podesta_email_01525.txt

podesta-emails 5,969 words email

P17 D6 V11 P22 D4

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*​**Correct The Record Wednesday December 3, 2014 Morning Roundup:* *Headlines:* *Bloomberg: “Hillary Clinton's Historic 2016 Primary Advantage in Two Charts” <http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2014-12-03/hillary-clintons-historic-2016-primary-advantage-in-two-charts>* “The press wants a race, and the left wants a race, but the Democratic electorate isn't sure that it needs one.” *Politico: “Delay of game” <http://www.politico.com/story/2014/12/hillary-clinton-2016-elections-113285.html>* “Despite a commanding lead among Democrats and the widespread expectation that she’ll run, Clinton is still uncertain about whether to launch a second run for president, according to several people familiar with her thinking in recent weeks.” *Wall Street Journal blog: Washington Wire: “Elizabeth Warren Still a Longshot in Possible 2016 Matchup” <http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2014/12/02/elizabeth-warren-still-a-longshot-in-possible-2016-matchup/>* “Mrs. Clinton is in a more dominant position than was the case eight years ago, when she was also seen as the inevitable nominee (only to lose the nomination to then-Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois).” *Washington Post blog: The Switch: “Can political groups raise money for the mere idea of a woman president?” <http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/12/02/can-political-groups-raise-money-for-the-mere-idea-of-a-female-president/>* “ActBlue, the Democratic online fundraising powerhouse group, is asking federal election officials whether it can set up a system for allowing fundraising on behalf of a female presidential candidate before knowing who, exactly, the money would go to.” *Dallas Morning News: “Cruz links Hillary Clinton to Obama as he blasts U.S. foreign policy” <http://www.dallasnews.com/news/politics/headlines/20141202-cruz-links-hillary-clinton-to-obama-as-he-blasts-u.s.-foreign-policy.ece>* “In the jockeying ahead of the 2016 presidential race, Sen. Ted Cruz blasted the ‘Obama-Clinton foreign policy’ on Tuesday — taking aim at the current president and the Democrats’ leading contender to replace him.” *Wall Street Journal: “Sen. Rand Paul Says Foreign Policy Stance Puts Him in Mainstream” <http://online.wsj.com/articles/sen-rand-paul-says-foreign-policy-stance-puts-him-in-mainstream-1417555241>* “Mr. Paul didn’t mention potential Republican competitors for president but he did take a shot at former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton , who is weighing another bid for the Democratic nomination. Mr. Paul called Libya ‘Hillary’s war,’ referring to Mrs. Clinton’s support for the 2011 bombing campaign aimed at eradicating the Gadhafi regime.” *New York Post column: John Podhoretz: “Why Hillary’s walk to the Democratic nation is a sign of the party’s weakness” <http://nypost.com/2014/12/02/why-hillarys-walk-to-the-democratic-nation-is-a-sign-of-the-partys-weakness/>* "Mrs. Clinton will be the best-known person to run for the presidency since Dwight David Eisenhower decided to go for it in 1952." *Articles:* *Bloomberg: “Hillary Clinton's Historic 2016 Primary Advantage in Two Charts” <http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2014-12-03/hillary-clintons-historic-2016-primary-advantage-in-two-charts>* By David Weigel December 3, 2014, 9:14 a.m. EST [Subtitle:] The Democratic frontrunner is running twice as strong as she did at this point in the 2008 cycle. There are oodles of silly tropes in politics, but in the winter of 2014, this might be the silliest: “Hillary Clinton seems inevitable now, but wasn't she inevitable last time?” It's a blinkered way of viewing presidential politics, and the latest CNN/ORC International poll demonstrates why. First, the numbers. CNN's poll, conducted right before Thanksgiving with a sample of “1,045 adult Americans,” finds the former secretary of state far ahead of the Democratic field in a national ballot test. Clinton's at 65 percent support among Democrats, followed by Senator Elizabeth Warren at 10 percent, Vice President Joe Biden at 9 percent, Senator Bernie Sanders at 5 percent, Governor Andrew Cuomo, Governor Deval Patrick and (the only candidate so far exploring a bid) former Senator James Webb at 1 percent, and Governor Martin O'Malley with support too low to calculate. [GRAPH] There is no National Primary. There's an Iowa caucus, where Clinton's 3rd place 2008 showing started the Obama wave, in large part by convincing black voters that the Illinois senator could win. But about the national poll—it shows a Clinton lead that has not diminished