Right Wing Nut House

This won’t be directed at any one party or media outlet. Nor will it be about one candidate or another from either party or even about the efficacy of one ideology over another, although I suspect the situation I will describe has its roots in new left nanny statism.

No matter. The modern conservative movement is just as guilty as liberalism. I am talking about the babying of the American voter in which all media, parties, ideologies, and candidates insist on engaging. It isn’t just “dumbing down” political messages or coverage of politics that is the issue here, although it is certainly one of the symptoms. What I am talking about goes to the very heart of the relationship between those who govern and those who are governed with the media as a combination intermediary and watchdog and the utter contempt for the intelligence and discernment of the American voter exhibited by these elites who have deliberately infantilized the process of how we elect our leaders.

I’ve often thought that one reason Americans don’t trust their government is that their government doesn’t trust the American people very much. This goes double for the mass media whose sneering contempt for much of their audience is made abundantly clear in the way they cover politics and issues as well as what they choose to program as entertainment on their networks.

Even the 24 hours news nets - with rare exceptions - waste most of the day on trivialities. A story involving some pretty, blond, white woman who disappears or is murdered by her husband will get more attention for days or weeks at a time than the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan or issues of war and peace with Iran, North Korea, China, Russia, or any other place in the world where informing the people would mean spending more than 3 minutes with both sides shouting back and forth about who is at fault.

The bottom line is that even with 24 hours of programming to fill, the promise of all news networks to greatly enhance our knowledge base about the world at home and abroad has been miserably wasted as a result of a deliberate decision to make their broadcasts as a whole appeal to the lowest common denominator. And the problem there is that most media executives have such a titanically low opinion of the average American voter, that they inevitably find not the lowest common denominator but rather the lowest denominator period. A half wit would understand more nuance and depth than that given on most news broadcasts.

It’s all for our own good, of course. Witness last night’s Democratic debate where ordinary people simply weren’t trusted to ask decent questions of the candidates. The sponsoring network had to vet and approve all questions prior to their going on the air:

Maria Luisa, the UNLV student who asked Hillary Clinton whether she preferred “diamonds or pearls” at last night’s debate wrote on her MySpace page this morning that CNN forced her to ask the frilly question instead of a pre-approved query about the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository.

“Every single question asked during the debate by the audience had to be approved by CNN,” Luisa writes. “I was asked to submit questions including “lighthearted/fun” questions. I submitted more than five questions on issues important to me. I did a policy memo on Yucca Mountain a year ago and was the finalist for the Truman Scholarship. For sure, I thought I would get to ask the Yucca question that was APPROVED by CNN days in advance.”

CNN’s condescending explanation:

Sam Feist, the executive producer of the debate, said that the student was asked to choose another question because the candidates had already spent about ten minutes discussing Yucca Mountain.

“When her Yucca mountain question was asked, she was given the opportunity to ask another question, and my understand is that the [diamond v. pearls] questions was her other question,” Feist said. “She probably was disappointed, but we spent a lot of time with a bunch of different candidates on Yucca Mountain, and we were at the end of the debate.”

Note the tone: “She was given the opportunity to ask another question…” as if the most important thing in the world was face time on TV for Luisa. And given the extraordinary importance that the nuclear waste issue to the people of Nevada, who the hell is this guy Feist to say that they talked enough about it and it was time to move on to something else?

What he’s really saying is that this affects only the people in Nevada and the ignorant rubes in other parts of the country aren’t interested. The fact is that there is the real possibility that the nuclear power issue will once again be of overriding national importance very soon. There are plans to start building more reactors so the equally vital issue of what to do with waste from the new plants will have a direct bearing on the Yucca Mountain project which was, after all, conceived as a large part of the solution to the problem of spent fuel.

It seems to me that Feist and CNN had their heads so far up their large intestine about the “entertainment value” of their show that they missed the staggering implications of talking about Yucca Mountain as much as possible in order to inform the rest of us about an issue that will be of seminal importance in the near future.

CNN is not the only network whose arrogance causes them to treat the American people as if they were three year olds. Fox and MSNBC are equally guilty of supplying coverage of politics and issues that will fit in 3-5 minute segments and are more likely to offer “opposing viewpoints” on a candidate or an issue that accomplishes absolutely nothing except proving which side has the more colorful invective they can hurl at each other.

It is a matter of informing the public of the issues. Yes they are complex and can’t be broken down easily. But there is a real hunger for information in this country. Otherwise, people wouldn’t tune in as often as they do during the day. Nor would they be abandoning TV altogether in order to get their news on the internet where on line newspapers, blogs, and other publications devote considerably more time and space to giving information and offering informed opinion.

But that internet audience, compared the the electorate as a whole, is still relatively tiny. And here is where the candidates and parties fail to pick up the slack and force the issue of treating voters as adults and not children to be led around by the nose.

Candidates are more apt today to simply sound off on their positions on issues without giving any background to their thinking of how they arrived at a particular conclusion. The only candidate who is doing this today seems to be Barack Obama who takes great pains to talk about his position on the Iraq War and how he arrived at his anti-war position. I don’t agree with him but you can certainly respect someone who obviously gave the matter a great deal of thought.

It is clear that Obama trusts the voter more than most candidates. Not so his Democratic or Republican rivals who rarely delve into the meat of their positions and cite reasons why they think the way they do.

The reason they don’t is that it is too revealing. They are afraid that we, the ignorant voter, might get the wrong idea or more likely, lose track of where a candidate’s position shifted or was changed by the acquisition of new information and simply believe the simplistic mantra thrown out by his opponent that he is a “flip-flopper.”

The media plays along with this little game, dutifully reporting the idiotic charge and counter-charge with little effort to give context or meaning to the smears. It is politics as mud wrestling. And while there is a long, storied history of it in America, it appears to me that this something into which all politics has morphed; a slugfest that is as bereft of ideas and substance. Politicians have simply given up trying to explain themselves and have decided that going for the jugular is the best way to win.

It didn’t used to be this way. Read the campaign speeches of Eisenhower or Kennedy and prepare to be shocked. Sure there was plenty of fluff. But both men were fully prepared to have a conversation with the American people about their candidacy. They didn’t shrink from complex issues nor did they “dumb down” their positions and treat the voters as if they were 3 year old children whose diaper needed changing.

I realize I’m rambling a bit but I hate the feeling of being talked down to and treated by the media and candidates as if I wasn’t smart enough to make my decision on who to vote for and base that decision not on the treacle that passes for media coverage of a candidate or a candidate’s own cynical attempts to manipulate my emotions but rather on the candidates well thought out stands on the issues.

I am not naive. There has always been a certain amount of manipulation of voter emotions in politics. But one of the reasons for the extraordinary polarization today has got to be the demonization of the other side and fear mongering the notion that electing them will be the end of the world. This simplistic formulation for victory began in the 1970’s and gets worse every election cycle.

We enter an extraordinarily dangerous period in our history hopelessly divided and completely unable to work together on issues vital to our security and economic well being. And fully half of all registered voters will probably not vote in 2008 - mostly out of disgust and loathing for this state of affairs. There is plenty of fault to go around. The problem did not arise on January 20, 2001 nor will it end on January 20, 2009. The question isn’t “Who’s to blame” but rather “What do we do about it?”

We can start by demanding that the elites in media and politics begin to treat the American voter with more respect. A candidate and a government that starts to trust the people a little more will help. But given all that I’ve seen and heard, that day is a long way off.

Kevin Drum is extremely distrustful of anything the Bush Administration says or does. This is all well and good as the Bushies have made a nasty habit of surprising the country by saying one thing and later having the exact opposite of their claims revealed as the truth.

But don’t let Drum’s jaundiced eye toward politicians fool you. He is actually the most trusting of souls, willing to generously give the benefit of the doubt to all sorts of people - especially those disposed to vote for Democrats:

The State of Indiana has the most stringent voter ID laws in the country. Democrats are always griping about this, and have even gone so far as to challenge Indiana’s law in the Supreme Court. But this is just silly. In this day and age everyone has a photo ID anyway, so what’s the problem?

Just in case, though, the Washington Institute for the Study of Ethnicity and Race decided to check and see if this was really true. The three charts reproduced here illustrate the guts of their findings. By a substantial margin, the Indiana residents most likely to possess photo ID turn out to be whites, the middle aged, and high-income voters. And while this is undoubtedly just a wild coincidence, these are also the three groups most like to vote for Republicans. (2006 exit poll data here for the suspicious.) Overall, 91% of registered Republicans had photo IDs compared to only 83% of registered Democrats.

In truth, voter ID laws are highly discriminatory. The problem for Drum and other Democrats is that they discriminate against people who want to cheat the system and commit voter fraud. In Drum’s universe, anyone who shows up to vote should be taken at their word that they are who they say they are.

Just so we’re clear on this, in 2004 when the voter registration fraudsters at ACORN submitted registrations with names like Mary Poppins and Dick Tracy, Drum believes the poll workers should have just gone ahead and allowed anyone to vote who chose to use those names - even though Mary Poppins couldn’t possibly have been in Ohio at the time since she was working as a waitress at the greasy spoon down the street from where I lived in 2004, her being between nanny gigs at the time.

