Your 2016 Presidential Candidate Speculation Thread

George Pataki sure must be pissed that Hastert rained on his parade today

I'm constantly amazed at the kind of memory people have for this kind of weird shit:

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/243418-dennis-hastert's-weird-2014-CSPAN-call

I wouldn't have thought twice about that call; and it might wind up being unrelated; but that it even stuck in someone's head long enough for cspan to have created a page for it and for people to bring it up now is ... i don't know how much time people have to obsess on this kind of ephemera.

also that caller sounds kind of young to have been abused by Hastert in the 60's but maybe he's turned into some kind of man-child, like a Chuck and Buck thing.

Denny and Benny

I'll stop now.

still the rong thread

also does the extortionist get to keep the money in this case? i mean, obv they know who it was and that person hasn't been indicted.

all is president

George Pataki sure must be pissed that Hastert rained on his parade today

I'm not sure who's more of a hopeless vacuum - Pataki or Chafee

workin the tuff grandma angle

― j., Friday, May 29, 2015 4:45 PM (16 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

smart

also that caller sounds kind of young to have been abused by Hastert in the 60's

― akm, Friday, May 29, 2015 4:52 PM (9 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

the implication is that it was an open secret

that what was an open secret? the abuse? the phone call? if it's an open secret then why pay hush money if people already know about it?

your paying hush money to the person who can testify against you, a rumor in yr old town isnt enough to get you in touble

i mean if this was a serial abuse situation i guarantee u the word got out or at least kids were suspicious

there was a drivers ed teacher from my school who ended up going to prison after teaching for 25 years and every single girl at school was like that guy is creepy and up to no good

it's sad that i didn't even think to wonder how a congressman ended up with 3.5 million to expend

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/29/us/politics/bernie-sanders-campaign.html?_r=0

O'Malley is officially in. Announcement speech seems a little rough around the edges, but he's got time I guess. Love how CNN is playing up his low poll numbers versus Clinton - - - uh oh, trouble ahead!!! - - he literally just announced his campaign! Like, minutes ago!

I'd be surprised if he's even doubled the number of people who know him vs. this time last year. He's got a long road.

omalleymentum is in full swing!

O'Mentum, surely

whoa lets not get carried away here

O'mallaria

I wonder if Carcetti has better name recognition at this point

what do you folks think of o'malley? is he a serious person? (i don't mean a serious candidate.)

Grahamtastic!

is America ready for a gay vice president?

It's the worst kept secret in the Carolinas, so I'm giving it about two weeks before the floodgates open.

Graham quote from that article:

“If I’m president of the United States and you’re thinking about joining Al Qaeda or ISIL, I’m not going to call a judge,” he said. “I’m going to call a drone, and we will kill you.”

That says all that needs to be said about Mr. Graham. That is Dubya-level stupidity.

huh, thoughtcrime, cool. guess that's what the domestic wiretaps are for. keep your eyes on the skies, folks.

that is fantastic

Yes sending drones over to kill people, surely that will more folks over to our side.

“If I’m president of the United States and you’re thinking about joining Al Qaeda or ISIL, I’m not going to call a judge,” he said. “I’m going to call a drone, and we will kill you.”

http://i.imgur.com/rkVYipe.jpg

i'm sure everyone will be cool with this strategy

http://i15.tinypic.com/53ucxtl.gif

JE unable to wash loser-stink off of himself

btw the Dems are looking for "their" Koch Bros (can u spare $100 M?)

In planning sessions and one-on-one meetings with donors, Mr. Ickes, who is a Priorities USA board member, and other Clinton supporters are discussing how to raise as much as $300 million for Democratic outside groups. That is almost twice as much as Democratic super PACs and other outside groups spent to help re-elect President Obama in 2012, when conservative super PACs far outspent liberal ones.

This ambitious goal will require the emergence of a new class of at least 20 Democratic donors who can give $5 million or even $10 million each. Mr. Ickes said recruiting them would not be easy.

“Our side isn’t used to being asked for that kind of money,” Mr. Ickes said. “If you asked them to put up $100 million for a hospital wing, they’d be the first in line.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/31/us/politics/democrats-seek-a-richer-roster-to-match-gop-in-2016-election.html

what do you folks think of o'malley? is he a serious person? (i don't mean a serious candidate.)

― he quipped with heat (amateurist), Sunday, May 31, 2015 12:43 AM (Yesterday)

i read a longish interview with him at salon a while back and he came off as decent and thoughtful, but tbh not terribly inspiring.

omg at that lindsey graham quote. sometimes these guys' right-wing ids surface in all their homicidal splendor.

i dont understand why he even needs to send a drone cant we have drones that just automatically read yr thoughts then kill u

I can't stop laughing at the Lindsey Graham quote! OMG.
This is gonna be a fun campaign.

naw, gotta keep the human decision-maker element. the decider. i'm picturing lindsey graham strapped into Cerebro and surrounded by red buttons of death. i guess that's basically what we have now except for the mind-reading.

the commander guy

http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--Oh1HHcXo--/19aerwsa364gdgif.gif

today's WashPo/ABC poll:

http://i.imgur.com/vBKrLex.jpg

other/no opinion 2016

did Bobby Jindal somehow slip into 0%? his May dot doesn't even exist

Biden surging ahead!

the {candidate X is formidable} is aa strange election cycle tradition, like of course they were formidable in their home states otherwise they wldnt have made it to the presidential candidate level, but it says very little about whether theyll be able to out perform the other candidates who were also formidable at the state level http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/05/jeb-bush-2016-campaign.html

tho this one at least has a il info abt jebs shady business dealings

He also got involved in what to my mind is his most eyebrow-raising venture. In 2007, Jeb became a consultant to a company named InnoVida, whose CEO claimed to have cheap, ready-to-build temporary homes for victims of earthquakes and other natural disasters. Later, he joined the company’s board of directors. There was just one problem: The CEO, Claudio Osorio, was lying. His business was largely imaginary. Eventually, an investor in InnoVida sued. Osorio pleaded guilty to fraud and is now in jail. InnoVida declared bankruptcy.

In court records, Jeb claims he was acting in good faith when he served as a consultant to the company. (He’s since returned $270,000, though the company’s trustees sought nearly $470,000.) His spokeswoman, Kristy Campbell, adds that the governor hired a former federal-law-enforcement agent to conduct a background check on Osorio and his company. “The report he received,” she says, “didn’t have any red flags that indicated criminal or financial wrongdoing.”

But Linda Worton Jackson, the lawyer who represented InnoVida’s creditors, points out that even the simplest form of due diligence — namely, consulting the internet — should have raised those red flags.

“A simple Google search would have shown that Osorio had already committed the same type of fraud,” says Jackson. It’s true: Even in 2007, it was possible to punch Osorio’s name into Google and find a lawsuit over a bogus electronics concern he’d founded. In fact, Osorio had been sued several times for fleecing investors before 2007. Had the investigator gone to the clerk’s office at the federal court in Miami, he would have discovered this, including a subsequent class-action suit against the electronics company, in which it was called a “fraudulent scheme.” And there were plenty of warning signs about Inno­Vida itself: Nine months before Jeb climbed aboard, a judge evicted the company from its factory space. One of its part owners had also been convicted of selling cocaine. “Jeb was paid $15,000 a month,” Jackson adds. “That’s a lot of money to be a consultant to a company you know nothing about.” To say nothing of being on its board. He attended at least two meetings. “You do not generally see politicians on the board of directors of a Ponzi scheme,” she says. “That’s what’s unusual here.”

that chart is what one expects in the gen public's No One Is Paying Any Heed period.