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WEDNESDAY,  OCTOBER 22,  2008

INCREDIBLE NOTE AT 10:05 P.M. ET:  In researching Urgent Agenda each day I've seen reporters doing handstands trying to find something negative to say about John McCain, but this one takes the prize - the ultimate reporter-as-Obama-messenger incident of the campaign.  Footage of John McCain as a prisoner in North Vietnam has just been released.  This is the way Britain's Sky News reported it:

10:09 pm UK, Wednesday October 22, 2008

Footage of John McCain being interviewed as a bedridden prisoner during the Vietnam War has been released by the French national archive.

The video portrays the Republican as a hero but the message may be tarnished as he is filmed smoking a cigarette.

In the footage an emotional and shirtless McCain passes a message to his wife saying he will get well and loves her.

Please read the second paragraph again:  "The video portrays the Republican as a hero but the message may be tarnished as he is filmed smoking a cigarette."

Is this beyond the pale, or what?  John McCain's heroism is diminished because, in 1967, he smoked a cigarette?

Media bias?  There is no media bias.  Why, this is just perceptive reporting.  Right?

I think I've seen it all.

October 22, 2008.

UPDATE AT 9:50 P.M. ET:  Please note that this is Thursday morning in Asia:  "Oct. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Asian stocks slumped, sending the region's benchmark index to the lowest level in four years, after commodity prices tumbled on concern a global economic slowdown is reducing demand for raw materials."

COMMENT:  Will probably affect our market tomorrow, which was weak enough today.

SENSITIVITY...EXCEPT TO THE VICTIMS

Posted at 7:2 2 p.m. ET

Political correctness is a curse upon the land.  It is wrong in every circumstance because it stifles debate and short circuits the search for truth.  Here, though, is a particularly outrageous case, and the culprit is our own FBI. 

The FBI removed all mention of the controversial term “honor killing” from the wanted poster of a double-murder suspect after FOXNews.com ran a story announcing the use of the term.

Yasser Abdel Said, wanted for the murder of his two daughters, has eluded authorities for almost a year. The bodies of the young women — Sarah Said, 17, and Amina Said, 18 — were discovered in the back of a taxicab in Irving, Texas, on New Year's Day.

According to family members, Said felt he was compelled to kill his daughters because they had disgraced the family by dating non-Muslims and acting too "Western."

This is a rather famous case.  You will note the deep outrage of feminist groups.  Not.

The girls’ great aunt, Gail Gartrell, has always called the case an “honor killing.” And for a few days — until last Friday — the FBI publicly agreed.

“The 17- and 18-year-old girls were dating American boys, which was contrary to their father's rules of not dating non-Muslim boys,” The FBI "wanted" poster read early last week. “Reportedly, the girls were murdered due to an 'Honor Killing.'”

Obviously, the wanted poster was written by the Zionist lobby and Joe Lieberman.

The FBI said Tuesday that it had deleted the term because the FBI never meant to attach a label to the case. Special agent Mark White, media coordinator in the bureau's Dallas office, told FOXNews.com that the FBI changed the wording “because the statement was not meant to indicate that the FBI was ‘labeling’ anything.

"The person who wrote it up did not see the misunderstanding that [the original wording] would create,” White said.

Yes, of course.  We understand.  We must be sensitive to the honor killer community.

But Gartrell was outraged by the change and called White’s explanation semantics.

“It’s wrong," she said. "Everybody knows this is an honor killing, but even our own law enforcement and the FBI succumb to the pressure?

“In the end, it may be our own justice system that prevents these girls from getting justice,” she said, pointing out that there have still been no leads after almost a year.

Well said, well said.  Less oversensitivity, more criminal justice, please.

Mustafaa Carroll, the executive director of the Council of American-Islamic Relations in Dallas, said he agrees with the FBI’s decision.

“I’m glad they took it out until they find the guy, find the motive, and prove it in court,” Carroll said. “I’m happy in that this works against some of the stereotypes out there. … I appreciate [the FBI] reconsidering.”

