Subject: Correct The Record Saturday November 8, 2014 Roundup
From: Burns Strider <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked]
Date: Sat, 8 Nov 2014 12:30:22 -0500
List-Id: <CTRFriendsFamily.americanbridge.org>

Correct The Record Saturday November 8, 2014 Roundup:

 

Headlines:

 

MSNBC: “Hillary Clinton’s message comes into focus”

“While her speeches were tailored to the candidates she came to support and the politics of each state, a core set of themes began to emerge, according to a memo from Correct the Record, a pro-Clinton outside group managed by former staffers that has been defending the former secretary of state in the absence of an official campaign.”

 

MSNBC: “RNC chair: I ‘hope we’re running against Hillary Clinton’”

“Clinton defenders aren’t worried by Priebus’ talk, however, said Adrienne Elrod of the main group defending her, Correct the Record. ‘We agree with Reince – we hope she runs too! And Reince should be careful what he and the GOP wish for – 83% of Democrats think Hillary would make a good president, according to exit polls from Tuesday.  Hillary Clinton’s overwhelming, across-the-board popularity and admiration among Americans is a result of her vision to strengthen the middle class, increase opportunities for women, and ensure a better future for Americans from all walks of life,’ Elrod said.”

 

Politico Magazine: “Hillary’s Wonderful Week”

“Let’s say it straight out: The biggest winner of the week was Hillary Clinton. I’m a passionate conservative and former speechwriter for George W. Bush, and I don’t like that conclusion one bit. But there it is.”

 

Bloomberg: “Obama Needs a Democratic Successor for Legacy, Aide Says”

“President Barack Obama’s legacy could be damaged if he’s not succeeded by a fellow Democrat, White House senior adviser Dan Pfeiffer said today.”

 

Washington Post: “Ready for Hillary events drawing some prominent pols in O’Malley’s home state”

“As Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) weighs a 2016 presidential bid, a raft of other prominent Maryland politicians are booked to attend a pair of fundraisers next month for a group laying the groundwork for Hillary Rodham Clinton to run.”

 

The Hill blog: In The Know: “'Star Trek's George Takei: I'd 'absolutely' back Clinton”

“If Hillary Clinton decides to make a second run for president, she can count on Captain Sulu among her supporters: ‘Star Trek’ star George Takei says he’s firmly on Team Hillary.”

 

The Hill blog: Briefing Room: “Sanders: Obama, Dems need new message”

“Asked to assess Hillary Clinton’s biggest weakness, the liberal lawmaker [Sen. Sanders] responded, ‘I’m not here to attack Hillary Clinton.’”

 

CNN: “2014: Did Hillary Clinton get her groove back despite Democrats' loss?”

“Clinton visited 20 states and stumped for 26 candidates ahead of Election Day 2014. Her midterm record was an abysmal 11 wins, 14 losses and one runoff, according to CNN projections.”

 

Fox News: “For Hillary Clinton, an uncertain return to the campaign trail”

“She is the leading global voice championing the empowerment of girls and women, but of the eight Democratic women Hillary Clinton stumped for in the 2014 midterm cycle, only one was declared a winner.”

 

CNBC column: Larry Kudlow: “For 2016, Hillary had the worst night”

“What's important now is that the midterm exit polls turned conventional wisdom on its head. It's not just those awful numbers for the high-visibility Republican hopefuls. But Hillary loses to an unnamed name.”

 

Variety: “Bill Clinton Predicts ‘Boogie Dance’ in Washington After Republican Senate Win”

“Former President Bill Clinton weighed in Friday on the results of Tuesday’s midterm elections, suggesting that Congress and the White House can still ‘get things done’ and reflecting on his experience working with a divided government during a period of intense partisanship.”

 

 

Articles:

 

MSNBC: “Hillary Clinton’s message comes into focus”

By Alex Seitz-Wald

November 7, 2014, 5:01 p.m. EST

The pieces of an increasingly likely Hillary Clinton 2016 presidential campaign are starting to fall into place.

Clinton is already reportedly scoping out locations for a campaign headquarters, thinking about key staffing decisions and embarking on an unofficial listening tour to gain wisdom from a disparate set of thinkers.

And in the waning days of the 2014 midterm campaign, as Clinton stumped for Democrats across the country, a message began to emerge in her stump speeches. Over the course of 75 events on behalf of more than 30 candidates in 20 states, Clinton tested and honed and retooled the building blocks of what could become her presidential campaign’s raison d’etre.

While her speeches were tailored to the candidates she came to support and the politics of each state, a core set of themes began to emerge, according to a memo from Correct the Record, a pro-Clinton outside group managed by former staffers that has been defending the former secretary of state in the absence of an official campaign.

“The primary theme that emerged in Clinton’s national travels leading up to November 4th was advancing opportunity and prosperity, directly addressing a fundamental concern and cynicism among the American people,” Isaac Wright, the group’s executive director, wrote to allies of the group in the memo, shared with msnbc ahead of its release.

