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First Read notes that just after Terry McAuliffe (D) released a “warm and fuzzy TV ad showing him, among other things, in the delivery room when one of his children was born” came a Buzzfeed bombshell:
“McAuliffe also wrote about the birth of his children in his 2007 book What A Party, noting on one instance he left his wife at the hospital to attend a party for Washington Post reporter Lloyd Grove before the birth of his daughter Sarah.”
Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) writes in the Philadelphia Inquirer that President Obama was “misleading” and making “untrue” statements about Obamacare and its implementation in his news conference this week.
“The president has refused repeated Republican calls to take concerns about Obamacare public and prepare the American people for the changes ahead. In fact, on Tuesday, he actually chose to do the exact opposite, saying that ‘this thing’s already happened’ for most Americans. ‘Full stop, that’s it… they don’t have to worry about anything else.’ Well, that’s simply untrue, and that kind of misleading statement is only going to cause more Americans to be blindsided when more pieces of the law start to take effect.”
A new Quinnipiac poll finds Hillary Clinton has a huge lead over other potential 2016 candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination with 65%, followed by Joe Biden at 13% and Andrew Cuomo at 4%.
Said pollster Peter Brown: “Hillary Clinton has a rock-solid hold on the hearts of Democratic voters at this point. If she decides not to run, Vice President Joseph Biden does almost as well as she does against the rest of the field. There is a long way to go until 2016, but none of the other younger potential candidates for the Democratic nomination currently has anything approaching widespread support from party voters.”
“Then, my first gut reaction seeing the horror of that person that has their legs blown off. You know, the bone sticking out? He was not in shock. I looked and I thought there’s something… I don’t know what’s wrong, but it seems surreal to me. I talked to my sister, who’s not into politics at all, and she said, yes, I saw the same thing. He was not in shock. He was not in pain. If I had had those type of injuries, I’d be screaming in agony.”
— New Hampshire state Rep. Stella Tremblay (R), in an interview with Pete Santilli, suggesting “there’s something wrong here” in the official explanation behind the Boston bombings.
“Iowa’s Supreme Court chief justice will appoint an independent investigator with full subpoena powers to probe alleged ethics and criminal violations by Iowa state Sen. Kent Sorenson, who is accused of being paid to work on U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann’s 2012 presidential campaign,” the Minneapolis Star Tribune reports.
“In a 4-2 bipartisan vote, the Iowa Senate Ethics Committee voted Wednesday to request that an independent counsel investigate two charges against Sorenson. The investigator also will look into allegations that Sorenson stole a private database of home-school families from the personal computer of another Bachmann campaign worker, then used it to solicit campaign support from thousands of home-school families in Iowa.”
“Detroit has agreed to spend nearly $14 million since December to contract nine firms to provide a range of financial and legal services to help the city overcome its staggering deficit and costly long-term liabilities.” the Detroit Free Press reports.
“More than $3 million of that came in hiring emergency manager Kevyn Orr’s former law firm last month.”
“Making official what many Democrats have expected for weeks, President Obama plans to nominate Chicago business executive Penny Pritzker, a longtime political supporter and heavyweight fundraiser, as his new Commerce secretary this morning,” the Chicago Tribune reports.
“Pritzker’s nomination could prove controversial. She is on the board of Chicago-based Hyatt Hotels Corp., which was founded by her wealthy family and has had rocky relations with labor unions, and she could face questions about the failure of a bank partly owned by her family.”
The Washington Post reports Obama will also name economic adviser Michael Froman as U.S. Trade Representative.
Alaska Gov. Sean Parnell (R) will announce his plans for 2014 on Friday, the AP reports.
“He could seek re-election. Parnell inherited the governor’s office when Sarah Palin resigned in 2009 and won it in his own right in 2010. But he’s also been mentioned as a possible challenger to Democratic U.S. Sen. Mark Begich.”
