“I don’t see any real opportunities for us over the next six months to break out.”
— Rick Santorum, quoted by the Washington Post, suggesting he’s “the tortoise-and-the-hare kind” of presidential candidate.
“I don’t see any real opportunities for us over the next six months to break out.”
— Rick Santorum, quoted by the Washington Post, suggesting he’s “the tortoise-and-the-hare kind” of presidential candidate.
National Review: “The rate at which a candidate spends the money he raises — the burn rate — is important too. One top Republican strategist and pollster tells me that the burn rate is an indicator of the kind of campaign a candidate is running. A candidate with a low burn rate is spending little money, say, on personnel and, essentially, anything that’s not directed toward message delivery.”
“With the exception of Marco Rubio, none of the other candidates, that I’m aware of, have released cash-on-hand figures that would allow a burn-rate calculation. Others, like Scott Walker, haven’t been in the race long enough to make a calculation. But Rubio’s burn rate is around 19 percent, which is low, and suggests he’s running a streamlined campaign that’s not bleeding money on consultants and staffers. His campaign released a cash-on-hand figure, which suggests they’re proud of this.”
Maine Democratic lawmakers said that another 51 bills have become law after Gov. Paul LePage (R) missed his deadline to act on them by midnight Saturday, the Portland Press Herald reports.
“But LePage has said he won’t enforce the laws and is expected to take the issue to the Maine Supreme Judicial Court. He said that because lawmakers adjourned last month, the requirement that he must act on a bill within 10 days doesn’t apply. Democratic leaders insist the Legislature did not adjourn, but instead ‘recessed’ until Thursday to take up more vetoes expected from the governor and finish other work for the session. A recess would keep the 10-day deadline in place.”
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Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) told Bloomberg that the newly announced deal between Iran and six world powers is “akin to declaring war on Israel and the Sunni Arabs,” and will be a huge problem for Hillary Clinton.
Said Graham: “My initial impression is that this deal is far worse than I ever dreamed it could be and will be a nightmare for the region, our national security and eventually the world at large.”
President Obama, “in an early morning appearance at the White House that was broadcast live in Iran, began what promised to be an arduous effort to sell the deal to Congress and the American public, saying the agreement was ‘not built on trust. It is built on verification,'” the New York Times reports.
But Obama made it abundantly clear that he would fight to preserve the deal in its entirety: “I will veto any legislation that prevents the successful implementation of this deal.”
“Iran and a group of six nations led by the United States reached a historic accord on Tuesday to significantly limit Tehran’s nuclear ability for more than a decade in return for lifting international oil and financial sanctions,” the New York Times reports.
“The deal culminates 20 months of negotiations on an agreement that President Obama had long sought as the biggest diplomatic achievement of his presidency. Whether it portends a new relationship between the United States and Iran — after decades of coups, hostage-taking, terrorism and sanctions — remains a bigger question.”
Bloomberg: “Under legislation passed in May, Congress will have 60 days for public debate and hearings by as many as eight Senate and House committees. Lawmakers then could vote on a joint resolution to approve or reject the nuclear deal, though they also may not act at all.”
Politico: “If it succeeds, the agreement could upgrade President Obama’s checkered foreign policy legacy, as well provide a crowning achievement for Kerry’s 30-year political career.”
A Missouri country voted unanimously to observe one year of “mourning” over the Supreme Court’s June 26 decision that gay couples have the constitutional right to marriage, the Salem News reports.
The observance will come in the form of lowering the flags at the county courthouse and judicial building to below half-staff for the next year.
Beth Hansen, a top adviser in Ohio Gov. John Kasich’s (R) administration “is poised to become his campaign manager for his soon-to-launch presidential campaign,” the Columbus Dispatch reports.
Said Kasich: “I have total confidence in Beth. We’re close… Forget everything else, I love the fact that she’s a woman. What a fantastic thing that is. I like to have women in high places in organizations.”
