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WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 2010

DOES CHRISTINE HAVE A CHANCE – AT 7:05 P.M. ET:  I watched Christine O'Donnell on Sean Hannity's show last night, and I must tell you that she was delightful.  That's the good news.  The bad news is that it may be too late.

O'Donnell thoughtfully answered the charges against her, especially the one about owing back taxes.  She explained that this was an IRS error, and that she has the papers to prove there was nothing owed.  She was poised and mature in handling these issues.

Trouble is, she should have done this weeks ago.  Instead, her campaign referred questions to her website, which means voters who weren't participating in the Republican primary (which she won) never had a chance to hear her defend herself on TV.

Two basic rules of politics:  1) Never let anyone else define you, and 2) answer every attack and pulverize the attacker. 

I've never seen a candidate savaged the way Christine O'Donnell was savaged after she won her primary.  I was watching CNN yesterday, and you'd think O'Donnell doesn't even have an opponent in the general election.  There were no questions about him, none whatever.  I watched over the weekend as Bob Schieffer ridiculed O'Donnell's "witchcraft" past – she fooled around with some weird folks in high school – but never heard Schieffer or anyone else note that Hillary Clinton once tried to channel Eleanor Roosevelt while Clinton was first lady.

The result of the assault is that O'Donnell didn't get the usual post-primary bounce.  A poll put her 11 points behind her opponent a few days after the primary.  She's now, according to Rasmussen, 15 points behind.

It was a late O'Donnell surge that allowed her to win the Republican primary, that and dissatisfaction with the liberal tendencies of her opponent, Congressman Mike Castle.  Can there be another surge?  Well, it's tougher in the general election, when you're dealing with Democrats and independents.  And it's tough in a traditionally Democratic state.

The odds are against Christine O'Donnell.  She doesn't have much of a record, and she's made some whopping mistakes.  But miracles happen, and she's got to fight.  She's already made one good decision – not to do more national TV, but concentrate only on Delaware.

If I were a betting man, I wouldn't bet on her.  I want to be proved wrong.

September 22, 2010     Permalink

REPUBLICAN PLEDGE TO AMERICA – AT 6:20 P.M. ET:  CBS News has obtained a copy of the new Republican Pledge to America, a modern version of the very effective Contract With America that Newt Gingrich unveiled in 1994.  The pledge will be publicly unveiled tomorrow morning.  Here, according to CBS, are the highlights:

Jobs:

- Stop job-killing tax hikes

- Allow small businesses to take a tax deduction equal to 20 percent of their income

- Require congressional approval for any new federal regulation that would add to the deficit

- Repeal small business mandates in the new health care law.

Cutting Spending:

- Repeal and Replace health care

- Roll back non-discretionary spending to 2008 levels before TARP and stimulus (will save $100 billion in first year alone)

- Establish strict budget caps to limit federal spending going forward

- Cancel all future TARP payments and reform Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac

Reforming Congress:

- Will require that every bill have a citation of constitutional authority

- Give members at least 3 days to read bills before a vote

Defense:

- Provide resources to troops

- Fund missile defense

- Enforce sanctions in Iran

The CBS link has a reprint of the whole text.

COMMENT:  Sounds good to me.  Not original, but solid.  The Dems are already out with a wild-eyed attack on the document, using the usual scare tactics, and labeling it as a gift to the rich.  As we said here yesterday, the GOP must be ready with 1) a massive campaign to explain the pledge; and 2) a counterattack that will answer every criticism – every one.

Remember the advice of Fleet Admiral William F. Halsey Jr., (whom I once had the honor of meeting):  "Attack, repeat, attack."

September 22, 2010      Permalink

SNIPPET OF THE DAY – AT 10:50 A.M. ET: 

From AOL News: 

UFOs have monitored and possibly tampered with American nuclear weapons, according to a group of former Air Force officers who will make their claims public next week at a Washington, D.C., news conference.

"While most of the incidents apparently involved mere surveillance, in a few cases, a significant number of nuclear missiles suddenly and simultaneously malfunctioned, just as USAF security policemen reported seeing disc-shaped craft hovering nearby," says Robert Hastings, author of "UFOs and Nukes: Extraordinary Encounters at Nuclear Weapons Sites."

