“Obama’s new domestic terrorism plan probably requires Americans to memorize Koran verses.”
— Mike Huckabee, writing for Fox News.
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Visual Political Histories
As we head into the holiday season, here’s an interesting political gift: Death and Taxes 2016 is a poster that looks at how the federal budget has grown over the years.
These are also definitely worth a look:
Clinton No Longer Focused on Sanders
New York Times: “At rallies these days, Mrs. Clinton criticizes the Republican presidential candidates for their economic policies (‘Our economy does better with a Democrat in the White House’); she knocks their foreign policy approaches and says their positions on immigration and women’s issues would set the country ‘backwards instead of forwards.'”
“What she does not do is mention her main Democratic primary opponent, Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont…. She is now acting as if she were no longer running against one rival, Mr. Sanders, but 14: the Republicans who are still preoccupied with cutting down one another.”
The Latest on Wonk Wire
Is Donald Trump the Best Politician in the Race?
Rick Klein: “At this point, it’s not simply a matter of Donald Trump defying political gravity. Even his opponents have to marvel at how good a politician he is, in his ability to adapt to moments and channel the (often unspoken) passions of his supporters. With the establishment turning up the heat – and the cash – on Trump, there’s a real possibility that he can’t be brought down in a substantial way. (What new information about Trump will do what all the reams of information haven’t done before?) His rivals have to count on Trump supporters not being serious about supporting Trump – or not being serious about caucusing or voting at all. That would count as hope, not strategy. But it may be hard to beat.”
Trump Attacks Clinton’s Stamina
Donald Trump “has, over the last few days, been road-testing a new criticism of Hillary Clinton — that she is too low-energy to be president,” the New York Times reports.
Said Trump: “Somebody like Jeb, and others that are running against me — and by the way, Hillary is another one. I mean, Hillary is a person who doesn’t have the strength or the stamina, in my opinion, to be president. She doesn’t have strength or stamina. She’s not a strong enough person to be president.”
The Post-Truth Candidate
First Read: “We’ve been around the political block long enough to know that almost all presidential candidates exaggerate, dissemble, take statements out of context and, yes, lie. But from the start of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign (remember Mexican rapists?), he has taken this to a level we haven’t seen before in American politics.”
“Consider just these two examples from the weekend. First, Trump said on Saturday in Alabama: ‘I watched when the World Trade Center came tumbling down. And I watched in Jersey City New Jersey, where thousands and thousands of people were cheering.’ In fact, as the New York Times writes, ‘No news reports exist of people cheering in the streets, and both police officials and the mayor of Jersey City have said that it did not happen.’ But when ABC pressed Trump on his statement, he stood his ground. ‘It did happen. I saw it… It was on television. I saw it.’ Second, Trump retweeted a graphic claiming — falsely — that African American are responsible for the killing of most blacks and whites in America. ‘That is not true,’ the Washington Post notes.”
Benjy Sarlin: “Let’s not sugarcoat what’s going on. The GOP frontrunner is spreading hateful falsehoods about blacks and Muslims.”
Louisiana Proves that Candidates Matter
Washington Post: “Political scientists love to talk about fundamentals and concoct formulas to predict how races will turn out. But a bad candidate undermines that. Vitter was a bad candidate. Massachusetts is as blue as Louisiana is red, but Democrat Martha Coakley lost a Senate race to Scott Brown in 2010 and a governor’s race to Charlie Baker in 2014 because she is a terrible retail politician. In Kentucky, Jack Conway started as the frontrunner and blew totally winnable races against Rand Paul in 2010 and Matt Bevin in 2015. In both cases, the attorney general tried to make the race about his opponent’s flaws, and it backfired.”
Most Think Obama Has No Plan to Defeat ISIS
A new CBS News poll finds that only 23% of Americans think President Obama has a clear plan for dealing with ISIS, the lowest number yet recorded. Sixty-six percent do not think he has a clear plan – a new high.
“Large majorities of Republicans and independents say the President doesn’t have a clear plan, and almost half of Democrats (40%) agree. More Democrats (45%) say he doesn’t have a plan than say he does.”
