Subject: Correct The Record Monday July 14, 2014 Afternoon Roundup
From: Burns Strider <[email-masked]>
To: CTRFriendsFamily <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 14 Jul 2014 14:26:02 -0400
List-Id: <CTRFriendsFamily.americanbridge.org>

**

*Correct The Record Monday July 14, 2014 Afternoon Roundup:*

*Tweets:*

*Correct The Record* @CorrectRecord: .@NYTimesDowd writes an unscrupulous
column, but @mmfa has the facts:
http://mediamatters.org/blog/2014/07/13/nyts-maureen-dowd-theres-something-unseemly-abo/200086
…
<http://t.co/HCJkvc1p2C> [7/14/14, 11:36 a.m. EDT
<https://twitter.com/CorrectRecord/status/488708540140236800>]

*Correct The Record* @CorrectRecord: .@Schriock1 says @HillaryClinton “has
made a career out of championing the middle class"
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/stephanie-schriock/not-a-symbol-a-breakthrouh-geraldine-ferraro_b_5580378.html?utm_hp_ref=politics
…
<http://t.co/PitoQe46zs> [7/14/14, 10:20 a.m. EDT
<https://twitter.com/CorrectRecord/status/488689609300512768>]

*Correct The Record* @CorrectRecord: Clinton signed science & technology
agreement w/ Colombia to help both countries compete in global economy
#HRC365 http://1.usa.gov/1gyz7hB  <http://t.co/A4XYdhUhpu>[7/13/14, 1:00
p.m. EDT <https://twitter.com/CorrectRecord/status/488367456382361600>]

*Headlines:*

*Slate blog: Weigel: “Anti-Clinton Fan Fiction and Why People Read It”
<http://www.slate.com/blogs/weigel/2014/07/14/anti_clinton_fan_fiction_and_why_people_read_it.html>*

“My most basic point: It's really not bad for the Clintons to watch Klein
dominate the conservative literosphere. Humiliating, sure—there's a reason
Correct the Record, the "fact checking" third-party group, keeps updating
reporters with numbers to show that Hard Choices is selling OK.”

*Politico blog: Dylan Byers on Media: “Hillary Clinton to 'The Daily Show'”
<http://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2014/07/hillary-clinton-to-the-daily-show-192055.html>*

“Hillary Clinton will appear on Comedy Central's ‘The Daily Show’ this
Tuesday to discuss her new book and, inevitably, the 2016 presidential
race.”

*Glens Falls Post-Star (N.Y.): “Clinton to sign books in Spa City”
<http://poststar.com/news/local/clinton-to-sign-books-in-spa-city/article_a89caca2-0b57-11e4-95a6-0019bb2963f4.html>*

“SARATOGA SPRINGS - Former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton,
author of “Hard Choices,” will sign copies of her book at 12:15 p.m. July
29 at Northshire Bookstore.”

*Washington Free Beacon: “Lynne Cheney Mocks Hillary Clinton’s ‘Dead-Broke’
Comments”
<http://freebeacon.com/politics/lynne-cheney-mocks-hillary-clintons-dead-broke-comments/>*

“Former Second Lady Lynne Cheney took a shot at former First Lady Hillary
Clinton’s tone-deaf comments about her family’s wealth Monday during an
interview with Politico‘s Mike Allen.”

*USA Today: “Heat up your summer with 30 new books”
<http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/books/2014/07/14/30-hot-summer-books-2014/11320149/>*

“'HARD CHOICES' By Hillary Rodham Clinton; Simon & Schuster, non-fiction”

*The Guardian: “Edward Klein: the difference between the truth and a lie”
<http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/jul/14/edward-klein-blood-feud-difference-between-truth-and-lie>*

“Such clangers, along with excruciating claims about his subjects' personal
lives, have contributed to the establishment of a diverse anti-Klein
caucus, ranging from Media Matters on the left to the conservative
columnists John Podhoretz and Peggy Noonan.”

