President/Administration

I guess the question regarding Hillary is whether she'll generate the kind of enthusiasm that will get people to the polls to vote for her. "Ready for Hillary" just isn't good enough. "Fired Up for Hillary" is what's needed.

You know Paul Krugman's feeling well when he puts up a piece extolling the virtues of the Obama Administration calling it the "Big Deal". Here's Steve Benen's comment on it.

Now I know everyone's in a good mood at the moment but maybe we're going a bit too far? I'd be willing to settle for the 'Good Deal' or even the 'OK Deal'.

Interesting post-Election discussion by campaign leaders in the Obama and Romney campaigns hosted by Harvard's Institute of Politics: 2012 Campaign Decision Makers Conference.

Axelrod generates a lot of heat in the 'Discussion of the Democratic Strategy' particularly versus the press ("difference between the world we inhabit and reality"). Sad comment on the times: to the question of something you didn't expect, answer: the strength (particularly financial) of the Super PACs. Not good.

The obvious take-away from last week's election was quite simply, 'We Won', or in the words of Rachel Maddow:

.... President Barack Obama, yes, will go down in history as our nation`s first African-American president. But he will also go down in history as the most successful Democratic presidential candidate since FDR.

I'm not sure why so many pundits are declaring the first presidential debate a "victory" for Romney. Even TPM which usually has better judgement, gets into the act with the title of their report, "Romney Shines In Denver, Obama Camp Says So What"

I love how Republican candidates are running around the country presenting themselves as the true protectors of Social Security and Medicare. GOP VP candidate Paul Ryan just did it at an AARP confab where he claimed yet again that Obama wants to gut Medicare by $716 billion.

Actually the title reads, "Romney Allies Outspend Obama 2-1 This Week".

Just '2-1'? Naturally that's where the Democrat currently is enjoying the benefits of incumbency. What happens when this isn't the case, say in 2016, and the floodgates really do open? 10-to-1 may be 'low-balling' the advantage.

Steve Benen on the "road ahead" for Mitt Romney after losing to Rick Santorum in AL and Miss.:

PBS has a documentary discussing the Clinton legacy (see Tapped post).

Ultimately you have to ask, what got accomplished? The incumbent from one party leads the country in one direction while the incumbent from the other party, thanks to his accomplishments, leads it back. The problem with Clinton is, it's hard to identify anything he accomplished that wouldn't have been done by a moderate Republican. The pendulum, so to speak, didn't swing back -- it just kind of got stuck.