Paul Wins Straw Poll

Boos followed.

Rep. Ron Paul, the libertarian-leaning Texas Republican who ran a quixotic bid for the Republican presidential nomination in 2008, was the top vote-getter in the Conservative Political Action Conference’s straw poll, capturing the support of 31 percent of those who participated in the contest.


Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who had won the CPAC straw poll for three consecutive years, took 22 percent of the vote. Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin won 7 percent and Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty 6 percent. Pawlenty attended the
conference; Palin did not.


Paul’s victory renders a straw poll that was already lightly contested among the likely 2012 GOP hopefuls all but irrelevant as the 74-year-old Texan is unlikely to be a serious contender for his party’s nomination.


As the results were displayed on twin large screens in the ballroom – and even before Republican pollster Tony Fabrizio could announce who won – a cascade of boos came down from a crowd that views Paul and his fervent supporters as an irritant. Paul’s backers responded with cheers, though, when their candidate

Ron Paul always seems to do well in polls like this. He did very well in the first Iowa straw poll in the summer of 2007. I also once had a Libertarian friend of mine proclaim that Ron Paul actually won New Hampshire in 2008 in the Republican Party but had it taken by the "establishment".

These sorts of straw polls are great political theater but ultimately irrelevant. Mitt Romney was also a frequent winner here. John McCain didn't even show in 2007. The race for 2012 remains wide open and any poll at this point, straw or otherwise, is meaningless. Stilll, since he won, here's part of Paul's speech at CPAC.

The Worst Thing About the Bruhaha Over the New Palin Hit Piece

The worst thing is that it gives this long, tedious, very poorly written hatchet job publicity it doesn't deserve. At about 9000 words, it's almost a chapter in a book. The piece is full of unsupported accusations, digs by unnamed sources, as well as leaps made frankly out of the clear blue sky. The first paragraph is a sign of things to come.

Despite her disastrous performance in the 2008 election, Sarah Palin is still the sexiest brand in Republican politics, with a lucrative book contract for her story. But what Alaska’s charismatic governor wants the public to know about herself doesn’t always jibe with reality. As John McCain’s top campaign officials talk more candidly than ever before about the meltdown of his vice-presidential pick, the author tracks the signs—political and personal—that Palin was big trouble, and checks the forecast for her future.

How exactly does Purdum measure "disastrous"? Is it by the crowds she attracted, the fundraising she created, or the new excitement that surrounded McCain's campaign following her selection? She had several disastrous interviews but that doesn't make her entire selection disastrous.

The piece is full of these types of accusations. They aren't really supported. Worse than that, the accusations are often those with no context. As such, they are almost entirely done as nothing more than a salacious attack on Palin. My favorite part, if you will, was this.

More than once in my travels in Alaska, people brought up, without prompting, the question of Palin’s extravagant self-regard. Several told me, independently of one another, that they had consulted the definition of ‘narcissistic personality disorder’ in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders--’a pervasive pattern of grandiosity (in fantasy or behavior), need for admiration, and lack of empathy’--and thought it fit her perfectly.

Is Pardum serious? Does he really expect the readers to believe that layman use such clinical terms? Does he really expect us to believe that non psychiatrists consulted the "Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders"? Pardum's piece is another in a long line of pieces that can't seem to find one person in all of Alaska that could say a nice thing about her despite the fact that she's still overwhelmingly popular there. There it is. The article is 9000 words more or less like those I quoted. The New York Times published a similar hit piece during the campaign. That received scant coverage. I wish this had wound up the same.

The difference with this article is that it also quoted former McCain staffers, who anonymously attacked Palin. The most infamous attack insinuates that Palin had post partum depression.

Some top aides worried about her mental state: was it possible that she was experiencing postpartum depression?

There was several attacks like this one, though this has received the most attention. Of course, not one of the people that attacked Palin for this piece would put their name behind the attack. That's for good reason. If they did, they'd never work for any Republican ever again. Redstate once identified Nichole Wallace as the author of one previous anonymous Palin attack. Wallace now works for the liberal online publication, the Daily Beast. It's likely that's the sort of employment Wallace can expect going forward.

The worst part about all of this is that the piece once again makes the absurd allegation that Palin cost McCain the election. It's one of many things that anonymous sources told Pardum. Of course, that's absurd, and frankly, even if true, exactly whose fault would it have been if not the very folks making the accusation?

McCain lost the election the minute the economy tanked. He didn't help himself when he claimed the economy was on steady ground. He put the final nail in his coffin when in the debate he came out in favor of the bailout. None of that had anything to do with Palin. The only time the McCain campaign had any steam was in the weeks following her selection. When the economy tanked, that became the issue.

Her initial interviews were in fact disastrous. Of course, whose fault is that? Why would the campaign have her sit down with the MSM first? Wouldn't it have been much better if Palin was first rolled out with several friendly media? Furthermore, why did they cut her off after a few bad interviews? Wouldn't that have reinforced her image? A lot of the blame for the bad interviews of course goes to Palin herself but some go to these very anonymous advisers now attacking her.

Frankly, it's high time we stop rehashing the 2008 campaign. It's worse yet, when doing so, gives unneeded publicity to a terrible hit piece.

William Ayers: Media Darling

The MSM, fresh from carrying Barack Obama's water during the campaign, has decided to move onto other matters now that the campaign is over. Among them appears to be the concerted effort of reparing the damaged reputations of some of those that Republicans targeted in attacking President Elect Obama. Throughout the campaign the MSM did everything in its power to bury William Ayers and his connection to Barack Obama. Now that the campaign is over, William Ayers has become a fixture on television, print, and the internet. Yesterday, he was on television ripping on Fox News.



Prior to that, ABC gave him time on Good Morning America.



In the middle of these rants, Ayers also had time to show up on the liberal site, Democracy Now.



While all of this went on, he was also interviewed by Walter Shapiro of the liberal web site, Salon.com.


He has now become a full fixture on the talk show circuit. This about face by the MSM is not only hypocritical and duplicitous but it is perverse. The MSM had absolutely no interest in reporting on anything related to William Ayers throughout the campaign. They found his connection to Barack Obama entirely inconsequential. Yet, now that the campaign is over, William Ayers is among the most important topics for the very same MSM. There is of course nothing new to this story, and if anything, he should be even less significant now. Yet, after carrying the water of Barack Obama, they are now carrying the exact same water for William Ayers.

The mere fact that he finds an audience at all is perverse enough, however to add insult here, the MSM allows him to constantly obfuscate, equivocate, and flat out distort. Over and over, he maintains that he never killed anyone during his radical days. This is of course nonsense. The Weather Underground, the group he lead, killed police, judiciary, civilians and accidentally even members of the group. Beyond this, Ayers continues to insist 1) that his bombings weren't acts of terrorism and 2) the real terrorists were the members of the U.S. government. He also is allowed to make absurd claims about the nature of his relationship with Barack Obama. Here is what he said about it to Shapiro.

Let's come back to Obama. I'm curious. How many conversations have you had with him over the years? Fifteen? Twenty?

A dozen or 15 perhaps. There was a big thing made this morning [on "Good Morning America"] that I was coming out of my silence. Nothing could be further from the truth. I haven't been silent. I teach, I lecture at universities, I write, I'm not silent.

This claim is absurd on its face. He served on two boards with Obama, made more than one speech together, had him in his home to kick off Obama's campaign, and their kids go to the same school. Barack Obama told BillO'Reilly that the two of them worked on the crime bill together in Illinois. Furthermore, Obama wrote a blurb in Ayers' book in the 1990's. All of this supposedly happened with a tangential relationship of no more than 15 conversations. Beyond this, here is how Ayers characterizes Obama.

What have your impressions been of Obama over the years?

I met him sometime in the mid-1990s and, as I said, I know him about as well as thousands and thousands of other people do. And like millions of other people, I wish I knew him a lot better now. My impression of him from the start was that this was the smartest person who walks into any room he walks into. An incredibly bright, an incredibly quick person. A compassionate, kind person. And everyone who knew him thought that he was politically ambitious. For the first two years, I thought, his ambition is so huge that he wants to be mayor of Chicago. And that's where my imagination ran out of steam, apparently, because clearly he had his sights on something else and I'm delighted for him and for the country and the world that he was able to accomplish this.

That is a rather conveniently positive and detailed perception that Ayers has of Obama given that they supposedly only had 10-15 conversations. He says that for the first two years he had an impression that Obama would run for mayor. How could he have any kind of impression given that they couldn't have talked more than two or three times at that point?

