Our subcription drive ended last night.  A report will be posted for readers on Monday morning.

SATURDAY,  NOVEMBER 21,  2009

SWALLOW HARD BEFORE YOU READ THIS ONE - AT 8:22 P.M. ET:  If you really doubt that the civilian trial of the mastermind of 9-11 can suddenly run into problems, consider the behavior of one country whose intelligence service may play a role.  From Fox:

A German government official says the nation will send an observer to the upcoming trial in New York of the professed mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks and four accused henchmen.

Justice Ministry spokeswoman Katharina Jahntz on Saturday confirmed a report in Der Spiegel that a German observer would attend the trial to ensure that no evidence provided by Germany would be used to apply the death penalty.

We're moved to see Germany so concerned about preserving human life.  They're about 70 years too late.

Three of the four suicide pilots who carried out the attacks had lived and studied in the northern German city of Hamburg.  Germany, like the rest of Europe, except for Belarus, does not execute criminals

U.S. authorities announced last week that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed would be tried by a New York court. No date has been set, but the choice of a civilian court rather than a military tribunal set off heated debate within the United States.

President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder firmly rejected such criticism Wednesday, predicting that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed would be exposed as a murderous coward, convicted and executed.

"Failure is not an option," Holder declared.

An option for whom?  What if a judge throws out half the evidence and the prosecution falls apart?  What if one juror in 12 refuses to convict, leading to a hung jury? 

And how, precisely, will Germany have information excluded from the trial - information that could be crucial to the prosecution?

Aw, come on, just listed to Eric Holder.  It's a lock.  It's in the bag.   Like Chicago getting the Olympics.

November 21,  2009   Permalink

FORT HOOD LATEST - AT 5:51 P.M. ET:  The more we learn, the worse it gets.  From the Washington Post:

In the months before the deadly shootings at Fort Hood, Army Maj. Nidal M. Hasan intensified his communications with a radical Yemeni American cleric and began to discuss surreptitious financial transfers and other steps that could translate his thoughts into action, according to two sources briefed on a collection of secret e-mails between the two.

And get this:

The e-mails were obtained by an FBI-led task force in San Diego between late last year and June but were not forwarded to the military, according to government and congressional sources. Some were sent to the FBI's Washington field office, triggering an assessment into whether they raised national security concerns, but those intercepted later were not, the sources said.

Seems like our intelligence services are going back to the bad old days of the Clinton administration, when communication between agencies was poor to nonexistent.

"He [Hasan] clearly became more radicalized toward the end, and was having discussions related to the transfer of money and finances . . .," said the source, who spoke at length in part because he was concerned the public accounting of the events has been incomplete. "It became very clear toward the end of those e-mails he was interested in taking action."

COMMENT:  Do you remember the days, just after Hasan's attack, when the usual suspects in mainstream media sought to assure us that this was just, hey, one stressed-out fella?  Terrorism?  What terrorism?   Where do you see terrorism?

With the age of Obama came the age of new illusions.

November 21,  2009   Permalink

SARAH SELLS - AT 5:30 P.M. ET:  Sarah Palin, the author, has topped Hillary Clinton in first-day sales: 

NEW YORK (AP) - "Going Rogue" is going big.

Publisher HarperCollins said Friday that Sarah Palin's memoir sold 300,000 copies its first day, among the best openings ever for a nonfiction book. In 2004, Bill Clinton's "My Life" debuted with sales of 400,000 copies. The year before, Hillary Rodham Clinton's "Living History" started at 200,000.

"Going Rogue" was released this week and its print run already has been increased from 1.5 million copies to 2.5 million, HarperCollins announced Friday. Palin, the former Alaska governor and GOP vice presidential candidate, is in the midst of a nationwide promotional tour.

COMMENT:  The secretary of state is reportedly demanding a recount.  If she doesn't get it, you may find her on a high ledge at the State Department.

