WELCOME TO MY MANY VISITORS FROM BRAZIL. IF YOU KEEP COMING, I PROMISE TO LEARN SOME PORTUGESE. WHEN IT COMES TO ENERGY INDEPENDENCE, WE HAVE A LOT TO LEARN FROM BRAZILIANS.
NEW COLUMN UP AT 7 A.M. EASTERN TIME.
Michelle Obama says that her husband has always had "a healthy ego."
Katie Couric asked her: "How do you keep it in check?"
My Answer: "Have him read this blog."
Over the next week, I'll be writing about Barack Obama, who he is, what he's done, and why his election as President would be bad for America. Recently, I noted that Obama -- in terms of finances -- is largely a wholly owned subsidiary of George Soros, billionaire founder of Moveon.org and a full-time "Amerika-hater." I noted that Soros is a supporter of Hamas, the terrorist organization centered in Gaza.
One of my critics replied that I was part of "the Republican attack machine" in regard to Obama -- and that Soros merely wanted to "negotiate" with Hamas.
My response to him is as follows: "Negotiate" with Hamas about what? The morality of suicide bombings? The wisdom of firing Kastusha rockets into Israeli settlements? The seriousness of Hamas about its stated commitment to the destruction -- the annihilation -- of Israel? Or about the mass murder of members of the rival Fatah political group?
Go over to Moveon.org, the nation's largest hate-machine, and you will find out all you need about George Soros and his minions. They despise their country, the one that enabled someone like Soros to amass a fortune of roughtly $10 billion.
In my criticisms of Obama, I've noted that he was not only militantly pro-abortion, but also that he favored a form of infanticide. As Michael Barone, favorable in many ways to Obama's political skills, said in the curent edition of The Almanac of American Politics (p. 539): "He [Obama] voted against requiring medical care for fetuses who survived abortions." Unfortunately, I'm not making this up, and, yes, I do attack Obama for refusing to support any limitations on abortion.
Obama will talk a lot in his campaign about the importance of "our children." He won't indicate that he favors the destruction of our most vulnerable children, those gasping for air. I guess his commitment to "universal health care" doesn't apply to children who are victims of botched abortions. How does this man sleep at night? Would he have advocated such a fate for his own beautiful children?
In all his empty talk about bringing the country together and "reaching across the aisle" to Republicans, Obama neglects to mention that his political stands allow for no real compromises. Yes, he will occasionally work with Republicans on non-controversial issues, but on anything of true significance, he will function as a militant leftist.
When I noted that the non-partisan National Journal had designated Obama as the most liberal Senator, my critic replied that was only true of 2007. In the previous year, he has been "only" the 9th most liberal Senator. One doesn't know whether to laugh or cry. I guess the point is that Obama is a militant Leftist only when he's running for President.
Obama is the first presidential candidate ever endorsed by Soros' Moveon.org. The three million members of that group comprise most of the 20% of the Democrats in national survey who indicate they want the U.S. to lose the war in Iraq. Obama's prescription for what we should do in Iraq is to have us flee as soon as possible, leaving the country to the tender mercies of al Qaeda and other sectarian fanatics.
On the other hand, he apparently doesn't have a problem with having us invade Pakistan in search of al Qaeda leaders. In other words, his foreign policy is to desert one ally and alienate another. This is Soros-ism to a fault. It makes no sense, but it does produce standing ovations from the mindless Moveon types.
Honestly, I wish I were making this stuff up, but I'm not. I wish Obama were the attractive candidate he sometimes he tries to convince us he is. But he's not.
Yes, I'm going to continue attacking Barack Obama. I will never, never make up any charges against him. He has a terrible record, one of extreme partisanship and dishonesty about his motives. An individual who favors denying medical care to injured infants is beneath contempt.
That's not a gratuitous attack on Obama. Rather, it's just a call for him to practice some basic human decency.
The other day, before he attacked McCain, Obama said "John McCain is an American hero." What he should have said afterwards, but didn't, was "And I'm not." Like Soros, he's an American nightmare, and he must be defeated.
_________________________
OBAMA, CONGRESSIONAL ALLIES BACKING HUGE TAX INCREASE
Senator Obama's office today disseminated the following news release:
"Obama, Hagel, Cantwell, Smith Hail Committee Passage of the Global Poverty Act."
U.S. Senators Barack Obama (D-IL), Chuck Hagel (R-NE), and Maria Cantwell (D-WA) and Congressman Adam Smith (D-WA) today hailed the Senate Foreign Relations Committee's passage of the Global Poverty Act (S.2433), which requires the President to develop and implement a comprehensive policy to cut extreme global poverty in half by 2015 through aid, trade, debt relief, and coordination with the international community, businesses and NGOs. This legislation was introduced in December. Smith and Congressman Spencer Bachus (R-AL) sponsored the House version of the bill (H.R. 1302), which passed the House last September.
Here's the link to the entire release: http://obama.senate.gov/press/080213-obama_hagel_can_1/
The following is an assessment of the "Global Poverty Act" by Cliff Kincaid, director of Accuracy in Media (AIM) who, unlike Senator Obama, talks about the small matter of costs:
"A nice-sounding bill called the 'Global Poverty Act,' sponsored by Democratic presidential candidate and Senator Barack Obama, is up for a Senate vote on Thursday and could result in the imposition of a global tax on the United States. The bill, which has the support of many liberal religious groups, makes levels of U.S. foreign aid spending subservient to the dictates of the United Nations. Senator Joe Biden, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has not endorsed either Senator Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton in the presidential race. But on Thursday, February 14, he is trying to rush Obama’s “Global Poverty Act” (S.2433) through his committee. The legislation would commit the U.S. to spending 0.7 percent of gross national product on foreign aid, which amounts to a phenomenal 13-year total of $845 billion over and above what the U.S. already spends. "
Here's the link to the entire Kincaid article: http://www.newswithviews.com/Kincaid/cliff207.htm
Steve says: Frankly, I wish Senator Obama had asked his billionaire friend and financial backer George Soros (worth about $10 billion) and the folks at Moveon.org to use their own vast resources to eliminate poverty throughout the world. It doesn't seem fair to saddle U.S. taxpayers, in a time of economic downturn, with the obligation. It seems likely that most of the $845 billion will go down the usual rathole that is the repository of much economic aid.
Thursday, February 14, 2008
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Barack Obama: Rhetoric of Deceit
From Chicago Sun-Times: "Exactly what did Obama just say?"
Note: I'm doing rsearch on the relationship between George Soros and his political funding of -- and ideological influence on -- Barack Obama. A Hungarian who emigrated to American and made billions of dollars in finance and currency speculation, Soros, his family, and business associates have contributed huge sums to Barack Obama in his senatorial and presidential campaigns. (See the "Obama" financial sections on http://opensecrets.org/, especially the "top contributors" segment for 2006 and 2008.)
Soros is the financial "godfather" of Moveon.org, the nation's largest political hate group. He's also a fan of Hamas, the Palestine-centered terrorist group. On Feb. 1, 2008, Moveon.org, an organization that claims 3 million-plus left-leaning members, gave its first endorsement to a presidential candidate: Barack Obama. The vast amount of money that's recently poured into Obama's coffers apparently has come from Moveon-types. Moveon.org members and Soros have been pressuring Obama to take more extreme positions on the economy and the war on terrorism.
My columns on Soros, Moveon, and Obama will begin appearing on Sunday, February 17.
Michael Barone's The Almanac of American Politics, 2008, p. 539, says the following of Obama as an Illinois State Senator: "He voted against providing medical care for fetuses who survived abortions." So much for his "universal health care."
"Hope is the thing with feathers [the bird that flies]." -- Emily Dickinson
"I'm not a hope-monger." -- Barack Obama (Oh, really?)
