Category: Obama

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Election 2008 McCain Obama Politics

McCain Throws an Elbow

Matt Drudge is reporting that the McCain campaign will leak the identity of their Vice Presidential pick at 6 pm tonight, and confirm the identity at 8 pm. Barack Obama is scheduled to give his acceptance speech between 10 pm and 11 pm. Obviously, this is a tactic designed to break into Obama’s news cycle.

It’s cheap. It’s pretty low class. And it’s excellent politics.

I think the McCain camp is miscalculating here – and although an announcement tomorrow might cut into Obama’s bounce, leaking the news tonight will cut into any benefit McCain might derive from it.

But the real bet must be that by leaking the news tonight so soon before Obama’s speech they can force him to react to the pick or look foolish not doing so.

I’m not sure exactly how this will play out – but McCain is playing a dangerous game here. And I’m not sure his campaign is up to it.

Of course, McCain does seem a bit cranky in his recent interview with Time magazine:

In 2000, after the primaries, you went back to South Carolina to talk about what you felt was a mistake you had made on the Confederate flag. Is there anything so far about this campaign that you wish you could take back or you might revisit when it’s over?
[Does not answer.]

Do I know you? [Says with a laugh.]
[Long pause.] I’m very happy with the way our campaign has been conducted, and I am very pleased and humbled to have the nomination of the Republican Party.

You do acknowledge there was a change in the campaign, in the way you had run the campaign?
[Shakes his head.]

You don’t acknowledge that? O.K., when your aides came to you and you decided, having been attacked by Barack Obama, to run some of those ads, was there a debate?
The campaign responded as planned.

I guess McCain has now decided to go out of his way to alienate the group he once called his base – presumably following the same Rovian strategy that Bush did.

McCain obviously does not care about his independent brand anymore.

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Domestic issues Election 2008 Morality Obama The Media

Mixing Theology and Politics

Rachel Zoll, under the headline, “Pelosi gets unwanted lesson in Catholic theology” concludes with this scolding that seems directed only to the Democrats:

It is a complex discussion. The Rev. Thomas Reese, senior fellow at the Woodstock Theological Center at Georgetown University, has some advice for candidates who seek to join the debate: Stick to politics – and support programs that truly help reduce the number of abortions.

“It is a big mistake,” Reese said, “for politicians to talk theology.”

What I find amusing about this whole conclusion to Zoll’s article is that it makes exactly the point that Obama and Pelosi were trying to make. Obama said that deciding when human life begins was “above his pay grade” and Pelosi said that the issue was complicaed. They both wanted to avoided theological discussions. Now, Rev. Reese is scolding them for talking about theology – which is, clearly, exactly what both wanted to avoid – and is exactly what many on the right are explicitly trying to do.

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Election 2008 Obama Politics The Clintons

Bill


[Image by greekchickie licensed under Creative Commons.]

Watching the Democratic Convention a few minutes behind real time (thanks DVR) and without having read or heard the instant post-speech analysis – I have to say, Bill Clinton gave exactly the speech Obama needed. And his performance tonight reminded me of why this man is the only Democrat to have been elected president twice since Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

Hillary Clinton’s speech last night was good – though it was clearly not directed at me. She hit her notes, and demonstrated how much she had improved her public speaking skills in the past few years. Bill Clinton today, though, managed to play to multiple audiences simultaneously – those disappointed in him for not supporting Obama; those who supported Hillary; those who had doubts about Obama; and those wavering on the line between McCain and Obama.

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Election 2008 Obama Politics Videos

Dukakis: “I owe the American people an apology.”


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[digg-me] Katie Couric interviewed Michael Dukakis today – the man who lost the 1988 presidential race to George H. W. Bush. The quote that makes the interview worth watching is from the very end:

Look, I owe the American people an apology. If I had beaten the old man you’d of never heard of the kid and you wouldn’t be in this mess. So it’s all my fault and I feel that very, very strongly.

H/t Jason Zengerle.

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Economics Election 2008 Obama Politics

Obamanomics

[digg-reddit-me]In the past ten years, a Democratic consensus has emerged from opposing poles represented by Robert Rubin, Secretary of the Treasury under Clinton, and Robert Reich, Secretary of Labor under Clinton.

The consensus stems from a shared conclusion:

In the past generation, the American economy has been benefiting the vast majority of Americans less and less; and the trends that are causing this cannot be stopped.

