New York Times: “That Mrs. Clinton is more hawkish than Mr. Obama is no surprise to anyone who watched a Democratic primary debate in 2008. Her policy differences with the president are well-documented: She favored supplying arms to moderate Syrian rebels, leaving behind a larger residual force in Iraq, and waiting longer before pulling American support for Egypt’s former President Hosni Mubarak during the historic protests in Cairo.”

“What has changed is her readiness to surface those differences and put them in the context of a different worldview… Mrs. Clinton is suggesting that she and the president hold fundamentally different views of American power: his view cautious, inward-looking, suffused with a sense of limits; hers muscular, optimistic, unabashedly old-fashioned.”

Despite extensive media coverage about U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara’s investigation into Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s (D) now defunct Moreland Commission, a new Siena Poll finds Cuomo leads challenger Rob Astorino by a whopping 32 points, down a little from 37-points three weeks ago.

National Journal: “Every four years, presidential hopefuls flock to the Iowa State University campus in August to court a small handful of Iowans for the storied Ames straw poll. But if they got their own ballot, some of those candidates might vote to scrap the whole exercise. As would-be 2016 entrants head to Iowa … and presidential jockeying begins in earnest, Hawkeye State Republicans are genuinely unsure about what will happen to their famed event by the time next August rolls around. Most expect to see big changes at the very least, and potentially no straw poll at all.”

A new Boston Globe poll in Massachusetts finds Martha Coakley (D) leading Charlie Baker (R) in the gubernatorial race by double-digits, 42% to 31%.

Coakley is also way ahead of Steve Grossman (D) in the Democratic primary, 45% to 18%.

Des Moines Register: “A nine-hour summit of Christian conservative activists on Saturday was the first big Iowa cattle call of potential presidential candidates of the 2016 season — and Iowans’ first opportunity to directly compare five Republicans as they spoke, back to back, on the same stage.”

“She has accomplished a lot of very positive things in her career, but I’m not quite sure that the political process is one in which we anoint people.”

— Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), in an interview with Yahoo News, critical of the seeming coronation of Hillary Clinton for president.

A new We Ask America poll in Illinois finds Bruce Rauner (R) way ahead of Gov. Pat Quinn (D) in the governor’s race, 51% to 38%, with 11% still undecided.

A new Gravis Marketing poll has Rauner ahead 48% to 40%.

“One of five cities bidding for the Democratic National Convention, Philadelphia appears to hold an early edge with a track record of hosting the major gathering — not to mention that Hillary Rodham Clinton and Vice President Joe Biden have family ties to the state,” the AP reports.

“The original U.S. capital and now the nation’s fifth largest city, Philadelphia touts its historical significance. It has hosted the presidential nominating convention seven times since 1856, most recently the Republican one in 2000.”