Now that's a good compromise

Matt: I figure if the federal gov't is going to take a stronger role than in the past, they might as well do it right. I know money won't fix everything, but by god, I'd rather spend $15B on helping our nation's schools than on building another bomber.

Ryan: No no, I want the bomber. It's cooler.

Matt: How about we compromise?

Ryan: Ok, we can hold classes in my bomber.

O'Reilly's Interview with Obama: The Democrats are in Trouble

Say what you want about O'Reilly; he's a pitbull of an interviewer. Today he pressed Obama on the Surge and Iran. The results were not good for Obama supporters.

Obama acknowledged the success of the surge but claimed it exceeded the wildest expectations of even Bush and McCain. (I don't see how that's a bad thing.) He would not, however, admit that he was wrong in voting against it. In the process he missed a great opportunity for powerful rhetoric.

O'Reilly: "If we had listened to you, we wouldn't have had a surge and we wouldn't be winning the war!"
Obama (fire in his eyes): "If you had listened to me, we wouldn't NEED a surge because we wouldn't have STARTED this war in the first place!"

Now that's the Obama I love. Unfortunately, that Obama doesn't exist. Obama did not say that; there was no fire. He smiled and hemmed and hawed and said, "Well, we still are paying $12 billion a month on Iraq and..."

This remains an unpopular war among most of the American public and Obama needs to turn up the rhetoric. He would do well to remind us that we wouldn't be in this mess if he had been in the White House. (We might be in other messes, but not this one.) From what I've seen, it appears that as great as he is in a prepared speech, he isn't very good at extemporaneous speaking. Biden is amazing at it and that will help offset Obama's stilted responses, but Biden's not the guy who would be the commander in chief.

O'Reilly next moved on to Iran, and asked specifically what Obama plans to do. What happens if diplomacy doesn't work? Does he think military action is likely? Obama was quite evasive. He responded that, as a candidate for president, it's "not appropriate" for him to "tip his hand" regarding the direction he's going to go in Iran. Excuse me? You're not going to tip your hand? This isn't a Supreme Court nomination hearing, Obama, you are supposed to tell us what you're going to do. Eventually he gave his same old "all options are on the table" answer, but with no specifics.

Upon the conclusion of the interview, my first reaction was that Obama is going to lose. In any moderated debate with McCain, McCain will use forceful rhetoric about the need to use military force and confront our enemies. McCain will have fire in his eyes. Obama is, as usual, going to be very introspective, Kerry-like in his desire for nuance. It's not going to play well among the undecideds who agree the world is a very dangerous place.

Live Responses to the Palin Acceptance Speech

• Ok, I'm going to be live-tweeting the Palin speech and compiling it into a blog post later. First impressions: My oh my that is a VPILF.
• So that's what an Alaskan accent sounds like. Sounds vaguely like southern Ohio. Now she's playing the mom-of-soldier card.
• Now she's playing the ADORABLE daughter card. I still think Bristol Willow Piper sounds like a consulting firm.
• Her husband is an Eskimo fisherman snowmobile racer. Now there's a selling point.
• Ha! LIPSTICK! Hahahahahah! :-\
• Everyone's dissing Obama's "community organizing." I'm really curious how Palin is going to spin her mayoral "responsibilities."
• She's been talking for 10 minutes and hasn't said a word about her accomplishments -- just introduced family and bashed Obama.
• You do NOT want to talk about "leaving this nation better than we found it." 8 years of Dubya have not left this nation better than before.
• I'd like to show Palin my oil pipeline.
• Sorry, was overcome by VPlust. She knows about oil and I tend to agree that we should use the power we got until we get the power we want.
• Man oh man does Palin give good rhetoric.
• Palin, if John McCain were truly a maverick, you wouldn't be standing there.
• Listen, McCain is a patriot and yes he was a prisoner of war. I respect him. But that is not a major qualification to be president. Sorry.
• Good speech. MUCH better speaker than McCain. She seems pleasant enough. The American Everywoman. Not much substance though; lotta sarcasm.
• Bottom line: i like her a lot. She seems like a great person. She is not qualified to be my president.
• I'm looking forward to the debates. Obama will wipe the floor with McCain. The real exciting one will be Biden vs. Palin. Game on!