This is the sort of insanity that the media tour of William Ayers is bringing. Yet, Ayers isn't concerned much with his public image. Instead, he is peddling a book. That's his agenda with this media tour. In fact, had he been convicted of the crimes he so openly admits committing he wouldn't even be able to publish this book. If he isn't violating the letter of the law that prohibits criminals from profitting from their crimes, he is certainly violating the spirit. While he may not be breaking any laws by making this media tour in support of his book, there is also nothing that says that the MSM must oblige a former and still unrepentent domestic terrorist as he attempts to profit from his former terrorism. That they have so openly embraced the same man they tried so hard to keep under wraps is another example of their bias, hypocrisy, duplicity, and the perverse nature in which they operate.

Some Context on Jon Burge, the Chicago Media, and Election 2008

In yesterday's election for Cook County State's Attorney, Anita Alvarez trounced Tony Peraica. The only time that the race became a story in the press in the area was a bruhaha over an advertisement created by Tony Peraica. Tony Peraica used an advertisement that invoked the U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald.

U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald has asked Republican Cook County state's attorney candidate Tony Peraica to stop passing out a campaign flier that looks to Fitzgerald like Peraica is claiming his endorsement.

The flier shows side-by-side photos of Fitzgerald and Peraica and says, "U.S. Attorney's Office Needs Help Fighting Corruption in Cook County."

Fitzgerald said in his letter he had never even met Peraica. "The flier creates the misleading assumption that I have endorsed your candidacy. . . . That is by no means the case. I have never endorsed any candidate in any race for anything (much less someone I do not believe I have yet had occasion to meet.)"

Peraica's advertisement made the claim that if he (Tony Peraica) were elected, then Peraica would help Fitzgerald in rooting out corruption in Cook County. Alvarez cried foul because the advertisement was construed as an endorsement of Peraica by Fitzgerald, which Fitzgerald never did. While the advertisement was a bit misleading, the entire issue was rather trivial. Yet, this is the only thing that the media in the Cook County area focused on regarding the race.

At the same time, only weeks before the election Jon Burge was indicted by the same U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald. Burge is a former police commander in Chicago that committed systematic torture for almost twenty years before finally being removed in the early 1990's.

The Burge story should have been explored long before the campaign, but it should have especially been explored following the indictment. The Cook County State's Attorney's office didn't merely look the other way while this torture went on. In fact, they were often willing participants. It was in fact often Cook County State's Attorneys prosecutors that often took statements of suspects after being beaten for hours, electricuted, and other torture. The Cook County State's Attorney's office knew what happened and they participated for years actively in the torture.

Anita Alvarez is a twenty plus year veteran of the Cook County State's Attorney's office. Some of those years were spent in the office while Burge and his crew were committing systematic torture. Both the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun Times endorsed Alvarez. Both cited her "experience" as a main reason for their endorsement. In fact, the Cook County State's Attorney's race was a mirror of the Presidential campaign, with Peraica, the Republican, as the agent of change, and Alvarez, the Democrat, the agent of experience. As much as the folks at both the Sun Times and Tribune ate up Obama's message of change, they just as quickly dismissed the exact same message from Peraica.

The Cook County government is in need of far more significant reform than the govenrment in D.C., and that is coming from someone who knows full well how broken D.C. is. The Burge story only starts here as well. First, Burge was again indicted by the U.S. Attorney not the Cook County State's Attorney. Second, he was indicted for perjury and obstruction of justice not torture. That's because his acts of torture have now passed the statute of limitations. That's likely because the powers that be in places just like the Cook County State's Attorney's office protected Burge until the statute of limitations ran out.

All of this should have made the entire office toxic. Had the media given the Burge story and the overall corruption surrounding the proper coverage of a story of this magnitude, the entire Cook County State's Attorney's office would have become toxic. Had the media covered this story with the vigor that it finally deserves, Alvarez' 20 plus year connection to the office would have been as toxic as McCain's connection to Bush.

The State's Attorney's office almost never indicts a politician in the very crooked County of Cook. One of the reasons that the County is as corrupt as it is, is exactly because the Cook County State's Attorney's office does nearly nothing to be a watchdog. The other reason is because the major news organizations are just as ignorant.

Instead, the major media in the Chicagoland area focused on a silly advertisement. They made experience the important issue in the race, and as such, the apathetic voters voted in the ultimate insider to oversea one of the most corrupt political governments in the country.

Post Election Round Up

The people have spoken and their choice is clear. Barack Obama will be our next and 44th President. He will govern with heavy Democratic majorities in the House and Senate, so it appears we are headed for a serious lurch to the left.

All is not lost for the Republicans. They are almost certain to avoid the nightmare scenario of a filibuster proof majority in the Senate. As such, we will be spared the lunacy of such things as the Fairness Doctrine and open ballots for unions.

The first order of business for President Obama will be the economy. It remains to be seen if he is serious about his plan to to redistribute income. Of more priority for President Obama will be the continued implementation of the massive bailout passed in September. It remains to be seen if President Obama will attempt to implement some of his bolder agenda: universal health care, merit pay, and equal pay for equal work.

For the Republicans, the motto should be targeted filibuster. If they are to be bold, and I don't expect this, they would filibuster a lot and use that time to expose the plans a lot better than John McCain did. This of course would be a dicey proposition and appearing to be obstructionists would only hurt them even more in the next election, however there is still plenty to expose in his policies. If the public was really made aware that his tax plan amounts to a welfare plan, I think they wouldn't support it.

On foreign policy and judges, Barack Obama will have nearly free reign. My greatest fear on foreign policy is that Vladimir Putin will take up Joe Biden on his prediction and he will test him, in Ukraine, within the next six months. On judges, elections have consequences. Republicans should only oppose judges because they are unqualified not because of ideology.

There is still some house cleaning. In Minnesota, Norm Coleman appears to have won narrowly however a recount is almost certain. In Oregon, Senator Smith is holding on barely. In Georgia, it continues to remain unclear if Senator Chambliss will have a run off. In Alaska, Ted Stevens appears to also be headed to a razor sharp victory. Apparently, being convicted of felonies isn't enough to throw someone out of office in that state. The final numbers for the Senate are still not set.

As for me, I will give President Obama a chance. Some have said they believe he will govern from the middle. If he does, he has the chance to be the transformative figure some believe him to be. If he governs from the left or even far left, I predict he will go down in history as a disaster.

Broken Campaign Promises: As Old As Time Itself

A friend of mine, Russell, ran for sixth grade class President. He had a slogan that should have guaranteed victory

Hustle your bustle and vote for Russell

He would have won, and he should have won. Except, he ran against his girlfriend at the time. She promised the entire class a free trip to Great America. Without ever explaining how she would 1) pull everyone out of class one day, and 2)come up with the money for the trip, she convinced the entire class. Rather than questioning something that was obviously too good to be true, they followed her like sheep. She won, and of course the free trip never actually materialized.

Think about that story as you watch this video...

The Ten Most Important Moments and Events of the Campaign

1) Bush announces financial meltdown.

Nothing has affected the campaign more than the announcement that the economy was on the brink of collapse, that we are in need of a bailout, and that major financial institutions were no longer in a position to lend. As Barack Obama then said over and over, "this is the final verdict on the policies of the last eight years". We can debate whether or not this is actually fair, but politically it is correct. McCain has been tied to the policies and they turned a few point lead into a multi point disadvantage.

2)McCain decides to back Bush's bailout in the first debate.

McCain stuck his neck way out and suspended his campaign. The Republicans appeared to be holding their ground against the bailout. The bailout was nearly as universally despised as the President that proposed it. Why in the world did McCain back it? We will never know. He had an opportunity to tie Obama to a bad bill and an unpopular President and instead he blinked.

3) McCain picks Palin

For about two weeks it was all Sarah Palin all the time. The Obama campaign couldn't have been more flat footed. For a week, they attempted to argue that Barack Obama was more experienced than Sarah Palin. Wow!! She vowed crowds. Her speech was tremendous, and she continues to be infinitely fascinating. All of this would matter a lot more had it not been for number 1.

4) Senator Obama opts out of public financing.

He took a little heat but just a little. In the end, it meant that he raised and spent four to five times that of Senator McCain. He has hit McCain in all sorts of niche votes: seniors and Hispanics, most prominently, where McCain can't counter. It has allowed his ground game to dwarf that of McCain. He was able to do an infomercial. If anyone in the MSM cared, some would call this unfair and hypocritical (given that he himself says he wants to "spread the wealth around"), but they don't.

5) Inflammatory sermons by Reverend Jeremiah Wright surface


They speak for themselves, and it was the first time the Obama juggernaut hit a road bump. Once they found their way into a loop, Obama's image was forever tainted.

