While everyone seems to be focused on Minnesota and Alaska as best chances for another pickup, I see Martin as a GREAT opportunity. Any election that isn't on the 1st Tuesday in November is a pure turnout election: which ever side gets the most partisans out to vote wins the day. If you can find indie voters who will commit to you, more power to you. But by and large you don't waste time trying to persuade undecided voters. You get known Democrats (and our esteemed opponents get known GOP supporters) to do something rather unnatural: vote again in less than 30 days.
I've sent Martin $25 already. What else can I do from here, a brisk walk from "The Big House?"
Michael Whitehead
Ann Arbor, MI
About 3-4 years ago when I was considering buying a Prius, I noted that "certain" industry experts were saying the time it took to make up the cost differential between a Prius and a "comparable" conventional ICE vehicle would be 7-9 years. It took me a while to realize that they were assuming a gas price of around $2/gal.
That leads to this question: what ARE the proper numbers to use in discussing energy policy? How much does a deep water production crude oil rig cost? How much does a typically sized nuclear power reactor (that might be in planning stages now) cost? How much does a solar tower array or a wind farm that will produce comparable wattage?
Just as important, what are the lead times involved in building these energy sources? It would be helpful for as many of us as possible to be using the same figures when we advocate for energy sanity. The more info the better, so if there are figures for low head hydro, geothermal, etc. that would be helpful as well. I am not trying to exclude systems that would be better suited for individual homes, neighborhoods or small towns. It is simply that it is difficult to scale the argument for a home solar array vs. a nuclear plant that would serve many thousands of households and businesses when discussing this with "Joe and Jane Indie voter."
Thanks in advance for any and all feedback.
Ann Arbor
I ran across this snippet about John McCain's flyboy days:
"[A]fter a European fling with the tobacco heiress, John McCain reported to flight school at Pensacola in August 1958.... [H]is performance was below par, at best good enough to get by. He liked flying, but didn't love it. What he loved was the kick-the-tire, start-the-fire, scarf-in-the-wind life of a naval aviator. ...One Saturday morning, as McCain was practicing landings, his engine quit and his plane plunged into Corpus Christi. Knocked unconscious by the impact, he came to as the plane settled to the bottom....McCain was an adequate pilot, but he had no patience for studying dry aviation manuals.... His professional growth, though reasonably steady, had its troubled moments. Flying too low over the Iberian Peninsula, he took out some power lines, which led to a spate of newspaper stories in which he was predictably identified as the son of an admiral.... [In 1965] he flew a trainer solo to Philadelphia for the Army-Navy game. Flying by way of Norfolk, he had just begun his descent over unpopulated tidal terrain when the engine died. 'I've got a flameout,' he radioed. He went through the standard relight procedures three times. At one thousand feet he ejected, landing on the deserted beach moments before the plane slammed into a clump of trees."
from: John McCain: An American Odyssey, a biography by Robert Timberg, Sept., 2007
(found in posting by Jeffrey Klein on HuffingtonPost.com)
Makes one wonder just how McCain fell into enemy hands. Was he flying "with less than mission discipline", figuratively daring the NVA to shoot him down? Was his nearly 6 years as resident of the "Hanoi Hilton" essentially a self-inflicted wound as a result of one of his frequent, well documented episodes of recklessness?
I realize the desire to honor McCain's service to the nation, but it was over a hundred years before the truth about Custer and Little Bighorn came out. Are we getting sucked in by an overblown PR job when we don't really know the details of McCain's service?
Kerry's service clearly wasn't beyond "alternative perspective" after all.
If McCain was less than a model Naval Officer (and the record suggests that on balance he was) I don't hold that against him. History is littered with men who were reckless in their youth and developed sufficient discipline to succeed at some level. What I am concerned about is the apparent depth of real achievement in McCain's history as a politician. Did he garner all the attention and importance because his handful of "Maverick Moments" were the deciding votes in those pieces of legislation that bucked the GOP line? No. He was simply the colorful Vietnam Vet who had the background from "Central Casting" who joined several other GOP members in many of those cases.
Truth be told, McCain has had his eyes on the Presidency since Reagan took office. In and of itself that's not a bad thing. But it makes his "Maverick Moments" appear less courageous than calculated. The trick is how to express this to "Jane and John Independent Voter" without appearing to be attacking "the Military", "the Flag", etc.
I was overjoyed to be at the Obama rally in Detroit last night, and especially excited that Al Gore was on hand to officially endorse Obama at the event. I even got to be on the floor within spitting distance of the stage.
