A new Associated Press-GfK poll finds just 13% of Americans are confident the leaders can work together, while 86% have no such faith. That’s far more than the 58% who felt that way just after the 2010 midterm elections in which the tea party movement rose to prominence.
“The doubts cross party lines: Fewer than 1 in 5 Democrats or independents have confidence the two sides can cooperate. Republicans are even more pessimistic, with just 1 in 10 confident Obama and Congress can work together.”
CIA Director John Brennan “has been as close as anyone to President Obama on his most sensitive national security decisions, from drone strikes to the 2011 raid that killed Osama bin Laden,” Bloomberg reports.
“That helps explain why Obama isn’t abandoning his Central Intelligence Agency director despite some calls for his resignation following release of a Senate report detailing the CIA’s brutal interrogations of terrorism suspects during President George W. Bush’s administration. Brennan was a top official at the agency under Bush and then served as head of the National Counterterrorism Center before going to work for Obama.”
Norm Ornstein: “Democrats find their support among whites—especially working-class whites—slipping, and that is not just an artifact of differential turnout in midterm contests. Especially in the South, white voters are moving steadily more toward voting for and identifying with the Republican Party, while nonwhites, even with a small uptick in some states for GOP votes for Senate and gubernatorial candidates, are heavily Democratic. Those divisions could change, of course, but right now it is possible to see a future where the GOP is clearly and distinctly a white party, while Democrats are clearly a majority-minority party.”
Former Vice President Dick Cheney said that President Bush was not kept in the dark on the CIA’s interrogation techniques, calling the Senate Intelligence Committee report’s claim a “flat out lie,” according to The Hill.
Said Cheney: “I think he knew certainly the techniques, we did discuss the techniques, there was no effort on our part to keep him from that. That the president wasn’t being told is just a flat out lie.”
“The State Department has failed to turn over government documents covering Hillary Rodham Clinton’s tenure as secretary of state that the Associated Press and others requested under the U.S. Freedom of Information Act ahead of her presumptive presidential campaign. They include one request AP made four years ago and others pending for more than one year.”
Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA) “pretty much dismissed any notion that she would run again for governor, the Senate or any other public office,” Politico reports.
Said Landrieu: “Oh Lord, no. Well, let me say, I’m not going to say a definite ‘no’ about any of those two. I’ve been trained to never say no. But it is highly, highly unlikely.”
“The C.I.A. maintains that the brutal interrogation techniques it used on terrorism suspects a decade ago worked. The Senate Intelligence Committee concluded that they did not. And on that, at least, President Obama is not taking sides,” the New York Times reports.
“That debate, after all, has left Mr. Obama facing an uncomfortable choice between two allies: the close adviser and former aide he installed as director of the C.I.A. versus his fellow Democrats who control the Senate committee and the liberal base that backs their findings.”
A CNBC Millionaire Survey of people with investable assets of $1 million or more –which represents the top 8% of American households — finds that Hillary Clinton is their top choice for president with 31%, followed by Jeb Bush (R) at 18%.
“In a career-defining speech, Sen. Mark Udall (D-CO) took to the Senate floor Wednesday to disclose classified information regarding an internal CIA investigation into the agency’s Bush-era ‘enhanced interrogation techniques,'” National Journal reports.
Udall “began revealing key conclusions from the so-called Panetta Review, written in 2011 and named after then-CIA Director Leon Panetta. Udall says that the Panetta Review gives evidence that the CIA is still lying about the scope of enhanced interrogation techniques used during the Bush administration.”
[speech_bubble type=”std” subtype=”a” icon=”pwdome.jpg” name=””]Now, that’s a memorable way to leave the U.S. Senate [/speech_bubble]
The Madison Capital Times dug up a letter from Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) in which he goofed on a Jewish salutation by ending with, “Thank you again and Molotov.”
“Presumably, Walker meant to write ‘mazel tov’ and didn’t intend to wish good tidings of incendiary weapons. Perhaps it was a case of AutoCorrect or that pesky Microsoft Word paperclip causing shenanigans.”
“It served absolutely no purpose other than one last thumb in the eye of the Bush administration and was a big mistake in my opinion.”
— Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY), quoted by TPM, on the Senate’s torture report.
Smart Politics: “As a result of these competitive contests, caused in party by strong showings from several third party and independent candidates, 10 winning candidates will remain in or take office in the coming weeks without the support of the majority of the electorate.”
“Plurality winners in the 2014 cycle are independent Bill Walker of Alaska (48.1 percent), Democrats John Hickenlooper of Colorado (49.3 percent), David Ige of Hawaii (49.5 percent), John Kitzhaber of Oregon (48.9 percent), Gina Raimondo of Rhode Island (40.7 percent), and Peter Schumlin of Vermont (46.4 percent), and Republicans Rick Scott of Florida (48.1 percent), Sam Brownback of Kansas (49.9 percent), Paul LePage of Maine (48.2 percent), and Charlie Baker of Massachusetts (48.4 percent).”
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First Read: “Turning to 2016, it’s striking how many — if not most — of the potential presidential candidates have either run for the White House before or have had a relative do it. Think about it: There’s Hillary Clinton (who ran in ’08 and whose husband was president from 1993-2001), Jeb Bush (whose brother and father were president), Rand Paul (whose dad ran THREE times), Rick Perry (who ran in 2012 and is thinking about another retooled one), Mike Huckabee (who ran in 2008), Rick Santorum (who ran in 2012), and even maybe Mitt Romney (who GOP fundraisers believe is keeping his powder dry).”
“The only fresh faces we can think of: Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, Chris Christie, Scott Walker, Jim Webb, and Martin O’Malley.”
“The United States of America is awesome, we are awesome. We’ve closed the book on torture, and we’ve stopped doing it. And the reason they want to have this discussion is not to show how awesome we are. This administration wants to have this discussion to show us how we’re not awesome.”
— Fox News co-host Andrea Tantaros, quoted by Gawker.
Washington Post: “In his first week in office, Obama had ordered an end to torture. And back in May 2009, before rejecting the idea of setting up a commission, Obama condemned harsh techniques in a soaring speech at the National Archives… Obama wanted to avoid distracting and divisive criminal prosecutions or hearings. He believed any inquiry of his would look like an attack on his predecessor, President George W. Bush, and dispel any hope of bringing a bipartisan spirit to government. And he feared that the intelligence services, whose career rank-and-file members had followed guidelines handed down from above, would feel they had been abandoned by a new administration.”
Rep. John Fleming (R-LA) is “very interested” in running for Senate in 2016 if Sen. David Vitter (R) is elected Louisiana governor next year, Roll Call reports.
“Louisiana only wrapped up the 2014 Senate race a few days ago, but soon state operatives may start thinking about another race. Vitter has already announced an exploratory committee to run for governor in 2015. If Vitter wins, Fleming said, he wants to succeed him in the Senate.”
The Lexington Herald Leader looks at the possibility that Alison Lundergan Grimes (D) challenges Jack Conway (D) for the Democratic nomination for Kentucky governor.
“If Grimes wades into that race, it seems all but certain that her entry would mark the start of the next chapter in the Kentucky Democratic Party’s rough-and-tumble history, dividing a party that is already in the midst of a soul-searching journey and reopening divisions that Democrats hoped had been healed by their collective disdain for Mitch McConnell, who is about to become U.S. Senate Majority Leader.”
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.