Sen. Ted Cruz Jokes On GOP, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, and Himself
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Farah Pandith #39;90, first representative to Muslim communities
http://www.smith.edu/events/rallyday_2014.php Appointed in 2009 by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Farah Pandith leads U.S. efforts to engage and ...
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Farah Pandith '90, first representative to Muslim communities - Video
The fact that Bill Clinton is stumping in Kentucky on Tuesday for Senate candidate Alison Lundergan Grimesgot me to thinking about the 2016 presidential race. (It doesn't take much.) And, thinking specifically about this question: If Hillary Clinton is the Democratic presidential nominee in 2016, is the Bluegrass State actually in play?
Former secretary of state Hillary Rodham Clinton speaks Dec. 14, 2013, in New York. (Jason DeCrow/AP)
When I first grappled with that idea a few weeks back someone in my weekly Friday live chat asked about itI dismissed the idea out of hand. After all, President Obama won just 38 percent of the vote in Kentucky in 2012 and 41 percent in 2008. Five of the state's six House members and both U.S. Senators are Republicans. But, as I talked to more people Democrats and Republicans who know the state well, it became clear that my initial dismissive attitude was somewhat misguided. (What else is new?)
If she runs in 2016, Hillary Clinton will be very competitive in states like Kentucky," said Larry McCarthy, a Republican media consultant who works with Sen. Mitch McConnell's campaign and has done a number of races in the state. "Even though Kentucky usually votes red in presidential and Senate races, Kentucky has a moderate Democratic governor, Steve Beshear, and the plurality of voters still register Democratic." Added McCarthy: "Hillary knows these voters some parts of Arkansas are similar to Kentucky political values.Depending on who the Republican nominee is, that could make Hilary very competitive in Kentucky."
There is, without question, some track record of success for the Clinton brand in Kentucky."I love Kentucky," Bill Clinton said while campaigning for Lundergan Grimes today. "You've been good to me. Y'all voted for me twice." He's right although Clinton never won a majority of the vote in the state. In 1992, Clinton carried Kentucky with 45 percent as Ross Perot siphoned off 14 percent. In 1996, Clinton's winning margin narrowed to 13,000 votes (out of more than 1.3 million cast) as he took 46 percent to 45 percent for Bob Dole. (Perot, running again, took 9 percent.) Hillary Clinton took 65 percent of the vote over Barack Obama in the May 20, 2008, presidential primary. (Worth noting: The race was effectively decided for Obama by that point.)
There is some other evidence that the right sort of Democrat can win statewide in Kentucky. The governor's race is a prime example. Republicans have won only one governor's contest 2003, when then Rep. Ernie Fletcher was elected in the last 47 years. The Senate is a tougher sell for a Democrat, but even there the party has had victories; Wendell Ford (D) held a Senate seat in the state for more than two decades, and then Rep. Scotty Baesler very narrowly lost an open seat race to then Rep. Jim Bunning in 1998.
Here's the problem for Democrats,and those who make the case that a Hillary candidacy puts Kentucky and its eight electoral votes on the playing field in 2016: The last time Democrats were genuinely competitive in a statewide race for Senate or president was that 1998 race between Bunning and Baesler. (Federal races are different animals than state ones, dictated far more by the national agenda and national party figures than governor's races. That's why a Democrat can get elected governor of Kansas or Wyoming and a Republican can be the governor of Massachusetts.)
That was 16 years ago. Politics, Kentucky voters and the Clintons have changed since then, according to a senior GOP strategist who has spent significant time in Kentucky and pooh-poohs the idea that Hillary could make the Bluegrass State competitive."The Clintons of the 1990s were largely considered socially conservative southern Democrats in Kentucky, which is absolutely necessary to carry the western Kentucky Democrats in federal elections," explained the source. "A Democrat cannot win without winning that group decisively. As Democrats nationally have drifted further from the center on social issues, large blocs of Kentucky Democrats have not."
