Obama's Berlin Speech was a disappointment...when viewed on a historic timeline.

Barack Obama gave what is, for him, a fairly routine speech today in Berlin. (For McCain, it would have been a triumph, a speech beyond his capacity to give.) Obama hit all the important rhetorical points, stayed on message, said some inspiring things, had a great crowd, and kept the media attention on himself in a positive way. Already, though, I'm reading some negative coverage of his speech, some people are calling it a disappointment. I guess they were expecting him to outdo both Kennedy and Reagan.

People seem to forget that this guy isn't even the President yet. He's not even officially a nominee for President yet. He is not capable yet of making the kind of speech that people seem to expect every time out, not because he lacks the talent but because he lacks the historical circumstance and gravitas of, say, the end of communism and the collapse of the Berlin Wall.

So it's fine to say that Obama didn't bring his A Game - The time for the A Game has not yet arrived. I would be worried, very worried in fact, if Obama had given some sort of transcendent speech in Berlin, because then where would he go? He can't peak, it's July, and the people he's speaking to won't even get the chance to vote for him come November. So let's all just chill out and enjoy what we have -- A candidate for President who, even on a so-so day, gives a hell of a speech.

McCain tries to pass off Republican Talking Points as an Op-Ed...FAIL!

Last week Obama write an Op-Ed in the New York Times about his plan to withdraw from Iraq. Today McCain tried to put an Op-Ed in the paper and it got rejected. Of course, the right wing and the McCain campaign will take this as just another example of liberal media bias, and they're already up in arms about it, but the NYT was totally correct not to publish it. It was nothing more than a recitation of Republican Talking Points and innuendo about what Obama must be thinking. McCain doesn't offer a single new piece of information about himself or his plans in the piece. I'm not going to go through it point by point. Jason Linkins already did a great job over on HuffPost:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/07/21/inew-york-timesi-spares-m_n_114117.html

All I will say is that, whenever a candidate starts trying to tell me what the other guy is thinking, or what the other guy's actions MEAN, I cringe and instantly think they're full of shit. It's fine to criticize the guy's policies, but it's not okay to make assumptions about the other guy's motives. And it's not the responsibility of legitimate newspapers to give that kind of bald political posturing a forum.

It's almost funny at this point, because the McCain campaign seems almost incapable of simply explaining any of it's positions. It can only talk about what Obama says or does and try to tell us what that means about him as a candidate. Hopefully the rest of the country finds this as transparent as I do. I can't wait for the debates.

What dues has Hillary Clinton paid again?

I've been reading a lot of articles lately about Obama's VP selection. In most of those articles, there's some version of the idea that Hillary Clinton's supporters are pissed off because their candidate was snubbed after she "paid some serious dues". My question is, what dues? She married the most savvy politician in the last few decades and rode his coattails into the white house without getting elected on her own merits. Isn't that the exact opposite of paying dues?

I'm sure HRC did pay some dues before that, and since, but how is that different than any of the other thousands of politicians who labor away on a local or state or small national level but never become President? What about Bill Richardson? What about Wesley Clark? What about anybody else? Did they get "cheated" out of the Presidency by the rise of Obama? Or in their case, was it just a case of someone coming along that more perfectly captured the mood and flavor of the rising generation? How come Hillary is the only one who got "passed over"?

Maybe I'm just a misogynist, but a lot of feminist griping about getting passed over strikes me in this way. One article I read said that Clinton's supporters were so die-hard in their anger because the way that she was slighted reminded them of how they had passed over in their own lives by "men they had trained as Junior Executives who became the CEO."

It's hard not to feel that a lot of these complaints are just that, complaints. It's very easy to say that someone got a promotion ahead of you because they were a man - It's an impossible charge to disprove. It's also a much easier pill to swallow than admitting somebody passed you up because they were more talented.

I'm not suggesting for a moment that sexism isn't real. Of course it's real, but it's overblown in today's society. I'm 25, and in my life I've perceived more disadvantages than advantages from being a white male. Nobody has ever handed me anything because of my color or gender, but when I applied for college I didn't get to check any of those nice boxes that let everyone know how disadvantaged I've been. I don't discriminate against people because of their gender or race, but as a white male I get to fight against the assumption that gender and race factor into my every decision.

The one real advantage I've gotten from being a white male is that I grew up in a supportive home with plenty to eat and good parents who valued education. But guess what - So have a whole lot of women, including Hillary Clinton.

When a woman executive is passed over by someone younger for the CEO spot (or whatever spot), it's easy and nearly universal to blame sexism on some level, but they should remember that there are white men passed over for CEO's jobs all the time in favor of younger candidates: They just don't have a ready-made excuse for it. In fact, men, including me, from the time they become teenagers, learn to shrug off rejection without looking for excuses...That is to say, they start trying to get dates.

Hillary Clinton didn't lose the primary campaign because she's a woman. She lost because she allowed Mark Penn to terribly mismanage her campaign, she made false assumptions about an early end to the Primary process, and because Barack Obama ran a disciplined, tenacious campaign and did a better job connecting with the voters. Some media pundits made sexist remarks, but some made racial remarks about Obama. Overall the coverage was consistently crap, as it has been for a long time and still is. Clinton and her supporters should stop moaning about how unfair it all is, and face up to reality: If John McCain wins this election, Roe v. Wade is going to get overturned and abortion is going to be made illegal in this country. Wake the fuck up and watch out for the real misogyny that lurks just around the corner.

