What can the GOP do to recover?

Here’s what some conservatives are saying:

George Will:

Although John McCain’s loss was not as numerically stunning as the 1964 defeat of Barry Goldwater, who won 16 fewer states and 122 fewer electoral votes than McCain seems to have won as of this writing, Tuesday’s trouncing was more dispiriting for conservatives. Goldwater’s loss was constructive; it invigorated his party by reorienting it ideologically. McCain’s loss was sterile, containing no seeds of intellectual rebirth.

John Henke, TheNextRight.com:

Some of you will say “we have learned our lesson“, and then try to pass off cosmetic changes as Reform. You are the problem.

Some of you will say “Republicans need to fight/hold Democrats accountable“, as if it is sufficient to be against Democrats. The pendulum may eventually swing back to you, but you won’t know what to do with it.

Some of you will say “Republicans need to carry our message to the American people“, as if the problem is that Republicans haven’t been saying “tax cuts and limited government” loudly enough. The problem is not the inability to communicate; the problem is that you have no idea how to actually deliver on those ideas.

Others will say “Republicans need to be more principled“, as if the problem is a mere lack of personal courage and principle by Republicans. Even the best people can’t limit government if there is not an effective strategy for implementation - for getting “from here to there”. You don’t need better people. You need a better strategy.

Patrick Ruffini:

People have been focusing on whether the youth vote was up. It was — slightly: going from 17 to 18 percent. But the real story about the youth vote is not how many “new” voters Obama got to show up. It’s how he produced a gargantuan 25% swing among existing young voters, or those who were sure to vote for the first time anyway.

How big?

18 percent times a 25 percent increase in the Democratic margin equals 4.5 points, or a majority of Obama’s popular vote margin. Had the Democratic 18-29 vote stayed the same as 2004’s already impressive percentage, Obama would have won by about 2 points, and would not have won 73 electoral votes from Florida, Ohio, North Carolina, or Indiana.

So, to clarify here: Obama’s youth margin = 73 electoral votes. Without the economic crisis, this would have been the difference.

Above: NewsChannel9’s Derek Dellinger speaks with Zach Wamp.

Just 5 Days to Go!

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***Reminder: TODAY’s your LAST DAY to vote early in Tennessee & FRIDAY is your LAST DAY to vote early in Georgia!***

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Straddling the Eras of Slavery & Black Presidential Candidates

Above: 109 year old Texas resident Amanda Jones, daughter of a slave, who just cast her vote for Barack Obama for President.

Regardless of whom you hope will win the White House, this truly is an amazing achievement for our country.

Obama in the Sunshine State

[scroll down to see Biden, McCain & Palin]

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Are Late-Undecided Voters McCain’s ‘Lifeboat?’

Dick Morris thinks the answer is yes.

Nate Silver thinks the answer is no.

This article takes a look at last-week undecided trends from past elections.

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Palin Stumps in Rush’s Hometown

..that would be Cape Girardeau, Missouri. Scroll down to see McCain in Ohio.

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Biden, Like Palin, in the Show-Me State

[Scroll down to see Sarah Palin & John McCain.]

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Can He Keep His Mouth Shut Until Tuesday?

The Politico weighs the pros & cons of Biden’s contributions to the campaign trail.

Also: the Obama campaign tries to clarify Biden’s “mark my words” comment in a new ad:

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Racism Knows No Party

Read examples of racism from the left this election season here.

But whatever you do, don’t pigeonhole rednecks:

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TR’s a Socialist!!!

Read a letter to the New York Times from 1908 that brands McCain’s favorite president with his current favorite perjorative for his opponent.

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Pro-McCain Robocalls Now Hitting Homes in…Arizona

Read more about it here.

Is McCain really in that much trouble in his home state? Check the average of polls here. The Obama camp claims their internal polls are tightening.

Personally, I don’t think he’s going to lose his home state. But it may be the ultimate margin of victory that McCain’s trying to manipulate.

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McCain Ad: He’s Not Ready…Yet

What’s with the “yet” in this ad? Bob Cesca has a theory.

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Is Palin Looking Down the Road to 2012?

It would appear so, based on the clip above. A loss will have the conventional wisdom coronating her as the 2012 front-runner. However, there may be a few in the GOP who have been holding their tongues until after the ballots have been cast.

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Pizza Politics

From Domino’s Pizza, via Marc Ambinder. I sent this out to the newsroom & got a funny response from operations engineer John Creel, whose text below is in red:

Republicans

— Spend more per order than other consumers.

(*WITH THE OIL MONEY PROFITS WE CAN SPEND MORE.)

— They rely on credit cards to pay more than other consumers.

(*DOESN’T EVERYBODY’S HAVE A AMERICAN EXPRESS GOLD CARD.)

– They tend to order two large pizzas at a time, and they’re usually
specialty pizzas.

