Discourse.net

Great Ad by Joe Garcia

This is really good. Will it work?

YouTube - Diaz-Balart a One-Trick Pony

Is there a Spanish version?

Obama's Latest Ad -- A Step Off the High Road

I think there are aspects of this ad, Obama’s latest, which are fair, and one at least that verges on a cheap shot. “Guide” TV Ad.

I suppose this will please those who worry he’s ‘too nice’.

This Week's Hot T-Shirt

Bitter? Version 1, Version 2.

A Voice from the Field

Siva Vaidhyanathan writes, SIVACRACY.NET: Why Clinton should quit:

I just got back from a few days in Central Pennsylvania. I went there excited that this fervent and energetic contest between two leading lights of the Democratic Party was energizing people in all corners of the country. …

Now I have changed my mind. I want Sen. Clinton to quit running for president and get back to the project of helping New York.

In recent weeks she has disappointed me deeply.

What I did not know — what I could not have known had I not spent some time in Pennsylvania — was just how low, nasty, and unethical the Clinton campaign has become. I worked in and covered enough campaigns in big states to know that you can’t really tell what a campaign is up to from the speeches, television ads, and debates. You have to follow the direct mail, push polls, and the radio — especially the radio.

In Pennsylvania last week radio was full of ads for both candidates. It was as if all other forms of commerce were suspended.

The Obama ads I heard were optimistic and uplifting. They treat listeners and voters with respect. They treat the party and country with dignity.

The Clinton ads were mean, demeaning, and full of lies. The contrast was stark.

'I Want Barack'

Because it’s time for another video: Jay Jay French and Friends - I Want Barack

How to Choose Between Obama and Clinton

Historically, the taller candidate has won the Presidency far more often than the shorter one. (See Comparative table of heights of United States presidential candidates for the data.)

The modern exceptions to this rule are GW Bush, Jimmy Carter and Richard Nixon — and they were all bad Presidents.

Barack Obama: 6’ 1½” (1.87m)

John McCain: 5’ 7” (1.7m)

Hilary Clinton: 5’ 6” (1.68m)

It follows, therefore, that the Democrats should nominate Obama, or something terrible will happen.

When Stock Footage Bites Back

Hillary’s “3 A.M. ad” Girl Doesn’t Approve of that Message

Richardson Endorses Obama

Haven’t seen a link to it yet, but Bill Richardson is endorsing Obama for President.

Full text below.

During the last year, I have shared with you my vision and hopes for this nation as we look to repair the damage of the last seven years. And you have shared your support, your ideas and your encouragement to my campaign. We have been through a lot together and that is why I wanted to tell you that, after careful and thoughtful deliberation, I have made a decision to endorse Barack Obama for President.

We are blessed to have two great American leaders and great Democrats running for President. My affection and admiration for Hillary Clinton and President Bill Clinton will never waver. It is time, however, for Democrats to stop fighting amongst ourselves and to prepare for the tough fight we will face against John McCain in the fall. The 1990’s were a decade of peace and prosperity because of the competent and enlightened leadership of the Clinton administration, but it is now time for a new generation of leadership to lead America forward. Barack Obama will be a historic and a great President, who can bring us the change we so desperately need by bringing us together as a nation here at home and with our allies abroad.

Earlier this week, Senator Barack Obama gave an historic speech. that addressed the issue of race with the eloquence, sincerity, and optimism we have come to expect of him. He inspired us by reminding us of the awesome potential residing in our own responsibility. He asked us to rise above our racially divided past, and to seize the opportunity to carry forward the work of many patriots of all races, who struggled and died to bring us together.

As a Hispanic, I was particularly touched by his words. I have been troubled by the demonization of immigrants—specifically Hispanics— by too many in this country. Hate crimes against Hispanics are rising as a direct result and now, in tough economic times, people look for scapegoats and I fear that people will continue to exploit our racial differences—and place blame on others not like them . We all know the real culprit — the disastrous economic policies of the Bush Administration!

Senator Obama has started a discussion in this country long overdue and rejects the politics of pitting race against race. He understands clearly that only by bringing people together, only by bridging our differences can we all succeed together as Americans.

His words are those of a courageous, thoughtful and inspiring leader, who understands that a house divided against itself cannot stand. And, after nearly eight years of George W. Bush, we desperately need such a leader.

To reverse the disastrous policies of the last seven years, rebuild our economy, address the housing and mortgage crisis, bring our troops home from Iraq and restore America’s international standing, we need a President who can bring us together as a nation so we can confront our urgent challenges at home and abroad.

During the past year, I got to know Senator Obama as we campaigned against each other for the Presidency, and I felt a kinship with him because we both grew up between words, in a sense, living both abroad and here in America. In part because of these experiences, Barack and I share a deep sense of our nation’s special responsibilities in the world.

So, once again, thank you for all you have done for me and my campaign. I wanted to make sure you understood my reasons for my endorsement of Senator Obama. I know that you, no matter what your choice, will do so with the best interests of this nation, in your heart.

Sincerely,

Bill Richardson

The Speech: RFK or Adlai Stevenson?

As is so often the case Glenn Greenwald says it right when he describes this speech as a test of “Obama’s faith in the reasoning abilities of the American public”.

I’ll only add this: whether this is Obama’s breakthrough moment, as it deserves to be, or his Adlai Stevenson moment depends on two things: first, whether the gatekeepers of old media, few if any of whom are friendly to Democrats, allow his rich and complex statements anywhere near a voter. I’m pretty dubious about that. The first news report I read was from AP. By Notorious Nedra Pickler. And it missed all the points, by some combination of malice, haste, and stupidity. On the other hand, the considered reactions of both the Washington Post and the New York Times are fair while not fawning. But it is still TV, broadcast and cable, and radio that reaches the largest audience. And on radio, one still can expect only the very worst.

The second chance comes from the Internet, which allows the candidate to bypass the filter. But will anyone outside the choir come to hear the preacher?

Video of Obama's "More Perfect Union" Speech

YouTube - Obama Speech: ‘A More Perfect Union’

Only Words?

Senator Obama gave an impressive speech today on race relations (and the Wright affair), and much much more, entitled “A More Perfect Union”.

I’ve put the full text below. I’ll put a link up to video when I find one.

“A More Perfect Union”
Constitution Center
Tuesday, March 18th, 2008
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

“We the people, in order to form a more perfect union.”

Two hundred and twenty one years ago, in a hall that still stands across the street, a group of men gathered and, with these simple words, launched America’s improbable experiment in democracy. Farmers and scholars; statesmen and patriots who had traveled across an ocean to escape tyranny and persecution finally made real their declaration of independence at a Philadelphia convention that lasted through the spring of 1787.

The document they produced was eventually signed but ultimately unfinished. It was stained by this nation’s original sin of slavery, a question that divided the colonies and brought the convention to a stalemate until the founders chose to allow the slave trade to continue for at least twenty more years, and to leave any final resolution to future generations.

Of course, the answer to the slavery question was already embedded within our Constitution – a Constitution that had at is very core the ideal of equal citizenship under the law; a Constitution that promised its people liberty, and justice, and a union that could be and should be perfected over time.

And yet words on a parchment would not be enough to deliver slaves from bondage, or provide men and women of every color and creed their full rights and obligations as citizens of the United States. What would be needed were Americans in successive generations who were willing to do their part – through protests and struggle, on the streets and in the courts, through a civil war and civil disobedience and always at great risk - to narrow that gap between the promise of our ideals and the reality of their time.

