No surprise there: It’s been a disaster for their party and may well be producing a candidate that will be the most unpopular nominee in presidential campaign history.Obama campaign manager Jim Messina • Offering a harsh take on Mitt Romney’s recent primary wins and the GOP primaries in general, which he notes many Republican operatives have been using as a sign the other candidates need to get out of the race. As for Obama, Messina says, that “means we’ve all got to refocus the way we’ve been thinking about this race right now” and work harder to re-elect Obama.
A sampling of some of Gage Skidmore’s photos, hand-picked by the photog. In case you missed it, earlier today we did a quick profile on the teenage photographer, who has kept Flickr awash in Creative Commons photos of GOP politicians — especially Ron and Rand Paul. Which one’s your favorite?
It’s been discovered that an old obscure paragraph dealing with state pension benefits has allowed Texas Gov. Rick Perry to increase his take-home pay by more than $90,000 a year. While slashing programs for the poor, he’s getting retirement benefits while still working.
An interesting history of how Perry got the ability to double-dip.
I’ve never defined myself by anything other than my service, and my duty, and what we should all be judged on in life. We’ve all had relationships, as is clear as day now — now this is national news — that I have had one where he wanted to harm me. And now this is rolled out, and the timing is more than a coincidence.Pinal County, Ariz. Sheriff Paul Babeu • On having to “out” himself in light of a personal scandal. The sheriff, currently running for a Republican Congressional seat in Arizona, had been dogged by rumors that he threatened to deport an ex-lover to Mexico if their relationship a secret wasn’t kept. In order to deny those rumors, Babeu held a press conference and, in turn, announced his sexuality. Babeu, a hard-line conservative who had been a rising GOP star prior to the scandal, recently spoke at CPAC, where he called his primary opponent, Rep. Paul Gosar ”most liberal Republican member of Congress.” Babeu thinks political rivals were behind the recent scandal. ”I’ve got a record of service. people know me. I want to be judged, as every American should be, on results,” Babeu said. Does Babeu stand a shot at getting elected in the wake of this news? source (via • follow)
I cannot predict what will happen in the future, but I know that I have got the fire in my belly to try to help, to try to make a difference and if that involves running for public office at some point in the future, I’m game for that.Fox News analyst Sarah Palin • Continuing her long-running game of chicken with the idea of a future run for public office. Palin did not fully deny that she would jump into the presidential race if necessary. Sarah Palin may not be running for president, but she’s not entirely opposed to the idea either. In an interview Wednesday, she noted that she would “do whatever I could to help” in case the Republican party does not have a clear frontrunner by this summer. source (via • follow)
Newt finally on stage: Current chant? “You can win it! You can win!”
BREAKING: CNN reporting that former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush will endorse Mitt Romney, which is a big deal, because it wasn’t 100 percent clear he would get that endorsement.
Today our campaign for the presidency ends, but our campaign for a better and more trustworthy America continues.Jon Huntsman • Speaking at the announcement of his campaign’s suspension Monday morning.
(Source: CNN)
I’m moving back to New York in a few days. Unlike past...
OMG. I got so...
In this week’s Newsweek, a little...
Tumblr this morning. [h/t anne]
#@#$%!.tumblr.com
Here’s a hidden feature that shipped in...
Watch: PCB gets a visual shout out on GMA’s Yahoo/Tumblr...
Jon Huntsman’s campaign was never going to work. He finally realized that and will drop out to give Mitt Romney, for whom he exhibited no small amount of animosity during the debates, his support. In New Hampshire he preposterously told supporters that a weak third place finish, in a state in which he had campaigned almost exclusively, was his “ticket to ride” to South Carolina. But it wasn’t, just as his campaign wasn’t based on any natural constituency or rationale.The Washington Post’s Jennifer Rubin • Offering up her harshly-worded take on why Jon Huntsman’s leaving the race. “If it was the GOP presidential nomination he sought,” she continued, “it was of a GOP in some parallel universe created by the press in which the darn Tea Party never arose, Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) was still speaker of the House and Republicans yearned for an isolationist foreign policy even to the left of President Obama’s.” While the conservative Rubin clearly has her opinions, there is a grain of truth here. Huntsman’s a likable guy, but this was not a campaign that worked in his favor.
John Sununu is the best part of MSNBC’s New Hampshire coverage.
“There’s a technical term for that. It’s a crock of crap.” Ahahahahaha I love this guy. Way more fun than Pat Buchanan.
Relevant to Romney’s current gay-rights stance: This 2002 flyer, uncovered by BuzzFeed.
Mitt Romney: Politics is not a career. But he’s still running for president. Newt nails him: “Can we drop a bit of the pious baloney?”
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