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JUNE 18,  2011

PERRY WHIPS IT UP – AT 11:47 P.M. ET:  Governor Rick Perry of Texas, who seems to be inching closer to entering the presidential sweepstakes, whipped them up at the decidedly conservative Republican Leadership Conference in New Orleans.

Please note that the name is deceptive.  It's just a label.  They hold a straw poll each year after every conference, and the winner this year was Ron Paul, which should give you some idea what planet the conference is on.  Paul is known to haul in busloads of supporters for the poll.  From The New York Times:

NEW ORLEANS — Gov. Rick Perry of Texas, the latest Republican to muse openly about exploring a Republican presidential candidacy, drew booming applause here on Saturday for not only assailing President Obama but also lecturing some members of his own party on the importance of socially conservative principles.

“It saddens me, sometimes, when my fellow Republicans duck and cover in the face of pressure from the left,” Mr. Perry said, urging activists not to separate economic and social priorities. “We need to redouble our efforts to elect more conservative Republicans.”

In an appearance at the Republican Leadership Conference, which served as something of a debut for Mr. Perry’s presidential ambitions, hundreds of delegates chanted, “Run, Rick, run!” He smiled, waved and basked in the enthusiasm but did not say whether he would answer their call to join the party’s unsettled field of presidential candidates.

Mr. Perry, who succeeded George W. Bush as governor and was elected to a third term last year, had long maintained that he had no interest in running for president. But in recent weeks, he has signaled that he is reconsidering and trying to determine if there is still time to piece together a credible candidacy.

COMMENT:  Perry, who started political life as a Democrat, is a terrific campaigner who has never lost an election.  He would run on a record of job creation, in which Texas leads the nation.  On paper he's great.

Perry has two major problems:  First, he may not translate outside Texas.  He tends to sound local rather than national, and his views place him way to the right on the political spectrum.  Winning independents nationally will be the key to the 2012 election, and that may be a tough road for Perry.

Second, Perry's record of job creation will be researched up and down by the Obama brigades.  What kind of jobs were created?  Low paying?  High paying?  What was the cost of creating those job?  Texas has a massive $24-billion budget deficit.  And, in order to keep taxes low, Texas spends less per child on education than almost any other American state.  You can almost hear the Democratic attack lines.

There is much enthusiasm for Perry because of his campaigning ability, and I put a great emphasis on that.  You can't beat Obama with a weak campaigner.  But I want to see a lot more before I have both hands clapping.  Ronald Reagan won because he could appeal nationally.  Can Perry?

June 18, 2011       Permalink

SYRIA CRISIS DEEPENS – AT 11:25 A.M. ET:  The situation in Syria has become horrible, but the only response of the "international community" is condemnation, which isn't cutting it with the Syrian dictator.  From the Jerusalem Post:

The UK on Saturday urged British nationals to leave Syria immediately as violence continued between government forces and anti-regime protesters, the Guardian reported.

The British Foreign Office said UK citizens in Syria should leave by commercial flight while that was still a possibility because the embassy could not likely help if the situation continued to deteriorate. The statement added that evacuation options would be limited going forward.

The British announcement came as Syrian troops and gunmen loyal to President Bashar Assad stormed a town near the Turkish border, burning houses and arresting 70 people, witnesses said, in a wide-ranging military assault to crush a three month uprising.

"They came at 7 a.m. to Bdama. I counted nine tanks, 10 armoured carriers, 20 jeeps and 10 buses. I saw shabbiha (gunmen) setting fire to two houses," said Saria Hammouda, a lawyer from the small town of Bdama.

The town lies 2 km from the Turkish border, in Jisr al-Shughour region, from where thousands of people have fled to Turkey following military assaults to quell dissent against 41 years of Assad family rule

In Lebanon, the Lebanese army clamped down on two sectarian districts of a northern city on Saturday after a rally in support of anti-government protesters in Syria triggered deadly clashes between rival gunmen.

Lebanon is under the thumb of Syria. 

