Presumptuous Politics

Tuesday, March 8, 2016

Clinton Server Setup Cartoon

Senators again request State Department staffer testify about Clinton server setup

Senate lawmakers are renewing their request to question the State Department staffer who helped set up Hillary Clinton's private email server following revelations that he has been granted immunity by the Justice Department, according to a letter obtained by The Associated Press on Monday.

Republican senators Chuck Grassley of Iowa and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin have asked Bryan Pagliano to appear before them to discuss the server and to provide documents and communications about Clinton's personal email account.

Pagliano last year invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination in declining to answer questions from the lawmakers about the server and email setup.

But in their letter to Pagliano, the senators argue that the immunity grant from the Justice Department -- which is investigating the potential mishandling of sensitive information on the server -- means that the "Fifth Amendment privilege is no longer applicable."

"Because the Department of Justice has granted you immunity from prosecution in this situation, there is no longer reasonable cause for you to believe that discussing these matters with the relevant oversight committees could result in your prosecution," wrote Grassley and Johnson, who respectively serve as chairmen of the Senate committees on the judiciary and homeland security and governmental affairs.

The letter is dated March 3, the day after news broke about Pagliano's immunity offer.

The senators have also asked Pagliano and the Justice Department for copies of the immunity agreement, and they told Pagliano that he holds "unique information about this matter that is otherwise unavailable."

Mark MacDougall, a lawyer for Pagliano, declined to comment to the AP on Monday evening.

Clinton and her campaign have said that they are pleased that Pagliano was cooperating.

Israel's Netanyahu cancels US visit, catching White House off guard

Obama SUCKS.

The Obama administration said Monday that it was "surprised" to learn that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had canceled a planned visit to Washington later this month, and denied an Israeli media report that claimed the White House was unable to arrange a meeting between President Obama and Netanyahu.
Netanyahu's visit had been planned to coincide with the American-Israel Political Affairs Committee's annual conference. The White House said Israel had proposed for the two leaders to meet on either March 17 or 18 and the U.S. had offered to meet on March 18.
"We were surprised to first learn via media reports that the Prime Minister, rather than accept our invitation, opted to cancel his visit," National Security Council spokesman Ned Price told reporters Monday. "Reports that we were not able to accommodate the Prime Minister's schedule are false."
A report in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz cited sources close to Netanyahu who claimed "no appropriate time" could be found to hold the meeting.
The Israeli Prime Minister's Office said Tuesday that Israel's ambassador to the U.S. informed the White House last week there was a "good chance" Netanyahu would not make the trip.
An Israeli official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the issue publicly, told the Associated Press Netanyahu wanted to avoid meetings with presidential candidates.
The unusually pointed pushback from the White House was the latest signal of ongoing tensions between the U.S. and its closest Mideast ally, which have never fully recovered since Obama incensed Netanyahu's government by pursuing and then enacting a nuclear deal with Iran. The flare-up comes just days before Vice President Joe Biden is set to meet with Netanyahu during a visit to Jerusalem.
This isn't the first time Obama had been caught off guard by Netanyahu's travel plans. Last year, the White House accused Netanyahu of a breach of longstanding diplomatic protocol when he announced plans to speak to a joint session of Congress without consulting or notifying the president. Netanyahu used that speech to implore U.S. lawmakers to reject the Iran nuclear deal, which Israel sees as emboldening its archenemy.

FOX NEWS TOWN HALL: Sanders, Clinton in Michigan battle over auto bailout; Clinton unveils free tuition plan

Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Sen. Bernie Sanders laid out some of their key differences Monday in a Fox News Channel town hall event in Michigan -- including Clinton springing a surprise alternative to Sanders' millennial-friendly, free-college-tuition plan.