"It's not a promise of hope. It's a platitude." -- John McCain on Barack Obama's "message"
"Where's the beef?" -- Walter Mondale to Gary Hart in 1984 (Wendy's commercial)
My friends, I'm fired up -- and ready to go." -- John McCain
I'll have a new column on Barack Obama on Wednesday by noon, EST. My first column on Obama, the one with Che Guevera on a Cuban flag, is below. So are the links that will take you to the news sources that broke the flag/Guevera story.
Two columns down you'll find a piece about Mrs. Clinton ("Iraq: Is it Hillary's War?"). Mrs. Clinton is starting to look a lot like the silver medalist in the race for the nomination.
CNN announced earlier tonight (Tuesday) that the Virginia Republican Primary was "very competitive" (and thus "too close to call," their other favorite cliche). In fact, John McCain apparently won VA by about 50,000 votes (a 9 percentage-point victory). Anderson Cooper just called it "a close win." Wonder who CNN is backing?
NOTE: I'LL BE WRITING MUCH MORE ABOUT BARACK OBAMA, WHO NOW LOOKS LIKE THE LIKELY WINNER OF THE NOMINATION. The following material is new as of 1 p.m. EST on Wednesday.
John McCain did something important last night when he noted that Barack Obama's "message of hope" consists mainly of "platitude(s)." The emptiness of Obama's rhetoric -- not a typical subject in campaigns -- is quite amazing.
Frankly, Obama is drowning his audiences in rhetorical syrup, and many people who should know better are lapping it up. Senator Obama has been delivering mainly the same speech since 2006 (and probably longer), and he's good at giving it. The speech has some great lines and good anecdotes, such as the one about the 105-year-old African American woman. In Obama's case, practice does make nearly perfect -- in style if not in substance.
Frankly, the Senator's speech sounds great, but it doesn't really hold up to any kind of examination. In unguarded moments, Obama is almost incredibly pompous.
For example, in New Hampshire in 2006, Obama was repeatedly asked if he wanted to run for the nation's highest office. His response was he "expected to be involved in the process." That's double-talk meaning "Yes, I want to run for President." Rather than being candid -- or "audacious" -- he was evasive.
In looking carefully at Obama's speeches, I'm reminded of a passage in a new book by Englishman (and Harvard professor) James Wood. In writing about a minor novelist named A. C. Benson, Wood said of his subject's literary routine: ". . . He did nothing all morning and then spent the afternoon writing up what he'd done all morning." The same holds true for Obama.
The best analysis of Obama's speaking styles -- and he has at least two them, one conciliatory, one militantly leftist -- is by Dean Barnett. You can find Barnett's piece in The Weekly Standard at: http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/014/728ofzey.asp/url
Barnett focuses on a recent speech Obama gave in Virginia, one where he deviated from his usual stump presentation. His remarks contained a "threat to take away the profits of the drug and insurance companies." [Note: He took the same approach last night in Madison, WI.]
Barnett continues, "Perhaps Obama thinks that the drug companies will continue to develop life saving therapies out of benevolence, and that their employees will happily take the pay cuts that will accompany the loss of profits. This is yet another simplistic piece of us-against-them politicking, the kind of thing that Obama has reliably eschewed--at least when he's on script."
Barnett adds, "What makes Obama's Jefferson-Jackson speech [in VA] especially relevant is where he went when he went off script. The unifying Obama who has impressed so many people during this campaign season vanished, replaced by just another angry liberal railing against George W. Bush, Karl Rove, Exxon Mobil, and other long standing Democratic piñatas."
Barnett concludes, "The pressing question that Obama's decidedly uninspiring Jefferson-Jackson oratory raises is which Obama is the real Obama--the one who read beautifully crafted words from a Teleprompter after his victory in Iowa, or the tediously angry liberal who improvised in Virginia?"
Note from Steve: I'll be writing much more about Obama, his speaking style, and his dismaying agenda for America.
"I'm not a hope-monger." -- Barack Obama (Oh, really?)
"It's not a promise of hope. It's a platitude." -- John McCain on Barack Obama's "message"
"Where's the beef?" -- Walter Mondale to Gary Hart in 1984 (Wendy's commercial)
My friends, I'm fired up -- and ready to go." -- John McCain
I'll have a new column on Barack Obama on Wednesday by noon, EST. My first column on Obama, the one with Che Guevera on a Cuban flag, is below. So are the links that will take you to the news sources that broke the flag/Guevera story.
Two columns down you'll find a piece about Mrs. Clinton ("Iraq: Is it Hillary's War?"). Mrs. Clinton is starting to look a lot like the silver medalist in the race for the nomination.
CNN announced earlier tonight (Tuesday) that the Virginia Republican Primary was "very competitive" (and thus "too close to call," their other favorite cliche). In fact, John McCain apparently won VA by about 50,000 votes (a 9 percentage-point victory). Anderson Cooper just called it "a close win." Wonder who CNN is backing?
NOTE: I'LL BE WRITING MUCH MORE ABOUT BARACK OBAMA, WHO NOW LOOKS LIKE THE LIKELY WINNER OF THE NOMINATION. The following material is new as of 1 p.m. EST on Wednesday.
John McCain did something important last night when he noted that Barack Obama's "message of hope" consists mainly of "platitude(s)." The emptiness of Obama's rhetoric -- not a typical subject in campaigns -- is quite amazing.
Frankly, Obama is drowning his audiences in rhetorical syrup, and many people who should know better are lapping it up. Senator Obama has been delivering mainly the same speech since 2006 (and probably longer), and he's good at giving it. The speech has some great lines and good anecdotes, such as the one about the 105-year-old African American woman. In Obama's case, practice does make nearly perfect -- in style if not in substance.
Frankly, the Senator's speech sounds great, but it doesn't really hold up to any kind of examination. In unguarded moments, Obama is almost incredibly pompous.
For example, in New Hampshire in 2006, Obama was repeatedly asked if he wanted to run for the nation's highest office. His response was he "expected to be involved in the process." That's double-talk meaning "Yes, I want to run for President." Rather than being candid -- or "audacious" -- he was evasive.
In looking carefully at Obama's speeches, I'm reminded of a passage in a new book by Englishman (and Harvard professor) James Wood. In writing about a minor novelist named A. C. Benson, Wood said of his subject's literary routine: ". . . He did nothing all morning and then spent the afternoon writing up what he'd done all morning." The same holds true for Obama.
The best analysis of Obama's speaking styles -- and he has at least two them, one conciliatory, one militantly leftist -- is by Dean Barnett. You can find Barnett's piece in The Weekly Standard at: http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/014/728ofzey.asp/url
Barnett focuses on a recent speech Obama gave in Virginia, one where he deviated from his usual stump presentation. His remarks contained a "threat to take away the profits of the drug and insurance companies." [Note: He took the same approach last night in Madison, WI.]
Barnett continues, "Perhaps Obama thinks that the drug companies will continue to develop life saving therapies out of benevolence, and that their employees will happily take the pay cuts that will accompany the loss of profits. This is yet another simplistic piece of us-against-them politicking, the kind of thing that Obama has reliably eschewed--at least when he's on script."
Barnett adds, "What makes Obama's Jefferson-Jackson speech [in VA] especially relevant is where he went when he went off script. The unifying Obama who has impressed so many people during this campaign season vanished, replaced by just another angry liberal railing against George W. Bush, Karl Rove, Exxon Mobil, and other long standing Democratic piñatas."
Barnett concludes, "The pressing question that Obama's decidedly uninspiring Jefferson-Jackson oratory raises is which Obama is the real Obama--the one who read beautifully crafted words from a Teleprompter after his victory in Iowa, or the tediously angry liberal who improvised in Virginia?"
Note from Steve: I'll be writing much more about Obama, his speaking style, and his dismaying agenda for America.
OBAMA'S CUBAN FLAG, EMPTY RHETORIC
Picture from NewsBusters (via Race42008) of an Obama campaign office in Houston. Note the Cuban flag with the picture of Communist fanatic Che Guevara superimposed.
