Subject: Correct The Record Wednesday October 8, 2014 Morning Roundup
From: Burns Strider <[email-masked]>
To: CTRFriendsFamily <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2014 09:11:41 -0400
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*​**Correct The Record Wednesday October 8, 2014 Morning Roundup:*

*Headlines:*

*The Hill: “Clinton allies look to build tech advantage ahead of ’16”
<http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/220085-clinton-allies-look-to-build-tech-advantage-ahead-of-16>*

“Hillary Clinton’s allies are building a technological advantage for her
prospective presidential campaign, meant to scare Democrats thinking about
challenging her in a primary and intimidate Republicans who would oppose
her in the general election.”

*CNN: “Warren Buffett will bet you that Hillary Clinton wins in 2016”
<http://www.cnn.com/2014/10/07/politics/buffett-clinton-2016/>*

“Warren Buffett is so sure that Hillary Clinton will win the presidency in
2016, he is willing to wager some of his $58.2 billion net worth.”

*MSNBC: “Panetta hitches raft to Clinton, jettisons Obama”
<http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/panetta-hitches-raft-clinton-jettisons-obama>*

“On arming the so-called moderate Syrian rebels, the most contentious issue
that divided Clinton and Obama during her tenure in the administration,
Panetta staked out a position further from the White House than Clinton’s.”

*Washington Post blog: The Fix: “Leon Panetta boiled down Democrats’
criticism of Barack Obama to one sentence”
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2014/10/07/leon-panetta-boiled-down-democrats-criticism-of-barack-obama-to-one-sentence/>*

“What's fascinating about this gripe with Obama is how much it plays into
a) the argument that Hillary Clinton made against him in the 2008
presidential primary and b) the argument Hillary Clinton will likely make
when (sorry, if) she runs for president in 2016.”

*Politico column: Roger Simon: “4 things Hillary can do to win”
<http://www.politico.com/story/2014/10/4-things-hillary-can-do-to-win-111673.html>*

“Here are four dramatic things Hillary Clinton can do to win the
presidency. Wait, did I skip the fact she has not yet announced for office?
Yeah, I am skipping that.”

*Politico: “Bill Clinton urges young voters away from ‘resentment’”
<http://www.politico.com/story/2014/10/bill-clinton-arkansas-voters-111669.html?hp=r1>*

“He [Pres. Clinton] described his time teaching law at this school as among
the happiest times he and his wife — possible presidential frontrunner
Hillary Clinton — experienced.”

*Huffington Post opinion: Peter D. Rosenstein: “Hillary Rodham Clinton
Represents the Unfinished Business of our Democracy”
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/peter-d-rosenstein/hillary-rodham-clinton-re_b_5947288.html>*

“Hillary Rodham Clinton holds in her hands the hopes and desires of many
but none more than the women and girls here in the United States and those
who look to the United States around the world.”

*Mediaite: “Leon Panetta Defends Hillary from ‘Unfair’ Benghazi Criticisms
on O’Reilly”
<http://www.mediaite.com/tv/leon-panetta-defends-hillary-from-unfair-benghazi-criticisms/>*

“A significant chunk of Bill O’Reilly‘s interview with Leon Panetta tonight
was about Benghazi, as well as the Obama administration’s reaction to that
infamous attack. At one point, Panetta defended Hillary Clinton and said
she would have definitely acted on any security issues if she had been
aware of them.”

*National Review: “Panetta Hints He’d Take Hillary in a Match-Up Against
Biden”
<http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/389752/panetta-hints-hed-take-hillary-match-against-biden-brendan-bordelon>*

“‘Hillary Clinton, I know could do the job,’ he continued, ‘because she’s
somebody who’s got experience, she’s got the toughness of mind and
commitment to this country that I think is important.’”

*The Hill blog: Ballot Box: “Hawk eyes 2016”
<http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/220086-hawk-eyes-2016>*

“Former United Nations Ambassador John Bolton hasn’t decided whether he’ll
run for president in 2016 — but he says he’d like to debate Hillary
Clinton.”

*CNN: “Jindal is 'thinking and praying' about 2016 presidential run”
<http://www.cnn.com/2014/10/07/politics/bobby-jindal-thinking-and-praying-2016/>*

“He [Jindal] also slammed former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, a
potential Democratic presidential candidate, for making decisions the he
believes has set America on a path for ‘more chaos, more conflict and more
wars.’”

*Articles:*

*The Hill: “Clinton allies look to build tech advantage ahead of ’16”
<http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/220085-clinton-allies-look-to-build-tech-advantage-ahead-of-16>*

By Amie Parnes

October 8, 2014, 6:00 a.m. EDT

Hillary Clinton’s allies are building a technological advantage for her
prospective presidential campaign, meant to scare Democrats thinking about
challenging her in a primary and intimidate Republicans who would oppose
her in the general election.

It is an effort that allies — including former digital gurus to President
Obama’s presidential campaigns — say will far exceed the current
president’s campaign efforts, which broke new ground and relied heavily on
digital platforms to fundraise as well as organize and mobilize supporters.

The pro-Clinton super-PAC Ready for Hillary, for example, is on its way to
targeting 3 million identified Clinton supporters who could be relied on to
provide small-dollar contributions and come to the polls.

The political action committee, which has received money from more than
100,000 donors, is using a so-called “ladder of engagement” that begins
with a “please like our Facebook page” request and ends with an email
asking the visitor to donate or volunteer for the campaign.

