McCain: Opportunist and Not that bright June 23, 2008
Posted by Randy Allgaier in Blogroll, Civil Liberties, Culture, Democrats, Domestic Issues, Foreign Policy, General, Liberal blogs, News, News and politics, Policy and Law, Political, Political Analysis, Politics, Republican, Social and Political Commentary, Social and Politics.Tags: 2008 Election, Barack Obama, Democrat, Democratic Party, John McCain, McCain, Obama, President, Presidential Election, Republican Party, Republicans
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Ambition and lack of intellect- it seems like we are ending eight years of a leader who combined those two problems. Can we afford another President that is loaded with ambition but lacks the intellectual acumen to lead the nation? Let’s call a spade a spade- John McCain is not the brightest knife in the drawer. McCain graduated 894th out of 899 in his Naval Academy class. This of course is made more disturbing since in essence he was a “legacy” student. His family has been in the military since the French and Indian War and both his father and grandfather were both four star admirals. So- it seems that getting into the Academy was a no brainer and he scraped through by the skin of his teeth.
I know the man is a military hero and was a brave prisoner of war, but in all due respect to Mr. McCain’s clear sacrifice for his country- he is not the first man to sacrifice for his country, he isn’t the last and many more have given the ultimate sacrifice – their lives. It seems disconcerting that Mr. McCain’s resume centers around his sacrifice to his nation.
Other than McCain’s horrible ordeal as a prisoner of war his military career was lack luster. John McCain relied on family connections for every job he has held. His career before marrying Cindy Hensley was solely through family ties. When he married Cindy McCain he went to work for his father in law. Cozy huh? He became Vice President for Public Relations for Hensley and Company. There he gained political support among the local business community, meeting powerful figures such as banker Charles Keating, Jr., real estate developer Fife Symington III, andopen seat in Arizona’s 1st congressional newspaper publisher Darrow “Duke” Tully. In 1982, McCain ran as a Republican for an district. As a newcomer to the state, McCain was hit with repeated charges of being a carpetbagger. McCain responded to a voter making the charge with what a Phoenix Gazette columnist would later label as “the most devastating response to a potentially troublesome political issue I’ve ever heard”:
“Listen, pal. I spent 22 years in the Navy. My father was in the Navy. My grandfather was in the Navy. We in the military service tend to move a lot. We have to live in all parts of the country, all parts of the world. I wish I could have had the luxury, like you, of growing up and living and spending my entire life in a nice place like the First District of Arizona, but I was doing other things. As a matter of fact, when I think about it now, the place I lived longest in my life was Hanoi.”
There has been some sort of myth that McCain would never capitalize on his time as a POW- that it somehow is demeaning. It is and it is in bad taste- but Mr. McCain has been playing that experience since his entry on to the political stage. Quite frankly it is insulting to every man and woman who has come home from war injured or in a body bag that Mr. McCain uses this experience as his trump card. Who would dare challenge his sacrifice so he uses it to its highest political advantage. McCain didn’t have a real resume to tout so he resorted, and continues to do so, to shamelessly using his POW expereince to shut up opposition.
And there was “Mr. Straight Talk’s” envolvement with the Keating Six. Between 1982 and 1987, McCain had received $112,000 in legal political contributions from Charles Keating Jr. and his associates at Lincoln Savings and Loan Association, along with trips on Keating’s jets that McCain failed to repay until two years later. In 1987, McCain was one of the five senators whom Keating contacted in order to prevent the government’s seizure of Lincoln, which was by then insolvent and being investigated for making questionable efforts to regain solvency. McCain met twice with federal regulators to discuss the government’s investigation of Lincoln. Poor judgement from a not so bright guy. McCain was rebuked by the Senate Ethics Committee- so much for the straight shooting guy!
McCain developed the reuptation of a “maverick”, but only because it suited him in his 2000 presidential bid. He walked in lockstep with the Republicans for years. The Pew Research Center recently found, the word Americans now most frequently use to describe John McCain is not “maverick,” but “old.” But he has always been an opportunist and it is more blatant than ever.
I will grant that all politicians back pedal on issues, including Senator Obama whom I admire and ardently support. But Mr. McCain’s recent reversals give new meaning to the term “flip flop” (a term I use reluctantly because it is so over used by the punditry it makes me gag). The clearly opportunist approach of having absolutely no moral compass at all shows a man of limited intellect and wild ambition. But I’ll get to that record in a moment.
First let’s address the man’s horrible attempts at humor. There was his “rhymes with rich” item regarding Hillary Clinton and the wildly offensive joke about Hillary Clinton, Chelsea Clinton and Janet Reno should make any woman cringe and it is sheer stupidity that any politician would make such remarks. Then of course there is his “Bomb Bomb Bomb, Bomb Bomb Iran” remark. Tacky and stupid again.
He can’t seem to keep straight the difference between Sunni and Sh’ia, he seems not to have a clue as to the number of troops in Iran, he seems to be clueless about the growing threat in Afghanistan and instead concentrates every fiber of his foreign policy on Iran.
But the most current changes in his stances on virtually everything is what is most disturbing. This isn’t just political expedience – it is pandering and it is the vestige of a man who just isn’t too bright.
In his eternal quest for the Republican presidential nomination John McCain has repeatedly reversed long-held positions and compromised purportedly core principles. From the Bush tax cuts, the religious right and immigration reform to overturning Roe v. Wade, proclaiming Samuel Alito a model Supreme Court Justice and bashing France (just to name a few), McCain changed sides as changing political conditions dictated.
McCain’s recent rapid fire, acrobatic flip-flops have produced whiplash, at least for voters. Ten times since the beginning of June, McCain has retreated from, upended or just forgotten positions he once claimed as his own. On Social Security, balancing the budget, defense spending, domestic surveillance and a host of other issues so far this month, McCain’s “Straight Talk Express” did a U-turn on the road to the White House.
1. Social Security Privatization. John McCain has apparently learned the lesson that the more President Bush spoke about his Social Security privatization scheme, the less popular it became. On Friday, Mr. Straight Talk proclaimed at a recentl New Hampshire event, “I’m not for, quote, privatizing Social Security. I never have been. I never will be.” Sadly, McCain and his advisers like ousted Hewlett Packer CEO Carly Fiorina are on record declaring fidelity to the idea of diverting Social Security dollars into private accounts. On November 18, 2004, for example, McCain announced, “Without privatization, I don’t see how you can possibly, over time, make sure that young Americans are able to receive Social Security benefits.” And in March 2003, McCain backed his President, declaring, “As part of Social Security reform, I believe that private savings accounts are a part of it - along the lines that President Bush proposed
2. Raising - and Slashing - Defense Spending. John McCain was also for boosting American defense spending before he was against it. In the November 2007 issue of Foreign Affairs, McCain argued “we can also afford to spend more on national defense, which currently consumes less than four cents of every dollar that our economy generates - far less than what we spent during the Cold War.” But facing the $2 trillion budgetary hole the McCain tax plan is forecast to produce (a sea of red ink even the Wall Street Journal noticed), Team McCain changed its tune. As Forbes scoffed in amazement:
“McCain’s top economic adviser, Doug Holtz-Eakin, blithely supposes that cuts in defense spending could make up for reducing the corporate tax rate from 35% to 25% and the subsequent shrinkage in federal revenues. Get that? The national security candidate wants to cut spending on our national security. Wait until the generals and the admirals hear that.”
3. First Term Balanced Budget Pledge. With its on-again/off-again/on-again promise to balance the budget by January 2013, the McCain campaign executed that rarest of political maneuvers, the 360. During a February 15th rally in La Crosse, Wisconsin, “McCain promised he’d offer a balanced budget by the end of his first term.” But just days later, McCain’s senior economic adviser Douglas Holtz_Eakin announced a deficit-ending target of 2017. In mid-April, Holtz-Eakin proclaimed, “I would like the next president not to talk about deficit reduction.” McCain, too, signaled the retreat from his first-term balance budget commitment, explaining to Chris Matthews on April 15th that “economic conditions are reversed.”
Apparently economic conditions have improved dramatically since then. On June 6, Holtz-Eakin squared the circle, announcing, “That plan, when appropriately phased in, as it has always been intended to be, will bring the budget to balance by the end of his first term.”
4. The Media’s Treatment of Hillary Clinton. No doubt, John McCain suffers from recurring bouts of selective amnesia. And some episodes take only days to manifest themselves. During his disastrous “green screen” speech on June 3, McCain reached out to Hillary Clinton’s supporters by proclaiming, “The media often overlooked how compassionately she spoke to the concerns and dreams of millions of Americans, and she deserves a lot more appreciation than she sometimes received.” But by June 7, McCain denied to Newsweek that his media critique never passed his lips, “I did not–that was in prepared remarks, and I did not–I’m not in the business of commenting on the press and their coverage or not coverage.”
5. The Estate Tax. Just days before his contortionist act on Social Security, John McCain reversed course on the estate tax as well. On June 8, 2006, McCain on the Senate floor expressed his agreement with Teddy Roosevelt that “most great civilized countries have an income tax and an inheritance tax” and “in my judgment both should be part of our system of federal taxation.” But after years of battling Republican colleagues dead-set on dismantling the so-called “death tax” and instead promoting a $5 million trigger, on Tuesday John McCain sounded the retreat. Now, he insists, “the estate tax is one of the most unfair tax laws on the books.”