I'VE BEEN GETTING QUESTIONS ON THE FLAG ABOVE. THE LINKS BELOW WILL ALLOW YOU TO SEE THE DETAILS UP CLOSE AND PERSONAL. I'LL BE WRITING MORE ON THIS SUBJECT WEDNESDAY.
http://www.myfoxhouston.com/myfox/pages/Home/Detail?contentId=5700252&version=1&locale=EN-US&layoutCode=VSTY&pageId=1.1.1
It [[the flag story] was on the news in Houston. Above is the video from Fox Houston showing the flag in the background of Obama's office that was linked from Newsbusters at http://newsbusters.org/blogs/d-s-hube/2008/02/11/another-flag-issue-obama
THIS IS THE SAME OBAMA THAT REFUSES TO WEAR AN AMERICAN FLAG PIN ON HIS LAPEL. HE ALSO HAS A PROBLEM PUTTING HIS HAND OVER HIS HEART DURING THE PLAYING OF THE NATIONAL ANTHEM.
I'll build on this column throughout Tuesday, February 12, 2008 and will be writing the entire week on the two Democratic contenders, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. I've been writing for nearly a year about how Hillary Clinton will be the nominee. However, I'm much (much, much) less certain of that. Frankly, if Mrs. Clinton doesn't win in Ohio and Texas next month, she probably won't get the nomination.
The numbers are working against her. When she loses all three races today (MD, VA, and DC) in the "Potomac Primaries," that will be TEN losses in a row. When you're on that kind of losing streak, it's hard to see the trend coming to an end. The Democratic Establishment recognizes Obama's limitations, and they don't really want him to be the standard-bearer, but in the end they might not have a choice.
As a speaker, Mrs. Clinton reminds us of the proverbial fingernail scratching on a blackboard (now apparently known as "whiteboards"). In contrast, Barack Obama comes across as the silver-tongued orator. Where he fails is in what Martin Luther King called "the content of his character." His main commitment seems to be bamboozling the American people with pretty words. He relies on feel-good rhetoric to sell himself politically. He talks the talk but he doesn't truly walk the walk.
For example, Obama's stump speech begins with these words: "We are at a defining moment in our history." Some Democrats seem to find that statement to be profound. Actually, it's a clanking cliche that foreshadows presentations light on content and heavy on sanctimony.
Obama drenches his Democratic audiences in rhetorical syrup ("Yes we can!"), and they lap it up. But what do the pretty words actually mean? Do his stirring speeches stand up to any kind of examination?
Yesterday on TV, he said, "Change does not happen from the top down. Change happens from the bottom up."
A cynic (like me) might say, "I guess his belief in generating from the bottom-up is why he's running for a low-level office like President of the United States." His statement certainly doesn't apply to the candidate himself.
He likes to tell us that "Washington is broken," implying that he (and his Party) have little if anything to do with Washington, DC. He forgets to add that he -- and his main political allies -- are charter members of the Beltway Gang. He doesn't delve into how people like Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi are part of the fractured government.
Obama always begins his stump speech with the following words: "We are at a defining moment in our history." Oh, really? A few unsophisticated people might regard that hoary cliche as somehow uplifting. In fact, every generation has heard the same thing from politicians. It's like Macbeth's "tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."
Senator Obama has made himself a very wealthy man by giving speeches and selling books, particularly his The Audacity of Hope, for which he received an advance payment of $1.9 million. However audacious his own hopes, Obama's main characteristic is the emptiness of his rhetoric.
Granted, he never quite reaches the total inauthenticity of Hillary Clinton, but he comes close. The more one examines what Obama says, the less content there is. Without specifics, his stock-in-trade concepts like "hope" and "change" have no meaning. He's floating to the top on a stream of vast emptiness.
OBAMA WEARING THE FLIP-FLOPS ON TIME-TABLES:
Team McCain is chuckling over a comment from Barack Obama last night on "60 Minutes": http://cbsnews.com/stories/2008/02/07/60minutes/main3804268_page2.shtml
"At a time when American casualties are down, at a time when the violence is down, particularly affecting the Iraqi population, is that the right time to try and set time tables for withdrawing all American troops? I mean you talked about…the end of 2009," [Steve] Kroft remarked.
[Obama said] "Yeah, absolutely. I think now is precisely the time. I think that it is very important for us to send a clear signal to the Iraqis that we are not gonna be here permanently. We're not gonna set up permanent bases. That they are going to have to resolve their differences and get their country functioning."
"And you pull out according to that time table, regardless of the situation? Even if there’s serious sectarian violence?" Kroft asked.
"No, I always reserve as commander in chief, the right to assess the situation," Obama replied.
First he's for timetables, then he isn't. As one McCainiac just put it to me, "Shades of John Kerry. We already beat this guy. The last thing we need right now is indecisiveness."
Obama can ask Mitt Romney about how merciless McCain is when it comes to reading into his opponents' words on timetables.
Tomorrow's column on Barack Obama's supposed commitment to "universal health care." Question: if he's for it, why did he vote against mandating physician assistance in the case of "botched" abortions when a child is born alive? I hope it's not "audacious" to ask that obvious question.
Monday, February 11, 2008
Is Iraq 'Hillary Clinton's War?"
Note: In this piece I raise "the great unanswered question of 9/11." Read on.
In terms of her oratorical "style," Mrs. Clinton invariably risks frightening small children. She's the female analogue to Ted Kennedy, an angry, red-faced individual who shouts a lot. She brays at us.
To understand the phoniness of Hillary Rodham Clinton (and of tomorrow's subject, Barack Hussein Obama), it's important to understand their target audience: the far-left Democrats who actually participate in primaries and caucuses. These are Moveon.org types, the 20% of the Democratic Party -- one-in-five -- who tell pollsters that they hope America loses the War in Iraq. To reach such people, overheated rhetoric is an essential ingredient.
Two of my favorite Hillary-isms are as follows: (1) "George Bush doesn't care about people"; and (2) THIS IS GEORGE BUSH'S WAR!"
On the notion that GWB "doesn't care" about the people he represents and who elected him twice: Mrs. Clinton offers no evidence that she cares any more about "people" than does President Bush. She's a person who desires to become President, and to that end, she dumps verbal trash on the man who currently holds the office. Thus, she engages in political statements that don't go beyond hurling gratuitous insults -- an approach her husband and others have called "the politics of personal destruction."
Why would she make such improper statements about Bush -- ones that "rise" to the level only of schoolyard taunts? Because she understands that he's an easy political target -- and because the most important thing in the world to her is winning the nomination. Her target audience, Americans who generally don't like their country very much, wants red meat, so she stuffs it down their throats.
Specifically, what about the "this is George Bush's war" comment? Again, it's a demagogic accusation. Hillary Clinton wants to become commander-in-chief. If as President she has to go to war, does she want many Americans to condemn it as "Hillary Clinton's war?" Or World War II "Franklin Roosevelt's War?" Or Korea "Harry Truman's War?" Or Vietnam "Lyndon Johnson's War?"
Some enterprising media type should ask her those questions, although no one will. She might accuse the questioner of being part of "a vast right-wing conspiracy."
Mrs. Clinton has a bad habit of speaking without thinking. Apparently, if she believes some statement will generate votes from left-wingers, the words just fly out of her mouth.
However, is the conflict in Iraq really GWB's war, or is perhaps in a sense "Hillary Clinton's War?" One could make the case -- if one were so inclined -- to say that it is.
In October, 2002, Senator Clinton voted for the Iraq war resolution. In November, 2003, she also voted for the $87 billion supplemental appropriation to fund the war.
A month later, December, 2003, she said the following: "The fact is we're in Iraq and we're in Afghanistan, and we have no choice but to be successful." For some reason, she's stopped making that important -- and accurate -- point.
In the spring of 2004, Hillary Clinton called Saddam Hussein "a potential threat [to America]." She added that the Iraqi dictator had been "seeking weapons of mass destruction . . . whether or not he actually had them." There's no real debate on these matters.