That message resonates with Americans, Wright continued, citing exit polls that showed 83% of Democrats, and 40% of voters overall, think she would make a good president. That’s more than any other candidate, though a generic Republican beat her in a head-to-head match-up. Her message has the potential to resonate with the “emotional dismay of the electorate,” Wright continued.

Emotion was something too often lacking on the campaign trail from candidates this year, according to some Democrats, who complained that some candidates lacked an overarching positive message.

Clinton’s core themes, identified by Correct The Record, which as an independent expenditure group is prohibited from coordinating directly with candidates, include a focus on advancing middle class families and growing the economy and jobs.

Clinton also spoke about expanding opportunities for women and children, issues she has been involved in since her early adulthood. “One of the biggest differences between 2008 and the buildup to 2016,” Wright noted, “is Clinton’s relationship with her own position as a woman.” Not surprisingly, given her record, Clinton also put foreign policy front and center, speaking about support for U.S. troops and veterans.

Clinton has also been partisan on occasion, supporting Democrats and progressive values, while hitting Republicans – though almost never by name – and criticizing their policies. This was especially true when she slammed “trickle-down economics” in Massachusetts and went after Sen.-elect Joni Ernst in Iowa.

Some top Democrats, especially those associated with President Obama’s campaigns, have worried that Clinton will fail to offer a clear vision for why she should be president if she decides to run, aside from the strength of her resume.

Her initial pitch when she ran in 2008 was that she was “in it to win it” and that she would be “ready on day one.” Meeting the basic competency requirements of the job turned out to not be a very inspiring message. Later, after she lost the Iowa Caucuses, Clinton found her stride talking about populist economic issues. For instance, in Ohio, with the help of former Gov. Ted Strickland, she talked about taking on drug companies and credit card companies and sticking up for American families.

While the themes themselves may not be groundbreaking, Clinton has found a way to make them emotionally resonant. She speaks about values and fairness, instead of policy. And she connected her vision to her own story. The line that she repeated most on the trail in 2014 was, “You should not have to be the grandchild of a president to get” a fair shot. It speaks to fairness, her own story, and subtly addresses critiques of her wealth.

Expect to hear it a lot more.

 

 

MSNBC: “RNC chair: I ‘hope we’re running against Hillary Clinton’”

By Alex Seitz-Wald

November 7, 2014, 4:35 p.m. EST

Republicans want to run against Hillary Clinton for president, the head of the party insisted Friday, laying out how the GOP is already planning to capitalize on their wins in 2014 to be ready to take on Clinton in 2016.

Speaking at a breakfast with reporters hosted by the The Christian Science Monitor in Washington, D.C., Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus said Republicans are keeping staff in key presidential swing states such as Florida, Ohio and Virginia, and explained how the GOP plans to avoid the “circus” of the 2012 nominating process.

The RNC is overhauling its rules to shorten the primary and caucus calendar, and reducing the number of debates, which numbered a whopping 23 in the 2012 cycle. “We’re taking it from a six month slice and dice fest to about weeks,” Priebus said. “We’re going to contain the process so we don’t end up with rogue debates that provide the temptation for candidates to break the rules.”

They’re also improving their voter mobilization efforts, which has traditionally been a strength for Democrats, he said, explaining that 2016’s “ground game” will have to be at least three times larger than in 2014. “I think we’ve got to be about perfect to win a national turnout vote in this country. I think Democrats can be good and win, we’ve got to be great,” he added.

Are Republicans worried about running against Clinton, the presumed Democratic nominee? “I sure as heck hope we’re running against Hillary Clinton,” Priebus said.

Clinton allies have been trying to spin Tuesday night’s Democratic drubbing as a secret victory for Clinton, who will now have a clear villain to run against in the GOP-controlled Congress.

Nonsense, Priebus responded Friday. “If your job was to unify the party and raise a ton of money and get a ton of volunteers on the ground, I promise you, you would want no other opponent to run against than Hillary Clinton,” he said. Priebus also said voters rejected the Clintons when they rejected candidates endorsed by the Clintons.

Of course, that is exactly what a Republican leader would say, since it’s his job to project confidence and rally donors and activists. If the RNC were really so eager to take on Clinton, for instance, one might wonder why they bothered sending a staffer dressed as a squirrel to stalk the former secretary of state this summer.

Priebus said Tuesday’s wins were obviously very good for Republicans, but declined to say the party now had a mandate to govern. “I would call that a pretty sweeping victory, but whether it’s a mandate or not, that’s a different question,” he said.

Voters in Wisconsin, for instance, “accepted” conservative Republican ideas, Priebus said. “Perhaps embraced might be a little over the top.”

Clinton defenders aren’t worried by Priebus’ talk, however, said Adrienne Elrod of the main group defending her, Correct the Record. ”We agree with Reince – we hope she runs too! And Reince should be careful what he and the GOP wish for – 83% of Democrats think Hillary would make a good president, according to exit polls from Tuesday.  Hillary Clinton’s overwhelming, across-the-board popularity and admiration among Americans is a result of her vision to strengthen the middle class, increase opportunities for women, and ensure a better future for Americans from all walks of life,” Elrod said.