*The Hill blog: Ballot Box: “O'Malley 'seriously considering' a 2016 White
House bid”
<http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/212123-omalley-seriously-considering-a-2016-white-house-bid>*

“Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) said in a new interview that he’s
‘seriously considering’ running for president.”

*Washington Post blog: In the Loop: “Biden: Calling up the troops for
2016?”
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/in-the-loop/wp/2014/07/14/biden-calling-up-the-troops-for-2016/>*

“Now, some people might think he’s beginning preliminary organizing for a
possible 2016 run. Naw. We think he’s just being friendly. He even said he
was going to invite everyone to stop by the Veep’s house for a gathering
this fall.”

*Articles:*

*Slate blog: Weigel: “Anti-Clinton Fan Fiction and Why People Read It”
<http://www.slate.com/blogs/weigel/2014/07/14/anti_clinton_fan_fiction_and_why_people_read_it.html>*

By David Weigel

July 14, 2014, 11:57 a.m. EDT

Last week I reviewed Edward Klein's "reporting" about the Clintons and
Obamas in the form of a faux Klein story. CNN's Brian Stelter was nice
enough to bring me on Reliable Sources to give non-faux (real, I guess the
word is) opinions and reporting nuggets about the Klein book's audience and
sales.

[CNN VIDEO CLIP]

My most basic point: It's really not bad for the Clintons to watch Klein
dominate the conservative literosphere. Humiliating, sure—there's a reason
Correct the Record, the "fact checking" third-party group, keeps updating
reporters with numbers to show that Hard Choices is selling OK. But the
Clintons thrive when their opposition is barking at the moon and digging
into conspiracy theories. They thrive, in part, because the left climbs
aboard, and the mainstream press (which is giving off stink lines already
about the turgidness of a Clinton restoration) gives the couple sympathetic
coverage by proxy. (One example: this Guardian story by Jon Swaine, which
points out that the very first anecdote in Klein's book, allegedly a
quote-rich accounting of a lunch between Clinton and friends, gets the
restaurant owner's name wrong.)

*Politico blog: Dylan Byers on Media: “Hillary Clinton to 'The Daily Show'”
<http://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2014/07/hillary-clinton-to-the-daily-show-192055.html>*

By Dylan Byers

July 14, 2014, 12:31 p.m. EDT

Hillary Clinton will appear on Comedy Central's "The Daily Show" this
Tuesday to discuss her new book and, inevitably, the 2016 presidential race.

The appearance is a late addition to last month's "Hard Choices" media
juggernaut that saw Clinton doing sit-down interviews with ABC, NBC, CBS,
NPR and Fox News, as well as a town-hall event hosted by CNN.

Tuesday's appearance will be Clinton's third on the late-night program. She
previously appeared in 2003, as Senator of New York, and in 2008 as a
candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination.

*Glens Falls Post-Star (N.Y.): “Clinton to sign books in Spa City”
<http://poststar.com/news/local/clinton-to-sign-books-in-spa-city/article_a89caca2-0b57-11e4-95a6-0019bb2963f4.html>*

By Staff Report

July 14, 2014

SARATOGA SPRINGS - Former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, author
of “Hard Choices,” will sign copies of her book at 12:15 p.m. July 29 at
Northshire Bookstore.

Clinton served as the U.S. Secretary of State from 2009 to 2013 after
nearly four decades in public service as an advocate, attorney, First Lady
and senator. She is the author of several bestselling books, including her
memoir, “Living History,” and “It Takes a Village.”

Tickets are required. A limited number of tickets will go on sale this week
at 10 a.m. Monday. Tickets are free with the purchase of one copy of “Hard
Choices” from Northshire Bookstore. One ticket per book.

Purchases may be made in-store or by phone at (855) 339-5990. There are no
online sales for the event.