Of the $4 million the super-PAC raised in 2013, $1.2 million was invested
in digital advertising, the group’s largest expenditure, officials say.

The PAC is also using the database to help Democrats in tight races around
the country. That includes in Iowa, where it is helping Rep. Bruce Braley’s
struggling Senate campaign — and where it could benefit Clinton in the 2016
caucuses. The super-PAC used the database to send emails to supporters in
the state, asking them to join Clinton in supporting Braley by chipping in
$5.

“We can’t sit on the sidelines — we need to work as hard in 2014 as would
if Hillary were on the ballot,” one email to Iowa supporters says.

Within the next few days, the group will launch a “national call tool” that
will allow supporters to make calls to voters in crucial 2014 states, a
source familiar with the effort told The Hill.

Should she decide to run early next year, Clinton would simply have to buy
or rent the database to tap into the wealth of data the super-PAC has
collected.

Republicans acknowledge Team Clinton is “leaps and bounds” ahead of where
it needs to be, as one put it.

Tim Miller, the executive director of America Rising, the Republican
super-PAC that has been targeting Clinton, said Republicans “need to
realize this is an area where Clinton’s team is investing early, and where
they’re going to invest, and we need to level the playing field.”

Tony Fratto, who served as deputy press secretary to former President
George W. Bush, also acknowledged that the Clinton operation has a running
start.

“It’s true that, in the digital space, having a head start can help,”
Fratto said. “I don’t think there’s any question about it. … No one else
has an organization to speak of, and that could be a huge advantage for
her.”

To be sure, the digital and tech outreach is far better than the lackluster
tech operation Clinton had in 2008, which the Obama campaign pummeled at
the time.

Team Obama revolutionized modern campaigning, building a sophisticated and
comprehensive database and using technology as both a fundraising and
organizing tool to mobilize potential voters.

“[The online effort] was much more aggressive because it was something they
started earlier,” said Kevin Thurman, who served as Clinton’s deputy
Internet director in 2008. “They were taking a large amount of data and
making it more useful. We had to figure that stuff out.”

Thurman also added that Obama’s 2008 supporter base, made up of many
younger voters, gravitated toward that medium because they were looking for
a different kind of candidate.

In 2016, if Clinton chooses to run, she’ll be better positioned
technologically, according to allies.

For example, when Ready for Hillary relaunched its website in March, it had
help from 270 Strategies, a firm that employs a number of the players who
executed Obama’s digital strategy.

Betsy Hoover, a partner at 270 who served as director of digital organizing
for the 2012 Obama campaign, said the response rate to the Ready for
Hillary site has been “huge,” and she said there’s a “definite
infrastructure in place that will be helpful to the Clinton campaign.”

And while Hoover stopped shy of saying whether it would keep other
Democrats out of a presidential primary, Thurman, who is not currently
involved in any Clinton operation, said the former secretary of State is
well ahead of other potential competitors; Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.),
he said, would come closest to having an online footprint.

Sources at Ready for Hillary say the group’s main goal in starting the
digital venture before the campaign would be for Clinton to take over the
data it has gathered when she announces a bid for the presidency.

Clinton, sources close to her say, learned her lesson on the digital front
after her 2008 loss and became personally invested in trying to incorporate
it more during her tenure at the State Department and beyond. In the
immediate aftermath of her campaign, she started asking aides what she
could have done better technology-wise in various states during the
election. And when she arrived at Foggy Bottom, she invested resources to
applying it around the world in the spirit of public diplomacy.

One longtime Clinton aide summed up her embrace this way: “It’s gone from
being relegated to the basement to the corner office. … Once it was all
very second guess, and now everyone has realized it’s absolutely central.”

*CNN: “Warren Buffett will bet you that Hillary Clinton wins in 2016”
<http://www.cnn.com/2014/10/07/politics/buffett-clinton-2016/>*

By Dan Merica

October 7, 2014, 2:17 p.m. EDT

Warren Buffett is so sure that Hillary Clinton will win the presidency in
2016, he is willing to wager some of his $58.2 billion net worth.

"Hillary is going to win, yeah," Buffett, a outspoken Clinton supporter,
said at Fortune's Most Powerful Women Summit. "I will bet money on it. And
I don't do that easily."

But while Clinton has said she is thinking about running for president, she
has yet to announce.

Buffett suggested on Tuesday that her announcement is a forgone conclusion.

"Hillary is going to run," said the chairman and chief executive officer of
Berkshire Hathaway, later adding that "she is going to announce as late as
possible."

"I don't see how you could have anybody better qualified," Buffett told
CNN's Poppy Harlow in an interview. "I like what she believes in. ... I
think she's extraordinarily able and energetic for that matter in pushing
those beliefs."

Buffett has long supported Clinton -- he donated $2,000 to her Senate
campaign in 2000. But the investor from Omaha, Nebraska, supported Clinton
and then-Sen. Barack Obama in their fight for the Democratic nomination in
2008.

Buffett was less sure about which Republicans would run for president, he
said at the fortune event.

"I don't know," he said. "Her opponent will be whoever wins the Republican
primary and there are going to be a lot of people who want to do it."

