A friend who happens to be a Republican shill advised me after the election that America would suffer under the "leadership" of Nancy Pelosi. He was also very down on Harry Reid.
I did not know much about either, but I thought, "they cannot be worse that the Republicans".
I was wrong.
The Republicans rubber stamped any bill that gave government money to big corporations under the broad umbrella of national security. I hate that. They use scare tactics to stay in power and lack the political will and/or integrity to insist the government's primary military issue be capturing Bin Ladin and stamping out Al-Quida. Over the last 8 years, they have proven to be, with few exceptions, lying opportunistic garbage picking at the bones of the people killed in 9/11.
IMO.
But, at least they were competent at it.
Pelosi has done next to nothing beyond getting herself involved in a PR "scandal" going to visit one of our "enemies". Why would you do something like that? Don't you have to look at benefits vs. potential negative responses on everything you do at that level? As far as I can tell, she did it to basically announce there was a new sheriff in town. What did it accomplish on the international stage? Nothing much. What damage did it do in the US? It established that the only thing that Pelosi has done of note for the vast majority of Americans who just discovered her since she took power is to have possibly done something that is "fuzzy illegal" to spite Bush.
Pelosi DOES appear to be in over her head.
And Harry Reid...WTF!?!? I never thought I would meet a man who George Bush could consistently out maneuver. Reid seems like a nice guy, but he is really screwing the pooch here. America wants a politician who doesn't speak in platitudes or riddles, in the Senate more than anywhere else. Instead Reid talks about reading his child Dr. Seuss and quotes the books. Dude, you run the Senate. Make the only words that ever come out of your mouth to be along the lines of, "This bill was voted on and failed. 45 Democrats and 3 republicans voted for it." PERIOD. You have a real problem with Public perception, bottom lining stuff would really help you in that your image to the public would not be you being another stupid time waster.
The current immigration reform really kills me though. They put this bill forward knowing that Bush desperately wants his legacy not to just be iraq and that Bush will bite on anything that helps legalize all the backroom dealings he has had with Mexican officials and corporations to open our borders.
Why even trot this bill out? Bush has been called a lame duck president, but his veto has stopped almost every piece of legislation the Dems have put out. The Dems want to take down the Attorney General, but Bush laughs at their efforts. This Attorney General isn't even popular with the Republicans! Most political insiders thought the guy would be out in 2 weeks and here it is 3 months later and The Dems still haven't even accomplished that!!!! Bush publicly ridiculed their efforts and said he would not replace Gonzales earlier today. If this political balance stays in place, the Dems will have to throw Gonzales in jail to get Bush to replace him --- and frankly, even then replacement does not appear to be a certainty. Bush might just pardon Gonzales and keep him on.
The fact is, Bush is kicking the Democrats' asses, even as a "lame duck".
If Bush is a lame duck from here on out, why do they give him a chance to get out of that bed by putting this stupid immigration law out there? Why do this, when you can wait a little over a year and work with a more reasonable president and a larger democratic majority to pass a law that actually satisfies your constituency?
I take this as Pelosi and Reid deciding that they need to accomplish SOMETHING, even if it is something that paints Bush in a favorable light (as far as not being a lame duck). The thought is probably that Bush is on his way out and the Republicans can't possibly capitalize on this, because this splits their party and puts politicians against their constituency. That is just stupid logic.
If this bill passes, the Republicans will be able to say, "I was against all of the facets of the bill you don't like, but my President asked for my support. I refused, but he asked again and I grudgingly agreed, but only after insisting on these changes." It allows Republican Senators to appear loyal to the party and the president (voters love that about the republicans) and willing to work with the Democrats (independents hate gridlock brought about by party line voting) while protecting Republican core values.
This is not even a bone bone thrown to the Republicans and Bush. This is a fat leg of lamb. If this bill passes Republicans will profit from it far greater than Democrats. Republicans will be able to point at this crappy piece of heavily negotiated bi-partisan legislation and say if you vote for Democrats, this is the kind of bills you can expect. What do Democrats get out of this?
Then Harry Reid pulls it off the agenda stating the votes are not there to pass it. What are you thinking, Harry Reid?!?!?! Send it to a vote and watch it burn. Let the image of lame duck Bush stew in American minds for the next 6 months. Underscore the fact that his party has abandoned him. Let the America know that they ONLY way they are going to get immigration reform is with a better majority in Senate and a Democratic President.
Instead wet noodle Reid limply pulls it off the table letting the Republicans off the hook. Now if it passes, this was another triumph of embattled War President George Bush, saving legislation that the Democrats could not pass. George Bush, the tough president who could unite parties when the time came.
Dude this just makes me sick.
Harry Reid just turned over all credit for any good that bill might bring about to George Bush.
For that, he has to go.
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I do not mean to imply that immigration reform is a bad thing, but I think the Democratic strategists are being very stupid about it.
No other Republican but Bush would ever vote to give amnesty to 12 million illegal aliens. In other words, if Bush doesn't pass this law, a Democrat will. So if the choice is to make those mostly Mexican illegals Democrats or Republicans, why are Reid and Pelosi trying to make them Republicans? Politically, you are talking about the future of California, New Mexico, Arizona, and Nevada. Are you willing for California to become soft Democrat and New Mexico, Arizona, and Nevada to go hard Republican?
If you want to accomplish things, there are better ways to do so --- even on the policy of illegals.
1) Cater to Republican congressmen and congresswomen, not Bush. Republicans want their "War on Terror". Give it to them. Give them a simple law that ramps up US/Mexico border security by protecting border agents from political reprisals, giving the border patrol AND the national guard freedom to engage attacking Mexicans, AND build that damned fence. That is what most of America wants. America wants to feel secure. Republican senators will vote for any legislation that only deals with securing the border. Bush will vote against anything that appears anti-Mexican. If you can dig up enough Democratic votes, you can pass a secure mexican border bill into law OVER a Bush veto. That would be a crushing defeat for the Bush administration.
And it would make the Democrats seem like the party that is really tough on security. Democrats will need that in the presidential election.
You could actually use that process to build relationships with the Republican rank and file and maybe even secure promises to support future legislation to transition illegal immigrants to legalized migrant workers.
Illegals should have a way to become legal migrant workers, but there should be no way they should be allowed to stay here permanently. That is rewarding illegal activity and most Americans hate that on principle. Create a system that brings illegals in-line with legal aliens--- who are required to leave the country when their stay is up. Make deportation of illegals a every day reality. Everything will sort itself out from there. To do more than that is to take an unneccessary political black eye.
If you kill Bush by breaking his veto a couple of times, you liberate like minded Republicans to vote their conscience rather than the party line. You might even be able to get traction on Iraq and Gonzales, but that won't happen until the party gets their act together and learns how to lead.
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If this mismanagement continues, there will be no Democratic majority in the senate and the odds of a Democratic president are greatly reduced.
For the good of the party, Reid and Pelosi need to step down and let more forceful and media savvy democrats take their place.
Saturday, June 16, 2007
Tuesday, June 5, 2007
Still optimistic about Joe Biden
Along with the top 3, he did very well in the debate by the account of the media reveiwers. I am more and more impressed with Biden the more I see him.
He says things I beleive in.
He looks presidential.
I think the moving of most states dates to February 5th really helps smaller candidates and might bite the poll leaders in the butt.
Follow me for a second and I'll show you how Biden might win this thing. Every candidate has strengths and weaknesses.
Jan 14th.
Iowa.
Hillary struggles in the midwest where she is seen as a "feminazi" and a self absorbed harpy. Now expectation are that Obama takes Iowa. But what if Obama turns out to be suprisingly weak in the midwest? What if his strength in Illinois is just that? What if he continues to be somewhat uninspiring? This could turn into a 3 way heat between Obama the favorite, Edwards the challenger, and Biden, the campaign veteran. What if Iowa is up for grabs and Biden wins it collecting a good chunk of their delegates?
Biden gets media coverage from his unexpected upset leading up to Jan 19th.
Jan 19th.
Nevada.
Hillary should do better here, but this is not a blue state, so Hillary and Obama will be vulnerable here as well. There are a number of hispanics, so Governer Richardson could finish 3rd or even second. But again, Hillary and Biden know these primaries. A win or second would be huge in terms of momentum. I think these votes are going to be darned near split 4 ways anyway, although Hillary or the governor could suprise and run away with it. A second place finish would have the entire media rethinking the 2 horse race for the next 3 days.
Jan 22nd.
New Hampshire.
Word of mouth after the debate suggests New Hampshire saw it as 3 tiers: Hillary and Obama; Edwards and The Governor; and then Biden and the rest. The critics saw Biden as having a very strong debate, but the attendees were more taken with Hillary, Obama, and Richardson. Biden seems intent on working NH very hard and is well known in the area from previous campaigns. His efforts campaigning the state combined with momentum from the previous 2 primaries could deflate Edwards and even richardson a bit and have him displacing them as the alternate candidate and running a strong 3rd (say 20%) in NH. If New Hampsire turned to biden over Edwards and Richardson, both candidates might be willing to be brokered into a deal.
That would give a week of "wow, maybe Biden is legit talk" for the week leading up to Jan 29th. Now that would be a ton of free publicity for the public, and it could give rise to the kind of momentum that displaced Howard Dean. Biden is a well liked guy in the Democratic ranks. Hillary is respected, but liked? Maybe not so much. Obama suffers from the same problem as Dean did in 2004 as an outsider to the national party, but to a lesser degree. You won't see a thousand knives stabbing either in the back to help Biden like you did in 2004 helping Kerry, but you could see a couple people helping out. Chris Dodd, I could definitely see turning his people over to help Biden campaign. They seem to get along and are both small state guys trying to make the jump to higher political office. It works in Dodd's favor to try it. Perhaps a deal might be brokered with John Edwards at that point. "Deliver me a win in South Carolina and help me come in the top 3 in Florida and you will be my VP." At that point if things were not going well for edwards he might bite at that. Some money might come in on Biden as a flier. Knowing Biden, he would probably spend most of it immediately on advertising in Florida and South Carolina. I don't think Biden could talk Richardson out at that point as I expect Richardson to do well in Nevada and New Hampshire and be quite optimistic about Florida, but what would an offer of the Secretary of State job do for Richardson? I think that would be better than he'd get from Obama, but I think Richardson might hold out hope of a VP bid from Hillary.
Jan 29th.
The moment of truth.
South Carolina and Florida.
Can Edwards deliver South Carolina? I don't know if he could do it for him, let alone do it for someone else. I don't know if he could deliver 3rd in florida either as Richardson should do well with the hispanic vote, but after two weeks of watching Obama and Hillary struggle, the top tier support would be soft. I could see Hillary in the 25-30% range and Obama in the 15-20% range (it is the south afterall). With Dodd's and Edward's people on board I think they could be anywhere from 20-40% in South Carolina. If Richardson doesn't do as well as I anticipate in Nevada, he might bite on joining the Biden team. If so, that would put Biden as the #3 guy in Florida by process of elimination. If that happens, I could see Obama and Hillary splitting florida with Biden.
