Categories
Election 2008 McCain Politics

An Obvious Omen

Conservative columnist Kathleen Parker called on Palin to step down from the ticket for personal reasons because she was out of her league, calling on her to put country first last week.

This week, she sees the backlash against her as an omen of suggesting “a bleak future if we do not soon correct ourselves.” She defends her previous column:

Some of my usual readers feel betrayed because I previously have written favorably of Palin. By changing my mind and saying so, I am viewed as a traitor to the Republican Party – not a “true” conservative.

Obviously, I’m not employed by the GOP. If I were, the party is seriously in arrears. But what is a true conservative? One who doesn’t think or question and who marches in lock step with The Party?

The emotional pitch of many comments suggests an overinvestment in Palin as “one of us.”

Zing! But she leavens this defense by rather implausibly saying that these attacks on her demonstrate that the Democrats are as bad as the Republicans and that she hopes Palin kicks butt in the debate.

I guess there is only so far that conservatives are willing to stray, and by pointing out the obvious, Parker had apparently over-stepped the line.

Categories
Economics Election 2008 Humor McCain Politics

The Poetry of Sarah Palin

Slate goes there:

“Befoulers of the Verbiage”

It was an unfair attack on the verbiage
That Senator McCain chose to use,
Because the fundamentals,
As he was having to explain afterwards,
He means our workforce.
He means the ingenuity of the American.
And of course that is strong,
And that is the foundation of our economy.
So that was an unfair attack there,
Again based on verbiage.

(To S. Hannity, Fox News, Sept. 18, 2008)

And there’s more.

Categories
Election 2008 Obama Politics

Paul Begala on The Colbert Report

An especially funny interview this Monday.

Categories
Economics Politics The Opinionsphere

Optimistic v. Pessimistic Views of the Financial Crisis

An optimist thinks this is the best of all possible worlds, and a pessimist fears he may be right.

Mortimer Zukcerman responding to an especially astute and frightening description of the current financial crisis while moderating a panel of economic experts for the Council on Foreign Relations.

Categories
Domestic issues Economics Election 2008 Political Philosophy Politics The Opinionsphere

David Brooks’s Brand Loyalty

David Brooks has apparently had enough of the Republican party as most of us know it:

…let us recognize above all the 228 who voted no — the authors of this revolt of the nihilists. They showed the world how much they detest their own leaders and the collected expertise of the Treasury and Fed. They did the momentarily popular thing, and if the country slides into a deep recession, they will have the time and leisure to watch public opinion shift against them.

House Republicans led the way and will get most of the blame. It has been interesting to watch them on their single-minded mission to destroy the Republican Party. Not long ago, they led an anti-immigration crusade that drove away Hispanic support. Then, too, they listened to the loudest and angriest voices in their party, oblivious to the complicated anxieties that lurk in most American minds.

Now they have once again confused talk radio with reality.

The frustrating thing about David Brooks is that, as reasonable as he may seem on occasion, he refuses to leave the Republican party because of what he imagines it could be – a national greatness party that balances individualism and collectivism, that has a relatively big government, that promotes good behavior.

I find it difficult at times to see what keeps Brooks in the Republican party except brand loyalty.

Categories
Economics Election 2008 Foreign Policy

A Prophecy in the Guardian

John Gray, an author of big ideas with a focus on the apocalyptic and the grand sweep of history, has a must-read article in the Guardian. He calls it “A shattering moment in America’s fall from power.” He writes as if history is already written – and his examples are often petty and overblown. His piece reeks of self-importance and schaedenfraude. His big ideas seem more glib than profound.

And yet, his piece demonstrates two things.

First, his view is, I think, broadly reflective of how much of the world sees what is happening – with regional and cultural factors leading to the emphasis of slightly different aspects of the story. The Chinese would focus on the lack of centralized government oversight of the economy; the Europeans would see the lack of regulation and welfare programs; the Arabs would see the decadance. But in every telling, the story is the same – an empire is felled by it’s arrogance; the forces that led it to worldwide domination came back to destroy it.