How very trusting of Mr. Drum. And how oblivious can you be to the widespread potential for abuse of the system when Democratic partisans like ACORN and the NAACP Voter Fund register non-existent or dead people to vote and then have these phantoms show up on election day, presenting themselves as legitimate?

The Supreme Court ruled in Reynolds v Sims in 1964 that there should be “one man, one vote” not “one man, one vote per registration.” But if we were to listen to the Kevin Drum’s of the world, everyone is basically law abiding and there is very little chance to game the system by faking registrations and then organizing an election day party where groups of Democratic party supporters vote early and often.

To be fair, this excellent article from Slate last May by Richard Hasen outlines the difficulty in carrying out an effective fraud scheme at the polls. But Hasen, like Drum, suffers from an acute case of overtrusting their own interest groups as well as the individual voter.

How could an effective fraud scheme be carried out? This piece by Marc Ambinder reveals the AFL-CIO’s plans for the 2008 election:

AFL-CIO political director Karen Ackerman will oversee the deployment of more than 200,000 volunteers to 23 priority states, including Ohio, pennsylvania, Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin. Five house seats in “union-dense” districts and six Senate seats will be targeted.

In Ohio, where union households comprised 28% of the vote in 2006, the AFl-CIO plans to reach out to more than 1.4 million voters.

The labor federation will partner with other groups and use reams of consumer data to market precise political messages neighborhood-by-neighborhood.

“Our members are building an army to make more calls, knock on more doors and turn out more voters than ever,” said AFSCME President and AFL-CIO Political Committee Chair Gerald McEntee. “We’re going for the Trifecta: the House, the Senate, and the White House.”

In total, the AFL-CIO unions will spend about $200 million on Election 08 efforts, according to AFl-CIO estimates.

I would say that $200 million is lowballing it. AFSCME alone plans to spend $50 million in 2008. And some independent studies point out that staff time and other in kind contributions by labor raise that number by a factor of at least three, making the real figure closer to $600 million - almost all of it spent to aid Democrats.

The point is simple; there is ample money to organize, fund, and carry out voter fraud using labor allies in ACORN, the NAACP, ACT, and other organizations to supply the fake registrations, sharing that info with unions (unions help fund ACORN and ACT). And given the fact that there is massive resistance to purging voter registration rolls of the dead, of convicts, and others who may have moved out of state or otherwise become ineligible to vote, it seems abundantly clear that the potential exists not only to carry out fraud on a large scale but also, just as importantly, to escape detection doing so.

It is simply naive to believe otherwise.

The fact is, voter ID opponents do not have a good argument against a system that demands voters prove who they are prior to casting a ballot. Instead, they fall back on the tired old canard that requiring identification to vote is tantamount to a “poll tax” or “discourages minorities from voting” - even if, as the state of Georgia recently did, offer to give away state ID’s to those who couldn’t afford them.

They cannot argue simply on the merits of the plan. They must play the race card to obscure the real reasons for their opposition - that it would make voter fraud by labor and other Democratic allies extremely difficult.

Republicans, of course, have their own problems with voter fraud. I outline some of the ways the GOP attempts to tamp down minority voting in my PJ Media article here. Robert F. Kennedy estimates in his widely circulated Rolling Stone article that up to 350,000 minorities were intimidated or otherwise prevented from voting in Ohio in 2004. That number seems very high but there is no doubt that GOP efforts at “election monitoring” and spurious mailings to black precincts warning residents not to vote if they have so much as a parking ticket depressed black turnout.

I am not advocating making it difficult to register or vote. The process should be as simple as possible while still maintaining the integrity of the system. Otherwise, why bother?

I’m not revealing any privileged information by saying that our electoral system is in big trouble and needs to be fixed. Now that states are going to programs such as election day registration, it becomes paramount to make sure that each person votes only one time and that his vote is counted only once.

And if Kevin Drum and other Democratic partisans can quit playing the race card when it comes to voter ID programs, it might help in not only cutting down on fraud but also raising the confidence level of the American people that the most sacred of our democratic institutions is being safeguarded to the best of our ability.

Dennis Kucinich is just old enough to have been one of Ken Kesey’s “Merry Pranksters” - those wild and crazy post-beat generation prophets of the psychedelic age whose cross country trip on a bus named “Further” has captured the imaginations of rebels and reprobates for 40 years.

Immortalized in one of the most manic, most hilarious books of the 1960’s, The Electric Kool Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe, the Pranksters made it their business to try and alter the consciousness of America by getting everyone to drop acid and turn on to the psychedelic experience. The Pranksters themselves were quite the crew. “Pranking” unsuspecting citizens from coast to coast with elaborate hoaxes, the Prankster’s in your face method of revolutionary activity made them all seem larger than life.

Kucinich may not be quite ready to contaminate the Congressional water supply by dumping LSD into the cisterns. But he’s got a great head start on trying to alter reality:

Democratic presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich expressed satisfaction Tuesday with a series of procedural twists on the House floor that resulted in the Ohio congressman’s impeachment articles against Vice President Dick Cheney being sent for committee review.

A series of strategic maneuvers on both sides of the partisan aisle ended with a 218-194 vote along party lines to deliver the impeachment resolution to the House Judiciary Committee, the panel of jurisdiction for such matters.

“This vote sends a message that the administration’s conduct in office is no longer unchallenged,” Kucinich said after the vote.

The vote also sends the message that Dennis Kucinich is a certified loon. And his Democratic colleagues, scrambling like hell to avoid being lumped together with the Shirley McClaine of the House, tried desperately to avoid the impeachment issue alltogether by trying to kill the resolution outright. Alas, the Republicans decided not to be Pranked by their opponents and pulled a fast one:

Republicans, changing course midway through a vote, tried to force Democrats into a debate on the resolution sponsored by longshot presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich.

The anti-war Ohio Democrat, in his resolution, accused Cheney of purposely leading the country into war against Iraq and manipulating intelligence about Iraq’s ties with al-Qaida.

The GOP tactics reversed what had been expected to be an overwhelming vote to table, or kill, the resolution.

Midway through the vote, with instructions from the GOP leadership, Republicans one by one changed their votes from yes to kill the resolution to no, trying to force the chamber into a debate and an up-or-down vote on the proposal.

At one point there were 290 votes to table. After the turnaround, the final vote was 251-162 against tabling, with 165 Republicans voting against it.

“We’re going to help them out, to explain themselves,” said Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Texas. “We’re going to give them their day in court.”

The exquisite irony of watching Democrats fall all over themselves trying to kill impeachment after spending most of the last 7 years accusing Bush/Cheney of the most dire impeachable offenses was almost too delicious to watch. It showed the Democrats to be shallow political hacks, eager and capable of using rhetoric to undermine the presidency during a time of war but without the balls to match their actions to their words.

A truly pitiful performance.

Once again, I issue a challenge to those Democrats. If Bush/Cheney are truly guilty of all that you have charged them with over the last 7 years, stop talking and start acting. You own Congress now. There’s no real excuse you can use to delay any further. You have it in your power - not to mention an eager beaver Judiciary Committee Chairman in John Conyers - to begin serious, substantive hearings on everything you have accused this administration of doing for the last 7 years which would, if your rhetoric can be believed, lead to Articles of Impeachment being sent to the House floor.

If you are not willing to do so, STFU. Your apocalyptic rhetoric about the perceived sins of this Administration doesn’t match reality. It never has and never will. It proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that all the speechifying and wailing and gnashing of teeth has been nothing more than pandering to your rabid dog base of internet extremists. And the way they are turning on you today should tell you all you need to know about the viability of that strategy.

Kucinich is serious about impeachment because he is deranged. The rest of you may be more grounded in the reality found on this planet but nevertheless should be taken to task for your shameless, shallow political gamesmanship that has done almost as much damage to the United States as the Administration’s incompetence.

The fact that you won’t recognize that by either putting your votes where your mouths have been or toning down the rhetoric to a more civilized level of discourse reveals yourselves to be a collective of scumbags, unworthy of holding high office with responsibility for the safety and security of the American people.

By all rights, 2008 should be a hugely Democratic year. I daresay your actions yesterday along with other indications of your unfitness to be in the majority may yet save the GOP from disaster.

And if that happens, you’ll have no one to blame but yourselves.

It is usually very difficult to trace the origins of conspiracies. Much like the way urban legends are spread, finding out how a particular meme gets started is largely a matter of slogging detective work, tracing newspaper articles and wearing out shoe leather interviewing people.

It is believed that the very first hints of conspiracy involving Oswald and the JFK assassination could be traced to La Figaro L’Humanité, the communist party newspaper in France. A KGB defector in 1982 let on that the articles were part of a disinformation campaign designed to throw off suspicion of complicity by Moscow in the crime, something with which Kruschev was very concerned. (The defector’s reliability has been questioned on this and other matters).

A few months later, a small American publication called Ramparts began a series of articles using the La Figaro piece as a template to paste all sorts of conspiracies involving Johnson, the CIA, the Army, and large corporations. Other hard left magazines picked up on these theories and expanded on them. Even before the Warren Report was published, the paranoid left had a slew of conspiracy theories involving the assassination that fingered everyone but Oswald.

I bring this up because paranoia regarding the JFK assassination is one of the few semi- traceable conspiracies in modern history. Others have roots going back hundreds of years to the time of the Knights Templar and Illuminati and their beginnings have been lost to the mists of history. At bottom, all of these conspiracies posit the notion that powerful men using unseen and unknown methods control our destiny.

