Category: Presidential Campaign

Krugman Goes After Obama

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Mark Twain is supposed to have said, “Never pick a fight with someone who buys ink by the barrel.”

After Paul Krugman made some relatively mild, and completely accurate criticisms of Obama’s health plan, the Obama campaign decided to go with some remarkably bogus oppo research where they selectively quoted, and misquoted Krugman.

Stupid move, but typical of a candidate who has never had a serious electoral challenge from a Democrat.

So, now the most popular, and most widely read liberal commentator in the United States has decided to go further, and criticise the most basic theory of Barack Obama’s campaign, his call for an “end to partisanship”.

It’s no one’s fault but Obama’s. He took a mild difference in policy, and

This shows just how unprepared Obama is for the big time.

Mr. Edwards replied, “Some people argue that we’re going to sit at a table with these people and they’re going to voluntarily give their power away. I think it is a complete fantasy; it will never happen.”

This was pretty clearly a swipe at Mr. Obama, who has repeatedly said that health reform should be negotiated at a “big table” that would include insurance companies and drug companies.

On Saturday Mr. Obama responded, this time criticizing Mr. Edwards by name. He declared that “We want to reduce the power of drug companies and insurance companies and so forth, but the notion that they will have no say-so at all in anything is just not realistic.”

Hmm. Do Obama supporters who celebrate his hoped-for ability to bring us together realize that “us” includes the insurance and drug lobbies?

It gets better. Go read it.

Wanker of the Day: Matt Stoller

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Yep, this time I’m going after a liberal blogger, Matt Stoller.

Three, the Clinton’s have, how to put it, real character issues. I haven’t written this before, because I don’t believe in going after family members unless they make themselves an issue, but Chelsea Clinton, despite the opportunity to do anything she wants, chose to be a hedge fund manager. What does that say about the Clinton family commitment to public service? I write this because Clinton is using her daughter in an ad that says ‘My Mom taught me to stand up for myself, and to stand up for those who can’t do it on their own’, and then express pride at passing those values on to her daughter. What kind of value system is that? And what does it say that Clinton is bringing her daughter into the contest bragging about her daughter’s greed? This is one small example (Mark Penn is another), but it’s pretty clear that the Clinton’s have become in some ways Bourbon-esque aristocrats.

Bullsh@$….She’s campaigning for her mom, but her choice of work is not a valid critique.

Heck, if I had seen done to my parents what she saw done to hers, I’d run away from public servide like the plague.

Today’s “Liberal Blogosphere Worst Person in the World”…….

That being said, I think that it is a momentary lapse. He generally gets it.

Now Krauthammer is Hating on the Talibaptists

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First Peggy Noonan goes after the religious right, and now it appears to be Charles Krauthammer’s turn. (Apologies to the townhall.com link)

….

The right answer, the only answer, is that the very question is offensive. The Constitution prohibits any religious test for office. And while that proscribes only government action, the law is also meant to be a teacher.

In the same way that civil rights laws established not just the legal but also the moral norm that one simply does not discriminate on the basis of race — changing the practice of one generation and the consciousness of the next — so the constitutional injunction against religious tests is meant to make citizens understand that such tests are profoundly un-American.

….

This is pretty elementary stuff. I haven’t exactly invented hot water here. The very rehearsing of these arguments seems tiresome and redundant.

But apparently not in the campaign of 2008. It’s two centuries since the passage of the First Amendment and our presidential candidates still cannot distinguish establishment from free exercise.

It appears that the corporate green heads that have used the religious right for years cannot abide Huckabee, and this time, a few worda about abortion will not mollify his supporters.

I experience some Schadenfreude, but the thought of a Christian Dominionist as a major presidential candidate is rather more worrisome than my uncharitable amusement.

Telco Immunity: Reid to Choose Which Surveillance Bill to Send to Senate Floor

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It makes a big difference if it’s the Senate intelligence committee or the Senate Judiciary Committee version.

The former has retroactive Telco immunity for the illegal wiretaps that the Telcos did for Bush and His Evil Minions™.

