McCain v. Obama on the Economy

It's almost funny, if it weren't so sad and predictable, how both sides are trying to cast the other as the continuation of another failed President's policies. Obama calls McCain "Bush's Third Term" and McCain retorts that Barak's tax plan will take us "...back to the policies of the '60s and '70s that failed", invoking Jimmy Carter.

From my view, McCain's linking of Obama to Carter is well off the rails from an economic perspective, but may have some other interesting overtones.

From an economics POV, Barak's policies are more about getting back to the winning policies of the 90's under the Clinton administration, not Carter's. And strangely enough, much of the characteristics of the Carter years (high inflation, rising unemployment, rising gas prices and growing budget and trade deficits) resemble the current economy under Bush 43. And McCain is looking to extend much of the same economic policies that Bush promulgated, most notably the Bush tax cuts...which McCain voted against in 2001 and 2003, but now supports wholeheartedly. Kind of like "I voted against them until I voted for them", perhaps a weird homage paid to Senator Kerry who is seen as the anti-McCain from a Vietnam War perspective.

Now the other thought I've had on McCain's Carter-Obama linkage, is whether there is an ulterior motive of also trying to link them from an Israel policy point of view. Many Jewish voters are already concerned about Barak's support of Israel, partially because Hillary questioned it, on top of the fairly blatant lies about Barak's "Muslim upbringing" while living in Indonesia. While Carter was probably best known for delivering peace between Israel and Egypt in the Camp David Accords, for which he won the Nobel Peace Prize, Carter has recently acted as if he is a founding member of Hamas, pounding Israel at every opportunity. Perhaps the most inflammatory statement being about the existence of more than 150 nuclear warheads in Israel's arsenal (which I think they should use one of to nuke Plains, GA...if the warheads do truly exist). It was a truly idiotic statement by Carter which could accomplish nothing other than to weaken Israel and prop up both Hamas and Iran's push towards becoming a nuclear nation. I can't fathom the upside in pushing for either of those objectives. I think someone should give Carter a CAT-scan as he has clearly suffered some sort of head injury.

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).