There are many factors that have caused, worsened and continued to escalate this core problem:

  • the demise of America’s manufacturing base;
  • the increasing gap between the pay of CEOs and top corporate officials and the average worker;
  • the way the tax code has begun to tax labor at a far higher rate than it taxes capital;
  • the shrinking of organized labor;
  • the increasing instability due to globalization.

All of these are the symptoms and all of these are the causes.

Our economic system is breaking – the middle class is being squeezed; we are transferring a tremendous amount of our wealth to autocracies and our rivals around the world because of our dependence on oil; budget deficits are burdening our government which now practices a nefarious for of socialism, only for the rich; globalization is creating insecurity; our society is becoming more stratified ((Subscription now required.)), with many traditionally class-conscious European countries becoming more socially mobile; our infrastructure is eroding.

Barack Obama’s answer to this – accepting the Democratic party consensus – is a mix of short-term and long-term measures.

  • To alleviate the squeeze on the middle class as certain industries leave America looking for cheaper labor, he proposes to create jobs with infrastructure improvements and to push the development of a green energy industry.
  • To aid small businesses and to reduce the instability created by the greater turnover in jobs in a globalized marketplace, he proposes a universal health care plan that combines a government plan open to all citizens, various incentives for businesses to offer coverage, and various incentives for individuals to get coverage on their own.
  • With regards to taxes, he proposes tax cuts (graph) to those who need it and tax increases to those who have benefited most from our society – those making over $250,000.00.
  • To prepare the next generation for the globalized marketplace, Obama proposes various improvements to education.
  • Barack Obama is also the only candidate who has pledged to protect the foundation of the internet. (John McCain has recently come off the fence to support a policy that directly undermines the architecture of the internet since it began.)

For a more in-depth and reflective look at Obamanomics, check out David Leonhardt’s cover story this weekend in the New York Times Magazine.

Addition: What Obama and the Democrats have been struggling with is a way to frame this in a visceral way that can be easily understood. Here’s my proposition:

McCain and the Republicans want to give big corporations whatever they want – even if it hurts American in the long term. (Offshore drilling; telecom immunity; free trade without sensible provisions regarding labor and environmental regulation; tax cuts on corporations and the wealthy while the government needs more income; opposing the protection of the basis of the web, net neutrality, so that internet providers can make a bigger profit.)

Obama and the Democrats want corporations to do well, but at the same time, they want to protect American society from the destabilizing forces of globalization and to protect what has made America the most prosperous nation on earth – including a stable middle class and social mobility – both of which we are in danger of losing due to reckless Republican policies.

That’s the narrative – it’s not class warfare. It’s about protecting what has made America great against the forces of globalization, overly greedy corporations, and rapid change.

Continue reading “Obamanomics”
Categories
Election 2008 National Security Obama Politics The Opinionsphere The War on Terrorism

Dubya Made Obama Possible

The National Review seems to have come around to my position – that George W. Bush has made Obama’s candidacy possible:

My postulate is that George W. Bush’s presidency has been just bad enough to avoid destroying the core institutions that form the backbone of our society while creating a virtuous backlash that will strengthen these institutions in the long term. Bush has abused his power just enough, and aggravated festering issues just enough, and presided over a decline that was so sudden that he has created near ideal conditions to move the country in a positive direction.

Of course, Seth Swirsky thinks it was George W. Bush’s outstanding leadership and success which have made Americans “feel safe”.

On that, Seth Swirsky and I have differing opinions. The constant fear-mongering by the Bush administration has not made Americans feel safe. The colossal failures of the Bush’s administration’s War on Terror has not made Americans feel safer. The fact that the most significant effort to attack an American city after 9/11 was called off by Al Qaeda for unknown reasons instead of being disrupted by our national security state does not lead to confidence in the Bush administration. Of course, Swirsky write:

Of course, the Left insists that we’re no safer than we were before 9/11. But, until they come up with a number lower than zero, as in the number of attacks against us since then, that argument remains silly.

Is it really considered an “argument” to say:

We have not been attacked again; therefore we are safer.

There are so many assumptions behind that sentiment – many of which are specious; and there are so many alternate explanations to be proferred; and in fact, as the Bush administration and the McCain campaign have said – we will be attacked again. Doesn’t this undercut Swirsky’s point entirely?

