Posts

If Russian Bot Tactics Didn’t Defeat Roy Moore, They Didn’t Defeat Hillary Clinton

/0 Comments/in , /by

It turns out the Russians aren’t the only ones who know how to employ the Internet for political dirty tricks. As The New York Times reported in a front-page story on December 20, Russian bots were part of what the newspaper called a “secret experiment” in Alabama during the special Senate election won by Democrat Doug Jones in December 2017.

The tale involves a cyber-security firm that has played a role in hyping the claim that foreign intervention “influenced” the 2016 presidential election. It sought to duplicate the scheme in order to help Jones defeat Roy Moore. Although the Times dismisses the effort as “too small to have a significant impact on the race,” it acknowledged that the scheme, which involved fake Facebook and Twitter accounts, was patterned after the Russian meddling in American elections the year before. . .

What is most interesting about this “experiment” is that among its architects was the head of a firm that “wrote a scathing account of Russia’s social media operations in the 2016 election that was released this week by the Senate Intelligence Committee.” The Times obtained a report on the effort led by Jonathon Morgan of the New Knowledge cyber security firm. It detailed their efforts to mislead Alabama voters and thus aid Jones.

Both the Times and supporters of Jones are correct when they assert that this plot didn’t influence the outcome of the Alabama election even though the Democrat wound up winning by less than 22,000 votes out of more than 1.3 million votes cast. But there are two significant conclusions that can be drawn from the newspaper’s exhaustive account of the Democrats’ attempt to mimic Russian tactics. . .

The problem with many assumptions about 2016 is that there is no evidence significant numbers of voters were persuaded to think ill of Hillary Clinton only because of obscure posts by Russian bot accounts. Those false flag efforts were merely seconding the message voters got from many other sources that highlighted Clinton’s shortcomings, misleading statements about her emails, and other issues, including in many instances the mainstream media. (Read more from “If Russian Bot Tactics Didn’t Defeat Roy Moore, They Didn’t Defeat Hillary Clinton” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

With Sites Set on 2016, Jeb Bush Has Resigned from All Boards

/11 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

By Tom Hamburger and Lyndsey Layton. Former Florida governor Jeb Bush, moving closer to a possible presidential run, has resigned all of his corporate and nonprofit board memberships, including his own education foundation, his office said late Wednesday night.

He also resigned as a paid adviser to a for-profit education company that sells online courses to public university students in exchange for a share of their tuition payments.

Bush’s New Year’s Eve disclosure, coming in an e-mail from an aide to The Washington Post, culminated a string of moves he has made in recent days to shed business interests that have enriched him since leaving office in 2007. The aide said the resignations had been made “effective today”. . .

Aides said Bush wants to devote his time to exploring a return to politics rather than pursuing his business commitments. But separating himself from those interests now could also be a strategic attempt to prepare for the added scrutiny of a hotly contested campaign for the Republican nomination. (Read more about why Jeb Bush has resigned from all boards HERE)

_______________________________________________________

Jeb Bush Declines Offer to Speak at Steven King Summit

By Jonathan Easley. Likely 2016 presidential candidate Jeb Bush has declined an invitation to speak at a conservative summit in Iowa hosted by Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa.), a sometimes controversial figure in the GOP.

A Bush aide told The Hill that the former Florida governor appreciated the offer to speak at the Iowa Freedom Summit in late January but that he would not be able to attend.

The Washington Post first reported on Wednesday that Bush had declined the invitation to the summit, which will feature a host of other potential GOP presidential contenders, including Gov. Chris Christie (N.J.), Sen. Ted Cruz (Texas), Gov. Rick Perry (Texas), former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, and Dr. Ben Carson.

The summit in the early-voting state is a rite of passage for many Republican candidates seeking to shore up their support among the conservative base. Bush’s absence could fuel attacks against the governor from some on the right who say he’s too moderate to make it through the Republican primaries. (Read more from this story HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

George P. Bush Says Dad 'Moving Forward' On 2016

/4 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: JEFFREY COLLINS / APFormer Florida Gov. Jeb Bush is “moving forward” on a potential 2016 White House run and it appears more likely he will enter the Republican field, according to his son, who’s running for office in Texas.

