“I Have Become A Symbol”

July 29, 2008 by John H. Taylor | Filed Under Democratic Party, Election 2008 | 2 Comments 

Dana Milbank in the Washington Post hammers Sen. Obama mercilessly:

Barack Obama has long been his party’s presumptive nominee. Now he’s becoming its presumptuous nominee….

[His late-afternoon event] turned out to be his adoration session with lawmakers in the Cannon Caucus Room, where even committee chairmen arrived early, as if for the State of the Union. Capitol Police cleared the halls — just as they do for the actual president. The Secret Service hustled him in through a side door — just as they do for the actual president.

Inside, according to a witness, he told the House members, “This is the moment . . . that the world is waiting for,” adding: “I have become a symbol of the possibility of America returning to our best traditions.”

As he marches toward Inauguration Day (Election Day is but a milestone on that path), Obama’s biggest challenger may not be Republican John McCain but rather his own hubris.

Some say the supremely confident Obama — nearly 100 days from the election, he pronounces that “the odds of us winning are very good” — has become a president-in-waiting. But in truth, he doesn’t need to wait: He has already amassed the trappings of the office, without those pesky decisions.

The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder reported last week that Obama has directed his staff to begin planning for his transition to the White House.

No, We’d Best Not

July 29, 2008 by John H. Taylor | Filed Under Culture, Nixon Administration figures | Leave a Comment 

Everyone knows that pot leads to hard-core stuff — smoking crack, shooting horse, and jumping the shark. As its fourth season rolls, as it were, on, the dark, edgy Showtime series “Weeds” is getting darker and edgier. Maybe the producer’s handbook advises that elements such as 17-year-old-with-single-parent-neighbor sex, incestuous overtones, and pot dealer Nancy Botwin (Mary-Louise Parker) enjoying getting spanked by the mayor of Tijuana while she tries to get him to put her back in business will keep the dread beast at bay as it circles in the deceptively inviting waters off the coast of “Ren Mar,” which looks a lot like real-life Del Mar, one town south of Solana Beach in San Diego county, site of a fatal great white attack earlier this year.

Edgier: The title of this week’s anything-goes episode, “Yes I Can,” is a riff on Sen. Obama’s slogan.

Even edgier still: “Weeds” actor Andy Milder plays TNN’s Frank Gannon, a former White House aide, in the upcoming film “Frost/Nixon.”

Nixon In Cuba

July 29, 2008 by John H. Taylor | Filed Under International Affairs, Nixon Center, Richard Nixon | Leave a Comment 

Here’s gavel-to-gavel coverage of the New America Foundation’s panel discussion in Washington Monday on the question of what RN would’ve done about U.S.-Cuba relations. Among the panelists: Dimitri Simes, Nixon Center President and Publisher of The National Interest.

Trust, Then Verify

July 29, 2008 by John H. Taylor | Filed Under China, Election 2008 | Leave a Comment 

Steady in the buggy on China — so say two think-tankers to the Presidential candidates:

Since President Richard Nixon’s historic visit to China in 1972, all subsequent chief executives have ultimately stayed the course with the People’s Republic. The logic is simple: China has massive capacity to affect the world for better or worse. Cooperating with Beijing may challenge U.S. values, but the bond between nations improves global equanimity.

Presidential candidates should signal China’s leaders that they value a constructive and cooperative relationship with China. Personal relationships of trust are highly valued. The Chinese will react negatively if a new president throws difficult issues on the table before establishing such trust.

Some Required (OK, Highly Recommended) Reading

July 29, 2008 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Book Review, News media | 1 Comment 

Leon Wieseltier is the Washington Diarist in the new New Republic.

“Dread of Winter” is a typically thoughtful, provocative, and stylish article about —among many other things— the recent “humorous” New Yorker Obamas-as-terrorists cover.

There is also a new (at least to me) feature available:

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of the article with the strong, sinuous prose being read, at a quick pace, by a generally uninflected but borderline chipper female voice. I know that I’ve still got one and a half feet firmly planted on Gutenberg ground, but I find this new format distinctly unsettling — although not so much for its intention (at least I don’t think so) as for this incongruously inappropriate execution.

