The result's of the Globe's first caucus.
"GOP in Boston to strategize for 2016" by Jim O’Sullivan | Globe Staff, August 15, 2013
Republicans are meeting in Boston this week, trying to remake their party as a more inclusive, forward-thinking entity.
Excommunicating the Ron Paul people didn't help.
Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus, talking with reporters on the first day of the RNC’s summer meeting at the Westin Boston Waterfront Hotel, called it the “happy warrior” model.
Perhaps the party’s most visible embodiment of that ethos, relishing political combat, is Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey, who will address a closed-door luncheon Thursday. Considered one of the party’s strongest prospective 2016 presidential candidates, Christie has been outspoken in criticizing fellow Republicans who have voiced doubts about aggressive national security data monitoring programs.
He's for the spying?
RNC members said they were uncertain what Christie’s message would be. The New Jersey governor has taken flack from other Republicans for allegedly being too cozy with Democrats like Obama, in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, and Newark Mayor Cory Booker, the Democratic nominee for Senate in New Jersey.
But Rhode Island GOP chair Mark Smiley praised Christie’s “animal magnetism,” and members said they were looking forward to Christie’s remarks....
The meeting gives the GOP a stage to continue restructuring efforts after a second straight presidential loss, at the hands of a president many considered eminently vulnerable. Republicans hope to increase their House majority and retake the Senate. The three-day agenda is heavy on data and technology training, as the GOP looks to close a deficit in that sphere that has opened up during the Obama years....
“I think part of what we have to do, in the era of Obama’s disaster, we have to get beyond being anti-Obama and we have to reconvince people that you can have hope in America,” former House speaker Newt Gingrich said.
Scum had his chance.
Gingrich described stressing a positive future as a prudent electoral strategy for taking on Hillary Clinton, regarded as the most potent prospective Democratic presidential candidate.
Clinton vs. Christie?
“I don’t think we beat Hillary Clinton in a personality fight, because the news media will prop her up,” Gingrich said.
The former speaker blamed congressional Republicans for offering “zero answer” to the question of how to replace President Obama’s health care law.
Priebus said the party needed to work harder to court Latino voters, rather than making appeals just before elections.
“I think part of our problem as a party is that we haven’t shown up,’’ Priebus said. “I think if you’re going to get the sale, you’ve got to ask for the order.”
The party had tentatively scheduled the meeting for Chicago but decided to relocate to Boston after the Marathon bombings on April 15 as a show of support for the city. Priebus said he also wanted to send a message that the party has not thrown up its hands at the prospect of competing in the region.
“We need more red in New England if we’re going to be a serious national party,” he said....
I'm sick of you both.
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"Chris Christie addresses RNC in Boston; Said to impress party in speech closed to public" by Frank Phillips | Globe Staff, August 15, 2013
For a brash New Jersey pol, Governor Chris Christie was out of character Thursday when he whisked into Boston, addressed a national Republican gathering, and blew town without a word to the press.
He just lost and endorsement.
With a gaggle of national and local news media eager to get the usually voluble governor to mouth off, Christie remained behind the closed doors of Grand Ballroom A at the Westin Boston Waterfront Hotel as he spoke to a luncheon gathering at a summer meeting of the Republican National Committee.
The nonpublic appearance drew agitated demands by the news media to attend the event, but the RNC’s director of communications stood firm.
“It’s a business meeting of the party,’’ insisted Sean Spicer. He noted the session had been billed for weeks as closed to the press.
Inside, Christie didn’t appear to disappoint, according to party officials. He displayed some of his famous in-your-face pugnacity, but he also vowed to help the GOP in the 2014 midterm elections. He urged the crowd to proudly display their confidence in Republican principles. He warned the party needs to shed its image of waging war on women and to challenge every local election, the officials said.
Christie has taken heat from many in the GOP for working closely with President Obama just days before the 2012 election as federal and New Jersey officials grappled with the devastating aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. With many saying he undermined Mitt Romney’s presidential bid, Christie has refused to back down. He repeated that defiant tone Thursday.
“He basically said, ‘Get over it, it was nine months ago,’ ’’ said Kirsten Hughes, the Massachusetts Republican Party chair.
She came away impressed....
She said Christie never mentioned the 2016 presidential election, a contest in which many think the governor — if he is reelected next year — will be a serious contender. His only hint, she said, came when he said he wanted to be involved in shaping the party’s future.
“I’ve seen him several times before and his delivery is really getting better,’’ Hughes said. “He was extremely impressive.”
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Still, his decision to avoid press coverage comes just weeks after he attacked the party’s Tea Party libertarian factions, including one of its leading figures, Senator Rand Paul, a Kentucky Republican. Last month Christie ripped into Paul and his followers, saying their “strain of libertarianism . . . is a very dangerous thought.’’
Christie’s attack provoked a public spat with Paul, a war of words that analysts think are the initial skirmishes of what will likely be the basis of heated debates in 2016 GOP presidential primary battles.
The RNC is holding its summer meeting in Boston this week as part of its effort to retool and update its lagging campaign data and technology infrastructure, and to reevaluate its approach to women, Latinos, and younger voters.
Lipstick on a pig, perfume on a turd, take your pick.
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"RNC moves to block two networks" August 17, 2013
The Republican National Committee, responding to plans by two television networks to air programs about Hillary Rodham Clinton, approved a resolution Friday to block CNN and NBC from hosting GOP presidential primary debates.