This was one of the tasks we set forth at the beginning of this campaign – to continue the long march of those who came before us, a march for a more just, more equal, more free, more caring and more prosperous America. I chose to run for the presidency at this moment in history because I believe deeply that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together – unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction – towards a better future for of children and our grandchildren.

This belief comes from my unyielding faith in the decency and generosity of the American people. But it also comes from my own American story.

I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas. I was raised with the help of a white grandfather who survived a Depression to serve in Patton’s Army during World War II and a white grandmother who worked on a bomber assembly line at Fort Leavenworth while he was overseas. I’ve gone to some of the best schools in America and lived in one of the world’s poorest nations. I am married to a black American who carries within her the blood of slaves and slaveowners – an inheritance we pass on to our two precious daughters. I have brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, uncles and cousins, of every race and every hue, scattered across three continents, and for as long as I live, I will never forget that in no other country on Earth is my story even possible.

It’s a story that hasn’t made me the most conventional candidate. But it is a story that has seared into my genetic makeup the idea that this nation is more than the sum of its parts – that out of many, we are truly one.

Throughout the first year of this campaign, against all predictions to the contrary, we saw how hungry the American people were for this message of unity. Despite the temptation to view my candidacy through a purely racial lens, we won commanding victories in states with some of the whitest populations in the country. In South Carolina, where the Confederate Flag still flies, we built a powerful coalition of African Americans and white Americans.

This is not to say that race has not been an issue in the campaign. At various stages in the campaign, some commentators have deemed me either “too black” or “not black enough.” We saw racial tensions bubble to the surface during the week before the South Carolina primary. The press has scoured every exit poll for the latest evidence of racial polarization, not just in terms of white and black, but black and brown as well.

And yet, it has only been in the last couple of weeks that the discussion of race in this campaign has taken a particularly divisive turn.

On one end of the spectrum, we’ve heard the implication that my candidacy is somehow an exercise in affirmative action; that it’s based solely on the desire of wide-eyed liberals to purchase racial reconciliation on the cheap. On the other end, we’ve heard my former pastor, Reverend Jeremiah Wright, use incendiary language to express views that have the potential not only to widen the racial divide, but views that denigrate both the greatness and the goodness of our nation; that rightly offend white and black alike.

I have already condemned, in unequivocal terms, the statements of Reverend Wright that have caused such controversy. For some, nagging questions remain. Did I know him to be an occasionally fierce critic of American domestic and foreign policy? Of course. Did I ever hear him make remarks that could be considered controversial while I sat in church? Yes. Did I strongly disagree with many of his political views? Absolutely – just as I’m sure many of you have heard remarks from your pastors, priests, or rabbis with which you strongly disagreed.

But the remarks that have caused this recent firestorm weren’t simply controversial. They weren’t simply a religious leader’s effort to speak out against perceived injustice. Instead, they expressed a profoundly distorted view of this country – a view that sees white racism as endemic, and that elevates what is wrong with America above all that we know is right with America; a view that sees the conflicts in the Middle East as rooted primarily in the actions of stalwart allies like Israel, instead of emanating from the perverse and hateful ideologies of radical Islam.

As such, Reverend Wright’s comments were not only wrong but divisive, divisive at a time when we need unity; racially charged at a time when we need to come together to solve a set of monumental problems – two wars, a terrorist threat, a falling economy, a chronic health care crisis and potentially devastating climate change; problems that are neither black or white or Latino or Asian, but rather problems that confront us all.

Given my background, my politics, and my professed values and ideals, there will no doubt be those for whom my statements of condemnation are not enough. Why associate myself with Reverend Wright in the first place, they may ask? Why not join another church? And I confess that if all that I knew of Reverend Wright were the snippets of those sermons that have run in an endless loop on the television and You Tube, or if Trinity United Church of Christ conformed to the caricatures being peddled by some commentators, there is no doubt that I would react in much the same way

But the truth is, that isn’t all that I know of the man. The man I met more than twenty years ago is a man who helped introduce me to my Christian faith, a man who spoke to me about our obligations to love one another; to care for the sick and lift up the poor. He is a man who served his country as a U.S. Marine; who has studied and lectured at some of the finest universities and seminaries in the country, and who for over thirty years led a church that serves the community by doing God’s work here on Earth – by housing the homeless, ministering to the needy, providing day care services and scholarships and prison ministries, and reaching out to those suffering from HIV/AIDS.

In my first book, Dreams From My Father, I described the experience of my first service at Trinity:

“People began to shout, to rise from their seats and clap and cry out, a forceful wind carrying the reverend’s voice up into the rafters….And in that single note – hope! – I heard something else; at the foot of that cross, inside the thousands of churches across the city, I imagined the stories of ordinary black people merging with the stories of David and Goliath, Moses and Pharaoh, the Christians in the lion’s den, Ezekiel’s field of dry bones. Those stories – of survival, and freedom, and hope – became our story, my story; the blood that had spilled was our blood, the tears our tears; until this black church, on this bright day, seemed once more a vessel carrying the story of a people into future generations and into a larger world. Our trials and triumphs became at once unique and universal, black and more than black; in chronicling our journey, the stories and songs gave us a means to reclaim memories that we didn’t need to feel shame about…memories that all people might study and cherish – and with which we could start to rebuild.”

That has been my experience at Trinity. Like other predominantly black churches across the country, Trinity embodies the black community in its entirety – the doctor and the welfare mom, the model student and the former gang-banger. Like other black churches, Trinity’s services are full of raucous laughter and sometimes bawdy humor. They are full of dancing, clapping, screaming and shouting that may seem jarring to the untrained ear. The church contains in full the kindness and cruelty, the fierce intelligence and the shocking ignorance, the struggles and successes, the love and yes, the bitterness and bias that make up the black experience in America.

And this helps explain, perhaps, my relationship with Reverend Wright. As imperfect as he may be, he has been like family to me. He strengthened my faith, officiated my wedding, and baptized my children. Not once in my conversations with him have I heard him talk about any ethnic group in derogatory terms, or treat whites with whom he interacted with anything but courtesy and respect. He contains within him the contradictions – the good and the bad – of the community that he has served diligently for so many years.

I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother – a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.

These people are a part of me. And they are a part of America, this country that I love.

Some will see this as an attempt to justify or excuse comments that are simply inexcusable. I can assure you it is not. I suppose the politically safe thing would be to move on from this episode and just hope that it fades into the woodwork. We can dismiss Reverend Wright as a crank or a demagogue, just as some have dismissed Geraldine Ferraro, in the aftermath of her recent statements, as harboring some deep-seated racial bias.

But race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore right now. We would be making the same mistake that Reverend Wright made in his offending sermons about America – to simplify and stereotype and amplify the negative to the point that it distorts reality.

The fact is that the comments that have been made and the issues that have surfaced over the last few weeks reflect the complexities of race in this country that we’ve never really worked through – a part of our union that we have yet to perfect. And if we walk away now, if we simply retreat into our respective corners, we will never be able to come together and solve challenges like health care, or education, or the need to find good jobs for every American.