And then I think — maybe this is exactly the kind of joke he’s writing about and I’m not getting it and it’s just another dark night in the bridge and tunnel of my soul.

If You Want A Friend In Washington…

July 29, 2008 by John H. Taylor | Filed Under Democratic Party | Leave a Comment 

Pundits say Sen. Obama needs a pet. A record would also help.

2.5% And Falling

July 29, 2008 by John H. Taylor | Filed Under Election 2008, Richard Nixon | Leave a Comment 

On the surface, it’s hard to argue with Tony Campbell’s logic (though elsewhere in his post he uses a terrible metaphor):

McCain faces the shadow of an unpopular eight years of his [2000] adversary. In looking at past elections, the one that comes to mind is Richard Nixon’s win over Hubert Humphrey in 1968. Humphrey faced an electorate that was tired of policies initiated over eight years of a Democratic administration including an unpopular war (Vietnam), a high profile domestic social issue (Civil Rights), and the economic policies of Lyndon Johnson’s “War on Poverty” (including Medicare and Medicaid). In 1968, Humphrey lost to Nixon by a narrow margin. McCain faces similar obstacles in 2008 such as the War in Iraq, Gay Marriage and a stagnant economy.

The problem with the analogy is that Sen. Obama is no Richard Nixon, and in a bad way. By 1968 the former VP was the most known of political quantities. Voters understood exactly who he was, what he’d done, and what he stood for. Few of his most angry critics would’ve said he lacked the experience and competence for the job.

It’s not that Obama’s known to be incompetent. He’s not yet known to be much of anything, at least in comparison to most others who’ve been nominated for the Presidency. In 1966, President Johnson called RN a “chronic campaigner,” but Obama has done almost nothing besides plan his next step up the political ladder. His most important act in office, his vote against the Iraq surge, appears to have been a mistake. He’s an elite, insider’s phenomenon who evidently hasn’t yet registered with the broader public. How else to explain his drop to a lead of just 2.5% over McCain in the RCP average despite the sputtering of the McCain campaign? Obama dazzled elites with his Middle East swing and Berlin speech, but they obviously left many Americans cold. They knew Kennedy. They knew Reagan. They don’t know Obama, and they didn’t like him standing on ground that he hadn’t yet won.

As for the struggle to come, McCain ought to have a distinct advantage thanks to the elements of his rich narrative and extensive record that he can rely on in a campaign which Republicans hope they will be able to call “revitalized” before too long. Obama lacks that bench depth. Community organizer, law professor, young man’s memoir writer, and two-year senator don’t add up to much of a portfolio. So his only option is to have his writers stress different issues and themes in his speeches.

His inexperience is helpful to McCain in another way. Against a more seasoned opponent, McCain’s age might be a decisive factor. But for every voter who thinks he’s too old, there’s one who thinks Obama’s not ready. It’s possible — just possible — that the young man has peaked.

Where’s Dolley Madison When You Need Her?

July 29, 2008 by John H. Taylor | Filed Under Nixon Library | 5 Comments 

The Nixon Library suffered minor damage as the result of Tuesday’s earthquake, which was centered a few miles from Yorba Linda in the community of Chino Hills. No one was injured. The worst damage was in the White House East Room, where Martha Washington’s portrait and a few chandelier baubles fell to the floor. No structural damage was in evidence on the grounds or in the museum. As the situation was being assessed, Federal officials ordered the Library closed and sent their own and private Foundation staffs home.

Featured Articles — July 29, 2008

July 29, 2008 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Featured Articles | Leave a Comment 

Interesting Takes from Home and Abroad:

Oh, Lucky Man By Christopher Hitchens
Why Obama’s attitude on the surge hasn’t harmed his campaign.

The Biggest Issue By David Brooks
Why did the United States become the leading economic power of the 20th century? The best short answer is that a ferocious belief that people have the power to transform their own lives gave Americans an unparalleled ommitment to education, hard work and economic freedom.

