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Cardin, right, confers with Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn. during a committee markup meeting on the proposed nuclear agreement with Iran Tuesday. Win McNamee/Getty Images hide caption

Cardin, right, confers with Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn. during a committee markup meeting on the proposed nuclear agreement with Iran Tuesday.

It was a fluke that turned Sen. Ben Cardin of Maryland into the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. New Jersey Democrat Bob Menendez got hit with criminal charges and gave the rank up. Now, just two weeks into his new gig, Cardin has helped bridge the divide on legislation letting Congress weigh in on a nuclear deal with Iran. The bill thrust a man without flash or hubris into the spotlight.

The way his rabbi puts it, Democrat Ben Cardin isn't how you'd picture a senator.

"He is soft-spoken, unassuming, does nothing to draw attention to himself," said Mitchell Wohlberg, who's been the rabbi at Beth Tfiloh Congregation in Baltimore for 37 years.

But Wohlberg said those are the qualities that make people respect Cardin, and now the low-profile senator has landed in a position with high-profile consequences.

The rabbi told Cardin his ascension reminds him of the Biblical story of Esther.

"Where Mordecai says to Esther, 'You are the queen, and you have influence now in the upper echelons of the King's palace. Perhaps it was for this that God has put you in this place, at this time,'" Wohlberg recounted.

Probably not the first time Cardin heard his rabbi lay it on thick, but Wohlberg said the expectations on the senator have been the highest he's ever faced. Many supporters of Israel will not trust any deal with Iran.

"I don't think the senator has ever faced this kind of pressure from the Jewish community. I don't know if there's ever been an issue as sensitive as this. He has never been in that kind of public position that he's in right now since Senator Menendez had to step back," Wohlberg said.

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Helping Bridge Congress' Iran Divide, Sen. Ben Cardin Moves Into Spotlight

The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette's online presentation of a writer's near-death experience in the southwest Texas desert was one of 10 Arkansas winners of Great Plains Journalism Awards announced in a ceremony in Tulsa on Monday.

The Great Plains Journalism Awards recognize the best newspaper and magazine journalism each year from Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma and South Dakota.

The newspaper's online staff also won Great Plains Awards for spot news video coverage of the April 27, 2014, tornado and best overall website design for WholeHogSports.

Philip Martin, the newspaper's MovieStyle editor, won the entertainment/specialty blog category for his blog, blooddirtandangels.

Photographers Benjamin Krain, Rick McFarland, Melissa Sue Gerrits and Staton Breidenthal won the multiple news photography category for their pictures of the destruction and personal impact from the April 27 tornado that killed 16 people.

Reporter Chelsea Boozer's coverage of changes in Little Rock city government's sex-offender employment policy won for beat reporting.

Reporter Cheree Franco's story about an aficionado of 1960s garage bands won for best entertainment feature.

Deputy Sports Editor Jeff Krupsaw won for his portfolio of headlines.

Arkansas Life magazine's Nick Hunt, Katie Bridges, Jordan Hickey and Kelley Lane won the magazine feature writing category for a story about Arkansas-based storm chasers who end a long trek across Oklahoma without a tornado only to find one close to home.

Hickey, Bridges and Lane won the magazine profile writing category for a story about a man left "minimally conscious" after a car accident.

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State journalists garner 10 awards

It should come as no surprise that Ohio's Democrat Party leaders have endorsed former Gov. Ted Strickland as nominee for a U.S. Senate seat - without bothering to consider whether that may be the choice of Democrat voters.

But what is surprising is that the party machine believes Buckeye State residents have forgotten the mess Strickland created while governor.

On Saturday, party leaders endorsed Strickland in the Senate race next year against incumbent Republican Rob Portman. The endorsement came despite the fact the primary election is months away.

Another Democrat, Cincinnati city Councilman P.G. Sittenfield, already has announced he is running for the Senate. During the coming months, other Democrats may decide voters ought to have options other than Strickland.

But party leaders have made up their minds. Clearly, they would rather any other Democrat candidates just go away so they can get on with promoting Strickland for the Senate.

That will not be an easy task in a race against Portman, who has served Ohioans and the nation well in the Senate.