19 Syrians died on Friday when Syrian government forces fired at demonstrators demanding the removal of President Bashar Assad in the biggest protest since unrest against Baathist rule erupted in March, activists said.

European powers, which had initiated a detente with Assad prior to the street protests to try to draw the Syrian leader away from Iran and also stabilize Lebanon, said Damascus should face tougher sanctions for the violence.

Yeah, right.  Just as sanctions have worked against Iran. 

This is getting worse.  Obama seems as detached as usual.  There is a good chance that Assad will survive this, just as his father survived after ordering a wholesale slaughter in the Syrian city of Hama in 1982.  Most of the world is usually interested only in who wins.

Our influence, ever since Obama took office and started appeasing the Arab world, seems less than ever.

June 18, 2011       Permalink

QUOTE OF THE DAY – AT 11:01 A.M. ET:   Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour is one of this country's great political resources.  I think he probably knows more about American politics, and how to do American politics, than anyone else.  He is warning, properly, about the demands of some for ideological purity in a Republican candidate for president.  He should be listened to.  From the New Orleans Times-Picayune:

...Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, a former national party chairman, delivered a stern warning to Republican Leadership Conference delegates: Don't look for perfection in the potential nominees and don't even think about drafting a third-party candidate when the nomination fight is done.

"Don't get hung up on purity," he said. "In politics, purity is a loser. ... In this business, it is unity that wins elections. ... Barack Obama has worn out three sets of knee pads down his knees praying for the tea party to become a third party, because he can't lose."

Barbour, who has already announced that he isn't running for president, didn't call any of the announced candidates by name. But the warning was clearly a recognized party elder trying to navigate the disparate movements on display at the three-day conference that culminates Saturday with the announcement of a straw poll of more than 2,000 delegates.

COMMENT:  The genius of American politics is that it's practical.  Americans want effective, quick, practical solutions.  They are not very much interested in ideology, and, to their credit, they tend to reject extremes.   Fiorello LaGuardia, the great mayor of New York, once said that there's no Democratic or Republican way to pick up the garbage.

Clearly, we want our candidates to have an identifiable point of view, and one that we favor as voters.  But rigid ideology is something else.  Contrary to myth, Ronald Reagan was a very practical conservative who avoided rigidity.  Barbour quoted Reagan:

He added an axiom he attributed to former President Ronald Reagan, "Remember that a fella who agrees with you 80 percent of the time is a friend and ally; he's not a 20-percent traitor."

Very solid.

June 18, 2011        Permalink

WHERE OBAMA STANDS – AT 10:42 A.M. ET:  We prefer using the Rasmussen survey as our poll of choice here because Scott polls likely voters, the most reliable measure of what may happen in an election.  By that measure, President Obama is in serious trouble.

The president enjoyed a brief spurt of popularity after the bin Laden raid, but now is slipping back badly, alarmingly if you're a Democrat, to some of his worst numbers.

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Saturday shows that 21% of the nation's voters Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as president. Forty-one percent (41%) Strongly Disapprove, giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -20.

And...

Overall, 45% of voters say they at least somewhat approve of the president's performance. Fifty-five (55%) at least somewhat disapprove.

We haven't seen numbers like that since April 11th. 

This tends to confirm the trend we've seen from other polls.  The Gallup poll showed a generic Republic defeating Mr. Obama right now.  Trouble is, there's no such thing as a generic Republican.  The GOP candidate will have a name, which may either be our fortune or misfortune. 

Clearly, the president's numbers can turn around if the economy starts to gain.  So far, we've seen no sign of that.

June 18, 2011     Permalink

JUNE 17,  2011

WHEN WILL THEY EVER LEARN? – AT 10:29 P.M. ET:  CBS News is trying to rebuild its image, following the end of the Couric years.  Katie Couric didn't cut it as anchor for CBS Evening News, and her obvious liberal agenda annoyed multitudes.

You'd think CBS would have learned its lesson, and there was cause for encouragement in the naming of Scott Pelley to replace Couric.   But now the once-great news division demonstrates that it has actually learned nothing.  It has appointed NBC reporter Norah O'Donnell, airhead extraordinaire, to the lofty post of chief White House correspondent.

