Moderates, Independents or Con Artist

As the name of this blog indicates, I'm inexcusably a political moderate. Recent so-called moderates or independents have demonstrated why so many Americans grumble with those who wear such titles. Senator Joe Lieberman, the so-called independent democrat, has taken it upon himself to be one of the loudest voices for republican policy and the republican presidential candidate. It is more than his support of John McCain and Lieberman’s ambiguous conjoining attacks on Barack Obama that angers actual democrats. It goes beyond his resilient support of George Bush and his fruitless policies. It is the fact that he is one of the most pro-corporate politicians in the senate, the fact that he is extremely hawkish when it comes to war.

The alliance that was once about votes and back room deals came to the light when the senator from Connecticut and George Bush kissed Lieberman at the 2005 State of the Union speech. Lieberman had positioned himself to be closer to the opposing party’s leader than many of the most partisan right-winged republicans.

That observably orchestrated moment seemed to be something of a more personal message to democratic leaders for something in which the senator felt wronged or affronted. Conspiracy theories aside, you cannot help but wonder as to why this guy calls himself a democrat. Lieberman is not alone in this. Though his positions on many issues were more in lined with mine, I felt the same way about, former Vermont Senator, Jim Jeffords who switched from being a republican to an registered independent that usually voted with the democrats.

The strength that it takes to cross party lines when you feel that your party is on the wrong side of an issue has nobility. As a moderate, I respect when a politician, from any political party, is able to go against the party line for the sake of political survival. It is the reason why McCain still promotes his maverick brand despite his leaving that maverick style somewhere in the Arizona dessert, lost between his 2000 run for office and the day he announced his 2008 crusade.

Being the John McCain, the maverick, in 2000 had McCain in strong position to be the republican nominee, even without the backing of the much-valued conservative base. I strongly considered voting for McCain during that period. A lot of what McCain was saying in 2000 was inline of what Obama is saying today. I nearly trusted McCain to continue his fight against the more contemptible factions of the right. With independents less willing to accept republican candidates, McCain went after the republican base. In the process, he threw away his rebel ways and switched to a Bush light type of candidate.

Here in the Atlanta area we recently had a so-called independent democrat running for the senate by the name of Vernon Jones. Jones twice voted for George W. Bush for president and in his recent run for senate was opposed to Obama’s plan to repeal the Bush tax cuts. In the face of this, Jones posted billboards in mostly African-American populated areas with his face juxtaposed with Obama’s as if they were of the same mind politically. The Obama campaign was forced to emerge to clearly state they did not endorse Jones’ candidacy.

Jones’ democratic opponent called him an independent republican. In debates, Jones attacks came right out of the republican handbook of smear and scandal. Nonetheless, it was Jones who has been the subject of much intrepid blather that included two physical altercations with a female county commissioner, pulling a gun on another woman, and a withdrawn rape charge.

When asked why he voted for Bush, Jones astonishingly said that he did so as a protest to Al Gore’s lack of campaigning in the state of Georgia. Either Mr. Jones has some serious lack of understanding on national politics and the fact that Gore had little chance of winning the red state of Georgia over Bush or that excuse was quit simply a crock. I choose the latter due to the fact it does not explain why he for a second time voted for Bush in 2004 over John Kerry.

From both sides of the isle, politicians like Chuck Hagel, Tom Coburn, Jim Demint who stand for the best ideas of their parties and challenge the status quo are more of what is needed in American politics.

Trans democrats and republican like Vernon Jones and Joe Lieberman who appear to be republicans trapped in the bodies of democrats come off as more counterfeit than principled.

Does Obama Have What It Takes To Fight Fire With Fire?

As predicted by the more ingenuous pundits, the republican attack machine has reared its ugly head. Hillary warned us all but it didn't take a genie in a bottle to see what was on the horizon. It is what they do. It is what they have always done. They have procured much more than campaign success through the art of attack and mudslinging. Win or loose, the negative attack has been a vital component of republican strategy, especially in national politics.

That is not to say democrats have been in the clear. Still, when it comes to national politics, the Democratic Party doesn't even come close in this type of battle. For years, you hear the dissatisfaction of many democratic supporters for what can sometime give the impression of debility from their party leaders. Analyst and pollsters tell us that the public rejects negative campaign tactics. What few will tell us is that these tactics work. They are highly effective. These devices speak to the under-informed voter (the majority of voters) who might see a McCain web ad that touts Obama’s energy plan as being nothing more than advising Americans to maintain proper tire pressure. These misinformations are then doled out by talk radio proxies like Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity to listeners who treat these insanely partisan propaganda vehicles as tangible sources of news. So in the minds of many, McCain's lie just turned into a fact.

