Vote '08

OBAMA-JACKSON
Jackson apologizes for comments about Obama

CHICAGO (AP) - The Reverend Jesse Jackson says he’s “very sorry” for comments he made about Barack Obama during what he thought was a private conversation with a reporter.
Jackson tells The Associated Press he doesn’t remember “exactly” what he said after a Sunday interview about health care with a Fox News reporter when asked his opinion about Obama speaking in black churches.
Jackson says the comments were “a side light in a broader conversation about urban disparities.”
He issued a written statement Wednesday apologizing “for any harm or hurt that this hot mic private conversation may have caused.”
He says his support for Obama’s campaign is “wide, deep and unequivocal.”

What did he say? Oh, I’m not gonna go there. You can find it on the internets if you try a little.

Not gonna spend too much time on this as it’s quite the non-story .. except to say that this is nothing but a plus for Obama. He will win points with anyone considering him who doesn’t like Jesse Jackson, & lose support from … well, no one, actually.

What do you think?

UPDATE: Dan Balz of the Washington Post explains why this is such a boon to Obama:

“Obama did not have to rebuke an important constituency himself to define himself as different from the Jackson-Sharpton wing of the Democratic Party. Being attacked by Jackson was more than enough to get across the point. Whatever people may know or think they know about Obama, they can no longer mistake him as a direct descendant of old-style black politics.”

Totally non-important PostScript: This is a true story. In the summer of 1992 I was an intern at CNN in Washington, D.C. It was a pretty menial & somewhat pointless exercise but I did manage to have a lot of brushes with celebrities. As interns, we were instructed never to approach any of the famous “talent,” & at the time Jesse Jackson was in that group, hosting a show called “Both Sides with Jesse Jackson.” One day he interviewed Ross Perot, who that summer was giving both George H.W. Bush & Bill Clinton a run for their money. So just to say I did, I waited at the outside courtyard in front of the CNN studios to shake Perot’s hand (for the record, I was not a fan of Perot, but it was hard to pass up the opportunity). So finally Perot walks out of the building with Jesse Jackson all alone. No guards or assistants, just them. The height difference was remarkable. I believe Jackson is about 6′ 4″ or so & Perot stands about 4′ 10″ (just a guess). I approached them both, & remembering my earlier edict about not approaching “talent,” I said to Mr. Perot, “Mr. Perot I’m a big fan! Can I shake your hand?” He said “You’re very kind” & shook my hand & gave me an autograph. Jackson said nothing. I hope he didn’t take it personally - I just didn’t want to get in trouble if he saw me later.

Anyway, that was my brush with Jesse Jackson & Ross Perot. At the very least the above news story has given me a chance to tell that tale.

     TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Iran’s president says there’s no chance of a war with the United States or Israel. But Iran appears to be turning up the heat a bit.
      State television reports the Revolutionary Guards have tested nine new long- and medium-range missiles during war games. One of them has a range of 1,250 miles, which is within striking distance of Israel.
      The report describing missile tests comes a day after President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (ah-muh-DEE’-neh-zhahd) played down the risk of war as he visited a summit of developing Muslim nations in Malaysia.
      It also comes about a month after Israel’s military sent warplanes over the eastern Mediterranean. U.S. officials said at the time the military exercise could possibly be a rehearsal for a strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

McCain’s response:

“Iran’s most recent missile tests demonstrate again the dangers it poses to its neighbors and to the wider region, especially Israel. Ballistic missile testing coupled with Iran’s continued refusal to cease its nuclear activities should unite the international community in efforts to counter Iran’s dangerous ambitions. Iran’s missile tests also demonstrate the need for effective missile defense now and in the future, and this includes missile defense in Europe as is planned with the Czech Republic and Poland. Working with our European and regional allies is the best way to meet the threat posed by Iran, not unilateral concessions that undermine multilateral diplomacy.”

Obama’s response: 

On NBC’s “Today:”

Said the U.S. must respond with “aggressive diplomacy” to Iranian missile tests, called for possible U.S. divestment of Iranian holdings. Said he doesn’t understand complaints he has shifted to the center, saying he has consistently supported faith-based initiatives and the death penalty for acts such as child rape, and that he would “obviously” listen to military commanders in Iraq.

On ABC’s “Good Morning America”:

Called Iran “a grave threat,” expressed disapproval of higher U.S. exports to the country. Asked about potential Israeli strike against Iran, said “Israel always has the right to protect itself from serious threats, and Iran is a serious threat.” On Iraq, said his position has been “crystal clear” and has not changed. Mentioned economic agenda for women, criticized McCain for not supporting reversal of Supreme Court decision on gender pay discrimination.