In other words, back in the period from 2002-2004 Iraq was not "George Bush's war." It was America's war -- and hers. She noted correctly that if Saddam Hussein didn't have WMDs, he certainly intended to get them at the earliest possible time. Of course, she wasn't a candidate for President then.
Nowadays, of course, her comments on Iraq are much different. She indicates -- falsely -- that the Bush Administration somehow "misled" her about WMDs. What she neglects to say is that the CIA director appointed by her husband -- George Tenet -- had said to President Bush that Saddam's having WMDs was "a slam-dunk." Mrs. Clinton (and her husband) apparently agreed.
The approach Mrs. Clinton is taking allows her to be for a war when it's going well -- and against it when it's not. To paraphrase Kyle Smith, it turns politics and elective government into a circular firing squad, where ultimately no one is left standing.
George Bush clearly is a convenient scapegoat for Mrs. Clinton to use in her single-minded quest for the Democratic nomination. However, she fails to note that, as a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, she had the same information about WMDs as the President. She cast her war authorization vote with the same knowledge GWB had when he made the decision to go to war.
The events of 9/11 were the reason the U.S. went to war against al-Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan. The fear that Saddam Hussein had -- or was seeking -- WMDs that he wouldn't hesitate using was the main reason the country went to war in Iraq. Of course, Saddam had possessed -- and used -- WMDs against Iran and the Kurds.
The catastrophe of 9/11 represented a major failure of intelligence by the CIA, headed by Bill Clinton's appointee. They also reflected a failure on the part of the FBI, headed by Clinton appointee Louis Freeh. (William Mueller, Bush's appointee, had been in his office for only about a week when 9/11 occurred.)
A great unanswered question of that time is this: Why didn't GWB blame the failures of his predecessor, Bill Clinton, for 9/11? No one knows the precise answer. However, it appears that Bush -- unlike people such as Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama -- didn't want to play the blame game. Instead, he gave Bill Clinton a pass so as not to divide the country.
As we've seen, Mrs. Clinton has no such concerns, or any real grasp of her husband's role in letting 9/11 occur. Instead, she has the old Democratic strategy of divide the nation -- calling Iraq GWB's war -- in order to conquer as her Party's nominee. The phoniness is as transparent as it is malicious. A cynic might ask: What else is new?
Tomorrow, I'd be writing on the phoniness of Barack Obama, who never quite reaches the total inauthenticity of Mrs. Clinton but at times comes perilously close. Obama said today, "We are at a defining moment in our history." That is not really profound. Rather, it's in the category known as cliches. He's good at them.
On TV, he just said, "Change does not happen from the top down. Change happens from the bottom up." I guess that's why he's running for President. He wants to start at the bottom. The emptiness of the man's rhetoric is truly awesome.
In terms of her oratorical "style," Mrs. Clinton invariably risks frightening small children. She's the female analogue to Ted Kennedy, an angry, red-faced individual who shouts a lot. She brays at us.
To understand the phoniness of Hillary Rodham Clinton (and of tomorrow's subject, Barack Hussein Obama), it's important to understand their target audience: the far-left Democrats who actually participate in primaries and caucuses. These are Moveon.org types, the 20% of the Democratic Party -- one-in-five -- who tell pollsters that they hope America loses the War in Iraq. To reach such people, overheated rhetoric is an essential ingredient.
Two of my favorite Hillary-isms are as follows: (1) "George Bush doesn't care about people"; and (2) THIS IS GEORGE BUSH'S WAR!"
On the notion that GWB "doesn't care" about the people he represents and who elected him twice: Mrs. Clinton offers no evidence that she cares any more about "people" than does President Bush. She's a person who desires to become President, and to that end, she dumps verbal trash on the man who currently holds the office. Thus, she engages in political statements that don't go beyond hurling gratuitous insults -- an approach her husband and others have called "the politics of personal destruction."
Why would she make such improper statements about Bush -- ones that "rise" to the level only of schoolyard taunts? Because she understands that he's an easy political target -- and because the most important thing in the world to her is winning the nomination. Her target audience, Americans who generally don't like their country very much, wants red meat, so she stuffs it down their throats.
Specifically, what about the "this is George Bush's war" comment? Again, it's a demagogic accusation. Hillary Clinton wants to become commander-in-chief. If as President she has to go to war, does she want many Americans to condemn it as "Hillary Clinton's war?" Or World War II "Franklin Roosevelt's War?" Or Korea "Harry Truman's War?" Or Vietnam "Lyndon Johnson's War?"
Some enterprising media type should ask her those questions, although no one will. She might accuse the questioner of being part of "a vast right-wing conspiracy."
Mrs. Clinton has a bad habit of speaking without thinking. Apparently, if she believes some statement will generate votes from left-wingers, the words just fly out of her mouth.
However, is the conflict in Iraq really GWB's war, or is perhaps in a sense "Hillary Clinton's War?" One could make the case -- if one were so inclined -- to say that it is.
In October, 2002, Senator Clinton voted for the Iraq war resolution. In November, 2003, she also voted for the $87 billion supplemental appropriation to fund the war.
A month later, December, 2003, she said the following: "The fact is we're in Iraq and we're in Afghanistan, and we have no choice but to be successful." For some reason, she's stopped making that important -- and accurate -- point.
In the spring of 2004, Hillary Clinton called Saddam Hussein "a potential threat [to America]." She added that the Iraqi dictator had been "seeking weapons of mass destruction . . . whether or not he actually had them." There's no real debate on these matters.
In other words, back in the period from 2002-2004 Iraq was not "George Bush's war." It was America's war -- and hers. She noted correctly that if Saddam Hussein didn't have WMDs, he certainly intended to get them at the earliest possible time. Of course, she wasn't a candidate for President then.
Nowadays, of course, her comments on Iraq are much different. She indicates -- falsely -- that the Bush Administration somehow "misled" her about WMDs. What she neglects to say is that the CIA director appointed by her husband -- George Tenet -- had said to President Bush that Saddam's having WMDs was "a slam-dunk." Mrs. Clinton (and her husband) apparently agreed.
The approach Mrs. Clinton is taking allows her to be for a war when it's going well -- and against it when it's not. To paraphrase Kyle Smith, it turns politics and elective government into a circular firing squad, where ultimately no one is left standing.
George Bush clearly is a convenient scapegoat for Mrs. Clinton to use in her single-minded quest for the Democratic nomination. However, she fails to note that, as a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, she had the same information about WMDs as the President. She cast her war authorization vote with the same knowledge GWB had when he made the decision to go to war.
The events of 9/11 were the reason the U.S. went to war against al-Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan. The fear that Saddam Hussein had -- or was seeking -- WMDs that he wouldn't hesitate using was the main reason the country went to war in Iraq. Of course, Saddam had possessed -- and used -- WMDs against Iran and the Kurds.
The catastrophe of 9/11 represented a major failure of intelligence by the CIA, headed by Bill Clinton's appointee. They also reflected a failure on the part of the FBI, headed by Clinton appointee Louis Freeh. (William Mueller, Bush's appointee, had been in his office for only about a week when 9/11 occurred.)
A great unanswered question of that time is this: Why didn't GWB blame the failures of his predecessor, Bill Clinton, for 9/11? No one knows the precise answer. However, it appears that Bush -- unlike people such as Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama -- didn't want to play the blame game. Instead, he gave Bill Clinton a pass so as not to divide the country.
As we've seen, Mrs. Clinton has no such concerns, or any real grasp of her husband's role in letting 9/11 occur. Instead, she has the old Democratic strategy of divide the nation -- calling Iraq GWB's war -- in order to conquer as her Party's nominee. The phoniness is as transparent as it is malicious. A cynic might ask: What else is new?
Tomorrow, I'd be writing on the phoniness of Barack Obama, who never quite reaches the total inauthenticity of Mrs. Clinton but at times comes perilously close. Obama said today, "We are at a defining moment in our history." That is not really profound. Rather, it's in the category known as cliches. He's good at them.
