Once More, Unto the Breach Dear Friends

In the aftermath of the 2012 election, where GOP big shots from Karl Rove down to Mitt Romney sat stunned because they believed that the election was in the bag (and should have been in the bag), the GOP began a round of soul searching, as well as finger pointing (who can forget Mitt's double down comments crediting Obama's re-election to "gifts" to a variety of parasitical citizens)?

In the aftermath of this soul searching, the GOP produced a fairly interesting and revealing introspection about how the party would need to change if it wanted to win presidential elections, starting with the open-seat election in 2016.  The result of this introspection is a 100 page document titled the "Growth and Opportunity Project".  On page 69, the article focuses on the primaries, and especially the debates that took place among the potential nominees.

The authors note that in 1980, there were just six debates. In 2000 there were 13. But then in 2008 and 2012, the number of debates exploded, with 21 and 20 respectively. Furthermore, in 1980, the first debate did not take place until the Iowa Caucuses were about to begin, while in 2012 the first debate took place eight months before Iowa:

 In addition to the large quantity of debates, there was the added problem of two debates held back to back within a 12 hour period--the first in the evening on Saturday January 7, 2012 and the second in the morning on Sunday, January 8, 2012.

The authors argue that it is time for the Party to get control over the timing, sponsorship, and candidate participation of GOP debates because currently the GOP brand, and candidates, are being hurt via a collusion of the liberal media and unelectable candidates who push for more, and not less, debates.  They note:

The media will decide how many debates the party should have instead of the Party making the decision. In order to have a process that respects a candidate's time and one that helps the Party win (71).

 Their recommendations for 2016:

• Hold between 10-12 debates beginning no earlier than September 2015 and ending somewhere around Super Tuesday in late February or early March.
• After the last round of debates, if there continues to be a competitive battle between two or more candidates (similar to 2008 for the Democrats), then it should be up to the candidates to decide if they want to accept or decline additional debates
• The RNC needs to get control of the scheduling process as soon as possible: by announcing the number of debates as well as when they will begin in late 2014 or early 2015, before the field of candidates has had a chance to get set. Further, the RNC should penalize any candidate or state party that defects from the schedule by attending non-sanctioned debates (or hosting non-sanctioned debates) by taking away delegates going into the GOP Convention in the summer of 2016, or more realistically, by barring from sponsored debates the participation of candidates who appear in non-sponsored debates.

The RNC did announce its schedule of "sanctioned" debates: five in 2015 and then five more in 2016, with the first one held in Cleveland (also the home to their summer convention) on August 6, 2015 and the last one in March 2016, location TBD.  And no mystery, the big winner as far as hosts go is "Fox News" (or its subsidiary, the "Fox Business Channel"), which will air four of the debates.  In addition, the conservative Salem Media Group is also a big winner, sponsoring three of the debates.

The paper underscores a long standing tension between political parties, candidates, and the media when it comes to who or what matters during election time.  Back in 1969, the McGovern-Fraser Commission changed the control over the selection of party nominees, removing it from the party leadership and handing it over to the rank and file voter in the 50 states and territories.  As a result, who mattered in presidential elections shifted from Party-Candidate to Candidate-Media.  In fact, we can lay a great deal of the blame at the feet of the Democrats for agreeing to implement the Commission reforms, because it brought with it the need for incredibly enormous sums of money and a near dependence upon political advertising (one going hand in hand with the other). Furthermore, it removed the party from having any influence over the choice of nominees, often getting stuck with the least desirable candidate.  More recently, the political parties have been trying, with some success, to regain control over the selection of candidates and the direction of campaigns (see, for example, Groeling's When Parties Attack: Party Cohesion in the Media. NY: Cambridge University Press. 2010).


Jonathan Martin, writing in yesterday's New York Times, draws attention to the problems the GOP faces as it rushes headlong into the 2016 election cycle with a number of top shelf and bottom shelf candidates, versus the Democrats, who have Hillary Clinton and not much else (with all due respect to that loyal Bernie Sanders contingent).  The article also illustrates a particular problem regarding who gets to decide who appears in those debates sanctioned by the GOP.  From the lede:

Republican leaders, searching for a fair-minded but strategically wise way to conduct the presidential primary debates, are grappling with how to manage White House contenders in a sprawling field that mixes proven politicians with provocateurs and reflects an increasingly fractious party.

