Subject: Correct The Record Sunday July 27, 2014 Roundup
From: Burns Strider <[email-masked]>
To: CTRFriendsFamily <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 27 Jul 2014 15:43:47 -0400
List-Id: <CTRFriendsFamily.americanbridge.org>

**

*Correct The Record Sunday July 27, 2014 Roundup:*

*Headlines:*

*Boston Globe: “Hillary Clinton speaks of need for political compromise”
<http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2014/07/26/hillary-clinton-boston-address-speaks-need-for-political-compromise/SHPsiVejGGO1xTFaqy7uYM/story.html>*

“Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton issued an appeal for political
compromise Saturday at a financial advisers’ conference in Boston,
crediting business-minded Republicans with helping end the 2013 government
shutdown that she said had tarnished the United States’ image abroad.”

*Boston Herald: “Clinton makes splash at Boston convention, raps
partisanship”
<http://bostonherald.com/news_opinion/us_politics/2014/07/clinton_makes_splash_at_boston_convention_raps_partisanship>*

“Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton preached bipartisanship, plugged
her book, avoided talk of a 2016 White House run, and even joked about her
role as the last-minute fill-in speaker for former President George W. Bush
during a convention in Boston yesterday.”

*Boston Globe: “Hillary Clinton meets fans at Seekonk Sam’s Club”
<http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2014/07/26/hillary-clinton-meets-fans-sam-club-seekonk/EE7FAf7HyPHS22McZ5DVEN/story.html>*

“Against a backdrop of stacked paper towels and water bottle packs in an
aisle at a Sam’s Club, former US secretary of state Hillary Clinton greeted
nearly 1,000 people Saturday during a book signing at the retail warehouse
for her memoir, ‘Hard Choices.’”

*RealClearPolitics: “'Ready for Hillary' in Northeast Pennsylvania”
<http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2014/07/27/ready_for_hillary_in_northeast_pennsylvania_123473.html>*

“McNulty is clear about who Scranton will endorse in a primary race between
Clinton and Vice President Joe Biden, who also grew up in the city: ‘Sorry,
sir, with all due respect, this is Hillary Country.’”

*Politico: “Hillary Clinton addresses ‘vision,’ realities”
<http://www.politico.com/story/2014/07/hillary-clinton-interview-vision-reality-109407.html>*

“Hillary Clinton said in an interview airing Sunday that voters sometimes
look for ‘a vision that people can hang onto,’ but that must be based in
the realities of getting results in Washington.”

*CNN blog: Fareed Zakaria GPS: “Clinton: Settlement policy my biggest
complaint with Israeli government”
<http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2014/07/27/clinton-settlement-policy-my-biggest-complaint-with-israeli-government/>*

“The continuing settlements, which have been denounced by successive
American administrations on both sides of the aisle, are clearly a terrible
signal to send if, at the same time, you claim you're looking for a
two-state solution.”

*Mediaite: “Fareed Zakaria to Hillary Clinton: What Happened to the Reset
with Russia?”
<http://www.mediaite.com/tv/fareed-zakaria-to-hillary-clinton-what-happened-to-the-reset-with-russia/>*

“CNN’s Fareed Zakaria asked former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
Sunday morning if, as she claimed in her book, the “reset” with Russia
worked initially, when exactly did it stop working?”

*Wall Street Journal blog: Washington Wire: “Clinton to Europe: Loosen
Russia’s Energy Grip”
<http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2014/07/27/clinton-to-europe-loosen-russias-energy-grip/>*

“Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called on European nations to
become less dependent on Russian energy supplies and impose stronger
sanctions on their Eastern neighbor.”

*Wall Street Journal blog: Washington Wire: “Clinton: Any Enrichment by
Iran Could Trigger Arms Race”
<http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2014/07/27/clinton-any-enrichment-by-iran-could-trigger-arms-race/>*

“Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Sunday that any Iranian
uranium enrichment could trigger a nuclear-arms race in the Middle East.”

*The Daily Independent (Ashland, Kentucky): “Bill Clinton coming to eastern
Kentucky to stump for Grimes”
<http://www.dailyindependent.com/local/x1027609325/Bill-Clinton-coming-to-eastern-Kentucky-to-stump-for-Grimes?zc_p=0>*

“Former President Bill Clinton will join Grimes on Aug. 6 for a campaign
rally in eastern Kentucky, according to a campaign official who would
provide no further details.”

*CNN: “CNN Poll: Romney tops Obama but loses to Clinton”
<http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2014/07/27/cnn-poll-romney-tops-obama-but-loses-to-clinton/>*

“If a rematch of the 2012 presidential election were held today, GOP
nominee Mitt Romney would top President Barack Obama in the popular vote,
according to a new national survey. But a CNN/ORC International poll also
indicates that if Romney changes his mind and runs again for the White
House, Hillary Clinton would best him by double digits in a hypothetical
showdown.”

*New York Post: “How a ‘weird’ Chelsea Clinton is getting in on the family
business”
<http://nypost.com/2014/07/26/how-a-weird-chelsea-clinton-is-muscling-in-on-the-family-business/>*

“Yet for all this talk from a lifelong public person about her recent
decision to become a public person, Chelsea Clinton, now 34, remains an
enigma.”

*Articles:*

*Boston Globe: “Hillary Clinton speaks of need for political compromise”
<http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2014/07/26/hillary-clinton-boston-address-speaks-need-for-political-compromise/SHPsiVejGGO1xTFaqy7uYM/story.html>*

By Jim O’Sullivan

July 26, 2014

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton issued an appeal for political
compromise Saturday at a financial advisers’ conference in Boston,
crediting business-minded Republicans with helping end the 2013 government
shutdown that she said had tarnished the United States’ image abroad.

