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May 31, 2008

Exclusive: Saturday, May 31

Presidential Watch

Hillary Clinton --Please Exit, with Dignity, June 4!

Katrina vanden Heuvel, The Nation.com

Check out CNN.com for Bill Clinton's vent about how a "cover up " is hurting Hillary Clinton's chances of becoming the Democratic nominee. This is a man who has trampled on his spouse's voice every time, in this campaign, that she's found it.

The women of The Nation are the first to deplore the sexism in media commentary this primary season, but a "cover up"?

Hillary Clinton started this race last year as the one to beat--she had the money, the machine and the name recognition that assured her of quasi-incumbent status. And, indeed, she ran as a quasi-incumbent, an establishment candidate in a change- year election. Yes, there were the Chris Matthews and the Tucker Carlsons and the Mike Barnicles and the Rush Limbaughs and the women who were working out their Clinton hatred through Hillary's candidacy.

Betsy Reed's superb May 19th cover story, "Race to the Bottom: How Hillary Clinton's Campaign Has Divided the Feminist Movement," documents those sexist remarks--and explains how Clinton's campaign has divided the feminist movement. But Clinton's losses cannot be attributed solely or largely to a sexism that still runs deep in our political culture. Read article.

Peering behind Hillary gaffe

Clarence Page, JWR.com

History repeats itself, someone once said, because people don't hear it right the first time. The problem with Sen. Hillary Clinton's Robert F. Kennedy gaffe is her failure to recall correctly the history that she has helped to make.

She was wrong on the facts, wrong in her argument, and wrong in her recollection of the deep, gut-wrenching fear and loathing that the second assassination of a Kennedy inflicted on Americans - across party lines.

Grasping at historical straws to explain why she is still campaigning instead of putting her campaign on hold, at least, the New York senator unleashed an argument that not only sounded breathtakingly tacky but also happens to be wrong on its facts.

"You know, my husband did not wrap up the nomination in 1992 until he won the California primary somewhere in the middle of June, right?" she said to the editorial board at South Dakota's Argus Leader. "We all remember, Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California."

Yes, he was. But her argument falls apart ....... Read article.

Hillary's Last Hope

Kathleen Parker, Townhall.com

The question we keep hearing is: Why does Hillary keep running? The better question is: Why do people keep asking?

She's running because, despite evidence and warnings to the contrary, she still hopes to win.

Hubris is an equal-opportunity affliction.

But perhaps there's more than hubris at work here. On the one hand, yes, there is a sense of entitlement. The presidency is her due, not only for enduring public humiliations with which all are familiar, but also for smiling benignly through countless Bubba-fetes.

Could anything still happen? That's the operative question, especially when the 30-member rules committee is divided between Clinton and Obama supporters. And especially given that some of those members could have possible conflicts of interest.

Harold Ickes -- former assistant chief of staff in the Clinton White House -- is a paid adviser to the Clinton campaign, for instance. As a committee member, Ickes originally voted to strip delegates from Florida and Michigan for holding early primaries. Now he argues that the delegates should be seated. His first vote was as a committee member, he has said. His position now presumably is as a Clinton adviser.

Conflicts of interest are commonplace in Washington, but the stakes this time are supremely high for Hillary.

In a letter to the New York Daily News published Sunday, Hillary said that she's still running "because my parents did not raise me to be a quitter."

What she didn't say is, why should she quit? Because her former subjects want her to? Lest some have forgotten, the queen does as the queen wishes.

Let them eat grits. Read article.

Obama's Sin of Omission

Jon Keller, RCP.com

That was a fine speech Barack Obama gave at the Wesleyan commencement Sunday. In fitting tribute to Sen. Ted Kennedy's long tenure in the Senate, Obama chose service to country as his topic. He cited the social and political activists of the 1960s - singling out Peace Corps volunteers and civil rights demonstrators - as early role models. And he told the graduates of the two stories that will command their attention as adults.

By all accounts, the speech was a hit. "I was shaking, I was so moved by what he said," one young women told the Globe.

So I guess it's just me wondering -- how on earth do you give a speech on that topic and not mention our country's most widespread and important form of public service and sacrifice, military service?

Maybe Obama didn't want to go there because of the unfortunate political contrast between himself and John McCain when it comes to military service and knowledge, an unflattering comparison that left Obama on the short end of a recent political exchange over veterans' benefits.

Or maybe military service simply doesn't spring to mind for Obama or his handlers when they think of laudable sacrifice and contribution to the public good. And maybe that's what a justifiably war-weary electorate wants come November, a commander-in-chief who doesn't have the military on his cultural radar. Or maybe they're not quite so moved by such self-indulgent narcissism, and are shaking over Obama's speech for different reasons. Read article.

Whose Lens? - McCain's or Obama's

Judith A. Klinghoffer, Political Mavens.com

FT columnist Philip Stephens writes:

Mr Obama describes the world as is; Mr McCain as it seemed to be during that fleeting unipolar moment. America's voters will decide in November which of these lenses they prefer to look.

