EVENING UPDATE:  MAY 22,  2008

Posted at 7:36 p.m. ET

OBAMA'S V.P.?

The Washington Post speculates on a possible vice-presidential choice for Senator Obama:

Obama's campaign refused to talk about who was being considered, but some in the party are calling for him to pick Clinton. Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson said Thursday, "There have been no discussions with the Obama campaign about Senator Clinton being the V.P."

Other possible options are governors such as Arizona's Janet Napolitano, Kathleen Sebelius of Kansas and Tim Kaine of Virginia; foreign policy experts like former Georgia Sen. Sam Nunn, Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd or Delaware Sen. Joe Biden; or other senators such as Missouri's Claire McCaskill and Virginia's Jim Webb.

He could look outside the party to people such as war critic and Nebraska Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel or independent New York mayor Mike Bloomberg. Or he could look to one of his early prominent supporters such as former Sen. Tom Daschle of South Dakota or 2004 vice presidential nominee John Edwards. Or he could try to bring on a Clinton supporter like Indiana's Evan Bayh.

This is speculation, but the name that strikes me as most likely is Kathleen Sebelius of Kansas, a moderate Democrat.  First, she eases Obama's "woman" problem, the anger of some Democratic women over the defeat of Hillary Clinton.  Second, she's not from the party's left fringe, which never elected anyone to the presidency.  Third, she's from Kansas, home of the white side of Obama's family, allowing him to play up his multiracial background, which may assure some white voters.  (I hate to say things like that that, but in a political analysis you have to be direct.)  Fourth, she's personable, and an excellent, non-threatening campaigner.

Now watch.  I'll probably be wrong.  If I'm right, I'll brag about it for years.

May 22, 2008.      Permalink          

A BRIT VIEWS HILLARY

I've said all along that foreign reporters are doing some of the best work in covering our political campaign.  Among the finest reporters is Gerard Baker of London's Telegraph, who examines the issue of sexism in the campaign to defeat Hillary Clinton. He finds some, but...

To the cynics this US presidential election was always going to be a race to the bottom between racism and sexism. As the Democratic party continues to writhe through the final agonies of Senator Clinton's collapsing ambitions, her people think they know the real winner. They are muttering angrily that she is the most high-profile victim yet of sexual discrimination in the workplace. A favourite theme among them now is that Mrs Clinton is a kind of sacrificial figure: the woman who so obviously should have won the presidency but was denied by woman-hatred, the one whose efforts were not enough to conquer the legions of male bigots but whose sacrifice has made it possible for future women to scale the mountaintop. Henceforth, as it were, all generations shall call her blessed.

And...

There are things that are said all the time about Mrs Clinton's manner, her speaking style, assumptions that are made about her motivations, even the vocabulary in which she is described, that are, shall we say, certainly gender-specific. The cultural allusions played out with tired regularity to describe her campaigning style conjure the worst female images that lurk in the darkest corners of the male brain. She's Lady Macbeth and The White Queen and Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction rolled into one.

And yet...

And yet, are we truly expected to believe this is why Democratic voters have rejected her? I've no doubt that there are still some men who physically recoil at the thought of a woman in a powerful job but do people really think that there were not other - good - reasons for denying Senator Clinton her prize?

In the end the beauty of the “We only lost because people are sexist/racist/homophobic/stupid” argument is that it can't really be rebutted. The only way to deal with it is to explain patiently and with great understanding that there were valid reasons why millions of intelligent, thoughtful and tolerant Americans decided to run a million miles from the idea that this woman - this woman - should become the most powerful person on the planet.

The principal reason voters give for not liking Senator Clinton is that they don't trust her, that they sense that someone who would do or say anything to get elected is not someone who should be entrusted with the presidency. If anything has been demonstrated in the two long years in which she has been actively campaigning for the presidency, it is how right they are.

Yeah, he pretty much nails it.  The whole piece is good.  I'd only add that the abandoning of Clinton by African-Americans did play a decisive role, and must be mentioned.  African-Americans were routinely regarded as part of the Clinton base.  Baker concludes:

Now, there is much talk that if Mrs Clinton cannot be president she must be Mr Obama's vice-presidential nominee. But in her most recent speeches and actions she has surely demonstrated how dangerously unfit she would be. It would not be sexism or chauvinism but the clear-headed decision of a wise statesman, if Senator Obama brought this particular woman's presidential hopes to an unmourned end.

Mr. Baker will not soon be invited to dinner with the Clintons.

May 22, 2008.      Permalink          

McCAIN STRIKES

John McCain increasingly shows the fight that will be needed to win this election.  I think he's taken the measure of Barack Obama and found him a Chicago machine politician with surface elegance.  That's correct.  Here, McCain snaps back, as reported by Jonathan Martin at The Politico:

Jim Webb's GI Bill passed the Senate today with a bipartisan majority, 75-22. Clinton and Obama were both there, but McCain is in California today on the fundraising trail.

Obama used the opportunity to once again tie his rival to the president.