in what, the punditocracy decided, was a rotten year for her. Her book was outsold by Ben Carson's! Most of the candidates she stumped for lost! (They include the Democratic gubernatorial nominees in Warren's and O'Malley's states.) In November 2013, The New Republic's great Noam Scheiber published a cover story that pronounced Warren to be “Hillary's nightmare.” The November 2013 CNN poll found Clinton at 63 percent and Warren at 7 percent. After 13 months of hype, Democratic voters have remain unmoved: A supermajority of them favors Clinton. How does this compare to the “inevitability” of 2008? Good question! In late November 2006, CNN polled “1,025 adult Americans” and came back with a ballot test. Clinton led with 33 percent; three other candidates were above 10 percent, stronger than Warren now. [GRAPH] It's just a national test, but the story's identical in the states—Clinton with swollen leads in New Hampshire and Iowa. In Iowa her numbers are better than twice as high as they were at this point in that cycle, when a war-skeptical Democratic electorate was desperate for another choice. You see why the discussion among the chin-strokers is about whether Clinton can remain so aloof from voters and still win the nomination. The press wants a race, and the left wants a race, but the Democratic electorate isn't sure that it needs one. *Politico: “Delay of game” <http://www.politico.com/story/2014/12/hillary-clinton-2016-elections-113285.html>* By Maggie Haberman and James Hohmann December 3, 2014, 5:34 a.m. EST [Subtitle:] Clinton’s speech schedule indicates 2016 announcement may be months away. The would-be 2016 presidential candidates are increasingly seeing the benefits to waiting longer before declaring their intentions — including the dominant person in the race, Hillary Clinton, who shows few signs of making a decision before next year. Despite a commanding lead among Democrats and the widespread expectation that she’ll run, Clinton is still uncertain about whether to launch a second run for president, according to several people familiar with her thinking in recent weeks. While some advisers suggested she should form an exploratory committee this year to send a signal to donors, her allies who argued otherwise have won the debate — with no committee expected until well after January 1, the sources said. “She should take her time,” said one adviser who believes that the high-profile Clinton would only give license to her critics by becoming a declared candidate too early. Last time, Clinton felt pushed into the race earlier than she’d wanted to be by Barack Obama’s January 2007 announcement of an exploratory committee. Now she appears comfortable moving at a slower pace. She is still scheduling paid speeches, as POLITICO first reported, as late as February 24 – suggesting she’s unlikely to be a declared candidate until after that date. What’s more, the man she is expected to tap for a major role in her campaign, current White House adviser John Podesta, has raised the possibility of remaining in his job until after the State of the Union address in late January. Clinton could, in January, make clear she’s running but delay an announcement. And if she doesn’t intend to run, she would be criticized for harming the party’s chances of holding the White House if she waits much beyond mid-January, several Democratic insiders said. Clinton is by no means the only candidate waiting until next year. Other than Jim Webb, the long-shot former Virginia senator who recently launched an exploratory committee, the people likeliest to announce intentions now are those who aren’t running. That was apparent early Tuesday morning, when Ohio Sen. Rob Portman told a local newspaper that he planned to seek reelection to the Senate instead of launching a national campaign. Portman’s decision will have little bearing on what other Republicans decide to do in a field of up to 20 potential candidates. But at a moment when national politics seems relatively quiet, it provided clarity that the invisible primary is taking shape behind the scenes. Anyone considering running is assessing their chances, talking to supporters and debating when to make a move. For the 2008 election, the last time there was an open White House seat, candidates started announcing exploratory committees as early as December 2006, looking for an edge in a crowded field. In the 2012 race, with an incumbent President Obama, most Republicans waited until well into 2011 before declaring their intentions. The 2016 campaign is poised to look more like 2012 than 2008, with the majority of the major candidates waiting at least until January to make an announcement – and some saying they’ll put off a decision until summer. The