May 31, 2007
Fred Thompson to the Rescue? (Bill Press)
He hears a cry of distress. He steps into a phone booth. He dons his red cape. He leaps into action … It’s a bird. It’s a plane. It’s Fred Thompson!
Yes, in what many Republicans hope will be a repeat of 1980, another actor is flying to the rescue of the beleaguered GOP. According to Politico.com, Fred Thompson will file papers forming a campaign committee in early June, and officially announce his candidacy for president over the July 4 holiday.
Granted, it doesn’t take much to excite members of the Washington punditocracy. Nevertheless, Fred Thompson’s belated entry into the race has left even veteran reporters positively orgasmic — with little apparent reason.
No one can deny that, with the exception of Ron Paul, the current Republican field is decidedly unimpressive. Neither the Mayor nor the Senator nor the Used Car Salesman is setting the world on fire. But what makes Fred Thompson better than the other 10 candidates already in the race? And what does Thompson stand for? Does anybody really know? > Read More
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What's This Jeb Bush and Mehlman Salsa Around Illegal Immigration (Karen Hanretty)
Proving just how inept the White House is at communicating its message on illegal immigration is this bizarre talking point out of a Wall Street Journal op-ed today, penned by former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and former Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman:
“Hispanics are also the fastest growing segment of our population. Salsa outsells ketchup and tacos outsell hot dogs. One out of eight people under 35 in Nebraska is Hispanic.”
I’m not exactly sure what the salsa vs. ketchup argument is supposed to prove. I’m a white woman (full disclosure: over the age of 35 and not living in Nebraska) who eats more salsa than ketchup. And I’ve probably consumed more tacos this year than hot dogs. So what’s the point?
Here’s something for Mehlman and Bush to chew on: If you put Velveeta cheese and a jar of salsa in a bowl and microwave it, you get chili con queso dip. Makes you think, doesn’t it? > Read More
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What's This Iraq Cease-Fire: The Real Answer (Brent Budowsky)
There is a story on the AP wire quoting Gen. Ray Odierno instructing his commanders in Iraq to contact insurgent groups in search of possible cease-fires in the sectarian war.
This is profoundly important and represents the single best hope for a positive outcome in Iraq.
The idea would be to seek an all-Iraqi cease-fire and a political solution that ends the carnage among Iraqis and unifies everyone to achieve a military victory against the al Qaeda terrorists.
I proposed this strategy in an op-ed in The Hill under the title "How To Win the Iraq War" and discussed it further in a Pundits Blog entry here suggesting former Secretary of State Colin Powell be sent to Iraq on a special mission promoting a cease-fire and political solution. > Read More
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What's This A Squeaky-Clean GOP Contender (A.B. Stoddard)
Yes, it had been a good week for Mitt Romney, and that poll showing social conservatives choosing to stick with Rudy Giuliani despite his rejection of their principles must have had America's Mayor bouncing all over the Big Apple.
But that was then, and this is now. Now that Big Fred is here, the whole game has changed. And if you're a Republican running for president and you're not Fred Thompson, you're running scared. No, he is not the second coming of Ronald Reagan. But beyond his star power, his Southern drawl, his commanding 6-foot-6 frame, is Thompson's ace in the hole: there is nothing wrong with him. Big Fred sprints virtually clean onto a field of negatives — Romney's a Mormon flip-flopper, Rudy's a social liberal protested by 9/11 firefighters and their families wherever he goes with ethically challenged associates like Bernard Kerik, and after six years of courting them, the base just doesn't like poor John McCain. So Thompson may have had an active bachelor career? It hardly stacks up.
What's more, it sounds like Team Thompson is a force to be reckoned with, given their shrewd plan to come out strong from the starting gate — time the dropping of the bomb to ruin the next GOP debate and plot the collection of a boffo war chest before a formal announcement. > Read More
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What's This Big Auto could be the new Big Tobacco (Karen Hanretty)
Should state and federal governments, trial lawyers and insurance companies across the country band together and sue the auto industry just as they sued tobacco companies more than a decade ago as a way of recouping hundreds of millions of dollars in healthcare costs from a product (in this case, petroleum) they claim is a nuisance?
There is a movement afoot — slow and steady — leading in that very direction. Sue Big Auto for the costs incurred in providing medical care to people with birth defects, asthma, emphysema and cancer.
