Becoming More Visible...

The CPAC schedule is out! Let the Invisible Primary become a wee bit more visible...
For those who don't know: CPAC is the Conservative Political Action Conference which is held every year in DC. It's where the elites on the right meet up with the under-21 presidents of the Young Americans For Freedom chapters and where conservatives of all ages get a front row seat to hear from the new wave of heroes.

CPAC has long been a stomping ground for those who want to be president, and if given a pole position for the festivities, there is an indication that a speaker is a worthy candidate to monitor. Hence, the Invisible Primary in action! Let's hope there is enough water on hand for Marco Rubio.

OK. I actually do research on satire and so I must (must!) link to Letterman's Top 10 Marco Rubio post-SoTU speech catastrophe and to Colbert's send up as well. Was it that bad? Maybe not.... but I maintain that if the zeitgeist says it sucked, then it did, and nothing says "suck" more than easily-sent-and-forwarded mockery. When you made a mistake, did every late-night comedian make fun of you in a way that Google ranks it first? OK then.

But back to business. CPAC is in DC March 14-16 and the town is going to be over-run by white guys in red ties looking for economic liberty and camera time. Not necessarily in that order. Who is on the super-duper "look at ME!" guest list? Well, we have the expected: Marco (Where's My Water?) Rubio, Rand (Kill the Fed but Note My Jaw) Paul, Paul (It's the Budget, Stupid!) Ryan, plus Sens. Pat Toomey, Mike Lee, and former Sen. Rick Santorum who are all super-duper proud to be Americans, where at least they know they're free. Also joining the crowd is former Gov. Jeb (change the narrative!) Bush and Sen. Ron (No Hillary!) Johnson. See what I mean? The place is running amok with wannabees. Makes me want to cue the Spice Girls music.

But 'tis the season for the I.P.  This will give them the platform to pontificate and the mechanism to recruit volunteers. Obama proved it's all in the ground game: Here goes the team selection!

Invisible Primary: SoTU Edition!

It’s the biggest night in Washington, if you exclude Election Night, the Radio/ TV Correspondents’ Dinner, the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, the National Christmas Tree lighting, the Gridiron Dinner, a White House State Dinner, and the annual meeting of the Alfalfa Club. Yes, it’s the (seventh or eighth) biggest night in the city: State of the Union! Or, if you are into acronyms: SoTU.

Tonight President Obama addresses a joint session of congress, plus the Supreme Court, plus the Joint Chiefs, plus the Cabinet (minus one player-to-be-named-later), plus Ted Nugent to lay out his agenda for the coming year. The leaked parts suggest a speech about the middle class, jobs, and troop withdrawal from Afghanistan. The drinking games have begun that guess who sits next to FLOTUS, whether Rep. Eliot Engle (D-NY) will get to shake Obama’s hand, and how long the speech will last. The Invisible Primary games have begun to focus on the reaction to the speech.

The Iowa mini-Invisible Primary dynamic that my smart friend Dave blogged about a few postings below comes to the big screen tonight: The GOP-- Tea Party rumble that threatens to divide the party. What does the SoTU have to do with this? The official speech rejoinders! From the right, Florida senator Marco Rubio will deliver the Republican Response to the president’s SoTU speech and from further right, Kentucky Senator Rand Paul will deliver the Tea Party response. This is not unprecedented (Michelle Bachmann and Herman Cain have done the Tea Party response before) but it does speak to the Invisible Primary because we all know that Rubio and Paul have their eyes locked on 2016. What better way to position yourself for The Show than by giving a nationalized one-way refutation of your ideological opponent? In this case, the rebuff hits Obama and also goes intra-party, which gets to the interesting part.

Partisan squabbling is, of course, one point of the Invisible Primary, as Dave points out so well below. As we watch the possible contenders jockey for position and attention and (perhaps most important) money, it helps to shape the upcoming field. This highlights the nationalization of elections and the nature of modern American politics as much as it highlights the factions within the GOP. One terrific book on the Tea Party comes from Theda Skocpol and Vanessa Williamson who warn against underestimating their strength and lasting power. Paul’s stage tonight proves their point.

These two responses also underscore the various mechanisms in place to work the Invisible Primary system – that Sens. Rubio and Paul can capture the national attention on such a big night indicates their strength as 2016 contenders. They will seem serious and hard-hitting, arguing that they are the men who can lead the country into a new era, one presumably better than the one we’re in right now. The reaction (both in the press and from the public) to both men will be interesting and predictive to watch.

To end on a funny note: Andy Borowitz had a clever post about Paul’s Tea Party rebuttal, and Ted Nugent’s SoTU appearance is just plain hilarious on its own merits, thanks to his NRA interview last April where he said: “[I]f Barack Obama becomes the president in November, again, I will either be dead or in jail by this time next year.” Or attending the president’s State of the Union.  

I know. I know.