Trail To The Chief: Inaugural Edition

Trail To The Chief: Inaugural Edition












The Inaugural Edition






Hi there, and welcome to Trail to the Chief, HuffPost’s weekly trip through the folds of time-space to the peculiar world of the 2016 presidential horse-race and media coverage of it.



You probably have heard (because we are telling you) that the 2016 contest has begun, and that, like every other presidential contest, it will be THE pivotal turning point in American history.



We'll leave pivotal -- and watershed, seminal, sea change, groundbreaking, transformational, etc. -- to hype and history.



All we know is there IS a campaign, and attention must be paid. The question is how.



For depth, breadth and seriousness, nothing beats the political coverage of HuffPost.



Then there is Trail to the Chief.



Each week we will pre-ponder the ponderous and de-hype the hype. We will collect Data (Polling, Big and Meta), political science, research, media buzz and our own survey of conventional thinking (which we disdain and never propagate) -- and feed it all into artisanal algorithms devised by our team of Brooklyn-based quant-lumbersexuals, who do this work for us before band practice.



We will chart candidates and campaigns, flacks and fixers, pundits and the press, TV ads and position papers, donors and demographics. We'll talk about it on HuffPost Live each week at 12:20 p.m. EST.



We will take this process just as seriously as the candidates do. In fact, here is our firm promise to you: Should the candidates pull off the unlikely feat of staging a high-minded, responsible and substantive campaign, we will go away.



In the meantime, we will kid because we love. We love politics. We love democracy, even our flawed one. And, truth be told, we love presidential campaigns.



This week we set the stage by ranking leading contenders. Naturally, Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush top the charts, if only for the allure of a race larded with more '90s nostalgia than a season of "Portlandia." In our TTTC Image Of The Week, we show you the logo for Jeb’s new PAC. He calls it "Right To Rise." But is it to rise ... from the dead? (Basically, yes.)












A brace of GOP big dogs, Chris Christie and Scott Walker, primaried each other at Lambeau Field this weekend, each supporting an opposing team owner in the NFC Divisional Playoff. We're just sad we didn't get to see Christie execute a Lambeau Leap. And finally, as if the baby boomer theme weren't suffocating enough, let's all raise a glass of milk to Mitt Romney's return.



Ok, now here's our first list.

RANK		CANDIDATE	PARTY	RISING OR FALLING
1		HILLARY CLINTON Hillary machine idles with nothing to do, but somehow minor foes are getting leaked on	Democrat	▼
2		JEB BUSH Today's Mr. Sensible ran as wingnut in '94. Oops. And annoying Mitt won't quit	Republican	▼
3		RAND PAUL Media can’t help but hang on his every word because he could easily hang himself	Republican
4		SCOTT WALKER Union-busting governor in birthplace of progressivism: a perfect theme for the '50s	Republican
5		PAUL RYAN Might have won in 2012 if they used “dynamic scoring” to count votes	Republican
6		ELIZABETH WARREN It’s been weeks since she denied she was running. ... What is she hiding?	Democrat
7		MITT ROMNEY He 100 percent wants to be president, but only 47 percent wants to run	Republican
8		CHRIS CHRISTIE Mitt claimed kinship with NASCAR owners; bro-hugging N.J. governor does him one better	Republican	▼
9		MARCO RUBIO Holding first fundraiser at Manhattan restaurant; Yelp says oysters are subpar	Republican
10		JOE BIDEN Grandfathered into the top 10. Joe knew his way around a selfie long before the smart phone	Democrat
11		JOHN KASICH Speaks blue collar, raised Catholic and from Ohio. Pre-tea party, that was enough	Republican	▲
12		BOBBY JINDAL Enough with the Ivy League position papers, give us some “God, Guns, Grits and Gravy”	Republican
13		MIKE HUCKABEE Enough with the “God, Guns, Grits and Gravy,” give us some position papers	Republican	▲
14		TED CRUZ We know you’re trolling us, but we can monetize that	Republican
15		BERNIE SANDERS Unlikely to get Democratic nomination, but shoo-in for a Ben and Jerry’s flavor	Independent Socialist Democrat
16		JIM WEBB Hard-to-pigeonhole longshot, but reportedly got the attention of the Hillary machine	Democrat	▲
17		RICK PERRY New glasses don’t make him look studious, more like Warby Parker spokesmodel	Republican
18		BEN CARSON Wasted no time meeting at least one campaign requirement: a plagiarism apology	Republican	▼
19		ANDREW CUOMO Can count on one softball CNN interview	Democrat
20 (Tie)		RICK SANTORUM We still have our ‘12 sweater vest, but has he lost the ‘16 evangelical play-in game to Huck?	Republican
20 (Tie)		MARTIN O'MALLEY Relentless dinner-circuit travel and self-promotion save him from teeny type list below	Democrat

Even More Obscure Candidates


Cory Booker, Jerry Brown, Steve Bullock, Julian Castro, Mitch Daniels, Rahm Emanuel, Russ Feingold, Carly Fiorina, Newt Gingrich, Lindsey Graham, Luis Gutiérrez, Nikki Haley, John Hickenlooper, Amy Klobuchar, Joe Manchin, Jack Markell, Susana Martinez, Jay Nixon, George Pataki, Deval Patrick, Mike Pence, Rob Portman, Ed Rendell, Cathy McMorris Rodgers, Mitt Romney, Joe Scarborough, Brian Schweitzer, Donald Trump and Mark Warner






Candidate Photos: Getty, Associated Press

TTTC Image: Right to Rise logo via http://ift.tt/1BGcK03, Day of the Dead poster via Imp Awards