Sunday, July 29, 2007

Sunday Talk Review-The McLaughlin Report (PBS)-Bonus coverage.

For some reason the video game championships preempted the local CBS affiliate broadcast of Face the Nation (airing at midnight in Des Moines) so we here at the Real Sporer will have the rare opportunity to watch the McLaughlin Report.

Hillary vs. Barack

Pat Buchanan (paleocon) – Hillary won the substantive debate but Obama winning the after party fight by calling Evita’s vote to authorize the Iraq campaign, thereby linking her to Bush/Cheney.

Eleanor Clift (ultra lib) – No debate, ginned up for campaign ‘cuase no difference in positions. No clear winner but a tie goes to Hillary.

Tony Blankley (Gingrich futuristic con) - Obama significantly helped himself in the Democrat primary and demonstrated a good instinct in so quickly landing a hard blow on Evita. Tony felt Obama hurt himself in the general because Evita looked far more responsible.

Lawerence O’Donnell (Clinton apologist) - Obama won the after party although Evita looked good. Clinton apologist that he is, concluded Evita had the last word. Also concluded a tie.

My two cents, if a pair of Hillary supporters, and I believe O'Donnell and Clift have probably publicly supported Hillary, think it was a tie issue, then it probably was a major Obama victory.

Gonzales

The panel all agreed that Al has no friends in Washington but W, and that’s all he needs. Clift dwelt on the lunatic conspiracy theories that she used to float during the Reagan years. The show was filmed before the NYT disclosed the actual facts underlying Al’s testimony regarding a dispute about the intel actions so the commentary was of little value on the issue.

Complete Victory in Iraq.

Tony B. opened with a good discussion of all the positive developments since the ‘Surge” started.

Clift, predictably advocated defeat at any price and said applying term victory to Iraq was nonsense. I have yet to hear that explained. While it sounds cute to those who wish to destroy American public morale as a means of further demonstrating their desire to appease America’s enemies it has no practical or historic support in fact. Yes, Clift is one of those people Newt described and being heavily invested in American failure. Then again, she also blamed the United States for the Cold War.

The conversation turned to the Hillary DoD letter. The panel thought the Assistant Secretary’s response was harsh, although Tony B. didn’t weigh in, and something tells me that the Gingrich school of thought would hold that while Americans have a right to say almost anything they want but other Americans also have a right to demonstrate the consequences of the first Americans’ statements. That is the inherently bi-lateral nature of freedom of speech that stands in opposition to the liberal doctrine that equates criticizing the consequences of liberal speech with a denial of the liberals’ rights to speak.

The differences between the quality of the McLaughlin panel discussion and Russert’s group of partisan hacks, who do little more than state the obvious, was like the difference between the music of Lennon/McCartney and Eminem, and the McLaughlin gang even spent the last four or five minutes laughing about UFOs.

41 comments:

Anonymous said...

Jul 28, 4:04 PM (ET)

By PAGE IVEY

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) - Presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton told college Democrats on Saturday she would create a national academy to train public servants.

"I'm going to be asking a new generation to serve," she said. "I think just like our military academies, we need to give a totally all-paid education to young men and women who will serve their country in a public service position."

Anonymous said...

A state agency that helps protect older Iowans has accepted more than $70,000 in donations from senior-care companies doing business in Iowa during the past six years.

In return for the more substantial donations, those same companies - some of which have been repeatedly hit with fines for poor senior care - were offered promotional services from the state: ads in elder-care conference brochures, logos on conference materials, authorization to display a corporate banner during state-sponsored conferences, and other perks.

Anonymous said...

7/27: A Rorschach Moment

Whatever criticism one levels at the format of the CNN/YouTube debate, it has produced a controversy that almost perfectly encapsulates the case supporters are making for their respective candidates.

While making their arguments both sides seem to want their cake and eat it too.

For Barack Obama supporters, his answer both signals a substantial departure from current Washington establishment foreign policy thinking; but it does not suggest that Obama lacks the experience to do so in a way that does not protect American interests.

For Hillary Clinton supporters, her answer shows both a change from Bush-Cheney style non-diplomacy, but also a sophisticated understanding of the complexities involved.

The question for Dem primary voters then, is a change back to '90s-era Clinton foreign policy change enough; or is a more fundamental departure from foreign policy consensus required.

More importantly, what, outside of his pre-invasion opposition to the Iraq war, should voters be looking at to determine what Obama's new foreign policy vision is?

Anonymous said...

DesMoinesDem - RF

which side are you guys on? This is a big difference.

