Informed Speculation

Well, one name has surfaced already – Rahm Emanuel as Chief of Staff.  Some other possibilities I have heard or read include keeping Robert Gates as Defense Secretary (bipartisan gesture, continuity during time of war, acknowledgment that he has been much better than Rumsfeld), and Paul Volcker as a dark horse for Treasury Secretary (THAT [...]

Not his campaign team, but his media cheerleaders: At least one broadcast network and one Web site said Monday that they could foresee signaling to viewers early Tuesday evening which candidate appeared to have won the presidency, despite the unreliability of some early exit polls in the last presidential election. A senior vice president of [...]

…you don’t know me very well.  Mark Leibovich in the New York Times on John Kerry’s status as an isolated loser: Senator John Kerry keeps to himself around the Capitol. He is always rushing somewhere, head down, disappearing into elevators. A Senate loner for 22 years, Mr. Kerry seems all the more isolated now as [...]

…let’s call the whole thing off.  George Will is not convinced that we face a crisis: Enough already. It is time to call some bluffs. John Kerry says that one reason America has become an “international pariah” is President Bush’s decision to “walk away from global warming.” Kerry’s accusation is opaque, but it implies the usual [...]

God, the man just never shuts up: Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry slammed the foreign policy of the Bush administration on Saturday, saying it has caused the United States to become “a sort of international pariah.” The statement came as the 2004 Democratic presidential nominee responded to a question today at the World Economic Forum’s annual [...]

…was a lack of fundraising success, according to this article by Roger Simon: As John Kerry just found out, $13 million is sometimes not enough. That amount, which the senator from Massachusetts still had on hand after running for the presidency four years ago as the Democratic nominee, is only a fraction of what a [...]

The 2008 race just lost its crown jester: In these days when everyone and their brother seems to be running for president, someone today decided that he was not: Senator John Kerry, the Massachusetts Democrat who lost to President Bush in 2004. The news was relayed by a Democratic official in anticipation of an announcement [...]

Can it be? Can John Kerry truly still be pondering a 2008 run? Apparently: With the 2008 Democratic presidential field taking shape fast, Senator John F. Kerry still hasn’t decided whether to join the race, and maintains that the early announcements from other candidates won’t push him to act in haste , according to Kerry [...]

…while Rudy Giuliani remains the public favorite for the GOP: On the day that Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton officially entered the 2008 presidential sweepstakes, a new Washington Post-ABC News survey shows her with a wide lead over her potential Democratic rivals. Clinton took 41 percent in a hypothetical primary field against 12 other Democrats, far ahead of [...]

Chuck Todd and Marc Ambinder of The National Journal share their latest thoughts on the contenders and pretenders: moving up, both Rudy and Obama, though neither takes the top spot – yet…and moving way, way down, that lonely patrician known as JFK II…

Oh, I know, it’s hardly fair; the man should be retired from the category for general jackassedness.  Nevertheless, Kerry once again stood out this year. With the Democrats in control and sailing into the 2006 election with a full tail wind born of an unpopular war and an old-fashioned sex scandal, out pops Mr. Pomposity [...]

This is absolutely priceless…all I want for Christmas (a little late, I know) is for John Kerry to stay in the 2008 race! Run, John, run!…

A new ABC News/Washington Post poll shows – guess who – Rudy G. leading the way among Republican candidates.  At some point, the Rudy G. naysayers are going to have to start paying attention, because there are very few polls he hasn’t led in, and John McCain is not a nobody – i.e., it’s not [...]

…is also the most clueless.  How far has John Kerry fallen? So far that even Teddy Boy is ready to throw him overboard: Senator Edward M. Kennedy Monday dropped his public commitment to support Senator John F. Kerry in a 2008 presidential race, saying that he won’t wait “indefinitely” for Kerry to declare his intentions [...]

So sayeth the Nutroots® prophet: Standard caveats aside (it’s early, we don’t have a set field, blah blah blah), it’s hard to see how Barack Obama loses the nomination barring scandal or the mother-of-all gaffes. I’ve been working up a few scenarios given the primary calendar (which isn’t set in stone, with states like California [...]

Oh, for the love of…the Hotline’s Blogometer notes a list of Democrats on the outs with progressives for apparently not being hostile enough to capitalism, spearheaded by populist hack David Sirota.  The list includes the following ”negative” comment about Kerry: …[T]his year he voted for the Oman Free Trade Agreement, over the strong objections of labor, [...]

Can it be true? Is it possible that we won’t have John Kerry to kick around any more? Senator John F. Kerry’s election-eve “botched joke” about the war in Iraq — and the fierce denunciations his comments drew from fellow Democrats — has led him to reevaluate whether to mount a run for the presidency [...]

It’s clear to me that my old candidate profiles and odds are no longer operative, given the recent activity in the 2008 race.  We’ve had some declare, some withdraw, and the odds have shifted.  From where I sit, the quick view is this. Two candidates, one Democrat and one Republican, hold the keys to this election.  [...]

What a card: Enough with The Joke, John Kerry says. The Massachusetts senator and former Democratic presidential nominee said Wednesday night that it’s time to move on from his botched attempt at humor before the midterm election. Kerry had said young people might get “stuck in Iraq” if they do not study hard and do [...]

Give the man credit for this much – he brings people of all races, ages, and nationalities together in one crucial area: their intense dislike of John Kerry. Democratic Sen. John Kerry, mulling a second bid for the U.S. presidency, finished dead last in a poll released on Monday on the likability of 20 top American [...]