Jon Huntsman,circa 2007, expressing comfort with the idea of an individual mandate on health care.
"I'm comfortable with a requirement -- you can call it whatever you want, but at some point we're going to have to get serious about how we deal with this issue."
The video is another mark of how uncontroversial the mandate was before Obama, reluctantly, embraced it.
.... Tim Pawlenty expressed openness to, and reservations about, a mandate in the same period, which was soon after the passage of Mitt Romney's MassCare.
Sarah Palin plans to meet Tuesday night with Donald Trump in New York City, according to sources close to Trump.
Her office reached out to meet with Trump. The two plan to meet in his 45,000-square-foot apartment in Trump Tower and later plan to eat dinner together.
Sources say the restaurant will be low-key, not one of New York's more upscale dining establishements.
It's remarkable that Palin still wants to meet with Trump after his discredited birther push -- not to mention his other departures from orthodoxy, like pushing for seizing Iraq's oil wells.
Earlier this month, I chronicled the potentially, politically dangerous association for Palin.
Sarah Palin and businessman Donald Trump have formed a political bond, one united by their populist ideology and contempt for the mainstream media.
Their kinship grew during the height of the birther controversy. As Trump called on President Obama to release his birth certificate, Palin rose to Trump’s defense, excoriating the press.
She blamed the media, not Trump, for the business mogul’s fixation on birtherism, telling Fox News: “Donald Trump is the one being really treated unfairly, I’d say … in the press when they’re hammering him about the one issue … he’s merely answering reporters’ questions about his view on the birth certificate.”
To Palin, Trump’s crusade was merely a curiosity stoked by the media.
“The media is loving the fact that some curious Americans are actually asking the questions, and they’re trying to make those curious Americans sound kind of crazy,” she said about the birther movement one day before Obama released his long-form certificate.
When Obama released it, Palin promptly credited Trump for the action, tweeting, “Media, admit it, Trump forced the issue.”
For his part, Trump reveled in the attention Palin helped bring, telling The Wall Street Journal that she was “so gracious to me on the birther issue. I mean, she really thought that I was doing a great service.”
For better or worse, Palin has attached her seal of approval more clearly to the Trump phenomenon than any other potential presidential candidate.
I don't think Palin necessarily respects him for his positions, as much as she does his political celebrity, and particular, the idea that he was mistreated by the press.
She articulated just that last month (right before Obama released his certificate).
"Donald Trump is the one being really treated unfairly, I'd say, though, in the press when they're hammering him about the one issue that he has brought up and not been shy about, and that's the birth certificate.
He's merely answering reporters' questions about his view on the birth certificate, and then reporters turn that around and say 'That's all he's got. He's always only running on a birth certificate issue' when that's not the case."
A new Public Policy polling survey -- to be released tomorrow -- will showHerman Cain jumping all the way to 2nd place in a poll of likely GOP Iowa caucus-goers.
Meanwhile, the co-founder and national coordinator of the huge Tea Party Patriots tells the Washington Post:
“[Cain] is a lot more like us than anyone who has run for president in our lifetimes.”
The National Review's Stephen DeMaura on another score for Rick Perry's deep record.
In a unanimous vote last week, the Texas senate adopted ‘loser pays’ tort-reform legislation, which says that a plaintiff must pay the winning party’s legal fees if their complaint is judged to be groundless.
On Wednesday, the Texas house concurred. Governor Perry, who had championed the legislation from its inception, signed it Monday night.
After two days on the road, Palin now realizes a campaign “could be fun and exciting,” the source said, and she’s getting “more into the swing of things” as she tours and realizes “the press is not hostile to her.”
Reid Wilson reports that Michele Bachmann has hired Ed Goeas, president of the Tarrance Group, to be her campaign's top pollster.
He most recently worked for Haley Barbour, and wrote this piece in February about the 2012 field.
Republican voters, sensing their ability to reverse the mistakes and direction of the last two years, are determined not to fall into the trap of nominating the “next one in line” and risk snatching defeat out of the jaws of victory.
Sarah Palin tells Scott Conroy that it's not just the sacred cow of ethanol subsidies that's in her line of fire.
"I think that all of our energy subsidies need to be relooked at today and eliminated.
.... And we need to make sure that we're investing and allowing our businesses to invest in reliable energy products right now that aren't going to necessitate subsidies because, bottom line, we can't afford it."
Here's the weird thing: Both Tim Pawlenty and Sarah Palin need to win Iowa to remain viable, and both have now called for an end to subsides to the state's big ethanol industry.
Meanwhile, Mitt Romney doesn't need to win Iowa, but nevertheless, reiterated his support for ethanol subsidies last week.
.... he said the two living Republicans he most admires are now folk heroes: Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee.
