprawling, kaleidoscope-like field that’s taking shape is already prompting Republican presidential hopefuls to knock their likely rivals in private and, at times, publicly. The fact that several candidates’ prospects hinge in part on whether others run only exacerbates that dynamic. Ultimately, the large pack won’t be whittled for many months: Republicans have no idea who will end up running, and insiders don’t expect the field will gel in any way until at least the spring of next year.
“It feels like a big traffic jam after a sporting event,” said Craig Robinson, a former executive director of the Republican Party of Iowa. “There’s a lot of competition for every segment of the party.”
At least 15 Republicans are weighing campaigns, with no clear front-runner. Contrast that with Clinton, who has solidified her Democratic support to a deeper extent than any candidate in recent memory.
There’s no indication that the reforms suggested by the national Republican party to protect the eventual nominee — fewer debates, friendlier moderators and a truncated primary calendar — have necessarily altered how potential candidates are thinking about campaigning against other Republicans. In fact, they already are jockeying to define themselves — and their opponents — in sharp terms.
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) is a prime example. Seeking to expand his base of support beyond tea party conservatives, Cruz, who has been working donors and elites aggressively, has routinely dismissed New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie in private conversations as the “Rudy Giuliani of this cycle,” multiple sources told POLITICO. (A Cruz adviser noted that the senator has often praised Christie.) Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) denounced Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), an establishment avatar, in a Senate floor speech last month over what turned out to be an Internet hoax, a photo that falsely identified the senator meeting with Islamic State militants. When outgoing Texas Gov. Rick Perry attacked Paul’s foreign policy views, Perry responded in kind.
The desire in some quarters for a new tenor in the Republican primary is a visceral reaction to the party’s bitter 2012 loss, and Clinton’s commanding position on the Democratic side.
“I think because we’ve been frozen out of the White House for two terms here, I think Republicans by and large are going to be really focused on winning the general election and not wanting to do things to handicap your eventual nominee,” Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) told POLITICO. He said that there will be “pressure this time around to ask candidates to play nice with one another so that we can make sure we can focus on the general election.”
In an interview, Christie said, “It’s always important for us not to destroy each other — it’d be nice.”
“I think that after eight years in the wilderness, we should all be focused on winning,” he said. “That would help. And I think if we did that, people will conduct themselves” in a positive way.
Yet Christie and Paul spent a good chunk of 2013 savaging each other. And several Republicans point to a simple reality: After the GOP’s tea party wing notched big wins in the 2010 and 2012 congressional elections, and establishment forces battled back successfully this year, both sides are primed for a fight.
Newt Gingrich, one of the short-lived insurgent front-runners in the 2012 primary, dismisses the party’s desire to avoid bloodletting as “nonsense.”
“There’s a wing of the Republican party which would like life to be orderly and dominated by the rich,” said Gingrich, whose own candidacy was enabled by a super PAC funded by $21 million from casino magnate Sheldon Adelson and his wife, Miriam. “And so they would like to take all of the things that make politics exciting and responding to the popular will and they would like to hide from it. The fact is, if you can’t nominate somebody who can win debates and come out of the contest stronger, they wouldn’t have a chance to beat Hillary in the general.”
For his part, Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus pushed through major changes for 2016, including a condensed primary calendar and fewer debates.
“What I can do is follow through on what I can control,” Priebus said in an interview. “Limiting the process from a six-month slice-and-dice festival to 60-plus” days. Priebus added that he senses a “greater spirit of cooperation” among candidates who understand that the party is “not going to get ahead by killing each other.”
“I think people are starting to get that,” he said. “I think they understand that donors are not going to go out of their way to support candidates to kill each other.”
Some big-dollar donors who in the past have been harshly critical of bomb-throwing Republicans are trying to keep the spirit of being team players. Al Hoffman, a Florida-based bundler who lambasted people like Cruz for instigating the government shutdown, now says that he “can’t talk negatively against any Republican candidates right now.”
“The more, the merrier,” he said.
Hoffman might get exactly that. Each of the more than dozen potential candidates appeals to a different slice of the GOP primary electorate. And their future plans depend, in part, on one another — a drastic shift from past cycles that had a clear front-runner from the outset.