I'm sure he does.  And we all appreciate some of CAIR's strange activities and alliances.

Gartrell said she thought the FBI’s move was based on a desire to be politically correct. Phyllis Chesler, author of several books including "The Death of Feminism: What's Next in the Struggle for Women's Freedom," agreed that this was a plausible motive. And if cases like this continue to happen, she said, policy will have to change.

“They’re lucky they haven’t had to deal with many honor killings compared to places like the United Kingdom,” she said. “But if and when America begins to see more honor killings, maybe then the FBI will realize the importance of treating these cases differently.”

In the age of Obama?  I'm not sure, but I hope she's right.

What an awful fate those two girls shared.

October 22, 2008.      Permalink          

UPDATE AT 7:01 P.M. ET:   CHICAGO (AP) -- Media organizations will have to pay up if they want a prime spot to cover Democrat Barack Obama's Election Night party in a downtown lakefront park.  Obama's campaign, awash in money after raising a record-shattering $150 million last month, is asking news organizations to pay anywhere from $410 to $1,870 depending on where they want to be and if they want telephone or Internet service in Grant Park.

COMMENT:  Pretty typical of Chicago machine politics.  It's loose change you can believe in.

UPDATE AT 4:53 P.M. ET:  From the Politico:  RICHMOND, Va. — Acknowledging that his running mate “sometimes engages in rhetorical flourishes,” Democrat Barack Obama said Wednesday that vice presidential candidate Joe Biden meant to say this week that whoever is elected the next president — not just Obama — will be tested by foreign powers soon after taking office.

COMMENT:  Weren't we assured by the in-the-tank press that Biden was the consummate expert on foreign policy?  Now Obama is covering for Biden...on foreign policy.  Still, the press asks no questions, probes nothing in Biden's history.  Nothing to see, nothing to see.  I'd trust Sarah's instincts over Biden's anytime.   

UPDATE AT 4:31 P.M. ET:  The Dow closed down 514.  We're tanking again.

UPDATE AT 3:30 P.M. ET:  With a half hour of trading to go, the Dow is down 448.

UPDATE AT 3:21 P.M. ET:   Here's some encouraging news.  The race in Florida has tightened.  Mason-Dixon now has McCain up by one, 46-45.  The story says, "The results mirror three other Florida polls this week that, taken together, show the race is dead even as Democratic nominee Obama's momentum appears to have slowed."   

UPDATE AT 3:00 P.M. ET:  With an hour of trading to go, the Dow is down 415.

UPDATE AT 2:58 P.M. ET:   New polls are out, and they are all over the place.  The Gallup tracker (traditional) has Obama up five, and the expanded model has him up eight.  A Fox poll among likely voters has Obama up nine.  The IBD/TIPP poll has him up four; and an AP poll has Obama up only one. 

COMMENT:  The spread among major polls is outside the margin of error, so someone's margin has a lot of error.  The largest Obama lead is Zogby's 10, the thinnest is AP's one.  The Real Clear Politics average is Obama up 6.8.  We're two weeks out from the election.  Watch the trends, not each report.  Taken all polls together, I see no trend.

UPDATE AT 2:23 P.M. ET: The Dow is down 352.

UPDATE AT 11:36 A.M. ET:  Dow is down 303.

UPDATE AT 10:55 A.M. ET:  The Dow is down 261.

UPDATE AT 10:24 A.M. ET:  Battleground tracker has Obama up two, up from one yesterday.  Battleground shows the smallest Obama lead of all polls.  Hotline has Obama up five, down from six yesterday.  These variations are too small to be of immediate significance.

UPDATE AT 10:19 A.M. ET:  The Dow is down 349.

TAKE THAT!