5) Obama calls Pennsylvanians from small towns "bitter Americans"




Just as Obama was recovering from the Wright fiasco, he gets caught on tape in San Francisco disparaging those from small towns. Obama's campaign was in free fall. Three things saved him. 1) He had an insurmountable lead in the primary. 2) It was still in the primary. 3) It was nearly impossible for a Democrat to lose.

6) McCain wins New Hampshire

His campaign was left for dead following the debacle of the immigration bill in which he got into bed with Ted Kennedy. He was nearly out of money. He was flying coach and carrying his own bags. He made a desperate play for a state he could win, and it paid off. He never looked back and coasted to victory.

7) Hillary and Senator Obama go after each other in the Democratic debate hosted by Stephanopolis and Gibson.

If you are Conservative, there was never a finer moment than the mudslinging at this debate. Clinton accusing Obama of hanging with slumlord. It doesn't get any juicier. The scars haven't left completely, however the two sides toned it down afterwards and didn't allow this debate to send the campaign over the cliff.

8)

8)Senator Obama tells Joe Wuzelacher that he wants to "spread the wealth around"


Whatever chance Senator McCain still has, he owes it all to Joe the Plumber. By pronouncing that he wants to "spread the wealth around", Senator Obama allowed a whole new line of attack against him. Joe the Plumber has become a media darling/villain depending on where you turn. The election has turned as a result. The only question is will it be enough.

9) Obama wins Iowa

The "presumptive nominee" Hillary Clinton got beaten. Senator Obama first discovered that his base was tailor made for the caucus system. Suddenly, we not only had a race, but we had a race in which the first term Senator was the front runner.

10) Hillary beats Obama in New Hampshire.

My how fortunes change. Obama comes out of nowhere to beat Hillary in Iowa. Hillary turns the tables in New Hampshire, and it was on. It didn't end until the next spring.

In Defense of Sarah Palin

I have had more than one conversation with liberal friends and acquaintances in which my counterparts have told me that Sarah Palin was the biggest mistake that John McCain made. Most of those folks are not far left but rather merely liberal. As such, while they would be natural opponents of Palin, they wouldn't necessarily have such a visceral reaction.

I have heard these folks describe her using such words as stupid, uncultured, a zealot, and utterly unprepared. They have pointed to several bad performances in interviews, her sharpened and vulgar attacks on Obama (palling around with terrorists is the one most mentioned), and what they view as out of the mainstream beliefs.

These friends and colleagues laugh when I suggest that Palin is the future of the Republican party and that I believe she will be our candidate in 2012 (if not then certainly in 2016).

There are several things that need to be made clear about Palin. First, I believe that the McCain campaign mishandled Palin in a nearly politically criminal manner. The problme was NOT that she had a couple of bad interviews. Every politician since the beginning of time has bad interviews. Every politicians says dumb things in interviews. So what. The problem is that they left the Couric/Gibson interview hanging without allowing her to do more to overcome how poorly she had done. The MSM did a gotcha game as they should have expected. So what. Why wasn't she all over television so that these gotcha moments could be countered with other interviews.

The reality is that Sarah Palin viewed by some as some sort of imbecile because she didn't identify what Charlie Gibson meant by the "Bush Doctrine", couldn't name three Supreme Court cases off the top of her head, and couldn't recite McCain's legislative work on regulation. So what. This would have been nothing more than a blip had she become a fixture all over television, radio and the internet. The McCain campaign had found their secret weapon, Sarah Palin. She was interesting, intriguing, and people were drawn to her. Then, she had a couple of bad interviews and they hid her away so that no one could get to her. Why? No one will be flawless each and everytime they are in front of a camera. The campaign should have let her make mistakes but move onto the next interview. Instead, they allowed two bad interviews to define her.

Second, as the Vice Presidential candidate, she is the attack dog. Of course, she will hit Obama hard. That's her role. The fact that some find her attacks offensive and over the top is a sign that she is managing her role as she is supposed to do. Of course, liberals find her characterization of the relationship between Obama and Ayers "palling around" offensive. It's a sharp attack, and supporters aren't going to like it. If she had treated Obama with kid gloves, liberals would likely have found her "charming". They still wouldn't have voted for her but she would have been charming. That, there is a visceral reaction to her is a sign that her attacks are as sharp as they should be.

Third, the MSM has done everything they can to demonize her. The level of hate and venom to the Governor is unprecedented when directed at the Vice Presidential candidate. Everyone from feminists, gun control advocates, to late night comedians have taken an extraordinary amount of pot shots at her. If you get the bulk of your news from MSM, then no doubt you will find Governor Palin some sort of a stooge. Of course, we all need to keep in mind that most of the people taking pot shots at her are political opponents. Some have made hay of the likes of Kathleen Parker and David Frum, both conservative pundits, that have come out against Palin. Yet, Palin is still almost universally adored in the Conservative movement. You are never going to please everybody, and Obama has plenty of detractors on the left. It's just that the media, in love with Obama, pretends they aren't there.

The same things that first drew Conservatives to Palin are still there. She is still quite charismatic. She still has about an 80% approval rating in Alaska. This didn't happen by accident and it didn't happen because she governed like some extremist. Often in debating said liberals, they downplay her accomplishments in Alaska by saying the state is small. It's as though cutting taxes, reducing government, and fighting corruption is somehow easier in a small state than somewhere else. I'm always reminded of a friend of mine who attempted to change cable companies in his condo. He joined the seven member cable committee. He went to every meeting including through the months of January-April, when he an accountant was in the middle of tax season. Try as he might he couldn't get the rest of the group to see that the cable company, RCN, wasn't the best choice. The point of the story is that change is hard anywhere: D.C., Juneau, or on the condo cable committee. The idea that Palin's accomplishments are inconsequential because they were done in Alaska is the height of elitism.

She is still the same infinitely fascinating hockey mom, turned PTA mom, turned city coucil woman, turned mayor, turned whistleblower, turned Governor who hunts, fishes, and once won a state championship in basketball on a bad ankle.

Make no mistake. Sarah Palin is going to be a political force for years to come. She has arrived and she isn't going anywhere, win or lose tomorrow. Like any other political force, she will continue to irk her opponents for years to come. Just ask Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton. Whatever mistakes the McCain campaign has made one of them was NOT choosing Sarah Palin as the VP pick.

Will We Know a Radical When We See One?

We are on the brink of making a historic choice. First and foremost, Barack Obama is on the cusp of becoming the nation's first African American President. Besides that, he will also be one of its most liberal to the point of radical. It is often surreal to watch Obama's radicalism flashed in front of people, and then to watch people defend it as though it isn't really there. The defense takes on many forms. There are two that are most prominent. First, Obama's radicalism is framed into something moderate or even compassionate. The most obvious example is his plan for income redistribution which is framed into a "middle class tax cut". The second is to flip the radicalism around, and use the attackers words against him. This was the most common technique in the fiasco regarding BAIPA. His defenders proclaimed it ridiculous and beyond the pale to accuse Senator Obama of supporting infanticide. As a State Senator, he voted multiple times against a bill that would have provided life saving treatment for babies born after a botched abortion, but yet it is his accusers that are beyond the pale if they dare call this supporting infanticide. Senator Obama has a radical policy, but it is his opponents that are beyond the pale for calling a spade a spade. Yet, on social, economic, and national security issues alike Barack Obama has openly favored radical ideas, and yet, his defenders continue to defend them as mainstream. Furthermore, all of these radical ideas go along with a laundry list of radical associations, and yet again, it is his opponents that are painted as beyond the pale for daring to make the connection.

1) The economy, income redistribution.

It is beyond debate that Senator Obama wants to redistribute wealth. That's been his plan all along. He believes that those that pay 40% of their income to taxes aren't paying enough. On the other hand, he also believes that those that don't pay any federal income tax (only the Social Security pay roll tax) are paying too much. This is boiler plate income redistribution.

Yet, his defenders continue to insist that it isn't what it clearly is. Most of his defenders point out that his is doing nothing more than what Bill Clinton did. Better yet, they defend his plan by pointing out that our tax system is already progressive. Both defenses are totally out of context. First, Bill Clinton didn't also say he was going to raise the capital gains, corporate, and inheritance tax along with raising income taxes. Second, he didn't give a tax cut to those that pay no federal income taxes. Third, what Bill Clinton did is irrelevant. It's not an excuse to suggest income redistribution because someone else did it too. What kind of nonsense is this? Second, our tax system may in fact be progressive, however Senator Obama is specifically trying to make it even more progressive. There is a big difference between favoring a progressive tax system and looking at a progressive tax system and believing it isn't progressive enough. Finally, we also see Obama defenders get on television and call his tax cut a "middle class tax cut". Of course, that is so but what they conveniently don't say is that this tax cut comes as a direct result of a tax increase to those more wealthy than the middle class.