"I admire the single-minded, intense focus on finding solutions," he said, referring to Ryan's mission to address the debt and spending. He cited Huckabee for connecting to voters and articulating a message in a heartfelt and thoughtful way.
Who would've guessed? Jon Huntsman is a fan of the biggest '12 prospect to have opted out of a run, leaving millions of supporters with no one to support.
It doesn't hurt that Huck's deep feud with Romney might make Huck fans even more eager to vote against Mitt, which is where Huntsman -- as an alternative to Romney -- sweeps in.
Mitt Romney delivered the grade on The Today Show:
"He's been one of the most ineffective presidents at the job at hand that I've ever seen.
The number one issue he faced, walking into the door, was an economy that was in fast decline. He didn't cause that, but he made things worse.
.... [He's] failed."
NBC's Jamie Gangel then asked if he'd give Obama's performance an F, and Romney replied "Absolutely."
Romney is officially announcing his run for president this Thursday in New Hampshire, and told NBC that his odds of defeating Obama were better than 50/50.
Much has been of Mitt Romney's attempt to loosen up this time a-round -- something his wife, Ann, tried reinforcing on The Today Show this morning.
"[People] don't see him as the casual guy he is. Most the time his hair really is messed up."
Last summer, the Boston Globe noticed the transformation.
New Hampshire is the place Romney’s advisers and allies say they see Mitt at rest: a wearer of jeans and driver of a black 2003 Chevy Silverado pickup truck. Some of them are hoping that Romney’s laid-back summer lifestyle will survive Labor Day and endure onto the campaign trail, helping to erase the impression many voters have had of a wealthy candidate almost animatronically focused on winning.
.... In early July, Romney marched in Wolfeboro’s Fourth of July parade in jeans and a checked shirt, his hair tousled, a combination that became something of a uniform on his spring book tour.
When Mitt Romney breezed into a book-signing here recently, some people from Massachusetts may not have recognized him.
True, his hair was slicked back in signature style, but his rumpled cotton shirt looked nothing like the pressed suits he favored while governor of the Bay State.
Tufts of gray hair poked above the open neck, and a bronze California glow replaced the pasty complexion normally found amid a New England winter.
On The Today Show this morning, Mitt Romney debuted a new way of contrasting his Massachusetts health care plan with Barack Obama's.
"My bill was seventy pages. His bill is 2,700 pages. In those extra 2,630 pages, he's doing a lot of stuff that is just devastating the health care system in this country."
Sarah Palin pulled a clever bait and switch on reporters in Gettysburg on Tuesday.
The Palin family and a few members of her staff snuck out of their hotel early, leaving their flashy bus behind in the hotel parking lot to give reporters chasing her the impression that she was still readying for the day.
.... CNN was soon tipped off that Palin was long gone, off to visit the Civil War battlefields and onward toward Philadelphia.
By the media's standards, Michele Bachmann is still very much Sarah Palin's little sister.
During her brief appearance on Fox & Friends this morning, the hosts asked Bachmann three times about various aspects of Sarah Palin's potential bid for president.
The funnier thing is that the questions weren't sequential, but instead scattered throughout the interview, which the hosts kept trying to steer back toward Palin, despite Bachmann's understandable desire to talk about herself.
Here are FNC's three questions. Just watch the first, few seconds of each question -- pretty funny.
Tim Pawlenty released a new web video today, anchored by lots of footage of his Iowa presidential announcement.
Also included: Brief clips of i/views with voters attending the event.
The reactions that the campaign includes reveal one of T-Paw's strategies -- play up blue collar response to contrast with the aristocratic flairs of Mitt Romney and Jon Huntsman.
"I look into his eyes, and I see an honest man."
"He is the people's man, and he's trying to be fair with everybody."
Greta Van Susteren aired an interview last night aboard Sarah Palin's tour bus, where the elusive prospect explained her refusal to give the media or supporters an itinerary for her trip.
"[The media wants] kind of the conventional idea of a schedule, we want to follow you, we want you to bring us along with you.
I'm like a) I don't think I owe anything to the mainstream media. I think that it would be a mistake for me to become some kind of conventional politician and doing things the way that it's always be done with the media, in terms of relationships with them.
.... I want them to have to do a little bit of work on a tour like this, and that would include not necessarily telling them beforehand where every stop's going to be."
Maybe her reluctance to tell the MSM where she's going is understandable. But it's still strange that she'd promote the tour far and wide via the media, and then shut out not just that group, but also her supporters from showing up at the events.
And notice that in Palin's world, every odd decision is chalked up to being "unconventional", as if it grants her immunity from bad judgment.
AllahPundit notes that Sarah Palin used the media to spread the message far and wide that she was taking a bus tour, only to freeze out journalists once the tour began.
