May 30, 2007

5/30: More Obama Policy Specifics ...

... and more yawns from progressives. Just like his major foreign policy address, Barack Obama's recently unveiled health care plan failed to go as far as progressives were hoping the leading anti-HRC candidate would go. On Iraq, many were unhappy with Obama's calls for a larger military and failure to promise no residual force would be left in Iraq. On health care, most are disappointed Obama's plan falls short of universal coverage and relies to heavily on private insurance companies. If recent polling is indicative of an Obama plateau, will we see him start to move left on issues? Or maybe he's just tired like Instapundit suggests here.

DEM FIELD: Must See TV

DailyKos' founder Markos Moulitsas mocks Fox News' "big score" of getting Dennis Kucinich to commit to their CBC sponsored debate. Kos points out Barack Obama, John Edwards, Hillary Clinton, and Bill Richardson have all announced their intention to skip the debate, while Joe Biden has committed to attend. Kos quips: "A Biden/Kucinich debate would be HILARIOUS. I'd watch."

CLINTON: Tops Despite Top Down Tactics

Reviews/notes on Her Way: The Hopes and Ambitions of Hillary Rodham Clinton and A Woman in Charge: The Life of Hillary Rodham Clinton continue to filter including:

• TPM's Greg Sargent on both books: "One of the key charges made by Timesmen Jeff Gerth and Don Van Natta in their much-talked-about new book on Hillary's lifelong ambitions is that way back in the early nineties, she and Bill were already plotting two terms in the White House for her, too. ... But we've just received our copy of legendary reporter Carl Bernstein's forthcoming book on Hillary -- and his reporting appears to directly contradict this key allegation made by Gerth and Van Natta.
• TAPPED's Garance Franke-Ruta on A Woman In Charge: "I haven't yet had time to read the review copy ... but my first impression of it based on reading the introductory pages and some key passages makes two things clear: 1) this book will be a much more enjoyable read than the Gerth/Van Natta book and 2) its tone is far more sympathetic than the one Gerth and Van Natta took, even as the reporting is more personal and seemingly invasive when it comes to Clinton's private life."
• Talk Left's Jeralyn Merritt on A Woman In Charge: "It's been decades since I read Nora Ephron's Heartburn, her novel based on the crumbling of her marriage to Watergate reporter Carl Bernstein, so I don't have a ready answer as to whether Bernstein is a sexist. But judging from his new book on Hillary Clinton, I wouldn't be surprised."

Back in CA, juls links to recent HRC staffing announcements and predicts at Calitics: "It will be a very top down coordinated campaign that relies heavily on voter files to drive in early votes. She has locked up the two highest profile Latinos in the state and will use them as surrogates on her behalf. It is unlikely that she will garner many endorsements from grassroots organizations or labor. This will require her to lean more heavily on the elected officials who have endorsed her. Targeted voters will receive glossy mailers and phone calls. She will likely go up on both radio and do some limited (relatively speaking) television. The grassroots organizing will be limited but still present. They will in short, implement proven methods of turning out the vote in California, with a heavy emphasis on vote rich LA."

Also, Blog P.I.'s Bill Beutler observes that even though communication at HRC's YouTube channel "is strictly one-way" her YouTube YouChoose Spotlight asking viewers to help choose a campaign theme song has "by no small margin" been viewed the most times. Beutler comments: "This is interesting - because it challenges the arguments made by Dana Boyd at this year's Personal Democracy Forum that the "digital handshake" - candidate interactivity and reciprocity - is necessary for an effective online campaign."

DODD: Pushing Pressure Left

Firedoglake's Jane Hamsher promotes Chris Dodd's 5 PM " live video vlogging session where he will answer questions left by the FDL community in the comment section." Hamsher adds: "Dodd deserves a lot of credit for getting out in front of all the other '08 candidates on voting against those useless Iraqi benchmarks that Bush is free to ignore and also for putting pressure on Clinton and Obama. For my money I believe if he hadn't pushed as aggressively as he did things might have gone another way - he left them no choice but to vote against it. It should be interesting to see how he rates in the next DKos straw poll, his leadership position and his ability to move with agility within the blogosphere to draw the dialog to the left have certainly earned him both notice and praise."

OBAMA: Outlier Or Omen?

MyDD's Chris Bowers doubts ARG's new numbers showing Barack Obama at 11% in IA and 15% in NH but does allow: "Perhaps the ARG polls are just off, as outside of New Hampshire primaries and caucuses are not easy to poll. Perhaps they are identifying a weakness in Obama's coalition: too young, too independent to be considered "likely" voters. Or, perhaps the situation in the early states is far more fluid that we appreciate."