*MSNBC: “Panetta hitches raft to Clinton, jettisons Obama”
<http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/panetta-hitches-raft-clinton-jettisons-obama>*

By Alex Seitz-Wald

October 7, 2014, 4:31 p.m. EDT

Why do President Obama’s secretaries of defense keep trashing him?

This week, former Defense Secretary and CIA Director Leon Panetta joins his
predecessor, Robert Gates, in writing memoirs about their time in
government that includes unvarnished criticism of their former boss.

In Penatta’s book, “Worthy Fights: A Memoir of Leadership in War and
Peace,” and media interviews timed to its release, the Democrat says
President Obama has “lost his way” and was wrong to withdraw all troops
from Iraq. He also criticizes the president’s “failure” not to earlier arm
so-called moderate Syrian rebels. Rather than assert initiative, Panetta
writes, the president “avoids the battle, complains, and misses
opportunities.”

Gates went even farther in his book published in January, writing that the
president made military decisions for political reasons.

There’s a rich history of administration officials of both parties who have
left government to write censorious books about a chief executive still in
office. Besides these exposés’ stated goals of record straightening,
truth-telling, and lesson-dispensing, the books often have more personal
aims as well. After all, these former officials wouldn’t burn a bridge to
the most powerful person in the world unless they had a compelling reason
to do so, or at least feared no consequences.

Some commentators have wondered why Panetta and Gates (and to a lesser
degree former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton) have shown such “stunning
disloyalty” to the president, as the Washington Post’s Dana Milbank wrote.
Vice President Biden last week criticized the books as “inappropriate.”

But Gates and Panetta never took a loyalty oath to Obama. Neither man owes
Barack Obama for their careers, nor does he have anything to offer them in
his final two years in office. There is little downside to them for
speaking out, and plenty of upside. Call it a side affect of the
much-vaunted “Team of Rivals” approach Obama took in arranging his cabinet.

Gates was a Republican near the end of his career who was appointed defense
secretary by George W. Bush and had served previously under Bush’s father.
Obama, after winning election in 2007, had to practically beg Gates to stay
on the job. Panetta, meanwhile, had already served as White House Chief of
Staff and Budget Director under Bill Clinton. When Obama took office in
2009, Panetta was happily retired at his beloved walnut farm in California.

Panetta owes a lot more to Bill Clinton than to Obama. who made the former
House Budget Committee. And if anyone can offer Panetta anything of
interest now, it’s not the lame duck Obama, but Clinton’s wife.

Hillary Clinton and Panetta (and Gates before Panetta) were often allies in
internal administration debates, countering the influence of the more
dovish Biden. Now on the outside, Panetta seems to be doing as much as he
can to use his accrued credibility to boost Clinton.

In an interview with msnbc’s Andrea Mitchell Tuesday, Panetta was asked who
was more qualified to be president – Clinton or Biden, who is also
considering a bid. “They both could do the job as president. But, I think
Hillary Clinton, because she is out there, is somebody that i think could
be a very strong president,” he replied.

On arming the so-called moderate Syrian rebels, the most contentious issue
that divided Clinton and Obama during her tenure in the administration,
Panetta staked out a position further from the White House than Clinton’s.
While Clinton has said she “can’t sit here today and say that if we had
done what I recommended…we’d be in a demonstrably different place,” Panetta
is willing to go farther.

“We would be in a better position to have in the rebel operation, a group
that we would have worked with and helped arm,” he told Mitchell. That
position vindicates Clinton’s support for arming rebels, while allowing her
to stay closer to Obama,.

On Benghazi, the biggest scandal on Clinton’s watch at State, Panetta
offered another subtle, but notable assist to Clinton. She and former UN
Ambassador Susan Rice have come under fire for using talking points that
falsely stated the violence was the outgrowth of a protest, not a
coordinated terror attack.

But in his book, Panetta blames the CIA and its then-director, David
Petraeus, for delivering faulty intelligence. “I remember saying [to
Petraeus] look, based on the weapons I see and the nature of the attack, I
think this was a terrorist attack. He said look, the information we are
getting from intelligence sources is that it really was a demonstration. I
said you know, David, I don’t see it that way,” he told Mitchell.

The compound in Libya was essentially an intelligence operation with
diplomatic cover. And in the aftermath of the attack, the CIA and the State
Department fought a back-channel bureaucratic war over responsibility,
evident in emails released by the White House that show the evolution of
those infamous talking points.

By tacitly siding with Clinton’s State Department, and against the CIA,
Panetta bolsters Clinton on one of her biggest weakness with the
credibility that only a former CIA Director can possibly bring to the table.

The situation is more complicated for Clinton, who wrote her own memoir and
used the accompanying media tour to criticize the president’s foreign
policy. Her tenure as secretary of state has made her immeasurably stronger
politically, and she’ll need the president’s supporters if she runs again.

But Clinton did, of course, lose the presidential nomination to Obama in a
contest largely centered on the two candidates’ positions on the 2003
invasion of Iraq. And she’ll also need to distance herself from the deeply
unpopular White House if she runs again.

Panetta, it seems, is ready to help.

