Irregular Times Diaries: Unfit Discussion

In one of the most surprising endorsements of the 2008 presidential election, Ralph Nader has thrown his support to John Edwards for President, just a couple of days before the Iowa caucuses. The reason for Nader’s endorsement is very clear: Hillary Clinton is heavily associated with big corporate interest groups, and John Edwards offers the strongest voice in this year’s elections against corporate influence over America’s democratic government.

Nader said of Senator Clinton, “She has experience in the Senate, and what that experience has meant is going soft on cracking down on corporate crime, fraud, and abuse, soft on cutting tens of millions in corporate subsidies.” Yes, Hillary Clinton has experience, but it’s the wrong kind of experience - like her experience on the Board of Directors of Wal-Mart.

Hillary Clinton is the wrong choice for the Democrats, and John Edwards is the strongest alternative.

Though some Green Party activists are still trying to draft Ralph Nader for President in 2008, it’s becoming very clear that Ralph Nader will not run, and that, if he does, almost nobody will vote for him. Endorsing John Edwards was the best play for influence that Nader could make.

It’s becoming more clear that the real contest in the 2008 Democratic Party nomination is between Barack Obama and John Edwards. Hillary Clinton depended on the institutional support of right wing Democrats like James Carville, and a parade of corporate executives and lobbyists. She even hired the president of the PR firm that defended Blackwater mercenaries in Congress to be her campaign manager. She’s a longtime member of the right wing Democratic Leadership Council.

Put simply: Hillary Clinton is the Republican candidate of the Democratic Party, the Joseph Lieberman of 2008 presidential election.

So, it’s between Barack Obama and John Edwards to get the core of the Democratic Party vote - the support of voters who are smart enough to look for more than just nostalgia for the 1990s with the name of Clinton.

John Edwards got the support of Ralph Nader this week. Barack Obama got the support of Dennis Kucinich. That shows the world of difference between Barack Obama and John Edwards.

John Edwards spent just one term in the U.S. Senate, then quit when he couldn’t get re-elected. He’s done good work outside of the government, but he just can’t seem to manage to effectively use any government position. Isn’t Ralph Nader kind of like that?

Barack Obama, on the other hand, has been successful in using the power of government to do good from the state legislature in Illinois all the way on up. Obama sticks with it. Isn’t Dennis Kucinich kind of like that?

I say that in 2008, we need a President who is good at government, not someone who is good at picking from the outside.

John Edwards supporters ought to be ashamed of themselves for bragging about the endorsement from Ralph Nader. Have they forgotten how Ralph Nader threw the 2000 presidential election to George W. Bush? Now that Ralph Nader is endorsing John Edwards, a vote for Edwards is practically a vote for Bush.

Besides, John Edwards has really put all of his cards on the table. It’s Iowa or nothing for John Edwards, because he’s invested his campaign’s wealth there, organizing in the caucuses. If John Edwards doesn’t get first place in Iowa today, his campaign is dead in the water.

Hillary Clinton, on the other hand, doesn’t need to win Iowa at all in order to win the Democratic presidential nomination. Even if she comes in third place in the Iowa caucuses, it’s a sign of strength in her campaign, which invested little in Iowa.

Which kind of leader would you rather have for President - the kind who loses in second place, or the kind who wins even in third place? Hillary Clinton is the clear choice for voters today.

Here at Irregular Times, we aim for substance over style.

Just this once, however, I couldn’t resist. Seeing the photo of Matt Stoller with Mitt Romney over at Open Left, I found the answer to a question that has been dogging many a political junkie this year: How does Mitt Romney keep his helmet hair just so?

Now it can be told: Hair gel. Just look at that shine. It looks like an entire tube of hair glop goes into Romney’s hair at least twice a week.

After all, what does a little thing like logical incoherence on energy policy matter to the American public, when compared to hair?

It makes Romney “Reaganesque”, see.

Since when is Reaganesque a good thing?