OBAMA II: Thanks, But No Thanks

Obama's health care plan left many on the left wanting more. Reax include:

• TAPPED's Ezra Klein: "In the end, Obama's plan sections off the health care market. Rather than going towards massive integration ... Obama's plan seeks to correct the places in the market where we see folks having the most trouble getting insured. It builds on the current system much more than it transforms it.
• The Washington Monthly's Kevin Drum: "Overall, it sounds OK but not spectacular, yet another take on the Ron Wyden healthcare plan that I'm sort of lukewarm about."
• The Plank's Jonathan Cohn: "There's a mandate for kids to get insurance -- but not for adults. By my definition, that means it's not true universal coverage. At least not right away. ... Whether you get everybody or not at the outset is one of those big issues that actually matter."
• The Huffington Post's Rose Ann Demoro: "Sen. Obama, Please No More Deck Chairs on the Insurance Industry Titanic."

GOP FIELD: The InstaPrimary

Instapundit breaks down the GOP field (cuurently leaning towards Rudy Giuliani), among other topics, at Bloggingheads.tv

HUCKABEE: Progressivism Without Penalizing

Mike Huckabee has a diary up at RedState touting support for a "fair tax" which he describes as a complete elimination of "all federal income and payroll taxes. And do I mean all - personal federal, corporate federal, gift, estate, capital gains, alternative minimum, Social Security, Medicare, self-employment. Instead we will have the FairTax, a simple tax based on wealth."

More Huckabee: "The FairTax will replace the Internal Revenue Code with a consumption tax, like the taxes on retail sales forty-five states and the District of Columbia have now. ... Our current progressive tax system penalizes us for our success. The FairTax is also progressive, but it doesn't punish the American dream of success, or the old-fashioned virtues of hard work and thrift, it rewards them."

MCCAIN: Romney's Already Won!!!

Townhall's Hugh Hewitt is so confident that immigration is sinking John McCain's "like the Titanic after having run into the iceberg" that he's already holding a contest to predict "the date that John McCain officially takes his faltering jalopy of a campaign off the road." Winners get "an autographed (and personalized!) copy of 'A Mormon in the White House'" from Hewitt.

Not shying away from the subject, McCain talked to Captain's Quarters about immigration on CQ Radio here.

ROMNEY: It's An Anti-Mormon Off!

RCP Blog's Tom Bevan notes no GOPer has ever carried "the nomination without carrying the Palmetto State" and predicts possible IA and NH victories will lead to Mormon fears among SC primary voters. Bevan blogs: "the whispering campaigns against McCain in 2000 may look like child's play compared to next January."

Also addressing the Mormon issue, Townhall's Hugh Hewitt links to APreports on a Hillary Clinton supporter refusing to shake Romney's hand because he's a Mormon and comments: "There are certainly some conservatives who won't vote for a Mormon, but there's much more evidence that much of the anti-Mormon bigotry is on the left. Perhaps MSM will get around to speculating why that is, and will discover that the morals of most Mormons are not of the sort that attract the left and its attachment to license in most areas of human behavior, and that specifically Romney's defense of marriage as an institution reserved for one man and one woman is a great irritation to many on the left."

SEN LANDSCAPE: We Want You, For The U.S. Senate

Despite great prospects "on paper" MyDD's Chris Bowers has "a growing sense of unease" about '08 Dem Senate prospects. Bowers explains: "With the image of the national Republican Party still in the toilet, and with it sinking deeper every month that they continue to cling to the anchor that is open-ended war in Iraq, the national mood starts out decidedly in our advantage. ... However, right now this situation does not seem to be translating into many good pickup opportunities. Off hand, the problem seems to center around recruitment problems. In some states, we are failing to get our top recruits. In other states, our top recruits now seem less promising than they did just a couple months ago. Worst of all, in most states, we don't have any challengers yet."

Specifics from Bowers: "[A]t this point in the 2006 cycle, we already had multiple challengers in RI, PA, and MT, not to mention states like AZ and TN that helped stretch the playing field. By way of contrast, so far in 2008 we have seen our chances in ME, MN and OR all receive justifiable downgrades. Basically, everywhere outside of CO and NH, where we might develop LieberDem problems, it feels like we are spinning our wheels.