(*EVERYTHING WORTH HAVING COMES IN 2′S. WE ALL GOTTA PAIR DON’T WE.)
– They are more likely to order online, and more likely to pick up their
orders.

(*LIMOS ARE GREAT FOR PICKING UP PIZZAS, ESPECIALLY WHEN LOBBYIST ARE
BUYING.)

Democrats

— Rely on delivery more than Republicans.

(*DELIVERY BOY IS A JUST A GUY TRYING TO MAKE A BUCK. WE’RE SPREADING THE WEALTH WITH HIM.)

– Pay cash more than other consumers.

(*CREDIT CARDS LEAVE A PAPER TRAIL TO FOLLOW. WE DON’T LIKE ANYTHING TRACEABLE BACK TO US.)

– Like more variety with their orders, opting for side items, chicken and
beverages more than Republicans.

(*WE LIKE OUR PIZZA LIKE OUR POLITICS … LOTS OF VARIETY.)

(*REPUBLICANS CALL THE SIDE ITEMS PORK, BUT WE PUT THEM ON OUR
CONGRESSIONAL BILLS AND VOTERS LOVE THEM.)

Funny stuff, John! Thanks!

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‘Joe’ a No-Show

Oops. Maybe he was recording his album?

More from McCain’ speech in Defiance, Ohio:

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North Carolina Senate Race Gets Ugly

The ad above may be remembered as one of the worst in the country for the year 2008. It’s also a sign of how much trouble Elizabeth Dole finds herself in. The worst part about the ad is the woman saying “there is no God” at the end which is NOT Kay Hagan, Dole’s opponent. No politician who has integrity - on either side of the aisle - would do something like that.

…but how much of the ad is true? Click here for a fact-check.

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Georgia Senate Race Called a ”Tossup”

Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight.com speculates on the spellbinding Georgia Senate race:

“Very quick observation about Georgia’s senate race, which along with California’s Proposition 8, may be the thing to watch on Election Night in the event of an Obama blowout. The polls, from what I can tell, are showing a fairly high undecided vote among the African-American population. Rasmussen’s most recent poll, which had Saxby Chambliss up by two, shows that 12 percent of black voters are undecided in the senate race. Were those voters to split 4:1 to Jim Martin, that would be worth a net of around 2 points to him, making the race a tie. SurveyUSA, likewise, shows a higher rate of undecideds among black voters (7%) than among whites (3%).

Related thought: it’s very difficult to imagine what a Chambliss-Obama voter looks like. It’s pretty easy to imagine what a McCain-Martin voter looks like. So if the Georgia polls have Obama down by 4 or 5 points, but Martin down by 2 or 3 points (as they do), something doesn’t quite seem right; I’d think the gap should be a bit wider.

Basically, I think this race is a true toss-up rather than a Lean R. African-American voters might be unfamiliar with Jim Martin, who didn’t become the nominee until August, but the ‘D’ beside his name is worth a lot..”
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Local Early Voting Report

Above: at long last, the folks at Freedom Blogging have finally enabled me to post videos from NewsChannel9.com here. Above: NewsChannel9’s Erica Green has an early voting report.

The Hamilton County Election Commission says as of Wednesday, 61576 people have voted early.

Reminder: TODAY’s your LAST DAY to vote early in Tennessee & FRIDAY is your LAST DAY to vote early in Georgia!

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McCain Matching Obama in Battleground State Ad Buys

From the Boston Globe:

“Ad spending and ad placement data obtained from Democratic and Republican operatives show that in the closing days of the campaign the Republican voice has grown louder in states such as Florida, Ohio, North Carolina, Virginia and Pennsylvania.

For instance, Obama had been scheduled to buy about $2.5 million in Florida ads for the last week of the campaign. McCain is now set to spend about $1.6 million and the Republican National Committee added $1.5 million to their buy in the state this week. Obama appears to have added more weight to his ads since.”

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New Battleground State Polls

From Time magazine:

Pennsylvania: Obama 55, McCain 43
North Carolina: Obama 52, McCain 46
Nevada: Obama 52, McCain 45
Ohio: Obama 51, McCain 47
Arizona: McCain 53, Obama 46

Find out more info, including male/female & making over $50K/under $50K preferences here.

How about those Arizona numbers? Here’s another one, from NBC, that’s no doubt making McCain nervous. [Remember, Al Gore infamously lost his home state in 2000.]

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What Obama’s ‘Infomercial‘ Reminded Me Of Most

Think about it: what ad since 1984 can that infomercial compare to, besides this one?

Nate Silver adds:

“Discuss: all else being equal, the most optimistic candidate wins the election. And that’s definitely the mood that Obama is going for with this thing.”

I also would point out that not mentioning John McCain or President Bush was stroke of genius. It makes it harder for the right to criticize the ad because of this.

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Whoops:

Above: a screen grab from Fox News yesterday.

This is not the first time Fox’s graphics department has gotten it wrong.