Understanding this reality requires a reminder of how we arrived at this point. As William Faulkner once wrote, “The past isn’t dead and buried. In fact, it isn’t even past.” We do not need to recite here the history of racial injustice in this country. But we do need to remind ourselves that so many of the disparities that exist in the African-American community today can be directly traced to inequalities passed on from an earlier generation that suffered under the brutal legacy of slavery and Jim Crow.

Segregated schools were, and are, inferior schools; we still haven’t fixed them, fifty years after Brown v. Board of Education, and the inferior education they provided, then and now, helps explain the pervasive achievement gap between today’s black and white students.

Legalized discrimination - where blacks were prevented, often through violence, from owning property, or loans were not granted to African-American business owners, or black homeowners could not access FHA mortgages, or blacks were excluded from unions, or the police force, or fire departments – meant that black families could not amass any meaningful wealth to bequeath to future generations. That history helps explain the wealth and income gap between black and white, and the concentrated pockets of poverty that persists in so many of today’s urban and rural communities.

A lack of economic opportunity among black men, and the shame and frustration that came from not being able to provide for one’s family, contributed to the erosion of black families – a problem that welfare policies for many years may have worsened. And the lack of basic services in so many urban black neighborhoods – parks for kids to play in, police walking the beat, regular garbage pick-up and building code enforcement – all helped create a cycle of violence, blight and neglect that continue to haunt us.

This is the reality in which Reverend Wright and other African-Americans of his generation grew up. They came of age in the late fifties and early sixties, a time when segregation was still the law of the land and opportunity was systematically constricted. What’s remarkable is not how many failed in the face of discrimination, but rather how many men and women overcame the odds; how many were able to make a way out of no way for those like me who would come after them.

But for all those who scratched and clawed their way to get a piece of the American Dream, there were many who didn’t make it – those who were ultimately defeated, in one way or another, by discrimination. That legacy of defeat was passed on to future generations – those young men and increasingly young women who we see standing on street corners or languishing in our prisons, without hope or prospects for the future. Even for those blacks who did make it, questions of race, and racism, continue to define their worldview in fundamental ways. For the men and women of Reverend Wright’s generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years. That anger may not get expressed in public, in front of white co-workers or white friends. But it does find voice in the barbershop or around the kitchen table. At times, that anger is exploited by politicians, to gin up votes along racial lines, or to make up for a politician’s own failings.

And occasionally it finds voice in the church on Sunday morning, in the pulpit and in the pews. The fact that so many people are surprised to hear that anger in some of Reverend Wright’s sermons simply reminds us of the old truism that the most segregated hour in American life occurs on Sunday morning. That anger is not always productive; indeed, all too often it distracts attention from solving real problems; it keeps us from squarely facing our own complicity in our condition, and prevents the African-American community from forging the alliances it needs to bring about real change. But the anger is real; it is powerful; and to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots, only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races.

In fact, a similar anger exists within segments of the white community. Most working- and middle-class white Americans don’t feel that they have been particularly privileged by their race. Their experience is the immigrant experience – as far as they’re concerned, no one’s handed them anything, they’ve built it from scratch. They’ve worked hard all their lives, many times only to see their jobs shipped overseas or their pension dumped after a lifetime of labor. They are anxious about their futures, and feel their dreams slipping away; in an era of stagnant wages and global competition, opportunity comes to be seen as a zero sum game, in which your dreams come at my expense. So when they are told to bus their children to a school across town; when they hear that an African American is getting an advantage in landing a good job or a spot in a good college because of an injustice that they themselves never committed; when they’re told that their fears about crime in urban neighborhoods are somehow prejudiced, resentment builds over time.

Like the anger within the black community, these resentments aren’t always expressed in polite company. But they have helped shape the political landscape for at least a generation. Anger over welfare and affirmative action helped forge the Reagan Coalition. Politicians routinely exploited fears of crime for their own electoral ends. Talk show hosts and conservative commentators built entire careers unmasking bogus claims of racism while dismissing legitimate discussions of racial injustice and inequality as mere political correctness or reverse racism.

Just as black anger often proved counterproductive, so have these white resentments distracted attention from the real culprits of the middle class squeeze – a corporate culture rife with inside dealing, questionable accounting practices, and short-term greed; a Washington dominated by lobbyists and special interests; economic policies that favor the few over the many. And yet, to wish away the resentments of white Americans, to label them as misguided or even racist, without recognizing they are grounded in legitimate concerns – this too widens the racial divide, and blocks the path to understanding.

This is where we are right now. It’s a racial stalemate we’ve been stuck in for years. Contrary to the claims of some of my critics, black and white, I have never been so naïve as to believe that we can get beyond our racial divisions in a single election cycle, or with a single candidacy – particularly a candidacy as imperfect as my own.

But I have asserted a firm conviction – a conviction rooted in my faith in God and my faith in the American people – that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds, and that in fact we have no choice is we are to continue on the path of a more perfect union.

For the African-American community, that path means embracing the burdens of our past without becoming victims of our past. It means continuing to insist on a full measure of justice in every aspect of American life. But it also means binding our particular grievances – for better health care, and better schools, and better jobs - to the larger aspirations of all Americans — the white woman struggling to break the glass ceiling, the white man whose been laid off, the immigrant trying to feed his family. And it means taking full responsibility for own lives – by demanding more from our fathers, and spending more time with our children, and reading to them, and teaching them that while they may face challenges and discrimination in their own lives, they must never succumb to despair or cynicism; they must always believe that they can write their own destiny.

Ironically, this quintessentially American – and yes, conservative – notion of self-help found frequent expression in Reverend Wright’s sermons. But what my former pastor too often failed to understand is that embarking on a program of self-help also requires a belief that society can change.

The profound mistake of Reverend Wright’s sermons is not that he spoke about racism in our society. It’s that he spoke as if our society was static; as if no progress has been made; as if this country – a country that has made it possible for one of his own members to run for the highest office in the land and build a coalition of white and black; Latino and Asian, rich and poor, young and old — is still irrevocably bound to a tragic past. But what we know — what we have seen – is that America can change. That is true genius of this nation. What we have already achieved gives us hope – the audacity to hope – for what we can and must achieve tomorrow.

In the white community, the path to a more perfect union means acknowledging that what ails the African-American community does not just exist in the minds of black people; that the legacy of discrimination - and current incidents of discrimination, while less overt than in the past - are real and must be addressed. Not just with words, but with deeds – by investing in our schools and our communities; by enforcing our civil rights laws and ensuring fairness in our criminal justice system; by providing this generation with ladders of opportunity that were unavailable for previous generations. It requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams; that investing in the health, welfare, and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper.

In the end, then, what is called for is nothing more, and nothing less, than what all the world’s great religions demand – that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. Let us be our brother’s keeper, Scripture tells us. Let us be our sister’s keeper. Let us find that common stake we all have in one another, and let our politics reflect that spirit as well.

For we have a choice in this country. We can accept a politics that breeds division, and conflict, and cynicism. We can tackle race only as spectacle – as we did in the OJ trial – or in the wake of tragedy, as we did in the aftermath of Katrina - or as fodder for the nightly news. We can play Reverend Wright’s sermons on every channel, every day and talk about them from now until the election, and make the only question in this campaign whether or not the American people think that I somehow believe or sympathize with his most offensive words. We can pounce on some gaffe by a Hillary supporter as evidence that she’s playing the race card, or we can speculate on whether white men will all flock to John McCain in the general election regardless of his policies.