That would give Biden essentially the lion's share of Iowa (actual win+ Edward's), Nevada or a share of (his share and richardsons), 20% of New Hampshire (3rd), 40% of South Carolina (win), and 25% of Florida (3rd). That would probably give him say 12 + 10 + 6 + 20 + 47 = 95 of the 5 states' combined 297 delegates to clinton's say 4 + 10 +8 +15 + 49 = 86 and obama's say 6+3+ 8 +10 + 47 = 74 in those first 5 states and more importantly all of the momentum.
I'd say at that point the nomination would be decided if they corked my boy Biden's mouth. :)
Obama and Hillary are both running their campaigns based on where they are today. Hillary wants to be the front runner. Obama wants to stay close and be the only legitimate alternative. Both campaigns would collapse if faced with this scenario entering the week before the new Super Duper Tuesday. Hillary cannot manufacture instant momentum and Obama needs to remain distant and presidential looking--- getting down and dirty and practicing negative campaining won't work for him against a white candidate. (It is what it is, don't hate.)
Additionally, you have to understand Super Tuesday was designed to get a more moderate (and electable candidate). It hasn't really worked out. Super Duper Tuesday (what they are calling Super Tuesday with all the new states who have moved up their primaries) is going to severely curtail the east's ability to foist another guaranteed loser on the rest of the US. I think you'll see the rest of the US chosing a viable alternative to the candidate favored by the northeast a lot more frequently with the new system.
Clinton will win New York, but it isn't winner take all. Obama, IMO the california favorite, may still win California in this scenario, but that rest of those states could either be had or broken even on.
Super Duper Tuesday
5 February, 2008
Alabama (60)Alaska (18)Arizona (67)Arkansas(47)California(441)Colorado (71)Delaware (23)Georgia(104)Idaho (23)Illinois (185)Missouri (88)New Jersey (127)New Mexico (38)New York(280)North Carolina (110)North Dakota (21)Oklahoma (47)Tennessee (85)Utah (29)
Leaning Hillary = Arkansas(47)New Jersey (127)New York(280)
Leaning Obama = Arizona (67)California(441)Colorado (71)Illinois (185)Missouri (88)North Dakota (21)
Potentially leaning Biden = Alabama (60)Alaska (18)Delaware (23)Georgia(104)Idaho (23)New Mexico (38)North Carolina (110)Oklahoma (47)Tennessee (85)Utah (29)
When you consider the primaries are not "winner take all", there is a real opportunity for Biden if he can get some traction and work his way into the second tier in the early primaries.
He says things I beleive in.
He looks presidential.
I think the moving of most states dates to February 5th really helps smaller candidates and might bite the poll leaders in the butt.
Follow me for a second and I'll show you how Biden might win this thing. Every candidate has strengths and weaknesses.
Jan 14th.
Iowa.
Hillary struggles in the midwest where she is seen as a "feminazi" and a self absorbed harpy. Now expectation are that Obama takes Iowa. But what if Obama turns out to be suprisingly weak in the midwest? What if his strength in Illinois is just that? What if he continues to be somewhat uninspiring? This could turn into a 3 way heat between Obama the favorite, Edwards the challenger, and Biden, the campaign veteran. What if Iowa is up for grabs and Biden wins it collecting a good chunk of their delegates?
Biden gets media coverage from his unexpected upset leading up to Jan 19th.
Jan 19th.
Nevada.
Hillary should do better here, but this is not a blue state, so Hillary and Obama will be vulnerable here as well. There are a number of hispanics, so Governer Richardson could finish 3rd or even second. But again, Hillary and Biden know these primaries. A win or second would be huge in terms of momentum. I think these votes are going to be darned near split 4 ways anyway, although Hillary or the governor could suprise and run away with it. A second place finish would have the entire media rethinking the 2 horse race for the next 3 days.
Jan 22nd.
New Hampshire.
Word of mouth after the debate suggests New Hampshire saw it as 3 tiers: Hillary and Obama; Edwards and The Governor; and then Biden and the rest. The critics saw Biden as having a very strong debate, but the attendees were more taken with Hillary, Obama, and Richardson. Biden seems intent on working NH very hard and is well known in the area from previous campaigns. His efforts campaigning the state combined with momentum from the previous 2 primaries could deflate Edwards and even richardson a bit and have him displacing them as the alternate candidate and running a strong 3rd (say 20%) in NH. If New Hampsire turned to biden over Edwards and Richardson, both candidates might be willing to be brokered into a deal.
That would give a week of "wow, maybe Biden is legit talk" for the week leading up to Jan 29th. Now that would be a ton of free publicity for the public, and it could give rise to the kind of momentum that displaced Howard Dean. Biden is a well liked guy in the Democratic ranks. Hillary is respected, but liked? Maybe not so much. Obama suffers from the same problem as Dean did in 2004 as an outsider to the national party, but to a lesser degree. You won't see a thousand knives stabbing either in the back to help Biden like you did in 2004 helping Kerry, but you could see a couple people helping out. Chris Dodd, I could definitely see turning his people over to help Biden campaign. They seem to get along and are both small state guys trying to make the jump to higher political office. It works in Dodd's favor to try it. Perhaps a deal might be brokered with John Edwards at that point. "Deliver me a win in South Carolina and help me come in the top 3 in Florida and you will be my VP." At that point if things were not going well for edwards he might bite at that. Some money might come in on Biden as a flier. Knowing Biden, he would probably spend most of it immediately on advertising in Florida and South Carolina. I don't think Biden could talk Richardson out at that point as I expect Richardson to do well in Nevada and New Hampshire and be quite optimistic about Florida, but what would an offer of the Secretary of State job do for Richardson? I think that would be better than he'd get from Obama, but I think Richardson might hold out hope of a VP bid from Hillary.
Jan 29th.
The moment of truth.
South Carolina and Florida.
Can Edwards deliver South Carolina? I don't know if he could do it for him, let alone do it for someone else. I don't know if he could deliver 3rd in florida either as Richardson should do well with the hispanic vote, but after two weeks of watching Obama and Hillary struggle, the top tier support would be soft. I could see Hillary in the 25-30% range and Obama in the 15-20% range (it is the south afterall). With Dodd's and Edward's people on board I think they could be anywhere from 20-40% in South Carolina. If Richardson doesn't do as well as I anticipate in Nevada, he might bite on joining the Biden team. If so, that would put Biden as the #3 guy in Florida by process of elimination. If that happens, I could see Obama and Hillary splitting florida with Biden.
That would give Biden essentially the lion's share of Iowa (actual win+ Edward's), Nevada or a share of (his share and richardsons), 20% of New Hampshire (3rd), 40% of South Carolina (win), and 25% of Florida (3rd). That would probably give him say 12 + 10 + 6 + 20 + 47 = 95 of the 5 states' combined 297 delegates to clinton's say 4 + 10 +8 +15 + 49 = 86 and obama's say 6+3+ 8 +10 + 47 = 74 in those first 5 states and more importantly all of the momentum.
I'd say at that point the nomination would be decided if they corked my boy Biden's mouth. :)
Obama and Hillary are both running their campaigns based on where they are today. Hillary wants to be the front runner. Obama wants to stay close and be the only legitimate alternative. Both campaigns would collapse if faced with this scenario entering the week before the new Super Duper Tuesday. Hillary cannot manufacture instant momentum and Obama needs to remain distant and presidential looking--- getting down and dirty and practicing negative campaining won't work for him against a white candidate. (It is what it is, don't hate.)
Additionally, you have to understand Super Tuesday was designed to get a more moderate (and electable candidate). It hasn't really worked out. Super Duper Tuesday (what they are calling Super Tuesday with all the new states who have moved up their primaries) is going to severely curtail the east's ability to foist another guaranteed loser on the rest of the US. I think you'll see the rest of the US chosing a viable alternative to the candidate favored by the northeast a lot more frequently with the new system.
Clinton will win New York, but it isn't winner take all. Obama, IMO the california favorite, may still win California in this scenario, but that rest of those states could either be had or broken even on.
Super Duper Tuesday
5 February, 2008
Alabama (60)Alaska (18)Arizona (67)Arkansas(47)California(441)Colorado (71)Delaware (23)Georgia(104)Idaho (23)Illinois (185)Missouri (88)New Jersey (127)New Mexico (38)New York(280)North Carolina (110)North Dakota (21)Oklahoma (47)Tennessee (85)Utah (29)
Leaning Hillary = Arkansas(47)New Jersey (127)New York(280)
Leaning Obama = Arizona (67)California(441)Colorado (71)Illinois (185)Missouri (88)North Dakota (21)
Potentially leaning Biden = Alabama (60)Alaska (18)Delaware (23)Georgia(104)Idaho (23)New Mexico (38)North Carolina (110)Oklahoma (47)Tennessee (85)Utah (29)
When you consider the primaries are not "winner take all", there is a real opportunity for Biden if he can get some traction and work his way into the second tier in the early primaries.
Monday, June 4, 2007
Which candidate will flame out?
It is early in the election season and so far it looks like Hillary or Obama (although Edwards may be making inroads even if the stats don't reflect it) vs. Guliani or Thompson (with a chance of a McCain resurgence still floating out there).
But hold on. People forget about the flameout factor. In almost every Presidental election, one candidate flames out famously after seemingly wrapping things up. Think about it. Dean in 2004. McCain in 2000. Perot in 1992. Hart in 1988.
Let's review.
Dean was an outsider who was running away with the Democratic nomination with his narrow focus demolition of George Bush. His attacks in large part helped Bush's public support crumble to below 50% --- a historically guaranteed benchmark that foretold certain Republican failure. Then Dean made a weird noise that was recorded on tape. The Democratic establishment saw their opportunity to replace Dean with one of their own. The Democratic establishment rolled Dean up like old carpet and laid down John Kerry. Kerry, in spite of (because of?) his war hero past, simply couldn't deliver the biting Bush critism that Dean provided and his choice of a relative unknown who delivered no tangible benefits for vice president lead the Democrats to snatch defeat from the jaws of certain victory.*
But...I digress. Dean is the story here. He was too inexperienced to hold the crest. When he encountered a bad patch he and his advisors were unable to turn the tide.
John McCain seemed likely to wrap up the Republican nomination in 2000, then Karl Rove and his hatchet men spread stories of McCain having a half black child out of wedlock. (I think it turned out to be an adopted child or something totally innocent like that.) The story was not addressed immediately and properly by McCain and his staff. It festered. McCain fell behind Bush. To this day, he still doesn't seem to have recovered from the experience, seeming every bit as shellshocked as the day he lost to Bush.