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Campaign Quiz Time

Test your 2008 campaign knowledge here, & answer questions that include

2. Which one of these statements did Barack Obama make while campaigning?

A) “I’ve now been in 57 states. I think one left to go.”

B) “Most of all, I believe in you, Nebraska. Or South Dakota. Or wherever I am.”

C) “We’ve come so far since we began this campaign 21 years ago.”

Here’s a trivia question I’d add: which two presidential candidates stopped in Chattanooga during the primary season? (answer here)

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[below: the latest writings about the state of the conservative movement, as expressed by conservatives]

George Will:

From the invasion of Iraq to the selection of Sarah Palin, carelessness has characterized recent episodes of faux conservatism. Tuesday’s probable repudiation of the Republican Party will punish characteristics displayed in the campaign’s closing days.

Some polls show that Palin has become an even heavier weight in John McCain’s saddle than his association with George W. Bush. Did McCain, who seems to think that Palin’s never having attended a “Georgetown cocktail party” is sufficient qualification for the vice presidency, lift an eyebrow when she said that vice presidents “are in charge of the United States Senate”?

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Bill & Barack

Above: Bill Clinton & Barack Obama, together on stage for the first time, last night after the ‘infomercial‘ aired.

JUST 6 MORE DAYS

The Infomercial

I thought it was well-done. It certainly beats Ross Perot’s informercial from 1992.

He kept it positive - didn’t mention the word “Bush” once.

Watch & tell me what you think.

Read McCain’s ‘prebuttal’ to the infomercial here.

A lot of you have voted already. As of Monday, more than 50,000 people have voted in Hamilton County.

Which way are early voters leaning? Marc Ambinder:

Obama leads by 16 points among likely voters, by 17 points among independents, by 13 points among men, by 20 points among women, is tied among whites, and is up eight among white Catholics. Of the 15 percent of the sample who’ve already voted, Obama leads by 19 points (although this subsample has a fairly large MoE). 74% of Obama’s backers say they support him “strongly,” which is 20 points higher than the percentage who say the same about their support for McCain.

Click here for the full Pew results, as of Tuesday.

Here’s a site where you can see the early voting numbers already in from around the country. Very useful.

From that site I glean:

The number of early voters so far in Tennessee is 45% of the total number of votes in 2004. (wow.)

&, 36.4% of the ENTIRE number of votes cast in Georgia in 2004 have been cast already this year. (again, wow.)

The Peach state is turning into one of THE states to watch this year - & I had written that state off months ago, back when Bob Barr’s Georgia support started dropping off.

But now - look at this chart over at Pollster.com. We have ourselves a real nail-biter, folks.

& not just the presidential race. The battle for Saxby Chambliss’ Senate seat remains intense.

The two latest polls come from polling firms that lean either way.

The left-leaning InsiderAdvantage poll has Saxby Chambliss & Jim Martin at 46-44%, That same poll also shows McCain leading by just 1 point).

The right-leaning Strategic Vision poll has Chambliss up by 2, & McCain up by 6.

& it’s possible that Georgia may be the last Senate race called - as in called several weeks after election night. MSNBC’s First Read blog explains:

“If Martin wins, he’ll have Obama to thank because the surge in African-American turnout is clearly benefiting the Democrat. By the way, Georgia could be the state that is the final race called in the country. Why? The state has that quirky runoff law, and a third-party candidate in the race might hold one of the major party candidates under 50%. The last time Georgia hosted a Senate runoff was the last time the country elected a new Democratic president: 1992, when the election of Clinton ended up helping the Republicans pull the Senate upset (Paul Coverdell defeated Wyche Fowler). This time, however, Republicans fear that an Obama victory will only energize African Americans in the runoff and make Chambliss’ path to victory even more difficult.”

Speaking of African-American turnout, it’s huge in Georgia - check it out. Georgia’s Secretary of State reports that 35% of early voters are African-American - more than double the percentage of the state’s population.

& there seems to be a correlation between a state’s African-American voting population & percentage of early voter turnout. FiveThirtyEight.com’s Nate Silver has the details here. In short, the higher the percentage of blacks in a state, the higher early voter turnout is. The states with the highest turnout are Georgia, North Carolina & Louisiana.

Can McCain count on voters who make up their minds in this final week? The trends (from Pollster.com) from past Presidential elections, in terms of their numbers, don’t look promising:

Click this link (again, to Pollster.com) to find out which way those last-minute voters swing.

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But still, interestingly, yet probably unsurprisingly, Obama still faces a major disadvantage with voters down here in that long-GOP stronghold, the South, per ABC News:

Obama is outperforming any Democrat back to Jimmy Carter among white voters, getting 45 percent to McCain’s 52 percent. But in the South, it is a very different story. Obama fares worse among Southern whites than any Democrat since George McGovern in 1972.