Today’s nuts inhabit both the right and left sides of the ideological spectrum with the left wing paranoids more prominent if only because of their target; George Bush and his Administration.

No? How’s that military draft coming, guys? And what about that fallout from our attack on Iran? You know, the one that was “imminent” at least three separate times over the last few years? And while we’re on the subject, have you sent your Christmas cards to your friends rotting away in those concentration camps you were so sure were going to be set up to house “regime” opponents?

I could go on, of course. There is no end to the wild nuttiness of the left when it comes to their paranoia about the Bush Administration. To hear them tell it, Bush is both evil genius and incompetent clown - a dichotomy most sane people would find laughable but which the paranoids on the left blithely run off at the mouth coming up with ever more outrageous “warnings” about Bush actions. The closer we get to the end of the Bush presidency, the more we hear of the “manufactured 9/11″ where Bush would cancel the election of 2008 and rule by dictatorship.

There are going to be a lot of exploding heads on January 20, 2009 when Bush rides off to Texas.

Where does this idiocy come from? It comes from here:

In a new book alleging a campaign of slander and intimidation orchestrated chiefly by Hillary Clinton, Kathleen Willey points a finger of suspicion at the former first couple for the death of her husband, who was believed to have killed himself.

Willey, who claims she was groped by President Clinton in the White House, acknowledged in an interview with WND today that she stands by the speculation she poses about her husband’s demise in “Target: Caught in the Crosshairs of Bill and Hillary Clinton,” set for release this week by World Ahead Publishing, WND Books’ partner.

Asked if she suspects her husband Ed, a lawyer and son of a prominent Virginia lawmaker, was murdered, Willey replied, “Most definitely.”

There is absolutely no doubt that Bush Derangement Syndrome’s roots can be found in the Clinton Derangement Syndrome of the 1990’s. And if this book is any indication, BDS will continue to run long after George leaves office:

Willey writes that after her husband’s death, her friend Carole in Colorado told her something she had not known. Ed had confided to Carole’s husband that he had taken a briefcase full of cash to Little Rock, Ark., during the presidential campaign.

Willey said she was shocked but acknowledged her husband could have done it. Later she found a reference on a blog that explored illegal fundraising activities by the Clintons and noted Ed Willey was known for “handling large briefcases full of cash” as part of the 1992 presidential campaign.

She speculates: “I have no idea how anyone other than the Clintons would know that Ed might have carried cash in briefcases. So why would he be killed? Because he was carrying illegal money? That’s probably not enough reason. But what if, in his desperation, Ed had ‘illegally borrowed’ from the campaign?”

Willey herself brings up the obvious parallels to the Vince Foster suicide - which in Clinton Derangement Syndrome circles is listed as a “murder” despite numerous investigations by both Democrats and Republicans including independent counsels Fiske and Starr proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that Fosters death was by his own hand.

The money is another issue. Willey wouldn’t be the first to have taken suitcases full of cash to Little Rock. But bribery and campaign financial irregularities are a long way from murder. And while the Clintons have been known to play hardball with opponents, Willey’s accusations are pretty slanderous. They were back then and they are now.

What CDS did was gather the kooks, the loons, and the nuts on the right under one umbrella with the internet as catalyst. Chat rooms and message boards acted as incubators where the latest preposterous theories about the Clintons were born.

And perhaps it’s no accident that BDS was born just when blogs began their rise to prominence. The archives of Daily Kos are full of diaries and posts that posit the most jaw dropping conspiracy theories about Bush. If the largest liberal blog could indulge themselves in such tripe, then clearly the way to fame and fortune in the leftysphere was to outdo the big guys in coming up with even more ridiculous theories of dark doings and evil abroad in the land.

It has culminated in the Rosie O’Donnell-Keith Olbermann axis of celebrity where those worthies feed hundreds of thousands of people a day a steady diet of BDS related claptrap. One wonders what poor Keith is going to do when Bush leaves office. Methinks he’s in for a fall since his “angry man” routine will be difficult to maintain if Democrats control everything.

Frankly, I’m surprised that Hillary hasn’t come in for more CDS than she has. Perhaps the loons are waiting for the general election campaign before letting loose. There are many bad things to be said about Hillary Clinton both personally and politically but what she and her husband were accused of during their tenure in office is so far beyond reality that it gives those of us who wish to critique Mrs. Clinton rationally a bad name. Those on the left who have spent the last seven years realistically critiquing the Bush Administration know what I’m talking about. It is easy to get lumped in with the nuts.

I feel for Kathleen Willey but she is wildly off base in her charges. I suppose I’ll hear it from some of my friends on the right but the fact is, tales of intimidation of witnesses, murder, burglary, and other illegal activities are largely anecdotal and have their origins in internet rumormongering. There is no credible evidence for it and thus, it is safe to dismiss much of CDS as the ramblings of paranoids.

The same could be said of BDS sufferers, of course. And given the polarization of our politics and general political nastiness abroad in the land, both Syndromes will probably be with us for a while.

Fred Thompson’s campaign is in trouble.

Not that the former Tennessee Senator has made any killer gaffes or tragic mistakes. He hasn’t. Thompson is suffering from that inside the beltway syndrome that pushes a potential candidate to enter the race and then mercilessly tries to tear him down once he’s in. Beltway insiders like Dick Morris have positively skewered Thompson for everything from his “trophy wife” trying to run the campaign to his curious habit of constantly clearing his throat

Fred is also suffering from comparisons to Reagan which were inevitable but unfair. And his laid back style on the stump seems to be eliciting a laid back reaction from voters - they like him but are perplexed by his seeming lack of passion.

And slowly, like a leaking boat, Thompson’s once climbing poll numbers have started to go south. And not just in the national polls but state by state, Thompson has seen his percentages slipping.

He is currently behind Huckabee in New Hampshire with 5% of the vote. And he’s currently 4th in South Carolina, a state he led less than a month ago.

Face it Fred Heads; Thompson needs a boost, a spark - something - or he’s going to be out of the race early. Part of it is certainly the fact that the major punditry has already dismissed him as “dumb,” or lackadaisical,” or just plain “lazy.” But part of it is Thompson’s doing as well. He has been too cerebral, too remote. His campaign has failed to give off any heat, relying instead on the candidate’s folksiness and star quality. That worked for a while. But once people really began to take a look at him, what they saw didn’t impress as much as it raised questions about whether he really wanted the job or not.

I happen to think of all the major candidates in both parties, Thompson is running the most thoughtful campaign. His positions are fleshed out with some real meat on them - unlike the sugar coated cereal burgers offered up as ideas by his counterparts and adversaries. If you listen closely, there is coherence and logic to his arguments about federalism and limited government. And I like his realism on foreign policy in that he seems not to be beholden to either the neocon or the more traditional Republican camps. There is some nuance in his formulations about the greater Middle East and what our policy should be.

All of this would play very well if Thompson were running for Chief Policy Wonk. But he’s not. He’s running for the Presidency of the United States. And American voters not only like to see a candidate’s mind on display, they want to know what is in his soul as well. So far, Fred has proved unwilling or incapable of reaching out and connecting with people on an emotional level. And time is growing short for him to do so.

One area he could connect with part of the base would be on social issues. But here again, Thompson prefers to frame the issues in the much broader context of his case for increased federalism. On abortion:

Questioned about his views on domestic issues, Thompson repeatedly cited or alluded to his belief in federalism, at times with skill. Of course, on abortion and gay marriage such deference to states and localities may cause problems. On the former, especially, Thompson offered a stark reminder that he would prefer not to see abortion banned but rather to revert to the pre-Roe v. Wade model, when states decided their abortion laws. “No,” Thompson flatly replied, shaking his head when asked if he could run on the GOP platform that calls for a Human Life Amendment to the Constitution that would place unborn children under the protection of the 14th Amendment. Of course, Thompson’s less than orthodox views on the abortion issue are mitigated given his opponents’ views (past and present) on the topic.

This is almost a libertarian view of the abortion issue and the way Thompson has chosen to frame the issue does not sit well with those who see abortion as a defining matter for Republicans. His similar views on gay marriage are a little closer to the mainstream of GOP thought in that there is a sizable minority of the GOP who would like to see the issue decided by state legislatures. But his arms length relationship with the Christian right is not helping him catch fire even in the south where he is still running fairly well in most polls. For Thompson to break out of his regional candidacy, he must find a way to engage people’s emotions. And so far, he has been a disappointment.

I speculated a while back that the candidate may not be in the best of health although he is looking better of late. His energy level seemed better in the second debate as well. But with less than 2 months to go before the real contests begin in Iowa and New Hampshire, it may be too late for him to generate the kind of momentum that would allow him to challenge Romney in Iowa or New Hampshire and Giuliani just about everywhere else.

But stranger things have happened in presidential politics. And Thompson is known as something of a closer judging by his past races for the Senate. In order to have a chance, however, Thompson is simply going to have to change the tone of his campaign, bringing more enthusiasm and drive to his effort.

Otherwise, he may very well end up fading into background before the voting even starts.

Step outside your door and smell the air. Go ahead, take a whiff. What do you smell?

The stink of war is in the air.

