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Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-OK) told KRMG that he’s running for re-election and made his decision just hours after the November presidential election.
Said Inhofe: “I went home and I talked to my wife and I said you know we’ve got a serious problem here, we’re going to have this guy around for four more years. I just can’t bail out now.”
Pete Rouse, a former White House chief of staff and arguably President Obama’s “most-trusted West Wing adviser, has told friends he will be leaving the administration this fall,” Politico reports.
“The white-thatched Rouse, 67, occupies a unique niche in Obama’s tight-knit world. He’s a reassuring problem solver, one of Obama’s few congressional fixers and, in his role as counselor, serves as a both mentor and sounding board to a president who keeps his circle small and confidences close.”
A new Fox News poll finds 42% of Americans approve of the job President Obama is doing while 52% disapprove.
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Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) tells Time how he won his election to the U.S. Senate:
“There were two campaigns on which we modeled our campaign for Senate, and they were Obama’s campaign for president in 2008 and Marco Rubio’s campaign for Senate in 2010. If you look at that 2008 Democratic primary, there was no more formidable, unstoppable candidate – other than an incumbent president – in modern times than Hillary Clinton. And Barack Obama ran a guerrilla campaign that empowered the people. So for Christmas I gave a number of campaign staffers David Plouffe’s book, The Audacity to Win.'”
National Journal: “Immigration-reform activists aren’t supposed to talk publicly about a “Plan B.” They can’t, or won’t, answer questions from the media about what they will do if no bill passes this year to legalize the undocumented population. But as August wears on and there is no clear sense of what the House will do on immigration, some are starting to speak out.”
“The idea behind the “other track” is to freeze the current undocumented population in place through an administrative order, give them work permits, and hope for a better deal under the next president, with the hope that he or she is a Democrat. It’s a significant gamble, but some advocates–particularly those outside of the Washington legislative bartering system–argue that it’s better than what they stand to see under the legislation being discussed now.”
A new Quinnipiac poll in New Jersey finds Gov. Chris Christie (R) crushing challenger Barbara Buono (D) in the gubernatorial race, 58% to 30%.
“Although he has vowed to fight on, Silvio Berlusconi’s conviction for tax fraud has fuelled speculation that his eldest daughter Marina, head of his $6.6 billion business empire, could take his place as leader of the center-right in Italy,” Reuters reports.
Michael Crowley highlights several recent contentious exchanges between Associated Press writer Mathew Lee and State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki.
Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan (R) said that he “never had any intentions to step down even as his daughter, Attorney General Lisa Madigan, weighed a possible bid for governor,” the Chicago Tribune reports.
The statement “adds some less-than-flattering context to his daughter’s assertion last month that she ‘never planned to run for governor” while her father served as speaker.”
Said Madigan: “Lisa and I had spoken about that on several occastions, and she knew very well that I did not plan to retire. She knew what my position was. She knew.”
Rep. Rodney Alexander (R-LA) “isn’t wasting any time leaving Congress. The Louisiana Republican is expected to be appointed to Gov. Bobby Jindal’s cabinet at an event this afternoon,” Roll Call reports.
His appointment as the new head of the Louisiana Department of Veteran Affairs “will likely lead Alexander to resign from Congress, rather than simply retire at the end of his term. And that would mean another special election in the House.”
Noam Scheiber says that Democrats, who have an enormous advantage in upcoming presidential elections, shouldn’t have to worry about eliminating the filibuster in the U.S. Senate.
“The point is just that, if you’re predicting who benefits from a filibuster-less world based on where we sit today, the odds favor Democrats because of the odds they’ll generally control the presidency.”
“More to the point, Democrats don’t even have to do away with the filibuster to exploit this advantage. The very fact that eliminating the filibuster is likely to benefit Democrats should strengthen their hand in any confrontation with Republicans over nominees and legislation–like, say, Obama’s three DC appeals court candidates. That’s because, once Democrats recognize that killing the filibuster is in their interest, they should become much more willing to do it, knowing full well that they can live with the consequences.”
The spurned mistress of Australian Liberal National Party MP Peter Dowling has written to parliament “detailing their sexual relations and pointing out where she believes the backbencher has misused his entitlements,” The Australian reports.
“The letter, tabled in parliament yesterday, follows the revelation Mr Dowling had sent text messages to the woman of pornographic images of himself, including one in which his penis is in a glass of red wine.”
The Brisbane Times has Dowling’s reaction: “I am not proud of the events plastered all over today’s paper. And I can’t and won’t defend any part of it.”
A new Public Policy Polling survey in Georgia finds Gov. Nathan Deal (R) in good shape for a second term.
Deal leads Stacey Abrams (D), 37% to 34%, tops Jason Carter (D), 48% to 33%, and crushes Scott Holbomb (D), 48% to 28%.
Eliot Spitzer (D) “is unleashing a pair of new television ads Wednesday in the New York City comptroller’s race framing himself as an anti-establishment populist, a theme he has been hitting on the campaign trail since unexpectedly jumping into the race last month,” CNN reports.
“Both of the 30-second ads are titled ‘You,’ and portray Spitzer as a champion of working people standing up against special interests, corporations and Wall Street – “an independent voice,” as Spitzer’s campaign has taken to describing the former governor and attorney general.”
A new study finds that Democratic-leaning newspapers — i.e. those with a higher propensity to endorse Democratic candidates in elections — provide relatively more coverage of scandals involving Republican politicians than scandals involving Democratic politicians, while Republican-leaning newspapers tend to do the opposite.
“As the first-in-the-nation, you will have a big role in choosing our next nominee for president. My guess is that every one of the contenders would be better than whoever the Democrats put up. But there will only be one or perhaps two who actually could win the election in November.”
— Mitt Romney, quoted by CNN, urging New Hampshire Republicans to pick someone who can win in 2016.
Although the new WMUR poll in New Hampshire shows Hillary Clinton (D) and Chris Christie (R) topping their parties in a 2016 presidential primary, the most interesting finding of the poll is that Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) has slipped dramatically from his first place showing a few months ago.
President Obama appeared on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno and talked about his recent lunch with Hillary Clinton:
OBAMA: “I invited her. … She had that post-administration glow…. By the end of my first term, we had become genuinely close and I could not have more respect for her. She was a great Secretary of State, and I’m very, very proud of the work she did.”
LENO: “Did you notice her measuring the drapes or anything like that?”
OBAMA: “No. Keep in mind, she’s been there before. … So she doesn’t have to measure them.”
The Week: 7 takeaways from Obama’s interview with Leno.
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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