 At the moment, there does not seem to be a fair way to decide who appears and who does not.  As Martin argues, relying on polling could preclude current or former GOP politicians from participating because they may not be well known to the public at large.  What is especially ironic, or delicious, depending on your political views, is that public opinion polling is the weapon that the Democrats and Republicans use to keep third party candidates out of the presidential debates, and no one from either Party or from the Commission on Presidential Debates suggest any problems exist from using public opinion polling as a barrier to entry.  The problem for the GOP is relying only on public opinion polling to decide who participates or not is likely to be the very thing that pushes candidates into appearing in non-sanctioned debates.  And if some attend the non-sanctioned debates, you can bet most, if not all, will attend.

The GOP face the additional problem of optics in winnowing the field.  From Martin:

Many Republicans laboring to improve the party’s image recoil from the prospect that whatever debate-eligibility criteria are adopted could result in the barring of the only woman, Carly Fiorina, the former Hewlett-Packard chief executive, or Ben Carson, a retired neurosurgeon who is the only African-American candidate.

But if they decide to allow Fiorina and Carson to attend while cutting other candidates such as my State's Governor John Kasich, the GOP face the additional problem of appearing to embrace affirmative action. 

So how does the GOP leadership see a way to resolve this problem?  As Martin notes, for the first debate in August:

One member of the national committee panel charged with overseeing the debates said its members had discussed ceding the decision entirely to Fox News.

So pass the buck is your answer?

It may just be that the GOP leadership is looking at this in the wrong way.  While I am sympathetic to the problem of over exposure--too many debates--as well as over simplification--too many people on the stage forces each person to boil down complex arguments into bite sized nuggets due to time constraints, the GOP should be asking themselves just what do debates in general accomplish? What impact do they really have on the eventual decisions that American voters make in November?

Martin seems to believe that debates do make a difference.  He argues: "...as the 2012 primary demonstrated, televised debates can instantaneously reshape presidential races...".

He also suggests that candidates who do get excluded as a result of the criteria that the GOP, in conjunction with the media, develop will take their anger to

...conservative websites and talk radio to foment anger at the so-called Republican establishment — an assault that could undermine the national committee’s hold on the debate process.

If you believe people like John Sides, these pre-primary and primary debates do not matter much in affecting the electoral chances of the eventual nominee.  In fact, the benefit from these debates is two fold (at least):

First, it does act as a kind of training ground for the eventual nominees, who will only get three chances to debate one another in the general election (the list of potential debate sites is currently available at the Commission on Presidential Debates).

Second, these debates can save the party from making a very bad decision on a candidate who may be a media darling, but is nowhere near ready for prime time (think former Texas Governor Rick Perry).

It seems to me that the problem of superficiality, which some critics believe stems from too many candidates in the race, is less a result of the number of debates or the number of participants, and more the result of the media's role in the process, starting with sponsorship of the debates.  Each one of the ten GOP debates is sponsored by a media organization--either cable or broadcast television.  And if you recall the 2012 primary debates, the media coverage, coupled with the questions asked, were down right offensive to the intellect of the audience.  Examples?

In the June 2011 debate that CNN sponsored, the moderator, John King, said this:

All right. I want to -- got to work in one more break before we go. We've got a lot more ground to cover. Believe it or not, our candidates -- we're running out of time here.

Into and out of every break we're having a little experiment called "This or That."

Governor Pawlenty, to you, Coke or Pepsi?

PAWLENTY: Coke.

Or worse yet, who could forget the CNN "Tea Party" sponsored debate in September 2011, which had an introduction that was straight out of Monday Night Football or professional wrestling, or this from intellectual powerhouse Wolf Blitzer:

“Tonight, eight candidates, one stage, one chance to take part in a groundbreaking debate. The Tea Party support and the Republican nomination, on the line right now.”

And finally, regarding the worry about the power of the  fringe to take to conservative media and to bring down the Party is giving to much credit to the fringe and to conservative media.  As John Sides and Lynn Vavreck argue in The Gamble, one of the mistakes that Mitt Romney made in the primary back in 2012 was to over-estimate the power and the size of the Tea Party faction within the GOP, forcing him to take conservative stands when he did not need to.  And political talk radio, once a force in American, and Republican, politics has disintegrated as a result of an aging audience and the continual fragmentation of our media into a million little pieces.

It will be something to watch as 2016 comes closer into view to see whether or not the Party, or the candidate, has real pull in the election cycle.  But if the last two election cycles are any guide, having fewer debates is not likely to happen in 2016, or in any other presidential election cycle to come.

Zombie Myths: Invisible Primary Edition

Recently in the political science blogosphere there's been a venting on some of the enduring "zombie" myths. Despite the good work of several political scientists outreach towards journalists, and a warm reception to that outreach by many reporters, some of these myths just tend to stick around, the self-hair pulling and head bashing of the academy notwithstanding. Though I missed the tweet that started the avalanche over at Jon Bernstein's blog, and thus missed my chance to weigh in, I'll take the opportunity to throw out a few of my pet peeves in the coverage and perception of the invisible primary.