As I watch, Obama defenders defend his policy of income redistribution, I always wonder the exact wording of other radical ideas like Socialism under Marx. For those that defend Obama's tax cuts as "for the middle class", how is it that you thought that Marx sold his ideology? It isn't as though he proclaimed that government would control every part of everyone's life. Instead, Marx, too, said that he had a plan that would benefit the middle class. That's the problem. Obama pits one group against another in a blatant bit of class warfare and masks it in the nice sounding "middle class tax cuts". His defenders seem oblivious to this and continue to defend.

2) Social issues

There is no question that Barack Obama hasn't met an abortion procedure that he isn't in favor of. That is just the facts. He called Nebraska's outlaw of partial birth abortion a slippery slope.

I strongly disagree with today’s Supreme Court ruling, which dramatically departs from previous precedents safeguarding the health of pregnant women. As Justice Ginsburg emphasized in her dissenting opinion, this ruling signals an alarming willingness on the part of the conservative majority to disregard its prior rulings respecting a woman’s medical concerns and the very personal decisions between a doctor and patient. I am extremely concerned that this ruling will embolden state legislatures to enact further measures to restrict a woman's right to choose, and that the conservative Supreme Court justices will look for other opportunities to erode Roe v. Wade, which is established federal law and a matter of equal rights for women.

A partial birth abortion only happens in the last trimester, six plus months into the pregnancy. There are two inherent problems with the argument that the health of the mother needs to be taken into consideration. First, "the health of the mother" is far too vague. Any abortion doctor can then perform a partial birth abortion because the mother says that she gets chronic headaches. Second, what's more important the life of the fetus or the health of the mother? Since when is one person's health more important than the life of another person?

Of course, Barack Obama doesn't stop at merely partial birth abortion. He goes so far as to advocate the killing of a baby even after it is born. He voted multiple times against BAIPA (Born Alive Infant Protection Act) in the Illinois Senate. To me it is very simple. Babies were dying. Babies that were meant to be aborted but survived weren't being treated at hospitals in Cook County. The laws that were already on the books weren't protecting them. Barack Obama had an opportunity to save these babies, but instead, he was more concerned with ideology. His fear over the "slippery slope", again, caused him multiple times to vote against this act.

Now, Senators often make bad Presidential candidates because they vote so often and their votes can be taken out of context. In the case of BAIPA, this is exactly the defense that Obama's defenders take. They muddy the issue through a giant maze of procedural matters in order to make it seem as though the vote was really about something besides saving babies. All of this may in fact be so, but ultimately that's the problem. Barack Obama had a clear opportunity to save babies, and instead he chose to turn this into an ideological battle, and a battle to save abortions. In the end, protecting "reproductive rights" was more important than protecting babies. Rather than focusing on this truth, Obama's defenders focus on an endless stream of procedural matters involved with the vote, and then, they use those procedural matters, to proclaim with righteous indignation that it is beyond the pale to say that "Barack Obama supports infanticide". Here, we have a Senator that on more than one occasion voted against protecting infants born alive, and yet, it is his opponents that are beyond the pale.

3) Foreign policy

In a debate in April of 2007, Barack Obama made an astonishing statement. He said that he would meet with many of our enemies without preconditions in the first year of his Presidency.



He's never stepped away from this policy. He has tried to frame it better by proclaiming there would be preparations. Yet, ultimately, the problem isn't that he would jump on a plane and meet with leaders like Assad, Il, and Ahmadinejad before researching them and their nations. The problem is that he would do this without having the nations meet conditions beforehand. It is foolhearty and naive to believe that meetings on the Presidential level between ourselves and our neighbors will lead to anything but disaster. We need only to look back to Kennedy's meeting with Kruschev to see the disastrous results of Presidential meetings with no pre conditions with our enemies. Yet, Obama uses this very meeting as an example of the "positive" that can come out of it. Furthermore, he points to Reagan's meetings with Gorbachev as another example. Reagan never met Gorbachev with no pre conditions. In fact, the U.S. had beaten the Soviet Union into submission before he met with Gorbachev.



Rather than calling this foolish, naive, and radical policy what it is, his defenders muddy the issue and use all sorts of equvocations to try and defend what is truly an indefensible policy. Can you imagine the public relations coup that a photo of Ahmadinejad and Obama shaking hands would be for Ahmadinejad? Furthermore, the absurdity of this policy was proven when Iran set its own pre conditions prior to a meeting.

The vice president for Iranian media affairs says Iran has preconditions of its own. He tells the Islamic Republic News Agency Americans are in dire need of re-establishing ties with the Iranian people and that Iran will only hold talks if “the U.S. moves out of the Middle East and the U.S. government gives up its widespread support for the Zionist regime.”

Those, of course, aren't merely preconditions but rather some lofty preconditions. It seems our enemies understand the power of leverage better than Barack Obama himself. The news from Iran should have been enough to make his defenders understand that his policy is naive to the point of radical. Instead, his defenders have tried to obfuscate the issue. They point to folks like James Baker and Henry Kissinger as suggesting the same thing as Barack Obama. Of course, both those gentlemen suggest low level meetings first, and not Presidential level meetings with no preconditions.



4) Radical associations



It really doesn't matter just how many there are, and how close some of them are. All of them, to his defenders, are totally irrelevant and trivial. Senator Obama can sit in the pews of a racist, anti American zealot for twenty years, and anyone that brings this up is a "racist" themselves and trying to deflect from the "real issues".



He can sit on two boards and make a blurb in a book for an unrepentent former terrorist, and his defenders will claim that the association is loose and tangential.



He can have a twenty year association with a group (ACORN) that is being investigated in more than ten states for voter fraud, and it is also referred to as tangential.



He can have as a neighbor, a friend, a business partner, and a top fundraiser, a convicted felon and crook, and this relationship will also be dismissed as tangential.



Each one of his associations is often defended by pointing to associations of others. For every mention of Obama's association with Reverend Jeremiah Wright, there is a mention of McCain "relationship" with Pastor Hagee. Of course, Hagee merely endorsed McCain, and McCain was never a member of his church.



For every mention of Obama's relationship with William Ayers, there is someone pointing to John McCain's relationship to G. Gordon Libby. The difference is that Libby's crimes were siginificantly less violent, he served his time, and he apologized.



For every mention of Obama's relationship with ACORN, a defender points out that McCain made a speech in front of ACORN. Making a speech is not the same thing as a twenty year relationship that included: training their staff, defending them as a lawyer, having staff volunteer for his campaign, and finally currently paying them over $800,000 for "get out the vote efforts".



For every mention of Rezko, someone mentions McCain's ties to Charles Keating. First, the Keating five was over twenty years ago. Second, McCain only was at an inappropriate meeting, and most importantly, McCain not only apologized, but used the ordeal to begin a career long campaign against corruption. Obama dismissed his actions as "boneheaded". He proclaimed he knew nothing of Rezko's illegal activities. Furthermore, Rezko was Obama's neighbor, business partner, friend, and top fundraiser.



Yet, despite a never ending stream of radical associations, all are dismissed, by his defenders, as tangential. How many tangential radical associations can one person have before the sum total is something more than tangential?



So, there you have it. This is how a radical, that frankly makes no secret of his radicalism, becomes mainstream to about half, if not more, of the population. Rather than looking at the issue at hand, his defenders jump to defend. Each and every radical association, connection, and idea, is defended until most don't notice that the sum total of his radicalism can't be overlooked anymore. As such, we are on the cusp of voting in a radical.

The Ad McCain Needs to Make

In light of recent developments, here is an advertisment that McCain needs to put up immediately. Since I cut can't cut and paste videos like I would, please bear with me.

(voice over)

Senator Obama has made a lot of promises this campaign...

$65 billion-a-year health plan $15 billion in green energy spending$85 billion in tax cuts and credits A $25 billion-a-year increase in foreign aid$18 billion a year in education spending $3.5 billion for a national service plan. According to the Hill , Barack Obama's spending proposals could add as much as $1 Trillion in new spending per year.

He's also promised a tax cut to every working middle class family...

How does he plan on paying for all this? He promises to only raise taxes on the wealthiest Americans? How does he define wealthy? First he said it was anyone making $250,000 then $200,000. Fortunately, his surrogates are more truthful than the Senator.
(video should start at 28 seconds in)






(start about 25 seconds in and stop 40)


$250,000?...$200,000?...$150,000?...$120,000?...$70,000? Where will the tax cuts start and the tax increases end? The number gets lower and lower. That's because Senator Obama's plan doesn't add up. In the Senate, Senator Obama has voted 94 times to increase taxes and cut taxes for those making as little as $42,000 per year. Only the wealthiest 5% will get a tax increase, that just doesn't add up.

