The fact that there isn't a 'war on Christians' doesn't matter. The relevant issue is that Rand Paul is showing that he is willing to pander to christian conservatives which shows he can expand his base beyond the usual libertarian wing.

But where does the young Paul stand on SSM and the various 'vice' laws (porn, drugs, prostitution, etc)? The libertarian position tends to be the opposite of the christian conservative position. Seems to me he can't have it both ways in those cases.

You can hold Christian and Libertarian views on both. I don't approve of some things, but what right do I have to tell others? I might not like marijuana for example, but does that give me the right to prohibit others from it? The entire message behind libertarianism is personal choice and non-violence.

Yes Libertarians dont want to impose their views on others. However the likes of Huckabee and Santorum and Pat Robertson (and the people that voted for them) very much do want the state to impose their morals. Which is my point. Paul cant have it both ways.

I expect him to support lowering the age limit of porn to -0.75

The fact that there isn't a 'war on Christians' doesn't matter. The relevant issue is that Rand Paul is showing that he is willing to pander to christian conservatives which shows he can expand his base beyond the usual libertarian wing.

But where does the young Paul stand on SSM and the various 'vice' laws (porn, drugs, prostitution, etc)? The libertarian position tends to be the opposite of the christian conservative position. Seems to me he can't have it both ways in those cases.

Those I could Support (in order)
[1] Clinton 
[2] Cuomo
[3] Warner
[4] Biden
[5] Schweitzer
[6] Hickenlooper
[7] Gillibrand
[8] O'Malley

Would vote for Christie before Warren (too liberal) or Castro (too young/inexperienced) in a General

Christie is the Giuliani of 2016.

Unless they remove the path to citizenship entirely (which Obama will never sign) it will still be characterized as "amnesty for illegals" by the nativist wing. Some candidate is going to stake out the anti-immigration reform ground (Santorum, Ted Cruz, someone else?)

graphics mistakes are made all the time by all the cable news channels. It's not an agenda, it is incompetence.

of course Paul knows the lawsuit is going nowhere just like he knew his filibuster was going nowhere, but these political stunts are building his base bigger and bigger.

And not all Dems support the NSA thing even if it is an Obama program.

I think the issue will come down to if you support adding additional safeguards and/or oversight to the program. The most likely thing will be that by 2015 (when there will be prez debates) there will be (or have been) specific legislation that has tried to change the NSA program which candidates will be forced to either support or oppose (both Dem and GOP).

Since candidates mostly agree on everything else, this issue is one that has big potential as there is no consensus in either party

I think this NSA thing could be a big issue in 2016 as it is something where the candidates will disagree in both parties. The liberal wing of the Dems and the libertarian wing of the GOP are both opposed to it. If Hillary runs I imagine she will support it and someone from the liberal wing of the party can use it to differentiate like Obama used her vote for the war in Iraq.

Huckabee has expressed issues with how Christian conservatives are taken for granted. He wants churches to become political so that they (and by extension he) will have more power.

Another write-in vote for Walker.

of the above list i would say Paul

You have to hand it to the GOP, they did a great job vilifying the law but obviously not good enough to win the 2012 presidential election, the last real chance to end it. I doubt full repeal of Obamacare will even be an issue for the general election in 2016, although I am sure it will be for the GOP nomination.

The argument for all of this is that they need all this info to find terrorists. Fair enough but is it working? Even with this level of snooping they didnt catch the Boston Bombers even though some of their online activity combined with their proximity to the bombing combined with their FBI flag should have added up to at least putting them on a short list of suspects and yet all this all-seeing system didnt find them.

In July 2005 Gallup had Rudy Giuliani 64/19

Is it possible the OP is a machine intelligence that is trying to learn. Shall we be concerned when it achieves sentience?

Yesterday Rubio told FOX he didn't think the bill even had 60 votes to get out of the Senate.  And prospects in the House look even worse.

