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Marco Rubio announced his candidacy for president yesterday. He may be half of the makings of the 2016 GOP dream ticket. The Republicans have two big problems to solve if they hope to win the White House next time around. No, I am not talking about cracking the Latin American ancestry vote. It would be good for the party to do that, though probably more essential in the long run than right away. And there are questions about whether putting a Cuban-American on the ticket does that anyway. Cubans are already among the country’s highest turnout populations (67.2% in 2012,...

All the talk about GOP Sen. Marco Rubio’s prospects as a presidential candidate raises an inevitable question for Democratic favorite Hillary Rodham Clinton: If she’s the nominee, will she choose a Latino as her running mate?

Marco Rubio announced his candidacy for presidency of the United States at the Freedom Tower in Miami on Monday, highlighting his family’s hardscrabble immigrant roots, embracing traditional values but also vowing to usher in a “new American century.” As a matter of political pragmatism, is there any convincing reason Rubio shouldn’t be the Republican to take on Hillary Clinton in 2016? Because when it comes to natural political talent, it unlikely the GOP can do better. For starters, Rubio is the most compelling speaker in the Republican field. Sen. Mike Lee says Rubio “can bring grown men to tears with...

Billionaire hedge fund manager and green power advocate Tom Steyer is taking Gov. Scott Walker to task, accusing the Republican presidential hopeful of being a pawn for fossil fuel interests and a climate change denier. In a full page ad running in the Wisconsin State Journal Tuesday, Steyer’s group NextGen Climate blasts the state’s GOP leadership for promoting a “war on science” by banning work on climate change. The group calls out Walker specifically for staying silent on the issue and for signing a Koch-backed anti-climate change pledge. “Fossil fuel interests like the Koch Brothers have made millions while opposing...

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush lead the Republican field in South Carolina’s early presidential primary landscape, with 13.6 percent and 12.7 percent, respectively, the spring Winthrop University poll shows. The rest of the pack trails with single digit support each, according to results released Wednesday morning...... ..... The survey was conducted April 4-12 and included 996 voters polled statewide.

Two weeks ago, I noticed that national polling and noted that the media-fueled boomlet for Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker might be fading. If that’s true, it’s a phenomenon that is not apparent in a recent poll of GOP primary voters in New Hampshire. The results of a new NH1 survey conducted by the Republican firm Reach Communications from April 8 – 9 suggests that Walker’s appeal to the Republican electorate in this critical Northeaster state continues to grow. The survey found Walker leading with almost 23 percent of the vote, well outside the survey’s 3.0 percent margin of error. Former...

.......“This community has to face the reality that the gun laws that this state has put forward over the last few years – as proud as it makes the governor and legislature feel – has resulted in more guns on the streets of the City of Milwaukee,” Barrett said. Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke said that the gun laws Barrett referenced actually deal with concealed carry permits. “There is zero evidence that concealed carry permits [have] led to an increase in guns on the streets,” Clarke said.

Cruz rails against ‘crony capitalism’—and counts a CEO under investigation for unpaid billions in taxes as a mega-donor. Awwwwwkward. Hedge fund CEO Robert Mercer is all in for the conservative Texas Republican Ted Cruz, and the billionaire will have unusually substantial influence in how his contributions get spent. But the billionaire also has some baggage—like, the avoiding billions in taxes kind of baggage. His alleged failure to pay those taxes led to substantial congressional scrutiny in 2014—and it’s not clear the investigation is over. This, and some of Mercer’s side projects, could present interesting challenges for Cruz’s campaign. Especially since...

Hillary? Rand Paul? Ted Cruz? Marco Rubio? Four major candidates have stepped forward to run for the Democratic and Republican nominations for president, and a few more are sure to follow soon. Their entrances into the race couldn’t be more different. Republicans Marco Rubio, Rand Paul, and Ted Cruz went the more traditional route with kickoff events. Hillary Rodham Clinton went big on social with a much anticipated video and tweet combination, but is keeping events low-key to start – except for a Monday evening visit to Chipotle. So who’s winning the media battle at this very early stage? Take...

[At the source, the rational is given after each candidate] The first tier 1. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) (Sen. – FL) (Last month: 3) (Points: 91) 2. Scott Walker (Gov. – Wisconsin) (Last month: 1) (Points: 88) 3. Jeb Bush (Fmr. Gov. – FL) (Last Month: 3) (Points: 81) The Second Tier 4. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) (Senator – TX) (Last Month: 4) (Points: 73) 5. Bobby Jindal (Gov. – LA) (Last month: 5) (Points: 54) 6. Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY)(Sen. – KY) (Last month: 8) (Points: 52) The Third Tier 7. Rick Perry (Fmr. Gov. – TX) (Last month:...