Please click here to watch the Democratic Town Hall Live
Sanders opened by defending his auto-bailout vote, which Clinton hit him on during their debate the night before.
“What I did not vote for was the bailout of Wall Street. … She did vote for that,” Sanders said, referring to Clinton’s time as a New York senator.
The front-running Clinton and the Vermont senator made their cases in Detroit on the eve of Michigan’s Democratic and Republican presidential primaries.
Most polls show Clinton with a double-digit lead in Michigan, as she enters the primary with 1,130 delegates, compared to 499 for Sanders. Either needs 2,383 delegates to win the party nomination. The two will also compete in the Mississippi Democratic primary Tuesday.
Sanders on Monday night also hammered his message of economic equality and prosperity.
“There is no candidate in this race who has talked more about poverty than I have,” he said. “In the richest country in the history of the world, we have more income and wealth inequality than any other major country. We have too many people living in poverty. We have got to change our national priorities.”
He also repeated his calls for helping roughly 29 million Americans without health care, arguing the problem is in part the result of pharmaceutical companies gouging the country.
“We have many more (Americans) who are underinsured,” Sanders said. “And we are getting ripped off big time by the pharmaceutical industry, which are charging us the highest prices in the world.”
Clinton, meanwhile, was asked at the outset of the event about the ongoing classified email investigation being conducted by the FBI, claiming once again that she was not notified that she is a subject of that investigation.
“Absolutely true,” Clinton responded to the question by Fox News’ “Special Report” host Bret Baier.
Clinton also said neither she nor her lawyers have been informed that any members of her staff or former staff are targets of the investigation, which focuses on her use of a private email server while secretary of state.
Clinton also stood by decision, as part of the Obama administration, to remove Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi in 2011. But she acknowledged the “deeply regrettable” aftermath, in which the Islamic State terror group has flourished in parts of that country.
“If there had not been that intervention … we would be looking at something much more resembling Syria now,” Clinton said.
She also argued that the United States and its allies saw more turmoil in “leaving a dictator in place,” like Russia has done with Syrian leader Bashar al Assad. And she said the Libyan people have since had two fair elections to "get themselves a better future."
Clinton also used the forum to introduce her answer to Sanders’ popular free-tuition college proposal, unveiling the outlines of a plan in which students will no longer have to borrow money to attend a public college or university.
She said the New College Compact plan would also help with non-tuition costs.
“It is absolutely imperative that we make college affordable,” Clinton said.
Both candidates also explained their position on abortion, amid continuing debate about stopping the procedure after five months of pregnancy, with the exceptions for the life and health of the mother and baby.
“I am very strongly pro-choice,” Sanders said. “That is a decision to be made by the woman, her physician and her family.”
Clinton said she objects to the recent effort in Congress to pass a law saying no such exceptions after 20 weeks of pregnancy.
“Because although these (exceptions) are rare, they sometimes arise in the most complex, difficult medical situation,” she said.