Another thing that pollsters and pundits won't tell us is just how the democrat’s sometimes seemingly passive stance on opponents, in truth, turns off many of there latent supporters. Democrats come off as just that, passive, weak, and unwilling to sully their hands. This is America. Americans like leaders that emanate strength, force and might. In the minds of many, passivity is for Parisians and the Swiss. Americans like those who play to win. Policy aside, by default, some go to the side that looks to be the side of strength and vigor. Along with the oft hawkish nature, cowboy deportment, and intimidating practices gives conservatives a aura that they revel in.

Prediction suggest that Obama’s deep war chest will allow him a greater opportunity to strike McCain harder than other democrats have been able to do in modern election cycles. My question is, when will the striking begin? More often than not, Obama has been on the defensive end of so many of McCain condemnations, giving McCain the appearance of might.

It’s not that I'm looking for Obama to drop ads on the crass and tactless plane of what McCain has levied. The shams, distortions, and old-time polluted politics of the republican aren't needed when laying into McCain. The flipflops, bad decisions, and just being out of tune in what Americans proclaim they want. These attacks need not be unscrupulous, deceitful or based in pretense. John McCain, by himself, is ripe for frank, honest and resolute attacks. These attacks need not even be snarky or as snide as those from the GOP.

Simply go to Midwestern states and air commercials that show McCain saying how he thought Americans were better off now than they were 8 years ago. In the southern states Obama hopes to win, display a pre-Iraq McCain saying that oil profits would pay for the war. In the west reveal McCain saying that Afghanistan is not the front for the war on terror. In another region place ads that parade how McCain staggeringly wants to bestow big oil billions in tax breaks while they make record profits. Make these ads very unadorned, non-elaborate with little to no nuance. Get right to the point and stay on that point. That is what a good deal of Americans respond to. In other words, don't go the John Kerry route.

Real austere stuff. We aren't talking rocket science here.

Put theses ads on constant rotation. Making sure surrogates get the talking points while resisting the inducement to maneuver away from message. Once more, with an emphasis on making it plain, basic, and unremitting.

One quandary for dems is the high number of McCain mistakes to put in front of Americans. There is just too much material to work with. Self editing becomes a daunting task. Which is why I say to make it plain and make it concise. The credence that McCain puts on the surge is an archetypal example of selecting a choice opening and bombarding it at any and every chance. Take a page out of the republican handbook, Howard Dean.

Let the Barack barrage of blows commence.

Please? Pretty please?

McCain Flip Flopped On Affirmative Action

It’s absolutely extraordinary to me how the McCain campaign so easily played the media this week when it came to the issue of Obama’s so-called playing of the race card. John McCain’s properly displayed forged indigence finally put a stop to the beating he was taking from Obama’s well-run campaign in recent weeks. Immediately the media ran to cover the offended republican nominee. Perfectly played use of the race card (I really hate that term) John McCain. As tasteless as it was, it was a highly effective move on his part.

What makes it so absolutely extraordinary is how the media completely missed it when it came to John McCain’s use of the race baiting code word ‘quotas’ in his flip flopped stance on affirmative action. In the past, McCain has clearly supported affirmative action programs as long as they did not include quotas. He is now opposed to all affirmative action and uses quotas as his new found reasoning.

My friends, allow me to make this plain for this unaware of the facts. Affirmative action is not about quotas. If there is an affirmative action program that includes quotas then it is an erroneously run program that needs to be restored. Proponents of affirmative action know full well that quotas should not be a component of any such policy. Instead of amending improperly run policy, that include quotas, they attach the dastardly scary code word ‘quotas’ to each and every affirmative action program whether it includes such a stratagem or not. It is the classic bait and switch game used to flimflam the American public.

By engaging in this kind of trickery, John McCain sent a message to those who falsely see affirmative action as a form of reverse racism that seeks to give jobs and opportunities to less qualified minorities. The reality is that affirmative action favors white women more than any other group. So when Ward Connaly, America’s preeminent affirmative action adversary – who John McCain endorsed this week, ask questions like ‘what about poor white children’ they are purposely overlooking the gains that those poor white children get when these programs assist the mothers of these children in providing with better educational and occupational opportunities.

The press aids this kind of duplicity when they ignore it, when they go along with such fiction and don’t correct such falsehoods. Be that as it may, John McCain's camp and supporters still choose to display the media as being on the side of Obama.

Obama, The Presumptuous One? That's a Joke, Right?

