Category: Politics

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Election 2008 Humor New York City Obama Politics

Chris Rock: “You’d be real embarrassed” if Obama Won and You Supported “That White Lady”

[digg-reddit-me]Barack Obama was in New York City last night and unfortunately I wasn’t able to make it as I did his Washington Square Park event in September. By most accounts, the event was a huge success as Obama continued to use the new stump speech he premiered at the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner in Iowa earlier this month to great acclaim. Over 1,500 were packed into the Apollo Theater including Dr. Cornell West, Chris Rock, and the Reverend Al Sharpton, who is still on the fence about the Clinton-Obama match-up. Barack has consistently had strong showings in the New York City area and as happened at the two other campaign events I attended in New York, Obama attracted overflow crowds.

Chris Rock introduced Barack to the audience just a few blocks away from Bill Clinton’s Harlem office, slipping in a reference to “that white lady” who happens to be Bill’s wife, and explaining how George Bush has actually met our expectations as a nation:


From Newsday:

“I want to stand up for those who still hunger for opportunity, who still thirst for justice. I don’t want to wake up four years from now to find that we missed the opportunity. We cannot wait.”

At this point, it is hard to deny the momentum is building for Obama as many take a second look at Clinton and a first serious look at the race.

A note on Chris Rock‘s performance: Evidently not at his best last night. The line he delivered fell flat, but I think this phrasing, stolen from FoxNews is an improvement.

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Election 2008 New York City Obama Politics

Obama meeting with Mayor Bloomberg?

[digg-reddit-me]Here Matt Drudge goes again – a headline suggestive of something, but no one knows what. It’s just enough to get everyone talking. And chances are this is true – not because everything Drudge reports is true, but because, as this doesn’t fit into any Republican or Clinton agenda that I can think of, he has little reason to run it if it weren’t.

I can’t think of a reason Obama would be meeting with Bloomberg now – with the race so tight in Iowa and every moment precious – unless Bloomberg reached out in some way and wanted to discuss an endorsement. This is only my speculation, but nothing else seems to fit.

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Election 2008 Foreign Policy Iraq Politics The War on Terrorism

The Iraq Thing

“Even though I approved of Afghanistan and opposed Iraq from the beginning,” said Clinton, “I still resent that I was not asked or given the opportunity to support those soldiers.”[digg-reddit-me]

So Bill Clinton said yesterday in Iowa. Most people – myself included – were under the impression that the former president supported the Iraq war. Perhaps it was items like the one below that led me to such conclusions. Most of the commenters on this have concluded that Bill Clinton is trying to rewrite history. But parsing Clinton’s statements reveals something else. He made statements again and again that would lead any reasonable observer to believe he supported the invasion, but on closer examination, it depends on what your definition of is is.
In an interview with Time magazine in June 2004, Bill Clinton was asked if President Bush was right to invade Iraq.

You know, I have repeatedly defended President Bush against the left on Iraq, even though I think he should have waited until the U.N. inspections were over. I don’t believe he went in there for oil. We didn’t go in there for imperialist or financial reasons. We went in there because he bought the Wolfowitz-Cheney analysis that the Iraqis would be better off, we could shake up the authoritarian Arab regimes in the Middle East, and our leverage to make peace between the Palestinians and Israelis would be increased.

At the moment the U.N. inspectors were kicked out in ’98, this is the proper language: there were substantial quantities of botulinum and aflatoxin, as I recall, some bioagents, I believe there were those, and VX and ricin, chemical agents, unaccounted for. Keep in mind, that’s all we ever had to work on. We also thought there were a few missiles, some warheads, and maybe a very limited amount of nuclear laboratory capacity.

After 9/11, let’s be fair here, if you had been President, you’d think, Well, this fellow bin Laden just turned these three airplanes full of fuel into weapons of mass destruction, right? Arguably they were super-powerful chemical weapons. Think about it that way. So, you’re sitting there as President, you’re reeling in the aftermath of this, so, yeah, you want to go get bin Laden and do Afghanistan and all that. But you also have to say, Well, my first responsibility now is to try everything possible to make sure that this terrorist network and other terrorist networks cannot reach chemical and biological weapons or small amounts of fissile material. I’ve got to do that.