She needed the media to help put the word out about the bus tour, but once that mission was accomplished, she made SarahPAC a near-exclusive outlet for coverage.... It’s very much Palin’s M.O. to want to reach her supporters directly, without any media filter, so that makes sense.
That raises the question:
Why not announce her itinerary in advance on the SarahPAC website?
Having huge crowds of supporters waiting to meet her at each stop would make for dynamite photo ops, especially in contrast to the palpable lack of excitement surrounding Romney and Pawlenty.
Could be she’s worried that announcing the schedule in advance would also bring out the Palin critics, but that’s an unavoidable risk for any pol making a public appearance. Plus, her supporters are famously more devoted than most politicians’; I’d bet cash money that the cheers from local supporters would swamp any boos along the way.
Unprompted, Sarah Palin brought up Rick Perry's name yesterday as a strong presidential candidate.
"I think he would be a fine candidate.... we have a lot in common. I really like him. But there are so many candidates and potential candidates out there who have so much to offer."
Indeed. Except for Palin herself, Perry would probably be the strongest tea party candidate.
Meanwhile, here's some vid from the New York Times of her stop in Gettysburg last night, where she reiterated the message that even though the 2012 field is strong, "there will be more strong candidates jumping in."
“Truly, there is still a lot of time for folks to make up their minds and jump in and get their campaigns together. The field isn’t set yet. Not by a long shot.”
Which sounds like her way of telling GOP folks to keep the powder dry, and the media to keep on covering her.
The Hill's Jordan Fabian on a cow that's still sacred for Romney.
Mitt Romney on Friday voiced his support for ethanol subsidies during his first visit of the year to Iowa.
Asked about his position on federal ethanol subsidies following a talk at the Greater Des Moines Partnership's Presidential Forum Speaker Series, Romney said that ethanol is an important part of the nation's energy supply.
“I support the subsidy of ethanol,” said Romney, according to ABC News. “I believe it’s an important part of our energy solution in this country.”
Tim Pawlenty made a big splash among conservatives when he came out opposing the subsidies, while in Iowa, no less.
It was a smart move by T-Paw, because it fits into the harsh truth "narrative" that he's building for his candidacy. Meanwhile, it's also a chance to separate himself from Romney and call him a panderer -- a charge to which Romney is already susceptible.
Erick Erickson makes a good argument for a Chris Christie 2012 bid:
I think Chris Christie is going to all have a very difficult time winning reelection in New Jersey in 2013.
By then, New Jersey’s debt and economic problems will still be large, even if Chris Christie is successful in this term. Likewise, we can expect a more concerted and unified effort among Democrats and allies like unions than we saw even in 2009.
Given New Jersey’s nature as a Democrat leaning state, I think Christie will have a hard time getting reelected.
Were he to lose, it would be three years before the next presidential election making it even harder for Chris Christie to be seen as a viable presidential candidate.
Tim Pawlenty said in a 2006 speech that mandated health insurance was a "potentially helpful" -- but incomplete -- solution to the problem of the uninsured.
Pawlenty described a Massachusetts-style mandate in his speech as "a worthy goal and one that we're intrigued by and I think at least open to," but suggested that the central health care problem was not forcing people to buy insurance but helping them afford it.
.... Pawlenty does not appear ever to have advanced a mandate as part of his own health policy initiatives, and actually shelved the recommendations of two commissions that backed it. But he expressed openness in the 2006 speech to a mandate as part of a "holistic" health care package, and certainly never suggested that state mandates are illegal or immoral -- only ineffective.
Mitt Romney will welcome any sort of crack -- however minor -- in his opponents' rhetoric on this.
This is, in fact, a CNN poll of the 2012 GOP primary.
1. Rudy Giuliani 16%
2. Mitt Romney 15%
3. Sarah Palin 13%
4. Ron Paul 12%
5. Herman Cain 10%
6. Newt Gingrich 8%
7. Michele Bachmann 7%
8. Tim Pawlenty 5%
9. Rick Santorum 2%
10. Jon Huntsman and Gary Johnson 1%
WITHOUT Rudy G:
1. Mitt Romney 19%
2. Sarah Palin 15%
3. Ron Paul 13%
4. Herman Cain and Newt Gingrich 11%
6. Michele Bachmann 7%
7. Tim Pawlenty 5%
8. Jon Huntsman 3%
9. Rick Santorum and Gary Johnson 2%
Do you want to see the following run for president?
a. Paul Ryan 48%/43% want to see him run.
b. Chris Christie 45%/45%.
c. Rick Perry 40%/50%.
d. Jeb Bush 39%/58%.
So by 19%, Republicans don't want to see the ostensible savior, Jeb Bush, get in the race. I've written about this before -- the fact that there's a huge disconnect between the conservative intelligentsia and activists on Jeb.
