Subject: H4A News Clips 6.21.15
From: Alexandria Phillips <[email-masked]>
To: Alexandria Phillips <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 21 Jun 2015 10:23:44 -0400
List-Id: <HRCRapid.hillaryclinton.com>

*H4A News Clips*

*June 21, 201*

*TODAY’S KEY
STORIES.....................................................................................
**5*

*Hillary Clinton Calls America’s Struggle With Racism Far From Over* // NYT
// Nicholas Fandos – June 20,
2015......................................................................................................................................
5

*In San Francisco, Hillary Clinton challenges nation on racism: ‘Race
remains a deep fault line in America’* // WaPo // David Nakamura – June 20,
2015..............................................................................
7

*Clinton seizes the center on race and guns in wake of GOP's silence* //
VOX // Jonathan Allen – June 20,
2015.............................................................................................................................................
8

*SOCIAL
MEDIA................................................................................................
**10*

*Chris Bollwage (6/20/15, 12:52 pm)* - Secretary Clinton is delivering a
very powerful speech on racism in America and the need for common sense
gun  control laws in our country............................... 10

*Peter Nicholas (6/20/15, 12:53 pm)* - Hillary Clinton quotes FDR's "bold
and persistent experimentation" line. HRC has been channeling FDR in her
presidential campaign................................................. 10

*Niels Lesniewski (6/20/15, 12:55 pm)* - Sobering speech from
@HillaryClinton as the Conference of Mayors "It's not just the kooks and
Klansmen" but the
assumptions.......................................................... 10

*Daniel Hernandez Jr. (6/20/15, 5:27 pm)* - As a survivor of gun violence I
was happy to see @HillaryClinton address the US Conference of Mayors on
guns. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j5Xv80YydnI …          10

*Faiz (6/20/15, 1:01 pm)* - That was one of the more compelling Hillary
Clinton speeches I've seen in a
while.............................................................................................................................................
10

*Lynn Sweet (6/20/15, 1:08 pm)* - The speech @HillaryClinton just made at
the #USCM2015 about race is the most important so far in her campaign.
#CharlestonShooting.................................................. 11

*Jen Covino (6/20/15, 1:09 pm)* - Well, @HillaryClinton just left us all
emotional, speechless, teary-eyed, contemplative, determined, hopeful for
the future #USCM2015.............................................. 11

*Mitt Romney (6/20/15, 11:09 am)* - Take down the #ConfederateFlag at the
SC Capitol. To many, it is a symbol of racial hatred. Remove it now to
honor #Charleston victims..................................................
11

*Marc Caputo (6/20/15, 6:09 pm)* - Rubio won't say if SC rebel flag should
be moved because it's a state issue, will " do the right thing," backs Jeb
removing from FL Capitol................................................. 11

*Craig Gilbert (6/20/15, 8:47 pm)* - in gaggle after DC speech Walker
repeatedly defers on Confed flag issue in SC, saying debate should wait
'til after dead are
buried/mourned........................................... 11

*Dan Merica (6/20/15, 10:47 pm)* - Team Sanders says 4,500 ppl attended
their CO rally tonight. And Sanders came out to "Rockin' In The Free World"
w Neil Young's approval............................................ 11

*HRC NATIONAL
COVERAGE............................................................................
**11*

*Bush and Clinton are true policy wonks. Can they make a virtue of that?*
// WaPo // Dan Balz – June 20,
2015............................................................................................................................................
11

*Hillary Clinton Calls for Tighter Gun Control After Charleston Church
Shooting* // WSJ // Peter Nicholas – June 20,
2015...............................................................................................................................
14

*Hillary Clinton decries 'institutional racism' after Charleston shooting*
// AP – June 20, 2015... 15

*Clinton calls for ‘common-sense’ gun control: ‘We can’t give up’* // AP //
Lisa Lerer – June 20, 2015             15

*Hillary Clinton calls for ‘common sense’ gun reforms in wake of Charleston
shooting* // Politico // Annie Karni – June 20,
2015....................................................................................................................
16

*In Charleston's wake, Clinton speaks forcefully on guns, race* // CNN //
Dan Merica – June 20, 2015           18

*Clinton calls for new gun control laws, outflanking Sanders* // MSNBC //
Alex Seitz-Wald – June 20,
2015............................................................................................................................................
19

*Hillary Rodham Clinton makes strong plea for gun control* // USA Today //
Jon Swartz – June 20, 2015     21

*First on CNN: Hillary Clinton calls Lindsey Graham in wake of Charleston
shooting* // CNN // Dana Bash – June 20,
2015.......................................................................................................................
22

*Hillary Clinton Calls For 'Common Sense' Gun Reforms In Wake Of Charleston
Shooting* // HuffPo // Igor Bobic – June 20,
2015....................................................................................................................
23

*Hillary Clinton Calls for 'Common Sense' Gun Control After Charleston
Shooting* // ABC News // Erin Dooley – June 20,
2015.......................................................................................................................
24

*Hillary Clinton Calls for Gun Reforms in Speech to U.S. Mayors* //
Bloomberg News // Alison Vekshin – June 20,
2015...............................................................................................................................
25

*Hillary Clinton Talks About Racism And Gun Reform Following Charleston
Mass Shooting* // International Business Times // Michelle FlorCruz – June
20, 2015............................................................. 27

*Hillary Clinton: 'America's long struggle with race is far from finished'*
// LA Times // Cathleen Decker – June 20,
2015...............................................................................................................................
28

*Hillary Clinton After Charleston Shooting: Race Remains 'Deep Fault Line'*
// NBC News – June 20, 2015 30

*Hillary Clinton calls for “common-sense gun reforms” after Charleston* //
CBS News // Reena Flores – June 20,
2015....................................................................................................................................
30

*Hillary Clinton Calls for “Common Sense” Gun Control, Decries
“Institutional Racism”* // Slate Daniel Politi – June 20,
2015.......................................................................................................................
32

*Watch Hillary Clinton address Charleston shooting and ‘America’s long
struggle with race’* // Fusion // John Walker – June 20,
2015.........................................................................................................
32

*Flashback: As Governor, Bill Clinton Honored Confederacy On Arkansas Flag*
// Daily Caller // Derek Hunter – June 20,
2015.......................................................................................................................
33

*Hillary Clinton: 'America's Long Struggle With Race Is Far From Finished'*
// Crooks and Liars // Karoli – June 20,
2015...............................................................................................................................
34

*Hillary Clinton on Charleston: ‘We Can’t Hide’ From Truth of White
Privilege* // Mediaite // Andrew Husband – June 20,
2015....................................................................................................................
36

*In One Quote, Hillary Clinton Just Took a Bold Stance on Race in America*
// Mic // Tom McKay – June 20,
2015.....................................................................................................................................
37

*Clinton calls for gun reforms in wake of Charleston shooting* // The Hill
// Kevin Cirilli – June 20, 2015      38

*Hillary Clinton vows to keep fighting for common sense gun control* // The
Financial Times // Megan Murphy – June 20,
2015....................................................................................................................
39

*Here's why one of Hillary Clinton's big ideas is a smart move for 2016* //
Business Insider // Maxwell Tani – June 20,
2015.......................................................................................................................
40

*Election 2016: Beating Hillary Clinton Top Conservative Voter Priority* //
IB Times // Ginger Gibson – June 20,
2015.....................................................................................................................................
41

*CNN Panel Discusses Troubling Polling Numbers for Clinton 'This wasn't her
best week'* // Free Beacon // Washington Free Beacon Staff - June 21,
2015........................................................................
43

*Clinton confidant cuts ties with the formidable family* // NYPost //
Isabel Vincent and Melissa Klein - June 21,
2015.....................................................................................................................................
44

*Democrats veer left then blast everyone else for being ‘right wing’* //
NYPost // By Kyle Smith - June 21,
2015...........................................................................................................................................
48

*Will Obama’s coalition readily accept Clinton?* // Las Vegas Sun //
Clarence Page – June 20, 2015               50

*Hillary Clinton’s shameful charge to a children’s charity* // NY Post –
June 20, 2015................ 51

*John Bolton: No Hillary Clinton or Rand Paul for President* // The Blaze
// Fred Lucas – June 20, 2015      52

*OTHER DEMOCRATS NATIONAL
COVERAGE................................................. **53*

*DECLARED.................................................................................................
**53*

*SANDERS.................................................................................................
**53*

*Sanders banters on HBO with Bill Maher, praises pope and seeks support of
younger voters* // WaPo // John Wagner – June 20,
2015........................................................................................................
53

*Defying conventions, Bernie Sanders emerges as a challenger for Hillary
Clinton* // AP // Ken Thomas – June 20,
2015...............................................................................................................................
54

*Bernie Sanders' battle to get on the New Hampshire ballot* // Politico //
Jonathan Topaz – June 20,
2015............................................................................................................................................
56

*Maher tells Bernie Sanders: Your campaign must be working ‘You’ve got
Hillary talking like Elizabeth Warren’* // Raw Story // Tom Boggioni – June
20,
2015.......................................................................
58

*Leaving Brooklyn, Bernie Sanders Found Home In Vermont* // NPR // Tamara
Keith – June 20, 2015        58

*Bernie Sanders Wows Hollywood Progressives at Two L.A. Fundraisers* // The
Hollywood Reporter // Tina Daunt – June 20,
2015..........................................................................................................
61

*OTHER....................................................................................................
**63*

*Obama, Clinton mining state's gold, not voters* // LA Times // Cathleen
Decker - June 21, 2015 64

*GOP.................................................................................................................
**66*

*DECLARED.................................................................................................
**66*

*BUSH.......................................................................................................
**66*

*Can Jeb Bush Win the Christian Right?* // WSJ // Dante Chinni – June 20,
2015..................... 66

*Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio’s backyard battle royal* // Politico // Marco
Caputo – June 20, 2015 67

*Jeb Bush's Standing Improves Among Republicans* // NBC News // Mark Murray
– June 21, 2015               71

*Jeb Bush faces key test on immigration* // Albequerque Journal // Andres
Oppenheimer – June 20,
2015............................................................................................................................................
72

*Mitt Romney, Jeb Bush Say Confederate Flag Should be Removed* // Slate //
Daniel Politi – June 20,
2015............................................................................................................................................
74

*Confederate flag fell in Florida under Gov. Jeb Bush* // Tampa Bay Times
// Alex Leary – June 20, 2015   74

*RUBIO......................................................................................................
**75*

*In Miami, Rubio downplays competition with Bush: ‘It’s politics. It’s not
personal.’* // WaPo // Sean Sullivan – June 20,
2015.......................................................................................................................
75

*Jeb Bush vs. Marco Rubio: Can the friendly tone last?* // CS Monitor //
Linda Feldman – June 20, 2015     77

*At Miami-Dade GOP, a homecoming for Marco Rubio* // The Miami Herald //
Patricia Mazzei – June 20,
2015............................................................................................................................................
79

*Marco Rubio: 'No problem' with Catholic Church on climate change but
economy more important* // The Miami Herald // Patricia Mezzai – June 20,
2015................................................................... 81

*Marco Rubio to name Adam Hasner, Tom Rooney Florida campaign chairs* //
The Miami Herald // Patricia Mezzai – June 20,
2015.........................................................................................................
81

*Marco Rubio, Jeb Bush focus on home-state Republicans* // Sun Sentinel //
Anthony Man – June 20,
2015...........................................................................................................................................
82

*Senator Rubio falls silent on immigration, his signature subject* // The
Boston Globe // Matt Viser – June 20,
2015....................................................................................................................................
84

*As Marco Rubio speaks to the Miami-Dade GOP tonight, a look at his
Truth-O-Meter record* // The Miami Herald // Amy Sherman – June 20,
2015...............................................................................
90

*PAUL........................................................................................................
**91*

*Hedge fund manager Mark Spitznagel to advise Rand Paul* // CNBC //
Lawrence Delvinge – June 20,
2015............................................................................................................................................
91

*CRUZ........................................................................................................
**92*

*Ted Cruz: It’s up to South Carolina to decide on Confederate flag* // WaPo
// Katie Zezima – June 20,
2015............................................................................................................................................
92

*Ted Cruz Cracks Jokes On Gun Control Days After Charleston Shooting* //
HuffPo // Samantha-Jo Roth – June 20,
2015...............................................................................................................................
93

*U.S. should come together after Charleston, Cruz says* // The Des Moines
Register // Matthew Patane – June 20,
2015...............................................................................................................................
95

*For Ted Cruz, The Hard Part Comes Next* // NPR // Jessica Taylor – June
20, 2015.................. 96

*Cruz: 'Liberal fascism' took away Gortz Haus livelihood* // The Des Moines
Register // Matthew Patane – June 20,
2015...............................................................................................................................
99

*Ted Cruz Introduces Bill to Drain Amnesty Slush Fund Subsidized by Legal
Immigrants* // Breitbart News // Katie McHugh – June 20,
2015............................................................................................
100

*PERRY....................................................................................................
**101*

*Perry condemns Charleston church shooting after 'accident' flub* // CNN //
Danielle Diaz – June 20,
2015..........................................................................................................................................
101

*Rick Perry warns Jeb Bush ‘ Has to be Careful’ about criticizing Texas* //
Breitbart News // Sarah Rumpf – June 20,
2015.....................................................................................................................
102

*Rick Perry calls South Carolina church shooting an 'accident'* // AOL News
– June 20, 2015.... 107

*Rick Perry: Dylann Roof ‘Gunned Down 9 Children of God’* // Mediaite //
Andrew Husband – June 20,
2015..........................................................................................................................................
108

*GRAHAM...............................................................................................
**108*

*Sen. Lindsey Graham: there’s ‘No doubt’ that Charleston church massacre
was racially motivated* // McClatchy // William Douglas – June 20,
2015.....................................................................................
108

*Lindsey Graham gets to the heart of it* // The Baltimore Sun // John
McIntrye – June 20, 2015 109

*SANTORUM............................................................................................
**110*

*Rick Santorum and Bobby Jindal Talk Faith and Freedom* // KMBZ – June 20,
2015.............. 110

*HUCKABEE............................................................................................
**112*

*Fox host and Huckabee attack Obama over gun control comments — then call
for more civility and less rhetoric* // Raw Story // Tom Boggioni – June
20, 2015.......................................................... 112

*CARSON..................................................................................................
**112*

*Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson speaks in Birmingham* //
Alabama News // Adam Ganucheau – June 20,
2015...................................................................................................................
112

*TRUMP...................................................................................................
**113*

*Donoald Trump’s resume backs his run for president* // NY Post // Jonathan
Trugman – June 20, 2015     113

*Cher trashes Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign* // MSNBC // Adam
Howard – June 20, 2015     115

*UNDECLARED...........................................................................................
**116*

*WALKER................................................................................................
**116*

*Leading in polls, Scott Walker waits* // The Hill // Niall Stanage – June
20, 2015................... 116

*Walker wows social conservatives with attacks on Obama, puts GOP rivals on
notice* // The Washington Times // Madison Gesiotto – June 20,
2015....................................................................................
120

*Scott Walker denounces Charleston slayings, sidesteps flag debate* //
Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel // Craig Gilbert – June 20,
2015........................................................................................................
121

*CHRISTIE..............................................................................................
**122*

*Jeb Bush And Chris Christie Spout Anti-Women Rhetoric At Conservative
Conference* // Think Progress // Kira Lerner – June 20,
2015........................................................................................................
122

*Christie to attend memorial for Charleston murder victims at St. Matthew
A.M.E. church in Orange* // NJ News – June 20,
2015..........................................................................................................
123

*KASICH..................................................................................................
**124*

*Obamacare looms over Kasich's presidential bid* // Politico // Rachana
Pradhan And Kyle Cheney – June 20,
2015...................................................................................................................................
124

*OTHER...................................................................................................
**127*

*Mitt Romney Calls for Removal of Confederate Flag at South Carolina
Capitol* // NYT // Michael Barbaro – June 20,
2015.....................................................................................................................
127

*2016 GOP contenders face major political dilemma in Obamacare ruling* //
WaPo // Katie Zezima & Lena Sun – June 20,
2015.....................................................................................................................
127

*How Mitt Romney’s opposition to Confederate flag just put the GOP’s
current presidential candidates on the spot* // WaPo // Ed O’Keefe – June
20,
2015.........................................................................
131

*Why Republicans were quick to cite religion — but not racism — on
Charleston* // WaPo // Jannell Ross – June 20,
2015..............................................................................................................................
133

*Confederate flag sets off debate in GOP 2016 class* // AP // Steve Peoples
– June 20, 2015...... 135

*Romney: Take down the Confederate flag; 2016 GOP field: Leave it to South
Carolina* // Politico // Marc Caputo and Ali Breland – June 20,
2015..........................................................................................
137

*GOP Presidential Candidates: The More the Scarier* // Real Clear Politics
// Jonathan Riehl & David B. Frisk – June 20,
2015.....................................................................................................................
139

*Why Can’t Republicans Admit Dylann Roof Was Racist?* // NY Mag // Jonathan
Chait – June 20, 2015      142

*Religion and politics: GOP hopefuls' new insight on faith* // AP // Steve
Peoples – June 20, 2015 143

*OTHER 2016
NEWS........................................................................................
**145*

*TOP
NEWS.....................................................................................................
**145*

*DOMESTIC.................................................................................................
**145*

*Wait Lists Grow as Many More Veterans Seek Care and Funding Falls Far
Short* // NYT // Richard Oppel – June 20,
2015.....................................................................................................................
145

*Dylann Roof Photos and a Manifesto Are Posted on Website* // NYT //
Frances Robles – June 20, 2015      147

*Anthem Raises Offer for Cigna to $47.5 Billion* // WSJ // Jonathan D.
Rockoff,  Dana Cimilluca, Dana Mattioli And  Liz Hoffman – June 20,
2015.......................................................................................
150

*INTERNATIONAL......................................................................................
**152*

*Attack Gave Chinese Hackers Privileged Access to U.S. Systems* // NYT // David
E. Sanger, Nicole Perlroth And Michael D. Shear – June 20,
2015....................................................................
152

*Greece Considers Last-Ditch Proposals to Avoid Collision With Bailout
Creditors* // WSJ // Marcus Walker & Nektaria Stamouli – June 20,
2015.......................................................................................
155

*OPINIONS/EDITORIALS/BLOGS...................................................................
**158*

*Trade Winds Blow Ill for Hillary* // NYT // Maureen Dowd - June 20,
2015............................ 158

*Jeb Bush Has Hit a New Low* // HuffPo // Lev Raphael – June 20,
2015................................ 160

*Clinton calls Graham to offer condolences after Charleston shooting* //
The Hill // Kyle Balluck – June 21,
2015..........................................................................................................................................
160

*TODAY’S KEY STORIES*

*Hillary Clinton Calls America’s Struggle With Racism Far From Over
<http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/21/us/politics/hillary-clinton-calls-americas-struggle-with-racism-far-from-over.html?ref=politics>
// NYT // Nicholas Fandos – June 20, 2015 *

Hillary Rodham Clinton delivered on Saturday her boldest remarks yet on
race and gun violence, topics that have quickly become some of the most
prominent and divisive in the presidential campaign, particularly after
Wednesday’s mass shooting in Charleston, S.C.

“It’s tempting to dismiss a tragedy like this as an isolated incident, to
believe that in today’s America bigotry is largely behind us, that
institutionalized racism no longer exists,” Mrs. Clinton said in a speech
in San Francisco. “But despite our best efforts and our highest hopes,
America’s long struggle with race is far from finished.”

Invoking President Obama at times, Mrs. Clinton called for a “common sense”
approach to gun laws, pledging to take swift action if elected. She did
not, however, make clear how she would navigate the divide in Congress that
has undercut Mr. Obama’s own efforts to pass gun laws.

Mrs. Clinton’s strongly worded stance on the issue could help her make a
contrast with Senator Bernie Sanders, who has been drawing large crowds in
early voting states, where recent polls show him narrowing the gap with
Mrs. Clinton. Mr. Sanders, a socialist from Vermont also seeking the
Democratic nomination, has a decidedly mixed record on gun control, which
may pose problems for his campaign as it seeks to bill itself as a more
liberal alternative to Mrs. Clinton.

Saturday was not the first time that Mrs. Clinton’s Democratic campaign,
still in its infancy, had found itself having to address race and racism in
the wake of violence. Her first major campaign speech, at Columbia
University in April, coincided with widespread unrest in Baltimore after
the death of a black man, Freddie Gray, who had been injured in police
custody. Mrs. Clinton used that occasion to advocate an overhaul of the
criminal justice system, saying it was “time for honesty about race and
justice in America.”

She echoed that sentiment on Saturday at the annual meeting of the United
States Conference of Mayors, pressing for a candid national conversation on
what she called a “difficult topic.”

Race, Mrs. Clinton said, remains “a deep fault line in America,” despite
the election of Mr. Obama, the country’s first black president. She also
cited several statistics that suggest widespread inequality between black
and white Americans.

“Our problem is not all kooks and Klansmen. It’s also the cruel joke that
goes unchallenged. It’s the offhand comment about not wanting those people
in the neighborhood,” Mrs. Clinton said. “Let’s be honest, for a lot of
well meaning, open-minded white people, the sight of a young black man in a
hoodie still evokes a twinge of fear.”

Mrs. Clinton, who attended a fund-raiser Wednesday in Charleston just
blocks from where the shooting took place later that night, also called
Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina on Saturday to offer her support
to him and his constituents, Mr. Graham said. Race and gun violence quickly
reasserted themselves as topics of conversation on the campaign trail after
Wednesday’s deadly shooting, which took the lives of nine people gathered
for Bible study at Emanuel A.M.E. Church in Charleston. Both Republicans
and Democrats have scrambled to pay respects to the victims, but also to
take a stance that may attract voters.

Mitt Romney, the Republican Party’s 2012 presidential nominee, took to
Twitter on Saturday to press South Carolina to remove the Confederate flag
flying near its state capitol.

On the Democratic side, Martin O’Malley spoke out for gun control on
Friday, sending a strongly worded email to supporters calling for a federal
assault weapons ban, stricter background checks and measures to tamp down
straw-buying. In 2013, when he was governor of Maryland, Mr. O’Malley
signed similar measures into law, making his state one of the most tightly
controlled in the country.

Mrs. Clinton and her Democratic challengers will need to persuade minority
voters, an important Democratic constituency that put its vote behind Mr.
Obama in 2008, to support them in large numbers to win in 2016.

*In San Francisco, Hillary Clinton challenges nation on racism: ‘Race
remains a deep fault line in America’
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2015/06/20/in-san-francisco-hillary-clinton-challenges-nation-on-racism-race-remains-a-deep-fault-line-in-america/?postshare=141434821388589>
// WaPo // David Nakamura – June 20, 2015 *

Hillary Rodham Clinton on Saturday forcefully challenged the nation to
confront persistent racism in the wake of the mass shooting in Charleston,
S.C., declaring that "race remains a deep fault line in America."

"Despite our best efforts and our highest hopes, America’s long struggle
with race is far from finished," Clinton told the U.S. Conference of Mayors
at its annual convention here. "I know this is a difficult topic to talk
about. I know that so many of us hoped by electing our first black
president, we had turned the page on this chapter in our history. I know
there are truths we do not like to say out loud or discus with our
children. But we have to."

Clinton's appearance here came three days after nine people were shot to
death at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church. Dylann Roof, 21,
has been charged with murder in the case.

Although Clinton had called for stronger gun curbs during an appearance in
Las Vegas on Thursday, her remarks in San Francisco marked a far more
forceful foray into race relations, which have been strained in several
cities amid a series of racially charged protests over the deaths of
African Americans at the hands of police officers.

Obama addressed the mayors on Friday, and he also spoke about the
Charleston shootings, while calling for stricter gun laws. The president
has anguished over Congress's failure to approve his 2013 for tighter
controls, including more background checks and limits to ammunition
magazines, in the wake of the massacre of more than two dozen students in
Newton, Conn., in Dec. 2012.

Clinton vowed to complete what Obama was unable to in Congress. "The
president is right: The politics of this issue have been poisoned, but we
can’t give up," she said. "The stakes are too high; the costs are too dear.
I will not be afraid to keep fighting for common sense reform and with you
achieve that for all who have been lost because of senseless gun violence."

Obama has spoken more pointedly about race in his second term. Clinton's
foray into the nation's legacy of racism came as she has sought to inspire
early enthusiasm among the liberal base of the Democratic Party, staking
out progressive positions on immigration, gay marriage and trade. Clinton
advisers are hoping to recreate much of Obama's coalition of black,
Hispanic and female voters to help push her candidacy in a 2016 battle
against a Republican nominee.

The issue of gun control could become an issue in the 2016 campaign, and so
could race relations, and Clinton made clear she would not shy away from
talking about it. She said the problem of racism was not limited to "kooks
and Klansmen," but also was perpetrated by the off-hand joke, by whites not
wanting to live near blacks and by those affluent whites who are fearful of
young black men.

"Let's be honest," she said.

Clinton also praised the families of the Charleston victims, including
those who told Roof that they would forgive him, when he appeared in his
first court proceedings.

"Their act of mercy is more stunning than his act of cruelty," she said.
Wrapping up, she added that "what we need more of in this country is love
and kindness."

Clinton's visit to this city was the last stop on a week-long national tour
after her official campaign launch last weekend in New York.

She raised money Friday at a pair of fundraisers in Los Angeles, including
one at the home of actor Tobey Maguire.

Obama also raised money for fellow Democrats in the 2016 election cycle
during his California trip, attending two events in Los Angeles and two
more in San Francisco. The president was scheduled to travel to Palm
Springs on Saturday to play golf before returning to Washington on Sunday.

*Clinton seizes the center on race and guns in wake of GOP's silence
<http://www.vox.com/2015/6/20/8818611/clinton-Charleston-race-guns> // VOX
// Jonathan Allen – June 20, 2015 *

Hillary Clinton's not seen as honest and trustworthy by most voters. But on
Saturday the Democratic presidential front-runner spoke truths about race
and gun violence in America that her Republican rivals have refused to
utter after a shooter killed nine worshipers at the historic Emanuel AME
church in Charleston, S.C., this week.

If Clinton is to win the presidency, part of the reason will be
Republicans' unwillingness to seriously confront realities that threaten
the stability and strength of American society, from race and gun violence
to income inequality and climate change.

It's hard to come up with solutions if you refuse to identify the problems.
Clinton didn't advance the ball much on the former Saturday, but she
delivered on the latter — putting tremendous distance between herself and
field full of Republican gun-and-race deniers. One would think the GOP
would have learned this lesson from the 1990s: If you give a Clinton the
obvious middle ground, she'll take it.

Here's part of what she said on race.

"Bodies are once again being carried out of a black church. Once again
racist rhetoric has metastasized into racist violence. Now its tempting, it
is tempting, to dismiss a tragedy like this as an isolated incident. To
believe that in today’s America bigotry is largely behind us, that
institutionalized racism no longer exists. But despite our best efforts and
our highest hopes, America’s long struggle with race is far from finished."

And this is part of what she said on guns, a line that drew a long round of
applause from those in attendance at the U.S. Conference of Mayors in San
Francisco.

"I know that gun ownership is part of the fabric of a lot of law-abiding
communities, but I also know that we can have common-sense gun reforms that
keep weapons out of the hands of criminals and the violently unstable while
respecting the rights of responsible gun owners.

Clinton called the failure to implement universal background checks and
restrictions on gun sales to domestic abusers, the mentally ill and people
on terrorist watch lists "a rebuke to this nation we love and care about."
And she called racial tension the "deeper challenge we face."

Clinton's data points

The former Secretary of State cited a litany of statistics documenting
important racial disparities in American life:

Black applicants are nearly three times as likely to be turned down for a
mortgage as whites

Black children are 500 percent more likely than their white counterparts to
die from asthma

Black men are more likely to be stopped and searched, prosecuted for crimes
and sentenced to longer prison stints than white men

Schools are more segregated now than they were in the 1960s

And, of course, the median wealth for white families is over $140,000,
while the median wealth for black families is about $11,000.

"More than half a century after Dr. King marched and Rosa Parks sat and
John Lewis bled," she said, "how can any of these things be true?"

Compare what Clinton is saying in the wake of the Charleston massacre to
what Republican candidates for the presidency have said when asked about
racism and the availability of guns as factors in the horrific murders
Dylann Roof is accused of committing.

"I don't know what was on the mind or the heart of the man who committed
these atrocious crimes"

His spokesman, Tim Miller, later said that "of course" Bush thinks racism
was a factor in the killings.

Incongruously, Rand Paul made it an issue of failure to understand
religious teachings and the size and scope of government.

"What kind of person goes into church and shoots nine people? There’s a
sickness in our country, there’s something terribly wrong, but it isn’t
going to be fixed by your government. It’s people straying away, it’s
people not understanding where salvation comes from. And I think that if we
understand that, we’ll understand and have better expectations of what we
get from our government."

And Chris Christie, who hasn't yet declared a run for the presidency but is
still considered a possible contender, said "laws can't change this."

So, in the wake of Charleston, who is honest and trustworthy? It can't be
these guys.

In her remarks Saturday, Clinton said it's not just "kooks and Klansmen"
who are responsible for racial division in America.

The person who lets the racist joke go unchallenged or feels a twinge of
fear at the "sight of a young black man in a hoodie" is also responsible
for perpetuating racial tensions, she said.

Maybe, just maybe, the presidential candidates who dare not speak of racism
for fear of alienating voters who harbor deep bigotry bear some
responsibility, too.

*SOCIAL MEDIA*

*Chris Bollwage (6/20/15, 12:52 pm)*
<https://twitter.com/MayorBollwage/status/612301953880604672>* - Secretary
Clinton is delivering a very powerful speech on racism in America and the
need for common sense gun  control laws in our country*

*Peter Nicholas (6/20/15, 12:53 pm)*
<https://twitter.com/PeterNicholas3/status/612302252691161088>* - Hillary
Clinton quotes FDR's "bold and persistent experimentation" line. HRC has
been channeling FDR in her presidential campaign.*

*Niels Lesniewski (6/20/15, 12:55 pm)*
<https://twitter.com/nielslesniewski/status/612302651007627264>* - Sobering
speech from @HillaryClinton as the Conference of Mayors "It's not just the
kooks and Klansmen" but the assumptions.*

*Daniel Hernandez Jr. (6/20/15, 5:27 pm)*
<https://twitter.com/djblp/status/612371209670397952>* - As a survivor of
gun violence I was happy to see @HillaryClinton address the US Conference
of Mayors on guns. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j5Xv80YydnI
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j5Xv80YydnI> …*

*Faiz (6/20/15, 1:01 pm)*
<https://twitter.com/fshakir/status/612304164534628352>* - That was one of
the more compelling Hillary Clinton speeches I've seen in a while.*

*Lynn Sweet (6/20/15, 1:08 pm)*
<https://twitter.com/lynnsweet/status/612305965514391552>* - The speech
@HillaryClinton just made at the #USCM2015 about race is the most important
so far in her campaign. #CharlestonShooting*

*Jen Covino (6/20/15, 1:09 pm)*
<https://twitter.com/jencovino/status/612306169651003392>* - Well,
@HillaryClinton just left us all emotional, speechless, teary-eyed,
contemplative, determined, hopeful for the future #USCM2015*

*Mitt Romney (6/20/15, 11:09 am)*
<https://twitter.com/MittRomney/status/612276050182049792>* - Take down the
#ConfederateFlag at the SC Capitol. To many, it is a symbol of racial
hatred. Remove it now to honor #Charleston victims.*

*Marc Caputo (6/20/15, 6:09 pm)*
<https://twitter.com/marcacaputo/status/612381724845166592?refsrc=email&s=11>*
- Rubio won't say if SC rebel flag should be moved because it's a state
issue, will " do the right thing," backs Jeb removing from FL Capitol*

*Craig Gilbert (6/20/15, 8:47 pm)*
<https://twitter.com/WisVoter/status/612421447127011328>* - in gaggle after
DC speech Walker repeatedly defers on Confed flag issue in SC, saying
debate should wait 'til after dead are buried/mourned*

*Dan Merica (6/20/15, 10:47 pm)*
<https://twitter.com/danmericaCNN/status/612451673831809024>* - Team
Sanders says 4,500 ppl attended their CO rally tonight. And Sanders came
out to "Rockin' In The Free World" w Neil Young's approval.*

*HRC** NATIONAL COVERAGE*

*Bush and Clinton are true policy wonks. Can they make a virtue of that?
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/bush-and-clinton-are-true-policy-wonks-can-they-make-a-virtue-of-that/2015/06/20/8d60779a-16c1-11e5-89f3-61410da94eb1_story.html>
// WaPo // Dan Balz – June 20, 2015*

Hillary Rodham Clinton and Jeb Bush laid out ambitious agendas in their
announcement speeches over the past eight days. If they are as good as
their word, the coming months of the presidential campaign could be
remembered for something unusual: a summer of substance.

Though of different parties and different philosophies, Clinton and Bush
certainly share one thing in common: They are unabashed policy wonks. At
Clinton headquarters, policy meetings with the candidate are blocked out in
hours, not minutes. Bush, asked the other day to explain how he would
achieve one of his big goals, responded, “How much time you got?”

The two candidates obviously have specific vulnerabilities unrelated to
questions about their policy agendas. For Clinton it is the questions about
honesty, trustworthiness and personal accessibility. For Bush, it is the
resistance to his candidacy that comes with his family name and with
perceptions that his conservatism is too squishy for some in his party. But
both candidates say they are determined to make their campaigns about ideas
and the policies to back them up.

Their mutual interest in the details of policy comes from their long
experience in the public realm. Clinton has been grappling with domestic
policy problems ever since she joined the Children’s Defense Fund as a
young lawyer. Bush long has been known as the more policy-oriented brother
in the family business of elective politics, a reputation he earned before,
during and after his time as governor of Florida.

But if the two are steeped in policy, they have left themselves sizable
challenges as presidential candidates. Clinton’s is to flesh out her pledge
to make income inequality — the gap between the wealthiest and the rest of
society — the central issue of her candidacy. Bush’s is to demonstrate that
he has something fresh to back up his goal of returning the U.S. economy to
sustainable 4 percent annual growth rates.

The speech Clinton delivered at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms
Park on New York’s Roosevelt Island on June 13 offered sweeping rhetoric
about the state of an economy that she said should work for all and not
just the most privileged.

In tone, it was at least mildly populist. That was evidence of her
conclusion that the Democratic Party’s most important constituencies are
looking for something closer to the European Social Democrat views of Sen.
Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) than the New Democrat ideas that helped elect her
husband, Bill Clinton, to the presidency a quarter-century ago.

As she drilled down, however, the speech became a more familiar
Clintonesque approach to domestic and economic policy: a long string of
policy programs or ambitions, many of them proposed before. They represent
a general continuation of the approach followed by President Obama rather
than any dramatic break with mainstream, conventional orthodoxy of her
party.

The list of ideas included raising the minimum wage; offering paid family
leave for new parents and more flexible work schedules; giving small
businesses and others tax breaks to encourage long-term investment rather
than short-term profit; encouraging development of alternative energy
sources and discouraging the use of fossil fuels; creating an
infrastructure bank for matters including highways and broadband; providing
universal preschool and more access to high-quality child care; making
college more affordable; giving adults incentives for lifelong learning;
offering illegal immigrants a path to citizenship.

By this reckoning, Clinton is not a believer in a big-bang approach to the
problems she outlined. Instead, she favors smaller steps and an array of
programs, reminiscent of the State of the Union addresses during her
husband’s administration.

She said in her launch speech that growth and fairness were two goals of
her economic policy, though she neither established targets for growth nor
signaled the degree to which a third Clinton administration would pursue
policies of redistribution.

Her speech did not broach raising taxes on the wealthiest Americans, a
notable omission from a Democratic candidate trying to strike a populist
tone. Clinton campaign spokesman Brian Fallon said in a message that she
will deliver a fuller speech later this year calling for revising the tax
code and “ensuring the wealthiest Americans pay their fair share.”

In contrast, Bush established an ambitious and difficult-to-achieve growth
target in his speech. “There is not a reason in the world why we cannot
grow at a rate of 4 percent a year,” he said.

Not a reason, except that no recent president has managed to hit that
target other than for occasional quarters. Not Ronald Reagan during his
Morning in America years. Not Bill Clinton during a time when the economy
created more jobs than the 19 million that Bush said his policies would
deliver. Not his father, George H.W. Bush, nor his brother George W. Bush,
nor President Obama — each of whom governed during times of economic
downturns.

Bush’s “how much time you got” came in response to a question about whether
he has new policies to reach sustainable 4 percent growth. He cited
actions, including paring away regulations that he said began building up
before Obama took office, reforming a tax code that has not been reformed
since 1986, pushing for more development of traditional energy resources,
tackling “fiscal structural problems” and reforming immigration “to rebuild
the demographic pyramid” in the country. He also mentioned education and
training to produce a more skilled workforce.

That is an agenda for perhaps two terms. Bush was asked how quickly he
could get all this done. “All this stuff?” he responded. “I’m thinking
about how I’m going to do in the Iowa caucuses right now.”

He added: “But politics should be as much about aspirational goals and
about backing it up with substance and then explaining how you have the
leadership skills to make it so than just about how bad things are and how
bad the other guy is. And that’s what this is.”

That leaves Bush with much left to do. He has to flesh out his aspirational
goals with credible and achievable initiatives. He also needs to explain
how he would square his advocacy for taking care of those most in need in
the context of the Republican congressional budget blueprint of House Ways
and Means Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) that would squeeze domestic
spending.

But Clinton’s task isn’t much easier. She must try to satisfy the
progressive wing of her party that is hungering for harder-edged policies
to match the rhetoric of populist anger, which if the subject of trade is
any evidence, she is reluctant to do. She also must balance advocacy of an
agenda that calls for considerable government activism with public
skepticism about government’s ability to deliver.

Past campaigns have seen other candidates with an unabashed interest in and
knowledge of public policy, but rarely have there been two so obviously
steeped in the details as Bush and Clinton. That presages what could be a
compelling debate, even at long distance for the time being. But only if
both step up to the challenge they’ve set out for themselves.

*Hillary Clinton Calls for Tighter Gun Control After Charleston Church
Shooting
<http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2015/06/20/hillary-clinton-calls-for-tighter-gun-control-after-charleston-church-shooting/>
// WSJ // Peter Nicholas – June 20, 2015 *

Hillary Clinton called for “common-sense” gun control measures and said the
fatal shooting of nine people at an African-American church was not an
“isolated” tragedy, but a chilling reminder of enduring racism and
“bigotry” in the U.S.

In a speech Saturday at a conference of U.S. mayors, Mrs. Clinton, spoke
extensively about the murders and praised the victims’ families, who in
court proceedings said they forgave the white suspect, 21-year-old Dylann
Roof.

“In its way, their act of mercy was as stunning as his act of cruelty,” she
said.

The frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination, Mrs. Clinton
used the speech to highlight discrimination faced by black Americans. “Race
remains a deep fault line in America,” she said.

Mrs. Clinton said schools remains segregated, black Americans receive
longer prison terms than whites for the same crimes, and black children are
five times more likely to die from asthma than white children.

“It is tempting to dismiss a tragedy like this as an isolated incident,”
Mrs. Clinton said, referring to the shootings Wednesday night.

People are mistaken to conclude that “bigotry is largely behind us, that
institutionalized racism no longer exists.” she added.

Authorities have charged Mr. Roof with nine counts of murder. They say he
shot and killed the victims during a Bible study class at the historic
Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, S.C.

During the shooting spree, he said, “you are raping our women and taking
over the country,” according to witness accounts.

Many of the presidential candidates have spoken out on the shootings but
have been less willing to cast it as an example of broader racial injustice.

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, one of the leading Republican presidential
candidates, spoke to a conference sponsored by the Faith and Freedom
Coalition on Friday and did not initially address race. “I don’t know what
was on the mind or the heart of the man who committed these atrocious
crimes,” Mr. Bush said.

Later in the day, at a fundraising event, he framed the issue in different
terms. “It just breaks my heart that someone, a racist, would do what he
did,” Mr. Bush said.

In her speech, Mrs. Clinton aligned herself with President Barack Obama,
who at a fundraising event Friday said the country must make it tougher for
people to buy guns and then “act on this hatred.”

Mrs. Clinton laid out several steps toward offering the public greater
protections while safeguarding the constitutional right to own firearms.

She called for universal background checks for gun buyers and voiced
disbelief that the nation can’t keep guns “out of the hands of domestic
abusers or people suffering from mental illnesses …”

“The president is right,” Mrs. Clinton said. “The politics on this issue
have been poisoned. But we can’t give up. The stakes are too high, the
costs are too dear.”

*Hillary Clinton decries 'institutional racism' after Charleston shooting
<http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jun/20/hillary-clinton-gun-control-institutional-racism>
// AP – June 20, 2015*

Hillary Clinton on Saturday called for “commonsense” gun control
legislation and decried “institutional racism”, days after a shooting in a
historic South Carolina church killed nine of its black members.

Clinton, who was speaking at the US Conference of Mayors in San Francisco
after a west coast fundraising swing, said Congress should pass legislation
keeping guns from criminals and mentally ill people while “respecting
responsible gun owners”.

She said: “The politics on this issue have been poisoned but we can’t give
up.”

In 2013, in the aftermath of a shooting in which 20 children and six adults
were killed at Sandy Hook elementary school in Connecticut, Congress
rejected legislation that would have expanded background checks on firearm
sales.

Clinton also addressed what she called a “long struggle with race”, saying
the US “can’t hide from any of these hard truths about race and justice in
America”.

*Clinton calls for ‘common-sense’ gun control: ‘We can’t give up’
<http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/jun/20/clinton-calls-for-common-sense-gun-control-decries/#ixzz3df2fcX4p>
// AP // Lisa Lerer – June 20, 2015 *

Issuing an emotional plea following the South Carolina church shooting,
Hillary Rodham Clinton called for “common-sense” gun reforms and a national
reckoning with the persistent problem of “institutional racism.”

Three days after nine black church members were gunned down in Charleston,
Clinton said the country must take steps to keep guns from criminals and
the mentally ill.

Regulations, she said, can be passed while still respecting the Second
Amendment and “respecting responsible gun owners.”

“The politics on this issue have been poisoned, but we can’t give up,” she
told the U.S. Conference of Mayors in San Francisco on Saturday. “The
stakes are too high. The costs are too dear.”

In 2013 Congress rejected legislation that would have expanded background
checks on firearm sales and banned some semi-automatic weapons.

President Obama has blamed the continued national political inaction on the
issue on the influence of the National Rifle Association.

While Clinton did not propose any specific legislation in her address,
she’s previously supported limits on gun sales and extending the assault
weapons ban.

On Friday, former Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley, who’s challenging
Clinton for the Democratic Party nomination, called for an assault weapons
ban, stricter background checks and tougher requirements to buy a gun.

“I’m pissed,” he wrote in an email to supporters. “It’s time we called this
what it is: a national crisis.”

Clinton’s remarks also marked a forceful entry into the heated topic of
race relations, an issue that’s become a major theme of her campaign.
Clinton called race a “deep fault line” in America, noting that “millions
of people of color still experience racism in their everyday lives.”

The problem of racism was not limited to “kooks and klansman,” she said,
but included the off-hand, off-color joke; whites scared of young black men
and not speaking up against poverty and discrimination.

In previous appearances, Clinton has taken up a number of issues that are
important to African-Americans, calling for changes to the criminal justice
system, voting laws and assistance for minority small business owners. Her
campaign is trying to motivate the coalition of minority, young and liberal
voters that twice elected Obama to the White House.

“We can’t hide from any of these hard truths about race and justice in
America,” she said. “We have to name them and then own them and then change
them.”

Clinton’s address to the country’s mayors was her last stop on a
cross-country tour, largely of early voting states, after formally
launching her campaign a week ago in New York City. She spent Friday
raising money at three fundraisers in Los Angeles, including one hosted by
actor Tobey Maguire.

*Hillary Clinton calls for ‘common sense’ gun reforms in wake of Charleston
shooting
<http://www.politico.com/story/2015/06/hillary-clinton-calls-for-common-sense-gun-reforms-in-wake-of-charleston-shooting-119253.html#ixzz3dd9YxBHL>
// Politico // Annie Karni – June 20, 2015*

With tears welling in her eyes, Hillary Clinton on Saturday delivered an
emotional call to action after the Charleston church shooting, first vowing
to fight for “common sense” gun reforms, then shifting to an assessment of
racism in America.

“Race remains a deep fault line in America,” Clinton said, speaking in
front of the U.S. Conference of Mayors in San Fransisco. “Millions of
people of color still experience racism in their everyday lives.”

The massacre in Charleston, South Carolina, forced Clinton off of her stump
speech as she sought to confront some of the country’s most intractable
problems a week after her first big campaign speech on Roosevelt Island.

Clinton’s voice swelled with emotion as she described the testimony of the
families of the nine shooting victims, who offered forgiveness to the
alleged gunman Dylann Roof on Friday at a bond hearing.

“On Friday, one by one, grieving parents and siblings stood up in court and
looked at that young man who had taken so much from them, and said, ‘I
forgive you,’” Clinton said. “Their act of mercy was more stunning than his
act of cruelty.”

She said one of her first reactions was to ask, “how it could be possible
that we, as a nation, still allow guns to fall into the hands of people
whose hearts are filled with hate.”

Acknowledging that gun ownership is part of the fabric of many law-abiding
communities in the country, Clinton said firmly that the country “can have
common sense gun reforms that keep weapons out of the hands of criminals
and the violently unstable, while respecting responsible gun owners.”