IRAQ: Midnight Baghdad Basketball

An LA Timesarticle on U.S. military efforts to "redefine success" in anticipation of falling short of Pres. Bush goals for 9/07 didn't escape netroots attention. Reactions include:

• Matthew Yglesias: "Success has, however, already been redefined plenty. If you'd predicted back in February 2003 that the US would be in the mess we're in by May 2007 you would, rightly, have been viewed as someone who was predicting failure."
• The Washington Monthly's Kevin Drum: "These unnamed "counterinsurgency advisors" would be right if nobody had been working on any of these key goals until February 2007. In fact, though, they've been key goals for a long time. The problem isn't that we won't have any progress to show after six months, the problem is that we don't have any progress to show after four years. Another Friedman or two isn't going to change that."
• The Carpetbagger Report: "It's the Midnight Basketball-ization of Iraq policy. The administration can't tackle the sweeping challenges, so it's time for some micro initiatives that would give the appearance of progress. ... Be prepared for a series of almost comical examples of 'progress.'"
• Balloon Juice: "Bush's policies have failed. The war is a failure and a disaster. It is time to cut our losses. Hell, it is well beyond time to cut our losses."

Also, Jonathan Schwarz and Daily Kos' mcjoan urge Dems to call CIA Weapons Intelligence Non-Proliferation and Arms Control Center head Alan Foley in for questioning based off of excerpts from The Italian Letter which quote Foley telling center analysts: "If the president wants to go to war, our job is to find the intelligence to allow him to do so."

Schwarz comments: "Any serious congressional strategy to end this war would include nationally televised hearings about this and all the other lies that got us into Iraq. The seriousness of the Democrats can be judged by such hearings' non-existence."

IMMIGRATION: Exit, Stage Left

Pres. Bush's claim that opponents of the Senate immigration bill only want to "frighten people" was not well-received:

• The Corner's Kathryn Jean Lopez: "The president's dis to critics of his immigration is both unfair and unnecessary, albeit unsurprising. Does he really think Jeff Sessions and George Will want to frighten people?"
• A Lopez emailer: "This is the beginning of the Final Act for the Bush Presidency. I'm so over him, I may get a bumper sticker for my car that says 1-20-09."
• RedState's Rob Bluey: "Your remarks attacking opponents of the bill will only inspire my fellow critics to fight harder. ... The bill is the 1986 amnesty all over again. Only this time, instead of giving amnesty to 2.7 million illegal aliens, we're talking about doing it for 12 million. This bill will cause a flood of new illegal immigrants to America because it is so generous."
• The Corner's Mark Steyn: "I respect the President and I appreciate that his sincerity on this issue has been obvious for his entire political career. But I don't think he should impugn the good faith of those who, equally sincerely, disagree - not on "narrow slices" but on the central proposition: that drive-thru legalization for millions of people subject to desultory background checks by an agency without the resources to conduct them is not 'what's right for America'."
• The Corner's Jonah Goldberg: "Richard Cohen discovers something some of us on the right have been saying for a while: if you hold your head just so and look at Bush from the right angle, he looks an awful lot like a liberal."

Not focussing on Bush, Right Wing News announces Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) will be the first target of his Googlebomb campaign designed to "peel 5k-10k votes off the total of every pro-amnesty Republican in the Senate." Michelle Malkin and David All both chip in with videos on detailing the illegal immigration problem

Finally, Kausfiles pokes fun at immigration bill supporters: "Today, President Bush said his comprehensive immigration plan makes it "more likely we can enforce our border." Only "more likely"? Why the doubt? After all, the bill specifically provides for "4 Unmanned Aerial Vehicles" for the Southern border! ... hey, the bipartisan authors of the "grand bargain" didn't stop at three unmanned aerial surveillance craft. They have four! Sen. Kyl is one tough negotiator."

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: StopBuyingUselessCrap.org

After receiving emails from Laurie David's StopGlobalWarming.org asking her to buy 'green' products that have the added benefit of filtering money back to David's group, The Huffington Post's Elizabeth Royte advises:

Green purchasing tells us to vote with our wallets, but it ignores a third choice: not buying at all. I try to resist these green come-ons because I hate to think our strength is based on consumption, instead of more substantive action. I'm appalled by the amount of junk mail I (used to) get from environmental groups, much of it offering to reward donors with cheaply made premiums (how many tote bags and baseball caps can one person use?). Some even have the nerve to offer "affinity" credit cards, which only make it easier to buy more stuff, to consume without a thought for the natural resources that went into making these goods, and for the toll they will take on human health and the environment once we've consigned them to the dump.

LEST WE FORGET: Who Knew The Pope Was So Concerned With Your Happiness?

Linking to a SUNY-Albany study showing "women who do not use condoms during sex are less depressed and less likely to attempt suicide than are women who have sex with condoms and women who are not sexually active" Andrew Sullivan comments: "The Pope is right heterosexual barebacking is good for you."

Posted by Conn Carroll at May 30, 2007 12:39 PM