On CBS’ “Early Show”:

Again endorsed direct diplomacy with Iran. On Iraq, said “I have been entirely consistent that we are going to end this war when I’m president.” Repeated assertion he has not changed position on gun control, the death penalty and other issues. On the recent trouble aboard his campaign plane, said “When you fly as much as I do, some of this stuff’s going to happen.”

As you might expect, energy is the hottest subject of the latest round of ads from both sides.

1st up, an ad called “Balance” from the Republican National Committee comparing McCain’s & Obama’s ads. (Note: the RNC, unlike McCain, can receive unlimited contributions)

Here’s ad from McCain that addresses economic insecurities, called “Jobs for America:”

Obama has a new ad that doesn’t shirk from his stance on energy policy. This one’s called “New Energy:”

Here’s an ad from the Senate Republicans Conference (not to be confused with the National Republican Senatorial Commitee) that also hammers home the “drill! drill! drill!” message. Tennessee Senator Lamar Alexander appears briefly.

Now another one from McCain, that addresses baby boomers & leans toward the biographical, called “Love.” Note how he “tweaks” the Obama campaign, with the announcer saying ‘hope’ in a way that you can hear quotes around them:

Upon watching this, I noted the the line “when offered early release, he said no,” & wondered if the role McCain’s father played in his prisonerhood will ever be mentioned by the campaign. Did you realize that his father was commander of U.S. operations in the Pacific during the Vietnam War? That’s why his captors considered him such a high-value bargaining chip, & was the reason he was offered an early release. I asked several people in the newsroom if they were aware of this fact & they said no.

MSNBC’s Chuck Todd has some interesting analysis on this ad:

*** Talkin’ ’bout my generation: The TV ad the McCain campaign unveiled yesterday, which invokes the divisive decade of the 1960s, is just another reminder how big a role the generational divide could be in this election. One thing worth pointing out: Perhaps not surprisingly, McCain is over-performing with older voters, while Obama is over-performing among younger ones. According to exit polls, Bush won the 65-and-older crowd by five points (52%-47%) in 2004 and three points (50%-47%) in 2000. But in last month’s NBC/WSJ poll, McCain was leading Obama among this group by seven (48%-41%). Meanwhile, Kerry won the 18-to-29 set by nine points in 2004 (54%-45%), and Gore won them by two in 2000 (48%-46%). Obama? The NBC/WSJ poll had him up 13 points (53%-40%) among those 18 to 34. Also of note: Kerry lost the 30-to-44 crowd in 2004 (53%-46%), as did Gore in 2000 (49%-48%). Yet in our poll, Obama was leading among those 35 to 49 by four points (44%-40%).

…

*** One more thought on the ad: Yesterday’s release of the new McCain bio spot signals a turning point in the McCain message — that everything they do from here on out will be an attempt to make this election a referendum on Obama. The new ad, while appearing biographical in nature, is contrast heavy with Obama. Many Republicans were pushing for McCain to accept the fact that this wasn’t going to be about him, that he had to do something to shift the focus from Bush to Obama. Let’s see if they stick to this.

Finally, from the Republican National Committee, criticizing Obama’s Iraq plan:

It’s Republican heavy, I realize, but that’s just what’s out there now.

So what do you think of these ads? Which one is the most effective? Let us know by posting a comment!

What’s the first word that comes to your mind when you hear the word “Obama” or “McCain?”

The AP is out with a new poll that has the answer:

My answer for both candidates is, of course, “blog-material.”

How would you answer the question? Let us know by posting a comment!

Yes, & that’s actually a good thing.

Click here for a post we wrote all the way back on February 1st, 2008, 28 years ago, & see that we had been critical of both Clinton & Obama’s stances on Iraq. It’s not realistic to promise that we’ll be out in 16 months, & that promise smacks of pure political pandering.

Obama has drawn fire from McCain’s camp for apparent “flip-flopping,” but in actuality his announcement that he will adapt his plan to “facts on the ground” based on advice from military commanders on the ground is merely a step towards reality. & there is no doubt in our minds that McCain will also pursue a more realistic, less-beholden-to-ideology style of military pragmatism, the lack of which got us into the mess we’re in today. Why are we seeing success in Iraq these past few months? Because we’re adapting to whatever facts are presented to us on the ground. We’re not “refusing to talk to our enemies,” but rather convincing our enemies through deeds, not just words, that we’re the side they should be on. If only we could apply this to our entire current foreign policy.