That is what I found profoundly interesting about John Gray’s piece – that he was able to convey to me a sense of distance from the events taking place just a few blocks from where I work – a distance that allowed him to be smug and to “see” the future – a future that is very bleak.

Second, his piece does accurately reflect one way we could go as a nation. It can serve as a warning. Not a warning like Warren Buffet who called mortgage-backed derivratives “financial weapons of mass destruction” five years ago – but a warning that, like any real prophecy, is a vague and distrubing vision. The details may be wrong – but the vision is powerful – and it is entirely plausible.

It is a piece I would reccomend partisans of both the left and right read – and the muddled pragmatists in the middle too.

The trends Gray sees are really there – even if he uses a bit of poetic license in describing them.

Categories
Election 2008 Law McCain National Security Obama Politics

Yesterday’s American Heroes, Not Tomorrow’s Leaders

The Washington Post excerpted Barton Gellman’s new book on the Cheney Vice Presidency. Gellman includes the following scene which helps to fill in the gaps in the story that culminated in the infamous showdown in Attorney General Ashcroft’s hospital room. After Ashcroft, Comey, Goldsmith, and Philbin had determined that the Bush administration was breaking the law, they began to take steps to push the administration into compliance, leading to this meeting:

Comey, Goldsmith and Philbin found the titans of the intelligence establishment lined up, a bunch of grave-faced analysts behind them for added mass. The spy chiefs brought no lawyers. The law was not the point. This meeting, described by officials with access to two sets of contemporaneous notes, was about telling Justice to set its qualms aside.

The staging had been arranged for maximum impact. Cheney sat at the head of Card’s rectangular table, pivoting left to face the acting attorney general. The two men were close enough to touch. Card sat grimly at Cheney’s right, directly across from Comey. There was plenty of eye contact all around.

This program, Cheney said, was vital. Turning it off would leave us blind. Hayden, the NSA chief, pitched in: Even if the program had yet to produce blockbuster results, it was the only real hope of discovering sleeper agents before they could act.

“How can you possibly be reversing course on something of this importance after all this time?” Cheney asked.

Comey held his ground. The program had to operate within the law. The Justice Department knew a lot more now than it had before, and Ashcroft and Comey had reached this decision together.

“I will accept for purposes of discussion that it is as valuable as you say it is,” Comey said. “That only makes this more painful. It doesn’t change the analysis. If I can’t find a lawful basis for something, your telling me you really, really need to do it doesn’t help me.”

“Others see it differently,” Cheney said.

There was only one of those, really. John Yoo had been out of the picture for nearly a year. It was all Addington.

“The analysis is flawed, in fact facially flawed,” Comey said. “No lawyer reading that could reasonably rely on it.”

Gonzales said nothing. Addington stood by the window, over Cheney’s shoulder. He had heard a bellyful.

“Well, I’m a lawyer and I did,” Addington said, glaring at Comey.

“No good lawyer,” Comey said.

This story reminds me of something that gets lost in the day-to-day campaign: Attorney General John Ashcroft, Deputy Attorney General James Comey, Deputy Assistant Attorney General Patrick Philbin, Assistant Attorney General Jack Goldsmith, FBI Director Robert Mueller, Air Force Colonel Morris Davis, Army Captain Ian Fishback, General Eric Shinseki, and yes, Senator Chuck Hagel, Senator John McCain, Senator Lindsay Graham, and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates – all of these men, and other unnamed men and women stood against and were able to moderate the Bush administration’s worst impules. Some stood up and insisted that the rule of law applied to all citizens; others stood against and exposed torture and inhuman treatment; others stood against the hubris and arrogance of the Bush administration. Many Democrats were co-opted by the Bush adminisrtation, but more opposed it. But these Democrats never were let on the inside, and so never had the opportunity, never had to face the difficult choice of whether to risk their career and turn against their party for a moral or political principle. These individuals demonstrated courage, and they deserve credit and praise. These individuals, more than anyone, are responsible for preserving what is left of our republic.