Any attempt to make Strickland appealing will have to rest on the hope that Ohio voters have short memories.

But many recall he left office having helped create an $8 billion state budget gap - after insisting Ohio had no fiscal worries.

Too many also recall Strickland's unequivocal support for President Barack Obama's policies, including those aimed at destroying the coal industry and with it, the reasonably priced electricity on which so many Ohioans rely.

Last fall, voters throughout the country turned their backs on members of Congress who had the attitude that their party's president came first, with their constituents a distant second. Democrat leaders in Ohio do not seem to have gotten the memo on that.

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Strickland Bad Choice for Party

Meanwhile Conservative presidential hopeful Ted Cruz, who entered the fray last month, released his own video in reaction to Mrs Clinton's announcement, saying she represents a third Obama term and the "failed policies of the past".

The Scottish National Party's Nicola Sturgeon - another female powerhouse, seemingly backed Hillary, tweeting her support after the announcement:

While the video has gone down very well on social media, her new logo not so much. Memes have already been started, with unfortunate parallels drawn between the two vertical blocks for the H in "Hillary" and the Twin Towers, while others say it looks like a sign for a hospital

Our correspondent Rob Crilly happens to live down the street from Hillary's new HQ. He's checked it out for us:

One way for a 67-year-old former First Lady and Secretary of State to shed her image as part of the Washington old guard is to base her campaign in one of the most fashionable of New York neighbourhoods.

So it came as no surprise when details emerged that her embryonic team had leased two floors of an office block across the East River from Manhattan in Brooklyn Heights.

Even though the building itself is slightly stuffy housed on its 19 floors are the bankers of Morgan Stanley as well as lawyers working for the US attorney for the eastern district of New York - its owners market One Pierrepont Plaza as Brooklyn Cool.

And the roll-out continues. Clinton will apparently spend the next 6-8 weeks in "ramp up" mode while her team builds a "nationwide grassroots organisation", according to the first press release from her new Campaign For America operation. Some might say that she's been ramping up for years already. The first big rally will be some time in May, after she's been on her "listening tour" to Iowa, New Hampshire and other early caucus and primary states.

Her campaign team were said to have had a meeting yesterday in the new Brooklyn HQ. Jennifer Palmieri, who is expected to be her head of communications, tweeted this:

Philip Sherwell, our correspondent in New York, has this to say on her video announcement:

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'I'm running for President': Hillary Clinton launches campaign for 2016 Democrat nomination: live

Borders Liberal Democrat Michael Moore today said that as the second full week of general election campaigning draws to a close, only the Liberal Democrats have a fully-costed plan to increase investment in Scotlands NHS and give doctors and nurses the support they need.

Speaking as he was joined on the campaign trail in the Borders by Liberal Democrat Chief Whip Don Foster, Mr Moore said that by committing to Simon Stevens Five Year Forward View, the Liberal Democrats would invest 17bn more than the Tories and 7bn more than Labour in the NHS.

Last month, Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie MSP confirmed that this would mean an extra 800m per year for the NHS in Scotland.

Mr Moore warned the other parties that time is running out for them to set out how they would pay for their own NHS plans. Analysis of the SNPs full fiscal autonomy proposals has shown that Scotland would face a 7.6bn funding black hole in the very first year of the policy and a 40 bn spending gap over the next parliament.

Commenting, Mr Moore said:

Because we are willing to give the health service the money it has asked for, Liberal Democrat plans would see us spend 17bn more than the Tories and 7bn more than Labour to support doctors and nurses in our NHS. This would mean an extra 800m per year for the NHS in Scotland.

Our plans are fully funded but at the end of the second full week of campaigning we are still none the wiser as to how the other parties would pay for their NHS commitments. Time is running out for them to give people the answers they need.

"Only the Liberal Democrats have a fully costed plan to give the health service the money it needs.

Labour and the Tories have not matched Liberal Democrat NHS spending plans. The SNPs full fiscal autonomy plan and the 40bn funding black hole that comes with it mean that they could not deliver the investment that our NHS needs.

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Only Lib Dems have a fully costed plan to boost Scottish NHS funds