Battle for the Republican Vote in Texas

While John McCain mounts an effort to woo the conservative base in Texas, Barack Obama's reaching out to "Obamacans" - Republicans who might cross over to vote for the charismatic Democratic frontrunner.

Here's the Dallas Morning News on McCain's outreach:

John McCain was on a mission Thursday in Texas – consolidate the Republican base and frame the November election on his terms.

Far ahead of rival Mike Huckabee in delegates and the polls, Mr. McCain has taken advantage of the lack of meaningful primary competition to highlight the differences between himself and the eventual Democratic nominee.

And while he mentioned both Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton by name, his sharpest criticism was aimed at the Illinois senator in what sounded like a rehearsal for the general election campaign.

"Senator Obama has, according to the National Journal, the most liberal record in the U.S. Senate," said Mr. McCain, who took his three-day Texas swing Thursday to a town hall meeting at Texas Instruments Inc.

In a twist on the current campaign narrative, the 71-year-old opened a new line of attack – accusing Mr. Obama of dwelling on the past while he is focused on the future.

Of Mr. Obama's criticism that America should never have gone to war against Iraq, Mr. McCain said: "That's history, that's the past."

"What we should be talking about is what we're going to be doing now," he told 600 workers gathered in a large manufacturing hall festooned with flags and orange Texas Instruments banners.

The Washinton Wire has the background on Obama's crossover appeal to Lone Star Republicans:

MSNBC’s Alex Johnson looks at looks at a secret weapon for Sen. Barack Obama in Texas: Republicans who say they’re going to cross over to vote for him in the Democratic primary. Obama, Johnson notes, often says in his speeches that Republicans come up to him and whisper that they are supporting him. “If the latest polling data are to be believed, those Republicans aren’t whispering in Texas, where 195 of the 228 delegates the state will send to the Democratic National Convention will be chosen in a primary and caucuses Tuesday,” Johnson writes. “As many as a tenth of the Texans voting in the Democratic contests could be Republicans, and overwhelmingly they favor Obama, a first-term senator from Illinois, the polls show.” Some, he says, genuinely like Obama; some dislike Sen. Hillary Clinton so much they’ll vote for another Democrat next Tuesday just to stop her.

Also commenting on Obama’s ties to Republicans, The Washington Post’s E. J. Dionne takes a look at the similarities between Obama and Ronald Reagan. Both were criticized by opposing campaigns that charged that the candidates had nothing more than oratory skills. Both faced concerns about their ability to handle foreign policy. Both endured complaints that they wouldn’t achieve bipartisanship - Obama will reveal himself as a “big, bad liberal” and Reagan as a right-wing extremist. But the electorate wanted a change in 1980 and they took a risk to achieve it. And they’re doing it again this year. “Now is the time to go for broke, to challenge not only the ruling party but also the governing ideas of the previous political era and the political coalition that allowed them to dominate public life,” Dionne writes.

Will those same Republicans now looking to Obama in the Texas primary stick with him in November, assuming he's the nominee?

Obama Republicans... today's Reagan Democrats?

Doesn't have to same ring to it.

U.S. Will Succeed in Iraq, Poll Finds

I've long noted that public opinion on Iraq is far more complicated that the standard left-wing line that Americans want to "bring the troops home."

Indeed, not only are claims of a public demand for withdrawal unsupported, a recent Pew Research poll finds that a majority of 53 percent of Americans sees the United States ultimately prevailing in the conflict. Here's some background from Hot Air:

In case you were wondering why the Democrats are running from this debate, it’s because the more public opinion shifts, the more their willingness to abandon Iraq looks less like a “realist” exit strategy than calculated defeatism. Even so, note how inelastic most of the results are despite the security gains (especially in Anbar). The microresults show impressive shifts — click the image and follow the link to see double digit swings in the “Growing Perceptions of Iraq Progress” graph — but the baseline results below are static. I wonder why.

Here's the Pew summary of results:

Public perceptions of the situation in Iraq have become significantly more positive over the past several months, even as opinions about the initial decision to use military force remain mostly negative and unchanged.