Ross Perot was well on his way to winning the election of 1992 over the unpopular incumbent George Bush and unknown democratic candidate Bill Clinton when if Perot is to be believed --- and I don't see why not --- someone on the Republican side threatened to kill his family members if he stayed in the race. Apparently Perot felt this individual/group had the means to do it. He quit the race. Then he thought better of it and rejoined the race. At that point a good part of his support decided he wasn't just eccentric --- he was also flaky. He came in a distant third. (Perhaps he could take some solice that the candidate of the people who allegedly threatened him did not win.)
Gary Hart was the overwhelming favorite to capture the democratic nomination when he was caught with his girlfriend Donna Rice. It was just stupid, but some political collapses are like that.
So that leads us to today's feild. Who will suffer the horrendous flameout? Here are my odds.
Hillary - 10%
Obama - 10%
Edwards - 30%
Guliani - 60%
Thompson - 50%
McCain - 25%
I think in terms of flameouts this feild is promising, but not at the top of the Democratic feild. I think Hillary's camp wants to play from the frontrunner position allowing her to spend her time acting presidential and practically benevolent to her competitors. She will not allow any candidate to seem more hawkish than her when discussing combat, but on the same token her benevolence towards her fellow Democrats is helping the onetime "harpy" look almost grandmotherly. If she is constantly in the public presence and constantly putting out that tea and cookies vibe, eventually the hope is the public's high negative rating of her will enventually diminish. It isn't a bad plan at all.
Obama is a veteran politician with polished handlers too. I am frustrated by Obama's slow play, but I understand it. The Clinton handlers are the Democratic versions of Karl Rove. When Obama pushed close to Hillary a few months ago, Hillary and her handlers panicked and attcked pretty hard. It came back to bite Hillary, but next time it might not. Obama's handlers are pretty smart to let hillary have a comfortable (but not insurmountable) lead now, 6 months before the elections. That keeps the dirty tricks put away. I think the plan is probably to slowly chip away at the clock. As the election grows nearer, the smaller candidates will drop out or become so marginalized that their voters will abandon them. Obama's handlers are right to think that those voters are probably (with Hilary's 40 % negative approval rating) picking their favorite non-Hillary flavor and Obama will be their second choice. I think the plan is to pick up those votes and put on a feirce charge in the last 45 days, hoping Hillary and her handlers panic and make another mistake that may prove catestrophic. Again, not that bad of a plan, just pretty unsatisfying to me personally.
I rate Edwards at a 30% to meltdown, but that is misleading. Edwards isn't a frontrunner, so can he actually meltdown? I think Edwards has a handful of things working in his favor and a handful of things working against him. He has the legitimacy of and the experience from being a VP candidate. People know him and he has a better feel for what people want. He has good messages even if they are slightly too complex for his target audience. He has more than a little simpathy due to his wife's regrettable condition. On the negative side, he ooses pansy. I am sure I am not the only one who wonders if he is closeted. He is a bit of a fancy lad. As W proved in the last election, if you can't do anything else right, be predictable, dim, and painfully and consistently unrefined. Americans do not like to think and interpret candidates like W as "honest". I think that is maybe ingrained in us, since Hoover ruined being smart. Edwards is trying to make it a 3 person race so he can essentially decide the democratic nomination and use that to become VP. If he can consistently finish a strong third and maybe win some southern states, (Hillary and Obama are Yankees afterall) he could essentially demand the VP job with his delegates' votes. I find his campaign to be one of the more interesting stories on the democratic side as I think Obama REALLY doesn't like him and Hillary might be wise to grab New Mexico Governor Richardson as her running mate --- something I am sure her advisors have considered. It is in both candidate's interest to marginalize Edwards.
Guliani is the Howard Dean of this election. He has probably the greatest positive rating of any candidate among the entire voting electorate, but he is a green presidential candidate and simply is not conservative enough for his base. Like Dean, the Republican Party will do their damnedest to replace him with someone they like (Thompson). He is a very soft front runner.
Like the Dems with Kerry, the Republicans should be careful what they wish for in Thompson. He is a tough badger of a man ala Dick Cheney, but has that great mix of being unknown enough not to have gobs of enemies, but known enough to be seen as the savior of the party. Not so fast though. More than one account by people who know him well question whether he has the heart to go through the race. The very way he is holding off entering the race until essentially the last second possible (rumored to declare July 4th) could indicate that while he may want to be president he is not in a hurry to have to go through all the abuse to get there. Make no mistake about it, Guliani's may be a weak front runner but every politician at that level (ok, not named John McCain) knows how to go negative. And I totally see Mitt Romney brutalizing both front runners with his fat election cash. Thompson's people seem capable and the hard core conservative republicans are begging him to get into the race probably promising that it will be fairly easy, but if Thompson's heart really isn't in it and it turns out to be too much of a fight, I could see Thompson bailing before the primaries are over and throwing his support behind his friend McCain. The aftermath of that would really be something to see.
Like Edwards a true meltdown doesn't seem likely for McCain at this point --- although you could argue it already happened when he adopted the Iraq war and gave it a matching comb over at the start of his campaign. (I still think that approach will not end up burning him quite as badly as most thought at the time, because one of the only real constants in life is that people change their minds. What was hideously unpopular today might be marginally acceptable tomorrow. Look at bell bottoms and Bill Clinton.) At this point it seems like McCain will either peter along and maybe land enough support to become someone's VP or will be the veteran campaigner who capitalizes on someone else's mistakes or collapses to win the nomination in some bizzare finish.
I think Romney is done, so there is no meltdown rating on him. Like Edwards he sets off gaydar with his soft hand gestures. On the Republican side of the house voters are MUCH more sensitive to that, and I think that has a LOT more to do with his lack of traction than his Mormon faith. I don't think the republicans have put it together beyond "there's something I don't like about that guy". (The funny thing about it is that if he had run as a democrat he might have been the favorite right now. Now mind you jumping parties and running for office is not a simple thing, but think about it. He is Gary Hart without the girlfriend. He is tall and polished. He is financially conservative, but has always been socially progressive up to now. He could have run as what he (probably) is and has been, instead of what the voters want him to be. He isn't black or female which makes him an easier candidate for the American public to accept than Hillary or Obama. He would have been a stronger, more accomplished, more impressive version of John Edwards.)
* "And who would have been better vice presidential candiates than South Carolina's John Edwards?" Well, Howard Dean for one. When you really get down to it, Edwards did a fair job of holding his own in a debate against VP Dick Cheney and did a decent job being the ticket's attack dog --- allowing Kerry to look somewhat presidential staying above the frey for the most part, but Edwards at that point in his life just wasn't a pit bull. Dean would have been relentless in wrecking bush. Other candidates who a halfway decent manager and presidential candidate similar to Kerry (without the rocks in his head) might have selected would include former NATO commander and four star general Wesley Clark or former Florida Governor and Senator Bob Graham. Clark would have turned the election into a choice of two military heroes vs. two chicken hawks to run the war in Iraq. His presence on the ticket would have, in essence, validated Kerry's military resume. Clark's platforms also were much more substative than Kerry's and frankly Clark with his experience in world affairs probably would have at least broken even with Cheney in the VP debate. With Clark on the ticket, the military vote would have gone to Kerry --- that would have been enough. Graham also probably would have delivered the presidency. Graham had been governer and a senator in Florida and in his time in politics had NEVER LOST a florida election. It doesn't seem a big stretch that he could have delivered enough additional voters to capture Florida's 27 electoral votes.
But hold on. People forget about the flameout factor. In almost every Presidental election, one candidate flames out famously after seemingly wrapping things up. Think about it. Dean in 2004. McCain in 2000. Perot in 1992. Hart in 1988.
Let's review.
Dean was an outsider who was running away with the Democratic nomination with his narrow focus demolition of George Bush. His attacks in large part helped Bush's public support crumble to below 50% --- a historically guaranteed benchmark that foretold certain Republican failure. Then Dean made a weird noise that was recorded on tape. The Democratic establishment saw their opportunity to replace Dean with one of their own. The Democratic establishment rolled Dean up like old carpet and laid down John Kerry. Kerry, in spite of (because of?) his war hero past, simply couldn't deliver the biting Bush critism that Dean provided and his choice of a relative unknown who delivered no tangible benefits for vice president lead the Democrats to snatch defeat from the jaws of certain victory.*
But...I digress. Dean is the story here. He was too inexperienced to hold the crest. When he encountered a bad patch he and his advisors were unable to turn the tide.
John McCain seemed likely to wrap up the Republican nomination in 2000, then Karl Rove and his hatchet men spread stories of McCain having a half black child out of wedlock. (I think it turned out to be an adopted child or something totally innocent like that.) The story was not addressed immediately and properly by McCain and his staff. It festered. McCain fell behind Bush. To this day, he still doesn't seem to have recovered from the experience, seeming every bit as shellshocked as the day he lost to Bush.
Ross Perot was well on his way to winning the election of 1992 over the unpopular incumbent George Bush and unknown democratic candidate Bill Clinton when if Perot is to be believed --- and I don't see why not --- someone on the Republican side threatened to kill his family members if he stayed in the race. Apparently Perot felt this individual/group had the means to do it. He quit the race. Then he thought better of it and rejoined the race. At that point a good part of his support decided he wasn't just eccentric --- he was also flaky. He came in a distant third. (Perhaps he could take some solice that the candidate of the people who allegedly threatened him did not win.)
Gary Hart was the overwhelming favorite to capture the democratic nomination when he was caught with his girlfriend Donna Rice. It was just stupid, but some political collapses are like that.
So that leads us to today's feild. Who will suffer the horrendous flameout? Here are my odds.
Hillary - 10%
Obama - 10%
Edwards - 30%
Guliani - 60%
Thompson - 50%
McCain - 25%
I think in terms of flameouts this feild is promising, but not at the top of the Democratic feild. I think Hillary's camp wants to play from the frontrunner position allowing her to spend her time acting presidential and practically benevolent to her competitors. She will not allow any candidate to seem more hawkish than her when discussing combat, but on the same token her benevolence towards her fellow Democrats is helping the onetime "harpy" look almost grandmotherly. If she is constantly in the public presence and constantly putting out that tea and cookies vibe, eventually the hope is the public's high negative rating of her will enventually diminish. It isn't a bad plan at all.
Obama is a veteran politician with polished handlers too. I am frustrated by Obama's slow play, but I understand it. The Clinton handlers are the Democratic versions of Karl Rove. When Obama pushed close to Hillary a few months ago, Hillary and her handlers panicked and attcked pretty hard. It came back to bite Hillary, but next time it might not. Obama's handlers are pretty smart to let hillary have a comfortable (but not insurmountable) lead now, 6 months before the elections. That keeps the dirty tricks put away. I think the plan is probably to slowly chip away at the clock. As the election grows nearer, the smaller candidates will drop out or become so marginalized that their voters will abandon them. Obama's handlers are right to think that those voters are probably (with Hilary's 40 % negative approval rating) picking their favorite non-Hillary flavor and Obama will be their second choice. I think the plan is to pick up those votes and put on a feirce charge in the last 45 days, hoping Hillary and her handlers panic and make another mistake that may prove catestrophic. Again, not that bad of a plan, just pretty unsatisfying to me personally.