“The left claims they’re for American workers, and they’ve got lame ideas, things like minimum wage. We need to talk about how we get people skills and qualifications they need to get jobs that go beyond minimum wage.”
— Gov. Scott Walker, quoted by Politico.
Jeff Greenfield: “The key lesson we forget every four years is that the nominating process stands in sharp contrast to the general election, where ‘fundamentals’ often hold sway. While I’m skeptical about the predictive ability of academics and experts to call an election a year or two out, there’s good evidence that a combination of variables—mostly, but not exclusively economic—can provide a useful, if sometimes blunt instrument for gauging the outcome of an election.”
“The history of primary elections, by contrast, suggests that they might as well take place on a different planet. The presidential nominating process usually involves a number of contestants. It moves by fits and starts; candidacies can rise, fall, revive and collapse with breathtaking speed. Again and again, months, even years of assumptions are thrown into a cocked hat by a sudden surge or implosion of a campaign.”
“It’s a history that should lead any political journalist to question just how much the ever-increasing tonnage of pre-primary coverage really adds anything useful to our understanding of the process.”
Hillary Clinton blamed Republicans for “35 years” of policies that have exacerbated income inequality by giving “more wealth to those at the top” through tax cuts and corporate loopholes, the New York Times reports.
Said Clinton: “Twice now in the past 20 years a Democratic president has had to come in and clean up the mess.”
The Pentagon is moving to allow transgender people to serve openly in the military by early next year and end an “outdated” regulation that harms the armed forces, the New York Times reports.
“If realized, the plan would end what is seen as one of the last discriminatory rules about who can enlist or be commissioned in the American military. It would also be a tacit recognition that thousands of transgender people are already in uniform.”
Rick Santorum warned that Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s dissonance with his wife on same-sex marriage could cause him to be less “active” in his opposition, The Hill reports.
Said Santorum: “Spouses matter. When your spouse is not in-sync with you — particularly on cultural issues, moral issues — you tend not to be as active on those issues.”
National Journal: “Thanks to powerful new features unveiled since the 2012 campaign, Facebook now offers a far more customized and sophisticated splicing of the American electorate. And, for the first time in presidential politics, it can serve up video to those thinly targeted sets of people.”
“That unprecedented combination is inching campaigns closer to the Holy Grail of political advertising: the emotional impact of television delivered at an almost atomized, individual level. It makes the old talk of micro-targeting soccer moms and NASCAR dads sound quaint.”
Rep. Steve King (R-IA), a conservative influencer in the early caucus state, is standing behind Donald Trump and said his immigration remarks are catching fire, National Journal reports.
Said King: “He’s riding a good wave and right now if the caucus were held today, he’d probably come out on top.”
Just out: How to Use the Internet to Win in 2016: A Comprehensive Guide to Online Politics for Campaigns & Advocates by Colin Delany.
“Incorporating important lessons from the 2012 and 2014 U.S. elections, this book is essential for anyone running for office or trying to influence public opinion and public policy in 2016. It’s also extremely useful for individual activists, nonprofit political advocates and journalists covering political campaigns.”
Donald Trump used the escape of notorious drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman this weekend to criticize his presidential rivals, Politico reports.
Said Trump: “Can you envision Jeb Bush or Hillary Clinton negotiating with ‘El Chapo’, the Mexican drug lord who escaped from prison? Trump, however, would kick his ass!”
Rick Santorum said he wants “a constitutional amendment that defines marriage as between a man and a woman in all 50 states,” Bloomberg reports.
Said Santorum: “I believe we need a national standard for marriage. I don’t think we can have a standard from one state to another on what marriage is,” adding that he wants “to define marriage the way it was defined for 4,000 years of human history.”
The remarks put Santorum to the right of rivals such as Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Gov. Scott Walker (R), “who are pushing a different kind of constitutional amendment that would allow states to decide whether to allow or ban same-sex marriage, rather than an amendment that would set a national standard.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
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