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NOTE TO READERS:  Hillary Clinton is feeling serious legal heat.  It raises the issue of whether she will eventually need a pardon.  A friend of Urgent Agenda asks the following question:  "Do you have any readers who are currently licensed as attorneys in their own state who would be willing to give your readers a very short unsigned summary of the rules and laws and regulations concerning pardons? Must there be an arrest, an indictment, a filing of charges?"

If readers have answers, please send them to comments@urgentagenda.com and I'll publish the ones that seem to fill the bill.

FEBRUARY 1,  2016

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 2:25 A.M. TUESDAY

MARCO – No doubt about it.  Ted Cruz may have won Iowa, and Donald Trump, coming in second, may have been surprised.  But the real news on the GOP side is that Marco Rubio almost upset Trump for second place.  Marco is rising.  He may not be a smash in New Hampshire next week, but if he catches fire it will be in the states after that.  It's reported that Republican Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, an African-American, is about to endorse him.  The South Carolina "first in the South" Republican primary is February 20th.  Republican Congressman Trey Gowdy of South Carolina is also going with Rubio.  Big question:  Where will Nikki Haley, South Carolina's Republican governor, stand?  If she endorses Rubio, and Rubio gets the nomination, she could wind up as his vice-presidential candidate.  Utterly intriguing.

HILLARY, WE HARDLY KNEW YE – They aren't finished counting in Iowa.  We still don't know who won on the Democratic side.  The vote between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders is essentially 50-50, although a late statement by the Democratic Party suggests that Clinton may eek out the narrowest of victories, hardly anything to brag about.  After all, Sanders isn't even a Democrat.  He's an independent self-described socialist who honeymooned in the old Soviet Union.  The result is bittersweet for Clinton, who expected to sail to the nomination.  It may get worse next week in New Hampshire because Sanders, from the neighboring state of Vermont, is ahead in the polls.  Clinton's camp hopes that she will break out in the South Carolina primary, where African Americans make up a sizable proportion of the vote.  The real question is whether she can break out of the FBI investigation, which hovers over her campaign like vultures.

AND NOBODY CARES – Such big political news.  Michael Moore, who once was a well-known documentary-film maker of the political left, has endorsed Bernie Sanders for president.  From The Hill:  In a letter posted on his website just before the Iowa caucuses, Moore dismissed those who doubt Sanders and claim there's no way a "democratic socialist" can be elected president.  "Do you ever wonder why the pundits, the political class, are always so sure that Americans “just aren’t ready” for something — and then they’re always just so wrong? They says these things because they want to protect the status quo," Moore wrote. "They don’t want the boat rocked. They try to scare the average person into voting against their better judgment."  I don't recall the pundits and political class ever doubting whether the public was ready for Barack Obama.  The pundits read the polls.  If I were Bernie Sanders, I'd make sure no one knows about Moore's endorsement, not that anyone would care.

February 1, 2016       Permalink

THE RUBIO PITCH – AT 10:16 A.M. ET:  And it may be a winning argument.  One of the things you hear most about Marco Rubio is that he can actually win a general election against Hillary – Rubio, the young bilingual modern, versus Hillary, the aging princess of the 1960s.   Rubio has very low negatives, as opposed to Trump, whose negatives are HUGE.  Absolutely HUGE.  From The Wall Street Journal: 

DAVENPORT, Iowa – Marco Rubio’s closing message for supporters of the low-polling Republican presidential candidates: Pick me, because I’m going to win.

At his final campaign rally before Monday’s first-in-the nation caucuses here, Mr. Rubio pushed his hardest message of the day – arguing that he’s the party’s only candidate who can win the White House.

“Perhaps you came here tonight and had someone else in mind,” Mr. Rubio told an audience of about 300 in a ballroom at St. Ambrose University. “Maybe it’s someone whose campaign has not done as well as they’d hoped. They’re not going to win Iowa, not going to win the nomination. I would ask you, with all due respect, to consider switching. Because if I’m our nominee, we’re going to win.”

The Florida senator didn’t name who else his audience might have in mind, but he’s vying for the same breed of voter as former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who have settled into fifth and ninth places in the polls, respectively.

Mr. Rubio hopes the electability argument is enough to propel him to the upper reaches of the caucus results Monday. Unlike front-runners Ted Cruz and Donald Trump, Mr. Rubio doesn’t need a victory to claim success. Third place, his team has said, is good enough. A second place finish by him could prove a damaging blow to Messrs. Cruz or Trump while at the same time offering crucial momentum for the Floridian as the campaign shifts to New Hampshire on Tuesday.

COMMENT:  The next three weeks will determine Rubio's fate.  I agree that he has a very strong "electability" argument in his favor.  He can defeat Hillary.  But he has not polled as high in the nomination race as I'd expected.  He's shown some real fire in the last week, and maybe that will help him move up tonight.

February 1, 2016       Permalink

THE PEOPLE WHO CARE MOST – AT 9:38 A.M. ET:   They are the people who often decide elections, the people who actually turn up because they care the most.  And this year those people appear to lean Republican.  From the Washington Examiner: 

Republican voters are far more gung ho to vote in the fall presidential election than Democrats, a sign that two terms of Democratic ownership of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. may be at an end.