Since Mitt Romney is running for the United States of Hair?

Oh, the folly of follicles. Evolutionarily, we should have gone past the point of using hair as a good indication of adaptability.

Oooh. Bumper sticker idea: Mitt is Maladaptive

Here’s a great indication of the difference between the current state of the Democratic Party and the Republican Party: During the Iowa caucuses, the web site of the Iowa Democratic Party is running smooth and fast. The web site of the Republican Party of Iowa, however, is running as slow as slugs, taking minutes to load, when it loads at all.

Take note, voters, of which political party is better able to execute a plan.

It looks like Hillary Clinton is going to come in third in the Iowa caucuses - a humiliation, given that she was, just a month or so ago, described as the “inevitable” Democratic candidate. Furthermore, she’s not even close to Barack Obama - more than eight percentage points behind.

Heads are going to roll in the Clinton for President campaign. Don’t expect Hillary Clinton to give up yet, but DO expect some of her staff to get canned.

And Bill Clinton? What is Bill Clinton going to be doing tonight?

“Honey, I’ve got to go fill up the car with gasoline, before the hundred dollar a barrel oil drives the price above four dollars per gallon. I’ll be back soon… in March or so. Save me a Snickers Bar.”

In 1972 I was 21 years old,  town campaign manager for the McGovern Presidential campaign,and as idealistic and devoted to McGovern as any young Obama supporter today.  What a high we experienced the night that McGovern won the nomination; what disappointment we felt the night of the election.  In time, information was discovered that the Republicans had hoped for, indeed, planned on a McGovern candidacy, as they viewed him as the weakest candidate. Yes, McGovern enjoyed tremendous support from a new generation of young voters; and yes, we couldn’t have made the Republicans — and I do mean Richard Nixon et al — happier.

One of the most disillusioning revelations post-election 1972 was that many Republicans had influenced the outcome of primaries by registering as Democrats precisely in order to vote for McGovern. It was, in fact, the first time that voters were allowed to switch their party on primary day in NJ, and the Republicans evidently took advantage of it. Over time, I learned the painful truth that political decisions do not necessarily reflect the will of the supporters of any position or candidate; elections and voters can be and are manipulated in many ways. Voter idealism is an opportunity for exploitation by manipulators with less than idealistic goals.

In 2008, I see this blind idealism again in the young, first-time-voters and caucus participants in Iowa and elsewhere. And it raises for me the same concerns that I wish I had seen in 1972 but could only perceive and understand retrospectively some years later.

Specifically, I find it alarming that, as of January 2nd,  70-something-% of Iowans who supported Obama and were polled were first time caucus-participants. 20% were reported to be Republicans who planned on changing party to support Obama in the caucus. And I believe around 30-40% were Independents who had not been drawn into a caucus ever before.

While this all sounds quite positive for Obama, lets stop and consider, first of all, that 20% of his supporters are Republicans. How likely is it that Republicans in Iowa — a state which has never elected a woman governor, congressman or senator, no less a Black one — are switching parties to vote for the first serious Black Democrat contender? Were they closeted progressives all these years, just waiting for the most sincere and true Democrat for change to run? If so, how did they miss Howard Dean in 2004? I think that the 20% Republican support can be explained as well if not better by the hypothesis that the Republicans are again trying to tip the caucus in favor of a candidate who ultimately would have great difficulty in winning the national election.

The 30-40% Independents who have never before found a candidate of either party to support at a caucus are equally, if not more, suspect. Mind you, these are people who would have not even come out  to support Iowa favorite son Tom Harkin when he ran in the past in Presidential primaries. Most Independents I know are proudly and stubbornly independent — they’re suspect of politics in general, eschew registering allegiance to ANY party, Dem, Repub or 3rd party, and do not mind one bit not being able to choose a party candidate during the primaries by maintaining their independent status. Are we to believe, without question, that such a large number of Independents have somehow shaken loose from their prized independent status because Obama is such a great candidate? I don’t think so.

