There’s been a flurry of interesting items lately about the next<\/i> presidential race, with several players positioning themselves carefully.<\/p>\n
Wisconsin’s Russ Feingold (D), for example, was in Florida<\/a> over the weekend to talk to locals about his interest in the job.<\/p>\n U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., told the Tiger Bay Club of Volusia County on Friday that he’ll decide whether to run after “going around the country” working to return a Democrat to the White House. <\/p>\n In Bush’s first term, Feingold opposed the president’s policies on the Iraq war, USA Patriot Act, Medicare reform, education policy, environmental regulation and abortion rights. He made clear he was leaving his own presidential options open after a club member asked if he plans to run. <\/p>\n For now, Feingold said, he wants to be “part of the process” of identifying a candidate likely to succeed George W. Bush in 2008. That involves helping to create “national organizations of people to make that happen,” he said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Not exactly subtle. Nevertheless, Feingold deserves enormous credit for weighing a presidential run while also publicly railing against the federal death penalty<\/a>. Good for him; that’s a gutsy move.<\/p>\n And speaking of would-be presidential candidates with guts, a certain four-star general is thinking of trying his hand again<\/a>.<\/p>\n Among the earliest to start dialing for donors: Wesley Clark, who entered the ’04 race just a few months before the first primary but quickly stumbled with a flip-flop on how he would have voted on Congress’s Iraq-war resolution. Now he is telling potential supporters, according to one he called, that he “learned from his mistakes, he knows it takes more time and preparation than he put in — and that his wife is fully on board,” which wasn’t true the first go-round.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n But wait, there’s more. As for our friends on the other side of the aisle, Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback is starting to make a few waves<\/a> of his own.<\/p>\n Among the signs bobbing above the assembled throng at last week’s March for Life rally in Washington, D.C., were two worth noting for anyone with an eye on the next presidential race. One read, “Ohioans for Brownback”; the other, “Values Voters for Brownback ’08.” <\/p>\n That’s Kansas Republican Sen. Sam Brownback, hardly a politician with a high profile nationally, but a hero in social conservative circles. <\/p>\n Brownback is also one of a handful of Republican Senators privately mulling a potential presidential bid in three years time.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
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\nIndiana’s Evan Bayh, fresh off his bold stance<\/a> against Condoleezza Rice’s nomination, is generating all manner of speculation<\/a> about a White House run. It’s worth keeping an eye on him — the desperately moderate senator may start taking steps to reinforce his progressive bona fides if he’s serious about the campaign. Considering that he out-polled Bush<\/a> in the region’s most Republican state on Election Day, Bayh has to be considered a serious player.<\/p>\n