Clinton, widely discussed as a presidential front-runner in 2016,
repeatedly decried what she portrayed as ideological extremism in
Washington, invoking the presidencies of Ronald Reagan and her husband,
Bill Clinton, as eras of bipartisan accommodation.

“American voters should make it very clear that we will not vote for
someone who says proudly he or she will go to Washington and never
compromise,” Clinton said.

“We’re not even coming together to solve the emergency problems. We’re
having a big fight about what to do down on our border, with the tens of
thousands of youngsters that are there,” Clinton said, referring to the
crisis of migrant children on the US-Mexico border.

Touring behind her new memoir, “Hard Choices,” Clinton addressed the
Ameriprise Financial conference at the Boston Convention and Exhibition
Center as a substitute for former President George W. Bush, who had
canceled his appearance due to knee surgery.

“The last time a Clinton replaced a Bush, things turned out pretty well,”
Clinton quipped.

Much of her prepared remarks were devoted to American competitiveness with
China and what she called the growing threat of Russia under Vladimir Putin.

But Clinton also repeatedly jabbed at populist themes that another
frequently mentioned potential presidential candidate, Massachusetts
Senator Elizabeth Warren, often voices in her own speeches. Warren has
repeatedly said that she is not running for president.

“We have the feeling growing in our country that the deck is stacked
against the middle class, and those fighting to get into the middle class,”
Clinton said, adding that the country is hobbled by “rising inequality,
growth that hasn’t really picked up yet, and the feeling that many
Americans now have that somehow the system seems rigged against them.”

During a question-and-answer session with Ameriprise Financial CEO James
Cracchiolo, Clinton said right-leaning corporate leaders had helped fortify
GOP congressional leadership in October 2013 to end a two-week government
shutdown.

“People I knew, on boards, in executive suites, were calling Republicans
they supported – they’re conservative, that’s where their political
viewpoint rests -- and saying, ‘What are you guys thinking?’ And it was the
business community, Jim, that pulled us back from the brink.”

“Support those people. Support the people who are still able to make a
deal,” she said.

Clinton has taken criticism for the paid speeches she has made since
stepping down as the nation’s top diplomat after President Obama’s first
term.

Later on Saturday, she visited the Sam’s Club in Seekonk for a book-signing.

*Boston Herald: “Clinton makes splash at Boston convention, raps
partisanship”
<http://bostonherald.com/news_opinion/us_politics/2014/07/clinton_makes_splash_at_boston_convention_raps_partisanship>*

By Chris Cassidy and Laurel J. Sweet

July 27, 2014

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton preached bipartisanship, plugged
her book, avoided talk of a 2016 White House run, and even joked about her
role as the last-minute fill-in speaker for former President George W. Bush
during a convention in Boston yesterday.

“The last time a Clinton replaced a Bush, things worked out pretty well,”
Clinton told the crowd.

Bush had to cancel his appearance at the three-day Ameriprise Financial
conference at the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center because of an
injured knee.

In a 50-minute appearance, Clinton — his hired replacement — warned that
America’s image at home and abroad is being tarnished by never-ending
bipartisan wrangling in Washington, according to several attendees of the
event, which was heavily secured and closed to the press.

Clinton contrasted today’s grim atmosphere of conflict and gridlock on
Capitol Hill with the 1990s, when President Bill Clinton and House Speaker
Newt Gingrich fought publicly all day long, but at least privately
negotiated at night.

“She said, ‘Don’t be voting or pouring money into someone that’s going to
go into Washington and say, ‘I’m not going to compromise. I’m going to have
staunch ideas,’” said attendee Nancia Dalimonte. “Because nothing’s going
to change. Nothing’s going to get done.”

“She talked about compromise,” a Republican conventioneer from Washington,
D.C., said, declining to give his name, citing the strict confidentiality
rules of the event. “She just talked about how both Reagan and Bill were
able to work with the other party, and obviously that’s not happening
today.”

He added: “I’m not a fan of hers. I’m on the other side, but I was
reasonably impressed.”

Clinton’s message of political harmony could serve her well with
independent voters if she runs in 2016, said one political pundit.

“Independents are fed up with the excessive partisanship,” said Marc Landy
of Boston College. “She hasn’t got a clue about how to improve the level of
bipartisanship, but might as well talk about it. Why not?”

The speech by Clinton — who declined to speak to a reporter as she left the
building — drew generally warm reviews from the largely conservative crowd.

“As a registered Republican I was a little concerned when President Bush
canceled,” said conventioneer David Lowe. “I was pleasantly surprised and
impressed.”

“People were pretty uptight about her because she’s polarizing,” said Craig
Hanson of Wisconsin of the announcement that Clinton would replace Bush.

“But I thought she was great.”

Joe Castillo, a professional sand artist and finalist on the hit NBC show
“America’s Got Talent,” was one of Clinton’s opening acts at the event.

Castillo said Clinton “started talking right away about economics. She
talked about people paying their fair share.”

The applause from the crowd of financial advisers was, he said, “warm, but
not overly enthusiastic.”