On TV, he just said, "Change does not happen from the top down. Change happens from the bottom up." I guess that's why he's running for President. He wants to start at the bottom. The emptiness of the man's rhetoric is truly awesome.
Sunday, February 10, 2008
CONSERVATIVE OPTIMISM: MCCAIN CAN WIN
Put a cork in it, Sean. Nobody cares anymore about your half-baked "opinions."
Conservatives learn to live with McCain
By: David Paul Kuhn
February 10, 2008
Conservatives have already found something to like about John McCain: They think he can win in November. According to interviews with a dozen leading conservatives at the recently concluded Conservative Political Action Conference, movement leaders believe McCain brings significant advantages to the top of the ticket.
“The public who wants change is comfortable with John McCain, whom they view as someone who is not a wholly owned subsidiary of the Bush administration,” said former Oklahoma Gov. Frank Keating. The very issues that have estranged McCain from much of the conservative base “have actually strengthened him with moderates,” Keating added.
Part of McCain’s newfound appeal rests on his perceived distance from President Bush. “The unhappiness is with Bush and not the Republican agenda,” said Grover Norquist, a leading fiscal conservative activist. Norquist saw parallels with the 2007 election of conservative French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who followed the administration of fellow conservative Jacques Chirac. “This is Sarkozy saying, ‘I’m not Chirac,’” Norquist said of McCain in the coming race. “I’m the change, and she’s [opponent Segolene Royal] the socialist.”
Of course, McCain still has a ways to go in mending rifts with opponents and rallying an unenthused base. At one conference session, a speaker asked the audience whether Republicans were going in the right direction. Perhaps a dozen raised their hand “yes.” There were thousands sitting in the hall.
When Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.), a leading conservative in the House, spoke at the conference on Friday, he rhetorically asked, “What are conservatives supposed to do now?” One man yelled skeptically: “Tell us!” Later, as Pence spoke well of McCain, a woman extended her arm and gave a thumbs-down.“Republicans believe in markets. We also should believe in political markets,” Pence said after his speech to the convention. “And the market has spoken here. Not the party fathers, not pundits, the American people. Republican voters have given us a soldier, and it just may be what the Republican Party needs to take that hill in 2008.”
Pence said that if a reunion between McCain and the base occurs, “what appeals to independents and moderates is already in the package.”
With McCain as the presumptive nominee, many conservatives no longer believe Republicans are fated to lose in November — a shift from last year’s dour outlook. The turmoil within the base, many said, will prove ephemeral.Much of the change in thinking can be traced to the events of the last week.
First, Super Tuesday left Democrats preparing for a protracted and heated battle. Second, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney’s resignation from the race on Thursday effectively sealed McCain’s bid for the nomination. In the view of many conservatives, Romney’s quick withdrawal left time for McCain to unite the party before reaching out to those voters lost in the devastating 2006 midterm elections.“
"There is general acceptance of McCain as the nominee and they are thinking, ‘How can we work best together?’” Norquist said.
Few Republicans disagree that the hill ahead is steep. The war in Iraq remains unpopular, though less so of late. Only a quarter of the public thinks the country is heading in the “right direction.” Bush’s approval rating, hovering around 30 percent, is a millstone weighing the party down.
“History tells you that the Republicans shouldn’t be able to win in 2008,” said David Keene, chairman of the American Conservative Union. “But history is made up of exceptional acts. We still have a divided electorate. In the main, on most values issues, the public leans conservative.”
Another conservative House leader, Rep. Thaddeus G. McCotter (R-Mich.), said that though he was not an early supporter of McCain, he would nevertheless stand by him in the general election. He added that he also now believes that “this should be a close election.”
Many Republicans believe that the base will come together once the race turns to a “contrast” — to use South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint’s words — between the Republican and Democratic nominee. The alternative to McCain, according to this line of thinking, may be as much of a factor for the GOP as McCain himself.
“Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson or Haley Barbour may all be more conservative than John McCain. But he’s not going to be running against any of us. He’s going to be running against Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama,” said Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour.“In 2004, there’s an enormous premium on uniting and motivating and turning out your base. My opinion is 2008 is going to be much more of an election about persuasion,” Barbour continued. “McCain as our candidate actually benefits from that more than a Haley Barbour would.”
Even longtime conservative activists such as Paul Weyrich, who remains disheartened by the idea of a McCain nomination, believes that the coming general election offers Republicans newfound opportunities.Though Weyrich believes New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton “is clearly an easier target because her negatives are so high,” he also argued that Democrats have not considered Illinois Sen. Barack Obama’s “weaknesses.”
Most Republicans cite both Democrats’ relative inexperience compared with McCain. But many conservatives interviewed, like Weyrich, said the recent nonpartisan National Journal ranking of Obama as the most liberal senator illustrates a significant vulnerability.“I think [Democrats] really don’t know what’s coming,” Weyrich said. “In other words, they don’t really understand that his philosophy, his viewpoint, is going to be made an issue. Right now he has been winning on oratory and personality. Both of which are outstanding. But once people begin to understand where he is, and that he is really the same as Hillary on most everything, I think it’s going to be a different story.”
Conservatives also said that they believe an extended contest between Obama and Clinton will further divide Democrats. And many said the Democratic race has exposed weaknesses they did not foresee at the outset of the presidential race.
“Conservatives realize that Hillary Clinton is not a 10-foot giant and the newcomer has got his problems,” Keene said. “They see the Democrats involved in a fight that is going to go on and on and a fight that is going to get more and more bitter. So they are looking at a very different landscape than they did a year or so ago.”
NOTE: MONDAY I'LL HAVE A COLUMN ON THE PHONINESS OF HILLARY CLINTON. ON TUESDAY, IT WILL BE BARACK OBAMA'S TURN. AS PAUL WEYRICH SUGGESTS, BARACK TALKS A GOOD GAME BUT HE PLAYS THE SAME OLD LEFT-WING BROKEN RECORD. NOTE THAT THE NATIONAL JOURNAL RATED HIM THE MOST LIBERAL MEMBER OF THE SENATE.
By: David Paul Kuhn
February 10, 2008
Conservatives have already found something to like about John McCain: They think he can win in November. According to interviews with a dozen leading conservatives at the recently concluded Conservative Political Action Conference, movement leaders believe McCain brings significant advantages to the top of the ticket.
“The public who wants change is comfortable with John McCain, whom they view as someone who is not a wholly owned subsidiary of the Bush administration,” said former Oklahoma Gov. Frank Keating. The very issues that have estranged McCain from much of the conservative base “have actually strengthened him with moderates,” Keating added.
Part of McCain’s newfound appeal rests on his perceived distance from President Bush. “The unhappiness is with Bush and not the Republican agenda,” said Grover Norquist, a leading fiscal conservative activist. Norquist saw parallels with the 2007 election of conservative French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who followed the administration of fellow conservative Jacques Chirac. “This is Sarkozy saying, ‘I’m not Chirac,’” Norquist said of McCain in the coming race. “I’m the change, and she’s [opponent Segolene Royal] the socialist.”
Of course, McCain still has a ways to go in mending rifts with opponents and rallying an unenthused base. At one conference session, a speaker asked the audience whether Republicans were going in the right direction. Perhaps a dozen raised their hand “yes.” There were thousands sitting in the hall.
When Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.), a leading conservative in the House, spoke at the conference on Friday, he rhetorically asked, “What are conservatives supposed to do now?” One man yelled skeptically: “Tell us!” Later, as Pence spoke well of McCain, a woman extended her arm and gave a thumbs-down.“Republicans believe in markets. We also should believe in political markets,” Pence said after his speech to the convention. “And the market has spoken here. Not the party fathers, not pundits, the American people. Republican voters have given us a soldier, and it just may be what the Republican Party needs to take that hill in 2008.”
Pence said that if a reunion between McCain and the base occurs, “what appeals to independents and moderates is already in the package.”
