Smart Counts Again

Congrats to Barack Obama.

Short On Trust

What on earth could happen next with this election. It must be a heck of a difficult time for the people in the media who sort the news and decide what should be covered and how much. I'm sure questions abound like how hard should we look into Rick Davis's recent involvement with his own lobbying firm. It calls so loudly to follow the money.
But with the shocking suspension of Sen. McCain's campaign and all? First and foremost, better not appear biased. Maverick McCain putting his country first does sound pretty good. Let's just see where this trail goes and we can always double back for the rest of that Rick Davis story. Then again he is Sen. McCain's campaign manager. Oh dear, who's idea was it to suspend the campaign?
Friday, 9/26: What Rick Davis story was that?
Some people get bailed out by luck and some people create their own luck.

Karl Rove Creationism

I know that this appears trivial but it is classic Rovean politics and since nobody else seems to have mentioned it, I will. Yesterday Sen. McCain, during a speech, said he heard that Sen. Obama's advisers were happy with the financial crisis and that it would help their candidates chances. This drew a big reaction from the crowd. And if true it should have. In my mind I tried to imagine what had taken place and frankly, how could a campaign be so foolish. I thought about Sen. McCain adviser Charlie Black, famously saying that a terrorist attack would help the McCain campaign. But Charlie Black is sort of a loose cannon and from him you never know what to expect.
The Obama people are much smarter than that. So I wondered who was it that said such a thing.
Well, I searched and searched and here is all that I could come up with. Breitbart reports,

McCain aides: Obama 'cheerleading' Market. Top aides to Republican John McCain are claiming Democrat Barrack Obama and his advisers are exploiting Wall Streets financial problems for political gain. Aide Steve Schmidt, who worked for the Bush-Cheney team in 2004, told reporters Thursday aboard McCain's plane that Obama is "cheerleading this crisis." He said McCain is seeking a bipartisan solution although Schmidt and aides Mark Salter and Nicolle Wallace also said Democratic congressional leaders should be condemned for considering adjourning without addressing the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers, the sale of Merril Lynch and the emergency government loan to insurer AIG. The aides say the Arizona Senator will make the same criticisms during his speeches.

Ok, first of all there is a connection between Breitbart and Matt Drudge of the right leaning Drudge Report where this story appeared. Breitbart looks far and wide to provide Drudge with what he is looking for. And although written by an AP writer, the story's incoherence and obvious lack of scrutiny is appalling.
But most important here is that Steve Schmidt is as close to Karl Rove as one can get. So the protege, borrowing from the masters playbook, creates a story out of thin air. Then Sen. McCain repeats it in a speech like it is true. But the bold face in the bold face lie belongs to Karl Rove.
So how many voters made up their mind yesterday because they heard something that sounds this revolting? Steve Schmidt knows and he'll keep doing it until it doesn't work anymore.

With Friends Like That...

I've been wanting to say something about Carly Fiorina since she became involved with the McCain campaign. I lived near Sacramento for several years and my next door neighbor worked for Hewlett Packard. I don't remember exactly what his title was but he was a mid-level manager in product development and he traveled to Denver frequently and occasionally to France. The period we were neighbors was from 1992 until 2001.
Our homes were on 3 acre parcels with distance between and I also traveled a lot so we didn't speak regularly but over the years we had many over the back fence type conversations.
I clearly remember that he had little use for Carly Fiorina. She became CEO of Hewlett Packard in July of 1999 and I left the area in April of 2001 but in that short period he shared his criticisms many times about what she had done to the company. Generally he blamed her for how bad things had become.
Of course to be fair, this is anecdotal information and it is entirely possible that he was on the wrong end of some reorganization or something. But from his vehemence I took away that there was something to his complaints.
There are other indications that she was not as skilled as she could have been. One thing is that the company stock was cut in half from the time she arrived until the time she left. Again to be fair the technology bubble burst during this time. But Hewlett Packard isn't exactly a risk prone dot-com company and Fiorina did not leave until 2005. She had the time necessary to affect a recovery.
But perhaps the strongest indication that stockholders were not pleased with her is that when she announced her resignation the stock jumped 7%.
In fact there is plenty of evidence that she was at minimum divisive and a highly controversial figure.
Fast forward to yesterday and we see that she still possesses some of those same characteristics. She said that Gov. Palin was unqualified to be CEO of a major corporation. No doubt this was a strange comment but then she tried to fix it by saying that none of the candidates for VP or President were qualified. Unbelievable. Who is she working for anyway?
She has said other odd things but this one might just take the cake. This goes directly to the 2008 election gaffe hall of fame. I'll put this on par with Gedaldine Ferraro saying that the only reason Sen. Obama is where he is today (around the time he became the presumptive democratic nominee) is because he is black. Or call it neck and neck with McCain economic adviser, Sen. Gramm saying, you've heard of mental depression, this is mental recession...we have sort of become a nation of whiners. Though for my money the real doozy award goes to another McCain adviser, Charles Black, who said about Gov. Palin's lack of foreign policy experience, "She's going to learn national security at the foot of the master for the next four years, and most doctors think that he'll be around at least that long.
So once again I have some questions. Why on earth would he pick Carly Fiorina and what does this say about Sen. McCain? What does this say about who he would select to fill his cabinet?
I got the feeling that had she continued her thought that it may of sounded something like, hell, I couldn't even run a major corporation, you think these bozo's can?

