The truce is over, I am back to writing about the elections. In the latest installment of the Palin-Couric exchange, Palin has really outdone herself again. As a politician, Palin is free to have her political views on the issues of the day, and we as voters are free to agree or disagree with those views. So I will respect her views on abortion as a federal question. But in her answers to the follow-up questions — just as she does with every other follow-up question — she is so extremely uniformed about the issue, that her only remedy is to rearrange the syntax of her first answer, “sticking to her guns”, and hope that nobody notices. Unfortunately, these rephrased answers, which apparently have worked in Alaskan debates, highlight her utter lack of understanding of national issues and basic constitutional questions. Continue reading
Category Archives: Essays
The McCain Palin Microcosm
How would you even begin to analyze the recent footage from Katie Curic’s interview with Sarah Palin? If you thought that predator lenders were evil in pushing mortgages on naive Americans who wanted homes but couldn’t afford them, imagine a national congressional veteran convincing a small town rookie (and attempting to convince voters) that she was qualified for a position light years beyond her abilities? You almost feel embarrassed for her, like she’d been tricked, fooled by the Washington insider.
Not only is she not qualified, she isn’t even ready for a televised debate. She gets all of her terminology wrong and can’t speak in complete sentences. This interview definitively answered my question. McCain is right to keep her from the press. Like Paulson who wanted us to have 100% faith in his ability to unilaterally manage the $700 billion bailout, McCain — keeping Palin from the press — is essentially begging us to have faith in his choice and not to vet her.
McCain at the CGI but Not the Debate?
I thought that McCain had suspended his campaign and was calling to postpone the presidential debates to focus on solving the country’s economic woes. It was better to be on Capitol Hill than at a debate in front of the American people. That wasn’t just a cynical last ditch effort to turn around the latest polls. It was, you know, America First!
Although McCain and Obama will meet later today at the White House, how did McCain find the time to address the Clinton Global Initiative in New York? Where were those famous McCain priorities in a time of crisis? If there was no time for the debate, why was there time for addressing the Clinton cronies?
Let’s Call the Whole Thing (Temporarily) Off
McCain says “tomato” and then he says “tomoto”, why not temporarily suspend the campaign so he can get his story straight? Remember last week when the economy was fundamentally sound? Now it is in such dire straits that he has postponed his campaign and tomorrow night’s presidential debates so he can crash his straight talk express into Washington and solve the problems afflicting his campaign.
Just look at the numbers of a recent Washington Post/ABC poll showing that McCain is behind by nine points nationally. Another two polls show him behind in Michigan. This isn’t the firs time, though, that McCain has reacted to an Obama lead by threatening to suspend campaigning. He did it right after the DNC Convention when he delayed the GOP Convention. The excuse then was bad weather, but we all know that the McCain team desperately needed to keep W. from speaking.
This also isn’t the first time that McCain has showed his rash, shoot ‘m up judgment on the campaign trail. Continue reading
Unprecedented Censorship: How Bad Can She Be?
The press has threatened to boycott Palin’s U.N. speed date today with world leaders because the McCain Palin team were refusing to allow reporters access to the Republican vice presidential candidate. She still hasn’t held a single press conference. For the vice presidential debate, the Republicans have negotiated a format of short questions to further shield Palin from having to say too much.
Does McCain have that little confidence in Palin that he needs to censor her? Where is the transparency and openness? There is no other precedent in American history for a national candidate being kept this far from the public eye. Like we wouldn’t notice? You’d almost think she was a sequestered juror in a high profile murder case or an Alaskan teenager being protected from exposure to protection or certain unseemly reading materials.
I just wish someone out there would take us, the voting public, seriously. Come on, let her answer a few questions. How bad can she be?
Why Would You Want to Win?
Whenever I speak with my father about these elections, I always ask his opinion about Obama’s chances of winning. And ever since early January of this year, he has always had the same response, “Why would Obama want to win?” His argument was, even way back nine months ago, that whoever wins would face two insurmountable obstacles making reelection in 2012 almost impossible. The first was a nasty and complicated Iraq pull out, and the second was an economic recession and financial crisis.
It appears that we are already in said financial crisis. And if my father’s assessment is correct, things don’t look great for Obama because McCain looks even worse. Continue reading
Remember Paula Jones?