(John McCain voice over) I'm John McCain and I approved this message.

...

since it's likely you aren't going to see that ad, enjoy another that was desperately in need of eyeballs.

Huckabee Vs. Obama: A Thought Experiment

As I have watched the campaign unfold, I can't help but get a troubling feeling out of my head. Did the GOP choose the wrong guy to face off with Barack Obama? Would another candidate have changed the dynamic and likely beat Obama as badly as he appears to be beating Senator John McCain. Now, unfortunately, at the beginning of the year, when the Republican primary effectively ended, the nature of the way in which the race appeared to be is NOT the way in which the race wound up being. It appeared that national security would share the spotlight with the economy. One of the reasons that John McCain wound up grabbing the nomination is the tragic irony of the timing of the killing of Benazir Bhutto. With national security grabbing headlines right around the vote in New Hampshire, John McCain had the election timed on issues relating to his best traits.

Mike Huckabee has four things that John McCain doesn't: charisma, no discernible connection to President Bush, a consistent economic populist message, and opposition to the bailout. Watching John McCain debate Barack Obama, I couldn't help but wonder just how Huckabee would have handled Obama. McCain missed several opportunities in debates to point out that Barack Obama's tax policies were nothing more than income redistribution. It took Joe the Plumber to do it. I don't think that it would have taken an unlikely surrogate for Mike Huckabee to do it. John McCain also missed many opportunities to point out that Barack Obama's tax policies would include tax cuts for 40% of the population that currently pays ZERO in federal income taxes. This is yet another opportunity that Mike Huckabee wouldn't have missed. In fact, anyone that saw Huckabee debate knows that he would have fared far better than McCain did.

The other thing is that Huckabee ran on an economic populist message from the beginning. He didn't come late with a message in fighting for the little guy. He was talking about the pinch of the middle class, foreclosures, and high health care bills. In fact, Huckabee's message was so populist, economically, that his opponents effectively painted as liberal. Of course, this was a bit of a distortion. In fact, Huckabee had the innovative conservative idea of the fair tax. Putting Huckabee's fair tax against Obama's income redistribution proposal would have been the kind of contrast that would have made a real distinction. Rather than fumbling through an explanation of why we need to cut corporate taxes, we would have had a charismatic salesman selling an innovative tax idea. Rather than a debate over who should and shouldn't get tax cuts, we would have a debate over a change in a failed tax code and a revolutionary change to the tax code.

Where Huckabee would have wound up with the most traction is the bailout. He is one of the few politician to come out against the bailout. I believe John McCain lost the election when he supported the Bush bailout. This was an opportunity to distance himself from Bush and instead, John McCain doubled down on "a bi partisan proposal". Rather than running away from President Bush while Obama was siding with Bush, McCain took the easy way out and signed onto the bailout. Furthermore, he doubled down on his own quasi socialism when he proposed a massive bailout of borrowers. Neither of these are small government, fiscally conservative ideas, and neither would be supported by Huckabee. It muddies the waters when you call your opponent quasi socialist when you yourself propose quasi socialist ideas. Imagine the debate as the bailout was being debated. Imagine Mike Huckabee firmly saying that bailing out the irresponsible is not something he would sign onto. Now, on the single most important issue it would have been Senator Barack Obama that was allied with President Bush, and it would be Mike Huckabee that ran against President Bush. The bailout is overwhelmingly rejected. By running fiercely against the bailout, Huckabee would have pulled off the greatest political jujitsu. He would have hung the President Bush noose around Senator Obama. The centerpiece of Senator Obama's current attacks would wind up being used against him.

I believe for these four reasons mean the Republicans picked the wrong candidate and had they picked Mike Huckabee we would see a Republican in the White House.

The Ticking Clock Meets the Perfect Storm

There are now five days left until election day and Barack Obama is up by about 6 percentage points. As such, he has a nearly insurmountable lead with little time left. Barack Obama is now in a position to try and run out the clock. Is he about to face a perfect storm of negative campaign news that will jeopardize his election? Let's examine the details.

1) The natural glow of being in the lead.

Most analysts say that at the end of any campaign the race tightens. What they almost never do is explain why. The reason this happens is that the candidate in the lead also receives the bulk of the media attention. Most candidates don't do as well when all the spotlight is on them because each of their policies and proposals is put under a microscope. Once any policy is shown in full view, warts and all, it almost never looks as good as it does when it is presented merely with talking points. As such, Barack Obama, and all his policies, will be put under the proverbial microscope and that will hurt the campaign.

2) Spread the wealth...Socialism...Wealth/Income Redistribution

Ever since Joe the Plumber, exposed Barack Obama's affinity for income redistribution, it has given the McCain campaign a new talking point. Watch any cable news show with McCain or his surrogate and they are on message. McCain and his surrogates will hammer Obama with the "income redistribution" label over and over. As a McCain supporter, this is actually frustrating. Barack Obama hasn't hidden his desire for income redistribution. Had McCain used this line of attack earlier the race would likely look a lot different. That said, in the last days of a campaign it is always important to come up with something new. McCain has a new message while Obama continues to hammer at old themes. Furthermore, the income redistribution attack was given new credence with the release of this audio.



If McCain is wise, he would also make issue of this statement Barack Obama made to the Democratic Socialists of America in Chicago in 1996.

The first is “human capital development”. By this he meant public education, welfare reform, and a “workforce preparation strategy”. Public education requires equality in funding. It’s not that money is the only solution to public education’s problems but it’s a start toward a solution. The current proposals for welfare reform are intended to eliminate welfare but it’s also true that the status quo is not tenable. A true welfare system would provide for medical care, child care and job training. While Barack Obama did not use this term, it sounded very much like the “social wage” approach used by many social democratic labor parties. By “workforce preparation strategy”, Barack Obama simply meant a coordinated, purposeful program of job training instead of the ad hoc, fragmented approach used by the State of Illinois today.

The state government can also play a role in redistribution, the allocation of wages and jobs. As Barack Obama noted, when someone gets paid $10 million to eliminate 4,000 jobs, the voters in his district know this is an issue of power not economics. The government can use as tools labor law reform, public works and contracts.

This would be the final verdict on Barack Obama's plan to redistribute wealth in America. Income redistribution is overwhelmingly unfavorable in the U.S. A Gallup poll in March showed that it was disapproved by 84-13. McCain is on message and he finally has one that is effectively corroding Obama's support.

3) Joe Biden

The Vice Presidential candidate has become a magnet for gaffes and controversy. It first started with this interview with Diane West.


The Obama campaign already shunned the station that employs West and now it appears they are banning a second station. This sort of contentious attitude toward any media that they don't like is frankly downright chilling.





This became an internet sensation and furthermore it turned West into a bit of a national celebrity for a couple days. By doing so, it attracted attention to not only very un Presidential behavior by Biden but also lingering questions about Obama's Marxist tendencies.

The second controversy came right on the heels of this one with West.



Finally, Biden had this interview...


in which he suggested that Obama would cut taxes to those that make $150,000 and less. Of course, the campaign has insisted it is only those making $200,000 and less. This lends more credence to McCain's contention that Obama is not being totally truthful when he says that his tax cuts will only be for the very wealthy. Since these gaffes, Biden has become incognito. As such, the campaign realizes that Biden is a disaster that needs to be muzzled. That's not a good place to be.

4) Rashid Khalidi

Yet another radical associate of Barack Obama's has emerged in the last weeks of the campaign. Now, Khalidi would be more of an issue if the L.A. Times released a tape in which Barack Obama praises Khalidi at an event, attended by among others Bill Ayers, while others at the same event condemn and spew venom at Israel. Still, one other radical associate of Barack Obama is not a good thing. Khalidi is the radical, now professor, and former spokesperson for the PLO, when that organization was deemed a terrorist group by the United States. Barack Obama was a colleague of Khalidi's at the University of Chicago. It's unclear if only partisans care about this. There is certainly a lot of buzz about this in the right blogosphere, however I don't know how many independents care. They would care a lot more, however, if they saw on tape Barack Obama singing praise to this man at an event in which Israel was demonized.

5) Campaign donation fraud.

This is likely the most important scandal and also the one that will have the least impact. Here is what the Washington Post said.

In September, according to the campaign, $1.8 million in online contributions was flagged, and $353,000 was refunded. Of the contributions flagged because a foreign address or bank account was involved, 94.1 percent were found to be proper. One-tenth of one percent were marked for refund, and 5.77 percent are still being vetted.

But clearly invented names have been used often enough to provoke an outcry from Republican critics. Donors to the Obama campaign using false names such as Doodad Pro and Good Will gave $17,375 through 1,000 separate donations, with no sign that they immediately tripped alarms at the campaign. Of more concern, Cairncross said, are reports that the campaign permitted money from 123 foreign nationals to enter its accounts.