She said she agreed with President Barack Obama that the issue of gun
ownership has been politically poisoned.

“It makes no sense that we couldn’t come together to keep guns out of the
hands of domestic abusers, or people suffering from mental illnesses, even
people on the terrorist watch list,” she said. “That doesn’t make sense and
it is a rebuke to this nation we love and care about.”

But Clinton said the deeper challenge the country faces is racism. “Despite
our best efforts and our highest hopes, America’s long struggle with race
is far from finished,” she said.

“So many of us hoped that by electing our first black president, we had
turned the page on this chapter in our history,” she said, adding that
millions of Americans are held back by racism every day.

Black people are three times as likely to be denied a mortgage, she said,
and the median wealth of a black family in 2013 was $11,000, compared to
$134,000 for whites. She said black children were 500 percent more likely
to die of asthma than white kids.

“More than half a century after Dr. King marched, and Rosa Parks sat and
John Lewis bled, after the civil rights act and the voting rights act and
so much else, how can any of these things be true?” she asked. “But they
are.”

She said racism was pervasive in our society beyond the “kooks and
clansmen,” noting that well-meaning, open-minded white people still feel a
“twinge of fear” at the sight of a young black man in a hoodie. “We can’t
hide from any of these hard truths about race and justice in America,” she
said.

“I known it’s not usual for someone running for president to say what we
need more of in this country is love and kindness,” she said, “but that’s
exactly what we need more of.”

*In Charleston's wake, Clinton speaks forcefully on guns, race
<http://www.cnn.com/2015/06/20/politics/hillary-clinton-race-guns/index.html>
// CNN // Dan Merica – June 20, 2015 *

An emotional Hillary Clinton on Saturday called for more gun control in the
wake of the deadly Charleston, South Carolina church shooting that left
nine dead earlier this week.

"This generation will not be shackled by fear and hate," she said to
applause at the U.S. Conference of Mayors in San Francisco.

"We can have common sense gun reforms that keep weapons out of the hands of
criminals and the violently unstable while respecting owners," said
Clinton, the Democratic frontrunner for the 2016 presidential nomination.
"The stakes are too high, the costs are too dear, and I am not and will not
be afraid to keep fighting for common sense reforms and along with you,
achieve those on behalf of all who have been lost because of this senseless
gun violence in this country."

Clinton also said race remains "a deep fault line in America."

"Bodies are once again being carried out of black churches. Once again,
racist rhetoric has metastasized into racist violence," Clinton said. "Now
it is tempting, it is tempting, to dismiss a tragedy like this as an
isolated incident. To believe that in today's America, bigotry is largely
behind us, that institutionalized racism no longer exists. But despite out
best efforts and our highest hopes, America's long struggle with race is
far from finished."

Clinton has made addressing race issues a staple of her campaign since she
announced her candidacy in April.

Weeks after she formally announced her campaign, Clinton called for
mandatory body cameras on police and the end of the "era of mass
incarceration." Clinton told an audience in New York that it was time for
the United States to come to terms with "unmistakable and undeniable"
racial patterns in policing.

"As a citizen, a human being, my heart breaks for these young men and their
families," Clinton said, listing a number of incidents in the last year
that have seen black men killed at the hands of law enforcement. "We have
to come to terms with some hard truths about race and justice in America."

When the former first lady traveled to South Carolina -- an early voting
state -- for the first time, she focused her trip on minority women small
business owners.

And earlier this week in an interview in Las Vegas, Clinton called for "a
candid national conversation about race and about discrimination,
prejudice, hatred" in the wake of the Charleston shooting.

Clinton's aides argue that her outspokenness on race and crime follow her
history as someone who stands up for the oppressed. But the policy
positions also have political benefits and help the Democratic frontrunner
keep together the diverse coalition of voters that helped President Barack
Obama win the White House.

African-American voters flocked to Obama during the 2008 nomination fight.
The 2008 fight for South Carolina took a racial turn, too, and damaged
Clinton with some in the community.

But 2016 is not 2008. Obama won't be on the ballot and some of the
President's most vocal African-American supporters from 2008, like South
Carolina's Edith Childs, have already joined Clinton's nascent campaign.

"There is a time and a season for everything. That was his time," Childs
said during Clinton's first trip to South Carolina.

Childs became famous for coining the chant "fired up, ready to go," a
phrase that followed Obama from South Carolina in 2007 all the way to the
White House. Childs appeared next to Obama -- and against Clinton -- a
number of times during the 2008 primary fight. Now, though, she is ready
for Hillary.

"She is a woman and she can handle the job," Childs said. "And she knows
what we need especially as a woman because a lot of times men forget what
we need. With her being a woman, she knows exactly what we need."

*Clinton calls for new gun control laws, outflanking Sanders
<http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/clinton-calls-new-gun-control-laws-outflanking-sanders>
// MSNBC // Alex Seitz-Wald – June 20, 2015 *

In the wake of the Charleston, South Carolina massacre at a historically
black church this week, Hillary Clinton vowed Saturday to fight for new gun
control laws despite the overwhelming opposition. She also said America
must address lingering racism exposed by the shooting.

By leaning into gun control, Clinton found a place where is squarely to
left of Sen. Bernie Sanders, who has energized liberal crowds across the
country and gained steam in recent polls as her top rival for the
Democratic presidential nomination.

In a speech to the U.S. Conference of Mayors in San Francisco, Clinton said
it “make no sense” that Congress has failed to pass simple gun control
laws, like universal background checks. She vowed to keep fighting and
promised to achieve reform if elected president.

“The politics of this issue have been poisoned,” she acknowledged. “But we
can’t give up. The stakes are too high.”

Sanders hails from Vermont, a rural state that lacks virtually any gun
regulations and he seems uncomfortable discussing the issue. At an event in
Las Vegas, Nevada Friday, he was asked twice about guns, but declined to
promise specific new gun control laws and said he didn’t want to get into
the issue at the moment.

An attendee at a town hall meeting asked about his stance on gun control.
He explained that people in rural and urban areas view guns differently.
“This is an issue that must be dealt with,” he said, without getting into
details.

Reporters followed up by asking Sanders about the issue afterwards. “I
think we need to have as serious conversation about that,” he said. Pressed
again, he added: “I will talk about guns at some length, but not right now.”

Sanders voted against the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act in 1993,
arguing that waiting period for handguns could be better dealt with on the
state level. And he was boosted in his 1988 run for Congress when the NRA
attacked his opponent. In 2005, he voted for a controversial bill pushed by
the firearms industry. Slate recently labeled Sanders a “gun nut” in a
headline.

His defenders note that Sanders voted for the Assault Weapon Ban and has an
“F” rating from the NRA. And they argue that he is doing his job by
representing the interest of Vermonters, where gun laws are lax, hunting is
common, and violent crime is very low.

Nonetheless, Saunders’ record leaves enough room for Clinton – who has a
long history of supporting gun control – to outflank her liberal challenger
on his left. And with her visibility, Clinton can single-handedly ensure
that guns become a major issue of the Democratic presidential primary, if
she so chooses.

Former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, who is also running for the
nomination, sought to do the same Friday. He blasted out a strongly worded
letter to supporters calling for strict new gun control laws.

“I’m pissed that after working hard in the state of Maryland to pass real
gun control – laws that banned high-magazine weapons, increased licensing
standards, and required fingerprinting for handgun purchasers – Congress
continues to drop the ball,” he wrote.

Meanwhile on Saturday in San Francisco, Clinton spoke passionately about
the need to address racial inequities that persist to this day.

“It is tempting to dismiss a tragedy like this as an isolated incident,”
she said Saturday of the Charleston shooting. But she dismissed that
notion, saying the crimes of confessed shooter Dylann Roof must be placed
in the larger context of racism in America. “Once against racist rhetoric
has metastasized into racist violence,” she said.

But while Roof and his compatriots get the most attention, “our problem is
not all kooks and Klansman,” she continued, saying racism persists deep and
often unnoticed into otherwise upstanding communities.

“We can’t hide from any of these hard truths of race,” she continued. “We
have name them, then own them, then change them.”

But she said she had hope that “this generation will not be shackled by
fear and hate.”

*Hillary Rodham Clinton makes strong plea for gun control
<http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/06/20/hillary-rodham-clinton-san-francisco-speech/28981453/>
// USA Today // Jon Swartz – June 20, 2015 *

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton made a stirring
plea for "common sense" gun control Saturday.

"The passing of days has not dulled the pain or shock of this crime,"
Clinton said, in her most extensive comments yet on the tragedy Wednesday
that left nine dead in Charleston, S.C.

"As a mother, grandmother and fellow human being, my heart is bursting for
the victims, a wounded community and a wounded church," she said in a
passionate 30-minute address to American mayors gathered here.

"It makes no sense that bipartisan legislation fails in Congress despite
overwhelming public support," Clinton said. "The politics on this position
have been poisoned. I will not be afraid to fight for common-sense reforms
… because of this senseless gun violence."

"How is it possible that we as a nation allow guns to fall into the hands
of people whose hearts are filled with hate?" she said, voice rising. "We
can have common sense gun reforms that keep them out of the hands of
criminals and the mentally unstable while not penalizing responsible gun
owners," Clinton said to sustained applause. (Half of the audience of about
1,000 stood.)

The shooting spree at the predominately black church in Charleston, the
latest in a string of disturbing incidents in America over the past few
years, underscores an intolerant nation deeply in need of healing and
understanding, she said.

"Race remains a deep fault line in America," Clinton said, pointing to
ongoing discrimination, disparity in pay, illegal housing and other social
chasms.

Citing former Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young in the audience, Clinton said
America needs to emulate that city's slogan when he was mayor — a city too
busy to hate.

"What we need more of in this country is love and kindness," a resolute
Clinton said.

She spoke to civic leaders gathered for the U.S. Conference of Mayors here
this weekend.

Tech is a hot topic at the conference, which kicked off Friday with pointed
remarks from President Obama on the shooting rampage in Charleston.

If Congress passed what Obama called "common sense" gun safety, the
assembled mayors might have had to attend fewer funerals, Obama said.

It was Obama's 20th visit to San Francisco, where tech is the dominant
industry in the region and a major source for fundraising. The president
successfully tapped into it twice as a presidential candidate, and Clinton
is expected to do the same in her 2016 bid.

A key piece of her presidential bid is to help "build an economy for
tomorrow," Clinton said Saturday.

Ride-hailing service Uber is sponsoring the conference, where Cities 3.0 is
a major theme. A tour of Uber's downtown San Francisco headquarters is
scheduled Monday.

Executives from Airbnb and Salesforce.com are also scheduled to appear at
the four-day summit.

*First on CNN: Hillary Clinton calls Lindsey Graham in wake of Charleston
shooting
<http://www.cnn.com/2015/06/20/politics/lindsey-graham-hillary-clinton-call-charleston-shooting/>
// CNN // Dana Bash – June 20, 2015 *

South Carolina Republican Senator Lindsey Graham picked up the phone
Saturday afternoon to hear a familiar voice on the other end: that of
Hillary Clinton.

The Democratic presidential candidate told the Republican presidential
candidate that she was reaching out to extend her condolences on the
tragedy in his home state.

"She said she was calling to see how I was doing, and wanted to let me know
that she was thinking about me and about everyone in South Carolina,"
Graham told CNN, recounting the telephone conversation.

He said he was "pleasantly surprised" to get the call -- mostly because he
knows how busy she is.

"I know firsthand how hard it is to run for president," Graham said.

Although Graham, like other GOP presidential candidates, regularly blasts
Clinton on the campaign trail, the two actually had a good relationship
while serving with one another in the Senate.

They traveled together as members of the Senate Armed Services Committee,
and even co-authored legislation to give military reservists health
benefits.

"She is a nice person," Graham said.

"I told her that the call meant a lot to me, and would mean a lot to the
people of South Carolina. It is a tough weekend for all of us," he added.

*Hillary Clinton Calls For 'Common Sense' Gun Reforms In Wake Of Charleston
Shooting
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/06/20/hillary-clinton-charleston-shooting-guns_n_7627930.html>
// HuffPo // Igor Bobic – June 20, 2015*

Hillary Clinton pledged to fight for "common sense" reforms to the nation's
gun laws in the wake of a tragic shooting at a historically black church in
Charleston, South Carolina, and urged Americans to engage in a broader
conversation about race in order to build a more inclusive society.

Addressing the 83rd annual meeting of the U.S. Conference of Mayors in San
Francisco on Saturday, Clinton promised to do what President Barack Obama
has so far been unable to do -- pass legislation to curb gun violence.

"We can have common sense gun reforms that keep weapons out of the hands of
criminals and the violently unstable while respecting responsible gun
owners," she said. "The stakes are too high, the costs are too dear, and I
am not and will not be afraid to keep fighting for common sense reforms,
and along with you, achieve those on behalf of all who have been lost
because of this senseless gun violence in this country."

Noting the nation's struggle with race was "far from finished," Clinton
issued an impassioned plea for all Americans to come together in order to
create a more tolerant and empathetic society.

"I know that so many of us hoped by electing our first black president we
had turned the page on this chapter in our history. I know there are truths
we don't like to say out loud or discuss with our children. But we have to.
That's the only way we can possibly move forward together. Race remains a
deep fault line in America. Millions of people of color still experience
racism in their everyday lives," she said.

Clinton cited statistics showing vast disparities between white and black
families in the U.S., including differences in arrests and sentencing
guidelines -- reforms for which she has called for in the past.

"Our problem is not all kooks and Klansmen, it's also the cruel joke that
goes unchallenged," she added. "It's the offhand comment about not wanting
'those' people in the neighborhood. Let's be honest, for a lot of
well-meaning, open-minded white people, the sign of a young black man in a
hoodie still evokes a twinge of fear."

The former secretary of state pointed to the woman credited with helping
authorities apprehend the suspected shooter in North Carolina as an example
of how all Americans must do their part in helping build a more inclusive
society.

"I know it's not usual for someone running for president to say what we
need more of in this country is love and kindness," she said. "But that's
exactly what we need more of. We need to be not only too busy to hate, but
too caring, too loving to ignore, to walk way, to give up."

She also praised the relatives of the victims of the shooting, calling
"their act of mercy ... more stunning than his act of cruelty."

A racist manifesto that appears to be from the alleged shooter, entitled
"The Last Rhodesian," emerged earlier Saturday, detailing why the writer,
identified as Dylann Roof, chose to open fire in Charleston. It contains a
passage in which the writer cites the death of Trayvon Martin, a black
teenager in Florida who was killed by George Zimmerman, as a turning point
in his life that led him to research "black on White crime." It also
includes several photographs that appear to be of Roof, including one in
which he waves a Confederate flag.

Roof is charged with nine counts of homicide and possession of a firearm
during commission of a violent crime.

*Hillary Clinton Calls for 'Common Sense' Gun Control After Charleston
Shooting
<http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/hillary-clinton-calls-common-sense-gun-control-charleston/story?id=31910937>
// ABC News // Erin Dooley – June 20, 2015 *

n the wake of the massacre in Charleston, South Carolina, Democratic
presidential candidate Hillary Clinton today vowed to keep fighting for
common sense gun control and delivered a blistering indictment of racism in
America.

Speaking at the Conference of Mayors in San Francisco, Clinton said “bodies
are once again being carried out of a black church,” referring to the nine
people killed inside Emanuel AME Church on Wednesday. The suspect in the
shooting, Dylann Roof, has been charged with nine counts of murder and
possession of a firearm during the commission of a violent crime.

“How it could be possible that we as a nation still allow guns to fall into
the hands of people whose hearts are filled with hate?” Clinton said,
noting that “massacre after massacre” makes the urgency of passing gun
control legislation clear.

As a former resident of Arkansas, Clinton explained, she understands that
gun ownership is a cultural mainstay. But she said America needs to find a
way to keep guns out of the hands of those that would do their neighbors
harm.

“It makes no sense that bipartisan legislation to require universal
background checks would fail in Congress despite overwhelming bipartisan
support,” she said. “It makes no sense that we couldn’t come together to
keep guns out of the hands of domestic abusers, or people suffering from
mental illnesses, even people on the terrorist watch list. That doesn’t
make sense, and it is a rebuke to this nation we love and care about.”

Earlier this week, President Obama said the politics of Washington
"foreclose" some gun control legislation. But at the mayor’s conference
Friday, he said he was “not resigned” on the issue.

“The president is right -- the politics on this issue have been poison,”
Clinton said. “But we can’t give up. The stakes are too high, the costs are
too dear, and I am not and will not be afraid to keep fighting.”

But firearms aren't the most pressing problem, said Clinton. A friend of
Roof, 21, had said he wanted to start a race war and that he supported
segregation.

“It is tempting to dismiss a tragedy like this as an isolated incident, to
believe that in today’s America, bigotry is largely behind us, that
institutionalized racism no longer exists,” Clinton said.

But electing a black president didn't eliminate racial disparities in the
criminal justice system, education and the economy, Clinton said.

“More than half a century after Dr. King marched and Rosa Parks sat and
John Lewis bled, after the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act, how
can any of these things be true?” she asked.

“America’s long struggle with race is far from finished,” she said. “Our
problem is not all kooks and Klansman. It’s the joke that goes
unchallenged; it’s the offhand comment about not wanting 'those people' in
the neighborhood.”

The former secretary of state lauded the families of the Charleston
victims, who Friday offered Roof their forgiveness.

“In its way, their act of mercy was more stunning than his act of cruelty,”
Clinton said.

She also recognized Debbie Dills, who spotted Roof and called police,
vowing, “she didn’t remain silent -- well neither can we.”

*Hillary Clinton Calls for Gun Reforms in Speech to U.S. Mayors
<http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-06-20/hillary-clinton-calls-for-end-to-gun-violence-after-charleston>
// Bloomberg News // Alison Vekshin – June 20, 2015 *

Hillary Clinton called for an end to gun violence and said the country’s
long struggle with race is far from finished after a mass shooting at a
South Carolina church this week left nine people dead.

Clinton, 67, didn’t offer specific solutions beyond pledging to fight “for
common-sense reforms” and bemoaning gridlock in Congress over legislation
to require universal background checks for people buying guns.

“It makes no sense that we couldn’t come together to keep guns out of the
hands of domestic abusers or people suffering from mental illnesses, even
people on the terrorist watchlist,” Clinton, a Democratic presidential
candidate, said Saturday at a U.S. Conference of Mayors meeting in San
Francisco. “That doesn’t make sense and it is a rebuke to this nation that
we love and care about.”

“America’s long struggle with race is far from finished.”

Clinton’s speech was one of her first major addresses after the national
tragedy and as she makes her case for the White House. The former senator,
secretary of state and first lady echoed President Barack Obama’s remarks
at the mayors’ event on Friday in which he said mass shootings were
becoming too commonplace and called for curtailing easy access to firearms.

“We can have common-sense gun reforms that keep weapons out of the hands of
criminals and the violently unstable while respecting responsible gun
owners,” Clinton said to a standing ovation.

Wednesday night’s rampage by a lone gunman at Charleston’s Emanuel AME
Church is the latest in a string of such tragedies, including the school
shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, and the movie-theater massacre in Aurora,
Colorado, in 2012.

Racism Pervasive

Clinton told the mayors the incident illustrates that racism is still
pervasive in the U.S., noting that blacks are more likely than whites to be
denied a mortgage and black men are more likely to be stopped and searched
by police.

“It’s tempting to dismiss a tragedy like this as an isolated incident, to
believe that in today’s America bigotry is largely behind us,” Clinton
said. “But despite our best efforts and our highest hopes, America’s long
struggle with race is far from finished.”

Clinton, who in April announced her bid to become the nation’s first female
president, is running on a message of championing everday Americans,
including tackling income inequality, supporting gay rights and helping
immigrants become citizens. She gave her first stump speech June 13 on New
York’s Roosevelt Island, outlining a populist agenda aimed at girding the
middle class.

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti were among
the 277 U.S. mayors registered to attend the four-day annual conference
where Martin O’Malley, a Democratic presidential candidate and former
Maryland governor, is scheduled to speak Sunday.

“Mayors around the country are pretty tired of dealing with the inability
of Congress and state legislatures to be more aggressive and constrain gun
possession in a country where gun access is ubiquitous,” Sam Liccardo,
mayor of San Jose, California, said after Clinton’s speech.

Clinton didn’t offer details on gun-control legislation she’d push for if
elected, Liccardo said.

“We recognize this wasn’t a policy speech,” Liccardo said. “I don’t think
any of us were waiting for specifics. On the other hand, I’m hopeful there
will be some leadership on the federal level for real change because it
hasn’t been there.”

*Hillary Clinton Talks About Racism And Gun Reform Following Charleston
Mass Shooting
<http://www.ibtimes.com/hillary-clinton-talks-about-racism-gun-reform-following-charleston-mass-shooting-1976223>
// International Business Times // Michelle FlorCruz – June 20, 2015*

An impassioned Hillary Clinton spoke at the U.S. Conference of Mayors in
San Francisco, making a call for stricter gun control and challenging
racism following the mass shooting at a church in Charleston, South
Carolina, earlier this week. Nine people were shot and killed in a racially
motivated attack at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church.

"Despite our best efforts and our highest hopes, America’s long struggle
with race is far from finished," the presidential candidate told the U.S.
Conference of Mayors at its annual convention. "Bodies are once again being
carried out of a black church. Once again, racist rhetoric has metastasized
into racist violence.”

Clinton continued on to say that racism is an enduring pattern in America
and that the events that took place in Charleston should not be accepted as
an isolated incident. “Despite our best efforts and our highest hopes,
America’s long struggle with race is far from finished.” Clinton also
called race issues “a deep fault line in America.”

She also discussed gun control reform, saying that gun violence -- much
like racial injustice -- is not an isolated event. Clinton urged for
politicians to find a way to introduce gun reforms that could prevent
future violence.

“I know that gun ownership is part of the fabric of a lot of law-abiding
communities, but I also know that we can have common-sense gun reforms that
keep weapons out of the hands of criminals and the violently unstable while
respecting the rights of responsible gun owners.”

The issue of gun control has become polarizing among politicians, making it
difficult for new legislation -- such as universal background checks -- to
be adopted, despite being supported by most gun owners. “It makes no sense
that we wouldn’t come together to keep guns out of the hands of domestic
abusers or people suffering from mental illnesses, even people on the
terrorist watch list,” Clinton said. “That doesn’t make sense, and it is a
rebuke to this nation we love and care about.”

Clinton's words on gun control were met with a long applause.

*Hillary Clinton: 'America's long struggle with race is far from finished'
<http://www.latimes.com/nation/politics/politicsnow/la-pn-hillary-clinton-race-guns-20150620-story.html>
// LA Times // Cathleen Decker – June 20, 2015 *

an evocative and emotional address, Hillary Rodham Clinton on Saturday
urged the nation to come to grips with the "deep fault line" of race in the
U.S., blaming it and easy access to guns for the slayings of nine
worshipers at an historic black church in Charleston, S.C., days ago.

"It’s tempting to dismiss a tragedy like this as an isolated incident, to
believe that in today’s America, bigotry is largely behind us, that
institutional racism no longer exists. But despite our best efforts and our
highest hopes, America’s long struggle with race is far from finished,"
Clinton told hundreds of the nation’s mayors gathered in San Francisco for
their annual meeting.

Tackling an issue that has split the 2016 presidential candidates in the
wake of the horrific violence at Emanuel AME Church, Clinton ticked off a
litany of circumstances in which black children and families are hobbled by
lack of money, illness and thwarted opportunity.

"A half-century after Dr. King marched and Rosa Parks sat and John Lewis
bled and the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act and so much else,"
she said, "… how can any of these things be true? But they are."

She called on everyday Americans to play their role, beginning in
conversations with family members, to help the nation move past what she
called "a history we desperately want to leave behind."

"Our problem is not all kooks and Klansmen," Clinton said. "It’s also the
cold joke that goes unchallenged; it’s the offhand comment about not
wanting 'those people' in the neighborhood. Let’s be honest -- for a lot of
well-meaning, open-minded white people, the sight of a young black man in a
hoodie still evokes a twinge of fear."

The Charleston shootings, coming in a season of candidate announcements,
has thrust the issue of race and violence against African Americans into
the presidential campaign and exposed a rift between the political parties.

Let's be honest -- for a lot of well-meaning, open-minded white people, the
sight of a young black man in a hoodie still evokes a twinge of fear -
Hillary Rodham Clinton

Republican candidates have largely cast the shootings as an assault against
faithful churchgoers, rather than delving into its racial implications.
They have also brushed aside new calls for gun controls and any discussion
of South Carolina’s practice of flying the Confederate flag on the Capitol
grounds.

The flag has spawned controversy in numerous campaigns, with Republican
politicians generally defending it as a historic relic important to many of
the area’s residents. (An exception was 2012 Republican presidential
nominee Mitt Romney, who tweeted Saturday that "to many, it is a symbol of
racial hatred. Remove it now to honor Charleston victims.")

Clinton and other Democrats, including President Obama, have cited the
Charleston killings as evidence that stricter gun laws are needed. She
reiterated that plea on Saturday, to a standing ovation from the assembled
-- and bipartisan -- group of mayors.

"I know that gun ownership is part of the fabric of a lot of law-abiding
communities," she said. "But I also know that we can have common-sense gun
reforms that keep weapons out of the hands of criminals and the violently
unstable, while respecting responsible gun owners."

It makes no sense, Clinton said, that a measure to require background
checks failed in Congress despite support from a vast majority of Americans.

"It makes no sense that we wouldn't come together to keep guns out of the
hands of domestic abusers, or people suffering from mental illnesses, even
people on the terrorist watch list," she added. "That doesn't make sense,
and it is a rebuke to this nation we love and care about."

Clinton said she would work to "make this debate less polarized" — a hope
that belies the vitriolic nature of the nation’s past feuds over gun
measures. She asked the mayors to work with her to win passage of
background checks and other unspecified gun measures "on behalf of all who
have been lost because of this senseless gun violence in our country."

Clinton’s discussion of the lasting impact of race in American life rested,
she said, on growing up during the civil rights movement and living in one
of its flash points, Arkansas, during her husband’s governorship.

In 1957, black students attempting to integrate Little Rock’s Central High
School were blocked by white residents and National Guard troops ordered in
by the state’s governor, Orville Faubus. President Dwight D. Eisenhower
federalized the guardsmen, who were then ordered to protect the students,
and, as in other areas of the South, race relations remained fraught.

In broaching an unusual conversation for a national politician even in the
era of Obama, Clinton insisted that sympathy for victims of crime or
discrimination was not enough.

Too rarely, she said, do incidents like the Charleston shootings "spur us
to action or prompt us to question our own assumptions and privilege."

"We can't hide from any of these hard truths about race and justice in
America," she added. "We have to name them and own them and then change
them."

*Hillary Clinton After Charleston Shooting: Race Remains 'Deep Fault Line'
<http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/charleston-church-shooting/clinton-touts-gun-control-advocates-love-kindness-wake-church-shooting-n379061>
// NBC News – June 20, 2015 *

Hillary Clinton on Saturday echoed President Barack Obama's call for
"common sense" gun reform to help prevent another mass shooting after the
deadly rampage on a historic black church in Charleston, South Carolina.

"It makes no sense that bipartisan legislation for universal background
checks would fail despite overwhelming public support," Clinton, a
Democratic presidential candidate, said at the U.S. Conference of Mayors in
San Francisco.

She said that as a former resident of Arkansas and representative of New
York she understands that "gun ownership is part of the fabric of a lot of
communities."

"But I also know that we can have common sense gun reforms," she said.

But in America, Clinton added, the challenge is that "race remains a deep
fault line." Police say the shooting at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal
Church on Wednesday that left nine dead was a hate crime and a white
supremacist website appears to belong to the 21-year-old arrested gunman,
Dylann Roof.

"It's tempting to dismiss a tragedy like this into an isolated incident,"
but "our problem is not all kooks and Klansmen," Clinton said. "It's the
jokes that go unchallenged. It's the off-hand comment about not wanting
'that kind of person' in the neighborhood."

Clinton, who was campaigning in South Carolina a day before the church
massacre, said the country can learn plenty from the way those affected by
the shooting responded with mercy.

"On Friday, one by one, grieving parents and siblings stood up in court and
looked at the young man who had taken so much from them and said 'I forgive
you'," Clinton said. "Their act of mercy was more stunning than his act of
cruelty."

In a departure from politics to advocate for something that cannot be voted
on or approved, Clinton also commended those who were at the Bible study
and hosted the accused shooter in their church.

"During their last hours, nine people of faith welcomed a stranger in
prayer and fellowship," Clinton said. "That's humanity at its best, that's
also America at its best."

*Hillary Clinton calls for “common-sense gun reforms” after Charleston
<http://www.cbsnews.com/news/hillary-clinton-common-sense-gun-reforms-charleston-shooting/>
// CBS News // Reena Flores – June 20, 2015*

After a tragic church shooting in Charleston, South Carolina left nine
people dead on Wednesday, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton
is promising to fight for what she calls "common-sense gun reforms."

"You can't watch massacre after massacre and not come to the conclusion
that, as President Obama said, we must tackle this challenge with urgency
and conviction," Clinton told a crowd at the U.S. Conference of Mayors on
Saturday. "But I also know that we can have common-sense gun reforms that
keep weapons out of the hands of criminals and the violently unstable while
respecting responsible gun owners."

The former New York senator also expressed disbelief at the legislative
push for universal background checks for gun and high-ammunition magazine
sales -- a 2013 measure that failed in Congress despite its national
momentum after the shooting at Sandy Hook elementary school.

"It makes no sense that bipartisan legislation to require universal
background checks would fail in Congress despite overwhelming public
support," Clinton said. "It makes no sense that we couldn't come together
to keep guns out of the hands of domestic abusers or people suffering from
mental illnesses, even people on the terrorist watch list."

Addressing the same mayors' conference a day earlier, President Obama said
he would refuse "to act as if this is the new normal, or to pretend that
it's simply sufficient to grieve and that any mention of us doing something
to stop it is somehow politicizing the problem."

In a nod to the president's strong response, Clinton added that the
politics on the issue have indeed "been poisoned," but that the "stakes are
too high, the costs are too dear" to give up on tougher gun legislation.

The presidential hopeful, who made campaign stops in South Carolina on the
day of the shooting, had previously called on the country to face "hard
truths about race, violence, guns, and division." While her stance on
stricter gun regulation now aligns closely with that of President Obama's
in the wake of the Charleston shooting, during the 2008 Democratic primary
race against the then-Illinois senator, Clinton positioned herself to the
right. In a televised primary debate that year, the Democratic candidate
backpedaled from a proposal for a national gun registry she had made in
2000.

And in what may have been the strongest comments yet from Clinton on the
issue of race in America, the presidential contender called on the country
to confront systemic racism as the "deeper challenge we face."

"It is tempting to dismiss a tragedy like this as an isolated incident,"
she said. "To believe that in today's America, bigotry is largely behind
us. that institutionalized racism no longer exists. But despite our best
efforts and our highest hopes, America's long struggle with race is far
from finished."

*Hillary Clinton Calls for “Common Sense” Gun Control, Decries
“Institutional Racism”
<http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2015/06/20/hillary_clinton_calls_for_common_sense_gun_control_decries_institutional.html>
// Slate Daniel Politi – June 20, 2015 *

Hillary Clinton spoke forcefully about race and violence on Saturday in a
speech in which the presidential contender tried to address some of the
most difficult issues facing the country after the mass shooting in
Charleston, S.C. Clinton called for “common sense” gun reform to help
prevent another mass shooting. "It makes no sense that bipartisan
legislation for universal background checks would fail despite overwhelming
public support," Clinton said at the U.S. Conference of Mayors in San
Francisco.

"I lived in Arkansas and I represented upstate New York. I know that gun
ownership is part of the fabric of a lot of law abiding communities,"
Clinton said, according to CNN. "I also know that we can have common sense
gun reforms that keep weapons out of the hands of criminals and the
violently unstable while respecting responsible gun owners."

The presidential hopeful spoke extensively about the mass shooting and
praised the families who allegedly said they forgave the 21-year-old
suspect, Dylann Roof. “In its way, their act of mercy was as stunning as
his act of cruelty,” she said.

The mass shooting in South Carolina though is not just about availability
of guns, Clinton said as she called on the country to confront the racism
that persists across society. “It’s tempting to dismiss a tragedy like this
as an isolated incident, to believe that in today’s America bigotry is
largely behind us, that institutionalized racism no longer exists,” she
said.

"Despite our best efforts and our highest hopes, America’s long struggle
with race is far from finished," Clinton said, according to the Washington
Post. "I know this is a difficult topic to talk about. I know that so many
of us hoped by electing our first black president, we had turned the page
on this chapter in our history. I know there are truths we do not like to
say out loud or discus with our children. But we have to."

Although several presidential contenders have spoken out on the mass
shooting they “have been less willing to cast it as an example of broader
racial injustice,” notes the Wall Street Journal.

Clinton’s words do not just help her differentiate herself from the
Republican candidates but can also help her gain an upper hand on Bernie
Sanders. “Mr. Sanders, a socialist from Vermont also seeking the Democratic
nomination, has a decidedly mixed record on gun control, which may pose
problems for his campaign as it seeks to bill itself as a more liberal
alternative to Mrs. Clinton,” notes the New York Times.

*Watch Hillary Clinton address Charleston shooting and ‘America’s long
struggle with race’
<http://fusion.net/story/154301/hillary-clinton-charleston-shooting-racism-gun-violence-video/>
// Fusion // John Walker – June 20, 2015 *

Hillary Clinton used her speaking engagement at a mayoral conference in San
Francisco on Saturday to address the recent shooting at an historic black
church in Charleston, S.C.

“Once again, racist rhetoric has metastasized into racist violence,” the
presidential candidate said at the Hilton-hosted 83rd Annual U.S.
Conference of Mayors. “America’s long struggle with race is far from over.”

Clinton discussed various forms of institutionalized racism in the U.S.,
from housing discrimination to the disparity in median wealth between black
and white Americans. She went on to address less overt types of bias that
goes beyond “kooks and Klansmen,” like “cruel jokes,” “off-hand comments,”
and similar microaggressions.

The Democratic hopeful also tied the massacre—which took the lives of nine
congregants of the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, including
state Sen. Clementa C. Pinckney, on Jun. 17—to another systemic issue
facing the nation: gun violence.

“You can’t watch massacre after massacre and not come to the conclusion
that, as President Obama said, we must tackle this challenge with urgency
and conviction,” she told the nearly 300 American mayors in attendance. “I
am not and will not be afraid to keep fighting for commonsense reforms.”

Dylann Roof, the 21-year-old white supremacist who confessed to the
shooting, was apprehended by law enforcement on Thursday. His trial began
with a bail hearing on Friday.

*Flashback: As Governor, Bill Clinton Honored Confederacy On Arkansas Flag
<http://dailycaller.com/2015/06/20/flashback-as-governor-bill-clinton-honored-confederacy-on-arkansas-flag/>
// Daily Caller // Derek Hunter – June 20, 2015*

As the fight to remove the Confederate flag from the state House grounds in
South Carolina heats up, politicians are weighing in on the debate.

Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham defended displaying the flag, while former
presidential candidate Mitt Romney called for its removal. Carly Fiorina
called it a “symbol of racial hatred,” but stopped short of saying it
should be removed. Sen. Ted Cruz said South Carolinians should decide what
their state does. President Barack Obama’s spokesman said the flag belongs
in a museum.

But while former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has weighed in on the
gun control aspect of the national discussion, the leading candidate for
the Democratic presidential nomination has remained silent on the flag
controversy.

In 1987, when her husband was governor of Arkansas, Bill Clinton signed Act
116 that stated “The blue star above the word “ARKANSAS” is to commemorate
the Confederate States of America.”

When the Confederate flag issue arose in the 2000 election, Matt Drudge
reported that then-President Bill Clinton’s spokesman Joe Lockhart was
asked about the issue. Lockhart told reporters, “I’ve just never heard any
discussion or any objections that the president has raised.

In 2000, Drudge reported Vice President and Democratic nominee Al Gore as
accusing then-Texas Gov. George W. Bush of refusing to take a stand on the
Confederate flag issue, which then was flying over the capital dome in
South Carolina.

Drudge wrote:

The Gore campaign over the weekend repeatedly refused to comment on the
vice president’s silence when it comes to the flag flying over the Arkansas
State House!

“The vice president will not be commenting on the Arkansas flag,” a
campaign rep told the DRUDGE REPORT.

The debate of the Confederate flag resurfaced after the terrorist attack on
the Emanuel AME Church that saw nine people slaughtered because of the
color of their skin.

*Hillary Clinton: 'America's Long Struggle With Race Is Far From Finished'
<http://crooksandliars.com/2015/06/hillary-clinton-americas-long-struggle>
// Crooks and Liars // Karoli – June 20, 2015 *

Today Hillary Clinton delivered a powerful call for Americans to stand up
and really work at the race issues that bedevil this country.

Speaking to the US Conference of Mayors, Clinton was blunt, and her remarks
were not limited to evil acts of white supremacists.

But today, I stand before you because I know and you know there is a deeper
challenge we face.

I had the great privilege of representing America around the world. I was
so proud to share our example, our diversity, our openness, our devotion to
human rights and freedom. These qualities have drawn generations of
immigrants to our shores, and they inspire people still. I have seen it
with my own eyes.

And yet, bodies are once again being carried out of a black church.

Once again, racist rhetoric has metastasized into racist violence.

Now, it's tempting, it is tempting to dismiss a tragedy like this as an
isolated incident, to believe that in today's America, bigotry is largely
behind us, that institutionalized racism no longer exists.

But despite our best efforts and our highest hopes, America's long struggle
with race is far from finished.

I know this is a difficult topic to talk about. I know that so many of us
hoped by electing our first black president, we had turned the page on this
chapter in our history.

I know there are truths we don't like to say out loud or discuss with our
children. But we have to. That's the only way we can possibly move forward
together.

Race remains a deep fault line in America. Millions of people of color
still experience racism in their everyday lives.

Here are some facts.

In America today, blacks are nearly three times as likely as whites to be
denied a mortgage.

In 2013, the median -- the median wealth of black families was around
$11,000. For white families, it was more than $134,000.

Nearly half of all black families have lived in poor neighborhoods for at
least two generations, compared to just 7 percent of white families.

African American men are far more likely to be stopped and searched by
police, charged with crimes, and sentenced to longer prison terms than
white men, 10 percent longer for the same crimes in the federal system.

In America today, our schools are more segregated than they were in the
1960s.

How can any of that be true? How can it be true that black children are 500
percent more likely to die from asthma than white kids? Five hundred
percent!

More than a half century after Dr. King marched and Rosa Parks sat and John
Lewis bled, after the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act and so
much else, how can any of these things be true? But they are.

And our problem is not all kooks and Klansman. It's also in the cruel joke
that goes unchallenged. It's in the off-hand comments about not wanting
"those people" in the neighborhood.

Let's be honest: For a lot of well-meaning, open-minded white people, the
sight of a young black man in a hoodie still evokes a twinge of fear. And
news reports about poverty and crime and discrimination evoke sympathy,
even empathy, but too rarely do they spur us to action or prompt us to
question our own assumptions and privilege.

We can't hide from any of these hard truths about race and justice in
America. We have to name them and own them and then change them.

You may have heard about a woman in North Carolina named Debbie Dills.
She's the one who spotted Dylann Roof's car on the highway. She could have
gone on about her business. She could have looked to her own safety. But
that's not what she did. She called the police and then she followed that
car for more than 30 miles.

As Congressman Jim Clyburn said the other day, "There may be a lot of
Dylann Roofs in the world, but there are a lot of Debbie Dills too. She
didn't remain silent." (Applause.)

Well, neither can we. We all have a role to play in building a more
tolerant, inclusive society, what I once called "a village," where there is
a place for everyone.

You know, we Americans may differ and bicker and stumble and fall, but we
are at our best when we pick each other up, when we have each other's back.

Like any family, our American family is strongest when we cherish what we
have in common, and fight back against those who would drive us apart.

I'm certain that we'll hear the usual flurry of clucking from the right
wing media complex about how she's politicizing what happened in
Charleston, and how we don't dare politicize these terrible tragedies
because good Lord, people, those bodies aren't even buried in the ground
yet!

That's just the right wing's way of encouraging collective attention
deficits on the cancer rapidly multiplying in today's day and age. Ignore
it. Whether you support Hillary Clinton or not, she has a long record of
believing what she said right here, reaching all the way back to her days
as Arkansas' First Lady. For that reason alone, 2016 or not, what she says
should carry some weight.

*Hillary Clinton on Charleston: ‘We Can’t Hide’ From Truth of White
Privilege
<http://www.mediaite.com/tv/hillary-clinton-on-charleston-we-cant-hide-from-truth-of-white-privilege/>
// Mediaite // Andrew Husband – June 20, 2015 *

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton addressed the 83rd annual
U.S. Conference of Mayors in San Francisco on Saturday morning. Among other
things, she addressed Wednesday night’s shooting at the historic Emmanuel
African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina, and the
renewed discussion of gun control and the second amendment.

Reflecting on her time in Arkansas, Clinton noted:

“I know that gun ownership is part of the fabric of a lot of law abiding
communities, but I also know that we can have common sense gun reforms that
keep weapons out of the hands of criminals and the violently unstable,
while respecting responsible gun owners.”

She expresses her hope that those participating in the debates past,
present and future can “make this debate less polarized, less inflamed by
ideology and more informed by evidence.”

However, it’s later in the address that Clinton explicitly discusses the
racial nature of the Charleston shooting and the larger context it invokes:

“For a lot of well-meaning, open-minded white people, the sight of a young
black man in a hoodie still evokes a twinge of fear. And news reports about
poverty and crime and discrimination evoke sympathy, even empathy, but too
rarely do they spur us to action or prompt us to question our own
assumptions and privilege. We can’t hide from any of these hard truths
about race and justice in America. We have to name them, and own them, and
then change them.”

*In One Quote, Hillary Clinton Just Took a Bold Stance on Race in America
<http://mic.com/articles/121068/in-one-quote-hillary-clinton-just-took-a-bold-stance-on-race-in-america>
// Mic // Tom McKay – June 20, 2015 *

Over the past few days, the nation has been shocked, bereaved and outraged
by the terrorist attack on Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in
Charleston, South Carolina, during which alleged white supremacist Dylann
Storm Roof killed nine African-American congregants.

While prominent politicians were obviously quick to condemn the murder, not
all of them have been so quick to acknowledge the role racism played in the
massacre. But on Saturday, while speaking to the U.S. Conference of Mayors,
Hillary Clinton challenged the United States to go beyond condemning
individuals like Roof and stand up against racism in all the pernicious
ways it goes unchallenged across the country.

"After the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act and so much else, how
can any of these things be true? But they are. And our problem is not all
kooks and Klansmen, it's also the cruel joke that goes unchallenged,"
Clinton said, according to NBC News. "It's the offhand comment about not
wanting 'that kind of person' in the neighborhood."

Clinton criticized the mentality of other national leaders who have sought
to downplay the vicious racism that fueled the terrorist attack, announcing
that Americans "can't hide from any of these hard truths about race and
justice in America."

During the rest of the speech, Clinton thoroughly highlighted the
challenges facing people of color across the country, from mortgage
discrimination to systematic racism among police forces. Though she
endorsed tougher gun laws, the focus was on race.

Why it's important: Clinton wants the American people to understand that
it's not enough to pretend that racism doesn't exist in the United States,
a notion as ridiculous as some Russian politicians' insistence that there
are no gays in Russia. Instead, she made the case that the struggle is far
from over by pointing to an immediate event in our recent collective memory
as an example of the damage racism still causes.

But she didn't stop there. By tying racism to the everyday conversations
and attitudes many Americans have, Clinton attacked the kind of implicit
racism that runs rampant in polite society and asked well-meaning
individuals to challenge it wherever it props up. She also made it clear
that solving racism will require people across America to actually change
their attitudes towards race — particularly white people, who despite
boldly proclaiming themselves non-racist in increasing numbers, continue to
hold screwed up opinions about people of color.

She called out what racism is: Roof didn't emerge from a vacuum. He grew up
in a culture that tolerated racism instead of fighting to root it out.
Clinton has broken the tepid moratorium on calling out America's stagnation
on civil rights, which has troubled the country in many, more mundane ways
than singular and disturbing terrorist attacks.

Racism is when black people get herded out of their own communities. Racism
is when black men in poor communities experience permanent economic
recession. Racism is when powerful politicians say explicitly racist things
and then just shrug it off like they never opened their mouths. Racism is
when white folks insist that merely saying "I'm not racist" is a "get out
of jail free" card. Racism is the separation of the lived experience of
people of color from the political discourse that determines how they will
be treated by the rest of society.

If Americans don't want to be racist, then they can take Clinton's
challenge and step forward to defend the principle that all people deserve
to be treated with respect and dignity regardless of the color of their
skin. Or they can shrug and hesitate, and say "this was a terrible tragedy,
but..." and let whatever privileged position of their own choosing fill in
the rest of the blank.

*Clinton calls for gun reforms in wake of Charleston shooting
<http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/245640-clinton-calls-for-gun-reforms-in-wake-of-charleston-shooting>
// The Hill // Kevin Cirilli – June 20, 2015 *

Democratic presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton called for new
restrictions on firearms in wake of the shooting in the shooting at a
predominantly black church in Charleston, S.C., earlier this week.