1. Money ≠ Success. Political scientists have known this for years. While I'm still not sure about money buying happiness (I'll volunteer to be in the experimental group on that test), we political scientists are quite certain that it cannot buy elections. Granted, much of what we know about money and electoral success comes from general elections, which are far more predictable than primary elections making campaigning and spending less important. Still, presidential primaries are national events, requiring a solid network of volunteers in state after state to be viable. While money can certainly buy some resources necessary for nation-wide network building, it still requires help that cannot be purchased. Support from office holders in the form of endorsements is key. Throw in the fact that it's these office holders that are actively seeking out good candidates in the invisible primary, we're left in a position where, last I checked, these aren't on the auction block.

2. Self-financed candidates are toast. I mean carbonized, burnt to a crisp toast. These folks are usually self-financed for a reason, they just don't have the networks necessary to win over party activists and their financial constituents. Even when they get a degree of funds from other donors, their lack of political experience and allies just leaves them at a systematic disadvantage. While this is something of an apples/oranges comparison, contrast the 2002 gubernatorial campaign of Mitt Romney with the 2010 campaigns of Carly Fiorina and Meg Whiman. Romney, who at that point had only an election loss or two as the sum total of his political career, was actively recruited invisible primary style by a handful of Massachusetts Republican activists. While the organizational ranks of Bay State Republicans is admittedly scant relative to the Democrats, they had a successful string of Republican gubernatorial runs. However, they were dissatisfied with the prospect of incumbent Jane Swift (who assumed office as a result of Paul Cellucci resigning to become ambassador to the Great White North) running in her own right, and unceremoniously dumped her for Romney. Fiorina and Whitman were classic cases of self-financed candidates that hit a ceiling, pushing the bounds of what money can buy you politically. At the state level it may in fact get you a nomination, but it won't get you too far when running for your party's nomination for the presidency. Just ask President Forbes.

3. Super-PACs and sugar daddies ain't everything either. While it's clear that super PACs are changing the dynamics of campaign funding, and they've yet to come into their own in terms of strategies and effectiveness, they're still an improper measurement of success in the invisible primary. Again, the invisible primary is an elite driven affair. Gregory Koger is spot on in his assessment that mega-donors a type of elite whose power is becoming more important at the expense of traditional party players through the ability to buoy poor candidates like Gingrich that would have been weeded out earlier in the process a few cycles ago. But at least for now, their donations are hardly determinative. And as his MoF colleague Richard Skinner points out, there's bound to be counter spending of super PACs and sugar daddies who are more party oriented to match the more candidate centered sugar daddies supporting the fringier personalities.

4. Ignore the polls. Political scientists as a class have been saying this for as long as polls have been taken at this stage of the election. As the invisible primary is largely, well, invisible, preferences of voters in the early stages have little predictive power at this stage. All the things that invisible primary success can bring a candidate (endorsements, party activist/network support, greater news coverage) aren't going to be apparent to the average voter until a few months ahead of Iowa, so there's no use asking them about their preferences that far out. Couple this with the fact that we have a ridiculously crowded Republican field at this moment, you're just not going to get much utility from asking voters their preferences right now. While they are readily available to busy journalists rushing to make a deadline (as opposed to where the real invisible primary action is), it's sour low-hanging fruit.

5. Especially those damned straw polls. Republican nominees Gramm, Bachmann, Robertson, Bauer, and Paul can tell you how prescient these things are, whether they're of CPAC or Iowa flavors. The events that surround them also tend to be terrible indicators of invisible primary success, since the crowds at these events are hardly representative of all the key invisible primary players. While they can be fun to watch, or indeed soul sucking experiences where we lose degrees of faith in democracy itself, they're not going to give you any real sense of who's going to come out on top in the nomination.

Modeling the Endorsement Decision

For political scientists, March means one thing: conference season!  Though the macdaddy of conferences is labor day weekend, the ones I always look forward to the most (for a variety of reasons) are the MPSA and WPSA.  Even though I was crushed that I cannot attend the midwest this year (regional Model UN conferences... sigh), I'm in that sweet spot of a project where I'm furiously working on the models for my latest offering for the western.  It's really rough at this stage, mind you, and will need a significant amount of work in the coming months, but thus far it has some mildly interesting findings that are all about the invisible primary.