Palin is the most unqualified vice presidential pick in the history of modern elections

Okay. Even if I were still considering McCain, his choice of the most unqualified, unvetted runningmate in the history of modern presidential politics would completely turn me off.

McCain meets her twice: at a governor's conference, and on the day he offers her the job. No one in Alaska had received any calls inquiring into Palin's background. The "vetting" process was almost certainly a quick Google job. I am not confident about a presidential candidate who doesn't do any real research before picking the second-in-command.

And McCain, who has a history of skin cancer and other ailments, had a father who died at 70 -- two years younger than McCain is now. There is a significant chance he could die in office, or become incapacitated. And then what? Palin named her kids Trig, Track, Willow, Bristol and Piper. I don't trust that woman's judgment at all. And she raised a daughter whose values apparently did not preclude having unprotected sex and getting pregnant in high school. Way to go, mom! So much for conservative values (other than her pastime of hunting caribou and encouraging the teaching of Creationism alongside Evolution in SCIENCE CLASS).

What does this pick say about McCain's judgment?
And do we really think Palin is qualified to stare down Putin?

Word has it McCain really wanted Lieberman but decided against him because he didn't poll well. Yeah, real maverick.

Sorry, I'm just pretty annoyed at the direction the Republicans are going. Can someone please tell me why Palin is a good pick? I smell another Harriet Miers

Racism is NOT the only reason Obama might lose

Sometimes I think Slate.com writers intentionally offer the most illogical, unsupported arguments, solely to increase their number of page views. Take this article from one Jacob Weisberg, arguing that racism is the only conceivable reason why Obama might lose the presidency.

Weisberg begins with the premise that Obama is the perfect choice that every non-racist would vote for. With such a ridiculous premise, of course the only logical answer that follows for his neck-and-neck standing in the polls is RACISM!

But the fact is, just because the country is sick of Bush policies doesn't mean they believe McCain will simply continue them. Despite the left wingers' cries of "Bush McCain," much evidence exists to suggest McCain is in fact his own man. People may prefer McCain's experience to Obama's lack thereof. People may still generally prefer conservative, small government principles, to liberal, big government principles.

In short, there are many reasons why McCain and Obama are neck and neck. Simply put, they both offer good policies that appeal to conservatives and liberals, respectively. The country is roughly equally divided between conservatives and liberals. So we get tied poll numbers.

I am not arguing that racism doesn't exist. There is clearly a small percentage that would never vote for Obama because of his skin color. But that is absolutely not the main reason for the current poll numbers.

Is Senator Obama a pigheaded hypocrite?

I have now had several days to ruminate over the speech on race relations that Senator Obama gave to much acclaim on Tuesday. Several of the commentators who discussed the senator's speech compared him to John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr., and Abraham Lincoln. I must admit, I was one of them, complimenting his speech as "Lincolnesque." It was brilliant. It contained a healthy dose of truth, and an incredible amount of introspection. It changed my mind about Obama's association with his church, and with Reverend Jeremiah "God damn America" Wright.

And yet, my friends, I am concerned. You see, Senator Obama paints himself as a man who wants to work with the other side to find a middle position that we can all agree on. He wants us to believe that he is a man of compromise. But his record drastically undermines his message. And his record is the one thing that I cannot overlook, and that all the amazing speeches in the world will not obscure.

I greatly admire Senator Obama. He has accomplished more than I could ever hope to in terms of political power and prestige. He is an intelligent and eloquent man, thoughtful and introspective and able to rally Americans of all colors and creeds. However, I cannot get over the unsettling feeling that Senator Obama is a massive hypocrite.