Obama officials said they have identified similar irregularities in the finance records of their Republican rival, Sen. John McCain. "Every campaign faces these challenges -- John McCain's campaign has refunded more than $1.2 million in contributions from
anonymous, excessive and fraudulent contributors -- and we have reviewed and
strengthened our procedures to ensure that the contributions the campaign accepts are appropriate," said Ben LaBolt, an Obama spokesman.

McCain's contributor database shows at least 201 donations from individuals listing themselves as "anonymous" or "anonymous anonymous," according to Obama's
campaign. In one particularly embarrassing episode, the McCain campaign mistakenly sent a fundraising solicitation to the Russian ambassador to the United Nations.

Now, it's unlikely that mos of the public will even know about Senator Obama's troubling lack of oversight of credit card donations. The campaign has removed many safeguards that normally guard against fraud. It accepts pre paid cards, and it has accepted donations from those that clearly have made up names. The campaign says that they have plenty of safeguards on the "back end". That means that they have safeguards to insure that fraudulent donations are caught after they have been received, but they collected $150,000,000 last month alone. Furthermore, how in the world can they spot fraud from a pre paid credit card? Unfortunately, I believe that Barack Obama will take no political hit for this but he should.

There you have it. Five days left and a lead that is nearly insurmountable, but there is also a perfect storm of campaign trouble. An irresistable force meets an immovable object. Which will win? We'll find out on November 4th.

Barack Obama, Rashid Khalidi, Election 2008, the MSM...A Thought Experiment

Let's pretend for a minute that suddenly the MSM woke and decided to no longer be in the tank for Barack Obama. Let's just imagine what would happen with the story of the relationship between Rashid Khalidi and Barack Obama. Let's even assume that everything in the past happened exactly as it did.

First, let's review. Rashid Khalidi is currently a professor at Columbia University. He was once a professor at the University of Chicago where he was a colleague of Barack Obama's. They had some sort of a relationship though it is unclear just how close that relationship is. The L.A. Times published a story in which the author, Peter Wallsten, talks about a going away party thrown in the honor of Mr. Rashidi in which this occurred.

During the dinner a young Palestinian American recited a poem accusing the Israeli government of terrorism in its treatment of Palestinians and sharply criticizing U.S. support of Israel. If Palestinians cannot secure their own land, she said, "then you will never see a day of peace."

One speaker likened "Zionist settlers on the West Bank" to Osama bin Laden, saying both had been "blinded by ideology."

Among the attendees were none other than Mr. and Mrs. Khalidi, Mr. and Mrs. Obama, and Mr. and Mrs. William Ayers. According to Gateway Pundit, the L.A. Times has a copy of a tape of this soiree but they won't release it. Here what Little Green Footballs produced regarding the L.A. Times' response to readers asking for release of the tape.

The Times did write about the tape, so I’m not sure what you mean about suppressing the video or information from the video. Here is a copy of the
report about the video.Thanks again for writing,

Jamie GoldReaders’ Representative
...
If that is the case, then release the video that you have of the event and don’t merely report it. Why is the Los Angeles Times sitting on a videotape of the 2003 farewell bash in Chicago at which Barack Obama lavished praise on the guest of honor, Rashid Khalidi - former mouthpiece for master terrorist Yasser Arafat?
...
Thanks for your note back. It sounds as if you don’t find “mere reporting” to be enough, but The Times is not suppressing anything.Just the opposite — the L.A. Times brought the matter to light. Thanks again for taking the time to
write.

Jamie GoldReaders’ Representative

Now, there is no reason either journalistically or business wise not to release the tape. We've all heard the saying "a picture is worth a thousand words". Well, here an audio would also be worth a thousand words. There is no way for the reader to get any proper context without hearing the audio. As such, the L.A. Times' refusal to release the tape is another example of the MSM being in the tank.

Now, let's just imagine they weren't. What would happen? The first thing that would happen is that the Times website would approach records for number of hits in a single day. Those in sales, advertising, and marketing would have a field day trying to figure out ways to make money in banner advertising on that particular page. The L.A. Times would be linked by everyone from this blog to the government website of Kenya and everyone in between. The Times would go from scourge of the Conservative community to heroes. Their circulation would explode as Republicans and Independents would see the Times as a "courageous newspaper" and forgive all prior transgressions. The banner ad from this page would fetch fifty to one hundred times what they would normally fetch. (given their current struggles the extra ad revenue couldn't come at a better time)

They would become the scourge of the left wing establishment of the likes of Daily Kos, Moveon.org, and Media Matters. Their circulation would drop among the more liberal readers, but not nearly as much as it would pick up by Conservatives. Furthermore, the massive attention it would receive would also explode circulation.

The Times would be wise not to allow embed of the video and to warn You Tube et al ahead of time that the video is the Times' property and so it can't be downloaded in their sites. As such, they would be the one and only holders of the most talked about thing in the world.

The Obama campaign would call them a lackey for the McCain campaign and call it a coordinated plot between McCain, Fox News, and the L.A. Times. Then, all their reporters would be banned from interviewing the campaign. Obama's spokespeople would be on every airway calling this a distraction from the real issues. They would say this is a desperate attempt by the McCain campaign to to distract the public from the failing economy. Surrogates would becry this tape as guilt by associations. Sean Hannity would begin repeating: Chickens come home to roost, the first time in my life I am proud of my country, Bill Ayers unrepetent terrorist, and the crook Tony Rezko (though frankly that would be no different than what he does now) over and over.

Politically, the tape would then run as the so called loop for the next several days. Eventually of course, that tape would begin to run in a loop with some other well known tapes.


The Khalidi relationship would then be examined in the prism of the relationship that Barack Obama had with the likes of Bill Ayers. In other words, it would be the death knell of the Obama campaign. The inflammatory nature of this tape especially combined with the inflamatory nature of the Wright tapes, would send chills down the spines of most voters. I would take a bet as long as I got the "reasonable" 3 to 2 (in other words I bet two dollars to win 3) odds that Obama loses Illinois. The Democrats might not gain any seats. They might even lose seats. Barack Obama and the Democrats would suffer a stunning loss just as they were tasting victory.

All of this would happen merely by releasing a tape that any basic journalism student could tell you should be released regardless of the impact.

Will the Tape Be a Game Changer

Definitely...maybe. First here is the tape again.




There are many ways to examine its effect. First of all, you go to the source. So far, it has had just over 1.5 million viewings on Youtube and approaching fifteen thousand comments. That is a stunning amount. Clearly, it has had an immediate impact. What remains to be seen is just how many viewings it will have in a week. If the video has had its run and we seen only a small gain from here then its impact from this angle will be limited. The magic number for me is ten million and one hundred thousand. If it gets ten million viewings and one hundred thousand comments, then it will have a serious impact on the campaign from the You Tube angle.

That's just one way to look at it though. The other way is how does this tape affect the news cycle. Let's take a look.


and...





Here is a sampling of the media coverage on the net. Finally, here is some anecdotal evidence. I wrote this piece comparing Barack Obama to Karl Marx. Since this tape has come out I have had about three hundred looks at that piece. I normally get anywhere from one to ten. In other words, there is enormous interest in the idea that Barack Obama is like Karl Marx. Of course, what I don't know is if all the interest is coming from the right. Still, clearly this tape has an immediate effect and it has now dominated the media coverage.



That won't be enough to be a game changer. So, what John McCain needs to do is continue keep making this an issue. McCain has a them upon which to attack Obama incessently for the next seven days and he must take it. Joe the Plumber opened up this attack, and that's what makes this tape so potentially devastating. What it really does is reinforce a major vulnerability. By reinforcing his initial gaffe, the idea that Barack Obama wants to redistribute our wealth becomes that much clear to the voters. The rest of the campaign will be spent dissecting Barack Obama because that's what happens when you are in the lead.



Now, a couple of days ago, I suggested that John McCain repeat over and over this quote.



FROM THOSE ACCORDING TO MEANS TO THOSE ACCORDING TO NEEDS



Now after a couple of days, I think that is likely too loaded a line of attack. Openly comparing Barack Obama to Karl Marx (the author of this quote) is something that might make some sense for a provocative blogger, but it is likely too provocative for a Presidential campaign. Rather the McCain campaign should continue to attack using the same line they have been using.

INCOME OR WEALTH REDISTRIBUTION

That frankly is one of the most important concepts in Socialism or Marxism and so frankly it's much the same as calling him a Marxist only doing it in a more tactful way.



The most important thing the McCain campaign needs to verbalize in interviews, on the stump, and in commercials is this. Each and everytime a Democrat defends the Obama tax cut they proclaim that giving a tax cut to the middle class is not income redistribution. Cutting taxes for 95% of the people is not income redistribution.