*Washington Post blog: The Fix: “Leon Panetta boiled down Democrats’
criticism of Barack Obama to one sentence”
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2014/10/07/leon-panetta-boiled-down-democrats-criticism-of-barack-obama-to-one-sentence/>*

By Chris Cillizza

October 7, 2014, 2:59 p.m. EDT

Former CIA director Leon Panetta was on "Andrea Mitchell Reports" on MSNBC on
Thursday for an extended interview about the critiques he lobs at President
Obama  in a new book entitled "Worthy Fights". The most cutting -- and
perhaps most insightful -- portion of the interview was when Panetta told
Mitchell about his disagreement with Obama's approach to politics. "Too
often in my view the President relies on the logic of the law professor
rather than the passion of a leader," said Panetta.

That simple sentence encapsulates much of the criticism that I've heard
from Congressional Democrats (as well as many in the activist community)
about President Obama for years. (That similarity is not an accident;
Panetta spent almost two decades in the 1970s and 1980s in Congress as a
House member from California.) There is a sense that Obama believes that
simply proposing his argument is enough to carry the day. That the
nitty-gritty horse-trading of the sort past Democratic presidents like
Lyndon Johnson and Bill Clinton were legendary for is simply anathema to
how he views politics and his role in it.

Take the Affordable Care Act. Once it -- finally -- passed, Congressional
Democrats kept waiting (and waiting) for President Obama to take the
message reins and sell the hell out of it around the country. While Obama
did do some barnstorming in support of the law, it was never to the extent
-- or with the intensity -- that Democrats on the ballot in 2010 thought it
should be. The losses they incurred -- especially losing control of the
House -- were laid at the feet of Obama by many of the people who lost
their seats and those Members of Congress they left behind.

Since that debacle there has been an ever-present sense that the passion of
Obama on the campaign trail in his 2008 election has never been matched
while he has actually been in the White House. Obama as diffident -- or
indifferent -- to the differences between what is good for him and what is
good for the party has been a continuing source of frustration for
Democrats in Congress. Not only, they believe, has he not been willing to
really fight for his priorities but he also seems to not grasp that when he
says things like "every single one" of his policies are on the ballot this
fall, it makes their political lives that much harder.

Some of this tension is natural -- and transcends parties. Presidents
always have a certain way of doing things that they believe works because,
well, it got them elected president. And Members of Congress always feel as
though the president of their party isn't paying enough attention to them
and their needs because he is too focused on his own political life.

But, Panetta's comment does strike at the core of what many Democrats don't
like or don't trust about Obama. They simply don't believe he
understood/understands how Washington works -- Panetta said almost exactly
that later in his interview with Mitchell -- and has never truly grasped
that a single compelling argument alone isn't enough to change minds.

What's fascinating about this gripe with Obama is how much it plays into a)
the argument that Hillary Clinton made against him in the 2008 presidential
primary and b) the argument Hillary Clinton will likely make when (sorry,
if) she runs for president in 2016. That argument, in short: I have been
there and done that. I know what it takes to move the levers of power in
Washington -- and I am willing to do whatever it takes to make them move.

That's a message that will appeal to many establishment -- and activist --
Democrats who feel as though they have spent the last six years with a
Democratic president who didn't understand -- and didn't want to understand
-- the realities of getting things done in D.C.

*Politico column: Roger Simon: “4 things Hillary can do to win”
<http://www.politico.com/story/2014/10/4-things-hillary-can-do-to-win-111673.html>*

By Roger Simon

October 8, 2014, 5:01 a.m. EDT

Here are four dramatic things Hillary Clinton can do to win the presidency.

Wait, did I skip the fact she has not yet announced for office? Yeah, I am
skipping that.

And am I skipping her battle for the Democratic nomination? Yeah, I am
skipping that, too. For now.

I am going straight to the general election because the only way to get
past Hillary fatigue is to get things over with quickly.

So how does Hillary win the presidency? Should she play it cautiously and
hope the Republicans nominate somebody so out of touch with the American
people that she cannot lose? Or should she run a campaign of big risks and
big rewards?

Her nature may be to do the former. But some people I have been talking to
suggest she do the latter.

So here are four, somewhat startling things, she can do:

1. Hillary should announce she will serve only one term as president.

I admit I was shocked when I first heard this idea. I couldn’t see any
rationale for it.

“The rationale for running for just one term is that you can say: ‘Here are
the three or four big things I want to do in my administration, and I am
going to pursue them without the distraction of reelection,” a top-flight
Democratic strategist with presidential campaign experience told me.

“She says: ‘I can try to accomplish what I want to and not be focused on my
reelection 18 months after I get into office.’”

Also, it would save her the enormous amount of time, focus and energy it
takes to raise money for a second term, which by 2020, could be $5 billion
or so.

“It would send the message that we have a real agenda,” the strategist
said. “It would say: ‘We are going to pursue economic growth, immigration
reform, education reform and a sound foreign policy. We are going to keep
the American people on our side, put pressure on Congress, drive our agenda
and get something done.’”

2. Hillary should also require her running mate to serve for just one term.

“I think requiring the same pledge from the vice presidential candidate
would send the message we are not going to play politics for four years,”
the source said. “I admit it’s a pretty ballsy thing to do.”

The real question could be: Can you find someone who is willing to serve as
vice president for just four years and then not turn around and run for
president?

3. Hillary should not be afraid to choose a woman as a running mate.

Think that’s risky? Maybe. But not really that much riskier than when Bill
Clinton picked Al Gore as a running mate in 1992. The choice confounded
those who believed tickets had to be “balanced” in terms of geography, age,
religion, political leanings — or all of the above.

Yet Clinton and Gore both were from the South, they were only 19 months
apart in age, they were both Southern Baptists, and they were both
moderates.