Clinton's approach (about which I completely agree) is the same approach as Bush's.

Obama's approach (about which I completely disagree) is a different approach - at one time advocated by Clinton too, but that has changed now.

Edward's had no approach (which is a non-answer reflecting his lack of understanding that this is a real difference).

Anonymous said...

The Rorschach Moment story came from the Hotline.

It seems to me that liberals HAVE to go with Obama based on their constant shreiking and beserking about Bush not talking to our enemies. How does Billary get a pass on this?

Are you guys serious or just shreikers and beserkers for the sake of shreiking and beserking over anything Bush does?

I suspect it may be the latter.

Hillary is depending on her voters not knowing anything about foreign policy, or at least not caring about foreign policy. It likely is a combination of both.

Anonymous said...

For Hillary Clinton supporters, her answer shows both a change from Bush-Cheney style non-diplomacy, but also a sophisticated understanding of the complexities involved.

Anonymous said...

The question for Dem primary voters then, is a change back to '90s-era Clinton foreign policy change enough;

Anonymous said...

Matthew Yglesias encourages DLC (Democrat Leadership Council, sometimes referred to as Democrat Light Council) founder Al From "to look back at this APstory where he attacks the Democratic presidential candidates for snubbing his party, and ponder it just a bit."

Yglesias continues: "He could have easily down played the significance of this,

(THE SIGNIFICANCE IS THAT HER ROYAL CLEAVAGE IS TRYING TO PRETEND SHE'S NOT A MODERATE, OR PRETEND SHE IS A MODERATE. WHO WOULD KNOW FOR SURE? SHE PLAYS IT BOTH WAYS)

...graciously noted that the candidates are busy

...and have other things to do,

...observed that Hillary Clinton helped found his organization

...and Barack Obama's top economic advisor is listed on the DLC staff page,

...and noted that the Democratic line on national security is now the mainstream one.

(THE RADICAL MOVEON.ORG POSITION IS NOW CONSIDERED MAINSTREAM BY THE EXTREMISTS. THERE IS NO ROOM FOR MODERATE D's IN THE DEMOCRAT PARTY ANYMORE, EVEN THOUGH BILLY BOY AND VILSNAKE BOTH HEADED THE DLC AS A STRATEGY TO GET ELECTED).

Instead, he attacked the candidates for "tunnel vision."

It's not a good way to make friends."

(HILLARY WILL BE PISSED AND THEN YOU'LL EITHER END UP DEAD OR IN JAIL)

Anonymous said...

July 30, 2007
Gingrich: 'Fundamentally Flawed System'
Posted by BLAKE DVORAK

Newt Gingrich is the kind of politician that whether you're conservative or liberal, agree with him or not, you'd be wise to listen to.

With that in mind, I wanted to focus on another part of Gingrich's FNS interview to add to Tom's post below. Here's the relevant passage:

WALLACE: Pulling your punches as usual, you called the current campaign process pathetic and compared the candidates lined up in the debates to so many trained seals waiting for fish to be thrown at them. Is the process that demeaning?

GINGRICH: I think the process -- first of all, the actual quotes are all -- and the actual audios -- at Newt.org for anybody who wants to listen to it.

And I believe that the process is fundamentally broken.

When you have 10 people or 11 people or 12 people standing in a row patiently waiting for 30 seconds to be allowed to finally answer questions chosen by a personality other than the candidate, I think that you have demeaned seeking the president of the United States to a level that is an absurdity.

I mean, we are faced with enormous problems. In 1860 Abraham Lincoln gave a two-hour speech at Cooper Union. In 1858 Lincoln and Douglas debated seven times for three hours each.

We're faced with problems I think that are fully as great as those that faced Lincoln and Douglas in the 1850s, and yet we have reduced our political dialogue to a point where literally potential would-be leaders of the most powerful government in the world stand meekly in line waiting for somebody to pick a question, and the question can be anything.

I mean, it's entirely up to the television personality to pick what to ask. I think it's a fundamentally flawed system.

Without necessarily agreeing with Gingrich, one must admit there's a lot of truth this. Today's debates aren't like the Lincoln-Douglas debates.

But if your standard for a "good" debate is what is accepted as one of the greatest debates in American history, then there are precious few that measure up.

Anonymous said...

In what is being called a devastating defeat for a coalition of parties that have held power in Japan since 1955, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's Liberal Democratic Party lost its majority in the country's upper house of parliament in elections yesterday.

Anonymous said...