Back in late 2011 whilst still at Briar Cliff in Iowa, I was struck by what I thought was an invisible primary oddity.  Rep. Steve King took some time off blaming undocumented Hispanics for all of the nation's ills and expanding upon Todd Akin's legitimate rape comments, to rub elbows with a few of the presidential contenders; or perhaps more accurately, they interrupted his demagoguery to cozy up to him.  The prize being a coveted endorsement from an incumbent Iowan representative.  As we know, the success of an invisible primary candidacy can be predicted rather well by the number of endorsements they accrue in the pre-primary process.  What struck me as particularly odd about this case was that King never gave anyone the nod, despite the high profile hobnobbing.  Which begged a question of "why?"  As I puzzled over his decision not to endorse, I began thinking in broader terms: what factors out there can we associate with this decision?  What is it that drives this important behavior?  Luckily, the clever minds behind The Party Decides have a nifty data base of endorsements that can give a digital ream or two of information necessary to model this decision.  With the help of an undergraduate research monkey, I began to append some vital bits of data to every Representative and Senator in the 2000 presidential election cycle to build a logit model or two.

Though it's taken some time, thought, and rethinking, I'm beginning to see some results.  For those of you who wince at the sight of Stata outputs and the like, kindly avert your eyes and skip down the post a ways.  I modeled each party separately, as I reckoned there may be some differences between them.  The key independent variables are (in order presented): what week the presidential primary/caucus is in the MC's home state, state level presidential margin in 2000, the same margin squared, the electoral margin in the MC's last election, that margin squared, David Mayhew's state party culture (regular organization as reference), DW-NOMINATE dimensions 1 and 2 (common space, as I intend to go time series soon), years in office, age, and age squared.  The d.v. is a simple 0,1; no endorsement, endorsement.  Please forgive the cumbersome variable names.  Though they probably make no damn sense to you, they do to me, and that's what counts at this stage! 

Here are the Democrats:

And the Republicans:

As you can see there aren't any earth shattering results, but there are some interesting contrasts.  My suspicion that Democrats and Republicans approach the endorsement decision differently is seemingly supported.  Briefly, Republicans seem more sensitive to state level electoral factors (as expressed in an interesting quadratic relationship to the presidential election margin in their home state) and Democrats to the electoral calendar and the enigmatic 2nd dimension of DW-NOMINATE.   Some noteworthy, but non-statistically significant associations are found with Republicans and ideology (both dimensions); and for Democrats, the years served in office and a quadratic effect of age.  Both parties were sensitive to party culture, though in slightly different ways.  And if you're wondering, I did suspect the possibility of non-linear relationships in each of these variables before I even opened Stata on this project.  

So what does all this mean?  Apart from the little story told above that I'll be hashing through and thickening in the next few weeks, I'm not 100% sure at this stage.  Clearly Democratic and Republican MCs see the decision to endorse, at least in 2000, in quite different terms, some of which may speak towards the invisible primary process.  However, as the results suggest, this model is far from complete.  What could be missing from this mix of variables?  I'm also a bit perplexed by the direction of the relationship between 2nd dimension of DW-NOMINATE and the d.v.  As Keith Poole has written on several occasions, the 2nd dimension might be reflecting an insider-outsider dimension within the parties, as the more mavericky/Tea Party types tend to score on the negative side of things.  This was why I included the 2nd dimension in the first instance.  Presumably those on the inside would be more likely to engage in this critical party conversation than outsiders looking in.  While it might not be the perfect measure of this inside-out split, it's a convenient proxy.  Yet for some reason, that initial sense I had appears to be back asswards.  Higher 2nd dimension scores (the more "inside" an MC is), are associated with a lower likelihood of endorsing amongst Democrats, and possibly Republicans as well.  I suspect that it's acting as a proxy for a yet-to-be-accounted-for variable.

So in the spirit of our age and latest trends of the interwebs, I've decided to try my hand in a bit of crowd sourcing on these two key questions:

1) Are there any obvious omissions that come to your mind?  I'm all for clean, short, and sweet models, but glaring omissions need to be attended to...

2) What's with the 2nd dimension of DW-NOMINATE here?  Assuming this is a good measurement of "inside-outside" status, I suppose one could hypothesize that "outsiders" due to their outsider position, might feel more compelled to interject into the party conversation with an endorsement than a real insider.  Frankly, I'm not too happy with that line of reasoning.  Something is clearly going on here, but I'm not convinced I'm on to it just yet.

So crowd, get to it.  Any productive discussion is warmly welcomed and appreciated.  Moreover, I hope to see many of you in Seattle!