Getting To Know The Republican Base

I was talking to a home schooling Evangelical Christian fellow yesterday that I have become friendly with. He indicated that he was pleased with the selection of Gov. Palin for VP. We talked about a number of related issues and as I had previously been made aware, he said that abortion and gay marriage are by far the most important issues for him in this election. If it isn't clear yet, I am pro-choice because I'm old enough to remember what it was like before Roe v. Wade and about gay marriage, I couldn't care less.
I'm one that has never quite understood how an irrational willingness to wage war and an unwillingness to accept any form of gun control can co-exist with a pro-life opinion. But what do I know?
The more we talked the more I realized that he was exactly what the calculation to select Gov. Palin was all about.
Discussing the respective campaigns it was obvious that as long as his candidate is solidly pro-life and defines marriage as a union between a man and a woman, nothing else really mattered that much. As I was to find out, the ethics involved in running a campaign was just simply not that important.
After I had given him plenty of time to talk, I was curious and seeing a limited opportunity I began to open up the possibility of a different perspective. I started by pointing out for example that Sen. McCain had not been truthful the day before when he said on the television show, The View, that Gov. Palin had not received earmark funding as Governor. I said, in fact, she will receive 256 million this year. I also pointed out that Gov. Palin told ABC's Charlie Gibson, touting her energy credentials, that Alaska provides 20% of the U.S. supply of energy when in fact the number is 3.5%. Then I told him that she had just told her son and fellow soldiers who were heading to Iraq, that they were being sent to protect us from the people who carried out the attacks on 9/11. I said, another falsehood.
He wasn't having any more of this and said, what's wrong with soliciting and receiving earmarks? To his surprise I said, nothing, I would expect my Governor to go after every penny available. Pork barrel rules do need to be changed but until they are it's fair game. He looked confused. I said, this is not about that, it's about lying to become President. Surely your religion teaches you that lying is wrong.
About Iraq, he said that it hadn't been proven that they weren't involved in 9/11. I said, yes it has. Then he went into this whole-all is fair in love and war-type of counter argument and says that both sides are as guilty as the other.
Well, I quickly realized that I was never going to convince him of what I do strongly believe, that the McCain campaign has run a much more deceptive and dirty campaign.
To change the subject I asked if he had seen Saturday Night Live. He said he hadn't but he did catch the Gov. Palin/Sen. Clinton bit on line and he thought it was very funny. Then he surprised me by saying that he couldn't believe that people in the McCain campaign thought it was disrespectful. Then adding that this was what satire is all about and what about that New Yorker cover with Barrack Obama and his wife as terrorists? Talk about disrespectful he said, did you know that there was even an American flag burning in the fireplace on that cover. I hadn't thought about it until then but it was an excellent point and I told him so. Then he said, you know, except for a few big issues I bet you and I don't see things all that differently. I said, I'm not so sure about that.