Clinton also called for a national conversation about race relations,
saying institutionalized racism still exists in prepared remarks in San
Francisco at a national mayoral conference.

"How is it that we as a nation still allow guns to fall into the hands of
people whose hearts are filled with hate?" she asked. "You can't watch
massacre after massacre and not come to the conclusion that as President
Obama said, we must tackle this challenge with urgency and conviction."

"I am not and will not be afraid to keep fighting for common-sense reforms
and, along with you, achieve those on behalf of all who have been lost
because of this senseless gun violence in our country," she said.

She said that "once again, bodies are being carried out of a black church,"
adding that while "it is tempting to dismiss [this tragedy] as an isolated
incident ... America's long struggle with race is far from finished."

Earlier this week, authorities arrested Dylann Roof, 21, in connection with
the killing of nine members of Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church,
a predominantly black church.

"Faith has always seen this community through and I know it will again.
Just as earlier generations threw off the chains of slavery and then
segregation and Jim Crow — this generation will not be shackled by fear and
hate," Clinton said.

Clinton alluded to a gun-reform proposal put forth by Sens. Joe Manchin
(D-W.Va.) and Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) that failed to become law after an
elementary school shooting in Newtown, Conn.

"It makes no sense that bipartisan legislation to require universal
background checks would fail in Congress despite overwhelming public
support," she said. "It makes no sense that we couldn't come together to
keep guns out of the hands of domestic abusers or people suffering from
mental illness, even people on the terror watch list."

"That doesn't make sense and it is a rebuke to this nation we love and care
about," she said.

On the topic of race, she said Americans need to ask themselves
uncomfortable questions, saying that "the sight of young black man in a
hoodie still evokes a twinge of fear" for many white people.

Racism, she said, still exists subtly in "the cruel joke that goes
unchallenged. It's the offhand comment about not wanting 'those' people in
the neighborhood."

"We can't hide from any of these hard truths about race and justice in
America," she said. "We have to name them and own them and then change
them."

*Hillary Clinton vows to keep fighting for common sense gun control
<http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/82e24388-1776-11e5-8201-cbdb03d71480.html#axzz3dd4gJ5dX>
// The Financial Times // Megan Murphy – June 20, 2015 *

Hillary Clinton vowed to keep fighting for “common sense” gun control
reforms if elected president, denouncing the persistent stain of racism in
America days after a 21-year-old white gunman killed nine black churchgoers
in Charleston, South Carolina.

Mrs Clinton, speaking at a US conference of mayors in San Francisco,
referred to race as a “deep faultline” that continued to divide America.
And she refused to shy away from America’s decades-old battle over gun
control, where efforts to pass legislation restricting ownership and
certain types of deadly weapons have repeatedly stalled even after the kind
of tragedies seen in Charleston.

“The politics of this issue have been poisoned, but we can’t give up,” Mrs
Clinton said. “The stakes are too high, the costs are too dear, and I am
not and will not be afraid to keep fighting for common sense reforms and
along with you, achieve those on behalf of all who have been lost because
of this senseless gun violence in this country.”

The comments, Mrs Clinton’s most expansive yet on race and gun control,
will probably move both issues toward the heart of the 2016 presidential
campaign.

While the former secretary of state has repeatedly talked about race during
the early months of her campaign, including the disparate incarceration
rates between black and white men and the need for reforms to the criminal
justice system, resistance to gun control has long been a sacred cow among
the Republican party.

Speaking at a “Faith and Freedom” coalition event in Washington this week,
several leading GOP candidates affirmed their support for the right to bear
arms under the second amendment hours after the South Carolina shootings.

“If I am president of the United States, we will appoint justices and we
will have an attorney-general who will protect our second amendment
rights,” said Marco Rubio, the Florida senator who is one of the early
frontrunners for the nomination.

Dylann Roof, 21, has been arrested and charged with nine counts of murder
after being caught in North Carolina a day after the killings, in what US
authorities are investigating as a hate crime.

Mrs Clinton on Saturday acknowledged that discussing race openly remained
difficult in the US. Even for Barack Obama, the nation’s first black
president, it has been difficult to move forward on an issue that continues
to divide Americans amid deep mistrust, particularly between the black
community and law enforcement in urban centres.

“I know this is a difficult topic to talk about. I know that so many of us
hoped by electing our first black president, we had turned the page on this
chapter in our history, “ Mrs Clinton said. I know there are truths we do
not like to say out loud or discus with our children. But we have to.”

*Here's why one of Hillary Clinton's big ideas is a smart move for 2016
<http://www.businessinsider.com/hillary-clinton-voting-plans-automatic-registration-2015-6#ixzz3df8479oS>
// Business Insider // Maxwell Tani – June 20, 2015 *

Democratic presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton is making a big deal
about an issue of rising importance within her party: voting rights.

And new poll released by Public Policy Polling on Friday shows that her
focus on the issue may prove politically popular in 2016 among more than
just Democrats.

Automatic voter registration, something Clinton proposed earlier this
month, enjoys relatively strong support, with 48% approving and 38%
disapproving, according to the PPP poll.

In one of the first major speeches of her campaign earlier this month in
Texas, Clinton railed against voter suppression and laid out a broad set of
initiatives that would expand access to voting.

The former Secretary of State called for allowing early voting weeks before
an election, automatic voter registration for 18-year-olds, and a
strengthened Voting Rights Act, which was gutted by a Supreme Court
decision two years ago.

Automatic enrollment is also popular among moderate voters, 57% of whom
said they back the initiative. And it's a favorable concept among voters
that Clinton is hoping to court in the primary and general elections. Black
(73%) and young voters (58%) overwhelming support it. And according to PPP,
women opposed restrictions on voting at much lower rates than men — only
35% of women oppose, compared to 42% of men.

It's unlikely that the concept will prove to be one that drives voters to
the polls like economic or foreign policy initiatives, but the PPP poll
suggests it's a smart issue for Clinton to latch onto for support from her
base and from certain broader portions of the electorate.

But any progress made on the issue would likely come when the next
president inhabits the White House. Congressional Republicans have declined
to take up voting reform issues, including the fix to the Voting Rights Act
that Clinton is pushing.

Clinton's advocacy may not be helping, at least right now. Automatic voter
registration is also becoming increasingly partisan. As The Huffington Post
notes, since March, the percentage of Republicans who support automatic
voter registration has dropped from 53% to around 38%.

*Election 2016: Beating Hillary Clinton Top Conservative Voter Priority
<http://www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-beating-hillary-clinton-top-conservative-voter-priority-1976156>
// IB Times // Ginger Gibson – June 20, 2015*

Conservative voters, regularly chided by the establishment for putting
ideology above electability, are starting to come around to the importance
of picking primary candidates who are best equipped to win a general
election. But that doesn't mean they're jumping on board with Jeb Bush yet,
even though he is considered in many establishment circles to be the most
formidable candidate to topple Hillary Clinton.

This weekend, many of the nation's conservative voters convened at the
sprawling Omni Shoreham Hotel in Washington to watch as a parade of
Republican candidates took turns making their pitch as to why they should
be the next president and brandishing their religious credentials. It was
the Faith & Freedom Coalition's "Road to Majority" conference, and 14
confirmed or likely Republican candidates showed up to make their appeal.
The only ones missing were Donald Trump and Mike Huckabee.

"Electability is very important, absolutely," said Jerry Jenkins, 72, of
Kennett Square, Pennsylvania. Jenkins is leaning toward Ben Carson, but he
realizes that the neurosurgeon is going to face struggles and may not have
enough political experience to win. When it came to electability, Jenkins
pointed to New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie who he called “a guy who is the
most impressive.”

It’s counter to the conventional wisdom that Bush is being painted as the
most electable. “Jeb, I was disappointed,” Jenkins said. “Can he get the
nomination? He might be able to pull off the nomination, but I think
Hillary [Clinton] can beat him.”

The question of electability versus ideology has become pervasive through
the GOP. Washington insiders have taken to procrastinating just what the
electorate is going to be inclined to favor. The arguments tend to go one
of of two ways. Some Republican voters see Clinton as so easily defeatable
that any of the more than 15 likely candidates could topple her. They
believe the best course of action is to nominate the most conservative
candidate and ensure the White House doesn't get too moderate. This camp
points to the defeats of John McCain and Mitt Romney -- two candidates
closer to the center -- as evidence that a moderate can't win.

The opposing side believes that Clinton could easily defeat several of the
Republican candidates. They believe that nominating a very conservative
candidate -- particularly on social issues and immigration -- would give
Democrats a bevy of possible attacks and weaken their chances. They point
to tea party darlings like Christine O'Donnell and Sharron Angle as
evidence that someone that far right -- even in favorable conditions --
can't get elected.

Many of the voters who convened for the Faith & Freedom event did seem to
think that any candidate in their field could beat Clinton. But they’re
still growing cautious about how Republicans should be approaching the
election.

The warning signs are starting to go up. Katie Packer Gage, who was deputy
campaign manager for Romney in 2012, penned a piece this week warning
candidates against repeating the former nominees' mistake of trying to move
to the right during the primary on immigration. “What we found is that GOP
nominees chasing the relatively small group of anti-immigration primary
voters — and giving opponents ammunition to portray them as
anti-immigration — risk alienating 24 percent more voters in a general
election than they attract,” she wrote.

Kathy Dwan, of Saginaw, Michigan, wants her party to stop talking about
social issues. The self-described “far right” and “extreme” conservative
said she sees among her friends those who don’t vote for Republicans
because of social issues but would vote for the GOP if they dropped them.

“I really wish they would all stop talking about the social issues,” Dwan
said. “To be honest, I think they should stay out of politics. I know I’m
here at Faith & Freedom, and everybody is pro-life -- which I am -- but I
think the government should stay out of the social issues...we should just
talk about the health of our country fiscally and rule of law. We have to
get back to some basics.”

Dwan -- who is leaning toward Rand Paul because she likes his message of
personal liberty -- thinks the whole field can beat Clinton. But she isn’t
sure who is in the best position to take on Clinton. “The jury is out on
who might be the best because we’re just starting,” Dwan said.

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz appeared to receive the warmest reception from crowds
at the event, at least in the first couple of days before Scott Walker had
a chance to woo the crowd. And Cruz is trying to court the evangelical
vote, a path that candidates have previously taken to victory in the early
primary state of Iowa. But political observers warn that Iowa -- and
evangelical voters around the country -- are beginning to worry more about
picking winners instead of picking those who are like-minded.

Some evidence that conservatives are looking beyond a strict set of
ideological parameters could be the reception received from candidates who
most dismiss as too moderate to ever win the far-right voters.

Brian Frey, 34, also of Saginaw, Michigan, walked away from the event
impressed with a couple of candidates he had never seen speak before,
including Ohio Gov. John Kasich -- who has yet to announce his campaign --
and former New York Gov. George Pataki. “I was kind of blown away by
Pataki,” Frey said. “He is very electable.”

Kasich, Washington insiders will tell you, will never make inroads with
conservatives because he expanded Medicaid in his state as part of the
Affordable Care Act. Pataki, who was a three-term governor of New York,
came under fire for naming a moderate Republican to challenge Chuck Schumer
in the 2004 Senate race. And in the last 11 years, the political ecosystem
has only made it harder for Republicans to overcome such criticism.

But most surprising was the warm reception New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie
received. Conservatives began scoffing at the brash-talking governor after
his much-derided embrace of President Barack Obama on a tarmac in New
Jersey after Hurricane Sandy. While the criticism lacked much substance --
Christie has been a consistent critic of the president -- the imagery
created headaches for the governor.

But Linda Cleaver of Chester County, Pennsylvania, said after hearing
Christie speak Friday at the conference, he moved up her favorites list.
Cleaver, who said she’s “one step to the left of radical” conservative and
is a tea party member, said she was pleased to hear Christie talk about
taking on entitlement programs.

“He would never have been my choice,” Cleaver said. “[But] I like somebody
who just speaks and doesn’t pull any punches. They tell you the truth
whether they think you can handle it or not.”

And what about Bush? “I will never vote for him,” Cleaver said. “Unlike
other people, I did like George [W.] Bush, but he has the party message.
Religiously, he’s good, apparently. But he has some positions that may
change in time, but I think he’s just the party and that needs to change.”

*CNN Panel Discusses Troubling Polling Numbers for Clinton 'This wasn't her
best week'
<http://freebeacon.com/politics/cnn-panel-discusses-troubling-polling-numbers-for-clinton/>
// Free Beacon // Washington Free Beacon Staff - June 21, 2015 *

CNN’s Inside Politics panel discussed polling showing Democratic
frontrunner Hillary Clinton underwater on honesty and trustworthiness in
key battleground states Sunday.

A Quinnipiac poll revealed majorities of voters in Florida (51 percent),
Ohio (53 percent) and Pennsylvania (54 percent) do not find she has those
qualities.

“This wasn’t her best week,” host John King said.

Self-described socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) also finished just
10 points behind Clinton, 41-31, in a poll of likely New Hampshire voters,
something else that could alarm her campaign.

Associated Press reporter Lisa Lerer said Clinton had played it “extremely
safe” on issues important to the left flank of the Democratic Party, and
she’s “stayed silent” on controversial intra-party topics like trade and
NSA surveillance.

*Clinton confidant cuts ties with the formidable family
<http://nypost.com/2015/06/21/clinton-confidant-cuts-ties-with-the-formidable-family/>
// NYPost // Isabel Vincent and Melissa Klein - June 21, 2015 *

Just weeks before Hillary Clinton kicked off her campaign for president on
Roosevelt Island, a Clinton family loyalist quietly parted ways with the
powerful clan.

Doug Band, a man once so close to President Bill Clinton that he was
considered a surrogate son, left the Clinton Foundation, where he had
various board appointments, The Post has learned.

Band declined to comment, except to confirm he resigned his position last
month. The departure marks the end of a complicated relationship between
Band’s controversial consultant corporation, Teneo, and the Clintons.

And while the Clinton Foundation has been under fire for allegedly trading
millions of dollars in donations for access to Bill and Hillary Clinton
when she was secretary of state, Teneo’s role is less well-known.

But Teneo played a part in what author Daniel Halper in his 2014 book
“Clinton Inc.,” described as a vast money-making machine.

“I think Teneo is not just emblematic of how Clinton Inc. works, it shows
the political and financial mess that this whole thing has created,” Halper
told The Post.

In a preview of the Clinton Foundation scandals that have dogged Hillary
Clinton this year, The New Republic noted the suspicious nature of Band’s
work in a 2013 article.

“There’s an undertow of transactionalism in the glittering annual dinners,
the fixation on celebrity and a certain contingent of donors whose
charitable contributions and business interests occupy an uncomfortable
proximity. More than anyone else except [Bill] Clinton himself, Band is
responsible for creating this culture. And not only did he create it, he
has thrived in it.”

Get Rich Quick

Now headquartered on the 45th floor of the Citigroup Center in Manhattan,
and with offices around the world, Teneo — Latin for “to guide” — started
more modestly in 2009 by business consultant Paul Keary.

Band and Declan Kelly, who had been US economic envoy to Northern Ireland
in Hillary Clinton’s State Department, joined the firm in 2011, turning it
into a global powerhouse.

Modal TriggerBand is a 42-year-old Florida native who started his career at
22 as an intern in the Clinton White House. He earned a law degree, worked
his way up at the White House, eventually becoming indispensable to the
president as his aide or “body man.” Band was constantly by the president’s
side, carrying bags and keeping Clinton on schedule.

When Clinton left office in 2001, Band reportedly turned down a job at
Goldman Sachs and stuck with the former president as his personal assistant.

Band became the gatekeeper for those wanting access to Clinton. The two
were so close that Band was at Clinton’s bedside when he had heart bypass
surgery in 2004.

It was Band who, in 2005, came up with the idea for the Clinton Global
Initiative, a yearly meeting of business bigwigs and heads of state in
Manhattan.

Band was paid by Clinton and, once the Global Initiative was up and
running, he drew a salary of $110,000 to head the group. But he was also
paid an undisclosed extra amount of money by Clinton benefactor Ron Burkle,
who sent checks to SGRD, Band’s Florida-based LLC, The Wall Street Journal
reported. It was an attempt to keep Band on board with Clinton and not flee
to a more lucrative position, the newspaper reported.

Band got rich quickly. By 2003, he bought a $2.1 million condo at the
Metropolitan Tower on West 57th Street. He sold it in 2008 for $4.1 million
and moved to the tony Essex House on Central Park South, where he still
lives in a sprawling apartment.

Band married investment banker Lily Rafii in 2007. Clinton attended the
wedding in a Paris chateau even though Band had asked him not to come. “Not
only did he come, he made this incredible speech,” Band told a Florida
newspaper in 2009.

Band traveled the world with Clinton, even accompanying him to North Korea
in 2009 to secure the release of two journalists.

Band, in his bio on the Teneo website, says he was “part of the negotiation
team that handled all aspects of Hillary Clinton’s becoming secretary of
state.”

Clinton told The Washington Post in 2008, “I’m amazed he still works for me
because he could make a lot more money somewhere else.”

‘Promise of Access’

In 2011, Band did branch out on his own, joining the fledgling Teneo and
recruiting Bill Clinton to be a member of the advisory board. Clients paid
staggering monthly retainers — up to $250,000 — to Band’s company. They
were reportedly encouraged to give to the Clinton Foundation and, in turn,
foundation donors were encouraged to use the services of Teneo.

“The idea for Teneo was to have Fortune 400 companies pay large monthly
stipends in exchange for access to Band, Clinton and their massive
international network. The group would ‘consult’ with the companies, offer
strategic advice and help them overcome issues in various countries across
the globe,” Halper wrote in “Clinton Inc.”

But a former Teneo employee told Halper that what the clients really got
was nothing, other than an “implicit promise of access to Clinton.”

In addition to Clinton, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, former US
Sen. George Mitchell and Ed Rollins, Ronald Reagan’s campaign manager, all
came on board at Teneo.

Clinton was the key to Teneo’s success. “The two needed the president,” a
source told Halper. “It was he who they were selling to their corporate
clients. Or, more precisely, it was their proximity to power — President
Clinton, and his wife, who was then secretary of state — and their own
Rolodexes, which were a natural extension of the work they had done over
the years for the Clintons.”

Clients included Bank of America, Dow Chemical, UBS Wealth Management and
Coca-Cola.

In exchange, Bill Clinton was given a contract with Teneo worth $3.5
million, Halper said. It is unclear, however, how much Clinton was actually
paid.

The Chelsea Problem

Chelsea Clinton and her husband, Marc Mezvinsky, also wanted to muscle in
on the action and asked for an equity stake in the company, Halper
reported. But Band refused, seeing too much of a potential conflict in
doing business with the daughter of the secretary of state. There may have
been some “sibling” rivalry between Band and Chelsea Clinton.

In 2008, Band told restaurant owner Nino Selimaj to take down Chelsea’s
photo from the wall of Osso Buco saying the former first daughter was not a
public figure, according to New York magazine.

In the end, Bill Clinton’s tenure at Teneo was short-lived.

The Post reported in December 2011 that Teneo had been advising MF Global,
the doomed international brokerage firm headed by former New Jersey Gov.
Jon Corzine. The firm paid Teneo an eye-popping $125,000 a month as it was
imploding and losing millions for its investors.

Although Clinton’s office insisted the former president was not profiting
from the MF Global arrangement, Hillary Clinton was said to be furious over
the controversy. By February 2012, Clinton stepped down from Teneo.

Shortly before he severed ties with the company, Clinton reportedly started
to resent how Band and his partner Declan Kelly threw his name around to
inflate Teneo’s importance.

In one reported instance, Kelly seemed to take public credit for getting
Clinton invited to speak at an economic forum in Dublin. But the former
president had actually been invited by the Irish prime minister and was
said to explode in anger at the suggestion that Teneo had somehow brokered
his participation at the event.

But the connection to the Clintons continued. In June 2012, Hillary
Clinton’s senior aide Huma Abedin began working as a part-time consultant
to Teneo during her final months at the State Department.

Abedin, the wife of disgraced former Congressman Anthony Weiner, was
designated a “special government employee,” which allowed her to both work
for the State Department and to hold outside gigs. She also consulted for
the Clinton Foundation and for Hillary Clinton.

Once the arrangement became known, there was criticism that there was
overlap between a private firm and the inner workings of the State
Department.

A source close to the negotiations told The Post that the deal came about
as a way to help Abedin financially after her husband resigned in the wake
of a sexting scandal in June 2011.

“The truth is people felt sorry for Huma,” the source said. Asked if Abedin
provided any inside intelligence about the State Department for Teneo, the
source denied it. “People watch too much ‘House of Cards.’ ”

After Huma’s arrangement with Teneo came to light, Sen. Chuck Grassley, an
Iowa Republican, asked the Government Accountability Office to conduct a
review of the special government employee exception.

New Business

While it’s not clear whether Band or Teneo will play a part in Hillary
Clinton’s presidential campaign, the company has continued to wield
influence on a global scale without Bill Clinton on the board.

Its website says its executives are involved in everything from sorting out
issues around the Greek financial meltdown to working to leverage economic
opportunities in Africa. It recently opened offices in the Far East and
Brazil.

Tax filings show that Band was last paid by the Clinton Foundation in 2012,
when he got $53,000. He remained linked to a European arm of the Clinton
Foundation until stepping down last month.

A source told The Post that it became increasingly difficult for Clinton
loyalists like Band to work with the Foundation after Chelsea Clinton was
brought on board. “She wanted to be famous and rich and have a place to
go,” said the source, adding that Chelsea was too inexperienced for the
job. “It just didn’t make any sense.”

*Democrats veer left then blast everyone else for being ‘right wing’
<http://nypost.com/2015/06/21/democrats-march-further-left-then-claim-the-rest-of-nation-is-right-wing/>
// NYPost // By Kyle Smith - June 21, 2015 *

Hillary Clinton knows she has more baggage than Newark Airport. She doesn’t
care, because she is counting on two strong forces to carry her to victory:
Demographics and the leftward turn in American culture.

She and the other Democrats suffer from cultural hubris, though. Their
social justice wings always threaten to take them a little too close to the
sun.

Even if all enemies are vanquished, the progressive wars can never be won.
The Democrats will always find new hostile territory to invade, always
creating a New Frontier.

Two weeks ago I wrote about a massive, silent cultural revolution in
American attitudes: Since just the middle of the last decade, there has
been a huge increase in support for gay marriage, legalized marijuana and
single parenthood.

These changes favor Democrats, as does increasing ethnic diversity. Mitt
Romney won the same percentage of white Americans on election day of 2012
as Ronald Reagan did in 1980. Reagan became president in a landslide.
Romney was seen pumping his own gas the following week.

Yet as the parade veers left, the Democrats must always race out to be in
front of it. This week’s Gallup poll says that a record high 47% of
Democratic voters identify as both socially liberal and economically
liberal or moderate. That’s up 8 points since the 2008 election of
President Obama and 17 points since 2001.

Just as yesterday’s luxuries become today’s necessities, Democrats are
continuously redefining what it means to be Democrats.

They celebrate their many gay-marriage victories, with a final, 50-state
resolution due soon, perhaps any day now. But that won’t be the end of the
issue. As recently as early 2012, even Obama opposed gay marriage. Within
15 minutes after he publicly reversed course, liberals were routinely
comparing gay-marriage opponents to racists, and 30 seconds after that
liberal judges started forcing evangelical bakeries out of business for
declining to participate in gay weddings.

Just this spring, Obama’s own solicitor general let slip that “it is
certainly going to be an issue” whether universities that decline to back
gay marriage will be able to retain their tax exemptions.

If such exemptions are henceforth made conditional on offering hearty
support for same-sex unions, by what logic would churches that oppose
homosexuality be able to retain their tax-exempt status?

We’ve already seen that the First Amendment’s guarantee of religious
freedom couldn’t save a Christian bakery.

Could Catholic priests be forced to marry Adam and Steve? “Not a chance,”
declared Slate’s Emily Bazelon in a sneering column that said this was a
mere “scare tactic.” Political sci-fi. You might as well fear an invasion
of zombies.

That was 2¹/₂ years ago. Two months ago, gay New York Times columnist Frank
Bruni pushed the goalposts down the field. He wrote approvingly of Mitchell
Gold, a gay philanthropist and founder of the activist group Faith in
America, which is dedicated to stamping out what it calls “religion-based
bigotry.” Gold says churches must “take homosexuality off the sin list.”

Last year an essay by The Atlantic’s Ta-Nehisi Coates touting reparations
payments for black Americans was warmly received by the left-wing
intelligentsia. Yet in a YouGov poll, only 6% of white voters agreed that
blacks deserve cash payments, while 59% of black voters think so.

How much longer will Democrats be able to forestall talking about an issue
that receives strong support from their base? It’s not hard to picture
Bernie Sanders clobbering Clinton with the idea in a debate.

And, by the way, Sanders’s self-identification as a “socialist” no longer
marks him as extreme, at least to Democrats. Forty-three percent of
Democrats say they approve of socialism, the same percentage who like
capitalism. The public, to say the least, does not agree: By a margin of
two to one, they preferred capitalism to socialism in a May YouGov poll.

Obama supports a federal minimum wage of $10.10 an hour. Hillary Clinton
has moved far to the left of that, seemingly endorsing a $15-an-hour wage
floor in a call to fast-food workers this month. On free trade, which is
backed by Obama, was a core policy of her husband’s administration and
which she herself has supported many times in the past, Clinton is suddenly
silent.

In order to lock down Latino support, Clinton has staked out a position to
the left of Obama’s extreme position on immigration, and less than 48 hours
after arsonists in Baltimore burned down an innocent CVS store, she said
“it is time to end the era of mass incarceration,” marking herself as
perhaps the first president ever to run overtly as a friend of the criminal
class.

The media often remind us that Democrats and Republicans used to forge
bipartisan policy solutions, scolding Republicans for supposedly moving
right.

But if the center is becoming a lonely place in American politics,
Democrats are walking away from it much more rapidly than Republicans are.

*Will Obama’s coalition readily accept Clinton?
<http://lasvegassun.com/news/2015/jun/20/will-obamas-coalition-readily-accept-clinton/>
// Las Vegas Sun // Clarence Page – June 20, 2015*

His campaign is a long shot, but I’m happy to see Vermont Sen. Bernie
Sanders putting forth a good impersonation of a serious challenge to
Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. Like a near-sighted javelin
thrower, the self-described democratic socialist may not score many points,
but he’ll keep the crowd alert.

The former first lady, senator and secretary of state needs someone to keep
her alert. Her avoidance of reporters and any other unscripted public
moments sometimes makes her appear to be asleep at the wheel.

Her slow reaction to widespread suspicions about her private, unsecured
email server, for example, seemed odd compared with her husband’s
rapid-response campaign team in 1992. And why encourage an image of
aloofness and entitlement at a time when voters are expecting candor and
transparency?

One wonders: Is she relying on her potential Republican opponents, whose
numbers seem to grow by the day, to trip over themselves so much that she
can quietly waltz her way to her party’s nomination? That’s not a totally
bad bet, considering how the mere mention of Clinton’s name was driving
right-wingers bananas years before anyone had reason to mention “Obama
derangement disorder.”

At least no one has demanded to see her birth certificate, but just wait.

Yet, as much as her campaign seems to be leaning on celebrity style more
than substance, her initial speeches offer hints of a long-term goal: She
aims to rally the same coalition of voters who twice elected President
Barack Obama.

You can hear it, for example, in her pronouncements on voting rights,
immigration, the incarceration explosion and equal pay for women.

At Texas Southern University in Houston, she issued a major appeal for
every American to be automatically registered to vote when they turn 18
unless they choose not to be. She called for a nationwide standard of at
least 20 days of early voting. She called on Congress to strengthen the
Voting Rights Act, which a 2013 Supreme Court ruling weakened. She also
attacked restrictive voter-identification card laws imposed by Republican
lawmakers in some states for discouraging lawful voters from voting.

Republican governors from two of those states, New Jersey’s Chris Christie
and Texas’ Rick Perry, sharply denied her accusation, even though Perry did
sign a controversial requirement that Texans show photo identification
before voting.

But those responses were politely restrained compared with those of
conservative critics who accused Clinton of “race-baiting” and “playing the
race card.”

“She needs black voter turnout in 2016 in order to win,” townhall.com
editor Katie Pavlich said on anchor Gregg Jarrett’s Fox News program. “And
the way that she’s going to do that is by perpetuating this bogus,
race-baiting narrative that somehow voter-ID laws disenfranchise minority
voters.”

Actually, that narrative is not so bogus. A report released last fall by
the Government Accountability Office, Congress’ investigative arm, on
voter-ID laws in Kansas and Tennessee found a dip in 2012 election turnout
of about 2 percent points in Kansas and between 2.2 and 3.2 percent in
Tennessee. As the Demoratic lawmakers who called for the probe suspected,
the GAO found the declines to be greater among younger and black voters.

That’s not a huge percentage, but it’s certainly big enough to have a
significant impact in close elections. Yet, the perception of minority
voter suppression is believed to have contributed to a surge in the
nationwide black turnout rate in 2012 that, for the first time, exceeded
the white turnout rate.

A big looming question: How much have black voters gotten over hard
feelings left over from Clinton’s long-running primary battle against Obama
in 2008? A lot of people have long memories, especially in politics.

Another question: Are Obama’s core supporters so disenchanted over what he
was unable to accomplish against his strong Republican opposition that they
won’t bother to vote this time?

That’s always possible. But here, too, Clinton has hope. She undoubtedly
hopes her political adversaries overreact harshly enough to remind her base
that things always could be worse. A lot worse.

*Hillary Clinton’s shameful charge to a children’s charity
<http://nypost.com/2015/06/20/hillary-clintons-shameful-charge-to-a-childrens-charity/>
// NY Post – June 20, 2015 *

Hillary Clinton says, “Success isn’t measured by how much the wealthiest
Americans have, but by how many children climb out of poverty.” So why did
she charge an exorbitant speaking fee to a charity that helps poor kids?

Fine, she sent the cash to another “nonprofit” — the family’s $2 billion
foundation. But Condi Rice, another ex-secretary of state, gave her own
(much lower) fee from the same outfit — the Boys and Girls Club of Long
Beach, Calif. — back to the charity.

Politico reports that Clinton charged $200,000 to speak at the club’s
annual fund-raiser last year, the most the group ever paid a speaker. As a
result, the club — which provides after-school programs to underprivileged
children — netted only $106,000 from the event, its lowest take in 25 years.

Rice spoke at its 2009 fund-raiser, charged $60,000 and immediately donated
it back. That event yielded nearly $258,000.

The difference — $150,000 — is a big deal for a charity with a budget of
under $3 million a year.

Hillary’s better half charged the charity $150,000 for a 2007 speech. And,
Politico notes, that “was reported as personal income — not a donation to
the Clinton Foundation.”

Oh, and the woman who says she “has spent my life fighting for children,
families and our country” gave her speech and left “without visiting any of
the club’s facilities to meet the children who benefit from its services,”
Politico reports.

Yep, the Clintons just love the little people.

*John Bolton: No Hillary Clinton or Rand Paul for President
<http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2015/06/20/john-bolton-no-hillary-clinton-or-rand-paul-for-president/>
// The Blaze // Fred Lucas – June 20, 2015 *

Former United Nations Ambassador John Bolton has not decided who he will
support for president, but he knows who he won’t.

Bolton, who served in the position under President George W. Bush, said he
will work to ensure that neither former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
nor Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul come to occupy the Oval Office.

“National security needs to be at the center of debate,” Bolton told
TheBlaze. “For the last six-and-a-half years there has been inadequate
debate on the threats we face.”

He will be pushing his super PAC  <http://boltonsuperpac.com/>and a
separate organization, Foundation for American Security and Freedom, to
make national security a more paramount issue.

“Hillary Clinton does not have sound judgment,” Bolton told TheBlaze. “She
is an ideological twin to President Obama. The majority of Republican
candidates for presidential candidates are in the right direction. I want
to see them elaborate on their good judgment.”

As for Paul, Bolton said he understands the Republican senator’s appeal to
conservatives on domestic issues, but argued his opposition to the Patriot
Act and unwillingness to take action abroad could put the United States in
a precarious situation.

“His views are contrary to the conservative and tea party movement,” Bolton
said. “There is a lot of support for him on domestic issue, but would lead
us down the wrong path on national security.”

Bolton considered a presidential run in 2016
<http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2015/05/14/john-bolton-is-not-running-for-president/>
himself
but opted against it. His political action committee contributed to 87
House and Senate candidates in the 2014 election cycle. He said he hasn’t
decided if his organizations would endorse a candidate in the Republican
primary or wait until the general election.

*OTHER DEMOCRATS NATIONAL COVERAGE*

*DECLARED*

*SANDERS*

*Sanders banters on HBO with Bill Maher, praises pope and seeks support of
younger voters
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2015/06/19/sanders-banters-on-hbo-with-bill-maher-praises-pope-and-seeks-support-of-younger-voters/>
// WaPo // John Wagner – June 20, 2015 *

ernie Sanders, the surging 73-year-old contender for the Democratic
presidential nomination, talked up his appeal to younger voters and his
appreciation of Pope Francis during an appearance Friday night on HBO’s
edgy “Real Time with Bill Maher.”

Maher welcomed Sanders to the live broadcast by informing him “you’re a
rock star now,” a reference to Sanders’s swelling crowds on the campaign
trail and his rising poll numbers.

Maher noted that Hillary Rodham Clinton remains well ahead with women
voters, telling Sanders that “some women you will just never get.”

“I don’t mean personally -- although that too,” Maher told a beaming
Sanders. “Because there’s a lot of enthusiasm for the first woman
candidate.”

But Maher said Sanders is doing well with men, particularly older men, and
said that he sees a lot of potential for Sanders to do well with younger
voters -- a point on which Sanders agreed.

“We are being very aggressive in reaching out to young people,” the senator
said, noting his large following on Facebook. “What we want to do is have
the idealism of the kids.”

Sanders cited climate change as an example -- kids want to lead the world
in fighting it, he said -- and praised the leader of the Catholic faith for
issuing his encyclical this week on the subject.

“This pope, dare I say, has been a miracle for humanity,” said Sanders, who
was born to Jewish parents and describes himself as a democratic socialist.
“He makes me very conservative on economic issues, and that he spoke out on
climate change in as forceful a manner as he did is just extraordinary.”

Sanders predicted that the pope’s input would have “a profound impact all
over this world.”

The show was broadcast from Los Angeles. On Saturday, Sanders is scheduled
to hold an event in Denver, where campaign officials said they already have
received about 7,000 RSVPs. If they all show up, it would be perhaps the
largest rally any candidate in either party has staged thus far in the 2016
campaign cycle.

*Defying conventions, Bernie Sanders emerges as a challenger for Hillary
Clinton
<http://www.kshb.com/news/political/defying-conventions-bernie-sanders-emerges-as-a-challenger-for-hillary-clinton>
// AP // Ken Thomas – June 20, 2015 *

Bernie Sanders likes to call it "practicing democracy."

He doesn't take the stage to a blaring soundtrack. He doesn't have a
teleprompter or a phalanx of Secret Service agents surrounding him. But
when his Brooklyn accent booms out at a campaign stop in rural Iowa, heads
nod along in approval.

"What I'm doing in this campaign is trying to tell the people the truth —
but a truth which is not heard a whole lot in Washington or discussed a lot
in the media," Sanders said recently at a picnic in Iowa's Warren County,
south of Des Moines.

"So let me lay it out on the table for you," he said. "You're living in a
country today which has more wealth and income inequality than any major
industrialized nation on earth."

In a race for the Democratic presidential nomination with Hillary Rodham
Clinton, the blunt talk about the economy and the gap between the rich and
poor is working for Sanders.

The independent senator from Vermont is an unconventional messenger at a
time when many politicians test-drive what they want to say in polls and
with focus groups.

Sanders is drawing sizable crowds in the early voting states. He's also
gaining against Clinton in very early polls, particularly in New Hampshire,
a factor that impresses the political class even though opinion surveys at
this point are limited in predicting who will win.

Clinton remains the race's overwhelming favorite, but there's no question
that the 73-year-old self-described democratic socialist, whose disheveled
white hair might remind some of Doc Brown from "Back to the Future," isn't
just a novelty.

"This is a unique individual," said Iowa Democratic state Rep. Scott Ourth,
who introduced Sanders last weekend at the picnic in Indianola. "This guy
has only one standard. If it's right for people, he's going to fight for
it. If it's bad for people, he's going to take a stand against it."

Drawing unexpectedly large crowds, the campaign has moved a town meeting
planned in Las Vegas on Friday into a more spacious venue. About 5,000
people are expected at a rally Saturday at the University of Denver.

"The challenge for us, really, is that at this point the crowds are way
ahead of us," said Sanders campaign manager Jeff Weaver.

Sanders is running with a relentless focus on policy. He rarely talks about
his family, other than mentioning his four children and 7 grandchildren
when explaining the importance of confronting climate change. In
Minneapolis he was joined on stage by his wife, Jane, and noted they had
just celebrated their 27th wedding anniversary.

He's promoting a massive government-led jobs program to fix roads and
bridges. He wants a $15-an-hour minimum wage, and higher taxes on the
wealthy and Wall Street. He advocates for a single-payer health care
system, an expansion of Social Security benefits and debt-free college.

He's combative, too.

Sanders often points to some European and Scandinavian countries that
provide subsidized or free education, universal health care and generous
family leave policies as models for the U.S.

While speaking to graduate students recently, Sanders asked a student from
Finland whether his country is "crazy" to pay for his education. Then he
grilled the students about U.S. policy on paid sick leave for new parents.

"C'mon guys, you're in graduate school!" he barked. "What are you teaching
these guys? Do you know anything?"

One woman yelled, "None," meaning no national policy on such leave.
Nodding, Sanders instructed the students that people in Finland get paid
leave after they have children.

"Ahhh. Now I want to get everybody very nervous," Sanders said
sarcastically. "This is called European socialism! Terrible, horrible,
right? Because none of you want to be able to go to college and graduate
school tuition-free.

"None of you, when you have kids, want the opportunity to bond with your
kids. Terrible! European socialism!"

His speeches often reflect such a black-and-white view of the world. He
rarely mentions that tax rates in such countries are far higher than in the
U.S.

It's a style that couldn't be more different than Clinton's.

Hours before the first major rally of her campaign, Clinton released a
Spotify playlist of songs, featuring music by Katy Perry, Kelly Clarkson
and Sara Bareilles. One of her campaign Twitter feeds showed a green
silhouette of her head wearing trendy headphones.

Clinton has been traveling with Secret Service agents since her husband's
presidency in the 1990s.

Sanders shows up at rallies and events with a small contingent of aides. In
Indianola, he carried a folded piece of paper scrawled with notes while he
spoke.

Other presidential candidates in Iowa and New Hampshire will linger long
after their speeches, trying to shake every hand and make a personal
connection with a potential voter. Sanders doesn't make a lot of small
talk. After receiving a standing ovation in Indianola, he was stopped
repeatedly for photos and handshakes — which he obliged — but he kept
moving.

"Very quickly, very quickly," he said to one man requesting a photograph.

For all of that, the woman he's challenging is perhaps the most dominant
front-runner within the party in a generation.

"Clinton is going to be a safer bet," said John MacBride, a 24-year-old
Sanders supporter who drove from Kansas City to see him speak. "A lot of my
peers think she's a safer bet. But they like what he says better."

*Bernie Sanders' battle to get on the New Hampshire ballot
<http://www.politico.com/story/2015/06/bernie-sanders-battle-to-get-on-the-new-hampshire-ballot-119251.html>
// Politico // Jonathan Topaz – June 20, 2015 *

Bernie Sanders has vowed to win the New Hampshire Democratic presidential
primary. As of right now, though, the Vermont independent isn’t entirely
assured that he’ll qualify for the ballot.

Unlike early nominating states such as Iowa and South Carolina — where the
process for getting on the ballot will be very simple for the Vermont
independent — it has the potential to get a bit dicey in the Granite State
(see below for the process).

At a town hall Friday in Nevada, a supporter said some of her friends were
still concerned Sanders would be running as a third-party candidate in the
mold of Ralph Nader — whom his campaign has explicitly cited as a model
they wanted to avoid. “I am running for the Democratic nomination!” Sanders
said loudly into the mic, drawing raucous cheers from the crowd.

It’s a complication for Sanders, who for a long time mulled a third-party
presidential bid as an independent. Unlike former Gov. Howard Dean, who was
the last Vermonter to run for president in 2004, Sanders has never called
himself a Democrat, has declined the Democratic Senate nomination in
Vermont and remains an independent in Congress, where he has served as an
independent since 1990. (He’s the longest-serving independent in
congressional history.)

Sanders does have many factors in his favor, and remains a virtual lock to
get on the New Hampshire ballot: The Democratic National Committee has
welcomed him into the Democratic race without qualification. Sanders has
caucused with the Democrats for the past 25 years and has held top
committee positions within the party — he’s now Senate Budget Committee
ranking member and served as Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee chairman
when the Democrats were in the majority. In Vermont, he’s voted in
Democratic presidential primaries.

He also has the unqualified support of the New Hampshire Democratic Party,
which would be allowed to make its case to a bipartisan commission in the
event of a challenge. “The New Hampshire Democratic Party considers Bernie
Sanders a Democratic candidate for President and we will work to satisfy
any requirements to make sure he’s on the ballot in February,” said state
party chairman Ray Buckley.

People in New Hampshire also note that it would be a political nightmare
for the state to ban Sanders — who is receiving more than 30 percent
support from New Hampshire Democratic voters according to two polls this
week — from the ballot. “It would cause all sorts of negative feedback if
Sanders was banned for the ballot, no matter if there technically was a
legal case or not,” said University of New Hampshire political science
professor Dante Scala.

Sanders has said several times that he will win in New Hampshire, and his
campaign doesn’t seem unduly concerned about getting on the ballot.

Said spokesman Michael Briggs: “We don’t think it’s going to be an issue.”

The process:

The Sanders campaign will file a declaration of candidacy — which will
declare his registration with the Democratic Party in the state — to the
New Hampshire Secretary of State’s office, which is tasked with certifying
his candidacy. New Hampshire Secretary of State William Gardner has not
committed to putting Sanders on the ballot, previously citing that Sanders
isn’t yet a registered Democrat.

Vermont doesn’t have voter registration by party, meaning that Sanders
can’t be a registered Democrat in the state even if he wanted to.

Even if Gardner certifies his candidacy, which is not a foregone
conclusion, Sanders can face another challenge. If an individual with
standing contests his candidacy, the bipartisan New Hampshire Ballot Law
Commission will hear an official challenge.

“Usually we’ve been pretty liberal about letting people challenge,” said
Brad Cook, the commission chairman, when asked how the committee determines
what New Hampshire residents have standing.

“Frankly, with the number of people running and the contentiousness of the
primary, I wouldn’t be surprised if we couldn’t find a Democrat to
challenge it,” said Cook, who added that many Republicans in the state
would also likely have standing to challenge his candidacy.

If the commission took up a challenge, Cook, a Republican appointed to his
position by Democrats, would assess Sanders’ candidacy with two Democrats
and two Republicans.

*Maher tells Bernie Sanders: Your campaign must be working ‘You’ve got
Hillary talking like Elizabeth Warren’
<http://www.rawstory.com/2015/06/maher-tells-bernie-sanders-your-campaign-must-be-working-youve-got-hillary-talking-like-elizabeth-warren/>
// Raw Story // Tom Boggioni – June 20, 2015 *

Friday night Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) got the rock star treatment from
Real Time host Bill Maher who praised the darkhorse candidate’s campaign
for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination, telling the fiercely
liberal senator that his run from the left has forced consensus favorite
Hillary Clinton to start “talking like Elizabeth Warren.”

Walking onto the stage to chants of “Ber-nie, Ber-nie” the Vermont
independent sat down and explained that his campaign was about something
other than normal politics, stating, “It’s a very radical idea: we’re going
to tell the truth.”

“The truth is that, for forty years, the middle class of this country has
been disappearing. And there has been a huge transfer of billions of
dollars of working families to the top one-tenth of one percent.” Sanders
said. “And what the people of this country are saying is, ‘Enough is
enough, our government, our country, belongs to all of us, not just a few
billionaires.'”

“So let’s dig down a little deeper into the campaign,” Maher replied. “I
mean you are closing the gap on Hillary, but obviously she’s still way
ahead with women. You do very well with men and the older — older men,
especially. Now some women you will just never get…I don’t mean you
personally.”

Maher went on to advise the candidate that “You could do well with younger
voters. They liked Ron Paul.  He was not a young-un, but he had that same
authenticity thing going,” before jokingly asking Sanders “Are you on
Tinder?”

Sander explained that his campaign has “A very active social media effort.”

“In the Senate, we have more people on our Facebook page, than any other
member of the United States Senate,” he said, before adding, “Look, what we
want to do is tap the idealism of the kids. And what the kids are saying,
for example, is that this country should lead the world in transferring our
energy system and dealing with climate change. And that solution we’re
going to talk about a whole lot.”

*Leaving Brooklyn, Bernie Sanders Found Home In Vermont
<http://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2015/06/20/415747576/leaving-brooklyn-bernie-sanders-found-home-in-vermont>
// NPR // Tamara Keith – June 20, 2015 *

How did a city kid, who grew up in a 3 1/2-room apartment in Brooklyn,
N.Y., end up the mayor of Burlington, Vt., and later one of the state's two
senators? For Bernie Sanders, it began with a subway ride into Manhattan
with his brother.