To put a little data on that point, the 1st district, which includes the city of Paducah, takes in the vast majority of western Kentucky. Democrats still dominate in terms of voter registration 284,304 Democrats, 156,505 Republicans but many of those people are Democrats in name only. They tend to be significantly more conservative than the national Democratic party and identify with Republicans on virtually every federal issue. They simply have never changed their party registration from a time when everyone in the south was a registered Democrat. The 1st gave Obama just 32 percent of the vote in 2012. McConnell won it with 56 percent in his competitive reelection race against Democrat Bruce Lunsford in 2008.Clinton, on the other hand, carried it by four points in 1996 and nine points in 1992.
The question for Hillary Clinton then is could she reach back to the"I'm one of you" argument that her husband used so successfully in 1992 and 1996, and which, to a large extent, he made Tuesday as a surrogate for Lundergan Grimes? Or, with 20 years of Clinton-ness under the bridge since her husband last carried the state, would Hillary be cast as just the sort of national figure that Kentuckians have moved away from?
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Washington (CNN) Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Tuesday that womens peace and security issues were integral for dealing with foreign policy issues in Syria, Iran and Libya.
In front of students and former State Department officials at Georgetown University, Clinton made the case that issues like rape in conflict areas and upward mobility for women were not just issues that women should address. Instead, she said, they are a responsibility that we all share.
It is important at the outset to underscore that this is not a womens issue, Clinton said. This cuts to the very core of who we are as human beings and what kind of societies that we choose to have, to what kind of world we want to live in and leave for our children.
Clintons remarks came during an award ceremony, where the former first lady was giving the Hillary Rodham Clinton Award for Advancing Women in Peace and Security to Dr. Denis Mukwege, founder of Panzi Hospital in the Democratic Republican of the Congo, and William Hague, secretary of state for the United Kingdom. Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the current Secretary General of NATO, also received the award but was unable to attend the ceremony.
Clinton said the fact that three men received the award was intentional and an effort to point out that men too can be champions of womens security issues.
When introducing Hague, the former first lady commended the conservative diplomat for leading on issues of women, peace and security, especially considering issues like Syria, Libya and Iran were commanding international attention.
What he understood and why I respect this decision of him so greatly, is that these are not separate issues, Clinton said. Women, peace and security are and must be recognized as being integral to dealing with all of those headline issues.
Tuesday's award ceremony was part of Georgetowns Institute for Women, Peace and Security, an office that is led by Melanne Verveer, a woman whose ties to Clinton date back to her early years in the White House and was Clintons ambassador-at-large for global womens issues.
Clinton left the State Department at the start of 2013 and is now considered the frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016. Clinton, however, has said she has yet to decide whether she will run.
Hague dedicated the start of his speech to Clinton, commending the former first lady and noting a few light moments the two shared when they worked together.
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Clinton: Womens issues integral to dealing with Syria, Libya
Vice President Joe Biden on Tuesday said that Hillary Clinton's 2016 plans would not affect his...
Vice President Joe Biden on Tuesday said that Hillary Clinton's 2016 plans would not affect his own decision on whether or not to run for the presidency.
Whether she runs or not will not affect my decision, Biden said during an interview on ABCs daytime talk show The View.
Its as likely I run as I dont run, he added. I just truly havent made up my mind.
Biden has declined to close the door on a possible run, despite polls showing him a distant second to former Secretary of State Clinton for the Democratic nomination.
Clintons supporters have begun laying the groundwork for her to run, but she has sidestepped questions about her future, telling ABC in an interview in December that she would make a decision sometime next year.
The vice president said that he would run if he believed he was the best candidate to press forward President Obama's agenda, citing his work on foreign policy and to help bolster the middle class.
I think my knowledge of foreign policy, my engagement with world leaders, my experience uniquely positions me to be, to follow through on the agenda that Barack and I have of bringing up world peace in a way that is real and substantive, he said.
Biden also cited his concerns for the middle class, calling it the single focus, what we should be looking at, how to grow it.
But the vice president cautioned that Democrats should stay focused on the approaching 2014 midterms.
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Joe Biden: Hillary Clinton's decision won't affect my 2016 plans