6. FISA, Domestic Surveillance and Telecom Immunity. When it comes to the Bush administration’s program of domestic spying on Americans, McCain has performed similar logical gymnastics. On December 20, 2007, McCain suggested to the Pulitzer prize-winning journalist Charles Savage that President Bush had clearly crossed the line. As Wired’s Ryan Singel noted:
“I think that presidents have the obligation to obey and enforce laws that are passed by Congress and signed into law by the president, no matter what the situation is,” McCain said. The Globe’s Charlie Savage pushed further, asking , “So is that a no, in other words, federal statute trumps inherent power in that case, warrantless surveillance?” To which McCain answered, “I don’t think the president has the right to disobey any law.”
But on June 2, McCain adviser Holtz-Eakin put that notion to rest, telling the National Review:
“[N]either the Administration nor the telecoms need apologize for actions that most people, except for the ACLU and the trial lawyers, understand were Constitutional and appropriate in the wake of the attacks on September 11, 2001.”
Pressed to explain the glaring inconsistencies, John McCain on June 6 played dumb, deciding that cowardice is the better part of valor. As the New York Times reported, McCain now believes the legality of Bush’s regime of NSA domestic surveillance is unclear and, in any event, is old news:
“It’s ambiguous as to whether the president acted within his authority or not,” he said, saying courts had ruled different ways on the matter. “I’m not interested in going back. I’m interested in addressing the challenge we face to day of trying to do everything we can to counter organizations and individuals that want to destroy this country. So there’s ambiguity about it. Let’s move forward.”
As for immunity for the telecommunications firms cooperating with the White House in what before August 2007 was doubtless illegal surveillance, there too McCain’s position has evolved. On May 23, campaign surrogate Chuck Fish announced that McCain would not back retroactive immunity “unless there were revealing Congressional hearings and heartfelt repentance from those telephone and internet companies.” Subsequently, the McCain campaign swiftly backtracked, claiming its man supports immunity unconditionally.
7. Restoring the Everglades. On June 5, John McCain traveled to the Everglades to win over Floridians and environmentally-minded voters. There he proclaimed, “I am in favor of doing whatever’s necessary to save the Everglades.” Sadly, as ThinkProgress documented, McCain not only opposed $2 billion in funding for the restoration of the Everglades national park, he backed President Bush’s veto of the legislation in 2007. “I believe,” he said, “that we should be passing a bill that will authorize legitimate, needed projects without sacrificing fiscal responsibility.”
8. Divestment from South Africa. During his June 2 speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), John McCain called for the international community to target Iran for the kind of worldwide sanctions regime applied to apartheid-era South Africa. Unfortunately, McCain’s lobbyist-advisers Charlie Black and Rick Davis each represented firms doing business with Tehran. Even more unfortunate, John McCain was frequently not among those offering “moral clarity and conviction” in backing “a divestment campaign against South Africa, helping to rid that nation of the evil of apartheid.” As ThinkProgress detailed:
Despite voting to override President Reagan’s veto of a bill imposing economic sanctions against South Africa in 1986, McCain voted against sanctions on at least six other occasions.
9. Fighting Job Losses in Michigan. During the run-up to the Michigan primary, John McCain cautioned workers there in January that he didn’t want to raise “false hopes that somehow we can bring back lost jobs,” adding that it” wasn’t government’s job to protect buggy factories and haberdashers when cars replaced carriages and men stopped wearing hats.” But after getting trounced in Michigan by Mitt Romney and watching the economy deteriorate further, McCain has had a change of heart. As Bloomberg noted on June 5:
“Nowadays, the party’s presumptive nominee is singing a different tune, striking a populist pose and saying “new jobs are coming”… …Over the past few months, however, McCain has taken a lesson from Romney, acknowledging recently that “Americans are hurting.” Returning to Michigan last month, the Arizona senator told a local television station that he would fight for new jobs and the state wouldn’t “be left behind.”
Perhaps the good people of Michigan, as John McCain suggested to a Kentucky audience in April, can make a living on eBay.
10. Opposing Hurricane Katrina Investigations. During a June 4th town hall meeting in Baton Rouge, John McCain answered a reporter’s question regarding Hurricane Katrina and the failure of the New Orleans levees by announcing:
“I’ve supported every investigation and ways of finding out what caused the tragedy. I’ve been here to New Orleans. I’ve met with people on the ground.”
As it turns out, not so much. McCain’s revisionist history neglects to mention that in 2005 and 2006 he twice voted against a commission to study the government’s response to Katrina. He also opposed three separate emergency funding measures providing relief to Katrina victims, including the extension of five months of Medicaid benefits. And as Think Progress pointed out, “until traveling there one month ago, McCain had made just one public tour of New Orleans since Hurricane Katrina touched down in August 2005.”
And so it goes. As surely as the sun rises in the east and sets in the west each day, so too will John McCain change positions. (Like that other law of nature, McCain’s flip-flops are literally becoming a daily occurrence. Since this piece was originally drafted on Saturday, McCain added two new policy turnabouts - on phasing out rather than repealing the Alternative Minimum Tax and on requiring a litmus test for his judicial appointees - to his litany of reversals.)
Of course there is also the issue of torture on which McCain has so heinously showed himself as an opportunist of the lowest order. As Andrew Sullivan of “The Atlantic” wrote:
“McCain reveals himself as a positioner even on the subject on which he has gained a reputation for unimpeachable integrity. McCain has indeed been a leader in preventing the military from torturing terror suspects, and in banning waterboarding. But by leaving this lacuna in the law, he gives this president the space he wants. As president himself, of course, McCain would surely instruct the CIA to uphold the American way of interrogation, and not to adopt techniques once used by the Gestapo and prosecuted by the US as war crimes. But we now know that there will be one difference between Obama and McCain in November. One will never tolerate torture; the other just did.”
And last but not least is the issue of off shore oil drilling. McCain recently decided that along with a “gas tax” holiday he would again pander to the stupidest among us, because that is what he knows best, by reversing himself on the issue of off shore oil drilling as a remedy to the high price of gas. SAY WHAT?
Opening America’s coastal waters to oil drilling, as John McCain urged in an address Tuesday, is unlikely to provide Americans with more oil for at least seven to 10 years. That’s the estimate from the American Petroleum Institute, the oil industry trade group. The Interior Department offered a wide range of estimates of how much oil might be within reach of U.S. offshore drilling in a 2006 report. It estimated that the Outer Continental Shelf could hold 115.4 billion barrels. However, it also estimated that recoverable reserves off U.S. coasts in areas now banned from production probably hold only about 19 billion barrels. One thousand million barrels equals 1 billion, so if there are 19 billion barrels in the areas McCain would open to drilling, that’s enough to provide about 920 days, or about 2.5 years, of current U.S. consumption.
Mr. McCain is an unabashed opportunist who has played his undeniably horrendous experience in Viet Nam with an unashamed gall that diminishes his own sacrifice and is insulting to every man and woman who has sacrificed for our nation, he has used every family connection he could use including connections that were morally corrupt (Keating), he doesn’t seem to hold an opinion very long if it is politically uncomfortable and he seems to take bad advice. He is not to bright but dangerously ambitious. Haven’t we had enough of that?
An Open Letter to Supporters of Hillary Clinton from a Supporter of Barack Obama June 6, 2008
Posted by Randy Allgaier in Civil Liberties, Culture, Democrats, Domestic Issues, Foreign Policy, General, Liberal blogs, News, News and politics, Political, Political Analysis, Politics, Republican, Social and Political Commentary, Social and Politics, abortion.Tags: Barack, Barack Obama, Clinton, Conservative, Democratic Party, Democratic Unity, Hillary Clinton, Liberal, Obama, Republican Party, Republican; Democrat, Republicans
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This has been a grueling primary season and historic in so many ways- not the least of these being the first viable woman and the first African American with an real opportunity to become the presidential nominee of a major political party and potentially President of the United States. It was also a primary season that left people feeling a range of emotions. Should it surprise any of us that two strong candidates who represent history and constituencies long ignored inspired their core base and engendered strong emotions?
Many of us did not think we would ever see the day where we had potentially the first female President or the first African American President. One can either claim that this has been an ironic twist of fate – after years of waiting for either of these historic moments that it was the year to see both of these historic campaigns occur in competition. Or one can see it is an embarrassment of riches that is also an eloquent statement about the inclusiveness of the Democratic Party and the positive movement that our nation has made in dealing with gender and racial inequity.
Former President Bill Clinton waxed prosaic about the irony that he had been waiting his whole life to cast his vote for an African American running for President only to be in a position to find a woman running in the same election- a woman who was also his wife.
I tend to think of this choice we had as an embarrassment of riches, not a Solomon like quandary. Many supporters of Senator Clinton have said they would never vote for Senator Obama- they would vote for Senator McCain or stay home rather than vote for Senator Obama. I also acknowledge that some of Mr. Obama’s had the same level of passion and said similar things.
To those of you who are angry and leaning to voting for McCain or not voting, I plead with you to re-think this decision.
As fellow Democrats there is more than binds us than divides us. While this election is historic and it is easy to describe it in its starkest terms-black, female, age- it is more than that. This election should not be about being an African American’s turn, a woman’s turn or a septuagenarian’s turn for that matter.