The Washington Post’s editorial today on the matter is generally how we feel about it:

“In fact, Mr. Obama can’t afford not to update his Iraq policy. Once he has the conversations he’s promising with U.S. commanders, he will have plenty of information that “contradicts the notion” of his rigid plan. Iraq’s improvement means that American forces probably can be reduced next year, but it would be folly to begin a forced march out of the country without regard to the risks of renewed sectarian warfare and escalating intervention in the country by Iran and other of Iraq’s neighbors.”

But what about you? What do you think? 

Here’s the current Gallup standing between Obama & McCain:

How does that compare with past presidential contests after the 4th?

Details (as always, with pictures!) after the jump from an article in Politico titled “Past July 4 Polls Promising for Obama:”

(more…)

Tom Bevan of RealClearPolitics.com recently interviewed Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen about Tennessee’s role in the presidential campaign, & about the inroads Obama still needs to make.

Read the interview in full after the jump.

(more…)

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AP) - Barack Obama is urging Americans to find a way to help make the American dream a reality not just for themselves, but for all.
His call to service is part of a flag-draped week focused on God, country, veterans and freedom.
The Democratic presidential candidate told a University of Colorado crowd that loving your country shouldn’t just mean watching Independence Day fireworks.
As Obama describes it, the problem isn’t that Americans aren’t willing to serve. It’s that they haven’t been asked aggressively enough or given enough opportunities. He recalled that Americans eager to pitch in after the Nine-Eleven attacks were merely “asked to shop.”
Obama plans to offer repeated calls for American sacrifice as president and expand government national service programs. Besides expanding the Peace Corps and Americorps, Obama proposes creating a “Green Vet Initiative.” It would offer counseling, job placement and mediation with industry for veterans wanting to enter the growing renewable energy field.

Obama’s not the only one saying this; here’s what McCain has said recently about national service:

This is a call with which many Americans from the so-called “Greatest Generation” are familiar:

Now contrast those calls to all Americans for service & sacrifice with this one, from 2006:

CHICAGO (AP) - Barack Obama is unveiling his plans to expand President Bush’s program steering federal social service dollars to religious groups.
      In remarks obtained by The Associated Press for delivery today in Zanesville, Ohio, Obama says the challenges are “simply too big for government to solve alone.”
      David Kuo — a conservative Christian who was deputy director of Bush’s Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives — says Obama’s proposal “is a massive deal.”
      But Obama’s support for letting religious charities that receive federal funding consider religion in employment decisions could bring protests from within his own party.
      The Reverend Barry Lynn, who heads Americans United for Separation of Church and State, says the Bush administration’s faith-based program “ought to be shut down, not continued.”
      Obama is also proposing a 500-million-dollar-per-year program to provide summer learning for 1 million poor children to help close achievement gaps with white and wealthier students.

Read more about the plan here, at the Chicago Tribune, at the Chicago Tribune, & read more about Obama’s feelings on faith in general here,  at his website (PDF file).

What do you think?

(above: waterfall at Old Stone Fort Park in Manchester)

This article’s a hoot, & examines some of the questions we asked its subject, Bill Hobbs of the Tennessee GOP, last week:

“What is in the Water in Anti-Obama Tennessee?”

by Sam Stein, the Huffington Post

There has been some lament within conservative circles over the absence of a clearly defined attack machine to take on Barack Obama. T. Boone Pickens, the financier of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth effort, has pledged, at this juncture, to sit the election out. Republican insiders have worried about a lack of funds, and a public relations backlash that comes with launching such ads.

There has, however, been one organization at least nominally willing to step into this attack-politik void. And it isn’t one of the much-discussed discussed 527 variety.

The Republican Party of Tennessee has, on several occasions, trotted out lines of criticism against Obama that put them further down that road than even Karl Rove - the vaunted campaign attack alchemist - has been willing to go. The state’s GOP released a press release in late February, accusing the Democratic nominee of being anti-Israel, linking him to Louis Farrakhan, and featuring a photo of the Senator in African garb for good measure.

Nearly two months later, the party began circulating a video of Michelle Obama saying that she was proud of her country for the first time in her adult life, followed by a montage of Tennesseans discussing the essence of their patriotism (including, conspicuously, a guy at a pool table with a rack of guns behind him).