The real point is that this is a silly statement used for political effect – and one which demonstrates how circular the Republican propaganda machine has become.

Categories
Election 2008 Obama Reflections

Should. Could. Would.

There will be ups and downs – and the path will be rocky. The Republicans will get in quite a few more good digs – and in the first two weeks of October, I will want to take this back, as the campaign hits new lows. And while over a year ago I decided that Barack Obama should be the next president of the United States; and while less than a year ago, I finally realized that Barack Obama could be the next president of the United States; it was not until tonight that I realized Barack Obama would be the next President.

An excellent speech by Michelle Obama caps off a mediocre opening night of the Democratic National Convention. And somehow, in the midst of all the hubub, it struck me. I think many other people can see it, and can feel it too.

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Election 2008 McCain Obama Politics The Opinionsphere

The Qualities Needed To Succeed

Andrew Sullivan compares and contrasts Obama and McCain in his most recent piece for The Sunday Times:

Obama is politically liberal and temperamentally conservative; McCain is temperamentally liberal and politically unpredictable. Obama is cerebral; McCain is emotional. Obama is reserved, sometimes aloof; McCain is a social gadfly and seemingly terrified of being left alone and silent. Obama wins press adoration but is not close to journalists; McCain is personal friends with hacks of all sorts. Obama makes plans and executes them with sometimes chilling discipline; McCain veers from one passion to another, winging it – and somehow pulling it off…

The difficult question Americans have to ask themselves is not who is the right man – it is who is right for now. After 9/11, Afghanistan and Iraq, as Russia reasserts itself, as Iran closes in on a nuclear bomb, as Pakistan threatens to crack apart and as the US economy teeters on crisis, which of these two men has the qualities needed to succeed?

If you believe the problem with America’s war on terror is that it has not been ambitious enough, or tough enough, or monumental enough, McCain is your man. If you think the United States needs to be feared more than it needs to be loved, McCain is your man. And if you think that the economic policies of the past eight years – specifically Bush’s low tax rates – are necessary for growth, McCain is the obvious choice.

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Economics Election 2008 McCain Obama Politics The Opinionsphere

Change Before It’s Too Late

Frank Rich in yesterday’s Times coins a new slogan for Obama’s campaign:

…[T]he unsettling subtext of the Olympics has been as resonant for Americans as the Phelps triumph. You couldn’t watch NBC’s weeks of coverage without feeling bombarded by an ascendant China whose superior cache of gold medals and dazzling management of the Games became a proxy for its spectacular commercial and cultural prowess in the new century. Even before the Olympics began, a July CNN poll found that 70 percent of Americans fear China’s economic might — about as many as find America on the wrong track. Americans watching the Olympics could not escape the reality that China in particular and Asia in general will continue to outpace our country in growth while we remain mired in stagnancy and debt (much of it held by China).

How we dig out of this quagmire is the American story that Obama must tell…Americans must band together for change before the new century leaves us completely behind. The Obama campaign actually has plans, however imperfect or provisional, to set us on that path; the McCain campaign offers only disposable Band-Aids typified by the “drill now” mantra that even McCain says will only have a “psychological” effect on gas prices…

Is a man who is just discovering the Internet qualified to lead a restoration of America’s economic and educational infrastructures? Is the leader of a virtually all-white political party America’s best salesman and moral avatar in the age of globalization? Does a bellicose Vietnam veteran who rushed to hitch his star to the self-immolating overreaches of Ahmad Chalabi, Pervez Musharraf and Mikheil Saakashvili have the judgment to keep America safe?

R.I.P., “Change We Can Believe In.” The fierce urgency of the 21st century demands Change Before It’s Too Late.

Categories
Election 2008 Obama Politics

It’s Joe Biden


[Image by SEIU International licensed with Creative Commons.]

In an email sent out at 3:30 am, the Barack Obama campaign announced that it had picked Joe Biden to run as Barack Obama’s Vice PResident.

Negatives:

Positives

  • He’s been involved in American foreign policy for twenty years.
  • He captured Rudy Guiliani’s essence better than anyone when he said, “Rudy Giuliani — there’s only three things he mentions in a sentence: a noun, a verb, and 9/11.”
  • He will attack McCain relentlessly.
  • He’s a Catholic (and Catholics are a key swing group.)
  • He’s old, with all the wisdom of being old.