November 21,  2009   Permalink

IS THIS THE WINNING STRATEGY? - AT 12:41 P.M. ET:  The states have always been great political and social laboratories.  A part of the American social safety net originated in work done by Al Smith in New York in the early part of the 20th century.  Now Republicans are looking to the states for a winning political strategy for the future.  They think they have found the answer in Virginia, as The Politico reports:

CEDAR CREEK, Tex. –After four years of grappling with how to appeal to voters, a group of top Republicans believe they’ve found a winning formula for 2010. Call it the McDonnell Strategy.

The shorthand: run on economic policy, downplay divisive cultural issues, present an upbeat tone, target independent voters and focus on Democratic-controlled Washington—all without attacking President Barack Obama personally.

It’s an approach that elected Bob McDonnell to the Virginia governorship earlier this month.

While Republicans posted two hard-fought gubernatorial victories on Nov. 3, McDonnell’s path to victory is the one that most encourages the GOP, a remarkable case of a social conservative who made his name in politics as an abortion opponent yet managed to reverse a Democratic trend in Virginia and shellack his opponent by nearly 18 percent while largely steering clear of cultural issues.

As rejuvenated GOP governors gathered at a resort outside Austin for their annual strategy session there was little doubt who they wanted to spotlight. McDonnell was shown off at nearly every public event, paraded before the reporters, consultants and lobbyists here as the example of how Republicans can find swing state success in the Obama era.

COMMENT:  Maybe.  Maybe not.  I'm in Virginia right now.  Like every state, it has its own characteristics and political hot buttons.  McDonnell ran a superb campaign.  Virginia, though, is a purple, swing state.  Just as impressive is the gubernatorialwin by Chris Christie in New Jersey, the bluest of the blue states.  If I were running Republican strategy, I'd look at both races. 

McDonnell was the smoother candidate.  Christie, a rotund fellow whose physical appearance was not helpful, had the harder job. 

I agree that direct personal attacks on the president don't work.  But criticizing his increasingly unpopular policies does work. 

Republicans have a great chance next year.  Studying strategies from recent victories is a fine way to begin.

November 21, 2009   Permalink

HEALTH CARE DEBATE BEGINS IN THE SENATE - AT 11:30 A.M. ET:  Generally liberal columnist David Broder, who's had some critical things to say about the Obama administration recently, takes on health care.  The Senate debate on a health bill is starting.  It will culminate tonight in a procedural vote, which will test the strength of the various factions.  (There seems to be a new trend to do these things on Saturdays, when fewer people are watching.  I wonder why.) 

Moderate Democrats are apparently being bought off by earmarks, the better to insure their votes for "reform."  The American people are less than enthusiastic, as Broder reports, citing a question in a recent Quinnipiac University survey:

It read: "President Obama has pledged that health insurance reform will not add to our federal budget deficit over the next decade. Do you think that President Obama will be able to keep his promise or do you think that any health care plan that Congress passes and President Obama signs will add to the federal budget deficit?"

The answer: Less than one-fifth of the voters -- 19 percent of the sample -- think he will keep his word. Nine of 10 Republicans and eight of 10 independents said that whatever passes will add to the torrent of red ink. By a margin of four to three, even Democrats agreed this is likely.

That fear contributed directly to the fact that, by a 16-point margin, the majority in this poll said they oppose the legislation moving through Congress.

I have been writing for months that the acid test for this effort lies less in the publicized fight over the public option or the issue of abortion coverage than in the plausibility of its claim to be fiscally responsible.

It isn't fiscally responsible.  And despite lopsided opposition to the bill on the part of citizens, it is being pushed through Congress by the liberal left, which believes that it knows best, that it does best, that it is best.  This is elitism, pure and simple, a belief that those peasants out there couldn't possibly understand something as complex as health care.