******
Day After Addendum: a technical note you should be aware of is that the dependent variable is an endorsement during the pre-primary period, prior to the Iowa caucuses.  As you may know, most every MC eventually makes an endorsement at some point, but often it's after the nomination's all but sewn up.  This is especially true of Democrats whose role as super delegates in the convention gives them a slightly different incentive structure in the endorsement decision.  One of a few reasons I model the parties separately.

More GOP Rule Changes in Store

Once again, I've been beaten to the punch on things invisible primary, but Fridays are filled with classes and cricket (I'm proud to be the Bob Uecker of the SDSU Cricket Club), so delay was inevitable.  In truth, I've been pondering this post since December when details began to emerge about the rule changes the GOP was considering, particularly their plan to compress the nomination calendar.  The mulling is now over, and changes have been adopted.  Over at Bloomberg, Jonathan Bernstein has an insightful post on the net effects of the rule change on the nomination process.

Speaking for myself from the perspective of a political scientist, the GOP navel gazing is at once heartening, yet quite frustrating.

To the former, as someone who spends a great deal of time studying institutions, it nice to see that politicians and party officials recognize that individual behaviors are affected by rules and structures, and that they are trying to harness that behavior in a positive direction.

What's frustrating is precisely what Bernstein dubs "fighting the last war;" ferreting out what they felt went wrong in the last race and rearranging institutions based on some pretty spurious evidence of what made the election break against them.  Could the calendar have mattered in 2012?  Highly unlikely.  As Bernstein articulates (and as most political scientists would concur) the happenings of the primary season are noticed by only a very small sliver of the population and they're lost in collective memory come November.  Assuming that the divisions of the primary season aren't indicative of deep, irreconcilable factionalism  - and 2012 wasn't such a case - an extended primary isn't the worst thing that can happen to a party.  And frankly, it didn't take an undue amount of time for Republicans to choose Romney in 2012.  GOP suspicions in 2012 that the partial move from primarily winner-take-all to a degree of proportionality in delegate allocation in early primary states drew out the nomination fight were effectively shown to be mythological by Josh Putnam and John Sides.  GOP navel gazing by the likes of Chris Christie, Mitch Daniels, and John McCain was purely speculative, superficially impressionistic, and wildly uninformed with readily available empirical evidence.  It seems to me that these rule changes now are due in part to the survival of this myth.  What's more important to the party's general election prospects are election fundamentals, and what candidates can do in their campaigns to make the best of the cards they are dealt.  That's what the party ought to be concerning itself with, not so much the timing of primaries and sanctioning states for breaking their rules.  It's just not determinative of general election results, or even the results of the nomination fight.  Now, if a primary season is extended by an inability of the party to triangulate on an acceptable candidate across factions that is highly problematic, but a compressed calendar isn't going to help, as the party's got far bigger issues to worry about.

One minor departure that I take from Bernstein's post has some direct relevance to the invisible primary.  While he's spot on in noting that "any old crank" can have a good two weeks in the pre-primary period (and if the timing is right lucky, in the early primary states ala Santorum), I'm more confident that threshing machine of the invisible primary will effectively separate the wheat from the chaff.  So by my reckoning, a compressed calendar won't make much of a difference on nominee quality.  While the cranks might stick around for the sake of landing a book or TV deal, the probability was exceedingly low that the GOP would nominate Bachman, Cain, Santorum, or Gingrich, as each were at the very best factional leaders, and frankly, not particularly serious candidates to begin with.  To the extent that proved necessary, Romney had the party behind him before the first vote cast in Iowa.  The invisible primary actually threshed out some serious candidates, as it should, like Governors Tim Pawlenty and Rick Perry.  And though this thought isn't original to me (and for the life of me I cannot remember who had written it) we know they were serious because they dropped out when they recognized nomination was out of their grasp.  What was left for Romney to contend with were empty husks of challengers, that more or less blew away in the in the early primary season winds.

The bottom line for me (like Bernstein) is that neither party should worry too much about the little details of their nomination systems, they just don't matter that much.  While wholesale changes we saw in the aftermath of the 1968 election cycle were very consequential (and the parties had to scramble to adapt), it seems to me that monkeying around on the margins carries high opportunity costs.  Spend the time, money, and effort on ensuring the chaff is separated from the wheat effectively in the primaries while keeping your party unified, and help nominees carefully choose a general election path that maximizes political return on the fundamentals they have to work with.  Should both parties play a larger role throughout the entire electoral process, our democracy will be that much better off.

The invisible primary in hiding.

It is tempting to want to unload over the current budget and impending debt limit crisis.  There is so much to say, so much grist for the mill.  But most of it has probably been said and, besides, this blog is about the invisible primary so, is there anything to say about it given the current distraction?

