Category: Politics

A Candidate In Full

Two interesting pieces on the Giuliani campaign, the first coming from New York Magazine. They take a look at the conventional wisdom and find that all the ink about Giuliani having no chance doesn’t quite seem to hold:

Once the rest of the country sees Giuliani up close, the conventional New York wisdom once held, his campaign will surely fold. So far, exactly the opposite has happened. The more Rudy has put himself out there, the higher his numbers have climbed. Last week, a CBS poll showed Giuliani leading McCain by a whopping 21 points while a Quinnipiac survey found Giuliani running five points ahead of Hillary nationally, and dead even in blue states.

Yes, Rudy is the new horse in the race and thus, for now, the most compelling. Much of his popularity comes from the fact that he’s entered the race just as McCain’s ties to George Bush’s Iraq policy threaten to render his once inevitable nomination stillborn. At the same time, an idea has taken root that the 70-year-old Arizona senator, cancer survivor, and former POW, who would be the oldest person ever elected president, won’t be up to the job.

Giuliani’s pro-war stance and his moderate social-issue positions may yet bury him. So could a lack of money, a green campaign staff, his thin political résumé, his trifecta of marriages, and, not least of all, the fact that the 9/11 card, however powerful it is, could simply prove too flimsy to carry him all the way to the White House. With 21 months to go before Election Day, there’s still more than enough time for McCain to reassert himself—or any number of other scenarios to play out that don’t involve Giuliani’s becoming president. Still, no Republican presidential candidate in modern history has held this big a lead a year out and not scored the GOP nomination.

Believe it or not, America’s Mayor could be America’s next president.

It seems that the more exposure Giuliani gets, the better he seems to look. The question is why: and I think it comes down to something more than just being “the President of 9/11”.

It’s a reader of Andrew Sullivan’s that seems to understand what’s going on here:

Democrats have made an enormously stupid bet about the Republican Party: you can see it in their blogs. They have told each other that we were sure to nominate Elmer Gantry and go to the country with a Bush Clone like George Allen. They have sworn, up and down, that Rudy could not get the nomination. Someone like Kos or Josh Marshall will never, ever get this about us – we are an extremely pragmatic group of people who like to win and aren’t willing to lose just because liberal bloggers and the Media say we should lose.

Authenticity vs. inauthenticity. That’s the story of 2008. Rudy is real. You can touch and feel the Catholic kid from the Neighborhood. You know that some of his friends died in the Towers. Rudy is real. McCain has sometimes tossed away his authenticity he earned the hard way, and let’s face it, he’s not in the best of health. Romney is not quite authentic but Lord how he tries.

I think that’s exactly it. For all Rudy Giuliani’s many faults, there’s one thing that he is not and that is inauthentic. He could have tried to spin his way out of his own positions on civil rights for gay couples, firearms, or abortion. He hasn’t. He went to Sean Hannity and said what he believes.

And yet, conservatives seem to be embracing him.

It’s that authenticity that is Giuliani’s biggest asset against anyone of any party in the field. Hillary is as made-up as they come — she’s like a politicized, feminized Barbie. Barack Obama is the same thing — he’ll be what you want him to be but one is never quite sure what he really stands for beyond all the bobble-headed platitudes. Edwards — well, putting the blow-dried trial lawyer in front of the former federal prosecutor would be like putting a show dog in front of a pit bull.

Why would evangelicals support someone who seems so hostile to their beliefs? For one, Giuliani isn’t all that hostile. His personal pro-choice convictions are matched by his desire to restrain the judicial activism of the Supreme Court by appointing judges who will follow the principles of the Constitution and not legislate social policy from the bench. He’s not for gay marriage rights, but civil unions. His personal foibles may be troublesome, but the very essence of evangelical thought is that we are all sinners in need of redemption.

Evangelicals can support Giuliani for the reason the rest of the Republican Party appears to be embracing him — because he’s honest and forthright in his affairs. That’s a principle of evangelical Christianity that Giuliani has in spades, and it may be enough to win over those who would otherwise be skeptical about his candidacy.

