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June 18, 2008

Exclusive: Wednesday, June 18

Presidential Watch

Listen to Michael Medved's radio interview with Bobby Jindal - CLICK HERE.

Cliff Kincaid talks to Mark Carbonaro of KION about Frank Marshall Davis, Barack Obama's Communist childhood mentor. GO HERE.

Great Surge, Let's Quit

Abe Greenwald, Commentary Magazine.com

It's official. There will be no more argument from the Democrats about the success of the troop surge. Their plan is to bury their error in judgment in a larger fabricated argument about American hegemony. Not only is Barack Obama acknowledging progress in Iraq-he's now pleased with it. And he let Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari know as much when the two spoke by telephone earlier today. However if you're a Democrat, a smidgen of U.S.-praise must come with a heaping pile of "but." Here's Obama on his talk with Zebari:

I emphasized to him how encouraged I was by the reductions in violence in Iraq but also insisted that it is important for us to begin the process of withdrawing U.S. troops, making it clear that we have no interest in permanent bases in Iraq.

Why? Why does Obama - without delving into the regional ramifications - want to make it clear to Iraq, its neighbors, and terrorists laying in wait that "we have no interest in permanent bases"? This is not necessarily to say that we do have such interests or that we should. But it's certainly a question that demands a more nuanced approach than the one the Democratic nominee has fashioned into a cuddly soundbite. Obama was hasty (and wrong) about the need to send more troops into Iraq in 2007. You'd think the knee-jerk inclination to apologize for American force would have been tamped down by some humility. But once again, he's arguing against the judicious implementation of U.S. troops.

Moreover, it's not yet clear where Iraq and the U.S. stand relative to one another in the status of forces discussion. Someone might want to let Obama know that there are compromises between immediate withdrawal and a permanent U.S. presence, and that U.S.-Iraq negotiations on this point are underway. Having lost the surge debate, the Democrats are grasping at straws. If Obama can shave an hour off a proposed drawdown plan, he'll do it and say he's halting a Republican scheme for global military domination. Read article.

Welcome to the real campaign, Senator Obama

Dan K. Thomasson, Scripps Howard News Service

Pitching himself to voters as a centrist candidate with a slight adjustment to the left who appeals to both sides of the political aisle and is a prototypical outsider is going to be a tough sell for Barack Obama who has supported his party's line for the two years he has been in the Senate and is advised by leading insiders.

His economic mantra of readjusting the nation's incomes to soak the rich and help the middle and lower classes through government spending is pure liberal dogma. It is the solution to our economic ills that the Democratic Party has espoused since Franklin Roosevelt. There is nothing wrong with that if one believes it will work except that it has been roundly rejected in the last 50 years or so of presidential elections.

Obama would make sure everyone had health care at taxpayer expense. He would raise the capital gains tax and up the corporate and individual income taxes for the "wealthy" and slow down if not end trade agreements in an effort to protect American labor despite the fact these alliances work. He is calling for a $50 billion economic stimulus plan that would include rebate checks for the unemployed and health care subsidies paid for by the above mentioned tax increases. So much for "Mr. Down the Middle."

But that doesn't seem to be all that may not be quite as the presumptive Democratic nominee likes to portray. On the same news pages that reported on Obama's economic proposals were stories about his connections to Capitol insiders like controversial former Fannie Mae chief executive James Johnson, belying somewhat the image of the consummate outsider he used effectively in his campaign for "change" against Hillary Clinton. He now hopes to hang the same tag on Republican John McCain, a 26-year veteran of Washington maneuvering. Read article.

Things Change

Powerline Blog.com

They change especially fast in politics. John McCain thought he was running for Commander In Chief. Now it looks as though the economy--in particular the price of gasoline--will be the key issue in November.

The soaring price of gasoline represents a golden opportunity for the Republican Party. While most of them don't say it out loud, the Democrats have long wanted higher gas prices as part of their desire to remake America into a land of granola, mass transit and windmills. Most Americans, however, don't share the Democrats' indifference to economic decline and would turn out in droves to vote for a party that pledges to get the economy going again, and relieve the pain at the pump, by drilling for oil.