How about Paul Ryan’s almost no-existent roll in all this?  He is, as I remember it, the Radical Right’s wonder-boy when it comes to the budget.  But he has almost nothing to say.  In realty, his former obsession with Medicare might actually be a better fit as a bargaining chip for the GOP.  Medicare actually has a big impact on the current and future federal budget, certainly more than the ACA by most assessments.  I mean, if you are going to hold a hostage, you might as well get what you want for its return straight.  It is like someone stealing my cat and demanding a ransom from my proctologist (not that I need a proctologist….).  More accurately, it is like kidnapping your own child, and demanding ransom from their sibling for her to be returned.  You both want her returned, you will make sure she is going to get returned, you were just too stupid not to hold the Dora the Explore DVD in return for the ransom.

Interestingly enough the one glimmer you see of him is fundraising over the issue for his leadership committee, Prosperity PAC.  And his dealings over this issue are not the only place he stays hidden.  In August, as these issues began to percolate, he attended a highly secure and secret meeting with the Koch brothers in New Mexico.  Does his public silence on this tip his hat to a view that this battle may not be good for a presidential run?  Given the leadership vacuum in the House, this would be a good time for him to try and give clarity and logic to the Tea Party message.  His potential challengers, Cruz not withstanding, have been equally quite or even somewhat critical of the approach adopted by the radical minority of the GOP.  Marco Rubio weighed in on the faux-filibuster with Cruz, but just enough for the people who care to notice.  In fact, except for Cruz, the Senate Republicans really want little to do with all of this.  Chris  Christie criticized the approach, but his position has to be taken in context of an impending reelection as governor.  Jeb Bush, critical; Rand Paul, mostly silent; Scott Walker, silent; Condoleezza Rice; silent (yes, I am the first on this blog to suggest she could be a conten-da).  Rick Santorum, he is talking about it, but I addressed him last week in my entry.

I think one reason why Ryan, and some of the other invisible primary contenders, are staying silent is because they are interested in governing and this is clearly not governing.  So they have that going for them, which is nice.

Fall = Best Season Ever

And we're back! Late September formally brings us academic classes in full swing and autumnal glory where all college campuses look like they do in the brochures. Crunchy leaves, sweater-wearing students, cheerful football games and underage drinking. Ah, September. On a personal note, my students this semester are fabulous! They totally make up for the feces-fest unraveling now on Capitol Hill, because watching that is enough to discourage even a stalwart, system-adoring political scientist. Here's to a new generation!

But first, let's look at the current state of affairs.

This September brings us another perennial nugget of joy: the threat of a government shutdown. Unless you have been completely distracted by the WORLD'S BEST COMMERCIAL (as, I confess, I have been at times where distraction is necessary), you know about the looming crisis and the resulting rift in the Republican Party. If not, please let this terrific article explain for you the coming week (courtesy of my friend and fellow blogger, Lonce). And sorry for stealing this, Lonce. You an also check out this good one from Politico (like they do anything badly?).

Since this entire kerfuffle is political theater, you just know there has to be Invisible Primary drama behind the scenes and so we begin with the thespianism on the floor of the US Senate right this minute! Quick! To C-SPAN 2 (the Deuce)! Texas Senator Ted Cruz (R) launched an old-fashioned filibuster (ala Mr. Smith) against Obamacare and vouched to speak "until I am no longer able to stand." Good on you, sir, and this comes after a bruising little amount of press that called you a bunch of names and also questioned your popularity. It's good to stand for something, especially when you actually have to stand in order to stand for it.

But the possible shutdown tactic is splitting the GOP which is never good, unless you are a Democrat. Specifically, the 2016 IP contenders have to weigh in on this and thus far the results are mixed. Republican Governors Chris Christie (NJ) and Scott Walker (WI) both begrudgingly said that they would not want to shut the government down, as did former Florida Governor Jeb Bush. On the other side are the aforementioned Cruz and Sen. Mike Lee, and sorta kinda Florida Sen. Marco Rubio who seems to want it both ways by saying that "The American people support defunding Obamacare and oppose shutting down the government." OK! Not sure how that works out, but here is PolitiFact's take on Rubio's press statement.

So how is it going to end? Good Lord, who knows? I do know that Veep Biden schlepped out to flood-devastated Colorado and promised that regardless of any shutdown, FEMA would provide assistance to those in need which was both reassuring and tactically savvy, all at the same time. Last week, Biden was in Iowa at the Tom Harkin steak fry, which fueled speculation that he was, in fact, running. At the fry, he swapped hats with an Iowan for a photo-op, which only fueled my motherly instinct to yell "DON'T DO THAT!" as a preventative measure against head lice. Joe, don't say I didn't warn you. And don't share your comb or barrettes either.