*Washington Free Beacon: “Lynne Cheney Mocks Hillary Clinton’s ‘Dead-Broke’
Comments”
<http://freebeacon.com/politics/lynne-cheney-mocks-hillary-clintons-dead-broke-comments/>*

By Washington Free Beacon Staff

July 14, 2014, 12:34 p.m. EDT

Former Second Lady Lynne Cheney took a shot at former First Lady Hillary
Clinton’s tone-deaf comments about her family’s wealth Monday during an
interview with Politico‘s Mike Allen.

Asked about the political life at an event along with her husband Dick
Cheney and daughter Liz, Cheney said the enthusiasm level in her family for
it varied.

“When Dick was asked to be vice president, he thought that was a great
idea,” she said. “I was not so sure. You know, give up your job, give up
your house and move. We weren’t dead broke, excuse me.”

Clinton was ridiculed for telling ABC’s Diane Sawyer last month that she
and President Bill Clinton were “dead broke” when they left the White House
and were faced with “mortgages” for their multiple homes. The Clintons have
earned more than $100 million in speaking engagements alone since 2001.

*USA Today: “Heat up your summer with 30 new books”
<http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/books/2014/07/14/30-hot-summer-books-2014/11320149/>*

By Jocelyn McClurg, Bob Minzesheimer and Renee Klahr

July 14, 2014, 10:20 a.m. EDT

From Stephen King to the King of Pop, publishers are stepping up to quench
the thirst of summertime readers. USA TODAY's Jocelyn McClurg and Bob
Minzesheimer guide you through the 30 hottest titles.

…

'HARD CHOICES'

By Hillary Rodham Clinton

Simon & Schuster, non-fiction

What it's about: The former first lady and senator reviews her four years
as secretary of State under President Obama.

Why it's hot: Clinton is widely expected to seek the Democratic
presidential nomination in 2016.

ON SALE JUNE 10

…

*The Guardian: “Edward Klein: the difference between the truth and a lie”
<http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/jul/14/edward-klein-blood-feud-difference-between-truth-and-lie>*

By Jon Swaine

July 14, 2014, 11:56 a.m. EDT

[Subtitle:] He's a veteran journalist whose new book on the Clintons sits
atop the bestseller list, but Klein again stands accused of fabrication.
Friends and former colleagues describe the man behind the controversy

The opening scene in Blood Feud, the new book by Ed Klein about the
Clintons and the Obamas, is a classic of the 77-year-old author’s
scurrilous brand of political non-fiction.

On a sunny afternoon in May last year, we are told, Hillary Clinton
gathered six girlfriends from Wellesley's class of 1969 for a boozy lunch
at Le Jardin du Roi, a bistro near her home in Chappaqua, New York.
Recently liberated from the State Department, Clinton is said to have let
loose on her erstwhile boss, accusing President Obama of having “no hand on
the fucking tiller”.

Klein discloses breathlessly that “the wines had been carefully chosen by
Roi, the owner of the restaurant,” and that “Roi waited on Hillary
personally and prepared a special vegan dish for her after the former first
lady told him that she was trying to lose weight.”

There is, however, a problem with this centrepiece of Blood Feud’s
prologue. Le Jardin du Roi was not named after the backyard of a man called
Roi. It means “The Garden of the King”, or “The King’s Garden” in French.
“It’s just the name of the restaurant,” a puzzled staff member told the
Guardian when reached by telephone. The name of the man who owns the
restaurant is Joe.

This is not the first glaring factual error to have made its way into
Klein’s reporting. It is not even the first time a mistake has been made in
the very first anecdote of one of his books. Such clangers, along with
excruciating claims about his subjects' personal lives, have contributed to
the establishment of a diverse anti-Klein caucus, ranging from Media
Matters on the left to the conservative columnists John Podhoretz and Peggy
Noonan.

People close to Clinton in the past week directly alleged that Klein had
made up parts of the book. Theirs were only the heftiest blows in a fresh
barrage of criticism delivered even as Blood Feud rose to the top of New
York Times bestseller list, selling more than 20,100 copies in a week to
oust Clinton’s own memoir Hard Choices, which sold about 16,600, from the
number one slot.