Whether this is an atmosphere deliberately fostered by those in the Administration who wish to insure that Iran does not develop the capability to construct a nuclear weapons or whether there truly are signs that the world is preparing for the worst if we attempt to take out Iran’s nuclear infrastructure is impossible to tell. That’s because the consequences of such an attack simply cannot be foreseen. As hard as we try to game out all the scenarios of the attack, there is a real and palpable sense that the dominoes are all set up and ready to topple if we were to go ahead and do what many believe needs to be done to protect our friends and keep The Bomb out of the hands of those seen as irresponsible, messianic fanatics.

It was different with Iraq. Many of those who gave lip service to condemning our attack were privately cheering us on, seeing the toppling of Saddam as a desirable end. But the confrontation with Iran is much more complex and problematic undertaking. There is the real possibility that the Iranians would unleash their proxy armies in Lebanon and Iraq not to mention goading Syria into attacking. If that were to happen - and it is difficult to imagine a reason Iran would forgo the opportunity - the very real possibility of a general Middle East war with the rest of the world choosing sides is not beyond imagining.

A worst case scenario? Pie in the sky fear mongering? Idiotic speculation? Ask the Pentagon. Even the best case scenario involves risks for our troops in Iraq not to mention Israeli civilians. The point is simple; war with Iran involves tremendous risks. And the startling realization is that the best we can do is set back the Iranian nuclear program a few years.

Is it worth risking so much for a gain of so little?

Proponents of bombing Iran point to the possibility of regime change, whether as a result of our attacks or due to encouraging those already fighting the Islamic regime. I reject the liberal argument being made that this would be as bad as bombing. Their reasoning (or lack thereof) is that fomenting revolution is an act of war in and of itself.

Let me know when the left is through wringing its hands that nothing can be done about the possibility of Iranian nukes. Then the grown ups can allow them back into the conversation. After all, they refuse to acknowledge that Iran considers itself already at war with America, having demonstrated that fact time and time again since 1979. Anything short of endless, fruitless negotiations (”As long as we’re talking, we’re not shooting at each other.”) is neocon warmongering in their view.

But an exception to that liberal futility is surprisingly coming from Democratic Presidential candidate Barack Obama. In an interview with the New York Times, Obama outlines a very interesting diplomatic scenario that includes some pretty strong incentives for the Iranians as well as the outline of a “Grand Bargain” on Iraq:

In an hourlong interview on Wednesday, Mr. Obama made clear that forging a new relationship with Iran would be a major element of what he pledged would be a broad effort to stabilize Iraq as he executed a speedy timetable for the withdrawal of American combat troops.

Mr. Obama said that Iran had been “acting irresponsibly” by supporting Shiite militant groups in Iraq. He also emphasized that Iran’s suspected nuclear weapons program and its support for “terrorist activities” were serious concerns.

But he asserted that Iran’s support for militant groups in Iraq reflected its anxiety over the Bush administration’s policies in the region, including talk of a possible American military strike on Iranian nuclear installations.

Making clear that he planned to talk to Iran without preconditions, Mr. Obama emphasized further that “changes in behavior” by Iran could possibly be rewarded with membership in the World Trade Organization, other economic benefits and security guarantees.

“We are willing to talk about certain assurances in the context of them showing some good faith,” he said in the interview at his campaign headquarters here. “I think it is important for us to send a signal that we are not hellbent on regime change, just for the sake of regime change, but expect changes in behavior. And there are both carrots and there are sticks available to them for those changes in behavior.”

Obama is not the first to propose such a quid pro quo; guaranteeing Iranian sovereignty in return for constructive engagement by the mullahs in Iraq. I wrote about it many months ago, drawing a parallel with the resolution of the Cuban missile crisis and Kennedy’s pledge to respect Cuban sovereignty:

Kruschev wrote in his memoirs that the reasons he placed missiles in Cuba in the first place was to redress what the Russians saw as a strategic imbalance between the two countries and to protect his client from a Bay of Pigs repeat. The missiles were removed only after Kennedy promised privately to retire the obsolete Jupiter missiles based in Turkey (which were as provocative from the Soviet point of view as missiles in Cuba were to the United States) and a further guarantee that the Americans would not invade or use a proxy army to overthrow Castro. Later, Bobby Kennedy reasoned that such a promise did not include attempts to assassinate Castro, which continued until at least 1965.

Would such a Quid Pro Quo work with the Iranians? Could we guarantee the sovereignty of the Iranian state in exchange for intrusive inspections by the IAEA and a promise by the mullahs not to enrich uranium?

All would depend on whether or not the leaders of Iran are indeed rational and fear war with the United States and the destruction of their regime. And much would also depend on the IAEA, an organization that would have to prove itself to be more than the nuclear enabler it has been in the past.

There are other carrots we can hold out to the Iranians including unlimited access to enriched uranium for their power plants as well as joint enrichment projects on Iranian soil with other nuclear powers. These are similar deals we’re making with the North Koreans and hold out the promise to end the threat of nuclear weapons from that country.

I realize my conservative brethren are rolling their eyes and shaking their heads at this point. The IAEA? ElBaradei’s nuclear enablers? Obviously, such a deal would depend on full disclosure of the Iranian nuclear program and unconditional cooperation by the mullahs in the kind of monitoring and inspection regimes that would be effective. It would take time to negotiate and set up and in the end, may not even be 100% satisfactory to the United States and our allies.

But as an alternative to war, it’s a good start.

I don’t believe an Obama Administration should be the entity to negotiate such a deal. I prefer a little more steel in the backbone of our negotiators. Perhaps a Clinton or Giuliani Administration would be able to accomplish more given both candidates statements on their willingness to confront the Iranians militarily if negotiations fail.

The point is that negotiations are going to occur one way or another prior to the outbreak of hostilities. What are we prepared to offer in order to get what we want? A package of incentives that include a promise not to invade Iran or support groups that wish to overthrow the mullahs may - just may - be enough of temptation to the Iranians for them to talk about their nuclear enrichment program in the past tense.

We may very well one day be forced to prevent the unthinkable reality of Iranian nuclear weapons by bombing them. But war should only be considered after all diplomatic options have been exhausted. And this is one option I think we can’t afford not to try.

This article originally appears in The American Thinker

What is it about the candidacy of Ron Paul that has attracted the paranoid fringe of American politics?

Clearly, there are Ron Paul supporters who are rational and grounded, not given to spouting conspiracies or blaming “neocons” for everything bad that happens in the world (neocons being a blind for anti-Semitism). For all we know, they may be the majority of his voters.

But just as clearly, there is a dark underbelly to the Paul campaign - a ruthless, mob of internet ruffians who seek to intimidate those who would dare criticize them, the Paul candidacy, or most especially, one of their pet conspiracy theories about 9/11, the “New World Order” (an amorphous term that generally means the imposition of a one world government), or something as mundane and silly as planting a computer chip in every new born in America.

The question isn’t whether Ron Paul believes in any of these conspiracy theories, although he has said on at least two occassions that he believes the investigation into 9/11 must be reopened to explore “unanswered questions” about the tragedy. It is his apparent pandering to this lunatic fringe that must be explored and reasons for it demanded from the campaign.

I say “apparent” pandering because there is the possibility that Paul is completely clueless that his anti-government rants (a subjective word but apt if you listen to his speeches or watch him in the debates) full of dark hints of conspiracy and wrongdoing by the highest officials in the land, actually ring a Pavlovian bell for the paranoid conspiracy freaks causing them to flock to his banner.

For example:

A lot of times they think subsidies and welfare goes to poor people. Now there’s some welfare that goes to poor people, but sometimes I think they’re crumbs. The real big welfare in the system that we have goes to the military-industrial complex and the big banks, that’s where it goes. [applause]

Speak to a crowd of conspiracists and mention the “military-industrial complex” and visions of sinister men meeting at Bretton Woods and the Council on Foreign Relations are immediately conjured up. And the inclusion of banks as a beneficiary of government “welfare” may be true but is a curious choice nonetheless. Banks get nowhere near the federal dollars that defense contractors get. Why include them?

Every anti-Semite worth his salt knows exactly what Paul is talking about when he mentions banks in the same breath as the military-industrial complex conspiracy - Jewish control of the financial destiny of this country.

Paul is no anti-Semite. But is he pandering to the fringe by speaking like this? When he talks about “neocons” - which for some in this country is a codeword for the Jewish conspiracy and Jewish power in Washington - is he aware of the effect on his more bigoted supporters?

In fact, Paul’s rants against “neocons” have been so vicious and full of deceitful half truths that National Review columnist Michael Ledeen thought of suing Paul for libel:

On July 10, Ron Paul, a congressman from Texas, delivered a tirade against his version of neoconservatism. He called it “Neo-Conned!” and he posted it on his website and had it distributed as best he could. A considerable part of it is devoted to his version of my writings, and is so inaccurate, so distorted, and so nasty, as to make me wish once again that this country had a decent libel law so that I could at least get some money from him and give him a healthy dose of the public humiliation he deserves.

[snip]

A final point: Paul’s accusations are not simply political disagreements, and his language is not merely critical. He is trying to demonize an entire group of people. He says we are not only wrong, but morally evil and an active danger to American society and the peace of the world. His attack, like those coming from the likes of Pat Buchanan and extremists on the other end of the political spectrum (look at David Frum’s recent encounter with some of my leftist attackers), are incitements to personal violence.

