Sarah Palin: A Bridge to Nowhere

John McCain has really lost the right to proclaim himself a "maverick". I know he's saying that he didn't choose the safe pick when he announced Sarah Palin as his VP on the ticket ahead of Romney, Pawlenty and Ridge. He even went as far to say that this pick was made on his gut, not on the polls. But I've got to call "Bullshit" on this one. The political calculus here is so obvious.

I'm sure that there are many good attributes in Mrs. Palin's favor, but this is the most obvious case of pandering to a number of constituencies, not least of all the disaffected Hillary voters who feel that the Hill-dog got mis-treated in the Democratic primaries. Palin is supposed to be the:

Bridge to Women Voters: The ultimate pander. In the wake of Obama's victory over Hillary, McCain did everything he could to court the 18 million people who voted for Hillary. Now he took the 'daring' step to bring a woman onto his ticket as VP. But once these female democratic voters start to see some of Palin's positions -- e.g. hard-core Pro-Life and lifetime NRA member -- I don't think the average 'soccer mom' will connect with this particular 'average hockey mom'.

Bridge to the Future: Yeah, McCain is the old guy. He doesn't come across as hip or knowledgeable about any technology invented after 1982. So while people like Bobby Jindal (R-GOV LA) and Tim Pawlenty (R-GOV MN) were in the mix, they had that extra Y chromasome that knocked them out of the running. But Palin's youth and inexperience (2 years as governor of the least populated state and 2 terms of Mayor of a town of 9,000 people; I realize I'm glossing over her run as sports reporter) will blunt McCain's position that Obama is too inexperienced to be President -- especially since at 72, being "one heartbeat away from the presidency" never felt so close

Bridge to Conservative Voters: This one he got right. I do not doubt that in the coming weeks you will hear a lot about the truly heart-wrenching story (no sarcasm intended) of her choice to continue with the pregnancy of her son Trig even though she knew he would be born with Down's Syndrome. It was no shocker that Dr. James Dobson was one of the first to praise her selection. And her other positions on gun control (or lack thereof) and offshore drilling will certainly thrill the conservative base.

But in the end, she will be a Bridge to Nowhere, much like Senator Ted Stevens' (R-AK) misguided project to build a $350M bridge to connect 4 seals to 3 polar bears.

Now the upside from the selection for me is that I think the late night talk show hosts should have a lot of good material to work with. There is no doubt that Jon Stewart will comment on Palin's relative hot-ness in the political world. I mean this is the guy that made a joke about spying a Merkel camel toe in a picture at a G-8 meeting. A few other potential jokes I expect to hear (all of which are terrible. read at your own risk. please play mental rim shot in your head at the end):

Yes, Sarah Palin is immensely popular in Alaska. She has the caribou vote all wrapped up

Sarah Palin will be very comfortable in the White House. After all she grew up in one herself...but it was called an igloo.

Experience and the Democratic Nomination

I was talking with my colleague Jerry Smith today about the latest turn of the Democratic presidential race. Jerry is a conservative Republican, so he's really enjoying all of this...and like many GOP faithful are praying for Hillary to win the nomination.

One of the subjects we discussed was all of the hullabaloo about Clinton's claims that she has the experience to take the 3am phone call and Obama doesn't. It's all crap. It's not as if Obama, or any President for that matter, will live in seclusion and make all the decisions by themselves. There will be advisors everywhere: NSC, Pentagon, Secratary of State, etc. It's the quality of the team that you can build that makes any enterprise successful. Great CEO's don't know the ins and outs of every element of their businesses and neither do great Presidents. Was Reagan an expert on any issue? Probably not. But he was a great leader and surrounded himself with experts.

Hillary touts her 8 years in the White House. Jerry quipped that he heard someone in the media (undoubtedly Fox News because he doesn't accept that any other media exists) that using that logic, a chef who served in the White House can make the same claim. Now I do not doubt that she was far more involved in the Clinton White House than the chef, let's not confuse lunch with Tony Blair's wife with foreign policy experience either. Hyperbole works both ways.

Now Bill Clinton is widely lauded as a great President. Interestingly he was the same age as Obama when he ran for President and did just fine. Jerry noted that he's usually go with someone with gubernatorial experience over a Senator. He thinks the executive experience goes a long way (editor's note: Jerry was a Mitt supporter. We all know how that turned out).

Let's look at Bill's experience prior to entering the White House (we will skip the extramarital encounters segment, but clearly that experience didn't help either when you consider that as the most powerful man in the world he hooked up with Monica). So what was Bill's great accomplishments at Governor of Arkansas -- finishing 49th out of 50 states in education? Did dealing with the backwaters of Arkansas provide any special insight into dealing with third-world countries.

And finally, I think that all Democrats can agree that experience doesn't necessarily lead to good results or good judgment. Dick Cheney and Don Rumsfeld served in government for years. So did our friend "Brownie". 'Nuff said.

She Ain't Getting My Vote

As are many Obama supporters around the country, I was disheartened by the results from Tuesday. I was shocked at the outright drubbing Clinton gave Obama in Ohio.

But as McCain sealed the GOP nomination on the same day, I came back to what Obama said a few weeks ago: "I'm confident that I'll get all her votes, but I don't think that she'll get all of mine". I realize that I'm a sample size of n=1, but I think he's right. She's certainly not getting my vote if she gets to the general election.

Big Mo' in Barack's Corner

After a convincing sweep (if not a trouncing) of the mid-Atlantic primaries (VA, MD and DC) Obama has assumed the delegate lead for the Democratic nomination for the first time since Iowa. That's 8 states in a row and momentum is building. All the while Clinton seems to be stumbling and spinning, not winning.