It’s far too early to say that Giuliani (or anyone, for that matter) is truly a “front-runner.” A campaign that has been building momentum for months can die in a heartbeat and underdogs can become leaders of their party just as quickly. However, it’s important not to discount the value of Giuliani’s innate authenticity in this race — especially against the current field. In politics, perception matters as much as anything, if not more than anything. The American people have seen Giuliani provide leadership in a time of profound crisis, and they’ve seen someone who is unafraid to speak his mind and put his ideas out there without the need to spin and obfuscate.

Giuliani is very much in play, and I’ve the feeling that the more the media tries to marginalize him as having no chance in the early primaries, the more many conservatives will want to support him.

Burning The Heretics

The Washington Post had a rather interesting story on how the radical “netroots” are targeting a moderate California Congresswoman:

The Democratic majority was only three weeks old, but by Jan. 26, the grass-roots and Net-roots activists of the party’s left wing had already settled on their new enemy: Rep. Ellen O. Tauscher (D-Calif.), the outspoken chair of the centrist New Democrat Coalition.

Progressive blogs — including two new ones, Ellen Tauscher Weekly and Dump Ellen Tauscher — were bashing her as a traitor to her party. A new liberal political action committee had just named her its “Worst Offender.” And in Tauscher’s East Bay district office that day in January, eight MoveOn.org activists were accusing her of helping President Bush send more troops to Iraq.

Politically, the netroots are probably the worst thing that could happen to the Democratic Party. They got lucky in 2006 — endorsing Democrats in a Democratic year will guarantee you win, but for the long-term future of the Democratic Party they’re only going to push the Democrats farther and farther to their radical leftist vision. You have a group of people who have absolutely no sense of compromise and will try and destroy anyone who doesn’t meet their ideological purity tests now grabbing the Democrats by the hair and screaming if they so much as protest.

If I were a moderate Democrat, I’d be scared as hell.

Thomas Barnett finds it all to be a sign of a group of people who have gotten too big for their britches:

Why do these guys like Kos and Ralph Reed and the rest of them always get so drunk on themselves and start acting so creepy and intolerant the minute they gain the slightest pull over others? Where does their humanity go?

I’m not talking about not pushing hard or maintaining all the necessary ego for the fight. I’m talking that nasty, creepy, hate-filled sense or moral superiority that I associate with fascism and other over-the-top, emotionally distorted, authoritarian tendencies we normally link to retarded social development?

It’s just so pathetically millennial.

Why does America so often nowadays see its politically ambitious types grow so power mad so fast?

It’s just really depressing because it’s so childish, in that devolving sort of way. Most of these people I wouldn’t want anywhere near my kids. I feel dirty enough when they spew their bile here or wherever else I get posted. You just want to keep your distance from these types, like the nasty drunks in the bar or the impotent creeps who threaten your family.

It is disturbing. It isn’t necessarily unprecedent — American politics has frequently been just as vitriolic, but the effect of mass media has been to make things worse rather than better. What is the message that’s being sent by the “netroots” these days? That either you do what we want or we’ll “take you down?” If you’re a Catholic Democrat who believes strongly in the Democratic Party due to your views on social responsibility, what is your reaction to Amanda Marcotte going to be? Is that going to make you more likely to vote Democratic? What about someone who is a moderate in the vein of Ellen Tauscher? The message that’s being sent by the “netroots” is you’re not partisan enough to be a “real” Democrat.

There’s no question that the “netroots” can do what they’re doing. If they want to drive the Democrats over a cliff, that’s their prerogative. However, the question that the “netroots” should be asking is whether they should be engaging in activities that alienate their own moderates.

That’s the problem with extremists. They never bother to examine the consequences of their actions, and in a party motivated by the most base hatred of the opposition, disagreement is treason and moderation is evil. It’s interesting how much projection is involved in all the critiques of the “vast right-wing conspiracy” that float around the left-wing of the blogosphere.

Sooner or later the Republicans will wake up to the fact that moderates define elections — and when they do, the result could well be a political realignment the likes of which we haven’t seen in a very long while…

A Moment In Political Courage

Rep. Sam Johnson (R-TX) gave this address on the House floor, one that has been making the rounds lately and is well worth noting here:

It is not courageous to be against this war — that is now the majority position. It takes real courage to admit the consequences of our actions now, and Rep. Johnson is one of the few who has the political courage to say what’s right. We urgently need more of his kind at this crucial moment in our history.