And they both won. Twice.

Some powerful women in the Democratic Party have already come out against
the idea, however. “It’s certainly possible to have two women,” Sen. Dianne
Feinstein of California told The New York Times in April. “I am not sure
it’s wise. You want a ticket that represents men and women.”

Ruth Mandel, director of the Eagleton Institute of Politics at Rutgers
University, told the paper: “If Hillary Clinton decides to run, she will
bring many women with her. Her candidacy would be a historic moment in
mobilizing women’s interest. But whether she would put another woman on the
ticket, that’s a very different calculus. As women, we tend to do our
changes in increments.”

But why get cold feet now? The Democrats have a deep field of qualified
women, and there is no disputing the power of the women’s vote.

Some 53 percent of voters in 2012 were women, and 55 percent of them voted
for Barack Obama, compared with 44 percent who voted for Mitt Romney.
Romney won the male vote by 52 percent to 45 percent, but it didn’t put him
in the White House.

Republicans who think they can spurn female voters and still win the
presidency are probably kidding themselves.

4. Hillary should distance herself from Obama, not so much on issues as on
attitude.

One senior Democrat already has a theme for her: “I can work with people.”

“If she has a specific agenda and the ability to work with people,” the
strategist said, “then voters will assume she can get something done. It
would be a big game changer.”

*Politico: “Bill Clinton urges young voters away from ‘resentment’”
<http://www.politico.com/story/2014/10/bill-clinton-arkansas-voters-111669.html?hp=r1>*

By Katie Glueck

October 7, 2014, 2:13 p.m. EDT

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Former President Bill Clinton on Tuesday made a
tailored pitch to young voters, urging students to back Democrats on the
2014 ballot because they are “too young” to cast votes of “resentment.”

Those comments came at the University of Arkansas’ flagship campus on the
third stop of Clinton’s two-day, four-stop tour stumping for Arkansas
Democrats.

“Why are all these people trying to get you to cast resentment votes?” said
Clinton, this state’s beloved former governor, of national Republicans.
“You’re too young. You should be voting for what you’re for. …You should be
voting for your dreams.”

It was an echo of remarks he made a day earlier, when Clinton argued that
the GOP was trying to convince Arkansans to view the midterm elections as
their last chance to vote against President Barack Obama, who is deeply
unpopular here. Clinton has been making the case that Sen. Mark Pryor
(D-Ark.) and Democratic gubernatorial candidate Mike Ross should be viewed
on their own merits, and that the national party is irrelevant in their
races.

But polls show that Ross is behind GOP candidate Asa Hutchinson and Pryor
is in one of the closest races of the cycle, against Rep. Tom Cotton.

Clinton’s emphasis here, speaking to a pavilion packed with cheering
students, was more focused on the importance of the youth vote — a group
that tends to back Democrats, but also tends to stay home during midterms.

“The reason this keeps happening is, you don’t show up in midterms!” he
admonished as he lamented congressional gridlock.

As he did in earlier stops, Clinton noted that the polls show the Democrats
either locked in close races or trailing — but said that was based on the
assumption that young people don’t vote.

“This is all about whether you show up,” he said here, saying that midterms
are “every bit as important to your future as elections when there is a
presidential candidate on the ballot.”

Clinton zeroed in on issues like student loans and equal pay for men and
women, hot-button issues for the base. But he couldn’t help waxing
nostalgic about his past. He reminisced about the “broad-based prosperity”
enjoyed during his administration. And he described his time teaching law
at this school as among the happiest times he and his wife — possible
presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton — experienced.

“I got to live my dreams,” he said, hitting the podium as he reflected on
the “six jobs” he worked through law school, the gig he held down as an
undergrad and his eventual ability to pay down his student debt. He argued
that the Democrats on the ballot want to make that kind of future more
accessible for everyone — and that students here should care about that,
too.

Clinton, reminding the students to take the election personally, told the
crowd: “I’ve got more yesterdays than tomorrows. You’ve got more tomorrows
than yesterdays.”

*Huffington Post opinion: Peter D. Rosenstein: “Hillary Rodham Clinton
Represents the Unfinished Business of our Democracy”
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/peter-d-rosenstein/hillary-rodham-clinton-re_b_5947288.html>*

By Peter D. Rosenstein

October 7, 2014, 2:26 p.m. EDT

Hillary Rodham Clinton holds in her hands the hopes and desires of many but
none more than the women and girls here in the United States and those who
look to the United States around the world.

She represents the fulfillment of what I am sure many of our fore-mothers
erroneously believed about the Declaration of Independence and that was
that they were meant to be included in these most famous lines, "We hold
these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they
are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among
these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

Women learned and had confirmed for them again in the fight over the Equal
Rights Amendment (ERA) to the Constitution that it wasn't true. The simple
words of that amendment first written by Alice Paul in 1923 and finally
passed by both houses of Congress in 1972 failed to get enough state
legislatures to pass it. The sentiment rejected was, "Equality of rights
under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by
any state on account of sex."

So our Constitution, admired by people around the world, is an unfinished
document purposely not granting full equality to more than half the
population. Its preamble reads, "We the People of the United States, in
Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic
Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare,
and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do
ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."
As late as the 1980's when the fight for the ERA was lost, Americans said
they were not ready to ensure that women could see themselves in the
statement 'We the People'. Hillary Clinton's election in 2016 would declare
to the world that the United States is now ready to include all people in
order to form a 'more perfect union'.