Cruz Says He’s the Most Electable Conservative
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-IA) “is among the most hated men in Washington, reviled by leaders of both parties as an ideological hard-liner loyal only to the far-right of the conservative movement,” the AP reports.
“But racing down an Iowa highway on a snowy weekend morning, a solemn Cruz suggested some of his Republican rivals for president have amped up their rhetoric too much — especially on policy toward people who are in the U.S. illegally.”
Said Cruz: “I cannot help the language that others use… I can only help the words that come out of my own mouth.”
Republicans Find a New Enemy
Politico: “During the past century, the GOP focused on the internal subversive threat of communism and often depicted liberals as traitors. Now many on the right have seamlessly moved on to hunt for Muslim traitors as part of a third World War against a foreign enemy. They’ve been identifying domestic traitors and declaring a broader war against Islam for years, but have been, for the most part, speaking to deaf ears… Now after Paris, the radical right is grabbing the opportunity to push their case to a wider audience.”
Republicans Are Much Angrier Than Democrats
A new Pew Research poll finds that Republicans “are nearly three times as likely as Democrats to say they are angry with the government. And among politically engaged Republicans and Democrats – those who vote frequently and follow politics on a regular basis – the gap is nearly four-to-one (42% to 11%).”
“In Barack Obama’s six years as president, 13% of Republicans, on average, have said they can trust the government always or most of the time – the lowest level of average trust among either party during any administration dating back 40 years. During George W. Bush’s presidency, an average of 47% of Republicans said they could trust the government. By contrast, the share of Democrats saying they can trust the government has been virtually unchanged over the two administrations (28% Bush, 29% Obama).”
Voters Trust Clinton More on Terrorism
A new Washington Post-ABC News poll finds Hillary Clinton is better-trusted on dealing with the terrorism threat, with her biggest edge over Donald Trump.
“By 50% to 42%, more Americans say they trust Clinton to handle the threat of terrorism than Trump, who leads the Republican field and responded to the Paris terrorist attacks by calling for heightened surveillance of mosques and redoubling his opposition to allowing Syrian refugees to settle in the U.S.”
Sanders Steps Up Spending in Iowa
Sen. Bernie Sanders “more than quadrupled his spending in Iowa during the third quarter, pouring almost a half-million dollars into the state,” the Des Moines Register reports.
“He still falls short of U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, a Texas Republican, and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in terms of total spending this cycle, but Sanders’ third-quarter spending represents a surge for him as he continues to challenge Clinton for front-runner status in the race for the Democratic nomination.”
Marco Rubio’s Political Dexterity
New Yorker: “Rubio, who has entered six elections and never lost, is alert to the appearance of overweening ambition. … He considers himself a Catholic, but he attends two churches-an evangelical Protestant service on Saturdays and a Roman Catholic Mass on Sundays… He used to proclaim his love of nineties-era hip-hop-particularly Tupac Shakur-but recently he has also taken to praising cross-genre artists, such as Drake and the Weeknd, who blend electronic dance music with hip-hop, rap, and R. & B… Rubio’s ecumenism is one reason that prominent Democrats consider him the most worrisome contender.”
Police Chief More Concerned with Guns Than Refugees
New York Police Commissioner Bill Bratton called on Congress to “help us out with that Terrorist Watch List, those thousands of people that can purchase firearms in this country,” saying he’s “more worried about them than I am about Syrian refugees, to be quite frank with you,” NBC News reports.
Bonus Quote of the Day
“Maybe he should have been roughed up because it was absolutely disgusting what he was doing.”
— Donald Trump, quoted by the Washington Post, on a black activist who was choked and thrown to the ground after trying to disrupt Trump’s rally.
Quote of the Day
“Well, we’ll see what happens. It will be very interesting. But I’m leading every poll by a lot. It’s not even a little bit anymore, it’s a lot.”
— Donald Trump, quoted by the Wall Street Journal, once again suggesting he would run for president as an independent if not “treated fairly.”