It once again begs the question; are Paul’s speeches against neocons designed to attract that segment of the population that believes neoconservatives have an agenda created in Tel Aviv and are nothing more than tools of Israel? Or is he just a crank who is oblivious to the impact his words have on the fringes of American politics? I am not one who believes that everyone who criticizes neoconservatives is an anti-Semite. But in Ron Paul’s case, he has attracted the support of white supremacists largely because they believe that his attacks on neocons validate their view (link goes to hate site) that the neoconservatives are agents of Israel and part of the worldwide Jewish conspiracy to destroy America and the white race.

At the risk of repeating myself, I do not believe the majority of Ron Paul supporters are haters. But reading my emails over the last 72 hours following my postings about some of the supporters of Ron Paul’s candidacy as well as my experiences on my own personal blog and the experiences I’ve read about from numerous bloggers, writers, pundits, and media outlets, I have no doubt that the haters, the paranoid conspiracists, and even some anti-globalist anarchists are the most committed and most visible of his campaign volunteers.

The blog RedState recently felt it necessary to ban the “Paulbots” as they’re called because of their personal attacks on commenters as well as their continuous spouting of outlandish conspiracy theories:

Effective immediately, new users may *not* shill for Ron Paul in any way shape, form or fashion. Not in comments, not in diaries, nada. If your account is less than 6 months old, you can talk about something else, you can participate in the other threads and be your zany libertarian self all you want, but you cannot pimp Ron Paul. Those with accounts more than six months old may proceed as normal.

Now, I could offer a long-winded explanation for *why* this new policy is being instituted, but I’m guessing that most of you can probably guess. Unless you lack the self-awareness to understand just how annoying, time-consuming, and bandwidth-wasting responding to the same idiotic arguments from a bunch of liberals pretending to be Republicans can be.

For those not familiar with Paulbot tactics, the attacks are usually well coordinated with similar arguments used by most emailers. Hence, the euphemism “Paulbots” since it is almost like an attack by spam bots.

They have driven on line polls sponsored by bloggers out of existence thanks to their gaming the system. Apparently, some kind of sophisticated email campaign is at work because no sooner would a poll on a blog go up than the Paulbots would swarm to the site and vote for their man. Following the Fox News debate in Orlando, Paulbots inundated the online poll measuring the winner of the debate and Paul got 34% of that vote. Unfortunately for Paul, the focus group disagreed:

After the debate 34% of Fox News viewers said that Ron Paul won the debate with 27% saying that Mike Huckabee won the debate. That was in stark contrast to the Fox News focus group who when asked if Ron Paul won nobody raised their hands.

The focus group was chosen by pollster Frank Lunz and done according to accepted scientific methods. Tell that to the Paulbots and they’ll talk about a conspiracy to deny their candidate his debate “victory:”

Constant attention is paid to Technorati and other blog search engines so that the most minute negative mention of Paul will bring several commenters rushing to his defense. Some are indeed polite and accommodating. Most are not. Personal attacks are common as are charges that the blogger is part of a conspiracy against the candidate.

Most bloggers are sick of the attacks. And the fact that the Paulbots seem come out of nowhere is disconcerting. Most of us who blog know who our commenters are and are familiar with their positions. The Paul supporters are what are known as “Drive bys” - commenters who drop by specifically to comment on one topic only and have no desire to read anything else or visit the site again. It is obvious from many of their comments that they don’t even bother to read what is written about their candidate.

This was brought home last summer when Digg, the hugely popular social networking site, banned Ron Paul articles from being promoted to the front page of the website because of an organized “Digg” campaign to favorite any post mentioning Paul thus moving the article to prominence. Such gaming of the system was explained here:

When I say “Ron Paul supporters,” I mean that these people ONLY digg stories about Ron Paul, and many of them don’t read the actual content of submissions. My “history” post had Ron Paul’s name in the title (Digg Dirt: From the Digg Army to Ron Paul) but had only the minutest mention of him in the article – I referenced how a push from Digg may have resulted in him getting on the Daily show. The piece itself had NOTHING to do with Ron Paul!

So why the Diggs? Who are these people? The “Ron Paul Army” has a very strong and unified presence on Digg, but no one calls them out on it – at least not on the individual level. Ron Paulers are organized and networked. They are “friends” on Digg. Their mission: Digg every story with even a slight mention of Ron Paul in order to keep his name in the public eye. How can I say that? RyanUnderdown.com has done a pretty good job of cataloging memos related to the planned Digg manipulation. Check them out here.

(Note the comments in this post from the blog on which I found the link to the above story for a good example of Paulbots in action.)

The link above goes to a site that lists 12 separate email lists that urge Ron Paul supporters to game Digg. Here’s an example:

I previously explained about Digg.com and how their recent addition of non-technology topics (e.g. Politics, Business & Finance) has opened an opportunity for pro-market/pro-liberty articles to get an airing at this very popular news site.

Stories are “promoted” to the Digg.com front page by “digging” (voting) for a story. To coordinate efforts to promote free market and libertarian articles I have started a list of libertarian diggers. As I write this I already have 45 people on it. We have once again this morning been successful in promoting an article. In this case, today’s Mises.org Daily Article on inflation and the Fed. Head over to Digg and join the heated discussion about the article, (you will need to set up a free account).

If you want to join our merry band of libertarian diggers, here are the details…

E-mail me and send me your Digg Username (you login to Digg with this). I will add you to my list of Friends which is serving as our list of libertarian diggers.

No doubt there are Technorati email lists as well as others begun by Paul supporters. And then there’s this curious notion of below the radar email lists illuminated in this piece by The Nation that points to far right network that is fairly nebulous but effective. The spread of stories and rumors mimics uncannily the speed of response to postings by Ron Paul supporters. A legitimate question could be asked about whether or not this email network is also part of the Paul unofficial communications apparatus.

Finally, there is this email campaign we reported on earlier where Ron Paul spam from several different countries from around the world ends up in thousands and thousands of mailboxes.

No doubt Paul adherents will point to this networking with pride and boast how organized they are. And they would be correct. But with Ron Paul a blip in all the polls, garnering less than 2% from likely Republican voters nationally according to the latest Fox Poll, one wonders how they can make their grandiose claims of winning on line polls and having legions of supporters. Are Republican primary voters lying to pollsters? If not, Paul supporters must accept the fact that their candidate is a fringe candidate and has zero impact on the race for the nomination.

And if he is a fringe candidate, it is almost certainly partially a result of his curious relationship with perhaps the strangest radio host in the country.

Alex Jones has been positing conspiracies for more than a decade. Prior to 9/11, most of those conspiracy theories involved secret societies who had gotten control of the government and were plotting to rob us of our freedoms and sovereignty, folding us into a one world government run by rich, powerful men.

It’s “The New World Order” on steroids and there are literally dozens of conspiracies associated with it. For example, a perusal of Jones’ website reveals the following:

Hurricane Katrina: Katrina served as a testing ground and precedent setting case for the coming Police State, with forced gun confiscations and deliberate withholding of aid by FEMA.

The Tsunami: Was the high death toll a result of incompetence, greed, deliberate weather warfare, a combination of all three or none?

Bohemian Grove: From Nixon to Clinton, Arnold to George W, all have been initiated into and are regular visitors to the Satanic hideout known as Bohemian Grove.

Bilderberg: Hundreds of high powered world figures, politicians to film directors meet every year to direct world events and formulate plans for the takeover.

Ron Paul has appeared on the Alex Jones show several times. He has accepted money from Jones and even appears in Jones new film “Endgame.” What’s it about?

Estulin explains that the Bilderberg Group control the world by means of a process called systemic methodology, where they carve up the globe into numerous different pieces and then place their designated frontmen in charge of the major institutions that govern each part of the world.

By this method, Bilderberg were able to merge the nations of Europe into the EU under the guise of trade deals, and the same process is now unfolding with Canada, the U.S. and Mexico being conglomerated to form the North American Union - but not without committed resistance on behalf of the American people.

That resistance is being countered by the beefing of a brutal police state nationwide and the increasing use of U.S. troops in domestic law enforcement. Endgame exposes how the elite are trying to overcome opposition to their agenda by instituting the framework of martial law with executive orders that are designed to combat “domestic insurrection,” as President George Bush officially announces a fiat dictatorship.

Needless to say, Paul’s appearance in such a film calls into question his judgement, if not his sanity. And being interviewed on The Alex Jones Show several times raises a serious question I asked at the beginning of this piece.

Is Paul pandering to the conspiracy nuts in America, knowing their enthusiastic support for him will assist his campaign or is he unaware that by appealing to the basest emotions brought to the surface by his dark hints involving dark forces carrying out a campaign to take away our freedoms, he is giving the paranoid, the fearful, the ignorant haters a standard to rally around?

He is a foolish man if he believes he can control these forces. In the end, they can only destroy him.

UPDATE

Wired latches on to the UAB study of “criminal botnets” spamming Americans from overseas that AT had earlier in the week.

If Texas congressman Ron Paul is elected president in 2008, he may be the first leader of the free world put into power with the help of a global network of hacked PCs spewing spam, according to computer-security researchers who’ve analyzed a recent flurry of e-mail supporting the long-shot Republican candidate….

