Amusing Fan Tribute

Yeah, this is pretty funny:

John McCain, American Everyman

Faux-populism has always been a prevailing feature of the conservative movement, an election-year strategy that has proven to be indispensable at dispatching liberal opponents. In 2000 Bush proudly stated at a black-tie dinner, “This is an impressive crowd: the haves and the have-mores. Some people call you the elite; I call you my base.” Four years later, he proceeded to run a campaign based on the idea that John Kerry was a elitist, rich, out of touch debutante, while Bush himself was a man of the people, a rancher, more middle-class than prep-school.

While this version of reality was preposterous, many Americans bought into the line, and voted for George W. Bush because he claimed to respect them and share their values (in all fairness, John Kerry was all the things that Bush tagged him with, other than a traitor; it's just that Bush was an even better example of this type of person).

Now, Sen. McCain, John McCain of $520 shoes and 10 houses, is using the same tactic against Obama. His new ad talks about how easy Obama has it, while ordinary Americans “like us” struggle in an economic climate suddenly, inexplicably, turned against us. This is John McCain, son of a four-star Admiral, grandson of a four-star Admiral, schooled at a preparatory academe, legacy admission to and bare graduation from Annapolis.

Yes, yes, he spent five years sleeping on the floor of a bamboo cage. But lets be serious, if only for a second; those five years were the only five years McCain hasn't gone to bed on silk sheets. He was born into an elite family, married into one even more so, and now claims that his opponent, fathered by an immigrant nobody and raised by another nobody, who rose from obscurity to become the first black editor of the Harvard Law Review, is the one who had a smooth ride. Yes, John McCain was a prisoner of war and American hero. But as Wesley Clark said, if you run for President in 2008, you gotta bring something more to the table than, “I got shot down in 1967.”

But it's not just in this area that McCain sounds ridiculous. On August 19, John McCain apparently referred to lobbyists as “birds of prey” who feed on destroy good government, and pledged that there would be no place for them in his administration, should he be elected. McCain is going to have a hell of a time keeping lobbyists out of his White House when he doesn't even have the fortitude to keep them out of his campaign.

The loudest voice on his crew calling for the admission of Georgia into NATO was none other than a former lobbyist for Georgia. He's already had to ask several members of his team to step down, not because of lobbying, but because of blatantly inappropriate lobbying that presented numerous conflicts of interest. The fact is that in the primaries, John McCain took more money from lobbyists than any other candidate running for President. His campaign manager and top adviser are both registered lobbyists. There's no ambiguity here; McCain is extremely cozy with lobbyists. Statements to the contrary are patently absurd.

Now, I'm not going to go so far as to say that lobbyists are Satan's spawn. There's nothing wrong with advocacy for a viewpoint, even paid advocacy. I've even spent time lobbying legislators in an official capacity when I was in college. The problem is when lobbyist associations create either perceived or potential conflicts of interests with one's professional responsibilities.

I lobbied for several pieces of legislation on behalf of my college, but it's not like I worked for the legislators that voted on the bills, or really even the education "industry" itself. I don't necessarily agree with McCain that lobbyists are "birds of prey," but that's OK since neither does McCain. Nor do I think that being affluent should be a barrier to public office (though neither should a lack of worldly wealth); again, McCain clearly agrees with me. I just wish he'd cut the antics and say so.

Oh No, It's Joe!

The text finally arrived early this morning, at 2:48 a.m. CST:

Barack has chosen Senator Joe Biden to be our VP nominee. Watch the first Obama-Biden rally at 3pm ET on www.BarackObama.com. Spread the word.

I will be in Springfield this afternoon covering the rally. I expect to post a recap sometime later tonight or early tomorrow.

