Joe Lieberman Has Become the Republican Attack Dog

Wesley Clark’s remarks regarding Sen. McCain’s service record and his ability to lead are front page news. The Republicans have responded with a collective “How Dare You.” Lieberman’s remark about a possible terrorist attack have not garnered nearly as much attentiton. Lieberman suggested there will probably be an attack early in the first term of the new presidency. He said  ”Our enemies will test the new president early,” Lieberman, I-Conn., told Face The Nation host Bob Schieffer. “Remember that the truck bombing of the World Trade Center happened in the first year of the Clinton administration. 9/11 happened in the first year of the Bush administration.” So this according to Lieberman is the reason that we must vote for McCain because he will keep us safe. This is similar to what McCain chief strategist, Charlie Black said. Black was forced to give the obligatory apology, but that is not the Lieberman role. His job is to throw the dirt and see what sticks.  This is the politics of fear at its very best. Lieberman goes out there and says this as if he is speaking as a true independent.  It is hard to believe that just 8 years ago he was number 2 on the Democratic ticket. He is a new man with a new job–the McCain dirty work.

Angry Bill Clinton Not Ready for Unity

Bill Clinton is still mad. He feels that Hillary Clinton should have been the nominee and he also believes the Obama team has portrayed him as a racist. Sources say that Bill Clinton has said that Obama will have to “kiss his ass” if he wants his support. Clinton denies saying this, but his actions seem to suggest this. The primary season is over and it is time for the party to unite. Bill Clinton is the only two-term Democratic president in modern history so he is important to the party. Clinton is important to the process, but he is not essential. If he chooses to sit on his hands during this historic election that is his right, but he needs to be prepared to deal with the consequences. He has a big job ahead of him. He has to do his own share of fence-mending. He will be reaching out to the African-American community. If he wants them to reach back he will need to embrace the first African-American presidential candidate, Senator Barack Obama.    

Does Gen. Clark Have the Right to Question McCain’s Qualifications?

General Wesley Clark while appearing on Face the Nation yesterday made some controversial statements regarding Sen. John McCain’s qualifications to be president.  He said. “I certainly honor his service as a prisoner of war. He was a hero to me and to hundreds of thousands and millions of others in the armed forces, as a prisoner of war. And he has traveled all over the world. But he hasn’t held executive responsibility.”  He went on to say “He hasn’t been there and ordered the bombs to fall. He hasn’t seen what it’s like when diplomats come in and say, I don’t know whether we’re going to be able to get this point through or not,” .Clark who is an Obama supporter is getting some heat for making these remarks, but this is not what the Republicans did to John Kerry in 2004. The swiftboaters questioned what Kerry had done while serving in Vietnam they questioned the validity of his service. What Clark is doing is putting McCain’s service in perspective. McCain is a war hero whose service to this country is unquestioned, but what would that service bring to the presidency? How did what he did prepare him for Executive office? McCain has shown genuine disdain when Obama has challenged him on any armed forces issues. He has acted as if his service record makes him immune to criticism and this premise is simply not true. General Clark has a right to raise the issue since he too served his country valiantly.

Vote As if Your Child’s Life Depends On It

I was reading a magazine today and the article suggested that this year we should vote as if our child’s life depended on it. That is an interesting perspective. We tend to get caught up on the here and now. The cost of gas, food, unemployment and crime. All of these are very important issues but they are not the only issues. We have a Supreme Court with a number of aging members. The next president will be the one to nominate new justices to the court. These justices will be outlining policy for this country for years to come. We should think about this when we are voting. As the Iraq War drags on we are depending on a volunteer armed service to fight, but at some point people might not be prone to volunteer when they know they will be shipped to a war zone. What happens when we run out of volunteers? The Draft could be implemented again and that would be very personal to me. There is currently a commercial featuring a woman and her baby. She talks about John McCain and his 100 year war remark. She ends the commercial by introducing the infant and telling McCain that he can not have her son. I would say the same thing. I have a 13 year old son full of promise and potential. The sky is the limit for him, and I can not allow a war to extinguish his future. In November I will cast a vote for the future of our country and that is a vote for the children.

Obama Supporters are Making “Hussein” a Household Name

Today in the New York Times I read an article about how young people are adopting the name “Hussein”. This is Barack Obama’s middle name. A name given to him by his Kenyan father who was a Mulim and died an atheist. Political foes on the right have used the name to reenforce the falsehood that Obama is a Muslim. A growing group of young people on the web have started using Hussein as their own middle name. The goal is to remove the stigma of the name. Some of them say conservative commentators say the name as if it is a curse word. Their premise is if you hear it all the time the fear is removed and it looses its power. Obama’s message has resonated with young people and this radical act shows that they truly believe in this “skinny kid with a funny name”.