Should women be proud of Senator Clinton’s campaign? Absolutely! Should women see Senator Clinton’s campaign as both historic and a real world lesson for their daughters’ hopes and of their mothers’ histories? Definitely! Was there a streak of misogyny apparent in the media’s coverage of the campaign? You bet there was!
Clearly African Americans have the same sense of pride about Mr. Obama and clearly there was overt and tacit racism present in the media’s coverage of this campaign as well.
While our nation has moved to a point where a woman and an African American have a real chance of leading our nation, there will still be those who will not vote for one or both of these candidates because they can’t pull that lever for either a woman or a black man. That is sad, but it is a fact. No matter what our arguments on behalf of Mrs. Clinton or Mr. Obama those people would never vote for one of these candidates- their prejudices (misogynistic and/or racist) are too ingrained and visceral to be swayed by intelligent discourse. I am not addressing my remarks to those who will not vote for Mr. Obama because he is black- those people will never vote for him. There is nothing I can say in a blog article that will erase their racism and frankly I won’t waste my time or their’s trying to do so.
This is open letter is to those of you who supported Mrs. Clinton and who are enlightened enough to see beyond gender and race.
While this election will always be historic and groundbreaking because of the demographics of the candidates- and that history should be acknowledged and celebrated; it should not be about their gender or race; it should not be about identity politics. It should be about the issues that we, as Democrats, care about and that bind us together.
The differences in policies between Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama are nuanced and a pale shade of grey. The differences between Mr. Obama and Senator McCain are stark and black and white. We have a clear choice and an important one. In all due respect, if you supported Mrs. Clinton because of her stance on issues it would be insanity to vote for Mr. McCain or not to vote (effectively ceding your franchise and effectively helping Mr. McCain). I plead with you to think carefully.
First is the issue of the Supreme Court. The 44th President of the United States will likely appoint 2 new members to the Court and potentially 3. Justice John Paul Stevens is 88 and Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is 75 and both are likely to retire during the next presidential term. It has been rumored that Justice David Souter, although only 68, would love to return to his home in New Hampshire and retire.
If Mr. McCain becomes President the court will definitely move far to the right. It is clear that Mr. McCain would nominate justices that are in the vein of Justices Scalia, Thomas and Alito- three justices that the candidate is on record admiring. The current court is tilting to the right, a McCain presidency would take it far to the right and there is no doubt that Roe v. Wade would be overturned and a woman’s right to choose would be in jeopardy. Clearly, Mr. Obama does not have an agenda to overturn Roe v. Wade and supports a woman’s right to choose.
Mr. Obama has sound policies to address not only the issue of choice but many other issues of concern to women- http://my.barackobama.com/page/content/womenissues
Mr. McCain’s policies on privatizing Social Security would put that program- a safety net for the nation’s elderly and disabled- at risk. The burden on elderly Americans is already significant and Mr. McCain’s policies would only exacerbate those burdens. Mr. Obama wants to shore up the Social Security Trust Fund. Would that mean higher taxes? It would raise taxes on 6% of Americans- the 6% that make over $97,000 a year. It has never made sense to me that there is a cap on Social security taxes that tax the poorest but do eliminate a tax liability for the richest. Let’s be honest about Social Security- it needs to be protected and in order to ensure that it functions and works for future generations raising or eliminating that cap makes sense. We should listen to Warren Buffet- the richest man in the country- he believes that folks like him should be paying a higher percentage of their income to taxes- including Social Security. In an interview he talked about how absurd it is that his administrative assistant pays a higher percentage of her income in taxes than he does. Mr. Obama’s removal of the cap for the Social Security tax will not be popular among the advocates for the wealthy but it is fair and will go a long way to keeping the program solvent. Mr. Obama is offering real solutions that do not burden middle and low income Americans to sustain Social Security to continue providing needed financial help for the elderly. Mr. Obama’s plans for social security can be found at http://www.barackobama.com/issues/seniors
Mr. Obama has a plan that would essentially offer universal coverage. It is true that Mrs. Clinton’s program went further than Mr. Obama’s does, but Mr. Obama’s is a plan that is light years better than the restructuring of the health care market place that Mr. McCain proposes. Essentially Mr. McCain offers no sort of health care reform. Ironically, Mr. McCain’s plan would make it difficult for people like him- Americans with preëxisting conditions- to obtain affordable care. Mr. Obama’s health care plan can be found at http://www.barackobama.com/issues/healthcare/
Mr. Obama actually has thoughts about education something on which Mr. McCain has not offered much of a position. Mr. Obama believes that we must equip poor and struggling districts, both rural and urban, with the support and resources they need to provide disadvantaged students with an opportunity to reach their full potential. Too often, our leaders present this issue as an either - or debate, divided between giving our schools more funding, or demanding more accountability. Mr. Obama believes that we have to do both and has offered a cogent plan available on his website http://www.barackobama.com/issues/education/ .
Mr. Obama’s position on the war in Iraq is well known and unlike Mr. McCain he acknowledges that this war is not worth more blood and treasure. Mr. Obama believes that this ill-conceived war that has done nothing to address the threat of terrorism has taken the lives of too many of our nation’s sons and daughters. This issue too is addressed on his website in depth http://www.barackobama.com/issues/iraq/ and a description of his sound foreign policy objectives can be found at http://www.barackobama.com/issues/foreignpolicy/
Today- we heard more disastrous economic news. Higher unemployment, more home foreclosures, skyrocketing oil prices, obscene gas prices. Mr. McCain acknowledges that economics is not his strong suit and he offers nothing more than more of the disastrous economic policies of Mr. Bush- policies that benefit the wealthiest among us and multinational corporations that ship jobs abroad and has no qualms about spending billions of dollars on a war while ignoring our domestic economic disaster and our crumbling infrastructure. Again there is more information at http://www.barackobama.com/issues/economy/
The Democratic Party must be unified in this election. It is a pivotal time for our nation. With 81% of all Americans having the opinion that the nation is headed in the wrong direction, the last thing we need is Mr. McCain’s replay of Mr. Bush.
Mr. McCain has a reputation as a maverick which is appealing to many. However whatever maverick tendency the Senator may once have possessed has evaporated in recent years. It is clear that Mr. McCain has consistently moved to the right in recent years- in ways that are troubling. His commendable comments about Jerry Falwell as an agent of intolerance were bold for a Republican but he later caved and embraced Falwell at Liberty University- not unlike the embrace he had, and continues to have, with George W. Bush.
So, my fellow citizens, my friends who supported Mrs. Clinton- please think about the significance of your action in November. A vote for no one or a vote for Mr. McCain is simply not an option for any one who agrees with Mrs. Clinton on the issues. Please join me and ensure that Mr. McCain does not become the next President. I know that you may never be the supporter of and believer in Mr. Obama that I am, but our nation needs you to make the right choice and ensure that we do not have four more years of a Bush presidency in the name of McCain and morphed into McBush.
Your party and your nation need you to cast your vote for Mr. Obama.
And Let the Games Begin! Bush, Nazis and Appeasement May 23, 2008
Posted by Randy Allgaier in Blogroll, Civil Liberties, Culture, Democrats, Domestic Issues, Foreign Policy, General, Liberal blogs, News, News and politics, Political, Political Analysis, Politics, Republican, Social and Political Commentary, Social and Politics, blogging, blogs.Tags: Add new tag, Appeasement, Barack Obama, Bush, Clinton, Democrat, Democratic Party, Democratic Primary, Election 2008, George Bush, Hillary Clinton, John McCain, McCain, Obama, President Bush, President George W. Bush, Presidential Election, Republican Party, Republicans
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I guess the months between now and November will be rich with fodder for the blogosphere- the first slavo of the general election campaign has been lobbed by of all people the lame duck president- George W. Bush. (I’m sure Senator McCain is thankful for the President’s support!)
I am a little late to the party writing about the President’s inappropriate remarks at the Knesset because in many ways the remarks speak for themselves- they are wildly inappropriate – like most of the actions of his administration. I won’t even dignify the President’s discussion of domestic politics at the podium of a foreign parliament or the evocation of Hitler to the Israeli Knesset. But Senator McCain has grabbed onto the word Appeasement- a word they have so blatantly misused and he is like a dog with a bone. So I guess this is with us for a while.
After watching Chris Matthews eviscerate conservative radio host Kevin James trying to get James to define what appeasement really is and what the act of appeasement was in 1938 by Neville Chamberlain, I would have thought that the conservative right would think twice before using this word so recklessly.
The actual definition of appeasement, literally: calming, reconciling, acquiring peace by way of concessions or gifts (the verb ‘to pay’ also goes back to the Latin ‘pax’ = peace). Most commonly, appeasement is used for the policy of accepting the imposed conditions of an aggressor in lieu of armed resistance, usually at the sacrifice of principles. Usually it means giving in to demands of an aggressor in order to avoid war. Since World War II, the term has gained a negative connotation in the British government, in politics and in general, of weakness, cowardice and self-deception.
President Bush, who brandished about the ill-remembered prime minister’s name in the Israeli parliament, last week. Bush implicitly likened Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama’s statements about diplomacy to Chamberlain, and the idea that aggressive dictators should have their demands appeased. Dispelling any doubts about the target of Bush’s remarks, Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain has made the same accusation, while naming Obama. Both men have simultaneously, however, unfairly maligned one of the best tools that American leaders have at their disposal: presidential diplomacy.