The number of Americans who say the military effort is going very or fairly well is much higher now than a year ago (48% vs. 30% in February 2007). There has been a smaller positive change in the number who believe that the U.S. will ultimately succeed in achieving its goals (now 53%, up from 47% in February 2007).

The polls have been moving in the right direction since last summer, but you wouldn't know it from the journalistic coverage.

Here's the Economist's latest on McCain, for example:

The success of the surge has done almost nothing to reduce Americans' desire to leave Iraq to the Iraqis.

This meme on the "demand" for withdrawal will continue, and I'll continue to debunk it.

War Goes Glam? Angelina Jolie Rejects Iraq Retreat

Recall Daniel Drezner's recent point about celebrities and world politics:

IT IS TRUE that star activism can influence the global policy agenda. But as we’ve seen, when it comes to concrete achievements, celebrities have a spotty track record.

Not only that:

Celebrity activism rubs many policymakers and pundits the wrong way.

So, with that, what do we make of Angelina Jolie's rejection of antiwar demands for a precipitous retreat from Iraq? Jolie make the case for a long-term U.S. commitment to Iraq on humanitarian grounds:

The request is familiar to American ears: "Bring them home."

But in Iraq, where I've just met with American and Iraqi leaders, the phrase carries a different meaning. It does not refer to the departure of U.S. troops, but to the return of the millions of innocent Iraqis who have been driven out of their homes and, in many cases, out of the country.

In the six months since my previous visit to Iraq with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, this humanitarian crisis has not improved. However, during the last week, the United States, UNHCR and the Iraqi government have begun to work together in new and important ways.

We still don't know exactly how many Iraqis have fled their homes, where they've all gone, or how they're managing to survive. Here is what we do know: More than 2 million people are refugees inside their own country -- without homes, jobs and, to a terrible degree, without medicine, food or clean water. Ethnic cleansing and other acts of unspeakable violence have driven them into a vast and very dangerous no-man's land. Many of the survivors huddle in mosques, in abandoned buildings with no electricity, in tents or in one-room huts made of straw and mud. Fifty-eight percent of these internally displaced people are younger than 12 years old.

An additional 2.5 million Iraqis have sought refuge outside Iraq, mainly in Syria and Jordan. But those host countries have reached their limits. Overwhelmed by the refugees they already have, these countries have essentially closed their borders until the international community provides support....

The Iraqi families I've met on my trips to the region are proud and resilient. They don't want anything from us other than the chance to return to their homes -- or, where those homes have been bombed to the ground or occupied by squatters, to build new ones and get back to their lives. One thing is certain: It will be quite a while before Iraq is ready to absorb more than 4 million refugees and displaced people. But it is not too early to start working on solutions. And last week, there were signs of progress.

In Baghdad, I spoke with Army Gen. David Petraeus about UNHCR's need for security information and protection for its staff as they re-enter Iraq, and I am pleased that he has offered that support. General Petraeus also told me he would support new efforts to address the humanitarian crisis "to the maximum extent possible" -- which leaves me hopeful that more progress can be made.

UNHCR is certainly committed to that. Last week while in Iraq, High Commissioner Antonio Guterres pledged to increase UNHCR's presence there and to work closely with the Iraqi government, both in assessing the conditions required for return and in providing humanitarian relief....

Today's humanitarian crisis in Iraq -- and the potential consequences for our national security -- are great. Can the United States afford to gamble that 4 million or more poor and displaced people, in the heart of Middle East, won't explode in violent desperation, sending the whole region into further disorder?

What we cannot afford, in my view, is to squander the progress that has been made.

Now that's an interesting development!

While Jolie states she's "not an expert," humanitarian activism's brought her around to the longstanding expert position that a U.S. cut-and-run from the deployment would be a disaster: It's fantasy to think that "our exiting Iraq would leave us better off, when in all likelihood it would fan the flames of jihadism."

See also Anthony Cordesman, "Victory and Violence in Iraq: Reducing the "Irreducible Minimum."

Jolie and the experts start off at different points on the spectrum, but they all end up at a point of consensus on the importance of American's commitment to the Iraqi people (humanitarian and strategic).

Perhaps this will be a case of celebrity interest in world politics that works to make a difference.