But still, especially in this election year, we must remember that these men were Republicans for a reason – and most have remained Republicans. Jack Goldsmith forced the Justice Department to re-write the torture memos – but he still believes in a unitary executive, with many of its extreme implications. John McCain may have criticized Donald Rumsfeld, but he was always a strong supporter of the Iraq war as well as any other necessary military interventions in the Middle East. John Ashcroft may have heroicly refused to give in to executive pressure on wiretapping while hospitalized, but he also routinely authorized gross violations of civil liberties.

These individuals deserve great credit for keeping their heads about them while the Bush administration sought to seize near unlimited power, but we need more than a more moderate version of George W. Bush from out next president.

Which is why, as much as we should honor these individuals, they do not represent the future, the next step.

Categories
Domestic issues Election 2008 McCain Politics

A Wink and a Wagging Finger

Tom Perrotta explains the unique appeal of Sarah Palin in Slate:

[Sarah Palin] engage[s] in the culture war on two levels—not simply by advocating conservative positions on hot-button social issues but by embodying nonthreatening mainstream standards of female beauty and behavior at the same time. The net result is a paradox, a bit of cognitive dissonance very useful to the cultural right: You get a little thrill along with your traditional values, a wink along with the wagging finger. Somehow, you don’t feel quite as much like a prig as you expected to.

Categories
Economics Election 2008 McCain Obama Politics The Opinionsphere

John McCain: Gambling With Our Futures

[digg-reddit-me]

Obama:

I read the other day that Sen. McCain likes to gamble. He likes to roll those dice. And that’s OK. I enjoy a little friendly game of poker myself every now and then. But one thing I know is this – we can’t afford to gamble on four more years of the same disastrous economic policies we’ve had for the last eight.

Obama seems to have read this article in the New York Times:

Senator John McCain was on a roll. In a room reserved for high-stakes gamblers at the Foxwoods Resort Casino in Connecticut, he tossed $100 chips around a hot craps table. When the marathon session ended around 2:30 a.m., the Arizona senator and his entourage emerged with thousands of dollars in winnings.

A lifelong gambler, Mr. McCain takes risks, both on and off the craps table. He was throwing dice that night not long after his failed 2000 presidential bid, in which he was skewered by the Republican Party’s evangelical base, opponents of gambling. Mr. McCain was betting at a casino he oversaw as a member of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, and he was doing so with the lobbyist who represents that casino, according to three associates of Mr. McCain.

The visit had been arranged by the lobbyist, Scott Reed, who works for the Mashantucket Pequot, a tribe that has contributed heavily to Mr. McCain’s campaigns and built Foxwoods into the world’s second-largest casino. Joining them was Rick Davis, Mr. McCain’s current campaign manager. Their night of good fortune epitomized not just Mr. McCain’s affection for gambling, but also the close relationship he has built with the gambling industry and its lobbyists during his 25-year career in Congress.

The article also could have mentioned that McCain’s recent moves – from suspending his campaign to picking Palin could also be included among his “gambles”.

Of course, his decision to blame Pelosi for the bill’s failure isn’t a gamble – it’s just ridiculous, a desperate attempt to distract the country from this latest incident in which his party has place ideology above country. Combine this with McCain’s apparent propensity of over-personalize conflicts and crises, and you get an idea of what a disaster a McCain administration would be.

This guy wasn’t even able – after he put himself on the line and went to Washington and acknowledged something had to be done – to get a significant minority of his party to support any sort of compromise on this issue. The Republicans demonstrated today that they are not willing to make the difficult choices needed to lead.

But better days are coming:

The skies look cloudy and it’s dark. And you think the rains will never pass. But these too will pass: a brighter day will come.

Categories
Economics Election 2008 McCain Politics

“A Partisan Speech” by Pelosi

I just want to point out that it’s ridiculous for the Republicans to blame Nancy Pelosi’s speech attacking Bush’s economic policies as their reason for opposing the bill Bush is himself pushing.

Bush wants this bill.

Pelosi criticizes Bush’s past actions for leading to the need for this bill.

Republicans, incensed that Pelosi would criticize Bush, vote against Bush’s bill.

Ridiculous.