In the establishment lane are Christie, Ryan and Bush, while Paul and Cruz occupy the insurgent lane. Paul has grabbed headlines with his ventures into inner cities and the liberal Bay Area. Cruz has impressed donors in money centers like New York. Cruz has a strong connection to the grass roots and social conservatives, but his hawkish views on foreign policy have helped draw support from the donor base as well.
Paul, who’s drawn the most media coverage of anyone in the field, is trying not to be typecast as a libertarian.
“Rand is positioned to be the conservative who can build a bigger, more inclusive Republican party so we can win in 2016,” said a Paul adviser. “He knows you don’t get there overnight or in a straight line, but it will take new ideas and new tactics to break the GOP losing streak. Our party’s worst-case scenario is that we box ourselves in again and put forward the same old, same old.”
David Kochel, who ran Romney’s campaign in Iowa in 2012, said, “There’s no question” Paul is the early front-runner in The Hawkeye State, but he has room to slip.
“He’s got the firmest and biggest base of support right now,” he said. “But we saw what happened to Ron Paul, which is what Rand Paul is trying to avoid, which is having a high floor, but a low ceiling.”
Not to be forgotten is Mitt Romney, who limped out of 2012 but is now seeing a wave of adulation. His backers think many of his 2012 campaign positions have been validated, especially on foreign policy. Most Romney insiders believe he won’t run, but enough donors are taking it seriously to spark constant chatter in money circles. Ohio Sen. Rob Portman is publicly toying with a bid but is unlikely to jump in if the establishment lane is too crowded. His state’s governor, John Kasich, will also likely watch what Portman does.
“It’s much more complicated this time than it was last time,” said strategist John Brabender, Santorum’s longtime adviser. “Last time Romney had his own box. This time it’s much more complicated.”
That means a field that is so crowded and overrepresented in each segment that the top few vote-getters will win by substantially smaller percentages, he said.
“No one’s going to win Iowa with 38 percent, they’re going to win with 28 percent,” Brabender said.
Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal has positioned himself as a thought leader, though it’s not clear he will run. And Perry is poised to run a redemption race by trying to win Iowa. Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, who was an early adopter of tea party flavored policies by voting against Bush-era spending, is also considering a White House campaign.
Florida Sen. Marco Rubio — who, like Ryan and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, can straddle different lanes of the GOP electorate — is showing moderate interest in a race, but is unlikely to run if Bush jumps in. Rubio would be especially dissuaded if the Senate turns Republican. Walker is considering running, and Ryan is seen as less likely to run if the governor does.
The social conservative sphere is also complicated. Cruz fits in the mold, as does former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, former Pennsylvania Sen Rick Santorum and Dr. Ben Carson.
The true fear that’s gripping some operatives: There will be no way to narrow the field anytime soon. The push to eliminate the Ames Straw Poll in Iowa has exacerbated those worries. Establishment Republicans say the event, held the August before the caucuses, is too easy to rig and turns candidates away from Iowa.
“My fear is we have a giant field and nothing to winnow it until the contests,” said Robinson, the former head of the Iowa Republican party. “No Ames Straw Poll and fewer debates.”
Despite the huge number of candidates, players in the establishment and grass roots are sounding hopeful tones. Former Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour said the “field promises to be a much higher-quality field [than 2008] — a lot of governors with records of accomplishment, both sitting governors and former governors.”
Conservative strategist Greg Mueller said there is “a lot of energy and excitement in the conservative grass roots for the field that appears to be emerging.
“It is an A-list of conservative and reform-minded thinkers who are strong advocates for limited constitutional government,” he said. “I do not think big-government Republicanism is going to sell very well in the 2016 cycle, so candidates such as Gov. Bush and some others who advocate for these types of Washington-driven policies, even though they may have a higher name ID, are going to be somewhat out of step with not only the conservative voter, but I would say the mainstream Republican voter in the wake of the Obama, Reid, Pelosi era of radical liberalism.”