GOP consultant Katie Packer Gage was quoted in a Hill newspaper article
saying about Hillary, "Women are not necessarily a group that feels in need
of a champion". She totally misses the point about Hillary. Hillary can be
elected because at one time or another all people feel the need for a
champion. She is more than just a champion for women's rights and the
rights of girls to get a fair shot at success. She has become a champion
for those who have worked their entire lives and fear not being able to
leave their children a better life and safer world. Whether it is her work
for the Children's Defense Fund, rebuilding the education system in
Arkansas, fighting for healthcare for all Americans or as Secretary of
State, she is a champion to many around the world.

Champions aren't always universally loved. But even many of those who don't
see her as their champion respect her intelligence and incredible work
ethic. They understand, whether they agree with her or not, Hillary has
lived her life guided by a steadfast set of principles leading her to help
others be all they can be. Her faith has played a big part in her life and
while she may not attend church each Sunday she is clearly a religious
person. Brought up a Methodist she often attended services with her
daughter at the Foundry United Methodist Church in the District of
Columbia; a congregation with a strong commitment to community service.

Many know that a Hilary Rodham Clinton campaign in 2016 will be different
from the one her consultants crafted in 2008. Hillary appears to have
reached a stage in her life where she is totally comfortable being true to
who she is and speaking out as the brilliant and caring person she is. When
Hillary's feelings and beliefs share the stage with her knowledge she
always shines. When she doesn't follow a script written by campaign
consultants but rather follows her heart she wins.

Hillary Rodham Clinton is recognized as a world leader with more background
and experience in policy and diplomacy than any person ever to run for
President. Lest anyone forget her courage they must remember Hillary as the
woman who stood up and spoke from her heart in 1995 at the United Nations'
Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing. There she called on the world
community "to protect women against violence, improve their access to
health services and education and give them more self-determination." The
most quoted line from that speech is; "It is time for us to say here in
Beijing, and the world to hear, that it is no longer acceptable to discuss
women's rights as separate from human rights. It is a violation of human
rights when babies are denied food, or drowned, or suffocated, or their
spines broken, simply because they are born girls." No one could question
that Hillary was a champion then.

This is the Hillary Rodham Clinton who if she runs and is elected President
in 2016 will move us another giant step toward forming a 'more perfect
union' and finishing the business of our democracy.

*Mediaite: “Leon Panetta Defends Hillary from ‘Unfair’ Benghazi Criticisms
on O’Reilly”
<http://www.mediaite.com/tv/leon-panetta-defends-hillary-from-unfair-benghazi-criticisms/>*

By Josh Feldman

October 7, 2014, 9:21 p.m. EDT

A significant chunk of Bill O’Reilly‘s interview with Leon Panetta tonight
was about Benghazi, as well as the Obama administration’s reaction to that
infamous attack. At one point, Panetta defended Hillary Clinton and said
she would have definitely acted on any security issues if she had been
aware of them.

O’Reilly brought up the frequent criticism that Clinton received multiple
cables about security problems at the Benghazi consulate, but didn’t act.
He asked if that’s fair or not. Panetta said, “I think it’s unfair, because
if I know Hillary Clinton, if she knew there was a security problem in
Benghazi, she would have done something about it.”

When pressed by O’Reilly, Panetta said he’s not intimately familiar with
the bureaucracy at the State Department, but insisted that if Clinton had
been aware of any security issues, she would have acted.

Watch the video below, via Fox News:

[VIDEO]

*National Review: “Panetta Hints He’d Take Hillary in a Match-Up Against
Biden”
<http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/389752/panetta-hints-hed-take-hillary-match-against-biden-brendan-bordelon>*

By Brendan Bordelon

October 7, 2014, 2:16 p.m. EDT

Leon Panetta worked closely with both Vice President Joe Biden and former
secretary of state Hillary Clinton as CIA director and then secretary of
defense. So it’s not surprising he was diplomatic when asked about a
possible presidential matchup between the two, but it was easy to tell whom
the former secretary of defense favors.

“Who would be a better commander-in-chief?” NBC’s Andrea Mitchell asked
Panetta on Tuesday.

“You know, it’s tough for me to kind of say that Joe Biden couldn’t do that
job,” he said. “Because frankly Joe Biden has a lot of experience,
particularly as vice president.”

“Hillary Clinton, I know could do the job,” he continued, “because she’s
somebody who’s got experience, she’s got the toughness of mind and
commitment to this country that I think is important.”

Panetta was former President Bill Clinton’s chief of staff from 1994 to
1997, and it’s been suggested he’ll be angling for another White House post
should Hillary win the White House in 2016.

*The Hill blog: Ballot Box: “Hawk eyes 2016”
<http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/220086-hawk-eyes-2016>*

By Alexandra Jaffe

October 8, 2014, 6:00 a.m. EDT

Former United Nations Ambassador John Bolton hasn’t decided whether he’ll
run for president in 2016 — but he says he’d like to debate Hillary Clinton.

“I’m not giving anything away here, but I’d love to debate Hillary Clinton
one on one,” he told The Hill, detailing his frustration with the former
secretary of State and Democratic front-runner during a Tuesday interview
at his political action committee’s downtown Washington offices.