 

 

Politico Magazine: “Hillary’s Wonderful Week”

By Matt Latimer

November 7, 2014

[Subtitle:] A Bush speechwriter proclaims: Her campaign lacked villains. Now she’s got a lot of them.

Let’s say it straight out: The biggest winner of the week was Hillary Clinton. I’m a passionate conservative and former speechwriter for George W. Bush, and I don’t like that conclusion one bit. But there it is.

Shortly after the election results came in, most of the conventional wisdom was that Clinton emerged from the midterms tarred, along with her husband. After all, the former secretary of state and party front-runner campaigned for candidates all across the country, and more than 30 of those candidates lost.

But what was she supposed to do, campaign against them? Bill Clinton also went out on the trail, as did Joe Biden and virtually every Democrat of national import able to board an airplane. As fun as it is for Republicans to argue otherwise, Clinton’s no more to blame for, say, Kay Hagan losing North Carolina than she is for CBS canceling “The Mentalist.”

Here’s why Clinton is now sitting pretty. All campaigns are about narratives and before Tuesday, Clinton’s was shaping up to be rather difficult. She had been a very public player in an increasingly unpopular administration, charged with overseeing a foreign policy that looks more discredited by the day. Her latest book tour revealed a clunky, not-ready-for-primetime operation, and her sales, while good by any conventional measure, were disastrous when compared to the expectations her PR team clumsily set. No one could quite sense it yet, but there was a whiff of yesterday’s news emanating all around her.

Then came November 4.

Despite rumors that Clinton is in person a warm, loyalty-inspiring manager, she has never worn that role convincingly with the general public. Stylistically, Clinton is far more suited for the role of leader of the opposition, rallying against her enemies (real or imagined). And at last she has something every good campaign narrative desperately needs: real villains. A lot of them. Ironically they are the very same villains who rescued her husband’s waning political fortunes exactly two decades ago: a Republican-led Congress.

This doesn’t necessarily have to be the GOP’s fate over the next two years, though there is a compelling precedent. Recall, if you will, the 1994 tsunami that propelled Newt Gingrich to the speaker’s chair and left an unpopular Democratic president lamely telling reporters that he was still “relevant.” Bill Clinton was angered and humiliated by the voters’ repudiation of his administration—and his party. But only for a moment. It did not take long for the Sinatra of Spin to figure out how to turn the Republicans, with the help of many co-conspirators in the media, into America’s version of the Borgias.

If Republicans aren’t careful, they will watch that history repeat. After all, how does one put this charitably? The usual spokesmen for today’s GOP possess all the charisma of extras on “Murder, She Wrote.” You know who I mean—the aging day players with graying hair and familiar (pasty) faces who stand around looking vaguely uncertain while Angela Lansbury solves all the crimes. Next to them Hillary Clinton, who will be 68 on the eve of the Iowa caucuses, looks like Renée Zellweger. (Perhaps a bad example, but I like the new her!) In any event, it’s fair to say the Republican leadership in 2016 will be far easier to run against than it was in 2008 to run against a charismatic African-American son of a single mother at the height of media rapture.

“The first thing I need to do is get the Senate back to normal,” Senator Mitch McConnell said upon winning the majority. Let’s hope he was kidding. Unfortunately, one suspects it won’t be too long before the GOP puts its champagne bottles back into the fridge and returns to its years-long preoccupation—waging an internal civil war over the party’s message, goals and future.

One can sympathize with both sides in the dispute. On the one hand are those who fought hard to win back their chairmanships and plush offices in the U.S. Capitol and are willing to do anything to hold onto them. Which generally means pursuing an agenda of caution over controversy. Polls and platitudes over risky policies. On the other are those who think the party rose to power for a reason: that they must use their majority to enact the proposals they campaigned on. Which means pushing for an agenda that many in the Washington pundit class won’t like: fighting debt ceiling increases, cutting spending for popular programs, repealing Obamacare by any means necessary and not simply a show vote that will lead to a presidential veto.

Both sides will draw different lessons from the 1994 experience—a misplayed hand that led to a government shutdown, Speaker Gingrich’s resignation in 1998 and even eventually a resurgent Bill Clinton. The cautious establishment Republicans claim the Gingrich Congress failed because it was too radical and overreached. The activist movement Republicans say the Gingrich Congress buckled too quickly to the Clinton administration, and let critics in the media cow them. Regardless, McConnell will not have an easy time managing this rift. Nor will he likely enjoy the unenviable task of wrangling with a conference whose members will either be running for president, running for vice president or stewing with resentment over those who do. The more he tries to bring order to his caucus, the more division he will engender. (For an example, see Boehner, John.) In the meantime, Clinton supporters in the House and Senate will keep pushing popular-sounding if wholly unaffordable initiatives on health care, education and the environment, and then blame the Republican Congress for blocking them.