Obama sparked controversy when he declared last summer that he would be willing, without preconditions, to meet with unfriendly foreign leaders, such as the presidents of Iran or Venezuela. Obama bases his stance on the history of U.S. diplomacy, citing presidents such as John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan. Anti- communist to his core, Reagan still thought that the risks of nuclear war made dialogue with Moscow a moral and political necessity. Nor did Reagan regard dialogue with Soviet leaders as any kind of appeasement. Reagan’s commitment to dialogue paved the way for a peaceful conclusion to the Cold War.
Another vigorous practitioner of presidential diplomacy was a Democrat whom Reagan particularly admired: Kennedy. Like Reagan, Kennedy came to office believing that the United States stood at a critical point in the Cold War, and that it desperately needed to regain its good standing in the world. During his first year in office, Kennedy met with the feisty Soviet premier, Nikita Khrushchev, and numerous other foreign leaders. Many of these men were widely disliked in the United States - Kennedy did his political standing no favors by meeting with them. Nonetheless Kennedy, a decorated World War II veteran, and the author of a bestselling study of Chamberlain’s policies, never thought meeting with these leaders was akin to appeasing them. Indeed, Kennedy always argued his case vigorously, giving his counterparts reason to respect and take him seriously - as either a friend or a foe. The Kennedy years witnessed real improvement in the image of the United States throughout the world, as shown by a remarkable global outpouring of grief that followed his assassination.
This is the tradition of diplomacy to which Obama refers. It is a strange turn of events when our leaders cast off the bipartisan U.S. commitment to diplomacy in the belief that we give something away just by meeting with foreign leaders.
Speaking this week, McCain deemed this policy reckless; but it would have been far more reckless for either Kennedy or Reagan to shun the Soviet Union or make dialogue with it contingent on extensive preconditions. It would be ideal if, as McCain has said, such meetings could only occur when they promise to advance American prestige, but neither Reagan nor Kennedy thought the issues that they faced could wait for the diplomatic stars to move into perfect alignment - nor should we.
Confronting the problems of a fractured world, we can reassure ourselves by invoking Chamberlain’s errors one more time. Or, perhaps, we can remember his successor, Winston Churchill, who stood up bravely to Hitler, but who also remarked about dialogue: “To jaw-jaw is always better than to war-war.”
But Barack Obama is not the only one who should be taking offense at President Bush’s insistence that anyone having truck with terrorists is no better than Neville Chamberlain and, furthermore, ignores the lessons of the Holocaust.
According to an opinion poll last February, 64% of Israelis — many of them Holocaust survivors or their relatives and descendants — wanted their government to talk directly to Hamas.
Many Israeli analysts and senior military officers have long felt the same way. For example:
Hamas is not going to disappear,” says Shlomo Brom, a former Israeli military chief of strategic planning. “They’re not Al Qaeda; they’re a national political movement.” Brom, who favors indirect negotiations with Hamas, says he believes a dialogue could help moderate the Islamists.
Appeasers all, in President Bush’s world view (and John McCain’s, apparently — although it differs with what McCain said about Hamas a couple of years ago)
As for Iran, also the focus of Bush’s and McCain’s appeasement wrath, here is Bush’s own Defense Secretary:
In a speech given to a group of former American diplomats, Robert Gates, the US Secretary of Defense, stated that his country needs to seek dialogue with Iran. He advocated engaging Tehran diplomatically, rather than simply attempting to intimidate it.
Let’s be clear what Chamberlain’s appeasement really was:
The policy of appeasement, embraced in vain by Great Britain and France in the 1930s, was ultimately a bid to reach a peaceful understanding with Germany. The major powers were anxious to abort any German influence over Eastern Europe. While the countries of this region were equally anxious, their interests rested elsewhere–unrestricted barter of agricultural products for that of German manufactured goods. As it was, Czechoslovakia remained the sole nation who relied upon support from Great Britain and France.
On May 5, 1936, the Italians invaded the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa, using both merciless air power and indiscriminate poisonous gassings. By the time Emperor Haile Selassie had been deposed, the west African nation suffered more than three times the number of battle casualties than its aggressors. On June 30, 1936, Haile Selassie appealed to the League of Nations Assembly for league assistance against the Italian antagonists: “It is us today. It will be you tomorrow. In response to the Italian descent from the northern colony of Eritrea, the League imposed feeble economic restraints on the aggressors. After proving ineffective and even producing uninvited results, the measures were dropped, leading Mussolini towards an alliance with Hitler and the idea that subsequent actions would result in similar leniency.
Accordingly, in 1935, Hitler announced that Germany was undergoing preparations to rearm itself, a fervent violation of the Treaty of Versailles. In 1936, Hitler continued to disobey the restrictions that followed the Great War by announcing the mobilization of troops in the French-occupied Rhineland. Though the German army was under strict order to retreat in case of resistance, it was a simple victory. With France and Great Britain at odds with one another and a lack of support for France from Great Britain, Hitler was allowed to believe that his defiance of the Treaty of Versailles was tolerable.
Following the German conquest of the Rhineland and Italian success in Ethiopia, there was a great expansion of both the distinction and appeal of the authoritarian orders. The various dictatorial regimes of Poland, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, and Yugoslavia were quick to emulate the forms and methods of their Fascist and National-Socialist mentors. Those tyrannical rulers insisted their governments were the embodiments of a new political essence. Just when it seemed the situation could not reach a more volatile state, a cooperation was forged between Hitler and Mussolini, giving the Rome-Berlin axis a concrete foundation.
As the Allies reeled at the thought of a Fascist-dominated Europe, the western democracies were also faced with two alternatives-opposition by force or negotiations which would ultimately end in concessions to Nazi Germany. In August 1938, negotiations began after local German officials asserted that the Sudeten people had been discriminated against by the Czech government. On September 29, 1938, the Munich Pact, which allowed for the cession of four specific districts of the Sudetenland to Germany, was signed.
The transitions of power in the Sudetenland and ensuing actions were overseen by an international commission comprised of delegates from France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Czechoslovakia, and representatives of adjoining German territories. Additionally, Germany, as well as Great Britain and France, agreed to guarantee the new borders of Czechoslovakia. The commission also addressed the issues of the plebiscites. By 1939, it was abundantly clear that the policy of appeasement had rendered ineffective by any standard.
In March 1939, Hitler continued his rampage by invading the remains of Czechoslovakia without resistance from the French or the British. That action, which led to the revocation of the Munich Pact, had two engaging, quite opposing effects. It was Hitler’s invasion that finally convinced France and Great Britain that the Fuhrer would not terminate his actions voluntarily. It was also that action which in August 1939 persuaded Stalin of the cowardice of the western allies. That was cited by Soviet statesmen as leading to the non-aggression pact that chiseled Poland into German and Soviet territories.
On September 1, 1939, Hitler invaded Poland, with the firm belief that Britain and France would condone his action. Ironically, in March, 1939, a British-French alliance pledged to aide Poland with all available power “…in the event of any action which clearly threatened Polish independence and which the Polish Government accordingly considered it vital to resist with their national forces,” (Neville Chamberlain, Great Britain, House of Commons, Parliamentary Debates, Vol. 3e45, March 31, 1939). On September 3, 1939, Great Britain and France declared war against Hitler and Nazi Germany.
Ultimately, appeasement failed. The commencement of World War II forced the western allies to realize the flaws of the policy of appeasement. Though appeasement appeared to be the solution to all problems, it ensured a peace that would have been very costly to maintain. To a great extent, appeasement was a course that tended to ignore some hard political ideas. The question of the Rhineland occupation presented differences in diplomatic procedures, testing the durability of the French-British alliance. The western Allies emerged from the war having defeated Hitler and his army in 1945, yet somehow, the word “winner” seems inappropriate.
So, Mr. President and Senator McCain – I realize that neither of you were very good students- but please get your facts straight. Senator Obama is talking about talking not about appeasing.
The President and the Senator from Arizona are not just poor students of history, they obviously forgot that diplomacy not saber rattling should be how the greatest and most powerful nation on the planet should conduct itself in the community of nations.
The Trailer Trash Gal- the reinvention of Hillary Clinton May 6, 2008
Posted by Randy Allgaier in Blogroll, Culture, Democrats, General, Liberal blogs, News, News and politics, Political, Political Analysis, Politics, Social and Political Commentary, Social and Politics.Tags: Barack, Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Clinton, Democratic Party, Hillary, Hillary Clinton, Obama
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Let me tell ya a story ‘bout a gal that’s been the talk of the trailer park recently. She’s been seen slingin’ back beers and shots, runnin’ around in pick up trucks and has been huntin’ all her life ever since she was knee high to a grasshopper. Yup this gal even has a southern white accent tinged with a little Midwestern twang. Damn- you’d think that this good ‘ol girl came from the hills of West Virginia and daddy was a coal miner. I’m waitin’ for her to talk about bein’ raised in Butcher Holler and spending her childhood hoein’ the corn fields. Now, now- she’s a good gal- I bet she’s spent her whole life since droppin’ out of school at the local steel mill. She’s rough and tumble- scrappy!. She’s a no nonsense gal who won’t take any guff from her man. She comes home each night to the double wide, pops open a can of Bud, puts a Swanson’s TV dinner in the microwave for her and her man Bubba. She sits back on the recliner and tunes in to re-runs of “Married With Children” while Bubba cleans his rifles and nods off with a cheap cigar in his mouth dreamin’ about that gal he met at the gun show.