“The Hour of Europe” Tolls Again By Anne Applebaum
But are European politicians up to the task?

Our First Transnational President? By Rich Lowry
If elected, Barack Obama might make history in more ways than one. He will be the country’s first black president, but also — perhaps as consequentially — could be its first transnational president.

‘Active grannies’ the new soccer moms By MarK Penn
Despite all the talk about this election being driven by the youth vote, America as a nation has never been older and the power of the senior vote has never been greater.

Another Blow To Justice By Jamie Gorelick
Another stunning report has documented the bold and illegal influence of politics at the Justice Department over the past eight years.

Obama Should Stand Up to Russia’s Regime By Garry Kasparov
Democrats once understood that placating thugs is not the answer.

Mercenaries for Darfur By William McGurn
If the U.N. won’t step up, then it’s time to consider alternative remedies.

The Berlin Obama Didn’t See By Bret Stephens
Grand schemes that didn’t quite pan out. 

Depends On What You Mean By “Likely”

July 28, 2008 by John H. Taylor | Filed Under Election 2008 | Leave a Comment 

According to a Gallup poll, Sen. Obama is eight points ahead among registered voters. According to another, Sen. McCain leads by four among likely voters. That news likely registers well with McCain. And yet the “Huffington Post” makes an effort to explain why it’s good news for Obama.

Goin’ Where The Weather Suits His Clothes

July 28, 2008 by Robert Nedelkoff | Filed Under American Politics, Culture, Democratic Party, Election 2008, Entertainment | Leave a Comment 

Jon Voight is known for a number of things – for playing the immortal Joe Buck in Midnight Cowboy, for being the subject of Seinfeld’s “Mom And Pop Store” episode, for winning the best-actor Oscar for his performance in Coming Home, for fathering Angelina Jolie, and even (in some quarters) for being the brother of Chip Taylor who wrote “Wild Thing” and “Angel Of The Morning.”

But recently Voight has started to make a name as one of the handful of Hollywood figures ready to take on the liberal status quo in Tinseltown.  His latest effort in this regard is a column concerning Sen. Barack Obama’s campaign in this morning’s Washington Times in which he unequivocally states:

The Democratic Party, in its quest for power, has managed a propaganda campaign with subliminal messages, creating a God-like figure in a man who falls short in every way.  It seems to me that if Mr. Obama wins the presidential election, then Mssrs. [Minister Louis] Farrakhan, [Rev. Jeremiah] Wright, [ex-Weatherman leader Bill] Ayers, and [Rev. Michael] Pfleger will gain power for their need to demoralize this country and help create a socialist America…

If Mr. Obama had his way, he would have pulled our troops from Iraq years ago and initiated an unprecedented bloodbath, turning over that country to the barbarianism of our enemies. With what he has openly stated about his plans for our military, and his lack of understanding about the true nature of our enemies, there’s not a cell in my body that can accept the idea that Mr. Obama can keep us safe from the terrorists around the world, and from Iran, which is making great strides toward getting the atomic bomb.

The rest of the column is as heartfelt, and some of the sentences are as clumsily constructed as the one in the first paragraph.  I get the feeling Voight pounded it out himself – no smooth ghostwriter for him.  There’s already been a fair amount of blogging about it.  So keep an eye out for that LeBaron (Seinfeld fans will know the reference).

O. Stone’s Stone Cold W.

July 28, 2008 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Entertainment | 1 Comment 

Here it is, uploaded less than 24 hours ago: the teaser-trailer for Oliver Stone’s upcoming epic biopic W.

It looks —how can I put this delicately— like a real stinker.

But then it’s only a trailer. It’s a wonderful world, and a lot could happen between now and 17 October. It could go back to the cutting room and re-emerge as this generation’s Gone With the W.

Or not.

Get Well Soon

July 28, 2008 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under News media | Leave a Comment 

(UPDATE: Great minds continue to think alike, and I published this post unaware of my colleague Robert Nedelkoff’s just-prior notice of this unhappy turn of events.)