George P. Bush told ABC’s “This Week” that his father is “still assessing” a presidential bid, but suggested it was more likely that he would seek the White House this time. The ex-governor declined to run for president in 2012 despite encouragement from Republicans.

“I think it’s more than likely that he’s giving this a serious thought and moving — and moving forward,” said the younger Bush, who is running for Texas land commissioner.

Asked if that meant it was “more than likely that he’ll run,” George P. Bush responded: “That he’ll run. If you had asked me a few years back … I would have said it was less likely.”

Read more from this story HERE.

To Distance Themselves from Obama, 2016 Democrats Will Move To the Left

/1 Comment/in , /by

Photo Credit: Cliff OwenThe 2016 Democratic presidential field is likely to run to the left of President Obama, partly because candidates will try to distance themselves from his political baggage while jockeying for an increasingly liberal base of voters, analysts predict.

Prospective candidates and their surrogates insist it’s too early to tell what kind of standing Mr. Obama will have with voters and whether he will be seen as damaged goods the way President Bush was for Republicans in 2008.

But discontent is brewing within the Democratic Party over what some see as Mr. Obama’s concessions to Republicans.

Those Democratic voters will be looking for candidates willing to slide further to the left, especially on economic issues.

“I don’t think there’s any doubt that the next Democratic candidate is likely to be more populist than Obama has been. I think you might see [Hillary Rodham Clinton] move in that direction. I think you might see any major challenger to her move in that direction,” said Mike Lux, co-founder and CEO of the consulting firm Progressive Strategies who has worked on five presidential campaigns. “I think you will see that rumbling under the surface, that a Democrat is going to need to run a more populist campaign. I don’t think it will be an open, outright distancing from Obama, but just a much more populist version” of the Obama approach.

Read more from this story HERE.

Many 2016 Republican Hopefuls Agree: Defund ObamaCare

/2 Comments/in , /by

Paul-Cruz-LeeMany Republicans who are eyeing a run for president in 2016 are backing an all-or-nothing plan to defund ObamaCare.

More than half a dozen possible GOP White House candidates support that strategy while a handful are calling for a more nuanced approach to defunding or repealing the healthcare law. Another five are dodging questions and a couple others are not signaling one way or another.

In short, some are willing to go to the brink and beyond of a government shutdown to defund ObamaCare. But it’s far from unanimous.

Still, the results of The Hill’s survey favors the shutdown-showdown strategy hatched by Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), thanks to outspoken endorsements from GOP frontrunners, such as Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.).

The Florida Republican and three other colleagues also entertaining presidential runs — Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and John Thune (R-S.D.) — have backed Lee’s effort by refusing to support government funding bills that include money for ObamaCare.

Read more from this story HERE.

Marco Rubio Touts Chris Christie in Fundraising Pitch

/15 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: AP

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio’s PAC has sent an email to his supporters praising New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie as a “conservative leader” in the blue state where he’s running for reelection.

The pairing of Rubio and Christie is interesting for a few reasons, including that both are often mentioned as potential 2016 GOP presidential hopefuls. Christie has been hit by conservatives for appearing with Obama during the final week of the election after Hurricane Sandy, a move critics said unnecessarily undermined Mitt Romney.

And Rubio — one of the party’s brighter young stars after he defeated then-Gov. Charlie Crist in the tea party wave of 2010 — has been dinged by some conservatives over his work on the immigration reform bill that recently cleared a Senate committee.

“Conservative leadership is hard to find these days, but the voters in New Jersey have seen it firsthand,” Rubio writes in the email from his Reclaim America PAC.

Read more from this story HERE.

Rand Paul on 2016: It’s About Independents and Moderates

/0 Comments/in , /by

Republican Rand Paul is going to take his politicking to moderate voters, and away from fire-breathing ultra-conservatism that turns off people who favor same-sex marriage and abortion rights, he said in Iowa today.