Here, for example, is what Robert Bixby, the executive director of the Concord Coalition, a bipartisan group of budget watchdogs, told me: "The Senate bill is better than the House version, but there's not much reform in this bill. As of now, it's basically a big entitlement expansion, plus tax increases."

Here's another expert, Maya MacGuineas, the president of the bipartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget: "While this bill does a better job than the House version at reducing the deficit and controlling costs, it still doesn't do enough. Given the political system's aversion to tax increases and spending cuts, I worry about what the final bill will look like."

The logical conclusion?

The challenge to Congress -- and to Obama -- remains the same: Make the promised savings real, and don't pass along unfunded programs to our children and grandchildren.

COMMENT:  Some chance of that.  The White House turned health care over to Congress, and the result was predictable.  We have a monstrosity, not reform - a bill more than 2,000 pages long, longer than "War and Peace," longer than the Old Testament, and not as inspiring as either. 

In the 1960s the far left developed a plan to flood the political system - with welfare applicants, paperwork, and bureaucracy - hoping to bring down capitalism in the process by paralyzing the country.  It came close to working in New York City.  I sometimes get the feeling that the current crowd in Washington has pulled out that same playbook, producing legislation that floods the system, is impossible to understand, and which will break the bank.

But I'm sure the bill is being published on non-acid, environmentally friendly paper.

November 21,  2009   Permalink

FRAUD OF THE CENTURY? - AT 10:36 A.M. ET:  A number of readers, led by Ken Braithwaite, alerted us to this story before it hit the mainstream media.  Now it's hit.  It could be a major story, dealing with a possible major scandal, if it's allowed to breathe by the press, and if the "scientific community" acts responsibly and demands investigations.  This is about "global warming, from The New York Times:

Hundreds of private e-mail messages and documents hacked from a computer server at a British university are causing a stir among global warming skeptics, who say they show that climate scientists conspired to overstate the case for a human influence on climate change...

...In one e-mail exchange, a scientist writes of using a statistical “trick” in a chart illustrating a recent sharp warming trend. In another, a scientist refers to climate skeptics as “idiots.”

Some skeptics asserted Friday that the correspondence revealed an effort to withhold scientific information. “This is not a smoking gun; this is a mushroom cloud,” said Patrick J. Michaels, a climatologist who has long faulted evidence pointing to human-driven warming and is criticized in the documents.

And...

In several e-mail exchanges, Kevin Trenberth, a climatologist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, and other scientists discuss gaps in understanding of recent variations in temperature. Skeptic Web sites pointed out one line in particular: “The fact is that we can’t account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can’t,” Dr. Trenberth wrote.

Yeah, we've kind of wondered about that little thing, too.

At first, said Dr. Michaels, the climatologist who has faulted some of the science of the global warming consensus, his instinct was to ignore the correspondence as “just the way scientists talk.”

But on Friday, he said that after reading more deeply, he felt that some exchanges reflected an effort to block the release of data for independent review.

He said some messages mused about discrediting him by challenging the veracity of his doctoral dissertation at the University of Wisconsin by claiming he knew his research was wrong. “This shows these are people willing to bend rules and go after other people’s reputations in very serious ways,” he said.

COMMENT:  This can grow and grow.  Remember, there are careers involved, and government grants, and reputations, and prizes.  Those things are often more important than "science" to many people.

Skepticism toward the "science" of warming is increasing.  These revelations will just magnify that skepticism.  It's time Congress held some thoughtful, informed hearings on the whole subject. 

We tend to think of scientists as godlike.  They are not.  They are investigators.  There have been scientific and medical theories that have been accepted for decades, only to be proved wrong.  Before we invest trillions of dollars in "global warming" projects, maybe we'd better find out exactly what's in this can of worms.

November 21,  2009   Permalink

WE GET TOUGH WITH IRAN - AT 10:20 A.M. ET:  The steel, the declared will of iron men, the determination to win.  What more can we ask for, as the West gets tough with Iran.  Not.