You see, Senator Obama touts his ability to compromise, and yet he has the most liberal record in the United States Senate. Senator Obama claims to be a man of all the people, and yet he falls to the left of Ted Kennedy on the political spectrum. That is not hyperbole; that is a fact. during his first year in the Senate, The National Journal ranked him the 16th most liberal senator; during his second year, the 10th most liberal; and in 2007, the most liberal.

For all his talk about compromise, Senator Obama never has. Where Senator John McCain earned the respect of his political opponents and the ire of his so-called allies by routinely stepping across the aisle and sponsoring or backing bipartisan legislation, Senator Obama has remained firmly entrenched on the extreme left of the left wing of the Democratic Party.

So, as amazing as Senator Obama's speech was, it cannot erase the years of ultraliberal voting patterns. As enlightened as he wants us to believe he is, the fact remains that his political beliefs have been completely one-sided.

I would love to believe that the brilliant and eloquent Senator Obama can unite the country, but I am afraid his unwillingness to truly understand the other side will make him more of a divider than a uniter.

I'm not sure if Senator Obama could deliver a speech that would assuage my concerns about his unwavering liberalness. As eloquent as the man is, his voting record and actions in the Senate show him to be an unabashed liberal, unwilling to see the wisdom in the other side.And before you go calling me a "Monkey Republican" again, note that I would say exactly the same thing about someone who always voted Republican. Make no mistakes, my friends, there is always wisdom in the other side. Show me someone who always believes a certain way, who always votes with one party, and I will show you someone who is pigheaded and stubborn in his unwillingness to examine an issue from all sides.

Only a fool would think that his side is always correct.

Does Barack Obama hate America?

I feel compelled to offer my voice in the ongoing cacophony that is the 2008 election discussion. This may become an ongoing feature. I'm not sure. All I know is that today, I want to talk about Senator Barack Obama.

I like the man. He is inspirational, he knows how to give a good speech, and he is intelligent. As Joe Biden put it, he is "clean-cut." At the risk of derailing my one-day presidential campaign, I must say that I agree with Senator Biden. Senator Obama appears to be an intelligent, charismatic John Kennedy for the current generation.

However, I am very disturbed by the recent revelations that have come to light concerning the people with whom he surrounds himself. Senator Obama thanked the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Jr., when he won his Senate campaign, and he titled his second book, the Audacity of Hope, after the name of one of the reverend's sermons. Of course, Senator Obama married his wife -- selected her among all the women in the world as the person he wanted to spend his life with. He calls her his "rock." He depends on her for guidance.

This is disturbing because of what these individuals have said. The Reverend has been in the news lately because of some very incendiary remarks he made about America in several of his sermons. The wife was in the news recently for her comments that, until her husband had won the support of certain states, she had never before been proud of America.

I know that Senator Barock Obama is thankful to this country for the opportunities it has provided him. And I know that he regrets the things that his close allies have said publicly. He has called some of the remarks shameful and despicable. But the fact remains that he has chosen to surround himself with these people. This shows, to me, that he agrees with these sentiments -- at least privately. And, even if he does not consciously agree with these statements, it is a fact that, when surrounding yourself with certain viewpoints for so long, those viewpoints will begin to seep in.

An intelligent, impressionable individual who surrounds himself with America-haters for so many years is bound to pick up some of those beliefs. Even if he does not actively hate America, I am positive that at least some small part of him, spurred by the outright disgust of his compatriots, resents America.

None of this really matters to me; I am a John McCain supporter, as I have been for the past eight years or so. But I think it is important that my friends, who are so impressed by Senator Obama's idealism and intelligence and seeming integrity, listen to the words of Obama's preacher and Obama's wife. Don't just dismiss those anti-American ramblings as insignificant words of people who are not running for the presidency. Because, the fact is, those people, and those views, exist somewhere in the heart and mind of the man who is running for the presidency.

You cannot live for so many years with people who distrust America, and not start to develop some of the same views yourself.

Mandela is not dead: Deconstructing a Bushism

It seems there has been some confusion over a recent remark by President Bush. At a news conference yesterday, President Bush pounded his lectern with ferocity and said, "I heard somebody say, 'Where's Mandela?' Well, Mandela's dead because Saddam Hussein killed all the Mandelas."