But he also met for a full hour with deeply conservative Iowa pastors — a team of men who came away impressed, saying they’re certain that Paul has “a Biblical world view” and the Christian values they’re looking for in a presidential candidate.

“Elections are about independents and moderates,” Paul, a U.S. senator from Kentucky who has all but declared a White House bid for 2016, told reporters at a news conference this afternoon.

Paul’s trip was seen as a way to introduce himself as a presidential material in his own right, not just as a surrogate for his father Ron, a three-time presidential candidate. His itinerary seemed like one Iowans might see a month out from the 2015 caucuses. He booked a GOP fundraising dinner, a house party, a breakfast with activists and the private meeting with about 15 pastors who are influential with the GOP’s most faithful caucus-goers.

While Rand Paul, 50, and Ron Paul, 77, share the same limited-government philosophy and many of the same policy positions, their public personas are considered very different. The younger Paul, despite some recent controversies over statements that appeared to backtrack on his policy positions, is generally viewed as smoother and more credible than his father — with a promising strategy for a White House victory.

Read more from this story HERE.

Is Chris Christie’s Weight-Loss Surgery a 2016 Clue?

/0 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: New Jersey National GuardNew Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who recently described himself as “the healthiest fat guy you’ve ever seen,” revealed Tuesday that he’s taken a major step toward slimming down.

The Republican told the New York Post that he underwent lap-band stomach surgery over the Presidents Day holiday — auspicious timing given that news of the procedure is seen as the latest indication that he’s eyeing a White House run in 2016.

Christie, however, denied that the procedure had any political implications, saying the decision was made after pleas from his family to shape up after a milestone birthday.

“I’ve struggled with this issue for 20 years,” he told the newspaper. “For me, this is about turning 50 and looking at my children and wanting to be there for them.”

Christie checked into a surgery center under a false name on Feb. 16, the Post reported. The procedure, which is less intrusive than gastric bypass surgery, is meant to make individuals feel fuller and cut down on food intake. One analyst told NBC News on Tuesday that Christie could lose 100 pounds if he does cut back on his eating.

Read more from this story HERE.

Rand Paul-Backed Group Attacks "Liberal" NRA, RINO's

/7 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: AP

Sen. Rand Paul, the tea party favorite and possible 2016 presidential candidate, is raising money for a conservative gun rights group that’s targeting fellow Republicans, including House Majority Leader Eric Cantor.

And when one congressman complained, the message from Paul’s camp was: too bad.

The Kentucky Republican has lent his name to fundraising pitches for the National Association for Gun Rights, a group that says the National Rifle Association is too willing to compromise on gun rights.

The group has blitzed the districts of Virginia Republicans Cantor and Rep. Scott Rigell with $50,000 worth of TV and radio ads accusing them of helping President Barack Obama pass gun control legislation.

Paul’s email pitches for the group don’t mention Cantor or Rigell by name, but his activity for an organization that attacks fellow Republicans shows the potential 2016 presidential contender isn’t afraid to pick a fight inside the party. Paul chief of staff Doug Stafford is unapologetic.

Read more from this story HERE.

Karl Rove Wistfully Speculates that GOP’s Presidential Nominee Could Be Pro-Gay Marriage In 2016 (+video)

/0 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: YouTube

Republican strategist Karl Rove told an ABC News panel that he “could imagine” that come 2016, the Republican nominee for president could openly endorse gay marriage. Rove made the comments in the context of a discussion about the upcoming Supreme Court cases surrounding gay marriage, which will be decided this week.

George Stephanopoulos asked Rove, “Can you imagine the next presidential campaign, a Republican candidate saying flat out, ‘I am for gay marriage?’”

Rove responded this way:

“I could, but you know what? Let’s stay here for a moment. One of the interesting things to me is gonna be, you’ve talked about Justice Roberts and Justice Kennedy. I’m interested in Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.”

Watch video here:

Read more from this story HERE.