The McCain campaign needs to make crystal clear that Barack Obama intends on getting the money for all of these tax cuts by raising taxes on those that are wealthy. This isn't merely raising the income tax. It is raising the capital gains tax, the corporate tax, the inheritance tax,
and a brand new payroll tax on the wealthy only (to go to fund the Social Security income of those that aren't as wealthy)

What Senator Obama believes is that those that already pay about 40% of their incomes toward don't pay enough and should pay more like 50%. Meanwhile those that pay ZERO in federal income taxes pay too much and they will pay less. That's the definition of income redistribution. If Senator McCain that point forcefully and does it over and over, he will make the sale that Senator Obama's plans are nothing more than income redistribution. (something that polls 84-13 against).

From Each According to Their Means To Each According to Their Needs: McCain's Last Play

In response to a recent post, I received this astute comment with an advertising idea for John McCain.

(voiceover)From each according to his ability, to each according to his need. This was the philosophy of Karl Marx.

When a hardworking plumber, concerned about Barack Obama's tax plan, asked him why he was going to raise his taxes here is how Barack Obama responded.

(Cut to the video clip of Obama saying this)I don't want to punish your success. I just want to make sure that everyone that is behind you. They have a chance for success too.

(voiceover)We don't need a President whose tax policies were inspired by Karl Marx, nor do we need a president who thinks he is Robin Hood, stealing from the rich to give to the poor. We need someone who understands our country and our history.

Barack Obama. . . Not ready to lead.

(John McCain voice over)I'm John McCain and I approved this message.

In fact, Joe Biden was recently asked about this Karl Marx quote in a recent interview.



If you think the comparison between the philosophy of Karl Marx and the policies Barack Obama, look at it this way.

What do you think it is when someone thinks that "when you spread the wealth around that's good for everybody". Of course, it's as Karl Marx said.

FROM EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR MEANS TO EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR NEEDS

Still not convinced...Let's try it this way. Barack Obama has promised to raise the taxes of the top five percent as much as an extra ten percent. Furthermore, he will raise the capital gains taxes on these same folks, re install the inheritance tax, and raise the corporate tax. What will he do with this money? He will give tax breaks to everyone below them.

FROM EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR MEANS TO EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR NEEDS

You still aren't convinced. Who does Barack Obama intend on giving a tax cut to? It's to the middle class of course? How does he plan on paying for this tax cut? He plans on raising taxes on the wealthy of course.

FROM EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR MEANS TO EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR NEEDS

If you still aren't convinced, just listen to Joe Biden himself from the very interview I have embedded

All we want is to focus on the middle class and to give them a fighting chance. That's why we focus all of our efforts on the MIDDLE CLASS and giving them a tax cut...while John McCain gives a tax cut to the wealthiest people and corporations.

Like I said again,

FROM EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR MEANS TO EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR NEEDS

Barack Obama's tax policies, and frankly economic policies, are classic Marxian policies. From the blatant class warfare, to income redistribution, to his insistence thatjobs be created by the government, his economic platform is a reincarnation of Karl Marx.

John McCain needs to say it, say it, and say it again.

FROM EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR MEANS TO EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR NEEDS

On the stump, in interviews, and in every commercial they can spare...

FROM EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR MEANS TO EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR NEEDS

When Barack Obama talks about giving the middle class a tax cut by raising taxes on the wealthiest what he's really saying is...

FROM EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR MEANS TO EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR NEEDS

When Barack Obama says he wants to spread your wealth around what he's really saying is

FROM EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR MEANS TO EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR NEEDS

When he proclaims that the last eight years has created an income gap that he will resolve what he's really saying is.

FROM EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR MEANS TO EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR NEEDS

McCain needs to say it again and again until he forces the media, like this Florida reporter, to ask it of the Obama campaign. That's because you can't get around this fact. What's the Obama economic philosophy...

FROM EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR MEANS TO EACH ACCORDING TO THEIR NEEDS

...

The Political Science Class Lessons of the McCain Campaign

1) Sarah Palin is dynamic, charismatic, and telegenic on television and yet the McCain campaign decided to hide her.

(H/T Race 2008 I just took a peak at this interview of Sarah Palin by CNN

I can't understand what in the world the McCain campaign was thinking when handling the VP. She should have done all sorts of interviews. First of all, I wouldn't have rolled her out with Charlie Gibson. The first interview I would have had her done was local or state. I would have done something unconventional and given the local television station from Wasilla have to first interview. Then, I would have done a national interview. She should have done Rush's show right away. She frankly should have begun to do a lot of talk radio. Prior to her being

She frankly should have shown up every. She should have given local interviews in battleground states like in Philadelphia, Santa Fe, Grand Rapids, etc. Heck she should done interviews with bloggers.

The bottom line is she should have been in front of the camera and microphone as much as possible. Instead, we heard one of the greatest speeches of all time. Then, a week later a set of the worst set of interviews of all time. Then, we basically didn't hear her anywhere until the debate. Why would they hide her? It was mind boggling how badly they mishandled her.

2) Either you define your opponent or the opponent defines himself.

It was irritating watching McCain allow Obama to define his tax plan as being a tax cut for 95% of the people. I didn't hear him even point out that 40% of the people don't pay tax cuts until a couple weeks ago. He never once responded to Senator Obama's proclamation in any debate that 95% of the people would get a tax cut by pointing this out.

Then, Senator Obama's tax cut is a series of gimmicks and McCain couldn't figure out how to expose them. Joe the Plumber knew better than the McCain campaign how to attack Obama's plans. The McCain campaign should have been visiting successful small businesses all around the country showing how Obama's tax cuts would negatively affect their business. I would find a business like a successful company doing something in alternative energy.

The small business owner could point out that they could hire less workers as they walk through their staff. They could have shown some of the equipment that they use and would have to cut back on. Again, Barack Obama has been allowed to define the tax cuts as folks like himself and Warren Buffet. It could have been successful small business owner.

The issue goes on and on like this. Obama is able to define each portion of the tax issue in his favor. I watched Mike Huckabee on Fox News the other day, and he would have been able to pick apart the plan.

3) If you are going to stick your neck out, stick it all the way out.

So, McCain suspends his campaign, goes back to D.C., and then he winds up spending one day at his Virginia office. What was the point of coming back if all he did was massage a bad bill. The Republicans in the House had a great alternative. By sticking with them, he could have instantaneously distanced himself from Bush. Furthermore, Obama would have been left agreeing with Bush. The worst part from McCain's perspective, was that he always had an ace in the hole. The Democrats controlled both chambers. He could have always stipulated that if the Democrats wanted to pass a bill they could, but if they wanted the Republicans on board it wouldn't be a bailout.

It would have been the effective and astute political move. He would have come out taking control of the economic issue. It was mindboggling watching John McCain in the first debate simply saying that he wanted a bi partisan bill. This is where he likely lost the election.

4) Your opponent is far left economically. You don't need to move to the left on the issue.

For some odd reason, Senator McCain decides to propose a massive bailout of borrowers effectively blunting any attack on Obama's economic record. This mortgage bailout is mind boggling. Not only is it an asinine idea, it is totally politically brain dead. How can you say Barack Obama wants to increase the size of government and propose a $250 billion bailout for borrowers.

5) It's never over till it's over.

He learned it starting in the summer of 2007, and it isn't over now.

Here is how I viewed the other side.

A Tale of Two Endorsements

The Military Times released its latest polling results of military personnel from all branches of the military regarding the upcoming Presidential election. The results are in and they are overwhelming. The military wants John McCain to be their Commander in Chief. The polling, measuring a breadth of ranks, units, and military divisions, found that by a nearly three to one margin the military wants John McCain to be its next Commander in Chief. Why should this matter? On many levels it shouldn't. The only reason it should matter is because you will likely hear little about the results of this poll.

On the other hand, Colin Powell came out on Sunday and endorsed Barack Obama. Now, I pointed the other day that I was disgusted by the manner in which the conservative media demonized and marginalized both Colin Powell and his endorsement of Barack Obama. That said, what is truly amazing is the utter lack of context that the MSM has created with Colin Powell's endorsement. Unless you watch Fox News or read conservative blogs, you are rather unlikely to know that this poll was even taken. Yet, MSM commentators are all over the place making it seem as though Colin Powell's endorsement means that Barack Obama is just as ready to be Commander in Chief as John McCain.

Of course, if you listened to a pundit from the MSM like Eugene Robinson, you would get the idea that Colin Powell speaks for everything military.