"We stopped near the Radio City Music Hall and at that point the state of
Vermont had a storefront there, advertising Vermont land," says Sanders.
"It was for tourists."

Sanders, 73, the independent senator turned Democratic presidential
candidate, has called Vermont home for almost all of his entire adult life.
It started when he was around 13 years old, a fascination with the Green
Mountain State born in glossy real estate guides.

"We picked up the brochures," Sanders says. "We read them and we saw farms
were for sale."

And then after college, in the mid-1960s, Sanders, his then-wife and his
brother pooled some inheritance money and bought a small piece of the dream.

"We had never been to Vermont in our lives; we just drove up," Sanders
says. "We bought 85 acres for $2,500. How's that? But it was woodland."

From Gadfly To Mayor

Before long, Sanders had moved to Vermont full time. He did a series of odd
jobs, and got active in politics as a member of the Liberty Union Party,
which defines itself as a nonviolent socialist party. That's when he met
his very good friend Huck Gutman, a poetry professor at the University of
Vermont.

"A couple of my students said, you know, there's a guy you should meet. He
sounds like you. And I don't think they meant that we both sounded like we
came from New York," says Gutman — who does in fact sound like a New
Yorker, though less so than Sanders. "It meant that we both sounded
progressive. So I remember meeting with Bernie and talking about politics,
and we've been friends ever since."

Sanders ran for senator twice and governor once, but, Gutman says, "It was
a third party of the sort that doesn't gain much traction in the United
States — anti-big business, anti-war."

Sanders never garnered more than 5 percent of the vote as a member of the
Liberty Union Party. He never changed his politics, but he did switch his
party registration to independent and set his sights a little lower. His
10-vote victory over a Democratic incumbent in the 1981 race to be mayor of
Burlington is now part of the legend of Bernie Sanders.

With that win, he went from gadfly to elected official — with all that
entailed.

Another part of the legend: the snowplows. His wife, Jane Sanders,
remembers many a snowy night when Mayor Sanders obsessively monitored the
progress of the city's snowplows.

"Before the end of the night he would be out on the trucks, on the
snowplows with them, to make sure things were going well," she says. "He
takes his responsibilities extremely seriously."

A Little League Through Force Of Will

In the Senate recently, that meant teaming up with Arizona Republican John
McCain to pass significant changes to the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Or, back when he was mayor and Jane was the head of the city's youth
agency, insisting that the economically depressed Old North End
neighborhood get its own children's baseball league.

"He told me, 'We're going to start an Old North End Little League,' and
everybody said, 'Oh, it can't be done, they just can't sustain it — we've
tried,' " says Jane. "And he said, 'No, we're going to do it, just — here,
do a poster, and put it out, and we'll have everybody meet.' "

That first Saturday, she said, 90 kids showed up, along with Bernie and two
city attorneys, who served as coaches. "We got them uniforms. And we still
run into people who say, 'I was on your team.' "

Now, there weren't actually enough children for age-appropriate teams, but
that didn't stop them: Kids ages 6 to 16 were all on the same team. Jane
says the teenagers were simply told to take it easy on the little guys.

"So it became the most compassionate and supportive place to be," she says.

The league still exists today.

Supportive and compassionate: That pretty much sums up Burlington — a city
of 40,000 that Bernie Sanders led for eight years.

Just Don't Call It The 'People's Republic Of Burlington'

The weekly Burlington farmers market is a central meeting point that
started shortly before Sanders became mayor. There are people doing yoga on
the grass and parents pushing their kids in strollers.

Walking around, you could get the impression that this is an ideal place to
pick up overpriced organic arugula, at the heart of the 'People's Republic
of Burlington' — but the people at the market say that stereotype is not
quite right.

"So much of it is seeing people bump into their friends and chitchat all
day long," says David Zuckerman. "And that's part of what Burlington is:
You go anywhere in Burlington — or frankly anywhere in Vermont — and you're
going to bump into somebody that either you know or knows someone you know."

Zuckerman is an organic vegetable farmer, pig farmer and chicken farmer,
and a state senator. Yes, he sells arugula, but this farmers market — and
Burlington — is really about people. About community, he says.

'He Needs His Fix Of Vermont'

On a recent Saturday Bernie Sanders sat outside an ice cream stand that
sells a maple soft-serve called a maple creemee. (I can report it is
delicious.) The restaurant has ample outdoor seating and a pretty amazing
view of Lake Champlain.

At first, it seemed like the interview might not work, as people constantly
tried to say hi to their senator or catch his eye. People walking by shot
cellphone pictures.

Sanders told a story about a trip he took back to New York 10 or 15 years
ago. It just didn't feel like home, he says.

"I was walking in Manhattan, and I saw people and I'd say hello, and people
had this look like I was threatening them," said Sanders. "Here, when you
walk down the street, you nod to people and say hello. In the rural areas
it's not uncommon for two cars going in a different direction to stop.
People chat."

His friends say that, for Bernie Sanders, the hardest part of running for
president may be spending so much time away from Burlington. Gutman says
that until his friend started running for president, he came home to
Vermont regularly.

"I don't mean to suggest he's a junkie, but I think he needs his fix of
Vermont," says Gutman. "I think he needs to get his feet on the ground in
this state and in this city to feel at home with himself, and I think that
is a great thing. He's grounded here."

Jane says Sanders came back from a recent campaign swing in Iowa, where the
landscape couldn't be more different, and he told her: "You're going to
like the people there — they're very much like Vermonters."

*Bernie Sanders Wows Hollywood Progressives at Two L.A. Fundraisers
<http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/bernie-sanders-wows-hollywood-progressives-804004>
// The Hollywood Reporter // Tina Daunt – June 20, 2015 *

With the dust still settling after Barack Obama’s and Hillary Clinton’s
glitzy fundraising trips to Hollywood this week, Clinton’s first official
Democratic rival — Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders — slipped quietly into
town Saturday for a pair of low-key events that didn’t raise seven-figure
sums, but did warm the hearts of two overflowing crowds of Hollywood
progressives.

Sanders’ supporters might be called the entertainment industry’s
irreconcilables — the left flank of the Hollywood Dems’ most progressive
faction, with activists deeply disappointed in Obama, who they supported,
and unwilling to sign on to a Clinton presidential campaign. In the former
Secretary of State, they see another moderate waiting to happen.

Early Saturday morning, they filled the already blazing frontyard of
actress Mimi Kennedy’s Van Nuys home and — at midday — the living room of
long-time activists Betty and Stanley Sheinbaum’s sprawling Brentwood Park
mansion to hear the program of a candidate they see as everything Hillary
is not.

“I’m here with my wife and my friends because we believe Bernie is
providing us with the opportunity to have a voice and a role in the
Democratic process at a time when progressives are on the rise,” said
former California state Senator Tom Hayden, who introduced Sanders at the
Van Nuys event.

“Bernie has launched a very critical campaign in several states,” Haden
said. “He’s actually doing well in the early polls. He has an opportunity
to change the conversation in the country. He has an opportunity to be an
effective debater (against Clinton) in the primaries. He has an opportunity
to attract Libertarians and Republicans, as well as Democrats and
Socialists. It always was a motley crew — the progressive coalition.”

With Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren definitely out of the race,
Sanders — a self-described Democratic socialist — is the candidate who
checks all the progressive boxes, earning him a devoted Los Angeles
following. About 300 people turned out for Sanders’ two events on Saturday.
Attendees included Days of Our Lives actress Deidre Hall, Fear and Loathing
in Las Vegas producer Richard Foos, Sister Act producer Cindy Gilmore
Asner, filmmaker James H. Stern and actress/producer Sheila Emery.

In Van Nuys, Sanders told that crowd that the best part of running for
president is being able to talk about the issues the other candidates are
avoiding.

“Our campaign is catching fire,” he said. “It’s for one simple reason: We
are telling the truth. And I think that’s what the American people want to
hear. The truth may not be necessarily pleasant, but we can’t go forward
unless we have the courage to take a hard look at where we are today. And
where we are today is not in a good place.”

Income inequality and working conditions are one of his major concerns, and
he recently put his views to one interviewer like this: “What we have seen
is that while the average person is working longer hours for lower wages,
we have seen a huge increase in income and wealth inequality, which is now
reaching obscene levels. This is a rigged economy, which works for the rich
and the powerful, and is not working for ordinary Americans. You know, this
country just does not belong to a handful of billionaires.”

Since declaring his candidacy last month, Sanders has pointedly rejected
the usual stump speech ambiguities. His style seems to declare that when
you’re clearly on the attack, you don’t need room to maneuver. He has
declared himself against free-trade agreements and the Keystone XL
pipeline. He wants higher taxes on corporations and investors’ capital
gains to finance universal healthcare and free college educations for all
qualifying students. He has introduced legislation to require paid leave
and vacation time for every American worker.

He wants more regulation of Wall Street and the big banks and a rollback of
the Citizens United decision that ushered in the era of Super PAC’s. “I
don’t believe that the men and women who defended American democracy fought
to create a situation where billionaires own the political process,” he
said. Sanders, in fact refuses to accept Super PAC contributions and
several millions his campaign has taken in so far came from donors whose
average check was $43.

“Look, we knew from day one that we don’t have any Super PACs, and I don’t
have too many billionaires putting a lot of money into the campaign,”
Sanders told supporters gathered in the Sheinbaums' living room. Promoting
laughter, he added: “In fact, we have no billionaires.”

But he said that he believes he’ll have enough money to run a strong
campaign. In fact, Sanders has declared himself “stunned” by the crowds his
campaign stops have drawn. On Saturday, the Kennedy and Sheinbaum events
were no exception.

Betty and Stanley Sheinbaum are as close as the progressive Westside comes
to a first couple. (She’s Jack Warner’s daughter, and he’s a former
economics professor turned anti-Vietnam War and civil liberties activist.)
Their light-filled Brentwood Park living room has hosted generations of
liberal Democratic politicians and progressive foreign leaders. Some of
Bill Clinton's first introductions to Hollywood occurred there.

Daniel Ellsberg’s defense in the Pentagon Papers case was planned there and
the ACLU Foundation of Southern California founded around the fireplace
before which Sanders spoke on Saturday.

“In this country, when we stand together there are extraordinary things we
can do,” Sanders told the overflowing crowd. “We can provide health care to
all of our people. We can create decent paying jobs for all of our people.
We can lead the world in terms of combating climate change. We can end
racism and sexism and homophobia in the United States. We can end the
disgrace of having the highest rate of childhood poverty. All of that is
possible. This is not a poor country. This is a rich country. So work with
me please in bringing about this political revolution."

Amid rousing applause he added: "Let’s stand together and let’s do what
needs to be done to make this country the greatest country in the world.”

Following his Brentwood Park appearance, Sanders was off to Denver to
address a huge gathering of supporters eager to drink from the cup of
unadulterated progressive conviction.

*OTHER*

*Obama, Clinton mining state's gold, not voters
<http://www.latimes.com/local/politics/la-me-pol-california-politics-obama-20150621-story.html>
// LA Times // Cathleen Decker - June 21, 2015*

Last week proved anew just how convincingly California has become the place
where politicians go to rich people's homes to talk about the lives of
less-fortunate people they rarely meet.

President Obama crossed into Southern California airspace on Thursday and
promptly took part in two events with donors, one at the home of producer
Chuck Lorre and the second hosted by entertainer Tyler Perry. Later he had
dinner with Hollywood moguls Steven Spielberg and Jeffrey Katzenberg.

"Just dinner with friends," White House spokesman Eric Schultz said.

On Friday, after an interview for a comedian's podcast in Highland Park,
Obama spoke in San Francisco at the annual meeting of the nation's mayors,
then hitfundraisers on Nob Hill and at the Golden Gate Bridge-view home of
Tom Steyer, the hedge-fund billionaire who spent $74 million to become the
nation's most generous individual political donor in 2014. Then it was off
to Palm Springs, where Obama had plenty of time for a couple of rounds of
golf before Sunday's departure.

Hillary Rodham Clinton surfaced in Southern California on Friday, holding
three fundraisers in wealthy environs during which she "continued talking
about her commitment to being a champion for everyday Americans," her
campaign said.

She spoke to the mayors in San Francisco on Saturday, then raised money
elsewhere in the city. Clinton's speech to the mayors, an emotional
discussion of the lasting stain of racism, was the first non-fundraising
event in California of her two-month-old campaign.

For Democrats, the absence of a connection with the non-wealthy in
California prompts a certain unease, since it cuts against the party's
desired image and policy priorities. But it also represents a giant
political victory, one whose major participants include Clinton and her
husband, President Clinton, and Obama.

When a state is completely in the bag for either political party, there's
no need — indeed, it arguably would be wasteful — to spend the resources it
takes to mount an effort to persuade voters. And with more than a little
help from Republicans, Democrats have commanded the state completely for
two decades.

As last week reminded, California now serves the single purpose of
providing the financial heft to be used in the states that matter.

"California's just different. It's a money machine now, more than anything
else," said Tom Epstein, a former Clinton administration political hand and
now a vice president at Blue Shield of California, based in San Francisco.
Epstein's experience dates to the days it wasn't.

Little more than a generation ago, California's urban centers, suburban
sprawl and rural towns were regular battlegrounds for presidential
candidates. In 1988, Republican nominee George H.W. Bush held two campaign
events in Southern California the Sunday before election day, a time set
aside for big targets. A few days earlier, Democratic nominee Michael S.
Dukakis had chartered a train to choo-choo up the Central Valley, where he
spoke in Hanford, Fresno and Stockton.

Bush won — but when he ran for reelection four years later, Bill Clinton
used California to paint himself as the candidate who best represented the
future. Voters cranky about the recession-battered present sided with him.

Clinton's 13-point victory here was striking, and easy. His last California
visit came weeks before the election, with an exclamation-point foray into
the then-Republican stronghold Orange County.

Epstein became the administration's California point person, charged with
keeping Clinton in good favor here as he looked to repeat his victory in
1996.

California "was a very high priority," Epstein said. "Virtually every trip
he did he had a little reception for his supporters and tried to keep them
fired up and engaged.... The president really enjoyed California as we all
know, enjoyed hanging out with the Hollywood types and engaged pretty well
with Northern California. It was a top political priority in a way it just
isn't any more."

The attention dovetailed with Republican campaigns against illegal
immigration that enraged the state's growing Latino population, whose
retribution cinched Clinton's second victory and four subsequent Democratic
presidential wins here. President Obama lost the 2008 primary to Hillary
Clinton but won swamping victories here in the last two general elections.

Nothing, at this early moment, appears to stand in the way of Hillary
Clinton winning a resounding primary victory in June, followed by the
seventh-straight general election win for a Democrat in the state. Every
California poll shows her as the front-runner.

Hillary Clinton could use the state's cutting-edge image as Bill Clinton
did, embracing the tech wonders of Northern California — where the state's
center of political gravity has shifted — to portray herself as completely
in tune with the economic needs of the future. That is one of her main
planks, but there will be a temptation to put forward that argument — and
all others — in states that matter.

For his part, Obama has lavished attention on California's fundraising
salons — the Bay Area visit was the 20th of his presidency, most of them
involving money. To the mayors on Friday, he noted the presence of Gov.
Jerry Brown and Rep. Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco, briefly praising
Brown's moves on climate change and lauding the House Democratic leader
despite their recent break over a trade treaty.

Apart from that, there was no talk about the state in which he stood. The
mayors, to be sure, came from all over, so parochialism might have had
limited benefits. But it seemed symbolic nonetheless that Obama said almost
nothing at all about California before he left to collect more of its money.

*GOP*

*DECLARED*

*BUSH*

*Can Jeb Bush Win the Christian Right?
<http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2015/06/20/can-jeb-bush-win-the-christian-right/>
// WSJ // Dante Chinni – June 20, 2015 *

Here’s a challenge for Jeb Bush: Evangelical Christians like him – but they
don’t seem eager to vote for him. That’s one reason Mr. Bush hasn’t met
expectations that he’d break away from the GOP pack. Here’s a look at how
he fares currently, in three charts.

* * *

1. Jeb’s Evangelical Strength, Weakness

Some 55% of white evangelicals hold a favorable view of Mr. Bush—a larger
share than for any other GOP candidate tested by the Pew Research Center.
For Mr. Bush, that’s the good news.

* * *

2. Mike Huckabee Out Front

But those same voters favor other GOP candidates over Mr. Bush. He trails
Mike Huckabee significantly among evangelicals as their top choice for
president.

* * *

3. Evangelical Voters Early Influence

One reason for this may be that while Mr. Bush is seen favorably by many
evangelicals, he also leads his rivals in the share who hold a negative
view of him. That suggests that many evangelical voters are off the table
for Mr. Bush, at least for now.

And that’s significant, because evangelical voters have a big presence in
states that fall early on the nomination calendar. Mr. Bush doesn’t need to
dominate among evangelicals, since he appeals to a wide set of GOP voters.
But he does need a solid share of evangelical votes to build a winning
coalition.

*Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio’s backyard battle royal
<http://www.politico.com/story/2015/06/jeb-bush-and-marco-rubios-backyard-battle-royal-119247.html#ixzz3dcuoAp36>
// Politico // Marco Caputo – June 20, 2015 *

Jeb Bush built the Miami-Dade Republican Party. And now Marco Rubio wants
to take possession.

Just five days after Bush made his campaign for president official, Rubio
will be the headliner Saturday at the local GOP’s Lincoln Day Dinner
fundraiser. It’s indicative of the awkward predicament South Florida’s two
White House hopefuls find themselves in, and one of the complications of
having two Miami Republicans running simultaneously for the nation’s
highest office.

Known simply as “Jeb” and “Marco,” the men are longtime allies, friends and
neighbors who live a five-minute drive from each other in bordering cities.
Now the Miami-Dade GOP, built into a powerhouse by Bush in the 1980s, isn’t
big enough for the two of them.

The family feud between these two titans of the Republican Party has loomed
for months, during which GOP insiders from Miami to Tallahassee have dealt
with it like many a conflicted family: with denial. Then it became
indisputable Monday when Bush officially announced his bid — and his
surrogates threw a few not-so-subtle jabs at Rubio for his lack of
accomplishments and executive experience.

In one of the most politically dynamic counties in the most politically
dynamic state, many Republicans say it will only get worse.

“There’s a lot of passion, and this could almost literally come to blows,”
said David Custin, an independent and longtime Miami-Dade political
consultant who’s often hired to work on some of the roughest campaigns.

“If someone says the wrong thing in Nevada or something, there could be a
brawl at the Ball & Chain bar in Little Havana. If someone starts shoving
somebody in Illinois, fists could fly at The Pub in Coral Gables,” Custin
said. “A lot of us, a lot of my Republican clients, don’t know what to do.
They don’t want to pick a side. But they might have to.”

The contest between the two is particularly vexing to many here because
Bush and Rubio are party icons in Miami-Dade and across the state. Most
Republicans who run for office — especially in a primary — covet the
endorsement of both. They’re featured in candidate mailers, ads, robocalls,
fundraisers and rallies. Their respective endorsements are believed to move
poll numbers.

Perhaps the most-conflicted Republican of all is Nelson Diaz, the county
party chairman who secured Rubio’s commitment to appear at the fundraiser a
year ago — before it was clear that the first-term senator would run for
president. Diaz used to work as Rubio’s legislative aide. But he’s also a
lobbyist for Southern Strategy Group, established by Paul Bradshaw – the
husband of Bush’s top adviser, Sally Bradshaw.

“The Republican Party of Miami is and will remain neutral until we have a
nominee, at which point we will go all out to ensure there is a Republican
in the White House in 2016,” Diaz said, acknowledging a measure of
frustration that he has to bat down false rumors that he’s trying to give
Rubio an edge.

There are benefits, though, to being home to two serious candidates for the
presidency: Diaz on Friday triumphantly announced that the Lincoln Day
Dinner was sold out, and that the local GOP hasn’t had this many attendees
in more than 25 years.

The tensions and rumblings surrounding the question of who backs whom have
ratcheted up as the polling margin between the two men has shrunk. The two
are virtually deadlocked in Florida – a state that Republicans likely must
win in order to carry the White House. Bush nominally leads Rubio among
Florida Republicans, 20 percent to 18 percent — an inside-the-error margin
— according to Quinnipiac University’s latest survey. Wisconsin Gov. Scott
Walker comes in a distant third (out of 16 potential candidates) with 9
percent support.

The trend has been in Rubio’s favor. The two percentage point margin
between the two represents a net shift of 10 points toward Rubio and away
from Bush since March, when the former governor led the U.S. senator 24-12
percent in a Quinnipiac poll.

Nationally, it’s a similar story. According to Real Clear Politics’
national polling average of the race, Bush is essentially tied with Rubio.
The margin between the two is less than a percentage point, with Walker in
between. At its height at the beginning of the year, Bush’s lead over Rubio
was 17 percent to 5 percent. Bush’s advantage started to dissipate about
the same time Rubio announced for president in April.

The venue for Rubio’s campaign announcement – the Freedom Tower, nicknamed
“The Ellis Island of the South” — was a testament to the history of Miami,
particularly for Cuban exiles and immigrants. Many had their immigration
status processed at the iconic Mediterranean-style building after they fled
to the United States in the wake of Fidel Castro’s 1959 coup.

Bush’s Monday announcement also took place within the county borders, but
at a gymnasium lacking that symbolism. His team held a larger, more
traditional and well-organized campaign announcement that showcased more
surrogates and videos explaining his biography – a tacit admission that
Bush, who last ran for office in 2002, knows he needs to start from scratch
in introducing himself to voters. Where Rubio spoke only a line of Spanish
in his address, Bush spoke more Spanish and emphasized Latino culture.

It’s a practice he learned here in Miami-Dade, where campaigning in Spanish
— with a salsa-attuned-ear to Latin culture — is a must. Unlike any other
county in the United States, registered Republicans in Miami-Dade are
overwhelmingly Hispanic – almost 73 percent – and nearly all
Cuban-American. There are more Republicans here (it’s the most-populous
county in the state, with 1.3 million voters) than anywhere else in
Florida. And they vote at some of the highest rates in the state.

The nearly 360,000 registered Republicans are outnumbered 42 percent to 28
percent by registered Democrats but GOP politicians control the county’s
power structure, holding more seats on the county commission and the
state’s legislative and congressional delegations. As a result, GOP
politics, and therefore countywide politics, are often covered more in
Spanish TV and radio than in English here.

A majority of the county’s top elected officials – the three Cuban-American
members of Congress, top Republican state legislators – are with Bush, an
established figure since 1980. The race, though, could be far closer among
rank-and-file voters, said Armando Ibarra, who’s not siding with anyone and
is the director of club growth for Miami-Dade’s young Republicans.

“People are conflicted. Jeb has ties that stretch back 30 years in this
community, and that’s tough to match. But Marco is in a good spot. What I
hear from some people is that they were jittery about Jeb for a while,”
Ibarra said. “It’s going to be hard for a lot of Cuban-Americans in the end
to resist the temptation to vote for Marco, a son of this community.
There’s a saying with Cubans, ‘la juventud impone’ – it means something
like, ‘the youth gets ahead,’ that what the older generation is doing is
for the younger. A lot of older people like the idea that a kid who was
riding bikes in the neighborhood could be president.”

But Sasha Tirador, an independent political consultant who often handles
Spanish-language Republican campaigns, said she has heard older
Cuban-Americans grouse that Rubio didn’t wait his turn.

“The sense among many of them is that Marco betrayed his mentor,” Tirador
said. She said that Bush’s record of accomplishments might be more
attractive to Republican voters here, even Cuban-Americans, who don’t
necessarily view Bush as an Anglo.

“Jeb Bush is more than an honorary Cuban. He’s an honorary Hispanic,” she
said.

More than any other single figure in the county, Bush is responsible for
making the GOP what it is in Miami — and, perhaps, the state. And those
efforts helped pave the way for Rubio’s rise.

The bilingual Bush moved to Miami in 1980 when he was 27 years old (Rubio
was 9) to work on his father’s campaign for president and then vice
president on the ticket of Ronald Reagan, whose campaign team identified
Cuban-Americans as ripe for plucking because of their cultural
conservatism, vehement anti-communism and still-fresh memories of John F.
Kennedy’s botched Bay of Pigs invasion.

Ahead of Reagan’s 1984 re-election campaign, Jeb became chair of the county
party. He became known as a relentless recruiter who reveled in his work —
he described converting Democrats as “missionary work.”

The results: 4,000 Democrats switched their party registration that year,
with Bush hand-delivering half of that total to the elections office in a
single day. On one notable occasion, immediately after a 1984
naturalization ceremony in the Orange Bowl, nearly 10,000 Hispanics
registered Republican. In all, voter rolls grew 20 percent that year, an
increase disproportionately due to Hispanics, 74 percent of whom registered
Republican. Bush’s efforts helped reduced the Democrats’ 3-1 registration
edge over Republicans to 2-1 by Election Day, The Miami Herald reported.

A decade later, Bush ran for his first statewide elected office against
incumbent Gov. Lawton Chiles and narrowly lost. He continued building the
local GOP but also began to direct his efforts at the state level as well.
He won in 1998, becoming the first Republican since Reconstruction to
govern with a majority-Republican Legislature. In his 2002 re-election, Jeb
throttled his opponent as Republicans seized the Governor’s mansion,
Florida Legislature and Cabinet. In both of his wins, Bush carried
Miami-Dade, which remained disproportionately loaded with Democratic voters.

Along the way, Rubio entered Bush’s orbit. A child of the Reagan years,
Rubio came of age during the Bush-led Republican ascendancy in Florida. He
interned for Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and, in 1996, was recruited
by Bush’s future state GOP chairman, Al Cardenas, to run Miami
get-out-the-vote efforts for Bob Dole’s doomed presidential campaign. Two
years later, he won a city commission seat in the middle-class suburb of
West Miami, which borders the tonier Coral Gables where Bush lives today.
In 1999, less than a year after Bush assumed office, Rubio won a tough
special election for a state House seat.

A loyal Bush-agenda voter, Rubio scaled the rungs of power in the state
House and quickly began running for a future post as Florida House speaker.
Bush’s machine helped, but Rubio did much of it on his own as well.

Rubio started his two-year term as speaker in 2007, the same year Bush left
office due to term limits, and became the standard bearer for his legacy.
He hired Bush’s old staffers and policy wonks and resisted the agenda of
then-GOP Gov. Charlie Crist, who was viewed by conservatives with
suspicion. When the two clashed in the 2010 Senate race, Bush and his
network helped keep Rubio alive until he picked up momentum and defeated
Crist.

Rubio showed his gratitude by lavishing praise on Bush in his “American
Son” autobiography. A year after that, in 2013, Republicans started to turn
on both of them for supporting a pathway to citizenship for illegal
immigrants. Rubio tried to make amends with conservatives and backed away
from the immigration bill he helped draft. But Bush didn’t change much and,
unlike Rubio, stuck by his support for the Common Core educational
standards.

It caused a strain with the local party: the Republican Executive Committee
voted in September 2013 to oppose Common Core, a slap at the self-styled
“education governor.”

“Is loyalty to its lead promoters – Jeb Bush and the rest of the Republican
leadership — so cemented that we will be whipped into one mindset and put
party over principal?” activist Pam Evans asked Republicans before the vote.

Even as two favorite sons ascend to the national stage, the Republican
brand in Miami-Dade is diminishing. Local voters have drifted leftward in
the last two presidential elections: President Obama won the county in 2012
by a stunning margin of 208,459 votes, enabling him to squeak past Mitt
Romney in Florida. Registered Democrats now outnumber Republicans by
188,119; for the first time last year, voters of no major party affiliation
– typically called independents — now outnumber registered Republicans.

As if those trends weren’t worrisome enough for Bush and Rubio, younger
Cuban-Americans are less likely to register or vote Republican like their
parents or grandparents — the GOP is the last choice for non-Cuban
Hispanics lately when they register to vote.

*Jeb Bush's Standing Improves Among Republicans
<http://www.nbcnews.com/MEET-THE-PRESS/JEB-BUSHS-STANDING-IMPROVES-AMONG-REPUBLICANS-N379126>
// NBC News // Mark Murray – June 21, 2015*

Jeb Bush's standing among Republican primary voters continues to improve,
Marco Rubio remains popular with the party and two-thirds of GOP voters say
they couldn't support Donald Trump.

Those are the findings from a brand-new NBC News/Wall Street Journal, which
was conducted June 14-18 — during the build-up and coverage of Bush's and
Trump's official presidential announcements.

According to the poll, 75 percent of Republicans say they could see
themselves supporting Bush, the former Florida governor, for president,
versus 22 percent who couldn't (+53 points). That's up from his 70
percent-27 percent score in April (+43), and 49 percent-42 percent score in
March (+7).

Rubio, the Florida senator, has the highest margin of support among
Republicans, with 74 percent who could see themselves backing him and 15
percent who couldn't (+59) - unchanged from April's poll.

Meanwhile, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, who is expected to announce his
presidential bid next month, has plenty of upside with GOP voters: 57
percent could see themselves supporting him, versus 19 percent who couldn't
(+38), but there's another 21 percent who say they don't know his name.

The most unpopular GOP presidential candidate in the poll? Donald Trump,
who announced his White House bid last Tuesday (but who still has yet to
file his "statement of candidacy" with the Federal Election Commission).
Just 32 percent of Republican primary voters say they could see themselves
supporting him, compared with a whopping 66 percent who couldn't (-34).

Below are the scores on this question for the full GOP field:

•                     Marco Rubio: 74 percent-15 percent (+59)

•                     Jeb Bush: 75 percent-22 percent (+53)

•                     Scott Walker: 57 percent-19 percent (+38)

•                     Mike Huckabee: 65 percent-32 percent (+33)

•                     Ben Carson: 50 percent-21 percent (+29)

•                     Rick Perry: 53 percent-31 percent (+22)

•                     Ted Cruz: 51 percent-31 percent (+20)

•                     Rick Santorum: 49 percent-40 percent (+9)

•                     Bobby Jindal: 36 percent-28 percent (+8)

•                     Rand Paul: 49 percent-45 percent (+4)

•                     Carly Fiorina: 31 percent-29 percent (+2)

•                     John Kasich: 25 percent-30 percent (-5)

•                     Chris Christie: 36 percent-55 percent (-19)

•                     Lindsey Graham: 27 percent-49 percent (-22)

•                     George Pataki: 13 percent-44 percent (-31)

•                     Donald Trump 32 percent-66 percent (-34)

The margin of error on this question in the NBC/WSJ poll is plus-minus 6.4
percentage points. The full poll - which will include the horserace numbers
for the Democratic and Republican fields, as well as general-election
numbers - will be released on Monday night at 6:30 pm ET.

*Jeb Bush faces key test on immigration
<http://www.abqjournal.com/601442/opinion/jeb-bush-faces-key-test-on-immigration.html>
// Albequerque Journal // Andres Oppenheimer – June 20, 2015 *

Jeb Bush, who speaks fluent Spanish and has a Mexican-born wife, is the
Republican hopeful who would do best among Hispanic voters in the 2016
presidential elections. But his party – and he himself – have veered so far
to the right on immigration and social issues that even he will have a big
Latino problem.

Most pollsters agree Republicans will need between 40 percent and 44
percent of the Hispanic vote to win in 2016, more than they received in
recent elections. The most recent Republican candidate, Mitt Romney, lost
the 2012 election to a large extent because he only got 27 percent of the
Latino vote.

There is little question that Jeb would be the best equipped to win Latino
votes among the current Republican hopefuls. He is the only one who speaks
Spanish at home, has lived in Mexico and Venezuela, majored in Latin
American studies at the University of Texas, and has had close
Cuban-American ties since he moved to Miami in 1980.

It was no coincidence during his presidential announcement on Monday the
crowd chanted “Viva Jeb!” Congresswoman Ileana Ross Lehtinen, R-Miami,
said: “Jeb is Cuban. He’s Nicaraguan. He’s Venezuelan.”

While fellow Republican hopefuls Sens. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., and Ted Cruz,
R-Texas, have Cuban parents and Rubio also speaks fluent Spanish, they
don’t have a Mexican wife and Mexican-American children who can campaign
with them in Spanish, nor Bush’s personal history of having lived in Latin
America.

Despite all of this, Bush would face an uphill battle to get more than 40
percent of the Latino vote and win the 2016 elections. Democrats and
pro-immigration groups are already stressing that Bush is running for what
they call “the deportation party” and say that he is already retrenching
from his previous moderation on immigration issues.

Among their main lines of attack:

First, Bush is voicing strong opposition to Obama’s executive action on
immigration, which would freeze the deportations of up to 5 million
undocumented immigrants. That will put Bush at odds with millions of
Hispanic voters who have relatives and friends who would benefit from
Obama’s measure, critics say.

Second, Bush has adopted the conservative Republicans’ mantra that “we have
to secure the border” before implementing immigration reform. Critics say
that new measures to “secure the border” would not only be a waste of money
at a time when illegal immigration from Mexico is at a historic low, but
also is a Republican excuse for not doing anything about undocumented
immigrants now in the country.

Third, Bush has stepped back from his previous support for eventual
citizenship for undocumented immigrants who regularize their status,
writing in a 2013 book that he supports a legal path to permanent status,
but not to citizenship, critics say. In fact, Bush has gone back and forth
on this, but remains the most pro-immigrant among the major Republican
hopefuls.

Fourth, Bush supports many conservative stands, such as opposition to
Obamacare and raising the minimum wage, which most Hispanics support.

Matt Barreto and Gary Segura, of Latino Decisions, a Hispanic market
polling firm, wrote earlier this week that these and other stands are
likely to cause Bush to lose the Latino vote.

“Latino voters have proven more than willing to reject even actual Latinos
as candidates when their policy positions are in contrast to the community
preferences,” they wrote.

My opinion: The key test for Bush’s presidential bid will be whether he can
withstand the temptation to shift further to the right on immigration
during the primaries, where he will need to court anti-immigration voters
in northern states and where he will be attacked by his fellow Republican
hopefuls for his support for comprehensive immigration reform.

If Bush can win the nomination by keeping a pro-immigration profile and
convincing fellow Republicans that – whether they like his immigration
stance or not – he’s their best hope to win the White House, he’ll have a
chance in 2016.

If, as many of us suspect, he shifts to the right on immigration because he
thinks that it will be the only way to win the primaries, as Romney did in
2012, he’s doomed to lose the Hispanic vote, and the 2016 election.

*Mitt Romney, Jeb Bush Say Confederate Flag Should be Removed
<http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2015/06/20/mitt_romney_jeb_bush_call_for_removing_confederate_flag_from_south_carolina.html>
// Slate // Daniel Politi – June 20, 2015 *

Those calling for the removal of the Confederate flag that is flying above
the grounds of South Carolina’s state Capitol received support from two
Republicans on Saturday. Mitt Romney was by far the most forceful. The 2012
Republican presidential nominee did not mince words, taking to Twitter to
write: “Take down the #ConfederateFlag at the SC Capitol. To many, it is a
symbol of racial hatred. Remove it now to honor #Charleston victims.”

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush wasn’t as direct but his words left little
room for interpretation. In a post on Facebook, Bush said that his position
“is clear” on what should be done with the flag. "In Florida, we acted,
moving the flag from the state grounds to a museum where it belonged," Bush
said. "This is obviously a very sensitive time in South Carolina and our
prayers are with the families, the AME church community and the entire
state. Following a period of mourning, there will rightly be a discussion
among leaders in the state about how South Carolina should move forward and
I'm confident they will do the right thing." Bush's words appeared to
closely echo President Obama's views on the issue. “The president has said
before he believes the Confederate flag belongs in a museum, and that is
still his position,” spokesman Eric Schultz told reporters aboard Air Force
One on Friday.

Other Republican contenders got close to the line but fell short of saying
the flag should be removed outright. Carly Fiorina, for example, said she
agrees the flag is a “symbol of racial hatred” but her “personal opinion is
not what’s relevant here,” according to the Associated Press. Senator Ted
Cruz of Texas, meanwhile, told the Washington Post that South Carolina is
the one that has to decide what to do about the flag. “I think that’s a
question for South Carolina, and the last thing they need is people from
outside the state coming in and dictating how they should resolve that
issue,” Cruz said.

Although Romney’s strong statement was surprising considering how
Republican leaders have appeared reluctant to discuss the role of race in
the church shooting in South Carolina, the New York Times points out that
the former governor has been speaking up against the flag for years. “That
flag shouldn’t be flown,” Romney said in 2008. “That’s not a flag I
recognize.”

*Confederate flag fell in Florida under Gov. Jeb Bush
<http://www.tampabay.com/blogs/the-buzz-florida-politics/confederate-flag-fell-in-floirda-under-gov-jeb-bush/2234457>
// Tampa Bay Times // Alex Leary – June 20, 2015 *

Take down the #ConfederateFlag at the SC Capitol. To many, it is a symbol
of racial hatred. Remove it now to honor #Charleston victims. – Mitt Romney

We've asked the Bush campaign if he agrees with Romney. It would seem so.
Florida removed the flag under Bush. (Bush began yesterday not addressing
the racial motivation behind the shooting in Charleston but then pointedly
called the shooter a "racist."

"My position on how to address the Confederate flag is clear," Bush said in
a statement provided to the Tampa Bay Times. "In Florida we acted, moving
the flag from the state grounds to a museum where it belonged. This is
obviously a very sensitive time in South Carolina and our prayers are with
the families, the AME church community and the entire state. Following a
period of mourning there will rightly be a discussion among leaders in the
state about how South Carolina should move forward, and I'm confident they
will do the right thing."

From the St. Petersburg Times, Feb. 10, 2001:

The Confederate flag was removed this month from the Florida state Capitol,
with little notice and none of the uproar that accompanied its departure in
other Southern states.

The "Stainless Banner," which features the Confederate battle flag design
in the top left corner of a field of white, was retired Feb. 2. It had
flown since 1978 outside the Capitol's west entrance.

Gov. Jeb Bush and Secretary of State Katherine Harris -- Republicans who
angered thousands of black Floridians during the controversial presidential
election -- simply decided it was time for the flag to go.

"Regardless of our views about the symbolism of the . . . flags -- and
people of goodwill can disagree on the subject -- the governor believes
that most Floridians would agree that the symbols of Florida's past should
not be displayed in a manner that may divide Floridians today," Bush
spokeswoman Katie Baur said in a written statement.

Flags commemorating the French, Spanish and British governments that once
ruled the state and flew beside the Confederate flag also were removed. All
four will be housed at the Florida Museum of History a few blocks from the
Capitol.

"The governor is confident that a new historical display at the museum will
better reflect the context and history of Florida's historical flags as we
begin a new century," Baur's statement read.

*RUBIO*

*In Miami, Rubio downplays competition with Bush: ‘It’s politics. It’s not
personal.’
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2015/06/20/in-miami-rubio-downplays-competition-with-bush-its-politics-its-not-personal/>
// WaPo // Sean Sullivan – June 20, 2015 *

Jeb Bush launched his presidential campaign here in his hometown on Monday.
On Saturday, his Republican rival and mentee Marco Rubio took a turn under
the local spotlight. His message: Nothing personal.

Hours before he was scheduled to address a major Republican Party
fundraiser here in the city where both he and Bush have deep political
roots, Rubio, a Republican senator, sought to downplay his emerging
competition against the former governor.

"It's politics. It's not personal," Rubio told reporters, later adding:
"I'm not running against Jeb Bush. I'm running for president."

And when he gave his speech, Rubio emphasized that he is not looking for
nasty fight, complementing the field of GOP hopefuls.

"I am not running against any of my fellow Republicans," he said.

Bush mentored Rubio as he rose through the Florida political ranks. The
competition between the two has put Republicans here in their stomping
grounds in an awkward position.

"A lot of Republicans are kind of torn," said Miami-Dade County GOP
Chairman Nelson Diaz, a former Rubio aide who is staying neutral in the
primary. He said the decision to invite Rubio to speak at the Lincoln Day
Dinner was not a slight against Bush; Rubio was asked 14 months ago.

Fielding questions from reporters on a variety of subjects ahead of his
speech, Rubio said it is up to the people of South Carolina, not
"outsiders," to decide whether to remove the Confederate flag from the
state Capitol grounds, declining to echo Mitt Romney's call to remove it.

"This is an issue that they should debate and work through and not have a
bunch of outsiders going in and telling them what to do," he told reporters.

Rubio said he supports the 2001 decision in Florida, by then-governor and
now-rival Jeb Bush, to move the flag from the capitol to a museum.

But as a state House member in 2001, Rubio was one of the sponsors of a
measure to prohibit the "relocation, removal, disturbance, or alteration of
a monument, memorial, plaque, marker, or historic flag commemorating or
memorializing specified wars and military engagements," including the Civil
War, "permanently displayed on public property of the state or any of its
political subdivisions."

Rubio spokesman Alex Conant told the Huffington Post that Rubio, "along
with four other Cuban-Americans, two African-Americans, and a Jewish
Democrat co-sponsored this legislation” to protect "war monuments."

In his most expansive remarks on the deadly mass shooting at a black church
in Charleston that has sparked a national debate over the flag, Rubio said
the white man charged with the killings "carried out an act motivated by
racial hatred."

"It's an atrocity. It's a horrifying instance," said Rubio. He said the
suspect "is full of hate in his heart."

Asked about Pope Francis's encyclical on the environment, Rubio, a Roman
Catholic who has questioned how much humans have contributed to climate
change, sounded a respectful note, but he did not endorse the pontiff's
blaming of human activity for climate change.

"I have no problem with what the pope did," said Rubio. "He has a moral
authority, and as a moral authority, is reminding us of our obligation to
be good caretakers of the planet."

Rubio continued: "I am a political leader. And my job as a policy maker is
to act in the common good. And I do believe it's in the common good to
protect our environment. But I also believe it's in the common good to
protect our economy."

Outside the dinner Rubio supporters tried to drown out a handful of
immigration protesters critical of the senator:

In his speech, Rubio also made light of report about his purchase of an
$80,000 boat, saying it is "cleverly disguised as a family fishing boat."

*Jeb Bush vs. Marco Rubio: Can the friendly tone last?
<http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2015/0619/Jeb-Bush-vs.-Marco-Rubio-Can-the-friendly-tone-last-video>
// CS Monitor // Linda Feldman – June 20, 2015 *

Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio, both top GOP prospects for president, often
describe one another as “friend” or even “good friend.” And they seem to
mean it.

They are so close they’re practically family, like uncle and nephew, people
who know them have said. It is a relationship born of their days in Florida
politics, Mr. Bush as governor, Senator Rubio as a state representative.
They still live just a few miles apart, Bush in Coral Gables and Rubio in
West Miami.

Now they are out to vanquish one another. For the moment, top-tier
candidates like Bush and Rubio – and those with a shot at making the top
tier – are working on channeling their inner Ronald Reagan or even their
inner Barack Obama. Both presidents won election twice with positive,
hopeful messages.

That isn’t necessarily a bad thing, political analysts say. Campaigns are
all about making contrasts – in candidates’ styles, temperaments, records,
skill sets, and ideas. Voters need information on which to make a decision.
Sometimes, the information that emerges can be unflattering, but if it’s
accurate, then it’s fair game.

While unfair attacks or outright lies are another matter, a number of
factors – from the sheer size of the presidential field to the rise of
outside political groups – suggest that such attacks will remain a part of
the campaign playbook this election. Indeed, Bush’s own father in many ways
proved the power of the negative campaign, and so long as it remains
effective, politicians will use it.

“In politics, especially on this level, you have friendships, but just like
in business, when it’s time for business, it’s time for business. When it’s
time for politics, it’s time for politics,” says Matthew Corrigan,
political scientist and author of the book “Conservative Hurricane: How Jeb
Bush Remade Florida.”

Bush and Rubio “are both going to run very tough campaigns, and they’re
going to have to,” says Mr. Corrigan, who teaches at the University of
North Florida in Jacksonville.

Clearly, Bush and Rubio have much at stake in the messages that come out of
both their campaigns and the outside groups that support them – groups over
which the candidates have no control, in theory, as they are barred from
coordinating with the campaigns by law. Bush has pledged to campaign
“joyfully” and with a message of optimism. Rubio, the son of Cuban
immigrants, has gone far – and fast – by campaigning as a happy warrior and
a man of the future who embodies the American dream.

Still, they are taking shots at each other, if ever-so-gently. Bush
regularly touts his executive experience as a governor by comparing the
senators in the 2016 race – no names mentioned – to a certain former
senator now occupying the White House.

“As our whole nation has learned since 2008, executive experience is
another term for preparation and there is no substitute for that,” Bush
said in his announcement speech Monday.

When Rubio announced in April, he made a comment that was interpreted as a
swipe at Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton, who had announced the day
before. But it could just as easily have been a jab at Bush, the son and
brother of former presidents. “Yesterday is over, and we're never going
back,” Rubio said.

This is all pretty tame stuff. But it’s early, and history suggests that as
the stakes mount, the tone becomes more combative. It was Bush’s father,
the genteel George H.W. Bush, who brought in the aggressive operative Lee
Atwater to run his 1988 presidential campaign. Mr. Atwater was most famous
for using Willie Horton, a convicted murderer who had raped a woman while
on furlough, against Democratic nominee Michael Dukakis. Atwater famously
said he would make Mr. Horton “[Governor] Dukakis’s running mate,” after an
outside group made an ad highlighting Horton.

Jeb’s brother, George W. Bush, also benefited from the aggressive actions
of an outside group, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, during his successful
reelection campaign for president in 2004. The Swift Boaters effectively
attacked Democratic nominee John Kerry’s military service during the
Vietnam War. John McCain, the Arizona senator and former prisoner of war,
condemned the attacks, but the Bush campaign did not.