Just read this, and wonder if the meek foreign policy of the Obama administration has something to do with it.  From AP:

The West is "disappointed" over Iran's failure to respond positively to a UN-brokered nuclear deal, diplomats said in a statement Friday following a meeting of the UN Security Council's five permanent members plus Germany. However, no new sanctions were discussed during the meeting, according to an EU source.

There is no question that this will cause panic and war warnings in Iran.  Ahem.

"We urge Iran to reconsider the opportunity offered by this agreement ... and to engage seriously with us in dialogue and negotiations," the statement said, noting that Teheran had not responded positively to the proposal of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

An EU official said there was no mention of imposing further sanctions against Iran at the meeting. "These things are a matter of timing, and this was not the right time for it," said the official who asked not to be named because of the sensitivity of the matter.

First, they want to send Neville Chamberlain to Tehran for one grand try.

The Western officials said they would hold a follow-up meeting around Christmas.

Why so soon?  Why not let the diplomats do their Christmas shopping, trim the tree, and enjoy the season?  What's a few more spins of the Iranian centrifuges?

After Christmas, remember the U.N.'s wonderfully warm New Year's party. 

On this our safety depends.

November 21,  2009   Permalink

FRIDAY,  NOVEMBER 20,  2009

LOUISIANA HAYRIDE - AT 10:28 P.M. ET:  Why is it that the name "Louisiana" and the term "honest government" are rarely seen together? 

A few days after we reported that a $100-million earmark that could only be applied to Louisiana was put into the health "reform" bill to attract the vote of that state's on-the-fence senator, Mary Landrieu, the senator has hinted at her direction.  After deep thought, much prayer, and considerable contemplation about what was best for her people, Senator Landrieu tells us she's leaning toward "yes."

It is so moving to see such a powerful, moral intellect brought to bear on a decision.  Why, I never would have guessed that the senator would see the wisdom in "yes."  That $100-million earmark reminds me of the Rodgers and Hammerstein song from "Flower Drum Song," A Hundred Million Miracles:

A hundred million miracles,
A hundred million miracles are happ'ning ev'ry day,
And those who say they don't agree
Are those who do not hear or see.
A hundred million miracles,
A hundred million miracles are happ'ning ev'ry day...

Especially in the Senate, and especially when the people's money is thrown around by people who have ready access to it.

Yuch.

November 20,  2009   Permalink

I'M SHOCKED, SHOCKED, TO FIND OUT THERE'S THINKING GOING ON - AT 9:42 P.M. ET:  We knew the day had to come when some people would figure out that global warming isn't as, I apologize for this, hot as it's cracked up to be.  From Spiegel online:

Global warming appears to have stalled. Climatologists are puzzled as to why average global temperatures have stopped rising over the last 10 years. Some attribute the trend to a lack of sunspots, while others explain it through ocean currents.

Whatever the explanation, maybe we'd better nail down the facts before we spend trillions of dollars on junk science, possibly wrecking economies and making the world's poor even poorer.

The Earth's average temperatures have stopped climbing since the beginning of the millennium, and it even looks as though global warming could come to a standstill this year.

Ironically, climate change appears to have stalled in the run-up to the upcoming world summit in the Danish capital, where thousands of politicians, bureaucrats, scientists, business leaders and environmental activists plan to negotiate a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. Billions of euros are at stake in the negotiations.

Nothing to see here, folks, nothing to see.  The batteries in the calculator just went dead, that's all.

Even though the temperature standstill probably has no effect on the long-term warming trend, it does raise doubts about the predictive value of climate models, and it is also a political issue. For months, climate change skeptics have been gloating over the findings on their Internet forums. This has prompted many a climatologist to treat the temperature data in public with a sense of shame, thereby damaging their own credibility.

And maybe for good reason.  I think we've had more political science here than real science.

"It cannot be denied that this is one of the hottest issues in the scientific community," says Jochem Marotzke, director of the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology in Hamburg. "We don't really know why this stagnation is taking place at this point."