While there’s renewed talk of him running for the White House as foreign
policy becomes an important topic on this year’s campaign trail, Bolton
would rather discuss his efforts to “elevate national security in the
national debate” through his PAC and super-PAwC — a timely endeavor making
him a player in 2014.

Th groups together have raised more than $6.5 million as of the last
reporting period, and they plan to spend all of it on the midterm
elections. As for 2016, he’s focused on the current elections and claims he
has no timeline for making a decision on a presidential campaign.

“I don’t know when, and I don’t know what the factors will be [in making
the decision]. I’m focused on November, and I’ll just have to think about
it when it’s over,” he said.

But it’s clear the presidential race — and the likely skepticism he’d meet
despite re-emerging as a respected voice within the GOP on foreign policy
over the past year — is on his mind.

Bolton is traveling to Florida, Arkansas, Illinois and New Hampshire to
campaign for candidates over the next two weeks.

And during his interview with The Hill, Bolton mentioned multiple times,
unprompted, how the work of running a PAC has given him an inside look at
how to run a campaign.

“I’ve certainly learned a lot about how campaigns over the years, and
candidates, have wasted money in politics,” said Bolton. “So, I’m trying to
spend it in an effective fashion.”

He said the political operation has “involved me in a lot of nitty-gritty
that I think people who are running for office normally don’t get involved
in,” essentially “how this business of running a campaign normally gets
conducted.”

If he runs, Bolton would be the rare presidential contender to never have
been elected to public office. It’s even rarer that such candidates go on
to win.

He also took sharp jabs at two of his biggest potential rivals: Clinton,
and Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.).

Bolton went to Yale Law School a year behind Hillary and Bill Clinton, so,
he jokes, “I’ve been burdened with them 20 years longer than the rest of
the country.”

But he pledges now: “It’ll be a cold day in hell before I accept her
getting the presidential nomination.

“Despite her efforts to distance herself from the administration, she would
be Obama’s third term. She really hasn’t distanced herself from his foreign
policy,” Bolton said of Clinton.

And he’s not convinced by Paul’s sudden hawkish turn on foreign policy. The
Kentucky senator, known as the leader of the growing libertarian strain
within the GOP, recently departed from his typically noninterventionist
stance on international conflicts to back military strikes on the Islamic
State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

Bolton suggested the shift in the party toward a more hawkish foreign
policy might ultimately prevent Paul from running.

“I think his ambitions are in conflict with his basic beliefs. And where
he’ll be on any given day, obviously only he knows. But I think the fact
he’s been shifting shows the politician’s instinct, that his troops may be
moving in a different direction than he’d like to go,” Bolton said of Paul.
“And so, where he comes out, or in fact whether he even runs now, I think
is an open question.”

But Bolton also suggested he’s open to embracing Paul, if his foreign
policy conversion is genuine.

“I believe in redemption, and there’s room for everybody if they see the
light,” he said.

He said he “welcome[d] the fact” that the rest of the 2016 Republican
presidential field has shown a renewed focus on foreign policy and national
security in recent weeks. He said he found Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal’s
(R) Monday speech on the issue, as well as addresses by former Arkansas
Gov. Mike Huckabee (R) and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) in recent weeks,
heartening.

“I’ve talked to a lot of these folks, and I’m happy to talk to them at any
point — I want people to dive into this and have a chance to gain more
experience in it,” he added.

Bolton launched his political apparatus last year with the aim of making
foreign policy and national security issues in the midterms. He
acknowledges that recent news events, more than his PAC efforts, have
brought those issues to the forefront of the national debate.

He has kept the focus of his PAC on foreign policy and has spent millions
largely on digital ad campaigns, which Bolton sees as a wiser use of the
money than costly TV campaigns. On Tuesday, the super-PAC launched a $5
million digital advertising campaign across New Hampshire, Arkansas and
North Carolina.

He said he’s “optimistic” on Republicans’ chances this fall. He said
foreign policy could be a deciding issue in Colorado and Iowa, two
competitive Senate races, where Republicans have a shot at picking up seats.

“I’m pretty optimistic now, but I think there are a lot of idiosyncratic
factors at work. I think the prospect of something happening on the
international scene is very real, and we don’t know what the president’s
reaction to it would be,” he said.

But the president’s foreign policy, as it’s unfolded during his two terms,
has been “weak and feckless,” and that’s why Obama is having such a drag on
Democrats this year, Bolton said.

“One reason Democratic candidates are fleeing from the Obama administration
is the relationship between leadership as a general issue and leadership in
foreign policy. And people see this as a badly failed presidency with a
weak and feckless leader, when it comes to foreign policy, and they make
the perfectly sensible jump from that to domestic policy too,” he said.

In particular, Bolton said, Obama’s strategy to tackle ISIS “is manifestly
failing already,” and “ISIS has already adapted to it.”

“Instead of pursuing gradual escalation in order to prevent ISIS from
consolidating its control over the territory it holds, we should’ve used
the maximum force available to us.”

But he says, even if Americans are paying attention to national security
now, his efforts won’t end in November.

“It’s not enough to say, Mr. X is now talking about foreign policy —
problem solved. That doesn’t do it. And it doesn’t do it to have several
Mr. X’s talking about foreign policy,” Bolton said. “It’s about restoring
national security to where it should be on the priority list. So I see this
as a long-term priority.”