debates this cycle are unlikely to start until August, and the Iowa caucuses may happen in February 2016, instead of January, giving candidates an additional cushion. “The benefits of starting early aren’t what they were eight years ago,” said Republican strategist Chip Saltsman, who managed Mike Huckabee’s dark-horse campaign in 2008. “For some of the bigger names out there, they’re a known quantity and they don’t feel like they need to get out of the box early.” In 2012, former Minessota Gov. Tim Pawlenty was harmed by his early entry into the presidential race, in March 2011. He faltered and ultimately cratered at the Ames Straw Poll in Iowa over the summer. By contrast, Rick Perry, the outgoing Texas governor, entered the race in August – giving him no time to recover from serious blunders. “I don’t think you’re going to see anybody go out before the end of the year, and I’m not so sure you’re going to see anyone officially get in until maybe late first quarter,” said Saltsman, adding that big money super PACs alleviate the fundraising imperative and thus provide potential candidates more time to weigh their options. “And I think the bulk of people will get in during the second quarter.” There is little question, in interviews with more than a dozen operatives and donors, that Clinton is the dominant figure in both primaries. Some Republican may see a window in early 2015, if she still hasn’t declared, to try to position themselves as the strongest “anti-Hillary,” several operatives said. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), the libertarian favorite who has attracted attention for his attempts to broaden the party’s reach among African-American voters, announced Tuesday he will run for reelection. But Paul’s decision is not just about looking like he wants to defend a seat – if he runs for president, the time he spends raising money for his seat can also work for a national race down the road. On a conference call with reporters Tuesday, senior advisor Doug Stafford said Paul, who has been the most transparent about his national ambitions, is “still months away” from an official announcement on a White House run. “He’ll make that decision in the early spring,” said Stafford. “We don’t have an exact hard cut off on that.” One issue for Paul is that legally he cannot be on the ballot for president and Senate at the same time, but his team has satisfied itself that there are ways around this. Jeb Bush appears genuinely torn whether to give it a go. At a Wall Street Journal event on Monday, he said he would decide “in short order, not that far out into the future.” Bush learned earlier this year the dangers of being perceived as a candidate too early: after he described illegal immigration as an “act of love” by families, he was promptly eviscerated by conservatives. He lowered his profile shortly after. If Bush bows out, he’s expected to say so fairly soon; no word from him would indicate that he’s learning toward running. But he doesn’t have the luxury of waiting until, say, May, given the work involved in launching a campaign operation and soothing Republican donors who are waiting to see what he does before committing to a candidate. Another formidable potential candidate, Republican Scott Walker, seems poised to wait as long as possible before announcing. The Wisconsin governor has kept on a host of aides from his successful reelection campaign for a likely bid, but he said in a recent interview that a formal announcement would not come until after a spring legislative session, and possibly as late as midsummer. His team feels no need to rush because Walker built relationships with the donor class during his successful campaign to beat back an effort to recall him from office. “Rick Perry got in too late” in the 2012 election cycle, a senior Walker adviser said recently. “Tim Pawlenty got in too early. So it’s all about figuring out what’s just right.” Many Republicans have expected that New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie would make a decision shortly after the midterms. But he recently said he plans to wait until after the first of the year. Some donors believe Christie will move to form a committee sooner rather than later to be the “first ask” with donors from whom he and Jeb Bush would both seek support. The GOP field has a key advantage this time around that no one other than Mitt Romney had last time – existing donor networks. Former Romney adviser Kevin Madden said the candidates eying a run seem to be moving at a “a more measured pace” in hiring staff and lining up fundraising commitments. “Many like Christie, Paul and Bush,” Madden said, already “have existing core teams or a strong national fundraising base.” There are a handful of other candidates who appear certain to run. Perry is convening donors and seems likely to launch a campaign early next year, given the work he needs to do to restore credibility after his disastrous 2012 run. Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal said in a statement that he’ll decide “in the first half of next year.” Rick Santorum won the 2012 Iowa caucuses and has made no secret that he’s running again, but the former Pennsylvania senator is never going to raise huge money, so there’s little pressure to enter the race early. Huckabee, the 2008 caucus winner, would likely draw from Santorum’s support if he ran. The former Arkansas governor has been speaking with donors and is looking at a possible announcement in April or May if he runs. As for establishment figures, Rep. Paul Ryan, the Wisconsin congressman and 2012 vice presidential nominee, has said he will wait until 2015 to decide. People close to him believe he is giving it a close look, but would only run if there is a clear path to the nomination. Florida Sen. Marco Rubio has a book coming out on January 13, which will be followed by a national book tour that’s expected to take him into the early presidential nominating states. A formal announcement wouldn’t likely come until after the tour ends. Rubio is also up for reelection to the Senate in 2016 and has said he won’t run for both offices. If Bush runs, Rubio’s fundraising and path to the nomination would become much more difficult, potentially dissuading him from a White House bid. Ohio Gov. John Kasich is the only potential candidate who would appear to benefit from Portman’s decision this week, giving him easier access to the Buckeye State’s conservative donor network. Among those said to have spoken favorably of Kasich privately is Rupert Murdoch, the billionaire News Corporation and Fox News owner. A News Corporation official declined comment. Kasich, who briefly sought the presidential nomination in 2000 and just skated to reelection, is about to launch a national tour to lobby other states to pass a Balanced Budget Amendment to the Constitution. He has trips planned to states including Idaho, Utah and Wyoming. “Right now the governor is preparing for a second term in office, he’s writing the next budget for the state of Ohio, and he’s engineering Ohio State’s national championship win,” said Kasich spokesman Rob Nichols. “Needless to say, he has a lot on his plate.” *Wall Street Journal blog: Washington Wire: “Elizabeth Warren Still a Longshot in Possible 2016 Matchup” <http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2014/12/02/elizabeth-warren-still-a-longshot-in-possible-2016-matchup/>* By Peter Nicholas December 2, 2014, 1:13 p.m. EST No other prospective Democratic candidate comes close to threatening a Hillary Clinton bid for the party’s presidential nomination, a new poll shows. A CNN/ORC survey shows that Mrs. Clinton commands 65% support from Democrats and independents who lean Democratic. Far behind was Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.), whose support stood at 10%. Ms. Warren is a favorite of the Democrats’ liberal wing. Only 9% backed Vice President Joe Biden. The poll underscores the hard reality of 2016 Democratic presidential politics: Though the party has a long history of contested nominations, no one at this stage seems positioned to mount a serious challenge to Mrs. Clinton. Ms. Warren, for her part, has said she won’t jump in the race. Mr. Biden has said he is considering a run. Mrs. Clinton said she will announce her plans in the new year, though she is widely expected to enter the race. Democrats who seem more inclined to run trail Mrs. Clinton by even wider margins. Former U.S. Sen. Jim Webb, a Virginia Democrat, announced last month he was setting up a presidential exploratory committee. Mr. Webb notched only 1% in the CNN/ORC poll. Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, who has made repeated trips to Iowa and New Hampshire and is also mulling a presidential bid, is actually losing ground, the poll shows. He had 2% support in three different polls over the past year, but wound up with less than 1% in the latest survey. Should Mrs. Clinton decide not to run, Mr. Biden stands the most to gain. The poll showed that if Mrs. Clinton were to bow out, 41% of Democrats and those who lean that way would favor Mr. Biden. By contrast, 20% would support Ms. Warren, the survey shows. Mrs. Clinton is in a more dominant position than was the case eight years ago, when she was also seen as the inevitable nominee (only to lose the nomination to then-Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois). In the summer of 2006, a Gallup survey of Democrats showed