This Ain't Top Dead Center

Senator Obama listen up. You may not think they're in your head so let's try and explain it in a different way. Let's just say that the Rovean approach is to get under the hood of your car.
There is something under there called ignition timing and it has to do with an exact moment when gasoline vapor is compressed and spark plugs fire. If it occurs at the right moment your car runs great. This moment can be adjusted to either side of what is called, top dead center, or TDC. Depending on how much your timing is set away from TDC your car runs more and more poorly or even not at all. Karl Rove has taught his disciples to do whatever it takes to keep your car adjusted off of TDC. And if I may say so, they're doing a pretty good job of it right now. In Simpler terms-they are driving the debate or how about starting a lot of fires they know you'll try to put out.
Surely you have someone on your staff to remind you that under the circumstances you shouldn't try colloquialisms that have anything to do with pigs right now. Remember when Sen. Clinton, refusing to back out of the race and explaining why, mentioned one too many times that Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in the month of June. People were appalled because she uttered the assassination word. She needed that same person on her staff to.
I know you have plenty of people around you who could take on a little more responsibility. That same person could have given you a much better line like, do you know what the difference is between President Bush or Vice President Cheney and Gov. Palin? Lipstick. Now, that one may have worked. Maybe even to fix the lipstick on a pig comment.
I realize that you are terrified of swift-boating but your situation is much different. Unless I'm mistaken there doesn't seem to be a lot of people in your past that are going to come forward to attack you. I know a guy who went to school with you in Hawaii and says nothing but nice things about you and this seems to be the general impression of everyone. Besides, you would know by now if there were any such people in the wings.
Remember, it is not dirty politics to discuss your opponents shortcomings. For example most people realize that "drill baby drill" is not a long term energy policy. And many agree with the Alaska Wildlife Alliance who said that Sen. Palin's philosophy is "cut,kill,dig and drill." In fact I think that you need to dust off, re-assert and be proud of a few principles of the democrat party and the environment might be a safe place to start.
Also, please stop explaining things in such detail. The crowd your trying to win over at this point has a limited attention span and thinks they're hearing re-distribution of wealth every time you go near economic fixes. You need quick pulses like, you'll bring tax relief to 95% of Americans. While we are here, please drop the neighborly talk, you already have the vote of the people with heart strings. And on the ethics front, another pulse might be, Sen. McCain has 159 lobbyist working on his campaign and you have none. At some point you may want to point out that your Vice Presidential nominee is not under investigation for abuse of power and that Alaska's Department of Public Safety Administrator, Dan Spencer said, that ebay thing didn't work out very well.
To combat McCain's veteran status how about contrasting your work on veterans legislation with his.
Finally, you can marvel at how dirty they are or you can marvel at how well they play the game, It's up to you.
One more point on energy. You need to make people realize that this isn't some gift that Alaskans are willing to bestow on the lower 48. This week every man woman and child in Alaska will receive 3269.00 dollars just for living there. This goes a long way to explain Gov. Palins approval rating but more so explains that they won't bite the hand that feeds them. Alaska's a red state with 3 electoral votes, you can afford to piss them off a little. The bloom on Gov. Palin's rose will begin to wilt soon and you should be ready to pounce because it's your turn to get them off of top dead center.

Gov. Palin's Speech

Nice job reading a speech. Sen.Obama wrote his, there's a big difference. They even tried to say her tele-prompter wasn't working properly to leverage it's remarkableness (which has been proven false by people who could see it).
Madison avenue could learn a thing or two from this event. It was like watching a good TV commercial. Unfortunately it wasn't subject to truth in advertising laws. In fact it had nothing to do with the truth.
But most disturbing was that it was completely unhitched from the heavy load of the issues. Sen. McCain's campaign manager, Rick Davis said it, the campaign has become one of personality over issues.
So there you have it, the McCain campaigns final act; people vote from their gut and not from their brain. Among the faithful, the truth being a nuisance, scores will resort to their comfort level and vote unwittingly for more of the same.
Fortunately the faithful is perhaps 35 percent of voters in this country so now the Obama campaign has to remind those who will listen that issues are how this contest should be decided and then they should work toward bringing Gov. Palin down to size. You may not be able to attack John McCain's risk taking behavior because his war record shields him from such criticism but the sexism or gender shield shouldn't hold for her. It's hard for a moose hunting moose eating woman to have it both ways.
They must shoot holes in her claims about what she has accomplished. It simply is not what she claims. There is solid stuff like Alaska has the lowest high school graduation rate in the nation. Or her 80 percent approval rating may have something to do with the 1200 dollars she gave each Alaskan due to the increased share of oil profits. And this is on top of the over 2000 dollars each Alaskan (children included) receives each year from oil profits from the permanent fund. Now you see why she's so hell bent on exploiting every drop of Alaskan oil.
Of course there's trooper gate and the bridge to nowhere flip flop where she managed to still receive the money. Or her beginning as mayor of Wassilla when it had no debt then leaving it 22 million in debt. She was on the receiving end of plenty of pork-barrel funds and had a relationship with the federally indicted Sen. Ted Stevens. They need to expose the good fortune of her being governor when the spike in oil prices flooded the State coffers with cash. Her veto pen wielding fiscal conservative reputation is also not at all what it seems.
There is plenty more that needs to be researched but what can't remain to stand is that somehow her life experience is in any way more preparatory than Sen. Obama. The whole band wagon now calls her government positions executive experience and somehow superior to Sen. Obama.
To start with, practically speaking, I have always found that when you come up through the ranks you work harder and learn more than the people who through good fortune manage to miss the thankless and tedious part of the career path. Once you do get to the top, under normal circumstances by earning it, it's a relief and an easier job because you now have the power to make a decision without having to convince the world first. But you can get there in other ways, like in an election.
The idea that her charmed life in Wassila Alaska with a good family that resulted in a B.A degree, beauty pageants, working in her husbands business, a stint as a sports announcer , a PTA member, City Councilwoman, Mayor and Governor, voted in by 114,000 voters, somehow constitutes more experience than Sen.Obama, is beyond ridiculous. Senator Obama lived off food stamps and without a father, he was schooled in Indonesia, Hawaii, Los Angeles, Columbia University and Harvard Law School where he received his J.D. and where he was the first black President of the Harvard Law Review. He worked as a civil rights lawyer at a Law Firm and taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law school. He served 7 years as a State Senator then was elected in 2006 to the U.S Senate.
But what did Gov.Palin mention repeatedly? His role as a community organizer which she mocked as being less important than her mayorial role. Sen. Palin might want to take a trip to Chicago's south side for some perspective before comparing her sun-kissed life to his. He volunteered for this work in poorer economic times. Her volunteer work was at the PTA.
But it's not surprising that she wouldn't know what a community organizer did when a month ago she said to Larry Kudlow of CNBC, "as for that VP talk all the time, I'll tell you I still can't answer that question until somebody answer's for me what exactly a VP does every day..."