We can do that.

But if we do, I can tell you that in the next election, we’ll be talking about some other distraction. And then another one. And then another one. And nothing will change.

That is one option. Or, at this moment, in this election, we can come together and say, “Not this time.” This time we want to talk about the crumbling schools that are stealing the future of black children and white children and Asian children and Hispanic children and Native American children. This time we want to reject the cynicism that tells us that these kids can’t learn; that those kids who don’t look like us are somebody else’s problem. The children of America are not those kids, they are our kids, and we will not let them fall behind in a 21st century economy. Not this time.

This time we want to talk about how the lines in the Emergency Room are filled with whites and blacks and Hispanics who do not have health care; who don’t have the power on their own to overcome the special interests in Washington, but who can take them on if we do it together.

This time we want to talk about the shuttered mills that once provided a decent life for men and women of every race, and the homes for sale that once belonged to Americans from every religion, every region, every walk of life. This time we want to talk about the fact that the real problem is not that someone who doesn’t look like you might take your job; it’s that the corporation you work for will ship it overseas for nothing more than a profit.

This time we want to talk about the men and women of every color and creed who serve together, and fight together, and bleed together under the same proud flag. We want to talk about how to bring them home from a war that never should’ve been authorized and never should’ve been waged, and we want to talk about how we’ll show our patriotism by caring for them, and their families, and giving them the benefits they have earned.

I would not be running for President if I didn’t believe with all my heart that this is what the vast majority of Americans want for this country. This union may never be perfect, but generation after generation has shown that it can always be perfected. And today, whenever I find myself feeling doubtful or cynical about this possibility, what gives me the most hope is the next generation – the young people whose attitudes and beliefs and openness to change have already made history in this election.

There is one story in particularly that I’d like to leave you with today – a story I told when I had the great honor of speaking on Dr. King’s birthday at his home church, Ebenezer Baptist, in Atlanta.

There is a young, twenty-three year old white woman named Ashley Baia who organized for our campaign in Florence, South Carolina. She had been working to organize a mostly African-American community since the beginning of this campaign, and one day she was at a roundtable discussion where everyone went around telling their story and why they were there.

And Ashley said that when she was nine years old, her mother got cancer. And because she had to miss days of work, she was let go and lost her health care. They had to file for bankruptcy, and that’s when Ashley decided that she had to do something to help her mom.

She knew that food was one of their most expensive costs, and so Ashley convinced her mother that what she really liked and really wanted to eat more than anything else was mustard and relish sandwiches. Because that was the cheapest way to eat.

She did this for a year until her mom got better, and she told everyone at the roundtable that the reason she joined our campaign was so that she could help the millions of other children in the country who want and need to help their parents too.

Now Ashley might have made a different choice. Perhaps somebody told her along the way that the source of her mother’s problems were blacks who were on welfare and too lazy to work, or Hispanics who were coming into the country illegally. But she didn’t. She sought out allies in her fight against injustice.

Anyway, Ashley finishes her story and then goes around the room and asks everyone else why they’re supporting the campaign. They all have different stories and reasons. Many bring up a specific issue. And finally they come to this elderly black man who’s been sitting there quietly the entire time. And Ashley asks him why he’s there. And he does not bring up a specific issue. He does not say health care or the economy. He does not say education or the war. He does not say that he was there because of Barack Obama. He simply says to everyone in the room, “I am here because of Ashley.”

“I’m here because of Ashley.” By itself, that single moment of recognition between that young white girl and that old black man is not enough. It is not enough to give health care to the sick, or jobs to the jobless, or education to our children.

But it is where we start. It is where our union grows stronger. And as so many generations have come to realize over the course of the two-hundred and twenty one years since a band of patriots signed that document in Philadelphia, that is where the perfection begins.

Latest Obama Inspirational Video

will.i.am does it again for Obama.

Lots of Spanish for the Texas vote. Note that this isn’t apparently an official campaign video, just a very effective one. (But are there declining returns to scale?)

Jack Nicholson Video For Hilary Clinton

Jack Nicholson has done a video for Hillary Clinton. (“Jack and Hill”)

At madisonian.net, they have some good questions about it, Jack Approved But Did Everyone Else?.

Hussein, An All-American Name

Juan Cole takes us on a tour of Barack Hussein Obama, Omar Bradley, Benjamin Franklin and other Semitically Named American Heroes.

Not that this will stop the nonsense.

Secret Service Tightens Obama Security

OK, this is more like it: Security tight at Obama rally in Fort Worth. But it does make you wonder about the earlier claims that all was well with transparently inadequate security.

Previous items:

• NY Times on Obama’s Security: Clueless or Coy?
• Secret Service Says Low Security is All Part of the Plan
• Look, We Worry About This Stuff

(thanks to D. for the link)

NY Times on Obama's Security: Clueless or Coy?

The New York Times’s Jeff Zeleny has a long article about people worrying about Barak Obama’s safety, In Painful Past, Hushed Worry About Obama.

In the past few days, a major Dallas-area paper ran a two inconclusive stories about the level of security at Obama’s Dallas rally. These stories were supplemented by a number of blog posts all over the place, many of which include eyewitness accounts of recent Obama rallies elsewhere which also seemed to have a level of security that was at best uneven. Given all that, you might expect that when the Times does a major article on fears for Obama’s security, something would be said about what happened in Dallas at the Obama rally.

You would be wrong.

Here’s all that the NYT has to say on the subject of Dallas security:

Here in Dallas, those memories were raised in conversation after conversation with several of the 17,000 people who came to see Mr. Obama at a rally last week.

“Right around the corner is the John Kennedy Memorial; everyone all around me was talking about it,” said Imogene Covin, a Democratic activist from Dallas. “In the back of my mind, it’s a possibility that something might happen because he’s something to gawk at right now. But you know why I think he will be safe? He has a broad range of people behind him.”

In fact, as readers of this blog or many others, or of the Dallas-Fort Worth Star-Telegram, know “here in Dallas,” there was a lot more than “memories raised in conversation” — there were allegations by the local cops of bad security judgment. And the Secret Service’s response while not totally implausible, hasn’t been totally convincing either.

Should we expect better from the Times?

I suppose it’s possible the NYT is being coy as a result of a request from the Secret Service not to discuss operational details, but if that were the case you would think that they could tell us so. I can’t help but wonder if they just didn’t know about the controversy, or if this is another example of an article going into the hopper several days before its printed and being dated by the time it sees daylight.

I’ve written to Mr. Zeleny to ask, but don’t really expect an answer.

Related posts:

• Secret Service Says Low Security is All Part of the Plan
• Look, We Worry About This Stuff

Secret Service Says Low Security is All Part of the Plan

Star-Telegram.com: | 02/22/2008 | Secret Service defends security at Obama rally in Dallas: The U.S. Secret Service on Friday defended its handling of security during a massive rally in downtown Dallas for Barack Obama, saying there was no "lapse" in its "comprehensive and layered security plan," which called for some people to be checked for weapons, while others were not.

...

Nick Shapiro, a spokesman for Obama in Texas, said the campaign would have no comment on whether there was a security breech in Dallas. Shapiro referred questions to the Secret Service.

"There were no security lapses at that venue," said Eric Zahren, a spokesman for the Secret Service in Washington. He added there was "no deviation" from the "comprehensive and layered" security plan, implemented in "very close cooperation with our law enforcement partners."

