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Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Are Hillary Clinton's Presidential Ambitions Clouding Her Morals?





Whether or not Clinton has formally announced her candidacy, her silence on Iran speaks louder than words

 
 
Hillary Clinton. (Photo: Mark Wilson/Getty Images North America)




Asked in an interview this week about her presidential ambitions, Hillary Clinton gave an answer that qualified as a howler even by Clinton standards: "I'm not thinking about it."

Clinton is widely considered the presumptive Democratic nominee for president in 2016. Given the atavistic chaos that afflicts the Republicans, many view her as the virtual president-elect. Time magazine ran a cover story this month headlined "Can Anyone Stop Hillary?" The New York Times Magazine followed with a cover story of its own, the latest in a stream of media coverage of the juggernaut that is Clinton's unannounced presidential campaign.

One of the surest signs that Clinton is running for the presidency is her refusal to take a position on the greatest geopolitical question now facing the United States. President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry are engaged in a high-stakes effort to end 35 years of hostility between the United States and Iran. Debate about this initiative is intense in Washington. No one, however, knows the opinion of the woman who was Kerry's immediate predecessor and is evidently seeking to govern the United States beginning in 2017.

Kerry has asserted that negotiations with Iran are "one of those hinge points in history," and argued that they give the United States "a chance to address peacefully one of the most pressing national security concerns that the world faces." Senator Dianne Feinstein, who heads the Senate Committee on Intelligence, has warned that those who seek to block reconciliation are on a "march toward war."

Sentiments are just as strong on the other side. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has denounced negotiation with Iran as a "historic mistake" that is making the world "a more dangerous place". His partners in Washington vigorously echo that view. One of them, Senator Mark Kirk, has accused Obama of behaving "like Neville Chamberlain" and charged that he is setting the stage for "a large and bloody conflict in the Middle East involving Iranian nuclear weapons".

This is the most far-reaching foreign policy debate that has broken out in Washington in more than a generation. The stakes for the United States, Iran, the Middle East and the world are huge. American politicians are falling over one another to press their views. Clinton is the glaring exception.

Throughout her career, Clinton has stayed well within the Washington paradigm on foreign policy issues. Like many American politicians who came of age during the Cold War, she takes an us-versus-them view of the world. She has never dissented from the Washington chorus that portrays Iran as an irredeemable font of evil. Had she remained on the job as secretary of state rather than resigning and paving the way for Kerry, the United States would certainly not have made an effort to engage Iran.

Now that a preliminary agreement has been struck and international inspectors are monitoring Iran's retreat from its nuclear program, it is reasonable for Americans to expect their leaders to say whether they favor or oppose this process. That is especially true of Clinton, who until a year ago was the global face of US foreign policy. Yet her silence has been deafening.

Clinton has a habit of not taking any position until it is clear which position will be most politically beneficial. "No doubt we will find out HRC's true convictions just as soon as her focus groups report in or her major donors tell her what to think," Stephen Walt wrote in his Foreign Policy blog.

Here lies the dilemma. A strong statement by Clinton in favor of reconciliation would be a game-changer in Washington. She would be giving a centrist, establishment endorsement of her former boss's most important foreign policy initiative. That would provide political cover for moderate Democrats terrified of antagonizing the Netanyahu government and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which is leading the anti-reconciliation campaign in Washington.

Such a statement, however, would risk outraging pro-Netanyahu groups and individuals who have been among Clinton's key supporters since her days as a Senator from New York. Having spent years painstakingly laying the ground for a presidential campaign, she does not want to risk a misstep that would alienate major campaign contributors.

Clinton's choice is clear. If she opposes détente with Iran, she will look like a warmonger who prefers confrontation to diplomacy. If she supports it, she will alienate a vital part of the base she is relying on to finance her presidential campaign. With this in mind, she has chosen to remain silent on the central foreign policy issue of the age. It is a classic act of political cowardice – the kind that often leads to victory at the polls.

Stephen Kinzer

Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Chris Christie's Top Aide Linked To Traffic Jam Payback Against Democratic Mayor

Litter on the Road to Potus



 
 

politics

 
chris christie traffic

WASHINGTON -- New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie's (R) deputy chief of staff was directly involved in a mean-spirited effort to create "traffic problems" for a mayor who declined to endorse the governor's reelection bid, according to newly released emails.



"Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee," Deputy Chief of Staff Bridget Anne Kelly wrote in an email on Aug. 13. 

"Got it," replied David Wildstein, who was then one of Christie's top aides at the Port Authority, which is run jointly by New York and New Jersey.

A month later Wildstein did indeed create the traffic problems that Christie's office requested. He closed down two of Fort Lee's access lanes leading to the George Washington Bridge, the busiest bridge in the country. The closures came on Sept. 9, the first day of school in Fort Lee, leading to massive traffic jams as bridge traffic backed up into local streets. As a result, police and emergency vehicles were delayed in responding to reports of a missing child and a cardiac arrest.