Race, Identity Sensitive Issues in Campaign '08

With the McCain campaign's recent mini-controversy over a supporter's introductory remarks at a town hall rally stressing Barak Obama's middle name, it looks as though a new era of top-level racial senstitivity has arrived:

The Los Angeles Times has the story:

When John McCain apologized to Barack Obama this week for the comments of his warm-up act at a rally, it was not the first time -- and probably won't be the last -- that the most competitive black presidential candidate in U.S. history has heard the words, "I'm sorry."

In his yearlong quest to win the White House, the Democratic senator from Illinois has changed the rules of political engagement, forcing his rivals to step delicately in a normally no-holds-barred arena.

As the possibility grows that voters may bestow the nation's highest public office on an African American, serial public apologies -- largely by Democrats -- show just how sensitive race remains. What is less clear is how race could help or hinder Obama, who has struggled to keep it in the background.

If current or future opponents focus on Obama's race, it could help them by playing on some voters' racial prejudice, or it could help Obama if he is seen as a sympathetic victim of his rivals' insensitivity.

Hey, what happened to the "Obama's Bradley effect?"

I thought race was supposed drag down black candidates at the polls, not give them an advantage? Maybe there's a "Reverse Bradley Effect" working to give black candidates an edge, since questions of race can't be raised for fears of allegations of insensitivity. Boy, it's tough to run a campaign these days...

And don't even get me going about religion!

Throughout Obama's campaign, foes have invoked his middle name as a kind of dual-use code word to remind voters of his African ancestry and call into question his Christian faith.

McCain had not arrived at the rally in time to hear Cunningham's remarks. Asked whether Obama's middle name -- a family name of Arab descent -- was appropriate fodder for political discourse, McCain said, "No, it is not. . . . I absolutely repudiate such comments."

Now, seriously, McCain made the right call on the "Hussein" smear, simply because Obama's not Muslim and he's got no ties to international Islamic terrorism.

Domestic terrorism another story, however. Will Obama's ties to former Chicago Weathermen be off the table of reasonable campaign challenges and debate?

Geez, it's getting to be so that a guy can't raise old-fashioned questions of character these days, not to mention sling a little mud!

Blog Posts Lead to Japanese Murder Suspect's Arrest

Because I blog on controversial topics, I never post personal information, family pictures, or specific travel itineraries. It's enough that I'm a public blogger, not to mention that I've had serious threats against my safety on more than one occasion.

Thus, given the often rough nature of online publishing, I'd expect bloggers to use that kind of caution.

I guess that's not so in the case of Kazuyoshi Miura, a Japanese national wanted for the suspect murder of his wife in Los Angeles 27 years ago. The Los Angeles Times has the story:

In the end, it was his own Internet blog that helped Los Angeles detectives nab Kazuyoshi Miura.

The Japanese businessman was wanted for allegedly hiring a gunman to shoot his 28-year-old wife, Kazumi, on a downtown Los Angeles street 27 years ago. Miura, who was wounded in the attack, made it appear to be a random crime, fanning Japanese fears of a city known for its street violence.

Miura was arrested Friday while trying to leave Saipan, a popular tourist destination in the Pacific north of Guam. He had remained in the sights of the Los Angeles Police Department as a generation of homicide investigators came and went.

The 60-year-old suspect spent 13 years in Japanese prison after being convicted in that country of attempted murder for an earlier attack on his wife in a Little Tokyo hotel in Los Angeles. He was also convicted in Japan for the murder of his wife, but the case was overturned on appeal.

Miura, who was charged here with murder two decades ago, had remained out of the reach of Los Angeles police and prosecutors until the persistence of retired police Lt. Jimmy Sakoda and other detectives finally paid off, officials told The Times.

For the last two years, police had been monitoring a blog written by Miura, who had become a crime sensation in Japan because of saturation media coverage of his case. In recent blog postings, he spoke of his international travel plans, including a possible trip to Saipan.

Sakoda, who worked with Japanese authorities in their prosecution of Miura, had maintained contact with his international counterparts and immigration officials in Saipan, according to Det. Rick Jackson of the LAPD's Cold Case Homicide Unit.