That’s why I supported the Iraq thing. There was a lot of stuff unaccounted for. So I thought the President had an absolute responsibility to go to the U.N. and say, “Look, guys, after 9/11, you have got to demand that Saddam Hussein lets us finish the inspection process.” You couldn’t responsibly ignore [the possibility that] a tyrant had these stocks. I never really thought he’d [use them]. What I was far more worried about was that he’d sell this stuff or give it away. Same thing I’ve always been worried about North Korea’s nuclear and missile capacity. I don’t expect North Korea to bomb South Korea, because they know it would be the end of their country. But if you can’t feed yourself, the temptation to sell this stuff is overwhelming. So that’s why I thought Bush did the right thing to go back. When you’re the President, and your country has just been through what we had, you want everything to be accounted for.

I’ve excerpted the entire response here for two reasons: 1) to demonstrate that I’m not selectively highlighting certain statements; and 2) to show how deftly President Clinton failed to answer the question. If I read this at the time, I would have been under the strong impression that Bill Clinton supported the invasion of Iraq. If I had read the text extremely closely, trying to determine if he had actually said he supported the invasion, I would have found that he had not. Clinton is suddenly vague when saying what he supports: calling it “the Iraq thing”.

A charitable reader, or even a normal person, would take this to mean that the individual speaking could not think of the appropriate word for a moment. But if, three years later, President Clinton is insisting that he opposed the war in Iraq from the beginning, the whole conversation takes on a different cast: his comments are clearly designed to lead someone to believe he did support the invasion, but he was apparently careful enough not to say this directly. A lie is a statement that deviates from or perverts the truth. Clinton spoke as if he were trying to avoid being charged with perjury while avoiding the truth. But his intent is now clear.

In short, we shouldn’t be surprised: Bill Clinton lied for political reasons.

Meanwhile, Marc Ambinder explains how Bill’s statements have been hurting Hillary.

Continue reading “The Iraq Thing”
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Election 2008 Humor Obama Politics

Overrated Much?

[digg-reddit-me]The Daily News’ article starts off a little less breathless than the headline:

Now Oprah Winfrey’s saleswomanship will be put to an ultimate test: Can she influence the course of American politics by helping vault Barack Obama into the White House?

By the third paragraph though, the hype suddenly jumps into overdrive:

Her power is almost unprecedented. Her show, now in its third decade, has helped shape the national debate on a huge range of issues and, with a few well-placed words, changed the buying habits of millions and put once-obscure books on the best-seller list.

Michael Saul, The Daily News‘ writer concludes on this jarring note:

Yesterday, Obama downplayed the power of Winfrey’s endorsement. “Ultimately, I’m going to have to make the sale,” he said.

I am not sure anyone can be said to be downplaying an endorsement by mentioning that, in the end, the election comes down to the candidate him or herself.

The Oprah story is getting a lot of play – I saw it on the cover of Newday and The Daily News this morning, and a Google News search reveals over 300 stories written around the world about the television diva’s decision to campaign for Barack Obama. From my brief foray into these stories, they all ask the same question: “What effect will Oprah have on the raceNervous Bill and Hillary?” They all strive to come to a clean answer, and end up with, “I don’t know.” But that doesn’t seem to stop the headline writers who have variously written: in Time magazine, “Why Oprah Won’t Help Obama”; at MSNBC, “How will Oprah’s endorsement affect 2008?” (Answer: The author doesn’t know.); the Toronto Star asks a similar question: “Can Oprah boost Obama’s political dream?” and answers in the same manner. The National Review‘s Myrna Blyth teases her readership with the headline: “Obama-Oprah 2008”. The subhead reveals the tease for what it is however: another over-processed story: “Can Oprah sell her favorite candidate?” I personally liked the Washington Post‘s approach best. They coupled a boring article covering all the celebrities converging on Iowa and New Hampshire without much hype but with this picture of Bill and Hillary looking very nervous. In other news, the Post article also reveals that John Edwards is sending in BONNIE RAITT. If this was a war of celebrities (and what else is a campaign but that), you know you’re leading the pack when you have Bonnie Raitt, who was kind of big a dozen years ago, as your top celeb campaigner.

Yet another day in the Freak Show that is our political system.