Posted at 10:14 a.m. ET

We always depend on Tony Blankley to provide some terrific material, and again he comes through.  A great frustration in recent days has been watching Republicans jump ship.  Real heroes they.  Blankley calls them on it, and takes on the old GOP wooden heads:

On the cusp of what some think will be a major Obama victory, we are beginning to see emerge what I will call "me-too conservatives" -- initially among conservative commentators (politicians to follow). I have in mind, among others: Peggy Noonan, David Brooks, Chris Buckley, David Frum and Kathleen Parker.

Name the names, Tony.  Name the names.  The worst that can happen is, they'll call you a right-wing McCarthyite.

The hopelessly enthralled David Brooks wrote recently:
"(Obama) doesn't seem to need the audience's love. But they need his. The audiences hunger for his affection, while he is calm, appreciative and didactic.

"He doesn't have F.D.R.'s joyful nature or Reagan's happy outlook, but he is analytical. . His family is bourgeois. His instinct is to flee the revolutionary gesture in favor of the six-point plan."

Oh, did he actually say that?  Well, writing for The New York Times changes a man.

Peggy Noonan charges that Palin's "political decisions seem untethered to a political philosophy. . She does not speak seriously but attempts to excite sensation -- 'palling around with terrorists.' . But it's unclear whether she is Bushian or Reaganite. . She has spent her time throwing out tinny lines to crowds she doesn't, really, understand. This is not a leader, this is a follower. . She could reinspire and reinspirit; she chooses merely to excite. She doesn't seem to understand the implications of her own thoughts."

Tony comments:

Oh, my. Has Peggy been napping up there on Mount Olympus through the past several generations of American politics? She accuses Palin of not engaging America in a Socratic dialogue, of using phrases untethered to a political philosophy. Exactly what philosophy are the slogans "change" and "hope" tethered to?

And the heart of the matter:

I think that Peggy may have unconsciously touched on what really is going on here when she accuses Palin -- who is attracting crowds as big, if not bigger than any Reagan ever drew -- of being a "follower not a leader."

Peggy's unconscious fear may be that it will be precisely Sarah Palin (and others like her) who will be among the leaders of the about-to-be-reborn conservative movement. I suspect that the conservative movement we start rebuilding on the ashes of Nov. 4 (even if McCain wins) will have little use for overwritten, over-delicate commentary. The new movement will be plain-spoken and socially networked up from the Interneted streets, suburbs and small towns of America. It certainly will not listen very attentively to those conservatives who idolatrize Obama and collaborate in heralding his arrival. They may call their commentary "honesty." I would call it -- at the minimum -- blindness.

Wonderfully stated.  He writes as well as Peggy Noonan.  Finally...

The new conservative movement will be facing a political opponent that will reveal itself soon to be both multiculturalist and Eurosocialist. We will be engaged in a struggle to the political death for the soul of the country. As I did at the beginning of and throughout the Buckley/Goldwater/Reagan/Gingrich conservative movement, I will try to lend my hand. I certainly will do what I can to make it a big-tent conservative movement. But just as it does in every great cause, one question has to be answered correctly: Whose side are you on, comrade?

One nice thing about Tony:  Like Kirsten Powers (see below) it's obvious he doesn't care much about Washington party invitations, because he just lost a season's worth.

Great writing.  Solid argument.

October 22, 2008.       Permalink          

UPDATE AT 9:41 A.M. ET:   The Dow opened down 192.

UPDATE AT 9:32 A.M. ET:  Rasmussen now is reporting Obama up six, an increase from four yesterday.  Rasmussen joins most other pollsters in showing an upward trend for Obama.  The Powell endorsement may have helped.  This race is not tightening.  It appears to be widening. 

UPDATE AT 9:07 A.M. ET:   LAKE WORTH, Fla. (AP) - Democrat Barack Obama said Tuesday that Republican John McCain is offering little more than "willful ignorance, wishful thinking, outdated ideology" to an economy in crisis, seeking to capitalize on the main issue that is propelling him forward in the race for the White House.

COMMENT:  It's a characteristic of elites to use words like "dumb" or "ignorant" to depict their opposition.  It makes them feel good about themselves.  This is pure elitism.