I rate Edwards at a 30% to meltdown, but that is misleading. Edwards isn't a frontrunner, so can he actually meltdown? I think Edwards has a handful of things working in his favor and a handful of things working against him. He has the legitimacy of and the experience from being a VP candidate. People know him and he has a better feel for what people want. He has good messages even if they are slightly too complex for his target audience. He has more than a little simpathy due to his wife's regrettable condition. On the negative side, he ooses pansy. I am sure I am not the only one who wonders if he is closeted. He is a bit of a fancy lad. As W proved in the last election, if you can't do anything else right, be predictable, dim, and painfully and consistently unrefined. Americans do not like to think and interpret candidates like W as "honest". I think that is maybe ingrained in us, since Hoover ruined being smart. Edwards is trying to make it a 3 person race so he can essentially decide the democratic nomination and use that to become VP. If he can consistently finish a strong third and maybe win some southern states, (Hillary and Obama are Yankees afterall) he could essentially demand the VP job with his delegates' votes. I find his campaign to be one of the more interesting stories on the democratic side as I think Obama REALLY doesn't like him and Hillary might be wise to grab New Mexico Governor Richardson as her running mate --- something I am sure her advisors have considered. It is in both candidate's interest to marginalize Edwards.
Guliani is the Howard Dean of this election. He has probably the greatest positive rating of any candidate among the entire voting electorate, but he is a green presidential candidate and simply is not conservative enough for his base. Like Dean, the Republican Party will do their damnedest to replace him with someone they like (Thompson). He is a very soft front runner.
Like the Dems with Kerry, the Republicans should be careful what they wish for in Thompson. He is a tough badger of a man ala Dick Cheney, but has that great mix of being unknown enough not to have gobs of enemies, but known enough to be seen as the savior of the party. Not so fast though. More than one account by people who know him well question whether he has the heart to go through the race. The very way he is holding off entering the race until essentially the last second possible (rumored to declare July 4th) could indicate that while he may want to be president he is not in a hurry to have to go through all the abuse to get there. Make no mistake about it, Guliani's may be a weak front runner but every politician at that level (ok, not named John McCain) knows how to go negative. And I totally see Mitt Romney brutalizing both front runners with his fat election cash. Thompson's people seem capable and the hard core conservative republicans are begging him to get into the race probably promising that it will be fairly easy, but if Thompson's heart really isn't in it and it turns out to be too much of a fight, I could see Thompson bailing before the primaries are over and throwing his support behind his friend McCain. The aftermath of that would really be something to see.
Like Edwards a true meltdown doesn't seem likely for McCain at this point --- although you could argue it already happened when he adopted the Iraq war and gave it a matching comb over at the start of his campaign. (I still think that approach will not end up burning him quite as badly as most thought at the time, because one of the only real constants in life is that people change their minds. What was hideously unpopular today might be marginally acceptable tomorrow. Look at bell bottoms and Bill Clinton.) At this point it seems like McCain will either peter along and maybe land enough support to become someone's VP or will be the veteran campaigner who capitalizes on someone else's mistakes or collapses to win the nomination in some bizzare finish.
I think Romney is done, so there is no meltdown rating on him. Like Edwards he sets off gaydar with his soft hand gestures. On the Republican side of the house voters are MUCH more sensitive to that, and I think that has a LOT more to do with his lack of traction than his Mormon faith. I don't think the republicans have put it together beyond "there's something I don't like about that guy". (The funny thing about it is that if he had run as a democrat he might have been the favorite right now. Now mind you jumping parties and running for office is not a simple thing, but think about it. He is Gary Hart without the girlfriend. He is tall and polished. He is financially conservative, but has always been socially progressive up to now. He could have run as what he (probably) is and has been, instead of what the voters want him to be. He isn't black or female which makes him an easier candidate for the American public to accept than Hillary or Obama. He would have been a stronger, more accomplished, more impressive version of John Edwards.)
* "And who would have been better vice presidential candiates than South Carolina's John Edwards?" Well, Howard Dean for one. When you really get down to it, Edwards did a fair job of holding his own in a debate against VP Dick Cheney and did a decent job being the ticket's attack dog --- allowing Kerry to look somewhat presidential staying above the frey for the most part, but Edwards at that point in his life just wasn't a pit bull. Dean would have been relentless in wrecking bush. Other candidates who a halfway decent manager and presidential candidate similar to Kerry (without the rocks in his head) might have selected would include former NATO commander and four star general Wesley Clark or former Florida Governor and Senator Bob Graham. Clark would have turned the election into a choice of two military heroes vs. two chicken hawks to run the war in Iraq. His presence on the ticket would have, in essence, validated Kerry's military resume. Clark's platforms also were much more substative than Kerry's and frankly Clark with his experience in world affairs probably would have at least broken even with Cheney in the VP debate. With Clark on the ticket, the military vote would have gone to Kerry --- that would have been enough. Graham also probably would have delivered the presidency. Graham had been governer and a senator in Florida and in his time in politics had NEVER LOST a florida election. It doesn't seem a big stretch that he could have delivered enough additional voters to capture Florida's 27 electoral votes.
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
"U.S. policy on immigration is a tragic joke..." By Lou Dobbs
http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/viewpoints/articles/0828dobbs0828.html
There is a common front in our illegal-alien crisis, the war on drugs and the global war on terror. That front line is easily defined as our nation's borders, airports and seaports. And Arizonans know only too well the pain and problems of living and working on the front line of our border with Mexico.
South of that border is a corrupt and ineffective government run by President Vicente Fox, who has no apparent incentive to control the flow of drugs being shipped from Mexico into the United States and every incentive to continue the exportation of illegal aliens into this country. This year, in fact, remittances back to Mexico from the estimated 20 million Mexican citizens living in the United States, most of them illegally, surpassed oil as Mexico's No. 1 source of foreign revenue.
In the United States, an obscene alliance of corporate supremacists, desperate labor unions, certain ethnocentric Latino activist organizations and a majority of our elected officials in Washington works diligently to keep our borders open, wages suppressed and the American people all but helpless to resist the crushing financial and economic burden created by the millions of illegal aliens who crash our borders each year.
They work just as hard to deny the truth to the American public. That's why almost every evening on my CNN broadcast we report on this country's "Broken Borders." The truth is that U.S. immigration policy is a tragic joke at the expense of hard-working middle-class Americans.
What has been the response of the Bush administration? It proposed a guest-worker program giving legal status to millions of illegal aliens. But national opinion polls reveal an overwhelming majority of Americans are contemptuous of such cynical proposals. The latest Zogby poll shows only 35 percent of those surveyed support the president's approach. The American people want our borders secure, want our immigration laws enforced and want those who hire illegal aliens both punished and held liable for the economic and social costs of breaking our laws.
We are a nation of immigrants, and there is no more diverse and welcoming society than ours. But we are first a nation of laws, and upholding those laws and our national values makes this great country of ours possible.
Arizonans are to be commended for passing Proposition 200 and creating the political will that led to last week's declaration of the state of emergency by Gov. Janet Napolitano. Neither act is sufficient to solve our illegal-immigration crisis, but both acts constitute a beginning in resolving what may well be the most critical issue facing the United States.
Last week, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said he wanted to "stabilize" our borders and create more detainee beds and expedite more deportations. Stabilizing our borders is not enough. If we do not take control of our borders, deportations amount to little more than inconvenience to illegal aliens and whomever else wants to enter our country.
Failure to secure our borders means that we will continue to lose the war on drugs and lose a generation of Americans to those drugs. It also means the crushing burden of our failed immigration and homeland security policies will continue to fall exclusively on the shoulders of working men and women. Not only do illegal aliens and those who employ them cost the nation tens of billions of dollars in social services, principally in health care and education, they also depress wages for American citizens by an estimated $200 billion a year.
The most reasonable response I have seen to this illegal-immigration crisis is legislation introduced by one of your state's distinguished senators, Jon Kyl, who co-sponsored a bill with Sen. John Cornyn. That bill seeks 10,000 new Border Patrol agents and detention beds, fraud-resistant Social Security cards, increased penalties for employers and current illegal aliens would have to leave the United States to apply for permanent citizenship.
Reform begins with the truth. And our elected officials must begin to recognize the reality that a war on terror and war on drugs can be won only by securing our borders and that any reform of our immigration policies must begin first at the front line of the crisis: our border with Mexico. Anything less is just another sad joke, and we know at whose expense.
Lou Dobbs is the anchor and managing editor of CNN's "Lou Dobbs Tonight."
There is a common front in our illegal-alien crisis, the war on drugs and the global war on terror. That front line is easily defined as our nation's borders, airports and seaports. And Arizonans know only too well the pain and problems of living and working on the front line of our border with Mexico.
South of that border is a corrupt and ineffective government run by President Vicente Fox, who has no apparent incentive to control the flow of drugs being shipped from Mexico into the United States and every incentive to continue the exportation of illegal aliens into this country. This year, in fact, remittances back to Mexico from the estimated 20 million Mexican citizens living in the United States, most of them illegally, surpassed oil as Mexico's No. 1 source of foreign revenue.
In the United States, an obscene alliance of corporate supremacists, desperate labor unions, certain ethnocentric Latino activist organizations and a majority of our elected officials in Washington works diligently to keep our borders open, wages suppressed and the American people all but helpless to resist the crushing financial and economic burden created by the millions of illegal aliens who crash our borders each year.
They work just as hard to deny the truth to the American public. That's why almost every evening on my CNN broadcast we report on this country's "Broken Borders." The truth is that U.S. immigration policy is a tragic joke at the expense of hard-working middle-class Americans.
What has been the response of the Bush administration? It proposed a guest-worker program giving legal status to millions of illegal aliens. But national opinion polls reveal an overwhelming majority of Americans are contemptuous of such cynical proposals. The latest Zogby poll shows only 35 percent of those surveyed support the president's approach. The American people want our borders secure, want our immigration laws enforced and want those who hire illegal aliens both punished and held liable for the economic and social costs of breaking our laws.
We are a nation of immigrants, and there is no more diverse and welcoming society than ours. But we are first a nation of laws, and upholding those laws and our national values makes this great country of ours possible.
Arizonans are to be commended for passing Proposition 200 and creating the political will that led to last week's declaration of the state of emergency by Gov. Janet Napolitano. Neither act is sufficient to solve our illegal-immigration crisis, but both acts constitute a beginning in resolving what may well be the most critical issue facing the United States.
Last week, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said he wanted to "stabilize" our borders and create more detainee beds and expedite more deportations. Stabilizing our borders is not enough. If we do not take control of our borders, deportations amount to little more than inconvenience to illegal aliens and whomever else wants to enter our country.