In both cases, it was not the Bushes themselves who were making the
negative assertions. It was operatives, or advertisements, or outside
groups. That’s the lesson Jeb learned when he ran for governor of Florida
the first time, unsuccessfully, in 1994.

“Bush was the one making the tough statements, and of course he got hit for
it and lost,” says Corrigan at the University of North Florida.  “He
learned from that model, it’s not the candidate that should be making the
big haymakers, usually. You’ve got a whole operation to do that.”

Indeed, part of the purpose of the political machinery around candidates is
to allow the candidates themselves to remain positive while still attacking
through back doors. Even as Bush and Rubio take the rhetorical high ground,
their surrogates – people deputized to speak for the candidates – will not
feel the need to be so high-minded.

“Do I think you will see campaign surrogates attacking the other
candidates? Yes,” says Kathleen Hall Jamieson, director of the Annenberg
Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.
“Will they try to do it off the record? Yes. Will they be planting
opposition research with the press? Yes. Because that’s how politics works
these days. If they didn’t do that, they would not be a competitive
campaign, unfortunately.”

For other, lower-tier candidates, the size of the Republican field could
spur desperate moves. Then there's billionaire Donald Trump, who plays a
different kind of political game. He went after Rubio and Bush by name in
his 40-minute stemwinder of a campaign announcement Tuesday, slamming both
for their answers to questions on the Iraq War.

Mr. Trump doesn’t mince words – and he wins some support for his brash
style, possibly enough to qualify for the first debate on Aug. 6. Though he
has virtually no chance of winning the GOP nomination, with three-quarters
of Republican voters ruling him out, the tactic of attack will likely
become an integral part of the campaign.

“I don’t expect it from candidates who are ahead in the polls,” Ms.
Jamieson says. “You expect it from those trying to get into the debates by
attacking the front-runners. As they become more desperate for news
coverage, to get their polling numbers up, their rhetoric becomes harsher
and less factual.”

“I don’t expect it from candidates who are ahead in the polls,” Ms.
Jamieson says. “You expect it from those trying to get into the debates by
attacking the front-runners. As they become more desperate for news
coverage, to get their polling numbers up, their rhetoric becomes harsher
and less factual.”

*At Miami-Dade GOP, a homecoming for Marco Rubio
<http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/elections-2016/marco-rubio/article25097653.html#storylink=cpy>
// The Miami Herald // Patricia Mazzei – June 20, 2015*

It was homecoming for Marco Rubio at the Miami-Dade Republican Party on
Saturday night, and he relished the chance to kid around with the people
who know him best.

“Marco! Marco!” the sold-out crowd cheered as he took the stage.

“My son was saying ‘Polo,’” Rubio joked.

The Florida senator and 2016 presidential candidate headlined the local
GOP’s annual Lincoln Day fund-raiser. They booked him a year ago, long
before he launched his candidacy. The choice proved prescient: The party
sold more tickets than it had since 1989, Chairman Nelson Diaz said.

With the loyalties of Miami Republicans split between Rubio and that other
local candidate, no one on stage uttered the words “Jeb Bush.”

Bush, who kicked off his campaign Monday at Miami Dade College, was alluded
to several times. But this night was Rubio’s.

“I am not running against any of my fellow Republicans,” Rubio insisted,
addressing the news media. “I know they want us to fight. I know they want
us to argue. It makes for better articles.”

He directly poked fun at a New York Times story that detailed Rubio’s
finances — a story he then used as a campaign fund-raising pitch.

“We’ve even been able to make enough to buy a luxury speedboat,” Rubio
said, “though I admit it’s cleverly disguised as a family fishing boat.”
The crowd roared.

He declared himself “proud” to be from a state with four presidential
candidates — also Ben Carson and Mike Huckabee — and “from a city with more
presidential candidates per capita than any city in America.”

Seated in the ballroom at the DoubleTree by Hilton Miami Airport &
Convention Center were longtime Rubio friends he praised by name, including
“political godmother” Rebeca Sosa, a county commissioner, and David Rivera,
a former congressman. Rubio’s wife, Jeanette, and their four children were
also in attendance — a rare occurrence, he pointed out, considering how
much time he’s spent on the road since declaring his candidacy in April.

He recounted his first campaign, for West Miami City Commission in 1998, as
the time he “really met my community face to face.” He’d have 18 cups of
Cuban coffee a day, he said, and get so jittery that “my hands were
shaking.”

Rubio didn’t deviate much from his stump speech, portions of which are
familiar to many Miami-Dade Republicans who have been listening to him for
years. As a result, his remarks weren’t especially rabble-rousing. He
received much applause for opposing the Affordable Care Act — “We will
repeal and replace Obamacare before it repeals and replaces American jobs”
— and got in a few indirect jabs at Bush, including over educational
standards — “We still improved our schools without Common Core,” he said of
his time in the statehouse.

And he concluded by tugging at the immigrant heartstrings of the heavily
Cuban-American audience by mentioning his father, who worked as a bartender.

“The journey from behind that bar to behind this microphone — journey is
the essence of the American Dream,” he said. “In America, that’s not just
my story. That’s our story. In Miami, that is our story.”

The crowd ate it up.

*Marco Rubio: 'No problem' with Catholic Church on climate change but
economy more important
<http://miamiherald.typepad.com/nakedpolitics/2015/06/marco-rubio-no-problem-with-catholic-church-on-climate-change-but-economy-more-important.html>
// The Miami Herald // Patricia Mezzai – June 20, 2015 *

Marco Rubio, a Roman Catholic, said Saturday he has "no problem" with Pope
Francis' encyclical urging action on climate change -- but added he won't
support policies that could help the environment but "hurt our economy."

"I have no problem with what the pope did," Rubio told reporters in Miami
before speaking to the Miami-Dade County Republican Party. "He is a moral
authority and as a moral authority is reminding us of our obligation to be
good caretakers to the planet. I'm a political leader. And my job as a
policymaker is to act in the common good. And I do believe it's in the
common good to protect our environment, but I also believe it's in the
common good to protect our economy."

Though scientists are in broad agreement that climate change is man-made,
Rubio continued to question that premise. He said his focus is on tackling
the consequences rather than what caused it.

"I don' think there is a scientific consensus on what percent, how
sensitive, climate is to human activity," he said. "But the broader
question as a policy maker is not whether I believe humans have contributed
10 percent, 50 percent or 99 percent. The fundamental question I have as a
policymaker must be what can we do about it and what impact will it have on
the rest of our country and the rest of our lives. And what I am not going
to support are measures that will hurt our economy and put people out of
work and increase the cost of living."

He began answering the question by poking at Democrats who have trumpeted
the pope's position on the environment but not social issues.

"I find it ironic that a lot of the same liberals who are touting the
encyclical on climate change ignore multiple pronouncements of this pope on
the definition of marriage and on the sanctity of life," Rubio said.

*Marco Rubio to name Adam Hasner, Tom Rooney Florida campaign chairs
<http://miamiherald.typepad.com/nakedpolitics/2015/06/patriciamazzei-marco-rubio-on-saturday-will-name-two-longtime-supporters-as-co-chairmen-of-his-2016-presidential-campaign.html>
// The Miami Herald // Patricia Mezzai – June 20, 2015 *

Marco Rubio on Saturday will name two longtime supporters as co-chairmen of
his 2016 presidential campaign in Florida.

U.S. Rep. Tom Rooney of Okeechobee and former Florida House Majority Leader
Adam Hasner of Delray Beach will be in charge of building a grass-roots
donor and activist network for Rubio.

The Republican senator will announce the appointments at the Miami-Dade
County GOP's Lincoln Day dinner Saturday night.

Rooney briefly flirted with running for Rubio's U.S. Senate seat but
decided against it in April. He is one of only a few members of Florida's
Republican members of Congress who have endorsed Rubio for president. The
majority have backed hometown rival Jeb Bush.

Hasner was the GOP leader under Rubio's House speakership from 2007-08.
Rubio's team has already named statewide chairs or co-chairs in the four
key early primary and caucus states: Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina
and Nevada.

*Marco Rubio, Jeb Bush focus on home-state Republicans
<http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/politics/fl-marco-rubio-home-turf-20150621-story.html>
// Sun Sentinel // Anthony Man – June 20, 2015 *

Neither Marco Rubio nor Jeb Bush is willing to cede an inch of Florida
territory to the other.

Speaking just five days after Bush's presidential announcement, Rubio
showed Saturday night with a speech to a hometown crowd why Florida's
presidential primary may be a close contest — and critical in deciding who
wins the Republican presidential nomination.

Rubio told almost 750 party faithful at the Miami-Dade Republican Party's
Lincoln Day dinner that he had "no intention of running for president with
the desire of tearing anyone down," then took a couple of jabs at Bush.

When he was speaker of the Florida House, Rubio said, "we still improved
our schools without Common Core." Bush supports the Common Core educational
standards, an attempt to improve the way schools teach and test critical
subjects that is vehemently opposed by many in the conservative wing of the
party.

Before the dinner and during his speech, Rubio, 44, also repeated his pitch
for the future, which serves as a contrast with Bush, 62. "This is an
election about the future, not the past. And I think we need to be led by
leaders in this country who understand the 21st Century and have an agenda
for it."

In his kickoff in Miami on Monday, a short drive from Rubio's speech
Saturday night, Bush presented himself as a leader whose background as a
governor shows he can produce results. "There's no passing off
responsibility when you're a governor, no blending into the legislative
crowd or filing an amendment and calling that success."

On Saturday, Rubio promised to ensure America remains strong and powerful,
suggesting a difference with President Barack Obama. "We're not just going
to hold press conferences where we talk tough."

Rubio punctuated his 36-minute speech with frequent humor, often aimed at
himself. He noted Lt. Gov. Carlos Lopez-Cantera's frequent swigs of water
during his speech. It was lunging for a bottle of water on nationwide TV
early in his term that earned Rubio lots of negative attention.

He observed that Miami has more presidential candidates per capita than any
other. He reproached some of the shoppers at the Kmart where his mother
worked. "Thanks for making a mess in the aisles. She had to clean it up."

And he poked at a recent New York Times investigation into his finances,
with the newspaper reporting he bought a speedboat, something his campaign
has said isn't true. Rubio joked that his family was successful enough that
"we've even been able to buy a luxury speedboat," he said. "It is cleverly
disguised as a family fishing boat."

Judging from the applause, the crowd liked what it heard, something Nelson
Diaz, chairman of the Miami-Dade Republican Party, said is easy to
understand. "Marco's a hometown boy. He's running for president. And he's a
superstar," he said.

But Rubio can't take the region for granted.

West Miami is home to Rubio, the state's junior U.S. senator, and Coral
Gables is home to Bush, the state's former governor.

Miami-Dade County, home to the largest pool of Republican voters in
Florida, likely will play a critical role in determining which man wins the
state's March 15 primary, which could turn it into ground zero at a
critical stage of the competition for the Republican presidential
nomination.

The Sunshine State primary comes after the pivotal early states — Iowa, New
Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada — begin winnowing the field and two
weeks after a flurry of other states' primaries on March 1.

Florida is an early mega-state primary, and a rule change for next year
makes it a winner-take-all contest instead of awarding nominating
convention delegates based on each candidate's share of the vote.

So a win or loss for one of the favorite sons could prove decisive — giving
a jolt of momentum to the winner and major blow to the loser.

With such high stakes, the contest for Florida is highly competitive
between the two.

"I think it's going to be very competitive," said Mike Rump, president of
the Republican Business Network in northwest Broward, who attended the
dinner. "Jeb might win Florida, but they've both won statewide elections.
Marco might beat him."

A Quinnipiac University Poll released Thursday showed the two men are
effectively tied, with 20 percent for Bush and 18 percent for Rubio, with
no other candidate coming close.

When Republicans' first and second choices are combined, Rubio is 3
percentage points ahead of Bush.

As the race has tightened in recent months — Bush was ahead by 17
percentage points in February and 12 points in April — opportunities to
rally Republican activists are more important than routine stops on the
rubber-chicken circuit.

After his Monday kickoff that drew 3,000 people to Miami-Dade College's
Kendall's campus, Bush was back in the state for a speech Friday at the
Hillsborough County Republican Party's Lincoln Day dinner in Tampa.

Bush announced that his Florida campaign would be headquartered in Tampa —
not in his South Florida home base — signaling the importance of the
Interstate 4 corridor that runs through the central part of the state.

On Saturday, Rubio announced that his Florida campaign will be headed by
former Florida House Majority Leader, R-Boca Raton, and U.S. Rep. Tom
Rooney, R-Okeechobee.

He declined to offer any expectations for Florida's primary. "That's a long
way off. There are a lot of votes before that. And I can tell you if you
don't do well in some of those early states, you won't be involved in the
Florida primary."

Senate race

Also present was Rubio pal and Florida Lt. Gov. Carlos Lopez-Cantera.

Lopez-Cantera is widely expected to enter the race for the Republican
nomination to succeed Rubio, who isn't running for a second term because
he's running for president.

Lopez-Cantera teased the audience about his intentions. He said he wouldn't
run if he couldn't still be a good husband and father — and revealed that
his wife is urging him to run. He also took swipes at U.S. Rep. Patrick
Murphy, who is seeking the Democratic Senate nomination, and U.S. Rep. Alan
Grayson, expected to run for Senate.

He revealed that he'd announce his decision on July 15.

*Senator Rubio falls silent on immigration, his signature subject
<https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/nation/2015/06/20/senator-marco-rubio-led-boldly-bipartisan-immigration-bill-then-walked-away-his-political-calculation-shifted/4cr6gepBmphifsLqMPoUUK/story.html>
// The Boston Globe // Matt Viser – June 20, 2015 *

Over the first six months of 2013, freshman Senator Marco Rubio shot to
national prominence as he took the lead on one of the nation’s most
divisive issues, with all the political promise and peril that goes with
such a move.

He joined a bipartisan group of senators pushing a law to crack down on
illegal immigration while blazing a path for some of the 11 million illegal
immigrants already here to achieve legal status.

In that cause, Rubio relentlessly pursued the spotlight. He granted at
least 50 interviews on television and radio, many with conservative hosts
who adamantly disagreed with his plan and considered him a traitor for
working with Democrats. On one Sunday alone, he appeared on seven
television shows.

“In my heart and in my mind, I know we must solve this problem once and for
all,” he said, just before the Senate bill passed. “Or it will only get
worse and it will only get harder to solve.”

But then, almost as soon as he and his allies finished pushing the bill
through the Senate, Rubio walked away from the issue in what, even for
Washington, represented a stunning about-face. Hopes for an immigration
overhaul soon fizzled in the House, where the conservative critics vowed to
block any bill offering what they consider “amnesty.’’

Now, as Rubio runs for president in the Republican primary, he has almost
completely purged his signature issue of two years ago from his political
vocabulary.

During 2013, he mentioned “immigration” or “immigrant” 135 times on the
Senate floor. But over the last two years, he’s only uttered those words
two times, according to a Globe review of the Congressional Record. Over
those first six months of 2013, his office sent out nearly 150 press
releases on immigration. Since then, he has issued just three press
releases on the subject.

‘Young Mr. Rubio is figuring out the hard facts of politics in America.’

The story of Rubio’s shift not only reveals an especially bald political
calculation, but also reflects broader Republican ambivalence on an issue
that continues to bedevil the party. His Cuban-American heritage, his
family story, and his leadership on immigration made Rubio one of the GOP’s
most promising political figures to appeal to a growing and influential
Hispanic demographic that is increasingly key to the national electoral
success.

But now that he seeks the favor of conservative primary voters, Rubio has
transformed his calling-card issue into something else — a question mark in
his presidential resume.

From Miami, a rising star

Rubio was born 44 years ago in Miami, and his parents’ story is a key
component of his own. His father was a bartender, his mother a maid — both
immigrants from Cuba who fled political and economic hardships in 1956 and
became naturalized US citizens nearly two decades later.

A politician who rose to speaker of the Florida House of Representatives,
Rubio was elected to the Senate with Tea Party backing. He had a bilingual
background. In many ways, he was the ideal political leader to help craft
an ambitious immigration plan. And Republicans desperately needed one.

Party leaders who dissected the carcass of Mitt Romney’s failed 2012
presidential bid determined that Romney bungled the issue of immigration,
particularly when he declared in a debate that undocumented immigrants
should engage in “self-deportation.”

He won only 27 percent of the Hispanic vote in the general election
campaign against President Obama.

It was in this climate that Illinois Senator Dick Durbin, the number-two
leader in the Democratic majority, approached Rubio in the Senate gym in
December 2012 and implored him to join an emerging bipartisan effort to
craft a comprehensive immigration overhaul.

“I went to him and said, ‘I think you should be part of this. But you have
to understand that path to citizenship is part of the deal,’ ” Durbin
recounted in an interview.

Many conservatives oppose the idea of granting citizenship to those in the
country illegally, considering it amnesty. Democrats have resisted the
conservative demand that beefed-up border security take priority, but were
willing to make a trade.

According to Durbin, Rubio accepted the political risks: “He said, ‘I’m
prepared to go forward.’ And he did.”

With Rubio in, the lead backers of the bill became known as the “Gang of
Eight” — four Democrats and four Republicans.

Rubio, in a show of his seriousness, expanded his staff, bringing in an
immigration expert to help craft legislation. He spoke before groups of
white evangelical pastors, quoting Scripture as a justification for the
bill, inspiring them with his life story.

The way he spoke of his status as a son of immigrants resonated then, and
still does.

“He is connecting the immigrant experience with the American Dream and the
larger American story. He does so personally, in a way that connects well,”
said Russell Moore, head of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and
Religious Liberty Commission. “When he talks about his Cuban immigrant
father working as a bartender — it takes a lot of rhetorical skill to get
Southern Baptists to tear up at a bartender. But he’s able to do it.”

Senator Marco Rubio (left front) was among the lawmakers on hand in 2013
when Senator John McCain (center) outlined legislation proposed by the
bipartisan “Gang of Eight” that would have given illegal immigrants a path
to citizenship.

In a dozen interviews with those involved in crafting the Senate plan —
including most members of the Gang of Eight — there is universal agreement
that Rubio’s intellect and charisma were crucial in both convincing
skeptical Republicans and blunting the barrage of criticism.

“I’ve often said he was more important than the rest of the Republicans
combined,” said Senator Jeff Flake, an Arizona Republican and one of the
other members of the group.

Representative Luis Gutierrez, an Illinois Democrat who has worked for
years on immigration reform, recalled walking out of an hourlong meeting
with Rubio and his staff, early in the push for the Senate plan, feeling as
though they were about to accomplish something historic.

“I couldn’t have walked away from that meeting happier,” Gutierrez said. “I
said to him, ‘We’re going to get this done. We’re absolutely going to get
this done.’ ”

The Senate bill would have provided a path to citizenship for 11 million
undocumented immigrants, and would also have enhanced border security,
adding 20,000 Border Patrol agents and 700 miles of fencing along the
southern US border. Under the terms of the bill, the security measures
would be completed before any undocumented immigrants achieved legal status.

“During that period, he was engaged in using political capital for the
right purpose, from my perspective. And being bipartisan in that
engagement. And being willing to argue his case in the most difficult
circles,” said Senator Robert Menendez, a New Jersey Democrat. “But maybe
there’s a reality to how far their party can go.”

Rubio appeared to have moments of doubt that the bill struck the right
balance. In public comments, he would express worry over whether border
security measures were going far enough.

Other negotiators detected a rift within Rubio’s staff. His policy team was
eagerly trying to reach compromise, while his political team seemed to try
to derail it.

Rubio would sometimes seem to distance himself, but never for long.

“He always came back,” said one Democratic staffer. “It was kind of like
Lassie.”

Rubio’s ambivalence was understandable given the beating he was taking on
conservative talk radio.

Glenn Beck called him a “piece of garbage.” Laura Ingraham panned his plan
and said Rubio would “rue the day he became the Gang of Eight’s poodle.”
Senator David Vitter, a Republican from Louisiana, called his colleague
“just amazingly naive” and “nuts.”

“The reaction was pretty harsh,” said Brent Bozell, a prominent
conservative activist and founder of the Media Research Center, a
conservative media watchdog organization. “It was rather surprising. I was
hearing it all over the country.”

After the legislation passed, it was touted as a historic vote. The Gang of
Eight had accomplished something few thought they would and, in a
valedictory moment, walked off the Senate floor together and into one of
the most ornate hallways in the Capitol, prepared to address reporters.

But one of the eight was missing. Rubio, who did vote for the bill, didn’t
show.

“It’s hard to explain. He clearly had a change of heart on the issue,”
Durbin said. “It’s an extremely controversial position for him. And as he
started entertaining the thought of running [for president], I think his
visibility on immigration reform diminished. And his interest in our
compromise changed.”

Rubio declined requests for an interview. His spokesman declined to comment
for this story.

Tempered expectations

A month after it passed, when advocates were hoping to keep pressure on the
House to consider the Senate compromise bill, Rubio told Fox News the
legislation he helped author wasn’t perfect and he downplayed its
importance.

“Look, it’s not the most important issue facing America,” he said. For
example, he said, repealing Obama’s health care plan was a higher priority.

In October 2013, he sometimes spoke as as though he and other Republicans
had never been part of the bipartisan push that won Senate passage of the
bill.

“The House [isn’t] just going to take up and pass whatever the Democrats in
the Senate are demanding,” he said on CNN.

Rubio has also directly contradicted some of his previous statements. In
June 2013, responding to constituent concerns, Rubio said one of the
reasons immigration is so challenging is that all of the issues — border
security and pathway to citizenship — have to be handled together.

“It is all interwoven. It’s all related to each other. It’s literally
impossible to do one part without doing the other,” he said.

Four months later, he stated virtually the opposite.

“When you try to do something big in Washington, it ends up running into
headwinds,” he said on CNN. “Now that’s the direction the Senate went … but
I continue to believe that a series of sequential, individual bills is the
best way, the ideal way, to reform our immigration system.”

Immigration advocates trying to keep up the momentum for reform were
deflated by Rubio’s change in tone.

The Rev. Samuel Rodriguez, the president of the National Hispanic Christian
Leadership Conference, was wowed by Rubio’s early leadership. The
conviction with which he spoke about the issue could sway an entire room.
Rodriguez misses that voice.

“He was Joshua leading the people into the Promised Land of immigration,”
he said. “Then, right when we were on the Jordan River, he pivoted. He
looked back to the desert. All of the sudden he pivoted; he took his foot
out of the water.”

Now immigration is an uncomfortable conversation for Rubio, said Rodriguez,
“a de facto don’t ask, don’t tell.”

“The decibel level is lower. That passion is no longer there. … When you
hear him speak now you see his eyes move down a bit, his voice fluctuates a
tad,” he said. “It’s not the same convicted Marco Rubio that led the charge
back in 2013.

“I believe he hasn’t changed at all in terms of his convictions, but he has
changed in his political calculations he believes necessary to win the
Republican nomination,” Rodriguez said.

“Are we sacrificing conviction and truth at the altar of political
expediency? That’s the question that has to be asked.”

A group of immigrants from Honduras and El Salvador who crossed the
U.S.-Mexico border illegally were stopped in Texas.

A lesson learned

Earlier this year, Rubio drove to suburban Washington and appeared before
the Conservative Political Action Conference, the largest annual gathering
of conservative activists.

He told them he had been wrong to pursue comprehensive immigration before
first securing the border.

The lesson he’s learned from it all, he said, is that comprehensive
immigration reform “just really has no realistic chance of passing.”

Outside observers doubt Rubio will make immigration a major focus of his
presidential campaign.

Why fall on your sword for immigration when it can’t pass in the House,
where conservatives hold even greater sway than in the Senate?

“Young Mr. Rubio is figuring out the hard facts of politics in America,”
said Javier Palomarez, president of the US Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.
“Could he have done more? Possibly. But the criticism that he’s changed
tacks simply to run for president is overly simplistic. This change in
tactic is due to congressional gridlock more than political ambition.”

Palomarez believes Rubio’s shifts on the issue show political savvy. After
all, the passionate conservative opposition to Rubio has dissipated as his
rhetoric has shifted, giving him better standing in the GOP primary
electorate.

And immigration advocates like Palomarez still view Rubio as an ally,
someone who could achieve greater gains on the issue from the White House.

“I look at him and say he’s evolving on issues that are important and
realizing the landscape he’s working with and the Congress we’ve got,’’
Palomarez said. “It illustrates a savvy businessman who says, ‘To get from
point A to point B, I have to adapt.’”

*As Marco Rubio speaks to the Miami-Dade GOP tonight, a look at his
Truth-O-Meter record
<http://miamiherald.typepad.com/nakedpolitics/2015/06/as-marco-rubio-speaks-to-the-miami-dade-gop-tonight-a-look-at-his-truth-o-meter-record.html>
// The Miami Herald // Amy Sherman – June 20, 2015 *

Sen. Marco Rubio, who speaks to the Miami-Dade Republican Party Saturday
night, has kept PolitiFact Florida’s Truth-O-Meter busy since 2009 when he
ran for U.S. Senate.

One of our earliest fact-checks examined his claim that "Fifty-seven" of
Rubio's 100 ideas  “ultimately became law” in Florida related to his tenure
as House Speaker. We rate that claim Half True.

We have fact-checked Rubio 93 times on a variety of claims including about
climate change, Common Core, Cuba, the federal health care law, foreign
affairs, guns, poverty,  space and technology.

Out of Rubio’s 93 ratings, he has received 17 percent True, 24 percent
Mostly True, 20 percent Half True, 23 percent Mostly False, 14 percent
False and 2 percent Pants on Fire. We also gave him a Half Flip for his
position on whether the Iraq war was a mistake.

(And here is the Truth-O-Meter for his fellow Miami-Dade
resident/presidential primary opponent Jeb Bush.)

Here is a look at a few of our recent fact-checks related to Rubio:

Bulk metadata collection: "There is not a single documented case of abuse
of this program,” Rubio said. There are plenty of documented cases of
misuse of the metadata collection program. It just depends whether that
misuse is what you or Rubio have in mind when you think of abuse. We found
no example of intentional misuse of the program. Keep reading here.

Immigration: "We have a legal immigration system in America that accepts 1
million people a year, legally,” Rubio said. “No other country in the world
even comes close to that." The United States accepted just under 1 million
people in 2013, the most recent numbers available. As a percentage of
population, though, the United States ranked 19th out of 24 countries in
2013. Still, Rubio is correct that the overall figure puts the United
States ahead of other countries. Keep reading here.

Restoring felons’ rights: A Facebook meme says Marco Rubio said that
"felons should not have their voting rights restored" but that "convicted
felons should be allowed to own guns after they have done their time." The
meme was posted by a site that describes itself as satirical, and we found
no evidence that Rubio actually said the words attributed to him. While
Rubio has spoken critically in the past about felons regaining voting
rights, he does not appear to have taken a stance on the restoration of
felons’ gun rights. Keep reading here.

*PAUL*

*Hedge fund manager Mark Spitznagel to advise Rand Paul
<http://www.cnbc.com/id/102774049> // CNBC // Lawrence Delvinge – June 20,
2015 *

Mark Spitznagel, the libertarian hedge fund manager, has a new part-time
job: senior economic advisor to Rand Paul's campaign for president.

Spitznagel is the founder and chief investment officer of Universa
Investments, a fund that specializes in protecting investors against sharp
market drops, sometimes referred to as Black Swan events. The firm manages
about $6 billion in assets, a sizable figure for the hedge fund industry.

"I am very grateful to have Mark Spitznagel serve as senior economic
advisor to my campaign," Paul, now a U.S. senator from Kentucky, said in a
statement.

"As I travel across the country, the top concern of the American people is
our failing economy. I believe we can revitalize our economy by encouraging
opportunity and entrepreneurship with lower taxes, a balanced budget, less
Federal Reserve interventionism, and limited government spending," the
candidate said.

"I look forward to working alongside Mark to solve our nation's economic
problem and to restore the American Dream," he added.

Paul, one of the leading contenders for the Republican party nomination,
was elected in the Tea Party wave of 2010. Much like his iconic father Ron
Paul, Paul has become a libertarian standard-bearer.

Read MorePresidential candidate Rand Paul plans to 'blow up' tax code

Spitznagel is also the author of an investing book, "The Dao of Capital"
and runs Idyll Farms, an organic goat farm in northern Michigan.

Universa moved its headquarters from Santa Monica, California, to Coconut
Grove, Florida last March because of what Spitznagel called a "more
hospitable business and tax environment."

"Rand Paul is the only candidate that really understands the destructive
ramifications of current economic policy driven in large part by a reckless
Federal Reserve. I lookforward to working with him on his ideas and message
to change that policy," Spitznagel said in a statement about his new role.

*CRUZ*

*Ted Cruz: It’s up to South Carolina to decide on Confederate flag
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2015/06/20/ted-cruz-its-up-to-south-carolina-to-decide-on-confederate-flag/>
// WaPo // Katie Zezima – June 20, 2015 *

Sen. Ted Cruz says whether or not South Carolina removes the Confederate
flag from a state house memorial is an issue for the state to decide and
that he sees “both sides” of the debate.

In an interview with The Washington Post on Saturday, Cruz (R-Tex.) said
that he understands why people equate the flag with both racial oppression
and historical traditions.

“I understand the passions that this debate evokes on both sides,” the GOP
presidential hopeful said. “Both those who see a history of racial
oppression and a history of slavery, which is the original sin of our
nation, and we fought a bloody civil war to expunge that sin.”

He added: “But I also understand those who want to remember the sacrifices
of their ancestors and the traditions of their states, not the racial
oppression, but the historical traditions, and I think often this issue is
used as a wedge to try to divide people.”

Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, the 2012 Republican presidential
nominee, said Saturday that the flag should be taken down.

Cruz noted that he is from Texas and the state is “fond of the Texas flag”
because it was an independent nation for nine years, and people’s emotions
run deep on the issue. He said it is up to South Carolina to decide what to
do with the Confederate flag.

“I think that’s a question for South Carolina, and the last thing they need
is people from outside the state coming in and dictating how they should
resolve that issue,” Cruz said.

Cruz has repeatedly said he is “horrified” by the shooting deaths of nine
people at a historic African-American church in Charleston, S.C., and has
offered prayers for the families of the victims.

“One of the incredible things yesterday was to see the families of those
who were murdered calling for forgiveness of the murderer,” Cruz said
Saturday. “I have to admit, if it were my family, I don’t know that I could
demonstrate that degree of forgiveness.”

Cruz said he agrees with South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley’s assertion that
the accused gunman should be subject to the death penalty. Dylann Roof, 21,
has been charged with murder in the case.

In an event at an indoor shooting range and firearms training facility
here, Cruz again vociferously defended the Second Amendment and said
Democrats are using the Charleston shootings to try to roll back gun rights.

Cruz on Saturday said again that Democrats and Obama “cynically” used the
2012 school shootings in Newtown, Conn., to try to take away gun rights and
that he fought to block that gun control legislation.

Cruz said that the Obama administration only prosecuted a fraction of the
people who tried to purchase a firearm after failing a background check,
and that its prosecution rates of gun felons dropped.

“In my view that’s totally unacceptable. If you have a violent felon, if
you have a fugitive who is illegally trying to buy guns, we should come
down on them like a ton of bricks,” he said. “If there are murders and
rapists and they’re coming in trying to get guns, we ought to go and stop
them.”

Cruz again laid out a laundry list of ways that he has protected the Second
Amendment, including writing a pro-Second Amendment amicus brief on behalf
of 31 states that he submitted to the Supreme Court when he was Texas
solicitor general. The Supreme Court overturned the District of Columbia's
ban on handguns in the case, District of Columbia v. Heller.

After taking questions and shaking hands, Cruz took to the shooting range,
firing off rounds on a semiautomatic .223-caliber Smith and Wesson M&P15.

*Ted Cruz Cracks Jokes On Gun Control Days After Charleston Shooting
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/06/20/ted-cruz-gun-control-charleston_n_7628960.html>
// HuffPo // Samantha-Jo Roth – June 20, 2015 *

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) dropped a few gun control jokes during his latest
swing through Iowa, days after the shooting deaths of nine people in a
Charleston, South Carolina, church.

"You know the great thing about the state of Iowa is, I'm pretty sure you
all define gun control the same way we do in Texas -- hitting what you aim
at," Cruz said at a town hall meeting Friday in Red Oak.

Before a crowd of nearly 70 people, Cruz recalled a recent excursion to a
gun range in New Hampshire that had fully automatic machine guns.

"My wife, Heidi, who is a petite, 5'2 California blonde, she was standing
at the tripod unloading the full machine gun with a pink baseball cap that
said 'armed and fabulous,'" he said.

This is the second ill-timed joke the Republican presidential hopeful has
made this month. Cruz made a joke about Joe Biden just days after the vice
president's son died from brain cancer.

Cruz did not mention the mass shooting during the town hall meeting Friday,
but when prompted by reporters later said Democrats were using the event as
an excuse to take away Second Amendment rights.

"It's sad to see the Democrats take a horrific crime and try to use it as
an excuse, not to go after people with serious mental illness or people who
are repeat felons or criminals, but instead try to use it as an excuse to
take away Second Amendment rights of law abiding citizens," he told a group
of reporters.

"I'll tell you, it's reminiscent of Rahm Emanuel who said you can never let
a good crisis go to waste," Cruz said, referring to the Chicago mayor and
former White House Chief of Staff.

Asked why it has been difficult for some Republicans to acknowledge the
racial aspect of the incident, Cruz said he didn't accept the premise of
the question.

"It appears to be racially driven from what it was reported this strange
man said, and a racial hate crime is horrific, any hate crime is horrific,"
he said. "I don't think we should be using this tragedy to try and divide
people and to try and seek partisan advantage. I think we should be praying
for those who lost loved ones in this horrific murder."

At an event at an indoor shooting range in Johnston Saturday, Cruz again
called for defending the Second Amendment.

"There's a famous saying, praise the Lord and pass the ammunition," he
said."There is a reason why the Second Amendment is right after the First."

Following his remarks, Cruz headed to the shooting range, where he fired
off rounds on a semiautomatic .223-caliber Smith and Wesson M&P15.

*U.S. should come together after Charleston, Cruz says
<http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/elections/presidential/caucus/2015/06/20/cruz-second-amendment-event-johnston/29037901/>
// The Des Moines Register // Matthew Patane – June 20, 2015 *

The death penalty was made to punish crimes like the recent shooting that
killed nine people in a historic black church in Charleston, U.S. Sen. Ted
Cruz said Saturday at a shooting range in Johnston.

"Gov. Nikki Haley in South Carolina said this individual who committed the
heinous murder in South Carolina should be subject to the death penalty. I
got to say the death penalty was designed for people who commit horrid
crimes like this," Cruz told reporters.

At multiple Iowa stops this weekend, The Republican presidential candidate
has said Obama and Democrats are trying to politicize the shooting instead
of using them to bring people together.

"It's a shame that there are some in politics that want to use this to
divide us. I think that's wrong," he said.

"Now is the time for mourning and for healing," Obama said. "But let's be
clear: At some point, we as a country will have to reckon with the fact
that this type of mass violence does not happen in other advanced
countries. It doesn't happen in other places with this kind of frequency.
And it is in our power to do something about it."

When asked what restrictions he would place on gun ownership, Cruz said
lawmakers should focus on stopping criminals, not law-abiding citizens,
from buying guns.

"If you have a violent felon, if you have a fugitive who is illegally
trying to buy guns, we should come down on them like a ton of bricks," Cruz
said. "I want to know if there are murderers and rapists trying to buy
guns. We should stop them."

Cruz also said the shooting does not open the door to crack down on the
rights of law-abiding citizens.

Upholding the Second Amendment, he said, is "altogether different and
unconnected from a horrific murder committed by a sick and deranged
individual."

The Republican presidential candidate spoke before a "Celebrate the 2nd
Amendment" event hosted by State Rep. Ralph Watts. Cruz's visit to the
event was scheduled about a week before the South Carolina shooting.

After speaking, Cruz took time to shoot a Smith & Wesson M&P 15 rifle.

Cruz has focused his campaign around the idea of abiding by the
Constitution. That includes maintaining religious liberty and the Second
Amendment, he has said at multiple Iowa stops.

"In Texas, there is a right answer on the Second Amendment: I support the
Second Amendment. Unless you are clinically insane, that's the right
answer. Heck, even Democrats say they support the Second Amendment in
Texas," Cruz said during stops in Johnston and Denison this weekend.

SETTING: A "Celebrate the 2nd Amendment" event held at CrossRoads Shooting
Sports, an indoor shooting range in Johnston. State Rep. Ralph Watts,
R-Adel, hosted the event. Donations were collected f*or the Iowa Firearms
Coalition.*

CROWD: Between 20 and 30 people filtered in to hear Cruz, Watts and
Congressman David Young, speak. That's not counting customers who visit*ed
CrossRoads Saturday morning.*

REACTION: Cruz received some applause and garnered laughs for many of the
same lines he's given during past town halls. Those include jokes about
Hilary Clinton and the Obama administration, and calls to repeal Obamacare,
Common Core and abolish the IRS.

*For Ted Cruz, The Hard Part Comes Next
<http://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2015/06/20/415827279/for-ted-cruz-the-hard-part-comes-next>
// NPR // Jessica Taylor – June 20, 2015 *

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz blew away another gathering of religious conservative
leaders this week, preaching about threats to religious freedom to a
receptive and hungry crowd.

"I will never, ever, ever shy away from standing up and defending the
religious liberty of every American," the GOP White House hopeful thundered
at the Faith and Freedom Coalition's "Road to Majority" conference in
Washington.

"Religious liberty has never been more threatened in America than right now
today," Cruz added.

Cruz hit all the right notes and could easily be declared the winner of the
three-day conference, which wraps up Saturday. But despite the good
receptions at events like these, Cruz's work on stage is not translating to
the campaign trail. He not only lags behind in early state polls, but also
in organization. And despite being the first major presidential candidate
to declare this cycle, early state activists are baffled by how little they
say they have seen Cruz.

"I've always thought that Ted Cruz was kind of the perfect caucus
candidate," said Craig Robinson, who runs "The Iowa Republican" website and
is a former political director for the state party. "But what we haven't
seen is a real commitment to the state."

Speaking their language

There's a reason Ted Cruz does well in front of these crowds. He roams the
stage with the gusto of a televangelist. He does not work from a podium,
and he strikes just the right tone.

At the Road to Majority confab, he slammed other Republicans for backing
down on Indiana's controversial religious freedom law, warned against a
potential same-sex marriage decision from the Supreme Court and bashed the
Obama administration for not standing up more forcefully to the threat of
Islamic extremism.

He boosted his own bona fides, too, telling the audience how he had
successfully argued cases before the Supreme Court on "religious liberty,"
such as protecting a Ten Commandments display at the Texas Capitol.

And with the cadence of a preacher, Cruz seamlessly and empathetically
weaved in the tragic Charleston, S.C., shooting that had occurred the night
before that left nine dead at a historically black church.

Cruz led the audience of hundreds — they could have been congregants — in a
moment of silence.

"Christians across our nation, across our world — believers across the
world are lifting up the congregants at Emanuel AME," Cruz said.

Other GOP rivals touched on many of the same issues, but none with perhaps
the same zeal or with the same visceral reaction from the audience.

The faithful ate it up.

"I like the fact that he fights even his own party for the right issue and
the right cause," said John Redell, who was attending from Wilmington, Del.
"That's the kind of strength we're going to need for a president: someone
who can say no — even to his friends — to do what's right for the nation."

Jessica Burnett, a student at Georgia State University: "Ted Cruz was full
of energy. He spoke a lot about the issues. He really got the crowd riled
up a lot, and you can tell how serious he is about this and how much he
cares about America."

The importance of retail politics

It's perhaps no surprise Cruz is able to channel a preacher. His father is
an ordained minister, and he went to high school in Houston on the campus
of a megachurch.

The former Ivy League debate champion has always loved performance art. He
has moved between stages his whole life — from high-school musicals to the
high-pressure collegiate debate circuit to the floor of the U.S. Senate.
The challenge, though, for Cruz is coming down from the stage.

A majority of Republican caucus-goers and primary voters in Iowa and South
Carolina are white, evangelical or born-again Christians. In 2012, 57
percent of GOP voters in the Iowa caucuses described themselves that way,
while 65 percent of the GOP primary electorate in South Carolina said so,
according to entrance and exit polls.

The candidate who can unify them has a time-tested path to victory in those
states and, with it, a springboard to the front of the presidential pack.
But winning over those voters requires hand-to-hand, grip-and-grin
campaigning — retail politics.

It's what former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and former Pennsylvania Sen.
Rick Santorum did in Iowa in 2008 and 2012, respectively. Former Texas Gov.
Rick Perry, who built a career on this kind of campaigning, has already hit
hard key sections of the state with deep pockets of religious voters.

The building blocks, the enthusiasm, are there for Cruz, but so far,
observers in early states say, he has not shown the willingness to do the
kind of required on-the-ground work — to the extent it's needed to win.

Craig Robinson, the former Iowa GOP political operative, noted Cruz's thin
staff in the first caucus state compared to other candidates. What's more,
Cruz, who is in Iowa this weekend, has held just 23 events in the state
over a total of 16 days, according to the Des Moines Register's candidate
tracker. That ranks seventh among Republican candidates and isn't in the
top 10 overall.

By contrast, Santorum has already held 62 events over 29 days; Rick Perry
61 over 30 days; Rand Paul 41 over 16 days; and Mike Huckabee 37 events
over 20 days. Even Carly Fiorina and Bobby Jindal, who is set to declare
Wednesday, have done more events.

"I still think Cruz has some work to do in terms of his retail campaigning
in Iowa," Robinson said, "but I think he has it within himself to do it."

The battle for the evangelical vote

Some of those who have topped him in sojourns to the state are also
competing for the same crucial evangelical voters, and were also
well-received at the conference this week.

Santorum reminded the audience of his long track record fighting for
conservative issues, while others were just talk.

"You know me, I'm probably best known for issues of faith and freedom. In
some cases, I'm only known for that," he laughed.

Jindal also spoke at length about the threats to religious liberty the day
after Cruz, and was also well received by the crowd. Talking of his own
conversion to the Christianity from Hinduism, he bemoaned how he felt it
was no longer acceptable to stand up for unpopular opinions central to much
of the evangelical faith, such as opposition to abortion and same-sex
marriage.

"I'm tired of the hypocrisy of the left," Jindal said. "They say they
tolerate diversity, and they do, unless you disagree with them. ... The
United States of America did not create religious liberty. Religious
liberty created the United States of America," he added to applause.

Ben Carson, another favorite of the crowd, Iowa conservatives and Tea Party
supporters, spoke of how his faith helped him in his career as a
world-renowned neurosurgeon. He said he saw the healing power of prayer and
attributed his surgical skill to God after a child he didn't expect to
recover went on to do so.

"I thought I was doing everything," Carson said. "I realized after that,
that it wasn't me, it was God. I just said, 'Lord, you be the neurosurgeon,
and I'll be your hands.' "

Carson, who rose to political fame in 2013 after giving a blistering
broadside of Obamacare as the president sat feet away, had another critique
for the president's administration.

"I know that President Obama says we're not a Judeo-Christian nation,"
Carson said, "but he doesn't get to decide. We decide."

While Cruz may have blown away many in the crowd the first day, others were
left impressed by many others, underlining the difficult choice Iowa and
South Carolina evangelical voters will have next year.

"I'm hoping, because we have such a large field, that as the field narrows
down, the candidates are seeing what the American people really are looking
for," said Terri Wical of Atlanta. "You know, getting back to our roots,
getting back to character and all that. They don't want someone moderate.
They don't want something that's going to accommodate everybody ... They
want somebody that's going to stand on a firm foundation."

*Cruz: 'Liberal fascism' took away Gortz Haus livelihood
<http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/elections/presidential/caucus/2015/06/20/cruz-gortz-haus/29035749/>
// The Des Moines Register // Matthew Patane – June 20, 2015 *

Democrats' stance on gay marriage ruined the livelihood of the owners of
Gortz Haus Gallery, Republican presidential hopeful Ted Cruz said Saturday.

"Today, the modern Democratic party has decided their devotion to mandatory
gay marriage in all 50 states is so unforgiving that there is no longer
room for defending religious liberty," Cruz told a group in Johnston.

Gortz Haus owners Dick and Betty Odgaard faced litigation after declining
to host a same-sex marriage at the Grimes gift shop, which used to house a
Lutheran church. The Mennonite couple said it would have gone against their
religious beliefs.

"It was inconsistent with their faith to host a gay wedding, so they
declined," Cruz said. "They found themselves enmeshed in legal proceedings
and persecution. Finally, they had to write a check for $5,000 and to
promise to never again host another wedding."

The Odgaards announced earlier this year that they will stop holding
weddings at their Grimes' gift shop to end the litigation.

"So, the Odgaards livelihood has been taken away by this liberal fascism,
this extreme view that if you hold a biblical teaching of marriage that is
the union of one man and one women that the modern Democratic Party will
persecute you and try to drive you out of civilized society," Cruz said.

Cruz said he will visit the Odgaards later Saturday. Cruz came back to Iowa
Friday for two town halls in western Iowa and made a stop Saturday for a
"Celebrate the 2nd Amendment" event.

Speaking during an event in Johnston, Cruz reiterated his position that
religious liberty in the U.S. is under fire. The Texas U.S. senator has
made the issue a cornerstone of his campaign as he seeks his party's
presidential nomination.