Zahren rebutted suggestions by several Dallas police officers at the rally who thought the Secret Service ordered a halt to the time-consuming weapons check because long lines were moving slowly, and many seats remained empty as time neared for Obama to appear.

"It was never a part of the plan at this particular venue to have each and every person in the crowd pass through the Magnetometer," said Zahren, referring to the device used to detect metal in clothing and bags.

Personally, I don't consider this an adequate explanation. Although I put the original item, Look, We Worry About This Stuff, in my "tinfoil" category, I'm promoting it now to regular politics.

Gravel Loves Chomsky

Another, far weirder, Gravel video.

Did he really say that Ralph Nader helped Al Gore? And did he really say he’d want Noam Chomsky as one of his closest advisers?

And did he really say he’s going to be on the ballot in November (maybe with Nader) on what can only be understood as a third-party ticket?

Noam Chomsky??? As a Presidential adviser? Seriously weird.

On the other hand, as entertainment goes you do approach a Gravel video with the fear that he could do or say anything.

Viva Obama Video

Living in Miami, how could I resist sharing a video called VIVA OBAMA?

More at amigosdeobama.com.

Clinton Competence Report

A major reason to support Sen. Clinton over Sen. Obama, at least in my book, has been the suggestion that she brings with her a management team tested by time, one much more ready to hit the ground running if they take office.

Competence, as the last seven years — not to mention the Carter administration! — have taught us, is no small thing.

But the Clinton competence aura has taken a big hit in the campaign. First there was the devastating Joshua Green article in the Atlantic, Inside the Clinton Shake-Up.

Now comes this corroborative account of Team Clinton haplessness when it comes to the Texas primaries, Burnt Orange Report::: Senator Clinton Campaign Worried by Texas Primary System.

It does make you wonder.

YouTubers For Obama

Barow Wow Wow, Go Obama! (Politics of Hope Mix)

There’s also a less jolly alternate version they call the “politics as usual mix”; I don’t like it as much.

The GOP Slogan: "No, You Can't"

Equal time for the GOP: NO, YOU CAN’T — NO, SE PUEDE.

McCain -- What's Fair Criticism?

The Smirking Chimp, Puffing up John McCain, POW, has some rough stuff about McCain.

I think this part is not only fair criticism, but gets at the heart of one of the main reasons I can’t trust the guy and get steamed every time I hear about his ‘Straight Talk’:

McCain’s tragic flaw: He knows the right thing. He often sets out to do the right thing. But he doesn’t follow through. We saw McCain’s weak character in 2000, when the Bush campaign defeated him in the crucial South Carolina primary by smearing his family. Placing his presidential ambitions first, he swallowed his pride, set aside his honor, and campaigned for Bush against Al Gore. It came up again in 2005, when McCain used his POW experience as a POW to convince Congress to pass, and Bush to sign, a law outlawing torture of detainees at Guantanamo and other camps. But when Bush issued one of his infamous “signing statements” giving himself the right to continue torturing-in effect, negating McCain’s law-he remained silent, sucking up to Bush again.

Ditto McCain’s off-again on-again kowtows to the theocratic right wing. Or yesterday’s cowardly eleventh-hour failure to vote on the stimulus package even though McCain was in DC.

But the main thrust of the Smirking Chimp article is that McCain is to be blamed for cracking after days of very vigorous torture that he suffered as a POW and/or for not correcting people who say he didn’t. I don’t buy that.

Muppets Endorse Edwards!

Funny video — Muppets for President — but isn’t it a stealth Edwards endorsement?

I jest; everyone likes Kermit, so that’s the endorsement.

(spotted via la Bartow)

Barack Obama, Ida Merriam, and the Power to Inspire

The thing that sets Barack Obama apart from Hilary Clinton is his ability to inspire with words. For many, Hilary Clinton inspires just by being; so too for other does Obama. (And then there’s the people who are inspired by both…) But Sen. Obama gives a quantum better speech. I know that I’ve suggested before that speechifying isn’t the first thing I look for in a candidate, but it does matter and not just in the obvious ways.

To explain what I mean, I need to tell you about Ida Merriam. Ida Merriam was one of the many idealistic young people who responded to FDR’s call to come to Washington and help make the government better, joining the Social Security Administration (SSA) at its founding. Like many others drawn to DC by FDR, she stayed on, although both her tenure and her achievements at the SSA’s Office of Research and Statistics were exceptional. She was still going strong when she retired in 1972.

Mrs. Merriam brought a clear vision of the importance of research to sound policy development. Cogent analysis, clear writing and impeccable accuracy are the hallmark of her own work and set the standard for others. Research on public programs, in her view, belongs in the public domain and the role of government research is to put it there in clear and understandable form. Under her direction ORS publications grew beyond the monthly Social Security Bulletin, to include special reports and brief R&S Notes that were issued quickly to respond to policymakers’ questions.

The Social Security Bulletin brought a broad view of the role of social insurance in the nation’s social and economic fabric. Mrs. Merriam personally established the social welfare expenditure series that tracks national spending for such purposes as education, health care, social and vocational services and income security through social insurance and social assistance. In that series, social insurance is not only Social Security, but other public programs —unemployment insurance, workers’ compensation, and public employees retirement systems—as well as private group efforts to protect individuals against the economic vicissitudes of life—such as short-term sickness and disability benefits, private group life and disability insurance and private pensions. Trends in each of these systems were brought together in the social welfare expenditure series. The health care component of the series set the framework for the national health expenditure series that is now used to project future national health spending.

…

In the 1960s, under Mrs. Merriam’s leadership, ORS catapulted into the forefront of social policy analysis. New concerns about the poor and civil rights for minorities, a building debate on health insurance for the elderly, extension of disability insurance to workers under age 50 and enactment of early retirement benefits for men all posed new research challenges.

Longstanding scholarly interest in defining and measuring “low-income” took a major step forward when ORS published what was to become the official poverty thresholds for comparing the economic status of families of different sizes. For the first time, statisticians could count the number of poor children, elderly and other adults.

…

Dorothy Rice, who directed and conducted many of the health insurance studies recalls, “Throughout her career as a public servant, Mrs. Merriam earned a well-deserved reputation as an administrator with scientific objectivity, outstanding social policy expertise, and unquestioned integrity. She was one of those public servants who viewed government service as a noble calling, a medium through which she could and did make a positive and lasting impact on the social well-being of the populace.

People like Mrs. Merriam not only made FDR’s New Deal possible, they made it last.

JFK’s call to public service (“And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country.”) produced a similar, if maybe smaller, wave of people who staffed the bureaucracy and helped the lumbering beast be more responsible and responsive. It was notable that his next four successors were not as successful at attracting deep talent to staff their administrations; each had their stars and their workhorses, but not in the same quantity.

I suppose in some way one could say that Ronald Reagan also energized a generation of people to come to DC and take jobs in the bowels of the government, although in this case the idealistic charge was to destroy the beast from the inside, an inheritance that has been coming to its fruiting in the current, less inspiring and more nakedly corrupt, administration. It’s notable that one quiet Republican achievement has been to work hard to undermine the legacy left by Ida Merriam and her equally unsung opposite numbers in other agencies by ruining the government’s ability to collect (not to mention to share!) good data. Without decent time series data, future governments will find it that much hard to build a case for social policies.