Japan isn't the only nation that's seen widespread electoral change over the last two years. In 2006, Canada voted out Paul Martin's Democrats in favor of fresh-faced conservative Stephen Harper, and Portugal elected a conservative to take over for a socialist president.

Anonymous said...

My goodness...What is happening all over the world with the allies that the liberal left in the US think have abandoned america?

Why, it turns out, it was just their out of touch leadership who were against america.

The people are FOR america and understand what is really at stake for us all. They understand that libs all over the world do not understand the threat to the safety of the west.

Anonymous said...

Finally, former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney told a town meeting in Iowa yesterday that the radical Shiite group Hezbollah has succeeded in gaining a toe-hold in Southern Lebanon by providing "health clinics to some of the people there and schools, and they built their support by having done so.

That kind of diplomacy is something that would help America become stronger around the world."

Meanwhile, five years ago, Washington State Senator Patty Murray took some heat from conservatives when she suggested that Osama bin Laden was popular in the Arab world largely because he had been "out in these countries for decades, building schools, building roads, building infrastructure, building day care facilities, building heath care facilities, and the people are extremely grateful. We haven't done that."

It's well before business hours on the West Coast, though we've emailed the Washington State Republican Party, which blasted Murray for her comments, to see what they have to say about Romney, Murray, or both.

UPDATE: "Mitt Romney was accurately describing reality, and Patty Murray was not," said Josh Kahn, spokesman for the Washington State Republican Party. Murray's comments would have been accurate, he said, if she were discussing Hezbollah.

Anonymous said...

"Among political insiders who closely follow the presidential race and gossip about who is up and who is down in every campaign, Elizabeth Edwards is seen as the hidden hand behind virtually every important decision regarding her husband's second bid for the White House," writes the Washington Post's Dan Balz in a profile of Mrs. Edwards.

While she doesn't micromanage the campaign, Mrs. Edwards' influence on the broad outlines and some details is without question.

Though her cancer now helps to define her public persona, making her husband president "remains at the forefront of her life."

(HER CANCER HELPS HE DEFINE HER PUBLIC PERSONNA??? WHAT ON EARTH DOES THAT MEAN?)

Mrs. Edwards denies her surprise appearance on "Hardball" to confront Ann Coulter and recent comments about Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama were purposeful.

(YEA, SURE. THE TEMPER TRANTRUMS ARE COMPLETELY PREDICTABLE. THEY TRADE ON CONVINCING OTHERS THEY ARE THE BIGGEST VICTIM)

The Edwardses don't always see eye-to-eye in the policy realm, with Mrs. Edwards usually hewing further left.

(SO WHOM ARE WE TO BELIEVE WITH RESPECT TO POLICY? IS IT LIZ OR IS IT JOHN? THEIR POLICY DIFFERENCES ARE SUBSTANTIAL AND SHE KEEPS TELLING HIM WHAT TO SAY)

Anonymous said...

Though her cancer now helps to define her public persona, making her husband president "remains at the forefront of her life."

Anonymous said...

Edwards is currently third in South Carolina polls and his fundraising in the state fell off 78 percent from Q1 to Q2.

To win the state, Edwards will need to pull votes from other candidates as there are few undecided voters.

Anonymous said...

question for DesMoinesDem:

How do you feel about Lizzie's attachment parenting style? She's terminal. Two of her kids are under 10 years old. They are going to be motherless. They know death. They lost a child and know that loss. How can she be so cavalier about her impending death and not take all this time to be with her kids?

Her kids will suffer greatly and her husband will NOT be elected President, so for what purpose did all this absence from them achieve?

Anonymous said...

LONDON — President Bush and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown on Monday laid to rest any speculation that their relationship would be any less chummy than the one between the U.S. president and Brown's predecessor, Tony Blair.

But Brown's opening remarks in his first press conference with the U.S. president went a step further, laying down a set of priorities with which the next occupant of the White House will have to deal.

The British prime minister emphasized security issues and echoed the president when he said that decisions about troops would only be made "on the military advice of our commanders on the ground

Anonymous said...

BROWN: There is no doubt ... that Al Qaeda is operating in Iraq.

There is no doubt that we've had to take very strong measures against them.

And there is no doubt that the Iraqi security forces have got to be strong enough to be able to withstand not just the violence that has been between the Sunni and the Shia population and the Sunni insurgency, but also Al Qaeda itself," Brown said.

"So one of the tests that the military commanders will have on the ground ... before we move from combat to overwatch, is whether we are strong enough and they are strong enough to enable them to stand up against that threat," he said.

Anonymous said...

....After all, three years ago, Obama was a state senator. And no matter how you slice it, such a jump to the highest office in the land would be unprecedented.

