Weekend Open Thread [3.22.15]

Sorry for the lack of an open thread yesterday. It has been a busy weekend, and I personally am recovering from hernia surgery, which is fun. So here are some recent political stories that have interested me.

Headline: Hillary not hurt at all by eghazi, leads by landslide margins over all comers.

NATIONAL–PRESIDENT–REPUBLICAN PARTY–CNN/ORC: Bush 16, Walker 13, Paul 12, Huckabee 10, Carson 9, Christie 7, Rubio 7, Cruz 4, Perry 4, Kaisch 2, Graham 1, Jindal 1, Santorum 1.
NATIONAL–PRESIDENT–DEMOCRATIC PARTY–CNN/ORC: Clinton 62, Biden 15, Warren 10, Sanders 3, O’Malley 1, Webb 1
NATIONAL–PRESIDENT–DEMOCRATIC PARTY–CNN/ORC: Clinton 55, Bush 40; Clinton 55, Walker 40; Clinton 55, Christie 40; Clinton 55, Rubio 42; Clinton 55, Huckabee 41; Clinton 54, Paul 43; Clinton 56, Carson 40.

There are 13 Republican candidates polled in the CNN poll above. From the Hill, “as many as 20 Republicans are taking a serious look at running for the White House in 2016. A handful of candidates have moved aggressively into the field, and others are expected to ramp up in the coming weeks, with several announcements expected in April.” Donald Trump is going to run, allegedly. Carly Fiorina is another expected to run, primarily to be a female voice that will lob the harshest criticism at Hillary.

Hillary herself has a 53 percent, which is tops among all the candidates listed, and highest among all politicians living save from her husband, who gets a 65 percent approval rating. 57 percent say she is “someone you would be proud to have as president.”

The same CNN/ORC poll showed that 68 percent of Americans favor the Obama administration’s diplomatic efforts to keep Iran from achieving nuclear capabilities. Direct diplomatic negotiations with Iran are broadly popular, 68% favor them, while 29% oppose them. That support cuts across party lines, with 77% of Democrats, 65% of Republicans and 64% of independents in favor of diplomacy between the U.S. and Iran in an attempt to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons.

Meanwhile, a plurality of Americans disapproved of the effort by 47 Republican senators to scuttle the talks by sending a letter to the leaders of Iran: 49 percent said it went too far, 39 percent thought it was appropriate, and 12 percent had no opinion. Opinions on the letter were divided along partisan lines, with 67% of Democrats saying it went too far while 52% of Republicans called it appropriate. Among independents, 47% thought it went too far, 42% that it was appropriate.

More Americans, 48 percent, trust President Obama to deal with the major issues of the day than they do Republicans in Congress (39 percent).

Finally, in our polling section, we have a poll from Iowa:

IOWA–PRESIDENT–REPUBLICAN PRIMARY–Insider Advantage: Walker 27, Huckabee 20, Carson 13, Bush 11, Rubio 6, Trump 4, Perry 4, Paul 3, Christie 3

New York Times: “Rhetorical excess was good for business, but Carson now wants to be seen as more than a novelty candidate. He has come to learn that such extreme analogies, while true to his views, aren’t especially presidential. They alienate more moderate voters and, perhaps even more damaging, reinforce the impression that he is not “serious” — that he is another Herman Cain, the black former Godfather’s Pizza chief executive who rose to the top of the early presidential polls in 2011 but then bowed out before the Iowa caucuses, largely because of leaked allegations of sexual misconduct, which he denied but from which he never recovered.”

“Cain lingers as a cautionary tale for the party as much as for a right-leaning candidate like Carson. The fact that Cain, with his folksy sayings (‘shucky ducky’) and misnomers (‘Ubeki-beki-beki-beki-stan-stan’), reached the top of the national polls — much less that he was eventually followed there by the likes of Michele Bachmann, Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum, who all topped one or another poll in the 2012 primary season — wound up being a considerable embarrassment for the eventual nominee, Mitt Romney, and for the longtime party regulars who were trying to fast-track his way to the nomination.”

Rick Klein: “Two weeks after the world learned of Hillary Clinton’s unusual email arrangement, her answers are incomplete, Democrats are anxious, she’s still not a candidate – and none of it matters in terms of her likelihood to become the 2016 nominee. For all the churn beneath the surface, Clinton is still essentially running against herself on the Democratic side. Her would-be challengers have barely whispered a critique of an email setup that strayed from State Department custom, if not rule or law, for reason that appear to include a desire for secrecy.”

“It’s an instructive episode for the emerging Clinton team, one that may actually confirm the instincts of those who think any ‘new Hillary’ wouldn’t be worth the downside. Of course these last few weeks haven’t been helpful. But would anyone argue they have seriously hurt her chances of capturing the nomination?”

The Washington Post reports that Hillary Clinton “is already running her presidential campaign — against the Republican Congress.

“In blasts of rapid-fire Twitter messages just this week, Clinton accused Republicans of waging a war on women, playing politics with a black nominee, shortchanging students, endangering the economic recovery and trying to yank health-care coverage for 16 million Americans.”

What I want from Hillary is no triangulation. I want her to run against Republicans in Congress and out, and run with and support Democrats inside Congress and out. Let’s elect Democrats, not just the Clintons.

Charlie Cook: “The race for next year’s Republican presidential nomination is going to be fascinating on so many levels, but none more than the challenges facing former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush.”

“On the one hand, more money is likely to be raised on behalf of Bush this quarter than has been for any non-incumbent in history. Numbers from $80 to $100 million have been bandied about, which would be more than Mitt Romney’s campaign (excluding allied groups) raised the entire 2011 calendar year. Furthermore, he is likely to have an all-star team of talent to help his cause, and he comes across as highly polished, even more presidential than any of his nomination rivals, as one might expect from someone who has been governor of one of the nation’s largest states, and a swing state at that.”

“On the other hand, Bush will be seeking the nomination of a party that clearly wants someone very conservative, arguably more conservative than he is.”

New York Times: “Who is the Republican front-runner for 2016? It is often hard to tell. But there is little debate about who is the biggest curiosity in the race: Mr. Paul, the junior senator from Kentucky, who has been building the most unorthodox campaign for the Republican nomination, bringing his brand of libertarian conservatism to audiences that are more inclined to vote Democratic.”

“Being a political curiosity is far different from being politically credible, however. And Mr. Paul is facing a challenge that will be much more complex than attracting cameras and crowds: persuading voters to get behind him, not just hear him out. In trying to expand the Republican coalition, Mr. Paul is fighting political and demographic trends that are pushing more voters away from his party. His campaign, which he is expected to announce early next month, will be a test of whether the kind of Republican rebranding he is attempting can happen in the next year, or whether it will take until 2020 or beyond.”