Damn? You know what? I think that this ‘ol gal- this regular blue collar gal is my idea of the ideal President. She knows about people! She’s not one of them Ivy League educated effete elite liberals. She gets us. Heck she’s one of us- she has machine grease running through her veins.
Well not machine grease- but some sort of grease. How has Hillary Rodham Clinton reinvented herself as the Queen of the Blue Collar Crowd? During the campaign in Pennsylvania she was a rootin’ tootin’ shootin’ Annie Oakley from Scranton. Now she seems to have accentuated her Midwest twang and her drawl seems much more pronounced each day- you’d swear she came up from the nearby trailer park. While Bill is on his Bubba tour (and he does have Bubba roots he can pull from), Hillary is running as the gal from the factory- not as much of a pansy as Rocky Balboa with testicular fortitude to spare. Meanwhile her husband, the former President, is having the time of his life on his Bubba tour of the back country of North Carolina.
Hillary’s father was a successful business owner and she grew up in the upper middle class suburb of Park Ridge Illinois. She went to Wellesley College- one of the elite “Seven Sisters” colleges and later to Yale Law School. Later she was a proferssor of law at the University of Arkansas, first lady of Arkansas, and a partner in the prestigious Rose Law firm. She served on three corporate boards – TCBY, Lafarge and Wal-Mart. Oh yeah – she had a stint as First Lady of the United States and then became a US Senator.
Yup- this gal feels my pain- she’s not part of that elite establishment! No she’s not she OWNS that elite establishment It is remarkable that this newly minted “good ‘ol gal” has reinvented herself so completely, The grating pundit- Chris Mathews- who thinks he is a one make spokesman for blue collar voters (while calling them that arrogant media term- “Lunch bucket Republicans” while living an inside the beltway life- said that Clinton is amazing- you’d think she grew up in Scranton and got her GED. Hardly! Her pedigree is elite- more elite than most and what’s wrong with being the smartest person in the room?
How soon we forget! The gal fightin’ for the regular guy is the same person who made culturally dismissive remarks about Tammy Wynette (“I’m not sitting here, some little woman standing by her man”) and her outlook on marriage and about women staying home and baking cookies and having teas.
I hope we aren’t that dumb. This reinvention is political cynicsm and is a lie. Add the pandering about the gas tax and I just want to send her home singin’ the blues. Senator Clinton- I have a request. Don’t treat the American people like a bunch of dumb hicks and don’t pretend you are something you aren’t.
What’s wrong with being smart? Those BAD “Elitists” May 3, 2008
Posted by Randy Allgaier in Blogroll, Culture, Democrats, Domestic Issues, General, Liberal blogs, News, News and politics, Political, Political Analysis, Politics, Republican, Social and Political Commentary, Social and Politics.Tags: 2008 Election, Barack Obama, Clinton, Democrat, Democratic Party, Democratic Primaries, Election '08, Hillary Clinton, John McCain, McCain, Obama, Presidential Election, Republican Part, Republicans
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Recently the news media have concentrated their coverage on the needs, opinions and voting patterns of “lunch bucket” Democrats - a term the media use to condescendingly describe lower middle class older voters without college degrees. This voting block has also been the focus of endless pandering by Senators McCain and Clinton. Being able to bowl and slug back a shot and a beer seem to get more coverage than the number of American troops who died in April (the number is 52 in case you are interested).
Chris Matthews of “Hardball” on MSNBC lauded Senator Clinton at her prowess in re-inventing herself as a girl from Scranton with a GED as if that gave her higher credibility as a presidential candidate than her true pedigree- middle class Park Ridge Illinois, Wellsley and Yale Law. By the way-Matthews likes to view himself as a blue collar “regular guy” even though he attended a private high school, the elite Holy Cross College in Boston and, after a stint in the Peace Corps did graduate work at UNC Chapel Hill.
I obviously would be thrown into the elite pile by the media (by the way- most of the media, like Matthews, are elite too). I come from a privileged background, I have a private school and Ivy League education, I read books and publications like “The New Yorker”, “The Nation”, The New Republic” and “The New York Times”, I watch news shows like “Meet the Press” and I have worked for years in public policy- focused on health care access and public health planning. What all of that translates into is that I am informed. And I don’t turn off the Republican debates or Bush speeches- I listen to the other side as well. I like to think that I can think!
But during this election cycle I feel more annoyed than usual about the elite label. Elite is never used with Conservative, although it is ironic that most of the wealthy and social elite in this country are Republicans who have a stake in policies and laws that protect their wealth and protects the growth of that wealth. Elite is always used with Liberals- people who feel that government has a roll to play in helping lift up the least of us; believe that there is a social contract at play where we all are responsible for the welfare of our fellow citizens; and support labor unions and the needs of average working people. I find that the height of irony. But there is a greater myth that I want to address.
Elite is often interchanged with alliterative labels like “Latte Liberals” and “Limousine Liberals”. These monikers conjure an image promoted by those on the right- that there are a bunch of out of touch wealthy people who condescendingly “know what’s best”.
They are really trying to say that the elite are people who are wealthier than you and have an educated smugness that is arrogant and are people to whom the “average” American cannot relate. Suddenly education and intelligence are bad things. I thought the average American aspired to have their children go to college and do better and I thought we wanted to give the message that education is a good thing.
Let’s assume that the “elite” are informed and educated – an assumption on which most of those who deride the “elite” agree. What on earth is wrong with educated and informed people? What is wrong with an electorate engaged in the issues rather than campaign imagery? What is wrong with people who don’t swallow sound bites and talking points whole cloth from either the White House or the Speaker of the House? Quite frankly – I want a president who is the smartest person in the room, someone much smarter than me, someone who has encyclopedic knowledge and who is capable of strong nuanced thinking. Do I want a president who is educated and smart, ergo “elite”? Damn straight!
But there is a something else attached to this “elite” myth. It makes it sound like those of us with good educations and hold liberal views are living in ivory towers or at least in gated communities. Not true.
Again- I use myself as an example. Cornell and Harvard educated- I spent the last part of my career in the non-profit sector working on issues I care about. My partner also works for a non-profit doing direct service with adults living with developmental disabilities. Folks working for non-profits are not known for making buckets of money. We both share “liberal” ideologies, we both read newspapers, listen to debates, and we both have good minds and good hearts. But we aren’t wealthy – we are in the middle class and our combined income is NOT in the 6 figure range. I am on a fixed income having been disabled with AIDS and Hepatitis C for nine years. We live on a budget and we are affected by higher prices on groceries and I am always worried about the vagaries of health care – its cost and quality. Presently I have good coverage- but given the precariousness of health coverage- that could change. If I lost coverage I would not be able to pay the nearly $12,000 per month that my medications cost on average. We occasionally indulge ourselves- but we travel less and we dine out less. Our lives are quiet, domestic and we struggle to decrease debt and stay a step ahead. Is that elite? I don’t consider myself elite; our lives sound like the majority of people in this country. I consider myself middle class with a good education.
So I ask the question, what’s wrong with smart people? Why are we derided as out of touch and our thoughts dismissed? If being educated means being dismissed by the nation then why do we view education as important? On the other hand if the people of this country believed strongly in education, we would invest more in education. But that would cost us more money and therefore taxes would be higher. Now I get it! Educated people are elite because educating us raises your taxes.
Mission Accomplished? More Like Mission Impossible May 2, 2008
Posted by Randy Allgaier in Blogroll, Culture, Democrats, Domestic Issues, Foreign Policy, General, Liberal blogs, News, News and politics, Policy and Law, Political, Political Analysis, Republican.Tags: Barack Obama, Chris Matthews, Clinton, Democrat, Democratic Party, George W. Bush, Hillary Clinton, Iraq, Iraqi War, John McCain, McCain, Mission Accomplished, Obama, President Bush, Republican Party, Republicans
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It seems that there have been too many milestones recently related to the war in Iraq. There was the fifth anniversary of the war on 19 March; the 4,000 death on Easter Sunday just 4 days later; and yesterday was the fifth anniversary of the most shameless spectacle ever seen in the history of the United States- President Bush declaring that the war in Iraq was essentially won and reconstruction was beginning on the deck of an aircraft carrier and under a banner that declared “Mission Accomplished”. He did this after he had his boyhood dream of being a fighter pilot fulfilled by flying onto the carrier in a fighter jet dressed in full fighter-pilot regalia. The president had his “Top Gun” moment. I have written extensively about this war and my piece written on the fifth anniversary summarizes those articles- Five Years in Iraq- A somber reflection
But as was true in the run up to the war, the President had an extremely effective accomplice- the press.
On May 1, 2003, Richard Perle advised, in a USA Today Op-Ed, “Relax, Celebrate Victory.” The same day, exactly five years ago, President Bush, dressed in a flight suit, landed on the deck of the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln and declared an end to major military operations in Iraq — with the now-infamous “Mission Accomplished” banner arrayed behind him in the war’s greatest photo op.