House Republicans are doing a great job of getting this message out. Today Congressman John Peterson offered an amendment in the Appropriations Committee to ease federal restrictions on exploration of the outer continental shelf, which contains enormous reserves of both oil and natural gas. The Democrats defeated the Peterson amendment on a 9-6 party line vote, demonstrating, as Minority Leader John Boehner said, "cold indifference toward the problems of typical families and businesses in their congressional districts and across the country." House Republicans intend to continue forcing votes on proposals to liberate our economy by developing our domestic oil and gas resources.

But it's going to be difficult, if not impossible, for Republicans to get traction on the energy issue without help at the top of the ticket. Here, the problem is that John McCain long ago signed on to the anthropogenic global warming fallacy. As a result, his energy policies can scarcely be distinguished from those of the Democrats. This was in evidence this morning, when McCain appeared on NBC's Today Show.

McCain did fine as long as the topic was foreign policy, but when the conversation turned to the economy, he was pathetic: Read article.

McCain: Four More Years of Mumbling?

Michael Reagan, Townhall.com

The last thing America needs is another four years of listening to a president mumble. I don't care how great the man is otherwise, and a quick look at the amazing progress in present day Iraq accomplished by the president reveals a greatness that offends liberals, but if he's a mumbler that's what he'll be seen as.

The same is true of John McCain. His wartime heroism and whatever he's accomplished in the United States Senate fades almost into obscurity because he is seen -- and joked about -- as a politician who, despite his boast of being a straight talker, is seen as a man who mumbles his way through the verbal thickets.

You can't make a point if you can't articulate it in the strongest and clearest way possible.

People remember a president who communicates. You may hate his message but you have no trouble absorbing it when Barack Obama speaks. He's like the Pied Piper -- he'll lead you off a cliff, but while he's doing it there's no doubt that he can put two words together, finish a sentence, and sound as if he means what he says and has enough fiery rhetoric in his verbal arsenal to keep you marching behind him on the way to the cliff's edge. He's like a Venus's-flytrap -- you think you're smelling roses when no matter how sweet the odor, it is really poison gas. Read article.

How to Pick a Vice President

Morris & McGann, Vote.com

Bill Clinton's selection of Al Gore changed forever the calculus presidential candidates need to use in choosing their running mates. Previously, presidential candidates usually used their VP pick to help them to carry a pivotal state or region, as JFK did in choosing Lyndon Johnson in 1960.

But the single state theory doesn't work anymore. Voters can tell the difference between the first and second place on the ticket and don't let the tail wag the dog in determining their votes. After all, John Kerry couldn't carry North Carolina even after putting Edwards on his 2004 ticket.

Instead, presidential candidates should use their VP choice to make a statement about their own candidacy. The vice president is a candidate's first and most important appointment. Gore served Clinton well because his selection made the generational subtext of the race against Bush Sr. explicit - two babyboomers challenged the last of the G.I. Generation presidents.

This year, Barack Obama suffers from an obvious lack of Washington and national security experience. Even his most avid fans have to wonder if two years in the U.S. Senate (before he started to run for president) is enough experience. Just as Bush, who had never served in Washington, chose Cheney and Dukakis looked to Lloyd Bentsen to provide gravitas and federal expertise, so Obama needs to look toward Washington in finding his running mate.

He needs to select someone with national security credentials and DC know-how. Senate Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Joe Biden (D-Del.) impressed us all in the Democratic debates. He, or Senator Chris Dodd (D-CT), would make good choices.

Obama would be ill-advised to choose Hillary since Bill comes as part of the package. The former president's lack of campaign trail discipline and questions about his recent financial dealings would dog the Democratic ticket, burdens Obama does not need. Read article.

Young House Star is Just the Ticket for John

Charles Hurt, NY Post.com

In picking a running mate, John McCain needs someone young to offset his own petrification.

He needs someone to help him geographically and someone with a strong domestic résumé to possibly ease those concerned that McCain once said in public he doesn't really understand the economy as well as he should.

The choice should be historic if Republicans want to get in on the excitement over Barack Obama's breaking down racial barriers.

Oh, and the guy has to be a ferocious fund-raiser to make up for McCain's pathetic performance in this area. (Obama has outraised McCain 3 to 1.)