By David Hawkings
October 7, 2014, 5:00 a.m. EDT
They are matches made in Democratic political consultant heaven: More than a dozen statewide candidates whose fortunes could turn on turnout by women, each paired with the woman getting ready to run again toward what she’s dubbed “that highest, hardest glass ceiling in American politics.”
In the final four weeks before an election, there’s really only one surefire way to generate “positive-earned media,” the euphemism for getting the campaign’s message on the local news for free and without much filter. That’s to import someone like-minded from the political A-list to talk up the candidate at a rally or photogenic factory tour. And about the best way into the pockets of the local donors who haven’t “maxed out” yet is to persuade that same big surrogate to stick around for a fundraiser after the TV crews have left the scene.
In the pantheon of Democratic celebrities, of course, Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton stand apart, and the former president generated ample attention Monday when he started two days of barnstorming in his native Arkansas with a rally for Sen. Mark Pryor, who’s now a slight underdog for a third term, and gubernatorial candidate Mike Ross, the former congressman.
But while Bill Clinton is out to remind the folks back home of their past fondness for white-guy Democratic moderates, it’s Hillary Clinton who is all-but-officially out to capture the party’s future — which is what’s making her the biggest “get” of all this fall.
All of a sudden, she is hardly being stingy with her time. After steering almost entirely clear of the public campaign trail in the six years since her first run for president, the former secretary of State has now mapped an October that includes stumping or fundraising in a dozen states. Half have been intensely contested in recent national elections and several are also pivotal players in the Democratic nominating process. She’s going to put herself out there to try to influence the outcome of at least seven Senate elections, five races for governor’s mansions and even a handful of House contests.
Eight of the 14 candidates Clinton has agreed to help are women. But in almost every case where she’s going in for a male candidate, a decent chance at victory will require significant turnout by female voters on Nov. 4.
The current itinerary (first detailed last week by Politico) might get adjusted a bit in the days ahead. But the signal it is sending seems clear. When Clinton took the hay-baled stage in Iowa three weeks ago, her first trip there since 2008, it was more than a highly choreographed political aberration. It was the start of this fall’s dress rehearsal for 2016, with several objectives. Those include testing and refining her newly-populist rhetoric, underscoring the rise of women as a political force and doing favors she hopes will be returned in the next year or two.
The tour (which will also include several opportunities for hawking her “Hard Choices” memoir) opened last week in the critical swing-state of Florida. Clinton spent the day in Miami selling books and then brought in $1 million for Charlie Crist, the ex-Republican ex-governor who’s now in a tossup quest to win his old job back as a Democrat.
She’ll be raising money in California for a pair of top-dollar fundraisers on Oct. 20 — a midday event hosted by Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi in San Francisco to benefit House candidates, and a dinner where she’s guest of honor in Los Angeles benefiting the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.
On Wednesday, she’ll raise money in Chicago for Gov. Pat Quinn of Illinois, whose bid for a second term is in serious jeopardy. (Michelle Obama, though she’s doing less midterm campaigning than the former first lady, is headlining a Tuesday rally for Quinn.) Clinton will pass through New York on Thursday, long enough to be the top attraction at a fundraiser for Pryor, before headlining a “Women for Wolf” rally outside the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia for businessman Tom Wolf, favored to oust GOP Gov. Tom Corbett of Pennsylvania.
Another gubernatorial candidate that’s been given a chance to stand in Clinton’s shadow this month is Martha Coakley, the Massachusetts attorney general who has seen another of her once-formidable leads narrow in recent days.
Her efforts to help her party hold the Senate will intensify near the middle of the month. She has promised to stump for two incumbents in tight races, Kay Hagan in North Carolina and Mark Udall of Colorado, whose states combine for 24 electoral votes that will be coveted by both presidential nominees in 2016. And she’s promised to appear with the two women who have the most realistic shots at upsets that would take seats away from the GOP: Michelle Nunn in Georgia and Alison Lundergan Grimes in Kentucky.