Which brings us down to the great NON-QUESTION of the 2008 primaries: are Caucasian Americans really ready to vote for a Black/minority president? Well maybe this is less of a non-question than it is the non-discussed question of the season. Listening to a panel of supposed election experts from the far-right Enterprise Institute discussing possible primary outcome scenarios, I was almost convinced, as they insisted, that there just was no reason at all to think that race would influence voter preferences. I actually had to stop and think: wait a minute, there still is a serious underclass in the U.S., isnt there? and that underclass contains most of the 16% of Americans who are Black, right? (As Obama correctly noted recently, there are still more college-age young Black men in prison than there are in college — a statistic that has not changed since I first heard it reported 20 years ago.)  Of course other minorities are found in the underclass, but the majority of Blacks are found there.

Who keeps Blacks in the underclass? Certainly predominately white communities, companies, law firms, professional schools, etc.  But it happens daily in many ways and is ignored and hence implicitly supported by most Caucasian Americans.  Support for Obama is very real in some sectors, very politically correct in others. Don’t tell me that MANY Americans, of both parties, have not considered the possibility of and experience some trepidation when they envision a government dominated by Black Americans.

I’m not saying I’m among them. But when it comes to evaluating Obama’s true chances for winning a national election that requires winning the hard South and Conservative Western states, one simply can’t ignore the issue of race and how it could influence the outcome of the election.

Prove me wrong. Let’s start a real discussion of this important issue NOW, while the primary season is in its infancy. Let’s be conscious of the possibility of cynical manipulation of our youngest and often our most idealistic voters. Let’s pick a presidential candidate with our eyes, ears and minds open to the most critical question of electibility in November 2008.

I should make a big noteworthy post, being the first one after the record ice storm came through my town, but I’d rather post a comic:

Yesterday morning, Senator Joseph Biden was all full of bluster. “You can’t tell me this race is over,”, he said.

Um, yes I can. Senator Biden, your race is over.

Maybe if you had spent less time talking about what a great guy you are, you could have lasted until New Hampshire. Then again, you were relatively clean and articulate… though not as much as Barack Obama.

While I have yet to see any official announcement saying Chris Dodd is no longer a candidate for president, I don’t see his name on the list for the New Hampshire debate Saturday either.  I had sort of hoped that he would add his voice to those standing against the current erosion of freedom.

But some of have not forgotten his role in killing S.2454, the safety and security bill for Peace Corps volunteers, either. The bill passed the house, was introduced in the Senate by Republican Sen. DeWine and Democratic Sen. Durbin, but was killed in Dodd’s Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere, Peace Corps, and Narcotics Affairs of the Senate Foreign Relations committee.

Chris Dodd could have gotten that bill out onto the Senate floor for the vote it deserved.

If Hillary Clinton loses the New Hampshire primary this coming Tuesday, it’s a sign that her campaign is serious trouble. A failure to come in first in New Hampshire could even put Clinton’s adopted home state of delegate-rich New York into play on Super Tuesday February 5th. If Hillary Clinton has to defend home turf, it will make it all the more difficult to her to win in other states.

It seems that Hillary Clinton’s vote in favor of George W. Bush’s plan to start a war in Iraq is finally coming back to haunt her. The strategy of the Clinton for President campaign of trying to establish her as invincible before any primaries or caucuses, as if the actual Democratic voters didn’t matter, was apparently also not a great way to endear her to the Democratic rank and file.

On top of Hillary Clinton’s stumble in Iowa, there’s news that the mood among New Hampshire Democrats is turning decidedly against her presidential campaign. At the New Hampshire Democratic Party’s 100 Club Dinner yesterday, Democrats booed when Hillary Clinton tried to attack Barack Obama and John Edwards. When Barack Obama took to the stage, however, the Democratic crowd erupted into enthusiastic applause, chanting his name and his trademark, Fired Up Ready To Go.