The closures came just weeks after Fort Lee's mayor, Democrat Mark Sokolich, had declined to endorse Christie's reelection bid.

For weeks, Christie has been denying any involvement in the lane closures and refuting the idea that political retribution was at play. He has stood by his aides' explanations that the lanes were closed as part of a traffic study, even though Port Authority Executive Director Patrick Foye, who was appointed by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D), said he was never made aware of the study's existence.

But the new emails, provided by Wildstein in response to a subpoena from state lawmakers, bring Christie and his inner circle closer to the scandal.

The emails point to clear political motives for the closures, and the officials seem almost giddy at the problems they create. 

At one point, Wildstein received a text message from an unknown sender -- the emails are partially redacted -- saying, "Is it wrong that I'm smiling."

"No," replied Wildstein. When the other person added, "I feel badly about the kids. I guess," Wildstein reminded them that their parents are probably Democrats anyway. 

"They are the children of Buono voters," said Wildstein, referring to Democrat Barbara Buono, who unsuccessfully challenged Christie in the Nov. 5 gubernatorial election. 

Wildstein also predicted political problems for Sokolich over the issue, writing in a Sept. 18 email, "It will be a tough November for this little Serbian."

The Port Authority's Foye was furious when he learned about the lane closures and ordered the lanes reopened on Sept. 13. Wildstein and Kelly were, in turn, furious at Foye for screwing with their plan.
"The New York side gave Fort Lee back all three lanes this morning," wrote Wildstein in an email to Kelly on Sept. 13. "We are appropriately going nuts. Samson helping us to retaliate."
"What??" replied Kelly.

"Yes, unreal," said Wildstein. "Fixing now."

David Samson, as The Record notes, is chairman of the Port Authority and a close adviser to Christie.
Christie's spokesman did not return a request for comment from The Huffington Post.

Christie, who is considered a possible 2016 presidential contender, has dismissed the controversy over the bridge closures and blamed it on Democrats trying to score political points against him. 

"National Democrats will make an issue about everything about me. So get used to the new world, everybody," he said in a Dec. 13 press conference. "You know, we're not in Kansas anymore, Dorothy. That's the way it goes, so it's fine."

Since news of the closures broke, Wildstein has resigned, as has his boss Bill Baroni, who was deputy executive director of the Port Authority and a top Christie aide. Christie, however, has maintained that Baroni's resignation was planned before news of the controversy broke.
 

Monday, January 6, 2014

Hillary Clinton's shadow campaign

POLITICO


Hillary Clinton's shadow campaign

 

Silhouetted by a stage light, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton speaks at the University of the Western Cape about U.S.-South Africa partnership in Cape Town, South Africa. | AP Photo
Publicly, Clinton insists she’s many months away from a decision. | AP Photo


Early last summer in her Georgian-style home near Washington’s Embassy Row, Hillary Clinton met with a handful of aides for a detailed presentation on preparing for a 2016 presidential campaign.

Three officials from the Democratic consulting firm Dewey Square Group — veteran field organizer Michael Whouley, firm founder Charlie Baker and strategist Jill Alper, whose expertise includes voter attitudes toward women candidates — delivered a dispassionate, numbers-driven assessment. They broke down filing deadlines in certain states, projected how much money Clinton would need to raise and described how field operations have become more sophisticated in the era of Barack Obama.

The meeting was organized by Minyon Moore, a longtime Clinton intimate also at Dewey Square who has informally become the potential candidate’s political eyes and ears of late. Clinton listened closely but said little and made no commitments, according to people familiar with the nearly hourlong gathering. It appears to have been the only formal 2016-related presentation Clinton has been given from anyone outside her immediate circle.

Publicly, Clinton insists she’s many months away from a decision about her political future. But a shadow campaign on her behalf has nevertheless been steadily building for the better part of a year — a quiet, intensifying, improvisational effort to lay the groundwork for another White House bid.

Some of the activity has the former first lady’s tacit approval. Some involves outside groups that are operating independently, and at times in competition with one another, to prepare a final career act for the former senator and secretary of state, whose legacy as the most powerful woman in the history of American politics is already secure.

More than two dozen people in her orbit interviewed for this article described a virtual campaign in waiting — a term that itself makes some of Clinton’s supporters bristle — consisting of longtime Clinton loyalists as well as people who worked doggedly to elect her onetime rival Obama.

There are two spheres of influence. One is made up of more than a dozen Clinton staffers, loyalists and longtime friends whose advice she values the most.

(PHOTOS: Who’s talking about Hillary Clinton 2016?)

The other sphere is more complex. It includes an assortment of super PACs and outside groups, all jockeying to be part of the Clinton movement but operating beyond her immediate direction and control. Still, some of these efforts could become the foundation of an eventual campaign.