Even Rush Limbaugh, the king of conservative talk radio, told his listeners
last week that the purported dialogue in some of Klein’s florid set pieces
– “You can’t trust the motherfucker,” Clinton is supposed to have said of
Obama over her next glass of wine – does not ring true. “Some of the quotes
strike me as odd,” said Limbaugh. “In the sense that I don’t know people
who speak this way.”

Publishing industry sources contacted by the Guardian were privately
withering about the veracity of Klein’s reporting, while declining to allow
their names to be associated with such allegations in public.

Former colleagues wonder aloud how this one-time editor of the New York
Times Magazine, senior Newsweek editor and staff writer for Vanity Fair
came to join what might be termed the Fox News Industrial Complex. Yet as
Blood Feud scales the same chart-topping heights of The Amateur – his
scathing 2012 take on Obama’s presidency, which sold more than 230,000
copies – Klein appears to be laughing off his critics all the way to the
bank.

“Attacking the messenger to hide the truth is the first page of the Clinton
playbook,” Klein told the Guardian in a statement. “Even in a city
completely devoid of accountability, it never ceases to amaze that a
Clinton operative could call anyone a ‘liar.’ For starters, ask the
families of the victims of the Benghazi attacks how far the Clintons and
the Obamas are willing to go to hide the truth.” Klein did not agree to a
more extensive interview for this article, and a spokeswoman for his
publisher issued a blanket denial to a series of questions put by the
Guardian, some of which contained assertions that were demonstrably true.

*'The eternal lessons of good and right journalism'*

Klein was born in Yonkers in October 1936. His father owned a dress shop,
he has said, but he wanted to be a writer from a young age. He states on
his personal website that after working as a copyboy for the New York Daily
News, he graduated from Columbia University’s journalism school, which
awarded him a fellowship to go to Tokyo, where he worked as a correspondent
for UPI. It was there that Klein also reportedly befriended Abe Rosenthal,
a Pulitzer-winning foreign correspondent and future executive editor of the
New York Times.

Around this time, Klein also met his first wife, Emiko, with whom he went
on to have two children. Their daughter, Karen Klein Hirsch, floor-managed
the Four Seasons restaurant in New York for a decade until 2004, and now
has a daughter of her own. Their son, Alec Klein, is a professor at
Northwestern University’s Medill journalism school and a former
award-winning investigative reporter for the Washington Post and other
newspapers. In the acknowledgments to a 2007 book, Alec thanked his father
“for teaching me the eternal lessons of good and right journalism”.

After returning to the US, Klein joined Newsweek and climbed the newsroom
ladder. He rose to assistant managing editor, before being poached in 1977
by Rosenthal to run the prestigious Sunday magazine. By then, Klein and
Emiko had divorced and fought in the New York courts for custody of their
children, in a case that involved the use of a court-appointed psychiatrist
and reached the state appeals court. Almost 40 years later, court officials
are not authorised to disclose how the case was resolved. Emiko, an artist
now living in Westchester, could not be reached for comment.

Klein subsequently married Tessa Namuth, a former colleague at Newsweek, in
1978. But two years later they, too, were divorced. “Tessa says it won’t be
amicable from her point of view,” the syndicated gossip columnist Liz Smith
wrote, in November 1980. Tessa’s attorney told Smith that Klein “served on
us a vicious complaint, alleging misconduct in the marriage”. Klein’s
attorney told Smith: “My client made every effort to resolve this fairly.”
Tessa, who has since remarried and still lives in Manhattan, did not return
a message seeking comment.

Colleagues from the Times said that while Klein was sociable, he was too
often cowed during working hours by Rosenthal, the boss who had brought him
to the Gray Lady. He failed to fight their corner during inevitable
newsroom disagreements, one claimed.