One e-mail was designed to look as if it came from within a major Silicon Valley corporation, he notes. But when the researchers looked up the IP address, the computer from which the note was sent was actually in South Korea. Another e-mail that was designed to look as if it came from Houston was sent from Italy.

That pattern led Warner to conclude that the messages had been laundered through a botnet — also a standard spammer practice, though a decidedly illegal one.

The body of a message examined by Wired News covered familiar Paul campaign themes, such as ending the war and eliminating the Internal Revenue Service and the Federal Reserve. It also read:

Ron Paul is for the people, unless you want your children to have human implant RFID chips, a National ID card and create a North American Union and see an economic collapse far worse than the great depression. Vote for Ron Paul he speaks the truth and the media and government is afraid of him.

Perusing the blogs and the political wire this morning, one would think that Hillary Clinton’s candidacy just received a death blow from which she will be unable to recover.

I’m talking, of course, about her non-answer to the question of whether she agreed with the program being proposed by New York Governor Eliot Spitzer to give drivers licenses to illegal aliens.

“Clinton on the Ropes!” screams Andrew Sullivan.

“Clinton Stumble Provides Dems an Opening,” opines The Note.

“Hill Trips Over Spitz Debate,” gasps the New York Post.

“Hillary’s Big Blunder,” says a satisfied Malkin.

To political junkies, Hillary’s answer to the question about drivers licenses for illegal aliens showed a chink in her armor:

McKinney said Clinton grew testy when pressed on whether she agrees with a proposal her home state governor has to give driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants. She first expressed support for the idea. But when Dodd objected, Clinton grew defensive and said she wasn’t saying it should be done, although she recognizes why the governor is trying to do it even though she doesn’t think it’s “the best thing for any governor to do.”

Edwards pounced. “Unless I missed something, Senator Clinton said two different things in the course of about two minutes,” he said. “America is looking for a president who will say the same thing, who will be consistent, who will be straight with them.”

Obama piled on. “I can’t tell whether she was for it or against it,” he said. He said he supports the idea.

Ed Morrissey sums up Hillary’s play nicely:

Hillary Clinton cannot have thought that the policy would go unremarked during the debate. In New York, it has created a firestorm of controversy for Governor Eliot Spitzer, who has seen his approval ratings plunge in the first months of his term of office, thanks to tone-deaf manoeuvrings such as this. With immigration policy on the forefront of both political parties this year — and with MSNBC so desperate for new material that they started asking about UFOs (see below) — Hillary should have prepared an answer for this question.

Clearly, she did not. And just as clearly, the result left her looking shifty, pandering, and unsure of herself. It also brought out her public personality problems — showing her to be cranky and rather unlikable when on stage. Worse yet, it made her look indecisive, a quality no voter wants in a President, and the same quality that made Kerry such a lousy candidate.

While all of this is true, aren’t we used to this sort of thing from the Clinton’s by now? These guys have made straddling a preferred sexual position. It gets them off every time with the majority of the American people. For the Clinton’s, there is no real history; only quicksand and painted over memories. Was Clinton really against welfare reform before he embraced it as his own? Not according to him. Was Hillary’s health care plan really defeated because the insurance companies and doctors ganged up on her and brainwashed the American people into writing their Congressman to reject it? Or did citizens not like the idea of the government making so many health care decisions for them?

There is a political art to the straddle and the Clinton’s have been masters at it for more almost 20 years. True, Hillary’s rather inelegant response to the drivers license question was perhaps not her best attempt at appealing to all sides of a question. But the point wasn’t to win the argument but simply not to lose it.

Did she anger anyone beyond the beltway elite and political class? I doubt it. Citizens from both sides of the debate heard what they wanted to hear which is what you get when you examine Clinton’s tactics on just about any issues but especially controversial ones.

Think about her position on Iraq. She mouths platitudes about leaving while slamming George Bush. Meanwhile, she makes it clear she will stay and if not finish the job, not withdraw willy nilly thus endangering American interests all the while slamming George Bush. She says she opposes the war but refuses to apologize for her vote authorizing it all the while slamming George Bush.

Do we see a pattern here? She has successfully made Bush’s policies in Iraq the issue not what she will do about the place once she gets into office. Perfect triangulation.

If Clinton loses any ground because of this flap I will be shocked. The beltway boys in the media may desperately wish to see a competitive race on the Democrats side given the orgasmic coverage that Obama is getting and would continue to receive. But it’s extremely difficult to see such a race developing since Obama has forsworn using the kind of attack politics that would give him a chance to get back in the race. His “campaign of hope” may be what the people crave. But beyond that, Democrats want to win very badly. Torn as they are in being tempted to give their messiah Obama a shot at the nomination, hard headed realism tells them - correctly - that Hillary would be a better candidate to go against the Republicans. Therefore, her little slip in the debate last night won’t matter a fig.

And Republicans are dreaming if they think they can nail Clinton to a cross of flip flops and double talk on any issue during the general election campaign. She’s too clever and is so good at parsing her responses that it will be like trying to nail down a Mexican jumping bean. Best that the GOP concentrate on her far left agenda while reminding people why they don’t want to elect another Clinton to the presidency. That way lies a better chance of success in what is still promising to shape up as a Democratic year.

In the old days when watching television involved trying to decide what sitcom to watch on which of the only three networks the entertainment Gods saw fit to make available to us mortals, “channel surfing” meant heaving yourself up from the easy chair, walking over to the TV and manually twisting a knob that changed the station.

A “knob.” How quaint. The knob actually had the numbers 1-13 of which perhaps 5 channels actually featured a network. And one of those stations - PBS - wasn’t really considered TV anyway. No laugh track, nobody was ever gunned down, and nothing ever blew up. What was it good for, anyway?

Then came the TV remote control and life as we know it on earth was altered irrevocably. At first, men were able to drive their wives to homicide by switching back and forth between three channels - an admittedly futile and annoying practice since one was apt to confuse the plot lines of the shows you were trying to watch. Hence, it became difficult to remember if Dick Van Dyke was really going to be able to rescue Sgt. Saunders and Little John from the Germans while Marshall Dillon and FBI Inspector Erskine tried to arrest Johnny Yuma for crimes against good acting.

We have no such problems today thanks to the 200 plus cable and satellite stations available to any American of modest means. And with this explosion of choices, the TV remote has assumed the status of domestic icon, a talisman of power that allows the possessor a window on the universe or at least the ability to find out what the temperature is outside your window.

Such power is intoxicating. But it can also condemn the user, like the Headless Horseman from Sleepy Hollow, to go off on a futile quest in search of something important that can never be found - the perfect television show where even the commercials are riveting entertainment. Unfettered channel surfing is as much an expression of hope as it is a way to alleviate boredom.

Thus, last night, I found myself in a monumental quandary. There was the GOP debate from Florida on Fox News where the grown up candidates were being asked questions by grown up journalists that actually elicited responses that voters might use to make up their minds about a candidate’s presidential qualifications and not demonstrate whether our future president might emote well when asked silly questions about how they are “feeling.”

Then there was Sunday Night Football on NBC with the Steelers going up against the Broncos at Mile High Stadium - classic match-up with classic announcers in Al and John. The fact that there are few things in life more enjoyable than watching NFL Football in Hi-Def was also an attraction.

Finally, to make my conundrum complete, there was the 7th game of the ALCS featuring the Indians - who haven’t won a World Series since 1948 - and the Red Sox who have made a wonderful habit in recent years of coming back from the dead and going on to victory.

For an hour and a half while the debate was occurring, I was clicking like a madman. Both ballgames ended up being as good as advertised (the Red Sox pulled away late to win 11-2) so I missed huge chunks of the GOP debate. This I didn’t mind because the football game was so good, it almost made me forget how badly my beloved Bears have been playing this year (despite an incredibly desperate, 97 yard TD drive with less than two minutes and no timeouts against the Eagles that saved their season temporarily).

However, thanks to old fashioned VCR technology, I was able to tape the debate and watch most of what I missed live. In this, I was not disappointed because the debate was perhaps the most animated, most interesting discussion compared to any of the previous GOP get togethers.

I thought that once again, Rudy Giuliani was sharp, on point, and at times, inspiring. However, he had trouble defending himself from some of the attacks launched against him by Romney and Thompson. There really isn’t any getting around the fact that when Mayor of New York City, Rudy acted at times in a decidedly unconservative manner. How much this truly hurts him I just don’t know. My issues with Rudy revolve around his experience and temperament not his lack of conservative credentials. But for some, I’m sure, his liberal apostasy will keep them from voting for him.

Romney was surprisingly subdued although smooth and very well prepared as usual. He actually had a hair or two out of place which almost made him look human. Why he is wasting his time attacking John McCain is beyond me. Their catfight elicited the liveliest exchanges of the night but Romney’s target should be Giuliani. Besides that, he said nothing memorable and got bogged down a couple of times in minutiae. Not his best performance.

McCain also seemed a little off although he delivered the best line of the night talking about the $1 million earmark Hillary delivered for the Woodstock Museum. He noted that the concert was probably a “a cultural and pharmaceutical event” but that he couldn’t attend because he was “tied up at the time” - a reference to his horrific experience as a POW. That crack garnered a standing ovation and applause from the other candidates.