Article II, What Article II?

Someone should remind John Murtha (D-PA) that he’s not the Commander in Chief of the US military, as he’s on a one-man mission to force the US to surrender in Iraq. Not only is it borderline treason to attempt to deliberately hamper the mission of our troops abroad, but Murtha is essentially attempting to wrest control of the war powers placed deliberately in the hands of the Executive by the Founding Fathers.

Even The Washington Post, the nominal voice of the Washington establishment has taken Murtha out to the woodshed for his overreach:

Mr. Murtha has a different idea. He would stop the surge by crudely hamstringing the ability of military commanders to deploy troops. In an interview carried Thursday by the Web site MoveCongress.org, Mr. Murtha said he would attach language to a war funding bill that would prohibit the redeployment of units that have been at home for less than a year, stop the extension of tours beyond 12 months, and prohibit units from shipping out if they do not train with all of their equipment. His aim, he made clear, is not to improve readiness but to “stop the surge.” So why not straightforwardly strip the money out of the appropriations bill — an action Congress is clearly empowered to take — rather than try to micromanage the Army in a way that may be unconstitutional? Because, Mr. Murtha said, it will deflect accusations that he is trying to do what he is trying to do. “What we are saying will be very hard to find fault with,” he said.

Mr. Murtha’s cynicism is matched by an alarming ignorance about conditions in Iraq. He continues to insist that Iraq “would be more stable with us out of there,” in spite of the consensus of U.S. intelligence agencies that early withdrawal would produce “massive civilian casualties.” He says he wants to force the administration to “bulldoze” the Abu Ghraib prison, even though it was emptied of prisoners and turned over to the Iraqi government last year. He wants to “get our troops out of the Green Zone” because “they are living in Saddam Hussein’s palace”; could he be unaware that the zone’s primary occupants are the Iraqi government and the U.S. Embassy?

The idea that a member of Congress representing one district should be able to steer the course of American military policy is abhorrent to the Constitution. Congress does have the power of the purse, but with that power comes the responsibility to use it wisely.

What Congressional Democrats are essentially doing is selling our troops short, and it is absolutely reprehensible.

What makes it even more reprehensible is that Congress doesn’t have the integrity to even admit the reality of what the radical left is trying to do — Murtha is forced to play games with the lives of our troops in order to ensure failure in Iraq.

The purpose of this is to destroy the Bush Administration — the reality is that a failure in Iraq would create a humanitarian disaster of nightmare scale, set a precedent that would be deeply destructive to the American military, and also ensure that future Presidents — Democrat or Republican — can see their ability to conduct American military policy sacrificed on the altar of political expediency at any time.

What is happening now presents a serious crisis to the American system of government, and the blindly partisan Democrats are too focused on their own petty political interests to understand the ramifications of their actions. Indeed, Rep. Murtha seems to be dangerously uninformed about the situation in Iraq. Is he truly so foolish as to believe that Iraq would be better off were the US to leave?

The future of this country cannot be sacrificed on the altar of political expediency — and Murtha must be reigned in before his crusade ends up undermining US policy for years to come.

…And Now For The Bad News

While Al Franken may have made a splash with his announcement of candidacy the polling data doesn’t look good for him:

U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman would win easily if he ends up facing comedian Al Franken in Minnesota’s U.S. Senate race in 2008, according to an exclusive 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS/SURVEY USA poll.

The popular comedian announced that he would seek the seat Wednesday on the last episode of his radio show.

The poll shows Coleman getting 57 percent of the vote and Franken getting 35 percent.

The poll also looked at a possible matchup between Coleman and attorney Mike Ciresi, who is also expected to seek the DFL nomination. Coleman also wins that match by a margin of 57 to 34.

The margin of error on the poll is +/- 3.9 percent; 632 registered voters were polled on Feb. 12 and Feb. 13.

For one, since when has Al Franken been either a comedian (at least intentionally) or popular?

