Nation-Building

I'd previously been a fan of Richardson for Obama's veep, but the results today coming out of West Virginia have made me question whether a brown-black ticket wouldn't be overdoing it. Todd Beeton lays out a number of reasons why the Hillary veep scenario makes sense, not least of which being that a majority of Democratic voters want it to happen, according to a US News poll: In a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll, 55% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents also would like Illinois Sen. Barack Obama to choose Clinton as his running mate, although there's notable resistance among his backers. [...] Three of four Clinton supporters would like to see her on Obama's ticket. But 52% of Obama supporters would rather he "choose someone else." There are however pragmatic reasons for Hillary as veep, as Todd also notes. I think that anyone who is automatically against Hillary for Veep is needs to understand the role that a Vice President pick plays. In order of impo...

I hate to pessimistic or cynical, but I think the nutty Pastor achieved his goal of payback to Barack Obama by sufficiently muddying the waters to cost Obama the Indiana primary. The recent Rassmussen poll numbers show a cratering of support for Obama there after Wright repudiated his repudiation. It remains to be seen whether Obama's unequivocal re-repudiation of Wright will let his numbers recover, but I think in a race as close as Indiana that barring a slipup or scandal from Clinton, even the slightest molehill can play a mountainous role. Clinton is taking some well-deserved heat on one thing or another but plant closings and foreign jobs and whatnot don't have the raw emotional resonance of a Crazy Black Man. As Trippi has argued , Clinton's real focus is on North Carolina. At present Clinton still hasn't broken through a ceiling of 44% support there, but coming off a win in Indiana, the momentum might well change. Ultimately though this still boils down to the s...

This Dem primary has been invaluable in the sense that it has been a goldmine for the demographics of the liberal, Democratic-leaning electorate. In a post I did a while back, I compared the primary outcomes for Ohio to Wisconsin and found that the two looked remarkably different: Wisconsin is not a rust belt state like OH and PA and hence economic concerns (especially NAFTA-gate, which turned out to have been wholly false) play a greater role in the voters’ consideration. Wisconsin has a much more diverse economic foundation and thus I think Wisconsin was more receptive to idealistic arguments than mere pocketbook and standard of living ones. The electoral maps of Ohio and Wisocnsin are almost inverted: Obama consistently does well in urban areas but the rural regions of both states were played quite differently. Like many others, I predicted that the PA map would resemble Ohio more than Wisconsin, and that turned out to indeed be the case: It's interesting to note that Indiana ...

Even as Pennsylvania looms like a storm on the horizon, the dry spell between primaries has left the fields of the liberal blogsphere in substantive-debate drought, ablaze with the fires of fraternal warfare. The lines of polemic have consolidated around several narratives: - Hillary should resign, because she can't win - Obama is a weak candidate in the general election - Hillary is destroying the party by giving the GOP ammunition/using their attacks - Obama is just another politician who lies and panders - McCain is benefiting from the delay in choosing a nominee - The damage to the Democrats from this civil war is permanent I like to think of these tropes as She's Lost, He'll Lose, She's a Traitor, He's a Liar, We're Screwed, and Why Can't We All Get Along, respectively. And yet all of these, every single one, is completely wrong. Let's take a cool and clear-headed view at each in turn. She's Lost For Hillary to win, she needs to win win by the r...

It's a tight race in Wisconsin but I think Obama will eke out a win here. Given the way the primary mechanics work in Texas , I also think that Obama is going to win there, largely because Clinton's campaign didn't seem to be paying attention (and truthfully never expected to have to fight beyond Super Tuesday). In Ohio, even though the polls show Obama slightly ahead , I still think Hillary has an advantage. Let's see how it all pans out. The chips begin to fall tomorrow.