But McCain seemed a little flat when defending some of his positions and didn’t have the energy the other candidates brought to the debate. A disappointing performance.

The Huckaboob was his ‘ole self, grinnin’ like a possum and reeling off southern aphorisms one after another. I suppose we’re going to have to put up with him for a while longer since he’s closing fast in Iowa and might shock the world and finish 1st or 2nd. He doesn’t have a prayer in the general election if he were to win the nomination so if the GOP wants to commit suicide, the Huckathing is their man.

Hunter,Tancredo and Paul could have stayed home. I think Paul even did more damage to himself by his reaction to the booing in the audience. It was the first venue where his Paulbots seemed to be drowned out by the rest of the audience and it appeared to disconcert him. If possible, he was even more shrill and nonsensical than usual. If people were actually going to give him a serious look last night, I would think they would have to come away disappointed.

But if there was a winner last night, it had to be Fred Thompson - not because of his outstanding performance but because once again, he exceeded expectations. I thought he was rather subdued and tired looking in that first debate but this time, he looked much better (make-up?) and sounded much more alive and forceful. He was animated in his debate with Giuliani over tort reform and I think he scored quite well with his federalism answer to Rudy’s charge. He also took a nice chunk out of Rudy with his pointing out the former Mayor’s inconsistency with regard to sanctuary cities. Rudy’s answer was vague and unconvincing. In short, Fred scored against Rudy while establishing himself as the leading conservative in the field. Not a bad night for someone already being written off by the inside the beltway crowd.

Note to the political parties: Please do not schedule your debates opposite NFL Football ever again. My thumb eventually became sore switching back and forth between the two great American games and I would hate to have to give up watching either one just to prevent carpel tunnel syndrome.

As all other Presidential campaigns have done, Hillary Clinton’s foreign policy team has written an essay for Foreign Affairs outlining her thoughts and goals for her potential presidency.

I felt that given the fact that it is a good bet at this point that Mrs. Clinton will be putting her thoughts into action come January, 2009, a close look at her ideas and proposals would be of interest to all.

Generally, speaking the essay is typical Democratic party boilerplate with some interesting differences, including the eye-popping inference that a Clinton Administration may be willing to negotiate with al-Qaeda:

Use our military not as the solution to every problem but as one element in a comprehensive strategy. As president, I will never hesitate to use force to protect Americans or to defend our territory and our vital interests. We cannot negotiate with individual terrorists; they must be hunted down and captured or killed.

We can’t negotiate with “individual terrorists” but does that mean we might be willing to sit down with terrorist groups? I hope somebody asks her that question but for the moment, I’ll just put it down to poor writing on the part of whoever penned the piece.

As for the rest, I was surprised at what the left would consider to be her bellicosity toward Iran as well as a realistic view toward China. I would say that her outlook is not quite a 9/10 view of the world but she seems to have one foot in the past when it comes to fighting terrorism. And for all her Bush bashing rhetoric, she appears willing to carry on many Bush policies, despite not giving the President credit for them.

Here are some specifics:

The tragedy of the last six years is that the Bush administration has squandered the respect, trust, and confidence of even our closest allies and friends. At the dawn of the twenty-first century, the United States enjoyed a unique position. Our world leadership was widely accepted and respected, as we strengthened old alliances and built new ones, worked for peace across the globe, advanced nonproliferation, and modernized our military. After 9/11, the world rallied behind the United States as never before, supporting our efforts to remove the Taliban in Afghanistan and go after the al Qaeda leadership. We had a historic opportunity to build a broad global coalition to combat terror, increase the impact of our diplomacy, and create a world with more partners and fewer adversaries.

But we lost that opportunity by refusing to let the UN inspectors finish their work in Iraq and rushing to war instead. Moreover, we diverted vital military and financial resources from the struggle against al Qaeda and the daunting task of building a Muslim democracy in Afghanistan. At the same time, we embarked on an unprecedented course of unilateralism: refusing to pursue ratification of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, abandoning our commitment to nuclear nonproliferation, and turning our backs on the search for peace in the Middle East. Our withdrawal from the Kyoto Protocol and refusal to participate in any international effort to deal with the tremendous challenges of climate change further damaged our international standing.

It’s hard to dissect so many mis-statements, falsehoods, and plain old Democratic talking points so I’ll just handle a couple of the more glaring errors.

First, the idea that all was peaches and cream on January 20, 2001 when the first President Clinton left office is so outrageously false as to be beyond belief. We were then as we were on 9/11 and afterwards, widely mistrusted and disliked by a vast majority of the world’s people and governments. The idea that 9/11 changed that is bunk, as I wrote about here.

This persistent myth is convenient politically but historically a sham. It has no basis in fact and has more to do with a desire by the left and the Democratic party to make some ridiculous point about America being loved by the world until George Bush came along.

I might have a few other questions for Hillary just from these first paragraphs.

* Which “new alliances” did the Clinton Administration build?
* Explain how gutting the military modernized it.
* Is it your position that we have more “adversaries” now than we did in 2001? Than 1996? Who are they? When did they move from the “neutral” or “friendly” column on to the “enemy” side of the ledger?
* Is it your position that we do not have a “broad coalition” fighting terrorism today - sharing intel, cooperating with law enforcement agencies around the world and generally working around the clock with literally dozens of countries to keep the US safe?
* Do you remember the Senate refusing to take up the Kyoto agreement during your husband’s presidency? Do you remember why?
* Do you remember the Iraq Regime Change Act of 1998? Or did you sleep through that one too?

Those are for starters. If we all got together and really put our minds to it, I’m sure we could come up with a couple of dozen more questions just from those first two paragraphs.

But that was just from the intro to the essay. Let’s get to the meat and potatoes:

IRAQ

We must withdraw from Iraq in a way that brings our troops home safely, begins to restore stability to the region, and replaces military force with a new diplomatic initiative to engage countries around the world in securing Iraq’s future. To that end, as president, I will convene the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the secretary of defense, and the National Security Council and direct them to draw up a clear, viable plan to bring our troops home, starting within the first 60 days of my administration.

While working to stabilize Iraq as our forces withdraw, I will focus U.S. aid on helping Iraqis, not propping up the Iraqi government. Financial resources will go only where they will be used properly, rather than to government ministries or ministers that hoard, steal, or waste them.

As we leave Iraq militarily, I will replace our military force with an intensive diplomatic initiative in the region. The Bush administration has belatedly begun to engage Iran and Syria in talks about the future of Iraq. This is a step in the right direction, but much more must be done. As president, I will convene a regional stabilization group composed of key allies, other global powers, and all the states bordering Iraq. Working with the newly appointed UN special representative for Iraq, the group will be charged with developing and implementing a strategy for achieving a stable Iraq that provides incentives for Iran, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Turkey to stay out of the civil war.

“While working to stabilize Iraq as our forces withdraw” - a nice trick if you can pull it off. If we could stabilize the damn place while taking our troops out, somehow you have to believe we’d be doing it already.

And why should Iraq’s neighbors Iran and Syria work to “stabilize Iraq’s future” when they’re the ones destabilizing it at the moment? Is it Hillary’s belief that once we start to leave that those two terrorist supporting nations will suddenly cease their interference in Iraq and allow the legitimate Iraqi government some breathing room?

This is realism?

And then there’s the shocking notion that aid will go to the “Iraqi people” and not “prop up” the Iraqi government? What is she, nuts? While corruption is endemic in Iraq (as it is in every government in the region and most of the world) is that a reason to cut Maliki off at the knees? With us gone and the Iraqi government collapsing because a Clinton Administration won’t support them, who in God’s name is going to fill the vacuum?

Madness.

And I don’t hear Hillary or the left up in arms about giving assistance to African dictators who routinely line their pockets and those of their cronies with our foreign aid. If she cared half as much about a sizable portion of the rest of the foreign aid budget going into the Swiss bank accounts of the generals, potentates, and dictators who rule most of the world, you could at least give her credit for not being a towering hypocrite.

The regional conference idea is a good one - something Bush should have embraced years ago. If he had, there’s a chance that pressure from other Arab states could have curtailed Syrian involvement. Iran is a whole different story. The mullahs have their claws firmly gripping a sizable chunk of Iraq thanks to their influence with some powerful forces as well as individuals. I doubt there is much that can be done to lessen their interference in Iraqi affairs.

IRAN

Here, Hillary admits Iran is supplying weapons to our enemies in Iraq, something not too many Democrats have done so I give her credit for abandoning a cherished Democratic talking point. As for the rest of her prescription regarding the mullahs, she mixes tough talk with unrealistic diplomatic goals:

The case in point is Iran. Iran poses a long-term strategic challenge to the United States, our NATO allies, and Israel. It is the country that most practices state-sponsored terrorism, and it uses its surrogates to supply explosives that kill U.S. troops in Iraq. The Bush administration refuses to talk to Iran about its nuclear program, preferring to ignore bad behavior rather than challenge it. Meanwhile, Iran has enhanced its nuclear-enrichment capabilities, armed Iraqi Shiite militias, funneled arms to Hezbollah, and subsidized Hamas, even as the government continues to hurt its own citizens by mismanaging the economy and increasing political and social repression.