When Jackson got a call last year from Sakoda about the blog postings, detectives alerted Immigration and Customs officials in Guam and Saipan, both U.S. territories, to be on the lookout for Miura.

On Friday, immigration agents caught Miura as he was preparing to leave the island for Japan. The arrest culminated a case that has spanned three decades and has become one of the most sensational crimes in Japanese history -- that nation's version of the O.J. Simpson case.

"It was just a matter of wait and see," Jackson said of the final push to catch Miura. "If he left [Japan], and whether things would work out with our liaisons in other countries."

Miura, who has repeatedly denied involvement in his wife's murder, is awaiting extradition back to Los Angeles.

Additional details on the case will be discussed this afternoon at a City Hall news conference. Officials said that, based on recent court decisions, prosecuting Miura again in Los Angeles in his wife's murder does not violate the ban against legal double jeopardy.

Well, it's safe to say Miura didn't have time to make guest-blogger arrangments. Extented vacations can be murder on blog traffic.

The Search for the Next Dayton Housewife

Karlyn Bowman and Ruy Teixeira provide an intereting analysis of this year's election demographics, at the Wall Street Journal:

Ben Wattenberg and Richard Scammon introduced us to the Dayton housewife in their famous 1970 book, "The Real Majority." She was blue-collar and from middle America. She was middle aged and her views were moderate. Since their pioneering work, analysts, pundits and soothsayers have followed in hot pursuit, looking for the group holding the keys to the next presidential election.

In recent years, angry white men, soccer moms and Nascar dads have joined their Dayton housewife. Today's leading contender for the Democrats appears to be waitress moms.

There's usually some truth to the political shorthand, but only some. Soccer moms, supposedly college-educated women with children who lived in the suburbs, were 1996's great political icon. But most suburban women are not college educated, large numbers do not have children, and together those two groups were more important in that election than their college-educated cousins. This fact was lost in the buzz.

Still, the evolution of American politics is bound up with demographic and geographic change. So what are the trends to watch in 2008? A number of them will be examined today at an American Enterprise Institute-Brookings Institution conference featuring leading demographers and geographers.

The authors highlight a number of changing trends in the electorate:

• Hispanic voters are becoming increasingly important.
• Evangelicals are an important, but not overwhelming, force.
• The influence married voters have on elections is declining.
• The suburbs are the contested terrain.
• America's shifting class structure has reduced the white working class's political role.
• People are becoming increasingly likely to live close to those who look, act and think like them.

The discussion of married voters caught my attention:

Married voters typically vote solidly Republican and married voters with children even more so. But their representation in the national electorate is waning, as are some values to which these groups have traditionally been linked. According to Tom Smith of the National Opinion Research Center, two-parent families with kids at home were 23% of the population in 2006, down from 45% in 1972. The proportion of never-married adults rose to nearly a quarter of the electorate between 1972 and 2006, up from 15%. Overall, never-married, divorced, or widowed women are now a narrow majority of adult women, and unmarried households are now a majority of the nation's households. The growing, unmarried slice of the electorate is tilting Democratic.

That's a striking figure for "familied" couples with children. Married couple recently slipped to minority status in Census statisics on the American demography, but the number of married without children is pushing nearly 2 in 10 of the population.

Certainly that's an advantageous demographic trend for the Democrats, as those identifying as members of non-traditional family structures increasingly find themselves on the left side of the political divide.

I guess some of those Dayton housewives we might find'll be childless.

Abu Ghraib Makes a Comeback

There's a bit of a buzz today with the release of new, "disturbing" photographs from Abu Ghraib, the Baghdad Correctional Facility where cases of abuse and mistreatment of prisoners in 2004 created a firestorm of far-left wing condemnation of the Bush administration's invasion of Iraq.

Are these new photos significant?

Of course the first batch of images were disturbing, especially as they represented the actions of rogue service personnel who in no way represented the U.S. military's increasingly powerful ethic of compliance with the laws of war and principles of non-combatant immunity.

But check out the take on this at JammieWearingFool:

They're being plugged as disturbing. Maybe I'll be disturbed by the fact the New York Times now has seven months of fresh material leading up to the election.