*Boston Globe: “Hillary Clinton meets fans at Seekonk Sam’s Club”
<http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2014/07/26/hillary-clinton-meets-fans-sam-club-seekonk/EE7FAf7HyPHS22McZ5DVEN/story.html>*

By Oliver Ortega

July 27, 2014

Against a backdrop of stacked paper towels and water bottle packs in an
aisle at a Sam’s Club, former US secretary of state Hillary Clinton greeted
nearly 1,000 people Saturday during a book signing at the retail warehouse
for her memoir, “Hard Choices.”

Some even spent the night in the parking lot so they could be first to
enter the store when it opened at 7 a.m. and line up for a signed copy and
a few seconds with Clinton, widely discussed as a front-runner for the next
presidential election.

“I wanted her to see that she met probably the first woman president,” said
Sherry Tomasso, referring to her 9-year-old granddaughter, Kyllei Shelton,
who came with her to the signing. The Rehoboth residents arrived at the
store at midnight with folding chairs, blankets, and snacks to brave the
chilly night.

Clinton came out to raucous applause and cheering. Outside, some in the
rear of the line also voiced their enthusiasm when Clinton aides
periodically came out to thank them for coming and to reassure them that
they would get to see the former first lady and US senator.

“Run, Hilary, run,” one woman chanted.

“I have so much respect for her,” said Diane Bergeron of Malden, who came
to the store at 5 a.m. and left with a gleeful smile and a signed book
clutched to her chest.

“She has my vote, and I’m going to campaign for her, which I never do, but
I will for her,” said Lynn Vandenburgh of Plymouth.

Vandenburgh said she was exhausted and could barely remember the short chat
she had with Clinton, but that having Clinton’s hand on top of hers for a
few seconds made it “all worth it.”

Until just before 4 p.m., when the event was scheduled to end, the line
stretched from the back of the store to the parking lot. Store employees
handed out water and snacks throughout the day.

A bus belonging to the Ready for Hillary Super PAC was stationed outside
the store, and about 600 people signed up to volunteer or receive
information, according to the group’s communications director, Seth
Bringman.

Some at the store said they were surprised at the choice of venue.

“I thought they had evacuated Sam’s Club when I saw the line in the parking
lot,” said Helena Gernold of East Providence, R.I.,who was shopping there.
“This is like a warehouse. You would expect like a Barnes & Noble.”

Abigale Sanft, an 18-year-old from Taunton, said the location was strange
but that she did not think it affected attendance.

“What really matters is that she came to the area,” Sanft said. “People are
here anyway.”

Security was tight, with dozens of State Police, Seekonk police, and Secret
Service agents restricting access to Clinton and checking the perimeter.

Several aisles were cordoned off so people could not cut in without being
screened. The store’s café was closed and the space was used to give out
wristbands, for which people either had to buy a book or bring their own
for signing.

Dianna Gee, a spokeswoman for Sam’s Club, said the store has hosted book
signings for a variety of authors over the past few years. A few weeks ago,
Clinton held one in Arkansas at a Walmart, the company that owns Sam’s Club.

Clinton has been promoting her book across the country since June. Last
week she stopped in Cambridge.

In its first week, “Hard Choices” sold 86,000 copies, though book sales had
plunged to 10,000 by last week, according to Nielsen BookScan. A new book
attacking Clinton, Ed Klein’s “Blood Feud: The Clintons vs. the Obamas,”
has outsold it for three weeks in a row.

*RealClearPolitics: “'Ready for Hillary' in Northeast Pennsylvania”
<http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2014/07/27/ready_for_hillary_in_northeast_pennsylvania_123473.html>*

By Salena Zito

July 27, 2014

Evie McNulty and her husband, Jim, have been there from the beginning.

She is Lackawanna County's recorder and he is Scranton's former mayor.
Despite serving only one term in the 1980s, he is credited with starting
the renaissance of the former industrial city; he enjoys popularity and
stature as the city's unofficial ambassador, the kind of popularity you
can't get in public office.

Charming, smart, folksy, beloved and, above all, very connected, they are
the Democratic Party's powerhouses in Northeast Pennsylvania.

Arguably, their support and network is more valuable to a Democrat in a
primary or general election than anything that state party chairman Jim
Burn could deliver to a presidential candidate.

Six years ago last month, Evie wept on her couch in Scranton as then-Sen.
Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., took to the stage at the National Building Museum
in Washington — where supporters had lined up around the block for hours —
and told the cheering crowd of mostly women and families, “Well, this isn't
exactly the party I'd planned, but I sure like the company.”

It marked a spectacular end to arguably the longest presidential primary
race in modern American political history.

Clinton started the campaign in 2007 slightly blindsided by a freshman
senator from Illinois, who barely had a year under his belt in Washington.

She was even more blindsided by the loss of support in Washington — from
the Teddy Kennedys of the political world who were legends, as well as from
the “fresh” Washingtonians such as Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo. Their
endorsements of Sen. Barack Obama instead of Clinton were a sharp slap in
the face to the former first lady.

In late 2007 and early 2008, Clinton stumbled out of the gate; she was too
rigid, too strident, failed to reach out to the progressive activists who
make or break low-turnout caucus contests and, above all, was way
over-handled by her advisers and staff.

“They did not let Hillary be Hillary,” said McNulty from her home, and you
could hear her husband in the background agreeing.

When Clinton reached the Midwest and South, especially the primary races in
Ohio and Texas, she shed her handlers and began to hit her stride,
according to McNulty. “By the time she hit her home state of Pennsylvania,
she had her groove on, she connected, she relaxed, she was herself, and
that is the Hillary Clinton I know and love.”