Whites in the East and West tilt narrowly toward Obama (he’s up 8 and 7 points, respectively), and the two run about evenly among those in the Midwest. By contrast, Southern whites break more than 2 to 1 for McCain, 65 percent to 32 percent.

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SIX DAYS.

Barack Obama

His informercial appears on most of network TV tonight… except for ABC (read why here). Needless to say, I’m ashamed of my parent network about this. It’s airing “Pushing Daisies” instead, & running some frankly offensive promos about it.

Above: wet, wet wet conditions in Chester, Pennsylvania on Tuesday. Doesn’t look fun at all.

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Above: Obama making calls to undecided voters in Colorado.

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Has Obama fudged his “no tax increases for those making under $250,000″ promise this week? Marc Ambinder does some fact-checking.

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Michelle Obama appeared on Jay Leno Monday. Click here to watch.

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Why the Right’s ‘Kitchen Sink’ Philosophy is Failing

From the Toot:

“…once you’ve made a narrative choice, you do have to stick with it - you can’t just keep bouncing around, or people become confused. If you are telling the story of a scary vampire, you can’t decide in chapter 2 that he’s also 500 feet tall and radioactive and bent on destroying Tokyo, in chapter 3 that he is actually a giant man-eating shark, and in chapter 4 that he is all this and a super-terrorist trying to plant a nuclear bomb in Los Angeles. All of these things are, indeed, scary, but taken together they add up to a muddle.

This is the problem. It’s not just the McCain campaign’s problem - although their inability to pick a narrative and stick to it is a special kind of inexcusable - it’s a problem for the entire wingnut noise machine. Obama is a Marxist Muslim Arab Jesus Black White Terrorist Technocrat Racist Do-Gooder Liberal FDR Stalin Hilter Commie Fascist Gay Womanizing Naive Cynical Insider Noob Boring Radical Unaccomplished Elite Slick Gaffe-Prone Pedophile Pedophile-Seducing Liberation Theology Atheist Etc. & Anti-Etc. with a bunch of scary friends from - wait for it! - the Nineteen Hundred And Sixties. It makes no sense. It’s a jumble sale of fears and scary associations from 50 years of wingnut witch hunts and smear campaigns, a flea market of pre-owned and antique resentments, and if one does detect a semi-consistent 1960’s motif running through it all, that’s because that’s when most of these ideas were coined.”

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John McCain

Above: at a joint rally with Sarah Palin in Hershey Pennsylvania on Tuesday.

He also appeared in North Carolina..

…but, interestingly, without incumbent GOP Senator Elizabeth Dole. (this may be why)

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Speaking of absences, someone’s face appears to be conspicuously absent from his own party’s website.

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Is the ‘Divided Government’ Argument Going to Work?

It’s the major card McCain has left to play. But Newsweek’s Andrew Romano is pessimistic. Former Bush staffer Peter Wehner hsays the party needs to return to its reformist roots [which, I'd add, is what John McCain should have pushed harder for - challenging his party to return to its fundamental principles - instead of blatantly pandering to its base, which has spent the past year essentially rooting for the status quo, or at least is blind to why the status quo is in such a sorry state].

Here’s a ‘Silver Lining’ for Republicans, though:

Single-party government rarely works for very long. It tends to overreach when there are no limits to those in power (see Congress/President Bush, 2002-2006). If this plays out, that will bode well for the beginning of a comeback for the now-battered GOP. [though I will say that if you sat on your hands & approved of how things were run under Republican leadership, you have a smaller rhetorical leg to stand on.]

& here’s a reason Democrats might prefer divided government:

['divided' here being less than a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate]

If this crazy year ends the way the trends are looking - that Obama will be elected - Obama’s historical standing would improve if he brought about change with the help & support of the minority party.

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The Keystone State Conundrum

Why is McCain behind Obama in the Pennsylvania polls? Michael Barone hazards a guess:

“My hypothesis is that that is because places like the Philly suburbs are places where the recent decline in household wealth has been most conspicuous. Housing prices mean a lot more to you when your house started off at $400,000 and declined to $290,000 than they did when you started off (as may be typical of Scranton or a blue-collar town in metro Pittsburgh) at $140,000 and declined to $110,000. Newspaper coverage of our current economic distress focuses on the very poor (like a recent Washington Post story on North Carolina, which focused on an ex-convict in a cheap motel in Charlotte), but the people who are getting hurt most visibly in their lifelong project of accumulating wealth are the more affluent. They’re the ones whose house values have most visibly and spectacularly declined, and whose 401(k) accounts and stock portfolios have tanked in the last few months as well. Folks in Scranton or in the cheap motel in Charlotte didn’t expect to live comfortably ever after off their increased house values, 401(k)’s, and Merrill Lynch accounts; a $700 monthly check from Social Security is about what they have long expected and that’s not in danger (yet). Folks in the Philly suburbs did expect to live comfortably off such assets.”

