Tag Archives: Hillary Rodham Clinton

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Hillary vs. Mitt in 2016 … seriously?

This just in: A new Iowa poll says Mitt Romney is miles ahead in a poll of 2016 Republican caucus participants.

Run, Mitt, run.

http://www.politico.com/story/2014/08/mitt-romney-2016-election-iowa-poll-110392.html?hp=r2

The 2012 Republican presidential nomineeĀ has dropped a hint or two that might be thinking about a third run for the presidency in 2016. He lost the GOP nomination to John McCain in 2008, then got thumped — surprisingly, in the eyes of many — two years ago when President Obama thumped with a decisive Electoral College victory.

“Circumstances could change,” Mitt said recently when asked about a possible run once again for the White House.

What might those circumstances be? Only he and, I presume, his wife Ann, know the answer. OK, throw in his five sons; they’ll know when something is up.

Frankly, I’d like to see Mitt go again. I am curious to see if the Olympic organizer/business mogul/former Massachusetts governor has learned from the mistakes that might have cost him the White House in 2012. Will he steer clear of “47 percent” comments? Will he refrain from saying that “corporations are people, too, my friend”? Will he forgo making $10,000 wager offers on a debate stage with other Republican rivals?

He might also be a bit more specific than he’s been about how he’d handle these international crises differently than the man who beat him in 2012.

For my money, Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton remains the candidate to beat in 2016, even though she’s looking less inevitable than she was looking about six months ago.

Mitt, though, could give her a tussle.

You go, Mitt.

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Pay us a visit, Mme. Secretary

Just thinking out loud here.

Watching the reporting on Hillary Rodham Clinton’s book tour brings to mind a 2008 campaign stop her husband, the former president of the United States, made here on her behalf — in Amarillo, in the Texas Panhandle, of all places.

Bill Clinton came to campaign for his wife as she fought Sen. Barack Obama for the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination.

He packed the Grand Plaza Ballroom at the Amarillo Civic Center. Indeed, it overflowed. A lot of Republicans attended the event just to get a glimpse of the 42nd president and to determine for themselves if he is as charismatic as everyone says he is.

President Clinton didn’t disappoint anyone, Republican or Democrat. Clinton would win the Democratic primary that year, but eventually lose the nomination fight to Obama.

http://www.texastribune.org/2014/06/20/hillary-clinton-book-tour-comes-austin/

I’d bet real U.S. money that Hillary Clinton would get a smashing reception here if she chose to come to Amarillo to hype her new book, “Hard Choices.”

She’s a possible, if not probable, candidate for president in 2016. There would be interest in that campaign as well.

The Texas Tribune reported on her book-tour stop in Austin, which everyone knew she’d make. Austin is one of the last Democratic bastions left in Texas. It’s a no-brainer for her go there and visit with friendly audiences.

Why not pay a visit to us here, on the High Plains of Texas, where no one would expect her to go?

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HRC fires another 'campaign' salvo

Hillary Rodham Clinton ventured to the city of my birth and delivered what sounds to me like yet another shot in her still-to-be-announced campaign for the presidency of the United States.

Speaking to the World Affairs Council of Oregon in Portland, Clinton said the current no-compromise political climate in Washington has hurt the United States.

Gee, do you think?

http://www.oregonlive.com/mapes/index.ssf/2014/04/hillary_clinton_tells_portland.html#incart_river_default

She’s saying far more than the obvious, of course. “Don’t vote for people who proudly tell you they won’t compromise,” she said to the crowd that jammed the hall to hear her words.

Indeed, Americans have gotten an overdose of what happens when zealots place their hands on the controls of government … which is that government stops working. They don’t know how to operate the levers. They refuse to listen to other points of view. They cannot bend for fear of breaking. They believe their way is the right way and other guys’ view will doom the country to, well, a miserable future.

Clinton is married to a man who knew how to compromise when he served as the 42nd president of the United States. Bill Clinton famously enacted the strategy called “triangulation,” in which he played both extremes — left and right — against each other to come up with policies that tracked more or less down the middle.

Indeed, the nation’s greatest legislators of the past 100 years or so knew “compromise” isn’t a four-letter word. They worked well with legislators on the other side: Ted Kennedy, Bob Dole, Hubert Humphrey, Everett Dirksen, Sam Rayburn, Mark Hatfield, Lyndon Johnson, the list can go on for a long time, but you get my drift.

My strong sense as well is that Clinton well might have included the current president in the “no compromise” category of modern politicians. Barack Obama blames Republicans for refusing to bend; the GOP fires back with some credibility that the president is afflicted with the same malady.

OK, so Clinton has said she’s “thinking about” running for president in two years. Duh!

Let’s prepare for a lot more of these kinds of talks from the former secretary of state and U.S. senator.

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Clinton star power shows itself in Kentucky

Who’s the biggest political star in the Democratic Party?

Hint: It ain’t the guy who occupies the White House.

It’s the guy who served two presidencies prior to Barack Obama’s arrival in January 2009.

William Jefferson Clinton packed ’em in at a fundraiser this week in Louisville, Ky., on behalf of Allison Lundergan Grimes, who’s running for the U.S. Senate seat occupied by Republican Mitch McConnell.

http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/senate-races/199419-clinton-raises-700k-for-grimes

The 42nd president raised $700,000 for Grimes’s campaign. He bowled over the audience in a state that voted against Obama twice in 2008 and 2012, but which Clinton won in 1992 and 1996.

This shouldn’t be a big surprise. Bill Clinton brought his towering presence to an even more anti-Democrat region back in 2008.

He came to Amarillo that year to campaign for his wife, the then-U.S. senator from New York, Hillary Rodham Clinton, who was locked in a tough primary campaign against then-Sen. Obama.

How did Bill Clinton fare when he showed up at the Grand Plaza Ballroom at the Amarillo Civic Center? He filled the place. It was an overflow crowd that, interestingly, included a lot of leading local Republicans who showed up just to hear Clinton’s remarks on behalf of his wife.

Make no mistake about what that 2008 appearance said about the former president’s magnetism. It’s real and can become a decisive asset for whoever the Democrats nominate as their presidential candidate in 2016.

Any bets that Democrats are going to nominate someone other than Hillary?

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Fox News might have to clam up about HRC film

The Fox News Channel has been all over the tumult involving CNN and NBC’s involvement in projects involving former Secretary of State (and possible 2016 presidential candidate) Hillary Rodham Clinton.

CNN is planning to air a film about Clinton; NBC is hoping to air a four-part miniseries. Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus is threatening to shut the two networks out of GOP presidential debates when the 2016 campaign kicks into gear.

But wait. The New York Times reports that Fox Television Stations is involved in the production and distribution of the CNN project.

http://www.politico.com/story/2013/08/reince-priebus-hillary-clinton-miniseries-nbc-95431.html?hp=r2

What say you now, Fox News Channel talking heads?

Priebus clammed up about the NY Times report, preferring to focus instead on the creative minds behind the works. Priebus, of course, loves FNC — as do political conservatives all over the country, given the network’s right-leaning slant.

Oh, I forgot, Fox is “fair and balanced.”

Whatever. I’m going to lay down a bet that Fox commentators might have to tone down their outrage.