To the McNultys, Hillary Rodham Clinton is one of them — a daughter of
Scranton, where generations of the Rodham family worked at the lace
factory, where she was baptized and spent summers, and where her brothers
still own a cabin.

McNulty is clear about who Scranton will endorse in a primary race between
Clinton and Vice President Joe Biden, who also grew up in the city: “Sorry,
sir, with all due respect, this is Hillary Country.”

McNulty defends Clinton's rocky rollout of her book tour, during which she
was criticized for remarks that seemed out of touch with working-class
voters and with the populist movement percolating outside Washington in
both political parties. That movement is building incredible momentum
against all things elite and big — big banks, big government, big money.

“They should have called me, I would tell her to just be herself,” she said.

Today, McNulty spends her time collecting names, phone numbers and email
addresses for Clinton's next presidential campaign. The county row officer,
who has won every election since 1998 by overwhelming majorities, really
wants only one thing in return.

“Every year we try to get Hillary to come and speak to our Society of Irish
Women dinner but she has been unable to because, when she was senator, they
had their parade in New York, and she had her hands full when she was
running for president, then she was so busy when she was secretary of
State,” said McNulty, one of three Pennsylvania women elected to the
Democratic National Committee.

“God, I wish we could, I wish we could,” she said excitedly of getting
Clinton to speak at the next St. Patrick's Day dinner in Scranton.

Clearly, she is “Ready for Hillary,” as the pre-2016 bumper stickers and
buttons declare.

*Politico: “Hillary Clinton addresses ‘vision,’ realities”
<http://www.politico.com/story/2014/07/hillary-clinton-interview-vision-reality-109407.html>*

By Katie Glueck

July 26, 2014, 12:19 p.m. EDT

Hillary Clinton said in an interview airing Sunday that voters sometimes
look for “a vision that people can hang onto,” but that must be based in
the realities of getting results in Washington.

The former secretary of state and possible Democratic 2016 frontrunner
offered those remarks on CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria GPS,” set to air for the
full hour on Sunday. She dismissed the notion that a Washington “insider”
would have a tougher time securing the presidential nomination.

“I think that we, perhaps, go through periods where what we want and what
we need is a vision that people can hang onto,” she said, according to a
transcript provided ahead of the show. “But it needs to be rooted in the
hard work of getting anything done in Washington. And I think the next
election will be based around the economy, around people’s standard of
living, around what’s happening to the middle class in America.”

Clinton, who has been traveling the country and internationally to promote
her memoir of her time at the State Department, “Hard Choices,” has
generated much speculation about what overarching message a presidential
campaign of hers would offer.

“And whoever runs is going to have to speak candidly and come up with a set
of recommendations that the American people believe would be in their
interest, so that you have an election not about a candidate, but you have
an election about an agenda,” she said.

When Zakaria noted that the last several Democratic presidents have
backgrounds primarily outside of Washington — including her own husband,
former President Bill Clinton — Clinton replied that every election is
unique.

“It starts with where we are in the country at this time, with what
Americans are thinking, feeling and hoping,” she said. “And it proceeds
from there. And it’s always about the future. So whether you’ve been in
office a day or you’ve been in office 20 years, you have to come to any
campaign with as clear an understanding as you can get of where the country
is and where you wish it to be.”

Clinton, in other interviews and in her book, has also appeared to create
some space from the Obama administration on foreign policy matters
including Syria and Russia.

Asked about what she learned from her vote to authorize military action in
Iraq while she was in the Senate — an issue that took a major toll on her
presidential primary campaign in 2008 — she again seemed to signal distance
from the office of the presidency.

“Well, I learned to be far more skeptical of what I’m told by presidents,
no matter who the presidents are, and also to be much more cautious,
always, in any action or vote that could lead to the use of American
military power and most particularly what we call boots on the ground.”

*CNN blog: Fareed Zakaria GPS: “Clinton: Settlement policy my biggest
complaint with Israeli government”
<http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2014/07/27/clinton-settlement-policy-my-biggest-complaint-with-israeli-government/>*

[Transcript]

July 27, 2014, 12:53 a.m. EDT

[Fareed speaks with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton about unrest
in the Middle East. Watch the full interview on "Fareed Zakaria GPS," this
Sunday at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. ET on CNN.]

*Martin Indyk has just resigned as the kind of sherpa of the peace process.
And he says that the immediate trigger, in his view – there were many – was
the fact that the Palestinians looked at the Israeli continued settlement
activity...*

Right.

*…and said these guys are not serious, we're never going to be able to get
a state...*

Right.

*…look at what they're doing.*

This is my biggest complaint with the Israeli government. I’m a strong
supporter of Israel, a strong supporter of their right to defend
themselves. But the continuing settlements, which have been denounced by
successive American administrations on both sides of the aisle, are clearly
a terrible signal to send if, at the same time, you claim you're looking
for a two-state solution.

*Mediaite: “Fareed Zakaria to Hillary Clinton: What Happened to the Reset
with Russia?”
<http://www.mediaite.com/tv/fareed-zakaria-to-hillary-clinton-what-happened-to-the-reset-with-russia/>*

By Evan McMurry

July 27, 2014, 10:48 a.m. EDT

CNN’s Fareed Zakaria asked former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton Sunday
morning if, as she claimed in her book, the “reset” with Russia worked
initially, when exactly did it stop working?

“I was among the most skeptical of Putin during the time that I was there,
in part because I thought he had never given up on his vision of bringing
mother Russia back to the forefront,” Clinton said. “So when he announced
in the fall of 2011 that he would be changing positions with Medvedev, I
knew that he would be more difficult to deal with. He had been always the
power behind Medvedev, but he had given Medvedev a lot of independence to
make the reset a success.”