Clinton, Trump eye Michigan wins as candidates face first big Midwest test

Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump look to rebound from weekend setbacks with victories in Tuesday's Michigan primary, the first big industrial state to be contested in the 2016 presidential race.
Squeezed between high-profile Super Tuesday and high-stakes primaries next week in Florida and Ohio, Tuesday's contests are unlikely to dramatically reshape either party's primaries. But with 150 Republican and 179 Democratic delegates at stake, the races offer an opportunity for the front-runners to pad leads and rivals to catch up.
In addition to Michigan's primaries, both parties will hold their primary in Mississippi Tuesday, with Republicans also caucusing in Idaho and voting in the Hawaii primary.
But Michigan is the night's crown jewel in terms of delegates. Fifty-nine are at stake in the Republican race, while 147 will be awarded on the Democratic side.
While Trump has stunned Republicans with his broad appeal, he's forged a particularly strong connection with blue-collar white voters. With an eye on the general election, he's argued he could put Midwestern, Democratic-leaning industrial states such as Michigan and Wisconsin in play for Republicans.
A Monmouth University poll released Monday showed Trump winning 36 percent of likely GOP primary voters, 13 percentage points ahead of Texas Sen. Ted Cruz. Ohio Gov. John Kasich, who said Michigan was part of his "home court" last week, polled a close third with 21 percent of the vote, while Florida Sen. Marco Rubio placed fourth with 13 percent of the likely vote.
Victories by Cruz in Kansas and Maine have threatened to make the Republican race a two-man sprint to the finish. But Kasich and Rubio are holding out hope they can win their winner-take-all home states March 15.
Entering Tuesday, Trump leads the Republican race with 384 delegates, followed by Cruz with 300, Rubio with 151 delegates and Kasich with 37. Winning the GOP nomination requires 1,237 delegates.
"It's not just the whole country that's watching Michigan — now the world's beginning to watch," Kasich said Monday during a campaign stop in the state. "You can help me send a message about positive, about vision, about hope, about putting us together."
Rubio sought a boost in Tuesday's contests from Mitt Romney, the 2012 GOP nominee. Romney has recently become an outspoken critic of Trump and recorded a phone call on Rubio's behalf in which he warns Republicans that if the real estate mogul wins the nomination, "the prospects for a safe and prosperous future would be greatly diminished."
Romney has not endorsed a candidate in the GOP primary, but clearly says in the phone recording that he's speaking on behalf of the Rubio campaign. A Romney spokeswoman said the former Massachusetts governor has offered to help Rubio, Kasich and Cruz in any way he can.
During a stop at a catfish restaurant on Monday in Mississippi, Cruz said the current vacancy on the Supreme Court means Republicans can't take a chance on Trump.
"He's been supporting left-wing politicians for 40 years," Cruz said.
On the Democratic side, Clinton boosted her delegate lead over Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders over the weekend, as a win in Saturday's Louisiana primary canceled out wins for Sanders in the Kansas, Nebraska and Maine caucuses. The Monmouth University poll gave Clinton a 13-percentage point lead over the self-described democratic socialist among likely voters.
Ahead of Tuesday's two Democratic contests, Clinton had accumulated 1,130 delegates and Sanders 499, including superdelegates. Democrats need 2,383 delegates to win the nomination.
In an effort to boost his standing in Michigan, Sanders has repeatedly accused Clinton of of being disingenuous when she asserted that he opposed the bailout of carmakers General Motors and Chrysler during the Great Recession.
Sanders defended his voting record on the issue again during a Fox News town hall in Detroit Monday night.
"What I did not vote for was the bailout of Wall Street. … She did vote for that,” Sanders said, referring to Clinton’s time as a New York senator.
Sanders and Clinton both voted in favor of a bailout bill in 2008, but it failed to clear the Senate, prompting then-President George W. Bush to announce about a week later that the federal government would step in with $17.4 billion in federal aid to help the carmakers survive and restructure. The last $4 billion was contingent on the release of the second installment of the Wall Street bailout funds.
Sanders did vote for a 2009 motion to block the release of those funds, though the measure was defeated by 45 Democrats, including Clinton, and a handful of Republicans.

Monday, March 7, 2016

CPAC Cartoon

CPAC Accomplishment 2012

Money Pours In as Move to Stop Donald Trump Expands

A Bunch of Idiots?

Republicans hoping to halt Donald J. Trump’s march to their party’s presidential nomination emerged from the weekend’s voting contests newly emboldened by Mr. Trump’s uneven electoral performance and by some nascent signs that he may be peaking with voters.

Outside groups are moving to deploy more than $10 million in new attack ads across Florida and millions more in Illinois, casting Mr. Trump as a liberal, a huckster and a draft dodger. Mr. Trump’s reed-thin organization appears to be catching up with him, suggesting he could be at a disadvantage if he is forced into a protracted slog for delegates.

And vote tallies on Saturday made clear that Mr. Trump has had at least some trouble building upon his intensely loyal following, leaving him increasingly dependent upon landslides in early voting.

In Louisiana, where Mr. Trump amassed a lead of more than 20 percentage points among those who cast votes before Saturday, Senator Ted Cruz of Texas effectively tied him among voters who cast their ballots on Saturday.

Marco Rubio in Toa Baja, Puerto Rico, on Saturday, a day before winning the primary there. Credit Dennis M. Rivera Pichardo for The New York Times

“Trump has to worry about the consistent late-voter rejection of his candidacy,” said Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker and Republican presidential candidate.

Mr. Trump’s losses to Mr. Cruz in Kansas and Maine on Saturday, coupled with closer-than-expected victories in Louisiana and Kentucky, have heightened the prospects for a two-man race, though many Republican leaders eye Mr. Cruz warily.

As his rivals have despaired over the race’s vulgar turn, Mr. Trump struck a subdued tone, by his standards, as returns came in late Saturday night. He aborted his first attempt to take the stage and left the room after asking reporters if the race in Kentucky had been called.