One reads today’s typically insightful Bob Novak column with the knowledge that he was rushed to a Boston hospital yesterday and diagnosed with a brain tumor.

He issued a statement: “I will be suspending my journalist work for an indefinite but, God willing, not too lengthy period.”

For decades Bob Novak has been the man liberals love to hate — at least partly because he’s so damned good at what he does. No one who wants to know what is going on behind the scenes in Washington can fail to read him.

Less well known are the many stories —all admiring and some even affectionate— from liberal reporters who respect his continuing dedication to the old fashioned school of shoe leather on the ground reporting, and who have benefited from his encouragement and help as long as they were working to uncover a fact rather than grind an ax.

The superbly-sourced insider book he wrote with Roland Evans about the first years of the Nixon administration —Nixon in the White House: The Frustration of Power— is an excellent example of contemporary books by journalists as the second drafts of history.

His recently-published informative and entertaining memoir The Prince of Darkness: Fifty Years of Reporting in Washington— will be published in paperback in September.

Robert Novak’s Involuntary Hiatus

July 28, 2008 by Robert Nedelkoff | Filed Under American Politics, Democratic Party, Election 2008, News media | 1 Comment 

Robert Novak’s new column concerning the campaign, linked to below among the featured articles, is a quite incisive analysis of Sen. Barack Obama’s big dilemma of the moment – how to get his support in the polls above 50%, which means trying to find a way to move toward a realistic position on Iraq without causing his most militantly antiwar supporters to sit out the election (or, worse, vote for Nader and thus perhaps swing some states to Sen. John McCain). 

Unfortunately, it is also the last Novak column, at least for the foreseeable future. Over the weekend the columnist fell ill while visiting Cape Cod and was taken to a hospital, where tests revealed a brain tumor.  (At this point no biopsy has been done, so it is unknown if the growth is benign or malignant.) This afternoon Novak announced he will cease writing his column for the time being.

Being Hip Can Be Hard On Your Hip

July 28, 2008 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Election 2008 | Leave a Comment 

Wonkette asks the question: “Is Obama some sort of secret old person?”

The answer, happily, seems to be: no.

One threadster snarkily wonders “why doesn’t he rub some hope on it?”

If This Is Funny There Truly Is No Hope

July 28, 2008 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under American Politics, Election 2008 | Leave a Comment 

Moveon.org —never known for its sense of humor— has decided to try to attract attract voters with the unfamiliar honey of its laughter than the well-known vinegar of its earnestness.

The result is, not to put too fine a point on it, embarrassing any way you look at it. At least any way you look at it will only take .30 seconds from your otherwise worthwhile life.

A collection of who-are-they? minor league celebrities and others overact and underachieve as they break the butterfly on the wheel. And the payoff is, almost literally, what LBJ said happened to chicken salad.

The Most Important 2008 Political Primary

July 28, 2008 by Frank Gannon | Filed Under Election 2008, International Affairs, Israel and Palestinians | Leave a Comment 

In their column in today’s New York Post, Dick Morris and Eileen McGann suggest that the most important 2008 political primary will be taking place in two months in Israel.

That’s when the Kadima Party will choose between dovish Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and hawkish former Army Chief of Staff Shaul Mofaz. (As the Morrises put it: “Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is expected to sit out the contest and concentrate on staying out of jail.”)

The argument (very devious — which is to say very Morrisian) is as easy to follow as it is provocative:

Livni is thought unlikely to attack Iran precipitously; she largely sees eye-to-eye with advocates of diplomatic solutions to the various problems her country faces. But Mofaz has openly said he’d resort to bombing Iran if it were necessary to stop the mullahs from getting the bomb.

So if Mofaz wins, military action becomes much more likely. But when?

By most accounts, the Israeli Defense Force would need considerable American cooperation to pull off such a strike. No top-level Israeli politician has much confidence that Barack Obama would be forthcoming. But most are confident that President Bush or John McCain would give Israel the help that it needs.

