Biden Meets with Warren - Biden 2016 Odds Reach 60%

WASHINTON, DC - In the biggest move yet indicating that Vice-President Joe Biden is considering a run for the presidency, he met with U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren earlier today in his residence at the Naval Observatory. 

CNN has the story:

The meeting between Biden and Warren, confirmed by two people familiar with the session, is the biggest indication yet that Biden is feeling out influential Democrats before announcing his intentions.

Beloved by liberal Democrats, Warren decided to sit out a campaign of her own, but she has yet to formally endorse a candidate. In an interview on Friday, she told WBZ in Boston: "I don't think anyone has been anointed."

The vice president arrived in Washington shortly before lunchtime, even though his official schedule said he was planning to spend the weekend at his home in Delaware.

The news of Biden's meeting with Senator Warren has led to political investors giving the Vice-President a 60% chance of running at Predictit, the highest odds the former U.S. Senator from Delware has seen in weeks, if not months. 

Sanders Savages "Billionaire Class"

SOUTH CAROLINA - More so than any other candidate this election cycle, U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders has fashioned himself into a one man opponent to the billionaire class, a message that has resonated with millions nationwide.

Coupling his sudden popularity and national appeal with Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton's email scandal, Sanders has found himself rising in the polls steadily as he turns out record number crowds across the political landscape. 

USA Today had this to report from his latest stop:

Nearly 3,000 people answered Bernie Sanders' call for “political revolution” in Greenville on Friday, greeting the Democratic presidential candidate with repeated loud cheers and sign waving as he railed against “the billionaire class” at the TD Convention Center.

The senator from Vermont drew crowds ten times as big during appearances in major West Coast markets.

Still, his first stop in Greenville was one of the best attended presidential campaign events in the state this election cycle, Democrat or Republican.

The silver-haired populist pointed in the air and waved his hands as he belted out the message of class struggle that has made him the closest rival so far to Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton.

Although emerging as the heartthrob of millennials and progressives, many in the Democrat Party (which Sanders, an Independent, is not apart of) are looking for Vice-President Biden to enter the fray to offer a main stream alternative to the former Secretary of State.

Cruz Rallies Iowa Conservatives

IOWA - U.S. Senator Ted Cruz is anything but a conventional politician. He openly attacks the establishment, he has defended Republican front-runner Donald Trump from attacks, and he has banked his campaign strongly on the ideals of social conservatism. 

All of which, in addition to his favorable position with the conservative talk show circuit, has led Cruz's presidential campaign to emerge near the top of the top tier of GOP contenders.

From the New York Times, he is remaining on point:

Senator Ted Cruz on Friday night drew one of the largest crowds in Iowa of any candidate this year: some 2,300 Christian conservatives, who turned out for an unusual program featuring people Mr. Cruz called "victims of government persecution."

The eight people included bakers, a florist, wedding planners and others from several states. All of them said they have been sued, fined or fired for refusing service to same-sex couples or for expressing opposition to homosexuality. Several of them were well known to audiences of right-leaning news media.

Cruz is not the only Republican that is speaking out about social issues, but he has, thus far, been the most successful of the pack in receiving a positive response from the base.

Christie's Fading Hopes

NEW JERSEY - Governor Chris Christie had a lot going for him when he entered the Republican field: he is a brash, plain spoken former U.S. Attorney who won the governorship in a very liberal state with a fairly right of center platform. 

However, in a political climate that is demanding ideological rigidity and is hostile to the appearance of moderation, Christie has floundered in the middle of the pack, and may continue to fall even further down the list. 

As reported by Politico:

Chris Christie, the voluble New Jersey governor, is once again facing the possibility that he might be relegated to the junior varsity debate — and rival Republican campaigns and outside observers say his window to re-enter the top tier of presidential candidates is closing fast.

Wednesday night’s scene in New Hampshire showed the daunting challenge ahead of Christie. As CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC covered Trump’s first town hall live — breaking only to run clips of Jeb Bush attacking the real estate tycoon — Christie was gasping for air on C-SPAN. Because the governor’s dimly lit event — a town hall at a restaurant outside of Manchester — was outdoors, the few viewers watching saw the candidate gradually disappear into darkness. The next day’s headlines duly focused on the Jeb-Donald contretemps, ignoring Christie’s play for a state he has made central to his fading White House hopes.

Jumping up from Fox News' junior varsity debate is one thing, but dropping down at CNN's is a different story altogether, and unless Christie can turn it around, his campaign might be on death's door. 

Webb: Super PACs are not Ethical

VIRGINIA - Former U.S. Senator James Webb believes that the influence of money in politics is corrupting the process and preventing his campaign from gaining traction in his bid for the Democratic nod.

Webb, a Vietnam War veteran and former Secretary of the Navy in the Reagan Administration, has staked out a fairly centrist platform in his campaign for his party's nomination, but has failed to impact the race significantly thus far. 

The former U.S. Senator told The Daily Progress:

"The challenge that we have right now in the current political environment, money dominates the process like it never has before," said Webb, who served as a U.S. senator from Virginia from 2007 until 2013, on MSNBC's "Morning Joe."