“I saw that firsthand with respect to the parliamentary elections in
Russia, because they were filled with irregularities and Russian people
poured out into the streets to protest, and I, as secretary of state, said
the Russians deserved better,” Clinton continued. “Putin attacked me
personally because is he very worried about any kind of internal dissent.”

Clinton reiterated her call for a stronger response from Europe.

“If the United States and Europe don’t present a united front, I think
Putin’s the kind of man who will go as far as he can get away with,”
Clinton said. “I think he is still smart enough and cautious enough to be
pushed back, but there has to be a push in order to make that happen.”

Watch the clip below, via CNN:

[VIDEO]

*Wall Street Journal blog: Washington Wire: “Clinton to Europe: Loosen
Russia’s Energy Grip”
<http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2014/07/27/clinton-to-europe-loosen-russias-energy-grip/>*

By Amy Harder

July 27, 2014, 10:53 a.m. EDT

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called on European nations to
become less dependent on Russian energy supplies and impose stronger
sanctions on their Eastern neighbor.

“They need to understand they must stand up to [Russian President] Vladimir
Putin,” Mrs. Clinton said on CNN in an interview with Fareed Zakaria. “The
reluctance has to do with European dependence on energy from Russia.”

Mrs. Clinton said that while she was Secretary of State during the first
term of the Obama administration, she told European nations then that they
need to diversify their energy supplies. As secretary, she created in 2011
the department’s Bureau of Energy Resources, a roughly 100-person office
that seeks to further diplomacy through energy security.

“Russia doesn’t have that many markets,” Mrs. Clinton said. “They’re also
dependent upon European markets. I think Europeans can go much further on
sanctions and should do so as quickly as possible.”

Mrs. Clinton, who is considered the top potential Democratic candidate for
president in 2016, said the downing of the Malaysian Airlines 3786.KU
-2.22% airplane justifies stronger sanctions on Russia.

“If there were any doubt it should be gone by now that Vladimir Putin
certainly indirectly threw his support of the insurgents in Eastern Ukraine
and… bears responsibility for what happened with the shoot-down of the
airplane,” Mrs. Clinton said. “So therefore we have to up these sanctions.”

About 34% of the European Union’s natural-gas imports come from Russia, and
several European nations are much more heavily dependent, including six
that get all of their gas from Russia, according to a U.S. Congressional
Research Service report released in August 2013. Ukraine relies on Russia
for 70% of its natural-gas supply, and it’s a key transit country for
Russian gas headed to more than a dozen other European nations.

This dependence has led to some wariness among European officials and
businesses over aggressively backing sanctions, since it could end up
hurting European firms and the economy.

Earlier this month, Mr. Obama announced another round of sanctions that
targets, among others, three major Russian energy companies: the
state-controlled Rosneft, Russia’s biggest oil producer; OAO Novatek, the
second-biggest gas company; and OAO Gazprombank, the bank connected with
the country’s gas-export monopoly.

*Wall Street Journal blog: Washington Wire: “Clinton: Any Enrichment by
Iran Could Trigger Arms Race”
<http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2014/07/27/clinton-any-enrichment-by-iran-could-trigger-arms-race/>*

By Amy Harder

July 27, 2014, 11:31 a.m. EDT

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Sunday that any Iranian
uranium enrichment could trigger a nuclear-arms race in the Middle East.

“I believe strongly that it’s really important for there to be so little
enrichment or no enrichment at least for a long period of time because I do
think any enrichment will trigger an arms race in the Middle East,” Mrs.
Clinton said on CNN in an interview with Fareed Zakaria.

As secretary of state, Mrs. Clinton led the Obama administration’s efforts
to get international sanctions imposed on Iran, including its oil sector,
in 2012. Mrs. Clinton stepped down in early 2013 and is now considered a
top potential presidential candidate for 2016, though she has declined to
yet say whether she is running.

Earlier this month, Iran and six world powers, including the U.S., agreed
to extend negotiations over Tehran’s nuclear-enrichment program for four
more months to reach a comprehensive deal.

Iran agreed to take further measures to curtail the most advanced parts of
its nuclear program. It will accelerate the conversion of its 20% enriched
uranium into fuel for its research reactor, U.S. officials said. That move
will make the material significantly harder to reconvert into a form that
can be used for a nuclear weapon, they said.

*The Daily Independent (Ashland, Kentucky): “Bill Clinton coming to eastern
Kentucky to stump for Grimes”
<http://www.dailyindependent.com/local/x1027609325/Bill-Clinton-coming-to-eastern-Kentucky-to-stump-for-Grimes?zc_p=0>*

By Ronnie Ellis

July 26, 2014

GLASGOW — Democrat Alison Lundergan Grimes is again calling in the “Big
Dog” in her quest to unseat five-term Republican U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell.

Former President Bill Clinton will join Grimes on Aug. 6 for a campaign
rally in eastern Kentucky, according to a campaign official who would
provide no further details.

But given the efforts by the McConnell campaign to tie Grimes to the
environmental policies of President Barack Obama, and the declining
fortunes of the eastern Kentucky coal economy, it’s probably a safe bet the
event will take place somewhere in the coal fields of southeastern Kentucky.

It will be the second visit to Kentucky this year by Clinton on Grimes’
behalf, but probably not the last. Clinton is a close friend with Grimes’
father, Jerry Lundergan, and he has known Grimes since she was a teenager.