Mrs. Merriam — as I always called her — lived in our neighborhood in Washington DC, and used to walk by our house from time to time. She’s always symbolized to me how political inspiration could shape lives in ways lasting a generation or more. Thanks in no small part to her work, and that of others like her, the SSA was known as the most efficient and well-run federal government department. And she was a very nice lady, too.

The power to inspire is the power to mobilize not just masses to turn out for rallies, not just voters to turn out to polls, but also to get people to make (and re-make) institutions. And as Jean Monnet (a sexist but wise Frenchman) said, “Nothing is possible without men, nothing is lasting without institutions.”

The ability to give a great speech is a tool of statecraft. It can open doors, make possibilities. The power to inspire is the power to direct at a distance, to harness human energy while reducing the need for political command-and-control.

The ability to give a great speech also can be a tool of nation-(re)building. It depends, of course, on what you say.

But if you and your country are lucky, the next Ida Merriam is listening.

[Note: An earlier draft of this essay accidentally briefly appeared on the site.]

Let the GOP Food Fight Begin

The week before Super Tuesday should see the GOP dumping its opposition research on McCain. (And there’s so much to mine.)

This anti-McCain ad is in one way quite brilliant:

The Republican base ought to hate this. But in another way it’s quite insidious. If McCain survives this sort of onslaught, it may make him more electable by making him seem less conservative.

Is that a bug or a feature?

(FWIW I think that McCain’s real weakness is character. One gets the feeling that too many people who know him personally think that he’s a wacko; and too often he talks like a warmonger.)

Edwards Pulls Out

It’s soon to be official: after his weak showing in Florida, John Edwards is pulling out of the race.

I guess that means I’m an Obama supporter now. Not that I couldn’t support Clinton, but I have enough doubt about the people she surrounds herself with and attracts — DLCers for example — that Obama seems a better bet.

I also think Obama will have an advantage in foreign relations, as he’ll be perceived as more of a clean slate than someone named Clinton. He’s been an opponent of the Iraq war from the start, and still has a better, clearer position than Clinton on ending the war and removing US troops from Iraq (even though Edwards’s position was better still). He’s better on telecoms issues too.

That said, on domestic issues there’s also much to like on paper about the Clinton candidacy as compared to Obama’s especially on health care. How much of that would survive contact with lobbyists and Republicans is the question.

Whoever it was who said that Obama is running as (Bill) Clinton and (Sen.) Clinton is running as Gore got it mostly right. I didn’t want either as my first choice; even if I get my third choice it is sure to be much better than the remaining alternatives.

And I hope Edwards becomes Attorney General. That would be something.

Election Returns

McCain wins over Romney, Rudy! crashes, Huckabee is reduced to “other”.

Look for Rudy! to endorse McCain tomorrow. The chance of a brokered convention just went down — but the intra-party dirt will really start to fly now.

Clinton crushed Obama but gets no delegates.

Both Amendment 1 (cutting property taxes) and Initiative 3 (more slot machines) passed. Sigh.

Will anyone remember this prediction a year from now?

A study done by Coral Gables-based Washington Economics Group for the pro-slots organization Yes for a Greater Miami-Dade said more than 6,400 jobs could be created by the machines in their first year of operation. The study projects $26 million in tax revenues will go to the county and the cities of Miami and Miami Gardens in the first year.

I doubt they’ll see that kind of money, although I’ll not bet against gamblers’ addictions, but I know there’s no way they’ll see a net increase in jobs anywhere near that size (they may displace a few, though).

Take the Train

It seems that if you take the train you might hear stuff: Open Left:: An Interesting Train Ride.

One interesting aspect of this story is that it probably never occurred to the main protagonist, a paleoconservative former US Senator, that any of the regular folks hearing him would have access to the sort of megaphone that blogging can give you.

And after all, if they were DC journalists, odds are good that they’re housebroken and would never write about it without permission.

Why Republicans Will Lose The Presidency In 2008

YouTube - Why Republicans Will Lose The Presidency In 2008

Well, that and the economy.

Jar Jar Kucinich et al

Not written by a nine year old (cf.): best of craigslist : Star Wars Guide to the Candidates.

Rangel Remains the Establishment Man

Anyone who read machine-pol-and-proud-of-it Rep. Charles B. Rangel’s autobiography (see Charlie Rangel’s “And I Haven’t Had a Bad Day Since”) would have predicted that Rangel Remains in Clinton’s Camp in Her Battle With Obama.

Huckabee Demonstrates His Brand of Moral Leadership

Demonstrating his brand of moral leadership, former Gov. Mike Huckabee showed how he believes a Bible-inspired Presidential aspirant should take a stand against long-time symbols of racism such as the flying of the Confederate flag on state property:

Huckabee Says Let SC Decide on Flag — Pressed later on whether he finds the flag offensive, Huckabee refused to give an opinion.

”It’s really not something that is an issue for the president of the United States; that’s an issue South Carolina would deal with,” Huckabee said at a news conference in Columbia, S.C.”

Even if one believes — as one well might — that federalism concerns make this a state issue as a legal matter, that doesn’t absolve national figures from offering moral leadership. Or from showing their true colors.

Squirrelly Politicians

Maybe I read too many blogs, but when I saw News That Stays News at Unqualified Offerings reporting,

Dr. Eric Weisman, a behavioral neurologist who practices in rural western Kentucky, reported in the distinguished British medical journal The Lancet that he has treated 11 people for Creutzfeldt-Jakob in four years, and all had eaten squirrel brains at some time.

… it triggered an instant association: I immediately thought of a recent Talking Points Memo item pointing to this video in which former Gov. Huckabee explained that while in college he used to use a popcorn popper to cook squirrels:

…only to find as I kept reading that The Poor Man thought of the connection first.

Al Franken's Fourth Grade Teacher Endorses Him

I love this campaign commercial by Al Franken, who’s running for Senate from Minnesota. It features his fourth grade teacher, Mrs. Molin:

Leader/Manager/Worker: An Analysis of Democratic Candidates' Speaking Styles

Here’s an interesting analysis of the three leading Democrats’ speaking styles: Group News Blog: Declaration - Request - Promise::Lead - Lobby - Legislate. It’s a long post, but here’s a taste of the key part:

Executive = Declarations: bring forth, generate something new, lead.
Manager = Requests: please do x by time y with condition of satisfaction.
Worker = Promises: deliver competent performance in a domain, over and over.

And never the twain shall meet.

Let’s walk it back to our Presidential candidates.

One speaks in declarations, inspires, leads.
The second requests you elect him to fix problems, lobbies for a change so he can fix the system.
The third talks of her competence and experience, promises she will do what she’s always done, and has the policy plans and papers to prove it.

Leader. Manager. Worker.

Obama is breaking out now because he speaks the language of a leader.

Obama’s vision is true right now.

Watch him at the 100 Club Dinner in New Hampshire.

He’s not making promises, even when the words coming out of his mouth are a promise. ALL of everything he’s saying is a declaration, a future which is true now because he speaks it.

Edwards, he argues, uses the language of a manager: I can fix things, but only if you elect me. So it’s a request, rather than a declaration. Clinton users the language of a worker, promising competence and skill. But these are promises while Obama says it it and makes it so.

I’m not sure if I’m convinced, but it’s interesting.