Well, this voter prefers to look at Obama's lens. It is prettier and more comforting. But I knows that taking my eyes off the McCain lens will put my life in jeopardy. For the world is not as Obama describes it and Islamist terror has nothing to do with the fleeting unipolar moment. If the US and Israel disappeared tomorrow would Jihadist stop their terror campaign agaist India where they only last week they killed 80 in Jaipur in order to "blow part of your tourism structure" and, second, to "demolish your faith in the dirty mud, in the name of Hanuman, Sita [and] Ram".?!

Stephens is not alone in his wish to make the world go away. Rather, his mood is representative of that of the liberal/leftist transnational elite that believes it found a champion in Obama. If avoiding reality means expunging the historical record and making mass executioners like Che Guevara into heroes, wannabe Hitlers like Ahmadinejad into a trustworthy negotiating partners, and putting up with a "reasonable number" of terrorist attacks as India has been so virtuously been doing, it is a price they will gladly pay. After all, what are the chances that they personally will be the victims?! Read article.

Beneath the Change Mantra

David Limbaugh, Washington Times.com

Columnist Robert Novak reports John McCain will not yield to Barack Obama's efforts to shame him into running a vanilla campaign. Instead, he says, Mr. McCain is lining up crack research operatives. Interestingly, their charge is not to gather dirt on Mr. Obama per se, but "to focus on the real Barack Obama." From where I'm sitting, that looks like one whale of a target-rich environment.

That is, Mr. McCain's operatives don't have to dig up dirt on Mr. Obama to damage his chances; they merely have to dig through the facade and uncover the real Barack Obama. Even with the damning revelations concerning his association with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright and former terrorist William Ayers, I suspect Obama explorers have barely scratched the surface.

While Mr. Obama will continue to complain that an examination into his associations is dirty politics, it is anything but. We are known by the company we keep, and this goes for applicants for leader of the Free World as well.

But in Mr. Obama's case, the McCain researchers will just be getting started with Mr. Obama's sordid associations. Where he's really vulnerable - where he most doesn't want you to find out who he really is - is on policy.

Given his George Soros brand of extreme leftism, Mr. Obama will do his best to conceal his real policy self, except to the San Francisco environmental- and social-issues anarchists, the arts and croissants crowd of the Northeast Corridor, and the neo-Marxist professorial elite in academe. Read article.

Republicans Are in Denial

Tom Coburn, Online WSJ.com

As congressional Republicans contemplate the prospect of an electoral disaster this November, much is being written about the supposed soul-searching in the Republican Party. A more accurate description of our state is paralysis and denial.

Many Republicans are waiting for a consultant or party elder to come down from the mountain and, in Moses-like fashion, deliver an agenda and talking points on stone tablets. But the burning bush, so to speak, is delivering a blindingly simple message: Behave like Republicans.

Unfortunately, too many in our party are not yet ready to return to the path of limited government. Instead, we are being told our message must be deficient because, after all, we should be winning in certain areas just by being Republicans. Yet being a Republican isn't good enough anymore. Voters are tired of buying a GOP package and finding a big-government liberal agenda inside. What we need is not new advertising, but truth in advertising.

Becoming Republicans again will require us to come to grips with what has ailed our party - namely, the triumph of big-government Republicanism and failed experiments like the K Street Project and "compassionate conservatism." Read article.

Conservatives Concern with Earmarks, Iraq and Immigration

Brian Darling, Human Events.com

Earmark Reform

Earmark Reform is a big issue for conservatives, because the American people want to see members of Congress weed out waste, fraud and abuse from the federal budget. Most earmarks are special-interest pork projects for a specific state or congressional district. On March 13, Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) offered an amendment to create "a 1-year moratorium on all earmarks by establishing a 67-vote point of order against bills with earmarks." Sens. Barack Obama and John McCain were co-sponsors. It failed, with only 29 senators voting yea.

In November 2007, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) spoke to the Senate about the pervasive problem of earmarks: "The earmark system exists to serve politicians, not local communities. Members earmark funds rather than advocate for grants because they want the political credit for spending money. Earmarks oftentimes are worthwhile, but the system under which they are propagated is not. Earmarks are the gateway drug to overspending, one of the No. 1 issues for which the American people have a problem with Congress. Our problem is, we refuse to make the tough choices families have to make every day, every week within their own budgets." Conservatives should note that Obama and McCain are on the record voting in favor of stopping Congress from earmarking special-interest projects.

The ultimate goal would be to stop the growth of congressional spending and engage in true earmark reform. Read article.

The Obama Learning Curve

Kimberley A. Strassel, Online WSJ.com

As Mr. Obama shifts and shambles, all the while telling audiences that when voting for president they should look beyond "experience" to "judgment." In this case, whatever his particular judgment on Iran is on any particular day.