But I was very disappointed with the level of loud booing that greeted Granholm when she onstage to introduce Gore and Obama. Yes, I know she came out early for HRC, and that it she was pulling strings to force the process to go HRC's way by cheerleading for an early Primary in defiance of the DNC calendar.
But guess what? The nomination battle is over. Obama won. It's time to exercise not just good sportsmanship, but exemplary sportsmanship. Booing HRC and her high profile supporters only lenghtens the time that HRC's most ardent supporters stay on the sidelines. They are looking for excuses and examples to feed their hurt feelings. And when we boo "Jenny from the Block" or any other (especially female) high profile HRC supporter, we are co-dependent in allowing the HRC uber-faithful to infer "sexist behavior."
Those who know me personally know I am painfully introverted, but I was driven to loudly, but as gently as I could manage, admonish the young people around me on the floor to "BE NICE!" when the booing erupted at Granholm. Maybe I'm wrong, maybe I'm simply old enough to be "old-fashioned" but in my world you don't "rub someone's nose in it" one day and expect them to seemlessly work shoulder to shoulder with you the next.
Before those various groups and individuals continue their insistence that Obama won't/can't get their vote without putting HRC on the ticket, they need to step back and ask a couple of questions:
1. Does HRC want the job? Frankly, I don't think so. She enjoys more freedom and independence of action as a sitting US Senator. And they don't name landmark pieces of legislation after VPs. This might be her chance to create the"Clinton Health Care Act", the piece of legislation that will (finally) allow us to catch up to the rest of the developed world.
2. Does HRC being on the ticket really improve chances of winning? What good is it to be on the ticket if the ticket falls short of victory? Sure HRC will energize some portion of the "18 million" who voted for her. It also may do what McCain cannot: energize conservatives to actually participate in this election.
3. Does insisting that she be given the spot help her if she DOES want it? Obama may gain more from "staring down" a major bloc of the Party from Independent voters than from bowing to the demands of what is rapidly becoming a relatively small but vocal cadre of activists. “Hillary holds the entire Latino community in the palm of her hand,” said. Rep. José Serrano (D-N.Y.), whose district went heavily for Clinton. ( http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/hispanic-dems-warn-obama-he-risks-losing-latino-voters-2008-06-11.html ) I take it that Rep. Serrano is discounting the recent polling that indicates Obama is making significant progress with Latino voters post-HRC's endorsement. It may be that adding HRC to the ticket is not any better for the ticket than any other choice, and that HRC may have to show how she can help an Obama Admininstration better than other choices can. Indeed, that is the very factor that led Bill Clinton to choose Al Gore.
I'm not pretending that I know the future. HRC may well want to be VP. Obama's selection team may conclude that HRC is the best #2. There may be more to gain than to lose by putting her on the ticket. But all this VP talk at this moment is premature. It may make for great pundit talk, but it really is not on Obama's front burner and won't be until Caroline tells him that her team has finished creating the only short list that counts.
Both Politico.com and Huffington are reporting that HRC is going to make a MAJOR speech tomorrow night. Sounds very much like she is going to start pulling the plug.
If you haven't started practicing your very best gracious greeting to HRC hard-liners that you may know, this would be a good time to begin such practice. It's going to take a long time to talk some of these good souls off the ledge.
I started reading this article because the Southern Poverty Law Center lawyer mentioned was my wife's roomate at William & Mary, and a bridesmaid at our wedding. But as I read it, I got chills.
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20080526/lovato
Using the Fugitive Slave Laws of the mid 19th century as a model to arrest and detain the undocumented? Are we doomed to repeat the sins of our past? Is this some big fraternity initiation of sorts, that you have to suffer a generation or two (most of MY family will say it's GOT to be more than two, 'cause we're going on eight, nine, and ten) before you "become American?"
One thing is for certain: an Obama Administration would not use our ugly past as a frame of reference to manage some uncomfortable aspects of our present and future.
It has finally been disclosed that HRC did indeed lend the campaign more money in the period leading up to these last 3 primaries.
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/05/07/clinton-lends-campaign-6-mllion/
So the post-Pennsylvania $10 million on-line cash infusion story looks even more suspect now. Team HRC has cancelled some public events scheduled for today in order to "reassess."
Can the end finally be in sight? Expect Team HRC to continue on for West Virginia and Kentucky, though how they do that on financial fumes is beyond my feeble mental powers.