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Domestic issues Election 2008 Law Politics The War on Terrorism

Our Lady of the Law

I’m still hoping someone out there has the full text of this speech by former Governor Cuomo that is being called “Our Lady of the Law”:[digg-reddit-me]

Cuomo said we have to make them understand that we are after

“something sweeter than the taste of partisan victory”

The clear message was that he fully expected that it was the obligation of lawyers everywhere to speak up in support of the Rule of Law or as he persisted in calling it “Our Lady of the Law.” That he expected us to take to the streets, to the OpEd pages, the airwaves, and to every other medium available to us…

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Election 2008 Humor Politics

How Kucinich Found Love

From a 2005 article in the Cleveland Plain Dealer republished at Common Dreams. I will not comment at all, but instead let the excerpts speak for themselves.

While Dennis was sure of his attraction at their initial meeting, he didn’t know how Elizabeth felt. Several nights later, in his Washington office, he sat at his desk and thought about her. “Basically, I asked for a sign,” he says. Seconds later, ping! went his computer, alerting him to an e-mail.

It was from Elizabeth. The first line read, “This has no connection to work.” Dennis was ecstatic.

She was forwarding an e-mail from one of her friends that related to the peace legislation he had proposed as a presidential candidate. He noticed her signature quote at the end: “Knowing love I shall allow all things to come and go, to be as supple as the wind and take everything that comes with great courage. My heart is as open as the sky.”

This gave Dennis hope.

[Elizabeth’s mother], too, found the age difference – Elizabeth’s 27 years to Dennis’s 58 – insignificant. “This is about a meeting of souls.”

“People who see us together understand – they see our connection,” Elizabeth says. “And it’s not like I’m some ditsy young thing and he’s an old fogey. He has the wisdom of an ancient and the energy of youth.”

Dennis says, “I’ve never seen myself as time-bound. When you make a connection on a soul level, age is not important.”

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Domestic issues Election 2008 Law Politics

Does winning the Supreme Court galvanize social movements?

JB over at the Balkinization blog has an insightful post about whether or not “winning in the Supreme Court” galvanizes social movements.  His conclusion: in the short term, it galvanizes the loser of the case, and in the long-term, tends to work for the winner.  In analyzing what is likely to happen after the Heller decision, which JB assumes will be in favor of gun owners, he writes:

Conversely, it is possible that right wing groups like the NRA, unlike the women’s movement, the pro-choice movement, the civil rights movement, and the gay rights movement, will not be demobilized in the short run by a major victory in the courts but in fact will be ever more galvanized. But I wouldn’t bet on it. My guess is that following what I predict will be a significant victory in Heller, the NRA and other gun rights groups will overinvest in litigation to push for additional gun rights victories in the courts, and they will simultaneously experience a short term drop-off in contributions and movement energies.

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Domestic issues Election 2008 Obama Politics Post 9/11 Generation

The Disengagement with Power

All of these legacies have left the young feeling depressed, cynical and[digg-reddit-me] powerless. And yet our democracy needs them more than ever now. Young people are always in the vanguard of any movement to sustain or advance liberty. Students led the charge for freedom in Prague and Mexico City in 1968, in Chile in 1973, in Beijing and throughout Eastern Europe in 1989.

Naomi Wolf in the Washington Post on the disengagement with power of the Post 9/11 generation. I’ve posted about this before: excerpts from an interview with a former radical Weatherman, a meditation on the post 9/11 generation, and a similar, but much more extreme version of this disengagement and its effects in the islamist movement.

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Domestic issues History Law Political Philosophy Politics The War on Terrorism

A Defense of Compromise and the American Experiment

In response to a blog post by lynx on natural rights, as well as comments made on my post[digg-reddit-me] about whether or not terrorists have rights, and another post of mine that discussed torture, comments made by Andrew K at essembly.com, and in various reddit discussions:

A few definitions

freedom – the ability to act without restraint; referring to politics: the right of self-determination as an expression of the individual will. (see footnote 1)

society – a collection of individual beings who together form a community with a shared culture and a shared set of rules or laws.

a rule or law – a restriction on the freedom of an individual or institution.

radical – someone who rejects the way things are in favor of revolutionary change.

Absolute freedom

Based on these definitions, it is clear that any society is, by it’s nature, the result of the compromise of individual freedom. Absolute freedom is a state enjoyed only by tyrants. In a society of equals or near-equals, the freedom that is enjoyed is the result the compromise of each individual’s absolute freedom. These compromises are memorialized in laws, constitutions, rules, mores, ethical principles, and customs among other means. They are enforced through various methods – from social pressure to the courts of law.