Speculation That Doesn't Involve Joe Biden

A Washington Post report revealed today that organized speculation by big players in the financial industry may have had a far greater effect on the rise of oil prices than previously thought. The Commodities Futures Trading Commission found that a Swiss trading conglomerate called Vitol had begun scooping up oil futures sometime during the spring, and by June 6 had acquired futures contracts for 57.7 million barrels of oil, an amount three times that which is consumed daily in the U.S. On that day, the price of oil rose $11 a barrel, producing a hypothetical profit in excess of half a billion dollars. Under New York Mercantile Exchange rules, these contracts could have been purchased for less than a billion dollars, the rest of the cost being leveraged against company assets through a series of exotic deals that are all too familiar.

By July, Vitol had increased its market share, holding 11% of all oil futures traded on the NYMEX. The Commission study found that Vitol was not alone, and in fact determined that financial firms and their clients controlled an astounding 81% of traded futures contracts, a number that is expected to rise as more firms are audited. By bringing the heft on the financial industry to bear on an already inflated commodities market, these investment groups were able to initiate a stratospheric rise in the price of oil, one that far outpaced actual demand.

If this is a little complicated, let me break it down: the much-maligned oil companies, already turning out a product that is producing recording-breaking profits for them, sold contracts for the purchase of oil to a handful of investment banks, which then added a premium surcharge on top, before selling the contracts at a higher price to the refining interests that turn oil in other petroleum products. As soon as it became clear that this was unsustainable, these firms sold off their contracts, leading to the 22% deflation in the price of oil between July and the closing bell yesterday.

This turn of events is a relief to the average consumer, of course, but it doesn't refund the manufactured demand premium that we have been paying on everything for the last few months. While complicated and likely even legal, this defrauding of the American public should be considered outrageous, if not particularly surprising. It's the child of excessive deregulation; the steady weakening of oversight that has led to capitalism run amok. But even at this late stage of the current economic breakdown, there is great resistance to more financial transparency. It's too bad this story is likely to get lost in the election coverage, because it would make a pretty good talking point for the Democrats.

Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones: 1949-2008

The New York Times is reporting that Ohio Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Jones, found unconscious yesterday in her car, has died of complications secondary to a cerebral aneurysm. She was a member of the House Ways and Means Committee, the first member of Congress to join Sen. Barbara Boxer in officially objecting to the reported results of the 2004 Presidential election, and the first black woman to represent Ohio in the House. She was 58.

The Slow Unraveling of the Great Design

It is starting to look like while we were all paying attention to the thing I am refusing to talk about, the hawks and wolves in our midst have mired us in another Cold War that could last decades. In the course of just the last few weeks, NATO (ie. The U.S.) has begun to shut down communication and cooperation with Moscow, which in turn has led Moscow to engage in proportional freezing. The right-wing's loud demands to admit Georgia (and many other former Soviet satellites) into NATO have resulted in a geographically different but strategically similar expansion of the Warsaw Pact.

Finally, the U.S. insistence on a ballistic missile shield with launch sites in Poland has led the Russians to threaten all-out war, leading us to threaten all-out retaliation. Two weeks ago we were talking about Paris Hilton's response to McCain's T.V. spot, and now it almost seems as if we should start dusting off the Strategic Air Command and stocking fallout shelters with food.

What's stupid about all this is that it was completely avoidable. Tom Friedman makes exactly this point in a New York Times piece this morning, explaining how our neglect and antagonism of the budding Russian democracy circa 1993 led to the rise of Putin and the hardliners. When given the opportunity to become a friend to our vanquished arch-enemy, we chose instead to strengthen our alliance against them, cornering, humiliating, and enraging them. What a shock that they eventually bit back.

For all the talk about the "pre-9/11" mindset that Democrats and liberals are supposed to be stuck in, the right-wing has never moved out of the "pre-Cold War" mindset. They continue to insist that the world follow American dictates and remain beholden to American interests. When there is rebellion against this regime, the response must be instant and violent. Anything short is appeasement.