*Ted Cruz Introduces Bill to Drain Amnesty Slush Fund Subsidized by Legal
Immigrants
<http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/06/20/ted-cruz-introduces-bill-to-drain-amnesty-slush-fund-subsidized-by-legal-immigrants/>
// Breitbart News // Katie McHugh – June 20, 2015 *

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) introduced legislation on Wednesday that would
forbid the Obama administration from using fees paid by legal immigrants to
fund Obama’s executive amnesty for illegal aliens.

The Immigration Slush Fund Elimination Act would stop the executive branch
from using fees collected from legal immigrants who obeyed U.S. immigration
law to pay for the ongoing illegal alien naturalization surge. Thanks to
the million or so legal aliens flocking to America every year, that’s a lot
of cash. Cruz notes that USCIS Chief Financial Officer Joseph Moore can lay
claim to nearly $1 billion in application fees. Cruz’s bill would return
the pursestrings back into Congress’s hands — and perhaps most importantly,
stop the White House from ramping up legal immigration and issuing more and
more fees in order to grant more illegal aliens amnesty.

Legal immigrants can wait up to ten years to become legalized and pay
thousands of dollars in fees. Once Obama enacted his DACA executive amnesty
order in 2012, wait times for legal immigrants tripled.

“America has always been a land of refuge and opportunity for those seeking
freedom, and we should champion legal immigration,” Cruz said in a
statement. “Ronald Reagan referred to legal immigrants, immigrants like my
father, as Americans by choice. The federal government should not be in the
business of looting the wallets of those who followed the law and came here
legally to fund the President’s illegal and unconstitutional amnesty. This
bill will cut off DHS’s credit card and put Congress back in charge of
funding the agencies responsible for immigration.”

In typical Obama fashion, amnesty is funded by a wealth transfer from the
law-abiding to the law-breaking. A Mexican man who applies for U.S.
citizenship and goes through the normal process subsidizes his Mexican
neighbor who darted across the border, maybe threw a few rocks at border
patrol, and lives in a sanctuary city while waiting for amnesty.

Both are legalized; Mexican man number one is poorer than his illegal
cousin thanks to the fees he paid, and both of them work for lowered wages
while voting for more government spending. It’s a win-win for Democrats and
big business.

*PERRY*

*Perry condemns Charleston church shooting after 'accident' flub
<http://www.cnn.com/2015/06/20/politics/rick-perry-charleston-south-carolina-massacre-shooting-accident/>
// CNN // Danielle Diaz – June 20, 2015 *

Rick Perry condemned the Charleston church shooting Saturday as "an
absolute heinous hate crime," one day after a spokesman said the Republican
presidential candidate misspoke when he called the massacre an "accident."

"I think we all come here today with heavy hearts for those individuals in
Charleston -- those Charleston Christians -- who were gunned down in an
absolute heinous hate crime inside of their place of worship," the former
Texas governor said at the Faith and Freedom Coalition "Road to Majority"
Conference in Washington Saturday morning. "That deranged individual didn't
just take lives of black Americans -- he gunned down nine children of God.

"There is something more basic to our humanity than the color of our skin,
our ethnic heritage, our nationality. It's that we're all made in the image
of a loving God," Perry continued. "And we cannot let hatred and violence
break the ties that bind us together."

After his speech at the conference, Perry told reporters that a discussion
on gun control is a good thing.

"I think it is healthy for us as a nation to have conversations and defend
our positions whatever they may be," he responded. "I do have an issue that
the knee-jerk from the left is always, 'We're going to take people's guns
away from them,' when in fact there may be a host of contributing factors
here."

Perry's comments on Saturday follow an interview he did with the
conservative NewsmaxTV Friday, in which he referred to the massacre as an
"accident." A spokesman for the former Texas governor quickly clarified by
saying Perry meant to say "incident."

In the interview, Perry, a staunch opponent of gun laws, was asked about
whether President Barack Obama was too quick to blame guns after the
Charleston shooting.

"Any time there is an accident like this, the President is clear," Perry
said in response. "He doesn't like for Americans to have guns, and so he
uses every opportunity, this being another one, to basically go parrot that
message."

Despite addressing his comments and speaking openly about the shooting
Saturday, many people were still outraged over his "accident" line and took
to social media to criticize his comments.

Perry, who served as governor of Texas for 15 years, has an A+ rating from
the National Rifle Association and has his own concealed handgun license,
even though he can't carry guns after he was indicted last August on counts
alleging coercion of a public servant and abuse of his official capacity.

When he was governor, he signed several bills to loosen gun control laws in
the United States, including a bill that allows people to store guns in
their cars and another that reduced the price to renew a concealed handgun
license for veterans to $25.

*Rick Perry warns Jeb Bush ‘ Has to be Careful’ about criticizing Texas
<http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/06/20/exclusive-rick-perry-warns-jeb-bush-has-to-be-careful-about-criticizing-texas/>
// Breitbart News // Sarah Rumpf – June 20, 2015 *

Breitbart News caught up with former Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX) as he took a
swing through Texas in his second week back on the campaign trail since
launching his presidential campaign in Addison, Texas on June 4th.

In an exclusive interview with Breitbart News, Perry shared his perspective
on how this campaign differs from his 2012 attempt, why he believes that
his record stacks up favorably against any of his competitors, what he
believes will be a major challenge for former Gov. Jeb Bush (R-FL), his
thoughts on the abuses at the VA, and a special memory he shared about time
he spent with Breitbart News founder, the late Andrew Breitbart.

We met Perry at a Starbucks in San Antonio, the latest stop in a busy
campaign schedule that had him in at least six cities spread across Texas
in half as many days. Perry, who just wrapped up fourteen years as Texas’
Governor this past January, is a well-recognized figure in his home state
and was warmly greeted by many of the Starbucks patrons, including a little
girl who shyly asked Perry to sign her autograph book.

The Governor drew a little heart in the girl’s book and wrote “Study Hard!”
before signing his name. His act was as sweet as the skinny mocha
frappuccino (with whip cream!) that Perry had ordered. Perry cracked a joke
about the sugary drink — “Isn’t that a beautiful thing? That’s calories, is
what that is” — and pointed out that he likes to start the day with regular
dark roast coffee.

Perry smiled in recognition and pulled out his cell phone to show me the
background image. It was a target sheet from a shooting range, from a day
he had gone shooting with Andrew.

“He had never shot a pistol before,” said Perry, “and as a matter of fact,
he did pretty well, you can see,” pointing to the tight grouping. Perry’s
autograph on the target sheet reads, “To Andrew — Shoot Straight! Vote
Conservative… Rick Perry.” Andrew had taken the original back with him to
the Breitbart offices in Los Angeles, and Perry had saved this photo.

“He was a good man,” added Perry, smiling at the memory.

The conversation turned to the campaign, just launched two weeks ago to the
day as we talked that Thursday. Perry’s 2012 campaign was a roller coaster
ride, shooting to the top of the polls when he first entered the race, but
then plummeting back down after a series of debate missteps.

To his credit, Perry has been very forthcoming in acknowledging what went
wrong in 2012, saying very frankly that he had not had adequate time to
prepare on the broader list of issues and his recovery from back surgery a
few months before entering the race had been longer and tougher than
anticipated.

Not only is he completely healthy, Perry wants people to know, he has
undertaken serious study over the past few years, and also no longer has to
divide his attention between the campaign and being the Governor of Texas.

“It’s a very different time,” said Perry, explaining that the “biggest
difference” was that he was “healthy and prepared” this time. “Both of
those were challenges in 2011.”

“You have to take the time to go get the briefings, to go acquire the
knowledge,” he explained. “That’s what I didn’t do in 2011 but what I have
done for the last three and a half years,” describing trips he had taken to
meet with policy experts at the Hoover Institute, Manhattan Institute,
Heritage Foundation, Hay Initiative, and other conservative think tanks.
“The preparation side of it is very important.”

I was actually at both of Perry’s presidential launches, in August 2011 in
Charleston, South Carolina, and in Addison, Texas on June 4th. Both
featured Perry confidently touting his record in Texas as his best resume
line to qualify him for the White House, but there are a number of key
differences this time around.

In 2012, Perry’s message was heavily focused on the Texas economic miracle,
and rightfully so. During Perry’s tenure as Governor, the Lone Star State
added more jobs than all the other states put together, one-third of all
jobs created in the U.S. since 2000. These numbers are even more impressive
considering that this happened during the Great Recession and its aftermath.

Jeb Bush “has to be careful” about criticizing Texas

This campaign has seen Perry move beyond just touting Texas’ impressive
numbers, readily contrasting his record with any of his competitors, with
former Gov. Jeb Bush (R-FL) in particular.

Perry noted that Bush was bragging that he had created more jobs in Florida
during his time as Governor than were created in Texas. While Perry said
that he respected Bush’s record — “job creation is what a governor’s
supposed to be about” — but added that it was important for Americans to
remember that it was “blue skies and smooth sailing” for Bush, who
benefited from the surging prices during housing bubble, which burst after
he was out of office.

“What happened in those states when the Great Recession occurred, the worst
recession America’s had since the Great Depression?” asked Perry. “In fact,
there’s only one state [that didn’t suffer]…we outperformed, nobody else is
even close!”

“Jeb has to be careful about his criticism of bypassing Texas,” added
Perry, “because the bulk of that, his brother was the Governor, and his
brother’s probably not going to take very kindly to him saying ‘we kicked
Texas’ butt,’ but, you know, I’ll let him work that out with his brother.”

Jim Tankersley at the Washington Post agreed with Perry’s assessment:

A significant amount of Florida’s economic and job growth in the Bush era
was driven by a massive run-up in housing prices — which peaked in Bush’s
last year in office, then plunged the state into a worse recession than the
nation as a whole.

When you account for the role of housing, Bush’s economic record looks a
lot more mixed. Almost all of the gains he talks up today, including
three-fifths of the job creation, were wiped out in the four years after he
left office, once the bubble burst.

The housing bubble, of course, was not the fault of Bush or any one
governor, but if Bush cannot be blamed for losses caused by the bubble, it
is equally problematic to grant him credit for its gains, as blogger Ace of
Spades pointed out.

Matthew Yglesias at Vox — certainly no staunch conservative or Perry
apologist — wrote an article recently with a compelling summary of Perry’s
economic record, calling it “far and away the best and most coherent story
of any candidate in the field about why his record in office should make
you think he could deliver the kind of prosperity the voters crave.”

Yglesias’ article included the chart shown below, comparing in-state job
growth with the national average rate during the tenure of several
governors. “You can see that Perry’s time in office largely corresponded
with a not-so-hot spell of job creation for the United States of America,”
writes Yglesias, “but that he nonetheless has the strongest record of
in-state job creation of anyone in the sample.”

With his new campaign, Perry is still happily bragging about all the new
jobs in Texas — “we’re the most successful state in the nation” — but he is
also making the effort to articulate the policies enacted during his tenure
that encouraged economic development, as well as connecting that economic
growth to improvements in the lives of ordinary Texans.

“We went in and really did some things that created a great positive effect
on our economy,” said Perry. “Passed the most sweeping tort reform in the
world, we reduced spending by ten billion dollars rather than raising
taxes…It was a very concerted effort to send a message that you can risk
your capital and have a chance to have a return on your investment.”

The results of this tort reform, according to Perry, were that over 35,000
more physicians were licensed to practice in Texas than had been a decade
earlier. “That’s a huge number, and the access to health care exploded. I’m
a big believer that the way you judge if you’re successful on the health
care front is not how many people you force to buy insurance, but how many
people have access to better health care, and we’ve done that in Texas.”

Perry also rattled off several reforms to the public education system, to
“make our schools more accountable,” including incentive pay for good
teachers, expanding charter schools, implementing testing that made it
easier to intervene earlier if they were struggling.

These efforts paid off, taking Texas from “in the middle of the pack,”
ranked 27th in the U.S. in 2003 for high school graduation rates, to second
in 2013. “That is a powerful, powerful story.”

Texas didn’t just improve overall graduation rates, but was ranked number
one for both African-American and Hispanic graduation rates, statistics of
which Perry is very proud. “You’ve got to remember, Texas is a very diverse
state. We’re the largest majority-minority state that’s seen progress in
their public schools…there’s not a more powerful message to a family that
we care about you, and we’re taking care of your kids, than to graduate
them from high school” and make sure they have a future,” said Perry.

Failure to care for veterans “pisses me off,” says Perry

Texas’ job creation is also sharing the spotlight in Perry’s campaign with
national security and foreign policy issues, and caring for America’s
veterans, an issue near and dear to Perry’s heart. Other than extreme
longshot Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC)47%

, Perry is the only Republican candidate with military experience, having
flown C-130 tactical aircraft as an Air Force Captain during the 1970s in
Europe and the Middle East.

“This veterans’ issue is one that we’ve been dealing with for five or six
years, so it’s not new to us, but it became a national issue a year and a
half ago,” he said. Taking care of veterans’ needs “is a really important
public policy issue that needs to be addressed,” said Perry, who added that
he had been working with these issues for a long time, “both in a personal
way and in a professional way.”

The “personal way” Perry mentioned included helping former Navy SEAL Marcus
Luttrell, who had appeared at his campaign launch along with his twin
brother and fellow SEAL, Morgan. Luttrell, the author of the book Lone
Survivor about his experiences surviving an ambush in Afghanistan, was
befriended by Perry and his wife Anita after he returned to Texas after his
combat service.

Suffering from PTSD and physical injuries sustained in combat, plus
challenges readjusting to civilian life, Luttrell showed up unannounced on
the doorstep of the Governor’s Mansion one day in 2007. He had met Perry
before and the Governor had told him to let him know if they could ever
help him. The Perrys invited Luttrell to move into the Governor’s Mansion
while they worked to help him find doctors to treat his injuries, including
a spinal surgeon, as well as providing him with a safe, home-like
environment where his heart and mind could recover.

Perry described his frustrations dealing with “this very archaic and broken
system” to get Luttrell the medical care and support he needed. “I had to
literally intervene to the height of the Secretary of the Navy,” he said.

“There’s ten thousand kids like Marcus who didn’t have a Governor, and that
pisses me off,” said Perry, noting that it should not require the Governor
of Texas to make that kind of phone call in order for a veteran to get help.

“As the Governor, we were putting teams that were going into the VA here in
Texas, to help alleviate the red tape. All these veterans will tell you
that the VA was just slow, and bureaucratically archaic, it was a corrosive
process for them. They can’t get the benefits they need, or have to wait
months to get their benefits.”

“That is just not acceptable.”

Perry noted that the Obama administration had the opportunity to address
these problems, but no real progress could be seen. “I’m still very unhappy
with how this has been addressed, we’re a year plus [after] they changed
Secretaries [of the VA], they got all this money from the federal
government, and I’m not sure anything has changed.”

“No one gives you a manual” to learn executive experience

Perry has called this campaign the “show me, don’t tell me election,” and
has sought to emphasize that his record shows that he is the best prepared
among the ever-growing field of candidates for the job of President.

“Executive experience is really important,” said Perry. “You can’t get
executive experience but by one avenue, from my perspective…you can read
all the books you want on how to deal with catastrophic events, but until
you go through it and you live through it and you manage it, it’s just
words on paper.”

“No one gives you a manual on how to deal with the space shuttle
disintegrating over your state,” he continued. “No one gives you a manual
on how to deal with hurricanes — Katrina, Rita, Ike — and the list goes on.
Nobody can tell you how to deal with a crisis on your border, where you
have literally tens of thousands of people show up, trying to penetrate
through your border and the federal government’s not assisting you. Or how
to deal with Ebola.”

“All of those things are executive experience that is invaluable.” However,
Perry noted, “governors generally don’t deal in the arena of monetary
policy, domestic policy, or foreign affairs,” or at least most governors
don’t. The situation is a bit different when you’re Governor of Texas, “the
twelfth largest economy in the world,” he explained, mentioning the 1200
mile border with Mexico, and trips he had been able to take, not just to
visit important trading partners in Europe and Asia, but also combat zones
like Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.

Read Part I of Breitbart News’ exclusive interview with Gov. Perry, in
which he discusses how his lack of trust in President Obama made him unable
to support the “Obamatrade” bills, despite his belief in free trade.

Stay tuned for Part III, in which Perry talks about why Texas is the model
for criminal justice reform, the vital role his wife Anita will play in the
campaign, why would veto the funding for the Public Integrity Unit under
troubled Travis County District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg all over again,
and the message he hopes voters hear as he makes a second attempt to earn
their support to elect him President.

*Rick Perry calls South Carolina church shooting an 'accident'
<http://www.aol.com/article/2015/06/20/rick-perry-calls-south-carolina-church-shooting-an-accident/21198908/>
// AOL News – June 20, 2015 *

Former Texas governor Rick Perry went into damage control mode on Friday
after calling the mass killing in South Carolina an "accident."

"Any time there is an accident like this the president is clear."

His comment came during a NewsmaxTV interview in which he was asked about
President Obama's reaction to the shooting that killed nine people.

After the interview, in which Perry also refers to the shooting as a hate
crime, a representative classified it as a simple slip saying Perry meant
to say "incident" rather than "accident."

But, of course, the Internet didn't let it slide.

On Twitter, @michaelianblack said, "Rick Perry describing the Charleston
shooting as an 'accident' is about as plausible as Rick Perry becoming
president."

And @HaroldItz scolded the presidential candidate, saying, "No, Rick Perry,
an accident is what your dog does on the rug. Or what you do when you
speak."

@kidrauhlangels added, "Someone please take Rick Perry home and put him to
bed, he's clearly drunk."

But Perry making a few flubs is nothing new.

Back in 2011 during a Republican debate, he completely blanked trying to
remember the third government agency that he would eliminate if elected
president.

"The third agency of government I would do away with. Education...uh...the
uh... Commerce...And let's see. I can't. The third one I can't. Oops."

*Rick Perry: Dylann Roof ‘Gunned Down 9 Children of God’
<http://www.mediaite.com/online/rick-perry-dylann-roof-gunned-down-9-children-of-god/>
// Mediaite // Andrew Husband – June 20, 2015 *

Less than a day after former Texas Gov. Rick Perry accidentally referred to
the Charleston church shooting as, erm, an “accident,” the 2016 GOP
presidential candidate addressed the terrible events on Saturday morning.

Perry was speaking at the Faith and Freedom Coalition’s “Road to Majority”
conference in Washington, D.C., and much of what he said concerned his
condolences to the victims’ families and his heartbreak at the loss of
these “nine children of God”:

“I think we all come here today with heavy hearts for those individuals in
Charleston — those Charleston Christians — who were gunned down in an
absolute heinous hate crime inside of their place of worship.”

Much of Perry’s remarks focused less on the event’s racial implications, as
he chose to highlight the anti-religious nature of the crime:

“There is something more basic to our humanity than the color of our skin,
our ethnic heritage, our nationality. It’s that we’re all made in the image
of a loving God, and we cannot let hatred and violence break the ties that
bind us together.”

Rather tellingly, the 2016 GOP hopeful referred to shooting suspect Dylann
Roof as a “deranged individual” who “didn’t just take lives of black
Americans,” but specifically “gunned down nine children of God.”

Perry later told reporters that he thought a renewed national discussion
about gun control would be “healthy.” However, he cautioned against “the
knee-jerk from the left” that demands all guns be banned and taken away
from responsible gun owners.

*GRAHAM*

*Sen. Lindsey Graham: there’s ‘No doubt’ that Charleston church massacre
was racially motivated
<http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2015/06/20/270687/sen-lindsey-graham-theres-no-doubt.html>
// McClatchy // William Douglas – June 20, 2015 *

Days after several Republican presidential candidates downplayed or
sidestepped the issue of race in the shooting deaths of nine people inside
an historic African-American church in Charleston, S.C., Sen. Lindsey
Graham acknowledged that race was the primary factor in the killings.

"There can be no doubt that the shooting on Wednesday night was racially
motivated and signals to all of us that the scars of our history are still
with us today," Graham, R-S.C., said in a statement Saturday. "Throughout
our country, we still have much to do in the name of equality. I want to
talk about those issues on the campaign trail."

He added: "I’m from South Carolina. My state, like our nation, has a
difficult history of race relations. We have tried to address it through
compromise and working together. There is no doubt we have made great
progress, but Charleston reminds us there is still much to do."

Graham’s remarks about the massacre at Charleston’s Emanuel African
Methodist Episcopal Church came after several Republican White House
hopefuls struggled to deal with race and the shootings during appearances
Thursday and Friday at the Faith and Freedom Coalition’s conference in
Washington.

The nine shooting victims were African-American. The alleged gunman,
21-year-old Dylann Roof, reportedly went on racist rants. Saturday, state
and federal law enforcement officials were examining a recently-discovered
hate-filled website to determine whether it belonged to Roof.

Republican presidential hopefuls at the Washington conference expressed
their outrage and condolences over the shootings but largely steered clear
of what role race may have played in the attack.

For example, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., didn’t mention the shootings during
his speech. Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush told conference attendees that he
didn’t know what was in the mind or heart "of the man who committed those
atrocious crimes."

"I do know what was in the heart of the victims," he added. "They were
meeting in brotherhood and sisterhood in that church."

However, retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson, the only African-American
presidential candidate, spoke bluntly about the racial element in the
shootings, telling the crowd that "If we don't pay close attention to the
hatred and division going on in our nation, this is a harbinger of what we
can expect."

*Lindsey Graham gets to the heart of it
<http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/language-blog/bal-lindsey-graham-gets-to-the-heart-of-it-20150620-story.html>
// The Baltimore Sun // John McIntrye – June 20, 2015 *

A difficulty in discussing the Confederate battle flag—whether it should be
honored or discarded—is that not everyone can agree on basic facts.

Yesterday, writing in the Washington Examiner, Philip Klein presented a
cogent conservative argument against continuing to display the flag, in
which he stated a fundamental fact: “The Confederacy was formed to preserve
and expand the brutal institution of slavery, and then its proponents
subsequently tried to disguise their motivations in lofty language about
states' rights.”

He quoted from the “cornerstone” speech of Confederate Vice President
Alexander Stephens and cited the formal secession documents of Texas,
Georgia, South Carolina and Mississippi, all of which emphatically and
explicitly said that the Confederate states were seceding to preserve white
supremacy over blacks, whom they branded an inferior race.

And, of course, it became in the 1950s and 1960s an emblem of resistance to
the civil rights movement, the banner of segregation.

Commenters, predictably, refused to address the historical facts and
instead resorted to ad hominem abuse of Mr. Klein.

But rather than tread that ground again, I prefer to look at an
illuminating comment by Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina during an
interview yesterday. Concerning public display of the Confederate battle
flag, he said, “If at the end of the day, it is time for the people of
South Carolina to reconsider that decision, it would be fine with me, but
this is part of who we are.” [Emphasis added]

Though he does not seem to be aware of it in the interview, Senator Graham
has touched on a central question: Who are the we?

In fact, it is the central question. Are African-Americans Southerners as
much as white Southerners are? That was the question that some thought was
decided by the events of 1861-1865 and by the ratification of the
Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments to the Constitution. But
laws establishing segregation, along with lynchings and other violence
against blacks, insisted that African-Americans are not part of us.

So Senator Graham might well consider this: Are black people, born and
raised in the South, for whom the Confederate battle flag is a perpetual
reminder that they were treated as an inferior class of human beings, as
much Southerners as white people, born and raised in the South, who see
that flag as a proud symbol of their identity while ignoring the ugliness
that is inextricably attached to it?

Short version: Do you want that flag to say who we are?

*SANTORUM*

*Rick Santorum and Bobby Jindal Talk Faith and Freedom
<http://www.kmbz.com/pages/21659541.php?> // KMBZ – June 20, 2015 *

At Faith and Freedom Coalition’s Road to the Majority event Saturday, ABC
News asked two Republican presidential players to share their thoughts on
some related hot-button political issues in the news.

Here’s what former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum -- who is running for
president in 2016 --  and Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal -- who is considering
running -- had to say about Democrats talking gun control in the wake of
the tragic Charleston church shooting, flying the confederate flag, and the
Supreme Court’s decision on gay marriage.

ABC News: What do you think when you hear Democrats talking about gun
control right now?

Santorum: "I think that's politicizing a very tragic event that has serious
repercussions about who we are as a country I mean the idea that there
would be this kind of racial crime in America purely hate-filled evil crime
driven by race is is enough to focus on. To try to piggyback that onto
something else I think is really disrespectful."

ABC News: You are against gay marriage. Would you support a Supreme Court
decision legalizing it?

Santorum: “As I've said repeatedly I'll wait and see what the Supreme Court
is going to decide, but I don't change my opinion . If the Supreme Court
decides something is right or something is wrong -- that's the great thing
about our Republic, is that civil institutions make decisions whether
they're laws or whether they're executive orders or whether they're Supreme
Court decisions and you, as a free person in this country, can go out and
still advocate for what you believe in.”

ABC News: What's your reaction when you see the politicians talking about
gun control in the wake of a massacre like this?

Jindal: "Look the President's remarks within the first 24 hours are still
within the first 48 hours - I think it's shameful to score cheap political
points. He's the commander-in-chief. He should be uniting us he needs to be
bringing us together it's a time for healing if you want a great contrast
look at Gov. Nikki Haley -- her tremendous leadership during this crisis
this is a time to come together as one country in prayer and start the
healing process."

ABC News: Should the confederate flag still flying in South Carolina or
anywhere else in the United States?

Jindal: We'll let the states decide that, but again, just like the gun
issue -- let's have that debate at the right time. And right now we should
all be in mourning. I think flags should be at half-mast across our states
across our country. Now's a time for mourning. Now's the time to tell our
kids it really doesn’t matter, we're all brothers and sisters ... I happen
to be a Christian, and those are brothers and sisters of mine in my faith.
Whether you're Christian or not -- whatever you wish -- those were our
brothers and sisters, it doesn’t matter if in South Carolina, it doesn’t
matter [if you are] Black or White, young or old -- those were our brothers
and sisters killed in that church.”

*HUCKABEE*

*Fox host and Huckabee attack Obama over gun control comments — then call
for more civility and less rhetoric
<http://www.rawstory.com/2015/06/fox-host-and-huckabee-attack-obama-over-gun-control-comments-then-call-for-more-civility-and-less-rhetoric/>
// Raw Story // Tom Boggioni – June 20, 2015 *

Repeating an often heard suggestion following every mass shooting in the
United States, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee complained that
President Barack Obama was “grandstanding” when he called for more gun
control after the Charleston church shooting, saying instead more guns is
the solution.

With Fox News host Todd Starnes calling the president’s comments
“despicable,” Huckabee joined in to attack the president before pointing
out that it was a shame no one attending the prayer meeting was packing a
gun.

“Well it was disappointing to hear the president within virtually minutes
of the news breaking, or certainly hours, for him to come to the podium and
immediately say, ‘Alright, this is a great opportunity for me to grandstand
and jump up on the stump and talk about gun control.'” Huckabee said.

Saying that no gun control proposal could have stopped the shooting at the
Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal church in Charleston or at the Sandy
Hook Elementary school, Huckabee lamented the fact that no one at the
prayer meeting was carrying a gun.

“The one thing that would have at least ameliorated the horrible situation
in Charleston would have been that if somebody in that prayer meeting had a
conceal carry or there had been either an off duty policeman or an on duty
policemen, somebody with the legal authority to carry a firearm and could
have stopped the shooter,” Huckabee said. ”

Huckabee added, “I go back to was has often been said, and it sounds crass,
but frankly the best way to stop a bad person with a gun is to have a good
person with a weapon that is equal or superior to the one he’s using.”

Fox’s Starnes, notorious for his false reporting of supposed persecution of
Christians in American society, then called for civility instead of
rhetoric by our nation’s leaders.

*CARSON*

*Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson speaks in Birmingham
<http://www.al.com/news/birmingham/index.ssf/2015/06/republican_presidential_candid.html>
// Alabama News // Adam Ganucheau – June 20, 2015 *

More than 6,500 attendees of a men's Christian conference packed the Legacy
Arena early Saturday morning to hear Republican presidential candidate Ben
Carson speak.

Carson, who formally launched his campaign in May, was a keynote speaker at
the Gridiron Men's Conference, a Christian conference held at the
Birmingham Jefferson Convention Complex.

"Let me make it clear to you and the press," radio evangelist Phil Waldrep,
the conference's sponsor, said before introducing Carson to the stage.
"This is not a political rally. (Carson is) here because he wants to speak
into your life and encourage every man in this place to leave this building
to make a difference."

While Carson did integrate his faith into the 49-minute address, the speech
at times resembled a political speech rather than a Christian testimony,
rousing applause from the audience after riffs about combatting some of
America's problems.

He touched on a few of his platforms and expressed his political ideas on
subjects like the government's role in distributing welfare, the importance
of positively influencing youth at an early age, protecting freedom of
expression and the status of the education system in America.

"Education is the great divide in our country," Carson said. "It doesn't
matter what your ethnic or economic background is, if you get a good
education you will succeed. That is something we must begin to emphasize
again."

Carson, who is a retired Johns Hopkins neurosurgeon, is one of many
candidates vying for the Republican nomination for the 2016 presidential
election. He has edged his Republican counterparts in multiple straw polls
and has been a very popular candidate among those who affiliate with the
tea party.

Earlier this month, four of Carson's senior campaign officials quit,
drawing speculation to the campaign's health.

But in Birmingham Saturday, he focused on his ideas and his faith. He
quoted multiple passages from the book of Proverbs during the speech and
said multiple times that his success came from his faith in God.

"I think that God gives everybody special gifts and talents," Carson said
of knowing when he knew he wanted to become a surgeon.

Carson was just one of the conference's six speakers, including New Orleans
Saints quarterback Drew Brees, who spoke Friday night. Attendees of the
conference are in Birmingham from 15 different states.

*TRUMP*

*Donoald Trump’s resume backs his run for president
<http://nypost.com/2015/06/20/donald-trumps-resume-backs-his-run-for-president/>
// NY Post // Jonathan Trugman – June 20, 2015 *

So Donald Trump — New York’s charismatic multibillionaire businessman — has
thrown his hat into the 2016 presidential ring.

While many question his presence in the race, 2016 may be the year in which
America is in desperate need of a suave, successful businessperson like
Trump — or former HP CEO Carly Fiorina — to solve what ails our economy.

Unlike most politicians, these two have plenty of experience building
things, hiring people — and sometimes firing people — and both have
extensive résumés and are not just spouting rhetoric.

There’s no doubt that most Americans are hurting right now. The economy is
much weaker than advertised and not expected to get stronger anytime soon —
the Federal Reserve on Wednesday downgraded its growth forecast for this
year to 1.9 percent.

If that forecast comes to fruition, it will mean seven years in a row of
below-3 percent GDP growth. No president has ever had that distinction.

So the next president could use a track record of building and developing
growth, since the measures by the Fed of keeping rates at zero and making
$4 trillion worth of QE bond buys have done nothing for growth.

If a businessperson were to get the keys to the White House, here’s what he
or she would need to do.

The single most important issue is jobs, and Trump is well aware of it.
Getting the job market back on its feet will not be easy, but Trump has
built a global business that employs thousands of people — from
contractors, plumbers and electricians to investment bankers, lawyers and
accountants — whom he pays quite well. So he actually knows what it takes.

The Donald could very well live up to his claim, which was vintage Trump:
“I will be the greatest jobs president that God has ever created.”

While the unemployment rate is misleadingly low — folks taking two or three
part-time jobs at a time skew the stats — the more accurate and
encompassing labor-force participation rate remains near the all-time low
of 62 percent.

That is because millions of Americans have left the labor force and have
given up looking for a job.

Unfortunately, the attitude and the algebra today is, if you can’t make
more than the government assistance pays, then why bother going back to
work?

For those fortunate who have steady work, there have been no wage gains to
speak of for the last decade. Nothing says “failing economy” like working
for 10 years and not seeing your buying power increase.

Both Trump and Fiorina are pragmatists, which doesn’t bode well for a
political career, but that quality could be refreshing. Their opponents
will have a hard time trying to fit them into a box on the political grid.

By working to free up capital in corporations and motivating companies to
bring work back to the US, they will back up their words.

Also, look for Trump to forge large bipartisan infrastructure deals to
rebuild America’s dilapidated highways, bridges and tunnels and to bring
America into the 21st century technologically. After all, it can’t be
denied that Trump knows plenty about construction.

That the Beltway Brigade never addressed this issue is mind-boggling. You
can’t drive two miles without dodging potholes, losing a filling or blowing
a tire.

This is a huge opportunity, and it will put people back to work, on
projects that are actually necessary — unlike the “shovel-ready”
infrastructure programs in the $850 billion stimulus plan President Obama,
Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid put together.

Our candidates have become more and more like a bunch of mannequins and
actors reading from TelePrompTers than CEOs of a $15 trillion economy. Only
a few people in the race have legitimate bodies of work and accomplishments
that enable us to see how they have actually performed when in charge.

Trump and Fiorina are two that can be called all-business.

*Cher trashes Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign
<http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/cher-trashes-donald-trumps-2016-presidential-campaign>
// MSNBC // Adam Howard – June 20, 2015 *

Pop icon Cher definitely does not back Donald Trump’s run for the
presidency.

Although the real estate mogul’s 2016 campaign launch this week was widely
ridiculed across the media landscape, the “Believe” singer’s social media
reaction garnered some of the most attention.

In addition to saying she would relocate to the planet Jupiter if Trump was
ever elected, the 69-year-old called him a “loudmouthed bigot” and an
“obnoxious a–hole,” in a series of tweets.

“Donald Trump can’t come up with a hairstyle that looks human, how can he
come up with a plan to defeat ISIS,” Cher said incredulously on Twitter.
“Donald Trump’s ego is so inflated, he might as well be the Hindenburg,”
she added in another tweet.

The outspoken, Oscar-winning performer said choosing between GOP contender
Sen. Ted Cruz and Trump was “like saying ‘would you rather have a Migraine
or Throw Up.’” And ultimately that: “Donald Trump’s Punishment, Is being
DONALD TRUMP.”

Cher has been a longtime supporter of liberal causes and politicians. But
in recent years, she has expressed dissatisfaction with President Obama,
even calling into C-Span to voice her displeasure with his foreign policy.

Trump has yet to respond to Cher’s remarks, but he has a long history of
lashing out at his high-profile critics on social media and in various
other forms. In the past he’s engaged in public feuds with Rosie O’Donnell,
Jerry Seinfeld, Bill Maher and countless others.

Most recently, he’s aimed his ire at conservative pundit George Will,
calling him “boring,” “often wrong” and “a total dope!”

*UNDECLARED*

*WALKER*

*Leading in polls, Scott Walker waits
<http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/245617-leading-in-polls-scott-walker-waits>
// The Hill // Niall Stanage – June 20, 2015 *

Scott Walker edged closer to a White House bid this week, but his official
entry into the race is still not expected until mid-July.

The Wisconsin governor’s slow-moving campaign launch could cause him to
lose altitude, some observers say, since other top-tier candidates such as
former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) are already in.

“The biggest risk is that, with every week, donors start to make decisions
about who they want to invest in,” said Julian Zelizer, a professor of
public affairs at Princeton University.

“The voters who are paying attention now are shaping their perceptions of
who’s good and who’s bad, and they are not really thinking about him as
much as the others,” Zelizer added.

When it comes to donors, however, Walker’s Thursday announcement of a new
“testing the waters” committee might help. The new committee has more
leeway than an official campaign under election-finance regulations, and
its formation crystallizes the sense that Walker is indeed moving toward a
presidential run.

He is widely expected to join the race on July 13 in his native Wisconsin,
the state where he has been governor since 2011. He won a recall battle in
2012 and reelection in 2014.

An appeal from his new committee to donors suggests that they should aim to
raise $27,000 by July 12. The maximum individual contribution is $2,700, so
the total would be equivalent to eliciting the biggest possible donation
from 10 people.

Some GOP strategists believe that Walker is being wily in holding off from
a full declaration of candidacy for as long as he possibly can. Super-PACs
are playing an increasingly important role in campaigns, they note, but
coordination between an official candidate and a super-PAC is prohibited.

Republican consultant Ed Rollins drew a comparison between Walker and Bush,
who helped start a super-PAC that is headed by operative Mike Murphy.

“You can’t talk to [the super-PAC] and you can’t coordinate, so now Jeb
can’t talk to Mike Murphy again,” he said. “Walker has a super-PAC and once
you declare, you have to play by those rules.”

Walker’s super-PAC is called “Unintimidated,” after the title of a book the
governor published in 2013. Two former top aides, Keith Gilkes and Stephan
Thompson, founded it.

More broadly, Walker supporters could issue a simple rebuttal to
suggestions that he is putting an official declaration off for too long: It
hasn’t harmed him so far.

Walker is performing very well in opinion polls, especially in Iowa. In
three of the four most recent polls among Republicans in the Hawkeye State,
he led his nearest rival by either seven or eight percentage points. The
other survey also showed him leading, but by a more modest margin of four
points.

In New Hampshire, where Walker’s socially conservative outlook is less of
an asset, he is nonetheless running a close second to Bush in the
RealClearPolitics polling average. The equivalent national polling average
shows the two in a de facto dead-heat.

Walker has made such strides while neither seeking nor attracting as much
national media attention as Bush, Rubio or even candidates whose poll
numbers are lower, such as Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.). Walker’s participation
in Sen. Joni Ernst’s (R-Iowa) barbecue-and-motorcycle-riding “roast and
ride” event two weeks ago — he rode his own Harley-Davidson — was one of
his relatively rare high-profile events of late.

Some Republicans believe that Walker’s skills are being underestimated by a
news media that don't recognize his blue-collar appeal.

“What Walker brings … is the white working-class voter,” GOP strategist
Ford O’Connell said. “He has the ability to speak to them in a way that
they gravitate toward. When he talks about shopping at Kohl’s, a lot of
people in the media roll their eyes. But that resonates so well with
voters.”

O’Connell also argued that more time away from the spotlight could assist
Walker, in terms of letting him bone up on issues that he is less familiar
with — notably foreign policy.

He drew criticism earlier this year when he suggested that his fight
against public unions in Wisconsin was relevant experience for the struggle
against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

Others note that, for all of Walker’s impressive poll ratings, the race is
only in its earliest stage, and the Wisconsin governor has not yet had to
face serious attacks from rivals.

“My question is, how does Scott Walker hold up when the campaigning begins,
once a [hostile] super-PAC tries to define him?” said Craig Robinson, a
former political director of the Iowa Republican Party. “I’m curious to see
how he withstands that.”

Others note another drawback to the Wisconsin governor’s slow rollout: It
could provide a window of opportunity for even more potential rivals to
join a crowded field.

“The more Scott Walker waits, the more that opens the door to other
governors,” said Zelizer. “Somebody like [Ohio Gov.] John Kasich is getting
more interested.”

Kasich, he added, was exactly the kind of candidate who could “squeeze
Walker’s chances.”

*Scott Walker Pledges to Fight for Republican Ideals*
<http://www.politicspa.com/scott-walker-pledges-to-fight-for-republican-ideals/67146/>*
// Politics PA // Nick Field – June 20, 2015 *

One of the leading Republican candidates for the presidency visited
Philadelphia today.

Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker gave the keynote address at the National
Republican Leadership Conference.

Walker isn’t officially in the race yet, but he did lay out a fundraising
goal nicknamed “The Road to 270” (270 is the number of electoral votes it
takes to win the White House). Therefore, it’s safe to say he’s in.
Supporters expect him to announce on July 13th.

A new national PPP poll released Tuesday showed Walker as the GOP
front-runner. On an anecdotal note, I heard two separate attendees state
that they would support any candidate but Jeb Bush.

In fact, the PA GOP conducted a straw poll through the three-day weekend of
perspective 2016 GOP candidates. Walker won with 25.3% of the vote followed
by Chris Christie (11.3%), Marco Rubio (11%), Rick Santorum (9.6%) and Jeb
Bush (9.6%).

The Governor was introduced by fellow conservative (and foe of organized
labor) State Sen. Scott Wagner. His biggest applause line came when he
praised Gov. Walker’s ability to pass voter ID and “right-to-work” laws.

The guest of honor started off with a prayer for the victims in Charleston
and a round of applause for military members.

Despite the presence of a podium, the future candidate chose to take the
microphone and roam the stage as he spoke. A smart move that made it easier
to connect with a crowd that constitutes men and women he’ll need to be
successful in his quest.

He further endeared himself to the audience when he said that as a runner,
he loved being able to replicate the famous Rocky run up the Art Museum
steps.

At another point, he mentioned that his Great-great grandfather emigrated
to Philadelphia and worked as a blacksmith.

He even finished with a story about visiting Independence Hall.

Referring to the attempt to remove him in a June 2012 recall, he thanked
all the GOP faithful who aided his retention effort.

“I appreciate the help for when we faced that recall election,” Walker
stated before transitioning to the future.

“We’ve formed a testing the process committee, which is the next big step
in deciding whether you’re going to run for President.”

The passionate conservative then laid out his pitch as to why he is
uniquely equipped to be victorious.

“To win the center, you don’t always have to run to the center, you have to
lead,” Walker asserted.

The Wisconsin native believes this mantra can play anywhere but can be
especially beneficial in the Rust Belt.

“I believe the next President is going to come from the industrial part of
this country and Pennsylvania will play a big part of that.”

Walker also dipped into what will surely be the accomplishments section of
his future stump-speech, contending (as all Governors that run for
President do) that what worked in their state can work for the country.

“If we could do that in a blue state. If those reforms can happen in a
state as blue as Wisconsin, they can happen anywhere.”

Gov. Walker went on to outline the core of his speech with three distinct
points: “Growth, Reform and Safety”.

Apparently, the Wisconsinan feels the nation’s leading Democrats are too
focused on Washington.

“They think you grow the economy by growing Washington,” Walker said of
Democrats like President Obama and Secretary Clinton.

Concerning reform, he said that Democrats measure the success of government
by how many people depend on it, while Republicans measure it by how many
people are no longer dependent on government.

For a man with no international experience, Walker was very passionate on
national security issues.

He explained that he chose to identify national security as “safety”
because overseas atrocities like beheadings had affected him so personally.

Walker also unequivocally came out against any nuclear deal with Iran.

“That is a country we should not be doing business with,” he asserted.

The biggest standing ovation of the day, in fact, came when Walker
criticized the President for identifying climate change as the largest
national security threat instead of radical Islamist terrorists.

“Our enemy is like a virus,” he said. “I’d rather take the fight to them
rather than wait for them to take the fight to us.”

He finished but pledging to reminding the audience that he had fought the
good fights and won the good fights and that the American people “want
someone who is not only going to fight but win.”

It was an impressive performance that reached the crowd of Republican
die-hards in the Sheraton ballroom and may be able to extend far beyond
there.

Still, the spectre of the biggest fight of Walker’s life hung over the
event.

Through some playlist oversight, the most unlikely tune emerged from the
loudspeakers just minutes before Walker took the stage.

*Walker wows social conservatives with attacks on Obama, puts GOP rivals on
notice
<http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/jun/20/scott-walker-wows-social-conservatives-withering-a/>
// The Washington Times // Madison Gesiotto – June 20, 2015 *

ust weeks away from possibly joining the 2016 race, Wisconsin Gov. Scott
Walker thrilled a crowd of social conservatives Saturday night with a
withering attack on President Obama’s record while putting his potential
GOP rivals on notice that he plans to run on his record as a get-it-done
governor.

Mr. Walker sought to convince the Faith and Freedom Coalition’s 2015 Road
to the Majority Conference he may be the best choice for president,
repeatedly citing his record of success in Wisconsin that includes a
balanced budget, concessions from unions and pro-faith policies.

Seeking to differentiate himself from some of his potential rivals who
serve in Congress or have been out of office for some time, Mr. Walker said
he was a unique combination of fighter and election and policy victor,

“We fight the good fight and win those fights over and over and over
again,” he said.

Mr. Walker also mocked the president on national security, citing Mr.
Obama’s recent speech in which he said climate change was the biggest
threat facing America.

“I’ve got a message for you, Mr. President. The number one threat to the
military, the number one threat to America, the number one threat to the
world is radical Islam. It’s time we do something about it,” he said to
roaring cheers.

Mr. Walker mixed in barbs with folksy Midwest humor, drawing laughter with
a tale about his trips to his favorite department store and even poking fun
at fellow Wisconsin Republican Rep. Paul Ryan.

Reminiscing about their earlier years of flipping burgers at McDonalds, Mr,
Walker told the crowd, that “the only difference is, his manager actually
told him he has to flip hamburgers in the back because he didn’t have the
interpersonal skills to work the cash register.”

Although Mr. Walker hasn’t officially declared his candidacy for 2016, he
has been “testing the waters” and is expected to make an official
announcement in mid-July.

*Scott Walker denounces Charleston slayings, sidesteps flag debate
<http://www.jsonline.com/news/statepolitics/scott-walker-denounces-charleston-slayings-sidesteps-flag-debate-b99523568z1-308740771.html>
// Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel // Craig Gilbert – June 20, 2015 *

Speaking to a gathering of religious conservatives here Saturday night,
Gov. Scott Walker spoke for several minutes about the shooting in
Charleston, S.C., calling it a "racist" and "evil" act and asking for a
moment of prayer for the "nine brothers and sisters in Christ who were
taken on Wednesday."

But in talking to reporters afterward, Walker steered cleared of the debate
over the Confederate flag in South Carolina that is playing out in the
aftermath of the shootings.

Walker said he didn't think it was appropriate to debate that issue until
the family members of victims have had a chance to bury and mourn the dead.