Do you remember Paula Jones? I bet you remember Monica Lewinsky. Paula was suing Bill Clinton, and in the course of the discovery process, Bill tried to hide his relationship with Monica, just in case it could be used as evidence against him. Later when he was being investigated for perjury and suborning perjury, President Bill Clinton said that he didn’t have to play by the rules because he believed the case was baseless.
Now Sarah Palin’s “first dude”, her husband, is refusing to testify in an abuse of power investigation into his wife’s conduct as Governor of Alaska because he “no longer believes the legislature’s investigation is legitimate”. Back in 1998, I was appalled that Clinton thought he was above the law and had some special right to bypass the judicial process. As I wrote last year about the matter,
President Clinton repeatedly justified his alleged “obstruction of justice” as having been in response to Ms. Jones’ unfounded and frivolous lawsuit. But if the President shared his feminist constituents’ beliefs and trusted the legal system, he would have allowed justice to run its normal course instead of trying to impede a woman’s right to bring a sexual harassment case against her employer.
I feel the same way today about the Palin’s. What right does Todd Palin (or anyone else for that matter) have to ignore a subpoena to testify in an investigation? Is his opinion about the legitimacy of an investigation superior to that of the democratically elected Alaska legislature? Does he have jurisdiction over the legislature? Why do we have legislatures, judges, courts, juries, or law enforcement if it all comes down to guys like Clinton or Dude Palin extra-judicially determining they’re above the law?
What Clinton didn’t understand then and what Palin doesn’t understand now is that they are not fighting to protect their rights, but are disrespecting and undermining the public institutions that comprise the American democracy. If they believed in the system, then they would show a little more faith in the rule of law in this country — like ordinary Americans are forced to do every day in court — and let justice run its due course.
Bring in the Marines
John McCain is a tough guy, and like all tough guys he solves problems by being tough. Toughness is definitely what we need, and if John Wayne McCain were president, he’d fire the chairman of the S.E.C. Then he’d probably convene the Joint Chiefs of Staff and bring in General David Petraeus to clean up the mess. Continue reading
In Praise of Regulations
One thing that has historically set the U.S. apart from other nations is its strong adherence to the Rule of Law. Not just through legislation, but through regulations (and the U.S.’s special brand of rules for promulgating regulations), the country has been able to afford all sorts of protections to consumers, workers, investors and businesses without having to increase the size of government a la European socialism.
I know it’s a Republican catch phrase to call everything that they don’t like “big government” but there is absolutely no relationship between regulating activity and increasing the size of government. So it is no wonder that McCain’s recent schizophrenic attacks don’t quite square with reality. Continue reading
The United States of Corruption
John McCain declared yesterday that both Washington and Wall Street were corrupt. By Washington, I can only assume that he means the U.S. government comprised of both the Congress for which he has been a member for more than 20 years and the Bush administration. By Wall Street, I assume that he means the back bone of our financial system and the international emblem and symbol of America’s economy.
I am not saying that this statement isn’t true. It may very well be. But it seems kind of strange coming from the mouth of the country’s greatest patriot and hero. First, I can’t recall a U.S. presidential candidate or statesmen ever so boldly criticizing his country. In the U.S., we call Venezuela corrupt and we call Nigeria corrupt, but we would never look in the mirror and bravely accuse Amurika (as McCain pronounces it) as being equally rotten. If John McCain really believes what he said, then kudos to him for finally speaking out.
And that’s precisely my next point, finally! McCain has been in Washington for how long? Is he one of the Washington corrupt? If not, who is corrupt in Washington? The Bush Administration for the past eight years? The Republican Congress for six of the last eight years? Or did this corruption just start in the past two years? Maybe they are all corrupt, each and every one of them except for John McCain. He has spoken out against pork and earmarks, but surely those are more wasteful than corrupting. Surely, pork and earmarks did not lead to today’s financial crisis. How has McCain’s 90% pro-Bush voting record or insistence on deregulation of the financial markets thwarted corruption? If McCain hasn’t been able to put a dent in corruption between 1982 and 2008 in Washington, how is he going to change things now?
From a purely pragmatic standpoint, how responsible is it to call the U.S. government and banking and financial systems corrupt? What effect does it have on the market, on value of the dollar and U.S. debt, and on global confidence in the American economy and businesses? Or the future of Wall Street (and the U.S. for that matter) as the financial center of the world? If you thought factory jobs were heading south, wait until there is white collar flight to less risky markets like London.
One last question: were John McCain president of a foreign nation, would he negotiate with the corrupt United States without conditions?
Grave Error 