Monday Open Thread [4.13.15]

So today we will have reactions to Hillary Clinton’s campaign roll out, and I have to see it has been a shattering success so far. The video was well received, and she did the impossible and surprised the Press Corps with a secret road trip through Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois on the way to Iowa. Whenever the Press Corps is surprised, they always bestow some respect.

The AP reports on how she got here from there.

Hillary Clinton’s “decision to run again would be slow, almost painstakingly deliberate, a reflection of Clinton’s methodical and cautious nature. She put off much of the process until last fall, around the midterm elections. Only then did she delve deeply into consultations with dozens of policy and political experts, analysis of countless memos, and a reexamination of what went wrong in her failed 2008 campaign.”

“There was plenty that gave Clinton pause. She grimaced at the thought of giving up her privacy again. She worried about putting Chelsea, husband Marc and their baby in the spotlight. She felt bad that her candidacy would crowd out Vice President Joe Biden, a longtime friend who was also toying with a White House run. Clinton was also mindful of chatter that she could be challenged from her party’s liberal left flank… A less talked-about concern was health, both hers and her husband’s.”

By Christmas last year, “she had largely settled on running a second campaign, but wanted to make the final determination with her husband, Bill. When she returned to New York in the new year, there was no formal meeting with staff or email to friends to announce her candidacy. Clinton simply started telling advisers to move forward with hiring and find a campaign headquarters.”

I actually believe that about Biden. The Hillary-Biden friendship is well documented. And I get the feeling that all of Biden’s pronouncements about possibly running were to keep up his own political capital, and to provide Democrats with a Plan B should his friend not run. But deep down, Joe Biden always had to know that the next in line when it comes to 2016 was Hillary and not him.

“If they get to nominate Hillary Clinton, why don’t we get to nominate Dick Cheney?” — Bill Kristol on ABC’s This Week program on Sunday. Please proceed, Mr. Kristol. Do it.

Ed Kilgore of the Washington Monthly: “The diversity of the images in that video are a good reflection of where the Democratic Party finds its support these days, and the tone of “humility” is an appropriate antidote to the “coronation” talk we will inevitably hear from most Republicans and some Democrats.”

Nancy LeTourneau of the Washington Monthly: “I have to say that I think she’s made some good choices. This is exactly the right message to send. […] Hitting the road to earn votes and recognizing that, for the voters, “It’s your time” indicates that her campaign is more prepared this time. That was elaborated on by Clinton’s campaign manager Robby Mook yesterday when he said, “This campaign is not about Hillary Clinton and not about us – it’s about the everyday Americans who are trying to build a better life for themselves and their families.” Apparently Clinton will also play to her strengths by opening her campaign with smaller more intimate gatherings. She has plenty of time to build towards big campaign rallies and her challenge right now is more about building her reputation as someone who is authentically engaged. So that’s another smart move. We’ve got a long haul ahead. But I’d say that so far…so good.”

E.J. Dionne Jr.: “David Axelrod, Obama’s longtime adviser, has noted that voters are always looking for the corrective to whatever they didn’t like in the previous administration. Clinton will present herself as both a realist when it comes to the intransigence of the Republican Party — it took Obama time to acknowledge this — but also as someone with a history of working with Republicans. It will be an intricate two-step. “Tough enough to end polarization” may seem like an odd slogan, but something like it will be at the heart of her appeal. And she will have to go both to Obama’s left and right. Clinton needs to run hard against economic inequality, pledging to get done the things Obama couldn’t on issues including family leave, pre-K and higher education. She will have to be strong on expanding the bargaining power of the lower-paid. Trade will be the tricky issue here. Her video made clear that middle-class populism will be her dominant key, even as she nodded to the improvements during the Obama years.”

Brian Beutler on why Hillary Clinton’s campaign frightens Democrats:

It may even be the case that some of these Democrats with rattled nerves are less anxious about Clinton’s prowess against Republicans than about the fact that all of the party’s hopes now rest on her shoulders. Her campaign has become a single point of failure for Democratic politics. If she wins in 2016, she won’t ride into office with big congressional supermajorities poised to pass progressive legislation. But if she loses, it will be absolutely devastating for liberalism.

If you’re faithful to the odds, then most of this anxiety is misplaced. Clinton may have slipped in the polls by virtue of an email scandal and her return to the partisan trenches more generally. But she’s still more popular and better known than all of the Republicans she might face in the general, her name evokes economic prosperity, rather than global financial calamity, the economy is growing right now, and Democrats enjoy structural advantages in presidential elections, generally.

But all candidates are fallible, and most of them are human, which means every campaign labors under the small risk of unexpected collapse. The one real advantage of a strong primary field is that it creates a hedge against just such a crisis.

Steve Benen:

[T]he kickoff told us quite a bit about the kind of campaign Clinton intends to run, and the key differences from her previous candidacy. There’s also increased clarity Clinton’s rationale: “Everyday Americans need a champion, and I want to be that champion.” As one-sentence summaries go, that’s not a bad pitch. But as yesterday’s developments unfolded, I found myself thinking about history.

The historical angles Benen thought of for Hillary’s candidacy: 1) The opportunity for the first woman president; 2) an instant intra-party frontrunner without precedent; 3) Clinton brings a unique resume to voters (she would be the first president to be both a cabinet secretary and a statewide officer since 1856); 4) Parties usually struggle to win three in a row (Since 1952, it has only been done once, twice if you consider 2000 a win for the Democrats that got stolen, which I do).

Jonathan Chait explains why “Hillary Clinton Is Probably Going to Win the 2016 Election” at New York Magazine.

“Unless the economy goes into a recession over the next year and a half, Hillary Clinton is probably going to win the presidential election. The United States has polarized into stable voting blocs, and the Democratic bloc is a bit larger and growing at a faster rate.”

“The argument for Clinton in 2016 is that she is the candidate of the only major American political party not run by lunatics. There is only one choice for voters who want a president who accepts climate science and rejects voodoo economics, and whose domestic platform would not engineer the largest upward redistribution of resources in American history. Even if the relatively sober Jeb Bush wins the nomination, he will have to accommodate himself to his party’s barking-mad consensus. She is non-crazy America’s choice by default. And it is not necessarily an exciting choice, but it is an easy one, and a proposition behind which she will probably command a majority.”