On Monday, at the National Press Club, Hastings will present six former Air Force personnel who will break their silence and disclose dramatic first-hand experiences with UFOs at nuclear weapons sites.

The White House will respond that President Obama inherited this situation from Bush, and that he, Obama, has reached out to the UFO's and shown respect for their culture.

September 22, 2010      Permalink

OH DEAR, OH DEAR – AT 10:34 A.M. ET:  Washington is all abuzz about Bob Woodward's new book on the Obama administration, especially its portrayal of Obama as philosopher in...I mean commander in chief.  WaPo has a description.  Take Advil first:

President Obama urgently looked for a way out of the war in Afghanistan last year, repeatedly pressing his top military advisers for an exit plan that they never gave him, according to secret meeting notes and documents cited in a new book by journalist Bob Woodward.

Frustrated with his military commanders for consistently offering only options that required significantly more troops, Obama finally crafted his own strategy, dictating a classified six-page "terms sheet" that sought to limit U.S. involvement, Woodward reports in "Obama's Wars," to be released on Monday.

According to Woodward's meeting-by-meeting, memo-by-memo account of the 2009 Afghan strategy review, the president avoided talk of victory as he described his objectives.

"This needs to be a plan about how we're going to hand it off and get out of Afghanistan," Obama is quoted as telling White House aides as he laid out his reasons for adding 30,000 troops in a short-term escalation. "Everything we're doing has to be focused on how we're going to get to the point where we can reduce our footprint. It's in our national security interest. There cannot be any wiggle room."

Words like "victory" apparent never left the launching pad.

Obama rejected the military's request for 40,000 troops as part of an expansive mission that had no foreseeable end. "I'm not doing 10 years," he told Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton at a meeting on Oct. 26, 2009. "I'm not doing long-term nation-building. I am not spending a trillion dollars."

Woodward's book portrays Obama and the White House as barraged by warnings about the threat of terrorist attacks on U.S. soil and confronted with the difficulty in preventing them. During an interview with Woodward in July, the president said, "We can absorb a terrorist attack. We'll do everything we can to prevent it, but even a 9/11, even the biggest attack ever . . . we absorbed it and we are stronger."

And why were we stronger?  Does the name Bush come to mind?

The portrayal here, and elsewhere, shows a president who has little conception of strategy, and no conception of how to be commander in chief.  This book will not help the administration.

September 22, 2010      Permalink

SARAH RISING – AT 9:17 A.M. ET:  Andrew Malcolm at the L.A. Times's Top of the Ticket blog raises some intriguing questions about Sarah Palin, whose stock seems to be soaring.  (Even the liberal commentator Mark Halperin was favorably assessing her earlier this week.)  Andrew posts a new Sarah video and asks:

Watch it. See if you think it's from someone who is not running for, oh, say, the nomination for an important office from a major political party. Or laying the foundation to play a major role in that decision by assembling a following of numerous like-minded, loyal folks.

Did you notice anything missing in this video, as we did? (Answer down below.*)

As we wrote here on The Ticket Tuesday, a majority of Americans now say their views match Palin's. Or vice versa.

Play the video.  What do you think?  Please send us some thoughts.  Oh, by the way, what's missing from the video is that Sarah doesn't mention either political party.  Hmm.

September 22, 2010      Permalink

JIMMAH MUST BE LOVING THIS – AT 8:49 A.M. ET:  Jimmah Carter has been all over the tube this week promoting still one more book of wisdom, getting back at his enemies and proclaiming his divinity and greatness.

Trouble is, the political talk about him is taking a different turn.  Reader John Catherwood alerts us to this John Fund piece reporting on the comparisons between Jimmah and another self-proclaimed deity:

Comparisons between the Obama White House and the failed presidency of Jimmy Carter are increasingly being made—and by Democrats.

Walter Mondale, Mr. Carter's vice president, told The New Yorker this week that anxious and angry voters in the late 1970s "just turned against us—same as with Obama." As the polls turned against his administration, Mr. Mondale recalled that Mr. Carter "began to lose confidence in his ability to move the public." Democrats on Capitol Hill are now saying this is happening to Mr. Obama.

Mr. Mondale says it's time for the president "to get rid of those teleprompters and connect" with voters. Another of Mr. Obama's clear errors has been to turn over the drafting of key legislation to the Democratic Congress: "That doesn't work even when you own Congress," he said. "You have to ride 'em."