Chris Matthews on MSNBC called Bush a “hero” and boomed, “He won the war. He was an effective commander. Everybody recognizes that, I believe, except a few critics.” He added: “Women like a guy who’s president. Check it out. The women like this war. I think we like having a hero as our president. It’s simple.” Mr. Matthews was shameless on his program yesterday where he was outraged by this “anniversary”.
PBS’ Gwen Ifill said Bush was “part Tom Cruise, part Ronald Reagan.” On NBC, Brian Williams gushed, “The pictures were beautiful. It was quite something to see the first-ever American president on a — on a carrier landing.”
When Bush’s jet landed on an aircraft carrier, American casualties stood at 139 killed and 542 wounded.
Five years after President George W. Bush declared “Mission Accomplished” from the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier off San Diego, Iraq is in chaos, U.S. troops are mired in a sectarian war, and the entrenched conflict is dragging the nation into a recession.
Indeed, the only people for whom “the mission” has been accomplished are the many companies with lucrative military contracts. They have raked in over $100 billion so far from the Iraq War, enabling them to earn record profits. With Bush intent on staying the course until he leaves the White House, Sen. John McCain voicing his approval for the United States to stay in Iraq for another 100 years, the Democratic candidates unwilling to call for a complete withdrawal of all troops and contractors, and Congress ready to approve another $100-200 billion for the war, it is up to the American people to demand an end to the war.
• Mission Accomplished? 4,056 U.S. Soldiers, Over a Million Iraqis Dead: The Iraq War has cost the lives of over 4,000 U.S. soldiers, over a million Iraqi civilians, and over a thousand contractors. Nearly 30,000 U.S. soldiers have been injured. A recent report estimates that over 320,000 soldiers have suffered traumatic brain injuries and estimated 300,000 soldiers will sustain post-traumatic stress disorder. These afflictions will haunt these men and women for the rest of their lives.
• Mission Accomplished? $520 Billion Squandered Over the past five years, Congress has provided over $520 billion dollars for the Iraq War. But this is just the tip of the iceberg. Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz and Harvard University’s Linda Bilmes estimate the long-term cost of the war will top $3 trillion, once you include the interest and debt service payments from this borrowed money, and the costs of rebuilding the military after the war and providing for veterans’ long-term health care.
• Mission Accomplished? $100 Billion Spent on Contractors: The mission has indeed been accomplished for corporations with military contracts. Since the war began, they have reaped large profits, while producing substandard work, putting our nation’s soldiers at risk on the battlefield time and time again. Military contractors have opened fire on Iraqi civilians and reconstruction contractors’ work has been fraught with waste, fraud, and abuse. While Congress has tried to mandate better oversight of companies such as Halliburton, CACI, Titan, and Bechtel, Bush has exempted contractors from any real accountability.
• Mission Accomplished? Fueling a Sectarian War: As the war has dragged on, the United States has tried many different approaches to bolstering security on the ground. Over the past five years, the United States has spent over $20 billion training the largely Shi’a Iraqi army and police, and also arming and training the Kurdish Peshmerga troops in Northern Iraq. But since the “surge” began, the U.S. has also been arming, training, and financing the largely Sunni “Awakening” councils. Further complicating the situation, the U.S. has backed the sectarian Iraqi government in their attacks on the forces loyal to Moqtada al-Sadr, fueling the Shi’a-Shi’a conflict in Iraq’s South.
• Mission Accomplished? Majorities of Iraqis Want the U.S. to Withdraw: Since the war began, Iraqis have supported a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. troops. This still holds true five years later, latest polling indicates nearly 40% of Iraqis want the U.S. to leave immediately and less than 30% believe the United States is making Iraq safer.
• Mission Accomplished? No End in Sight: Over a year ago, Congress demanded that Bush produce a plan for withdrawal from Iraq. Instead, Bush decided to send more troops into the battlefield. In recent hearings, General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker indicated that no plans were being made for withdrawing additional U.S. troops. More importantly, they didn’t offer any new plans for how they could stabilize Iraq, promote reconciliation, reduce costs, and protect Iraqi and U.S. lives on the ground in Iraq. Over the past five years it has become crystal clear, continuing the war and occupation of Iraq only leads to greater death and destruction.
Standing on the deck of a ship and declaring “Mission Accomplished” doesn’t make it so. Since Bush’s ill-timed and now easily lampooned speech, Iraqis are no better off, U.S. soldiers continue to be put in harm’s way for an ill-defined and poorly executed mission, and our presence is only fueling the violence on all sides.
As we mark this fifth anniversary and Congress begins to deliberate spending an additional $100-200 billion to continue the war, we need to ask our nation what mission can be accomplished? By “staying the course” we only prolong the inevitable, doing more harm to both Iraqis and ourselves as we plunge deeper into economic crisis.
With 70% of Americans opposed to the war, and large majorities supporting a timeline for withdrawal, it’s time to demand the same from Bush and Congress. The most important mission to accomplish now is political — it’s time for our leaders to stop the funding, bring the troops home, and pledge our long-term support to Iraq.
It’s true that the nation’s focus has moved from the war to the economy because Americans are more concerned with their wallets than a war; a war where they were told to go shopping as a way to support the troops. But it is clear that this entire fiasco was the biggest disaster in American foreign policy and one of the presidential candidates fully supports the war- John McCain. It is also clear that Hillary Clinton was one of the Senators that gave Mr. Bush the green light for this farce. Only Barack Obama, of the three candidates, decried the war from the beginning.
While Indiana and North Carolina squabble over a bogus gas tax holiday, let’s also remember what Mr. McCain and Mrs. Clinton hath wrought in Iraq.
Mr. McCain and Mrs. Clinton have an ally in the press as Bush did in the run up to the war and on May 1, 2003. For the past week we have heard everything about Reverend Wright and nothing about the 52 troops who died in April.
This hasn’t been Mission Accomplished- it has become mission impossible and it will take someone who will change the landscape of our foreign policy and who has the willingness to engage in real diplomacy to extricate us from this quagmire.
Pandering v. Nuance aka Clinton v. Obama April 30, 2008
Posted by Randy Allgaier in Blogroll, Democrats, Domestic Issues, Faith, Foreign Policy, General, Liberal blogs, News, News and politics, Policy and Law, Political, Political Analysis, Politics, Republican, Social and Political Commentary, Social and Politics.Tags: 2008 Election, Barack Obama, Clinton, Democrat, Democratic Party, Democratic Primary, Hillary Clinton, John McCain, Obama, Presidential Election, Republicans
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Senator Barack Obama’s unequivocal denouncement yesterday of Reverend Wright’s comments and performance was definitive and eloquent. But of course the question many have is “Why did he sit in the pew for 20 years?” Well folks- a lot of well respected people sat in those pews listening to Wright’s sermons for years. It isn’t like Mr. Obama was attending some voodoo ceremony where the pentagram was hanging. He saw a ministry that had a social commitment- he was part of a community of faith that offered ministries to “the least among us”. While Reverend Wright adheres to a “Black Liberation Theology” and every one knew that- it seems clear that part of that theology, the part that spoke to Obama, was outreach to the community and lifting up those with no hope. If one reads Obama’s books and listens to the man- you can see what it was about Trinity – its community work- that appealed to Obama. It was the sense of Christianity being tied to good works in the community that is what brought Obama to Christ and it was that part of Wright that appealed to Obama.
It is clear that Mr. Obama’s relationship with Reverend Wright was complicated. He saw Wright as someone important in his life- and like all of us we have friends who are flawed and we look beyond those flaws to see the good that they do. Did Obama know that his pastor was controversial- sure, did he think that he was a nut case that had views that were so “out there”, no. Even if he had occasionally heard black liberation rhetoric from Wright- it was not pronounced enough to severe his ties. This was a spiritual and emotional relationship- it was complicated.
It says a lot about Mrs. Clinton that she said she would have left the pews of Trinity a long time ago. She either didn’t see or didn’t want to address that these relations are complicated and they are nuanced. No one is totally evil and no one is totally a saint. Mr. Obama was part of a community of faith that was doing good works in the straining neighborhood of Chicago’s south side. Mr. Wright was responsible for building that community of faith regardless of his most incendiary comments- his church has done amazing work.
If Mrs. Clinton sees the world so black and white- with such starkness- I think it tells me that she is not a person of good judgment. Diplomacy, the economy, the disaster where we find ourselves at the present time need someone who can appreciate the nuances and the finer points of these complicated problems. But Mrs. Clinton is a very smart woman- she knows what sort of complexities are involved- but she choses to pander.
Not only did she flippantly remark on a very personal and complicated relationship between a man and his pastor with a quick answer- she said what was politically expedient. She should know how complicated relationships are- she could have thrown Bill under the bus after his lie to her and the country about his sexual relationship with Monica Lewinsky, but she chose not to. Relationships- especially relationships that are based on either intimacy in marriage or intimacy of faith- are complicated. She was pandering.
But that is just the beginning. Sure she threw the kitchen sink at Obama in Pennsylvania and it apparently worked- but now she is offering everything to the voters including that kitchen sink. Let’s take this gas tax holiday.