This comes to mind because of a promise from the Illinois senator to union members in Iowa, that some might see as another example of naiveté, and a pledge that might be difficult to keep.

And it may provide evidence for those critics who wonder if he is up to the job.

In an appearance before a meeting of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Workers, the nation's largest public employees union,. Obama pledged as president he would join the picket line in a strike.

It would not be presidential.

By promising that he would do so as president Obama is making an unusual promise that leaves him open to charges he does not understand the role of president.

Not only would it be a logistical nightmare, it would demean the office.

Anonymous said...

According to Mike Glover of the Associated Press, the candidate said that he had marched with picketers trying to unionize a Chicago hotel, and had told them "if they were still fighting four years from now, I'd be back on that picket line as president of the United States."

Obama was a community organizer before he got into elective politics and his commitment to organized labor is genuine.

But a president has an obligation to be president of all Americans.

Only about one in ten American workers are members of a labor union these days.

To assume that as president he would be speaking for the American people by injecting himself in a labor dispute is a questionable decision.

Being known as the president who embraces organized labor is one thing, being one of its soldiers is another.

Would a President Obama be willing to buck organized labor in a national crisis?

Would he, for instance, fire air traffic controllers as did Ronald Reagan, if he felt such a move was necessary to keep the nation's commercial air system - and the economy dependent on it - running?

At that point, it would be reasonable for the American people to wonder whose interests would be foremost in Obama's mind - the American peoples', or organized labor.

It may get lost in the frenzy that is a presidential campaign, but the episode provides insight into a man who would like to be president of the United States.

Author Peter A. Brown is assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute.

Anonymous said...

July 23, 2007
Leaving Boomer Conflicts Behind
By Michael Barone

For the past 15 years, our politics has been a civil war between two halves of the baby boom generation (generally taken to include those born between 1946 and 1964). We have had two presidents who were born in 1946 and graduated from high school in the class of 1964.

Both those presidents happened to have personal characteristics that people on the opposite sides of the culture war absolutely loathe.

We first saw the acrimony of the boomer civil war in the 1992 vice presidential debate between Dan Quayle (born 1947) and Al Gore (born 1948).

We see it in the hate-filled reactions to Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.

And we are tired of it. Most voters would like to move on to something new.

Anonymous said...

MORE: It's not clear whether we will.

Right now, the Democrats seem likelier than the Republicans to nominate the next president, and the candidate they seem likeliest to nominate is Hillary Rodham Clinton (born in 1948).

She tends to polarize voters in much the same way her husband and his successor have.

Her favorable-unfavorable in poll after poll runs around 49 percent favorable and 47 percent unfavorable.

That means: a) she can win and b) she can lose.

Obviously, many Democratic primary voters are troubled by the existence of this second possibility in a time when other factors are so positive for their party.

Anonymous said...

The leading alternative, Barack Obama, has presented himself from his first moment on the national stage, at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, as a man who wants to move us beyond the boomer civil war by emphasizing what we all have in common.

Born in 1961, he came in at the tail end of the baby boom generation, and in his book "The Audacity of Hope," portrays himself as having a very different generational identity.

His favorable-unfavorable ratio is much more positive than Clinton's, and he obviously has a greater upside potential.

It's possible to conceive of him winning a larger percentage of the vote than either of the boomer presidents won in their re-election years (49 percent for Clinton, 51 percent for Bush).

Anonymous said...

Most of the leading Republican candidates do not have this problem.

Rudolph Giuliani (born 1944) is still perilously close to being identified as a boomer, but his stands on many cultural issues and his personal life are closer to the half of the boomer generation that backs the other party.

John McCain (born in 1936) is a heroic member of a different generation, one whose leading politicians typically served in the military (Edward Kennedy, Walter Mondale, Michael Dukakis).

Fred Thompson (born in 1941) had at least one child who was a boomer and is the father of two young children today.

Only Mitt Romney (born in 1947) is clearly a boomer -- one who has lived his life and has taken positions (albeit some of them recently) that clearly identify him as part of the conservative half of his generation.

All of which suggests that the Republicans are better positioned than the Democrats to move beyond the boomer civil war.

Anonymous said...

But some things may keep us there.

Attitudes on Iraq are reminiscent of those on Vietnam, the war that split the baby boom generation in two.

Abortion, though overemphasized by a press full of aging boomers, is still a proxy for the cultural issues that divide their generation.

Global warming is advanced by liberal boomers like Gore with an intensity that makes it less a technical or scientific matter and more like a religious faith -- the stuff of culture wars.