Franken’s numbers will improve — the DFL could put a dead marmot up for election and most of the Twin Cities would vote for it, but not by all that much. The reality remains that Al Franken just isn’t the sort of person who makes a good politician — and all it takes is one instance of blowing one’s lid to demonstrate it in front of the entire electorate. (And if you don’t buy that, ask Mike Hatch…)

Coleman’s a talented politician, and he’s been careful not to associate himself too closely with the Bush Administration — he opposed drilling in ANWR, he supported the Warner/Levin Amendment on Iraq, and he’s hardly a staunch conservative. However, he is conservative enough that Republicans will still support him (as 94% in this poll do), but not so conservative as to alienate moderates.

Coleman also has the benefit of the free publicity of the Republican National Convention in 2008, which is a powerful incentive as well.

Franken may be more of a serious candidate that I’d first thought, but he’s got a long way to go before he even gets the DFL nomination — and Mike Ciresi has the money to pull off a serious challenge. I’m not convinced that the DFL will see Franken as being in their best interest, and Franken may not even get the chance to run against Coleman — at least as an endorsed DFL candidate.

Franken’s Announcement

Al Franken has officially announced his run for Senate in 2008 and produced this video announcement:

As much as it pains me to say it, this was probably one of the better campaign announcements I’ve ever seen.

Franken’s not a dumb guy. He knows that the meticulously polished, scripted, and controlled campaign speeches that everyone else does won’t fly for him. So instead, he chose to be conversational, sounding like he’s just sitting down and explaining himself. The fact that it sounds so unscripted (and I’m presuming that it really is) helps sell Franken as a viable candidate.

Franken explains his liberalism in a way that’s conversational and appealing. If this is the only Al Franken we get during the campaign, Senator Coleman is going to have one hell of a job keeping his seat.

Franken’s big problem is that the Al Franken we see in this announcement is not the real Al Franken. As Ed Morrissey explains:

Despite being a Minnesota native, he seems far too obnoxious to gain a following in this state. People here talk about Minnesota Nice, where people remain pleasant and mind their manners even when they encounter unpleasantness. Franken is the opposite, attacking his political opponents in mean-spirited, schoolyard epithets. That might sell in New York, where Franken lived most of his adult life, although he seems a little too strong even for the Big Apple, but that kind of temperament will only appeal to the most hard-core, left-wing voters in this state.

Sooner or later, that Al Franken will come out. If the only side of him we see is the side he displays in this announcement, I’d give him good odds at winning. However, there’s a world of difference between sitting down in front of a camera and speaking and having to deal with the rough-and-tumble world of politics. Franken is an actor, he knows how to play a role, but politics is different than Saturday Night Live.

Still, I will give Franken this, his announcement was excellent. He and his advisors crafted a powerful message, and Franken made it work. It gives him the level of respectability that he needs to get his campaign off the ground. Ultimately, I don’t think it will be enough, but Franken has demonstrated that he has the ability to be a great communicator. In terms of political rhetoric, Franken just hit his first home run. It may not win him the game, but it certainly puts him off to a strong start.

The Libertarian Underground

John Fund has an interesting look at the impact of libertarianism on American politics. One of the larger factors behind the GOP’s loss in the 2006 elections is the way in which libertarian voters stayed home, disgusted with profligate spending in Congress. While social conservatives get all the press, libertarian-leaning conservatives are also a substantial voting bloc within the GOP, and the Republican Party hasn’t done nearly as well at speaking to their interests.

It seems likely that libertarianism will be a part of American politics for some time, albeit probably not a part of the mainstream. The libertarian tradition does descend directly from the classical liberal traditions of Locke and Mill, and the American experience tends to produce a libertarian outlook in people. It is perhaps not a coincidence that the “closing of the American frontier” (to borrow from Frederick Jackson Turner) happened to preface the rise in American statism under the New Deal. An urban society is more likely to want big government than a rural one, and the American frontier mentality tends to be strongest in the libertarian red states than the statist blue states.

Libertarians are an under-appreciated bloc within American politics, but they have had their impact. Dozens of races were decided based on the libertarian vote, and GOP strategists would be wise to do better in appealing to those for whom smaller government is a key issue — even some on the Left are trying to make appeals to libertarians (albeit with very little success). The future of American politics may swing upon those 10-15% of the electorate who hold libertarian views, even if they don’t identify themselves as libertarians. In an electoral climate where a swing of just a few percentage points can have far-reaching consequences, neither party can afford to ignore the voices of this key electoral minority.

