Former Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA), who declined to run in the special U.S. Senate election in Massachusetts, told Fox 25 that he would be able to win the seat if he had run.
Said Brown: “Yeah, I do. I could beat Ed Markey, absolutely.”
Dean Would Consider Another Presidential Bid
Howard Dean told CNN that he would consider another run for the White House.
Said Dean: “I am not driven by my own ambition. What I am driven by is pushing the country in a direction that it desperately needs to be pushed; pushing other politicians who aren’t quite as frank as I am who need to be more candid with the American people about what needs to happen. I am not trying to hedge, it’s a hard job running. It’s really tough. I am doing a lot of things I really enjoy. But you should never say never in this business.”
He added: “If you had to put a gun to my head and make me decide right now, I
wouldn’t. But who
knows?”
How Jay Carney Dodges Questions
A Yahoo News analysis of the 444 briefings that White House press secretary Jay Carney has held since becoming spokesman has identified 13 distinct strains in the way he dodges a reporter’s question.
Cuomo Target of Death Ray Plot by KKK
A federal criminal complaint says self-proclaimed Ku Klux Klansman Glen Hubbard “was planning to use a radiation-emitting device to attack a Muslim organization, a political party and a political figure,” the New York Daily News reports.
Sources say the unnamed political figure was Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D).
New Jersey Preps for Election Bonanza
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) “is ready to hire more state workers and rent extra voting machines to avoid any last-minute chaos between New Jersey’s two major elections this year,” the Newark Star Ledger reports.
“Christie called a special Senate election for Oct. 16 at an estimated cost of $12 million — a price tag that would rise if the Republican governor goes through with any of the backup plans his staff described to the court.”
“The date for the Senate election — 20 days before the Nov. 5 vote for governor and for all the seats in the Legislature — has rankled Democrats who said Christie could have combined the two elections but chose to spend millions to split them and boost his re-election chances.”
Illinois GOP Official Resigns Over Remarks
Downstate Illinois GOP county chairman Jim Allen resigned after likening former Miss America Erika Harold (R), who’s challenging a sitting Republican congressman in next year’s primary election, to a “street walker” whose “pimps” were Democrats and moderate Republicans, the Chicago Tribune reports.
The Newest Senator
The Newark Star Ledger profiles Sen. Jeffrey Chiesa (R-NJ), “an affable career prosecutor appointed by Gov. Chris Christie (R) to watch over the late Sen. Frank Lautenberg’s (D) seat until mid-October.”
“Chiesa is relying on a hybrid staff — made up of former employees at the attorney general’s office, people he hired when he was Christie’s chief counsel, and veteran Washington hands like Ken Lundberg, former communications director for recently retired Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-ME) — to helps him navigate the Capitol’s secret passageways, centuries-old rules and the current blizzard of bills.”
Low Turnout Indicator for Massachusetts Race
Requests for absentee ballots in next Tuesday’s special U.S. Senate election have slipped 22% from the January 2010 special election, the Boston Globe reports.
Secretary of State William F. Galvin’s office said he was “extremely concerned” about the level of voter participation in the race between Ed Markey (D) and Gabriel Gomez (R).
Lawmaker Who Claimed Bombings Were Faked Quits
New Hampshire state Rep. Stella Tremblay (R) resigned from the New Hampshire House of Representatives abruptly a day after she made another allegation the Boston Marathon bombing might have been a government conspiracy, WMUR-TV reports.
The Selling of Obamacare
Time: “Though Barack Obama has competed in his last election, he has one more campaign ahead of him. This fall, Obamacare will go into full effect, with the promise of insuring as many as 40 million Americans if it succeeds. But it could still fail.”
“To prevent that, Obama-land is going on offense. Organizing for Action, the grassroots group spun out of the President’s campaign, has made selling the already-passed bill a top priority with its first television ad. Enroll America, a nonprofit coalition of community groups and insurers that has been promoted by the White House and is staffed by Obama campaign alumni, launched its “Get Covered America” campaign to educate uninsured Americans about the exchanges.”
Bonus Quote of the Day
“He’s the first one to give it to the people without providing Vaseline.”
— Maine Gov. Paul LePage (R), quoted by the Bangor Daily News, on Democratic rival Troy Jackson (D) who he said has a “black heart” and should go back in the woods “and let someone with a brain come down here and do some good work.”
Bush’s Ancestor Was a Slave Trader
Slate: “Twelve American presidents owned slaves, eight while serving in office, and at least 25 presidents count slave owners among their ancestors. But new historical evidence shows that a direct ancestor of George W. and George H.W. Bush was part of a much more appalling group: Thomas Walker was a notorious slave trader active in the late 18th century along the coast of West Africa.”
“Walker, George H.W. Bush’s great-great-great grandfather, was the captain of, master of, or investor in at least 11 slaving voyages to West Africa between 1784 and 1792.”
Farm Bill Defeated in Blow to Boehner
The House defeated the farm bill resoundingly on a 195-234 vote, “dealing a blow to Speaker John A. Boehner and prompting a bitter round of finger pointing between Democratic and Republican leaders,” Roll Call reports.
“Most Democrats opposed the bill, unhappy with a deep $20.5 billion, 10-year cut to food stamps and backed by a White House veto threat, while Republicans split into competing factions, with a sizable group opposing the bill over concerns it did not cut deeply enough.”
The Downfall of Moderation
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.”