A couple more take-aways from the poll. Obviously, Rudy is up there. A big part of that is name ID, but Sarah Palin, Mitt Romney, and Newt Gingrich probably have at least Rudy's name ID.
Meanwhile, news comes that Rudy is going to address the New Hampshire GOP next Thursday, which happens to be the same day Romney is giving his formal announcement -- also in New Hampshire!
One, other take-away: Herman Cain hits double-digits. Another way of underscoring that is by mentioning he's polling 2x better than T-Paw.
I'm a broken record on this, but only because there's this common idea that Pawlenty will surge once he gets better known. Sometimes surges don't happen. Harold Miner was supposed to be Baby Jordan, after all.
At a news conference today to ceremonially sign the Voter ID bill into law, surrounded by Republicans, Perry was asked again about the matter.
He first said, as he always does, that he’s focusing on the legislative session.
Asked if he’ll think about running when the session ends Monday, Perry had a new answer: “Yes sir. I’m going to think about it.” Then he added, “I think about a lot of things”
Asked what made him change his mind, Perry first said, “I didn’t say I was running, did I? I’m going to think about it.”
A new Rasmussen Reports poll shows Chris Christie putting New Jersey in play if he were the Republican nominee for president.Barack Obama beats him 49%/44% in the state, but the race might actually be a lot closer.
That's because the POTUS pulls in 88% of Democrats, while Christie gets just 80% of Republicans. Those numbers give the governor room to grow, and in the heat of a general election battle, partisan support tends to firm up.
Meanwhile, Obama leads Mitt Romney by 6% in the state -- 49%-43%.
Obama won New Jersey by 15% in 2008, so things have tightened.
Rush Limbaugh told Fox News last night that the GOP establishment is as "frightened" of Sarah Palin as are Democrats.
"The inside-the-beltway, the ruling class, the elites -- they're more oriented toward candidates they can attach the word 'serious' to, which is another way saying somebody that's boring, somebody that doesn't ruffle feathers, somebody that exudes an air of formal education and sophistication -- she doesn't exude that.
.... You know the effect that she has on establishment Republican people. They're just as frightened -- in their own way -- as the Democrats are."
Once again, a heavy dose of class warfare in the battle over Palin.
As Gallup showed earlier this week, she leads the pack among those who didn't attend college, Romney triples her among those who graduated from college.
Herman Cain's rise is remarkable, and shows how quickly you can catch fire, and how surely it can boost you.
It must be frustrating for Tim Pawlenty to see both Cain and Michele Bachmann doubling his support -- even though he's been at this longer, and according to the Beltway, is a more viable contender.
A few, other notes:
If you poll just those calling themselves "very conservative", Romney drops to a tie for 3rd with Cain -- behind Palin and Bachmann.
But he wins moderates, though it's just a 4% difference with Palin.
Gender remains one of my favorite things to check, because Palin's divide there is so fascinating. Once again, she performs measurably better among men than women. In fact, Newt Gingrich even outpolls her with women.
And this survey is another example of how much Huckabee's absence turns things around. Things are suddenly very open for Sarah Palin.
Karl Rove weighs in on Sarah Palin's bus tour, which is sure to attract throngs of supporters.
"There's a difference between crowds and what you need to run a campaign.
Some of the biggest campaign crowds that you've ever seen in modern, American politics occurred in the 1972 election, and they were crowds for George McGovern, who was going down to a huge defeat.
So you can't equate size of crowds, necessarily, with your acceptance by a broader populace."
True, and for a more contemporary analogy, look at Donald Trump. Even as he was crashing in the polls, he was still the biggest draw, and is probably the only guy who could touch Palin, in terms of filling a stadium for a rally.
Karl Rove talked about Sarah Palin's bus tour last night, and concluded that she'll likely run for president.
"Look, I don't think she thinks the rules apply to her. She doesn't need to have the traditional trappings of a presidential campaign -- no finance committee, she can raise the money, she doesn't need to go shake a lot of hands in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina.
.... she gets to decide what the rules that govern her campaign and go, accordingly, and politics is changing.
Some people have done things that have been outside the norm and custom and have won.... I think this is an interesting way to run for president, and I think she is going to run for president."
Tim Pawlenty slammed ethanol subsidies again on Morning Joe today.
"We can't have any more sacred cows, and this is about the budget.
I think renewable fuels still has a bright future in America, but we can't subsidize it with cash anymore, and that's why I said what I said in Iowa."
It'll be interesting to see how Pawlenty talks about this in Iowa -- will he include it in his stump speech, or will it just be a response to frequent townhall questions?
Tim Pawlenty, after being asked this morning if he thinks Sarah Palin will run for president.
"Who knows?
I don't know if she's running or not. I don't know what the bus tour means or not. Whoever's going to get in, I hope they get in soon, because I want the field to be set, so we can have the real debate.