Lots of hopey changey stuff when Mr. Obama took office.  It didn't last long:

But within a few months, liberals were already finding fault with his rhetoric. "He's the great earnest bore at the dinner party," wrote Michael Wolff, a contributor to Vanity Fair. "He's cold; he's prickly; he's uncomfortable; he's not funny; and he's getting awfully tedious. He thinks it's all about him." That sounds like a critique of Mr. Carter.

I wish they'd told us that during the campaign.

Foreign policy experts are also picking up on similarities. Walter Russell Mead, then a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, told the Economist magazine earlier this year that Mr. Obama is "avoiding the worst mistakes that plagued Carter." But he warns that presidents like Mr. Obama who emphasize "human rights" can fall prey to the temptation of picking on weak countries while ignoring more dire human rights issues in powerful countries (Russia, China, Iran). Over time that can "hollow out an administration's credibility and make a president look weak."

And...

Liberals increasingly can't avoid making connections between Mr. Carter's political troubles and those of Mr. Obama. In July, MSNBC's Chris Matthews asked his guests if Democrats up for re-election will "run away from President O'Carter." After much laughter, John Heileman of New York Magazine quipped "Calling Dr. Freud." To which Mr. Matthews, a former Carter speechwriter, sighed "I know."

Don't you love it?  Don't you just love it?  Enjoy.

September 22, 2010    Permalink

COULD THIS BE POSSIBLE? – AT 8:15 A.M. ET:  The Quinnipiac poll is highly respected.  Q is out this morning with a real New York stunner:

ALBANY - A stunning new poll this morning shows Democratic Attorney General Andrew Cuomo holding a mere six point lead over bomb throwing Buffalo businessman Carl Paladino in what until now has been Cuomo's runaway race for governor.

The startling Quinnipiac University survey of likely voters showed Cuomo ahead of Republican Paladino by 49-43 percent, a far cry from the 60-23 percent lead he held in a Quinnipiac poll of registered - but not necessarily likely - voters released Sept. 1.

Since the poll's margin of error is plus- or minus-3.6 percent, the findings - if accurate -- mean the race between the popular and well-known attorney general and the little-known but highly controversial, Tea Party-linked, Paladino could be a dead heat.

COMMENT:  The key here is "likely voters."  Enthusiasm this year is far higher among conservatives than among liberals, who are crushed that The One has not yet brought peace on Earth and good will toward men. 

We'll wait for other polls, which may or may not confirm this result.  But if the poll is accurate, we may see a political revolution in New York.  And, if accurate, it may be an indicator of what's happening around the country.  We stress the word "may." 

I'm underwhelmed by Paladino, who has the elegant style of a junkyard dog.  But I can't help but be impressed by his winning the GOP gubernatorial nomination.  Stand by on this one.

September 22, 2010     Permalink

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2010

ONE DOWN – AT 7:47 P.M. ET:  Rahm Emanuel has a dream.  Oh yes, oh lawd, he has a dream.  And his dream is to be mayor of Chicago.  You know, when you can hire all those meter maids, what else is there in life?

So, Rahm is now White House chief of staff, and the mayor of Chicago, Richard Daley, has announced that he won't be running again.  Rahm is ready to jump in, but there are others in his way.  What to do, what to do?  Well, the first thing you do is to pray to the great god of Chicago politics – usually a prosecutor – that your opponents disappear.

Answered prayers.  One of Rahm's biggest obstacles appears to have bitten the dust:

U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-Ill.) said Tuesday he is “deeply sorry” for having “disappointed some supporters” regarding his relationship with a female “social acquaintance.”

Yeah, just a social acquaintance.  We're just friends.

But the congressman vowed to stay in office in the wake of a Chicago Sun-Times report that a major political fund-raiser has told federal authorities that Jackson directed him to offer former Gov. Rod Blagojevich millions of dollars in campaign cash in return for an appointment for Jackson to the U.S. Senate, to succeed President Obama.

A little confusing, so let me explain:  There is sworn testimony that Jackson sought to buy the U.S. Senate seat vacated by the president.

In his dealings with a go-between, Jackson apparently asked that some air tickets be purchased for...

...a Washington, D.C., restaurant hostess named Giovana Huidobro — described as a “social acquaintance” of the Democratic congressman — to Chicago to visit him.