Senators are aggressively lobbying Senate Leader Harry Reid on this.

Chris Dodd has already made it clear that he will filibuster, and because Reid won’t extend the courtesy that he does to the obstructionist Rethuglicans, this will mean him talking, and talking, and talking, and talking on the floor of the Senate.

It would take Dodd off the campaign trail, but the spectacle would be the best thing that could possibly hit his candidacy.

The following letter was sent to him:

Dear Majority Leader Reid:

We understand that the Senate will shortly be considering amendments to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. As you know, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and the Senate Judiciary Committee have reported very different versions of the FISA Amendments Act, S. 2248, and it is up to you, as Majority Leader, to decide how the Senate considers this legislation.

We urge you to make the version of S. 2248 reported by the Senate Judiciary Committee the base bill to be considered by the full Senate. While the structure of Title I of both bills is the same, and both make improvements over the Protect America Act, the reasonable changes to Title I made in the Judiciary Committee ensure that the FISA Court will be able to conduct much-needed oversight of the implementation of these broad new surveillance authorities, and help to better protect the rights of innocent Americans. While we appreciate the hard work that the Intelligence Committee has done on this legislation, the process by which the Judiciary Committee considered, drafted, amended and reported out its bill was an open one, allowing outside experts and the public at large the opportunity to review and comment. With regard to legislation so directly connected to the constitutional rights of Americans, the results of this open process should be accorded great weight, especially in light of the Judiciary Committee’s unique role and expertise in protecting those rights.

We also believe that the Judiciary Committee bill is preferable because it does not provide immunity for telecom companies that allegedly cooperated with the administration’s warrantless wiretapping program. As this is such a controversial issue, we feel it would be appropriate to require the proponents of immunity to make their case on the floor.

Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,

Russell D. Feingold (D-WI)

Christopher J. Dodd (D-CT)

Barack Obama (D-IL)

Bernard Sanders (I-VT)

Robert Menendez (D-NJ)

Joseph R. Biden, Jr. (D-DE)

Sherrod Brown (D-OH)

Tom Harkin (D-IA)

Benjamin L. Cardin (D-MD)

Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY)

Daniel K. Akaka (D-HI)

Jim Webb (D-VA)

Edward M. Kennedy (D-MA)

Barbara Boxer (D-CA)

For your convenience, I have highlighted the presidential candidates who have objected.

Gravel, Kucinich Out of Tomorrow’s Debate

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I think that this is a good thing. They aren’t serious candidates, and they aren’t serious by the definition of Iowa PBS either:

  • an F.E.C. statement of candidacy;
  • having an Iowa campaign staffer and Iowa campaign office as of October 1;
  • registering at least at 1 percent in the October Des Moines Register poll.

Not quote sure how Keys got into the Republithug debate today. My only explanation is that it was affirmative action.

FEC to Review Matching ActBlue Funds To Edwards

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Well, it looks like the FEC will not be matching Act Blue contributions. The theory behind this is that Act Blue is a dingle entity, and hence no matching except for the first $250 from the group.

At least that is what the draft ruling says.

Of course, it is the individual donors who decide which candidate gets the cash with Act Blue. They are really more of a clearinghouse than a PAC.

Kos has more info. Comments must be in by tomorrow.

Jerome Armstrong Has the Definitive Word on Obama

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The “Blogfather” just put his finger on my problem with Obama, and I did not realize that I hadn’t gotten what was wrong already.

Once again, someone who writes better than I ever will.

Barack Obama is lacking in the most basic experience of a presidential candidate: He has never run a real campaign against a Republican.

His state senate races were in a safe Dem district, and for Senate, he ran against Alan F###ing Keyes.

All of his real political campaigns have been against Democrats, in the primaries.

….