The media seems to be having a field day with the idea that Barack Obama is being presumptuous in his behavior on the campaign trail. Obama's successful tour of Europe, meeting with Federal reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, even the actions of Obama’s Secret Service detail have been hit with the label of being ‘presumptuous’ by all corners of the American media, right wing talk radio and of course the increasingly negative John McCain campaign.

The McCain campaign has tried to make as much of a stink as possible on the European tour. First they tried to make a case that Obama was ignoring problems that many Americans are facing, despite the fact that McCain himself has recently traveled to Canada, Mexico, and Columbia. McCain whined about the high number of media that traveled with Obama notwithstanding the fact that McCain’s camp did not invite media to join him in his travels abroad.

McCain ridiculed Obama for not going to Iraq and not meeting with General Petreus to become "educated" on the situation in Iraq. Yet when Obama meet with the leader of the fed, during theses most disturbing economic times, he gets called ‘presumptuous’.

I don’t get why the media is not asking who is really being the more presumptuous candidate? Allow me to take a quick moment to examine just some of the actions of John McCain:

• John McCain is conducting weekly radio addresses to America.
• During the month of May, John McCain’s campaign aired two commercials that actually referred to him as ‘President McCain’.
• John McCain gave speeches detailing what life would be like after his first term as president.

If the media were to properly do its job it would weigh both sides of the issue.

Did We Need The Surge To Reduce Violence In Iraq?

Barack Obama has taken a myriad of hits for his so-called refusal to admit that the surge has been a success in Iraq. Obama’s take on the surge has been that the Sunni awakening along with political shifts in the Iraqi government has played a monumental part in getting Iraq to where it currently stands. In examining the facts, I agree with his position.

Its too easy to only survey the surge and give it all of the credit for the plummet in violence in Iraq. Until Obama brought up the Sunni awakening, the media said very little about just how deeply those actions affected violence in Iraq. More than 80,000 Sunnis went from attacking coalition troops along side of al Qaeda to attacking al Qaeda. That many enemy combatants changing sides to become allies had a vast influence on conditions in Iraq that cannot be abated. These circumstances give the impression of being absent to John McCain. Remarkably, he (with a straight face) credits the surge for the Sunni awakening despite the fact that it occurred a year before the surge. On what planet does that make sense and why does the media let such a falsification of the facts be articulated without being repudiated?

Which had the greater effect? The adding of 25,000 more troops or 80,000 newly allied fighters no longer going after our troops. 80,000 supplemental forces suddenly going after our cardinal antagonist, al Qaeda? There is no way of determining which had the biggest impact, especially when people outside of and not closely connected to the United States military are not actively studying the culmination of these and other events.

Another pivotal change in tactics came when we set in motion a system of paying these Sunni forces for NOT fighting against us. For a mere $10 a day we bought the friendship of the largest group of Iraqis who were opposed to the occupation by U.S. forces. Bribery goes a long way, even in a war zone. Too bad the established press has spoken very little on this form of spending. We could have just as easily bankrolled or purchased the adherence of those U.S. allied Iraqis. $80,000 a day sounds like a lot of money (well, because it is) but it pails in what we paid (I mean borrowed) for the surge. I'm only speaking of the fiscal cost. Seriously, lets say we spent 2, 3, OK let's go as high as 10 times that $80 k rewarding (paying off) Iraqis to turn their guns IEDs away from our troops. That $8 million a day is a far cry cheaper than the close to HALF A BILLION (yes, half a BILLION) dollars we are spending EACH AND EVERY DAY that we stay in Iraq.

In addition to Sunni forces joining out fight against al Qaeda, prior to the surge, U.S. ground forces made sharp changes in strategy. We completely refashioned how we dealt with Shia extremist. The use of Embedded Provincial Reconstruction Teams, also known as the civilian surge, made immense transformations for the people of Baghdad, They acted as liaisons between Iraqi citizens and our troops. EPRTs went into Iraqi targeting the more compliant, pro U.S. citizens to be more immersed in the local leadership. They then connected local leadership to the national leadership, a concept that had been unheard of to the people of Iraq. The work of the EPRTs should not be discounted or overlooked. Essentially these small groups successfully worked as problem solvers aimed at stimulating Iraq growth and development through its citizens.

Am I saying that the surge did not hasten these successes? No. Am I saying that the surge would have not been a success without these other exploits? NO ONE KNOWS. Has Barack Obama repeatedly given credit to the contributions that the ancillary infantry gave to these staggering developments? Yes he has! Notwithstanding, I think it is very credible that we could have aided these triumphs in absence of the surge. McCain and the media are quick to assail Obama for his view that possibly the surge was not the only or the predominant reason for the welcomed improved conditions in Iraq.

The surge is about all that McCain has to stand on. What's the media’s excuse?