“He had a very good staff, but I don’t think he protected them as well as
he could have,” James Greenfield, who eventually took over from Klein as
magazine editor, said in an interview. “If you run a magazine, you have to
protect your people, both internally and externally, and if he got internal
criticism I don’t think he protected them enough.” The magazine team
“needed reassurance” after Klein’s departure, said Greenfield.

Nonetheless, it was under Klein’s leadership that the magazine won its
first Pulitzer prize. The 1983 award for feature writing went to a cover
story by the writer Nan Robertson about her struggle with toxic shock
syndrome, which caused her to lose the ends of eight fingers.

Yet by 1987, a pair of embarrassing errors on successive Sundays led to
public speculation about Klein’s position. Newsday reported at the time
that the magazine was first forced to clarify a not-so-rags-to-riches story
about a first-time novelist, and then explain that a photograph of a
dramatic drugs bust in Miami had in fact been staged for an advertisement.
The errors were only the final straw, said Max Frankel, who succeeded
Rosenthal as executive editor in 1986. “He was the first person that I let
go when I became editor,” Frankel said in an interview. “He and I just … I
just found him … uhh ... unable to work with him, let’s put it that way.”

Frankel explained that he was troubled by Klein's aversion to “straight
answers” and “the degree of supervision he was willing to submit to”. He
said: “All that he thought he was doing with the magazine just had no
relation to what I thought we should be doing, and I suggested we part ways
very quickly.”

Klein also found himself lambasted repeatedly in the pages of Spy, a
boisterous monthly launched by Condé Nast in 1986 and co-edited by Graydon
Carter, the future Vanity Fair supremo. The magazine, which frequently
devoted a full-page column to internal machinations at the Times, reported
after Rosenthal’s departure that while Klein was “universally despised”, he
probably remained “the right man for the job of keeping the magazine stolid
and unsurprising”.

*Walter Scott and Ed Slime: brainchildren of a distinguished editor*

He finally departed the Times in late 1987 just before his third wedding,
to Dolores Barrett, a PR consultant, who died in December last year after
more than a quarter-century of marriage. “She was everything to him,” said
LeBoutillier. “But he’s handling it OK. He was right in the middle of
working on [Blood Feud] when it happened, so he had something to do every
day.”

Spy magazine celebrated Klein’s fall from the paper by reporting gleefully
that he was trying to found a new magazine, Newsplay. Spy said Klein
described it in his own pitch document, targeting the big shots of the New
York media industry, as “the brainchild of a distinguished editor”. The
review was scathing. “Klein refers to himself in the third person no fewer
than 20 times in the prospectus’s 30 pages of overwritten yet uninspiring
prose,” Spy disclosed, warning would-be investors: “No pushing or shoving,
please. One person at a time!”

The new venture did not get off the ground. Instead, as the 1990s dawned,
Klein became a contributing editor at Vanity Fair, while also quietly
taking on the Personality Parade column, bylined to “Walter Scott”, in
Parade magazine and syndicated in hundreds of Sunday newspapers around the
US, for which he reportedly received between $300,000 and $350,000 a year.

At Vanity Fair, he specialised in splashy profiles of some of the decade’s
biggest names, including Donald Trump, Jackie Kennedy Onassis, Diane Sawyer
and Mort Zuckerman. His pieces caused the requisite stir of follow-up in
New York’s tabloids. He and Dolores partied with Sally Quinn’s high-society
set in Washington. Yet the magazine’s then-editor, Tina Brown, later joined
Klein’s detractors, speculating in a 2005 article that a “secret fantasy of
girl-on-girl action” had led him to “obsess” in the pages of his first book
about Clinton about rumours that she had a “lesbian ethos”. Brown, who
lamented that “Klein used to be a workmanlike scribe” and renamed him “Ed
Slime”, told the Guardian in an email: “Ed figured out where the big bucks
were and tailored his ‘reporting’ accordingly.”