As with every human endeavor, the system of compromises that allows society to exist is deeply flawed. Rules are unequally applied; mores are arbitrary; laws are broken. But even in the purest theoretical state, absolute individual freedom is impossible in a free society.

The American experiment

What we are left with then is disarmingly simple: we must try to figure out what is the best compromise of individual freedoms that will allow us to live together in a society. The dream of greater freedom, of a more free society, has motivated people throughout history: from Gandhi to Plato, from Che Guevera to Simon Bolivar, from Alexander Hamilton to James Madison, from Robespierre to Abraham Lincoln.

As often as these experiments have been tried, they have failed. In the name of freedom, Robespierre instituted a Reign of Terror; Plato banished poetry and democracy; James Madison protected slavery; Abraham Lincoln waged a bloody civil war; Che Guevera fought for a dictatorship. This is what men have done in the name of freedom.

Despite these flawed individuals and their flawed conceptions of a free society, advances have been made in the past few centuries. (See footnote 2.) The American Revolution established the principle that the consent of the governed is required in a free society, and that certain rights are inherent, such as life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The subsequent Constitution and Bill or Rights established a government that for the first time, attempted to balance power sufficient to maintain a stable society with numerous checks and restrictions to limit abuses of this power. The 14th Amendment committed the federal government to guarding and preserving the rights inherent in the founding documents. Finally, the New Deal and subsequent programs made the state responsible for providing basic economic opportunities to its citizens and for protecting them from the excesses of capitalism.

The most important liberties in any free society are those which are essential to allow for the effective consent of the governed in creating and maintaining the policies and laws of the government. There has been much debate about what is needed, but on the whole, most agree that this list encompasses the basics:

  • an independent judiciary;
  • fair and transparent elections;
  • a free press;
  • a military subordinate to civilian authority;
  • habeas corpus;
  • freedom of speech;
  • freedom of assembly.

Without these, a government is not able to gain the free consent of it’s people.

At the time of the American revolution, individual liberty and the right to pursue one’s happiness beyond these basic rights were acknowledged in theory, but violated in practice – especially at the state level. Since then, as the government has become more powerful, regulations have been created to restrain the government more. But government power has outstripped regulation and especially since the New Deal, these non-basic liberties have been eroding. (See footnote 3.)

Our society is still substantially free – even today. There are growing defects apparent in our institutions of government; there are many attempts – some successful – to undermine the freedom of the press, habeas corpus, the independent judiciary, and the civilian authority over the military. Yet despite these attacks on basic liberties, and the glaring exceptions that are generally gathered together under the heading of consensual crimes, individuals in contemporary American society still have substantial freedom to pursue their happiness as long as their desires do not conflict with the rights of others.

Compromise

There is the rub. In a society, the rights of one individual is often pitted against the rights of another. Does the absolute freedom of speech mean I can lie about a product I am selling; or endanger others by inciting violence; or slander the reputation of my neighbor? How does the absolute freedom of religion deal with religions that seek to impose their views of ethics on all others? Does the freedom to assemble mean that I can gather together with 500 of my closest friends in your backyard?

Compromise is the basis of our system of government, and the basis of our society. A significant part of the effectiveness of terrorism is that it exploits the liberties inherent in a free society. Terrorism is the price we pay for freedom. But upon due consideration, and with the goal of preserving our way of life and with the consent of the people, compromises may be made in order to reduce the dangers of terrorism. Our compromises should be in proportion to the problem: suspending habeas corpus during an insurrection is one thing; suspending it indefinitely as a result of possible future plots is quite another.

We must zealously guard the aforementioned pillars of a free society: freedom of speech, freedom of the press, etcetera. But we must guard them not because they are ideals which are perfect; but because they are the pillars of a free society. If we begin to focus on the absolute ideals and lose focus on the society in which we live, we risk going down the path of Robespierre, who in the name of liberty, fraternity, and equality became a tyrant.

Every society is the result of a particular set of compromises and is delicately balanced between anarchy and tyranny. The problem with radicalism is that it has no patience for balance – instead, seeking to create society anew. The desire to start again, to erase all the evils of the world with a new social compact, is a compelling idea that has seduced many. Inevitably, it has led to tyranny as the delicate balance holding society together is disturbed.