Longtime GOP strategist and pollster Ed Goeas told Secrets that the eagerness for Election Day is driven by one thing: Republicans want President Obama and his supporters out of the White House.

A new survey his company, the Tarrance Group, conducted for the centrist Republican Ripon Society uncovered an 11-point "intensity" gap among white Republicans and white Democrats.

"We had in 2010 a nine-point advantage on intensity. Going into 2014 we had a seven-point advantage on intensity, meaning our voters are more intense about voting. Right now we have an 11-point advantage," he said. "I've never seen a double-digit advantage in terms of intensity to vote."

In 2010, Republicans took control of the House. In 2014, they took over the Senate.

"Why is it 11? It's intensity toward the president," he explained.

A deeper plunge into the numbers, Goeas said, is even more remarkable.

For example, Republican women, who typically don't express voting eagerness in levels as high as men, are equal for the first time, at 89 percent, he said. What's more, on the issue of intensity, they are just three points back.

And...

Among African-Americans, for example, he found that 22 percent were voting Republican or undecided. Among Hispanics, 45 percent are already backing the GOP or are undecided.

COMMENT:  Makes me smile, but we should caution that this is only one poll.  As elections approach, many voters tend to go back home politically.  It will be a bitter fight for the presidency, and I would not take anything for granted.  We don't even know who the nominees will be.

February 1, 2016       Permalink

IOWA TONIGHT – AT 8:51 A.M. ET:  Real people get to cast real votes in today's Iowa caucuses.  Voters go to meetings (the caucuses), listen to some speeches by representatives of the candidates, then cast their votes.

Tonight Iowa will be the center of the world.  By Wednesday it will drop to 223rd place.  It's the nature of primary election campaigns, wherein a state is only as important as its vote in the primaries.  Then it's forgotten until the general election, when it may have some value to someone.

Iowa has not been predictive of winners in the past.  On the GOP side, Mike Huckabee won one year, and Rick Santorum another.  The caucuses do provide bragging rights and some convention delegates, but that's all.  Observers will be looking for, and yearning for, surprises.  That will be the news.  Will Cruz defeat Trump and take some wind out of the latter's ego?  Will Marco Rubio "exceed expectations" and place himself in a position where he can take on the leaders in future primaries?  Will Bernie Sanders, an aging socialist who honeymooned in the Soviet Union, dent the campaign of Queen Hillary, gracious sovereign and bringer of federal grants?

Some of the lower-ranking candidates have already left Iowa for New Hampshire, having run up bar bills larger than their poll totals.  And, yes, New Hampshire votes next week.  The spotlight shifts.  And then it goes south to South Carolina.  Within 30 days this race may well look entirely different.

What may also look different is the profession of polling.  It's clear that this is an unusual election year, and that accurate polling is difficult.  Polls are great for journalism.  They provide instant numerical news, and reinforce the idea that this is a horse race, a contest, a game.  But if the pollsters are proved wrong regularly, and if traditional methodology doesn't work, polling may take a major hit and some journalists may actually have to condescend to speaking to voters themselves. 

So, relax and watch the stupendous returns come in tonight.  And then start learning the names of towns in New Hampshire.  You'll need that knowledge for a week.

February 1,  2016     Permalink

JANUARY 31,  2016

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:31 P.M. ET:

FULL EQUALITY – From Yahoo:   The skies weren’t so friendly on a recent Delta Air Lines flight. After two female flight attendants got into a fist fight on flight 2598 traveling from Los Angeles to Minneapolis, the captain decided to make an unscheduled landing in Salt Lake City.  According to the Aviation Herald, the flight attendants had a disagreement over work issues on the Jan. 22 flight. A third woman on the plane tried to break up the fight and was also hit by the brawling flight attendants. At that point, the captain made the decision to land the Boeing 757. The plane was flying just south of Salt Lake City when the fight broke out.
We are approaching full gender equality.  The women are just as adolescent and violent as the men.

HELLO YOUNG LOVERS – From the College Fix:   The old adage “a kiss is just a kiss” may not stand up to scrutiny anymore.  On Thursday, the University of Southern California’s student government hosted a “Consent Carnival” that aimed to teach students how to properly hook-up under the “yes means yes” state law that requires so-called affirmative consent throughout any sexual encounter.  With that, a “Kissing Booth” at the event offered Hershey Kisses glued to little sheets of white paper that essentially explained how to properly kiss without committing sexual assault. The five-step checklist states on the front “what exactly does it mean to … ‘consent’ to a kiss?” and on the back states that “consent is”: For the answer, go here.  It's the rest of the piece, and a remarkable example of the infantilization of college students.

FREE AT LAST – From BBC:  A huge vulture detained in Lebanon on suspicion of spying for Israel has been returned home after UN peacekeepers intervened, Israeli officials said.  The bird, which has a 1.9m (6ft 5in) wing span, flew over the border from an Israeli game reserve and was caught by Lebanese villagers on Tuesday.  They became suspicious as the griffon vulture had a tracking device attached to its tail.
It is part of a conservation project to reintroduce raptors to the Middle East.  Wildlife officials say the vulture was brought from Spain last year and set free about a month ago in the Gamla Nature Reserve in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.  Tel Aviv University is involved in tracking the bird, and as well as a GPS transmitter, it had tags on its wings and an engraved metal ring on its leg saying: "Tel Aviv Univ Israel".
The UN finally did something useful.  It should stick to getting vultures out of trouble.