Failure to secure our borders means that we will continue to lose the war on drugs and lose a generation of Americans to those drugs. It also means the crushing burden of our failed immigration and homeland security policies will continue to fall exclusively on the shoulders of working men and women. Not only do illegal aliens and those who employ them cost the nation tens of billions of dollars in social services, principally in health care and education, they also depress wages for American citizens by an estimated $200 billion a year.
The most reasonable response I have seen to this illegal-immigration crisis is legislation introduced by one of your state's distinguished senators, Jon Kyl, who co-sponsored a bill with Sen. John Cornyn. That bill seeks 10,000 new Border Patrol agents and detention beds, fraud-resistant Social Security cards, increased penalties for employers and current illegal aliens would have to leave the United States to apply for permanent citizenship.
Reform begins with the truth. And our elected officials must begin to recognize the reality that a war on terror and war on drugs can be won only by securing our borders and that any reform of our immigration policies must begin first at the front line of the crisis: our border with Mexico. Anything less is just another sad joke, and we know at whose expense.
Lou Dobbs is the anchor and managing editor of CNN's "Lou Dobbs Tonight."
Monday, May 28, 2007
"How do I become an Illegal Alien?" (a letter to Tom Harkin)
I was sent this by a friend via e-mail. It purports to be an actual letter from an Iowa resident sent to his senator. I am posting this because it raises questions on both ends and is a fascinating read. I have not yet had a chance to read the proposed immigration bill, so unfortunately I cannot conclusively say whether this letter accurately sums up the benefits and costs illegal immigrants might receive or whether this is simply a part of the standard disingenuous smear campaigning that we often see when something is put out that radicals at either part of the spectrum disagree upon. It is certainly a motivation to track that piece of legislation down though.
"The Honorable Tom Harkin
731 Hart Senate Office Building
Phone (202) 224 3254
Washington DC , 20510
Dear Senator Harkin,
As a native Iowan and excellent customer of the Internal Revenue Service, I am writing to ask for your assistance. I have contacted the Department of Homeland Security in an effort to determine the process for becoming an illegal alien and they referred me to you.
My primary reason for wishing to change my status from U.S. Citizen to illegal alien stems from the bill which was recently passed by the Senate and for which you voted. If my understanding of this bill's provisions is accurate, as an illegal alien who has been in the United States for five years, all I need to do to become a citizen is to pay a $2,000 fine and income taxes for three of the last five years. I know a good deal when I see one and I am anxious to get the process started before everyone figures it out.
Simply put, those of us who have been here legally have had to pay taxes every year so I'm excited about the prospect of avoiding two years of taxes in return for paying a $2,000 fine. Is there any way that I can apply to be illegal retroactively? This would yield an excellent result for me and my family because we paid heavy taxes in 2004 and 2005. Additionally, as an illegal alien I could begin using the local emergency room as my primary health care provider. Once I have stopped paying premiums for medical insurance, my accountant figures I could save almost $10,000 a year.
Another benefit in gaining illegal status would be that my daughter would receive preferential treatment relative to her law school applications, as well as "in-state" tuition rates for many colleges throughout the United States for my son. Lastly, I understand that illegal status would relieve me of the burden of renewing my driver's license and making those burdensome car insurance premiums. This is very important to me given that I still have college age children driving my car.
If you would provide me with an outline of the process to become illegal (retroactively if possible) and copies of the necessary forms, I would be most appreciative.
Thank you for your assistance.
Your Loyal Constituent,
Donald Ruppert
Burlington , IA
Get your Forms (NOW)!! Call your Internal Revenue Service 1-800-289-1040. Please pass this onto your friends so they can save on this great offer!!!!"
"The Honorable Tom Harkin
731 Hart Senate Office Building
Phone (202) 224 3254
Washington DC , 20510
Dear Senator Harkin,
As a native Iowan and excellent customer of the Internal Revenue Service, I am writing to ask for your assistance. I have contacted the Department of Homeland Security in an effort to determine the process for becoming an illegal alien and they referred me to you.
My primary reason for wishing to change my status from U.S. Citizen to illegal alien stems from the bill which was recently passed by the Senate and for which you voted. If my understanding of this bill's provisions is accurate, as an illegal alien who has been in the United States for five years, all I need to do to become a citizen is to pay a $2,000 fine and income taxes for three of the last five years. I know a good deal when I see one and I am anxious to get the process started before everyone figures it out.
Simply put, those of us who have been here legally have had to pay taxes every year so I'm excited about the prospect of avoiding two years of taxes in return for paying a $2,000 fine. Is there any way that I can apply to be illegal retroactively? This would yield an excellent result for me and my family because we paid heavy taxes in 2004 and 2005. Additionally, as an illegal alien I could begin using the local emergency room as my primary health care provider. Once I have stopped paying premiums for medical insurance, my accountant figures I could save almost $10,000 a year.
Another benefit in gaining illegal status would be that my daughter would receive preferential treatment relative to her law school applications, as well as "in-state" tuition rates for many colleges throughout the United States for my son. Lastly, I understand that illegal status would relieve me of the burden of renewing my driver's license and making those burdensome car insurance premiums. This is very important to me given that I still have college age children driving my car.
If you would provide me with an outline of the process to become illegal (retroactively if possible) and copies of the necessary forms, I would be most appreciative.
Thank you for your assistance.
Your Loyal Constituent,
Donald Ruppert
Burlington , IA
Get your Forms (NOW)!! Call your Internal Revenue Service 1-800-289-1040. Please pass this onto your friends so they can save on this great offer!!!!"
Thursday, May 24, 2007
Democratic leadership owned by Bush
pulled from http://www.thenation.com/blogs/notion?pid=198331
" Not a "Compromise," It's a Blank Check
by John Nichols
The question is not whether House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid flinched in their negotiations with the Bush administration over the continuation of the Iraq occupation.
They did. Despite some happy talk about benchmarks that have been attached to the Iraq supplemental spending bill that is expected to be considered by Congress this week, the willingness of Pelosi and Reid to advance a measure that does not include a withdrawal timeline allows Bush to conduct the war as he chooses for much if not all of the remainder of his presidency. This failure to abide by the will of the people who elected Democrats to end the war will haunt Pelosi, Reid and their party -- not to mention the United States and the battered shell that is Iraq.
This "compromise" legislation is such an embarrassing example of what happens when raw politics overwhelms principle -- and political common sense -- that House Democrats have divided the $12O billion measure into two sections. That will allow Republicans and sold-out Democrats to vote for the president's Iraq funding, while anti-war Democrats and their handful of Republican allies can vote "no." Then both Democratic camps can vote separately for the second section -- including a federal minimum-wage increase and more than $8 billion in funding for domestic programs -- while Republicans oppose this section.
Presuming that both parts pass the House, they will then be sent to the Senate as a single bill for members of that chamber to accept or reject. The end result of this confusing set of legislative maneuvers will be twofold: Lots of House members will be able to avoid accountability for their votes, while Bush will get his blank check. Even Pelosi says she'll vote against the Iraq funding section of the House bill because it lacks "a goal or a timetable" for extracting U.S. troops from the conflict. But, no matter how she votes, Pelosi will have facilitated a process that gives the president more war funding than he had initially requested
But the real story now is not the refusal of the Democratic leaders of the House and Senate to hold steady in the face of the president's cynical claim that refusing him a blank check to maintain his war through the end of his presidency somehow threatens U.S. troops. That has happened and no matter what games are played with voting procedures, the reality is that the Democratic leadership has failed to lead at the most critical juncture.
The question that remains to be answered is a frustrating but significant one: How many Democrats and responsible Republicans will refuse to accept this ugly political calculus?
What we know is that there will be opposition. MoveOn.org, which provided critical cover for the Democratic leadership during earlier fights on the supplemental and related matters, is now urging all Democrats to vote "no" on the war funding -- and it is threatening in-district ad campaigns against Democrats and Republicans who back the measure.
The most genuinely anti-war members will not need any encouragement to reject the deal.
Senator Russ Feingold, the Wisconsin Democrat who has led the fight to get Congress to use the power of the purse to bring the troops home, immediately announced that he would not follow Reid into the abyss of surrender to a White House that is getting everything that it wants.
"Under the president's Iraq policies, our military has been over-burdened, our national security has been jeopardized, and thousands of Americans have been killed or injured. Despite these realities, and the support of a majority of Americans for ending the President's open-ended mission in Iraq, congressional leaders now propose a supplemental appropriations bill that does nothing to end this disastrous war," says Feingold. "I cannot support a bill that contains nothing more than toothless benchmarks and that allows the President to continue what may be the greatest foreign policy blunder in our nation's history."
Anticipating the cynical gamesmanship of the debate that will play out this week, the Wisconsin Democrat says, "There has been a lot of tough talk from members of Congress about wanting to end this war, but it looks like the desire for political comfort won out over real action. Congress should have stood strong, acknowledged the will of the American people, and insisted on a bill requiring a real change of course in Iraq."
Feingold is, of course, right. But how many senators will join him in voting "no"? That question is especially significant for the four Senate Democrats who are seeking their party's presidential nomination: New York's Hillary Clinton, Illinois' Barack Obama, Delaware's Joe Biden and Connecticut's Chris Dodd. Dodd says he is "disappointed" by the abandonment of the timeline demand; if he presses the point as he did on another recent war-related vote, he could force the hands of the other candidates. If either Clinton or Obama do go ahead and vote for the legislation, and certainly if both of them do so, they will create a huge opening for former North Carolina John Edwards, who has staked out the clearest anti-war position of the front runners for the nomination. But this is about more than just Democratic presidential politics: A number of Senate Republicans who are up for reelection next year -- including Maine's Susan Collins, Minnesota's Norm Coleman and Oregon's Gordon Smith -- may well be casting the most important votes of their political careers.
Collins, Coleman and Smith have tried to straddle the war debate. If they vote to give George Bush another blank check, however, they will have removed any doubt regarding how serious they are about ending the war -- as will their colleagues on both sides of the aisle.
BLOG | Posted 05/23/2007 @ 10:20am
Not a "Compromise," It's a Blank Check
John Nichols
PERMALINK SEE ALL POSTS
EMAIL THIS POST COMMENTS (101)
The question is not whether House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid flinched in their negotiations with the Bush administration over the continuation of the Iraq occupation.
They did. Despite some happy talk about benchmarks that have been attached to the Iraq supplemental spending bill that is expected to be considered by Congress this week, the willingness of Pelosi and Reid to advance a measure that does not include a withdrawal timeline allows Bush to conduct the war as he chooses for much if not all of the remainder of his presidency. This failure to abide by the will of the people who elected Democrats to end the war will haunt Pelosi, Reid and their party -- not to mention the United States and the battered shell that is Iraq.