Clinton also is planning her second trip to Iowa of the fall, this time hoping to boost Rep. Bruce Braley in his tight Senate bid and former state Sen. Staci Appel in her tossup quest to claim an open GOP House seat. And she’ll cap the cycle in New Hampshire, locale of the first presidential primaries. Clinton’s get-out-the-women’s-vote rally on Nov. 2, two days before the election, is billed as an event for both Sen. Jeanne Shaheen and Gov. Maggie Hassan, but the state’s two House members, both female Democrats in tight re-election races, should get some benefit. (Clinton appeared at a New York fundraiser for Shaheen last week.)
To be sure, all sorts of presidential possibilities are playing the guest star game this month, ranging from former Democratic Sen. Jim Webb of Virginia (off to New Hampshire in two weeks) to GOP Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio (in Iowa last week). But as with so much else in politics these past three decades, nobody is working the angles as forcefully or purposefully as someone named Clinton.
The Nation: “Hillary Clinton’s Midterm Schedule Makes It Clear: She’s Running”
By John Nichols
October 6, 2014, 1:20 p.m. EDT
Perhaps it is time to drop the pretenses and accept that Hillary Clinton is an all-in, touching every base, dotting every “i” and crossing every “t” candidate for president.
The formal announcement swing will have to be scheduled for some appropriate day—or week—next year. Before it comes, there will, of course, be the final round of “will she?” speculation in the media. But that’s just the dance that is done before the inevitable moment when Clinton makes her move.
The best confirmation of Clinton’s candidacy—short of an actual announcement—came with the detailing (via Politico, the gossip gazette of insider positioning) of the presumed Democratic front-runner’s exceptionally busy schedule for the month leading up to the November 4 midterm elections. Anyone who is serious about running for the presidency in 2016 has to hit the trail in 2014. It’s not just expected, it’s necessary—as it is on the midterm trail that presidential candidates rally the base, test-drive messages and collect commitments from appreciative governors and members of Congress.
Clinton plans to do all of that, and more—maintaining an intense schedule that will have her campaigning in every region of the country, jetting from fund-raising events in California and Florida to rallies in Iowa and New Hampshire.
As someone who has been around presidential politics since her high-school days as a self-described “active young Republican” and “Goldwater girl” and her college days as a New Hampshire volunteer for Eugene McCarthy’s antiwar bid, she well understands the art of midterm campaigning by an all-but-unannounced presidential contender.
By hitting the trail hard and grabbing the spotlight as the midterm voting approaches, even in what could be a tough year for the party, a prospective presidential candidate positions as the great partisan hope. If the party does better than expected, Clinton shares in the credit. If the party does worse than expected, Clinton offers a road back.
There are few risks and many potential rewards, as savvy presidential contenders have long recognized. Even as he was campaigning for re-election to his Massachusetts US Senate seat in 1958, John Kennedy showed up for for Democrats in Iowa, Oregon and even Alaska during the midterm elections preceding his 1960 presidential run. Richard Nixon used a hyperactive midterm campaign schedule in 1966—“Mr. Nixon specifically stumped for eighty-six republican candidates for governor, senator and representative.”—to renew his damaged reputation (after losses for president in 1960 and governor of California in 1962) and to position himself as the Republican front-runner for 1968. Ronald Reagan kept his profile high with campaigning in 1978 that put him at the head of the Republican pack for 1980.
Clinton knows all this history. Yet, for much of 2014, she seemed far less engaged with the midterms than other potential 2016 Democratic contenders, especially Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley. The former secretary of state spent most of 2014 hawking a book (a subtler signal of presidential intentions), commenting on foreign affairs and talking about the arrival of her first grandchild.
Now, however, she is going all in. With this full October campaign schedule, she is pushing her profile and seeking to promote the sense of inevitability that has already been fostered by early polls and “Ready for Hillary” campaigning.
Clinton will face opposition as she bids for the 2016 Democratic nomination, very probably from O’Malley, very possibly from Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders and maybe from former Virginia Senator Jim Webb and others. There will continue to be plenty of speculation about a run by Massacusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, despite Warren’s denials of candidacy.
Clinton learned in 2008 that nothing is guaranteed in presidential politics. But the former senator’s 2014 moves are part of a deliberate and determined strategy to secure her front-runner status.