& he concludes

“The irony here is that voters motivated by anger at the decline in their wealth seem about to elect a president who has promised to embark on wealth-destroying policies.”

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What Hath Karl Rove Wrought?

The exodus of a chunk of voters - Libertarians - who traditionally vote Republican, that’s what.

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Joe Biden

Here’s a view-from-the-crowd at a Joe rally in New Port Richey, Florida on Monday. He remained in Florida on Tuesday.

Sarah Palin

Above: at a rally in Hershey, Pennsylvania, appearing with McCain.

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Sadly, there appears to be quite a few reports of ‘ugly Americanism‘ at her rallies, & that’s a shame for Palin & her supporters, who in my opinion should quickly & forcefully speak out about those who would tarnish her image, especially if you are hoping she becomes the Republican party’s standard-bearer after the election.

That’s it for now! I know it’s a lot to digest, but please feel free to comment on anything mentioned above. ALL views are welcome here.

& check back later in the day, as I’ll provide more info in this post. Let me know what you think of the ‘one-post’ format. I think I’ll stick to doing it this way through the home stretch.

Today’s most interesting writings about the future of conservatism - by conservatives - in the blogosphere:

Peter Suderman at Culture 11:

“the problem is real: the mechanisms for acceptable self-criticism on the right aren’t very good, especially in election years. Any institution, even one with noble intentions, that dedicates itself to simple self-preservation without the added step of self-monitoring is bound to face corruption, disarray, and discontent. Do I have a grand, systematic solution? No, but a little more honesty and public self-questioning from any somewhat influential conservative who can afford to do so would certainly help.”

Patrick Ruffini, the Next Right:

“Like Mark McKinnon I too feel the McCain camp could probably have done some things differently, but it probably wouldn’t be enough to save them. What is striking about 2008 is how little the campaigns have mattered in comparison to the fundamental nature of the two men running.

Nothing the McCain campaign did could change the reality of McCain the candidate’s poor management instincts and his tendency to fidget around and not stay on message. When the economic crisis hit, this reality flew in the face of the McCain campaign’s message of steadiness versus inexperience. Whether by design or the candidate’s nature, Obama’s caution and deliberation was a living, breathing talking point against the experience card.

Likewise, I think it will be said that the McCain campaign has yet to really lay a glove on Obama character-wise because Obama himself simply does not project the cloying, insecure, effete tendencies of past nominees like Gore and Kerry, though the only two times he’s come close (Wright and bitter/cling) have barely figured in the general election campaign. I do think “celeb” was the best chance we had to define Obama personally, but again, though there is something to be said for attacking a guy’s strength, Obama’s grassroots appeal was a legitimate strength, not a hidden weakness.”

Ross Douthat, the Atlantic:

Whatever direction you think conservatism should be going in from here on out, the absolute worst thing the members of a losing political movement can do - if they ever want to win again, at least - is attempt to pre-emptively close off debate about the movement’s future. Conservatives need to have arguments, not promise excommunications, or else pretty soon there won’t be very much worth arguing over.

Daniel Finkelstein, the (London) Times Online:

“I was in Conservative Central Office in May 1997, on the night the Tory Party lost power after 18 years. I saw friends, and people I liked a little less than that, lose their seats or scrape home. And then the Prime Minister, John Major, returned and took his friends and advisers to a private room where he talked to us of his plans to resign as Conservative leader the next morning.

…

There was a feeling of euphoria in Britain that morning, a feeling of freshness and change. Even people who hadn’t voted for Blair were caught up in it. Many of them wished that they had, and his poll rating soared. Much of the good feeling about new Labour was generated in the months after their landslide, oddly, rather than in the months before it.

And here’s the lesson for Tories. The hardest thing to absorb was this - we didn’t matter.

For the first time in years the story wasn’t about us, and our squabbles and intrigues seemed oddly silly and pointless. And we, especially those of us who had worked on the losing campaign, felt excluded from a great national party. It was a little bit like sitting in the gloomy train Woody Allen films in Stardust Memories, while in the happy train everyone is popping champagne corks.

The first step towards recovery for the Conservative party was to stop thinking that we were the centre of the universe and that what we thought mattered more than what others thought.

The Republicans are about to go through a period of self absorption and will think it is all that matters. They will only recover when they start to understand that no one is watching and that no one, except them, cares.

That realisation will be more painful than the battles themselves.”

What do you think?

The most fascinating discourse of this election cycle, for me, has been those in the conservative movement who recognize that their movement is adrift without a rudder, in this nearly-post-Bush era.

I’ve already touched on this here, here, here, & here (& many other places - click on “The GOP” over on the right, in the categories, to get the full list)

Over the course of the next 10 days - & beyond - I hope to highlight some of this fascinating discussion.

The questions that remains to be answered: how long will it be before conservatives regain power in American government again? & who will be the standard-bearer to take the conservative movement in a new direction?