At another moment during Hillary Clinton’s speech, a Time Magazine reporter who attended writes, the Democratic audience let out “a noise that sounded like a thousand people collectively groaning”.

Things are not looking good for Hillary Clinton in New Hampshire. That doesn’t mean the election is over for her, but it does mean that all the hype for most of 2007 about her invincible status was nothing but the babbling of Washington D.C. insiders ignorant of the mood of actual Democratic voters across the country.

At a campaign event today, Fox television personality Bill O’Reilly jumped a barricade, swore repeatedly at an Obama campaign staffer, pushed him aside to get access to Barack Obama. Then, Bill O’Reilly called the Obama campaign staffer “low class”.

Low class?!?

Is that what Bill O’Reilly thinks the 2008 presidential election is about? Trying to keep the lower classes down? Class warfare from the wealthy, like him, against the rest of America?

So now, according to Bill O’Reilly, the Barack Obama campaign is with the working class of Americans, not the wealthy elites.

Did Bill O’Reilly mean to give Barack Obama that endorsement?

Rudolph Giuliani just said, in the Republican presidential debate, that “America is not moving in the wrong direction.”

So, Giuliani thinks that an increasing disparity in income between rich and poor is the right direction?

Giuliani thinks that gas prices at around $3.50 per gallon, and crude oil at $100 per barrel is the right direction?

Giuliani thinks that increasing temperatures and regional water wars is the right direction?

Giuliani thinks that the housing crisis is the right direction?

Giuliani thinks that the credit crisis is the right direction?

Giuliani thinks that the exploding federal budget deficit is the right direction?

Giuliani thinks that the shrinking Bill of Rights is the right direction?

Giuliani thinks that two wars going on for years and years with no plan to get out is the right direction?

What kind of idiot would say such a thing? Is Rudolph Giuliani so out of touch with the current American reality?

The recently budding elitist echo story about how great it would be if a billionaire could run for President on the basis of his having a lot of money and the support of a group of powerful Washington D.C. insiders is based upon the assumption that the American people have very short memories. Given my experience in discussing political issues with other Americans, that’s a pretty safe assumption. It’s a sadly calculating foundation for a presidential campaign, though.

The billionaire is, of course, Michael Bloomberg. Think about it now… as you’ve gone about your daily business, have you ever heard anybody say, “Oh, if only Michael Bloomberg would run for President!” Of course you haven’t. That’s why Bloomberg will need his billions of dollars to spend on television advertisements, to try to convince you that you’ve just been dying to hand over power to him.

The thing about Michael Bloomberg, is that for all his talk about “unity”, he complains a lot about problems made by bad people. Which bad people? Well, Mikey never says, exactly… because… he’s one of them.

Today, at Politico, Bloomberg was quoted as whining, “People have stopped working together, government is dysfunctional. … There’s no accountability today,!”

The government is dysfunctional? Michael Bloomberg helped to put the government into place, remember? He sent out his New York City police to infiltrate groups of anti-Bush protesters, to spy on them and bring the information back to New York City Republican headquarters. He did it for George W. Bush, his big buddy in the White House.

Remember 2004. George W. Bush and Michael Bloomberg were the best of friends. It’s only since the Republican Party became unpopular that Bloomberg has tried to re-cast himself as an independent.

Independent. Oh, sure. A big city mayor with immense personal riches and Wall Street connections who first was a Democrat, and then a Republican, and then neither. When Mike Bloomberg says “independent”, what he means is “opportunistic”.

Opportunistic, like a rat jumping from a sinking ship, now telling us that he’s been with us all on dry land all along.

Beware of billionaires who complain that the system isn’t working. Their idea of a solution will be worse than the problem.

I’m still lazy, so here’s another comic;

The two words have become, in the last week, buzzwords. They’ve becoming annoying, as many candidates start trying to insert them into every sentence they can, without knowing anything more than that doing so is what their campaign consultants tell them to do.