UPDATE AT 8:14 A.M. ET:  Oct. 22 (Bloomberg) -- Stocks fell around the world, the euro sank to a 20-month low against the dollar and oil retreated as the deepening economic slump sapped corporate profit.

COMMENT:  It's not wrong to look for some good news amidst the gloom.  Gas at the pump is way down.  A stronger dollar means cheaper imports.  And American innovation, which is not a myth, can come into play. 

UPDATE AT 7:13 A.M. ET:  Zogby is reporting Obama up ten this morning.  I'm not buying it, but I have to report it.  Zogby has shown Obama soaring in the last week.  Gallup shows the same thing.  Other polls do not. 

UPDATE AT 7:10 A.M. ET:  From The Hill:   Police departments in cities across the country are beefing up their ranks for Election Day, preparing for possible civil unrest and riots after the historic presidential contest.  Public safety officials said in interviews with The Hill that the election, which will end with either the nation’s first black president or its first female vice president, demanded a stronger police presence.  Some worry that if Barack Obama loses and there is suspicion of foul play in the election, violence could ensue in cities with large black populations.

COMMENT:  This story didn't come out of nowhere.  We discussed months ago at Urgent Agenda the probability of intimidation in this election - a message that, if Obama isn't elected, there'll be "trouble."  Now we're seeing it.  And voters will be intimidated.

CORRUPTION

Posted at 7:03 p.m. ET

I've discussed media bias regularly at Urgent Agenda.  I think, given the sheer extent of i it this year, that we can cautiously escalate the vocabulary and call it what it's become, media corruption.  Corruption is a painful word to use about my old profession, but that is what we are seeing. 

Occasionally an article comes along that perfectly describes this tragedy.  Kirsten Powers, an active Democrat whom we often see on Fox News defending the Democratic cause, has the courage to speak out in a piece in today's New York Post.  What she is describing is a profession abdicating its responsibility, and trading in its greatest asset, its credibility, for a place in the Obama universe:

Barack Obama's choice of Joe Biden as his running mate prompted a small wave of warnings about Biden's propensity for gaffes. But no one imagined even in a worse-case scenario such a spectacular bomb as telling donors Sunday to "gird your loins" because a young president Obama will be tested by an international crisis just like young President John Kennedy was.

Scary? You betcha! But somehow, not front-page news.

Again the media showed their incredible bias by giving scattered coverage of Biden's statements.

Well Kirsten, stay goodbye to an invitation to the inaugural ball.

Exceptions?

There were a few exceptions. On MSNBC's "Morning Joe," co-host Mika Brzezinski flipped incredulously through the papers, expressing shock at the lack of coverage of Biden's remarks. Guest Dan Rather admitted that if Palin had said it, the media would be going nuts.

I never thought I'd be praising Mika Brzezinski or Dan Rather, but we surprise ourselves, don't we?

And Biden is the foreign-policy gravitas on the Democratic ticket, so his comments are actually even more disconcerting.

But please, we don't want to damage The One, do we?

The outtakes of his Sunday remarks don't begin to capture the magnitude of what he said. After warning the crowd that there would be some sort of international incident - Biden could think of four or five scenarios - he told the donors: "We're gonna need you to use your influence, your influence within the community, to stand with him. Because it's not gonna be apparent initially, it's not gonna be apparent that we're right."

What does that mean? Obama's election would provoke an international incident because of his inexperience and even Obama's biggest supporters won't be reassured by his response?

Yes, that's what it means. 

"There are gonna be a lot of you who want to go, 'Whoa, wait a minute, yo, whoa, whoa, I don't know about that decision.' "

Biden is telling us that, at a time when Americans need to feel confidence in their government, they will be going "Oh my God." Not a great message.

Needless to say, if Sarah Palin said this about a McCain administration, the media world would be exploding.