Even though Obama seems to be bypassing us, Hillary will not be : Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton's campaign has announced which cities she will visit on her Saturday night-through-Tuesday morning tour of the Badger State, though no details on times or dates. Her campaign will take her to: Milwaukee, Green Bay, Madison, Eau Claire, Wausau and Oshkosh. Depending on when she will be here, I might well bundle the baby up and go to Wausau to hear her speak. Who knows, without Obama to make his case in person, maybe Hillary can seal the deal :)

Having spent 9 years in Texas, I am unused to the idea that my vote will actually count for much. But now that I live in Wisconsin, which votes next Tuesday, it seems that my vote has real power - practically every candidate running for President is here this week: With less than a week to go before Wisconsin's primary on Tuesday, candidates from both parties were on the ground Wednesday. The Republican field made its first stop in Wisconsin, with former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee asking a crowd in Waukesha to help boost his bid for the presidency and saying he would maintain the party's core principles in a way front-runner John McCain, a U.S. senator from Arizona, could not. For his part, McCain will campaign in Wisconsin on Friday. Meanwhile, Democratic U.S. Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois visited Janesville, Waukesha and Racine, talking about inequality in the global economy and his plan to address it. In Racine, Obama's campaign pumped some dollars into the local econo...

Only one conclusion can be drawn from Super Tuesday, as far as the Democratic nomination goes: it was super-inconclusive. Obama and Hillary did not win decisively, but rather are now in a true horserace. Clinton's strategy was to go for the big prizes like California and Texas, whereas Obama's was more to aim for the smaller caucuses and primaries, competing everywhere. The parallel to the dispute between party establishment Clintonites like Rahm Emanuel and DNC Chairman Howard Dean over the 50-state strategy is not accidental. There's a deep rift inside the Democratic Party and Clinton stands firmly on one side, Obama (and Dean, and Al Gore) on the other. In fact the nomination process itself is a proxy battle for this civil war; consider the factors that will determine the outcome: a distributed small-donor base versus big-name backers and bundling a "compete everywhere" strategy vs. a "maximized return" strategy the brewing battle over the delegates f...

I know my track record thus far is dismal but I'm going out on one of the remaining limbs and calling SC for Edwards today. This won't help Edwards much on Tsunami Tuesday in February, but what it will do is keep him viable enough to survive beyond it. I assume that Edwards will have a solid bloc of delegates going into the convention, maybe not for kingmaker, but enough at least to influence the policy platform. Is he angling for Veep? I don't think he can appeal to either Hillary or Obama for that, and he is in a sense somewhat damaged from 2004. Let's see how it goes today.

It is almost obscene how much I am enjoying this election year, and it's only just begun. I love being wrong because my predictions thus far have been the kind you make in a year where the dynamics are known and oppressive, where polls not people matter. But not this time. It seems instead that there is a poll backlash instead. Consider: Hillary took New Hampshire. That excites me to no end. How about this for a crazy theory? Obama's wave of independent support was imminent and then indies said to themselves, "he we like Obama. You know, we also like McCain. Since Obama's got this in the bag (according to all the polls), they reason, what the heck, let's support McCain instead and keep Romney down. Result? McCain sins the indies, and Obama loses them - making the race closer on the Democratic side. Meanwhile, Democrats who've been following the news are suddenly reading how after the meaningless Iowa caucuses, Hillary is supposed to close up shop, it's over...

some men aren't .

A pair of similar news reports give me pause. First , Pakistan tribal elders shot dead Gunmen in Pakistan have shot dead eight pro-government tribal leaders in the troubled South Waziristan region on Afghanistan's border, officials say. The tribesmen were killed in two separate attacks on Sunday night and early Monday, a security official said. and second , Suicide Bomber Kills Key Sunni Leader in Baghdad BAGHDAD — A suicide bomber assassinated a key leader of American-backed militia forces in a Sunni stronghold of Baghdad on Monday morning, the latest attack on nationalist Sunnis who have recently allied themselves with American troops. That attack, and a second bomb that exploded minutes later, killed at least six and wounded another 26 in total, hospital officials said. The killing of the militia leader, Col. Riyadh al-Samarrai, on the fringes of north Baghdad’s Adhamiyah district, was one of the most significant attacks so far on leaders of former Sunni insurgents who have band...