The big bucks were in books, sensational ones, beginning with four in eight
years about the dependably chaotic Kennedy clan. Claiming to have been a
friend of Jackie Kennedy Onassis, Klein was mocked by more earnest Kennedy
historians but made headlines by reporting that Jackie had lost her
virginity in a lift in Paris and had an extramarital affair of her own.

*'The difference between the truth and a lie'*

But it was not until 2005, and The Truth About Hillary, that Klein enraged
the present-day powerful, alienated swaths of critics and – according to
people who know him – pushed himself firmly to the right. The book
notoriously implied, via anonymous sources, that Chelsea Clinton was
conceived in 1979 in Bermuda during a rape, and that Hillary Clinton was a
closeted lesbian. It was dismissed by some conservatives – “Poorly written,
poorly thought, poorly sourced,” wrote Peggy Noonan; “Thirty pages into it,
I wanted to take a shower,” pleaded John Podhoretz – but viscerally
appalled many critics on the left such as Jamison Foser, a former
Democratic operative, who wrote an 11,000-word debunk of it for Media
Matters.

It appears to have been a turning point for Klein, who in the past had
rarely disclosed any “basic convictions or political agenda”, according to
Frankel, the former New York Times editor. “He really got angry over the
way he was treated by his then-fellow liberals,” said LeBoutillier. “He was
somewhat liberal, but his friends on the left were so horrible to him
because he dared to criticise Hillary Clinton. That that was a big moment
for him.”

Things might have turned out differently. In the 1990s, Klein had a
contract with Little, Brown to write a book about George HW and Barbara
Bush. But the project fell apart when Bush’s team withdrew an apparent
offer of cooperation, and the New York Observer reported that Klein was
ordered by a judge in New York state supreme court to return an advance of
more than $165,000.

Instead, he turned his attentions to Clinton before continuing to infuriate
Democrats with 2012’s The Amateur, in which he painted a picture of chaos
in the White House and claimed that marital relations between the Obamas
had plumbed to such depths that Michelle at one stage had divorce papers
drawn up. A White House spokesman accused him of having “a proven history
of reckless fabrication in order to sell books,” correctly predicting the
volume would fly off shelves.

Klein’s friends are quick to defend his integrity. “Ed is a hard working
reporter,” said LeBoutillier. “He’s a professional reporter.” Another
complained that Klein is unfairly maligned for blind-quoting while other
journalists who play the same game, such as Bob Woodward, are hailed as
genuine scoop-getters. Yet there is unquestionably something more
disconcerting about Klein’s work. Aside from the errors and the miraculous
quotes, there are the details reported like exclusive disclosures – such as
the names of novels on Obama’s bedside table during his summer vacation,
attributed to a housekeeper – that were actually already in the public
domain.

Two publishing industry sources familiar with the situation confirmed a
report by BuzzFeed earlier this year that Blood Feud had been dropped by
its original publisher, William Morrow, because the content did not pass a
vetting by in-house lawyers. “When you’re at an imprint of HarperCollins,
which is part of NewsCorp, they take that stuff very seriously, and they
check all of your sources and notes and they want to know where you got
stuff,” said one. The book has instead been released by Regnery, the
Washington-based conservative imprint that has also published Ann Coulter
and Newt Gingrich.

Klein does not appear troubled in the slightest. “I just think he has
decided he could make a lot of money on that side of the street, so he has
gone over there,” said Frankel. But while Klein is wealthier now, friends
say that his lifestyle is little changed. He still splits his time between
the Upper East Side apartment on Park Avenue where he has lived and worked
for decades, and an upstate getaway in Ghent. Klein also fell behind on
payment of his taxes several times in recent years, according to state and
federal records, owing as much as $218,000 to the IRS between 2009 and
2010. He is now fully paid and up to date.

He remains impeccably turned out – his teeth rows of perfect white, his
skin tanned and what is left of his hair neatly cropped in mounds above his
ears. It could not be confirmed whether he still practices krava maga, an
Israeli hand-to-hand martial art, as was reported in 2002. But Klein can
often be found, in one of his double-breasted suits, lunching at Michael’s,
the West 55th Street spot long beloved by major players in publishing.