The perfect fit is a congressman little known outside political circles but highly admired by political heavyweights and bankrollers in key states.

Eric Cantor, 45, is from Virginia, which is one of the top red states on Obama's list to pick off.

The fourth-highest-ranking Republican in the House, Cantor is credited with some of the Republicans' more sensible legislative efforts. Read article.

If Michelle Obama Isn't Racist, What Is She?

Katherine Berry, Pajamas Media.com

Maureen Dowd fears Michele Obama will be tagged an "angry black woman." With good reason. In Wednesday's NY Times, she warns conspiracy-seeking lefties that Obama's candidacy is sure to incite the GOP to attack his wife, Michelle Obama. As if Obama himself doesn't provide us with a good enough target. No, Dowd says, the true focus will be on Michele Obama as a "female version of Jeremiah Wright, an angry black woman."

Well, as we say here in Kansas - where we're all typical white people, I hear - "if the shoe fits, wear it."

Oh, I'm not saying that Michelle Obama's a racist. On the contrary, her husband's campaign seems to value white people. Why, just two months ago when Mrs. Obama spoke at a rally on the campus of Carnegie Mellon University in Pennsylvania her staff rearranged the crowd's seating so a white person could have an Asian woman's spot. "Get me more white people," one of her event coordinators said. "We need more white people."

With Michelle Obama, you see, it's not all about what race a person is. It's about what race they are not. As Mrs. Obama has made clear, it's not really about other people's whiteness. It's about how white people don't share what she calls her "blackness," a distinction she made it her mission to examine.

Her senior thesis at Princeton University analyzed that very subject as she sought to examine "Princeton-Educated Blacks and the Black Community". (Mrs. Obama's thesis, written under her maiden name of Michelle LaVaughn Robinson, has been temporarily withdrawn from the stacks at Princeton's library until the day after the presidential election. Read article.

Obama anti-smear site: 'He was never a Muslim' - But contemporaries, records indicate candidate once 'quite religious in Islam'

Aaron Klein, WND.com

In an effort to combat what it calls Internet smears, Sen. Barack Obama's presidential campaign yesterday launched a website with the stated aimed of setting the record straight.

One of the main issues addressed by Obama's "Fight the Smears" site is the contention the Illinois senators was once a Muslim.

"Senator Obama has never been a Muslim, was not raised as a Muslim, and is a committed Christian," states the site.

But as WND reported, public records in Indonesia listed Obama as a Muslim during his early years, and a number of childhood friends claimed to the media Obama was once a mosque-attending Muslim.

Obama's campaign has several times wavered in response to reporters queries regarding the issue of Obama's childhood faith.

Commenting on a recent Los Angeles Times report quoting a childhood friend stating Obama prayed in a mosque - something the presidential candidate said he never did - Obama's campaign released a statement explaining the senator "has never been a practicing Muslim."

The issue of Obama's personal faith has dogged the candidate amid multiple scandals involving his now former Chicago church and several spiritual advisers. Read article.

Talking Taxes

Citizen Jane Politics.com

If you're wondering what your tax bill is going to look like when we get a new president, you've come to right place. Let's break it down by candidate. These are the highlights:

Under President McCain's best-case scenario:

Bush tax cuts stay in place past 2010 (when they're set to expire).

The Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) will be phased out, thus giving many middle class taxpayers about $2,000 more in their pockets.

Corporate tax rates get cut from 35% to 25%.

It will take a 3/5 majority for Congress to pass any tax increase.

Under President' Obama's best-case scenario:

$500 annual tax credit for just about anyone with a job- that's 150 million people.

Seniors making less than $50,000 will pay NO income tax.

Tax increase for anyone making more than $250,000.

Tax increase on capital gains, dividends and carried interest. If you don't know what carried interest is, this doesn't apply to you or your hedge fund. Also, if you have an oil company, take a Xanax.

Lots of other tax credits to cover the cost of child care, college, and other daily expenses.

Here are some things to keep in mind about both of these: Read article.

McCain's executive edge

Bob Tyrrell, JWR.com

Think of it! Since early 2007, ambitious politicians have cluttered up the news with their campaigns for the presidency. Giants, such as Dennis Kucinich, Joe Biden and Bill Richardson, have tantalized us with the possibility that America could, under their leadership, become the new Athens.