The country is facing huge issues, and we need to quit worrying about polls and bus tours and get onto the issue of how we're going to fix the country, and get the country back on track.
The country -- in many ways -- is slipping away, and we don't have a lot of time to fix it.
The time is now. We need leaders, so I'm not going to be worried about bus tours and name ID polls that don't even relate to the early states.
Let's get to the issues and fix the darn problems."
"I think there's a potential trap here for Sarah Palin, if she's considering running.
You talk to these people who support the kind of elite candidates -- or the more traditional candidates -- and it's almost like the Left and the Right, to some extent, both want Palin to run, so then they can use her candidacy as kind of leverage among the electorate.
So they can say 'Well, you've got to support me; otherwise, Sarah Palin will be the president."
She's essentially defining political polarization.
During the former House speaker’s two-day campaign swing through New Hampshire, the roughly 600 people who came to see him were largely uninterested in his jewelry-buying habits. Nor did they ask about his criticism — since retracted — of a GOP plan to replace Medicare insurance with vouchers.
Instead, the crowds heard Gingrich declare at nearly every stop that his campaign is alive and well, casting himself as a “comeback kid."
Surely he knows that the most famous politician using this was Bill Clinton -- why the reminder about the fact he was Speaker way back then?
A fascinating exchange between CNN's John King and Michele Bachmann last night, and ironically, the fact that Bachmann so readily acknowledges her discipline problem is a sign itself of.... indiscipline.
KING: You had a conversation with Chris Wallace right after the Libya invasion started -- the Libya bombing started -- where you said that you heard a report from an ambassador to Tripoli that maybe 10,000-20,000-30,000 people had been killed. That number was, of course, not anywhere near reliable.
So some people say 'Michele Bachmann just sees one little report and goes and quotes it on television'.
Do you have to work on discipline if you run for president?
BACHMANN: I think it's important to have discipline and a message, that's true, and have I been accurate in everything that I've said?
No, that's not true. You can fact-check, but the fact is I read, and I read a lot.
And that morning I had a report by AP, and the overall number was correct, and it was a number that was given by the Ambassador. It wasn't in one, particular engagement, but it was the number of people who had been wounded, so far, so that was accurate.
Bachmann is blurring some lines.
I blogged that exchange with Wallace on May 1, and it's clear Bachmann was referring to the NATO strikes that had occurred that weekend, and not the overall number.
That's an important distinction, because she was relying on a Libyan ambassador's report.
Regardless of whether his words were quoted in an AP article, discipline requires care about banking on a source from the Gaddafi regime, and it highlights the idea that she uses reports haphazardly and for her particular goal -- in this case, saying the U.S. shouldn't be involved in Libya.
BACHMANN: [Obama] said he wanted to go in for humanitarian purposes, and overnight, we're hearing that, potentially, 10,000-30,000 people could have been killed in the [NATO] strikes.
Those are some of the reports.
WALLACE: The NATO strikes? 10,000-30,000?
BACHMANN: There is a report that came out from an ambassador from Tripoli that said we won't know until we're able to...
WALLACE: [interrupting] ... the NATO strikes killed 10,000-30,000 people?
BACHMANN: A report that came out last night from the Tripoli ambassador said that, potentially, there could be 10,000-30,000.
WALLACE: You said "the Tripoli ambassador." You mean, the Libyans?
BACHMANN: Yes.
WALLACE: So you're believing the Gaddafi regime?
BACHMANN: We don't know. We don't know.
WALLACE: You think Muammar Gaddafi is a reliable person?
BACHMANN: I don't think anyone thinks that.
When President Obama went in, his doctrine was to enter into Libya for humanitarian purposes. The point of what I'm saying is that we're seeing many, many lives lost, including innocent civilians' lives.
Now back to her CNN interview, where she finishes with this, possibly, too candid acknowledgment.
"You have a very good point, though, that I think when you're in the presidential realm, I do think message discipline is required, and I think that that is something -- all of us have areas where we need to do better on -- and that's certainly one I'll pay a lot of attention to."
Jonathan Martin, in Iowa, where Michele Bachmann talked with reporters and addressed the perception that they're carbon copies of one another.
The Minnesotan called Palin “a friend,” but quickly added that no two candidates “are interchangeable” and then touted her resume as a tax attorney, education reformer and former state senator
.... “Oh goodness,” Bachmann exclaimed when asked how her roots here would help.
“Being born in Iowa gives every advantage – every advantage a girl would want to have.”
Mitt Romney (R) will formally announce his presidential campaign next Thursday in New Hampshire.
Romney, who's formed an exploratory committee to seek the Republican presidential nomination, will formally enter the race at a barbecue in the Granite State, a centerpiece of his strategy to win the nomination.