Big Auto is to blame, and Big Auto owes us. That, in essence, is the claim of an obscure man you've probably never heard of who is running for president of the United States. His name is Terry Tamminen, and before you blow him off (preferably through tailpipe emissions out of your massive Hummer), know that he is a close friend and adviser to California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and is the former secretary of the California Environmental Protection Agency. Oh yes, and he has written a book: Lives Per Gallon. (I'd make a snarky comment about people who run for president to sell their books, but that criticism cuts across both parties, doesn't it?) > Read More
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What's This May 30, 2007
Even in the Right, Bush Can’t Help But Go Low-Blow (Peter Fenn)
I know this is hard to believe, but I began this blog post yesterday with the idea of praising President Bush. I thought, you know, Bush is getting a bum rap on his immigration reform proposal. He has stuck by the importance of actually solving the problem, getting something done, producing a compromise plan and working with all sides.
And I actually feel that he believes in a humane, comprehensive plan that treats people fairly and deals with the need for enforcement and border control. He, of all people, understands the issue from his days as governor of Texas and has been totally consistent for years.
OK, so what happened?
Bush goes to Georgia and attacks his opponents (primarily Republicans this time) with accusations that they have not read the bill, that “they don’t want to do what’s right for America” and they want to “frighten people.” > Read More
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What's This Mr. Nice Guy and More (A.B. Stoddard)
Mitt Romney is finally having a good week. A new Des Moines Register poll has found him ahead of Sen. John McCain and Rudy Giuliani in the key state of Iowa, where Romney is diligently plotting for victory at the Aug. 11 straw poll in Ames to pave his way for victory in the caucuses. By the way, he is ahead by a LOT — he is at 30 percent to McCain’s 18 percent and Rudy’s 17 percent.
With this momentum Romney should probably stop attacking McCain and set his sights on the solid lead Giuliani still holds. Even after the drama at the debates, sparked because Rudy dared to state his real position on abortion, he remains the frontrunner and a new Pew research poll shows social conservatives willing to abide Giuliani’s heretic social views because they think he is a winner. > Read More
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What's This The President and the Right (John Feehery)
How liberating it must be to not have to face another election!
President Bush is calling them as he sees them. And as he sees it, the conservative critics of his immigration bill are way out of bounds.
Talk about biting the hand that feeds you.
I support the immigration bill. I think it is important to get something done and get it done this year, for our nation’s economy and security. I also think it could be good politically for the Republican Party. We need to get to be able to compete for the Hispanic vote if we want to be the majority party in the long term, and getting this bill done could help us.
But the president needs to engage the critics of the bill in a constructive way. Saying that they haven’t read the bill insults their intelligence and is easily disprovable. Calling concerns “empty political rhetoric” and critics “fear-mongers” doesn’t help. And it certainly won’t help get the bill done in the House. > Read More
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What's This Cindy Sheehan’s Bitter Retreat (Armstrong Williams)
So Cindy Sheehan has decided to “throw in the towel.” She is emotionally exhausted and politically frustrated at congressional Democrats for continuing to fund the Iraq war. She no longer wants to be seen as a leader of the anti-war movement and feels betrayed by the Democratic Party and other organizations that rallied behind her two years ago.
The Democratic-controlled House and Senate recently approved fresh billions for the Iraq war on Thursday, minus the troop withdrawal timeline that drew President Bush’s earlier veto. What Cindy is now beginning to understand is the Democrats do not want this war to end. To Sheehan, her crusade against this war was a matter of “right and wrong,” not “right or left.” As she stated, “I was the darling of the so-called left as long as I limited my protests to George Bush and the Republican Party. Of course, I was slandered and libeled by the right as a ‘tool’ of the Democratic Party. However, when I started to hold the Democratic Party to the same standards that I held the Republican Party, support for my cause started to erode and the ‘left’ started labeling me with the same slurs that the right used.” > Read More
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What's This Why Democratic Political Consultants Love the Iraq War (Brent Budowsky)
Now we read in the Boston Globe how John Kerry, preparing to campaign to be commander in chief, voted in 2002 for the Iraq war after his political consultants informed the would-be leader of the free world that he would not be "politically viable" unless he voted yes.
This followed the disclosure that Bob Shrum advised John Edwards to send young men and women to die as a way of improving his weak national-security resume in 2002.
Why Democratic officials listen to this is beyond me.
Here are the presidential campaigns that Bob Shrum lost: 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004.
Here are the presidential campaigns Mr. Shrum won: none.
Nice work, if you can get it. > Read More
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