5 Stories You'll Care About in Politics This Week

— -- Which is harder to believe ... That President Obama really taught Kevin Spacey how to do Frank Underwood, or that Bill Clinton really confides in Kevin Spacey? That the timing Bob Menendez's indictment wasn't secretly pushed by "House of Cards" producers? Or that Tom Cotton wrote an open letter to the Iranians but only got calls back from Miley Cyrus fans?

We had a deal that wasn't really a deal, some action in Indianapolis that had little to do with basketball, and some news out of Brooklyn that just might have something to do with presidential politics.

Here’s a glimpse at some of the stories your ABC News political team will be tracking in the week ahead:

BIG SELL

It may be written of President Obama someday that he had more success negotiating with the Iranians than he did with the Republicans in Congress. That becomes freshly relevant now that the president has a framework of a nuclear agreement with Iran in hand, though no signed deal, and a skeptical Congress. The White House is stepping up its outreach and challenging critics to offer an alternative. But the hole-poking is only beginning, and will get a big boost from the Israeli government. The president has another week to make his case before Congress comes back to town, and might be helped by the indictment this past week of the leading Democratic critic of an Iran deal, Sen. Bob Menendez of New Jersey.

GROWING IN BROOKLYN

Hillary Clinton is on the clock, or whatever device hipsters use to tell time these days. The news that the Clinton camp has signed a lease for a campaign headquarters in Brooklyn set off metaphor alerts about a building that houses Morgan Stanley and sits at the end of (one-way) Clinton Street. More importantly, it signals a move toward reality for the campaign-in-waiting that is Hillary Clinton’s. She’ll enter the race – most likely later this month – as the runaway front-runner for the Democratic nomination, and a favorite against the main Republicans, according to the latest ABC News-Washington Post poll. But that same poll shows the perils of political life: Her approval rating, which soared during her time as secretary of state, is now a downright terrestrial 49 percent.

RFRA’S WAKE

A whirlwind of a week led to “clarifications” in Indiana and Arkansas, with the business and sports worlds pushing politicians to ensure that gays and lesbians won’t be subject to discrimination. But the story doesn’t end there, or with the end of the Final Four: Similar “religious freedom” bills are at various stages of consideration in a dozen-plus other states. The GOP 2016ers are putting little daylight between themselves or the Republican governors who are coming under scrutiny. But that doesn’t mean the party is comfortable with a debate that highlights a cultural shift in attitudes toward the LGBT community over the past decade.

RAND’S RUN

Next in the presidential pool: Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky. The eye doctor and son of a former presidential candidate has his sights on becoming the second official major 2016 candidate on Tuesday in Louisville, with visits to the four earliest-voting states coming immediately thereafter. Paul’s tea party and libertarian leanings make him a first-tier candidate, and “Stand with Rand” signs and T-shirts have already popped up at other candidates’ events. Paul is boasting of crossover appeal among younger voters and minorities, presenting himself as a potential demographic scrambler for the GOP. But some of his views, particularly on national defense and foreign policy, leave him out of step with the Republican base. Paul is already sanding away some of his sharper edges, reversing, for example, his longstanding call for cuts in defense spending.

RAHM’S STAND

Chicago’s mayoral election runoff Tuesday will blow far beyond the Windy City. Mayor Rahm Emanuel is seeking a second term against a progressive favorite, Jesus “Chuy” Garcia, after failing to secure a majority in the first round of voting. Emanuel’s ties to the Democratic Party’s establishment – he was, of course, a top aide to both Bill Clinton and Barack Obama – have made him an easy target for a restive liberal base. Sprinkle in Emanuel’s famously combative manner, a surge in street violence, and budget clashes with labor unions, and an upset is possible, though the mayor leads in public polling. A loss for Emanuel would reverberate throughout the Democratic Part, including in the emerging Hillary Clinton campaign, which will have to accommodate roughly similar liberal angst with her all-but-certain candidacy.