Don’t make the mistake of thinking, however, that these words mean nothing. In the election of 2008, hope and change have profound meaning.

The meaning of hope is best understood when it’s remembered that hope is not just some vapid, foggy notion of good things happening in the future. Hope is the opposite of fear.

Hope requires courage. An authentic message of hope is a signal to all who are brave enough to unbow their heads and heed it that there is no more need for cowering. Hope is the understanding that there is no need to “balance” freedom with security, because freedom is our security.

Hope is the idea that we have the power to turn our backs on fear and walk away from it.

Change means that things don’t always have to be the way that they have been. Change is the answer to those who say that we have to make choice between our ideals and our actions. Change is the argument against those who say that America just isn’t ready to do what’s right.

Change is the idea that prove ourselves ready to do what’s right by doing it, not by hoping that the time will be right some time later.

This week, there have been a lot of presidential candidates using the words “hope” and “change”, thinking that just by using those words, they will catch enough of the persuasive power of Barack Obama to have a chance of winning the New Hampshire primary.

Here’s where I get a hokey: I believe that there’s a difference between them and Barack Obama. I believe that Barack Obama understands what the concepts of hope and change mean, and understands why they are important, in a way that the other presidential candidates, with the possible exception of John Edwards, do not understand.

It’s more than just a little exasperating the way that many Americans are only now paying attention to the presidential campaign of Barack Obama, only considering his candidacy when it became popular to do so. However, we here at Irregular Times have been following Barack Obama for years now.

I won’t speak for the other writers here, but here’s what I have concluded about Barack Obama: I think that he understands the historical moment in a way that the other candidates do not. I also think that, often, Barack Obama loses sight of that understanding. Sometimes, it’s quite clear that Barack Obama becomes distracted by the political moment, and forgets the significance of the historical moment. It’s then that he loses track, and betrays the promise of hope and change. Look around here at Irregular Times, and you’ll find my strong objections at the times when he has lost track in the past.

However, I am willing to cast my vote for Barack Obama. It’s not because I think that he’s a hero. It’s not that I think he will change things for us, or give us hope.

In fact, if Barack Obama could change things for us, or give us hope, I think he’d be the wrong choice. Democracy is not something that anyone can do for us.

Rather, I am willing to cast my vote for Barack Obama because I believe that he’s seen and comprehended an authentic vision of hope and change for America. Because of that, I believe that he’ll be more likely to listen to the side of America that is willing to say that we can do better, and that we no longer need to be afraid.

Barack Obama may, like many successful politicians, become arrogant. It then becomes our duty to speak loudly against his arrogance. In fact, even as Barack Obama surges toward the Democratic nomination, it is our duty to remind voters of Obama’s shortcomings, as well as his assets.

In doing so, if he is willing to listen, we will help Barack Obama gain political strength, by keeping him close to the course of his motivating vision.

If I’m wrong, and Obama is not willing to listen, then he isn’t worthy of the presidency, and our criticism will have the merit of preventing his corrupted influence on the government.

I’ve said that I am willing to cast a vote for Barack Obama, but I am not committed to doing so. In America, we should not so much elect presidents as hold them on a leash.

That goes for Barack Obama as much as anyone else.

Want proof that global warming is real? Even the government is preparing for it. That’s really interesting too, given that the government has spent so much time telling you that global warming does not exist.

Why didn’t they tell you? The reason is that, if you knew how bad global warming is going to get, you would freak out. Just think about the parameters that the Ames Laboratory, operated by the Department of Energy, is preparing for. This is from a press release that leaked out from the Ames Laboratory today:

“Ames Lab colleagues Bill McCallum and Matthew Kramer, have designed a high-performance permanent magnet alloy that operates with good magnetic strength at 200 degrees Celsius, or 392 degrees Fahrenheit, to help make electric drive motors more efficient and cost-effective. The work is part of the DOE’s Vehicle Technologies Program.”