Now, this caused immediate derision among comedians and bitter left-wing activists. Bush is an idiot! Look, see what he just said? Buffoon!

Well, I am not so sure. After almost seven years, I am starting to think that perhaps our president is not as dumb as he appears. On the contrary, it is possible that he is far smarter than anyone gives him credit for. Indeed, I am fairly certain that President Bush speaks in metaphors -- which would no doubt cause confusion among liberals determined to malign him at every opportunity. Further, the president probably does not say what he is thinking, and when he does pick up a thought in the middle, it is even more confusing for the rest of us, who were not privy to his original internal discussions. ( I am fairly certain he does this, because I used to be guilty of the same offense. in my freshman year writing composition course, I never provided enough background exposition, and my grade suffered for it.)

So let's go ahead and break down the president's remark:

It probably made perfect sense to the president, because he was thinking of a recent discussion he had had, and so to him, the context of his statement was clear. To the rest of us, it was not, at least not initially. But, clearly, the president had been discussing freedom in Iraq, and somebody had probably asked him, why are there no Iraqi revolutionaries stepping up? Why won't anyone stand up against the violence and the injustices -- Where are all the Iraqi Nelson Mandelas?

Well, the president must have responded, "No one is stepping up because all of the potential democratic reformers were killed in Saddam's regime. There are no more Nelson Mandelas..." (and this is where he started the story with the reporters) "...Mandela's dead because Saddam Hussein killed all the Mandelas."

In the president's mind, "Mandela" is a symbol for any outspoken Democratic activists. Now, I'm not sure if the president actually believes that there are no more potential activists in Iraq because Saddam killed them all, or whether he is simply speaking in hyperbole. But either way, he is clearly not unintelligible.

The key, then, to understanding the president, is to think like the president.

Top Five Zombie Presidents

Neil the Intern recently asked me who would be my top 5 zombie presidents. He elaborated: "Who, if they returned from the dead, would make the best president?"

What an interesting prompt! I quickly took up the challenge, and came up with the list below. Note: My Zombie president list may or may not be the same as my “best presidents” list.

1. Ronald Reagan. I’m not sure if his aggressive Cold War style strategies would work in today’s world (it’s a lot harder to intimidate Gorbachev – who was, ultimately, rational – than to intimidate thousands (millions?) of people driven by religious fervor), but it sure would be fun to see Reagan try. “Mister bin Laden, tear down this cave!”
2. John F. Kennedy. Once the nation gets over the disgusting hole in the side of his head, I think Zombie JFK would still be able to inspire us all with his rhetorical abilities. His quotes are my favorite of any modern president. Particularly poignant: "Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty." Also, he’s a supporter of Israel. (“Israel was not created in order to disappear - Israel will endure and flourish. It is the child of hope and the home of the brave. It can neither be broken by adversity nor demoralized by success. It carries the shield of democracy and it honors the sword of freedom.”)
3. Abraham Lincoln. Granted, Lincoln was one of the ugliest presidents, and he would not do well in a televised world. This would go doubly so today: I highly doubt Zombie Lincoln would be more photogenic. That said, I think he would appreciate the enormity of sending our boys to die in Iraq, and be able to convey that gravitas to the world while still likely convincing a majority of Americans to go along with it. (As opposed to just pissing everybody off with a smirk and a few trite lines about freedom.) Also, we could install 21st century defensive technologies in his Top Hat, protecting him from any assassin’s bullet. “I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just. TESLA COIL ACTIVATE!”
4. Thomas Jefferson. I love this man, and I think it would be reassuring for the country to know that a Founding Zombie is watching over us. I’d also be curious to see if he drops his whole Agrarian vision today, in the age of commercialized factory farming. Finally, I think it is about time our country has another redheaded president.
5. Teddy Roosevelt. For no other reason than how cool it would be to see a fat Zombie Roughrider running around shouting, “Bully!”