But Yeah hes only vastly different on preemptive wars...

and extrajudicial killings.. and civil liberties.. and criminal justice reform.. and the federal reserve.. and nsa surveillance.. and Gitmo..and police militarization..and the war on drugs..and foreign aid..and marriage contracts..and corporate subsidies..and...i think you should be getting the point by now.

Looks like Kasich hired media consultant Fred Davis for his campaign: http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-06-10/exclusive-john-kasich-s-super-pac-hires-fred-davis-as-media-strategist?cmpid=yhoo
He's the guy who cooked up the 3-minute "Demon Sheep" ad from Carly Fiorina's failed Senate campaign, as well as the infamous "I'm not a witch" ad from Christine O'Donnell's failed Senate campaign.

The Bush hire is interesting. Diaz cut his teeth as a bare-knuckled Oppo-Research guy and it's interesting Bush would put someone like that at the head table opposite Sally Bradshaw. It suggests Bush is aiming for an aggressive campaign that buries competitors (Romney) rather than a passive one that preserves electability (McCain). Diaz probably should have gone to Bush's "Super PAC" though where the money and distance from Bush is easier to maintain, but I guess Jeb felt the campaign needed the direction bad enough. And even if the displaced Kochel focuses on Iowa where he has a good reputation it signals that Bush isn't very optimistic about a strong finish there.

That's a shame. All the quizzes I've taken match me up with him the most.

Kasich could be a good candidate (moreso in the G.E. than primary) but he sort of has to make moves like this. He has to make a splash in order to even get into the debates, and Davis is one way to do it because he's made about 4-5 truly outrageous ads in his career. Most of them backfired completely, but that's his style. They'll try to cook something up to get Kasich on the stage and then try to sell it from there.

I've been impressed by Rand Paul during his tenure in the Senate. He's a real player.



He tried to polish a couple turds for the party. Consider the sources. Kasich is different than Fiorina and O'Donnell. Hell, that year I'm convinced the GOP was just fucking off in a couple of the races, like Nevada senate.

This post was edited by Skinned on Jun 9 2015 11:23pm

At what? LOL?



This is just Fred Davis' history over his entire career. The "Debbie Spend-it-Now" ad that backfired was made in 2012, and he was guy Joe Ricketts commissioned to plan out a $10 million smeer campaign that would attack Obama over Reverend Wright and all the race-baiting nonsense the same year. He also came up with the "Celebrity" ad in 2008, and though it backfired too it fortunately didn't have any racial issues that some of the others did.

Two fantastic articles and two truly terrible ones.

In the first camp is this article about the brewing Koch vs. RNC conflict which is a must read. Most people aren't aware that from 2013-2014 the Kochs spent unheard-of money to build an apparatus key 2014 states including AR, NC, and CO that greatly overshadowed the GOP network in those states. In the case of CO the GOP didn't even build a traditional apparatus, they outsourced the entire role of boosting GOP candidates to the Kochs. After they used the Koch money to help them win they let their data-sharing agreement expire and now the Kochs are obviously furious: https://www.yahoo.com/politics/the-koch-brothers-and-the-republican-party-go-to-121193159491.html?soc_src=unv-sh&soc_trk=tw

The rare article that actually recognizes why the Bush campaign is struggling: http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-jeb-bushs-campaign-ran-off-course-before-it-even-began/2015/06/10/386331e6-0eb6-11e5-adec-e82f8395c032_story.html?hpid=z1

On the "holy shit, these people are clueless" end of the spectrum are the articles written by David Brookes and Ron Fournier that continue the firestorm that was set off by the NYT article mentioned earlier about Clinton's strategy. Both articles are dumb but I'll just link to Fournier's since his is funnier: http://www.nationaljournal.com/2016-elections/the-right-way-and-wrong-way-to-win-the-presidency-20150608

Very interesting. The Kochs are interesting Americans. Talk about power. My opinion has been changing on them.



He is relatively new to the Senate and he has been able to hold the whole apparatus hostage a couple different times, plus his willingness to strike out on his own and dissent within reason. When he joined the Senate with Ted Cruz I expected Cruz to become a player and Paul to just be a clown....boy I got that backwards. Also, it takes somebody with a sack and a brain to talk in front of the Senate for as long as he has during his mini-filibusters. I know you're cynical and think those were political stunts, but all politics is that and he has delivered more than once.

He says crazy things like the Baltimore riots are a result of taxes being too high Which is about as stupid of a thing as I image, but he only said that because he had to backtrack on a statement he said pandering to some racists there, as Republicans tend to do behind closed doors, see 47% comment.

This post was edited by Skinned on Jun 11 2015 11:35am

I know Rubio is top tier cause the NY Times just ran a front page story about him getting 4 driving tickets in 17 years. I use to have some editorial respect for the Times, but their grasping at straws only makes me respect Rubio a bit more.

This post was edited by card_sultan on Jun 11 2015 11:52am

But every Senator has that ability, most of them just recognize it's smarter to not use it. There's nothing unique about Paul that's made him able to do that outside his specific needs to run his presidential campaign. If Cruz was not the face of a pointless government shutdown then Paul would be the most disliked Senator among the other 99. They're both clowns, neither is a player in the Senate. Paul is honestly the weakest non-freshman Senator. All politics is not a political stunt (as the behavior of most Senators shows), honestly that's the real cynical view here. I think it's at least partially admirable to take the risk of a 10-hour speech, but "brains" is about the last thing I'd credit considering the many contradictions during those speeches and even in the days that followed them.

The Koch's just want what they feel is owed to them for bankrolling the GOP over the past 6 years. Everybody knows the deal, and they wouldn't have anywhere near as many seats in Congress without them.