It's not clear that voters who want to move on will get their wish.

MICHAEL BARONE

Anonymous said...

Iowans are launching a new anti-war campaign right in their own back yards, and it officially kicks off this morning.

The group, Americans Against the Escalation in Iraq, is putting up 6,000 yard signs across the state. Their message is simple, "Support the Troops, End the War."

The campaign is targeting 40 U.S. Republican lawmakers. In Iowa, the list includes Sen. Charles Grassley and Congressman Tom Latham. Iowa is one of 15 states participating in this campaign.

Anonymous said...

After 16 months of sorting through the Central Iowa Employment and Training Consortium scandal, Des Moines city councilwoman Christine Hensley said there is a proposed plan for who will pay back the misspent money to the federal government. The city and eight counties will likely agree to pay back part of the $2.5 million owed.

The money was spent on bloated salaries and bonuses paid to top CIETC officials. The proposed settlement still needs approval from the Des Moines City Council and county supervisors.

Anonymous said...

Des Moines City Council - 1 Republican - all the rest are Democrats -including Mr Rubber Stamp himself, VLASSIS.

Polk County Supervisors - 2 Republicans - 3 democrats (one being mauro, another, a south side cousin)

Des Moines School Board - 1 Republican - the rest D's, and some of them Union Officials

Anonymous said...

Cedar Rapids -- Barack Obama wants to be known as the president of political reform, he told a crowd of about 600 people here Monday.

One example Obama used is the $1.1 billion in farm subsidies to 172,801 dead people given to people by the federal government between 1999 and 2005, according to a federal report released this month.

"That˙s a problem when your tax dollars are going to dead people," Obama said to the cheering at Roosevelt Middle School. "That˙s not just crazy, it˙s wrong."

Anonymous said...

Obama told the crowd that, as president, he would be like Theodore Roosevelt, in which the school is named for.

Roosevelt, more than 100 years ago, helped break apart powerful monopolies "to give the American people a shot at the American dream," Obama said.

Anonymous said...

Algore III pleaded guilty to two felony counts of drug possession, two misdemeanor counts of drug possession without a prescription, and one misdemeanor count of marijuana possession, the district attorney's office said.

Anonymous said...

Al Gore's son found with 140 Vicodin pills, according to a report from the People.com Web site.

Gore also was charged with a traffic infraction for allegedly driving faster than 100 mph.

Prosecutors said he could be sentenced to a maximum of three years and eight months in prison if convicted on all counts.

In addition to Vicodin, officers found Xanax, Valium, Soma, and Adderall as well as a small amount of marijuana.

The son of the former vice president and Democratic presidential nominee was previously arrested for marijuana possession in Bethesda, Maryland, in 2003, when he was a student at Harvard University.

Gore completed substance abuse counseling to settle those charges.

Anonymous said...

Gore is the youngest of Tipper and Al Gore's four children. He now lives in Los Angeles and is an associate publisher of GOOD, a magazine about philanthropy and aimed at young people.

Anonymous said...

Cut Gore some slack - he was in a hurry to get to a meeting with Rush Limbaugh.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for asking re: Obama vs. Hillary on diplomacy. Consistent with my earlier statements on the topic, I have to go with Obama. I do think we need to talk to our enemies, just like RR did. But, I agree with one commentator who pointed out that Hillary & Obama actually are taking very similar stands on this. In the debate with limited time, Obama focused on the major point that he is willing to meet with the bad guys. Hillary saw an opening and focused on the details of diplomacy, trying to make it seem like there is a big difference. I think Hillary overplayed this thing by continuing to argue the topic after the debate. It gave Obama a valid reason to hit her pretty hard on her greatest weakness – her position & history on Iraq. Plus, he could call her on her seemingly changed position.

Anonymous said...

On the conservative election victories in Europe - again. First of all, Europeans surely vote mostly based on domestic issues. They don’t take stands on US foreign policy when they go to vote in their domestic elections. Do you base your own vote on the dynamics of British politics? Just laughable. Second, a “conservative” European is most likely aligned with a pretty darn lefty D. Talk about apples and oranges.

Anonymous said...

RF - do you think Britain is not affected by terrorists? They voted based on THEIR foreign policy and we voted based on OUR foreign policy.

They just happen to be the same wtih respect to the GLOBAL WAR ON TERRORISM.

And...the point is, they elected a more conservative government than they had before regardless of where the starting point is on the left-right continuum in their particular country.

They are moving MORE conservative and FURTHER AWAY from liberalism.

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