As he approaches his 79th year, Klein shows no sign of mellowing. “Knowing
him, he will get right back on to another book,” said LeBoutillier. And as
the 2016 presidential primary approaches, he made clear to Sean Hannity on
Fox News during the promotional swing for his book last month that he has
not stopped thinking about one subject in particular. “You know, Hillary
has a very tenuous hold on reality,” he said. “There’s a real
characterlogical (sic) problem. I think the problem really is that this is
a woman that wants to be president, but I don’t think she knows the
difference between the truth and a lie.”

*The Hill blog: Ballot Box: “O'Malley 'seriously considering' a 2016 White
House bid”
<http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/212123-omalley-seriously-considering-a-2016-white-house-bid>*

By Rebecca Shabad

July 14, 2014, 10:28 a.m. EDT

Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) said in a new interview that he’s
“seriously considering” running for president.

In the interview published Monday, The Los Angeles Times asked O’Malley
what’s keeping him from launching a 2016 White House bid.

“I’m seriously considering it,” he replied.

Asked why he thinks he should be president, O’Malley said the United States
can do better and he might have something to offer to make improvements.

“So as I look at the challenges we face as a country and I look at my own
service, I ask the question as to whether or not our country can do better
and whether I can help us do better,” he said.

O’Malley said a potential presidential candidate has to “be very clear that
what it is that you have to offer, what mix of experience, insights,
talents, desires and hopes do you have an ability to bring forward on
behalf of the people that you would serve that would make our country a
better place.”

The governor reiterated that his decision to run isn’t “at this point”
predicated on whether Hillary Clinton launches a campaign.

In February, O’Malley told The Washington Post in an interview that he
can’t wait for Clinton to make a decision. At that point, he said he had
already begun exploring a bid of his own by holding meetings with domestic
and foreign policy experts.

O’Malley told The Los Angeles Times the federal government can be
transformed from a “traditional bureaucracy” into a “results-oriented
meritocracy” if officials are more entrepreneurial.

“All of this can be changed,” he said. “We don’t have to accept
underperforming bureaucracies, agencies or departments.”

*Washington Post blog: In the Loop: “Biden: Calling up the troops for
2016?”
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/in-the-loop/wp/2014/07/14/biden-calling-up-the-troops-for-2016/>*

By Al Kamen

July 14, 2014, 12:41 p.m. EDT

Everyone with even a passing interest in politics has likely followed the
astonishing, self-inflicted, downhill slide of Hillary Clinton amid the
launch of her most recent memoir, “Hard Choices.”

Was Vice President Biden one of those watching? After all, he certainly has
a passing interest in politics.

We’re hearing that he’s recently reached out to many of the hundreds of his
former Senate, vice-presidential and campaign staffs — and he’s run a
number of campaigns, including two for president –just to say “Hi, howahya?”

The Democratic National Committee e-mail invite, from Biden counselor Greg
Schultz —  Ohio state director for the Obama-Biden re-elect and former Ohio
deputy political director in 2008 — was followed by a July 1 reminder from
Schultz to “join the Biden alumni call” that evening and “hear from the
vice president as to what he’s working on.” Schultz asked recipients to
“pass the message on” if they knew people who may not have been invited.

It’s unclear how many people dialed the special call-in number — the
callers were on mute — but Biden popped on right on time at 7 p.m., we
heard, to say that he had wanted to do this shout-out for a couple of
years. He lamented that, while he saw some former aides all the time, he’s
sorry he hasn’t been able to keep up with everyone.

The call, we were told, lasted just a few minutes.

Now, some people might think he’s beginning preliminary organizing for a
possible 2016 run.

Naw. We think he’s just being friendly. He even said he was going to invite
everyone to stop by the Veep’s house for a gathering this fall.