As a result, we have lost precious time. Iran must conform to its nonproliferation obligations and must not be permitted to build or acquire nuclear weapons. If Iran does not comply with its own commitments and the will of the international community, all options must remain on the table.

On the other hand, if Iran is in fact willing to end its nuclear weapons program, renounce sponsorship of terrorism, support Middle East peace, and play a constructive role in stabilizing Iraq, the United States should be prepared to offer Iran a carefully calibrated package of incentives. This will let the Iranian people know that our quarrel is not with them but with their government and show the world that the United States is prepared to pursue every diplomatic option.

Talking is fine but what do we discuss? Iran has ostensibly taken their enrichment program off the table so some kind of “Grand Bargain” involving Iraq and Iran’s nuclear program would seem to be nixed for now.

If she believes that her Administration would be able to offer anything to Iran that would make it “willing to end its nuclear weapons program, renounce sponsorship of terrorism, support Middle East peace, and play a constructive role in stabilizing Iraq,” she is dreaming. There are no “calibrated incentives” that would encourage the mullahs to behave like decent citizens of the world. Even without Ahmadinejad in the picture, the nuclear issue won’t be negotiated to our satisfaction. We just don’t have enough to offer the Iranians that would knock their socks off and give them the incentives to make a deal.

If elected, she will have about 2 years to decide whether to attack or live with a nuclear Iran. It will be the hardest decision of her presidency - as it would be for anyone sitting in the Big Chair at that time - and whatever she decides will have severe consequences for American policy.

AFGHANISTAN

The forgotten frontline in the war on terror is Afghanistan, where our military effort must be reinforced. The Taliban cannot be allowed to regain power in Afghanistan; if they return, al Qaeda will return with them. Yet current U.S. policies have actually weakened President Hamid Karzai’s government and allowed the Taliban to retake many areas, especially in the south. A largely unimpeded heroin trade finances the very Taliban fighters and al Qaeda terrorists who are attacking our troops. In addition to engaging in counternarcotics efforts, we must seek to dry up recruiting opportunities for the Taliban by funding crop-substitution programs, a large-scale road-building initiative, institutions that train and prepare Afghans for honest and effective governance, and programs to enable women to play a larger role in society.

We must also strengthen the national and local governments and resolve the problems along Afghanistan’s border. Terrorists are increasingly finding safe havens in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan. Redoubling our efforts with Pakistan would not only help root out terrorist elements there; it would also signal to our NATO partners that the war in Afghanistan and the broader fight against extremism in South Asia are battles that we can and must win. Yet we cannot succeed unless we design a strategy that treats the entire region as an interconnected whole, where crises overlap with one another and the danger of a chain reaction of disasters is real.

Hillary’s heart and head are in the right place regarding Afghanistan but the problem is there is very little to be done about Pakistan and not much militarily that can be accomplished in Afghanistan without a 180 degree change in the attitude of our NATO partners about engaging the enemy (”How many NATO troops do we need to guard the airport?” asked one Canadian general).

The political problems in Afghanistan that prevented us from taking out the opium crop last year, leading directly to a Taliban flush with cash to buy weapons and influence with the tribes need to be solved by President Karzai and the National Assembly. Other questions directly bearing on the Taliban resurgence in the south have to do with the ease with which their fighters can infiltrate across the border with Pakistan.

And there, Hillary is once again dreaming if she thinks there is anything the US can do to help the Pakistani government (which will be even less cooperative with the US once civilian control is restored early next year and we will be dealing with Benazir Bhutto as Prime Minister), especially in the NWFP - the “federally administered tribal areas” - where the writ of Pakistani law has never run in the 60 years of independence. We could “redouble” our efforts, triple them, and then multiply that by a hundred and still come up short. Musharraf can’t control those areas. What makes Hillary think we can?

No word in the essay about how divided Pakistan is about helping us with the people madly opposed to American policy in Afghanistan and the intelligence service ISI supportive of the Taliban. Pakistan is a much tougher nut to crack than simply “redoubling” our efforts.

RUSSIA

Statesmanship is also necessary to engage countries that are not adversaries but that are challenging the United States on many fronts. Russian President Vladimir Putin has thwarted a carefully crafted UN plan that would have put Kosovo on a belated path to independence, attempted to use energy as a political weapon against Russia’s neighbors and beyond, and tested the United States and Europe on a range of nonproliferation and arms reduction issues. Putin has also suppressed many of the freedoms won after the fall of communism, created a new class of oligarchs, and interfered deeply in the internal affairs of former Soviet republics.

It is a mistake, however, to see Russia only as a threat. Putin has used Russia’s energy wealth to expand the Russian economy, so that more ordinary Russians are enjoying a rising standard of living. We need to engage Russia selectively on issues of high national importance, such as thwarting Iran’s nuclear ambitions, securing loose nuclear weapons in Russia and the former Soviet republics, and reaching a diplomatic solution in Kosovo. At the same time, we must make clear that our ability to view Russia as a genuine partner depends on whether Russia chooses to strengthen democracy or return to authoritarianism and regional interference.

First, it is difficult to see how we could have deflected Vladmir Putin from his goal to establish himself as virtual dictator. But having said that, I’m glad to see Hillary not taking the Russian bear for granted and realizing at the same time that there are vital areas where cooperation is desired by both sides. Non proliferation is huge and the Bush Administration should be faulted for its laxity in this regard.

One area of cooperation she didn’t mention was in fighting terrorism. We have worked closely these last few years with Russian internal security to combat the Chechen menace - one of the more active terrorist enclaves in the world. She might want to see about increasing those contacts and firming up some of these relationships that I understand are somewhat informal.

CHINA

Our relationship with China will be the most important bilateral relationship in the world in this century. The United States and China have vastly different values and political systems, yet even though we disagree profoundly on issues ranging from trade to human rights, religious freedom, labor practices, and Tibet, there is much that the United States and China can and must accomplish together. China’s support was important in reaching a deal to disable North Korea’s nuclear facilities. We should build on this framework to establish a Northeast Asian security regime.

I would be interested to hear her thoughts on the possible Chinese thrust at Taiwan. The day may come in the next 8 years where China feels strong enough militarily to take us on in their own waters. Do we abandon Taipei to the tender mercies of their communist cousins? Or do we risk a general war with China to try and save her?

As for the rest, Japan, China, and the US have been the powers that be in Asia for the last 100 years and will be for the next 100. Working together the last quarter century has brought peace to Asia for the first time in a thousand years. A “Northeast Asian Security Regime” is fine as long as it recognizes our current commitments to South Korea and Japan. And I’d love to see a Democrat stand up to the Chinese about their unfair trade policies.

GLOBAL WARMING

This is worrisome:

We must also take threats and turn them into opportunities. The seemingly overwhelming challenge of climate change is a prime example. Far from being a drag on global growth, climate control represents a powerful economic opportunity that can be a driver of growth, jobs, and competitive advantage in the twenty-first century. As president, I will make the fight against global warming a priority. We cannot solve the climate crisis alone, and the rest of the world cannot solve it without us. The United States must reengage in international climate change negotiations and provide the leadership needed to reach a binding global climate agreement. But we must first restore our own credibility on the issue. Rapidly emerging countries, such as China, will not curb their own carbon emissions until the United States has demonstrated a serious commitment to reducing its own through a market-based cap-and-trade approach.

The problem is that the Kyoto protocols were not a “powerful economic opportunity.” Far from it. The protocols would have sucked several hundred billion dollars out of our economy and placed it in the hands of countries who had the offsets for sale. And the goals set for the US - emissions targeted to 1993 levels - could very well have had us spinning into a depression.

I would prefer a more modest approach to curbing emissions involving the only countries that matter - the industrialized nations of the world. We don’t need a Fidel Castro going on for 4 hours telling us how great an environmentalist he is and how evil we are. Kyoto was a scheme to transfer massive amounts of wealth from the rich to the poor countries of the world and was too complex to work anyway (witness Europe’s failure to meet Kyoto targets despite their best efforts). What is needed is an agreement among those nations who are responsible for 95% of the greenhouse emissions on the planet.

GROVELING APOLOGIES…

To build the world we want, we must begin by speaking honestly about the problems we face. We will have to talk about the consequences of our invasion of Iraq for the Iraqi people and others in the region. We will have to talk about Guantánamo and Abu Ghraib. We will also have to take concrete steps to enhance security and spread opportunity throughout the world.

Perhaps we should get her some sack cloth and ashes as an inaugural present. From the sound of the above, she will be knee walking her way around the world apologizing for America being so beastly to everyone else.

Wake me when it’s over.

SUMMARY

Not as bad reading it the second time around. Clearly, Hillary’s inside look at how the presidency operates in a hostile world taught her some valuable lessons. My question is how resistant she is going to be to the siren call of appeasement and surrender of the base in her party? Ironically, for some of her bolder, stronger moves in foreign policy she may have to rely on the rational right in Congress to support her.

I am encouraged by some of what she is thinking and frightened by some other ideas. But taken in total, it is not a foreign policy I could get behind and support with any enthusiasm. Better than Obama’s. Better than any other Democrat’s so far. But far short of what I think is necessary as far as fighting an implacable enemy who, given the odds, will probably hit us again during her presidency.

And then we’ll see, in the crucible of crisis, of what exactly Hillary Clinton is truly made.