“Let me be clear, I don’t trust the Republicans. And I don’t trust the Democrats.”
— Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), quoted by TPM, responding to criticism from Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) for blocking budget negotiations.
Not All Sex-Scandal Comebacks are the Same
Anthony Weiner announced his comeback attempt earlier today, but Karen Tumulty notes his challenge is greater than Mark Sanford faced earlier this month.
“Sanford, once it became clear that he had not been hiking the Appalachian Trail, pretty much owned up to where he had really been and the truth about his relationship with Maria Belen Chapur. Weiner continued to deny that the crotch photos sent through his Twitter account were in fact of his own crotch, even as the falsehood became more and more transparent.”
“And where Weiner was forced to resign, Sanford remained in office, surviving an effort to impeach him, paying the largest ethics fine in South Carolina history, and ultimately enjoying the most productive period of his governorship. Indeed, he left office in 2011 on something of a high note, with approval around 55 percent–which, as the Charleston Post and Courier noted at the time, made him more popular than half the nation’s governors.”
Senate Democrats Face Tougher Political Environment
Stuart Rothenberg: “While national polls haven’t shown a shift in the public’s opinion of President Obama’s performance, recent controversies have, in my view, significantly changed the political landscape.”
GOP Aides Worry About Partisan Overtones on Benghazi
Senior GOP aides tell Roll Call they are worried that the “partisan overtones” in the investigation of the Banghazi attacks “are diverting Congress from identifying and addressing the real lessons learned from the attack.”
“In particular, these aides say key staffers have been overly consumed with chasing down or addressing inaccurate or unfounded accusations emerging from the inquiry.”
Exchange of the Day
Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett (R-PA) was asked about Latinos working in his administration during a moderated discussion in Philadelphia last week:
Moderator: Do you have staff members that are Latino?
Corbett: No, we do not have any staff members in there. If you can find us one, please let me know.
Moderator: I am sure that there are Latinos that…
Corbett: Do any of you you want to come to Harrisburg? See?!
Former Clinton Aide Says IRS Scandal Threatens Hillary in 2016
Former Clinton White House counsel Lanny Davis said the growing IRS scandal has robbed Democrats of the so-called “trust edge” they held over Republicans and is now jeopardizing hopes that Hillary Clinton will replace President Obama in 2016, the Washington Examiner reports.
Said Davis: “This hurts the Democratic Party and will hurt anybody who runs for president in 2016. It will make it almost impossible to elect a [Democratic] president…I’m nervous.”
Coincidentally, Davis has a new book on how to deal with scandals called Crisis Tales.
Paul Ryan is Writing a Book
Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) “is working with attorney Bob Barnett to release his first major book next year, and it’ll feature a mix of autobiography, political analysis, and policy prescriptions,” National Review reports.
“So far, Ryan has been doing the writing by himself. The early theme of the draft is a broad discussion of American renewal, with an emphasis on the Republican future and the party’s need to articulate what he calls the ‘American idea.'”
Tennessee Shifting on Same-Sex Unions
A new Vanderbilt University poll in Tennessee finds that 49% of Tennesseans support gay marriage or civil unions while 46% are opposed to both, suggesting the state is now evenly divided on whether to extend legal recognition to same-sex couples.
The results suggest a marked shift in Tennesseans’ views since
2006, when 81% of voters approved an amendment to the state
constitution defining marriage between one man and one woman as “the
only legally recognized marital contract” in the state.
Bonus Quote of the Day
“Because I’m asserting my right not to testify I know people will assume I’ve done something wrong. I have not. One of the basic rights of the Fifth Amendment is to protect innocent individuals and that’s the protection I’m invoking today, thank you.”
— IRS official Lois Lerner, quoted by the Washington Post, in a prepared statement before the House Oversight and Government Affairs Committee.
Crack Mayor
Jon Stewart suggests that Toronto Mayor Rob Ford is either the victim of malicious video editing, or has decided to clean up his city by smoking all its crack himself.