Mrs. Clinton with 36% support. Ranking second was former Vice President Al Gore, at 16%. As strong as Mrs. Clinton now appears, some Clinton loyalists worry that her public image is more blemished now than was the case when she served as secretary of state. A Wall Street Journal-NBC News poll from September, for example, showed that her favorability rating had fallen 16 percentage points over the past five years. “It’s all well and good to be the front-runner, but that pales in comparison to being the front-runner on election day,” said Doug Schoen, a former pollster for ex-President Bill Clinton. “And right now her numbers are not going in the right direction.” The CNN/ORC poll interviewed a total of 457 Democrats and had a margin of error of +/- 4.5 points. The survey was conducted Nov. 21-23. *Washington Post blog: The Switch: “Can political groups raise money for the mere idea of a woman president?” <http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/12/02/can-political-groups-raise-money-for-the-mere-idea-of-a-female-president/>* By Nancy Scola December 2, 2014, 2:02 p.m. EST ActBlue, the Democratic online fundraising powerhouse group, is asking federal election officials whether it can set up a system for allowing fundraising on behalf of a female presidential candidate before knowing who, exactly, the money would go to. This is how it would work: Democrats would chip in $5, $10, $50, $100 for a generic, to-be-named female candidate. If, say, Hillary Clinton or U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren got the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination, she would get whatever money had piled up. But if, say, former senator Jim Webb was the Democrats' nominee instead, the accumulated money would revert elsewhere -- perhaps to a group like EMILY's List. That cash could give a female candidate a little more incentive to run -- and the Democratic establishment a little extra motivation to rally behind a female candidate. That's ActBlue's hope, anyway. "If someone has a strong preference for a woman, but not for one candidate over the other," says Steven Gold, ActBlue's general counsel, "this is a way they could express that preference." ActBlue executive director Erin Hill describes it as letting small-dollar donors shape the "marketplace" for candidates. The nonprofit ActBlue has received FEC approval for other unusual fundraising strategies. The group was the first to establish "draft campaigns" to raise money for candidates who had not announced they were running. Warren, for example, had more than $100,000 in ActBlue -- collected donations waiting for her from one "Draft Warren" fund alone -- when she got into the 2012 race for the Senate. Of course, gender can be a tricky thing. ActBlue told the FEC in its application that it "looks forward to the day when a transgender candidate mounts a viable presidential campaign, but for purposes of this opinion, we respectfully request that the Commission treat gender as though it is easily determined." Founded in 2004, ActBlue has figured out how to use the Internet to extract vast sums of money from Democratic donors. Donations can be as small as a dollar, and the mean donation last election cycle was just $45, but ActBlue has managed to raise more than $680 million in its decade of existence. The platform's first great innovation was making it trivially easy for campaigns of any size to tap into state-of-the-art online fundraising technology and a networked base of ready donors. It's been pushing the boundaries of what's possible with small-dollar, digital donations ever since. Republicans have tried to set up ActBlue equivalents over the years, but none have stuck. The FEC declined to comment on ActBlue's application as the request is still pending. *Dallas Morning News: “Cruz links Hillary Clinton to Obama as he blasts U.S. foreign policy” <http://www.dallasnews.com/news/politics/headlines/20141202-cruz-links-hillary-clinton-to-obama-as-he-blasts-u.s.-foreign-policy.ece>* By Todd J. Gillman December 2, 2014, 10:11 p.m. WASHINGTON — In the jockeying ahead of the 2016 presidential race, Sen. Ted Cruz blasted the “Obama-Clinton foreign policy” on Tuesday — taking aim at the current president and the Democrats’ leading contender to replace him. “I guess Antarctica is doing OK,” Cruz joked. In a scathing critique, he asserted that the rest of the world suffers from a lack of American leadership — a vacuum that he said Russia, Iran, China and the Islamic State terror group are eager to exploit. “The failures of the Obama-Clinton foreign policy are manifest,” he said. “If Saturday Night Live were parodying a hapless, ineffective president, they couldn’t make things up worse. Just a few months