Mr. Obama is correct that this is a political stunt being played by both Senators Clinton and McCain. 3 months of gas at a few cents less per gallon that may add up to $30.00 per car over the course of the “holiday”. Yes, Mrs. Clinton says that she would pay for this with windfall tax money from the oil companies. But that strategy only works if she is elected president and she has a Congress that agrees with her. Should she be promoting a policy that would occur NOW without knowing for sure how it will be paid for in the future?
In his Op/Ed piece today in the New York Times, Thomas Friedman wrote:
“This is not an energy policy. This is money laundering: we borrow money from China and ship it to Saudi Arabia and take a little cut for ourselves as it goes through our gas tanks. What a way to build our country. When the summer is over, we will have increased our debt to China, increased our transfer of wealth to Saudi Arabia and increased our contribution to global warming for our kids to inherit.
No, no, no, we’ll just get the money by taxing Big Oil, says Mrs. Clinton. Even if you could do that, what a terrible way to spend precious tax dollars — burning it up on the way to the beach rather than on innovation?
The McCain-Clinton gas holiday proposal is a perfect example of what energy expert Peter Schwartz of Global Business Network describes as the true American energy policy today: “Maximize demand, minimize supply and buy the rest from the people who hate us the most.”
Good for Barack Obama for resisting this shameful pandering.”
Then there are Mrs. Clinton’s hawkish comments about obliterating Iran if they would attack Israel or any of our friends in the region- creating, in her own mind, a sort of mid-East NATO. Obama said that in response to an attack against Israel (or any other US ally) by Iran, he would act “forcefully and swiftly”. Well, that’s a bit vague, but it’s certainly better than immediately saying “we will obliterate them!” We need a leader who will be forceful and swift, but we also need to know that Obama won’t immediately rush into military attacks or outright war like President Bush did.
Why on earth would Mrs. Clinton begin sabre rattling á la Cheney / Bush? It is probably the same reason she ended the Pennsylvania campaign with an add that featured Osama bin Laden- FEAR. Thanks Mrs. Clinton, I thought we were over that. Playing fear equals pandering in my estimation.
Clearly Mr. Obama is asking voters to think. The times demand hard thinking. Mr. Obama believes that voters will see through fear mongering and pandering on issues like gas taxes. Mr. Obama talk about ”us” making change- that we must work together to make change. This point of view challenges us to think and to look at the nuance in policy.
Mrs. Clinton is promising everything to everybody- like the “Forty Acres and a Mule” promise during the Civil War’s reconstruction. Her blantant stunt with the gas tax, her flippant comment about a personal relationship between Senator Obama and Reverend Wright that is as complex as her own with her philandering husband, and her fear mongering and hawk posturing with Iran point to a cynical sense of the electorate.
Senator Obama was racked over the coals for comments he made “It’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.”
What Obama was saying is true- people use the spectre of destroying faith and guns, immigrants and jobs – gay marriage and gun control state initiatives, anti-immigration legislation, and blaming everything on NAFTA- to stoke the fears of voters. Republican have been very deft at using these wedge issues to manipulate voters from voting in their economic interest. He was exposing the cynisism of the current political system that expolits these issues and fears as a destraction and assumes the lowest common denominator among our electorate.
Clearly Mr. McCain is continuing this well tried tradition in the Republican party, but Mrs. Clinton is using the same tactics in the primary. Who is elitist? The person who is pandering or the person who exposes the pandering? I think the answer is clear.
The Tabloid Debate- ABC insults the American people April 17, 2008
Posted by Randy Allgaier in Blogroll, Culture, Democrats, Domestic Issues, General, Liberal blogs, News, News and politics, Political, Political Analysis, Politics, Social and Political Commentary, Social and Politics.Tags: Barack Obama, Clinton, Democrat, Democratic Debates, Democratic Party, Hillary Clinton, Obama, Pennsylvania Primary, Presidential Election
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I hope we don’t see any more debates between Senators Clinton and Obama. Maybe after more than 20 debates there is little substantive that can be explored- well at least be explored and garner ratings for ABC. Flag pins, Reverend Wright regurgitated, sniper fire, elitism, bitter Pennsylvanians and asking Obama about a relationship, that is tenuous at best, with a former member of the Weather Underground who was an active “domestic terrorist” when Barack Obama was about 8 years old and who is now a Professor at the University of Illinois in Chicago. Thank you Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopoulos for bringing Presidential debates to a new low!
At a moment when the American economy is in a recession, when the U.S. trade deficit is breaking records, when the vice president and the secretary of state stand accused of organizing torture parties in Washington, when the president has gotten us bogged down in two foreign quagmires, and when official gaming of globalization has stirred up food riots around the world, Gibson and Stephanopoulos led Senators Obama and Clinton into the last debate before the critical Pennsylvania primary trying to out-FOX one another.
Wednesday night’s moderators, who pummeled Obama for most of the night — almost made a viewer long for a long-winded intervention by the CNN’s self-absorbed but reasonably serious Wolf Blitzer. And the questions from viewers appeared to have been selected with the purpose of raising doubts about whether these people may be spending just a little too much time listening to Rush Limbaugh.
“In perhaps the most embarrassing performance by the media in a major presidential debate in years, ABC News hosts Charles Gibson and George Stephanopolous focused mainly on trivial issues as Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama faced off in Philadelphia,” Huffington Post analyst Greg Mitchell wrote on the site Thursday. “They, and their network, should hang their collective heads in shame.
The absolute low point of a debate that rarely left the low road came when former Clinton aide Stephanopoulos asked Obama about his meetings with Bill Ayers, a 1960s Weather Underground radical who went on to become a college professor.
Bill Ayers and his wife, Bernadine Dohrn, have lived in the Hyde Park area in Chicago. So has Barack Obama. Ayers is one of numerous people, in the Chicago area, whom Barack Obama has run across. Obama has much closer relationships with numerous conservatives on the University of Chicago faculty, many of whom have given money to Obama’s campaign, and many of whom have talked to him at length and been at social occasions with him.
Gail Collins in her New York Times Op/Ed piece wrote: “I know it’s been a hard couple of weeks, people. You were all excited about this election and now you feel like someone who got all dressed up for a great event and wound up at a B-list party with a cash bar. You never want to hear the words “bitter” or “Bosnia” again. And the only political story that you’ve really enjoyed lately is the one about Cindy McCain’s list of favorite recipes being cribbed from The Food Network.
But as upset as many of us are who had to sit through the intolerable trerrible tabloid debate, Senator Barack Obama is making lemonade out of the lemons from last night.
At a town meeting today in North Carolina, where he arrived to campaign in advance of the May 6 primary, Mr. Obama seemed intent on seeking to quell any political fallout from the debate in Philadelphia. “That was the roll-out of the Republican campaign against me in November. That is what they will do,” Mr. Obama said. “They will try to focus on all these issues that don’t have anything to do with how you pay your bills at the end of the month.”
With a wide smile, and a sarcastic tone, Mr. Obama sought to brush aside criticism about his performance in what he said was the 21st debate of the presidential nominating fight. “I will tell you, it does not get much more fun than these debates. They are inspiring events,” Mr. Obama quipped.
Obama said, “Last night, I think we set a new record because it took us 45 minutes before we even started talking about a single issue that matters to the American people. It took us 45 minutes! Forty-five minutes before we heard about health care. Forty-five minutes before we heard about Iraq,” he continued. “Forty-five — 45 — minutes before we heard about jobs. Forty-five minutes before we heard about gas prices.”
He told the audience that he intended to let the criticism roll off of him. As he spoke, he made a dramatic gesture of wiping off his sleeves and dusting off his dark suit. “That’s what you got to do,” he said, drawing loud applause from the audience. “That’s what you’ve got to do. But understand this, that is also precisely why I’m running for president – to change that kind of politics.”
After Mr. Obama’s opening remarks, a woman in the audience asked how he intended to forcefully challenge Senator John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee. “It’s a little hard to do with a fellow Democrat. I’m trying to show some restraint. I won’t have as much restraint with the Republicans,” Mr. Obama said, adding: “That’s the debate that I am really looking forward to. I am confident that that’s the debate the American people are going to want to have. What they are going to figure out is who is the person who can lead this country and actually solve problems,” he added. “We’ve been going through this politics – tit for tat silliness – for decades now.”
Well, Senator Obama- I’ll take my lead from you and ignore the idiocy of last night’s debate. But truly this debacle was not just an insult to Senator Obama (and to some extent Senator Clinton) it was an insult to the American people. Maybe I am part of that undefined “elite” but I hope my fellow citizens are more intelligent than falling for the garbage that passed for issues last night. I hope that the American people learn from mistakes- those mistakes are George W. Bush first term and George W. Bush second term. It is possible we only made one mistake since in 2000 Al Gore actually won the popular vote.
Let’s get out of the muck and mire, the tit-for-tat, the gotcha politics and take this election seriously. There are serious issues in this country and in the world. Having a debate on tabloid stories is demeaning, demoralizing and just plain wrong.
Obama Elitist? Not! McCain and Clinton are the essence of the Power Elite April 13, 2008
Posted by Randy Allgaier in Blogroll, Democrats, General, Liberal blogs, News, News and politics, Politics, Social and Political Commentary, Social and Politics.Tags: Barack Obama, Clinton, Democrat, Democratic Party, Hillary Clinton, John McCain, McCain, Obama, Republican Party, Republicans
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Senator Obama’s recent comments about the frustration that many middle class Americans feel were poorly worded, especially in the world of 24 hour news cycles, repetitive loops, pundits bloviating ad nauseum and where cynicism reigns supreme.
