In the mail: Rule and Ruin: The Downfall of Moderation and the Destruction of the Republican Party, From Eisenhower to the Tea Party by Geoffrey Kabaservice.
Has Jeb’s Time Come?
Jon Meacham: “Those who think that ‘Bush Fatigue’ is preemptively fatal to Jeb’s chances may be underestimating the American affinity for brand names.”
“The speculation about a Bush bid in 2016 tells us a lot about one of the handful of truly influential American families and more than a little bit about the country that family has helped shape. Jeb long ago internalized and then lived out his family’s guiding precepts. Bushes move to new parts of the country; they work hard; they learn from their mistakes, particularly from failed campaigns; and they never, ever give up… the Bushes aren’t kings; in management speak, they’re a line of related products that most Americans recognize and have chosen on three (1988, 2000 and 2004) of the four occasions they’ve been on offer.”
“It’s possible that the choice will come down to the Bushes and another familiar American product: the Clintons. Perhaps the two clans will soon join Lancashire and York, Gladstone and Disraeli, Fitzgerald and Hemingway, and the Yankees and the Red Sox as one of history’s great rivalries.”
The Outrage Industry
Coming soon: The Outrage Industry: Political Opinion Media and the New Incivility by Jeffrey M. Berry and Sarah Sobieraj.
Tea Party Turns on Rubio
Dana Milbank: “Much of the scene was
familiar: the yellow flags, the banners protesting tyranny and
socialism, the demands to impeach President Obama and to repeal
Obamacare. But there was a new target of the conservatives’ ire: Sen.
Marco Rubio (R-FL) and his ‘amnesty’ plan for illegal immigrants. The
loathing of this onetime darling of the movement — Rubio rode the tea
party wave to office in 2010 — could be seen in the homemade signs on
the East Lawn of the Capitol proclaiming, ‘Rubio RINO’ (Republican In
Name Only) and ‘Rubio Lies, Americans Die.’ Rubio antagonism became a
main theme of the event.”
Inside the Obama Campaign’s Cave
The New York Times magazine has a must-read piece on the Obama re-election campaign’s digital team and how they’re now cashing in on their experience.
“Political marketing has usually lagged behind commercial marketing. Companies that spend billions of dollars a year developing ways to make many more billions of dollars a year tend to have little to learn from presidential campaigns, which are generally start-ups aimed at a one-day sale. But the (re)selling of the president, 2012, was an entirely different matter. The campaign recruited the best young minds in the booming fields of analytics and behavioral science and placed them in a room they called ‘the cave’ for up to 16 hours a day over the course of roughly 16 months. After the election, when the technology wizards finally came out, they had not only helped produce a victory that defied a couple of historical predictors; they also developed a host of highly effective marketing techniques that were either entirely new or had never been tried on such a grand scale.”
Cruz’s Father Bribed Official to Enter the United States
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) frequently points to his father’s experience leaving Cuba as shaping his views on immigration: “In my opinion, if we allow those who are here illegally to be put on a path to citizenship, that is incredibly unfair to those who follow the rules.”
But even though the elder Cruz tells NPR he “came to this country legally” he also notes he “basically bribed a Batista official to stamp my passport with an exit permit.”
Quote of the Day
“I was having a look around to see how bad it would be to live there. And I concluded it was really bad to live there — traffic is bad, weather is worse. Most of the people you talk to are frauds. You know.”
— Former Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer (D), in an interview with Roll Call, as he mulls a U.S. Senate bid.
Perry Will Decide This Month on Re-Election Bid
Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) said he would make a decision to run again for governor before July 1, Bloomberg reports.
He added: “Later in the year, if there’s more expansive plans than that we’ll announce at the appropriate time.”
Senators Reach Deal on Border Amendment
“A bipartisan group of senators are expected to announce they have reached an agreement to strengthen border security in the Senate’s immigration bill, a breakthrough that could pave the way for a significant number of GOP senators to support the comprehensive legislation,” NBC News reports.
First Read notes “the compromise talks have been aimed at winning over enough GOP votes to
pass a comprehensive immigration reform bill with an overwhelming
majority of senators — without angering Democrats who want to make sure
that the path to citizenship included for undocumented immigrants isn’t
affected.”
Obama Will Propose Limits to Power Plan Emissions
President Obama “is preparing regulations limiting carbon dioxide emissions from existing power plants… The move would be the most consequential climate policy step he could take and one likely to provoke legal challenges from Republicans and some industries,” the New York Times reports.