I agree with blogger L’Hote who says he is tired of what he sees, which is an unhealthy preponderance of the implementation of the phrase President Bush used in the days after 9/11: “you’re either with us or against us:”

“There’s been a lot of talk in reformist conservative circles about what the litmus test for conservatism is these days. It’s simple: the willingness to participate in dividing the country between worthy people and rotten people. There’s no ideology or policy preference or philosophy or method of intellectual comportment that holds a candle to hatred of the other, in today’s American conservatism. To that extent, a reformist conservative is no conservative at all. Some will deny this. But they only have to look around to see the absurdity of this claim. Spend a few moments on Red State. Cruise around the Corner. Follow Instapundit’s links. Check out Drudge. Watch Fox News. Attend a McCain/Palin rally. Tell me what you see. You can certainly question the right of these culturally conservative institutions to expel anyone from the ranks of conservatism, but if we recognize that they represent a kind of conservative center, we should acknowledge that this center seeks to define conservatism by its willingness to exclude others from real America.

This isn’t fair to many conservatives. But there simply exists a conservative movement, a conservative center of gravity, that has moral content. And that mainstream of conservative thought insists on cleaving these bright lines. So while I have sympathy for those who come under criticism here unfairly, to an extent this is an inevitable consequence of exactly the “big sort” that the Republican mainstream has been engaging in.

…

There comes a time when a reformer has to realize that what he is reforming is beyond saving. At what point does the conservative zeal for punishing the wicked Blue become such a dominant narrative on your side that principle demands you abandon the designation? Conservatism is not going to give up on dividing the nation into camps of the worthy and the unworthy. It is not going to stop questioning the patriotism of those who disagree with it. It’s the engine that powers the ideology. It’s possible that conservatism can be saved from pure other-hatred. But I am beyond skeptical. Those who question this allegiance to pure identity politics are quickly smacked down by the conservative message-discipline machine. (A machine which has no liberal analog.) What’s more, those conservatives who do pose these kinds of questions then become twice as likely to traffic in apologetics for the same kind of behavior, as their professional lives depend on not going too far off the reservation. (Pick your favorite CW-questioning conservative blogger. Wait for them to post something critical of conservative hatred of unreal America. Now see how long it takes them to turn around and excuse a similar but less intense argument. I think you’ll find it happens with almost mathematical precision.)

So look, conservatives– if you’re going to engage in tribalism, here is your party. Here’s your tribe. It’s at an extreme place. I can’t continue to take stock of conservatism as it currently stands and deny that the only meaningful criteria for designation as a conservative is willingness to cast your opponents out of the American experience. (Which is an act of extreme intellectual violence.)”

Well said.

Yes, I know this is an election year, but this whole “whose side are you on” mentality is really what’s contributed to driving this country into a ditch.

I believe more pluralism is what’s called for. That’s the system of government the founding fathers believed in. Pluralism is when various groups who share a common interest band together to bring about change.

Pluralism has never failed to exist in this country; it’s just that these days it is often groups with corporate or lobbying interests (Wall Street, anyone?) that have really been able to exploit pluralism’s power.

There is no problem that we can’t come together to solve - even if it’s only for that one problem.

I believe that deep down in my soul.

So let’s stop the bickering, & caring about sides or teams, stop the discussions about what constitutes the “real America” et al, & roll up our sleeves & get to work - no matter who wins the presidency.

Please? For the country?

Interesting tidbit from the Nielsen blog about the differences in the level of engagement between television viewers who consider themselves Democrats or Republicans:

Nielsen’s analysis found that the cable programs that received the highest overall engagement scores — meaning viewers were most engaged in the shows’ content — also received the most bipartisan support, drawing high engagement scores from viewers of both parties, as well as from viewers who identify as political “Independents.”

As might be expected, however, several programs had clear partisan bents. On Comedy Central, for example, Democratic viewers paid the most attention to “The Colbert Report,” while “South Park” was the network’s most engaging show among Republicans.

Read the full list of ‘most engaged shows’ here.

A first-hand account of exactly how the Republican brand has damaged itself, based on conversations I had Sunday with voters who picked George W. Bush in the past, but are choosing to pull the lever for Obama this time around - after the jump.

Read the rest of this entry »

The era of Reagan is over.

No, it’s not.

Yes, it is.

No, it’s not.

What do you think?

Bring Back Machiavelli

Mikhail Emelianov writes a defense of the flip-flop:

“…if a politician changes his mind on the issue, then he is “for it before he was against it” and it’s a horrible thing. TV commercials are reciting a specific point of view over and over again, candidates give the same speech over and over again, proposals are made - repetition is the key.  One creates the illusion of certainty by constantly sticking to the point, even if it leads to some disastrous results. Whatever happened to the true political values of flexibility, politicking, negotiation, manipulation, and compromise? There is no need to bring up Machiavelli, but certainly politicians have always prided themselves on shrewdness, not naivete and dogmatism.  Certainly, there’s plenty of good old backstabbing and manipulative lying both in the public sphere and behind the closed political doors, but why aren’t those things popular with the people? Did American populism kill the true political activity? Is American politics basically a beauty pageant at this point?  Where is the strife?”