How very convenient that Lake County in Indiana went 55-45 for Obama. Convenient because the margin was expected to be larger. In fact, any larger and Clinton might have LOST Indiana outright. This brings to mind the complaints of my relatives in Philly that "official results" undercounted the city, and scattered reports from Super Tuesday that some precincts in Harlem and other significantly African American areas in "The City" had questionable results for Obama.
Why did it take so very long for Lake County to report results? Did they have to "vett" the totals before releasing them. And very curious that the Mayor of Hammond (a Clinton supporter) declared that his city went for Clinton a full 2 hours before the results were released.
I REALLY don't want to learn a couple of months from now that Clinton supporters in key places engaged in "selective vote reporting" in key states between February and today.
Up to this point, I've chalked up the questionable tactics that Team HRC has used to gain votes against Obama to simple short term political calculation. No matter how nasty things got, I assumed that HRC would(somehow) be able to repair the coalition and win in November.
Then I saw this posting on Politico.com:
http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0508/Clinton_mail_attacks_Obama_on_guns.html
As Smith points out:
"The piece is particularly striking coming from Clinton, who has been seen for most of her career as a firm advocate of gun control, but more recently has emerged -- without dramatically shifting her stance on specific issues -- as a defender of the Second Amendment who fondly recalled being taught to shoot by her grandfather in Scranton."
HRC is now verging on political suicide. It's one thing to attack one's opponent in an attempt to win the nomination. It is quite a different matter to pretend after years of being a gun control advocate that one is now also seeking the Presidency of the NRA. This is not triangulation: this is just short-sighted pandering of the worst kind. The kind that invites "flip-flop" ads in October. The kind that loses big pieces of your core constituency without any corresponding gain in independent voters.
But on a positive note, the kind that Superdelegates will recognize as downright stupid.
Mid-June cannot come soon enough.
Let's be clear about this folks, the MSM does NOT want to see an end to this Primary race. The go to sleep with visions of floor fights and delegation challenges dancing in their heads. Because conflict sells. Acrimony sells. Strife grabs attention. And none of them wantS to be restrained in their reporting (parroting of Team HRC's talking points seems to pass for that these days) if this is the haymaker that puts Obama on the mat.
(Ironic that the sports leagues with replay review have found out that fans really don't mind the game being a few minutes longer IF the correct ruling is made. Ironic because in that situation, the correction get more play than the initial ruling on field. The MSM still lives in a world where corrections reside on page 13 below the fold, or a miscellanous link on a website.)
For Team HRC, it is crucial to keep throwing big punches and hope one lands. The remaining states are likely to earn more delegates for Obama in total than for HRC. The ONLY way HRC can get the Superdelegates to look at the calculus differently is to claim loudly (and "prove") that Obama is a "flawed candidate" in November.
And at this point, what if he is? Here's the thing that Team HRC is discounting big time: down ballot candidates (which is what many Superdelegates are) are likely to conclude that even if Obama loses the election against McCain, he doesn't hurt them so much being on the ballot. Can they conclude the same thing about a candidate saddled with very high negatives prior to the "Swift Boat" operations playing their roll?
I just finished reading an article on the American Prospect (Prospect.org) which I feel compelled to share. Consevatives for far too long have owned the definition of what is in "Our National Interests." It's refreshing to see the alternative view written in such frank language. Here are a couple of portions:
Rather than simply re-litigating the argument over the Iraq War, Yglesias situates the war, and the debate that led to the invasion, in the context of longer-running arguments about the proper direction of U.S. foreign policy. In particular, he laments the relative abandonment of the vision liberals have held dear since World War II -- that of a rules-based international order in which America sacrifices a certain amount of autonomy in order to gain a greater measure of legitimacy, and works mightily to create, preserve, and strengthen international institutions that let other countries do the same. Those who would promote liberal values, in other words, need also submit to them. This means, at times, restraining American power and even accepting that our agenda can be impeded by the intransigence of our allies and, occasionally, our adversaries. But better we endure smaller setbacks than revisit the brutal struggle for power that defined world affairs in the pre-internationalist period. (emphasis added)
******************************************************
This, fundamentally, is the foreign-policy debate in our country. Liberals see America possessing tremendous power that must be tempered and legitimized by the rules we choose to follow and the restraint we choose to apply. Conservatives see great vulnerabilities that can only be assuaged through sufficient application of violence and will. And that's the choice: Do we want the foreign policy of Jack Bauer and John Yoo, or of Clark Kent and George Marshall? It's a question that Gen. Petraeus, sadly, has no answer for.
http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=a_superman_approach_to_foreign_policy
I believe these constraints would serve us very well in the present context and any future situations that will arise. But I am under no illusion that such a policy wouldn't be vigorously challeged by a doctrine of "Absolute American Sovereignty." The NeoCons may see that as a show of strength rightfully exerted by the lone Superpower on the planet. I view it as "International Thuggery."