Charles Bird at RedState recently made an articulate and principled case for John McCain . Ultimately, for Charles (who I respect very highly), it came down to one thing: character. Keep that in mind when watching this:

It's 2000 all over again, and this time it's blogs who are the mainstream media (though the mainstream media is also the mainstream media). Case in point: Kos takes Hillary to task ! Hillary said she paid a tip but actually the waitress says she didn't even though the manager says she did and the campaign she did but now there's questions about her TRUTHFULNESS and lol OMFG HILLARY"S WEBSITE HASN'T UPDATED WITH THIS!! I am paraphrasing somewhat. Why are the liberal netroots so eager to buy into the bogus frames and smears of the right? As far as I can see it's because it's just too tempting not to pile on. Fundamentally, Hillary's crime is not sharing the dogma about Iraq withdrawal. And because of that, every smear on the right is going to get serious traction on the left. This is dangerous brinksmanship. If Hillary beats Rudy, it will be in spite of teh netroots, not because of it. If she loses, then the netroots become the Green Party circa 200...

The resemblance of this video to the other one is ... not a good thing.

As others have noted , the GOP field is running against Hillary Clinton, as if she were the incumbent in the White House rather than George Bush. This hilarious, yet pathetic, video from TPMtv makes the point pretty effectively: I think that once the filing deadline for NH passes and (assumed) Gore does not file, then it's time to pick a horse. I have serious problems with Hillary, admittedly, and in many ways Obama would be a stronger candidate with more crossover appeal. But in the absence of a Gore run (ideally, a Gore/Obama ticket), I think that Hillary is the one who brings the most to the table. I'm probably going to vote for Edwards in the primary but I also intend to show Hillary support because she's taking all the incoming fire from the GOP, and that has given Obama and Edwards both a lot of breathing room.

The Republican presidential candidates are all single-issue candidates. War on Terror? Fiscal hawks? Social values? nope. 2008 is going to be an entertaining election season. This is reason enough to console myself with a Hillary nomination (as increasingly seems inevitable). The headline at myDD is a gem: " Snow White and the 8 Angry Dwarves ".

Markos essentially declares Senator Hillary Clinton to be a nonstarter. I think he's wasting the netroots political capital; and that decision isn't his to make. Kos argues , I don't want her to apologize. I want her to say, "I made a mistake." Edwards did it. Just about every other Democrat who idiotically trusted this president and supported the war has done it. Had Hillary done this last year, the issue would be moot. And does she really want to argue that her vote wasn't wrong? The thing is, that by insisting that her vote was wrong, Kos is the one who is legitimizing the war , not Hillary. Clinton's position - that she stands by her vote, but in retrospect realizes she was misled by the Administration - is reasonable . The context of the AUMF was that the Administration would try diplomacy, would consult with allies, would allow the inspectors to do their job, etc. That was the case that the Administration made to the Congress, using Colin Powell as t...

A few days ago, I asked the following question of former President Jimmy Carter: Dubai Ports deal and allies in the middle east (3+ / 0-) I was dismayed by the way in which the Democratic establishment seized upon the Dubai Ports World deal as a means to burnish their foreign policy credentials at the expense of the Bush Administration. If we are to reform the Arab world, it will require building long-lasting economic links between our societies, and making common cause with political moderates against the Islamists. As has been noted, the Islamophobia evident in the reaction to the DPW deal (which was largely fueled by the Democrats, it must be noted) has had serious consequences . What is President Carter's position on the DPW deal and what strategies does he support for reaching out to the moderates in the middle east? by azizhp on Mon Jun 26, 2006 at 10:50:35 AM CDT Today, President Carter did me the immense honor of replying , as follows: Answer to azizhp: In an interview on ...