O'Donnell, a committed leftist, makes Katie Couric look like a mild moderate.  And O'Donnell is not known as one of the deeper minds in broadcast journalism.  She has movie-star looks, which probably accounts for the appointment, but her journalism is often shoddy and argumentative.  NewsBusters has the sordid story:

"If Time-magaziner-turned-White House-press-sec Jay Carney ever tires of defending President Obama," wrote NB's Mark Finkelstein earlier this year, "Norah O'Donnell clearly seems ready to step in."

News broke Thursday that O'Donnell will, in fact, be moving to the White House briefing room, but she'll staying on the same side of the podium as CBS's Chief White House Correspondent. But that doesn't mean her incessant cheerleaeding for the Obama administration and its party will relent.

O'Donnell is one of television news's more blatantly liberal non-prime time personalities.

And...

For all of O'Donnell's fondness for Obama, she really does not like Sarah Palin. Norah appeared at a Palin book signing - crib notes in hand - last year to grill a teen Palin fan, but threw softballs to a pro-Obamacare child weeks later. O'Donnell's lame defense of Obama's decision to wear a tacky faux-military leather jacket to an address to troops in Afghanistan was a childish "Sarah Palin wears a leather jacket too!" Norah also harped on the Palin "hand note" non-story perhaps longer than any other television personality.

Filmmaker John Ziegler even called on NBC to fire O'Donnell for her vehement hatred of everything Palin.

The firing never came, but now O'Donnell has left for another network where, no doubt, the Palin hatred and the rest of the liberal quips will continue.

For the record, Norah O'Donnell is the only journalist I've ever written to in order to complain about her work.  I never got an answer.  She is a terrible choice for CBS, unless all they want is a pretty face.  That's all they'll get.

June 17, 2011       Permalink

BACHMANN BUZZ CONTINUES – AT 10:22 A.M. ET:  While Mitt Romney has improved his standing with Republican voters recently, and did well in Monday's debate, there is real buzz around Michele Bachmann, who was the standout performer.  From The Politico:

A Magellan poll commissioned by the website NH Journal shows Mitt Romney taking 42 percent of the vote in New Hampshire, with his nearest rivals — Ron Paul and Michele Bachmann — tied at 10 percent each. The rest of the field is in single digits.

There are signs, though, that Bachmann has growth potential:

The most surprising numbers emerged when we asked which candidates had the strongest debate performance ... Thirty-nine percent said Romney gave the strongest performance. But an impressive 28% said Bachmann did. No other candidate finished in double-digits. Among self-identified conservatives who watched the debate, Bachmann performed even better. Among this group, 37% said Romney had the strongest performance, while 33% said Bachmann.

COMMENT:  Now, consider this:  Down the road, should Romney be the nominee, he may well have to decide whether he wants Michele Bachmann as his v.p. choice.  There may be intense pressure from the conservative wing to take her, especially as the obvious choice, Marco Rubio, refuses. 

That will not be an easy decision for Romney because of two words:  Sarah Palin.  He will have in mind what was done to Palin during the 2008 campaign.  Bachmann has a history as a bit of a loose cannon, although she's recently exhibited admirable discipline and on-message deliveries.  But the 2008 experience will weigh heavily on any GOP nominee, as the media will go after Bachmann with the same intensity with which it pursued Palin.

At the same time, even liberal stalwart Dan Rather recently cautioned about underestimating Bachmann.  She's a trained lawyer, does vast amounts of homework, and has a very quick mind.  Watch her rise.

June 17, 2011      Permalink 

WARNING FROM THE IMF – AT 9:37 A.M. ET:  As if we need any coaching, the International Monetary Fund is warning the United States about its financial future. 

SAO PAULO (Reuters) - The International Monetary Fund cut its forecast for U.S. economic growth on Friday and warned Washington and debt-ridden European countries that they are "playing with fire" unless they take immediate steps to reduce their budget deficits.