I figure they can't keep making up stores about John McCain, so this will give them cause to just keep bashing Bush.

Fresh material alright.

The left's already scrambling to put out the renewed meme arguing that the ultimate font of terror in the world resides in Washington and its wars of imperial agression:

Here's this from The Impolitic:

Frankly, I'm not as disturbed by the images of torture and mayhem perpetrated by American "warriors" as by some of the public response you can see at Wired.com where Abu Ghraib photos have been published. It's the ones that argue "this is a war and in a war. . ." and the ones that say "but these are Muslims and they would be happy to eat your children, yada, yada" that make me most ashamed to have any association with this self righteous and evil nation. They've made me evil too; Dick Cheney and Don Rumsfeld and their puppet George Bush. I'm part of it because all I do is complain. I don't risk losing my life to end it, nor even my freedom. All I do is blog and go about my life of comfort and safety.

I got a video in my e-mail yesterday. I don't know whether it was staged or real, but it showed some US military personnel walking through an airport while people stood up and applauded. No one could have been thinking of the archive of pictures on view at UnderMars.com They aren't returning from a parade ground, but from hell and a hell the United States of America created with eagerness and enthusiasm and lies.Men with plastic bags on their heads being beaten, smiling "warriors" posing with corpses, a man's severed penis in a mousetrap, blood and pain and shit; these are things many Americans think "you do in a war" even though you started the war and of course anyone caught up in the grinder is promoted to the ranks of the "terrorists" who bombed New York even though they didn't.

So clap when you see our soldiers; I'm sure nearly all of them are good people, but don't call them warriors. Warriors take scalps, soldiers are responsible for their actions. Warriors represent themselves, soldiers represent us and when there's blood on their hands, it's on our hands too and remember, when John McCain tries to tell you this is noble, this is about protecting your sainted mother, your back yard barbecue and your civil rights - it isn't. It's about water up the nose, the cattle prod up the ass, bloody teeth spilling out like corn from a popper; it's about rape, about shit and piss and blood on the floor being wiped up with the flag we're supposed to worship like some tawdry pagan idol.

It's about millions of homeless innocents, about a lost generation of uneducated children brought up in terror and squalor and hate. It's about people whose crime was fighting for their homes being tortured like John McCain who once was tortured by those whose homes and children he was destroying. It's about evil. It's about me and about you justifying it all by just calling it war.

The Impolitic's low traffic profile among the nihilist left-blogosphere belies its consistency as a template of the most hardened anti-Americanism among the antiwar, multiculturalist Bush-bashing hordes.

This is the blog that applaued the story of al Qaeda's rumored deployment of women suicide bombers believed to have Down's syndrome, praising the terrorists for their "brilliant" military adaptation against U.S. and Iraqi forces.

But to summarize, the abuse at Abu Graib was a reprehensible violation of America's commitment to the international law and norms of human rights protection in wartime.

Criminal prosecutions of the perpetrators followed, however, resulting in the convictions of eleven lower-ranking soldiers accused of committing physical abuse and sexual humiliation of Abu Ghraib detainees.

Bullying Protectionists: Democrats on Trade

This Wall Street Journal editorial highlights a key international relations election issue that's been out of the media glare with so much talk about Iraq: Will the next president expand America's historic commitment to free trade, global markets, and the internationalization of economic opportunity?

The answer's less clear on the Democratic side:

Democrats claim the world hates America because President Bush has behaved like a global bully. But we don't recall him ever ordering an ally to rewrite an existing agreement on American terms -- or else.

Yet that's exactly what both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are now promising to do to our closest neighbors, Mexico and Canada. At their Ohio debate on Tuesday, first Mrs. Clinton, followed ever so quickly by Mr. Obama, pledged to pull America out of the North American Free Trade Agreement if the two countries don't agree to rewrite it on Yankee terms. How's that for global "unilateralism"?

Democrats sure have come a long way from the 1990s, when Bill Clinton pushed Nafta through a Democratic Congress. And the truth is that both Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama have spoken favorably about Nafta in the past. Yet now they are sounding the loudest protectionist notes by a potential President in decades. More dangerous, neither is telling the truth about the role of trade in the U.S. economy. If either one makes it to the White House, he or she will carry the weight of this campaign protectionism while trying to lead the global economy.