Texas and Ohio are next and there are huge delegate stakes up for grabs. It will be interesting to see how the next few weeks go. Both Texas and Ohio look to be strongly in the Clinton camp with a high proportion of Latino and middle income voters respectively. Both of these groups have been solidly behind Clinton so far. However, Obama is reaching out to both of these groups. The proof will be in the pudding, but anything short of a convincing (10 point margin) victory by Clinton will be tough to spin if Hillary wants to recapture the mantle of presumtive nominee.

If by chance Obama wins either of these two states it's game over and the only President Clinton will be Bill. But buck up Hillary, being a Senator from New York is still a pretty good gig.

Kennedy Backs Barack

The announcement expected today that senior senator and liberal standard bearer Ted Kennedy will endorse Sen. Barack Obama will have a huge impact leading up to Super Tuesday on Feb 5th. This is a big blow to Clinton and sure just about wrap up Massachusetts for Obama (along with support from Kerry and Gov. Deval Patrick). But more importantly, it should provide Obama with greater support from the Democratic base across the other states voting on Super Tuesday and Florida. This piece of good news for Obama comes right on the heels of Barack's impressive, one would say landslide, victory over Clinton in South Carolina where he more than doubled Hillary's tally.

The support from Kennedy also comes on the heels of the endorsement from Rep Mel Martinez of Florida. Martinez' endorsement could help prop up support for Obama from Latinos, where Clinton has been strong. Clinton's strength with Latinos was most notable in the recent Nevada primary where Clinton produced a 6 point victory in a race where Obama won the endorsement of the largest union in the state, yet Clinton peeled off enough of the union's Latino membership to pull off the victory.

You can also read between the lines that this is a rebuke of the more active and aggressive role that former President Bill Clinton has taken in the race. Bill came under intense rebukes from Democratic leaders like Kerry, Pat Leahy and Tom Daschle in the past few days for distorting Obama's positions much like former Republican strategist Lee Atwater used to do (most famously with the Willie Horton attach against Gov. Mike Dukakis is the 1998 election).

Political Roundup: A couple of quick hits

I'm woefully behind in half the stuff I want to write, so I'll hit some of these issues quickly.

Russia Rejects Stronger Sanction on Iran: It's hard to say if this even qualifies as news. Of course Russia would object to sanctions. They are selling a lot of equipment, especially nuclear related equipment to Iran. Other than oil and gas (which were private institutions before Stalin, I mean Putin, "nationalized", the only burgeoning market for Russia is to sell dangerous materials to dangerous countries. The only thing surprising about the story is that the push for these sanctions came from -- wait for it, wait for it -- France! The pussies from Old Europe getting tough? Maybe this Sarkozy guy is actually pretty cool.


Can Someone Please Explain Why John Edwards is Popular?: I don't get it. Somehow this bozo is still in the top half of the Democratic field for President. Yes, he's good looking, affable and so on, but he's still just a shyster lawyer. He rails against high medical costs, but he made his millions through frivolous law suits which helped to raise the cost of medical care and insurance. He's pandering to the left of the party by flipping his position on the war in Iraq. Big deal. First, it's ingenuous. He's only doing it to be popular with the most activist parts of the party. Like Mitt Romney, I'm not sure I will ever believe him when he tells me the color of his eyes, let alone his "current" position on any issue. But there he is running 3rd or 4th (depending on whether Gore is included in the poll). Yet a guy like Joe Biden, who is arguably the smartest guy running for President in either party, is only polling at 2-3%. I guess voters are stupid. What's worse is that it looks like in an election that the Democrats can't lose, they are leaning towards nominating the one person that has absolutely no chance to win in the General Election -- Hillary. Exasperating.

Lebanon's Bloody Road to a Stable Democracy: Another anti-Syrian member of parliament, Antoine Ghanem, along with 4 others was killed a week ago. He was the 8th Anti-Syrian legislator killed since the February 2005 assassination in Beirut of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, which sparked widespread protests that led to the ouster of Syrian forces from Lebanon (known as the Cedar Revolution). Of course this is happening leading up to Tuesday's scheduled Presidential Election in Lebanon where they are about to vote for a successor to Emil Lahoud, the current President and lap dog for the Syrian regime who must step down at the end of November. The timing of the assassination was so bad, even Hezbollah objected. The latest is that it appears that Lebanon will postpone the election by at least a month. The sad thing is that I don't believe that there's anyone on the planet who doesn't think that Syria was involved. But similarly, I don't think that any country of international body (think the UN) has the balls to do anything to help the citizens of Lebanon. The bloody march to democracy continues.


Petreus' Testimony to Congress: Did anyone expect anything different? Other than the opening line (let me paraphrase -- 'nobody helped me with my homework'), it sounded eerily like Bush's position on the war. I'm not a military analyst by any stretch, but it seems like the same story we've heard since the run-up to the 2004 election -- we're making great progress and the Iraqi military forces should be able to take over soon. Back in the first Bush-Kerry debate Bush stated that by January 2005 there would be over 125,000 Iraqi troops trained to take over some of the military and security duties of US-Coalition forces. I don't think we have that level today, nearly 3 years later. Especially when many non-partisan organizations like the GAO are painting a very different picture of the situation in Iraq, it's hard to believe General Petreus' "interpretation" of the situation.

Progress in Israeli-Palestinian Relations?: OK, here's another one where I won't hold my breath. Nothing would make me happier than a safer Israel and the end to the 60-year old conflict that began when Israel repelled a 5-nation attack on the very day it was formed. But while PM Abbas seems to be a reasonable partner in peace, most of the sticky issues (Jerusalem, right of return) aren't close to being solved. And it's not like Abbas represents the entire Palestinian people. Hamas is quickly turning Gaza into a fundamentalist Muslim theological state, and there is great suffering within those borders as the economy is in tatters. I'm not sure I see an end in sight. I wish I did, but peace still seems out of reach.