The IMF, in its regular assessment of global economic prospects, said that bigger threats to growth had emerged since its previous report in April, citing the euro zone debt crisis and signs of overheating in emerging market economies.

The global lender forecast that U.S. gross domestic product would grow an anemic 2.5 percent this year and 2.7 percent in 2012. In its forecast just two months ago, it had expected 2.8 percent and 2.9 percent growth, respectively.

The outlook elsewhere was mixed. The IMF said it was slightly more optimistic about the euro area's growth prospects this year, but a lack of political leadership in dealing with that crisis and the budget showdown in the United States could create major financial volatility in coming months.

COMMENT:  We are in trouble, and we've got to get out of trouble.  As Victor Davis Hanson has recently written, our economic troubles are the result of conscious decisions, and we can solve them by other conscious decisions.

At the same time, Hanson warned that we must never accept American decline as inevitable, which is what some on the left – possibly including the president – want to accept as part of economic reform.  American decline, which could include a new isolationism and a dangerous cutting of our defenses, will only result in tragedy down the road.

I might add that some on the right may also be tempted to accept American decline as part of an economic package, and indeed there was a whiff of isolationism in Monday night's GOP debate.  The temptation must be resisted at all costs.  We learned our lesson in the 1930s.  Didn't we?

June 17, 2011       Permalink

BULLETIN – AT 8:50 A.M. ET:  A reminder of what's out there.  From Fox:

DEVELOPING: Authorities say they have a suspect in custody after finding a backpack which may contain ammonium nitrate near the Pentagon in Arlington, Va.

A source with knowledge of the investigation told Fox News that authorities were alerted to a suspicious vehicle in the area early Friday morning. A backpack containing what they believe is five pounds of ammonium nitrate was found outside the vehicle, the source said.

A notebook was also found at the scene and contained threatening words like "Al Qaeda" and "Taliban," Fox News has learned.

The man arrested is a naturalized U.S. citizen who came to the country from Ethiopia, a source told MyFoxDC.com.

COMMENT:  Five pounds of ammonium nitrate can do some damage and take some lives.  We, of course, have to be careful about reporting this, as facts are just becoming known.  But we get a scare in America every few months when some would-be killer, whether affiliated with a group or not, tries something.  We've been lucky so far.  But no nation is lucky a hundred percent of the time.

June 17, 2011     Permalink

CALL IT THE CORVETTE REVOLUTION – AT 8:27 A.M. ET:  Saudi women have heard the call, "Ladies, start your engines."  A great story from Fox:

A number of Saudi women drove cars Friday in response to calls for nationwide action to break a traditional ban unique to the ultra-conservative kingdom.

"We've just returned from the supermarket. My wife decided to start the day by driving to the store and back," columnist Tawfiq Alsaif said on Twitter.

"My wife, Maha, and I have just come from a 45-minute drive. She was the driver through Riyadh streets," said Mohammad al Qahtani, president of the Saudi Civil and Political Rights Association, in another tweet.

Many Saudi women had pledged on Facebook and Twitter to answer the call to defy the deeply entrenched ban, in the largest such mass action since November 1990, when female demonstrators were arrested and severely penalized.

Instead of staging demonstrations, which are strictly banned in the absolute monarchy, women with driving licences obtained abroad were encouraged to take individual action.

Veteran women's rights activist Wajiha al Huwaider said she did not expect a huge turnout as hoped for by sympathizers abroad because of the severe response by officials to women who have taken the lead in recent weeks.

COMMENT:  Let's see how much support these women receive from "women's" groups in the West, many of whom have shown a marked indifference to the plight of Muslim women.  (The reasoning seems to be that if you support Muslim women you are helping "American militarism," or, horrors to horrors, the polices of BUSH (!!) or CHENEY (!!!!).

And let's see how much support these women receive from other "rebel" groups involved in the Arab spring throughout the Mideast.  One of our greatest dilemmas in dealing with these revolutionaries is finding out who they actually are and what they actually believe.  Do they believe in women's rights?  Important question, I think.

June 17, 2011     Permalink