Of course, the article goes on to pretty much endorse the conventional, trendy wisdom on warming - that it will resume, but the endorsement is half-hearted.  Many, many scientists are questioning what Al Gore has been preaching. 

Remember that careers are involved here.  Careers are often more important than the truth.

November 20,  2009   Permalink

OBAMA'S MAYOR GOES BATTY - AT 8:49 P.M. ET:  One thing about the late Mayor Richard Daley of Chicago - he may have been gruff, but he wasn't nuts.  We're really not so sure about his son, who has proposed a theory as to why Oprah Winfrey is shutting down her talk show, based in Chicago.  He proposes this theory at a time when parts of Chicago have become a shooting gallery, with kids gunned down regularly:

CHICAGO (CBS) — Mayor Daley had words of admiration for Oprah Winfrey on Thursday and suggested unfair criticism about her closure of Michigan Avenue may have expedited her departure from Chicago.

Daley said Thursday evening he's going to call Oprah to get the real story. But he's obviously concerned that if she says farewell to this city it'll be a blow to Chicago's image.

Image?

"I think she was the most successful woman that we will ever know in the history of this country," Daley said at a fundraising event for United Negro College Fund.

As we said, the mayor's mental state is in doubt.

The mayor says it was the flap over the show's season opener on Michigan Avenue in September that may have helped set Oprah's travel plans in stone. There was criticism about shutting down the Magnificent Mile for days for the taping. She reimbursed the city for costs related to the closure.

"That became a big rhubarb in the Chicago press -- beat up Oprah," Daley told reporters. "So you keep kicking people, people will leave, simple as that."

COMMENT:  Maybe the city should withhold the mayor's paycheck this week, just to hint that he might want to get back to the job. 

Maybe Oprah should talk to him.

November 20,  2009   Permalink

THE AFGHAN TRAGEDY - AT 8:23 P.M. ET:  President Obama specifically said during his election campaign, and after, that Afghanistan was a war of necessity.  He cannot take back those words.  And yet, every signal he sends negates that clear position.  Apparently, now that the president must face the fact that he's not running a student government, the war has become much less necessary.  His endless delays and waffling are taking a toll.  From The Wall Street Journal:

WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown have turned the focus of Afghan war planning toward an exit strategy, publicly declaring that the U.S. and its allies can't send additional troops without a plan for getting them out.

The shift has unnerved some U.S. and foreign officials, who say that planning a pullout now -- with or without a specific timetable -- encourages the Taliban to wait out foreign forces and exacerbates fears in the region that the U.S. isn't fully committed to their security.

And, let's face it, under this administration the U.S. isn't committed to anyone's security, including our own.

"It's not a good idea," said Rep. Ike Skelton (D., Mo.), chairman of the House Armed Services Committee.

He is a Democrat, and represents Harry Truman's old home town of Independence, Missouri.  Skelton's remark demonstrates something we've reported - the new willingness of Democrats to criticize Obama.

"When the area has been stabilized...then it's time to go home. But to set up a timetable for people in that neck of the woods, they'll just wait us out," said Rep. Skelton, a prominent supporter of proposals by Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the U.S. commander in Kabul, to send more troops for a counterinsurgency campaign.

McChrystal has already been marginalized by the administration, which hand-picked him only months ago.

Look, it may be that all this talking and agonizing will result in a workable policy.  It's the result that counts.  But the constant image sent out - what Walter Lippmann called "the picture in our heads" is of weakness and indecision.  Nothing encourages an enemy more.

There is much talk among the chattering classes that President Obama doesn't want Afghanistan to turn into his "Vietnam."  That's become pretty standard rhetoric in some circles.  It's fine - if you get an understanding of Vietnam right, which most on the left don't.  As I was reminded in a personal conversation with a Vietnam-era fighter pilot a few days ago, we never lost one engagement in Vietnam.  The war was never lost on the battlefield.  We lost through defeatism, disturbingly inaccurate reporting, and a deflation of political will.

