Herbert Claiborne “Clay” Pell IV (D) confirmed that he’s actively exploring whether to jump into the 2014 Democratic primary for governor of Rhode Island and expects to make a decision within weeks, WPRI reports.
Pell is the grandson of the late Sen. Claiborne Pell (D-RI) and has never held elected office. He and his wife, the Olympic figure-skater Michelle Kwan, live in Providence.
Mark Murray: “The reason why Virginia matters is that, politically, no other state better reflects the center of American politics than the Old Dominion.”
“In the last two presidential contests, the state’s popular vote (Obama 53%-46% in ’08; Obama 51%-47% in ’12) exactly matched the national popular vote… And Virginia, demographically, looks like the country at large — whites near 70% of the population, African Americans in the double digits, Latinos at 8%, Asian Americans at 6%. It also has a fairly even mixture of urban, suburban, and rural areas.”
Wonk Wire‘s “chart of the day” shows how political dysfunction in Washington “that created tremendous uncertainty recently is now filtering through the economy.”
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Former Rep. Rick Renzi (R-AZ), “convicted in June on 17 counts of extortion, racketeering and other federal charges, was sentenced to three years in prison this morning at the U.S. District Court in Tucson,” the Arizona Republic reports.
A federal judge barred Texas from enforcing two key provisions of abortion restrictions that were to take effect Tuesday, the Austin American Statesman reports.
“The two measures passed in July amid a marathon Democratic filibuster
and massive protests at the state Capitol. Aside from provisions on
abortion-inducing drugs and admitting privileges, the law also only
allows abortions in surgical centers and bans the procedure after 20
weeks.”
Former Vice President Dick Cheney told CNN that “there is an interest in conducting surveillance on a country or a leader, even a clear ally.”
Said Cheney: “We do have a fantastic intelligence capability, worldwide against all kinds of potential issues and concerns. We are vulnerable, as was shown on 9/11, and you never know what you’re going to need when you need it.”
He added: “We do collect a lot of intelligence. Without speaking about any particular target or group of targets, that intelligence capability is enormously important to the United States, to our conduct in foreign policy, to defense matters, economic matters, and I’m a strong supporter of it.”
E.J. Dionne: “Here’s the mistake made by President Obama and the Democrats that nobody is talking about: They have been too fearful of confronting our country’s three-year obsession with the wrong problem.”
“And here is the tea party’s greatest victory: It has made the wrong problem the center of policymaking.”
“The wrong problem is the deficit. The right problem is sluggish growth and persistent unemployment.”
The Republican National Committee “is taking a drastically different approach to spending its money in the upcoming mid-term elections next year, putting up more money early on in the campaigns to build the party’s grassroots rather than stockpile its cash until the final days of the election as it has been in the past,” the Washington Examiner reports.
“Now, instead of spending primarily on television ads and get-out-the-vote operations during the election’s final 90 days, the RNC says it is investing in consistent outreach to minority communities, and bulking up on its field and digital operations.”
Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) told Bloomberg that Hillary Clinton was an “outstanding” secretary of state — with the exception of her handling of the attacks in Benghazi, Libya, last year.
Said McCain: “I don’t think there’s any doubt she has widespread support. Her work as secretary of state, with the exception of this issue of Benghazi — which isn’t going away — I think has been outstanding. I think she would be viewed by anyone, Republican or Democrat, as a very formidable candidate for 2016.”
Roll Call: “Two pivotal conference committees could test the post-shutdown theory that now is the time for both parties and chambers to finally come to the table and resolve their differences.”
“The high-profile conferences on the budget and the farm bill could serve as the primary sites of legislative activity, but it’s not yet clear how much of either conference’s inner workings the public will get to see.”
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) threatened “to throw a wrench into Senate operations over the investigation of last year’s attack on Americans in Benghazi, Libya,” Roll Call reports.
“The Republican could cause a bottleneck for routine executive branch appointments that require Senate confirmation on which Senate Democrats wouldn’t want to burn through the time needed to overcome an objection.”
Businessweek ranks the states where Republicans may be most vulnerable in the 2014 midterm elections.
The most vulnerable states: Pennsylvania, Ohio, North Carolina, Michigan, Virginia, New Jersey, Indiana, South Carolina and Wisconsin.
“Bill Clinton, he makes a lot of money making speeches. And he changes a lot of lives with his speeches. I watch him. I learn. If you can get people to listen, they will react.”
— Red Sox slugger David Ortiz, quoted by ESPN, when asked about his motivational speech in the dugout during last night’s World Series game.
New York Times:
“New details about the monitoring of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s
cellphone by the National Security Agency further stoked the German
government’s anger on Sunday and raised two questions: Why did the
United States target her as early as 2002, and why did it take five
years for the Obama administration to put a halt to the surveillance?”
First Read: “It’s now eight days until Election Day 2013, and the featured Virginia and gubernatorial contests each pose a central question. In Virginia, the question is no longer will Democratic Terry McAuliffe win; it’s whether there will be a Democratic sweep (governor, lieutenant governor, and attorney general). And in New Jersey, the question isn’t whether Gov. Chris Christie (R) will win re-election; it’s how big his margin will be and if his all-but-certain victory will allow him to run up impressive results among women, minorities, and younger voters in the exit polls. But there’s an even bigger story in next week’s Virginia and New Jersey gubernatorial races: You’re seeing the two different halves of the Republican Party on full display.”
“For everyone who talks about wanting to win elections in 2014,
particularly in an off year, a non-presidential year — nothing,
nothing, nothing, nothing matters more than an energized and active
vocal grassroots America. That’s how you get elected.”
— Sen. Ted Cruz (R-IA), quoted by NBC News, saying moderation isn’t going to win the GOP more seats.
AP:
“The Obama administration will face intense pressure next week to be
more forthcoming about how many people have actually succeeded in
enrolling for coverage in the new insurance markets. Medicare chief
Marilyn Tavenner is to testify during a House hearing Tuesday, followed
Wednesday by Sebelius before the House Energy and Commerce Committee.”
Meanwhile, the New York Times reports
economists and policy wonks behind the Affordable Care Act worry that
the technical problems bedeviling the federal portal could become much
more than an inconvenience. If young applicants “decide to put off or
give up on buying coverage, rising prices and even a destabilized
insurance market could result.”
“The most urgent question Hillary Clinton would face if she were to run again for president is whether she could avoid the blunders — the bitter staff rivalries going public, the poisonous relationship with the press, the presumption of inevitability — that helped doom her campaign five years ago,” Politico reports.
“There’s one powerful piece of evidence that she could — her own bid for New York senator in 2000… It’s easy to forget just how precarious a venture Clinton was embarking on back then. The Clintons were fresh from the impeachment battle. The first lady was one the most polarizing figures in the country, surrounded by an international media swarm. The early betting was she couldn’t break through the protective bubble of Secret Service agents and advisers to forge a meaningful connection with voters.”
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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