Of course.  Compare, please, the coverage of Biden's nutbaggery with the coverage of Sarah Palin, who apparently now holds press availabilities on her plane, and has become quite adept. 

Whether you believe Biden is exaggerating, as he is known to do, or is providing real insight, the double standard in the media does even more damage to their lagging brand.

Part of the problem is their "Obama love," but we're also seeing the media elite's belief - prejudice - that anyone with an R behind their name is dumb. So, if they say something dumb, they must be dumb. A Democrat, like Biden, can make wildly inaccurate or outrageous comments and they are ignored because the TV and press insiders feel they "know who he really is."

From my own experience in journalism, I can attest to what Kirsten Powers is saying.  Journalists think "they know."  They often don't.  But they must make us think that they do.

On the stump recently, Sen. Biden declared he had "three words" for what the nation needs: "J-O-B-S."

Lucky for him, his name isn't Dan Quayle, or that would have followed him for the rest of his career.

Thank you, Kirsten.  If the Dems throw you out after this, you're always invited to my house. 

October 22, 2008.      Permalink          

TUESDAY,  OCTOBER 21,  2008

NOTE AT 7:50 P.M. ET:  Went to a briefing today by energy expert Robert Zubrin, who estimates that, within six years, there will be enough money in OPEC nations to buy a controlling interest in the entire Fortune 500 list.  Encouraging, ay?

He also said that we are spending more on imported oil today than on national defense.  In the early seventies we spent only four percent of what we spent on defense for imported oil.

NOTE AT 7:25 P.M. ET:  Some readers have asked why we don't cover Senate and House races.  It is very difficult to get up-to-date information on congressional races because polls are taken intermittently.  Often you're dealing with only one pollster, whose last poll may have been two weeks ago. So we can only make general estimates, although we might focus on a few races where well-known personalities are involved.

In general, Democrats are expected to do well in both houses.  But remember that "Democrats" is a vague term.  Some are liberal Dems, others are closer to centrists.  That matters as they establish a record they want to take into the next election.

Some fascinating Senate races:  Elizabeth Dole is locked in a tight race, but her opponent, Kay Hagan, is leading in all polls;  Comedian Al Franken, incredibly, is neck and nick with incumbent Norm Coleman in Minnesota; most interesting of all, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is in real danger of losing his seat in Kentucky.

We'll try to do more on this.

INSANITY

Posted at 6:58 p.m. ET

We are assured by the parishioners in the mainstream media that all the world wants Obama.  They yearn, they pray, they wish for The One. 

Well, not everyone.  There are actually some voices in other countries that think the whole Obama thing is...pick your own negative adjective.  And I suspect there are more than a few foreign leaders and diplomats who wonder what kind of leadership the free world will get from a guy whose career still needs training wheels. 

Gerald Warner in London's Telegraph, carries the banner for the Obamaskeptics.  He is brave for writing this, for it probably means fewer party invitations to better homes with solar power:

"We owe the rest of the world an apology for the last eight years. We can start to make it up by electing Barack Obama." Those words, spoken to a Daily Telegraph reporter by a lawyer interviewed in Tampa, Florida, chillingly illustrate the strain of masochistic insanity that seems to have gripped part of the American electorate.

Good, good.  Don't you like it already?

So, now we know what this election is really about. It is not about helping the Joes - Six-Pack or the Plumber - in Peoria. It is about appeasing the Fritzes in Düsseldorf, the Ivans in Moscow and the Wus in Beijing.

But to the better people, that's just so important.  One wants to travel with ease, after all.

Why the h*** should America apologise to the rest of the world? And why - above all - should it express its unwarranted contrition by handing supreme power to the one man most guaranteed to dismantle that country's greatness and make it a soft touch in global affairs?

As I've said before in this space, some British reporters have a better sense of reality about American politics than do American journalists.

