I know it’s really early, but I’d rather look super impressive and have bragging rights three years later or shrug and say the signs were misleading.

I called Paul Ryan for Romney’s VP on this blog long before his stock jumped on Intrade and long after most people were talking up Marco Rubio. I was briefly a political science major, so I know the basics, but I’ve also canvassed for the Democrats and think I have a pretty decent sense of people’s motivations.

I honestly believe that there’s going to be an epic Chris Christie versus Cory Booker showdown for President in 2016. I think it will be tight but I bet Cory Booker will win.

Other major players in the Republican GOP primary are going to be Marco Rubio and Bobby Jindal. Rand Paul will be around, but mostly serve as the libertarian placeholder for his dad. Rubio will be second banana to Christie, but will not be able to surpass Christie’s aggressiveness.

Other major players in the Democratic primary are going to be Elizabeth Warren and maybe Kirsten Gillibrand. (I’m a New Yorker now, so I’m now more familiar with Gillibrand.) I wish Michelle Obama was running too, because she is super smart and super fly, but she doesn’t seem to be interested in heading that way. It’s still nice to see the progressive ladies coming out into the spotlight to grab the torch from Hillary Clinton.

I do not think Hillary is going to run. Right now, this is not a popular opinion among the liberal wonks, but I’ve been thinking it for a while.

She’s tired of the infighting and made statements about how tired she is in the past. I know politicians can backtrack on their statements. But I’m really getting the sense that she just wants to chill for a while and focus her ambitions on knitting and enjoying retirement. Which is totally reasonable; she’s 65 now.

Nate Silver sounds like he’s leaning the same way with me on the Hillary Prediction: “She doesn’t really like the campaign all that much.”

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Anyway, I’ve written briefly before about how much of a badass Cory Booker is of a candidate. He’s relatively young for Presidential ambitions, but so was an inexperienced Senator named Barack Obama. I think Cory Booker will be great.

Now that Intrade is done, does anyone know where I can legally profit from my political acumen?

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