January 31,  2016     Permalink

ISIS PERSECUTES CHRISTIANS, AND THE OBAMANS SHRUG – AT 12:51 P.M. ET:  This country's response to the persecution of Christians by ISIS is obscene, but the mainstream media doesn't seem to care much.  From Gatestone Institute:

When a 1,400-year-old Iraqi Christian monastery was destroyed by the Islamic State (ISIS) most of the world condemned the demolition -- except for spokesman for the U.S. military's Operation Inherent Resolve, Col. Steve Warren.

"Thousands [of Iraqi Christians] have been killed, hundreds of thousands have been forced to flee," said CNN's Wolf Blitzer in an interview with Col. Warren the other week. "There is legitimate fear -- you're there in Baghdad -- that the long history of Christians living peacefully, productively in Iraq, is coming to an end. How worried should we be about the Christian community in Iraq?"

Col. Warren's response: "Wolf, ISIL doesn't care if you're a Christian ... We've seen no specific evidence of a specific targeting towards Christians."

Except that roughly two-thirds of Iraq's 1.5 million Christian citizens have been killed or forced to flee the country by ISIS and its jihadi predecessors over the past decade. This has nothing to do with their religious identity?

COMMENT:  I wish Christian groups would have their own million-man march to Washington to expose the horror in the Mideast.  I cannot understand the lack of urgency.

Read the whole story.  It's important.

January 31,  2016     Permalink

AND NOW FOR THE NEGATIVES – AT 11:37 A.M. ET:  Elections are won (and lost) as much by the dislike that voters have for candidates as for the like.  Gallup is out with a poll of all Americans on the "yuch" factor.  From The Hill: 

Republican front-runner Donald Trump has the highest unfavorable ratings of any presidential candidate in either party in the 2016 field, a Gallup poll released Saturday found.

Sixty percent of those surveyed gave the business mogul unfavorable ratings, while a third said they viewed him favorably, for a net favorability rating of -27.

Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Jeb Bush are tied for second-lowest net favorability ratings with -10 each.

Among other Republican candidates, Bush's 45 percent unfavorable rating is the next-worst after Trump.

Following him are Chris Christie at 38 percent, Ted Cruz at 37 percent, Marco Rubio at 33 percent and Ben Carson at 30 percent.

Clinton's unfavorable rating is 52 percent. Democratic presidential rival Bernie Sanders' is 31 percent.

The numbers pose a striking contrast to the fact that Trump dominates the Republican field in polls nationally and in most early-voting states.

COMMENT:  I'd look at those unfavorables very carefully.  Trump is leading the GOP race only because his opposition is divided among a phone book full of candidates.  He is unloved by the electorate at large.

Hillary's 52% yuch rating comes after 25 years on the national stage.  If she wins she wins by default, against a weak Republican candidate.  But that 52% indicates the enormous advantage the GOP has if it nominates someone the public can actually like.

January 31, 2016       Permalink 

IOWA TOMORROW – AT 10:48 A.M. ET:  The Iowa caucuses are tomorrow, not Tuesday, the traditional election day.  The candidates are making their last appeals.

Iowa is important.  It will remain important for about two days, then you won't hear the name again.  Same with New Hampshire a week from Tuesday.  Get the fame while you can.  From Fox: 

The 2016 presidential contenders are begging their Iowa supporters to get to the caucuses Monday and Donald Trump, true to form, is in-your-face about it.

"You're from Iowa," Trump told a Dubuque crowd Saturday. "Are you afraid of snow?"

A snowfall forecast to start Monday night appeared more likely to hinder the hopefuls in their rush out of Iowa than the voters who will be flocking to the caucuses in the first contest of the presidential campaign.

Still, there was every reason for candidates to be urgent about turnout in tight races on both sides.

Democrat Bernie Sanders called it a tossup with Hillary Clinton and said every caucus-goer counts.

Republican Ted Cruz directed much of his final advertising against Marco Rubio as the senators' feud grows even more bitter in the final days.

Texan Cruz, considered Trump's chief rival in Iowa, took to the airwaves to challenge the conservative credentials of Rubio, the Floridian who's running third in Iowa, according to the polls.

One ad said of Rubio: "Tax hikes. Amnesty. The Republican Obama."

"The desperation kicks in," Rubio said in response. "From my experience, when people start attacking you it's because you're doing something right."

Iowa offers only a small contingent of the delegates who will determine the nominees, but the game of expectations counts for far more than the electoral math in the state. Campaigns worked aggressively to set those expectations in their favor (meaning, lower them) for Iowa, next-up New Hampshire and beyond.

COMMENT:  So now we wait for the caucuses, and the even longer pundit analyses to follow.  By the time the analytics are finished, the candidates will be in New Hampshire, not recalling where Des Moines is.

January 31,  2016     Permalink