Why should the United States apologise? Is Russia apologising for invading Georgia? Is China apologising for its brutal occupation of Tibet? Is militant Islam grovelling to the West for its atrocities? So, if the most powerful democratic nation on earth turns into a guilt-ridden collective pantywaist, what will that mean for the rest of us? Real and present danger, is the answer. The conduct and standing of the United States affects all of us, around the world, and entitles us to make an earnest plea to the American electorate.

And what is that plea?

Walk tall, America, and proclaim your ideals by electing a president who embodies them.

I wish, I wish, I wish.

October 21, 2008.      Permalink          

UPDATE AT 5:16 P.M. ET:  The Real Clear Politics average of polls is creeping up again for Obama, and now gives him an average lead of 6.9 percent.  Individual polls have Obama up anywhere from one point to ten.  I said earlier at Urgent Agenda that I was skeptical about reports that the race was tightening.  I 'll stand by that.  I don't really see any evidence of it when all information is factored in.  It could still happen, of course.

UPDATE AT 5:11 P.M. ET:  I'm back from a meeting.  The Dow closed down 232. 

UPDATE AT 10:17 A.M. ET:  Dow is off 17.

UPDATE AT 9:41 A.M. ET:  Battleground tracker, just out, shows Obama with only a one-point lead, down from four yesterday.

COMMENT:  Be careful.  There's a margin of error and statistical noise.  Only trends count.

UPDATE AT 9:38 A.M. ET:  The Dow is down 94 at the opening.

UPDATE AT 9:35 A.M. ET:  Rasmussen, just out, has Obama up four, no change from yesterday.  But Zogby has him up eight, up from six yesterday.  Zogby, whose work is controversial, has tracked a large increase in support for Obama over the last week.

COMMENT:  There are reports that the race is tightening, but frankly I don't see enough evidence.  Some polls show it, some show increases for Obama.  There may be slight tightening in some areas, but the reverse in others.  It's still Obama with a solid lead, unfortunately.

SOWELL

Posted at 8:38 a.m. ET

Tom Sowell, the heroic African-American writer, and a brilliant one, reinforces his stand against Barack Obama:

Telling a friend that the love of his life is a phony and dangerous is not likely to get him to change his mind. But it may cost you a friend.

It is much the same story with true believers in Barack Obama. They have made up their minds and not only don't want to be confused by the facts, they resent being told the facts.

And, of course, as they're taught in today's colleges, there's no such thing as truth.  There are just different narratives.

Of the four people running for President and Vice President on the Republican and Democratic tickets, the one we know the least about is the one leading in the polls-- Barack Obama.

Some of Senator Obama's most fervent supporters could not tell you what he has actually done on such issues as crime, education, or financial institutions like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, much less what he plans to do to stop Iran from becoming a nuclear nation supplying nuclear weapons to the international terrorist networks that it has supplied with other weapons.

The magic word "change" makes specifics unnecessary. If things are going bad, some think that what is needed is blank-check "change."

But that makes things so easy, easier than buying flip-flops.  Right?

But history shows any number of countries in crises worse than ours, where "change" turned problems into catastrophes.

History?  Who studies history?

What specifics do we know about Barack Obama's track record that might give us some clue as to what kinds of "changes" to expect if he is elected?

We know that he opposed the practice of putting violent young felons on trial as adults. We know that he was against a law forbidding physicians to kill a baby that was born alive despite an attempt to abort it.

We know that Obama opposed attempts to put stricter regulations on Fannie Mae-- and that he was the second largest recipient of campaign contributions from Fannie Mae. We know that this very year his campaign sought the advice of disgraced former Fannie Mae CEO Franklin Raines.

Distractions!  Distractions!  We must not think about those distractions!

The public has been told very little about what this man with the wonderful rhetoric has actually done. What we know is enough to make us wonder about what we don't know. Or it ought to. For the true believers-- which includes many in the media-- it is just a question of whether you like him or not.

Think ahead a year.  Chilling, isn't it?