When he finally did speak, some of his usual bombast was missing, even as he insisted that it was time for Senator Marco Rubio to quit the race and that Mr. Cruz cannot win more moderate northeastern or coastal states.

“Donald Trump was uncharacteristically low energy,” Mitt Romney, the Republican nominee in 2012, said in an interview Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” taunting Mr. Trump with the insult Mr. Trump had employed against Jeb Bush. Yet despite the renewed optimism of his opponents, the path to deny Mr. Trump the nomination remains narrow and arduous.

Mr. Cruz’s emergence as the most credible alternative to Mr. Trump has proved both a boost and a complication for those seeking to derail the New Yorker. Mr. Cruz has tried to undercut calls for a contested convention to deny Mr. Trump the nomination, which Mr. Cruz says would yield a “manifest revolt” among voters. But Mr. Cruz has done little so far to threaten Mr. Trump’s lead in the delegate race.

Much of Mr. Cruz’s late-breaking support on Saturday seemed to come at the expense of Mr. Rubio, not Mr. Trump. And the Cruz campaign’s message of ideological purity and religious faith is a less natural fit for many of the delegate-rich Midwestern and coastal states that remain on the map.

“Saturday proved that Trump can be contained and even beaten,” said Scott Jennings, a longtime Republican strategist, who looked ahead to this summer’s Republican convention in Cleveland. “The question is whether the field is going to allow for it moving forward. The most likely scenarios remain that Trump gets enough before Cleveland, or nobody does. The latter moved a little closer to realistic Saturday.”

Mr. Rubio’s path is much less certain, despite his lopsided victory in Puerto Rico on Sunday. Even his supporters said that the results on Saturday seriously undercut the premise of his bid: that he is the only candidate who can unify the Republican Party and defeat Mr. Trump.

“Look, I’m supportive of Marco; I’m very hopeful,” said Mel Martinez, the former senator from Florida, who had supported Mr. Bush. “But it’s a great concern that time has kind of caught up with this whole thing.”

The Stop Trump forces are beginning to pour money into television ads, with a particular focus on the big states voting on March 15. Four different groups have reserved at least $10 million in airtime in Florida so far, according to trackers of media spending. That number is expected to grow, but television stations in Florida are already awash in such ads.

Two from the American Future Fund, which has spent $2 million so far in Florida and Illinois, show decorated veterans assailing Mr. Trump as a poseur on military matters. Michael Waltz, a retired Special Forces colonel, blisteringly calls Mr. Trump a draft dodger and, effectively, a coward. “Donald Trump hasn’t served this country a day in his life,” he says. “Don’t let Trump fool you.”

And a former prisoner of war in Vietnam, Tom Hanton, bluntly questions Mr. Trump’s toughness: “Trump would not have survived the P.O.W. experience. He would have been probably the first one to fold.”

Separately, Club for Growth Action, an arm of the anti-tax group that was the first to run ads in Iowa against Mr. Trump, has placed $2 million in commercials attacking him in Illinois on top of $1 million in Florida.

A third group, Our Principles PAC, which was created to defeat Mr. Trump, has reserved $3.5 million in Illinois and Florida and is also sending direct mail to voters’ homes in Florida. A group supporting Mr. Rubio, Conservative Solutions, is spending several million dollars in Florida as well.

The deluge of negative messages from a patchwork of groups — highlighting claims by angry customers of Mr. Trump’s defunct educational company and his history of shape-shifting positions — already appears to have hurt Mr. Trump’s cause.

In conversations with some of his allies, who insisted on anonymity to relay those private talks, Trump campaign aides have expressed concern about the money being spent against him on television. The Trump campaign has no pollster, so it is governed by public polling and what the candidate himself observes while watching cable news.

This off-the-cuff approach, and a string of self-inflicted wounds — refusing to clearly and immediately reject the support of the white supremacist David Duke, boasting about his sexual endowment on the debate stage and withdrawing from the Conservative Political Action Committee’s conference over the weekend — have fueled days of unfavorable coverage of Mr. Trump’s candidacy.

“Trump has total disdain for the professional political class,” said Scott Reed, a veteran Republican strategist. “He thinks they’re all about making money. Pollsters are hacks. Organization doesn’t matter. Their idea of a political organization is taking phone calls from some elected officials who wanted to endorse and making it work in the schedule. And that’ll catch up with you eventually.”