Yes, these are good days for the Hillary Clinton proto-campaign. Her first good days in a long while, in fact. No longer will she have to worry so much about gaining distance from President Obama—though that’s certainly on her agenda. No longer will she have to defend or explain her position on issues pushed by a Democratic Senate. No longer will she have to subtly run against her husband and his scandals. Instead, she can run squarely against the circus that will preoccupy Congress and the media with every passing day. The calm voice of wearied experience. The wizened wife and mother—now grandmother—who can keep those rambunctious boys in line.

She’s probably just about the only person in Washington today who’s even happier than Mitch McConnell.

 

 

Bloomberg: “Obama Needs a Democratic Successor for Legacy, Aide Says”

By Jonathan Allen

November 7, 2014

President Barack Obama’s legacy could be damaged if he’s not succeeded by a fellow Democrat, White House senior adviser Dan Pfeiffer said today.

“It’s very important because I know what we did in the first 100 days of our administration, and it was go through a lot of what President Bush did and sign executive orders doing the opposite,” Pfeiffer told reporters and editors today at a Bloomberg Politics breakfast in Washington.

That dynamic will shape Obama’s dealings with the Republican-led Congress and his party’s presidential nominee in the final two years of his presidency. Hillary Clinton, Obama’s first-term secretary of state and 2008 presidential primary rival, is the front-runner for the Democratic nomination in 2016, though she hasn’t said whether she’ll run.

“The best way to be succeeded by a Democrat is to be the best president we can be for the next two years and get as much done,” Pfeiffer said. “Some of that will be with Congress; some of it will be on our own. So that’s how we’re thinking about it.”

Trying to set up a Democratic successor isn’t “in tension” with efforts to work with congressional Republicans, he said. The 2016 presidential election may provide an incentive for gridlock and force Republicans to show they can govern, he said.

“I’d like to believe that the country would come before Party. I didn’t fall off a turnip truck yesterday,” Pfeiffer said.

Republican Brand

“A big anvil around the neck of Mitt Romney was the Republican Party brand,” he said of the party’s 2012 nominee for president. “Any Republican nominee is going to carry that. And it would be in their interest to improve that brand.”

Tension between Obama and Clinton rose when she criticized his approach to foreign policy during her book tour this summer. Tempers flared and quickly settled back. Whether it’s Clinton or someone else, Obama will need the Democratic nominee, Pfeiffer said.

“If you want to cement a lot of the very core elements of your legacy it’s much easier to do, obviously, with someone who supports your agenda,” he said.

 

 

Washington Post: “Ready for Hillary events drawing some prominent pols in O’Malley’s home state”

By John Wagner

November 7, 2014, 6:02 p.m. EST

As Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) weighs a 2016 presidential bid, a raft of other prominent Maryland politicians are booked to attend a pair of fundraisers next month for a group laying the groundwork for Hillary Rodham Clinton to run.

U.S. Sens. Barbara A. Mikulski (D-Md.) and Benjamin L. Cardin (D-Md.) are both listed as “special guests” at a Dec. 1 event in Baltimore to benefit the Ready for Hillary PAC. State Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr. (D-Calvert) is among the hosts, according to a “save the date” announcement.

Those advertised to attend an event three nights later in Potomac include U.S. Rep. John Delaney (D-Md.), Montgomery County Executive Isiah Leggett (D) and eight current or incoming members of the Montgomery County Council.

The host committee also includes two unsuccessful Democratic candidates for governor this year — Attorney General Douglas F. Gansler (D) and Del. Heather R. Mizeur (D-Montgomery) — as well as State Treasurer Nancy K. Kopp (D) and three current or recently elected members of the state Senate from Montgomery.

O’Malley spokeswoman Lis Smith declined to comment Friday on the Ready for Hillary events.

O’Malley has said he is moving forward with preparations for a possible White House bid regardless of whether Clinton runs. He recently told The Post that he will probably have decided whether to move forward before his tenure as governor ends in late January.

 

 

The Hill blog: In The Know: “'Star Trek's George Takei: I'd 'absolutely' back Clinton”

By Judy Kurtz

November 7, 2014, 3:00 p.m. EST

If Hillary Clinton decides to make a second run for president, she can count on Captain Sulu among her supporters: “Star Trek” star George Takei says he’s firmly on Team Hillary.

“We’re Hillary supporters from way back,” the social media whiz — who boasts nearly 8 million Facebook fans — exclaimed, appearing to include husband Brad Takei as a fan of the former secretary of State.

The outspoken Democrat and gay rights advocate says he would “absolutely” campaign for Clinton if she decides to throw her hat into the ring in the 2016 White House race.

ITK caught up with the 77-year-old actor and “Howard Stern Show” regular Thursday at government IT media company FedScoop’s annual FedTalks gathering in Washington. The yearly event brings together hundreds of political and industry leaders from the tech and government information technology communities.

While Takei would likely give the Vulcan salute to Clinton, there’s at least one Republican lawmaker he considers to be “rational.”