While this might have worked as the sole foreign policy of a super-power in an age before globalization, interdependency, and Mutually Assured Destruction, it is utterly preposterous in this day and age. As the list of events I opened this post with demonstrates, every action that Republicans demand will result in a reaction from Russia. Nuance, realism, detente: these are the tools of modern diplomacy, which lives in a world that has become both too small and too dangerous for hotheaded bluster.

I'm not crying that the sky is falling. I don't believe we are in for a nuclear war. But the foolish exchange of grunts across the sea has already resulted in a chain-reaction that is going to take many years and billions of dollars to inch back from. This brief exchange will undoubtedly birth new fighter jets, satellite surveillance systems, and tactical nuclear weapons that won't debut for decades, funded with tax dollars that could have gone to schools and health care. What a tremendous waste.

You Might Wanna Sit Down For This

It turns out that the dead Sasquatch that appeared in Georgia almost a week ago was really just a rubber gorilla suit stuffed with opossum guts. Nice. Maybe next time.

Friday?! Whatever.

CBS News has confirmed that Obama, taking the risk that the media might actually EXPLODE, is going to wait until Friday afternoon to roll out his VP. Also on the Veep front, Joe Biden told a mob of reporters outside his house to bugger off, 'cause he's not the guy. While this could be meaningless misdirection, Biden looked pretty serious when he said it, so who knows.

Journalistic frenzies like this produce some pretty divergent reporting and it's hard to distinguish the outliers until after the fact. Basically, don't listen to anything you read anywhere about the Veepstakes until he picks someone, not even posts on this site. Actually, I'll do you one better. Until Obama bites the bullet and sends out the text, I'm done talking about it.

Here It Comes...Almost There...I Can Almost See It...Wait...

After months of baseless speculation, countless weeks listing the pros and cons of the same four people, endless days of trying to come up with the weirdest guess to put in print, we are nearing the actual VP selection!!! Drudge reports that the New York Times reports that Obama has "all but finalized" his decision and is expected to announce...some time this week.

It will be late tonight, or early Tuesday morning! No says Marc, not tonight. Most others, not wanting to end up looking stupid, are sticking with "this week." The crack-head frenzy that began as the already caffeinated tradition of the "Veepstakes" has consumed the spare time of pundits and bloggers for far too long, and a respite, even if only for a week, will be quite welcome (I do not, by the way, exclude myself from this sickness; I count no less than a dozen posts on this blog over the last few weeks regarding this very topic).

Why has this year been so bad? The interest in this year's election has been intense, and as a result the demand for political stories has increased beyond reasonable expectations of supply. Normally, this market failure could be solved by expanding the depth of coverage, but it turns out that the American people aren't really interested in better coverage, or even different coverage: just more coverage. Not depth, per se, but breadth.

Again, I do not absolve myself of these sins, but I like to think that (from time to time) I at least try to elevate the level of discourse we as a society have about politics, and I am RELIEVED that in a few days, I'll be able to spend more time doing that, instead of being the 10,000th person to comb through Obama's press statements for hidden messages about red-state governors.

The VP Lotto: Joe Biden

After spending most of the summer out-shined by newer and more buzz-worthy contenders such as Tim Kaine and Kathleen Sebelius, Delaware Senator Joe Biden has suddenly become the Veep du jour in a contest that's just about over. The media narrative seems to have at last coalesced around his candidacy, and the timing couldn't be better. There is a lot of suspicion in the smart crowd that he's going to be the pick, and that it's going to come down early this week, and his weekend trip to Georgia to avert a new Cold War isn't quieting any of it down. So, before he gets picked and I look stupid for profiling nobody Tim Kaine before him, let's do Joe Biden.

Biden would bring a tremendous amount of experience to the ticket, having served continuously since being elected to the U.S. Senate in 1973 at the age of thirty. He has served as the Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee and currently serves as Chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He is also Chairman of the Judiciary's Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs, as well as a co-chairman of the Caucus on International Narcotics Control. His long experience in Washington lends him considerable credibility on questions of crime and foreign policy, two weak areas for Democrats generally and Obama specifically.

