Jeremiah Wright

This is the story that keeps on ticking. It hasn't helped that Reverend Jeremiah Wright has gone on a media tour these past several days. Wright clearly loves being the center of attention. I also think it is very clear that he is irritated with Barack Obama. He is irritated and he is jealous.

It is actually funny and pathetic. And it detracts from the righteous core message that Wright has historically conveyed from his pulpit. I happen to believe that Wright overwhelming speaks the truth from his pulpit. He gives voice to a perception that is held by many. It needs to be listened to. Obama said as much in his Constitution Hall speech on race.

It appears clear to me, however, that Wright is jealous that the young Barack Obama, whom he guided and counseled when he was a young man, has now eclipsed his elder, former spiritual mentor. This is a classic phenomenon. The young protege who learns the ropes from the older mentor, must as he matures, find his own way in the world and break from his mentor. That transition is a difficult and troublesome one. It is a time when jealousy and irritation over the protege's success can cause the mentor to be hurtful. The mentor always sees greatness in the protege, which is one reason the relationship begins in the first instance. The mentor knows that the protege will soar. But, is only human to see base emotions surface when the protege soars beyond the mentor's reach.

How Obama deals with this latest Wright flare up will say much about the man. I have a notion about how it should be handled, but I will hold back on that until we see the response of the man I believe should be our next President.

F**k The Press

I am sick and tired of the ultra lame coverage the press provides the Presidential race. They are always looking for the new angle. They are always looking for the tag line, the sound bite, the attention getting point of view. The Huffington Post headline this morning, "Media Jumps Ship From Obama," was idiotic. What did they mean? Who is the media? Is this a real story or a made up story.

We hear endlessly about Reverend Wright. We hear about the flag pin. The latest includes press articles indicating that the media is no longer enamored of Obama. One writer in the New Republic (who probably wasn't born in 1972) has now compared Obama to McGovern in taking up the Clintonista unelectable argument.

We continue to hear about the straight talk from McCain. The press drinks that kool-aid nonstop. More on that later, as I am convinced that McCain is the polar opposite of straight talk. Straight talk is nothing other than Rovian framing, in the same category as War on Terror, WMD and Family Values.

The press doesn't give focus to the really big stories. The big stories are the hundreds of thousands, even millions of new voters that the Obama campaign has brought into the political process. The big story is the young people excited about voting for a leader for the next generation. The big story is about changing the politics as usual landscape in Washington, DC.

The press has a difficult time digging deep and being thoughtful. And today, I am sick of it.

A Big Presidential Campaign Non-Issue

JUSTICE -- UNITED STATES LEADS THE WORLD IN INCARCERATION: According to data from the International Center for Prison Studies at King's College London, "[t]he United States has less than 5 percent of the world's population. But it has almost a quarter of the world's prisoners." The U.S. "leads the world in producing prisoners." "Americans are locked up for crimes -- from writing bad checks to using drugs -- that would rarely produce prison sentences in other countries. And in particular they are kept incarcerated far longer than prisoners in other nations." Last February, a report from the Pew Center on the States found that for "the first time in the nation's history, more than one in 100 American adults is behind bars." For some minority groups, the numbers are higher. The Justice Department says that "[o]ne in 36 Hispanic adults is behind bars" while "[o]ne in 15 black adults is, too." The high incarceration rates in the U.S. come despite figures from the FBI showing that in the last 20 years, "violent crime rates fell by 25 percent." Indeed, Europeans had previously come to the United States to study its prison systems and "came away impressed," but now, "far from serving as a model for the world," the contemporary American prison system "is viewed with horror."

Low Road to Victory

Published: April 23, 2008, The Lead Editorial in the New York Times

The Pennsylvania campaign, which produced yet another inconclusive result on Tuesday, was even meaner, more vacuous, more desperate, and more filled with pandering than the mean, vacuous, desperate, pander-filled contests that preceded it.

Voters are getting tired of it; it is demeaning the political process; and it does not work. It is past time for Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton to acknowledge that the negativity, for which she is mostly responsible, does nothing but harm to her, her opponent, her party and the 2008 election.

If nothing else, self interest should push her in that direction. Mrs. Clinton did not get the big win in Pennsylvania that she needed to challenge the calculus of the Democratic race. It is true that Senator Barack Obama outspent her 2-to-1. But Mrs. Clinton and her advisers should mainly blame themselves, because, as the political operatives say, they went heavily negative and ended up squandering a good part of what was once a 20-point lead.

On the eve of this crucial primary, Mrs. Clinton became the first Democratic candidate to wave the bloody shirt of 9/11. A Clinton television ad — torn right from Karl Rove’s playbook — evoked the 1929 stock market crash, Pearl Harbor, the Cuban missile crisis, the cold war and the 9/11 attacks, complete with video of Osama bin Laden. “If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen,” the narrator intoned.

If that was supposed to bolster Mrs. Clinton’s argument that she is the better prepared to be president in a dangerous world, she sent the opposite message on Tuesday morning by declaring in an interview on ABC News that if Iran attacked Israel while she were president: “We would be able to totally obliterate them.”

By staying on the attack and not engaging Mr. Obama on the substance of issues like terrorism, the economy and how to organize an orderly exit from Iraq, Mrs. Clinton does more than just turn off voters who don’t like negative campaigning. She undercuts the rationale for her candidacy that led this page and others to support her: that she is more qualified, right now, to be president than Mr. Obama.