The part of Vietnam that we're seeing now is that part, the loss of will, not battlefield problems.  Yes, of course, there are serious issues involving military action, strategy, and tactics.  But it's the political side that is now placing success in doubt.  So Afghanistan can indeed become Obama's Vietnam, but for reasons other than what the president thinks.

November 20,  2009   Permalink

THE DOWNWARD TREND - AT 9:43 A.M. ET:  Rasmussen has just released his tracker for Friday.  What's striking is the repeat of spread in Ras's presidential approval index:

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Friday shows that 27% 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 -14.

Today’s results match the lowest Approval Index rating yet recorded for this President and it’s the third straight day at -14. Prior to these three days, Obama’s ratings had fallen to -14 on only one day since taking office.

Obama doesn't fare much better in overall approval:

Overall, 47% of voters say they at least somewhat approve of the President's performance. Fifty-two percent (52%) now disapprove.

Rasmussen polls among likely voters, which we see here as the kind of polling most likely to be reflected in an election.

We stress, of course, that polls are snapshots, and can change quickly.  Also, this year's polling is not necessarily predictive of conditions next November, the time of major elections.

But what gets our attention is the intensity of the opposition to Obama.  The fact that 41% strongly disapprove his performance, and that this number has shown up three days in a row, has got to worry the White House.  Intensity is a critical factor in who goes to the polls, and who doesn't.  It was the intensity factor that worked powerfully in Obama's favor last year.  Now there's a reversal of fortune.

November 20, 2009   Permalink

THE INCREASING CONFIDENCE OF EXTREMISTS - AT 9:11 A.M. ET:  After the exploits of Major Hasan at Fort Hood, and the bitterly resented decision to try the mastermind of 9-11 in an ordinary court in New York, you'd think the jihadist crowd would lie low for a while.  But, of course, it's exactly the opposite.  They sense weakness in the administration, and they will exploit it, especially on our college campuses, where they're often more than welcome.  From the New York Post:

A controversial imam who authorities have called an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing is scheduled to speak tonight to a Muslim student group at Queens College on the subject "How Islam Perfected Thanksgiving."

The appearance by Brooklyn mosque imam Siraj Wahhaj - who also testified for convicted terror plotter "blind Sheik" Omar Abdel Rahman - and a recent nasty verbal altercation involving members of the Muslim Student Association that invited him, has spurred some other students to demand that Queens College cut off funding for that group.

Not a chance of that. 

Professor Tim Rosen said that at a screening of the anti-radical Muslim film "Fitna" two weeks ago, a MSA member was "laughing" and muttered "good" during footage showing American businessman Nicholas Berg being beheaded by terrorists in Iraq, and that the student was "giggling and saying 'good' " during footage of planes hitting the Twin Towers.

At a raucous post-screening debate with Queens College Republicans, who hosted the film, an MSA member said, "If I had enough money I would be part of the jihad army, I would kill all the Jews," recalled College Republicans treasurer Eli Karl.

Can you imagine what would happen to any student who got up and announced, "I want to kill all the Muslims"?

Mayor Bloomberg last week expressed regret for having Wahhaj attend a Nov. 12 City Hall meeting of Muslim leaders, where the mayor and the imam had shaken hands.

Queens College, when asked about Wahhaj issued a statement noting that speakers invited to campus are protected by the Constitutional guarantee of free speech.

I love it when colleges invoke the Constitution to protect extremists.  They rarely refer to it when the rights of others are involved. 

Queens College did not address a question about how campus security responded when some members of the College Republicans called security to report the MSA member who had mentioned "jihad" and a "bomb" after the movie screening.

I'd imagine that either there was no response, or the Republicans were chided for their cultural insensitivity.  It wasn't long ago that a dean at Pace College, five blocks from Ground Zero, threatened to report a group of students to the police for "hate speech" for daring to show the film "Obsession," which exposes Islamic extremism.