The unanimous vote affirmed RNC Chairman Reince Priebus’s threat against the networks if they went ahead with programs about Clinton, a possible Democratic presidential contender. Priebus said CNN has ‘‘an obvious bias.’’
‘‘That’s a network that won’t be hosting a single Republican primary debate,’’ Priebus declared, receiving a standing ovation from Republican activists from across the country gathered for the committee’s summer meeting in Boston.
In a statement, CNN said a division of the company planned to air a documentary about Clinton in 2014.
‘‘The project is in the very early stages of development, months from completion,’’ the CNN statement read. ‘‘We encouraged all interested parties to wait until the program premieres before judgments are made about it. Unfortunately, the RNC was not willing to do that.’’
Meanwhile, the Fox TV Studios has decided not to help produce NBC’s ‘‘Hillary’’ miniseries, said Leslie Oren, the company’s spokeswoman. Fox’s participation attracted attention because it is owned by News Corp. and is a sister company to the Fox News Channel, where the project has come under attack from commentators.
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I won't be watching the Clinton special or the debates, so....
"Chris Christie signs bill banning conversion therapy; Cites health risk of trying to shift sex orientation" by Angela Delli Santi | Associated Press, August 20, 2013
TRENTON, N.J. — Republican Governor Chris Christie signed a law on Monday barring licensed therapists from trying to turn gay teenagers straight, the latest example of the potential 2016 presidential candidate steering a moderate course....
California has also banned the practice, which is known as conversion therapy.
The decision marked the third time this month that Christie has staked out a moderate position on a hot-button social issue as he seeks a second term in a Democratic-leaning state. It also offers more evidence that the popular governor is positioning himself as a pragmatist who shuns more conservative elements within his party.
Christie found middle ground on medical marijuana for children when he agreed Friday to allow growers to cultivate additional strains and for marijuana to be made in an edible form for chronically ill children. But he would not lift a provision that could require as many as three doctors to sign off on a prescription.
Last week, Christie vetoed a ban on .50-caliber rifles that was opposed by firearms rights advocates and gutted a proposed overhaul of the state’s gun permit law that relied on undeveloped technology.
Recently, he signed 10 less-significant gun measures the Democrat-led Legislature passed after last year’s deadly school shooting rampage in Newtown, Conn.
The decisions allow Christie to quiet some of the criticism he could face from conservatives by offering specific reasons why he was taking the steps, often citing compassion for the needs of children and families.
In signing the ban, Christie reiterated his belief that people are born gay and homosexuality is not a sin, a position he first stated in a 2011 interview with CNN. That view is inconsistent with his Catholic faith, which teaches that homosexual acts are sins....
Christie, however, has not moderated his position on gay marriage, which he vetoed and continues to oppose. As a result, gay rights activists applauded Monday’s bill signing but pushed for more....
That's a pretty powerful lobby you are going up against there.
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Also see: GOP: Chris Christie’s professorial putdown
Any alternatives?
"GOP needs new ideas, Senator Rand Paul says" Associated Press, August 19, 2013
WASHINGTON — Senator Rand Paul, Republican of Kentucky, said Sunday that he and Governor Chris Christie, the Republican governor of New Jersey, will continue to disagree over national security and other issues, but the party is big enough to accommodate both men’s views.
‘‘There’s room for people who believe in bigger government in our party,’’ Paul said, in an reference to Christie. The New Jersey governor is considered a moderate whose views on government spending differ sharply from the libertarian Paul’s.
The two men, potential rivals for president in 2016, have been sparring for weeks.
Paul said in an interview on ‘‘Fox News Sunday’’ that Republicans should concentrate on expanding the party instead of bickering.
He said the GOP ‘‘is shrinking almost down to nothing’’ in the Northeast, Christie’s home base, and needs people with new ideas to attract independents and Democrats.
Christie has agreed to expand state’s Medicaid program under President Obama’s health care overhaul, while some other Republican governors have refused to do so. He also signed a law increasing pension and health costs for public workers.
Christie’s tendency to put pragmatism before party labels is considered a potential strength in a presidential election, but it could be a weakness in the race for his party’s nomination.
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I'm not a big Rand Paul fan. Not like father.
"Weighing White House run, senator clarifies citizenship" Associated Press, August 21, 2013
WASHINGTON — Senator Ted Cruz, seemingly eyeing a presidential run in 2016, calls his renunciation of Canadian citizenship no big deal, even though questions about candidates’ birthplaces have flared in recent elections.
Controversy still dogs President Obama from some quarters despite proof he was born in Hawaii.
Cruz, a Texas Republican and favorite of the Tea Party movement, was born in Canada, to a Cuban father and US-born mother. His mother’s status has allowed him to be a citizen of both the United States and Canada, but he said Tuesday in Houston, ‘‘I believe it makes sense for me to be only an American.’’
Previous foreign-born Americans — notably Republicans John McCain and George Romney — have run for president with some mention but no serious challenges of their eligibility.
It's only the Constitution that legally requires it, that's all. No big deal.
The chief upshot of Cruz’s announcement that he will renounce his Canadian citizenship is to suggest he’s seriously considering a presidential bid in 2016, and would like to settle that side issue now.
Oh, I doubt it.
Cruz is among Obama’s sharpest critics, and is vying for early national attention with another Tea Party-backed Senate freshman, Rand Paul of Kentucky.
Cruz is helping lead an effort to shut down the government if that’s what it takes to stop implementation of Obama’s landmark health care overhaul.
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President Cruz! That's as likely as a president named Osama or Obama.
Also see: The Boston Globe's August Town Hall Meeting