"I respect Sen. John McCain's service to our country," Obama said on the Senate floor this morning. "He is one of those heroes of which I speak. But I can't understand why he would line up behind the president in opposition to this GI Bill. I can't believe why he believes it is too generous to our veterans. I could not disagree with him and the president more on this issue."

The McCain campaign responded by issuing a sharply worded and lengthy statement in the senator's name. McCain notes his support for an alternative to the Webb measure, but points out his own military service and points out Obama's lack thereof.

"It is typical, but no less offensive that Sen. Obama uses the Senate floor to take cheap shots at an opponent and easy advantage of an issue he has less than zero understanding of," McCain said in the statement. "Let me say first in response to Sen. Obama, running for president is different than serving as president. The office comes with responsibilities so serious that the occupant can't always take the politically easy route without hurting the country he is sworn to defend. Unlike Sen. Obama, my admiration, respect and deep gratitude for America's veterans is something more than a convenient campaign pledge. I think I have earned the right to make that claim."

Pretty tough stuff.  McCain has to expand it to other areas, though.  His hero status is assured, but even that can wear thin over time.  Obama does poorly under pressure, and McCain must apply the pressure every day. 

Obama has this line that any attack on him is an attack on "unity."  It's a nice game designed to avoid attacks.  McCain should go after Obama on this very point, portraying the Illinois senator as someone who thinks he's too good for politics, someone above the nation.  That can stick.

May 22, 2008.      Permalink          

EARLY AFTERNOON POST:  MAY 22,  2008

Posted at 12:26 p.m. ET

POLLING

New polls out today bring no comfort for Senator Obama, especially in some battleground states.

The first national tracker out today, Rasmussen, has McCain up four points over Obama, and has McCain up three over Clinton. 

BATTLEGROUND STATES:  Quinnipiac has polled Ohio, Pennsylvania and Florida.  In Ohio they have McCain up four over Obama, but Clinton up seven over McCain.

In Pennsylvania, Quinnipiac has Obama up six over McCain, but Clinton up 13 over McCain. 

In Florida, Quinnipiac has McCain up four over Obama, but Clinton up seven over McCain. 

We must stress that this is one polling company, although a respected one.  We have to wait for others to confirm.  But the news has to be upsetting to the Obama camp.  Clinton simply does better, period, in these battleground states.  Obama wins only one, Pennsylvania, but by six points, a gap not that hard to make up. 

I have seen a clear trend, for several weeks now, showing that Clinton is the stronger candidate in the general election.  These findings, though, are probably too late.  The Democrats have made their decision.  It only needs to be ratified by the convention.

May 22, 2008.      Permalink          

THURSDAY:  MAY 22,  2008

NEVER FEAR?

Occasionally we get a newspaper piece written by those who actually do the research, have absorbed the facts, and can apply a reasonable perspective to a political stand.  Here, two writers, in a New York times op-ed piece, pretty much wreck Barack Obama's naive stance on negotiations.

In his inaugural address, President John F. Kennedy expressed in two eloquent sentences, often invoked by Barack Obama, a policy that turned out to be one of his presidency’s — indeed one of the cold war’s — most consequential: “Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate.” Arthur Schlesinger Jr., Kennedy’s special assistant, called those sentences “the distinctive note” of the inaugural.

A little problem...

But Kennedy’s one presidential meeting with Nikita Khrushchev, the Soviet premier, suggests that there are legitimate reasons to fear negotiating with one’s adversaries. Although Kennedy was keenly aware of some of the risks of such meetings — his Harvard thesis was titled “Appeasement at Munich” — he embarked on a summit meeting with Khrushchev in Vienna in June 1961, a move that would be recorded as one of the more self-destructive American actions of the cold war, and one that contributed to the most dangerous crisis of the nuclear age.

Senior American statesmen like George Kennan advised Kennedy not to rush into a high-level meeting, arguing that Khrushchev had engaged in anti-American propaganda and that the issues at hand could as well be addressed by lower-level diplomats.

And...

But Kennedy went ahead, and for two days he was pummeled by the Soviet leader. Despite his eloquence, Kennedy was no match as a sparring partner, and offered only token resistance as Khrushchev lectured him on the hypocrisy of American foreign policy, cautioned America against supporting “old, moribund, reactionary regimes” and asserted that the United States, which had valiantly risen against the British, now stood “against other peoples following its suit.”

And...

Paul Nitze, the assistant secretary of defense, said the meeting was “just a disaster.” Khrushchev’s aide, after the first day, said the American president seemed “very inexperienced, even immature.” Khrushchev agreed, noting that the youthful Kennedy was “too intelligent and too weak.” The Soviet leader left Vienna elated — and with a very low opinion of the leader of the free world.

Too intelligent and too weak.  Does that remind you of a certain Illinois senator? 

Finally...

The following spring, Khrushchev made plans to “throw a hedgehog at Uncle Sam’s pants”: nuclear missiles in Cuba. And while there were many factors that led to the missile crisis, it is no exaggeration to say that the impression Khrushchev formed at Vienna — of Kennedy as ineffective — was among them.