The Big Accomplishment of the Do-Nothing Congress
Molly Ball: “Perhaps, like approximately 80 percent of Americans, you disapprove of Congress. Beholding the nation’s capital, you are apt to see a sleazy, gridlocked mess, a Boschian hellscape of partisan acrimony and special-interest greed. Ever since Republicans won the House of Representatives in 2010, President Obama’s policy agenda has ground to a halt, and hopes of addressing the nation’s pressing issues through federal legislation have been dashed.”
“But the ironic thing is that, by virtue of its very do-nothingness, the do-nothing Congress got a big thing done. First, in the fiscal-cliff deal struck around the new year, wealthy Americans’ income-tax rates went up, a policy change long sought by the president and his party. Then, in March, the budget ax known as sequestration fell, chopping $1 trillion from federal spending over the next decade–a cherished goal for fiscal conservatives.”
“More revenue plus less spending equals a lower deficit. A much lower one.”
Ministry Apologizes to Gay Community and Shuts Down
Exodus International, the Christian ministry known for its “pray away the gay” therapy for homosexuals, issued an apology “for years of undue judgment by the organization and the Christian Church as a whole.”
The group also announced it was closing down after 37 years.
Said President Alan Chambers: “Exodus is an institution in the conservative Christian world, but we’ve ceased to be a living, breathing organism. For quite some time we’ve been imprisoned in a worldview that’s neither honoring toward our fellow human beings, nor biblical.”
The Week: Is this the end of “ex-gay” conversion therapy?
Border Activist Arrested for Child Molestation
Christopher Allen Simcox, a former border activist who ran for U.S. Senate, was arrested by police and accused of sexual conduct involving three girls younger than 10 years old, the Arizona Republic reports.
“Simcox was a lightning-rod leader in Arizona’s immigration debate, founding the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps and organizing members to conduct civilian border patrols.”
North Carolina Seeks to Restart Executions
North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory (R) “signed the repeal of a law that has allowed death row inmates to seek a reduced sentence if they could prove racial bias affected their punishment,” Reuters reports.
“The Racial Justice Act, the only law of its kind in the United States, had led to four inmates getting their sentences changed to life in prison without parole after taking effect in 2009. Supporters said the historic measure addressed the state’s long record of racial injustice in its capital punishment system, while critics said it caused unnecessary costs and delays after nearly all death-row inmates, including whites, sought relief under the act.”
Jackson Says Government Hurt Black Families More Than Slavery
Virginia Lt. Gov candidate E.W. Jackson (R) said that Americans “should remember” the country’s history of slavery, but “not wallow in it,” the Hampton Roads Daily Press reports.
He stressed that it was “not slavery that eroded the black family but government policies in the 1960s.”
Said Jackson: “In 1960 most black children were raised in two parent monogamous families. By now, by this time, we only have 20 percent of black children being raised in two parent monogamous families with a married man and woman raising those children. It wasn’t slavery that did that. It was government that did that trying to solve problems that only God can solve, and that only we as human beings can solve.”
The Quick Fall of Bob McDonnell
Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell’s (R) “evolution from Republican up-and-comer to the center of an FBI and grand jury investigation is bewildering to political observers and a potentially significant loss for his party,” Jill Lawrence reports.
“As recently as March, McDonnell was seen as so likely to run for the Republican presidential nomination that an anti-tax group ran an ad against him in Iowa, where caucuses launch the primary season every four years. But the investigations into an unreported $15,000 gift from a major donor, along with reports of improper billing and staff use at the executive mansion in Richmond, are a serious, possibly insurmountable obstacle to being on a national ticket.”
GOP Invisible Primary Begins
National Journal: “They swear they’re focused on more-immediate projects. They insist a White House campaign is the furthest thing from their minds. But with the 2016 invisible primary well under way, some Republican candidates are already lining up the campaign managers they will turn to if and when they decide to run for president.”
Schweitzer Reaches Out to Team Baucus
Brian Schweitzer (D) won a second term as Montana governor in 2008 “with nearly two-thirds of the vote, and he remained popular as he moved out of the governor’s mansion in January. But his style and perceived not-a-team-player attitude after eight years in Helena has rubbed numerous people in both parties the wrong way,” Roll Call reports.
“That includes — but is hardly limited to — the inner circle of retiring Democratic Sen. Max Baucus. According to several Montana Democrats — who all hope he runs and wins — Schweitzer’s campaign planning has included extending olive branches to a Baucus political apparatus he’ll likely need.”