Perhaps more than anything this was the miracle of the American Revolution – the fact that is was a non-radical revolution that never sought to remake its society.

Why I’m angry

It is because I believe our society is not entirely corrupt and because I believe it allows genuine freedom for most of its citizens that I am so angry at the current administration. As I have written previously and will again: I believe that the Bush administration has been fighting a war against our theoretical rights and liberties, against the system of checks and balances, and against the Constitution in the name of expanding executive power. They refer to it as allowing greater freedom for the president to execute policy and protect national security.

A challenge to those who disagree

  • define freedom (if you disagree with the definition given)
  • define society (same as above)
  • explain why compromise is not necessary (if you believe so)
Continue reading “A Defense of Compromise and the American Experiment”
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Election 2008 History Obama Politics

Experience : Judgment :: Clinton : Obama (or Paul or Kucinich)

An issue that has been raised repeatedly in the Democratic primary is that of “experience”.[digg-reddit-me] Hillary Clinton is claiming she is the most experienced candidate and has repeatedly criticized her opponents – specifically Barack Obama – for not having enough experience. This was my initial reaction after I first heard Obama was running earlier this year as well. But as the campaign wore on, Obama won me over. I think similar arguments could be made for Paul, Kucinich, or others as well. If you trust their judgment, then their experience is less important.

There are three main points that were made to change my mind.

  1. History has shown that experience does not lead to better job performance in presidential politics.
  2. Experience can be a proxy for good judgment, but it isn’t always.
  3. No one is prepared to be president, and anyone who claims to be prepared is lying.

1. History has shown that experience does not lead to better job performance in presidential politics.

I published this earlier, but have adapted it a bit for this post.

Richard Nixon was one of the most experienced people to assume the presidency. JFK had less experience than almost anyone. Yet he beat Richard Nixon in the middle of the Cold War while the president was responsible for overseeing a possible nuclear war. JFK’s inexperience led to the Bay of Pigs disaster, but he learned valuable lessons from this, accepted responsibility for the failure, and managed the Cuban missile crisis expertly. Richard Nixon was experienced, one of the most experienced men to have assumed the presidency having served eight years as vice president in addition to his significant legislative experience – he knew how to work the levers of power; but his personality led him to be secretive and paranoid, to try to bully and intimidate those who disagreed with him, etc. JFK was able to remedy his inexperience while Nixon was not able to remedy his character flaws.

If you want to look to a more recent example of the price of experience, just look at Donald Rumsfeld – who was one of the single most experienced bureaucrats in Washington – having worked in the military-industrial complex for the past three decades. He had already been Secretary of Defense during Ford’s tenure, and was chief of staff to the president before that. Despite – and in a way, because of – his experience, his time as Secretary of Defense was an absolute disaster for the military. We could talk about Cheney too if you wanted.

When you think about it, some of our greatest presidents have had little or no national experience before they became president during some of the toughest times in our history – Abraham Lincoln, who had no national or managerial experience, Harry Truman, who was isolated by FDR and did not even know that the atom bomb was in development, and Bill Clinton, whose previous experience had been governing one of the less important states in the union. Yet each of them rose to the challenges they faced, overcame their lack of experience, and mastered the job.

2. Experience can be a proxy for good judgment, but it isn’t always.

Obama in an interview with the Washington Post:

“They want to project Senator Clinton as the seasoned, experienced hand. I don’t fault them for that. That’s the strategy they’re pursuing, and my response is that what the American people need and what the Oval Office needs right now is good judgment. Experience can be a proxy for good judgment, but it isn’t always.”

[Obama] then repeated what he said during a debate in Chicago last week: “All the people who were on that stage in Chicago talking about their experience and criticizing me for the lack of it were the same people who went along and displayed incredibly poor judgment in going along with a war that I think has been a disaster.” [my emphasis]

3. No one is prepared to be president, and anyone who claims to be prepared is lying.

Chris Dodd to voters in Iowa:

“Anybody who stands before you and says, ‘I’m ready to do the job on Day 1’ ought to be disqualified. This is unique, this job. [When] you can sit behind the desk in the Oval Office, you can be better prepared and I believe I am. But you can’t be totally prepared for this.” In an interview afterward, Dodd suggested the proper attitude for anyone who inherits the White House in 2009: “They ought to be nervous.”

Continue reading “Experience : Judgment :: Clinton : Obama (or Paul or Kucinich)”