Very few people have as encyclopedic a grasp on world affairs as Biden does, and he would be able to wield this to considerable advantage both as a surrogate and during the October 2nd VP debate. On that note, Biden is a terrific debater and energetic campaigner, connecting well with the type of blue-collar Democrats that give Obama difficulty. He is also a passionate and skilled orator who would produce a ticket that is both inspired and inspiring. But the man is not without his downsides and flaws.

With his 35 year career in Washington, Biden is representative of the "same-old, same-old" that Obama has crafted his message to oppose, and it would be difficult to select him without looking beholden to the Democratic status-quo. Biden's initial support of the Iraq War doesn't help, nor does the fact that he argued against both the Surge and withdrawal, opting instead for a "federal" partition plan that has since lost favor in the Foreign Affairs world.

Biden also brings baggage with him, something the other candidates largely avoid. His 1988 Presidential Race was brought low by allegations (only mostly false) of plagiarism, and his political career has frequently been marred by uncontrollable gaffe-producing that is both a result of his cleverness and candor, and a result of how much he thinks of his cleverness and candor. Joe Biden loves Joe Biden, and a ticket with both Obama and Biden might look a little to rarefied for the average American.

Despite these limitations and liabilities, Biden's advantages might well outweigh the risks he carries, as well as the risks of his fellow shortlisters. He is currently the media favorite for the nomination, and in the last week has seen his stock double on the Intrade network, but my money is still on Bayh. Either way, we'll all know very, very soon.

Hypocrites Calling Hypocrites Hypocrites

As has been widely reported on this blog and others, the New York Times released its Non-Fiction Bestseller list this morning and the anti-Obama diatribe The Obama Nation was at the top. It is there not because of the free-market, a mechanism that allowed the book to compete with others and achieve a level of popularity equivalent to the skill used to craft it, but in spite of the market.

Book sales have been largely driven by bulk orders from conservative book clubs, and what small percentage are based on direct retail sales are being boosted by a promotional campaign not just from the publisher (Threshold Editions, chaired by none other than Republican activist-cum-literary elite Mary Matlin) but by the entire Republican media conglomeration. The author has been interviewed dozens of times by talk-radio and FoxNews type outlets, sponsored of course by the commercial advertisers that help fund McCain's campaign.

In light of this blatant rigging of the system, the proposition that Obama had to take public financing in order to be as honest as McCain is ludicrous. McCain, like Bush before him, was counting on the assistance of a vast, right-wing conspiracy to mobilize his soldiers. The campaign is only secondary to a much larger and richer movement to make him the next President. Until there is an honest attempt by both parties to limit this sort of behavior, there will be no meaningful campaign finance reform. And if John "Maverick" McCain of McCain-Feingold fame isn't prepared to call this stuff out, then all of his talk about wanting an honest and fair system is just that.

So What's Three Million A Year?

For those of you that missed it, there was a strange dual-interview conducted last night by Pastor Rick Warren at Saddleback Church with Presidential hopefuls Obama and McCain. Obama went out first and was interviewed for an hour, followed by McCain who received the same questions for the same length of time.

By and large, the event is what you would expect, with both candidates trying to look good and talk about their close personal relationship with Jesus as much as possible. The highlight of the night in terms of amusing, however, was when McCain was asked to define what it meant to be rich. He hemmed and hawed for a second before stating that if the question was regarding income, then five million dollars a year might be the line between rich and ordinary.

This will make a nice drop-in when it comes to the sort of "not one of us" ads that the AFL-CIO have been trying out. It also casts him in an elitist light in a rare year when that is potentially a more useful line of attack against Republicans than Democrats. No one said or did anything that is going to change the course of the election last night, but the time of vacations has clearly passed, and the general election campaign is starting to pick up.