For all the genuine excitement about the prospect that Clinton, 66, could shatter the glass ceiling she famously invoked in 2008, the potential for rancor among these groups is real.

In at least one instance last year, two super PACs collided over efforts to get behind a Clinton candidacy — forcing her allies to intervene.

“There’s upside and there’s risk” to this patchwork of outside forces, said Tad Devine, an unaffiliated strategist who worked on John Kerry’s 2004 presidential campaign, when Democratic-leaning outside groups often acted at odds with the candidate’s message.

“The upside is that people are out there doing valuable and important work for you,” he said. But “in a campaign, when people are acting on your behalf but they’re not driven by an agreed-upon strategy, then that’s the risk.”

The outsiders: friends with headaches

Hillary Clinton was a few months removed from the State Department when one of her top aides, Huma Abedin, received an alarmed phone call about trouble brewing between two groups looking to help her politically.

“Ready for Hillary,” the super PAC that was initially billed as a grass-roots effort to channel early energy for Clinton to run, had become a source of frustration, and it was reaching a boiling point. In addition to a moniker that irked some Clinton allies — they thought it had an air of inevitability that plagued her in the past ­ — the group was making an aggressive play for activists and donors to back their effort.

(PHOTOS: Hillary Clinton's 50 influentials)

At the same time, Priorities USA, the main super PAC behind Obama in 2012, was in discussions to reinvent itself as a pro-Hillary Clinton endeavor. That would mean appealing to some of those same supporters. The two groups also had wildly different views of how active to be while Clinton was assessing whether to run.

The Priorities official warned Abedin that the situation could become problematic for Clinton if it wasn’t resolved. The official sought guidance from someone who had the would-be candidate’s ear.
The efforts of pro-Clinton outside groups over the past half-year, and the Clinton allies trying to corral them, reflect a much-changed political landscape since Clinton’s last run. Back then, super PACs didn’t exist. Potential candidates who needed campaign prep work done had to set up an exploratory committee or PAC under their own direct control.
Now super PACs are a must-have political accessory for candidates of all stripes.

The groups can raise and spend unlimited sums in support of a candidate and perform key tasks the person isn’t ready to do. In Clinton’s case, Priorities will probably line up pledges from big donors. Ready for Hillary is building email lists. And Correct the Record — launched last year by Clinton-critic-turned-defender David Brock as an offshoot of the super PAC American Bridge — hits back when Clinton is attacked in the media and tries to define potential rivals like Chris Christie.

(Also on POLITICO: How she's fared in the polls)

The outside backers have allowed Clinton to stay out of the political fray for a longer period of time as she makes up her mind about whether to run.

But the free-agent entities can also become headaches when they act at cross-purposes — or in ways a candidate doesn’t approve of.

A clash of super PACs

The call to Abedin, described by several people familiar with the conversation, touched off a larger debate in Clinton’s circle. Clinton herself was forced to grapple with the run-in between the two groups; several sources familiar with the discussions said she wanted to keep her team distant from the work of the super PACs to avoid brushing up against rules forbidding coordination. But Clinton made clear to aides that the mess, which in many ways echoed the factionalism of her past, needed to be sorted out.

In a series of meetings in Washington and New York, advisers to both groups huddled to address the problem. John Podesta, the former chief of staff to Bill Clinton who recently joined the Obama White House, was among the participants brought in on the Priorities side to help.
Some suggested trying to force Ready for Hillary to shut down. That idea was rejected out of concern it would prompt negative stories about Clinton forces stomping on the grass roots.

Another adviser proposed merging the two super PACs, but that also went nowhere.

Eventually they settled on a solution: Ready for Hillary would focus on collecting and analyzing voter data, accepting donations up to $25,000. Priorities would be the super PAC for mega-donors, working solely on paid advertising.

Ready for Hillary has since won over key people close to Clinton impressed by its efforts like cultivating detailed lists of supporters through social media, which Clinton didn’t do in 2008. Among other moves, it brought on Craig Smith, a White House political director for Bill Clinton and friend from his Arkansas days. He gave the aura of an adult in the room to a group created by younger former Clinton staffers.
Most important is that Moore, whose background is in field organizing, is said to believe in the work the group is doing, as does Baker of Dewey Square, according to several sources. Besides the email list, Ready for Hillary is building a massive, 50-state direct-mail and voter targeting program. In a sign of cooperation, the group rented Clinton’s supporter list from her old PAC. It also brought on Obama’s field gurus, Mitch Stewart and Jeremy Bird, to help build up its efforts, including by supporting local candidates who Clinton backs in this year’s midterm elections.

Ready for Hillary hopes to make its data available to a 2016 Clinton campaign, and some Clinton allies believe there are a number of young aides and operatives working for the super PAC who could become part of her campaign. The 2008 campaign had many well-documented flaws, but one was the failure to prominently deploy young campaign talent, which flocked to Obama.