His decision to announce in New Hampshire underscores the intense focus Romney's set to place on the state, and it contrasts with former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty's (R) choice of an Iowa backdrop to announce his own official entry into the race.
Yeah, it's interesting to see Romney and Pawlenty -- who are vying for the same role as establishment choice -- taking slightly different paths to get to the same place.
Also, Rick Santorum is expected to announce June 6 in southwestern Pennsylvania near where his Dad worked in the coal mines.
Meanwhile, Michele Bachmann will likely announce in her hometown of Waterloo, Iowa, which happens to intersect nicely with her most important state.
Fox News Channel said Thursday that Sarah Palin will remain on air as a paid contributor, despite renewed speculation over whether she will run for president.
.... Asked by CNN if there was any change in Palin's role or if there was discussion of a deadline for a decision by Palin, Fox News Executive Vice President of Programming Bill Shine said in a statement, "We are not changing Sarah Palin's status."
After days of pestering from Democrats, Tim Pawlenty said Thursday he would sign Rep. Paul Ryan's (R-Wis.) budget if he were president.
Pawlenty, the former Minnesota governor, reiterated that he will release his own budget proposal that differs from Ryan's in key areas like Social Security and Medicare.
But he said that if Congress passed Ryan's plan — and his was not up for consideration — he would sign Ryan's into law.
"If I can’t have my own plan — as president, I’ll have my own plan [but] if I can’t have that, and the bill came to my desk and I had to choose between signing or not Congressman Ryan’s plan, of course I would sign it," he told reporters during a campaign stop in New Hampshire.
The first, most obvious question is whether it means she's going to run.
I've got a video answer for you. Watch the first, few seconds -- I've never seen a '12 prospect so pumped about the idea (May 20).
For people who don't think she'll run, why is she doing the tour now? It seems designed to get her name circulating again before it gets too cold.... or before someone else's name gets too hot.
As Ben Smith noted, her tour's timing takes some air out of Michele Bachmann's balloon. Palin had to get out there before The Bachmann Balloon (either a physicist's theory on the universe's expansion, or a colloquial term for an athlete's injury) exploded.
She could be late to the game if she were facing Romney, Pawlenty, and Huntsman. But not with the prospect of Bachmann looming.
Another biggie: what does this mean for her Fox News contract?
Regardless of her motives, it's hard to see how Fox can continue employing her. Yes, she's a ratings boomlet, but they can't keep her now, right? -- not after what they did to Newt, Santorum, and Huckabee.
If Gabriel Sherman's profile of Roger Ailes pegged him right, I doubt he'd want to boost Palin's presidential chances.
As for the state of the race, a Palin entry would change everything.
Herman Cain would have to apply for a delivery job, Rick Santorum would have to stop attending panels called "The Role of Churches in Promoting Democracy in Latin America" (Friday, in case you were wondering) and float Harold Camping as a running mate to get media exposure, and Gary Johnson's supporters would forget to wake him up. Somehow, I think Ron Paul's support, though, is Palin-proof. As it is everything proof. It's like great, great deck paint that you see commercials for at 3 AM.
Here's another question -- does this totally close the door on a Rick Perry bid?
There's not enough space for both him and Palin. The only way Perry could do something is if the GOP establishment panicked and tried picking a tea party candidate who's acceptable to them, so they could stop Palin. Perry would be far more acceptable to insiders than the former gov of Alaska.
AllahPundit recently said that a Palin bid would actually help Romney, and I think that's true. If Palin starts picking up major steam in Iowa, that could migrate to activists throughout the country. In the race's early stages, at least, Romney will be the front-runner, and he could become ground zero in stopping Palin, and remember -- Sarah Palin is much less popular with Republicans than people would immediately guess.
RCP's Scott Conroy, on something very big that might come your way in a very colorful, tea-party looking bus (more pics here).
In a move designed to propel her closer to a presidential run, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin will set out on a bus tour of the country on Sunday, making stops at symbolically significant venues along the way.
"Starting this weekend, Sarah Palin will embark on a ‘One Nation' tour of historical sites that were key to the formation, survival, and growth of the United States of America," SarahPAC treasurer Tim Crawford said in a statement to RealClearPolitics. "The tour will originate in Washington, D.C. It will proceed north up the east coast."
Details were still being hammered out on Thursday, but sources indicated to RCP that the bus tour is expected to last several weeks and will be divided up into separate geographical stretches for logistical reasons.
Members of Palin's immediate family are expected to join her on the trip, which will eventually take her through key early voting states.
This thing is going to take '12 buzz to a whole, new level, and should be great for unique hits democracy.
Paul Ryan fares best against Obama, thanks to strong consolidation among Republicans for the home-stater. To wit: he picks up 89% of Republicans, while Newt Gingrich takes just 74%.