Is She Enough?

I think enough time has passed for me to comment on John McCain's V.P choice. When I have strong feelings about something I tend to allow a waiting period to send emotions packing while I call all thoughts back to the brain for a little meeting before I speak. But to my surprise I don't see it any differently now than I did when I first heard it. I'll reach up high on the shelves of over used and worn out transitive verbs for this one and go with flabbergasted.
Initially, I thought Sen. McCain must know a lot that I don't. But since all I knew was that she was the pretty Governor from Alaska who was attempting to clean up some wrongdoing by politicians in her state, I figured of course he would. Unfortunately, relative to qualifications for her new job, the answer was nope, that's about it.
Instead, what has rushed into the information void are things like she has completed less than half a term as Governor, an investigation into abuse of power, a for-before I was against, flip-flop about the bridge to nowhere touted in her V.P. acceptance speech, a mother-in-law who is undecided whether or not she will vote for a McCain/Palin ticket who adds, "I don't know what she brings to the ticket other than being a woman and a conservative." There are bruising appraisals of her V.P. potential from the Alaska press and among others, a line from the Alaska State Speaker of the House who, when asked about her qualification, replied, "She's old enough- she's a U.S citizen." To be fair this may be sour grapes resulting from her house cleaning efforts but it is surprisingly difficult to find positive appraisals at the local level.
Of course from the McCain camp there is no shortage of glowing commendations but listen to what McCain top adviser Charles Black said, "She's going to learn national security at the foot of the master for the next four years and most doctors think that he'll be around at least that long." What can you say to that?
In fairness to Gov. Palin there is no disputing that she has accomplished a great deal in her life. She has much to be proud of. But she has now climbed onto an entirely different stage with an audience that's gone from 700,000 to over 300 million, and I happen to be one of the latter.
Call me cynical but I just don't get all that assured by looking at her early life, her education, her success in beauty pageantry or sports reporting. Her service in city government may be qualifying if the city was Los Angeles or even Anchorage but I've been to Wassila and like all rural politics, becoming the big fish in a small pond is not all that remarkable. In fact all politics in Alaska can be called small town and Gov. Palins service in Wassila may have prepared her adequately for the governorship but the real question is does she posses the skills necessary to be the Vice President of the United States?
I think it's worth mentioning here that Alaska, with a population of 700,000, is physically larger than the next three largest states of California, Texas and Montana which have a combined population of 62 million.
I have experienced the largeness of Alaska with trips out of Fairbanks in bush planes and on the Yukon traveling to distant remote villages. Why is this important? Because it is one way, without going into great detail, to help explain what defines Alaskans and it contributes to how they view the world. Alaska just feels limitless and unrestricted and I see a lot of this manifested in Gov. Palin. It is reflected in her confidence about her positions on the issues of our time. It has served her quite well but has she been shaped by a place that matches up well with the lower 48?
Take issues like immigration? Smart young people leaving state is a greater concern to Alaskans. Pollution? Too much land, not enough people. Taxes? They receive far more money from lower 48 tax payers than they pay. They even receive over 2000 dollars each per year (including children) from oil revenue. Energy? There is a lot of it and finding and selling as much as possible is a self-serving economic goal. Terrorism? About as safe as it gets. Crime and drugs? Alcohol and drug abuse is a scourge and per capita crime statistics rival the rest of the country. There is even gang violence in Anchorage but still a stretch to compare it with major cities of the lower 48. Gun control? not on your life. Ethics in government? She maybe the cleanest, but from a very dirty house. The Iraq war? It's God's will so more of the same. Foreign policy? Sen. Palin has absolutely None. The Economy? Apples and oranges. Alaska lives in a distorted reality, awash in oil profits.
So is this just a pro-Obama/Biden rant about anyone that McCain selected? I like to think it is more objective than that. In fact among the people mentioned on the "short list" I could have easily been silenced. They got the gender right but It should have been the one with gravitas like Kay Bailey Hutchison.
Finally, I do worry that Gov. Palin would be out of touch with what this country really needs at this time. An Anchorage Dailey News reporter called her career "sun-kissed," which doesn't seem to be the right credentials for dealing with the problems which will face the next administration.