October 21, 2008.      Permalink          

THE AURA

Posted at 7:38 a.m. ET

The Chicago Tribune, true to this year's trendiness, has endorsed Barack Obama, the first time the paper ever endorsed a Democrat.  But an op-ed columnist, Dennis Byrne, in an eloquent piece that should be widely read, will have none of it.  It is called, "The Aura of Mr. Smooth," and it is very good:

Aura: (n.) A general impression produced by a predominant quality or characteristic: air, ambience, atmosphere, feel, feeling, mood, tone.

A single word explains why Barack Obama might be president. Aura perfectly describes the Democratic candidate. An aura, the dictionary says, is the distinctive, but intangible air that surrounds a person. It derives from the ancient Greek, meaning breath or gentle breeze. I particularly like the third definition, which says an aura is "the supposed emanation surrounding the body of a living creature, viewed by mystics, spiritualists and some practitioners of complementary medicine as the essence of the individual and allegedly discernible by people with special sensibilities."

So true, so true.

Those of us with below-average sensibilities can only ponder how Obama has managed to establish a cult of personality the way no other presidential candidate has, except perhaps John F. Kennedy...

...Obama's aura overcomes his inexperience, his most liberal voting record and his outright deceptions (e.g. reneging on his pledge to take public campaign financing, and thereby limiting his campaign advertising).

More truth.

We could have 10 more presidential debates over the differences between Obama and John McCain on foreign policy, Immigration, the economy, government ethics and so on, but it wouldn't matter. Intricate policy differences between the two don't matter, because only aura counts. Because of his aura, Obama can engage in a presidential debate, and his aloofness and one-note message of "change" will be misinterpreted by burbling commentators as thoughtful, calm and intelligent discourse.

Yes, didn't the smooth and aura-equipped Colin Powell comment on Obama's calmness and thoughtfulness?

We are about to elect a president because of how he makes us feel, not how he makes us think.

Anyone care to deny that?  He is the ultimate candidate of the sixties generation.  If it feels good, do it.

Voters, never, ever have elected a president with policies this far to the left; rare, indeed, is the senator or congressman who is further left.

But, wait.  We can't say that.  Why, that's McCarthyism.  Isn't it?

Having aura is fine, but electing a president based on whether he or she possesses it shows curious understanding of how democracy is supposed to work.

Yes, tens of millions of Americans will feel wonderful when Obama is elected and maybe the stock market, the housing market and the rest of the economy will boom from that good feeling. I hope so, because that's just about what has been guaranteed by a vote for Obama, and I can't wait.

He will turn water into Kool-Aid, and we will drink it.

But there's this. After the aura has burned away—like the early-morning summer mist disappears before a rising sun—the president needs to make tough, on-the-run and wise decisions. It is then when a president's basic inclinations surface, about whether to involve the government more in your life, take more of your money or, in the face of our enemies, speak softy and carry a little stick. And then, the pathological definition of aura comes into play: a sensation, as of a cold breeze or a bright light, that precedes the onset of certain disorders, such as an epileptic seizure or an attack of migraine.

Or, more precisely, an attack of a real, actual problem that requires something more than Mr. Smooth.

Very well said.  And all true.

October 21, 2008.      Permalink          

UPDATE AT 6:59 A.M. ET:  WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) -- Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama is canceling nearly all his campaign events Thursday and Friday to visit his suddenly gravely ill 85-year-old grandmother in Hawaii, a spokesman said.  Robert Gibbs told reporters aboard Obama's plane that Madelyn Payne Dunham, who helped raise Obama, was released from the hospital late last week. But he said her health had deteriorated ''to the point where her situation is very serious.''

COMMENT:  Look, we have to take him at his word.  The woman was in fact in the hospital.  However - and I don't wish to be mean-spirited - but when your 85-year-old grandmother is suddenly gravely ill, you don't wait three days to go and visit her.  You drop everything and run.  I hate to say it, but this has about it the same image of cold calculation that has marked this man's life.  There is something not quite human here.  There is no feeling.  There is only a datebook and a schedule.   Okay, I've said it. 

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