Romney takes just 81% of Republicans with 10% undecided, while Obama is at 89% against Romney. So -- the former gov. from MA has room to grow and make it a tougher match.
As for Newt...
Gingrich's numbers may be particularly bad in Wisconsin because of his recent spat with Paul Ryan who's an absolutely adored figure with GOP voters in the state. 77% have a favorable opinion of him to 12% with a negative one.
Governor Christie said this morning that he will pull New Jersey out of a regional cap-and-trade energy program.
The move drew strong criticism from environmental advocates who argued it was a rollback of clean energy efforts. But it was supported by business groups who said the 10-state Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative was a burdensome energy tax.
.... A move by Christie to dismantle a state program viewed unfavorably by many Republicans could only help any presidential ambitions the governor may have. Christie has continually denied he wants to run for president in 2012 despite calls from many GOP powerbrokers.
Christie said he still believes in global warming and will work towards conservation and the use of wind, natural gas and other power sources that are cleaner than coal.
I still think it's highly unlikely he'll get in -- he's just been too adamant that he won't.
Brit Hume, who is a maker of good points, pointed out something important earlier this week.
"Chris Christie would have to kind of violate everything he's been about, which is being honest and straightforward, even blunt with people.
He has said it [that he won't run] every which way you can say it."
A new Public Policy Polling survey shows Barack Obama leading the three best-known GOP prospects in a general election.
a. Barack Obama 49% Mitt Romney 42%
b. Barack Obama 51% Newt Gingrich 37%
c. Barack Obama 54% Sarah Palin 37%
Favorable Ratings:
a. Mitt Romney 35%/48% for -13%.
b. Sarah Palin 30%/63% for -33%.
c. Newt Gingrich 19%/64% for -45%.
Barack Obama's approval rating is 48%/48%.
The Obama vs. Romney race is probably closer, since 10% of Republicans remain undecided in the matchup. Most of that number would break for Romney. Only 5% of Dems are undecided about Obama.
Meanwhile, in a Palin vs. Obama matchup, 19% of Republicans swing to Obama, she currently only takes 68% in her party. She'd undoubtedly raise that number in the heat of a general election, but it's still a relatively low number to work her way up from.
Newt Gingrich's favorability numbers are terrible, but he still manages to perform better than Palin against Obama.
.... Almost every minute of TV time given to Ms. Palin is subtracted from the breakout coverage that Herman Cain, Gary Johnson, and Ron Paul need so desperately.
Ms. Palin isn’t likely to do much good for the major contenders, Mitt Romney and Tim Pawlenty, either. The excitement she stirs up will just underline their inability to electrify the Republican base.
A new Gallup poll shows Mitt Romney and Sarah Palin in a close, 2012 primary battle.
1. Mitt Romney 17%
2. Sarah Palin 15%
3. Ron Paul 10%
4. Newt Gingrich 9%
5. Herman Cain 8%
6. Tim Pawlenty 6%
7. Michele Bachmann 5%
8. Jon Huntsman, Gary Johnson, and Rick Santorum 1%
Without PALIN:
1. Mitt Romney 19%
2. Newt Gingrich and Ron Paul 12%
4. Herman Cain 8%
5. Michele Bachmann and Tim Pawlenty 7%
7. Jon Huntsman and Gary Johnson 3%
9. Rick Santorum 2%
Notes: With Huckabee out of the race, why wouldn't Palin jump in? Those are juicy poll numbers, and we all know she'd love to be president (witness her chop-licking at the prospect here).
Meanwhile, check out Herman Cain's strong showing. This is a problem for Tim Pawlenty. New guys/gals are routinely vaulting ahead of him in polling, and he seems stuck in moment he can't get out of.
Here's a good demo table -- once again, there's an education and income divide between Romney and Palin.
Rep. Peter King -- a close ally of Rudy Giuliani's -- told Fox & Friends this morning that his buddy "very much wants to run" for president again.
King also said that Rudy's 2008 bid had too many advisers.
"I would say the main problem last time was nobody let Rudy be Rudy. He had all these layers and layers of advisers, telling him how to avoid controversy.
And my feeling is that if you're going to elect Rudy Giuliani president, it's 'cause you want a tough guy. You're not wondering whether he's a nice guy or not."
Yesterday, an adviser said Rudy would make his final decision in July, after taking a close look at the field of candidates.
On Greta Van Susteren's show last night, TX Gov. Rick Perry sounded like a man who wouldn't mind being drafted for a presidential run.
VAN SUSTEREN: With all your level of disappointment, for lack of a better word, with the federal government taking care of these issues, you say you don't want to run for president.
PERRY: Right.
VAN SUSTEREN: Why not? Are you tempted?
PERRY: At the end of the day, for the next week, I've got a legislative session to focus on. My hope is that person will come forward that can win the presidency that we can all get behind.