This questionnaire in and of itself is just one thing, but Obama’s response to it coming out is unsettling in it’s pattern of positioning himself above the partisan fray. Obama has never faced a serious Republican challenge. Not one. Obama has no experience of the hostile and polarized political environment that he’d enter were he to win the nomination, and he has distanced himself from partisan Democrats during his campaign for the nomination. I don’t think it’s spin to question how Obama might actually do once he confronts Republicans on the campaign trail, instead of across the table in those bipartisan negotiations he longs for making happen.

My guess is that, once he’s personally experienced the confrontation of the Republican machine, it would totally transform the way Obama views campaigns. Rather than viewing partisan progressives as something to Sister Soulja while he appeases the non-partisan media machine, he would come to realize the value, in today’s partisan environment, of engaging partisan Democrats as part of his campaign. He’d prepare to battle with us, rather than trash us as tokens of the past.

….

For Democrats that think about how a campaign might position itself best to win, the question really comes down to this: Do you believe that this nation is going to transcend partisan politics in 2008?

(emphasis mine)

I disagree on only one point, the media machine is not non-partisan. It’s had it’s tongue up the right wing’s ass for way too long.

Hillary might win. She is the most vetted candidate in history, and she understands the war, and even savors it a bit.

Edwards would win. He has been blooded by the 2004 election, and his own contentious senate campaign.

Obama can’t win. The press loves him right now, because he sucks up to them, and the ‘Phants are keeping their powder dry. He is bringing a knife to a gun fight.

Romney Spreading “Walking Around Money” In Iowa

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It appears that he’s paying for endorsements. Thomas Edsall, Ethan Hova report that Romney is making massive payments to various Republicans as “GOTV Consulting”.

The payments start at $500 a month, the base rate for student leaders, many of whom are chairs in the “Iowa Students for Romney” campaign organization. At a higher level, Joe Earle, former director of the Iowa Christian Alliance (the successor to the Iowa Christian Coalition) gets $4,000 a month, and Gary Marx, a top-level member on the Romney for President National Faith And Values Steering Committee, gets $8,000 a month.

Well, it appears that he gets votes the old fashioned way, he buys them.

It’s surprising that Giuliani is not doing the same, he’s got an even larger war chest.

So Now the Obama Campaign is Going After Krugman

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I have to agree with Ezra Klein when he says, Something’s really gone off the rails when the Obama campaign decides to release an oppo document on Paul Krugman. (Obama doc here)

Considering that Krugman is arguably the most prominent liberal pundit in America, this is surprising. What is not surprising is that, much like he does with social security, he goes out of his way to use Republican talking points to defend his ideas and attakc other’s.

Thirdestae has a good analysis, he believes that Obama is, “attempting to appease/manipulate the class of establishment pundits, and with them the press corps as a whole”.

I agree that this is part of his strategy, but it’s also a symptom of a problem, specifically that he wants to please people too much.

Edwards condemns NAFTA

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His point is not that trade deals are bad, but that bad trade deals are bad. This is how he couches his condmenation:

“NAFTA was sold to the American people with promises that it would grow the economy and create millions of new jobs. But today, we know those promises were empty,” he said in remarks prepared for delivery at a town hall forum in Derry. “In all three countries, it has hurt workers and families while helping corporate insiders.”

…….

“The folks in Washington say that trade is good for the economy, even if it hurts a few ‘losers,'” he said. “That’s the word they use, losers, and it tells you something about how they see regular American workers and families who are struggling to compete.”

This attitude on trade deals ties into an attitude of, “What’s good for Wall Street is good for the country,” which the has led to many of the problems we see now (housing crash, credit crunch, etc.)

Peggy Noonan Blast Talibaptists

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Really. I mean it. Former Reagan speechwriter, and erstwhile dolphin trainer* Peggy Noonan, a right winger through and through, just called the religious right a bunch of idiots.

She was writing about Romney’s “Mormon” speech, and talks about “a particular fundamentalist strain within evangelical Protestantism”, and she finishes with this:

There was one significant mistake in the speech. I do not know why Romney did not include nonbelievers in his moving portrait of the great American family. We were founded by believing Christians†, but soon enough Jeremiah Johnson, and the old proud agnostic mountain men, and the village atheist, and the Brahmin doubter, were there, and they too are part of us, part of this wonderful thing we have. Why did Mr. Romney not do the obvious thing and include them? My guess: It would have been reported, and some idiots would have seen it and been offended that this Romney character likes to laud atheists. And he would have lost the idiot vote.