The attacks on the Obama have not been the strict purview of the state’s GOP party. A local conservative radio talk show host has been called out for consistently using Obama’s middle name - “Hussein” - on the air, while a member of Tennessee’s Democratic Executive Committee was forced to apologize recently after suggesting that Obama may have terrorist connections.

Taken together, these episodes constitute some of the most inflammatory rhetoric of the early campaign season and raise a fairly curious question: what is in the water in Tennessee?

“It is all over the rural parts of Tennessee,” said a Democratic source from the state. “And it’s not just Republicans. I took that temperature a few months ago and the Democratic Party warned me that even some Democratic officials were believing viral smears about Obama.”

Much of the Republican bile directed Obama’s way has come, observers say, from the state GOP’s communications director Bill Hobbs. A conservative activist and quasi-journalist, Hobbs is known as a somewhat controversial figure. In February 2006 he resigned from Belmont University in Nashville, where he was serving in the communications department, after posting a cartoon of a stick-figured Prophet Mohammed holding a bomb. The drawing, entitled “Mohammed Blows,” was meant to spotlight the media’s unwillingness to publish the infamous Danish cartoons on Islam.

The firing did not dissuade the Tennessee GOP from offering Hobbs a job, nor did it dissuade Hobbs from pushing the political envelop, which he has done with regularity since taking over the new post.

“I think that [Michelle Obama] video, which we put up on YouTube, struck a nerve. It struck a nerve with Democrats and they squealed and they squealed really loud, and it caused a big storm in the media,” he told the Huffington Post. As for whether a candidate’s wife should be off limits, he added, “It doesn’t matter if the campaign surrogate is married to the candidate or not. What campaign surrogates say on the campaign trail during the course of the campaign is fair game.”

But not everyone has been on board. And the reaction to Hobb’s work has become a telling illustration of just how difficult it has been for conservatives to settle on a line of attack against Obama. Tennessee’s two Republican Senators expressed reservations, with a staffer for Bob Corker demanding that the Michelle Obama spot be taken down, and a spokesman for Lamar Alexander suggesting that “there are probably better ways to communicate our pride in America.”

“You’ve got the more centrist, moderate Republicans who are frankly embarrassed by Hobbs,” said Ken Whitehouse, a political reporter for the Nashville Post. “I’ve got Republican members of the state legislature who are biding their time, keeping their mouth shut, but don’t like what he’s doing because he is drawing attention to himself and not the message. But at the same time you have people who want to fight and love him for it.”

Indeed, it has been rumored that Karl Rove warned the state’s party directors not to use Obama’s middle name (to insinuate that he is a Muslim) for fear that the GOP would be seen as bigots — which, if true, puts Bush’s brain in a milder camp than some of the state’s conservative figures. And yet, it was a Tennessee Democrat who made such an insinuation.

A few weeks ago, former state Rep. Fred Hobbs suggested that Obama “may be terrorist-connected,” based on a Fox News report about a Hamas “endorsement.” The remark drew a sort of perplexed and outraged response. (A Democratic superdelegate from the state, Lincoln Davis, declared through an aide that while “he does not know for sure if Obama is terrorist connected…he assumes he is not.”) Fred Hobbs quickly apologized while Bill Hobbs (not related) pounced on the Democratic dysfunction: “It is interesting to see that the state party claims to be unified behind Barack Obama but it is clearly not true.”

More objective sources were forced to insist that (polling be damned) the state was not inherently anti-Obama. But even they admit that the rhetoric emanating from their state, at least so far, has represented the greatest pushing of political boundaries.

“That came out of left field,” Whitehouse said of Fred Hobbs’ comment. “You are going to have people associated with every party and every state in the nation, you will have people like that. I don’t think it is a cultural thing… Does it look bad for Tennessee that both guys named Hobbs are doing this? Yes it looks bad. It is embarrassing as hell. But I don’t think these guys represent what mainstream Tennesseans believe.”

I do take umbrage at the writer’s apparent painting of many Tennesseans with one stripe, particularly with the way the headline is written. Yes, there is an audience in the Volunteer State that is receptive to this type of political play, but it seems that the article is far more about Hobbs & his methods than the entire state.

What do you think of this article? Post a comment & tell us!

Speaking in Independence Missouri today, Barack Obama addressed the issue of patriotism. Watch the speech in full up above. Or if you prefer, read the full text after the jump.

& PLEASE comment! We’d love to hear your take!

(more…)