Protectionism has been an important theme throughout the campaign. See my earlier post, "Iowa Voters Jittery on Trade Policy."

But the gains from trade remain largely uncontroversial among economists.

But note further WSJ's editorial, which highlights the gains to both Canada and Mexico from the North America Free Trade Agreement.

Especially interesting here is Barack Obama's statements on trade. He campaigned as a free trader in earlier phases of his political career. Now he wants to roll back America's commitment to free international markets: He's like John Kerry on trade policy: He was for trade liberalization before he was against it.

The World After George W. Bush

What will the world be like in 2009, after George W. Bush exits the presidency? Not a bad place, but challenges remain, according to Victor David Hanson:

When President George Bush leaves office, will America once again be liked by most of the world? Not necessarily, since most current problems are either already getting better or not our fault.

When the next president takes office in January 2009, he or she will be confronted by a world that either understandably appreciates America or for self-interested reasons will challenge it.

On the positive side, the new president will see a Middle East without the Taliban in charge in Afghanistan or Saddam Hussein ruling Iraq. A stabilizing constitutional Iraq should result in a steadily diminishing American presence there.

In Europe, the French under Nicolas Sarkozy and the Germans under Angela Merkel will remain pro-American. But they will also expect continued American leadership. Both may talk grandly of the Atlantic Alliance, but in real terms they do little to help us in Afghanistan or elsewhere.

Most of Africa likewise is already friendly to the United States. And why not? President Bush extended more humanitarian aid to combat African hunger and disease than any president in our history.

But what of our enemies? Won't adversaries back off when the Christian cowboy George Bush rides back to Texas -- and we have a kinder, gentler commander-in-chief who offers hope, or at least change, to the world?

Hardly.

There are plenty of problems that both antedated George Bush and are likely to continue well after he's left office.

These problems include authoritarianism in Russia, which preceded the Bush administration, and Iran's nuclear challenge, which will be here for as long as it takes to disarm the mad mullahs in Tehran.

For more on the world after Bush, see "A New Middle East, After All: What George W. Bush Hath Wrought."

McCain’s Canal Zone Birth Raises Questions

I was born overseas at a U.S. military hospital, so I've often thought about John McCain's "natural born" status under the U.S. Constitution (Art. II, Sec. 1) and his qualifications for the presidency.

McCain was born in the Panama Canal Zone, and his eligibility is being questioned, as this New York Times story indicates:

The question has nagged at the parents of Americans born outside the continental United States for generations: Dare their children aspire to grow up and become president? In the case of Senator John McCain of Arizona, the issue is becoming more than a matter of parental daydreaming.

Mr. McCain’s likely nomination as the Republican candidate for president and the happenstance of his birth in the Panama Canal Zone in 1936 are reviving a musty debate that has surfaced periodically since the founders first set quill to parchment and declared that only a “natural-born citizen” can hold the nation’s highest office.

Almost since those words were written in 1787 with scant explanation, their precise meaning has been the stuff of confusion, law school review articles, whisper campaigns and civics class debates over whether only those delivered on American soil can be truly natural born. To date, no American to take the presidential oath has had an official birthplace outside the 50 states.

“There are powerful arguments that Senator McCain or anyone else in this position is constitutionally qualified, but there is certainly no precedent,” said Sarah H. Duggin, an associate professor of law at Catholic University who has studied the issue extensively. “It is not a slam-dunk situation.”

Mr. McCain was born on a military installation in the Canal Zone, where his mother and father, a Navy officer, were stationed. His campaign advisers say they are comfortable that Mr. McCain meets the requirement and note that the question was researched for his first presidential bid in 1999 and reviewed again this time around.

But given mounting interest, the campaign recently asked Theodore B. Olson, a former solicitor general now advising Mr. McCain, to prepare a detailed legal analysis. “I don’t have much doubt about it,” said Mr. Olson, who added, though, that he still needed to finish his research.

Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina and one of Mr. McCain’s closest allies, said it would be incomprehensible to him if the son of a military member born in a military station could not run for president.