Taxi King Says Bloomberg Threatened Him
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg “went on a spitting-mad rant against a city cab-fleet boss” who won a court victory over the mayor’s plans to reform how taxis operate vowing to “destroy your fucking industry” when he leaves office, the New York Post reports.
Taxi Club Management CEO Gene Freidman confirmed the blow-up noting that the mayor’s tirade included a warning: “After January, I am going to destroy all you fucking guys.”
Lawmaker Says He’s an Atheist During Daily Prayer
Arizona State Rep. Juan Mendez (D) acknowledged that he is an atheist as he gave the daily House invocation, urging legislators to look at each other, rather than bow their heads, and “celebrate our shared humanness,” the Arizona Republic reports.
Mendez said it was freeing to be open about his secular views.
The White House’s P.R. Problem
First Read: “While there is still no evidence connecting the IRS’s targeting of conservative groups directly to the White House or to the president personally, or to his re-election campaign, it doesn’t mean the White House doesn’t have a P.R. problem on its hands. And this P.R. mess is largely self-inflicted. For starters, its explanation about when it learned of the inspector general’s IRS investigation keeps changing… Then we discover that the IRS official Lois Lerner plans to plead the 5th Amendment at today’s House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. Both developments make it SEEM like the White House or the administration has something to hide — even if the evidence (so far) is that Team Obama wasn’t directly connected to this IRS story.”
Campaign 2012 and the Battle for the Soul of America
Here’s a must-read for the holiday weekend:
Reckoning: Campaign 2012 and the Battle for the Soul of America by Roger Simon.
Massachusetts Lt. Gov. to Step Down
Massachusetts Lt. Gov. Tim Murray (D) is expected to resign today to take a private sector job.
‘Sources close to Murray tell WBZ-TV Murray is poised to leave his office as early as today. There is some speculation he has another position lined up.”
Boston Globe: “He has been dogged by questions about a 2011 early-morning car crash in a state vehicle and his ties to former Chelsea Housing Authority director Michael McLaughlin, who earlier this year pleaded guilty to federal felony charges of concealing his salary.”
Former Miss America Mulls Senate Bid in Kentucky
Former Miss America Heather French Henry (D) said that “public and private figures are encouraging her to run for the U.S. Senate next year, but she is ‘not ready to confirm or deny’ that possibility,” the Lexington Herald-Leader reports.
Said French Henry: “I am completely honored that people are talking to me about this but I have made no decision.”
McCain Snaps Over GOP Roadblocks
Sens. John McCain (R-AZ) blasted his GOP colleagues for grandstanding on the budget, Ezra Klein notes.
“The quick background here is that congressional Republicans have spent years calling for a return to ‘regular order’ in which the House writes a budget, the Senate writes a budget, and the two chambers move to a conference committee to hash out their differences. This year, for the first time since 2009, Senate Democrats wrote and passed a full budget, shepherding it to passage through an open amendment process. Now various Senate Republicans are blocking the move towards conference — blocking, in other words, the move towards the regular order they demanded.”
McCain unloaded last night: “What are we on my side of the aisle doing? We don’t want a budget unless we put requirements on the conferees that are absolutely out of line and unprecedented?”
Why You Should Care About Investigations of Journalists
Dana Millbank: “Liberals may not be particularly bothered because the targeted journalist works for Fox News. Conservatives may not be concerned because of their antipathy toward the news media generally. And the general public certainly doesn’t have much patience for journalists’ whining.”
“But here’s why you should care — and why this case, along with the administration’s broad snooping into Associated Press phone records, is more serious than the other supposed Obama administration scandals regarding Benghazi and the Internal Revenue Service. The Rosen affair is as flagrant an assault on civil liberties as anything done by George W. Bush’s administration, and it uses technology to silence critics in a way Richard Nixon could only have dreamed of.”