So if Obama wins here, a Mofaz government would feel great pressure to attack before Bush leaves office. If McCain wins, Israel would have more time.

But Mofaz might not want to wait for our election. Why risk antagonizing a President-elect Obama by taking military action that he might vigorously oppose?

Then the question arises: would an Israeli Iran strike during the campaign favor McCain by forcing his primary issue —national security— unavoidably front and center? The Morrises are pretty sure of the answer to that one.

Obama’s Judgment

July 28, 2008 by John H. Taylor | Filed Under Democratic Party, Iraq War | 1 Comment 

John Dickerson on why Sen. Obama’s vote against the surge is a legitimate issue: It’s probably the most important thing the relatively inexperienced candidate has ever done:

When he voted against the surge in January 2007, he claimed on more than one occasion that it would lead to increased casualties and sectarian violence. It didn’t. How’d he get that one wrong? In January 2007, Obama claimed that the Iraqi government would make no hard choices if the United States stayed. But they have made hard choices. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki launched incursions into Basra and confronted cleric Muqtada Sadr, both of which helped pave the way for the Sunni faction’s return to the government. This is not enough progress to suggest Iraq is anywhere near stable, but like the drop in violence, it’s more than Obama predicted. These are not academic questions. Some people would say the vote on the surge was one of Obama’s most important as a senator.

Featured Articles — July 28, 2008

July 28, 2008 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Featured Articles | Leave a Comment 

Interesting Takes from Home and Abroad:

Can McCain Back in Again? By Robert Novak
In the contest for president, Barack Obama is a magnetic candidate supported by a disciplined, well-organized campaign. John McCain seems wooden, with a campaign that appears to be in shambles. Yet Obama’s lead in the polls over McCain is fragile because he so far has not won the support of a majority of American voters.

Unfinished Business at Freddie and Fannie By Lawrence Summers
What the Government Should Do if the Housing Giants Can’t Stand on Their Own.

Be Afraid. Please. By William Kristol
I went to the Real Clear Politics Web site, as I do every morning, for my fix of political news and commentary. I perked up when I saw the third entry on the list of that day’s notable articles — “No. 44 Has Spoken.”

Rewriting Reagan — again By Ralph R. Reiland
Barack Obama was way too pro-Reagan during an interview earlier this year with the Reno Gazette-Journal’s editorial board, according to Paul Krugman, professor of economics and international affairs at Princeton University and twice-weekly columnist at The New York Times.

Why Obama seized the faith-based mantle By Amy Sullivan
This wasn’t just a matter of political opportunism designed to remove an arrow from the GOP’s quiver. The Democratic nominee believes in the Bush program, and he’s upping the faith-based ante with fresh ideas.

A Defining Week for Congress By John Boehner
The final week before the August district work period is typically among the busiest of all for Congress – and usually one during which major legislation is passed in advance of the lengthy recess away from Washington.

In Russia, ‘Legal Nihilism’ as Usual By Jackson Diehl
Though he had been handpicked by Vladimir Putin, Dmitry Medvedev’s inauguration as Russia’s president in early May inspired some in the West to hope for real change in the Kremlin.

Aristide’s American Profiteers By Mary Anastasia O’Grady
What are they trying to hide?

Rwanda’s Women Are Leading the Way By Cindy McCain
No country has a higher percentage of female lawmakers.
 

 

Ben Says Keep Spending

July 27, 2008 by John H. Taylor | Filed Under Economic issues, Nixon Administration figures | Leave a Comment 

Ben Stein says it’s not so bad yet:

[I]f it is a recession, it’s a very close call. Of course, there are truly hard-hit areas around the country. But there are also areas that are booming, in the farming and minerals states and in any area near energy. If consumer spending, roughly two-thirds of the G.D.P., suddenly takes a dive, the effect would be bad. But so far, so good. Huge bank write-downs are bitter pills for the affected banks’ stockholders, but not enough to sink an economy of this size.

The real question is, why are we not in worse shape, considering the blows from fuel prices, the housing collapse, food prices and the credit crisis on Wall Street, such as it is?

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