The lies of the left drive American politics. For years we heard the “Bush Lied” mantra chanted endlessly. It didn’t matter that the claim was wrong. A lie is a very specific thing… Saying a falsehood when you know it to be wrong. Bush never did that. While in retrospect the question of Saddam’s WMDs is unclear, at the time George Bush, Bill Clinton and the intelligence agencies of most of the world believed he did. There is a difference between being wrong and lying… but the left doesn’t care about truth when a lie better serves their purposes, whether...

Another lie from Hillary Clinton? This first photos of her road trip van have been posted and it looks nothing like the “Mystery Machine” in the Scooby Doo cartoon:

SOURCE Emerson College Polling Society BOSTON, April 14, 2015 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A new poll conducted in California by the Emerson College Polling Society (ECPS) suggests that the perennially blue state, which has not been won by a Republican presidential candidate since 1988, may be in play for the 2016 election. Hillary Clinton holds a commanding 46-point lead over Senator Elizabeth Warren, her nearest potential rival for the Democratic nomination. However, in head-to-head matchups with the top two GOP contenders, Jeb Bush and Scott Walker, Clinton's 53% to 47% edge is within the poll's margin of error of +/- 3.2%. California...

One of the key issues in the 2016 presidential campaign is certain to be how the candidates propose to deal with illegal immigration, from border security to the treatment of undocumented individuals already in the United States. The question of immigration reform has particular salience to the large and growing Latino electorate, a group that leans heavily Democratic and makes up an important part of the coalition of voters that a Democratic candidate needs to assemble in a winning run for the White House. Right now, that candidate seems likely to be Hillary Clinton, who officially announced her presidential run...

Ohio Gov. John Kasich insisted Monday that he is "seriously considering" running for president, but first has to answer one question: "Can I win?" That's what he told the Columbus Dispatch in an interview Monday night after speaking to the Detroit Economic Club in Michigan. "I've been serious about this all along, you're just catching on," he said. The comments were the clearest signal yet from the Republican that he could make a play at the White House, but he admitted that he hasn't yet decided "if it's right" to run for president. "The most important [question] is can I...

The Left, which repeatedly has called conservatives racist, has shown its true colors with Marco Rubio's announcement that he is running for President. Liberals on social media were incensed that a minority would possibly run for office as a Republican. Hundreds went on racist tirades against Senator Rubio, letting him know that, as a Cuban man, he's not doing what liberals expect or want. Here is a small taste of the vitriol:

Hillary Clinton has announced that she is running to be the next President of the United States. What her likely nomination says about the Democratic party and tens of millions of Americans is depressing. Other than Barack Obama — whose résumé consisted of being a charismatic black — it is hard to come up with a less accomplished individual who has run for president in our lifetime. And, unfortunately, that is saying something. Moreover, at least Barack Obama had the excuse of having been in public life for only a few years, as a state senator and then a two-year...

One of the recurring knocks on Senator Marco Rubio, now officially a presidential candidate, is that as a senator, he’s never run or managed anything — a criticism that isn’t quite accurate. Rubio managed the Florida House of Representatives as speaker for two years, a period marked by some distinct successes but also lingering frustration with Republicans he deemed too passive and comfortable with the status quo. As speaker and in earlier leadership positions in the Florida House, Rubio demonstrated a willingness to delegate to focus on his strengths, communicating and negotiating. The record suggests that a President Rubio would...

Hillary Clinton is in it to ... assure you that she'll work hard to deserve your vote, especially if you're an everyday American. "Everyday American" is a short phrase that encapsulates the grand strategy of her campaign, a subtle way of throwing shade on the non-everyday Americans — the people that Elizabeth Warren decries, the 1 percent, the Wall Street bankers, and, generally, opponents of progress. Whether Clinton's campaign will be revolutionary or regular is a question that'll take at least a year or more to answer. Judging by the way the media dissected her campaign video, political reporters will...

Two weeks ago, Ted Cruz announced his candidacy for president at Liberty University, and last week, Rand Paul announced at the Galt House hotel in Louisville, Kentucky. Marco Rubio is expected to announce this week at the Freedom Tower in Miami. Others will follow. So what have we learned about the race for the Republican nomination for president so far? 1.) Nobody is running away with it. In no national poll of Republican primary voters this year has any one of the dozen or so candidates tested received more than 20 percent of the vote. And only twice has any...