“At times I support things that [Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.)] says. He’s one of the rational Republicans,” Takei says. “But I’m a Democrat and I think particularly with the Republicans now leaning more and more to the right, and with the extreme Tea Party people, there are very few Republicans that I can say are saying something rational.”

And what about the heavy Democratic losses in the midterm elections?

“I think the real winner of the midterm election was big money,” says Takei.

The entertainer is a supporter of the nonpartisan Mayday PAC, created by Creative Commons co-founder Larry Lessig and Republican strategist Mark McKinnon, which aims to “reduce the influence of money in politics.”

Making mention of the conservative group Citizens United, Takei added, “When billionaires can give $50 million, $500 million to a campaign, and there’s no limit, then it makes a mockery of ‘one man, one vote.’ ”

 

 

The Hill blog: Briefing Room: “Sanders: Obama, Dems need new message”

By Bob Cusack

November 8, 2014, 6:00 a.m. EST

Sen. Bernie Sanders said President Obama and the Democrats’ 2014 message played a significant role in the GOP’s takeover of the Senate.

In an interview on C-SPAN’s “Newsmakers” program, the Vermont legislator said Obama is partly to blame for the Republican rout.

“Some of the responsibility absolutely rests with President Obama. I think he’s not been as strong and clear about a message and legislation that will protect the interests of working families,” said Sanders, an independent who caucuses with Senate Democrats.

Sanders claimed Democratic candidates misread the electorate: “I think many of the Democratic candidates did not run on an agenda which resonated with working people…where the Democrats have been weak and individual Democratic candidates have been weak is not really coming up to the plate and saying, ‘You know what? We’re going to have to take on the billionaire class.’”

Democrats did not push hard enough for the minimum wage, Sanders added.

He credited Republicans for running a “very, very smart” campaign, though made clear he thinks it was deceitful. The GOP seized on the nation’s economic woes, Sanders pointed out.

“The Republicans said, ‘The problem is all Barack Obama. He caused it all. And any senator who has worked with Barack Obama — terrible, got to throw them out,’” he stated.

Sanders, who is thinking about running for president in 2016, declined to provide a timetable on when he will make a final decision, saying voters need a break from campaign politics.

Asked to assess Hillary Clinton’s biggest weakness, the liberal lawmaker responded, “I’m not here to attack Hillary Clinton.”

Sanders has not decided if he will run as a Democrat or an independent, but he suggested he’s leaning toward the latter. Running as an independent would require setting up a political infrastructure in 50 states, which would take an enormous amount of money and energy, he noted.

Sanders admitted he’s a long shot to win the presidency. But he noted that he won 2 percent of the vote in his first election and 1 percent in his second. In his most recent election, Sanders attracted 71 percent of the vote.

He does have a sizable campaign war chest with more than $4.4 million cash on hand.

 

 

CNN: “2014: Did Hillary Clinton get her groove back despite Democrats' loss?”

By Dan Merica

November 7, 2014, 6:27 p.m. EST

Election night was terrible for the Democratic Party, and Hillary Clinton was not spared.

Clinton visited 20 states and stumped for 26 candidates ahead of Election Day 2014. Her midterm record was an abysmal 11 wins, 14 losses and one runoff, according to CNN projections.

But there is an argument - Clinton advisers will spin it to you - in the context of what appears to be an all-but-certain run in 2016, that her Midterm record is far less important than what she gained while campaigning for Democrats.

Re-learning to stump

Going into the Midterms, Clinton's mostly paid speeches were corporate and dull. She addressed audiences that were full of executive types who did not alawys seem excited to see her; many of whom were attending conferences that had no connection to the former secretary of state.

That changed during Clinton's time on the campaign trail.

The former secretary of state stretched her long-dormant political legs and toyed with what will likely be her presidential message. She honed a new message based on women's rights and opposition to Wall Street and - perhaps most importantly - got some needed practice ahead of a possible presidential run.

When the former secretary of state took the stage at September's Tom Harkin Steak Fry in Iowa - her first real political speech of the year - she appeared to reporters on the ground to be flat and out-of-practice. That afternoon, the crowd responded with far more excitement to Tom Harkin, their retiring senator, and Bill Clinton, Hillary's husband and the former president.

But over time during the Midterms, Clinton became more comfortable on the stump.

"Elections come down often to who's got more money, who's peddling more fear and who turns out," Clinton confidently told an excited audience in North Carolina in October. She didn't she away from hitting her Republican opponents and drawing some contrast between them and the person she was endorsing.

Most noticeably, Clinton honed her focus on women.

Nearly every event Clinton did was geared towards some combination of mothers and grandmothers. In Pennsylvania she spoke to a "Women for Wolf" event, while in Louisiana it was "Moms and Grams with Mary" who filled the event space.

Clinton seemed to embrace the theme and recognize that fact that if she runs for president, it will be from a historic perch as possibly the nation's first woman president.

"Don't let anyone dismiss what you're doing today as women's work," she told an audience in San Francisco. "Don't let anyone send you back to the sidelines."

As Clinton has grown back into the role of retail politician, though, so have her Republican detractors.