With McCain as the presumptive nominee, many conservatives no longer believe Republicans are fated to lose in November — a shift from last year’s dour outlook. The turmoil within the base, many said, will prove ephemeral.Much of the change in thinking can be traced to the events of the last week.
First, Super Tuesday left Democrats preparing for a protracted and heated battle. Second, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney’s resignation from the race on Thursday effectively sealed McCain’s bid for the nomination. In the view of many conservatives, Romney’s quick withdrawal left time for McCain to unite the party before reaching out to those voters lost in the devastating 2006 midterm elections.“
"There is general acceptance of McCain as the nominee and they are thinking, ‘How can we work best together?’” Norquist said.
Few Republicans disagree that the hill ahead is steep. The war in Iraq remains unpopular, though less so of late. Only a quarter of the public thinks the country is heading in the “right direction.” Bush’s approval rating, hovering around 30 percent, is a millstone weighing the party down.
“History tells you that the Republicans shouldn’t be able to win in 2008,” said David Keene, chairman of the American Conservative Union. “But history is made up of exceptional acts. We still have a divided electorate. In the main, on most values issues, the public leans conservative.”
Another conservative House leader, Rep. Thaddeus G. McCotter (R-Mich.), said that though he was not an early supporter of McCain, he would nevertheless stand by him in the general election. He added that he also now believes that “this should be a close election.”
Many Republicans believe that the base will come together once the race turns to a “contrast” — to use South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint’s words — between the Republican and Democratic nominee. The alternative to McCain, according to this line of thinking, may be as much of a factor for the GOP as McCain himself.
“Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson or Haley Barbour may all be more conservative than John McCain. But he’s not going to be running against any of us. He’s going to be running against Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama,” said Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour.“In 2004, there’s an enormous premium on uniting and motivating and turning out your base. My opinion is 2008 is going to be much more of an election about persuasion,” Barbour continued. “McCain as our candidate actually benefits from that more than a Haley Barbour would.”
Even longtime conservative activists such as Paul Weyrich, who remains disheartened by the idea of a McCain nomination, believes that the coming general election offers Republicans newfound opportunities.Though Weyrich believes New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton “is clearly an easier target because her negatives are so high,” he also argued that Democrats have not considered Illinois Sen. Barack Obama’s “weaknesses.”
Most Republicans cite both Democrats’ relative inexperience compared with McCain. But many conservatives interviewed, like Weyrich, said the recent nonpartisan National Journal ranking of Obama as the most liberal senator illustrates a significant vulnerability.“I think [Democrats] really don’t know what’s coming,” Weyrich said. “In other words, they don’t really understand that his philosophy, his viewpoint, is going to be made an issue. Right now he has been winning on oratory and personality. Both of which are outstanding. But once people begin to understand where he is, and that he is really the same as Hillary on most everything, I think it’s going to be a different story.”
Conservatives also said that they believe an extended contest between Obama and Clinton will further divide Democrats. And many said the Democratic race has exposed weaknesses they did not foresee at the outset of the presidential race.
“Conservatives realize that Hillary Clinton is not a 10-foot giant and the newcomer has got his problems,” Keene said. “They see the Democrats involved in a fight that is going to go on and on and a fight that is going to get more and more bitter. So they are looking at a very different landscape than they did a year or so ago.”
NOTE: MONDAY I'LL HAVE A COLUMN ON THE PHONINESS OF HILLARY CLINTON. ON TUESDAY, IT WILL BE BARACK OBAMA'S TURN. AS PAUL WEYRICH SUGGESTS, BARACK TALKS A GOOD GAME BUT HE PLAYS THE SAME OLD LEFT-WING BROKEN RECORD. NOTE THAT THE NATIONAL JOURNAL RATED HIM THE MOST LIBERAL MEMBER OF THE SENATE.
GRASSROOTS: MCCAIN'S KEY TO VICTORY
Note: Please read tomorrow's column: "Clinton & Obama: Two Phonies"
I asked Sharon, of Norman, Oklahoma, how she and her political allies were able to generate victories in Oklahoma, a state with a tradition of voting for Democrats. Here's her reply, beginning with the emphasis on giving people T-shirts at football games. Her emphasis, like mine, is on the least expensive and most effective forms of campaigning. Both of us believe that TV ads are too expensive -- and increasingly ineffective.
These were t-shirts which they [the campaigns] picked up very cheap. We had Crimson for OU [Oklahoma University and for OSU [Oklahoma State University] they had Orange. Since our mascot at OU is the Sooner Schooner, they had that on both sides and one had Sooners for Bush-Cheney and the other side had Sooners for Coburn. Then the ones for OSU had their mascot, the Cowboy.
We actually walked doors in a U.S. Senate race [that resulted in the election of Dr. Tom Coburn, who introduced McCain at the CPAC convention]. In fact, in our Governor's race in 2006, we had Bob Sullivan pick out precincts around the state where he walked doors. It made the news on both sides of the state at 10:00 o'clock [note: in OK, the "late" news is at 10 p.m.].
Candidates for statewide races or Congressional seats do not walk doors normally. It started with Dr. Coburn in 2004 and then in 2006 our Governor/Lt Gov candidates walked some precincts. You cannot buy that kind of publicity. They actually had the media taking pictures and thety appeared in the paper.
When we walked our precincts asking for votes for Dr. Coburn, we wore the shirts. We heard more of, "How do we get one of those?" When you wear straight campaign shirts [without the football links], I have never been asked where they can get one.
If you do a TV ad, I would recommend trying to find the one that Senator Don Nickles ran in 1998 -- know it is a long time ago but his ad was about bringing Oklahoma values to DC and he was out in the countryside with a white farm fence. It could be upgraded for today but the central theme of bringing OK values to DC still resonates as Coburn used it in 2004 when he ran for Don's seat.
My State Rep, who was defeated last time, spent $243,000 for his failed campaign and the Dem spent $41,000 but walked the doors and advertised on the radio -- especially sports talk radio while the Republican ignored radio and went to TV. We had so many TV ads before the 2006 election, they were lost in the shuffle.
Congresswoman Mary Fallin wore out several pair of shoes walking her Congressional district in 2006 asking for their vote. She was out all the time as were her Republican opponents for the open seat. She walked the most doors, got in a run-off, walked even more doors, and won.
She connected totally with her district and to this day she is so well liked. She made the fair circuit of the counties in her district and was highly visible at our State Fair in [Oklahoma City]. She was on the radio a lot and she used the theme of bringing OK values and ideas to DC. She didn't use robo calls [automated calls] and neither did her opponent, Denise Bode, but several others did and they were not well-received. She had Ed Goeas as her consultant. Grassroots won it for Mary as she had the largest amount of volunteers.
I made calls before the primary election (not even my Congressional district) and the theme was: "Mary Fallin asked me to call today to ask for your vote." The senior citizens were so impressed that they were being asked by a live person. Then we had a cheat sheet to use if they had any questions but we found being short and to the point made the biggest impression. Dr. Tom's calls were the same -- we were live except for the ones the NRSC paid for that Bush and Cheney taped.
For the Rudy campaign, we had people use their cell phones on weekends when there are free minutes. It worked great and you can get a lot more people calling. Phone banks are expensive to set up for such a short period of time. so a lot of our campaigns are going to cell phones with a limited number of phones available for people to make calls during the week but on weekends it is almost all cell phones and same with the evening.
Big money doesn't mean you are going to get elected. You have to connect to the people, something a lot of candidates forget because of consultants who would rather line their pockets have forgotten.
Note from Steve: The emphasis in this blog is not on "borrowing" tidbits of information from news sources. Rather, it concentrates on political fundamentals. John McCain is not going to be able to raise as much money as his opponent -- either Clinton or Obama -- and he shouldn't even try. Instead, there should be as much emphasis on person-to-person contact as possible. The emphasis should be on low-cost, high effectiveness forms of campaigning, the kind Sharon outlines above. What worked in Oklahoma will work in any state or congressional district. If John McCain uses these techniques, he will win. If he doesn't, he won't.