What Campaign Finance Reform?

The headline on Huffpost right now is "$52 Million Dollar Man = Underdog". What's interesting to me is the numbers they give on what sort of personal donations are possible. It makes me wonder about the viability of either candidate claiming they are in favor of campaign finance reform.

The numbers you often hear tossed around are that a single donor can give a candidate $2300 during the primary (meaning until the convention) and $2300 during the actual election. This seems like it would help ameliorate the impact of single donors capable of making huge donations without an impact on their bottom line.

What I was unaware of until today is that each person is also allowed to give up to $28500 directly to the political party. That's a huge number, and it makes Obama's fundraising numbers even more significant. It means that individuals can donate over thirty grand to a political party in a single election cycle, which doesn't say much about the reform of campaign finance in this country. This is, of course, on top of free office space and homes for fundraisers and 527 and other 'unaffiliated' groups with no cap on donations.

What this adds up to is that, despite McCain's bluster about how much he wants to reform Campaign Finance, he's taking the same huge dollar donations from a minority of people in order to convince the lower-middle class majority that somehow tax cuts are good for them, and the Democrats love terrorists.

What this means to Obama is less clear, but I also don't think it's great. While it's true that much of his campaign funds come from small-dollar donations, he also takes maximum contributions from many people, and many such people also give big dollars to the Democratic party. The problem, as we have seen with the "Hillraisers" over the last few months, is that once you let someone put thirty grand into the party, they feel they have a right to say what goes on. Frankly, they have a point. They can say: "I donated a hundred times what some of these other people did, my voice should be heard louder than theirs." It's hard to tell those people they're wrong, because the Democrats NEED those donations.

The only real solution is to restrict, much, much more severely, the ability of single people to contribute. Get rid of the 527's and all this other bullshit. Limiting the ability of a single person to effect the outcome of an election with money is not limiting freedom of speech, any more than it is to censor someone from running an ad claiming that John McCain drinks the blood of children. Until we get some of that, we don't have any real campaign finance reform.

Obama might just be my guy

Saw this article today:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2007/08/01/obamas-terrorism-speech_n_58815.html

The article chronicles Obama's efforts to break from the democratic interest groups, including: Promising to go into Pakistan is they refuse to root out the terrorists hiding in their mountains (obviously still getting us out of Iraq), Raising the social security age without privatization, putting teachers on a merit pay system, and chastising black men who abandon their children.

Apparently a lot of people are trying to say this will hurt him. I've got news for those people. It won't hurt him with me. This guy is more right on every time he opens his mouth. I'm still technically undecided with regard to my primary vote, but I'm leaning towards Obama with an option to fall at any time. This guy is saying the things I've been waiting for a politician to say for a really long time.

Mike Bloomberg Changes Everything

Mike Bloomberg, the Mayor of New York, today renounced his membership in the Republican Party and registered as an Independent. Now, that doesn't mean he's running for President, but it does set him up for a Perot-Like run at an Independent candidacy. He's worth billions, and he can spend a billion dollars on this campaign and not even sweat it, and the guy is undeniably a genius.

For those of you wondering about his politics, I've done some research. There's a great website called "OnTheIssues.org" that analyzes candidates voting record in order to determine their overall stance on issues. Here's a basic Bloomberg rundown:

He's STAUNCHLY Pro-Choice and Pro-Gay Marriage.

He's STAUNCHLY Pro-Gun Control.

His stance on the War in Iraq is still unclear. He hasn't had to take a coherent position as Mayor of New York, so we'll have to wait and find out when and if he actually gets into the race. Stay tuned for updates.

On taxes, Bloomberg is fairly liberal, especially for a rich guy. He raised Property Taxes 18% as Mayor in order to balance the budget. He favors increases in spending for programs like Education, Health Care, and Defense. His positions aren't AS clear as they are on some other social issues, however.

Overall, I think we can safely call Bloomberg a moderate, but a social liberal. I've got to emphasize that he's not in the race yet, and at this point I must agree with the majority of the Pundits that Bloomberg will wait until the two parties have their nominees in place before deciding what to do.

If the nominees are really split to the left and right, along the lines of Obama and Thompson, look for Bloomberg to get in. If it's Hillary and Rudy, forget it, there's no room in that race for an independent, especially since that would mean three New Yorkers in the same race.

In any case, I love the idea of an independent candidacy whether or not I end up voting for Bloomberg. I've often said that what this country needs is the end of the two-party system. We need to go to more of a European system, where multiple parties more fully represent nuanced views and a variety of possible positions. No matter what ends up happening, this is a step in the right direction.

If this isn't the final straw we have to just declare Bush "King of America"

Check out this article on HuffPost:

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/06/16/counsel-hatch-probe/

Here is the pertinent passage:

The White House has admitted that roughly 20 agencies have received a PowerPoint briefing created by Karl Rove’s office “that included slides listing Democratic and Republican seats the White House viewed as vulnerable in 2008, a map of contested Senate seats and other information on 2008 election strategy.”

Politicization of the federal government has been illegal for decades. The 1939 Hatch Act specifically prohibits partisan campaign or electoral activities on federal government property, including federal agencies.

Okay...so this is it, right? There must be some criminal charges forthcoming. The White House has ADMITTED that this happened, and there is no grey area. This is illegal. If they can't touch Rove on this, because of some Executive Privilege bullshit, this is the last straw. I'm renouncing my citizenship and moving to Europe.