Clinton will be in Iowa to appear with US Senate candidate Bruce Braley. Yes, that would be the first caucus state of Iowa, where she has already delivered for retiring Senator Tom Harkin by appearing at the senior Democrat’s annual steak fry in September. Clinton will go deep in Iowa this month, campaigning not just for Braley but for Staci Appel, a US House candidate running in the critical contest to fill the seat representing Des Moines and southwest Iowa.
She will be in New Hampshire, campaigning with the state’s two most prominent Democrats, US Senator Jeanne Shaheen and Governor Maggie Hassan. Yes, that would be the first primary state of New Hampshire, where Clinton’s 2008 presidential run was briefly renewed with a primary win over upstart challenger Barack Obama, but where Clinton has no intention of stumbling again.
Clinton will also tour the states with the highest-profile Senate contests, including Colorado with Democratic Senator Mark Udall, Georgia with Democratic candidate Michelle Nunn, Kentucky with Democrat candidate Alison Lundergan Grimes and North Carolina with Democratic Senator Kay Hagan.
Senate majority leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, told Politico he “couldn’t be happier” to have Clinton, the former senator from New York, on the trail for his candidates—and his imperiled majority.
But Clinton is looking well beyond the Senate races. She will also be doing the gubernatorial circuit. That’s because she knows well, from her own 2008 campaign and from Bill Clinton’s 1992 and 1996 campaigns, that governors are critical allies in primary and general election campaigns for the presidency.
So look for Clinton in Pennsylvania, with Democratic gubernatorial candidate Tom Wolf, a likely winner. And in Illinois, with Democratic Governor Pat Quinn, who is in a critical “toss-up” race. And in Massachusetts, where Democratic nominee Martha Coakley is in another tight contest. And to Florida, where she will campaign with Republican-turned-Democrat Charlie Crist, who campaigned against Bill Clinton’s presidential runs in the 1990s but who could be an essential ally for a Hillary Clinton presidential run in 2016.
The Clinton camp cannot have minded the headline in The Palm Beach Post over the weekend, which read: “Crist: Hillary Clinton would be ‘great president.’”
Throw in some appearances with congressional candidates and huge fundraising events in California for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and with House minority leader Nancy Pelosi, and you are looking at a fall schedule of an all-in presidential candidate.
To suggest differently would be to deny political history, political reality and the rapidly-evolving dynamics of a 2016 presidential race that has already begun and that will be fully engaged on the morning of November 5, 2014.
Calendar:
Sec. Clinton's upcoming appearances as reported online. Not an official schedule.
· October 8 – Chicago, IL: Sec. Clinton stumps for Illinois Gov. Quinn (Chicago Sun-Times)
· October 8 – Chicago, IL: Sec. Clinton keynotes AdvaMed 2014 conference (AdvaMed)
· October 9 – New York, NY: Sec. Clinton fundraises for Arkansas Sen. Pryor (AP)
· October 9 – Philadelphia, PA: Sec. Clinton fundraises for gubernatorial candidate Tom Wolf (AP)
· October 13 – Las Vegas, NV: Sec. Clinton and Sen. Reid fundraise for the Reid Nevada Fund (Ralston Reports)
· October 13 – Las Vegas, NV: Sec. Clinton keynotes the UNLV Foundation Annual Dinner (UNLV)
· October 14 – San Francisco, CA: Sec. Clinton keynotes salesforce.com Dreamforce conference (salesforce.com)
· October 20 – San Francisco, CA: Sec. Clinton fundraises for House Democratic women candidates with Nancy Pelosi (Politico)
· October 20 – San Francisco, CA: Sec. Clinton fundraises for Senate Democrats (AP)
· November 2 – NH: Sec. Clinton appears at a GOTV rally for Gov. Hassan and Sen. Shaheen (AP)
· December 1 – New York, NY: Sec. Clinton keynotes a League of Conservation Voters dinner (Politico)
· December 4 – Boston, MA: Sec. Clinton speaks at the Massachusetts Conference for Women (MCFW)