The Republican Debates According to a 9-Year Old

According to a Daily Kos diarist, this is a genuine 9-year old’s rendition of yesterday’s Republican debate. Apparently, it was too hard for the poor kid to keep track of the names, so he recorded the participants as “Sarge, Wrinkles, Bunny Ears, Oily, Beagle Eyes and Carrot Face.”

Read it and see if you can guess which is which…

Is Obama This Generation's JFK?

Is Obama this generation’s JFK?

Or is he our Gene McCarthy?

The talk of “change” both generational and otherwise, of unity, the youth candidate angle, the ability to inspire, the number of more-right-wing-than-you-might-imagine political positions, can be spun any number of ways.

History doesn’t have to repeat itself, but it has a habit of doing so. And the JFK story — whatever you make of his politics — ends in tragedy.

techPresident's Favorite Videos of 2007: The Candidates

Here’s another good top-10 list: techPresident’s Favorite Videos of 2007: The Candidates.

I agree with seven of these as top-quality, although the actual rankings seem a bit random. I wouldn’t have made #1 the top choice or necessarily included it at all. Not that it’s a bad video, but is it really top-10 material, much less #1? And what’s with #9? (And #8 is a good clip, but it’s not a campaign video at all.)

As for my top choice, I might have put Bill Richardson’s ad as #1—certainly in the top 3. It’s much better than the candidate, who looks worse the more you see of him.

The Internet Is a Giant 'Topping' Exercise

When I took Theater Studies 100 as a college freshman, one of the exercises we did was a “topping” exercise. You had to tell a story, and somewhere in it you had to show that something was even MORE than you first realized (the fish was big, really big, really really really big — I mean BIG, humongously big, elephantinely big, giant big, Tokyo-stomping-monster big…it was so big I couldn’t finish it).

Well, it just struck me that the Internet is a giant topping exercise. Whenever you find a weird video (or whatever), there’s always a weirder one. This one stars Mike Gravel, so it has a head start, but it makes the most of it.

(spotted via Scholars & Rogues)

Then again, one of the many points of the topping exercise was that you often make a point stronger by being quieter. Does that work on the Internet?

Friday Fun: Let's Daydream About the GOP Convention

Booman Tribune is having some fun daydreaming about the GOP convention:

If John McCain does not emerge as the Republican nominee, there’s a good likelihood that the GOP is going to be in for a long, strange ride. Let’s walk though this.

…

[If there is] a Huckabee win in Iowa, then Romney will likely prevail in the Granite State. We could easily see McCain, Thompson, and Duncan Hunter drop out after New Hampshire or South Carolina. We could see Giuliani drop out after Florida. And we’ll be left with Huckabee, Romney, and Ron Paul. And Ron Paul will have enough money to compete everywhere on Super Duper Tuesday, while Huckabee will not, and Romney will have to spend his own fortune.

Even in this scenario, I do not expect Ron Paul to win the nomination, or even any states (although he could win a couple). But he could easily rack up a fifth of the available delegates in a three-way race. Imagine the Republican convention if Ron Paul has the third biggest block of delegates.

Let’s go even further here. Assuming that Romney’s delegates are more Mormon than his overall universe of support and that Huckabee’s delegates are more Southern Baptist than his overall universe of support, and that Ron Paul’s delegates are…well…the most enthusiastic and dedicated of Ron Paul’s supporters…the Minneapolis conventions is going to be a assembly of the cultural fringe.

Just imagine the platform fights!

I Like It

John Edwards’s holiday ad has a bit of a sting to it:

I like it. But then I’m probably biased: although I think there are several Democrats who’d make a good President, I think that on the issues I’m probably most in agreement with Edwards. I just wish I had more faith in the quality of his organization — who you come into power with has proved to matter almost as much as who you are. (From that point of view, Obama may have a small edge; Clinton has the most carefully tuned machine — but is it tuned to the right pitch?)

I used to say that I had a lot of trouble swallowing Edwards’s views on trade. I’m still dubious of his protectionist instincts, but I think that the trade deals — especially some of the bilaterals — we’ve entered into in the past few years are on balance not good for us or for our counter parties. They seem designed to lock in certain ideas of industrial structure, labor relations, and other (anti)social policies in order to put them outside the reach of democratic processes. So while I may not agree with Edwards’s philosophy here, many of his specific criticisms seem more on target now than they did four years ago.

More Weird Ron Paul Videos

Ron Paul videos really are different. This one, Ron Paul Girl - Register Now, was apparently produced a couple of months ago, but it really is one of the odder videos of the year. And there’s many more by the “Ron Paul Girl”.

Huckabee!

Dear Republicans,

Oh, please nominate Huckabee, please. I’m sure this video is only the beginning.

Yrs &tc.

Update (12/15): Opinions differ.

What Do the GOP Candidates Think of Bush

This seems to be promote-Dan-day or something, but be sure to see the great questions at
Rating Bush, on a scale of 1 to 10:

Republican candidates avoid talking about President Bush, for obvious reasons. But journalists should press them to say what they think of Bush’s legacy, which elements of his presidency they would emulate, and which they would reject.

And then he has a little list…

More Campaign Ad Parodies

Two more ad parodies:

Kinda funny: Rudy Giuliani Ad Parody: For The Ladies and not so funny: Hillary’s Open Letter To Obama.

But other people seem to like them more than I do.

Romney's Orwellian View of Freedom

I used to say that I could see Romney as the least bad of the Republican candidates. Surely no principles was better than bad ones?

I may have to reconsider. On the one matter where one has to assume he is least likely to lie to us, the place of religion in public life, former Gov. Romney has some very strange views, such as: “Freedom requires religion just as religion requires freedom.”

The clearest statement I’ve seen of the problem may be slacktivist, Mitt vs. atheists, martyrs,

Let’s deal with the latter assertion first: “religion requires freedom.” There are far too many counter-examples for this to be true. Think of China, where the government denies religious freedom to millions of Christians and Falun Gong adherents and Tibetan Buddhists. Yet despite this lack of freedom, despite this active oppression — and, in a way, in response to this oppression — these faiths are all thriving. ….

“Freedom requires religion,” Romney said. Had he said, “Freedom requires religious freedom,” then I would agree, absolutely. Try to imagine if you can a society in which people were denied this most intimate of freedoms, the freedom of conscience, yet remained in all other respects free. Such a thing is impossible. This is part of the genius of the First Amendment:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Take away any one of those freedoms and you take away the others as well. Each of those freedoms requires the others.

But Romney did not say that freedom requires religious freedom. He said, “Freedom requires religion.” And that’s a contradictory statement — a very different, and very frightening, thing.

If freedom requires religion, then the a-religious and irreligious, the non-religious and un-religious are the enemies of freedom. Romney believes, in other words, that atheism is incompatible with freedom. Whatever it is he means by “religious liberty,” he does not believe it can safely be applied to atheists.

Don’t get me wrong: I have no problem at all with devout candidates. I respect people who want to actualize their faith — just as long as in their public life they put the First Amendment first, and don’t try any back-door establishment of religion. Thus, I respect, but disagree with, people who say abortion is murder and wish to change the law to protect what they see as unborn people. I also disagree pretty strongly with people who want use state power to enforce their versions of morality, but I often do understand where they are coming from — even though I think that many of these efforts have serious constitutional difficulties and wish they were much more sensitive to these issues.