The GOP's 2012 nominee, Mitt Romney, said on Twitter Saturday that South
Carolina should remove the Confederate flag flying above its state Capitol
grounds, calling it a "symbol of racial hatred" to many. Several of
Walker's potential GOP rivals have also commented on the issue in the wake
of the shootings.

"I think they're going to have a good healthy debate and should have that
debate in South Carolina amongst officials at the state level," Walker told
reporters after his dinner speech at the "Road to Majority" conference.

"I just think before I or anyone else weighs in on anything to do with
policy, whether it's this or any other policy decisions, we should honor
the dead and the families by allowing them to bury their loved ones. And
then you could perfectly ask me that question at some point in the next
week or two when that's done."

Walker also deferred when asked by a reporter if he viewed the Confederate
flag as a symbol of racism.

Walker was among numerous GOP presidential hopefuls who appeared at the
four-day conference organized by the Faith and Freedom Coalition.

An evangelical Christian, the son of a preacher and a leading figure in the
party's 2016 field, Walker was introduced as a politician with a strong
record opposing abortion and someone whose "faith informs his beliefs and
his actions."

A banquet crowd of several hundred gave him a very enthusiastic reception.

Addressing the Charleston shooting at the outset of his speech, Walker said
what happened there is not just about that city, but "it's really about all
of us and trying to find a way to bring this country together instead of
ways to pull us apart."

The governor pointed to the expressions of forgiveness coming from family
members of victims, saying, "They showed us, they showed their community,
they showed their state, they showed their country, they showed the world
what it means to be a Christian."

Talking to reporters a short time later, Walker said the shootings were an
act of "racism" and "pure evil" and "all of us regardless of party or
background need to denounce not only the act itself but the beliefs" behind
it.

More broadly, he said, "I think there is a very real concern that needs to
be addressed in America about race relations. And I think we need to do
more, I think as Americans as a whole, we need to do more to talk about how
to unite people in this country."

*CHRISTIE*

*Jeb Bush And Chris Christie Spout Anti-Women Rhetoric At Conservative
Conference
<http://thinkprogress.org/election/2015/06/20/3672153/faith-and-freedom-women/>
// Think Progress // Kira Lerner – June 20, 2015*

“It was right here in this room that we celebrated the burial of the Equal
Rights Amendment,” conservative Phyllis Schlafly, who led the fight against
the constitutional amendment in the 1970s, told a cheering crowd in
Washington, D.C. on Friday. “We were able to celebrate a tremendous victory
against all the powers that be, and of all the things we taught people by
defeating the Equal Rights Amendment, it was that conservatives can win.”

Since successfully defeating the ERA in 1982 — a constitutional amendment
that she argued would hurt traditional gender roles — Schlafly has
continued her anti-feminism, anti-women’s choice messaging. She has
remained in the spotlight by making incendiary remarks, like that women
should be paid less than men so they can find husbands. And at the
conservative conference co-hosted by the Faith & Freedom Coalition and
Concerned Women for America this week, her anti-choice rhetoric was echoed
by many of the Republican candidates vying for the presidency in 2016.

Many of the candidates who spoke discussed their faith and their
traditional family values to justify their anti-choice, anti-equality
platforms. Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who declared his candidacy earlier
this week, listed off his anti-choice credentials, including the fact that
he signed into law a partial-birth abortion ban and pushed through a
constitutional amendment requiring that parents be given notice when their
minor daughters seek an abortion.

“When I became governor, I was shocked by the total lack of regulation of
abortion clinics,” he said. “Parents had no legal role in their minor
daughter’s abortion decisions so we put regulations on abortion clinics.
And we narrowed the number of them, but we made sure there was reasonable
health and safety standards to protect women.”

Studies have shown that abortions are actually extremely safe and that
major complications rarely occur. Nonetheless, conservatives have fought
for tighter restrictions on abortions by framing the issue around the
safety of the procedure. Bush also lent his support as governor to “crisis
pregnancy centers,” right-wing organizations often posing as women’s health
clinics with an explicit anti-choice agenda that use misleading information
and deceptive tactics to try to dissuade women from choosing an abortion.

“At my urging, the state of Florida was the first to sustain funding, $2
million a year, to go to crisis pregnancy centers to provide counseling and
therapy — state money going to crisis pregnancy centers to give moms other
choices.”

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who is likely to announce his campaign
within the month, also drew loud applause from the conservative audience
when he discussed his cuts to Planned Parenthood funding.

“When [the Democratic legislature] sends me Planned Parenthood funding year
after year after year and I am the first governor to veto Planned
Parenthood funding out of the budget, there is no room for compromise
there,” he said.

In 2010, Christie eliminated all family planning funding in New Jersey,
cutting off $7.5 million that used to support 58 clinics. The action has
had drastic effects on the state and its ability to meet the need for
family planning services ever since — nine health centers have been forced
to close and impoverished residents have suffered. Senate Majority Leader
Loretta Weinberg (D) has accused the governor, who was pro-choice until he
said he heard his daughter’s heartbeat on an ultrasound, of trying to drag
New Jersey back to the 1950s to pander to the social conservatives who
might support a 2016 presidential run.

*Christie to attend memorial for Charleston murder victims at St. Matthew
A.M.E. church in Orange
<http://www.nj.com/politics/index.ssf/2015/06/christie_to_attend_memorial_service_for_charleston.html>
// NJ News – June 20, 2015 *

Gov. Chris Christie will attend a memorial prayer service for the victims
of the Charleston, S.C. mass shooting Sunday evening at St. Matthew African
Methodist Episcopal Church in Orange.

Nine African-American parishioners were shot to death and a tenth wounded
Wednesday at the Emanuel African Methodist Church in Charleston. Dylann
Roof, 21, has since been charged with their murders.

On Saturday, media reports noted that Roof had apparently created a
website, www.thelastrhodesian.com, filled with white supremacist codewords
and rants along with photos of him posing with what appears to be a
.45-caliber Glock handgun – the same make and model firearm used in the
church killings and the same as the one found in his car when he was
arrested Thursday, according to police reports.

On Friday, President Obama called for a closer look at U.S. gun laws,
noting that "every country has violent, hateful or mentally unstable
people. What's different is that not every country is awash with easily
accessible guns."

The President added that he refused to act as if "any mention of doing
something to stop it is somehow politicizing the problem."

On Thursday evening, Christie, who had been attending a 2016 exploratory
event in New Hampshire, side-stepped the question of whether the
racially-motivated South Carolina church killings highlighted a need for
reform of the nation's gun laws.

"We don't even really know what the facts are here," Christie told CNN in
an interview, calling the murders "a depraved act" and adding that only
once "all the facts" are in could policy decisions be made.

*KASICH*

*Obamacare looms over Kasich's presidential bid
<http://www.politico.com/story/2015/06/obamacare-looms-over-kasichs-presidential-bid-119216.html>
// Politico // Rachana Pradhan And Kyle Cheney – June 20, 2015 *

The Republicans running for president have practically made careers out of
skewering Obamacare — so when Ohio Gov. John Kasich makes his expected
entry into the race, he’s likely to have a giant Obamacare target on his
back.

Kasich says he is no fan of the president’s health care law. But he fought
his own party to implement one of its core components and is now gearing up
to face GOP primary voters who want to rip the health law to shreds. His
decision two years ago to embrace Obamacare’s expansion of Medicaid to
provide health coverage to low-income adults — a move that offered
bipartisan cover to the White House during a tumultuous period — is likely
to dog him in Iowa and New Hampshire.

Kasich made both a moral and economic case for covering the poor with
mostly federal dollars. Many in his party disagree.

“We were deeply disappointed at Gov. Kasich’s actions on the Medicaid
expansion battle in Ohio,” said Tim Phillips, president of Americans for
Prosperity, a conservative think tank supported by the Koch Brothers.
“Obamacare is a core issue at this point for so many Americans who will
most likely be participating in primaries and caucuses. The question of
expanding Medicaid is arguably the most important state-level aspect of
Obamacare that’s in play.”

Strategists and political experts say the Medicaid issue alone isn’t fatal
to a Kasich candidacy, but it certainly doesn’t help at a time when more
than a dozen Republican candidates are groping to capture voters’ attention.

“When you have so many candidates to choose from, you could be for a
governor with a good record that didn’t do that,” said New Hampshire
Republican strategist David Carney. “There are 12 or 15 flavors. If you
love maple walnut ice cream but there’s just too much maple, you go for
something else.”

Other governors with 2016 aspirations have rejected Obamacare’s Medicaid
expansion, including Wisconsin’s Scott Walker, Louisiana’s Bobby Jindal,
and former Texas Gov. Rick Perry. And the Republican senators running for
president — Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio and Lindsey Graham — have all
voted for repeal of Obamacare. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who may
still join the race, enacted Medicaid expansion in a state where he faced
intense pressure to do so from a solidly Democratic Legislature.

Kasich, on the other hand, undertook an extraordinary maneuver to bypass
his Republican Legislature to expand Medicaid to hundreds of thousands of
people. In the fall of 2013, he lobbied an obscure state board to
unilaterally increase the state’s Medicaid spending levels to accommodate
the Obamacare program. Republicans howled and conservatives briefly
targeted Kasich in a 2014 primary, but the furor died down.

His maneuver is unlikely to go unnoticed, however, in presidential
politics. Kasich is fighting for the same center-right corner of the
Republican base as former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who in 2013 actively
lobbied lawmakers in his home state to reject Medicaid expansion even
though the state’s current Republican governor, Rick Scott, supported it at
the time. He’d enter the race as a long shot — he barely registers in early
polls outside of Ohio — but he’s hopeful that early stumbles by Bush will
give him an opening to win support in early voting states likes New
Hampshire.

Critics of the expansion, which provides coverage to low-income individuals
who make up to roughly $16,000 a year, say its costs will ultimately fall
on the states, crowding out other priorities like education and public
safety. Though Obamacare fully funds the cost of Medicaid expansion through
2016, states will gradually assume up to 10 percent of the cost.

In many states, including Ohio, Medicaid enrollment has vastly exceeded
original projections, setting off alarm bells among conservatives who say
the states and the federal government won’t be able to afford it. Nearly
540,000 Ohioans have been covered through the expansion already.

Kasich allies point out that the governor won a resounding reelection bid
last year with 64 percent of the vote and scared off his one brief primary
opponent, despite his association with the Affordable Care Act. They argue
that his earnest commitment to the program is actually refreshing to
voters, who crave his straight talk and willingness to take unpopular
stances.

“What they see is someone who is willing to do what he thinks is right from
a policy perspective and put politics to the side,” said spokesman Chris
Schrimpf, who noted that nearly a dozen Republican governors have embraced
the Medicaid expansion since Kasich did.

Kasich, however, was one of the few who supported a traditional Medicaid
expansion, without the right-leaning policy elements that made the program
more palatable to Republicans in other states, from Iowa to Arkansas to
Indiana. His imminent candidacy comes as New Hampshire — where Kasich has
been particularly aggressive — is in the midst of an intense partisan
battle over the future of its own Medicaid expansion.

Kasich argues that he’s only bringing back funding that Ohio sends to the
federal government, and that the Medicaid expansion has led to savings
elsewhere for the state. And one of Kasich’s favorite defenses is that
expanding Medicaid puts him in good company with the last Republican to
expand Medicaid — Ronald Reagan. He’s also irked Republicans by justifying
his decision as a moral and religious imperative.

“Now, when you die and get to the meeting with St. Peter, he’s probably not
going to ask you much about what you did about keeping government small.
But he is going to ask you what you did for the poor,” he told reporters in
Ohio in 2013.

That strategy works well in his home state and for independents, but it’s
not likely to be a big winner among GOP primary voters, said Robert
Blendon, a professor of health policy and political analysis at the Harvard
School of Public Health.

“You just have to move onto other issues,” he said.

Kasich has long argued that the Medicaid expansion established by Obamacare
is different than Obamacare itself. He has joined the chorus of calls for
repealing the entire law while contending that it’s unconnected to Medicaid.

But that unusual semantic argument elicits scoffs from conservatives, too.
The right has special hatred for Obamacare, but it also has separate qualms
about Medicaid, arguing that the entitlement program has outgrown its
original purpose of caring for low-income parents and people with
disabilities.

Nearly all of the 21 states that haven’t expanded Medicaid since the
Supreme Court made it an optional program in 2012 are led by Republican
governors. Just this year, fights over expanding the program have roiled
state politics in Alaska, Florida, Montana, Tennessee and Wyoming.

Though experts say a single issue isn’t likely to sink Kasich, it could
diminish his appeal among the conservatives who animate Republican
presidential politics.

“It’s not compassionate to take a failing program and expand it by dumping
millions of Americans in it,” Phillips said. “For Gov. Kasich and others
who have supported expanding this program, it’s going to be a difficult
explanation.”

*OTHER*

*Mitt Romney Calls for Removal of Confederate Flag at South Carolina
Capitol
<http://www.nytimes.com/politics/first-draft/2015/06/20/mitt-romney-calls-for-removal-of-confederate-flag-at-south-carolina-capitol/>
// NYT // Michael Barbaro – June 20, 2015 *

Mitt Romney, the Republican Party’s nominee for president in 2012, demanded
that South Carolina remove the Confederate flag flying above the grounds of
its state Capitol on Saturday, calling it a “symbol of racial hatred.”

His unambiguous statement will immediately intensify pressure on
Republicans seeking the White House in 2016 to confront the thorny issue,
which has long divided the state and bedeviled national candidates
campaigning in it.

So far, none of the party’s 2016 presidential candidates has gone as far as
Mr. Romney in demanding that the flag come down.

Mr. Romney’s words are striking because many Republican leaders, including
those now running for president, have seemed reluctant to discuss the role
of race — and racism — in the killing of nine parishioners at a Charleston,
S.C., church. And they stand out because Mr. Romney himself, as a
candidate, struggled to connect with black voters in 2012, later blaming
his loss in part on “gifts” that he said President Obama had given to
minority voters.

On Saturday, Mr. Romney took to Twitter to issue a firm message about the
flag and race.

With that, Mr. Romney became the most prominent Republican to make that
demand since the Charleston shooting.

The issue is not entirely new for Mr. Romney. He spoke out against flying
the Confederate flag as far back as 2008, when he first ran for president.
“That flag shouldn’t be flown,” he said at the time. “That’s not a flag I
recognize.”

*2016 GOP contenders face major political dilemma in Obamacare ruling
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2016-gop-contenders-face-major-political-dilemma-in-obamacare-ruling/2015/06/20/76e934bc-1378-11e5-89f3-61410da94eb1_story.html>
// WaPo // Katie Zezima & Lena Sun – June 20, 2015 *

Around the corner from Sen. Marco Rubio’s house and a few miles from former
Florida governor Jeb Bush’s, an insurance agency at a strip mall advertises
the Affordable Care Act.

Banners with a logo reminiscent of the one President Obama used during his
campaign hang on the exterior of the Eli Insurance Agency. An ad above a
window display touting trips to Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic says
in Spanish that Obamacare could be available for $0 a month. “Obamacare $0
mensual,” it reads. “Centro de aplicaciones aqui” — Application center here!

Those signs may not last much longer. Depending on how the Supreme Court
rules in King v. Burwell this month, they might disappear — replaced by a
major political dilemma for Eli Insurance’s presidential-contender
neighbors.

The pressing problem for the 2016 Republican field falls into the “dog
catches car” category: It’s one thing to call for the Affordable Care Act
to be repealed or to promise an Oval Office signing ceremony for its
repeal. It’s another to endorse pulling insurance subsidies used by more
than 6 million people in 34 states, including at least 1.3 million Florida
residents.

A ruling that subsidies provided to consumers to help them purchase health
insurance are not legal could spark chaos in the insurance marketplace and
help shape the electoral landscape in several key swing states. Beyond
those voters directly affected, many more could see their premiums increase
if the law unravels, driving up the number of uninsured.

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), a Republican presidential candidate, speaks
Thursday during the Road to Majority 2015 convention at the Omni Shoreham
Hotel in Washington. (Andrew Harnik/Associated Press)

The administration has said it has no Plan B if the court rules against it.
The sitting governors and senators in the GOP presidential field would be
among those who need to implement an emergency fix that helps people remain
insured. The rest of the candidates would be called upon to offer policy
alternatives. All of them would need to balance demands that they support
an emergency restoration of benefits with the demands of a conservative
base that wants to seize any opportunity to gut Obama’s signature domestic
policy achievement.

“The politics of this for Republicans are extremely tricky and treacherous,
and most Republicans privately would like to see the Supreme Court take a
pass on this one,” said John Ullyot, a Republican strategist.

As the decision date in the case edges closer, debate within the GOP has
been split between those who see a political opportunity and those who see
a looming disaster. Republicans have been furiously meeting on Capitol Hill
this week to hammer out proposals as a court ruling looms.

The 2016 contenders currently in Congress will be the ones “in the
crucible,” he said — they will have to take votes or make proposals “that
might not be as politically pure as needed during a Republican primary.”

On the other side of the spectrum, the Democratic presidential contenders
lie in wait. “Hillary Clinton can immediately pivot not to defending the
ACA,” said Republican strategist Rich Galen, but “can immediately begin
saying, ‘The Republicans won’t fix this; I will’ — and I think that’s a
big, big bow that the Republicans shouldn’t hand to her.”

Most of the major plans congressional Republicans and conservative think
tanks have proposed to address a hypothetical loss of subsidies would offer
some temporary relief — but only in exchange for a repeal of the
requirement that most Americans have insurance, the linchpin of the law.

“Republicans need to unify around a specific set of constructive,
longer-term solutions and then turn the 2016 presidential election into a
referendum on two competing visions of health care,” Sen. Ben Sasse
(R-Neb.), who proposed one of the plans, wrote in the Wall Street Journal
in February.

Although most states are considering their options, even talking about them
publicly before the decision is risky.

“The Republican governors have very little reason to put themselves at
political risk if they don’t have to,” said Caroline Pearson, a vice
president at Avalere Health, a consulting firm.

Florida, home to Rubio and Bush, and Texas — home state of presidential
candidates Rick Perry, the state’s former governor, and GOP Sen. Ted Cruz —
have the largest numbers of people at risk.

Gracita Beausejour, 62, of Miramar, Fla., said she receives more than $400
a month in subsidies and pays $30 monthly for her premium. She said she
lost her job at a hospital four years ago and has not been able to find
work since; she receives $590 a month in Social Security.

If she loses her subsidy as a result of the court ruling, “I’m going back
to having no insurance again,” she said. Referring to Republican lawmakers
in Congress, she said: “People who are higher don’t care for lower people.”

The ruling would land hard in a string of general election battlegrounds,
leaving next year’s GOP nominee potentially facing hundreds of thousands of
voters who lost subsidies in each of these states: North Carolina,
Pennsylvania, Virginia, Wisconsin, Ohio and Indiana. If the subsidies do
disappear, premiums in those states are projected to more than double, at a
minimum.

Cruz, who has said that his campaign is a “referendum on repealing
Obamacare,” signed a brief from members of Congress supporting the
challengers in the court case.

“The goal is to provide an off-ramp for our people to escape this law
without losing their insurance, and all conservatives in Congress should
work together toward this goal,” Rubio wrote in a Fox News op-ed in March.
He called for a refundable tax credit people could use to purchase health
insurance, reforming insurance regulations and putting Medicare and
Medicaid on “fiscally sustainable” paths.

Cruz has a health care policy team that is gaming out possible outcomes at
the Supreme Court, according to an adviser.

“I don’t think the answer is to extend the Obamacare subsidies,” Cruz said
after an event in Red Oak, Iowa.

If the court rules against the government, Congress should step in and say,
“This isn’t working, let’s repeal it and start over,” he said. “And at a
minimum, in the wake of King v. Burwell, I believe Congress should allow
states to opt out.”

The Texas Republican has said that health care reform should include being
able to purchase across state lines, expanding health savings accounts and
unlinking insurance from employment.

In Wisconsin, where 166,142 people are receiving subsidies, premiums could
jump 252 percent, according to a Kaiser Family Foundation analysis. Gov.
Scott Walker (R) has said the solution needs to come from Congress, not the
states. In Ohio, where 161,011 people would lose their subsidies, Gov. John
Kasich (R) said the state would “have to figure something out” and has not
ruled out creating a state exchange.

Bush mentioned the Affordable Care Act during his announcement speech only
in the context of a court case where an order of nuns challenged the law
because of a mandate that requires employers to offer insurance plans that
cover contraceptives; he did not mention repealing it.

Nowhere would a ruling against the law affect more people than in his home
state of Florida, where premiums could skyrocket by an average of 359
percent, according to the Kaiser analysis. An Avalere analysis found that
Florida residents would have to pay on average $3,500 more a year for their
premiums.

Brian Ballard, a Republican lobbyist in Tallahassee, noted that Rubio and
Bush have been steadfast in their opposition to the Affordable Care Act,
something that will help them with the conservative base.

“In a Republican primary I would argue that being anywhere around
supportive of Obamacare would be toxic to a candidate,” Ballard said. But
he acknowledged that there would be consequences.

“We’re going to have whatever backlash there is from those people receiving
the entitlement. There’s no doubt that’s going to be there,” he said.
“That’s going to be built into the framework of the election.”

“The solution is not to take away the Obamacare,” said Maylin Portell, who
works at the insurance agency, where photos of Cuba and a wooden carving of
the island hang on bright orange and yellow walls. Portell said the agency
has helped more than 300 people of all ages sign up for coverage. There
have been glitches, such as paperwork that needs to be reprocessed. But it
would be financially devastating if consumers lost the subsidies, she said.

*How Mitt Romney’s opposition to Confederate flag just put the GOP’s
current presidential candidates on the spot
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2015/06/20/how-mitt-romneys-opposition-to-confederate-flag-just-put-the-current-gop-presidential-candidates-on-the-spot/>
// WaPo // Ed O’Keefe – June 20, 2015 *

Mitt Romney, the Republican Party's 2012 presidential nominee, strongly
condemned the flying of the Confederate flag on the grounds of the South
Carolina state capitol on Saturday, putting pressure on current GOP
candidates to weigh in on a controversial subject in the "First in the
South" primary state.

Romney's comments repeating his longtime position came in the wake of a
shooting that left nine people dead Wednesday night at a historic black
church in Charleston, S.C. On Saturday, authorities were working to
determine whether the man accused of killing the nine African Americans
attending a church Bible study was the author of a racist manifesto
targeting blacks, Jews and Hispanics that was found on a Web site as part
of an ongoing investigation.

In the wake of the shootings, critics have denounced South Carolina leaders
for failing to lower to half staff a Confederate flag flying on State
Capitol grounds -- and for its placement near the Capitol at all. The flag
has flown atop or next to the Capitol in Columbia, S.C., since 1962.

In a compromise worked out after national pressure in 2000 -- when it
became an issue during presidential primary season in the key early-voting
state -- the flag was removed from atop the Capitol dome in 2000 and now
flies at a Civil War memorial next to the Capitol.

On Saturday, Romney took to Twitter to call the flag "a symbol of racial
hatred" and said it should be removed as a tribute to the victims of the
shooting.

Romney first weighed in on the flag as a Republican presidential candidate
in 2007, when he said "That's not a flag I recognize."

"That flag, frankly, is divisive, and it shouldn't be shown," he said
during a debate sponsored by CNN.

The comments sparked outrage among some South Carolina conservatives, a key
voting bloc in the Palmetto State. In protest, a group called the Americans
for the Preservation of American Culture ran several radio ads attacking
Romney for not supporting the state's heritage.

Ultimately, Romney placed fourth in the South Carolina primary. He restated
his opposition to the flag in 2012, when he won the GOP nomination.

While Romney took a pass on running for president yet again in 2016, he
remains a widely influential figure in the Republican Party. He hosted a
summit for some of his former top donors two weeks ago that was attended by
several presidential candidates or their representatives.

His comments Saturday came amid the struggle by several of those candidates
in recent days to articulate whether or not the flag should remain in place
-- and whether the motives of the church shooter were racist.

On Saturday, former Florida governor Jeb Bush said in a statement, "My
position on how to address the Confederate flag is clear. In Florida we
acted, moving the flag from the state grounds to a museum where it
belonged."

In 2001, Bush ordered the removal of the Confederate flag from the Florida
State Capitol, where it had flown since 1978.

But Bush's statement didn't explicitly call on South Carolina to do the
same: "This is obviously a very sensitive time in South Carolina and our
prayers are with the families, the AME church community and the entire
state. Following a period of mourning there will rightly be a discussion
among leaders in the state about how South Carolina should move forward,
and I'm confident they will do the right thing."

Late Friday, Bush told a Tampa Republican fundraiser that "It breaks my
heart that somebody, a racist, would do the things he did" in Charleston.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.), in an interview with The Washington Post, said
Saturday that decisions about the flag are for South Carolina to decide,
but that he understands "both sides" of the debate.

“Both those who see a history of racial oppression and a history of
slavery, which is the original sin of our nation, and we fought a bloody
civil war to expunge that sin," he said.

But, he added: "I also understand those who want to remember the sacrifices
of their ancestors and the traditions of their states, not the racial
oppression, but the historical traditions and I think often this issue is
used as a wedge to try to divide people."

On Saturday, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, who is poised to launch a GOP
presidential campaign, began a speech in Philadelphia by asking for a
moment of silence in memory "of those nine lives" killed in Charleston. As
he watched media coverage from South Carolina, he said he was stuck by how
many "family and friends were already talking about forgiveness."

But Walker left his speech at the Northeast Republican Leadership
Conference without taking questions from reporters, and a spokeswoman
wouldn't say whether the governor had a position on the Confederate flag.

Carly Fiorina, the former corporate executive also running for president,
didn't mention the shooting during a 20-minute speech Saturday at a Faith
and Freedom Coalition conference in Washington. Asked about Romney's
comments after her speech, she told reporters "personally I agree with him
but I believe it's up to the people of South Carolina."

Spokespeople for Sens. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) didn't
return requests for comment on the subject on Saturday.

On Friday, former Texas governor Rick Perry referred to the shooting as an
"accident" -- with campaign aides quickly saying that he meant "incident."
His slip of the tongue in an interview sparked a social media backlash and
immediately invited comparisons to his so-called "oops" moment during a
2011 debate, when he couldn't remember the three federal agencies he wanted
to eliminate as president.

Perry said during the interview with Newsmax that he would be open to
taking down the flag in South Carolina, saying "maybe there's a good
conversation that needs to be had."

But Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.), who is also a GOP presidential
candidate, dismissed questions about removing the flag when asked on
Friday, telling CNN that "We're not going to give this a guy an excuse
about a book he might have read or a movie he watched or a song he listened
to or a symbol out anywhere. It's him ... not the flag."

*Why Republicans were quick to cite religion — but not racism — on
Charleston
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2015/06/20/why-republicans-were-quick-to-cite-religion-but-not-racism-on-charleston/>
// WaPo // Jannell Ross – June 20, 2015*

In the days since America absorbed the fact that a man entered a historic
African American church and shot and killed nine of those in attendance,
politicians have lined up to express their sympathies and/or dismay. But
one likely motivation was initially, conspicuously absent from some
Republicans' comments.

Racism.

First, some facts: As reported by nearly every major paper and television
news outfit Thursday, witnesses -- meaning people in the room in which the
gunman sat with the bible-study group for almost an hour before opening
fire -- say the suspect, Dylann Roof, 21, did not operate in silence.
During an intermission in the carnage, Roof reportedly explained his
actions in some almost boilerplate, American racist terms:

“I have to do it," he reportedly said, according to an account the morning
after the tragedy. "You rape our women and you’re taking over our country.
And you have to go.”

If, for some reason, you rank among those unfamiliar with the provenance of
those ideas, consider finding an American history course to audit,
immediately.

Moving on.

Also on Thursday, several outlets reported on a picture of Roof wearing a
jacket with the flags of apartheid-era South Africa and Rhodesia -- another
flag with clear and unmistakable racist connotations. By midnight, the
Associated Press was reporting on a friend who said Roof was prone to
racist rants. Friday morning, CNN had Roof's friend on video saying that
Roof told him that he hoped to do something that would incite a "race war."
And Saturday a manifesto, possibly written by Roof, was found posted at
"The Last Rhodesian." It offered a mash-up of nearly every racist,
anti-Semitic, white supremacist and "white-pride" idea available for mass
consumption in the past century.

Finally, the gunman on Wednesday walked into the Emanuel African Methodist
Episcopal Church in Charleston, S.C. He did not go to any of the city's
many open-air public venues in which a young, white man might not have
stood out from the crowd. He did not enter one of the many other churches
in Charleston in which Southerners of all races find such comfort and
kinship that asking, "And where do you worship?" is often preceded only by
a solicitation of a new acquaintance’s name.

With some of this information clear or widely reported, GOP presidential
candidate Rick Santorum on Thursday morning described the attack as a
"crime of hate" and an assault on "religious liberty." By Friday, he added
that he did think it was racist.

Also Thursday morning, Fox News's Steve Doocy posited that perhaps the
massacre wasn't racially motivated at all but was instead about killing
Christians.

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (R), like Santorum, emphasized the religious
aspect of it all. On Thursday afternoon, he suggested it would be hard to
know what the gunman was thinking. "Law enforcement will figure out what
his so-called motivations were," Jindal said. "We shouldn’t try to pretend
we’ll understand his mind. I’d love to tell you there's some predictable
line between a and b."

And on Friday, former Florida Jeb Bush seemed to struggle with just how to
characterize it all. "I don't know what was on the mind or the heart of the
man who committed these atrocious crimes," Bush said at a Faith & Freedom
Coalition conference. Bush's spokesman clarified the governor's position a
short time later on Twitter, saying that "of course" Bush believed the
attack was racially motivated.

But while all of the above were quick to talk about the massacre in terms
of an assault on religion and/or perhaps-unknowable motivations, they did
not so quickly allow for the most obvious and increasingly apparent reason:
racism. Instead, they expressed doubt, stumbled or struggled their way
awkwardly around the idea. At this point, some have clarified their
position or publicly changed course to say that it was indeed racism.

So, what's going on here? Why did it take as long as it did? A few theories:

1. They were operating out of an over-abundance of caution. We are talking
about politicians, after all, and nobody wants to jump to conclusions that
prove to be wrong -- especially on such a sensitive topic. Even President
Obama didn't invoke the r-word -- at least directly -- in his remarks
Thursday. Of course, Obama rarely uses that specific word. Instead, he
referred to racism by citing "a dark part of our history" and said, "This
is not the first time that black churches have been attacked, and we know
the hatred across races and faiths pose a particular threat to our
democracy and our ideals."

2. They know that their party is often pegged as the white party. And it is
overwhelmingly white. Maybe they feared that any acknowledgement of racism
-- no matter how explicit or slight -- would open some sort of invisible
floodgate sending a lot of water the party's way. And since the party has
aligned itself with policies such as Voter ID and bans on Affirmative
Action in higher education admissions, there's a chance that whatever
emerges from a more earnest discussion about racism would eventually be
troublesome for their party. (And sure enough, we have now begun a
full-scale discussion about how Republicans feel about the Confederate flag
-- an issue that has regularly beguiled GOP candidates.)

3. Perhaps they saw the Charleston shooting as an opportunity to begin a
debate about religious liberty -- an issue much more in their party's
wheelhouse. If a mass shooting at an African American church is about ready
access to guns, Republicans are on the defensive. If it's a moment in which
talk turns to how Christians face ongoing danger -- something many
Republicans believe and have persistently argued -- it's an opportunity to
talk about something that appeals to many Republicans (Christianity).
Jindal, in particular, has regularly talked about a "silent war" on
religious liberty.

4. Maybe what we are hearing is an odd attempt to connect to the actual
humanity and vulnerability of African Americans, even those murdered in a
church while praying. Perhaps avoiding the r-word amounts to a kind of
twisted mercy; if the black human beings who died were first and foremost
Christians, perhaps this elevates them to a status beyond the race into
which they were born and for which they were murdered.

As we noted, some of these Republicans have now started clearly talking
about this in the racial terms that cannot be avoided. But, in this case,
the facts were pretty clear from the outset.

That the gunman hates Christians has never been substantiated; that he
hates black people became clear almost immediately.

*Confederate flag sets off debate in GOP 2016 class
<http://www.thestate.com/news/politics-government/article25066558.html> //
AP // Steve Peoples – June 20, 2015 *

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney called for the immediate removal of
the Confederate battle flag from outside the South Carolina Statehouse,
scrambling the 2016 Republican presidential contenders into staking a
position on a contentious cultural issue.

Some still steered clear from the sensitive debate, even after the shooting
deaths of nine people in a historic African-American church in Charleston
further exposed the raw emotions about the flying the flag.

Many see the Confederate flag as "a symbol of racial hatred," the GOP's
2012 presidential nominee tweeted on Saturday. "Remove it now to honor
#Charleston victims."

Romney joins President Barack Obama and civil rights leaders in calling for
the flag to come down as the nation grapples with Wednesday's murders. The
man charged with the crimes, Dylann Storm Roof, held the Confederate flag
in a photograph on a website and displayed the flags of defeated
white-supremacist governments in Africa on his Facebook page.

So far, most of the Republican Party's leading 2016 presidential contenders
have been silent on flying the Stars and Bars.

South Carolina was the last state to fly the Confederate battle flag from
its Capitol dome. A compromise in 2000 moved the flag to a 30-foot flagpole
elsewhere on Statehouse grounds, where it has been flying at full staff.

The debate holds political risks for Republicans eager to win over South
Carolina conservatives who support the display of the battle flag on public
grounds. The state will host the nation's third presidential primary
contest in February, a critical step in the 2016 race.

Former technology executive Carly Fiorina said Saturday she agrees the flag
is a "symbol of racial hatred" yet declined to call for its removal, saying
her "personal opinion is not what's relevant here."

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz said the last thing the people of South Carolina need
is "people from outside of the state coming in and dictating how they
should resolve it," Cruz said in a statement provided to The Associated
Press.

He said he understands both sides of the debate — including those who see
the flag as a symbol of "racial oppression and a history of slavery" and
"those who want to remember the sacrifices of their ancestors and the
traditions of their states — not the racial oppression, but the historical
traditions."

A spokesman for Jeb Bush had no immediate comment on Saturday, although
Bush ordered the Confederate flag removed from over the Florida Statehouse
in his first term as governor.

Both Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and Ohio Gov. John Kasich ignored
questions about the flag posed by reporters over the last 24 hours.
Spokesmen for most of the other Republican presidential contenders also
either ignored such questions or formally declined to comment. They include
Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee,
businessman Donald Trump and Sens. Rand Paul and Marco Rubio.

Democrats have been more willing to offer their opinions.

A White House spokesman said Friday that Obama continues to believe the
flag belongs in a museum. Democratic presidential contender Hillary Rodham
Clinton has yet to address the issue this week, but in 2007 called for the
flag's removal, in part because the nation should unite under one banner
while at war.

*Romney: Take down the Confederate flag; 2016 GOP field: Leave it to South
Carolina
<http://www.politico.com/story/2015/06/mitt-romney-take-down-confederate-flag-south-carolina-119250.html#ixzz3dhWftVkl>
// Politico // Marc Caputo and Ali Breland – June 20, 2015*

Mitt Romney showed his enduring influence on the Republican presidential
field on Saturday when he weighed in on the national debate over the
Confederate battle flag, calling bluntly for South Carolina to remove it
from the state capitol in the wake of the shootings in Charleston.

“Take down the #ConfederateFlag at the SC Capitol,” the 2012 Republican
nominee tweeted. “To many, it is a symbol of racial hatred. Remove it now
to honor #Charleston victims.”

It was hours before the GOP’s 2016 contenders followed with statements of
their own, illustrating their reluctance to wade into a conversation that
could put them at odds with the base of a party with deep roots in the
South and a complicated racial legacy.

Jeb Bush was the first candidate to issue a statement, noting that as
governor of Florida, “we acted, moving the flag from the state grounds to a
museum where it belonged.” But even Bush declined to demand that South
Carolina remove the controversial flag, which alleged Charleston shooter
Dylann Roof was shown brandishing in photos that emerged Saturday on a
website reportedly linked to him.

“This is obviously a very sensitive time in South Carolina and our prayers
are with the families, the AME church community and the entire state,” Bush
wrote in a Facebook post. “Following a period of mourning, there will
rightly be a discussion among leaders in the state about how South Carolina
should move forward and I’m confident they will do the right thing.”

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio approvingly pointed to Bush’s decision, in 2001,
to quietly move Florida’s confederate flag from the state Capitol to a
museum. Like Bush, Rubio said today’s decision is in South Carolina’s hands.

“In Florida it’s not up to our — it was moved to a museum. I support that
decision,” Rubio said. “And I think ultimately the people of South Carolina
will make the right decision for South Carolina. And I believe in their
capacity to make that decision.” Asked if moving the flag was an example of
the “right decision,” Rubio wouldn’t say.

However, Rubio didn’t mention that he signed on to what became a failed
bill in the 2001 Florida Legislature that would have prevented the further
removal of Confederate and other war memorabilia by executive action. The
bill was drafted in opposition to Bush’s unilateral removal of the
Confederate flag at Florida’s Capitol.

Rubio’s comments to reporters, somewhat ironically, came during the
Miami-Dade Republican Party’s Lincoln Day Dinner, named after the president
who crushed the South’s rebellion, which began when South Carolinians
attacked Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor.

Other Republican contenders were likewise cautious, to varying degrees.

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker said in a statement, “The placement of a
Confederate flag on the Capitol grounds is a state issue and I fully expect
the leaders of South Carolina to debate this but the conversation should
wait until after the families have had a chance to bury and mourn their
loved ones.”

Rand Paul declined to comment.

Ohio Gov. John Kasich said, “This is up to the people of South Carolina to
decide, but if I were a citizen of South Carolina I’d be for taking it
down.”

Carly Fiorina was the only other Republican to agree with Romney, but she,
too the state should make the decision. Sen. Ted Cruz told the Washington
Post that South Carolina should make the decision, though he understood
both sides of the debate.

South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, also a GOP candidate for president,
told CNN: “It works here. That’s what the statehouse agreed to do. You
could probably visit other places in the country near some symbol that
doesn’t quite strike you right …We’re not going to give this a guy an
excuse about a book he might have read or a movie he watched or a song he
listened to or a symbol out anywhere. It’s him … not the flag.”

Democrat Hillary Clinton called for the flag’s removal from South
Carolina’s statehouse grounds years ago, but critics have pointed out that
she and her husband were silent about Confederate Flag Day and other rebel
reminders in Arkansas when Bill Clinton was governor there. In an emotional
speech Saturday, Clinton called for renewed efforts pass gun-control laws
and decried America’s enduring racial divides.

“So many of us hoped that by electing our first black president, we had
turned the page on this chapter in our history,” she said.

President Barack Obama later Saturday tweeted “Good point, Mitt,” linking
to Romney’s 8 a.m. tweet.

The debate over the Confederate flag came as Roof’s purported manifesto was
uncovered Saturday.

The nearly 2,500-word document lays out the alleged shooter’s motivation
and leaves little question that he harbored deep racial resentment toward
African Americans and saw himself as a defender of white supremacy. It was
published, on a website called the Last Rhodesian, along with dozens of
pictures of Roof appearing with various Confederate monuments and symbols,
including the flag.

For some conservatives, the issue of South Carolina’s rebel flag has become
an unwelcome distraction. Writing in Hot Air, Ed Morrisey noted that the
issue puts GOP candidates in a theoretically tough position of either
pandering to fans of the flag or writing off South Carolina in the
primaries. “It puts Republicans at a stark disadvantage, all over a flag
which stood for rebellion and disunity, whose purpose ended 150 years ago —
and the attachment to it should have ended at the same time.”

Morrisey’s solution: Make South Carolina decide between keeping the rebel
flag on state house grounds or keeping its early-state status in the
primaries, where the flag issue becomes of outsized importance.

“If South Carolina wants to keep flying this flag at its capitol, that’s
their decision,” Morrisey wrote. “But if that’s their decision, then
Republicans should push South Carolina to the end of the primary season and
end this quadrennial embarrassment for Republicans in most other parts of
the country. Enough is enough.”

*GOP Presidential Candidates: The More the Scarier
<http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2015/06/20/gop_presidential_candidates_the_more_the_scarier.html>
// Real Clear Politics // Jonathan Riehl & David B. Frisk – June 20, 2015 *

Hillary Clinton apparently doesn’t scare the Republican Party, since a
candidate roster of unprecedented size is amassing in search of the party’s
presidential nomination. But the very size of that overcrowded field is
diminishing GOP chances of retaking the White House in 2016.

For centrist voters, the chaotic array of candidates will reinforce an
impression that except for criticizing the incumbent president, the GOP
lacks focus. Meanwhile the Democrats will, perhaps fitfully, draw toward
their center of gravity. The challenge Clinton faces in maximizing unity
and enthusiasm before her coronation as nominee is not trivial, as Bernie
Sanders’ unexpected strength in the recent Wisconsin Democratic convention
straw poll reveals. But Clinton's intra-party difficulties look trivial
compared with those a ridiculously crowded field presents to the GOP.

This is all the truer because base Republican voters are juggling a
complicated set of criteria that makes it hard for them to settle on what
“best nominee” actually means. With no clear leader, the conservative ship
of state is truly adrift – notwithstanding any half-hearted protestations
about the embarrassment of riches.

An important factor in lengthening the candidate roster and also making a
quick winnowing unlikely is a long decline in political discipline among
conservatives, who for many decades have dominated the Republican
electorate. One notable result of this indiscipline is trouble judging who
is most worth backing in a presidential race – the proliferation of fuzzy
thinking about who is most likely to win a general election, remain true to
conservative principles, and deliver for conservatives as president. This
situation results from at least two causes. One is conservatives' and
libertarians' ambivalent attitude toward power and therefore toward
practical, as distinct from merely expressive, politics. The other is their
long record of frustration with presidential power and federal authority.

Despite their substantial success within the GOP, some of these voters have
felt increasingly alienated from a political system that has produced such
limited policy victories for them in the half century since conservatives
flouted the party's moderate establishment to nominate the unabashedly
ideological Barry Goldwater. In addition, the famous “Buckley Rule” from
that era, accurately attributed to the founding editor of National Review —
that the party should nominate the rightmost viable candidate — has been
widely preached but little fulfilled.

What William F. Buckley Jr. meant was that the party should focus on
someone who would clearly advance the conservative cause even if he didn't
win. Even by that modest standard, it would be hard to choose from among
the current crop of contenders on the Republican right. How has Ted Cruz,
for example, demonstrated any ability to nudge large swaths of voters in
his direction, even in a losing cause? As for winning a national election
while advancing conservatism’s broader agenda, Ronald Reagan may be the
only nominee who ever pulled off that trick. In that sense Reagan succeeded
where Goldwater did not. But in the 2016 field, the Republicans don’t
appear to have a Reagan or a Goldwater. They do have a Bush, but that’s
part of the problem, not the solution.

To cite one result of the dysfunctional criteria many conservatives now
apply to nomination contests: Organizers of the early debates will probably
feel compelled to include Carly Fiorina and Ben Carson even if their poll
numbers are statistically nonexistent — lest conservatives accuse them of
favoring insiders. Symbolic politics are too much at work. Conservatism and
its postwar legacy of intellectual seriousness are in real peril.

The crowded debate stages will prevent any one or two candidates from
making a strong enough impression to actually begin shaping the Republican
field. Worse, the teeming cast will allow far too little time for viewers
to learn much about candidates or issues — a problem not just for
democratic citizenship, but for the GOP's morale and sense of identity as
well. The overcrowding will also tend to dangerously delay the emergence of
strong motivation for any particular candidate among volunteers and donors,
even if they have early inclinations toward one or another. (Each candidate
of any prominence will have some deeply, durably committed backers. But
not, we think, a very significant number.) The existence and likely
continuance of a plethora of campaigns will also multiply occasions for
resentment among the supporters of various candidates, or types of
candidates, as the looming battle is joined. And finally, all of this
proceduralism will waste even more Republican money in the primary phase
than would be the case anyway.

Furthermore, even if conservatives did promptly zero in on the questions
that actually matter most to their cause, this candidate field would be
hard to judge. A thumbnail sketch of the higher-profile Republican
hopefuls' key assets and liabilities suggests the trouble that primary
voters will have in deciding who is most electable and politically
trustworthy — and therefore ending, reasonably soon, what promises to be a
dangerously long primary season for the GOP.

Jeb Bush would insure the GOP against the risks of relative inexperience,
can be expected to show strong command of many issues, and wouldn't offend
centrist independents. But his name and the dynastic factor are
backward-looking minuses — and he isn’t likely to  win the hearts of social
conservatives or immigration restrictionists, two constituencies that exert
significant pressure on the nominating process, or the many Republicans who
distrust the politics of compromise and incrementalism.

Ben Carson breaks the party's supposedly damaging “white male” image — and
does so as an outspoken conservative. His combination of geniality,
superior achievement in a profession far more popular than the corporate
world, and fearless denunciation of the left could be formidable, but he’s
never held or run for office, and is given to the kind of impolitic gaffes
that invariably bedevil political amateurs.

Ted Cruz has a strong aura of self-promotion, and something rings hollow in
his rhetoric, (and his thin Senate record) especially if he is standing
next to someone like fellow freshman Sen. Rand Paul. But he can motivate
conservatives, and with his public speaking skills might be able to get
others to listen.