Why is the Ames Laboratory working on magnets that will work at 392 degrees Fahrenheit? Why would they do such a thing?

Think, now. The answer is disturbingly direct. They must have information indicating that the earth’s climate is going to heat up until the air is 392 degrees!

“Vehicle Technologies Program,” they call it, an obvious false acronym for Very Thermal Planet.

392 degrees, and are they designing heat shields for your home? No. They’re designing magnets to do the work that humans currently do.

They don’t need you, except to work right now, and pay your taxes so that they can fund their programs in the Ames Laboratory to develop your magnetic replacements.

How very “efficient”. How very “cost-effective”.

Never forget that there is no U or I in the “Department of Energy”.

Earlier today on the Irregular Times front page, Jim issued a request for any actual evidence of vote suppression against Ron Paul in the New Hampshire primary election this week.

I didn’t think that I’d see any concrete evidence, so I was surprised when I came across this bit of news from the Ron Paul Forums. Someone only identified as mlingley made the following specific claim:

“My mom, aunt, and dad all voted for RP today in my hometown, My mom and aunt both work passing out ballots, and checking them off. I just looked at the politico map and it says their town has ZERO votes for Ron. Now i know that there isn’t corruption on voting in that little town, so where they reported it must be. What do I do, anyone know???

Originally Posted by sstjean View Post
This was posted to ronpaul-801 tonight: “This town numbers are wrong wrong wrong on this map. I am from Sutton originally and my parents and one aunt all voted for Ron Paul today and Sutton says 0. So this is wrong. This is a town that had 20 people counting the ballots and I have no reason to believe that they cheated. Small town and I was born and raised there. The real numbers will come in by morning. The electronic machines in the big towns are the ones we have to worry about.”

So, here’s one specific piece of evidence: Someone in Sutton, New Hampshire alleges that their mother, father and aunt all voted for Ron Paul, but no votes for Ron Paul were shown for Sutton.

A reader of the Ron Paul Forums reacts, “This is fabulous We’re gonna have to check every county in every state”. How would this be fabulous for a Ron Paul supporter? Do they want there to be voter suppression? Of course, there is a definition of the word “fabulous” that does not mean something good.

There are a couple of obvious problems with this supposed evidence, however. First, mlingley is anonymous. Second, mlingley cannot know who his or her relatives really voted for. They could have just told mlingley that they voted for Ron Paul, and actually voted for someone else.

As it is, the Ron Paul Forums now claims, without any more citation than mlingley’s original claim, that “apperantly this issue was adressed and the vote totals where changed, someone sent me a pm saying this I didnt confirm it, so check for yourselves, lol”.

Check it for yourselves indeed. So far, the evidence for anti-Paul skullduggery isn’t even skin deep.

Spam Alert

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…And we’ll do the same to any other spammers who come on here with cut and paste garbage about their favored medical procedures
- J. Clifford

I’m rolling my eyes at the headline in the New York Times today that reads: “Calls Grow for Bloomberg to Make Up His Mind”.

Where? Where are these calls growing for Michael Bloomberg to make up his mind about whether he’s going to run for President or not?

I haven’t heard any such calls. No one I know is growing impatient, longing to hear what Mike Bloomberg will decide to do in 2008. There never has been any clamor for Michael Bloomberg to do anything among the people I know.

It seems to me that the only people who are calling for Michael Bloomberg to do anything are a bunch of Bloomberg’s fellow media tycoons and power brokers. Maybe they’re calling each other in a heated fury of anxiety, wondering if their favorite billionaire will represent their interests as President. I don’t know. I don’t have their telephone numbers.

But “Calls Grow for Bloomberg to Make Up His Mind”? Give me a break, New York Times.

I know that Bloomberg’s people have been planting little seeds in the ears of reporters, trying to create the impression that the “right” people are backing Bloomberg, but when it comes to the nearly 300 million of the rest of us who are not the “right” people, Michael Bloomberg could move to Antarctica and study penguins for all we care.