VAN SUSTEREN: Are you tempted?
PERRY: Oh, I can't say I'm not tempted, but the fact is: this is something I don't want to do.
Shushannah Walshe writes about Sarah Palin's rumored move to Arizona, and links to this local TV report, which notes that the home is actually a steal at $1.6 million.
Despite passing on a presidential run, Mike Huckabee remains politically active on the national scene. He endorsed another GOP Senate candidate in a competitive primary on Wednesday.
Huckabee, who backed state Sen. Mike Haridopolos (R) in the Florida Senate race earlier this month, has also endorsed Nebraska Republican Jon Brunning for the upper chamber.
.... Brunning faces investment adviser Pat Flynn and state Treasurer Don Stenberg for the GOP nod to take on Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.). State Sen. Deb Fischer is also mulling a bid.
Btw, I'm still following Huckabee and a few other guys who opted out of the '12 race, because they'll continue to play a role in affecting the outcome.
For example, it's arguably more important to cover Huck than John Bolton, who hasn't ruled out a bid.
Speaking of Bolton, here he is today talking about that awkward Obama toast in England.
Jake Menges, an adviser to the former New York City mayor, said Giuliani is still considering a bid and will make a decision sometime in mid-July, when he thinks the field will finally be set.
This the first I've heard of a timeline.
In March, Rudy gave Shushannah Walshe the old I'm not going to run, but know that it helps my profile to pretend like I am for as long as possible, and since I'm not employed by Fox News, there's no pressing reason for me to make a public declaration about it timeline.
“I don’t have a timeline. When somebody tells me this is the last day to decide, that will be the timeline.
.... If the first primary is in February, I know I have to do it by the end of the year. That I know. Will I decide before that? Maybe, maybe. I don’t know yet, really.”
Jon Huntsman, in Verum Serum's new web ad that's going around the 'sphere, using old Huntsman quotes like:
"What other Republican ever would have embraced the Western Climate Initiative, recognizing climate change for what it is, embracing a cap-and-trade proposal?
What other Republican ever would have embraced John McCain as a presidential candidate?"
“I do not believe that the South, nor Georgia, is necessarily Newt Gingrich’s territory, simply because of the experience that he has there.
.... We are going to do well in all of these early states."
Gingrich hasn't been knocking them dead in much polling, but the biggest survey yet of 11 southern states in March showed him running 2nd to Mike Huckabee in the region. Obviously, a lot has changed since then, for Newt's good (Huck dropping out) and his bad (Paul Ryan comments).
As for Sarah Palin...
“We are reaching out to [Palin] as we speak,” Cain says. “She is not afraid to stir the pot; she is not afraid to call it like it is. A lot of people are hoping that she runs.”
“But if she does not,” he notes, “I want her to continue to say good things about me.”
In the three shows since [announcing that he's not running, he's lost about 47,000 viewers on average when compared to his airings in 2011 before (and not counting) the widely-viewed announcement show.
Before the announcement episode, Huckabee averaged 1.137 million viewers per episode. Since, he's averaged 1.09 million.
It's hard to draw a ton of conclusions from the three episodes since his announcement, but the 11% dip shows that his audience is robust and indicates he'll still have a successful career without dangling the idea of a presidential run in front of his viewers.
Hedge fund investor Anthony Scaramucci plans to hold a fund-raiser for former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney on June 6, according to an invitation obtained by MarketWatch Monday.
The reception with Romney, which will be held at the Mandarin Hotel in New York, costs $2,500 per person or $5,000 per couple to attend, according to the invite. Contributions go to Romney for President Exploratory Committee Inc.
A new Public Policy Polling survey shows Barack Obama retainingNorth Carolinain a hypothetical matchup with his leading GOP challengers.
a. Barack Obama 46% Mitt Romney 43%
b. Barack Obama 50% Newt Gingrich 42%
c. Barack Obama 52% Sarah Palin 40%
d. Barack Obama 52% Donald Trump 17%
Favorable Ratings:
a. Mitt Romney 30%/43% for -13%.
b. Newt Gingrich 28%/54% for -26%.
c. Sarah Palin 32%/59% for -27%.
d. Donald Trump it's/bad.
Barack Obama's approval rating in the state is 50%/46% for +4%.
Pollster Tom Jensen has the key take-away -- White support for Obama has tumbled since 2008 in states like Ohio, but has stayed even in Virginia and North Carolina.
the key to his high water mark is that his 37% approval with white voters matches the 37% of their votes we found him winning on our last poll in 2008.
.... here and also in Virginia where we polled a couple weeks ago and where the President has looked consistently strong he's holding onto the white support he got last time around. That could mean Virginia and North Carolina become the new Florida and Ohio as the states Obama needs to put him over the finish line.