ago, Jimmy Carter criticized this president for being weak on foreign policy. Holy cow.” Cruz was delivering the keynote speech at a lunch hosted by Concerned Veterans for America, a conservative group, and the conservative magazine The Weekly Standard at a hotel a block from the White House. Cruz has given several such addresses and will deliver another next week at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, as he burnishes his credentials for a presidential run. Tuesday’s speech included numerous references to Hillary Rodham Clinton, Obama’s first secretary of state and the presumed Democratic front-runner for 2016. The Texas freshman, like Obama before he leapt from the Senate to the White House, lacks executive and military experience. He offered a vision of a far more muscular foreign policy. When the U.S. uses military force, he said, there should be a clear objective, overwhelming force and a quick exit. “It is not the job of our military to produce democratic utopias around the world. … Hunt down our enemies and kill them before they kill us,” Cruz said. “That is a focus that sadly has been lacking the last six years.” He asserted that Obama had allowed a “KBG thug,” Vladimir Putin, to flex Russia’s muscles virtually unchecked. When Russia menaced Ukraine and invaded Crimea, Cruz said, he would have hit back by expanding U.S. energy exports to undermine Russia’s leverage over its neighbors. When it comes to the Islamic State, Cruz accused Obama of pursuing a “photo op campaign” against the terror group rather than a “serious, concerted, real bombing campaign.” If he were in charge, he said, “We would be using the boots on the ground or the peshmerga to hunt down and kill the leadership of ISIS.” Cruz blasted Obama for failing to speak out with “a clarion voice for freedom,” especially religious freedom. He cited, as he often does, the cases of Saeed Abedini, a Christian pastor imprisoned in Iran since 2012, and others. Amid reports that Obama will pick Ashton Carter as his next defense secretary, Cruz asserted that the administration has treated Pentagon chiefs “as subservient to political lackeys in the White House.” “It is my hope that Mr. Carter will not give in to that,” he said. Carter would be Obama’s fourth defense secretary. The turnover reflects “a failure of leadership at a time when the world is on fire,” Cruz said. “We shouldn’t see more turnover at the Defense Department than one has at the typical Burger King.” *Wall Street Journal: “Sen. Rand Paul Says Foreign Policy Stance Puts Him in Mainstream” <http://online.wsj.com/articles/sen-rand-paul-says-foreign-policy-stance-puts-him-in-mainstream-1417555241>* By Beth Reinhard December 2, 2014, 7:33 p.m. EST [Subtitle:] Possible Republican Presidential Contender Speaks at Wall Street Journal CEO Council Meeting WASHINGTON—Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul , who is positioning himself for a bid for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination, sought Tuesday to present a fine-tuned approach to foreign policy that he said puts him in the mainstream of the country and his party. Mr. Paul said he sees war as a “last resort,” seeking a middle ground between his party’s traditional defense arm and a libertarian wing skeptical of foreign entanglements. Congress needs to be consulted on military actions and should approve defense budgets that don’t compromise national security or increase the deficit, he said. “I’m not going to apologize for this. If I’m ever commander-in-chief, I will not want to take the country to war,” he told The Wall Street Journal CEO Council’s annual meeting. Mr. Paul’s support in September for airstrikes against the Islamic State terrorist group in Iraq and Syria marked the first time since his 2010 election that he sided with President Barack Obama ’s use of military force. His caution is a potential political liability in a party that typically nominates candidates with a more muscular approach to foreign policy. To critics who call him an isolationist and could seek to block his path to the nomination, Mr. Paul said, “That’s a caricature and I will have to fight that.” He added, “I’m right there with most of the country and most of the party.” Support for U.S. intervention in foreign conflicts declined in the wake of protracted wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, but public opinion started to shift amid the rising threat of Islamic State and videos of the group beheading civilians. A Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll in September found almost two-thirds of respondents believed it is in the nation’s interest to confront the group, also known as ISIS. Mr. Paul touted his recent request for a congressional