Amen. What do you think?

From the AP:

RIVERSIDE, Calif. (AP) - A Republican group in San Bernardino, California, has distributed a newsletter picturing Barack Obama on a $10 bill adorned with a watermelon, ribs and a bucket of fried chicken.
The Riverside Press-Enterprise reports that the apparent linking of Obama to racist stereotypes drew denunciations from various GOP officials after the illustration appeared in the group’s October newsletter.
The president of Chaffey Community Republican Women says there was no racist intent. She says it was just food, to her.
She says she’d received the illustration in e-mails and decided to reprint it to poke fun at a remark by Obama that he doesn’t look like other presidents.
The Obama campaign says it doesn’t respond to such attacks.

More:

Sheila Raines, an African-American member of the club, was the first person to complain to Fedele about the newsletter. Raines, of San Bernardino, said she has worked hard to try to convince other minorities to join the Republican Party and now she feels betrayed.

“This is what keeps African-Americans from joining the Republican Party,” she said. “I’m really hurt. I cried for 45 minutes.”

&

Acquanetta Warren, a Fontana councilwoman and member of the women’s group, said the item is rude and requires a public apology.

“When I opened that up and saw it, I said, ‘Why did they do this? It doesn’t even reflect our principles and values,’ ” said Warren, who served as a Republican delegate to the national convention in September and is a regional vice chairwoman for the California Republican Party. “I know a lot of the ladies in that club and they’re fantastic. They’re volunteers. They really care — some of them go to my church.”

The Republican party I know never stands for this crap. Honorable Republicans that I’m acquainted with would denounce something like this, even though they know that saying nothing or refusing to confront something like this might, just might help their candidate get elected.

There are many reasons not to vote for Barack Obama. Saying he’s “Muslim” (untrue), “not a US citizen” (untrue) or even “the Anti-Christ” (way untrue) only makes your own side look bad.

Having your side lose is bad enough. But encouraging people to feel like it’ll be the Cuban missile crisis or 9/11 all over again if your side loses is un-American.

What do you think?

Unveils a New Plan for the Economy

BLUE BELL, Pa. (AP) - Republican presidential candidate John McCain is proposing that the government eliminate taxes on unemployment benefits.
That’s one part of an economic plan the Arizona senator is announcing Tuesday during a campaign swing in Pennsylvania.
McCain also is proposing that taxes be lowered on seniors when they tap their retirement accounts, and he’s pushing for an acceleration of the tax write-off for people who are forced to sell at a loss in the current market.
McCain also wants to see capital gains taxes lowered for 2009 and 2010 as an incentive to save and invest.

Read McCain’s prepared remarks delivered Tuesday morning here.

Read more details of the new McCain plan here.

So how much will it cost? Ummm….

Read the Obama camp’s response here.

The Final ‘Fight’

McCain says on St. Louis radio that he will mention William Ayers at Thursday’s debate; listen to it here. [waitaminute: what about that McCain talking point that one is not supposed to telegraph one's next move to one's enemies?]

Marc Ambinder:

This week, after a weekend and some sleep, the campaign is back in a groove, of sorts. McCain’s debuted a new speech, a speech with populist urgency, a speech centered around a new theme: “fight.” The word appeared 20 times in the 1,400 word prepared text that the campaign distributed this morning.

…

This is NOT McCain’s closing speech. McCain advisers say they’re saving their best material for the last ten days of the race, when, the campaign hopes, three quarters of the remaining undecided voters will make up their minds, and their minds will be concentrating on Barack Obama. When the urgency of the presidential election impresses itself, the hope is that these voters will swing back to the familiar, rather than the unknown. The last ten days, according to a McCain aide, are when the “imponderables” come into play.”

E.J. Dionne:

“We are in the midst of what could become — and here’s hoping it doesn’t — the worst economic downturn in decades. The last thing we need is a campaign that strengthens fanaticism, tarnishes the authority of the next president and whips up the worst kinds of prejudice. This works both ways: Obama should not be delegitimized if he wins, and McCain should not want to win in a way that would undermine his own capacity to lead.

When Christopher Buckley, a novelist and former speechwriter for George H.W. Bush, announced last week that he would vote for Obama (his first vote ever for a Democrat), he referred to words once spoken to him by his late father. “You know,” the conservative hero William F. Buckley Jr. said, “I’ve spent my entire lifetime separating the right from the kooks.”

McCain has an obligation, to his own legacy and the country he has served, to separate himself and his campaign from the kooks. Extremism in defense of liberty may be no vice, but extremism in pursuit of the presidency is as dysfunctional as it is degrading.”