But the sentiments are right on target. Many Americans feel that their government, their issues and their lives have been long forgotten by the power elites in Washington. Both Senators Clinton and McCain qualify, in spades, as members of the inside the beltway power elite. Mr. McCain has been in Congress since 1982 and Mrs. Clinton has been in the power elite since 1992 when her husband was elected President. Let’s see that is twenty six years of inside the beltway mentality for McCain and sixteen years of the same mentality for Mrs. Clinton.
Where do these centimillionaires come off claiming that Mr. Obama is elitist? It is indeed baffling that Mr. McCain with his multiple homes and a wife worth $100 million and Mrs. Clinton who has been entrenched in the upper echelons of the Democratic party for as long as some new voters have been alive would call a man of mixed race with a single mother as elitist. Mr. McCain is the son of an Admiral who, I am sure, used family ties to enter the Naval Academy where he graduated 3rd from the bottom. Mrs. Clinton grew up in the upper middle class suburb of Park Ridge IL and went to the prestigious women’s college- Wellsley.
Mr. Obama entered a California liberal arts college before transfering to Columbia University and later became the first African American editor of the Harvard Law Review. You can bet your bottom dollar none of that academic success came with the ease of a well-off middle class girl going to Wellsley or that of a well connected midshipman. Neither Senator Clinton or Senator McCain has a clue as to what it means to wonder whether or not government has left them behind. It is quite plausible-if not likely- that the black son of a white mother who was for the most part a single mom may have more of sense of how government can disappoint.
Let’s look at the ENTIRE quote- not just those incendiary sentences.
I think it’s fair to say that the places where we are going to have to do the most work are the places where people feel most cynical about government…. Because everybody just ascribes it to ‘white working-class don’t wanna work — don’t wanna vote for the black guy.’ That’s…there were intimations of that in an article in the Sunday New York Times today - kind of implies that it’s sort of a race thing.
Here’s how it is: in a lot of these communities in big industrial states like Ohio and Pennsylvania, people have been beaten down so long, and they feel so betrayed by government, and when they hear a pitch that is premised on not being cynical about government, then a part of them just doesn’t buy it. And when it’s delivered by — it’s true that when it’s delivered by a 46-year-old black man named Barack Obama (laugher), then that adds another layer of skepticism….
But the truth is … our challenge is to get people persuaded that we can make progress when there’s not evidence of that in their daily lives. You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania, and like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing’s replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. So it’s not surprising then that they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.
….[Y]ou can go in the toughest neighborhoods, you know working-class lunch-pail folks, you’ll find Obama enthusiasts. And you can go into places where you think I’d be very strong and people will just be skeptical. The important thing is that you show up and you’re doing what you’re doing.
Robert Kennedy said rather similar things four decades ago when he challenged many rural Indiana voters. As I recall, RFK did pretty well when the votes were counted.
The faux outrage expressed by Senators McCain and Clinton calls to mind the emotional torment suffered 16 years ago by then-Senator, now McCain backer, Al D’Amato. Ordinarily known for his salty demeaner, D’Amato pretended to cry when his hapless opponent Robert Abrams made a clumsy remark that could be construed as anti-Italian.
Barack Obama spent years of his life organizing out-of-work steelworkers on the south side of Chicago - people just like those who live in Allentown or Erie or Pittsburgh or the Monongehela Valley in western Pennsylvania. He stood shoulder to shoulder with them, sat at their kitchen tables, spent hours in their church basements.
He didn’t do those things as a famous candidate, but as a community organizer being paid $8,000 a year by a coalition of churches. You don’t build a resume or a client list organizing unemployed steel workers. You do it because you respect the people and you care about justice.
In fact, the trademark of Barack Obama’s campaign for president is the honest, respectful way he talks to everyone — and stands up for everyday Americans.
Senator Obama has given voice to the frustration of millions of Americans. It is the height of cynicsm for either Senator Clinton or Senator McCain to feign being stunned and flabbergasted that Barack Obama would imply that Pennsylvanians are bitter over, say, thirty years of economic decline in their local communities. The fact that they are parsing Mr. Obama’s words in order to manipulate the very people who are angry to feel disrespected is disgusting and is the “politics as usual” that Senator Obama has shunned.
If they in fact believe their own press than they are completely out of touch with the anger and the disillusionment among many Americans- that is why the message of change is so appealing. Mrs. Clinton and Mr. McCain, both of whom epitomize the power elite in Washington, are either completely out of touch or are playing purely cynical politics. You can decide for yourself which it is.
Threatening the Speaker? What is going on with the Clinton campaign? March 28, 2008
Posted by Randy Allgaier in Blogroll, Culture, Democrats, Domestic Issues, General, Liberal blogs, News, News and politics, Political, Political Analysis, Politics, Social and Political Commentary, Social and Politics.Tags: Barack Obama, Clinton, Democrat, Democratic Party, Democratic Pimaries, Election 2008, Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi, Obama, Pelosi, Presidential Elction, Robert Johnson, Speaker of the House
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I couldn’t believe my ears when I heard about the letter that was sent by some of the Democratic Party’s biggest donors and Clinton supporters to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi with a veiled threat that she better watch her step or else… The letter stated “We have been strong supporters of the DCCC. We therefore urge you to clarify your position on super-delegates and reflect in your comments a more open view to the optional independent actions of each of the delegates at the National Convention in August.”
Among the signees of the letter were prominent Democrats all of whom are Clinton supporters like Robert Johnson, founder of Black Entertainment Television; Bernard Schwartz, former chairman of Loral Space and Communications; and venture capitalist Steven Rattner. Remember Robert Johnson’s choice remarks before the South Carolina primary? He raised the specter of Barack Obama’s past drug use. He also compared Mr. Obama to Sidney Poitier, the black actor, in “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner.” After Senator Clinton’s disastrous performance in South Carolina one would think the last thing she needs is for Johnson to insinuate himself into the campaign again.
It was only 11 days ago that I pledged to a moratorium among some of us in the blogosphere who have a vested interest in seeing that there isn’t a McCain presidency (translation- a third Bush Presidency). But after this outrageous bullying tactic, I cannot remain silent. I will not make comments about Mrs. Clinton, but I will attack these big wig supporters. After all we do not have “proof” that her campaign was behind this outrageous threat so I will not speculate. However, sometimes the Clinton look like they are campaigning for John McCain- could they really want to see Obama lose the race should he be the nominee so that Mrs. Clinton has one more shot at the nomination in 2012? No one really knows for sure and as I said I will not speculate. But I think everyone is free to draw their own conclusions.
“The New York Daily News” reports that the “brazen move by Camp Clinton stunned veteran Democrats, particularly because at least eight of the letter’s authors have not donated to” the DCCC since Pelosi became speaker. One unnamed Democrat is quoted saying Clinton “looks desperate. There is no way they should have threatened to do this. It is terrible. … I am sure Obama is raising money off of it already.”
Messrs. Rattner, Schwartz and Johnson have nerve. Are they threatening to decimate the Democratic party in order to shore up Senator Clinton’s political career? And do they really think that they matter anymore? Look at Senator Obama’s fundraising power. There is not nearly the need for these rich fat cats as there was just four years ago. Their style of politics is “so yesterday”. Don’t these folks realize that so far this race has shattered every conventional metric and strategy that have been used in politics for decades? The work has changed folks.
My favorite comment was that of Chris Matthews when he decided to be kind to these donors and instead of calling them “fat cats” he decided to call them “ambassadors in waiting”.
Indirectly responding to a threat made by these “ambassador want to be’s”, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi pledged Friday to “do whatever it takes to protect” Democratic House candidates from falling victim to the exceedingly nasty and protracted Democratic presidential primary.
In an email that I received, as a Democratic donor to the DCCC:
Dear Randy,
Here’s what you and I can’t let happen. We can’t allow the tension and pressures of a spirited Presidential contest to spill over and harm hard-working Democratic candidates running to strengthen our Democratic majority in the House.
I will do whatever it takes to protect our candidates and make sure their campaigns to drive change forward don’t skip a beat. I need you to do the same. Please support our candidates now with a donation to the DCCC before the critical March 31st deadline hits by going to www.dccc.org/deadline.
Throughout the Presidential nominating process, I have been so proud to watch Democrats turn out in record numbers and demonstrate enormous grassroots energy. And soon we will have an exciting presidential nominee who will make our entire party proud.
She or he will lead our energized and united Democratic Party in the larger fight against John McCain, and his plan for 100 more years of war in Iraq. Now is the time to capitalize on the excitement that is sweeping the nation to ensure that our next President has a strong Democratic majority in the House to work with as we undo the damage from President Bush’s failed economic policies.
Nancy Pelosi
Speaker of the House of Representatives
Sent Wirelessly Via Blackberry
Thank you Madame Speaker! Thank you to standing up to bullies! And thank you for speaking your mind and being gracious, strategic and timely in how you responded to this outrageous threat. Do these idiots not realize that a divided party could self destruct and lose? Do these morons not realize that even if we have a President Clinton or President Obama, they will be able to acc