NOTE: PLEASE READ JACK KELLY'S COLUMN TODAY!
Please read the column today by Jack Kelly (a real conservative -- one with brains), who writes for the Toledo Blade and Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. It's accessible at: http://post-gazette.com/forum. One good line: "Every GOP candidate who rose above the asterisk level in the primaries has been called a RINO." He also beats Ann Coulter about the head-and-shoulders.
"Ann Coulter is so angry with McCain's occasional embrace of Democratic ideas that she says she'll campaign for Democrats if Mr. McCain wins the nomination." Kelly adds, "Ms. Coulter says this kind of thing whenever she feels she's not getting enough attention."
Also, "If Mr. McCain wins despite the objection of the [right-wing] RINOs, he'll owe them nothing, and it is doubtful he will have warm and fuzzy feelings about them."
Kelly concludes, "We're in the midst of a war we can't afford to lose. There is a stark difference between Mr. McCain and the leading Democrats on this and many other issues. Spare me your phony airs of moral superiority, RINOs. To sit out this election would be like sitting out 1944."
I asked Sharon, of Norman, Oklahoma, how she and her political allies were able to generate victories in Oklahoma, a state with a tradition of voting for Democrats. Here's her reply, beginning with the emphasis on giving people T-shirts at football games. Her emphasis, like mine, is on the least expensive and most effective forms of campaigning. Both of us believe that TV ads are too expensive -- and increasingly ineffective.
These were t-shirts which they [the campaigns] picked up very cheap. We had Crimson for OU [Oklahoma University and for OSU [Oklahoma State University] they had Orange. Since our mascot at OU is the Sooner Schooner, they had that on both sides and one had Sooners for Bush-Cheney and the other side had Sooners for Coburn. Then the ones for OSU had their mascot, the Cowboy.
We actually walked doors in a U.S. Senate race [that resulted in the election of Dr. Tom Coburn, who introduced McCain at the CPAC convention]. In fact, in our Governor's race in 2006, we had Bob Sullivan pick out precincts around the state where he walked doors. It made the news on both sides of the state at 10:00 o'clock [note: in OK, the "late" news is at 10 p.m.].
Candidates for statewide races or Congressional seats do not walk doors normally. It started with Dr. Coburn in 2004 and then in 2006 our Governor/Lt Gov candidates walked some precincts. You cannot buy that kind of publicity. They actually had the media taking pictures and thety appeared in the paper.
When we walked our precincts asking for votes for Dr. Coburn, we wore the shirts. We heard more of, "How do we get one of those?" When you wear straight campaign shirts [without the football links], I have never been asked where they can get one.
If you do a TV ad, I would recommend trying to find the one that Senator Don Nickles ran in 1998 -- know it is a long time ago but his ad was about bringing Oklahoma values to DC and he was out in the countryside with a white farm fence. It could be upgraded for today but the central theme of bringing OK values to DC still resonates as Coburn used it in 2004 when he ran for Don's seat.
My State Rep, who was defeated last time, spent $243,000 for his failed campaign and the Dem spent $41,000 but walked the doors and advertised on the radio -- especially sports talk radio while the Republican ignored radio and went to TV. We had so many TV ads before the 2006 election, they were lost in the shuffle.
Congresswoman Mary Fallin wore out several pair of shoes walking her Congressional district in 2006 asking for their vote. She was out all the time as were her Republican opponents for the open seat. She walked the most doors, got in a run-off, walked even more doors, and won.
She connected totally with her district and to this day she is so well liked. She made the fair circuit of the counties in her district and was highly visible at our State Fair in [Oklahoma City]. She was on the radio a lot and she used the theme of bringing OK values and ideas to DC. She didn't use robo calls [automated calls] and neither did her opponent, Denise Bode, but several others did and they were not well-received. She had Ed Goeas as her consultant. Grassroots won it for Mary as she had the largest amount of volunteers.
I made calls before the primary election (not even my Congressional district) and the theme was: "Mary Fallin asked me to call today to ask for your vote." The senior citizens were so impressed that they were being asked by a live person. Then we had a cheat sheet to use if they had any questions but we found being short and to the point made the biggest impression. Dr. Tom's calls were the same -- we were live except for the ones the NRSC paid for that Bush and Cheney taped.
For the Rudy campaign, we had people use their cell phones on weekends when there are free minutes. It worked great and you can get a lot more people calling. Phone banks are expensive to set up for such a short period of time. so a lot of our campaigns are going to cell phones with a limited number of phones available for people to make calls during the week but on weekends it is almost all cell phones and same with the evening.
Big money doesn't mean you are going to get elected. You have to connect to the people, something a lot of candidates forget because of consultants who would rather line their pockets have forgotten.
Note from Steve: The emphasis in this blog is not on "borrowing" tidbits of information from news sources. Rather, it concentrates on political fundamentals. John McCain is not going to be able to raise as much money as his opponent -- either Clinton or Obama -- and he shouldn't even try. Instead, there should be as much emphasis on person-to-person contact as possible. The emphasis should be on low-cost, high effectiveness forms of campaigning, the kind Sharon outlines above. What worked in Oklahoma will work in any state or congressional district. If John McCain uses these techniques, he will win. If he doesn't, he won't.
NOTE: PLEASE READ JACK KELLY'S COLUMN TODAY!
Please read the column today by Jack Kelly (a real conservative -- one with brains), who writes for the Toledo Blade and Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. It's accessible at: http://post-gazette.com/forum. One good line: "Every GOP candidate who rose above the asterisk level in the primaries has been called a RINO." He also beats Ann Coulter about the head-and-shoulders.
"Ann Coulter is so angry with McCain's occasional embrace of Democratic ideas that she says she'll campaign for Democrats if Mr. McCain wins the nomination." Kelly adds, "Ms. Coulter says this kind of thing whenever she feels she's not getting enough attention."
Also, "If Mr. McCain wins despite the objection of the [right-wing] RINOs, he'll owe them nothing, and it is doubtful he will have warm and fuzzy feelings about them."
Kelly concludes, "We're in the midst of a war we can't afford to lose. There is a stark difference between Mr. McCain and the leading Democrats on this and many other issues. Spare me your phony airs of moral superiority, RINOs. To sit out this election would be like sitting out 1944."
Saturday, February 9, 2008
Winning Elections in 2008: McCain
NOTE: THIS IS MY MAIN BLOG, WHERE THE POSTS GO UP FIRST. I HOPE YOU'LL BOOKMARK IT AND KEEP RETURNING. THERE WILL BE NEW POSTS 6-7 TIMES PER WEEK. YOUR COMMENTS ARE ALWAYS WELCOME.
Today on MSNBC, political pundit Roger Simon said the way to win elections in 2008 is to attract a core of people "who go door-to-door . . . friend-to-friend." That's the essence of grassroots politics.
This weekend (Saturday and Sunday) I'll be discussing a very successful political operative, Sharon Caliendo of Norman, Oklahoma, who's an expert in the kind of politics described by Roger Simon. If you scroll down to the previous column, you'll see how Sharon and her friends helped ensure the election of conservative Tom Coburn, in his race for a U. S. Senate seat.
(You can find Sharon's (and Greg Alterton's) blog at: http://rudysupportersformccain.blogspot.com/
In fact, Sharon's effort went one better than the door-to-door approach. She and her co-workers went where the people were: specifically, to the huge crowds that attended University of Oklahoma football games. In Oklahoma, the political activists handed out tee-shirts that promoted both the football team and the candidate. It would be possible to sell such tee-shirts, but it's better (if the campaign can afford it) to hand them out for free -- and encourage people to put them on right away.
She indicates the same approach would work country-wide.
The following are some additional comments by Sharon on the Coburn grassroots effort:
[I] added some more to the Coburn grassroots. It really needs to be an example for any candidate running a campaign on what they can do to get the grassroots involved.