James Fallows says he detects a tone of defeat in McCain campaign strategist Steve Schmidt in a recent interview to NPR:

“Rationalization and excuses (”We were ahead until the financial crisis began”). More excuses (”We have the handicap of wearing the ‘R’ label this year” — I mean, think about that for a moment, and imagine Karl Rove saying it). More and more excuses (”When someone says something inappropriate at our rallies, the media is all over it. When someone does it at an Obama rally…”) A “we’ll do our best” tone as opposed to confidence about being able to win. A rote quality to the pep talk about victory (”Senator Obama is known as a weak closer, and Senator McCain is a strong finisher!”). These quotes are approximate, a few minutes after hearing the spot, but true to the spirit. Given Schmidt’s reputation as the heir to Lee Atwater and Karl Rove, that he was not able to keep on his game face is startling.”

Patrick Ruffini says all is lost with McCain/Palin, & the Republican National Committee should focus its efforts in the remaining days holding on to a filibuster-proof Senate:

“…McCain should start explicitly making the argument for divided government, with him as the only hope of preserving it. This is unlikely to be a voting issue at the Presidential level, but we need to get the idea percolating that we are about to elect Obama with unchecked, unlimited power. Power corrupts… absolute power corrupts absolutely, etc.

Obama at 56 seats makes life hard, but a lot more bearable than Obama at 60 seats. The death of the filibuster would be like losing the White House all over again.”

Which party would’ve made you more money?

Interesting experiment from Tommy McCall, who’s the former information graphics editor of Money Magazine.

He asks:

“…which party has been better for American pocketbooks and capitalism as a whole? Well, here’s an experiment: imagine that during these years you had to invest exclusively under either Democratic or Republican administrations. How would you have fared?”

Click here for the answer. It may surprise you.

UPDATE/October 11th: I’m putting this post back above the fold because Harold Ford has weighed in on the issue described below in Saturday (Oct. 11th)’s Washington Post:

“While I am disappointed in McCain’s about-face, I am not surprised. When I ran for the Senate in 2006, my opponent, Bob Corker, also found himself trailing in the October polls. His campaign and the Republican National Committee launched a series of false and vicious character attack ads, including the infamous “call me” ad, in which a scantily clad white woman looked at the camera and said, “Harold, call me.”

Every major news organization and independent ad-checking group ruled the ad a smear and deemed it way over the line. But that didn’t stop John McCain from coming to Tennessee and campaigning for my opponent while the “call me” ad and other smears were broadcast across the state. Not once did McCain speak out against that ad as he did about the smear against John Kerry. In fact, the first manager he hired for his 2008 presidential campaign was Terry Nelson, the person who produced the “call me” ad. Nelson has such a history of practicing below-the-belt politics that Lee Iacocca, a strong supporter of McCain, wrote in his book “Where Have All the Leaders Gone?”: “What does it say about John McCain that he’s willing to make that kind of person the head of his team?”

This election may be the most consequential since Franklin Roosevelt won the presidency in 1932. Our country is at war in Iraq and in Afghanistan. The American dream isfalling further out of reach of millions of families. We face intense competition from rising economic powers in Asia. And after eight years of the failed leadership of President Bush and Vice Presient Cheney, our image and standing around the globe are in disrepair. Our budget is burdened with runaway entitlement costs, and our public education system is failing our children.

John McCain has to make a choice over the next 3 1/2 weeks. Will he succumb to base impulses and take the country down a path littered with smears and personal attacks? Or will he focus on the future with straight talk and big ideas? America deserves solutions for its problems. Where are McCain’s plans to replace the 750,000 jobs lost since the beginning of the year, to stop our financial meltdown, and to help the families hammered by the prices of gas, food and health care?

Both men of that contentious 2006 campaign have spoken, & both say there is much to regret. Looking back, this Senate race really was the “dress rehearsal” for what we’re going through now. What mistakes were made that we’ve learned from? Which ones did we make that we haven’t yet? Please weigh in with a comment. All viewpoints are welcome.

Read the original entry from earlier this week:

I came across this Vote08 post from May 18th which may give us all a window into what Tennessee Senator (& former Chattanooga mayor) Bob Corker likely thinks of John McCain’s current ‘personal’-style attacks against Barack Obama.

Like McCain, Corker also faced a telegenic ‘rising-star’ African-American candidate during his 2006 Senate race.

The original post highlighted a column by E.J. Dionne in which Corker attempted to explain some recent Congressional losses in traditional GOP districts.

As I point out below, Corker’s term has been a remarkable one in that during the past two years, he has made a concerted effort not to drink the idealistic neo-con GOP Kool-Aid that has led us into an economic & foreign-policy ditch. He has kept his cards close to his vest, & has in general a reality-based, pragmatic approach that should be applauded & encouraged across the board.

I’ve reprinted the May 18th post in full after the jump, & please take careful note of what the Senator has to say; it’s my view that he was 100% on the money t