Webb said he was concerned with the buying power of Super PACs that are funneling most of the $388 million spent on the election this year into the race. Unlike the candidates, PACs are allowed to accept unlimited contributions in support of candidates from almost any source.

"I don’t believe that Super PACs are ethically supportable concepts," Webb said. "That money ... is affecting our ability to get out and talk."

Webb also cited reports that less than 400 families nationwide are responsible for almost half the money raised in the 2016 presidential campaign — an unprecedented concentration of political donors. 

Seen as more of a conservative than the rest of his party's contenders, Webb is the only candidate on his side of the aisle to have declared his opposition to the controversial Iran nuclear agreement that President Barack Obama has championed. 

Pataki Struggles in Race for Relevancy

NEW YORK - Despite being one of the first candidates to announce for the 2016 Presidential election, former New York Governor George Pataki has found himself fighting for relevance. 

A rare breed of moderate Mid-Atlantic Republicans that took power in the 1994 elections, Pataki has struggled to make noise in the hotly contested race thus far, where he has campaigned heavily in New Hampshire in hopes of appealing to the state's more centrist primary electorate. 

The New York Times recently reported on Pataki's predicament:

As former Gov. George E. Pataki of New York strolled through the luncheon for seniors, bending his 6-foot-5 frame downward to make small talk over a soundtrack of square-dance music, he earned a rare smile of recognition. A retired high school teacher, Raymond Harmacinski, began to praise Mr. Pataki's record when a note of uncertainty crept into his voice.

"I followed you when - you weren't governor when they hit the towers?"

Mr. Pataki quickly assured the man that he had, in fact, been in office on Sept. 11, 2001. "I was," he said. "I was governor then."

Mr. Pataki spends a lot of time these days reminding voters that he used to run the State of New York. The former three-term governor faces vast obstacles in his bid for the Republican presidential nomination, but none may be more daunting than the electorate's fleeting memory.

In a field dominated by the media's infatuation with Donald Trump, a fellow New Yorker, and former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, it is easy to understand why Mr. Pataki has faced difficulty in obtaining the American people's attention. 

Draft Biden 2016 Movement Grows

WASHINGTON, D.C. - With former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's polling numbers continuing to plummet, many Democrats are turning to Vice-President Joe Biden to salvage the party's panic that Clinton's email scandal may further sink her campaign. 

According to recent polls, Mrs. Clinton is struggling in several battleground states against several of her potential Republican challengers. This news, coupled with Vice-President Biden's recent moves signifying his interest in mounting a third bid for the White House, has sparked some to dust off the former longtime U.S. Senator's campaign gear. 

According to Fox News:

The Biden 2016 buzz keeps building -- and the vice president is doing little to tamp down the speculation -- as the leading group trying to coax the veep into the presidential race touts new poll numbers they say put him in prime position to run.

The Vice President Biden chatter kicked up again this week on two fronts, as Hillary Clinton continued to see her numbers suffer in the face of mounting revelations in her personal email controversy.

First, the pro-Biden group Draft Biden 2016 signed up longtime Democratic strategist Steve Schale, who helped President Obama win Florida in 2008 and 2012.

In addition to Mrs. Clinton, U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders; former Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley; former Rhode Island Govenor Lincoln Chaffee; and, former U.S. Senator James Webb, are currently seeking the Democratic nomination. 

Trump Makes Play for South in Alabama

ALABAMA - Republican front-runner Donald Trump kicked off his southern strategy Friday night in Mobile, Alabama, with a massive campaign event that drew anywhere from twenty to thirty thousand supporters, depending on crowd estimates. 

Photo by Dave Weigel of the Washington Post.

Welcomed by U.S. Senator Jeff Sessions, who assisted Trump in crafting his immigration policies in a paper released early this week, the billionaire entertainer turned political mastermind enjoyed fairly enthusiastic support as he delivered conservative and populist platitudes to the adoring crowd.

As the Washington Post reported following the event:

It was the most audacious Donald Trump spectacle yet in a summer full of them, as the Republican presidential front-runner, in his Boeing 757, thundered over a football stadium here Friday night and gave a raucous speech to one of the largest crowds of the 2016 campaign.  

But Trump’s flashy performance was about more than showmanship. His visit to Alabama was coolly strategic, touching down in the heart of red America and an increasingly important early battleground in the Republican nominating contest.

The Manhattan developer, who strode on stage to “Sweet Home Alabama,” is trying to show that his candidacy has broad and lasting appeal across every region of the country — especially here in the South, where Alabama and seven other states are holding a clustered voting blitz March 1.

The scene Friday night put an exclamation point on an extraordinary run in which the flamboyant mogul has thoroughly disrupted the presidential campaign and kindled a national discussion about not just politics but American culture itself.

Trump, however, is far from being the only candidate to target the South. Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, U.S. Senator Ted Cruz, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee, and Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker have all made trips recently to the heavily Republican region in hopes of wooing its voters in next spring's primaries.