declaration of war against ISIS—a move that demonstrated his willingness to go to war while reassuring his libertarian base that he would pursue limits on executive-branch powers. Mr. Paul accused a “docile” Congress of abdicating its responsibility and said he introduced the war resolution “to shake them up a bit and say, ‘Hey guys, this is our responsibility.’” Asked if the president needs to seek congressional approval for every military action, Mr. Paul demurred, saying, “I don’t think anyone can give a blanket answer to every possible instance.” He also declined to be pinned down on a percentage of the gross domestic product that should be devoted to the military. During his first year in the Senate, Mr. Paul proposed cutting military spending by 10%. He now favors increasing the defense budget over spending limits set in the 2013 deal reached by Congress and the White House to avert a government shutdown. “I’ll spend more money [on defense], as much as I can get out of Congress if I were president,” he said. “However, I won’t do it and run up another $10 trillion in the deficit. So it has to be done by cutting other parts of government.” Mr. Paul said he doesn’t favor increasing sanctions on Iran as the U.S. continues diplomatic efforts aimed at ending the Iranian nuclear weapons program, saying, “I think it would be a mistake to push them away from the table.” Mr. Paul’s position puts him at odds with at least one potential 2016 rival, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio , who wants to boost sanctions and has tried to position himself as one of the biggest hawks in the nascent GOP field. Rep. Paul Ryan (R., Wis.), incoming House Ways and Means Committee chairman and another possible GOP candidate, separately told the CEO Council he will pursue an overhaul of the tax code next year focused on business rates. Mr. Ryan also said Republicans would spend the next two years working to build a GOP platform to sell to voters in the 2016 election and would pursue broader changes to a variety of programs, including welfare, if they win the White House. Mr. Paul didn’t mention potential Republican competitors for president but he did take a shot at former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton , who is weighing another bid for the Democratic nomination. Mr. Paul called Libya “Hillary’s war,” referring to Mrs. Clinton’s support for the 2011 bombing campaign aimed at eradicating the Gadhafi regime. In a sign of the continued instability in Libya, the U.S. had to evacuate its embassy there this summer, Mr. Paul noted. “Every time that we have toppled a secular dictator, it’s been replaced by chaos and the rise of radical Islam,” he said. Mr. Paul’s speech came just hours after he announced he will seek re-election to the Senate, triggering a broadside from national Democrats. Kentucky law forbids a candidate from running for two offices at once, but Mr. Paul’s allies are exploring options to allow him to do so. *New York Post column: John Podhoretz: “Why Hillary’s walk to the Democratic nation is a sign of the party’s weakness” <http://nypost.com/2014/12/02/why-hillarys-walk-to-the-democratic-nation-is-a-sign-of-the-partys-weakness/>* By John Podhoretz December 2, 2014, 7:12 p.m. EST You’d have to be crazy, right now, to run for the Democratic nomination against Hillary Clinton — but it would say something terrible about the condition of the American polity if she doesn’t face a serious challenge going into 2016 from within her party. You’d have to be crazy because, according to the latest CNN poll, Hillary is 55 points ahead — yes, I said 55 points ahead — of her closest rival. She gets 65 percent to Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s 10 percent. We’ve never seen numbers like this for any putative presidential candidate before. Even when Hillary herself seemed like a prohibitive front-runner for the 2008 nomination, she only led Barack Obama 33 percent to 15 percent in a comparably early CNN poll (taken in the third week of November 2006). What’s striking about 2016 is that Hillary’s service in the Obama administration allowed her effectively to steal away the veep slot from Joe Biden, who’s only five years older than she. In the CNN poll, he gets only 9 percent, a vertigo-inducing 56-point margin for Hillary. Democrats aren’t stupid; they may be amused by Biden or even admire his passion, but they know he’d likely embarrass them as their nominee. They admire Hillary, not least because she is so roundly disliked by the very people they dislike so much. More important, her vote for the Iraq war, which gave Barack Obama the opening he needed against her in 2007, will have been 14 years past by the time 2016 rolls around. What