“If you wonder whether Clintonworld has learned our lessons from 2008, look no further than the work of Ready for Hillary,” said one source supportive of its work.

It’s far from certain the outside group’s voter data would be welcomed by a Clinton campaign; it will likely prefer to compile its own. Or, some Clinton associates say, it could choose from any number of outside campaign data firms, including two launched by Obama 2012 veterans after his reelection.

Elsewhere in the constellation of outside groups doing work related to Clinton is EMILY’s List, led by operative Stephanie Schriock, who is frequently mentioned as a possible Clinton campaign manager. The group, which focuses on electing women and isn’t a super PAC, is conducting an expansive polling project about attitudes toward female candidates. Correct the Record, the Brock-sponsored rapid response project, is being managed by a Hillary Clinton favorite, Burns Strider, and has her allies’ nod of approval.

“This effort for Hillary, unprecedented in both its early timing and scope, is a demonstration of the extent to which the Democratic Party is unified behind this potential candidacy,” said one of the organizers.

From Obama ‘08 to Clinton ‘16

Two of the boldest-faced names to enter the Clinton constellation in 2013 tied their political fortunes to electing Obama in 2008: Jim Messina, who went on to become a top political hand in the White House and then run Obama’s reelection, and Hollywood mogul Jeffrey Katzenberg.

(PHOTOS: Stars line up for Hillary Clinton 2016)

Despite his late arrival to Obama’s campaign in 2008 — he didn’t come on board until after the bloody primary — Messina was seen by Clinton aides as carrying a deep grudge from the campaign to the White House. Some Clinton associates suspected he was behind a failed attempt to scuttle two of her top staff picks at State: Capricia Marshall and Philippe Reines.

But what Messina lacks in longtime loyalty to Clinton, he makes up for in connections to Obama’s vast network of donors and activists. That had obvious value to a group like Priorities USA, which early last year was looking to morph from its 2012 version that decimated Mitt Romney with a series of attack ads into a pro-Clinton endeavor for 2016.
Early last year, Messina, who quietly admired Priorities’ work in 2012, started talking informally to the super PAC about a role. One draw is that working on a super PAC is less of a grind, and certainly more lucrative, than an actual campaign.

The discussions went on for months last year, long before news reports in November that he was in serious talks to become a co-chairman of the group. But some Clinton allies have grumbled that Messina’s swelling list of business clients could potentially embarrass Clinton; his backers dismiss the complaints as professional jealousy, saying plenty of Clinton advisers have their own potential business conflicts.

The White House has its own worries about Messina’s hoped-for move. One is that it would look like Obama was giving his blessing to the pro-Clinton group as his own vice president, Joe Biden, is weighing a 2016 run. Concern within the administration about ruffling relations with Biden has been serious enough to cause a lengthy delay in signing off on Messina officially joining Priorities, according to two people familiar with the deliberations.

Whatever role Messina may end up playing in 2016, the mere fact that most Clinton allies are fine with him being part of a pro-Clinton group signals a rapprochement that began when Obama tapped Clinton as his top diplomat. Messina had informal discussions with some of her aides after 2012 about his view of modern campaigns, and Bill Clinton has publicly admired his work since developing a connection with him last year.

Messina wasn’t the only one affiliated with Obama to join the future Clinton army via Priorities. Katzenberg broke with the Clintons in 2008 to back Obama and four years later helped launch Priorities with a $2 million check.

“I hope my donation will draw attention to the amount of money being raised by the extreme right wing and serve as a catalyst for other Democratic donors,” the DreamWorks Animation chief executive told CBS News in April 2012. The super PAC is now broadly seen as his baby.
After Obama secured four more years, the Democratic rainmaker made clear he was prepared to get behind Clinton financially. With Priorities reinventing itself and Messina getting involved with the group — Katzenberg and Messina worked together during the 2012 race — the media mogul has positioned himself as the group’s ambassador to Hollywood.

If all goes as planned, the hope is that Katzenberg and Messina’s involvement on behalf of Clinton will signal a smooth passage from Obama to Clinton within the party.

“It reflects the fact that the Obama political infrastructure is seamlessly transitioning to serve as [Clinton’s] political infrastructure,” said California-based political strategist Chris Lehane. “And [it] sends a signal to both Obama donors and operatives that it is all right to begin actively supporting the Clinton ’16 effort.”

The don’t-do-it camp

Despite the feverish buildup to a Clinton candidacy, some of her closest advisers aren’t sure she’ll run ­— and some don’t want her to.
Clinton has as clear a path to the nomination as anyone could. But she also bears the scars from her 2008 battle, as do a number of her aides who remember vividly the toll the enterprise took on Clinton and everyone involved. They all want to help her achieve whatever she decides she wants, but they are clear-eyed about another campaign.