Colin Powell demonstrated his eponymous "Powell Doctrine" of overwhelming force on Sunday when he endorsed Barack Obama on Meet the Press. The one-time chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff systematically marshaled his assets to neutralize the Republican endgame strategy, which is to suffuse the air around Obama with a vague mist of terrorism, socialism and "otherness."

Powell was so definitive that it was easy to forget the disconnect: Obama made his reputation with a speech in 2002 warning against war in Iraq, while it was Powell who went before the United Nations and used his credibility to build support for the Iraq invasion.

Powell told Tom Brokaw that he still believes that war was the right course of action, based on what he and other officials knew -- or thought they knew -- at the time. He said he believes the war was mishandled. And he said he still opposes a "deadline" for withdrawing U.S. troops, though he added that a "timeline" for withdrawal is beginning to emerge.

That would be a fair summation of John McCain's position on Iraq, not Obama's. Powell framed his endorsement largely in terms of how McCain, Sarah Palin and their supporters have conducted the campaign against Obama -- and what that conduct says about McCain's judgment. It was hard not to conclude that Powell is offended by some of the Republican tactics and that he has decided to fire back in a way that Obama cannot.

In Robinson's estimation, the only one worthy of making a referendum on the Iraq War is Colin Powell himself. The men and women in uniform, if you read someone like Eugene Robinson, are totally irrelevant as far as opinions on the war they are now fighting. Of course, it should be pointed out that John McCain also received the endorsement of four previous Secretaries of State and 200 Generals, but again, none of their endorsements mean anything if you read the MSM.

Personally, I don't believe that any endorsement carries any weight. Everyone should make their own minds. They shouldn't look to someone else to make it for them. What is utterly despicable is the total lack of context that the MSM brought to the endorsement of Barack Obama by Colin Powell. While hundreds of thousands of current fighting men and women pick John McCain overwhelmingly to be their next Commander in Chief, those endorsements won't even be recognized by the MSM. Yet, the endorsement of one previous General will be made into some sort of game changer, as if no one that's ever served in the military would have endorsed Barack Obama.

The endorsement of Colin Powell should have been given its due, however so should the endorsement of four other Secretaries of State and 200 former Generals. Furthermore, so should have the hundreds of thousands of current military personnel. That one endorsement was isolated because it was the one that fit the worldview of the MSM is further proof of their blatant bias and corruption.

Time for McCain to Sharpen the Socialist Attacks

I read this piece on CNN and it gave me an idea about the manner in which John McCain should proceed in the last fifteen days.

Gov. Sarah Palin continued the GOP offensive Sunday, attacking Sen. Barack Obama's tax plan as "socialist," and though Sen. John McCain tempered his allegations, his message was the same.

The Palin-McCain line of attack was also echoed at an Orlando, Florida, event by their GOP colleague, Sen. Mel Martinez, who likened Obama's tax plan to communist Cuba.

"Where I come from, where I was raised, they tried wealth redistribution," the Cuban-American senator said. "We don't need that here. That's called socialism, communism -- not Americanism."

McCain dodged a question from Fox News' Chris Wallace about whether Obama, the Democratic presidential nominee, was a socialist himself, but McCain criticized Obama's tax plan, which he dubbed an effort "to spread the wealth."

Now, reading this piece got me thinking. If the McCain campaign makes the last fifteen days into an effective examination of Obama's policies and links them to socialism, they will win. That's because despite his eloquence his policies are largely socialistic in nature. That said, simply repeating over and over that he wants to "spread the wealth" and using that as proof of his socialism is not nearly enough. It appears that Dick Morris is again an oracle.

Follow this election cycle. Between the summer of 2007 and the end of February of 2008, all focus was on Hillary Clinton’s ups and downs. And Obama defeated her decisively. Then in March and April of 2008, Obama was in the focus and Rev Wright and the surrounding controversy propelled Hillary to victory. Then during the summer of 2008, all eyes were on Obama and he gained. In September, McCain was on the griddle. At first his selection of Sarah Palin let him move ahead. But then his “suspension” of his campaign and subsequent complicity in the bailout package cost him his lead and moved Obama to an advantage just short of double digits.
Now the attention should logically shift to Obama. He is way ahead and McCain is nowhere to be seen. Few give McCain any chance and the debate is over whether the race is over already. This is, of course, the ideal environment for a McCain surge. All attention would normally focus on the Democrat. But it isn’t. Every American checks the market before they check the polls. The ongoing anxiety over the stock market is not only giving more and more people reason to hate the Republicans of Wall Street and their allies in Washington, but it is keeping us from focusing on Obama.

In fact, as the race nears the end, with Obama in the lead, the focus is in fact now flatly on the front runner. This gives the McCain campaign an opportunity to massage the news cycle so that it focuses on Obama's policies in a manner that is optimum for the McCain campaign. If all the McCain campaign does is repeat Joe the Plumber, spread the wealth, and socialism over and over it won't be enough. It won't be near enough. In order for this to work, they must create a narrative and a narrative can be created that will leave no doubt that Barack Obama is much closer to a socialist than he is to a capitalist.

Soon, Sarah Palin must point out that Barack Obama believes that health care is a right. John McCain believes it is a responsibility. That was each of their answers at the second debate. Palin needs to forcefully point out that it was never the founding fathers intention to make health care a right. If it was, that's exactly what they would have done. When health care is a right that means the government imposes that "right". That's exactly what happens in Socialist societies. In fact, it isn't only in Cuba and Venezuela, but as Europe has moved more socialist, they have also created such rights as health care. John McCain should welcome a debate on whether or not it makes sense to make health care a right. He needs to use Sarah Palin to move the debate from Joe the Plumber to whether or not our country should make health care a right.

Then, the McCain campaign should point out that the center piece of Barack Obama's plan to create jobs the government to spend nearly a quarter million Dollars to create them. Remember, the center piece of Ronald Reagan's plan to create jobs was to cut taxes so that the private sector could create them. You can't get a more opposite philosophy than that. Of course, when the government spends more in order to create jobs, that is another center piece of Socialism, and again, Sarah Palin, the attack dog, must forcefully say it. The McCain campaign campaign must ask the simple question: Do we want a society in which the private sector leads in job creation or the government? If it's the first, vote for McCain, if it's the latter, vote for Obama.

Finally, the McCain campaign will need to wrap up the narrative in the last week in three ways. First, they must point out that Barack Obama's economic plan punishes each and every driver of capitalism: the entrepeneur, the investor, and the corporation. Barack Obama wants to raise the corporate tax, taxes on the highest earners, many of whom are successful small business owners, and the capital gains tax. Furthermore, he once told Charlie Gibson in a debate that he wants to raise the capital gains tax in the interest of "fairness". Of course, using tax policy to promote "fairness" is another bedrock of Socialism.

Second, they must soon begin to anticipate Obama's responses and use them against him. This was actually best done in this scene in the movie 8 Mile.



In it, Eminem's character anticipates all the insults his opponent will use in his own free style mix and thus takes away all the attacks from him. It isn't that difficult to anticipate what Barack Obama will say in response because he says the same thing over and over.

Lately, [McCain] and Governor Palin have actually accused me of -- get this -- socialism," Obama said. "It's kind of hard to figure how Warren Buffett endorsed me, Colin Powell endorsed me, and John McCain thinks I'm socialist."

Taxes are always a redistribution of money. Most of the taxes that are redistributed go back to those who pay them -- in roads and airports and hospitals and schools," President Bush's former secretary of state said. "And taxes are necessary for the common good, and there's nothing wrong with examining what our tax structure is or who should be paying more, who should be paying less.

"For us to say that makes you a socialist, I think, is an unfortunate characterization that isn't accurate

Barack Obama always responds by proclaiming that his tax policy will give more back to the middle class.

Here is how Sarah Palin should anticipate his response.

Folks, make no mistake. If Socialism is sold eloquently and with charisma, it can be made to sound like a great policy, but it will be Socialism nonetheless. Our opponent will tell you that he isn't a Socialist. In fact, he will say that all he is doing is providing more relief to the middle class. Folks, ask yourself this question: Where is he getting the money he is providing to the middle class. He's getting it from those at the top. That's income redistribution. He'll tell you that his plan will create jobs. Ask yourself how he wants to go about creating jobs. He will spend government money to do it. When government spends money to create jobs, that's socialism. He's going to tell you that health care is a right. Ask yourself what sort of person creates a right to health care, and of course that person is a Socialist.

Finally, the McCain campaign needs to wrap this up by tying Obama's Socialist leanings to many of his radical ties like Bill Ayers, the New Party, ACORN, and Frank Marshall Davis (his communist mentor in Hawaii). By tying his Socialist leanings to his radical set of friends and associates, they can make the connection why his past associations matter. It's because they have lead him to the ideology in which he wants to put America on a path to Socialism.