Finally, three months ago, the field was reduced to three candidates, and now it is down to two. Usually the last leg of a presidential campaign begins after Labor Day. From all I can tell, the last leg of Campaign '08 is already under way. Every day until Election Day, Nov. 4, the American people are going to be assailed by the two candidates' clever rhetorical sallies, shocking exposes, pratfalls and all the other cheap tricks that contribute to a candidate's presidential campaign. Is the thing possible? Will anyone still be paying attention come November?

Half the American people do not vote, and after this marathon campaign, that number might well increase, owing to one of history's rarely noted undercurrents: sheer boredom. Yes, dissatisfaction is an undercurrent of history.

However, another element of history is biography, a fact agreed upon by Carlyle and Emerson. The Obama biography is brief, as Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton suggested in deriding his lack of "experience." Obama's is an interesting biography, but it does not recommend him for the presidency, not yet. Sen. John McCain's biography, by contrast, is vast, and it does indeed recommend him for the presidency.

In McCain's biography, we see leadership, managerial skills, an ability to work with senators on both sides of the aisle, and a vigilance about national security that we do not see in his opponent. McCain will not need the cheap tricks of a presidential campaign to win on Election Day. His biography will be sufficient. Read article.

Code Pink co-founder is Obama bundler

Politico.com

A co-founder of the anti-war group Code Pink, which has made a name for itself by interrupting hearings on Capitol Hill, is a fundraising bundler for Barack Obama.

Jodie Evans has pledged to raise at least $50,000 for Obama, according the Democrat's campaign site.

According to research being circulated by GOP sources, Evans has a record of inflammatory statements such as saying that women were better off in Iraq under Saddam Hussein, "Men are dying in their Hummers in Iraq so you can drive around in yours" and, my favorite, that the invasion of Iraq amounted to "global testosterone poisoning."

That an activist liberal is raising money for Obama isn't all that surprising. But in a campaign that has been dominated as much by the associates of candidates as the candidates themselves (Jeremiah Wright, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush), Evans is a reminder that what may not have mattered much in a primary has the potential to be resonant in the general. Read article.

Court's course in next president's hands

David Espo, GOP USA.com

In a campaign dominated by the economy and the Iraq War, the Supreme Court's 5-4 ruling Thursday on detainees at Guantanamo marks a forceful reminder that John McCain promises one course and Barack Obama pledges another in picking future justices.

In the current controversy, McCain quickly expressed his disapproval of the opinion, while Obama issued a statement of support. It fell to outsiders to point out the broader implications in the race for the White House.

''With the replacement of a single justice from the majority ... today's four dissenters could become tomorrow's majority,'' said Nan Aron of the Alliance For Justice. The group supported the court's decision, which said detainees in the war on terror held at Guantanamo have the constitutional right to challenge their incarceration in the federal courts.

Security must exist ''in fidelity to freedom's first principles,'' wrote Justice Anthony Kennedy for a majority seeking to balance the nation's security needs with individual rights enshrined in the Constitution. He went on to criticize the Bush administration and Congress for yielding too much to the former at the expense of the latter.

Of the five justices who created a majority in the case of the Guantanamo detainees, Justice John Paul Stevens is 88, Ruth Bader Ginsburg is 75, and David Souter and Stephen Breyer are each 69. Kennedy is 71. Read article.

Country forced to play electoral vote numbers game

George Will, JWR.com

Presidential politics, like football, chess and other rule-bound competitions, is simple in objective but complex in execution.

The objective is 270 electoral votes. This year the execution will turn on numbers such as:

48.3: In 2004, John Kerry won that percentage of the popular vote, the strongest showing ever by someone losing to a re-elected President. The lesson of this is that Democrats start from a position of strength.

2016: Assuming, not rashly, that Barack Obama wins, 2016 is the next time Hillary Clinton, who will then be 68, can seek the Democratic nomination. By then, the median age of the electorate will be 47, so for many millions of voters, Bill Clinton's tenure will seem only slightly less distant than Grover Cleveland's, the last Democratic presidency that did not make sensible citizens wince. Read article.

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