A new Quinnipiac poll in Ohio finds Gov. John Kasich (R) has a 42% to 35% job approval rating — his first positive rating since he took office — but voters still say he does not deserve a second term by a 44% to 37% margin.
Become a member to get many great benefits -- exclusive analysis, trending news, a private podcast, no ads and more!
Fiscal Cliff Talks Get Serious
The White House and House Speaker John Boehner’s office held more negotiations on on ways to break the stalemate over the “fiscal cliff,” Reuters reports.
The Wall Street Journal reports talks “have progressed steadily in recent days, people close to the process said, breathing life into talks that appeared to have stalled… The people familiar with the matter say talks have taken a marked shift in recent days as staff and leaders have consulted, becoming more ‘serious.’ Both sides have agreed to keep details private, according to the people, who declined to detail where new ground was being broken.”
Meanwhile, Bloomberg notes President Obama has softened his rhetoric about Republicans which “coincides with an acceleration of private
meetings and discussions with the clock ticking down on the
deadline for a deal.”
Wonk Wire: What to expect if we go over the cliff.
The Biggest Political Story of 2012
Dan Froomkin: “Post-mortems of contemporary election coverage typically include regrets about horserace journalism, he-said-she-said stenography, and the lack of enlightening stories about the issues.”
“But according to longtime political observers Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein, campaign coverage in 2012 was a particularly calamitous failure, almost entirely missing the single biggest story of the race: Namely, the radical right-wing, off-the-rails lurch of the Republican Party, both in terms of its agenda and its relationship to the truth.”
McCain to Join Foreign Relations Committee
Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) told The Cable that he will join the Senate Foreign Relations Committee ahead of confirmation hearings for whomever President Obama nominates to replace Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
NBC News: “U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice is reportedly a finalist for Secretary of State. McCain has been a main critic of Rice’s, stemming from her appearances on Sunday shows following the attacks in Benghazi that killed four Americans, including an ambassador. But McCain’s move may not be all about Rice. Because of Republican Conference rules, he is term-limited as ranking member of the Armed Services Committee.”
RNC to Investigate What Went Wrong
The RNC “is rolling out a plan to review what worked and what didn’t for the party in the 2012 cycle,” Politico reports.
“The plan is to focus on: campaign mechanics, fundraising, demographics, messaging, outside groups, campaign finance, the national primary process and, last but not least, what the successful Democratic efforts revealed about the way forward, and recommend plans for the way forward.”
However, BuzzFeed reports that two of the people leading the effort — former Bush spokesman Ari
Fleischer and Republican committeeman Henry Barbour — pushed the
narrative that the polls were skewed, and Mitt Romney would ultimately
prevail.
Renegade Dems Give GOP Budget Control in Washington
Two Democrats in the Washington state Senate abandoned their caucus, “vowing to work with Republicans to control the chamber and push conservative budgeting principles,” the AP reports.
“Under the new plan, Republicans will chair six committees, including the
panel that controls the state budget. Democrats will control another
six committees while the parties will co-chair three others.”
Haley Will Not Appoint Placeholder
South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley (R) said that she would not appoint a “placeholder” to fill the seat of Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) when he leaves in January, the Washington Post reports.
The announcement bolsters speculation that Haley will appoint Rep. Tim Scott (R-SC), “a well-liked conservative with ambitions for higher office.”
A new Public Policy Polling survey in South Carolina finds Stephen Colbert tops the list of who voters would like to
see appointed at 20%, followed by Tim Scott at 15%, Trey Gowdy at
14%, Jenny Sanford at 11%, Henry McMaster and Mark Sanford at 8%, Jeff
Duncan and Joe Wilson at 5%, and Mick Mulvaney at 4%.
The Coming Conservative Revolt
Jonathan Chait: “In the immediate wake of the election, Republicans felt so
stunned — in no small part because they had deluded themselves into
expecting victory — that it seemed momentarily possible that the party’s
long march to the right may halt or even reverse. But the future of the
party is already taking shape, and that future will be, in some form or
fashion, a conservative reaction against the Republican leadership that
has sold them out. The smarter Republicans have already shaken off the
trauma of electoral defeat and begun positioning themselves to
capitalize.”
Jindal Aides Use Personal Email to Avoid Scrutiny
Top officials in Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal’s (R) administration “used personal email accounts to craft a media strategy for imposing hundreds of millions of dollars in Medicaid cuts — a method of communication that can make it more difficult to track under public records laws despite Jindal’s pledge to bring more transparency to state government,” the AP reports.
The Dick Morris Scam?
Paul Waldman takes another look at Dick Morris and his Super PAC, “an organization whose entire
purpose is to raise money, and its expenditures involve raising money and finding new donors. And not, say, getting Mitt Romney elected.”
“Perhaps there’s a more innocent explanation for all this, but the way it looks is that 1) People (should we call them ‘marks’?) donate money to Morris’ super PAC; 2) he pays that money to Newsmax for ‘fundraising’; then 3) Newsmax turns around and pays the money back to Morris, for access to his list of donors. Perhaps Newsmax takes a cut, or perhaps the list is their cut, because these people can then become marks for all kinds of future scams.”
The Destructive Role of Big Money
Wonk Wire highlights how money is still ruining elections even if it isn’t necessarily deciding them.
Why Republicans Will Cave on Tax Rates
Byron York: “First, many in the GOP do not believe that
raising the rate on top earners from 35 percent to 39.6 percent (the
rate before the Bush tax cuts) would seriously damage the economy.
Second, they know that most Americans approve of higher taxes on the top
bracket, and President Obama, having campaigned and won on that
platform, seems dead-set on higher rates. Third, they fear that if the
government does go over the cliff and Democrats propose re-lowering
taxes for everyone except the highest earners, Republicans would be in
the impossible position of resisting tax cuts for 98 percent of the
country on behalf of the top 2 percent.“
Cuomo Refuses to Say if He Would Back Clinton
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) refused to get pinned down on whether he would endorse Hillary Clinton if she runs for president in 2016, Politicker reports.
Said Cuomo: “There’s a long way away. We just elected a president… There’s no doubt that she’s incredibly popular, she’s got incredible support….She’s going to have to make her decision.”
Quote of the Day
“I don’t think the Republican Party schooled their candidates very well or supported their candidates very well… We had a lot of candidates quite frankly that did dumb things out there.”
— Former House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-TX), in an interview with CBS News, blaming Republican leaders for the party’s losses across the country in 2012.
Boehner Worries About Possible Challenge
Should a deal to avert the fiscal cliff “go sour,” National Review reports the buzz is that Rep. Tom Price (R-GA) may challenge House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) for the speaker’s gavel.
Said one aide close to the House leadership: “Price is the person we’re all watching. We know he’s frustrated, but we don’t know much else.”
The Obama Campaign Heroes
Rolling Stone profiles the ten key operatives who helped President Obama win re-election.
Majority See No Deal on Fiscal Cliff
Even as progress is reported in the fiscal cliff negotiations, a new poll for The Hill finds a clear majority of voters expect President Obama and Congress will fail to reach a deal, 58% to 39%.
First Read: “If the plan is to get something passed by Friday, Dec. 21 (right before
the Christmas holiday), then the legislation has to be written by Dec.
18. And that means that Obama and Boehner must reach an agreement by
Dec. 14-15, if there’s going to be a deal. So the time for posturing and
P.R. is over.”
The Rahmfather
NBC Chicago reports “mob-related questions” keep coming in connection with a company awarded a $99 million custodial contract at O’Hare International Airport while Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanual “skirted questions” over the process for awarding the contract.