I suspect he wont be too bothered if the bill dies at this point.

bad wording on my part but that is what I meant. those are not good favorable ratings for Christie among Republicans. The last PPP poll showed Christie 42/29, which was the worst unfav of any GOPer.

I still feel that Christie is 2016's Giuliani.  He has crossover appeal but is going to struggle appealing to the base in the early primary/caucus states.

40% approval among GOP nationally is not good for someone who needs to win a nomination

I have to say that I lost a lot of respect for Christie with this move. He was elected on the promise to cut waste and costs. He even signed a law to save money by consolidating elections (as pointed out by the Weekly Standard of all people).

But he decides to blow $24M of NJ taxpayer dollars to hold a special election 3 weeks before the NJ general just to keep Corey Booker voters away from the general where he is his party can  take over the legislature (and of course he wants to make sure his reelection goes easy). That's pretty craven and the kind of partisan hackary that I thought he was above.

There are two issues. One is churches acting as political organizations, but it seems to me that the 501c4s are are much bigger problem in this area of skirting the law. The bigger problem with churches is that many of them are essentially tax-free businesses. The taxpayers are subsidizing crooks who are duping weak-minded and elderly out of their savings with promises of salvation, etc. The problem is the system treats an order of monks with vows of poverty who feed the poor the same way it treats a megachurch TV network that sells DVDs, books, etc. (or as I mentioned before, Scientology, which I think everyone can agree is no 'church')

how is PVI +5 the magical line of 'best case'? why not +6 or +7. In reality the last two elections has focused mostly on the states with +2 or less.

PVI Neutral would be the Obama 2012 map with FL and OH going to GOP and VA being even or Dem 272, GOP 253 and swing 13

I still dont think the "Obama Administration" did anything wrong here. I doubt any senior political appointees were directing this. If anything the pressure came from Congress. In the wake of Citizens United and during the runup to the 2010 midterms there were clearly more GOP-friendly groups using this loophole and they were becming the dominant groups spending money on the 2010 midterms. This got members of congress freaked. Max Baucus wrote to the IRS Comissioner asking him to look into it at the time:
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/29/senate-democrats-press-i-r-s-to-review-political-spending-by-nonprofits/
Dem Senators continued to push the IRS to scrutinize political groups
http://www.startribune.com/politics/national/207889821.html
Dem House Members also pressured the IRS
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/05/congress-put-pressure-on-the-irs-to-investigate-conservative-tax-exempt-groups/275814/


All this was being done at the same time as the IRS was short on manpower and not getting the budget they wanted. It seems to me that they were just trying to please the Democrats in Congress to save their own budget....but now Obama is taking the blame when his people probably didn't know jack about it.  


This shows a bit of cowardice on the part of the Dems in Congress. They should have pushed for reforming the code instead of pressuring the IRS.

The Dems arent going to get the youngs to vote in midterms. They need to find a way to get back in with the old whites who do vote in midterms. The GOP advantage with that group is a recent phenomena. The Dems need to get back to their old message that the GOP want to kill Medicare (which the GOP stole from the Dems in 2010 saying that Obamacare was stealing from Medicare)

I agree the whole political groups becoming 501(c)(4)s thing is a joke. But the IRS should have treated all potential political groups equally.

Of course the real scandal here is congress allowing this loophole to exist and SCOTUS for making it worse.

Christie not playing politics. Good for him. I hope he selects someone who doesn't plan to run in the special. I'll be pleased if he selects Gov. Kean.

Anyways. Cory Booker has my vote if he wants it.

There is a bit of politics here. By choosing to have the special election a few weeks before the general in November (when runs for re-election) Christie ensures that he and Cory Booker wont be running in the same election so he avoids Booker's coat tails conflicting with his coat tails in regards to the state legislature where the GOP is hoping to make big gains.

It would obviously be more cost-efficient to have the special election held the same day as the general election in November. By having it on its own date he is spending state money to keep Booker away from his re-election.