Remember
Here's a photo I took of the flag that flies over the wreckage of the Arizona in Pearl Harbor.
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May 26, 2008
May 24, 2008
McCain veepstakes postscript
I was thinking again about this story on McCain's Memorial Day Veepstakes cookout, and something struck me. Look at the guest list. At the risk of sounding like James Watt, we're talking about two gays, an Indian, a Jew and a Mormon. I have a feeling this isn't going to be your typical GOP ticket. That could be a very good thing in today's climate (I'm still pulling against the Mormon, though.)
May 23, 2008
Meh
Hopefully it's just a barbecue, but lots of folks are looking at the guest list for John McCain's Memorial Day shindig and speculating that it might have something to do with his veep choice.
I kinda hope not. I'd rather believe it's a gathering of friends and supporters who were instrumental in helping McCain clinch the nomination with no overarching agenda. The most widely rumored veep candidates in attendance range from the merely uninspiring (Crist) to the crushingly disappointing (Romney) all the way to the disastrous (Huckabee.)
Fortunately, if you read past the first few grafs you learn that the guest list also includes Lindsey Graham and Joe Lieberman. Granted, they're probably only there because they're joined at the hip to McCain these days, but it still makes me feel better. As unlikely as I think they are to be veep candidates, I'd love to see either one of them on the ticket -- I like Graham (my former congresscritter) for all the same reasons I like John McCain, and I'd really like the star power that Lieberman would bring to the ticket. Then there's also Bobby Jindal, who'd make an interesting choice, and is certainly someone I could live with.
I just really hope McCain doesn't screw this up. Despite all the media attention it gets, I really don't think the VP nominee usually does much to boost a ticket. A bad pick, however, can certainly drag a ticket down -- especially for a candidate who's 71 years old.
UPDATE: Hmm. After re-reading my link, I realized I don't see Mike Huckabee's name anywhere in there. Hopefully I just imagined it.
May 22, 2008
Obama and the Jewish vote
Obama's enlisting some help in persuading Jewish voters in Florida to vote for him.
...Mr. Obama has lined up surrogates like State Representative Dan Gelber, the House minority leader, and Mr. Wexler, both of whom are Jewish. Mr. Wexler said he would try to convert voters one mah-jongg table at a time, with town-hall meetings in the card rooms of high-rise condominiums and articles in community newspapers.“Many of the political leaders in Palm Beach and Broward County were at my son’s bris,” he said.
That's great, but here's the thing. When you have to work to try to convince Jewish people to vote for a Democrat, that's a pretty good sign that you've got a problem on your hands. Time will tell how successful these efforts will bet, but so far?
Still, Mr. Wexler admits, he has not yet been able to persuade his in-laws to vote for Mr. Obama.
Not looking so good.
May 21, 2008
How to nominate a loser
For the second time in a week, nominee-apparent Barack Obama got a lopsided ass whippin' in a swing state by a dead woman. That can't be good news for the Dems, no matter how you slice it. Kentucky is a pretty reliable bellwether for presidential elections, successfully predicting the outcome of the past 11 presidential elections.
West Virginia and Kentucky are exactly the kinds of states the next president will need to win, but Obama's weakness in such states is crippling. Not only was he trounced by more than two to one, but a mere one-third of Hillary voters in Kentucky said they would support Obama in the general election. Those are pretty grim statistics for the Obama campaign. Whatever the polls say now, one is hard-pressed to look at the electoral map and explain how Obama can come up with 270 votes in November.
So how did the Dems end up in this situation? I think the answer is that the Democrats' nomination process is fatally flawed. Its problems extend beyond the superdelegate nonsense, and even beyond the proportional representation scheme, which not only guarantees a long, hard internecine slog, but is also a poor proving ground for the winner-take-all race in the general election.
More importantly, votes from districts that went Republican in 2004 were given less weight than blue districts. That's why we have the bizarre spectacle of Obama racking up huge wins in places he doesn't stand a prayer of winning in November, while Hillary has largely been kicking his ass in the swing states that will actually decide the next election. Once again, they've managed to nominate a candidate with no real strength outside the liberal archipelago.
I think what we are witnessing is an ugly, bitter divorce between the Democratic Party and the Clintons. It's a pity, because the Clintons are the only Democrats in my lifetime who know how to win a national election.