*CNN: “Jindal is 'thinking and praying' about 2016 presidential run”
<http://www.cnn.com/2014/10/07/politics/bobby-jindal-thinking-and-praying-2016/>*

By Marianna Sotomayor

October 7, 2014, 3:56 p.m. EDT

Washington (CNN) -- Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal said on Monday he was
"thinking and praying" about a presidential run and said that an
announcement could follow the midterm elections or "sometime after the
holidays."

If he decides to run, Jindal would likely be the first Republican candidate
to announce his decision. Most potential challengers have said they are
waiting until spring 2015.

In his speech, Jindal tried to rouse hawks in the party by harshly
criticizing President Barack Obama.

"The Russian reset, Iraq, Afghanistan, Israel, Egypt, Iran, Libya, Europe,
China, and the list goes on. In each of these areas, it's not just the
President took too long to come up with an answer. It's that the answer was
wrong," he said at an American Enterprise Institute event.

Jindal called Obama's cutting back on defense spending "foolish" and
"unacceptable" at a time when the administration has considered intervening
in several foreign conflicts.

The two-term governor went on to say that the U.S. is at war with ISIS and
that the President's hesitancy to call it a fight is "a projection of
weakness."

He also slammed former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, a potential
Democratic presidential candidate, for making decisions the he believes has
set America on a path for "more chaos, more conflict and more wars."

"Today, we are living with the consequences of the Obama-Clinton ideas when
it comes to foreign, domestic and defense policy... If only it had the help
of a wise, steady hand, a policy expert in dealing with foreign affairs,
he'd have come up with better answers. But instead he just had Hillary
Clinton," he said.

In a set of policy proposals, Jindal suggested that defense spending should
be 4% of the country's GDP. He also called for increasing the Pentagon's
funding, following the administration's decision to cut back $78 billion in
2011 as a way to decrease the deficit.

In the interim before potentially launching his campaign, Jindal hopes to
see the Republican Party take the initiative rather than being known as the
opposition party. Jindal mentioned that several Republican members have
sided with Obama in the past, including on defense spending cutbacks.

"[The people] are frustrated with the President, but they have yet to hear
a comprehensive alternative from the Republicans. All they heard so far is
that we are opposed to many of his policies," he said. "What they are
hungry for is a positive agenda from the Republican side."

*Calendar:*

*Sec. Clinton's upcoming appearances as reported online. Not an official
schedule.*

·  October 8 – Chicago, IL: Sec. Clinton stumps for Illinois Gov.
Quinn (Chicago
Sun-Times
<http://politics.suntimes.com/article/washington/hillary-clinton-hitting-illinois-stump-gov-quinn/mon-09292014-1000am>
)

·  October 8 – Chicago, IL: Sec. Clinton keynotes AdvaMed 2014 conference (
AdvaMed
<http://advamed2014.com/download/files/AVM14%20Wednesday%20Plenary%20Media%20Alert%20FINAL%209_30_14(1).pdf>
)

·  October 9 – New York, NY: Sec. Clinton fundraises for Arkansas Sen.
Pryor (AP
<http://bigstory.ap.org/article/03fe478acd0344bab983323d3fb353e2/clinton-planning-lengthy-campaign-push-month>
)

·  October 9 – Philadelphia, PA: Sec. Clinton fundraises for gubernatorial
candidate Tom Wolf (AP
<http://bigstory.ap.org/article/03fe478acd0344bab983323d3fb353e2/clinton-planning-lengthy-campaign-push-month>
)

·  October 13 – Las Vegas, NV: Sec. Clinton and Sen. Reid fundraise for the
Reid Nevada Fund (Ralston Reports
<http://www.ralstonreports.com/blog/hillary-raise-money-state-democrats-reid-next-month>
)

·  October 13 – Las Vegas, NV: Sec. Clinton keynotes the UNLV Foundation
Annual Dinner (UNLV
<http://www.unlv.edu/event/unlv-foundation-annual-dinner?delta=0>)

·  October 14 – San Francisco, CA: Sec. Clinton keynotes
salesforce.com Dreamforce
conference (salesforce.com
<http://www.salesforce.com/dreamforce/DF14/highlights.jsp#tuesday>)

·  October 20 – San Francisco, CA: Sec. Clinton fundraises for House
Democratic women candidates with Nancy Pelosi (Politico
<http://www.politico.com/story/2014/08/hillary-clinton-nancy-pelosi-110387.html?hp=r7>
)

·  October 20 – San Francisco, CA: Sec. Clinton fundraises for Senate
Democrats (AP
<http://bigstory.ap.org/article/03fe478acd0344bab983323d3fb353e2/clinton-planning-lengthy-campaign-push-month>
)

·  November 2  – NH: Sec. Clinton appears at a GOTV rally for Gov. Hassan
and Sen. Shaheen (AP
<http://bigstory.ap.org/article/03fe478acd0344bab983323d3fb353e2/clinton-planning-lengthy-campaign-push-month>
)

·  December 1 – New York, NY: Sec. Clinton keynotes a League of
Conservation Voters dinner (Politico
<http://www.politico.com/story/2014/09/hillary-clinton-green-groups-las-vegas-111430.html?hp=l11>
)

·  December 4 – Boston, MA: Sec. Clinton speaks at the Massachusetts
Conference for Women (MCFW <http://www.maconferenceforwomen.org/speakers/>)