Reuters:
Top Democratic donors say they are unfazed by the disclosure that Hillary Clinton conducted State Department business on a personal email account, although several said she could fend off Republican criticism by addressing the issue head-on and announcing her candidacy for president.
The presumed front-runner for the Democratic Party's 2016 presidential nomination had generally avoided controversy until the email issue emerged. It has sparked Republican claims that she was being secretive and could have posed a security threat.
“Do I think it will affect her fundraising? I doubt it,” said Miami physician and Democratic bundler J.P. Austin. “She’s the front-runner. She’s still the person to beat.”
Lena Kennedy, a Pasadena donor and bundler, added: “I just think Hillary needs to address the questions, and then we need to move on.”
Unfortunately for Republicans, their own candidates have either
used personal email or
don't know how to use email or still
can't get noticed altogether.
#Jebya is a thing.
He's being called #Jebya - can't be good...
MT .@owillis: i thought jeb bush wouldnt have as much of a problem with his last name...
— @Houckadoodledoo
NBC:
"Extraordinary" Democratic support for Hillary Clinton
On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton has near-universal support from Democrats.
According to the poll - most of which was conducted in the midst of the controversy over her use of private emails - 86 percent of Democrats say they could see themselves supporting Clinton, versus 13 percent who couldn't (+73).
The e-Ghazi issue should be known as the Political Reporter Full Employment Act of 2015. Like most Clinton "scandals", there's something you wish were done differently at the core, magnified beyond recognition by the press. In the end, it won't go away, it will be overdone by her opponents, and it won't matter. We've seen this movie for 20 years, and it always ends the same way. Get used to it.
More politics and policy below the fold.
Michael Hiltzik:
Opposition to the ACA is still a litmus test for Republicans, even though its benefits to millions of Americans are now manifest; in red states, the consequences of an adverse Supreme Court ruling include 2.5 million people losing their health insurance subsidies in Florida, and 1.75 million in Texas, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.
Congressional Republicans have responded by proposing several workarounds and alternatives.
Political commentator Jonathan Chait has written that conservative healthcare proposals tend to reflect the "Heritage Uncertainty Principle," a takeoff on the Heisenberg uncertainty principle of physics, which states that certain aspects of reality can never be determined.
His point, referring to the right-wing Heritage Foundation, was that "conservative health-care policies do not exist in any real form" — they're put forth only to counter whatever plan Democrats are offering, and they evaporate the moment anyone tries to take them seriously. The individual mandate, for instance, originated as a Heritage counterweight to the Clinton healthcare reform of the 1990s; once it was incorporated into the Affordable Care Act, conservatives denounced it as an infringement on individual liberty.
Jonathan Capehart:
A particular passage in President Obama’s remarks in Selma yesterday rings powerfully true today. “Of course, a more common mistake is to suggest that Ferguson is an isolated incident; that racism is banished; that the work that drew men and women to Selma is now complete, and that whatever racial tensions remain are a consequence of those seeking to play the “race card” for their own purposes,” he said. “We don’t need the Ferguson report to know that’s not true. We just need to open our eyes, and our ears, and our hearts to know that this nation’s racial history still casts its long shadow upon us.”
Less than 24 hours later, the nation’s eyes, ears and heart are offended by a video allegedly showing members of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon (SAE) fraternity at the University of Oklahoma leading a racist chant. ...
University of Oklahoma president David Boren wasted no time taking action. He banished SAE from campus and ordered the fraternity house shuttered by midnight Tuesday night. The fraternity’s national headquarters, calling itself “disgusted” and “embarrassed” by the video, suspended the entire Oklahoma university membership and promised to permanently revoke the membership of those responsible for the incident. Boren’s statement on the racist display was blunt. “To those who have misused their free speech in such a reprehensible way, I have a message for you. You are disgraceful,” he said.
Kudos to David Boren. And to Obama for the Selma speech.
The Hill:
The war of words over President Obama’s foreign policy reached a fever pitch on Monday as Democrats assailed Senate Republicans for issuing an open letter to the leaders of Iran.
The rebukes came all the way from the top of the party, with Obama hitting Republicans for making “common cause” with factions in Iran that are determined to thwart diplomacy.
Politico:
Immigration reform looks dead in this Congress
Republican leaders show little interest in returning to the issue after the Homeland Security fiasco.
This is what they do with a majority? This is how they convince voters they can govern and be trusted with power? Amazing how stupid Congressional Republicans have become.
Edward Jay Epstein:
O'Reilly's JFK Reporting Was Impossible. I Know Because I Was There