Mono A Mono

Now we've got a fight. Senator Obama clearly gave a terrific nomination acceptance speech. For heaven's sake, Chris Wallace, Bill Kristol and Charles Krauthammer even said so. If this isn't confirmation, what is?
It was beautiful and complete and most important he convinced me that in fact he is a formidable force who could throw a punch if the time came.. It must feel like some surreal out of body journey for him but last night, being finally able show himself to the world, he stepped up and scored big.
Remember that each of us is dealt a hand of cards in life. If you think that being black in this country doesn't amount to a few low cards then your kidding yourself. Add the interracial aspect, no father and no money and your ready to fold before you begin. Sen. Obama though, was dealt a few kings, maybe even an ace by having a good external image, a good mother and grandparents and a head on his shoulders. He stayed in the game but to do so he had to play his cards just right. The little intro film before he spoke may have given a clue about the source of a part of him--his reticence.
He said the only time his mother got mad was when she observed cruelty to others. And to her son she said, when people are mistreated, imagine standing in their shoes. This, working together with the don't be too uppity pledge that many African-Americans must take to succeed, could well of suppressed Obama's desire to engage. But it wasn't born from an emotional fear, it was a tried-and-true intellectual one.
Many instances along the way served to reinforce the relative safety of his reticence place. Recall his early "your likable enough Hillary" comment to Senator Clinton. Hardly a serious attack but success in Iowa came to a screeching halt in New Hampshire, reportedly due to this comment.
Maybe the campaign has finally adjusted to running against a man. A standard that sports served to normalize, where man on man rules nearly ignore black man on white man rules of yesteryear.
Well, to say the least Senator Obama did play his cards right and now has raked in about half the chips. The other half, ironically, may only be won if the full and genuine man emerges and that's what I hope we saw last night.

Well Done Convention But Get Ready

No thoughtful and objective person could believe that the speeches we heard from Michelle Obama, Brian Schweitzer, Senator Clinton, Senator Kerry, President Clinton and Senator Biden were not superb. As usual the hours of analysis, produced commentary that lost it's moorings. But the few remaining unaffected and unbiased media people scattered across the network and cable outlets did get it right and found that the speeches did all they could politically for the Democratic party.
So, even as the Republican party worked hard through ads, surrogates and party friendly media to interfere, it seems that the democrats will come out of their convention in fairly good shape. Senator Obama should dazzle the crowd as usual tonight and in the process have put together a nifty little organization in Colorado and beyond in the critical west.
So why don't I feel as excited as I possibly should? Simply because the Obama juggernaut was stalled by the efforts of the McCain campaign over the last month or so and they are working very hard to do it again.
The addition of Senator Biden will help to deliver whatever strategy they intend to use but the campaign itself must provide that strategy.
The problem is that this campaign has put it's bet down on the high road approach. Please don't think that I believe that they should wallow in the mud with McCain's Rovean warriors but there is a mile between the respective campaigns tactics. There is plenty of room to be aggressive or on offense or proactive if that feels better, without being dirty. The Republicans will continue to drive the debate unless the Obama campaign gets some surrogates out there willing to win at a cost greater than what their willing to afford right now.