Even power needs a day off.
| | | | |  | | By POLITICO MAGAZINE | | 
| | 
Illustration by Doug Chayka for POLITICO | With less than a decade in politics, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has established himself as a central figure in a GOP reconstituted by Donald Trump, lobbing legislative bombs into the widening chasm of culture-war politics over everything from mask mandates and sanctuary cities to so-called "election integrity" and LGBTQ rights. It seems to be working in his political favor. In the last two-plus years, he's raised nearly $200 million; polls predict he'll win the governor's seat again; and, he's seen as the most viable primary challenger to Donald Trump in 2024. DeSantis is running up the score — but close observers sense a looming vulnerability in episodes like the controversial suspension of Democratic State Attorney Andrew Warren, whom DeSantis targeted after he joined prosecutors from around the country in signing statements that condemned anti-trans laws and declined "to use our offices' resources to criminalize reproductive health decisions" in the wake of the Supreme Court's Dobbs decision. "When every time you swing the bat you hit a home run, you become so caught up and sold on your own abilities that you just keep swinging and never think you're going to miss," said John Morgan, the Florida-based mega-attorney and mainly Democratic donor who has been at times pro-DeSantis. "He has to resist becoming the protagonist in his own Greek tragedy," said Mac Stipanovich, the one-time Republican operative turned Democrat. If Florida is DeSantis' testing ground for a presidential run, it's also a bellwether for national Republican politics in the years to come. Michael Kruse reports on the raw ambition — some would call it dangerous hubris — driving DeSantis to the top of the Republican Party. Read the story.
| | | | 
| "He inherited some good instincts from his Quaker forebears but by diligent hard work, he overcame them." Can you guess who said this about Richard Nixon? Scroll to the bottom for the answer.**
| | | | 
| | 
POLITICO illustration by Jade Cuevas | 'I Would Rather Die' … Vladimir Putin's decision to draft 300,000 more soldiers into his war on Ukraine has placed Russian men who disagree with the invasion in an impossible position: They can refuse the draft and go to prison, fight in a war they don't believe in or else flee their home country. Anastasiia Carrier spoke with seven Russian men — some of whom have left Russia while others are hunkered down, trying to avoid draft notices — about what it's like to be called to kill.
| | | | 
| 55 percent … of Republican women have a Netflix subscription, compared to 71 percent of Democratic women and 62 percent of registered voters overall.
| | | | 
| | 
John Allen resigned as president of the Brookings Institution in June. | Win McNamee/Getty Images | Who's Filling the Think Tanks? … After the scandal over Qatari money at the August Brookings Institute led president John Allen to resign last summer, conservatives at right-leaning think tanks felt a certain amount of schadenfreude. But renewed Congressional scrutiny over foreign funding at think tanks "could ultimately complicate life at the same right-leaning institutions where people giggled at John Allen's dramatic fall from grace," writes Michael Schaffer in this week's Capital City column.
| | | | 
| Elon Musk took a short break from buying — or not buying — or, yes, buying Twitter to post a 4-point "peace plan" for ending the war in Ukraine last week. His suggestions caused quite a stir. Not exactly following the plot? Here's what you need to know when your friends bring it up this weekend. - Either you believe political consultant Ian Bremmer that Musk told him he talked to Vladimir Putin about the Kremlin's "red lines" for ending the war in Ukraine, or you believe Musk that he's spoken to Putin only once — about space. - What's this Musk tweeted about Crimea being part of Russia since 1783? It's a selective history the Kremlin would approve of. Impress the history buffs in your life by bringing up the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, in which Russia agreed to "respect the independence and sovereignty and the existing borders of Ukraine" — including Crimea. - At a cocktail party with the blob? Your opinion is: "That reference to Crimea's water supply was awfully specific for someone who says he hasn't been in contact with the Kremlin about Ukraine." - Gabbing in Silicon Valley? Just say: "Can you believe he was already being paid so much for Starlink and is hitting up the Pentagon for more?" - Whatever you do, don't post a twitter poll about this. That game has been won.
| | | | 
| | 
Ronald Reagan Library | Forty years ago today, in 1982, Ronald Reagan hosted soccer icons Pelé and Steve Moyers in the Rose Garden. Two youth groups watched a demonstration by the players before the president tossed a ball into the center of the garden to commence a match.
| | | **Who Dissed answer: It author James Reston, who advised British journalist David Frost on Watergate for his famous interviews with Nixon. politicoweekend@email.politico.com
| | | | Follow us | | | | |
0 Comments:
Post a Comment