This "compromise" legislation is such an embarrassing example of what happens when raw politics overwhelms principle -- and political common sense -- that House Democrats have divided the $12O billion measure into two sections. That will allow Republicans and sold-out Democrats to vote for the president's Iraq funding, while anti-war Democrats and their handful of Republican allies can vote "no." Then both Democratic camps can vote separately for the second section -- including a federal minimum-wage increase and more than $8 billion in funding for domestic programs -- while Republicans oppose this section.
Presuming that both parts pass the House, they will then be sent to the Senate as a single bill for members of that chamber to accept or reject. The end result of this confusing set of legislative maneuvers will be twofold: Lots of House members will be able to avoid accountability for their votes, while Bush will get his blank check. Even Pelosi says she'll vote against the Iraq funding section of the House bill because it lacks "a goal or a timetable" for extracting U.S. troops from the conflict. But, no matter how she votes, Pelosi will have facilitated a process that gives the president more war funding than he had initially requested
But the real story now is not the refusal of the Democratic leaders of the House and Senate to hold steady in the face of the president's cynical claim that refusing him a blank check to maintain his war through the end of his presidency somehow threatens U.S. troops. That has happened and no matter what games are played with voting procedures, the reality is that the Democratic leadership has failed to lead at the most critical juncture.
The question that remains to be answered is a frustrating but significant one: How many Democrats and responsible Republicans will refuse to accept this ugly political calculus?
What we know is that there will be opposition. MoveOn.org, which provided critical cover for the Democratic leadership during earlier fights on the supplemental and related matters, is now urging all Democrats to vote "no" on the war funding -- and it is threatening in-district ad campaigns against Democrats and Republicans who back the measure.
The most genuinely anti-war members will not need any encouragement to reject the deal.
Senator Russ Feingold, the Wisconsin Democrat who has led the fight to get Congress to use the power of the purse to bring the troops home, immediately announced that he would not follow Reid into the abyss of surrender to a White House that is getting everything that it wants.
"Under the president's Iraq policies, our military has been over-burdened, our national security has been jeopardized, and thousands of Americans have been killed or injured. Despite these realities, and the support of a majority of Americans for ending the President's open-ended mission in Iraq, congressional leaders now propose a supplemental appropriations bill that does nothing to end this disastrous war," says Feingold. "I cannot support a bill that contains nothing more than toothless benchmarks and that allows the President to continue what may be the greatest foreign policy blunder in our nation's history."
Anticipating the cynical gamesmanship of the debate that will play out this week, the Wisconsin Democrat says, "There has been a lot of tough talk from members of Congress about wanting to end this war, but it looks like the desire for political comfort won out over real action. Congress should have stood strong, acknowledged the will of the American people, and insisted on a bill requiring a real change of course in Iraq."
Feingold is, of course, right. But how many senators will join him in voting "no"? That question is especially significant for the four Senate Democrats who are seeking their party's presidential nomination: New York's Hillary Clinton, Illinois' Barack Obama, Delaware's Joe Biden and Connecticut's Chris Dodd. Dodd says he is "disappointed" by the abandonment of the timeline demand; if he presses the point as he did on another recent war-related vote, he could force the hands of the other candidates. If either Clinton or Obama do go ahead and vote for the legislation, and certainly if both of them do so, they will create a huge opening for former North Carolina John Edwards, who has staked out the clearest anti-war position of the front runners for the nomination. But this is about more than just Democratic presidential politics: A number of Senate Republicans who are up for reelection next year -- including Maine's Susan Collins, Minnesota's Norm Coleman and Oregon's Gordon Smith -- may well be casting the most important votes of their political careers.
Collins, Coleman and Smith have tried to straddle the war debate. If they vote to give George Bush another blank check, however, they will have removed any doubt regarding how serious they are about ending the war -- as will their colleagues on both sides of the aisle.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
John Nichols' new book, THE GENIUS OF IMPEACHMENT: The Founders' Cure for Royalism has been hailed by authors and historians Gore Vidal, Studs Terkel and Howard Zinn for its meticulous research into the intentions of the founders and embraced by activists for its groundbreaking arguments on behalf of presidential accountability. After reviewing recent books on impeachment, Rolling Stone political writer Tim Dickinson, writes in the latest issue of Mother Jones, "John Nichols' nervy, acerbic, passionately argued history-cum-polemic, The Genius of Impeachment, stands apart. It concerns itself far less with the particulars of the legal case against Bush and Cheney, and instead combines a rich examination of the parliamentary roots and past use of the "heroic medicine" that is impeachment with a call for Democratic leaders to 'reclaim and reuse the most vital tool handed to us by the founders for the defense of our most basic liberties.'" "
" Not a "Compromise," It's a Blank Check
by John Nichols
The question is not whether House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid flinched in their negotiations with the Bush administration over the continuation of the Iraq occupation.
They did. Despite some happy talk about benchmarks that have been attached to the Iraq supplemental spending bill that is expected to be considered by Congress this week, the willingness of Pelosi and Reid to advance a measure that does not include a withdrawal timeline allows Bush to conduct the war as he chooses for much if not all of the remainder of his presidency. This failure to abide by the will of the people who elected Democrats to end the war will haunt Pelosi, Reid and their party -- not to mention the United States and the battered shell that is Iraq.
This "compromise" legislation is such an embarrassing example of what happens when raw politics overwhelms principle -- and political common sense -- that House Democrats have divided the $12O billion measure into two sections. That will allow Republicans and sold-out Democrats to vote for the president's Iraq funding, while anti-war Democrats and their handful of Republican allies can vote "no." Then both Democratic camps can vote separately for the second section -- including a federal minimum-wage increase and more than $8 billion in funding for domestic programs -- while Republicans oppose this section.
Presuming that both parts pass the House, they will then be sent to the Senate as a single bill for members of that chamber to accept or reject. The end result of this confusing set of legislative maneuvers will be twofold: Lots of House members will be able to avoid accountability for their votes, while Bush will get his blank check. Even Pelosi says she'll vote against the Iraq funding section of the House bill because it lacks "a goal or a timetable" for extracting U.S. troops from the conflict. But, no matter how she votes, Pelosi will have facilitated a process that gives the president more war funding than he had initially requested
But the real story now is not the refusal of the Democratic leaders of the House and Senate to hold steady in the face of the president's cynical claim that refusing him a blank check to maintain his war through the end of his presidency somehow threatens U.S. troops. That has happened and no matter what games are played with voting procedures, the reality is that the Democratic leadership has failed to lead at the most critical juncture.
The question that remains to be answered is a frustrating but significant one: How many Democrats and responsible Republicans will refuse to accept this ugly political calculus?
What we know is that there will be opposition. MoveOn.org, which provided critical cover for the Democratic leadership during earlier fights on the supplemental and related matters, is now urging all Democrats to vote "no" on the war funding -- and it is threatening in-district ad campaigns against Democrats and Republicans who back the measure.
The most genuinely anti-war members will not need any encouragement to reject the deal.
Senator Russ Feingold, the Wisconsin Democrat who has led the fight to get Congress to use the power of the purse to bring the troops home, immediately announced that he would not follow Reid into the abyss of surrender to a White House that is getting everything that it wants.
"Under the president's Iraq policies, our military has been over-burdened, our national security has been jeopardized, and thousands of Americans have been killed or injured. Despite these realities, and the support of a majority of Americans for ending the President's open-ended mission in Iraq, congressional leaders now propose a supplemental appropriations bill that does nothing to end this disastrous war," says Feingold. "I cannot support a bill that contains nothing more than toothless benchmarks and that allows the President to continue what may be the greatest foreign policy blunder in our nation's history."
Anticipating the cynical gamesmanship of the debate that will play out this week, the Wisconsin Democrat says, "There has been a lot of tough talk from members of Congress about wanting to end this war, but it looks like the desire for political comfort won out over real action. Congress should have stood strong, acknowledged the will of the American people, and insisted on a bill requiring a real change of course in Iraq."
Feingold is, of course, right. But how many senators will join him in voting "no"? That question is especially significant for the four Senate Democrats who are seeking their party's presidential nomination: New York's Hillary Clinton, Illinois' Barack Obama, Delaware's Joe Biden and Connecticut's Chris Dodd. Dodd says he is "disappointed" by the abandonment of the timeline demand; if he presses the point as he did on another recent war-related vote, he could force the hands of the other candidates. If either Clinton or Obama do go ahead and vote for the legislation, and certainly if both of them do so, they will create a huge opening for former North Carolina John Edwards, who has staked out the clearest anti-war position of the front runners for the nomination. But this is about more than just Democratic presidential politics: A number of Senate Republicans who are up for reelection next year -- including Maine's Susan Collins, Minnesota's Norm Coleman and Oregon's Gordon Smith -- may well be casting the most important votes of their political careers.
Collins, Coleman and Smith have tried to straddle the war debate. If they vote to give George Bush another blank check, however, they will have removed any doubt regarding how serious they are about ending the war -- as will their colleagues on both sides of the aisle.
BLOG | Posted 05/23/2007 @ 10:20am
Not a "Compromise," It's a Blank Check
John Nichols
PERMALINK SEE ALL POSTS
EMAIL THIS POST COMMENTS (101)
The question is not whether House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid flinched in their negotiations with the Bush administration over the continuation of the Iraq occupation.
They did. Despite some happy talk about benchmarks that have been attached to the Iraq supplemental spending bill that is expected to be considered by Congress this week, the willingness of Pelosi and Reid to advance a measure that does not include a withdrawal timeline allows Bush to conduct the war as he chooses for much if not all of the remainder of his presidency. This failure to abide by the will of the people who elected Democrats to end the war will haunt Pelosi, Reid and their party -- not to mention the United States and the battered shell that is Iraq.
This "compromise" legislation is such an embarrassing example of what happens when raw politics overwhelms principle -- and political common sense -- that House Democrats have divided the $12O billion measure into two sections. That will allow Republicans and sold-out Democrats to vote for the president's Iraq funding, while anti-war Democrats and their handful of Republican allies can vote "no." Then both Democratic camps can vote separately for the second section -- including a federal minimum-wage increase and more than $8 billion in funding for domestic programs -- while Republicans oppose this section.
Presuming that both parts pass the House, they will then be sent to the Senate as a single bill for members of that chamber to accept or reject. The end result of this confusing set of legislative maneuvers will be twofold: Lots of House members will be able to avoid accountability for their votes, while Bush will get his blank check. Even Pelosi says she'll vote against the Iraq funding section of the House bill because it lacks "a goal or a timetable" for extracting U.S. troops from the conflict. But, no matter how she votes, Pelosi will have facilitated a process that gives the president more war funding than he had initially requested
But the real story now is not the refusal of the Democratic leaders of the House and Senate to hold steady in the face of the president's cynical claim that refusing him a blank check to maintain his war through the end of his presidency somehow threatens U.S. troops. That has happened and no matter what games are played with voting procedures, the reality is that the Democratic leadership has failed to lead at the most critical juncture.