Karl Rove: “The GOP has an outside chance of a Senate majority. To win, Republicans must also offer a compelling and substantive agenda for America’s economy, jobs, health care and fiscal situation that attract discerning independents (and the occasional disgruntled Democrats) on whom victory will depend. 2014 represents a great opportunity for Republicans: they’d better not let it get away.”
President Obama “is warning liberal supporters that their push to make changes in a comprehensive immigration bill could jeopardize the strategy of Senate leaders, who are aiming to win up to 70 votes for the measure,” the Washington Post reports.
“The efforts underscore the perilous path ahead for a comprehensive immigration deal, which is one of Obama’s top agenda items for his second term but faces mounting criticism from those on both the left and right.”
Michael Tomasky: “How stupid does the Senate background-check vote look now, I ask the pundits and others who thought it was dumb politics for Obama and the Democrats to push for a vote that they obviously knew they were going to lose. I’d say not very stupid at all. The nosedive taken in the polls by a number of senators who voted against the bill, most of them in red states, makes public sentiment here crystal clear. And now, for the first time since arguably right after the Reagan assassination attempt–a damn long time, in other words–legislators in Washington are feeling political heat on guns that isn’t coming from the NRA. This bill will come back to the Senate, maybe before the August recess, and it already seems possible and maybe even likely to have 60 votes next time.”
Stu Rothenberg: “Democrats won’t allow themselves to be surprised the way they were when Scott P. Brown beat Martha Coakley in the last Senate special election, in early 2010, and the national party’s image can’t do anything but hurt Gomez’s already uphill chances. But there is no reason to rush to judgment on this race, at least for a couple of weeks, and it’s worth watching to see how it unfolds. Obviously, Markey begins as the clear favorite.”
“One of the things that concerns my constituents — the majority of my constituents — is the appointments that are now being made in Washington by our President and the way he is handling the illegal immigrants, nationalizing them and giving them the opportunity to vote, and wanting to keep track of our guns. They are worried that they are going to have to use these guns because of our own government. Now is there anything in Washington that says — any telltale signs that maybe we might be headed for an internal revolution given the fact that these kinds of things are going on?”
— New Hampshire State Rep. Edmond Gionet (R), quoted by Think Progress, warning immigration reform could spark a revolution.
The RNC put out a new ad which criticizes President Obama on the failure of his legislative agenda — including gun control — and uses a black and white photo of the president reaching to embrace the mother of a Sandy Hook shooting victim.
A new Time/CNN poll finds that when given a choice, 61% of Americans say they are more concerned about the government enacting new anti-terrorism policies that restrict civil liberties, compared to 31% who say they are more concerned about the government failing to enact strong new anti-terrorism policies.
In a video, Larry Flynt called Mark Sanford a “sex pioneer” and endorsed his congressional bid in South Carolina.
Flynt said “no one has done more to expose the sexual hypocrisy of traditional values in America today.”
He added: “His open embrace of his mistress in the name of love, breaking his sacred marriage vows, was an act of bravery that has drawn my support.”
Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA) told the Times Herald that some Republicans opposed his amendment to expand gun background checks because they didn’t want to “be seen helping the president.”
Said Toomey: “In the end it didn’t pass because we’re so politicized. There were some on my side who did not want to be seen helping the president do something he wanted to get done, just because the president wanted to do it.”
“In subsequent comments, he tried to walk that remark part-way back by
noting he meant to say Republicans across the nation in general, not
just those in the Senate.”
Ruby Cramer points out that after Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT) announced last week “that he would not seek reelection in 2014, advocates on both sides of the gun control battle have flooded Montana with ads — a sign that they believe the Democrat, now free from the weight of reelection, could switch his vote on the bill that Sen. Joe Manchin has promised to somehow revive on the floor of the Senate.”
The latest ad “features a Claire Kelly, a gun-owning Montana voter, who urges Baucus to change his vote, citing a poll by the Michael Bloomberg-headed gun control group, Mayors Against Illegal Guns, that shows 79 percent of Montanans support background checks for gun sales.”
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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