If the guy's gonna cheat, you'd think he'd pay his own bills.

...Jackson acknowledged knowing Huidobro and that the relationship was something he an his wife, Ald. Sandi Jackson, have had to deal with.

“The reference to a social acquaintance is a private and personal matter between me and my wife that was handled some time ago,” Jackson said in his statement. “I ask that you respect our privacy..."

Have you noticed that all these guys who get caught at it sound exactly the same?  They must use the same law firm, Cheat, Sleaze and Explain, who are deeply respected among members of the excuse bar.

I think Jackson is, or was, the most formidable obstacle to Rahm Emanuel.  In Chicago, it is far better to have your opponent sink into a sea of corruption than to defeat him in a primary, which costs so much and wears out good shoes.

One down.  Chicago politics is absolutely fascinating.  And when someone in Chicago says he knows where the bodies are buried, he's talking about real bodies.

Stay tuned.

September 21, 2010      Permalink

HISTORICAL BULLETIN – AT 7:33 P.M. ET:  Jimmah Carter, having informed us within the last 24 hours that he's a better ex-president than his fellow exes, now gives us the benefit of his vast perspective to announce that the country is more divided than at any time since the Civil War.

In day where Jimmy Carter stole headlines for referring to his own tenure post-presidency as “superior” to that of other presidents, I thought it was somewhat disappointing that his real mind-bender was seemingly overlooked – even though it came in the very same interview as his other absolutely ridiculous comments. Remarking on the “state” of the United States, after being asked by Brian Williams if he views it as “glass half-full or half-empty”, Carter said he thought President Obama suffers from a Washington that has become more polarized than it was during the time of Abraham Lincoln and the “initiation of the ‘war between the states.’”

“This country has become so polarized that it's almost astonishing…. Not only with the red and blue states… President Obama suffers from the most polarized situation in Washington that we have ever seen – even maybe than the time of Abraham Lincoln and the initiation of the war between the states.”

You know, I agree.  In fact, just this afternoon I e-mailed the White House advising President Obama to beef up the security at Fort Sumter.  And he'd better have the FBI monitor all playings of "Dixie."

Carter is whacked out.  Period.  Soon he'll be recommending that our operations in Afghanistan be commanded by Robert E. Lee. 

This man was president.  If we can survive him, we can survive anything.

September 21, 2010     Permalink

WELL LOOK WHO'S TALKIN', AND THE MAN KNOWS POLITICS – AT 8:17 A.M. ET:  Former President Bill Clinton, who knows a thing or two about politics, is now publicly warning his fellow Democrats.  From ABC News:

Former president Bill Clinton had words of warning for Democrats who think Sarah Palin could be the best thing to happen to President Obama in a 2012 presidential bid – "It's always a mistake to underestimate your opponent."

“In the Republican primaries she's very popular with the conservative base. She gets more people to come out,” he told me. “And she hasn't won all of her endorsements, but she's won most of them. And you know, she's a compelling, attractive figure.”

And...

“I do think she’s a resilient character. And we may be entering a sort of period in politics that’s sort of fact free, where the experience in government is a negative,” he told me.

“I think she's clearly a public figure who is, who speaks well and persuasively to the people who listen to her. And she's somebody to be reckoned with,” he said. “And she's tough.”

Clinton recalled when “people were making fun of her” he read about Palin’s husband finishing the last 500 miles of Alaska’s Iron Dog race with a broken arm.

“Now, where I come from people like that. They think that's pretty good,” he said.

So is she qualified to be president? Clinton said the “American people can elect whomever they want.”

Yes we can.  We can elect whomever we want.

As readers know, I've been skeptical of Sarah Palin, but mighty impressed with how she's grown during this election season.  She puts herself on the line, and people like that.  Her approval ratings, still in the red, are lagging behind her progress. 

And she is still the most fascinating person in American politics, eclipsing the president of the United States.

The mainstream media will always hate her, but by 2012 the mainstream media may have as much credibility as a refrigerator salesman at the North Pole.

September 21, 2010      Permalink

MAJOR MOVE, BUT IT MUST BE WELL EXECUTED – AT 7:55 A.M. ET:  Republicans are about to roll out their new version of a "contract with America."  The roll-out itself must be a work of political art.  From The Politico:

House Republicans have chosen a hardware store in a Northern Virginia exurb for the much-hyped unveiling of their governing agenda, ending months of behind-the-scenes planning and wrangling over exactly what the GOP should stand for in a volatile political year.