I'm going to skip over McCain's long, incoherent ("There are Presidents who don't have a Federal Holiday" he once said. As if we would ever have a Warren G. Harding holiday) eventual accepting of the MLK holiday. What's important is that he has yet to embrace those very American values that Dr. King championed. McCain's stance on the Occupation of Iraq? Basically we need to stay 100 years (if necessary) "to fight them over there, so that we don't have to fight them over here." His stance on economic and social justice? A consistent voting history of support for the wealthy over working people. Hs stance on the possibility that millions of stressed homeowners may join the hundreds of thousands who have already lost that piece of the American Dream? As Robert Reich observed this past weekend, McCain essentially went "Marie Antoinette" on those victims of the lack of proper regulation in our financial markets: let them eat cake.
McCain enjoys a reputation of being a "Maverick", of being independent or even a moderate. His voting record -- on all issues, but especially those related to social justice -- indicate that he believes in the "Golden Rule": He who has the gold, makes the rules." It will take several months of respectfully but firmly reminding a sufficient number of those independent voters we need that McCain is not the "reasonable fellow" that the mainstream media wants to pretend he is. But it can and must be done.
I will strive to be very respectful of his valor and his military service, but as an elected steward of our Union, he pretty much sucks.
I read with interest McCain's speech and follow up on the financial markets. He obviously is still trying to win over the Conservatives in the GOP, because a nominee with full backing of the Wall Street wing of his Party would have laid out some modest proposals to at least indicate some need for oversight. I think his advisors have assured him that all that will happen is that a couple million of us plebleians will lose our homes because of forces already in the pipeline and that there are speculators ready to cash in when the housing prices fall so low they can't resist.
Unfortunately, that means that while many of us are repairing our credit, we will be sending our rent checks to overseas landlords. (The "Transaction Class" as I call them -- for they no longer do anything to create new products and services that result in domestic job creation -- will of course facilitate the transfer of payments for a tidy profit.) Perhaps McCain's advisors are assuring him that the cash flow will be sufficient to fund the DOD budgets and pay for the so-called "Black Ops" that he will deem necessary for the "forward security" of the nation. At worst, the bill will come due to the next generation, so it really doesn't matter if they underestimate the impact of the credit crunch and consumer confidence: McCain figures to rally the nation with a real call to arms, involving more of the country and demanding more sacrifice than "Dubya" did. Get ready for a reinstitution of the Draft in a McCain Administration, folks. And rationing of fuel and "strategic materials."
At his base, McCain is one of a minority of Vietnam Vets who believes that the politicians in Washington let him and his fellow warriors down in the field. Like Westmoreland, he thinks that redoubling our efforts after Tet would have defeated Ho Chi Mihn -- eventually. We would have "won."
But to what end? The South Vietnamese "government" was like all too many anti-communist puppets that we propped up after WWII: a collection of corrupt empty suits who didn't have the popular support of their citizens. And what is to be gained in Iraq by staying and "winning?" The eventual control of Iraqi oil? A hedge against Iranian influence in the region? Neither of those goals even combined is worth the TRILLIONS we will spend to "win" in Iraq, especially when you consider the "strings" that will eventually come attached to that spending by our overseas landlords and creditors.
What will McCain say after 4 years? We lost because our foreign creditors let us down?
This morning, Gov. Richardson will formally endorse Obama.
Obama-Richardson...hmmm. It kind of grows on you when you say it a couple times and read it in print.
The point is, Team HRC, that in America we don't limit our capacity to hope and dream and contemplate the POSSIBLE.
Too often we allow the discourse about Military Affairs to be hijacked by the "experts" and rarely, if ever challenge their basic assumptions -- or even challenge whether they are INDEED expert in this field.
On the face of it John McCain passes the "military expert" eyeball test. He was, after all, a decorated Vietnam Vet and a Five and one-half year resident of the infamous "Hanoi Hilton". But if you dare to scratch the surface, you should wonder if that is enough. John McCain is from a multi-generation Navy family. Both his father and grandfather rose to the rank of Admiral in the U. S. Navy. The point to be made here is that few, if any, men were allowed to rise to the rank of Navy Admiral on merit exclusively: McCain's grandfather may well have been a superior and gifted leader of men, but in the era of America's first Guilded Age, "commoners" --for lack of a better description -- were not allowed to rise to such a high rank.