accounts for her colossal lead? Two decades as one of the world’s most famous people, for one thing. Mrs. Clinton will be the best-known person to run for the presidency since Dwight David Eisenhower decided to go for it in 1952. At the time, Ike was the most revered figure in American public life after commanding the Allied forces in Europe in the Second World War and leading the West to its victory over Nazi Germany. Hillary is no Eisenhower, to put it mildly. Her tenure as secretary of state featured no signature accomplishments and was marred (by her own admission) by the security failures that contributed to the slaughter of four Americans at the Benghazi consulate in 2012. No matter, to Democrats at least. In contrast to 2008, when she consciously chose not to trumpet her position as the first serious female candidate for the nation’s highest office, Hillary and her people are making it clear that her 2016 candidacy will provide Democrats with a second historic opportunity to cast votes representing social change, comparable to their votes for an African-American in 2008. So she’s golden. And yet there’s something undeniably discomfiting about the ease with which she’s sliding straight into the nomination without any evident friction. Even Eisenhower faced a competitive field that included the governors of California (Earl Warren) and Minnesota (Harold Stassen). Ike was never assured of the nomination, and was challenged all the way to the national convention in Chicago by Sen. Robert Taft of Ohio. The presidency was up for grabs in 1952, since Harry Truman had chosen not to run for re-election. There have been five such open elections since. In all save the 2008 race, vice presidents were in the running. If one considers her the equivalent to Obama’s vice president, that too should make her supporters confident: Her four “veep” predecessors all secured their party’s nomination. But they faced challenges. Richard Nixon faced down Henry Cabot Lodge in 1960. Hubert Humphrey was nearly toppled by Eugene McCarthy and might have been taken by Robert F. Kennedy had RFK not been assassinated in June 1968. George H.W. Bush had seven rivals in 1988 and lost Iowa and several more states to Bob Dole. Only Al Gore skated into the nomination in 2000 after facing what turned out to be a lifeless challenge from Bill Bradley. Right now, Hillary’s token challenger is James Webb, a fascinating gadfly with no known constituency in the Democratic Party. She might have another in Sen. Bernie Sanders — who isn’t even a Democrat, but a Socialist. Neither is a remotely serious rival. This is disturbing because Hillary Clinton has no natural claim to her party’s nomination. She’s not even an especially gifted politician. Aside from the spectacular incompetence of her 2008 campaign, she is as gaffe-prone as Dan Quayle and as awkward as Bob Dole. It doesn’t speak well of the health of the Democratic Party that she and its voters seem to think she does have that claim. Rather, it’s a mark of lifelessness, of a hardening of the party’s arteries. *Calendar:* *Sec. Clinton's upcoming appearances as reported online. Not an official schedule.* · December 3 – Washington, DC: Sec. Clinton helps launch the “Security Through Inclusive Leadership” event at Georgetown (International Peace and Conflict <http://www.internationalpeaceandconflict.org/forum/topics/call-for-note-takers-security-through-inclusive-leadership-event> ) · December 4 – Boston, MA: Sec. Clinton speaks at the Massachusetts Conference for Women (MCFW <http://www.maconferenceforwomen.org/speakers/>) · December 5 – Washington, DC: Sec. Clinton speaks at the Saban Forum (CNN <https://twitter.com/danmericaCNN/status/539475682183880705>) · December 16 – New York, NY: Sec. Clinton honored by Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights (Politico <http://www.politico.com/story/2014/11/hillary-clinton-ripple-of-hope-award-112478.html> ) · January 21 – Saskatchewan, Canada: Sec. Clinton keynotes the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce’s “Global Perspectives” series (MarketWired <http://www.marketwired.com/press-release/former-us-secretary-state-hillary-rodham-clinton-deliver-keynote-address-saskatoon-1972651.htm> ) · January 21 – Winnipeg, Canada: Sec. Clinton keynotes the Global Perspectives series (Winnipeg Free Press <http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/Clinton-coming-to-Winnipeg--284282491.html> ) · February 24 – Santa Clara, CA: Sec. Clinton to Keynote Address at Inaugural Watermark Conference for Women (PR Newswire <http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/hillary-rodham-clinton-to-deliver-keynote-address-at-inaugural-watermark-conference-for-women-283200361.html> )