The question that remains to be answered is a frustrating but significant one: How many Democrats and responsible Republicans will refuse to accept this ugly political calculus?
What we know is that there will be opposition. MoveOn.org, which provided critical cover for the Democratic leadership during earlier fights on the supplemental and related matters, is now urging all Democrats to vote "no" on the war funding -- and it is threatening in-district ad campaigns against Democrats and Republicans who back the measure.
The most genuinely anti-war members will not need any encouragement to reject the deal.
Senator Russ Feingold, the Wisconsin Democrat who has led the fight to get Congress to use the power of the purse to bring the troops home, immediately announced that he would not follow Reid into the abyss of surrender to a White House that is getting everything that it wants.
"Under the president's Iraq policies, our military has been over-burdened, our national security has been jeopardized, and thousands of Americans have been killed or injured. Despite these realities, and the support of a majority of Americans for ending the President's open-ended mission in Iraq, congressional leaders now propose a supplemental appropriations bill that does nothing to end this disastrous war," says Feingold. "I cannot support a bill that contains nothing more than toothless benchmarks and that allows the President to continue what may be the greatest foreign policy blunder in our nation's history."
Anticipating the cynical gamesmanship of the debate that will play out this week, the Wisconsin Democrat says, "There has been a lot of tough talk from members of Congress about wanting to end this war, but it looks like the desire for political comfort won out over real action. Congress should have stood strong, acknowledged the will of the American people, and insisted on a bill requiring a real change of course in Iraq."
Feingold is, of course, right. But how many senators will join him in voting "no"? That question is especially significant for the four Senate Democrats who are seeking their party's presidential nomination: New York's Hillary Clinton, Illinois' Barack Obama, Delaware's Joe Biden and Connecticut's Chris Dodd. Dodd says he is "disappointed" by the abandonment of the timeline demand; if he presses the point as he did on another recent war-related vote, he could force the hands of the other candidates. If either Clinton or Obama do go ahead and vote for the legislation, and certainly if both of them do so, they will create a huge opening for former North Carolina John Edwards, who has staked out the clearest anti-war position of the front runners for the nomination. But this is about more than just Democratic presidential politics: A number of Senate Republicans who are up for reelection next year -- including Maine's Susan Collins, Minnesota's Norm Coleman and Oregon's Gordon Smith -- may well be casting the most important votes of their political careers.
Collins, Coleman and Smith have tried to straddle the war debate. If they vote to give George Bush another blank check, however, they will have removed any doubt regarding how serious they are about ending the war -- as will their colleagues on both sides of the aisle.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
John Nichols' new book, THE GENIUS OF IMPEACHMENT: The Founders' Cure for Royalism has been hailed by authors and historians Gore Vidal, Studs Terkel and Howard Zinn for its meticulous research into the intentions of the founders and embraced by activists for its groundbreaking arguments on behalf of presidential accountability. After reviewing recent books on impeachment, Rolling Stone political writer Tim Dickinson, writes in the latest issue of Mother Jones, "John Nichols' nervy, acerbic, passionately argued history-cum-polemic, The Genius of Impeachment, stands apart. It concerns itself far less with the particulars of the legal case against Bush and Cheney, and instead combines a rich examination of the parliamentary roots and past use of the "heroic medicine" that is impeachment with a call for Democratic leaders to 'reclaim and reuse the most vital tool handed to us by the founders for the defense of our most basic liberties.'" "
Saturday, May 5, 2007
The Reagan Library 2008 Presidential Debate: What the Republican Candidates Said About Your Civil Liberties by Tom Head
http://civilliberty.about.com/b/a/257639.htm
The Reagan Library 2008 Presidential Debate: What the Republican Candidates Said About Your Civil Liberties
Read more: The 2008 Republican Presidential Candidates on Civil LibertiesIt has been said that every generation rebels against its parents in a way that pleases its grandparents. Certainly this was the case at last night's Republican presidential debate at the Reagan Library in Simi Valley, California (transcript available), as ten Republican presidential candidates praised the legacy of Ronald Reagan (an average of once every four minutes) while for the most part working to distance themselves from the unpopular presidency of George W. Bush.Before we look at what this debate tells us about Republican candidates' positions on key civil liberties issues, it's worth mentioning some parallels--and non-parallels--with last week's Democratic debate.Both debates were held in states that consistently go to the other party. Republicans held their first presidential debate in California, which no Republican presidential candidate has carried since 1984; Democrats held their first presidential debate in South Carolina, which no Democratic presidential candidate has carried since 1976. But both were held on sites in those states that represented their strengths--the Republican debate in the memorial library dedicated to President Ronald Reagan, the most popular president of our generation, and the Democratic debate in the auditorium of South Carolina State University, one of the strongest historically African-American universities in the country.Both debates focused on the Iraq War. This makes sense from a political standpoint--Democrats want to reiterate President Bush's failure, Republicans want the opportunity to distance themselves from it--but it makes less sense from a policy standpoint, since the Iraq War of November 2008, if in fact there is still an Iraq War at that point, will presumably look very different from the Iraq War of May 2007. We can hope so, anyway--and since candidates on both sides seem to be making "optimism" the buzzword of the day, let's try to pretend it's a well-founded hope.On to demographics--maybe the most striking difference between the Democratic and Republican slates.On the Democratic side of the aisle, I count eight presidential candidates ranging in age from 45 to 76, with a median age of 60. Six of the eight candidates (75%) are white; one candidate is black, another Latino. Seven of the eight candidates are men, while one is a woman. Six of the eight candidates are primarily known as current or former U.S. senators, one as a U.S. representative, and one as a governor.On the Republican side, I count ten presidential candidates ranging in age from 50 to 71, with a median age of 60.5. All ten of the candidates (100%) are white. All ten of the candidates (100%) are male. Two of the ten candidates are known primarily as current or former U.S. senators, three as U.S. representatives, four as governors, and one as a mayor. The Democratic field is much more diverse with respect to race, gender, and age, but all but one of their candidates come from Congress. The Republican field is exclusively white and male, but only half of their candidates come from Congress.Both debates were 90 minutes long and featured some platform-defining statements relevant to civil liberties issues.Last week, I discussed what the Democratic candidates said in their debate. Here's what the Republicans said:
Abortion
Relatively early in the debate, moderator Chris Matthews asked: "Would the day that Roe v. Wade is repealed be a good day for Americans?" Here were the candidates' answers, along with their other remarks on the subject:
Sam Brownback: "Be a glorious day of human liberty and freedom." Brownback did state, however, that he would be able to support a pro-choice nominee on the basis of "the Ronald Reagan principle that somebody that's with you 80 percent of the time is not your enemy."
Jim Gilmore: "Yes, it was wrongly decided."
Gilmore later reiterated his belief that abortion should be legal during the first twelve weeks of pregnancy, but expressed support for waiting period laws, "informed consent" laws, parental notification, and the ban on live intact D&X.
Rudy Giuliani: "It would be okay." Matthews: "Okay to repeal?"Giuliani: "It would be okay to repeal. Or it would be okay also if a strict constructionist judge viewed it as precedent, and I think a judge has to make that decision."Matthews: "Would it be okay if they didn't repeal it?"Giuliani: "I think that -- I think the court has to make that decision, and then the country can deal with it. We're a federalist system of government, and states could make their own decisions."
Giuliani later reiterated that he is pro-choice--"you have to respect a woman's right to make that choice"--but supports the ban on live intact D&X.
Giuliani also highlighted efforts he had made, as mayor of New York City, to make adoption a more realistic option for women experiencing unplanned pregnancies. He claimed that these policy changes contributed to a 16% decrease in the number of abortions in New York City during his tenure.
Mike Huckabee: "Most certainly."
Duncan Hunter: "Yes."
John McCain: "Repeal."
Mitt Romney: "Absolutely."
Romney explained that his views on abortion changed two years ago (from "effectively pro-choice" to "pro-life") during the debate over embryonic stem cell research. "I took the same course that Ronald Reagan and George Herbert Walker Bush and Henry Hyde took ... I said I was wrong and changed my mind and said I'm pro-life." He later stated that he believes abortion should be dealt with on a state-by-state basis, and should be neither banned nor protected by the federal government.
Romney reiterated his support for "informed consent" laws and the ban on live intact D&X abortions. He also called on a loosening of restrictions on anti-abortion protests that take place outside of clinics, restrictions that were enacted after several notorious incidents of clinic violence during the 1990s. He took a potshot at the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform bill, which he argued "prevents ... those that care about this issue [from being] heard before Election Day."
Tom Tancredo: "After 40 million dead because we have aborted them in this country, I say that that would be the greatest day in this country's history when that is in fact overturned."
Later, when asked a reader's question regarding women's rights, including both fair wages and reproductive rights, Tancredo said: "The right to kill another person is not a right that I would agree with and support." Even though he still had another 13 seconds on the clock, Tancredo otherwise passed on the question and did not mention any measures he would take to protect women's rights in other areas.
Tommy Thompson: "Yes." Thompson later stated that he believes that individual states should have the right to make abortion legal or illegal, as they see fit.
Curiously, nobody mentioned a rape or incest exemption.
Church and State
I could catalogue some vague comments that were made back and forth, including numerous references to God and a debate between Brownback and Romney over the degree to which one's faith should influence one's political platform, but the church-state moment of the night had to do with a specific policy-related issue: creationism vs. evolution. In a show of hands, the ten candidates were asked whether they believe in the theory of evolution. Gilmore, Giuliani, Hunter, McCain, Paul, Romney, and Thompson indicated that they do; Brownback, Huckabee, and Tancredo indicated that they do not. This is significant to me, because I don't feel that any candidate who is completely beholden to the fundamentalist wing of the party would have been comfortable answering that question in the affirmative.
Gun Rights
Nobody mentioned gun rights.
Immigrants' Rights
Immigration came up a number of times during the debate. The key difference seemed to be between Giuliani and McCain, who favored a humane immigration policy, and Hunter and Tancredo, who focused on border security and enforcement, respectively.
Giuliani said as part of his response to the first question of the debate:
"[W]hat we can borrow from Ronald Reagan, since we're in his library, is that great sense of optimism that he had. He led by building on the strengths of America, not running America down. And we're a country that people love to come to. They want to come too this country. We're the shining city on the hill. So we should solve our immigration issue, including illegal immigration, from our strengths--not our weaknesses."
Duncan Hunter said: "I built that border fence" along the San Diego-Mexican border, and "I wrote that law that extends the San Diego fence for 854 miles ... that the president signed in October."
McCain was asked if he would be comfortable with the idea of Tancredo as head of the INS. McCain responded: "In a word, no." He later said: "I'm happy to say that we've been working very hard for a couple of months with Democrats and Republicans, led by the president and his Cabinet, to come up with a comprehensive solution and resolution of this terrible problem ... We have to secure our borders, but we also need a temporary worker program, and we have to dispose of the issue of 12 million people who are in this country illegally."