Wrapping up this week in the Invisible Primary, last night former President Bill Clinton was on David Letterman, who was fishing for Hillary 2016 scoop. Letterman said: “If she is running to your knowledge, blink twice.” Bill denied all knowledge of his wife's intentions, which did not seem to surprise me in the least. Fair turnabout, don't you think?

That's all from the cheap seats. if the government shuts down, I tell my students, the price of pizza is going to sky rocket and beer will be banned in all 50 states. They don't believe me. See? What a smart, terrific group I've got! Hooray for September. And Happy Fall everyone!

“We’ve Only Just Begun!” The IP Graduation Speech From Hell

‘Tis the time of year when chestnuts are roasting – not the kind of chestnuts that Bing Crosby sings about in December, but the old kind that gets tossed around graduation speeches like hacky sacks at a Further concert. Yes, these are the worn-out, unimaginative clichés that riddle university campuses, positioned right after the non-denominational prayer, right before the singing of the alma mater, right around the time the frat boys start to get woozy from the wake & bake and the sorority girls realize their shoe selection was unfortunate for a four hour event where most of it is spent standing.

The world is ahead of you.

Look forward, but also look back.

It is not the end, it is the beginning.

Life is a journey.

So true. So, so true. ALSO, so freakin’ stale they make my eyes roll reflexively. Thus, this IP posting will take these hackneyed phrases and put them to good use: to address the conundrum of how to “run” for office when you are not actually “running” for anything. Because you must walk before you run. And you will fly and soar as far as your wings will take you.

Good. Lord.

OK! Cliché Numero Uno: The world is ahead of you.

This one is dedicated to my girl, HRC, whose world now consists of her “transition office,” the nation of Libya, and the ten foot circumference around Sen. Rand Paul’s tuchas. The multi-perspective view of Hillary’s world begins at the same place but ends very differently: She is aiming for the White House using her experience as evidence of greatness, and Sen. Paul is aiming for the White House using her experience as evidence of skullduggery. The fun, of course, is in the spin. She says she done good as Sec State, he says she should be in prison. Potato, potahto. The interesting story to drop recently was that some of the big-wigs from Clinton’s 2008 campaign have begged off another chance at the gold ring, but as anyone who has visited my hometown knows: The place is lousy with big-wigs. And, apparently, locusts. But let’s not get distracted.

Cliché Numero Dos: Look forward, but also look back.

This goes out to IP fave Sen. Marco Rubio who has taken advantage of the IRS kerfuffle to propose an amendment to the upcoming 2013 Farm Bill (?) that punishes IRS officials who violate the constitutional rights of Americans. Sayeth the good Senator: “This IRS scandal has destroyed the American people’s confidence in this government institution and exposed the dangers of a large, unaccountable government operating under a President and administration that routinely intimidate and harass their political opponents.” Holy cats – knocking the administration AND the IRS in one fell swoop? Nice IP play, sir! Well done. Also, and I’m just whiffing here, it seems that throwing stones at the IRS today is sort of like proposing a Fight Club brawl with Olivia, your 6 year old niece. Who is blindfolded. Sorta easy, ain’t it?

Cliché Numero Tres: It is not the end, it is the beginning.

And hellllooooo NYC Mayoral Candidate Anthony Weiner! (You didn’t think I was gonna let this one go, didja?) I only have three things to say here: One, welcome to the race of a lifetime. Hot dog, this is gonna be FUN, even from the cheap seats. Do you think the New York Post just hired four new cover editors? Two, Congressman, I was wrong about Mark Sanford. But you are no Mark Sanford. Three, are you ready for more (much more) of this? I am proud that this video nugget was created by “a former student working in political consulting or advertising or whatever.” His words not mine, because I got clearance to give him a blind-item shout out. But anyway, Anthony, strap yourself in for more of this. Much, much more. And don’t say I didn’t tell you to wait.

Finally, Cliché Numero Quatro:  Life is a journey.

In this case, a journey to Israel. Mazel Tov to Democratic Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley who recently schlepped to the Middle East in order to talk shop with the chosen people, sharpen his Foreign Policy skills, and prove he’s got what it takes to run for the White House. We haven’t spoken about O’Malley in this blog YET but apparently this is an oversight. He went to Iowa (another designated IP destination) and he’s openly talking about 2016. A bold move from a bold man… that no one outside of Maryland has ever heard of. The good news: There’s still time!

And so graduates, faculty, proud parents, and blog readers: Keep reaching for the stars. You are the future, your education is just beginning, believe in your dreams and always remember: You did it. What you did is between you and your conscience, but I’m a liberal so I say go for it.    

