PRESIDENTIAL IDOL

Who will be a survivor in 2012?

As others have observed, President Obama's wise appointment of the highly qualified Jon Huntsman, Governor of Utah, as our ambassador to China may well have removed from contention a leading candidate for the 2o12 Republican presidential nomination. This follows his wise selection of Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State, thus probably eliminating this strong member of his team of rivals from the 2012 election. Perhaps unrelated is the news today that former President Bill Clinton has been named by the UN as special envoy to Haiti.

So what's next? Governor Bobby Jindal as ambassador to India. Florida Governor Charlie Crist (Spanish speaking?) as ambassador to Mexico?

homer  www.altara.blogspot.com

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Worth a look:

General impression:  NOM is in serious trouble - derision hurts, but irrelevance is fatal.

Random notes:

Interesting framing from Richard Piatt of LDS-owned KSL:  "Given the past power of the ultra-right on this issue ..."

Huntsman:  "If it equates to equal rights for all of our citizens, it's a conversation we need to have."

Lisa Riley Roche (Deseret News):  "Do you support that [NOM] campaign that seems to be suggesting there's an increasing threat to the American way of life by people seeking equal rights?"

Huntsman:  "I haven't given that [campaign] a second's thought."

Ouch.  

Irrelevance.

But then Huntsman pivots with a nod to (what he seems to agree/suggest are) supposedly more pressing concerns (food, shelter, clothing and the like).  A false choice?  Sure.  Am I bothered?  Not so much.  If/when Huntsman decides to run, Steve Schmidt will be on staff.  This Steve.  

Moving on ...

Huntsman:  "The Republican Party needs to let a thousand flowers bloom ... [allow] preeminence [to] stand taller than partisanship ... and see where that takes us ..."

Amen to that, Guv.  Amen.

P.S. Speaking of Steve Schmidt, this recent NOM press release exemplifies, for me, all that's wrong with Maggie's and Brian's and the ultra-right's approach:

PRINCETON, NJ, April 17 Christian Newswire -- Today, the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) responded to Steve Schmidt on CNN:

"Steve Schmidt's first national TV address this week is part of a coordinated campaign to manufacture a message point: Americans are ready to give up on the marriage issue. I'm not worried about this press spin, because the people who believe it are going to wake up to find the political landscape is very different than they imagine," said Brian Brown, executive director of NOM.  "People are responding very powerfully to our ads and other messaging because they don't want politicians imposing gay marriage on them or their children or their grandchildren."

"Steven Schmidt?  Isn't this the guy who ran a failed presidential campaign, who advised a failed governor (Arnold Schwarzenegger) who insiders say was recently fired by Meg Whitman?" Brown continued, "Sure, we can understand why Steve would be looking for a way to make some new friends -- but why would anyone take his advice on how to win elections at this point?"

"Imagine what America -- or the GOP -- will be like when anyone who believes marriage is the union of husband and wife can be excluded from high office, or public influence, in the way we now exclude bigots and racists. What does that do to the electoral map?" Brown asked.

"There is no conservative case for gay marriage.  Gay marriage represents the overthrow of the core idea of marriage in our tradition and every faith tradition. And it will put government on the side of excluding traditional faith communities from the public square," said Maggie Gallagher, President of NOM.

To schedule an interview with Maggie Gallagher, President, or Brian Brown, Executive Director of NOM, contact Elizabeth Ray (x 130, eray@crcpublicrelations.com) or Mary Beth Hutchins (x.105, mhutchins@crcpublicrelations.com) by calling 703-683-5004.

So, if you happen to work for a media outlet that might benefit from an in-person display of NOM's increasingly ugly and shrill appeals to fear, I guess you now know the numbers to call and the folks to email.  Enjoy.  But, your professional predicament aside, on a personal level, just talking among ourselves, before you decide to make that call or send that email to Liz or Mary at CRC, please know that I would enjoy reading your admission (even if merely posted anonymously in comments here) that you, too, also realize just how sad and pathetic NOM's schtick has become.  I mean, at this point, who among us still believes that NOM have any useful advice left to give regarding how to win elections?  I mean, at this point, even our colleagues in the Utah press have gathered that they don't.  

Why?  Because since their Pyrrhic victory in California, NOM have done nothing but lose.

Why?  Because, at this point, NOM have become ringleaders of the sort of media circus that any right-minded conservative abhors and any serious Republican recognizes as the central challenge facing the party:  how to best usher their clowns offstage to the benefit of both the GOP and the country.

Final thought:  Last time I checked, Steve was not a member of the press, Brian.  But you insinuate otherwise.  

Why?  Because you're a clown, Mr. Brown.

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Both the Salt Lake Tribune and the Deseret News are reporting that U.S. House Republicans just killed the Davis bill.

Earlier Tuesday, a spokesman for House Majority Leader John Boehner reaffirmed that the bill is not coming up. "That hasn't changed," spokesman Kevin Madden said.

I am glad they waited until after Utah spent all that money and effort to create a map before they nixed it.

Maybe they didn't like the map. Or maybe they believed what I wrote and worried about Utah Democrats picking up a seat.

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Utah and DC's seat deal remains valid in theory.  The New York Times picked up the story, which makes it seem more likely this is going to happen after all.  But the local papers are the ones with the actual news.   Buried in the first couple paragraphs of the Deseret News' article yesterday was this gem on the "bipartisan" bill, which I will show you on the flip

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Cross Posted at The Third Avenue. Bumped--Chris

In the end, the Legislature's special committee decided on a plan whose map was never released to the public...Plan L(PDF).

 L looks somewhat similar to previous plans.  The new 4th district will be Southwestern Utah (Tooele, Juab [save the Eastern jug end where everyone lives], Millard, Beaver, Iron, Washington Counties). However, the 4th also would include Southern Salt Lake County-- South Jordan, West Jordan, Cottonwood Heights, Talyorsville, Sandy, and parts of West Valley. The new 2nd will be like the 1990's 2nd (Northern Salt Lake County, with the Park City part of Summitt County, and a tiny sliver of Davis and Utah Counties [Woods Cross and Alta respectively]).  The new 3rd will include Eastern Utah "centered" around Provo (Morgan, rest of Summitt, Daggett, Wasatch, Utah, Duchesne, Uintah, Carbon, rest of Juab, Sanpete, Emory, Grant, Piute, Wayne, Garfield, San Juan, and Kane Counties).  The new 1st will be centered around Ogden (Box Elder, Cash, Weber, 99% of Davis, and Rich Counties).  

Bottom line, Matheson could run in the 4th, but he would have to overcome super conservative Washington county.  He was born in Iron County, so he should be OK there. He is excited to get back Talyorsville and would love to kick around House Speaker Greg Curtis some more in Sandy.  I wonder if he will bite.  I will lobby him to, because this 2nd district is pretty Democrat friendly.  I can envision a number of candidates who could be successful and still be A) Democrats B) not named Matheson. I think Matheson could win in this 4th, but it will be tough.  All his pork for St. George will come in handy now.  

"We've had a significant amount of public input," Sen. Curt Bramble, R-Provo, committee co-chairman told the Tribune. "There's been a great deal of discussion about the public perception that this is a majority party whitewash. That we are simply trying to gerrymander Republican Party seats. Nothing could be further from the case."

Um I say that is complete Bull.  No member of the public asked for protecting Matheson, not even Matheson.  The number of people wanting a mix of urban and rural districts were solely Republican partisans.  Why don't you ask the people living out in the rural areas if they want to fight for attention with Provo, Salt Lake County, or Davis/Weber Counties?  Of course they never had a hearing in rural areas, the closest they got was in St. George, our fastest growing city.