I don’t respect people who want to create special programs whose real purpose is to funnel money to churches (although I don’t mind at all having churches compete on a level playing field for federal funds so long as they observe the rules that apply to all recipients of federal money).

But I also respect (and would rather vote for) people whose faith — be it religious or secular — leaves more scope for individual choice and autonomy on most questions of morality.

Mitt Romney’s position that atheists are or should be second-class citizens hearkens back to an old American idea, mostly abandoned in the Enlightenment period, that the irreligious were fundamentally untrustworthy because without a fear of Hell they could not be trusted to keep their oaths.

It’s deeply depressing to consider that a major GOP candidate who is 200 years behind the times may still seem modern when part of a field that seems anxious to compete on who is more for torture of more detainees, and who has the cruelest plan for deporting and deterring undocumented workers.

Oh, wait. He’s campaigning as just as much a troglodyte as most of the others. Romney thinks we should double the size of the Guantanamo prison camp. I suppose that since Romney thinks Muslims are unfit for top government jobs this shouldn’t be totally surprising.

Race to the bottom. Dragging us down with it.

Strangest Obama Video

I understand that the Obama campaign is worried about the GOP whispering campaign that his name is really “Osama” and/or that he’s a closet Muslim, but is a video making people think he is a Hindu really going to help matters?

Found via: e.politics: online advocacy tools & tactics » Barack Obama Bollywood Video Editing Software = Genius

And yes, I am kidding.

Something New About Mitt and Mormonism

One of the few genuinely interesting and original things I’ve read in the torrent of words pouring out about Gov. Romney’s promise to give a speech about the so-called Mormonism issue, is Nate Oman’s Thoughts from the Anvil: Mitt, Mormonism, and American Religious Politics. Go read it.

Unlike Oman, I sure don’t have anything interesting to say. Personally, the man’s religion is not an issue for me. (The lying and apparent plasticity of principles on the other hand….) The timing seems very tactical, a response to dropping poll numbers. It’s a speech I think Romney would rather not give, since many GOP primary voters don’t believe in the separation of church and state at all — they want the state to enforce morality and subsidize their faith based activities and perhaps even their established churches. The general election voter, on the other hand, is a more diverse and discerning breed, and not so willing to have protectors of the faith, thought police, mullahs, or whatever, patrolling the virtual and actual streets. But you knew all that.

Giuliani Campaign Ad Parody

Click here if you can’t see the video.

Kudos (Again) to Sen. Dodd

via techPresident: Dodd Breaks the Frame, Asks YouTube Question of GOPers

Finally, a presidential candidate has seized the opportunity presented by the CNN/YouTube debates … it looks like the creative minds at Chris Dodd’s campaign—which has already distinguished itself with a string of web innovations—were paying attention. A few days ago, they posted this question from Senator Dodd for this Wednesday’s Republican CNN/YouTube event:

Direct link to video.

Giuliani's Campaign Theme

TPMtv: I’m Rudy Giuliani and I Approve This Message:

Ron Paul's TV Ads Mirror His Prospects

Ron Paul, the anarcho-libertarian running for President as a Republican, has two TV ads running in New Hampshire. One of them is really stilted and awful:

But the other ad isn’t bad:

Given that Ron Paul’s supporters raised over $3 million for him yesterday — apparently without much help from the campaign — it looks like he’ll be able to buy some serious air time in New Hampshire.

Quirky, ultra-right-wing anti-state and anti-tax New Hampshire one of the few states where Rep. Paul might actually do quite well. Let’s hear it for a brokered Republican convention!

Is There an ABC Candidate?

For the past week or two I’ve been musing about writing something about why John Edwards’s organizational imperfections were going to keep him — despite his good ideas and good speeches — from winning the race to be the “ABC” candidate, that is the person around whom all the “anyone but Clinton” factions would coalesce. My hypothesis was that things were getting to the point where, even though stately, boring, Senator Dodd had somehow turned into a fire-breather, the timing of early primaries and the need for serious campaign cash, all meant that Senator Barak Obama had become the only realistic contender for the ABC title. And even for him, time was running short.

Seems like the folks in the Obama camp were thinking something similar. But their reaction to that tactical observation has been so incredibly, well, stupid, that you have to wonder if there will even be an ABC candidate at all. Among the silly things were Obama’s speech in which he promised to attack Senator Clinton, rather than actually doing much of it, and the inept ‘gospel tour’ of South Carolina.

Could it be, however, that these are not errors of execution, but the inevitable results of a fundamental strategic error on Obama’s part? That’s the surprisingly convincing argument of the observant Chris Bowers in his provocatively titled Obama Campaign Post-Mortem.

So here’s my question, if Obama isn’t going to be the ABC candidate, is there anyone who can grab the mantle and make this a horse race, or is it over already?

Debasement of Discourse

Must not let this go without notice.

Via Crooks and Liars, Peronist Rudy Giuliani exposes his moral relativism about torture: it’s ok when we do it.

At a town-hall meeting in Iowa last night, Rudy Giuliani did his best impression of a crazy person.

After noting that Giuliani ally Michael Mukasey, the Attorney General nominee, “fudged” his answer on waterboarding, a local woman asked if a presudebt can order waterboarding, even though it’s torture.

Mr. Giuliani responded: “Okay. First of all, I don’t believe the attorney general designate in any way was unclear on torture. I think Democrats said that; I don’t think he was.”

Ms. Gustitus said: “He said he didn’t know if waterboarding is torture.”

Mr. Giuliani said: “Well, I’m not sure it is either. I’m not sure it is either. It depends on how it’s done. It depends on the circumstances. It depends on who does it.

I don’t know if he’s crazy, but he’s certainly dangerous: Rudy ♥ Torture.

Previous related post: Giuliani’s irrational hatred of ferrets.

Blowing It

When candidates asked about an important issue find themselves unwilling or unable to give a shorter and clearer answer than Joe Biden, they have a problem.

Both Senators Clinton and Obama have a problem this week.

Senator Dodd has drawn a line in the sand and promised to filibuster any bill that gives retroactive immunity to telecoms companies who conspired with government agents to spy on us illegally. (Leave aside the question of whether the sloppy language also retrospectively immunizes illegal black bag jobs.)

Asked if he would support Dodd’s filibuster, Joe Biden, a notoriously long-winded speaker, gave the following extended answer, which I quote in full:

Yes.

Compare that to Clinton and Obama’s game playing, per Glenn Greenwald.

Update: Sen. Obama has come up with a clear statement:

“To be clear: Barack will support a filibuster of any bill that includes retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies.”

Digging for the Details in Sen. Clinton's Health Care Plan

Ian Welsh at The Agonist has the best questions I’ve seen about HilaryCare 2.0.

They’re at Questioning the Hillary Health Care Plan.

I will say this: I think Ezra Klein is exactly right: if we get any sort of national health care plan of any value out of the next administration, whoever is running it, a good chunk of the credit belongs to the man who forced people to talk about it in a meaningful, detailed way: John Edwards.

Rudy Sees Red

MoveOn seems to have got Rudy Guliani’s goat. And all it took was the truth.

Best Giuliani Takedown Video

The REAL Rudy: Command Center video — probably the best Rudy Giuliani takedown video ever.

Pretty Picture

Can’t say I think it will happen, but it would be great if it did. (The other way round would be quite interesting too, although it’s a little harder to see Edwards agreeing to it.)