Tom Tancredo made many comments about the dangers of illegal immigration, but did not say anything out of the ordinary except remarking that the issue had made him a persona non grata at the White House, where President Bush favors a friendlier immigration policy.
Lesbian and Gay Rights
When asked if he believed that lesbian and gay employees working in the private sector should be protected from firings and other forms of discrimination, Tommy Thompson said no.
This was the only time that gay rights came up during the entire evening. Nobody even mentioned the idea of banning same-sex marriage or civil unions.
Read more: Lesbian and Gay Rights 101
Race and Equal Opportunity
The subject only explicitly came up once, in a question to Tommy Thompson:
"Governor Thompson, is racism still a problem in our society? And can a president do anything about it?"Thompson: "A president can do a lot of things. A president can -- can set a vision that's going to abrogate as much as possible racism in our society. A president's got to be able to get out and speak and be able to unite. And the great thing about Ronald Reagan was that he was a uniter, and that's exactly what I tried to do as governor of the state of Wisconsin. I tried to bring people together. And if you do that, you can reduce and abrogate racism to a very great degree, and the president of the United States has got to be the number-one person in doing that."
This stands in sharp contrast with last week's Democratic debate, in which race relations was a major theme.
Read more: Race Relations a Central Issue in the First 2008 Presidential Debate
War on Terror
Last week, civil liberties issues in the War on Terror did not come up during the Democratic debate. Last night, they did come up in response to the last question of the Republican debate, as answered by Ron Paul:
I would work very hard to protect the privacy of American citizens, being very, very cautious about warrantless searches, and I would guarantee that I would never abuse habeas corpus.Good for Rep. Paul. This is, perhaps, the only civil liberties issue addressed in the night's debate where a Republican candidate clearly outperformed the Democratic field.
The Reagan Library 2008 Presidential Debate: What the Republican Candidates Said About Your Civil Liberties
Read more: The 2008 Republican Presidential Candidates on Civil LibertiesIt has been said that every generation rebels against its parents in a way that pleases its grandparents. Certainly this was the case at last night's Republican presidential debate at the Reagan Library in Simi Valley, California (transcript available), as ten Republican presidential candidates praised the legacy of Ronald Reagan (an average of once every four minutes) while for the most part working to distance themselves from the unpopular presidency of George W. Bush.Before we look at what this debate tells us about Republican candidates' positions on key civil liberties issues, it's worth mentioning some parallels--and non-parallels--with last week's Democratic debate.Both debates were held in states that consistently go to the other party. Republicans held their first presidential debate in California, which no Republican presidential candidate has carried since 1984; Democrats held their first presidential debate in South Carolina, which no Democratic presidential candidate has carried since 1976. But both were held on sites in those states that represented their strengths--the Republican debate in the memorial library dedicated to President Ronald Reagan, the most popular president of our generation, and the Democratic debate in the auditorium of South Carolina State University, one of the strongest historically African-American universities in the country.Both debates focused on the Iraq War. This makes sense from a political standpoint--Democrats want to reiterate President Bush's failure, Republicans want the opportunity to distance themselves from it--but it makes less sense from a policy standpoint, since the Iraq War of November 2008, if in fact there is still an Iraq War at that point, will presumably look very different from the Iraq War of May 2007. We can hope so, anyway--and since candidates on both sides seem to be making "optimism" the buzzword of the day, let's try to pretend it's a well-founded hope.On to demographics--maybe the most striking difference between the Democratic and Republican slates.On the Democratic side of the aisle, I count eight presidential candidates ranging in age from 45 to 76, with a median age of 60. Six of the eight candidates (75%) are white; one candidate is black, another Latino. Seven of the eight candidates are men, while one is a woman. Six of the eight candidates are primarily known as current or former U.S. senators, one as a U.S. representative, and one as a governor.On the Republican side, I count ten presidential candidates ranging in age from 50 to 71, with a median age of 60.5. All ten of the candidates (100%) are white. All ten of the candidates (100%) are male. Two of the ten candidates are known primarily as current or former U.S. senators, three as U.S. representatives, four as governors, and one as a mayor. The Democratic field is much more diverse with respect to race, gender, and age, but all but one of their candidates come from Congress. The Republican field is exclusively white and male, but only half of their candidates come from Congress.Both debates were 90 minutes long and featured some platform-defining statements relevant to civil liberties issues.Last week, I discussed what the Democratic candidates said in their debate. Here's what the Republicans said:
Abortion
Relatively early in the debate, moderator Chris Matthews asked: "Would the day that Roe v. Wade is repealed be a good day for Americans?" Here were the candidates' answers, along with their other remarks on the subject:
Sam Brownback: "Be a glorious day of human liberty and freedom." Brownback did state, however, that he would be able to support a pro-choice nominee on the basis of "the Ronald Reagan principle that somebody that's with you 80 percent of the time is not your enemy."
Jim Gilmore: "Yes, it was wrongly decided."
Gilmore later reiterated his belief that abortion should be legal during the first twelve weeks of pregnancy, but expressed support for waiting period laws, "informed consent" laws, parental notification, and the ban on live intact D&X.
Rudy Giuliani: "It would be okay." Matthews: "Okay to repeal?"Giuliani: "It would be okay to repeal. Or it would be okay also if a strict constructionist judge viewed it as precedent, and I think a judge has to make that decision."Matthews: "Would it be okay if they didn't repeal it?"Giuliani: "I think that -- I think the court has to make that decision, and then the country can deal with it. We're a federalist system of government, and states could make their own decisions."
Giuliani later reiterated that he is pro-choice--"you have to respect a woman's right to make that choice"--but supports the ban on live intact D&X.
Giuliani also highlighted efforts he had made, as mayor of New York City, to make adoption a more realistic option for women experiencing unplanned pregnancies. He claimed that these policy changes contributed to a 16% decrease in the number of abortions in New York City during his tenure.
Mike Huckabee: "Most certainly."
Duncan Hunter: "Yes."
John McCain: "Repeal."
Mitt Romney: "Absolutely."
Romney explained that his views on abortion changed two years ago (from "effectively pro-choice" to "pro-life") during the debate over embryonic stem cell research. "I took the same course that Ronald Reagan and George Herbert Walker Bush and Henry Hyde took ... I said I was wrong and changed my mind and said I'm pro-life." He later stated that he believes abortion should be dealt with on a state-by-state basis, and should be neither banned nor protected by the federal government.
Romney reiterated his support for "informed consent" laws and the ban on live intact D&X abortions. He also called on a loosening of restrictions on anti-abortion protests that take place outside of clinics, restrictions that were enacted after several notorious incidents of clinic violence during the 1990s. He took a potshot at the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform bill, which he argued "prevents ... those that care about this issue [from being] heard before Election Day."
Tom Tancredo: "After 40 million dead because we have aborted them in this country, I say that that would be the greatest day in this country's history when that is in fact overturned."
Later, when asked a reader's question regarding women's rights, including both fair wages and reproductive rights, Tancredo said: "The right to kill another person is not a right that I would agree with and support." Even though he still had another 13 seconds on the clock, Tancredo otherwise passed on the question and did not mention any measures he would take to protect women's rights in other areas.
Tommy Thompson: "Yes." Thompson later stated that he believes that individual states should have the right to make abortion legal or illegal, as they see fit.
Curiously, nobody mentioned a rape or incest exemption.
Church and State
I could catalogue some vague comments that were made back and forth, including numerous references to God and a debate between Brownback and Romney over the degree to which one's faith should influence one's political platform, but the church-state moment of the night had to do with a specific policy-related issue: creationism vs. evolution. In a show of hands, the ten candidates were asked whether they believe in the theory of evolution. Gilmore, Giuliani, Hunter, McCain, Paul, Romney, and Thompson indicated that they do; Brownback, Huckabee, and Tancredo indicated that they do not. This is significant to me, because I don't feel that any candidate who is completely beholden to the fundamentalist wing of the party would have been comfortable answering that question in the affirmative.
Gun Rights
Nobody mentioned gun rights.
Immigrants' Rights
Immigration came up a number of times during the debate. The key difference seemed to be between Giuliani and McCain, who favored a humane immigration policy, and Hunter and Tancredo, who focused on border security and enforcement, respectively.
Giuliani said as part of his response to the first question of the debate:
"[W]hat we can borrow from Ronald Reagan, since we're in his library, is that great sense of optimism that he had. He led by building on the strengths of America, not running America down. And we're a country that people love to come to. They want to come too this country. We're the shining city on the hill. So we should solve our immigration issue, including illegal immigration, from our strengths--not our weaknesses."
Duncan Hunter said: "I built that border fence" along the San Diego-Mexican border, and "I wrote that law that extends the San Diego fence for 854 miles ... that the president signed in October."
McCain was asked if he would be comfortable with the idea of Tancredo as head of the INS. McCain responded: "In a word, no." He later said: "I'm happy to say that we've been working very hard for a couple of months with Democrats and Republicans, led by the president and his Cabinet, to come up with a comprehensive solution and resolution of this terrible problem ... We have to secure our borders, but we also need a temporary worker program, and we have to dispose of the issue of 12 million people who are in this country illegally."
Tom Tancredo made many comments about the dangers of illegal immigration, but did not say anything out of the ordinary except remarking that the issue had made him a persona non grata at the White House, where President Bush favors a friendlier immigration policy.
Lesbian and Gay Rights
When asked if he believed that lesbian and gay employees working in the private sector should be protected from firings and other forms of discrimination, Tommy Thompson said no.
This was the only time that gay rights came up during the entire evening. Nobody even mentioned the idea of banning same-sex marriage or civil unions.
Read more: Lesbian and Gay Rights 101
Race and Equal Opportunity
The subject only explicitly came up once, in a question to Tommy Thompson:
"Governor Thompson, is racism still a problem in our society? And can a president do anything about it?"Thompson: "A president can do a lot of things. A president can -- can set a vision that's going to abrogate as much as possible racism in our society. A president's got to be able to get out and speak and be able to unite. And the great thing about Ronald Reagan was that he was a uniter, and that's exactly what I tried to do as governor of the state of Wisconsin. I tried to bring people together. And if you do that, you can reduce and abrogate racism to a very great degree, and the president of the United States has got to be the number-one person in doing that."
This stands in sharp contrast with last week's Democratic debate, in which race relations was a major theme.
Read more: Race Relations a Central Issue in the First 2008 Presidential Debate
War on Terror
Last week, civil liberties issues in the War on Terror did not come up during the Democratic debate. Last night, they did come up in response to the last question of the Republican debate, as answered by Ron Paul:
I would work very hard to protect the privacy of American citizens, being very, very cautious about warrantless searches, and I would guarantee that I would never abuse habeas corpus.Good for Rep. Paul. This is, perhaps, the only civil liberties issue addressed in the night's debate where a Republican candidate clearly outperformed the Democratic field.
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