Mr. Obama is not blameless when it comes to the negative and vapid nature of this campaign. He is increasingly rising to Mrs. Clinton’s bait, undercutting his own claims that he is offering a higher more inclusive form of politics. When she criticized his comments about “bitter” voters, Mr. Obama mocked her as an Annie Oakley wannabe. All that does is remind Americans who are on the fence about his relative youth and inexperience.

No matter what the high-priced political operatives (from both camps) may think, it is not a disadvantage that Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton share many of the same essential values and sensible policy prescriptions. It is their strength, and they are doing their best to make voters forget it. And if they think that only Democrats are paying attention to this spectacle, they’re wrong.

After seven years of George W. Bush’s failed with-us-or-against-us presidency, all American voters deserve to hear a nuanced debate — right now and through the general campaign — about how each candidate will combat terrorism, protect civil liberties, address the housing crisis and end the war in Iraq.

It is getting to be time for the superdelegates to do what the Democrats had in mind when they created superdelegates: settle a bloody race that cannot be won at the ballot box. Mrs. Clinton once had a big lead among the party elders, but has been steadily losing it, in large part because of her negative campaign. If she is ever to have a hope of persuading these most loyal of Democrats to come back to her side, let alone win over the larger body of voters, she has to call off the dogs.

No Straight Talk

John McCain has carefully framed himself as a straight talker. His campaign bus is called the "Straight Talk Express." In the Rovian sense, we know that anyone who claims that they are a straight talker is the exact opposite. With McCain, that certainly seems to be the case.

Campaign finance is a perfect example. McCain has been an alleged champion of campaign finance reform. He even has the McCain-Feingold Campaign Finance Reform Act (Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002) to his credit. The most noteworthy part of that bill, from the layperson's perspective, is the requirement of "I approve of this message," language. That restrains third parties from running ads in support of a candidate.

McCain, however, recently engaged in activity which played fast and loose with campaign finance laws. He borrowed money from a bank in Maryland in December of 2007 and pledged as collateral for that loan Federal funds he would receive if he remained in the race. In other words, even if his campaign had tanked in late December and early January and he had lost New Hampshire to Guiliani with no hope of resurrection, he would have had to stay in the race to get the Federal money to pay back the Maryland bank. That entire episode is being investigated but the chance that anyone will notice is unlikely. And, at that point, no one knew that Cindy McCain was extremely wealthy.

The evidence of McCain's absence of straight talk is overwhelming. They include his position on Bush tax cuts, staying in Iraq, Pat Robertson, Reverend Hagee and a host of others.

The Straight Talk Express is a fraud. It is nothing other that clever framing designed to mislead the American voting public.

Pennsylvania Doesn't Matter

The old line about Pennsylvania is that is comprised of Pittsburgh and Philadelphia with Alabama in the middle (and that is poor and working class white Alabama).

Obama will win by a significant margin in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. Given the demographics and the population array in the rest of the state, Clinton will win Pennsylvania by approximately 5 to7 points. That is my midday prognostication.

It doesn't matter. She will pick up 10 or so delegates. She will pick up as much as 200,000 popular votes. She will claim victory. But, it doesn't matter.

Obama will win North Carolina by as much as 15% and will more than make-up the 10 delegates Clinton will gain in Pennsylvania. Indiana will be tight and could go either way. Thereafter, Obama will pick up Oregon and Montana and more than a majority of the remaining delegates.

I also expect Obama to pick up some noteworthy superdelegates in the next couple of weeks.

So, as it has for many weeks, the math favors Obama. There is no plausible way the Clinton can win. She continues to pray for a Hail Mary success. Her only hope is that Obama goes in the ditch. That is unlikely.

This process has been good for vetting Obama, but it has had the effect of undermining the lofty position the Clinton's have enjoyed.

As a friend mentioned yesterday, the real race for President is between Obama and Clinton. That person believes that McCain will implode before the election. More on that later.

McCain has Gas!

John McCain, who admits he doesn't know much about economics (he doesn't need to, because he wife has all the money) has proposed that the federal gas tax of 18.9 cents per gallon be dropped between Memorial Day and Labor Day.

This must be the most ridiculous proposal in my recent memory. It also shows how utterly out of touch John McCain is from the realities of life in America.

This is one of those policy proposals, so common in Washington, DC, which is literally pulled out of someone's ass. There is no analysis whatsoever. No doubt the conversation was something like, "Wow, the voters will really like that! It will reduce the cost of gasoline. John, that is brilliant. That is really Presidential!"

It also shows that McCain continues to dwell in some sleepy corner of the 1950's. It is Ozzie and Harriet time. Hey, let's go on a summer vacation and drive to the shore. Let's pack everything in the station wagon and go visit Grandma and Grandpa. Let go see the Great Smokey's. How about Zion National Park. Whoopee!!

The cost to the federal highway trust fund of McCain's funny proposal is $10 billion dollars. That is enough for 40 bridges to nowhere.

It is nice to see that McCain is a leader in setting a course for the nation to achieve energy independence. Let's encourage more gasoline usage by reducing the price through abandoning the federal tax. How ludicrous!

Unfortunately, as the policy makers in Washington, DC know all too well, the public is typically too stupid to understand the nuance behind political grandstanding. At least 30% of the voters think we found WMD in Iraq and that Saddam was behind the destruction of the World Trade Centers.

So, let's put a chicken in every pot. Let's help everyone feel good. Let's drive more this summer and drive this nation further into the toilet!