The rollout is the byproduct of a program called America Speaking Out, an online grass-roots effort Republicans used to build an election-year agenda. Republicans are holding the policy and government reform agenda very closely and declined to reveal what is in the document...

...Some specifics have leaked out, however. Republicans are likely to propose a measure that would give the public and members of Congress three days to read a bill before it heads to the floor. And another provision would require all bills to come with a certification of constitutional authority. Much of the document, though, will center on job creation and other measures to heal the economy. House leadership sources also have signaled that national security will be a big part of the plan.

COMMENT:  Republican planners must now, right now, be planning for a major sales pitch, and also for the expected Dem counterattack. 

The Republicans behind this document are smart.  They're not hacks, nor are they blind ideologists.  I'll make an educated guess that the document will be well done, but that the Dems will misrepresent it from the first second.  The Republicans must be ready with TV ads telling Americans what's in this new agenda, why it's good, and why it isn't extreme.  They must blunt any Dem attack even before it's launched.

It's all in the execution, as they say in Hollywood.  And for once, Hollywood is right.

September 21, 2010      Permalink

THE ONLY THING THEY HAVE TO SELL IS FEAR ITSELF – AT 7:41 A.M. ET:  A desperate Democratic Party is going into major fear mode, as Fox News reports:

The White House is pushing back on a report that President Obama's advisers are contemplating an all-out ad war to discredit Republicans by way of the Tea Party. But with the primaries now behind them, top Democratic officials have already made the Tea Party fear factor an integral part of their messaging.

Amid mounting predictions that Democrats could lose at least one chamber of Congress, a rhetorical campaign has been underway for weeks to cast the Republican Party as driven by the "extremist" faction of its conservative wing.

Warnings about the direction of the GOP got louder after dark-horse candidate Christine O'Donnell beat moderate Rep. Mike Castle for the Delaware Senate nomination last week and conservative Joe Miller beat incumbent Sen. Lisa Murkowski in the Alaska primary -- prompting Murkowski to launch a write-in campaign.

The New York Times reported Monday that Obama's advisers are considering whether to launch an ad campaign nationwide to portray the Tea Partiers as the new leaders of the Republican Party.

COMMENT:  This is pretty much the Democratic script, but Republicans aren't taking it seriously enough.  Marginalizing an opponent often works, or works well enough to affect close elections.  It works unless the target fights back, which the GOP must now do.  Every attack must be answered and buried.  The worst thing the Repubicans can do now is sit on their lead, which in some races is only razor-thin.

September 21, 2010      Permalink

HE DIDN'T.  TELL ME HE DIDN'T – AT 7:25 A.M. ET:  Well, it isn't the first time Harry Reid has made a fool of himself, but this takes some kind of prize for dumbness.  From The Politico:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid had an unusual form of praise for New York's junior senator, Kirsten Gillibrand, this morning at the fundraiser Mayor Bloomberg hosted for him at his townhouse - referring to her as "the hottest member" as she sat just a few feet away, according to three sources.

The comment prompted Gillibrand to turn red, according to the sources, and created a bit of stir among the small crowd there.

"It was pretty shocking when he said it," said one source familiar with the remark and the reaction.

A Reid spokesman confirmed it happened, but also noted that the Democratic Majority Leader also praised Gillibrand for her work.

First Bloomberg spoke, then Sen. Chuck Schumer, and then Reid, according to the sources. Reid praised Schumer at length, discussing how he could have run for governor - and won - in 2006, but didn't, and instead accepted the Nevada senator's entreaties to run the DSCC.

Then he turned his attention to Gillibrand, saying something about how "many senators are known for many things," according to a source. He added, "We in the Senate refer to Sen. Gillibrand as the hottest member."

COMMENT:  Well, I'll be.  Can you imagine, just imagine, if a Republican had said that about a female member of Congress?  There would be calls for resignation, punishment. 

We await word on what impact Reid's silliness will have in his tight race for reelection in Nevada, where he's opposed by Tea Partier Sharron Angle.   

There is also speculation that Reid faces a possible assassination attempt from Barbara Boxer, who thinks she's the hottest member. 

September 21, 2010     Permalink