In February Clinton spoke to about 1,000 Grimes supporters in Louisville,
endorsing the jobs plan Grimes touts in her campaign and focusing on the
economic issues Grimes wishes to use against McConnell.

That was Clinton’s first campaign appearance in the 2014 election cycle,
indicating the importance he attaches to the effort to defeat McConnell,
the Republican Senate Minority Leader who has been Obama’s major nemesis in
Congress.

Clinton also appeared in a video endorsing Grimes which was broadcast at
Grimes’ formal campaign kickoff last summer in Lexington at the Carrick
House, owned by Lundergan.

Unlike Obama, Clinton and his wife, Hillary, the former U.S. Secretary of
State who is widely regarded as the 2016 Democratic front-runner for
president, remain popular in Kentucky. Bill Clinton was the last Democrat
to carry Kentucky – twice – in a presidential election and Hillary Clinton
defeated Obama in the 2008 Kentucky presidential primary by a wide margin.
Lundergan managed Hillary Clinton’s 2008 Kentucky primary campaign.

“We are humbled by President Clinton’s continued commitment to our campaign
and the hardworking people of Kentucky,” Jonathan Hurst, Grimes’ campaign
manager, said Saturday.

“The President shares Alison’s vision for a strong middle class and his
support in electing Alison, a champion for working families, to the U.S.
Senate is invaluable,” Hurst said.

Grimes has run successive television ads hitting McConnell on traditional
Democratic working-class themes: Medicare and blue collar jobs.

Since McConnell gave a controversial answer to Edmund Shelby, Editor of the
Beattyville Enterprise, saying local job development wasn’t the job of a
U.S. Senator but that of the state commerce cabinet, Grimes has highlighted
the issue at every opportunity.

Clinton won his first term on similar issues when the internal theme of his
1992 campaign was, “It’s the economy, stupid.” He’s also known as an
effective advocate for Democratic policies. Clinton clearly boosted Obama’s
re-election fortunes with a speech at the 2012 Democratic National
Convention after which Obama dubbed the former president as “explainer in
chief.”

No doubt Grimes is hoping Clinton can do the same for her in the coal
fields, once a Democratic strong hold but increasingly inimical to Obama
and national Democrats.

In the primary, Grimes won coal-producing counties easily against an
undistinguished Democratic primary field, but she under performed in those
counties when measured against her statewide average vote totals. On the
other hand, McConnell outperformed his statewide totals in the same
counties.

McConnell accuses Obama of waging “a war on coal,” though most industry
experts blame the high cost of mining eastern Kentucky coal and market
forces such as cheap natural gas as primary reasons for eastern Kentucky
coal’s decline.

He also tells voters he could become the Senate Majority Leader if the GOP
wins control of the Senate this year as many think may happen and it would
be foolish for Kentucky voters to exchange a Senate leader for a “back
bencher” freshman.

Clinton is likely to address all those issues in his visit.

The announcement comes just a week before the annual Fancy Farm Picnic in
far western Kentucky where Grimes and McConnell will share the same stage
for the first time. Excitement over a Clinton visit can’t hurt the
enthusiasm of Grimes’ supporters at that event, either.

Most publicly released independent polls continue to show the race tight,
some with Grimes and others with McConnell leading. But all of them have
the race within the margin of error.

*CNN: “CNN Poll: Romney tops Obama but loses to Clinton”
<http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2014/07/27/cnn-poll-romney-tops-obama-but-loses-to-clinton/>*

[No Writer Mentioned]

July 27, 2014, 8:29 a.m. EDT

If a rematch of the 2012 presidential election were held today, GOP nominee
Mitt Romney would top President Barack Obama in the popular vote, according
to a new national survey.

But a CNN/ORC International poll also indicates that if Romney changes his
mind and runs again for the White House, Hillary Clinton would best him by
double digits in a hypothetical showdown.

The survey, released Sunday morning, also suggests that more Americans see
Clinton as a strong and capable leader than those who feel the same way
about Obama. But Clinton's numbers on five personal characteristics have
slightly edged down the past few months.

And the poll points to a jump the past month in support among Republicans
for New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Texas Gov. Rick Perry.

How Romney fares

According to the poll, if the 2012 election were somehow held again, Romney
would capture 53% of the popular vote, with the President at 44%. Obama
beat Romney 51%-47% in the popular vote in the 2012 contest. And he won the
all-important Electoral College by a wider margin, 332 electoral votes to
Romney's 206.

Last November, an ABC News/Washington Post survey indicated that if the
2012 election were held again, Romney would have had a 49%-45% edge over
Obama in the popular vote.

Romney has said numerous times that he won't run for the White House again.
But what if things changed and he ended up as the GOP nominee in 2016? The
CNN poll indicates that 55% of Americans would support Clinton, with Romney
at 42%.

"Politically speaking, there is an interesting group of people who would
not vote for Obama but would pick Clinton over Romney," said CNN Polling
Director Keating Holland. "It turns out that nearly seven in ten of them
are women, and 56% are Independents."

The CNN poll – just like almost every national and state survey preceding
it – indicates that the former secretary of state remains the overwhelming
frontrunner for the Democratic nomination. Clinton is seriously considering
a second White House run.

Two-thirds of Democrats and independents who lean toward the party say they
would most likely support Clinton for the presidential nomination. One in
ten say they'd back freshman Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, a
super star among liberals. And eight percent support Vice President Joe
Biden. That's a slight swap from last year, when Biden stood at 12% and
Warren at 7% in CNN polling.