Dr. Coburn held BBQ's around the state with free hamburgers/chips/drinks to recruit volunteers along with town hall meetings. The guy that did the grilling was a BBQ guru from the Tulsa area who made the best hamburgers. We held one at the OU duck pond and about 75 people turned out to the event and out of the 75, we recruited 63 of them to help, and it was repeated around the State and it just kept growing. Most amazing thing I have ever been involved with.
I will never forget when Dr. Tom won our County straw poll and was the only candidate there without a group of paid staffers but we won. I was Coburn rep for counting ballots and will never forget the look on Humphrey's campaign aide's faces when Dr. Tom won -- priceless. I live in the 3rd largest county and that was the beginning of a win for Dr. Tom who has never lost a race. In fact he won his House seat in an area that is heavily Dem and we haven't had a Republican since he left.
Hearing Dr. Tom speak today [at the CPAC convention where he introduced John McCain] brought back all those great memories from his campaign.
MCCAIN OPERATIVE BRAD MARSTON ON RADIO SUNDAY!
Brad Marston, who's been extremely successful in Internet politics for John McCain, sent the following:
I will be on live on 1590 AM in Nashua New Hampshire on Sunday 2/10 at 1 pm talking about John McCain. The call in number and the internet link are below. The shows host, Karl Zahn was one of the earliest and most influential NH supporters of McCain. New Hampshire is where it all began for McCain 2008.
I hope you and the rest of the MV08 bloggers will post about this and give the internet link so McCain supporters from around the country can listen in and join in. [Note: Find Brad's site at: http://mccainvictory08.com/.]
I doubt the Senator can join us but I am cc'ng the campaign to see if someone else might have a few words to say. Here's the link to the program: http://wsmnradio.com/.
Listen Live on the Internet.
603-883-9900 is the call in number.
Brad
Here's a partial list of the Bloggers 4 McCain, the world's fastest-growing group:
Ali Akbar, AzaMatterofact, AzaMatteroPrinciple, Blogs4McCain, BroadSideoftheBarn, Angora Politikos, ElectionNightHQ, America's Best Choice, Blue Star Chronicles, campaign2008victorya, Elyery Landavazo, Evangelicals for McCain, Gen X Dad, Georgians For McCain, How I Lost My Heart, RDM20, Libertas01, McCain Jewish Coalition of Illinois, Missourians For McCain, Myth Debunker, The Only Electable Conservative, Pajama Pack, Real World Libertarian, Right Wing Sparkle, Rudy Supporters For McCain, Rudy Supporters For McCain Yahoo Group, Think Right Arizona, Hoosiers4McCain, Iowa4McCain, McCain Blogettes, McCain States, McCain Talk, McCainVictory08, McCain Campaign Blog, Metaxupolis, My McCain Blog, NH4McCain, NJ4McCain, Pardon My French, Partisan American, PoliticoMafioso, Purple People Vote, Reality Bytes, Respectfully Republican, Stand Up For McCain>The Mad Irishman, The McCain Times, Vote McCain, With Both Hands, Porter County Politics, But I am a Liberal.Blue and New, Brainster, California Thoughts and Dreams, College Kid for McCain, McCain Monitor, Empty Rhetoric, Andrew Jones for America, JohnnyMillerBlog, Keystone for Victory, Michigan4McCain, Why McCain, and Wisconsin4McCain.
Today on MSNBC, political pundit Roger Simon said the way to win elections in 2008 is to attract a core of people "who go door-to-door . . . friend-to-friend." That's the essence of grassroots politics.
This weekend (Saturday and Sunday) I'll be discussing a very successful political operative, Sharon Caliendo of Norman, Oklahoma, who's an expert in the kind of politics described by Roger Simon. If you scroll down to the previous column, you'll see how Sharon and her friends helped ensure the election of conservative Tom Coburn, in his race for a U. S. Senate seat.
(You can find Sharon's (and Greg Alterton's) blog at: http://rudysupportersformccain.blogspot.com/
In fact, Sharon's effort went one better than the door-to-door approach. She and her co-workers went where the people were: specifically, to the huge crowds that attended University of Oklahoma football games. In Oklahoma, the political activists handed out tee-shirts that promoted both the football team and the candidate. It would be possible to sell such tee-shirts, but it's better (if the campaign can afford it) to hand them out for free -- and encourage people to put them on right away.
She indicates the same approach would work country-wide.
The following are some additional comments by Sharon on the Coburn grassroots effort:
[I] added some more to the Coburn grassroots. It really needs to be an example for any candidate running a campaign on what they can do to get the grassroots involved.
Dr. Coburn held BBQ's around the state with free hamburgers/chips/drinks to recruit volunteers along with town hall meetings. The guy that did the grilling was a BBQ guru from the Tulsa area who made the best hamburgers. We held one at the OU duck pond and about 75 people turned out to the event and out of the 75, we recruited 63 of them to help, and it was repeated around the State and it just kept growing. Most amazing thing I have ever been involved with.
I will never forget when Dr. Tom won our County straw poll and was the only candidate there without a group of paid staffers but we won. I was Coburn rep for counting ballots and will never forget the look on Humphrey's campaign aide's faces when Dr. Tom won -- priceless. I live in the 3rd largest county and that was the beginning of a win for Dr. Tom who has never lost a race. In fact he won his House seat in an area that is heavily Dem and we haven't had a Republican since he left.
Hearing Dr. Tom speak today [at the CPAC convention where he introduced John McCain] brought back all those great memories from his campaign.
MCCAIN OPERATIVE BRAD MARSTON ON RADIO SUNDAY!
Brad Marston, who's been extremely successful in Internet politics for John McCain, sent the following:
I will be on live on 1590 AM in Nashua New Hampshire on Sunday 2/10 at 1 pm talking about John McCain. The call in number and the internet link are below. The shows host, Karl Zahn was one of the earliest and most influential NH supporters of McCain. New Hampshire is where it all began for McCain 2008.
I hope you and the rest of the MV08 bloggers will post about this and give the internet link so McCain supporters from around the country can listen in and join in. [Note: Find Brad's site at: http://mccainvictory08.com/.]
I doubt the Senator can join us but I am cc'ng the campaign to see if someone else might have a few words to say. Here's the link to the program: http://wsmnradio.com/.
Listen Live on the Internet.
603-883-9900 is the call in number.
Brad
Here's a partial list of the Bloggers 4 McCain, the world's fastest-growing group:
Ali Akbar, AzaMatterofact, AzaMatteroPrinciple, Blogs4McCain, BroadSideoftheBarn, Angora Politikos, ElectionNightHQ, America's Best Choice, Blue Star Chronicles, campaign2008victorya, Elyery Landavazo, Evangelicals for McCain, Gen X Dad, Georgians For McCain, How I Lost My Heart, RDM20, Libertas01, McCain Jewish Coalition of Illinois, Missourians For McCain, Myth Debunker, The Only Electable Conservative, Pajama Pack, Real World Libertarian, Right Wing Sparkle, Rudy Supporters For McCain, Rudy Supporters For McCain Yahoo Group, Think Right Arizona, Hoosiers4McCain, Iowa4McCain, McCain Blogettes, McCain States, McCain Talk, McCainVictory08, McCain Campaign Blog, Metaxupolis, My McCain Blog, NH4McCain, NJ4McCain, Pardon My French, Partisan American, PoliticoMafioso, Purple People Vote, Reality Bytes, Respectfully Republican, Stand Up For McCain>The Mad Irishman, The McCain Times, Vote McCain, With Both Hands, Porter County Politics, But I am a Liberal.Blue and New, Brainster, California Thoughts and Dreams, College Kid for McCain, McCain Monitor, Empty Rhetoric, Andrew Jones for America, JohnnyMillerBlog, Keystone for Victory, Michigan4McCain, Why McCain, and Wisconsin4McCain.
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