Still, members of the Republican establishment have been left to grapple with what was once unthinkable: rallying around Mr. Cruz, a senator who built his reputation bashing them.

“Some hope with Ted, no hope with Donald,” Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina said on “Meet the Press,” summarizing the party’s dim view of its remaining options. Neither, he suggested, would be likely to expand the Republican tent: “We’re in a demographic death spiral.”

Less than two weeks ago, Mr. Graham joked about murdering Mr. Cruz on the Senate floor.

And yet, Mr. Graham said, he received a phone call from Mr. Cruz after Super Tuesday — part of efforts by the Cruz campaign to reach out, discreetly, to donors and party officials who might be interested in rallying around him.

With Mr. Rubio faltering badly across the board on Saturday, Mr. Cruz is moving to compete aggressively in Florida. He has also weighed the merits of a significant push in Ohio, the home state of Gov. John Kasich.

Both states are winner-take-all, and the Cruz campaign insists it would only dedicate substantial resources if it thought it could win outright. But the effort is risky: It could boost Mr. Trump, if Mr. Cruz diminishes his non-Trump rivals without a victory.

The Cruz campaign says it can reach the requisite delegate threshold of 1,237 without winning Florida or Ohio, thanks to its superior organization in later-voting states, many of which are closed to non-Republicans.

But several party strategists have disputed this math, even if the contests on March 15 force some of Mr. Cruz’s competitors from the race.

A moment of reckoning for Mr. Rubio will come Tuesday in Michigan, a state that has concentrations of the kinds of voters he performs well with: professional, younger, highly educated and upper-income. But a poll released on Sunday by NBC News and The Wall Street Journal showed Mr. Rubio trailing Mr. Cruz and Mr. Trump. Mr. Trump received 41 percent, followed by Mr. Cruz at 22 percent, Mr. Rubio at 17 percent and Mr. Kasich at 13 percent.

Despite this, some Michigan Republicans say that Mr. Kasich may emerge as the state’s establishment choice. And in a race that has often felt like a reality television show, Mr. Kasich secured an apt endorsement on Sunday: that of Arnold Schwarzenegger, who will replace Mr. Trump as the host of “The Celebrity Apprentice.”

Correction: March 6, 2016
An earlier version of a picture caption with this article misstated the location of a Conservative Political Action Committee conference. It was in National Harbor, Md., not Alexandria, Va.

Romney touts Cruz wins over Trump, will not reject GOP nod if drafted at convention

Choker?

Mitt Romney said Sunday that GOP presidential candidate Ted Cruz winning two primary states this weekend proves the Texas senator can stop front-runner Donald Trump, but declined to rule out his own White House scenario.
Romney, a former Massachusetts governor and the Republicans' 2012 presidential nominee, repeated remarks from last week, telling “Fox News Sunday” that he wouldn’t launch an eleventh-hour campaign for president. But he declined to reject being “drafted” at the GOP convention in July to be the party’s general election candidate.
“It would be absurd to say that if I were drafted I’d say no,” Romney said. “We have four strong people running for the nomination. One of them will be the nominee.”
Romney has occasionally weighed in on the 2016 GOP race. But he emerged in full force Thursday when he gave a speech in which he called Trump a “phony” and urged voters to instead back an establishment candidate like Cruz, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio or Ohio Gov. John Kasich.
“It was a big night for Ted Cruz,” Romney said Sunday about the Texas senator's Saturday wins in the Maine and Kansas caucuses. “That’s because people are starting to take a better look at Donald Trump.”
Romney returned to his argument that Trump touts being a successful New York real estate magnate and billionaire businessman. However, he has a long list of businesses failures including a commercial airline and his Trump University real estate school, Romney said.
“He’s not the real deal,” Romney told Fox. “He’s a phony.”
Still, Romney was pressed to explain why he accepted Trump’s 2012 endorsement and acknowledge that all of Trump’s business flops didn’t happen after 2012.
“Sixty-one million people voted for me,” Romney said. “I don’t think all 61 million should be president of the United States.”

Tuesday, March 8, 2016

Monday, March 7, 2016

Election 2016

Democratic Debate: Analysis