My feeling is we’ve bowed too far to the idiots. This is true in politics, journalism, and just about everything else.

Emphasis mine.

This, I think is illustrative of the divide between the Wall Street Republicans and the Talibaptists.

They don’t like each other. They don’t support each other. They just find the other side useful, and Noonan illustrates, as does the Club for Growth going after Huckabee, that there are strains in this relationship.

*She once wrote that Elian Gonzalez was saved from drowning by divinely inspired porpoises.
†Actually, not true, and many of the founding fathers would have been offended by this. They considered themselves spiritual, not religious. Many were deists, and a number, John Adams comes to mind, found religion to be an affront to what they saw as the divine. They thought that it was a con game, used to enrich and empower the falsely pious.

Clinton Aids Hired to Break Writers’ Strike

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Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers has hired Mark Fabiani and Chris Lehane to hit back on PR against the writers. Yep….While working for Clinton for the Democratic Party nomination, a party that is supposed to be pro labor, they are working to crush labor in Hollywood.

Seriously, Hillary Clinton makes my head hurt. Her campaign has amazing message discipline, they keep the press in line (they got Bob Novak to back down), and she actually votes when something controversial hits the floor, unlike the distinguished gentleman from Illinois.

And then she goes and surrounds herself to people who whore themselves out to strike breakers, and management in labor disputes.

Obama and Abortion: Profile in Cowardice

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It turns out that when Barack Obama had the opportunity to take a stand on abortion rights, in the state senate, when called to make a vote on the proposed ban on the DNX procedure, he voted “present”. (see here,
here, and here)

During Senator Obama’s 2004 senate campaign, the Illinois NOW PAC did not recommend the endorsement of Obama for U.S. Senate because he refused to stand up for a woman’s right to choose and repeatedly voted `present’ on important legislation.

As a State Senator, Barack Obama voted `present’ on seven abortion bills, including a ban on ‘partial birth abortion,’ two parental notification laws and three ‘born alive’ bills. In each case, the right vote was clear, but Senator Obama chose political cover over standing and fighting for his convictions.

“When we needed someone to take a stand, Senator Obama took a pass,” said Grabenhofer. “He wasn’t there for us then and we don’t expect him to be now.”

At the time, Obama represented what was arguably the most liberal senate district in Illinois, so there was no need for him to duck and cover, but duck and cover, he did.

Of course, he did it on the Petraeus/Moveon vote too, he showed up for Barbara Boxer’s amendment, but was not in the hall later that afternoon for the Moveon condemnation.

He’s very well spoken. He’s telegenic.

But it appears that when the going gets tough, and let’s be clear in his Hyde Park senate district, being unapologetically pro choice is actually pretty damn safe, he is AWOL.

His dog whistle gay bashing behavior with his gospel tour appears to be a part of a pattern.

No guts, and the moreI hear him going on using Republican talking points like “hostility to religion” and :social security crisis”, the more he sounds like Joe Lieberman with a better tan.

As to the Presidential race…He’s still ahead of Mike Gravel in my mind, but if push comes to shove, I vote Hillary instead of him*.

*Yuck…I think that I just threw up in my mouth.

Huckabee Pressured Parole Board to Pardon Rapist Who Later Murdered

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This could be compared to Willie Horton, but it’s not.

With Willie Horton, Dukkakis supported a furlough program to rehabilitate people. He had no other connection with the guy. With Wayne Dumond, Mike Huckabee specifically lobbied for his release, because the victim was a relative of Bill Clinton, and the daughter of a Clinton contributor.

According to Murray Waas, who has also been all over the Plame affair, Huckabee went so far as to imply that he would grant clemency if Drumond was not paroled.