Romney Makes It Official

Mitt Romney has officially thrown his hat into the ring for the 2008 race.

Romney’s position as being the third-place candidate is probably a good thing for him. You don’t necessarily want to be the front-runner this early as that means everyone starts gunning for you right out of the gate. Romney is in the position of being a very viable candidate, but letting McCain and Giuliani take all the fire. If those two cancel each other out (which is a strong possibility), Romney is in a position to be the first to take advantage of the opening in the GOP field.

Romney is also doing much to reach out to conservative voters and appeal to the GOP base. His earlier positions on gay marriage and abortion may hurt him, but he’s done enough recently to burnish his conservative credentials that it may not matter by the time the rest of the country starts paying attention. His line about not starting out as a Ronald Reagan conservative, but noting that Reagan himself didn’t is a rather effective one for dealing with the doubts of the GOP base.

He’s also telegenic, well-spoken, and he has a solid ground game running in key states. All of those things are crucial to a successful candidacy, which is why Romney may be the one to watch in this race. He’s positioning himself as the “safety” choice for conservatives, which is exactly what someone in his position should be doing.

His Mormon faith is a liability, but I doubt it will be as big of one as it seems. Already the Senate has two Mormons on both sides of the aisle (Orrin Hatch and Majority Leader Harry Reid), so it’s hardly revolutionary to have a Mormon serving in a high government position. If anything, Romney’s shown a deftness with dealing with the issues that evangelical voters find important, especially family issues.

It’s still a very open field, but just because McCain and Giuliani get all the early press doesn’t mean that it’s fair to view Romney has an also-ran. He’s a strong contender, and he’s positioned himself in the right place to benefit from a collapse of either candidate. Romney is the one to watch in this race, because he’s the candidate that could pull the come-from-behind win that changes the course of the race in very short order.

Good Riddance

Amanda Marcotte has left her position as John Edwards campaign blogger.

I’m not surprised by this at all. I would not at all be surprised if this wasn’t a forced resignation either as a face-saving technique for the Edwards campaign. This way, Marcotte can still play the martyr without incurring the wrath of the netroots on the Edwards campaign. Politically, it would be the best way to handle this situation.

As Jeff Goldstein deftly observes, Marcotte’s pouring on the rhetoric of victimization:

Sadly, it seems, Marcotte hasn’t learned anything from this experience. Instead, she continues to see conspiracies rather than geniune outrage—and in so doing, she continues to lean on the crutch of her collective rather than taking a good hard look at her method of discourse.

Oh, I’m sure her method of discourse is quite calculated. There’s a real market for bigotry out there.

No serious Presidential candidate should have ever hired someone who after all the controversy of the last week writes dreck like this:

The Christian version of the virgin birth is generally interpreted as super-patriarchal, where god is viewed as so powerful he can impregnate without befouling himself by touching a woman, and women are nothing but vessels.

Hate speech such as that has no business in a serious Presidential campaign, and while Marcotte has her right of free speech to make all the foul and bigoted insinuations she cares to make, she was a serious liability to the Edwards campaign.

Michelle Malkin has a large collection of links on the resignation, including many from left-wing Christians who are now feeling the effects of the new wave of anti-religious bigotry in the Democratic Party. I suspect that the reality that religious faith and Democratic Party politics are moving farther and farther apart will have a much wider effect than the fallout of this minor political scandal — the more this bigotry becomes commonplace the more and more moderate and evangelical Christians will find themselves on the outside of the Democratic Party — even more so than they already are.

Obama Puts His Hat In The Ring

Barack Obama is officially entering the 2008 race for the White House.

Politically, it’s a mistake for him. Obama has never had to deal with the stress of a truly competitive campaign, he’s never had to deal with concerted opposition researches digging up his past, and he’s running against one of the most ruthless political operatives in America today.

In others, he’s just jumped into the lion’s den.

As Politico notes, the public proctal exam that every candidate goes through is just beginning for Obama — he’s gotten a free ride thus far, but now that he’s officially in the race that ends. I have a feeling that once the heat is on, the Obama campaign will lose its luster very quickly, and Obama will see what could have been his front-runner status in 2012 destroyed by jumping the gun.