Groups like the Republican National Committee and America Rising learned how to prod Clinton and poked her with emails to reporters and tweets about her gaffes. They sometimes drove the media conversation and seized on mistakes she made.

Shortly after the Senate officially turned red on Tuesday, Rand Paul's Facebook page uploaded a photo of Clinton and the six losing Senate candidates that she endorsed. "HillarysLosers," read the photos that went gangbusters online. The morning after the country, effectively, turned red, the Republican National Committee blasted an email to reporters: "Hillary's Policies Were On The Ballot."

'This is bigger than a single surrogate'

Clinton's closest confidants also don't see Tuesday as a repudiation of Clinton.

"This is bigger than a single surrogate," said a Clinton source with knowledge of her midterm schedule who requested anonymity to speak candidly. "No surrogate is that, sort of, silver bullet."

The source added that going into the midterms there was a realization that Clinton "hasn't given a political speech, certainly on any regular basis, in six years."

Given that, and despite her less than 50 percent batting average with successful candidates, people close to Clinton felt confidant that the midterms were time well spent for the former first lady.

"I think her going back in for Grimes was a good example [of not shying away from tough races], going to Iowa twice, too" the source said. "There was no, 'Oh man, we ought to pull out of here because it is going to be a loss."

The source argued that 2016 didn't come up a great deal during the conversations about where to go in 2014.

Growing from the book tour

Hillary Clinton's book tour was defined by her gaffes in the interviews trying to sell it.

Out of the gate, Clinton slipped up answering questions about her and her husband's wealth - pointing out the now mega-rich couple was "dead broke" when they left the White House - and it seemed like she was never fully able to recover.

Longtime Clinton confidants were concerned about her book tour performance.

"With the book tour, there were a lot of unforced errors. That was concerning," said one longtime Clinton adviser. "It was an open question whether she was going to fumble about her wealth."

But watching Clinton on the stump, the source said, it seemed that Clinton kicked off the rust.

Republicans see it differently.

"She is going to have to meet a reality where talking about only war on women issues and raising the minimum wage is not sufficient to win a national election or elections in these states," said Tim Miller, executive director of America Rising, said after Tuesday night. "I think that is a reality that the whole Democratic Party is going to have to meet but Hillary Clinton was gung ho about that message, too."

The midterms also weren't rhetorically flawless for Clinton.

In Boston, the former first lady "shorthanded" a line that seemed to hint it wasn't "corporations and business that create jobs." Clinton went on to walk back the comment that was, for the most part, her only noticeable gaffe for two months on the stump.

That is a departure from her book tour, a two month long affair riddled with slips of the tongue, and confidants were happy to see her gaffe on the populist side of the party.

"Was it completely without these sort of perceived bumps? No," said the source with knowledge of Clinton's midterm schedule. "But, at the end of the day, was it viewed as time well spent? Yes."

 

 

Fox News: “For Hillary Clinton, an uncertain return to the campaign trail”

By James Rosen

November 8, 2014

She is the leading global voice championing the empowerment of girls and women, but of the eight Democratic women Hillary Clinton stumped for in the 2014 midterm cycle, only one was declared a winner.

She is the prospective frontrunner for her party’s presidential nomination in 2016, but of the 26 Democrats Clinton campaigned for in the midterms, 12 won, 13 lost, and one – Sen. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana – lingers in uncertainty, facing a Dec. 6runoff election against her Republican opponent.

This cycle marked Hillary Clinton’s return to the arena of electoral politics for the first time since her failed presidential bid in 2008 – secretaries of state traditionally abstain from partisan activity – and for those scouring the newly refashioned landscape for indications of how Clinton’s White House prospects may be affected, the results are decidedly mixed.

Supporters of the former secretary of state argue that, despite having eschewed the rough and tumble of politics for six years, she used her time on the stump this fall to good effect, forging new and strong ties with local party chieftains in states where such connections will prove valuable to a presidential run in two years.

“I think Hillary Clinton did yeoman's work in campaigning out there for Democrats,” said Patti Solis Doyle, a former Clinton campaign manager in 2008, in an interview with Fox News. “She did what she could to help her friends, and very strong Democrats out there. She raised money for them; she campaigned for them.”

Solis Doyle emphasized that neither Clinton’s name nor her policies were on the ballot on Tuesday – but that hasn’t stopped some of her potential rivals from spreading the word that the big GOP gains marked a major setback for her aspirations. Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., the GOP’s 2012 vice presidential nominee, told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt that Tuesday’s verdict “tells you that she’s not inevitable. I think she’s very beatable.”

More pointed was Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., who took to Twitter with unabashed glee to brand the 13 unsuccessful candidates Clinton stumped for “Hillary’s Losers.” “The 1990s was a long time ago,” Paul said on “Fox and Friends” on Friday morning. “I don't think there is such a Clinton cachet as there once was. ... There is a message here about Hillary Clinton as much as there is a message about the president.”