No! No! Don’t do that!

There are times in our lives when events conspire to make us stop and thump our heads against our desks in astonishment. People (not you savvy “Invisible Primary” blog readers, of course, but some people) make incautious errors, some people are socially tone deaf, and then there are those who are straight-up dum-dum, ass-hat nincompoops. According to no less a scholar than Big Bird, everyone makes mistakes: Your sister and your brother and your dad and mother too. Yes, everybody screws up… but mistakes are enormously fun to watch in the political realm.

Politics is a fecund field for the accident-prone, if only because of the spotlights and cameras that shine upon those who crave elected office. This means that a verbal slip-up or a miscalculation has the propensity for wide coverage. This is the force of the modern media, and it is the gift that brings us to today’s IP Media coverage: The unforced error. Several things hit my IP radar this week which made me bonk my head against my desk and yell “No! NO! Don’t do that!” to my computer screen. And so what I expect to be a long-running series, the first installment of what I will call “No! NO! Don’t do that!” (NNDDT! for short)

Our first NNDDT! Award goes to… former First Lady Barbara Bush.

I am not picking on Babs herself (she looks terrific, by the way) so don’t jump on me for carping on a civilian. Instead, I am giving the NNDDT! award for her comments about her son Jeb’s possible presidential run (See, Dave, I got there! Sometimes it just takes me a chatty while, as you well know). When asked by The Today Show’s Matt Lauer if she would like to see Jeb run, Barbara responded: “He's by far the best qualified man, but no. I really don't. I think it's a great country. There are a lot of great families. It's not just four families or whatever. There are other people out there that are very qualified. We have had enough Bushes.” I totally get that she’s a mom and she’s talking about another son going for another grueling campaign season and I appreciate her candor and her moxie and all that jazz… but the magic of editing just opened the door to every. single. oppo ad of 2016 featuring the quote: “There are other people out there that are very qualified. We have had enough Bushes.”

Mrs. Bush: NNDDT!

Or at least send Jebby a fruit basket with an apology note.

Moving right along, the second NNDDT! Award goes to… Sen. Rand Paul for taking the horrific Boston bombing and using it to throw a torx wrench into the nascent debate on immigration. The so-called “Gang of Eight,” which included IP fave Marco Rubio, had just unwrapped their immigration proposal when Sen. Paul sent a public letter to the media to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid urging: “We should not proceed until we understand the specific failures of our immigration system.” Good gravy. It makes me want to scream at my colleagues like a zealot. No wait – that was the two Chucks (Schumer and Grassley) over the head of poor Pat Leahy. Never mind. Anyway, it’s silly and you’re doing this to get attention and being obstructionist is no way to position yourself as a potential Free World Leader, so NNDDT!  

The next NNDDT! Award goes to… my man, former NY Congressman Anthony Weiner. Who went back on Twitter. And says there might be more saucy pictures of him out there. And he’s back on Twitter – I think this bears repeating. I suppose he might be trying to do it and get it out of the way, but this is no way to mount a comeback. Ha! OK, not enough? How’s this, from Stephen Colbert: “Weiner is ready to stick it back in. And that takes balls.” Better? Anyway, Weiner is going to face some stiff competition. And I suspect he’s going down. OK, I’m done now. But all of that said, he’s BACK ON TWITTER! Tweeting is not a necessity, by any means, not even a must for public office. And for Weiner, who had to resign from office BECAUSE OF TWITTER I suspect it is fraught with possible problems. I just cannot figure out what the heck he is doing, besides launching an effort to swell his support by intensifying and surging his popularity. OK, NOW I’m done. Is it hot in here?

Anywho: Anthony Weiner, put down the phone and as for Twitter…NNDDT!

The last NNDDT! Award goes to… former S.C. Gov. Mark Sanford who, after last week’s revelation that he broke into his ex-wife’s house, did the next most unconscionable thing: He took out an ad in the Charleston Post & Courier newspaper which began with the words: “It’s been a rough week.” Yes, Governor. It has. For the people for Boston and the people of Texas who had to suffer through real tragedy. And now you have just reminded people that you broke into your ex-wife’s house. Remember her? The one you cheated on with your current fiancé? Tone deaf. Senseless. Bonk, bonk, bonk. My head hurts too much to even tell you not to do that. Just please go away.

So those are the first of the NNDDT Awards. I suspect more will be on the way as our IP candidates hog the spotlight and step on their own… toes. Nominations will be accepted at this blog on a rolling basis. First come, first served.

OK. Now I’m done.