Carly Fiorina is the Hillary Clinton antidote, at least as far as gender
demographics are concerned, but her resume stands in stark contrast to the
Democrats’ frontrunner. Clinton is a former first lady, U.S. senator, and
secretary of state—though not without critics of her role as the nation’s
top diplomat. Fiorina is a corporate CEO with a mixed record of success and
a failed Senate candidate.

Mike Huckabee has, like Jeb Bush, “run” a state. Uniquely among the
candidates, he also has experience dealing with the Clinton machine back
home in Arkansas. More than most in the field, he understands the economic
plight of working and middle-class Americans. And his commitment to social
conservatism is genuine and appreciated by the GOP base, but may have
limited appeal. Those traits might make him a more formidable primary
season candidate than his current poll numbers suggest, but his social
conservatism could render him unelectable in November 2016.

Rand Paul capitalizes credibly on the anti-Washington mood —giving the
impression of an honest, committed, independent thinker who would rather be
right than president. But his tendency toward isolationism — even if he
pref ers it to be called non-interventionism — is simply not in sync with
most Republicans’ foreign policy views.

Marco Rubio, the third of the GOP’s troika of freshmen senators, is a fresh
face, projects inclusiveness and optimism, and is especially quick and
articulate. Like Cruz, he is Hispanic and speaks evocatively of the
immigrant experience. But many conservatives also want a candidate who can
speak convincingly of the great danger they believe the country is in — and
who is comfortable “going negative.” He may not be able to.

Scott Walker has an impressive gubernatorial and electoral record, beating
back the twin bogeymen of public-employee unions and MSNBC (in the person
of Ed Schultz) for good measure. But does he have the charisma the role
demands? His network of think tank leaders, opinion leaders, and donors is
impressive to insiders, but does he come across as presidential? Will his
lack of gravitas give voters pause?

*Why Can’t Republicans Admit Dylann Roof Was Racist?
<http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/06/why-cant-republicans-admit-roof-was-racist.html>
// NY Mag // Jonathan Chait – June 20, 2015 *

The mysteriousness of Dylann Roof’s motivations for allegedly murdering a
room full of African-Americans, rated on a scale of 1 through 10, is zero.
Roof has been described by people who knew him as obsessed with racial
hatred, has been photographed with racist symbolism, told his victims he
planned to murder them because of their race, and even let one live
specifically so that she could let the world know the reason for his crime.
It is entirely possible that some form of mental illness or adverse life
event caused Roof to embrace violent racism, but there is zero doubt that
racism directly motivated his actions.

Bizarrely, a number of conservative figures have treated Roof’s motives as
unknowable. South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley wrote, “we do know that
we'll never understand what motivates anyone to enter one of our places of
worship and take the life of another.” The Wall Street Journal
editorializes today, “What causes young men such as Dylann Roof to erupt in
homicidal rage, whatever their motivation, is a problem that defies
explanation beyond the reality that evil still stalks humanity.”

Jeb Bush, appearing at the Faith & Freedom Coalition Conference, said, “I
don't know what was on the mind or the heart of the man who committed these
atrocious crimes.” When pressed for a follow-up by the Huffington Post,
Bush continued to equivocate:

"It was a horrific act and I don't know what the background of it is, but
it was an act of hatred," Bush said.

Asked again whether the shooting was because of race, Bush added, "I don't
know. Looks like to me it was, but we'll find out all the information. It's
clear it was an act of raw hatred, for sure. Nine people lost their lives,
and they were African-American. You can judge what it is."

What’s genuinely mysterious is not just why conservatives believe such
nonsense but why they feel obliged to say it. After all, the Republican
Party may be in general denial about the persistence of racism as a
continuing force in American life, and openly racist whites may be a part
of their constituency (just as they have long been part of the Democratic
Party’s constituency).

In 2000, George W. Bush gave a speech at Bob Jones University, which banned
interracial dating. But Bush was competing in a Republican primary in South
Carolina and really needed the votes of whites who opposed interracial
dating. Neither Jeb Bush nor other Republicans need the votes of racist
murderers to win an election. It would be very easy to identify a confessed
white-supremacist murderer without doing violence to the overall
conservative worldview. It is not like admitting the persistence of racial
discrimination by police or employers or school administrators or courts,
all of which put pressure on conservative policies. Just say there are
still a small number of racist murderers in America!

Roof's actions are a completely sensible expression of his twisted
worldview. It's the failure to admit it that's senseless.

*Religion and politics: GOP hopefuls' new insight on faith
<http://bigstory.ap.org/article/2bb393b2ac544af9b13853e9dd618c10/religion-and-politics-gop-hopefuls-open-about-faith>
// AP // Steve Peoples – June 20, 2015 *

Republican presidential contenders railed against abortion rights on
Saturday as they courted religious conservatives, promising Christian
values would guide their personal decisions and public policies should they
win the presidency.

"My faith has guided me for my entire life, and I don't suspect that's
going to change," former Texas Gov. Rick Perry said after ticking off a
list of abortion restrictions enacted while he led Texas. "No candidate's
done more to protect unborn life."

Perry was among nearly a dozen presidential hopefuls in Washington this
week for one of the nation's premier gatherings of Christian activists.

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush called his Catholic faith "an organizing part
of my architecture." Ohio Gov. John Kasich said religion gives him more
empathy toward the poor. And Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas cited his Christian
values in lashing out at the Supreme Court.

The Faith and Freedom Coalition's annual conference began the day after
nine African-Americans were shot to death inside a historic South Carolina
church, offering a grim backdrop to the three-day meeting designed to give
religious activists a closer look at the large class of GOP candidates and
others considering bids.

Beyond decrying the shootings in South Carolina, presidential prospects
offered religious conservatives an intimate look at the role of faith in
their public lives.

Speaking on Friday, Bush noted that he converted to Catholicism after
marrying his Mexican-born wife. The religion, he said, has been "an
organizing part of my architecture, if you will, as a person and certainly
as an elected official."

He highlighted his work to institute new abortion restrictions during his
administration, which included strict parental notification laws and a ban
on "partial-birth" abortion. He also cited his fight for the life of Terry
Schiavo, a Florida woman kept in a vegetative state for 15 years on life
support. While her husband wanted her feeding tubes removed, Bush ordered
the tubes reinserted only to be overruled by a federal court.

"I insisted that we build a culture of life," Bush said of his eight years
as Florida governor.

Asserting that "people of sincere faith make better leaders," former
technology executive Carly Fiorina criticized Democrats for being weak on
social issues. "I do not think progressives share our belief in gifts and
the dignity of each and every human life," she said.

Kasich, who is expected to launch a presidential bid in the coming weeks,
said his Catholic background pushed him to run for governor.

"I got a calling, folks," he said Friday in a speech referring to Bible
verses from memory more than once.

"What my faith does for me, I hope, is gives me strength, it allows me to
have patience, it helps me to love my enemies, it helps me to care more
about other people," Kasich told reporters after leaving the stage.

The Republican Party's evangelical wing wields great influence in the
selection of the GOP's presidential nominee, particularly in Iowa and many
of the southern states scheduled to host primary contests early in the
voting calendar — South Carolina prominent among them.

Exit polls taken during the 2014 midterm elections found that 4 in 10
Republican voters were white evangelical Christians, and nearly half
attended religious services weekly. Among Democrats, a third attend
services weekly, while 11 percent are white born-again Christians.

While this week's conference drew almost the entire Republican presidential
field, some contenders will do better with Christian conservatives than
others.

Both Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and Perry have hosted daylong prayer
events in their states. Cruz had a strong religious upbringing. Former
Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum is a devoted social conservative. Former
Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee is also a Baptist minister.

Conference organizers were largely pleased with the Republicans' focus on
faith, although some said talk is cheap. A real test, they suggested, would
come after the Supreme Court weighs in on gay marriage. The court may
strike down state laws that ban the practice.

"We'll see who's offering political sound bites and who shows up when the
going gets tough," said Timothy Head, executive director of the Faith and
Freedom Coalition.

*OTHER 2016 NEWS*

*TOP NEWS*

*DOMESTIC*

*Wait Lists Grow as Many More Veterans Seek Care and Funding Falls Far
Short
<http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/21/us/wait-lists-grow-as-many-more-veterans-seek-care-and-funding-falls-far-short.html>
// NYT // Richard Oppel – June 20, 2015 *

One year after outrage about long waiting lists for health care shook the
Department of Veterans Affairs, the agency is facing a new crisis: The
number of veterans on waiting lists of one month or more is now 50 percent
higher than it was during the height of last year’s problems, department
officials say. The department is also facing a nearly $3 billion budget
shortfall, which could affect care for many veterans.

The agency is considering furloughs, hiring freezes and other significant
moves to reduce the gap. A proposal to address a shortage of funds for one
drug — a new, more effective but more costly hepatitis C treatment — by
possibly rationing new treatments among veterans and excluding certain
patients who have advanced terminal diseases or suffer from a “persistent
vegetative state or advanced dementia” is stirring bitter debate inside the
department.

The Veterans Affairs medical center in Phoenix, where 1,700 patients were
not placed on the official waiting list for doctors’ appointments, a report
by the agency’s inspector general found.Severe Report Finds V.A. Hid
Waiting Lists at HospitalsMAY 28, 2014

Agency officials expect to petition Congress this week to allow them to
shift money into programs running short of cash. But that may place them at
odds with Republican lawmakers who object to removing funds from a new
program intended to allow certain veterans on waiting lists and in rural
areas to choose taxpayer-paid care from private doctors outside the
department’s health system.

“Something has to give,” the department’s deputy secretary, Sloan D.
Gibson, said in an interview. “We can’t leave this as the status quo. We
are not meeting the needs of veterans, and veterans are signaling that to
us by coming in for additional care, and we can’t deliver it as timely as
we want to.”

Since the waiting-list scandal broke last year, the department has broadly
expanded access to care. Its doctors and nurses have handled 2.7 million
more appointments than in any previous year, while authorizing 900,000
additional patients to see outside physicians. In all, agency officials
say, they have increased capacity by more than seven million patient visits
per year — double what they originally thought they needed to fix
shortcomings.

But what was not foreseen, department leaders say, was just how much
physician workloads and demand from veterans would continue to soar — by
one-fifth, in fact, at some major veterans hospitals over just the past
year.

According to internal department budget documents obtained by The New York
Times, physician workloads — as measured by an internal metric known as
“relative value units” — grew by 21 percent at hospitals and clinics in the
region that includes Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina; by 20 percent in
the Southern California and southern Nevada regions; and by 18 percent in
North Carolina and Virginia. And by the same measure, physician care
purchased for patients treated outside the department grew by 50 percent in
the region encompassing Pennsylvania and by 36 percent in the region that
includes Michigan and Indiana.

Those data include multiple appointments by individual patients and reflect
the fact that patients typically now schedule more appointments than they
did in the past. But even measured by the number of individuals being
treated, the figures are soaring in many places: From 2012 to 2014, for
example, the number of patients receiving treatment grew by 18 percent at
the Las Vegas medical center; by 16 percent in Hampton, Va.; and by 13
percent in Fayetteville, N.C., and Portland, Ore.

Mr. Gibson said in the interview that officials had been stunned by the
number of new patients seeking treatment even as the V.A. had increased its
capacity. He said he was frustrated that the agency was running short of
funds. “We have been pushing to accelerate access to care for veterans, but
where we now find ourselves is that if we don’t do something different
we’re going to be $2.7 billion short,” he said.

He said he planned to tell Congress this week that the agency needed to be
able to shift funds around to avoid a crisis this fiscal year. That
includes using funds from a new program that was a priority for
congressional Republicans called the “Choice Card,” which allows certain
veterans to obtain taxpayer-funded care from private doctors. That money
would be used to pay for hepatitis C treatments and other care from outside
doctors.

In future years, Mr. Gibson said, more money will also be needed. He said
he intended to tell lawmakers, “Veterans are going to respond with
increased demand, so get your checkbooks out.”

The largest driver of costs has been programs designed to send patients to
outside doctors, either because of delays seeing V.A. clinicians or because
patients need treatments outside the system. Other major factors include
the demand for new prosthetic limbs and for the new hepatitis C treatment.

The “daily obligation rate in medical services” inside the Veterans Health
Administration — the part of the department that handles medical care — is
$166 million, or 9.2 percent higher than last fiscal year, according to a
presentation last week for senior department leaders. Costs for drugs and
medications have risen by nearly 17 percent, with much of the increase
because of the new hepatitis C treatment, according to the document. An
agency memo from last month stated that the need for the new hepatitis C
treatment “has greatly outpaced V.A.’s ability to internally provide all
aspects of this care.”

The crisis may come to a head when Mr. Gibson testifies on Thursday on
Capitol Hill, where Republicans have already criticized what they see as
foot-dragging by the department on starting the Choice Card program. One
congressional official briefed on the budget problems also said the agency
had been slow to recognize how much demand and costs would soar for
hepatitis C treatments. The budding crisis may reopen a partisan debate
about veterans’ health care that has paralleled a larger philosophical
debate about the size of government.

Last year’s waiting-list crisis led to complaints that the department was
divided by an acrimonious and retaliatory culture, where whistle-blowers
were punished and constructive criticism was stifled. But many experts say
the principal problems were a shortage of doctors and nurses in the system,
the nation’s largest integrated health care organization, and a lack of
office space for patient care — while demand rose sharply from aging
Vietnam War veterans and service members from Iraq and Afghanistan.

The department’s inspector general eventually concluded that “the systemic
underreporting of wait times resulted from many causes, to include the lack
of available staff and appointments, increased patient demand for services,
and an antiquated scheduling system.”

*Dylann Roof Photos and a Manifesto Are Posted on Website
<http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/21/us/dylann-storm-roof-photos-website-charleston-church-shooting.html?_r=0>
// NYT // Frances Robles – June 20, 2015 *

Dylann Roof spat on and burned the American flag, but waved the Confederate.

He posed for pictures wearing a No. 88 T-shirt, had 88 Facebook friends and
wrote that number — white supremacist code for “Heil Hitler”— in the South
Carolina sand.

A website discovered Saturday appears to offer the first serious look at
Mr. Roof’s thinking, including how the case of Trayvon Martin, the black
Florida teenager shot to death in 2012 by George Zimmerman, a neighborhood
watch volunteer, triggered his racist rage. The site shows a stash of 60
photographs, many of them of Mr. Roof at Confederate heritage sites or
slavery museums, and includes a nearly 2,500-word manifesto in which the
author criticized blacks as being inferior while lamenting the cowardice of
white flight.

“I have no choice,” it reads. “I am not in the position to, alone, go into
the ghetto and fight. I chose Charleston because it is most historic city
in my state, and at one time had the highest ratio of blacks to Whites in
the country. We have no skinheads, no real KKK, no one doing anything but
talking on the internet. Well someone has to have the bravery to take it to
the real world, and I guess that has to be me.”

The website was first registered on Feb. 9 in the name of Dylann Roof, the
21-year-old man charged with entering the historically black Emanuel A.M.E.
Church in Charleston on Wednesday night, attending a prayer meeting for an
hour and then murdering nine parishioners. The day after the site was
registered, the registration information was intentionally masked.

It is not clear whether the manifesto was written by Mr. Roof or if he had
control of it. Nor is it clear whether he took the pictures with a timer,
or if someone else took them. In a joint statement Saturday night, the
Charleston Police Department and the F.B.I. said they were aware of the
website and were “taking steps to verify the authenticity of these
postings.”

If it is genuine, as his friends seem to think, the tourist sites he
visited, the pictures that were posted and the hate-filled words on the
site offered a chilling glimpse into the interests of an unemployed former
landscaper said to have a fixation on race.

The racial makeup of Charleston shifted drastically over the last three
decades. In 1980, blacks made up nearly half of the city’s population.
Today the city is two-thirds white. The Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal
church is located in a predominantly white area of the city’s downtown
peninsula.

“This whole racist thing came into him within the past five years,” said
Caleb Brown, a childhood friend of Mr. Roof’s who is half black. “He was
never really popular; he accepted that. He wasn’t like: ‘When I grow up I
am going to show all these kids.’ He accepted who he was, and who he was
changed, obviously.”

Mr. Roof has been charged with nine counts of murder in the killings.
Victims included the Rev. Clementa C. Pinckney, who was both the church
pastor and a state senator.

Mr. Roof’s friends say that he only spoke of his murderous plans once —
when he recently warned that he planned to do something crazy with the gun
he had purchased with the money he got from his parents for his 21st
birthday. But they say his sense of racial grievance began with the Trayvon
Martin case.

The website, the lastrhodesian.com, which was not working by Saturday
afternoon, featured a photo of a bloodied dead white man on the floor. The
picture appears to be an image from “Romper Stomper,” an Australian movie
about neo-Nazis. The domain name is a reference to the white minority of
what is now Zimbabwe, where whites fought blacks for 15 years and enlisted
white supremacists as mercenaries.

The site was first discovered by a blogger who goes by the pen name Emma
Quangel, who paid $49 for a reverse domain search that turned up the site.

According to web server logs, the manifesto was last modified at 4:44 p.m.
Eastern time on Wednesday, the day of the Charleston shootings, and the
essay notes, “at the time of writing I am in a great hurry.”

In the manifesto, Mr. Roof writes: “The event that truly awakened me was
the Trayvon Martin case. I kept hearing and seeing his name, and eventually
I decided to look him up. I read the Wikipedia article and right away I was
unable to understand what the big deal was. It was obvious that Zimmerman
was in the right. But more importantly this prompted me to type in the
words ‘black on White crime’ into Google, and I have never been the same
since that day.”

The manifesto also says he learned from the website of the far-right
Council of Conservative Citizens. The council is an off-shoot of a 1950s
era-organization that fought school desegregation. A message on its website
says the group is “deeply saddened by the Charleston killing spree.”

A friend of Mr. Roof’s, Jacob Meek, 15, said the references to the Trayvon
Martin case made it clear that Mr. Roof had written the essay. “That’s his
website,” he said. “He wrote it, and I just can tell.”

Watchdog groups that track right-wing extremism say the manifesto reflects
the language found in white supremacist forums online and dovetails with
what has been said about Mr. Roof thus far — that he had self-radicalized,
and that he did not belong to a particular hate group. “It’s clear that he
was extremely receptive to those ideas,” said Mark Pitcavage, the director
of the Anti-Defamation League’s Center on Extremism. “At the same time, he
does not have a sophisticated knowledge of white supremacy.”

The icon for the browser tab on Mr. Roof’s website is an Othala rune, an
ancient symbol appropriated by the Nazis that remains common among neo-Nazi
groups.

Mr. Roof was the latest in what watchdog groups say is a growing group of
lone-wolf extremists. According to a study released in February by the
Southern Poverty Law Center, about 70 percent of the 60 recent domestic
terrorism attacks reviewed were conducted by people acting alone.

The writings on Mr. Roof’s website show a fixation with black-on-white
crime, which is common on white supremacy sites, said Heidi Beirich, the
director of the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Intelligence Project.

“They demonize blacks to position themselves as victims, and offer that as
proof of why they need their own state,” she said.

In one photograph posted on the website, Mr. Roof is shown posing with wax
figures of slaves. In others, he posed with a handgun that appears to be a
.45-caliber Glock. He had a .45-caliber Glock in his car when he was
arrested Thursday, the police said.

The website’s links contain several passages of long racist rants, in which
he said Hispanics are enemies, and “Negroes” have lower I.Q.s and low
impulse control. The manifesto praises segregation and says the author’s
reading of “hundreds” of slave narratives indicates that almost all slaves
gave positive accounts of their lives. The manifesto uses defamatory terms
for blacks, whom he accused of being “stupid and violent” with “the
capacity to be very slick.” It laments white flight, and suggested that the
whites should instead stay behind in cities and fight.

Criticisms are also levied at Jews, but Asians are praised for being
racists and potential allies. Mr. Brown said his friend’s transformation
appeared to have occurred after he left Columbia, S.C., for nearby
Lexington. Records show he switched schools in 2007.  “He wasn’t putting on
Facebook ‘I hate black people. I am going to shoot up a church,’ ” Mr.
Brown said.

*Anthem Raises Offer for Cigna to $47.5 Billion
<http://www.wsj.com/articles/anthem-bids-184-a-share-in-cash-and-stock-for-cigna-1434821349>
// WSJ // Jonathan D. Rockoff,  Dana Cimilluca, Dana Mattioli And  Liz
Hoffman – June 20, 2015 *

Anthem Inc. boosted its takeover offer for Cigna Corp. and is going public
with the bid after the two sides failed to reach agreement, the latest move
in a frenzy of attempted mergers among health insurers.

Anthem in a statement said it has offered $184 a share for Cigna. That
equates to about $47.5 billion for all the company’s stock that was
recently outstanding. Anthem is making the cash-and-stock offer public in
an effort to put pressure on Cigna through its shareholders, according to a
person familiar with the matter.

Cigna had no comment Saturday afternoon.

Anthem’s pursuit of Cigna comes as Cigna and others are eyeing Humana Inc.,
which has put itself up for sale. Aetna Inc. in the last few days made a
takeover proposal to Humana. It isn’t clear how much Aetna indicated it
would pay.

UnitedHealth Group Inc., meanwhile, recently made a takeover approach to
Aetna.

It isn’t clear what, if any, Aetna’s response was.

The five big managed-care companies are jockeying for deals that will
enable them to get more efficient and better respond to changes in the
health care landscape in the U.S. brought on by the Affordable Care Act and
other developments.

Analysts says it is likely regulators will only allow one or two such
combinations.

Anthem, which is based in Indianapolis and until last year was known as
WellPoint, made a number of bids for Cigna privately in June, according to
a letter Anthem Chief Executive Joseph Swedish sent to Cigna’s board
Saturday. The letter was released by Anthem. Among other things, it details
disagreement the two sides have over the role Cigna CEO David Cordani would
play in a combined company. He wants to be CEO, if not immediately then
after a period of time, which Anthem refuses to guarantee.

Anthem’s bid consists of about 31% of its own shares and the rest in cash.
About 76% of the combined company would be owned by Anthem shareholders,
while Cigna investors would own the rest, according to the latest proposal.

Cigna is seeking a nearly 50-50 split of directors on a combined company’s
board, Anthem said. Cigna also pushed for an offer price split evenly
between cash and stock, according to Anthem.

Anthem, which said it has been in negotiations with Cigna since Aug. 2014,
bemoaned what it called its rival’s refusal to “reasonably negotiate.” It
said the governance demands Cigna is making are excessive, given the rich
premium Anthem says it is offering.

“We were stunned that the Cigna board continues to insist on a guaranteed
CEO position for Mr. Cordani over choosing to allow its stockholders to
realize the significant premium being offered,” the Anthem letter reads.

Anthem said it submitted four bids in June, the most recent, of $184 a
share, on Thursday.

Shares of Cigna, which is based in Bloomfield, Conn., closed Friday at
$155.30, giving the company a market value of $40 billion.

A combination would create a big player in the commercial health-insurance
business, with strong positions among individual, small-business and
big-employer clients. It would vault Anthem, the nation’s second-largest
health insurer, closer to UnitedHealth in size. Cigna’s revenue last year
totaled $34.9 billion, while Anthem’s was $73.9 billion. UnitedHealth had
revenue of $130.5 billion, including its health-services arm, Optum, while
Aetna’s was $58 billion and Humana’s was $48.5 billion.

Anthem is a huge player in the individual and small-group markets in the 14
states where it holds the rights to be the Blue Cross and Blue Shield
insurer. It also has a strong role among national employers. Cigna,
meantime, focuses closely on self-insured commercial business and has a
significant and growing position overseas.

A merged company would have a bigger presence in the fast-growing Medicare
Advantage market, an area where both companies have lagged behind
competitors. Together, Anthem and Cigna would have more than a million
Medicare members. Anthem also has a major presence in Medicaid.

An attempt to seal an Anthem-Cigna merger could be complicated by Anthem’s
role as a Blue Cross and Blue Shield insurer, however.

The Blue Cross and Blue Shield plans hold geographic rights to use the Blue
brand only in a particular area, and they also agree to certain limits on
their non-Blue business. It is unclear how Anthem would manage the legacy
Cigna business in states where another insurer is the local Blue. In its
letter, Anthem said it was “confident in its ability to obtain regulatory
approvals” and this “includes matters related to the Blue Cross Blue Shield
Association.”

Humana has held sale talks with companies including Cigna and Aetna, people
familiar with the matter have said. Humana, based in Louisville, Ky., gets
the bulk of its revenue from its business administering the private version
of the federal Medicare program.

The company is seen as a prize because of its powerful Medicare franchise,
which is growing rapidly as baby boomers age into eligibility and opt for
these plans, known as Medicare Advantage.

Aetna has been viewed by some industry analysts as the most likely acquirer
of Humana, and executives at Aetna have spoken publicly about their
interest in acquisitions.

*INTERNATIONAL*

*Attack Gave Chinese Hackers Privileged Access to U.S. Systems
<http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/21/us/attack-gave-chinese-hackers-privileged-access-to-us-systems.html?ref=us>
// NYT // David E. Sanger
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/s/david_e_sanger/index.html>*
*, **Nicole Perlroth*
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/p/nicole_perlroth/index.html>
* And **Michael D. Shear*
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/s/michael_d_shear/index.html>*
– June 20, 2015*

For more than five years, American intelligence agencies followed several
groups of Chinese hackers who were systematically draining information from
defense contractors, energy firms and electronics makers, their targets
shifting to fit Beijing’s latest economic priorities.

But last summer, officials lost the trail as some of the hackers changed
focus again, burrowing deep into United States government computer systems
that contain vast troves of personnel data, according to American officials
briefed on a federal investigation into the attack and private security
experts.

Undetected for nearly a year, the Chinese intruders executed a
sophisticated attack that gave them “administrator privileges” into the
computer networks at the Office of Personnel Management, mimicking the
credentials of people who run the agency’s systems, two senior
administration officials said. The hackers began siphoning out a rush of
data after constructing what amounted to an electronic pipeline that led
back to China, investigators told Congress last week in classified
briefings.

Much of the personnel data had been stored in the lightly protected systems
of the Department of the Interior, because it had cheap, available space
for digital data storage. The hackers’ ultimate target: the one million or
so federal employees and contractors who have filled out a form known as
SF-86, which is stored in a different computer bank and details personal,
financial and medical histories for anyone seeking a security clearance.

“This was classic espionage, just on a scale we’ve never seen before from a
traditional adversary,” one senior administration official said. “And it’s
not a satisfactory answer to say, ‘We found it and stopped it,’ when we
should have seen it coming years ago.”

The administration is urgently working to determine what other agencies are
storing similarly sensitive information with weak protections. Officials
would not identify their top concerns, but an audit issued early last year,
before the Chinese attacks, harshly criticized lax security at the Internal
Revenue Service, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the Energy Department,
the Securities and Exchange Commission — and the Department of Homeland
Security, which has responsibility for securing the nation’s critical
networks.

At the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which regulates nuclear facilities,
information about crucial components was left on unsecured network drives,
and the agency lost track of laptops with critical data.

Computers at the I.R.S. allowed employees to use weak passwords like
“password.” One report detailed 7,329 “potential vulnerabilities” because
software patches had not been installed. Auditors at the Department of
Education, which stores information from millions of student loan
applicants, were able to connect “rogue” computers and hardware to the
network without being noticed. And at the Securities and Exchange
Commission, part of the network had no firewall or intrusion protection for
months.

“We are not where we need to be in terms of federal cybersecurity,” said
Lisa Monaco, President Obama’s homeland security adviser. At an Aspen
Institute conference in Washington on Tuesday, she blamed out-of-date
“legacy systems” that have not been updated for a modern, networked world
where remote access is routine. The systems are not continuously monitored
to know who is online, and what kind of data they are shipping out.

In congressional testimony and in interviews, officials investigating the
breach at the personnel office have struggled to explain why the defenses
were so poor for so long. Last week, the office’s director, Katherine
Archuleta, stumbled through a two-hour congressional hearing. She was
unable to say why the agency did not follow through on inspector general
reports, dating back to 2010, that found severe security lapses and
recommended shutting down systems with security clearance data.

When she failed to explain why much of the information in the system was
not encrypted — something that is standard today on iPhones, for example —
Representative Stephen F. Lynch, a Massachusetts Democrat who usually
supports Mr. Obama’s initiatives, snapped at her. “I wish that you were as
strenuous and hardworking at keeping information out of the hands of
hackers,” he said, “as you are keeping information out of the hands of
Congress and federal employees.”

Her performance in classified briefings also frustrated several lawmakers.
“I don’t get the sense at all they understand the problem,” said
Representative Jim Langevin, a Rhode Island Democrat, who called for Ms.
Archuleta’s resignation. “They seem like deer in the headlights.”

Josh Earnest, the White House spokesman, said on Wednesday that Mr. Obama
remained confident that Ms. Archuleta “is the right person for the job.”
Ms. Archuleta, who took office in November 2013, did not respond to a
request for an interview.

But even some White House aides say a lack of focus by managers contributed
to the security problems. It was not until early last year, as computer
attacks began on United States Investigations Services, a private
contractor that conducts security clearance interviews for the personnel
office, that serious efforts to develop a strategic plan to seal up the
agency’s many vulnerabilities started.

The attacks on the contractor “should have been a huge red flag,” said one
senior military official who has reviewed the evidence of China’s
involvement. “But it didn’t set off the alarms it should have.”

Federal and private investigators piecing together the attacks now say they
believe the same groups responsible for the attacks on the personnel office
and the contractor had previously intruded on computer networks at health
insurance companies, notably Anthem Inc. and Premera Blue Cross.

What those attacks had in common was the theft of millions of pieces of
valuable personal data — including Social Security numbers — that have
never shown up on black markets, where such information can fetch a high
price. That could be an indicator of state sponsorship, according to James
A. Lewis, a cybersecurity expert at the Center for Strategic and
International Studies.

But federal investigators, who like other officials would not speak on the
record about a continuing inquiry, said the exact affiliation between the
hackers and the Chinese government was not fully understood. Their tools
and techniques, though, were easily identifiable to intelligence analysts
and the security researchers who have been analyzing the breaches at the
insurers and the Office of Personnel Management. Federal officials believe
several groups were involved, though some security experts only detected
one.

“Since mid-2014, we have observed a threat group target valuable
‘personally identifiable information’ from multiple organizations in the
health care insurance and travel industries,” said Mike Oppenheim, the
manager of threat intelligence at FireEye, a cybersecurity company. “We
believe this group is behind the O.P.M. breach and have tracked this
group’s activities since early 2013.”

But he argued that “unlike other actors operating from China who conduct
industrial espionage, take intellectual property or steal defense
technology, this group has primarily targeted information that would enable
it to build a database of Americans, with a likely focus on diplomats,
intelligence operatives and those with business in China.”

While Mr. Obama publicly named North Korea as the country that attacked
Sony Pictures Entertainment last year, he and his aides have described the
Chinese hackers in the government records case only to members of Congress
in classified hearings. Blaming the Chinese in public could affect
cooperation on limiting the Iranian nuclear program and tensions with
China’s Asian neighbors. But the subject is bound to come up this week when
senior Chinese officials meet in Washington for an annual strategic and
economic dialogue.

Though their targets have changed over time, the hackers’ digital
fingerprints stayed much the same. That allowed analysts at the National
Security Agency and the F.B.I. to periodically catch glimpses of their
movements as they breached an ever more diverse array of computer networks.

Yet there is no indication that the personnel office realized that it had
become a Chinese target for almost a year. Donna K. Seymour, the chief
information officer, said the agency put together last year “a very
progressive, proactive plan that allowed us to see the adversarial
activity,” and argued that “had we not been on that path, we may never have
seen anything” this spring. She cautioned, “There is no one security tool
that is a panacea.”

A congressional report issued in February 2014 by the Republican staff of
the Senate Homeland Security Committee, concluded that multiple federal
agencies with responsibility for critical infrastructure and holding vast
amounts of information “continue to leave themselves vulnerable, often by
failing to take the most basic steps towards securing their systems and
information.”

The report reserves its harshest criticism for the repeated failures of
agency officials to take steps — some of them very basic — that would help
thwart cyberattacks.

Computers at the Department of Homeland Security, which is charged with
protecting the nation’s public infrastructure, contained hundreds of
vulnerabilities as recently as 2010, according to authors of the report.
They said computer security failures remained across agencies even though
the government has spent “at least $65 billion” since 2006 on protective
measures.

At the personnel office, a set of new intrusion tools used on the system
set off an alarm in March, Ms. Seymour said. The F.B.I. and the United
States Computer Emergency Response Team, which works on network intrusions,
found evidence that the hackers had obtained the credentials used by people
who run the computer systems. Ms. Seymour would say only that the hackers
got “privileged user access.” The administration is still trying to
determine how many of the SF-86 national security forms — which include
information that could be useful for anyone seeking to identify or recruit
an American intelligence agent, nuclear weapons engineer or vulnerable
diplomat — had been stolen.

“They are casting a very wide net,” John Hultquist, a senior manager of
cyberespionage threat intelligence at iSight Partners, said of the hackers
targeting of Americans’ personal data. “We’re in a new space here and we
don’t entirely know what they’re trying to do with it.”

*Greece Considers Last-Ditch Proposals to Avoid Collision With Bailout
Creditors
<http://www.wsj.com/articles/greece-considers-last-ditch-proposals-to-avoid-collision-with-bailout-creditors-1434823193>
// WSJ // Marcus Walker & Nektaria Stamouli – June 20, 2015 *

Greece’s government is considering new fiscal proposals to avoid a
collision with its creditors on Monday, in what could be a last-ditch
effort to avert capital controls and a debt default, according to two
Athens officials.

Government members are putting together a plan they hope would achieve
budget targets that bailout creditors want, while relying more on
eliminating tax breaks and less on pension cuts than the lenders’ own
proposal, the officials said.

The Greek cabinet is due to discuss the proposal on Sunday morning. It
isn’t clear whether the cabinet under Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras will
endorse the plan, which was being prepared on the weekend by Deputy Prime
Minister Yannis Dragasakis and others who are considered among the more
pragmatic members of the leftist Syriza-led government.

Greece is under heavy pressure to convince its creditors it can hit
ambitious fiscal targets ahead of scheduled meetings on Monday of eurozone
finance ministers and, later in the day, of eurozone heads of government.

European leaders have said Monday’s high-level meetings won’t reach any
agreements unless Greece first presents convincing policy measures to
inspectors from the International Monetary Fund, the European Union
Commission and the European Central Bank, which oversee Greece’s bailout
program.

Finding measures to reach the fiscal targets creditors want has become
crucial for unlocking fresh bailout financing for Greece, without which the
country would have to default on its debts in coming weeks, including on
loan repayments to the IMF on June 30 and on bonds held by the European
Central Bank in July and August.

Failure to agree on Monday could quickly lead to capital controls in
Greece, European officials said. The officials said a majority of members
on the ECB’s governing council is increasingly impatient with what it sees
as Mr. Tsipras’s stonewalling and anti-creditor rhetoric at a time when
deposits are fleeing from Greek banks at a rate of around €1 billion a day.
Greece’s central bank, which is a member of the ECB, is having to cover
that deposit flight.

A summit failure on Monday could well prompt the ECB’s governing council to
curb the provision of central-bank liquidity to Greek banks as early as
this coming week, the officials said. Such a move would force Greece to
impose capital controls that limit bank withdrawals, money transfers abroad
and other financial transactions, likely plunging Greece’s economy deeper
into recession.

The new Greek proposals include elimination of many tax breaks, including
scrapping exemptions on taxes on income from labor and capital, as well as
levies on fuel, retail sales and other items. The extra revenues that this
move could achieve, some officials hope, would allow shallower cuts in
government pension spending, which could make the overall package less
politically painful for the Athens.

Under one version of the proposal, pension spending would be lowered by
0.5% of gross domestic product a year, compared with 1% of GDP under a
proposed package of policy measures put forward by the IMF, the EU
Commission and ECB in early June. That policy package was compiled after a
summit of key European leaders in Berlin on June 2, where German Chancellor
Angela Merkel and others decided to present Mr. Tsipras with the outlines
of their final offer.

The Greek premier was told he could only change measures in that proposed
package if he offers alternative measures that achieve the same fiscal
effect. Mr. Tsipras has repeatedly denounced measures demanded by the
creditors.

Meanwhile, his government’s proposed alternative measures up to now have
been dismissed by lenders as falling a long way short of what is needed to
put Greece’s public finances on a sustainable footing. In particular, the
IMF, with German backing, has insisted that major cuts in pension spending
are unavoidable.

A cull of tax exemptions that Greece’s cabinet will consider on Sunday
would not only allow for smaller pension cuts, supporters of the idea hope,
but would also allow Greece to avoid imposing a hefty increase in
value-added tax on electricity—another measure the IMF and EU have proposed
but which is politically hard to sell for Syriza.

It wasn’t clear late on Saturday whether Mr. Tsipras had thrown his support
behind the proposal from the pragmatic members of his government. Mr.
Tsipras, in recent weeks, has shown defiance toward Greece’s main
creditors—other eurozone governments and the IMF,—rejecting their demands
and insisting creditors, not Athens, produce more-acceptable proposals.

Some members of Syriza and of the cabinet, including Finance Minister Yanis
Varoufakis, have continued to press Mr. Tsipras to stand firm. The
hard-line camp in Athens argues that creditors, led by German Chancellor
Angela Merkel, will offer Greece a more-lenient deal at the last minute
rather than countenance a Greek debt default and exit from the eurozone.

Eliminating all tax exemptions in Greece’s complicated tax code could raise
around €3 billion a year in extra revenue, the Bank of Greece estimated in
its recent annual report.

Greek governments of all political persuasions have so far shied away from
scrapping tax exemptions en masse for fear of angering various interest
groups that benefit from the breaks, ranging from farmers to hoteliers on
Greek islands. Mr. Tsipras’s left-wing Syriza party has also shunned this
option so far.

Nor was it clear late Saturday whether the latest Greek proposals, if
endorsed by the cabinet, would convince officials from the IMF, EU
Commission and ECB. Those three institutions have complained for weeks that
Athens hasn’t put forward sufficiently concrete or comprehensive policy
overhauls.

In the past, those institutions have signaled to Greece that they were open
to scrapping tax exemptions, but they have also warned that Greece’s
economy is already heavily taxed and that spending cuts, including to
pensions, are also unavoidable.

*OPINIONS/EDITORIALS/BLOGS*

*Trade Winds Blow Ill for Hillary
<http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/21/opinion/sunday/maureen-dowd-trade-winds-blow-ill-for-hillary.html?_r=0>
// NYT // Maureen Dowd - June 20, 2015 *

WASHINGTON — IT’S hard being Elizabeth Warren.

Especially when you’re not Elizabeth Warren.

Hillary Clinton had an awkward collision last week juggling her past role
as President Obama’s secretary of state, her current role as Democratic
front-runner and her coveted future role as president.

As secretary of state, she helped Obama push the Trans-Pacific Partnership
that is at the center of the current trade fight. In Australia in 2012, she
was effusive, saying that the trade pact “sets the gold standard in trade
agreements to open free, transparent, fair trade, the kind of environment
that has the rule of law and a level playing field. And when negotiated,
this agreement will cover 40 percent of the world’s total trade and build
in strong protections for workers and the environment.”

Now Hillary says she is unsure about the pact and would likely oppose
giving President Obama the special authority to negotiate trade deals for
an up-or-down vote in Congress. As a future president, of course, she would
want the same authority to negotiate trade deals that Obama is seeking in
the messy Capitol Hill donnybrook.

But as a candidate pressured by progressives like Warren and Bernie Sanders
and by labor unions, she turned to Jell-O, shimmying around an issue she
had once owned and offering an unpleasant reminder of why “Clintonian”
became a synonym for skirting the truth.

It depends on what your definition of trade is — and trade-off.

Hillary has vowed to be more straightforward this time about running as a
woman, her position on immigration and her relations with the press (which
are still imperious). The heartbreaking mass shooting in a black church in
Charleston, S.C., Hillary said, should force the country to face up to
“hard truths” about race, violence and guns.

But even after all her seasoning as a senator and secretary of state, even
after all her enthusiastic suasion on the president’s trade bill, she can’t
face up to hard truths on trade.

And we have to play this silly game with her, as she dances and ducks,
undermining President Obama by siding with Nancy Pelosi after Pelosi
filleted the trade deal on the House floor.

“The president should listen to and work with his allies in Congress,
starting with Nancy Pelosi,” Hillary said in Iowa last weekend, torpedoing
White House efforts to lure Democrats back on board.

In an interview with the Nevada journalist Jon Ralston on Thursday, Hillary
slid around her previous support of the Pacific trade pact and said that if
she were still in the Senate, she would “probably” vote no on the trade
promotion authority bill.

Obama loyalists were quick to note the irony that Hillary did not help
Obama, even though he is working to combat the deep Democratic resistance
spawned by the North American Free Trade Agreement that President Bill
Clinton signed.

The White House is certainly irritated with Hillary. Perhaps it will spur
Obama to wonder why he pulled the rug out from under poor old Joe, his own
vice president, to lay out the red carpet for his former rival.

As David Axelrod told The Times’s Michael Shear and Amy Chozick: “The fact
is, she was there when this thing was launched and she was extolling it
when she left. She’s in an obvious vise, between the work that she endorsed
and was part of and the exigencies of a campaign. Obviously, her comments
plainly weren’t helpful to moving this forward.”

CNN reported that Hillary had enthusiastically promoted the trade pact 45
times as secretary of state.

Aside from the fact that Hillary should be able to take a deep breath and
stick with something she’s already argued for, it plays into voters’ doubts
about her trustworthiness.

If you want to be president and you shape your principles to suit the
shifting winds — as Hillary did when she voted to authorize W.’s Iraq
invasion — then how can people on either side of an issue trust you?

Since she hasn’t sparked much passion herself yet, she may be frightened by
the passionate acolytes of Warren and Sanders — whose uncombed authenticity
is buoying him in New Hampshire.

And, given her own unseemly money grabs, she may not be willing to push
back on primal forces swirling around the trade issue about unbridled
corporatism in an era of stagnant wages.

But the greater danger for her is in looking disingenuous.

At the end of the day, leaders have to sometimes step up on some issues
that are not 80 percent issues. Unfortunately for her, Hillary is not as
artful a dodger as her husband.

Trade is a sticky wicket for her. But the path to the presidency is full of
sticky wickets. And being president is full of sticky wickets. So you have
to try to say what’s true and what you actually believe, not just what’s
tactical.

Surprisingly, I received a fund-raising letter recently. Hillary Rodham
Clinton was in large letters on the upper lefthand side of the envelope and
above my address was the typed message: “Maureen, this is our moment . . .
are you with me?”

Not at the moment.

*Jeb Bush Has Hit a New Low
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lev-raphael/jeb-bush-has-hit-a-new-lo_b_7628324.html>
// HuffPo // Lev Raphael – June 20, 2015 *

In case you missed it, the race-hatred massacre in Charleston has left Jeb
Bush clueless. He's not sure if race is actually a factor in this horrific
episode of domestic terrorism.

Every major news outlet in the country -- well, maybe not Fox? -- reported
that a survivor recounted the killer "had said that African-Americans have
'raped our [white] women, and you are taking over the country."

Could it be any clearer that this is a hate crime directed at
African-Americans in a historically important Black church? But when asked
point blank if the crime was motivated by race, Jeb said, "I don't know."
Despite the mountain of evidence that's already there, he doesn't know.

There's a hell of a lot Bush doesn't know. Back in February at a Chicago
Council on Global Affairs luncheon he was asked about NATO's stance in the
Baltic region. He said, "I don't know what the effect has been, because,
you know, it's really kind of hard to be out on the road, and I'm just a
gladiator these days, so I don't follow every little detail."

Asked about failed states in the Middle East, he came out with this gem: "I
don't have a solution. I mean, I -- I -- I've read articles, you know,
about whether the 1915 kind of breakout of the Middle East and how that no
longer is a viable deal."

He admitted he was no foreign policy expert, in a bizarre way: "Look, the
more I get into this stuff, there are some things [where] you just go, you
know, 'Holy schnikes.' "

He's clearly not ready for prime time and is a lousy decision maker, too.
Why did he show off his ignorance of foreign affairs at that foreign
affairs luncheon? Unless he thought his Bush name absolved him of having to
do research or prepare with consultants. Which means he's got as scary a
sense of entitlement as his brother did.

But he continues to display his ignorance (or vacillation or
unpreparedness) pretty much everywhere he goes. And this Bush is supposed
to be the smarter brother. Well, I guess the bar is pretty low in that
family.

*Clinton calls Graham to offer condolences after Charleston shooting
<http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/245655-clinton-calls-graham-after-charleston-shooting>
// The Hill // Kyle Balluck – June 21, 2015*

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton called Sen. Lindsey
Graham (S.C.), a GOP presidential candidate, on Saturday afternoon to offer
condolences in the wake of the church massacre in his home state, CNN is
reporting.

"She said she was calling to see how I was doing, and wanted to let me know
that she was thinking about me and about everyone in South Carolina,"
Graham told CNN.

Graham said he was “pleasantly surprised” to get the call, according to the
cable network.

"She is a nice person," Graham told CNN.

"I told her that the call meant a lot to me, and would mean a lot to the
people of South Carolina," he added.

Clinton on Saturday called for new restrictions on firearms after nine
people were killed last week Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, a
predominantly black church in Charleston, S.C.

"How is it that we as a nation still allow guns to fall into the hands of
people whose hearts are filled with hate?" she asked in San Francisco. "You
can't watch massacre after massacre and not come to the conclusion that as
President Obama said, we must tackle this challenge with urgency and
conviction."