It wasn't supposed to be this way. Democrats entered this race confident national security wouldn't be the drag on the party it has in the past. With an unpopular war and a rival who supports that war, they planned to wrap Mr. McCain around the unpopular Mr. Bush and be done with it. Mr. Obama is still manfully marching down this road, today spending as much time warning about a "third Bush term" as he does reassuring voters about a first Obama one.

Then again, 9/11 and five years of Iraq debate have educated voters. Mr. McCain is certainly betting they can separate the war from the urgent threat of an Iranian dictator who could possess nukes, and whose legitimization would encourage other rogues in their belligerence. This is a debate the Arizonan has been preparing for all his life and, note, Iranian diplomacy is simply the topic du jour.

Mr. McCain has every intention of running his opponent through the complete foreign-policy gamut. Explain again in what circumstances you'd use nuclear weapons? What was that about invading Pakistan? How does a policy of engaging the world include Mr. Ahmadinejad, but not our ally Colombia and its trade pact?

It explains too the strong desire among the McCain camp to get Mr. Obama on stage for debates soon. There's a feeling Mr. Obama is still climbing the foreign-policy learning curve. And they see mileage in his issuing a few more gut reactions. Read article.

Sen. Obama: Would You Allow A Nuclear Iran?

Arnold Ahlert, Political Mavens.com

According to Barack Obama, Iran is just a "tiny country" that doesn't "pose a serious threat to us.." Question, Sen. Obama: should Iran be allowed to go nuclear?

If your answer is yes, perhaps you could explain how such a development is either "inconsequential" or serves the best interests of the United States. That is perhaps you could explain it if someone in the MSM had the "temerity" to ask such a straightforward question. It is easy to talk about diplomacy or negotiation "without preconditions" in the abstract. And certainly a nuclear Iran would constitute "change," the buzzword of your presidential campaign.

Doubtless there are many liberals who believe that a nuclear Iran can be "contained," much like the Soviets during the Cold War. Perhaps you are one of them, despite the fact that the radical Islam preached by the Iranian mullahs calls for the return of the Twelfth or Hidden Imam, whose re-emergence requires a "period of chaos" before it occurs-and that the same mullahs are on the record as saying they don't care if Iran is annihilated, as long as Islam survives. Does such a suicidal rejection of MAD-mutually assured destruction-which deterred the Soviets and the Chinese, have any influence on your reasoning?

If your answer is no, to what lengths are you willing to go to stop them? It is apparent to some Americans that sanctions, the diplomatic efforts of France, England and Germany, and the desire to promote internal regime change have proved largely ineffective-even as Iran has increased the number of operating centrifuges from 3000 to 6000 in the past year. Since you've insisted there is a concrete time horizon for removing American troops from Iraq, regardless of conditions on the ground, do you have one regarding Iran's continuing defiance of international law? Is there ANY circumstance in which you would green-light the use of military force? Read article.

The Obama makeover

Salena Zito, Pittsburgh Live.com

Say it's the Tuesday after Labor Day weekend, the Democrats' convention is over, Barack Obama is their nominee, and the campaign season has officially begun.

What's the first thing Obama should do before he hits the trail and campaigns among real Americans?

Get a political makeover.

First, he should shed the Hollywood types, celebrities and anything that even hints of cultural elitism before he takes one step into Middle America.

If he doesn't, he becomes the next Mike Dukakis, nicer looking and a better speaker, but no more in touch with John Deere voters than that guy who looked really awkward when he wore a helmet and drove a tank. Americans want to know their commander in chief looks comfortable in leadership roles, not at Oprah's really amazing crib.

One of the side effects of such an elongated primary season is the damage done by his opponents, and Hillary Clinton has done a good job of hitting him on style and demographics. Policywise, Obama and Clinton have never been all that far apart, but he has shown weakness in his personality and his ability to appeal to Middle America. Read article.

The Presidential Race Is About Race & Gender

Don Bendell, NMJ.us

I lived with Montagnard tribes people in 1968 and 1969 in Vietnam, a tough, dark-skinned, primitive, aboriginal race of warriors. Plar was a cute, lovable 8-year old orphan of the Jeh tribe whose parents were both murdered by the Viet Cong. The Vietnamese called Montagnards "Moi" which translates to "Savage" but is synonymous with the "N" word in our language. They had no right to vote, no schools, no medical care, no equal representation in government.

I really loved Plar and obtained through channels the paperwork to adopt her, but while I was out in the jungle on an operation for two weeks, my allies, some so-called friendly Vietnamese in my camp raped and murdered her and tossed her body into the barbed wire on our perimeter. Do not try to tell me that I do not understand or care about racism simply because I am a conservative white male.

The big villain in the Presidential race is John McCain, because he too is a white, conservative, Christian, heterosexual male, and to make matters worse, he is not only a former POW but one of those dreaded Vietnam veterans...and a decorated one no less. If you do not believe me just listen to all the electronic news journalists who swoon and fawn about an Obama-Clinton ticket and how it would be a "dream team," because we would have a black candidate for President and a woman candidate for Vice-President. Wow!

Here is a question: Should electing the President of the United States be some wonderful social experiment? Read article.

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