If Barack Obama wants to follow in Kennedy’s footsteps, he should heed the lesson that Kennedy learned in his first year in office: sometimes there is good reason to fear to negotiate.

There's a lot to think about here.  But since those journalists who are in the tank for Obama are emotionally opposed to thinking, I'm not too optimistic. 

May 22, 2008.      Permalink          

UNDEMOCRATIC DEMS

I like to quote Froma Harrop, the common-sense columnist for the Providence Journal.  Here she takes the Democratic Party to task for its ridiculous, undemocratic system of nominating a president:

There was unfortunate symbolism in Barack Obama's choice of Des Moines as the place to celebrate his delegate milestone on the day of the Kentucky and Oregon primaries. The Iowa caucuses were the first contest of the nominating process, and Obama's success in them launched his campaign into the big time. But they were also the start of a deeply undemocratic process.

The caucuses produced no vote count. There were no secret ballots -- but instead a public two-hour tussle that disenfranchised many parents of small children, shift workers and those who couldn't drive in the dark. Certain caucus-goers enjoyed several times the clout of others -- it depended on where they lived. The result was not an election of delegates but of "delegate equivalents," a term with an Orwellian ring.

Obama didn't make these rules, and one can't begrudge him for playing the game so well. But at the end of the day, his resounding "victory" was the product of having a crack team of activists take advantage of a crazy system.

It's amazing how few professional election watchers have noticed that.  Take away these strange caucuses, available only to those who can find a responsible babysitter at a less-than-Exxon price, and Obama would be losing.  Finally...

If Democrats ever intend to again argue that the raw numbers should determine the next president -- and not an archaic system that can frustrate the democratic will -- they might start by setting a better example.

Yeah, but they're the change they believe in.

May 22, 2008.      Permalink          

FROM HILLARY'S BUNKER

Hillary Clinton is throwing a Hail Mary, or maybe a Hail Chelsea, in a last-ditch effort to wrest the Democratic nomination from Barack Obama:

BOCA RATON, Fla. – With a bit of momentum from her landslide Kentucky victory and less lopsided Oregon loss, Hillary Clinton is turning her attention to two states that have already voted, Florida and Michigan, over two states and a territory that have yet to, South Dakota, Montana and Puerto Rico.

It’s part of a last-gasp strategy aimed at prolonging her campaign by convincing the party to alter the nomination math. By seating the penalized Florida and Michigan delegations, she would not only gain a significant number of delegates but also bolster her popular vote argument with the superdelegates.

The new Florida and Michigan offensive will kick off in earnest today with three campaign events in South Florida – though she’ll have to share the state with Obama, who begins a three-day campaign swing there – and will likely also include campaigning in Michigan. That’s in addition to an already circulating online petition and escalating campaign rhetoric casting Clinton as best-positioned to carry the two important big states in the fall against presumptive Republican nominee John McCain – partly because of her fight against disenfranchising Democrats there.

In an intentional bit of symbolism, Clinton’s three campaign stops will be in Palm Beach, Broward, and Dade counties – the three jurisdictions where Democrats allege voters were disenfranchised during the 2000 presidential election.

Okay, fair enough.  But it's probably in vain.  The only thing that can stop Obama now is some bombshell revelation about him, which is probably what Clinton is hoping for.  She's correct, morally, on the disenfranchisement of Florida and Michigan, but it's ridiculous to think that the Obama forces will agree to any solution for those states that will hurt their candidate. 

It is, though, the Democratic Party, which reveres chaos and confusion.  You never know.

May 22, 2008.      Permalink          

PART OF THE FLEET WEEK

You'll love this.  It's Fleet Week in New York, and a young man's fancy turns to thoughts of visiting America's great naval vessels, tied up at the city's piers.  Well, that's the way it used to be, anyway.

For the last 18 years or so, there's been a bit of a problem, although most New Yorkers aren't even aware of it.  Mayor David Dinkins, the less-than-stellar mayor who preceded the very stellar Rudy Giuliani, handed down an edict that no ship carrying nuclear weapons could visit New York.  The Navy has interpreted that to also mean nuclear-powered ships.  Ostensibly, the purpose of the ban was to protect New Yorkers against a nuclear accident.  The real reason, of course, was party-line leftist thinking.  As one local pol put it:

"We put our young American servicemen and servicewomen in submarines and aircraft carriers, and we put them out to sea for eight or nine months at a time," state Senator William Larkin, a veteran of World War II and the Korean War, said yesterday in an interview. "Why would we be putting our members on board these ships and then say it's not safe? I wouldn't have any problem with it."

Well, Senator Larkin, the local yearners for peace do have a problem with it, so it will be a fight to get the ban lifted.  But it should be lifted.  New York used to be a Navy town.  It was the town attacked on 9-11.  But there are some local activists who don't even think it should be part of the nation.

May 22, 2008.      Permalink