Doug Schoen, a former pollster for President Clinton, dismissed Sen. Paul’s suggestions that Mrs. Clinton remains, in the public imagination, tied at the hip to the unpopular incumbent in the White House. “This election was a repudiation, first and foremost, as every Republican I've heard say, of President Obama,” Schoen said on Fox News' “Happening Now” on Wednesday. “I think that the Clinton brand is separate and distinct from President Obama. I don't think this has an appreciable impact on her fortunes and future.”

With long memories of the central role that Florida and Ohio have played in recent presidential contests, Clinton and her Democratic colleagues cannot have looked favorably upon the Republicans’ success on Tuesday in holding onto the governor’s mansions in those critical battleground states. Some have argued that she will benefit from the GOP wave by being able to run against the GOP Congress.

Yet in the actual business of campaigning – the deployment of rhetoric and charisma to sway persuadable hearts and minds – Clinton’s performance again left some feeling as though she has still not worked out the kinks on display in her rocky book tour this spring. Perhaps Clinton’s most memorable statement as a surrogate speaker during this cycle was her assertion, during an Oct. 24 appearance in Boston on behalf of (doomed) Massachusetts gubernatorial candidate Martha Coakley: “Don’t let anybody tell you that it’s corporations and businesses that create jobs.”

That statement prompted criticism from Charles Lane, the left-leaning opinion writer for the Washington Post. “ I thought NBC created a job for Chelsea [Clinton], so there is at least one corporation that has created a job,” he quipped on the Oct. 27 edition of Fox News' “Special Report with Bret Baier.” “She has made quite a few gaffes now since this unofficial presidential campaign has gotten underway.”

Solis Doyle, who recalled chatting amiably with Clinton at a Georgetown event last month, thought her former boss effectively used the campaign cycle to regain her footing as a stump speaker after a long absence from the trail and the difficulties of the "Hard Choices" rollout. “There has been some criticism over the book tour,” Solis Doyle said. “But I think what was good about that is that it was able to get some of the, you know, not-great performances out of the way, and she’s sort of back in her game. ... I thought her performance on the stump during the 2014 midterm elections was pretty good.”

 

 

CNBC column: Larry Kudlow: “For 2016, Hillary had the worst night”

By Larry Kudlow

November 8, 2014

We all know the Republican midterm landslide was largely a repudiation of President Obama's policies and his handling of the job of chief executive. And of course, we don't know who will succeed him in 2016. But buried deep inside Tuesday's exit polls is a series of numbers on presidential contenders that will blow your mind. It's completely different from most anything you've seen in the newspapers, the Internet, or on TV.

Get this. Here's a stunning question and answer from Edison Research, which interviewed 18,000 voters around the country as they left the polls on November 4:

Do you think Hillary Clinton would make a good president?

Yes: 42 percent. No: 52 percent.

Whether she's the front-runner or not, a majority of midterm-election voters don't want her running the country.

Does that leave the door open for other Democrats? Sure looks like it.

Does that leave the door open for a Republican? Hang on to your seats:

Do you think Jeb Bush would make a good president?

Yes: 29 percent. No: 59 percent.

Do you think Chris Christie would make a good president?

Yes: 24 percent. No: 64 percent.

Amazing. New Jersey governor Chris Christie, who is also the chair of the Republican Governors Association, has been widely praised for quarterbacking the GOP's tremendous election performance in the states. The GOP counted 31 Republican gubernatorial wins, even in deep-blue Massachusetts, Illinois, and Maryland. But voters still said no to Christie.

But there's more. Hang on to your seatbelts:

Do you think Rand Paul would make a good president?

Yes: 26 percent. No: 60 percent.

Do you think Rick Perry would make a good president?

Yes: 24 percent. No: 62 percent.

High-profile senator Rand Paul, who has had successful early years in the Senate, has a strong following among libertarian-like millennials, and has a crafty way of jumping on key issues, didn't do so well either. And Texas governor Rick Perry, who many experts suggest has recovered from his 2012 gaffes, also got a big thumbs-down.

But here's the kicker — my absolute favorite:

In the 2016 presidential election, for whom would you be more likely to vote?

Hillary Clinton (Dem): 24 percent. The Republican candidate: 40 percent.

That's right. The yet-to-be-named Republican beats Hillary.

I guess she shouldn't have said businesses don't create jobs. Or maybe voters remember her Russian reset with Putin, her calling Bashar Assad a "reformer" we can do business with, or her "who cares" exclamation about how the U.S. base in Benghazi was destroyed.

Or maybe the old Bill Clinton magic is not rubbing off anymore. But the fact is, the exit polls say ol' Hillary would lose to a Republican no-name. And at the margin, Tuesday's election has probably re-scrambled the Republican deck.

I'm sure not going to pick a winner here. But given the polling weakness of the other established candidates, and the virtual collapse of Hillary, you have to wonder ...

What about newly re-elected Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker? For quite a while he looked like he might lose, but he wound up with a bigger positive margin than anyone thought possible. He won his battle against the public unions. He cut taxes while strictly limiting spending. Is Governor Walker, who may possess the strongest political backbone in the country, now a Republican front-runner?