In many parts of the world - in Afghanistan, in Iran, in Western Europe, even in parts of Latin America, jihadists are asserting themselves, sensing that the man in the White House will do nothing but "engage" them.

November 20, 2009   Permalink

ANGER AT OBAMA BUILDS IN CONGRESS - AT 8:45 A.M. ET: We said at our Angel's corner last week that the preceding week might have been decisive for President Obama.  There seems to be a change in attitude toward him, extending into his own party.  There's a new anger, a feeling that Obama isn't doing the job or getting the results.  Sometimes that anger is directed at a Cabinet officer.  The Washington Post reports:

Growing discontent over the economy and frustration with efforts to speed its recovery boiled over Thursday on Capitol Hill in a wave of criticism and outright anger directed at the Obama administration.

We didn't expect to see a lead like that, especially in a liberal newspaper.

Episodes in both houses of Congress exposed the raw nerves of lawmakers flooded with stories of unemployment and economic hardship back home. They also underscored the stiff headwinds that the administration faces as it pushes to enact sweeping changes to the financial regulatory system while also trying to create jobs for ordinary Americans.

President Obama's allies in the Congressional Black Caucus, exasperated by the administration's handling of the economy, unexpectedly blocked one his top priorities, using a legislative maneuver to postpone the approval of financial reform legislation by a key House committee.

Two buildings away, at a session of the Joint Economic Committee, Republicans escalated their attacks on Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner, including a call for his resignation.

Politicians study the polls, and the polls for President Obama have been going south.  It is now politically safer to criticize him, although it's often done indirectly.

However, please note that some of the criticism is coming from the left wing of the Democratic Party, which doesn't believe Obama is liberal enough. The problem is, the more Obama tilts in that wing's direction, the less popular he becomes with the great majority of Americans who aren't part of that group.

Obama, skilled at running for president, has been less skilled at handling the politics of the office.  He needs to look at Ronald Reagan, who could inspire his base while keeping a certain distance from it, allowing him to govern from the center right, which was politically defensible.

One great fear:  Obama might try to pacify his party's left by throwing them national-security bones, like going even softer on Iran and pulling back in Afghanistan.  There'd be ecstasy in San Francisco.

November 20, 2009   Permalink

IS RUDY BACK? - AT 8:26 A.M. ET:  There are reports that Rudy Giuliani, having ruled out a run for the governorship of New York next year, will instead run for the Senate, as the Wall Street Journal reports:

Rudy Giuliani, the former New York City mayor who has been widely rumored to be interested in running for governor, is weighing "a real possibility" of seeking a U.S. Senate seat next year, a former Giuliani campaign aide said.

Mr. Giuliani has made no final decision, this person said, but said that the Republican is "more interested in running for Senate." He would seek the New York seat currently held by Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, who was appointed to the post last winter.

From a national standpoint, this is the critical part:

Some state Republicans said a run for a national office made more sense. Of late, Mr. Giuliani, who shepherded New York City through the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attack, has criticized President Barack Obama's decision to try several of the alleged 9/11 plotters in a criminal trial in New York, rather than in a military venue. Mr. Giuliani, they said, has clearly been attracted to a national platform, where he could speak out on national-security issues.

A Rudy run in New York would make that trial the centerpiece of his campaign, and keep focusing national attention on the absurdity of the decision.  The anger in New York over the risks posed by the trial could electrify the campaign and give Rudy the national-security platform he seeks.

But Rudy faces substantial hostility from the African-American community in New York.  Although he saved more African-American lives through his anti-crime program than all mayors of New York combined, he did so without genuflecting to the black leadership, a civil crime in New York.  They tagged him a racist, which he is not, and the label has stuck in many neighborhoods.

The sparks will fly.  Bring on the sparks.

November 20,  2009   Permalink