Like Clinton, Biden is mulling another presidential bid, while Warren has
said numerous times that she's not running in 2016.

Did book tour hurt Clinton?

The poll was conducted more than a month into Clinton's book tour for her
new memoir "Hard Choices."

Did Clinton's well publicized book tour – including her controversial
remarks that she and her husband Bill Clinton were "dead broke" when they
left the White House in 2001 – hurt her standing with the public?

The number who say that Clinton shares their values dropped from 56% in
March to 51% now, and the number who say she cares about people edged down
from 56% to 53% in the same time period.

"But it's tough to tell whether Clinton's remarks were the reason for any
change that might have happened. The number who believe that Clinton agrees
with them on issue and can manage the government effectively also dropped,
and those are not qualities that you would expect to be affected by any
concerns over Clinton's wealth," said Holland. "The more likely explanation
is that the book tour hurt Clinton - if it did so - not because of any
specific comments that she made but because more Americans now view her as
an active candidate for the White House."

GOP field all knotted up, but big jumps for Christie and Perry

The poll also indicates the race for the 2016 GOP nomination remains a wide
open contest with no obvious frontrunner among the potential Republican
White House hopefuls.

Thirteen percent of Republicans and independents who lean towards the GOP
say they'd likely back Christie, with Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky and former
Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, a 2008 Republican presidential candidate, each
at 12%. Perry – who ran for the White House last time around – and Rep.
Paul Ryan of Wisconsin – the 2012 GOP vice presidential nominee – are both
at 11%.

Christie and Perry have each jumped five percentage points from CNN's last
Republican nomination poll, which was conducted in June.

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas are both at 8%,
with Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida at 6%, Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin at
5% and former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, who battled Romney deep
into the 2012 GOP primary calendar, at 3%.

Turnout key in midterms

The poll's release comes with 100 days to go until November's elections.
And the biggest question surrounding this year's midterms is how many
people will turn out to vote.

The answer is crucial, because a smaller, more typical midterm electorate
should favor the Republican Party. That's because single women, and younger
and minority voters, who are big supporters of Democrats in presidential
election years, tend to cast ballots in smaller numbers in the midterms.

That's the problem facing Democrats this November, as they try to hold onto
their 55-45 majority in the Senate (53 Democrats and two independents who
caucus with the party). The party is defending 21 of the 36 seats up this
year, with half of those Democratic-held seats in red or purple states. In
the House, the Democrats need to pick up an extremely challenging 17
Republican held seats to win back the majority from the GOP.

The new CNN poll illustrates the turnout problem for the Democrats.

In the generic ballot question, the Democrats have a four percentage point
48%-44% edge over the Republicans among registered voters. The generic
ballot asks respondents to choose between a Democrat or Republican in their
congressional district without identifying the candidates.

But when looking only at those who say they voted in the 2010 midterms –
when the GOP won back the House thanks to a historic 63-seat pick up and
narrowed the Democrats' control of the Senate – Republicans hold a
two-point 48%-46% margin.

The poll was conducted for CNN by ORC International from July 18-20, with
1,012 adult Americans questioned by telephone. The survey's overall
sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points.

*New York Post: “How a ‘weird’ Chelsea Clinton is getting in on the family
business”
<http://nypost.com/2014/07/26/how-a-weird-chelsea-clinton-is-muscling-in-on-the-family-business/>*

By Maureen Callahan

July 26, 2014, 11:35 p.m. EDT

In 2012, four years after sort-of-stumping-but-not-really for her mother’s
presidential campaign, Chelsea Clinton sat down for a lengthy, laudatory
profile for Vogue. “Historically, I deliberately tried to lead a private
life in the public eye,” she said. “And now I am trying to lead a
purposefully public life.”

Last April, Clinton told Fast Company magazine much the same thing. As she
also did with NBC’s Brian Williams, who interviewed Clinton after she was
hired by the network as a “special correspondent” — albeit one with no
journalism experience. Her starting salary: $600,000 a year.

“For most of my life I did deliberately lead a private life and
inadvertently led a public life,” Clinton said. She was now ready to do us
the favor of stepping into the spotlight, prodded by her late grandmother.
“[She told me] that being Chelsea Clinton had happened to me, and that I
had a responsibility to do something with that asset and opportunity,” she
told Williams.

Yet for all this talk from a lifelong public person about her recent
decision to become a public person, Chelsea Clinton, now 34, remains an
enigma. She is the Derek Jeter of the political world, adept at talking
coherently while saying nothing. Who she is, what drives her, what she
believes in — aside from her family’s political primacy — is unknown.

Chelsea has held a series of jobs with sketchy descriptions, her
accomplishments vague. She depicts herself as just another New Yorker,
going to SoulCycle, taking the train, going to the movies every Sunday —
yet she demands a level of obeisance any true New Yorker would find
laughable.

“This is my gracious challenge with her,” NBC producer Jay Kernis told
Vogue. “People in television constantly interrupt each other. But when you
are with Chelsea, you really need to allow her to finish. She is not used
to being interrupted that way.”

She is also, it turns out, not necessarily the future of the Democratic
Party. As Daniel Halper reveals in a curiously overlooked chapter from his
new book, “Clinton, Inc.: The Audacious Rebuilding of a Political Machine”
(Broadside Books), Chelsea is, for good and for ill, very much like her
parents.

“The whole way she’s approached her emergence,” one Clinton aide told
Halper, “has been very self-laudatory and kind of selfish.”

Another close observer put it more succinctly: “She’s weird.”