Conservatives Call Barack Obama Everything But Black

This week Barack Obama has been called a number of names: flip-flopper, arrogant and finally tan. In this political season flip flopping is simply what both candidates do. Both he and McCain have changed their minds on a number of different issues. Obama backed away from his promise to accept only public funding for his campaign. McCain while stumping praised the GI Bill that he and President Bush opposed. So maybe we can say that Obama did flip flop on the issue. This is a name that Obama can live with because this is a name that has been used in association with both candidates.  There are a number of names reserved exclusively for Barack Obama. Karl Rove had the audacity to call Obama arrogant. Obama is a confident, accomplished black man with a healthy ego. Anyone who runs for president has to have an ego. Arrogant is a feeling of importance that is not predicated on fact. So I would have to say this does not describe Obama. Now Rove might have really meant Obama was uppity. This is a world usually reserved for black people that some white people fill are “acting white”. Where did I hear that this week? Ralph Nader had the nerve to say Obama was “talking white”. He was wondering why Obama wasn’t spending enough time talking about the plight of the inner city. For Nader it is simply not enough for Obama to speak out on issues that affect all Americans. So I think we will not use the term arrogant or white acting on Obama the terms simply don’t ring true. Let us not forget MSNBC political analyst, Pat Buchanan who continues to call Obama exotic. Buchanan’s mission is to paint Obama as someone outside of the mainstream. Finally, the latest attack comes from conservative Grover Norquist. He says that the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee is “John Kerry with a tan.” This is just another way of saying Obama is black. To some people a black man as president is a hard concept to grasp and the Norquists of the world are making it their mission to say it without saying it. The mainstream Republicans won’t be doing it but their minions like Norquist will be more than happy to do it.  Barack Obama better brace himself because he is going to be called a lot of names, but if he wins this election all of the name callers will have to call him Mr. President.

 

 

 

Straight-Talking McCain Now Takes Credit for the GI Bill He Opposed

McCain is now praising the GI bill he opposed. When this bill was being considered Barack Obama questioned McCain’s opposition to the bill. McCain became irate and said that since Obama had never served he had no right to question him. McCain’s response to the criticism was a little over the top, but the bottomline was he was against the bill. Now the straight talker is talking out of the other side of his mouth. Now in discussing the bill he says,”I’m happy to tell you that we probably agreed to an increase in educational benefits for our veterans that not only gives them increase in their educational benefits, but if they stay in for a certain period of time than they can transfer those educational benefits to their spouses and or children.” This is not just a change of position this is just plain dishonest.

Hillary and Barack’s Awkward First Date in Unity

Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama made their first joint appearance in Unity today. Critics have said they seemed uncomfortable and somewhat stilted. One pundit said they seemed like a couple that had been separated that got back together for the sake of the kids. Well in this case the kids are the Democratic party. Expectations for this union were probably set too high. They are doing well to have come this far. They had a brutal battle throughout the campaign season so to expect them to perform like kissing cousins was a little too much to expect. They have gone from trading insults to trading effusive compliments. They have come a long way, but they still have a long way to go. Some of the people that supported Clinton are not ready to jump on the bandwagon. Some have threatened to vote for McCain. Some have said they will simply sit out the election. Today both candidates made the effort to appear unified, but I once heard a preacher say “if you tie the tails of two cats together they are unified, but there is no unity.”

John McCain’s Wife Beating Joke Falls Flat

John McCain made a joke about beating his wife. It was not funny and we know he did not mean it. Years ago people laughed about beating their wives, beating their kids and even kicking the dog. But we live in the era that has been witness to the devastating effects of such behavior.  People don’t find this kind of thing funny anymore. A politician has to know what passed as humor in the past can be explosive if the media decides to make it an issue. This is a non-issue and since we know that the Senator was joking we will move on from this non-issue, but I would like to see this same level of civility extended to the Obamas in the event they say something that is so ridiculous we know they could not possibly be serious.

When Did Changing Your Mind Become a Crime?

When a politician changes his mind it is called a flip-flop. If a politician ever had an opinion he should keep it and carry it to his grave. We look for our elected officials to have a rigid mindset and not deviate from his past opinions. An old saying that applies to this election season is “a wise man changes his mind, a fool does not have a mind to change.” Over the past few weeks we had seen the media on the flip flop watch. They even do comparison charts to show how each candidate has flip flopped on key issues. In Obama’s case he initially said he would accept public funding for his campaign but when he saw that his campaign was a bringing in more cash than any other one in history he changed his mind. The problem was he didn’t say that he tried to position it has some kind of indictment of the system. Bad move. Just say in looking at the situation I changed my mind. In John McCain’s case he has always been opposed to off-shore drilling and now he is proposing off-shore-drilling. McCain just needed to say I changed my mind. The American people know that we have got to stop our dependence on foreign oil and to do that we might have to do things that we might not have done in the past.  We are fighting a war now because someone has steadfastedly refused to change his mind.  There are some things that define who you are and where you stand. Everyone has to be governed by an unchangeable set of core values, but politicians are people just like us and sometimes new facts dictate new decisions and that should be applauded not ridiculed.