Ben Carson said that if elected president he might implement a “covert division” of government workers who spy on their coworkers to improve government efficiency, MSNBC reports.
Carson told a crowd of Iowa Republicans he is “thinking very seriously” about adding “a covert division of people who look like the people in this room, who monitor what government people do.” He suggested people would work harder if they suspected their coworkers of monitoring their work.
Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) “says a fundraising e-mail isn’t the same as him making an official endorsement in next year’s Senate race,” according to River Bender.
“Durbin sent out a fundraising request on behalf of the Senate bid of Rep. Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), calling her ‘a friend’ and ‘a champion,’ but he says that’s not a formal endorsement. He says he’s helping with fundraising since the campaign is heating up earlier than he’d hoped.”
“Ultimately, Russia needs to be a European nation. Everything we do should be to isolate its corrupt leadership.”
— Jeb Bush, quoted by National Journal.
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New York Times: “In a major shift of focus in the battle against the Islamic State, the Obama administration is planning to establish a new military base in Anbar Province, Iraq, and to send up to 450 more American military trainers to help Iraqi forces retake the city of Ramadi. The White House on Wednesday is expected to announce a plan that follows months of behind-the-scenes debate about how prominently plans to retake Mosul, another Iraqi city that fell to the Islamic State last year, should figure in the early phase of the military campaign against the group.”
Here’s what’s trending on Wonk Wire today:
“If you live by the pen, you die by the pen. Everything put in place by executive order can be undone by executive order.”
– Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), in Washington Post interview about how he’d spend his first 100 days as president if he won, pledging to roll back more than just the president’s controversial orders related to immigration.
Rick Klein: “It’s easy enough to mock a particular media portrayal of Marco Rubio, cast as – shock! – someone who has struggled with his finances yet owns a luxury boat that isn’t that fancy and an expensive home that looks, well, fine. (The previous New York Times take on Rubio’s past, on his driving record, didn’t help its subsequent story.)”
“But even as Rubio’s campaign raises money off of the pair of Times stories, seeds of serious questions about Rubio are being planted. There are relationships with people as varied as former Rep. David Rivera and billionaire Norman Braman; credit-card missteps involving personal charges on a state-party card; and even the still-strange and very recent decision to cash out some 401(k) funds, penalty and all. If the story develops into one of a financially strapped young family, trying to make ends meet, it will all be part of a stump speech soon enough. But if it becomes one about a man with a law degree and six-figure income who couldn’t keep his finances straight, it will become part of a debate-stage attack just as quickly.”
Larry Sabato’s Crystal Ball: “If you’re looking for a dark-horse entrant into the first tier, it might be John Kasich. Few would bet on him today, but no sensible party will easily dismiss a popular two-term governor of swing-state Ohio. And Kasich’s federal, state and private sector experiences comprise impressive preparation for the presidency.”
“The primary obstacle for Kasich are his positions on Obamacare and Common Core, which have earned him the RINO label. He also has to generate interest in a hurry so he can get into the upcoming debates, for which he currently does not qualify. And Kasich must make a convincing case that he’s not just another Jon Huntsman, who won more plaudits from the media than votes from Republicans in 2012.”
“Republicans in Congress are worried the Supreme Court will hand them a major headache this month if it rules against the federal health insurance exchanges in more than 30 states, ending subsidies for millions of people,” The Hill reports.
Wonk Wire: Obamacare contingency plans are few and far between
President Obama, “who claimed when he first entered the White House to have mostly kicked his nicotine habit, may have been caught on camera holding a pack of cigarettes,” The Hill reports.
“The Obama administration is planning a series of actions this summer to rein in greenhouse-gas emissions from wide swaths of the economy, including trucks, airplanes and power plants, kicking into high gear an ambitious climate agenda that the president sees as key to his legacy,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
Wonk Wire: Secret conservative groups donated millions to promote climate skepticism
Rick Santorum may participate in the Iowa Straw Poll, he told the Des Moines Register, but he won’t spend any money on it.
Said Santorum: “My donors don’t have a lot of money. And when they give me money, I’m going to spend it on winning, not on straw polls.”
National Journal: “The Straight Talk Express has returned to New Hampshire, except with a different conductor: Chris Christie. Like John McCain in 2008, the New Jersey governor is holding lengthy town halls, sounding an unmistakably aggressive note on fighting terror overseas, and bluntly calling for radical reforms to entitlements, the tax code, and education at home as he seeks to make a miraculous comeback from the political doldrums.”
“Any Christie comeback will need to happen in the Granite State, which the governor has all but made a second home since exploring a presidential campaign.”
Gov. John Kasich (R) “has tapped a pair of veteran Republicans to play senior roles in his upcoming presidential campaign, according to multiple sources. The decisions are the latest steps in preparation for a formal announcement of candidacy that will come sometime next month,” the Washington Post reports.
“Kasich has picked John Weaver, a former top adviser in the presidential campaigns of Arizona Sen. John McCain, to fill the role of senior strategist. The Texas-based Weaver will oversee the general strategic direction of the Kasich campaign. Meanwhile, Fred Davis, a California-based ad maker, will assume the duties as lead media consultant for Kasich’s super PAC.”
“I’ve got a lot of friends. We’ll have a rotating first lady.”
— Sen. Lindsey Graham, quoted by the Daily Mail, on how the unmarried presidential candidate will handle the job of First Lady.
“In his first comments since Monday’s shakeup, Jeb Bush told reporters here he felt the need to reorganize his team based on ‘the magnitude of the journey,’ not any perceived struggles of his nascent campaign,” Politico reports.
Said Bush: “You start wherever you start, and you end a long way away from where we are today, so I just urge everybody to be a little more patient about this.”
Politico: “He’s stuck in the middle of the pack in Iowa, lags in polls, and much of the GOP donor class views him with disdain. But Ted Cruz is embracing a novel strategy for winning the nomination: He’s lowering expectations in the early states while investing in later-voting states that hardly see a candidate before March.”
Wall Street Journal: “First, the math is simply too tough for Democrats. They now hold just 188 House seats, which means they would need to win 30 seats now held by Republicans. Even in a good year, that’s too steep a hill to climb. So while Republicans do have more seats in danger in the changed environment of 2016, the numbers aren’t big enough to suggest a change. The Cook Report lists 22 Republican-held seats that are among the most vulnerable this cycle, and just seven Democratic ones, but even a clean sweep of such seats by the Democrats wouldn’t be enough to change control.”
“Second, that difficult math is the result of years of Republican efforts to draw up congressional districts that are safe for GOP candidates. Using their control of more governor’s offices and state legislatures in recent years, Republicans have been in the driver’s seat for reapportioning congressional districts and the advantage shows. The vast majority of Republican House members are safe from serious challenge from Democrats; only 16 of them won their seats by fewer than 10 percentage points, the Cook Report says.”
“And third, Democrats enter 2016 behind a president whose popularity is only in the mediocre range. In the latest rolling Gallup survey, Mr. Obama’s job approval stood at 46%–which is better than the 42.6% he averaged last year but not enough to sweep other Democrats forward.”
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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