‘Nothing seems very authentic’

Chelsea Clinton was born on Feb. 27, 1980, the only child of then-Arkansas
Gov. Bill Clinton and his wife, Hillary. From a very early age, her parents
trained her to survive the worst of politics.

When she was 6 years old, Bill and Hillary sat her down and tried to
explain how campaigning worked: Mainly, lots of people would say awful
things about her dad.

“Bill said terrible things about himself,” Hillary wrote in “It Takes a
Village.” “Like how he was really mean to people and didn’t try to help
them.”

Their daughter burst into tears, but the Clintons kept going, saying vile
things about themselves — not stopping until Chelsea learned to stop crying.

She was an awkward adolescent when her father was inaugurated in 1993, and
her parents insisted that the press leave Chelsea alone. “I really find it
hilarious when they make fun of me,” Bill told People magazine weeks after
winning the election. “But I think you gotta be pretty insensitive to make
fun of an adolescent child . . . We really work hard on making sure that
Chelsea doesn’t let other people define her sense of her own self-worth.”

According to Halper’s book, the Clintons overcompensated. She was known
among staff as “the royal child,” because she often got whatever she
wanted. “If she would ask for something and [her parents] said ‘no,’ she
would go behind their backs and go to staff and ask staff to do stuff,” one
associate told Halper. “How do you say no to her? She’s the boss’ kid.”

Chelsea, described by Halper as “tip-to-tail her daddy’s little girl,” was
devastated by the Lewinsky scandal. When Bill finally confessed to Hillary,
she punished him by forcing him to tell all to his teenage daughter. When
he learned she read the Starr Report online, he wept.

Aides and associates told Halper that Chelsea’s guilt-ridden parents have
since given her everything she asks for — including money for the
four-bedroom, 61/2 bath apartment on East 26th Street that she and husband
Marc Mezvinsky purchased in 2013 for $10.5 million.

“When you screw a young White House staffer,” a close Clinton source told
Halper, “or whatever they did, you’re paying the price for the rest of your
life. When your daughter wants to buy a $10 million apartment, the question
isn’t, ‘Are you crazy?’ It’s, ‘Where do I wire the money?’”

Such an unusual life, in some ways insulated and in others grotesquely
transparent, has contributed to Chelsea’s high-class aimlessness. In 2001,
she graduated from Stanford with a degree in history, then got a master’s
in international relations from Oxford, and then got a master’s in public
health at Columbia. Yet she’s never worked in any of those fields, instead
taking vague consulting jobs with six-figure salaries. She’s regarded by
many in ClintonWorld as an over-educated dilettante with no practical life
experience.

“It bothers the s— out of me that everyone thinks she’s the greatest thing
since sliced bread,” one ex-Clinton associate told Halper. “She’s never had
a [real] job. She’s been in college for 12 years.”

A friend of Paul Begala’s tells Halper that the longtime Clinton aide and
defender actively dislikes Chelsea and thinks her vanilla, good-girl
persona is an act.

“Nothing seems very authentic,” another source tells Halper. When Chelsea
was campaigning with her mother in 2008, giving speeches and taking
audience questions at various stops, she behaved as though she were still
that insulated 13-year-old: No questions from the media were taken, not
even from a 9-year-old girl reporting for Scholastic.

Her question: Would Bill be a good “First Man”?

“I’m sorry,” Chelsea told the girl. “I don’t talk to the press — and that
applies to you, unfortunately — even though I think you’re cute.”

‘Stay here — you’re not a Clinton’

Cheslea’s distaste for the media did not stop her from looking for a job in
the media. “She was basically shopping herself to networks, trying to get
the best deal,” an ex-Clinton staffer told Halper. “It’s just kind of
gross.”

In 2011, she was hired by NBC News, naively positioning herself as someone
whose “Making a Difference” pieces would make a difference — as if that’s
not the very definition of good journalism. Her fuzzy subjects and anodyne
approach were savaged in the press.

*Calendar:*

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

·  July 29 – Saratoga Springs, NY: Sec. Clinton makes “Hard Choices” book
tour stop at Northshire Bookstore (Glens Falls Post-Star
<http://poststar.com/news/local/clinton-to-sign-books-in-spa-city/article_a89caca2-0b57-11e4-95a6-0019bb2963f4.html>
)

·  August 9 – Water Mill, NY: Sec. Clinton fundraises for the Clinton
Foundation at the home of George and Joan Hornig (WSJ
<http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2014/06/17/for-50000-best-dinner-seats-with-the-clintons-in-the-hamptons/>
)

·  August 28 – San Francisco, CA: Sec. Clinton keynotes Nexenta’s OpenSDx
Summit (BusinessWire
<http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20140702005709/en/Secretary-State-Hillary-Rodham-Clinton-Deliver-Keynote#.U7QoafldV8E>
)

·  September 4 – Las Vegas, NV: Sec. Clinton speaks at the National Clean
Energy Summit (Solar Novis Today
<http://www.solarnovus.com/hillary-rodham-clinto-to-deliver-keynote-at-national-clean-energy-summit-7-0_N7646.html>
)

·  October 2 – Miami Beach, FL: Sec. Clinton keynotes the CREW Network
Convention & Marketplace (CREW Network
<http://events.crewnetwork.org/2014convention/>)

·  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 13-16 – San Francisco, CA: Sec. Clinton keynotes
salesforce.com Dreamforce
conference (salesforce.com
<http://www.salesforce.com/dreamforce/DF14/keynotes.jsp>)

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