McCain graduated from the Naval Academy in 1958, ranking 894 of a total class of 899. He immediately entered Naval Aviation training (there is no such thing as a Navy Pilot: they are Aviators), and has been part of that cozy fraternity ever since (you know, the same guys that bought us "TailHook"). I write this not to disparage the Navy, but rather to suggest that McCain has a very narrow exposure to the broad range of armed conflict experience that exists.
I will spend my next few Blog entries exploring this issue, but for now remember these key points:
1. The purpose of the Surge was to give the Iraqis "space" to deal with political reconciliation. The fact that violence has been reduced recently does NOT mean the Surge is working. Don't be surprised to see an uptick in violence because the weather is getting better. Historically, adversaries have taken the Winter to rest up and re-think and/or re-tool strategy for the coming Spring.
2. McCain may have gotten himself onto more committees and subcommittees regarding Defense and Foreign Affairs, but he has NOT exhibited anything more than an ordinary grasp of the complexity of the world. Indeed, his recent gaffes regarding Iran and Al Quaeda can cause one to seriously question if he has been paying attention to what is going on, or is he simply occupying a seat as a means of political resume padding?
What happens if we agree to let the results of the "illegal" primaries stand? Assuming the percentage vote translates directly to delegate allocation and -- this is extremely important -- on the condition that Barack is allowed to count ALL of the 40% "Uncommitted" vote as his own), HRC gains a net 24 delegates from Michigan. And Florida? At worst, HRC gains a net 35 delegates. It's highly likely that when all the proportional allocations are factored in, Team HRC will be celebrating a fewer than 55 delegate pickup.
Perhaps it is time to "concede" those illegal primaries, and go into Pennsylvania with the delegate issue off the table secure in the knowledge that our delegate haul from the Keystone State will be no less than 48% of the total. Then it's on to the remaining primaries and caucuses which we WILL win outright. I humbly submit that we have reached the point that -- under the conditions I've laid out -- we can afford to "lose" Michigan and Florida
Geraldine Ferraro's place in history as the first female ever to be part of a major party presidential ticket is etched in stone. It gives her the status of "elder party statesperson" that another generation will look upon as hallowed. So why would someone who broke a significant part of the ultimate glass ceiling" engage in what can only be described as "race-baiting?" Because that is how bare-knuckled politics is played from her point of view.
And let me remind you that she was subject to a similar type of ethnic smearing when she became Mondale's Veep. The GOP openly suggested that she might have mob connections in Sicily. Someone who underwent that kind of attack would never stoop to do the same to another member of the party, right?
Let me suggest a different explanation than Ferraro simply being an overzealous supporter of HRC. I submit that Team HRC knows that this battle is essentially over, and that their job now is to toughen us for the fight to come. It's ugly, it's uncivilized, probably unfair, but it is real. The "swiftboaters" are going to spring stuff on us that will make "secret Muslim" look like a reasonable assertion by comparison. It is a fact that a large portion of the so-called independent voters just don't focus on the election until after well after Labor Day. As hard as it is to believe, enough of them right now think that Obama might be some two-bit East African tyrant harboring terrorists with real WMD that when mid-October rolls around and they really tune in, they are going to be shocked! It is a storm we must be prepared to weather.
So thank you, Geraldine, my sistah. I know you are doing this out of "love". I don't like it, just like I didn't like getting "blown up" in pickup games by older cousins in my youth. But it will prepare us for the ugliness to come.
March 4 was a political nightmare for Team Obama. The Rezko news, the 3 AM commercial, the Canadian NAFTA debacle....all history. I know that there is more in the HRC bag of tricks, but I doubt that they can orchestrate as much bad news and seeds of doubt in late April.
After tonight's victory in Mississippi, I'm curious to hear how that state's citizens are irrelevant to victory in November. This I know from experience: you don't have to win a state to be effective. Back in 1988, Maryland was very much in play for Dukakis as late as mid-September. Then Dukakis had a string of bad luck and resources had to be pared down. Dukakis in Virginia closed up shop in late September, understandable on the face of it since it wasn't in play. What that did, however, was free up Bush/Quayle to send their Virginia staff to both North Carolina and Maryland.
It remains the last time that Maryland gave their electoral votes to a GOP presidential candidate.
Mississippi, Alabama and South Carolina may never go Democratic in our lifetimes, but Obama forcing the GOP to spend vastly more assets there than they would against any other candidate might just be enough to win some very competitive states this cycle: Colorado, New Mexico, perhaps even Virginia and North Carolina.