Or can the same be said of Ohio Governor John Kasich? He won re-election in a landslide, even after accepting federal Medicaid aid (unpopular in conservative circles). But he also found some spare budget cash to help Ohio's poor and stayed on the supply side with tax cuts.

Or what about Michigan governor Rick Snyder? He put the whole city of Detroit into bankruptcy to solve its collapsing financial structure and get it on the road to recovery. He also took on government unions and found a way to reduce tax burdens. And he made Michigan — the UAW's socialist paradise — into a right-to-work state.

Or maybe Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal has jumped to the front. He campaigned for fellow Republicans around the country while begging the GOP to come up with a true national message of economic growth, supply-side tax cuts, market-oriented health care, and education-choice reform.

I'm not going to go through the whole list. There are other Republican governors and senators, and at least one key policymaker in the GOP dominated House, who could be that yet-to-be-named Republican in 2016.

What's important now is that the midterm exit polls turned conventional wisdom on its head. It's not just those awful numbers for the high-visibility Republican hopefuls. But Hillary loses to an unnamed name.

To channel the great William F. Buckley Jr., get me a phone book and I'll start picking her opponents.

 

 

Variety: “Bill Clinton Predicts ‘Boogie Dance’ in Washington After Republican Senate Win”

By Jordyn Holman

November 8, 2014, 4:35 a.m. PST

Former President Bill Clinton weighed in Friday on the results of Tuesday’s midterm elections, suggesting that Congress and the White House can still “get things done” and reflecting on his experience working with a divided government during a period of intense partisanship.

“The retrospective memory of my six years tends to be one that is airbrushed,” Clinton told the crowd at USC. “For this time, what you gotta have is an agenda and get things done. There’s going to be a boogie dance for the first few months, but we’ll see what they’re going to do.”

Clinton said the election, in which Republicans gained control of the Senate and expanded their grip on the House, “completed the process that was started in 2010.” But he suggested that such a scenario was not so out of the ordinary given that Republicans seized control of Congress in 1994 while he was president.

Clinton said that one big showdown that will take place will be seeing if Congress defunds the Affordable Care Act. He added that he hoped they would continue the bipartisan support of funding basic research.

At the event, which was aimed at USC honor students and faculty, Clinton lauded the growth in technology and innovation that is reshaping the entertainment industry and economy. Clinton said the growing interdependence of countries is at the root of many of these trends.

“You have to have an idea of what you want the world to look like,” he said.

He pointed to the innovation taking place in Orlando, Fla., known mostly as the home of Disney and Universal theme parks, to describe the intersection of the technology with other sectors of the economy.

“Most people who don’t live there think of Orlando as the home of Disneyworld,” Clinton said. “But the Defense Department and NASA spend $5 billion a year on computer simulation. It’s obvious that they need improvement in simulation to keep theme park membership. It’s also way safer and cheap to teach young military personnel how to operate or fly a tank or airplane on a simulator than the real deal. There’s just this explosive creative environment down there.”

Clinton also touched on the influence of social media in connecting people in new and groundbreaking ways.

“The Internet has done a lot of good,” he said. “It allows six-year-olds to get on the Internet and find out what I had to go to college to learn about.”

Since leaving office, Clinton has dedicated his life to humanitarian efforts overseas, particularly focused on improving global health and wellness and increasing opportunities for women and children through the Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation.

The former president noted that there’s been a lot of headlines about turmoil around the globe, such as the ISIS terror campaign and the deadly Ebola outbreak, but he asserted that this obscures the progress on the geopolitical front. “Though every headline in the last few months seems negative, there have been a lot of positive trend lines,” he said.

He cited the Millennium Goals set forth by the United Nations, which will expire next year, as an example, saying some of them will be reached.

“We are in the best shape of any big country in the world in the next 20 years,” he said. “No big country that is running this well is as young as we are, as diverse as we are or as technological as we are. In the next 20 years, there will be bad days, there will be bad headlines, but you can keep the trend lines positive.”

Later on Friday, Clinton was scheduled to attend an event on the Paramount lot to raise money for his foundation, with Jessica Alba and musical act Parachute on the bill.

 

 

Calendar:

 

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

·  November 14  – Little Rock, AR:  Sec. Clinton attends picnic for 10thAnniversary of the Clinton Center (NYT)

·  November 15  – Little Rock, AR: Sec. Clinton hosts No Ceilings event (NYT)

·  November 21  – New York, NY: Sec. Clinton presides over meeting of the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves (Bloomberg)

·  November 21  – New York, NY: Sec. Clinton is honored by the New York Historical Society (Bloomberg)

·  December 1 – New York, NY: Sec. Clinton keynotes a League of Conservation Voters dinner (Politico)

·  December 4 – Boston, MA: Sec. Clinton speaks at the Massachusetts Conference for Women (MCFW)

·  December 16 – New York, NY: Sec. Clinton honored by Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights (Politico)