“He was posted there on orders from the United States government,” Mr. Graham said of Mr. McCain’s father. “If that becomes a problem, we need to tell every military family that your kid can’t be president if they take an overseas assignment.”

The phrase “natural born” was in early drafts of the Constitution. Scholars say notes of the Constitutional Convention give away little of the intent of the framers. Its origin may be traced to a letter from John Jay to George Washington, with Jay suggesting that to prevent foreigners from becoming commander in chief, the Constitution needed to “declare expressly” that only a natural-born citizen could be president.

Ms. Duggin and others who have explored the arcane subject in depth say legal argument and basic fairness may indeed be on the side of Mr. McCain, a longtime member of Congress from Arizona. But multiple experts and scholarly reviews say the issue has never been definitively resolved by either Congress or the Supreme Court.

Ms. Duggin favors a constitutional amendment to settle the matter. Others have called on Congress to guarantee that Americans born outside the national boundaries can legitimately see themselves as potential contenders for the Oval Office.

Well, McCain's not Arnold Schwarzenegger (who's Austrian born and widely considered ineligible), but it does sound that McCain's case could really create the demand for a definitive answer to the question.

*********

UPDATE: Captain Ed provides a pretty good response:

It’s a slam-dunk to the millions of military families whose service to this country should have left then with no doubts about their children being relegated to second-class citizenry. They sacrificed enough for their country without having to sacrifice the futures of their children. Any other conclusion would amount to a penalty for military service on those who did not volunteer.

The Founding Fathers recognized this. They passed a bill in 1790, three years after the adoption of the Constitution, which made clear that “natural born” applied to children born of American citizens “outside the limits of the United States”. That law remains in effect and has never been challenged. At the least, it speaks to the intent of the founders when they used the term “natural born” in the Constitution.

It’s beyond absurd to argue that John McCain doesn’t qualify to run as an American for the presidency. The candidate or party that files a lawsuit to challenge him on this point runs the risk of alienating a large swath of the public who have served this nation in uniform, in diplomacy, and in government.

Well said, Ed!

**********

UPDATE II: I haven't been as up on this naturar born issues as I might have been, once I get a look at what some of the law bloggers are saying.

Jim Lindgren at the Volokh Conspiracy notes that:

If the drafters of the Constitution had wanted to require that presidents be born in the United States, they could have done so. Instead, they invoked the then-standard idea of natural citizenship as reflecting natural allegiance to the king or the state.

In other words, the key is "natural allegiance" to crown or country. Lindgren cites the William Blackstone commentaries:

An Englishman who removes to France, or to China, owes the same allegiance to the king of England there as at home, and twenty years hence as well as now. For it is a principle of universal law, that the natural-born subject of one prince cannot by any act of his own, no, not by swearing allegiance to another, put off or discharge his natural allegiance to the former: for this natural allegiance was intrinsic, and primitive, and antecedent to the other; and cannot be devested without the concurrent act of that prince to whom it was first due.

Ann Althouse, moreover, takes Barack Obama to task, for turning a non-issue into an issue of McCain's qualifications to serve:

The argument that McCain isn't a natural born citizen within the meaning of Article II of the Constitution is an obvious loser, both as a matter of constitutional interpretation and as something that an opposing candidate would want to say. But Obama, co-sponsoring the bill [defining a "natural-born citizen" as anyone born to any U.S. citizen while serving...in the military], is acting generous, as though he is forbearing making an attack. But since there is no attack to make, he's not actually being magnanimous. He's only putting on a show.

What is more, offering a statutory solution sends the message that there is a problem to be fixed. So in fact, it's a crafty way of saying that McCain is not now currently qualified!

Good thing I blog! I'm picking up a lot here!

William F. Buckley, Jr., 1925-2008

William F. Buckley, Jr., died today at his home in Stamford, Connecticut. The New York Times obituary is here (and more views are posted at Memeorandum).

Buckley's ideological project, it may be said, sought to position the growing conservative movement within the mainstream of society, and Buckley sought to distance what he called "thinking right" from the far-right wing fringe, represented in the 1960s by the John Birch Society.

Efforts to that end are the subject of Buckley's article in the March issue of Commentary. Here's an excerpt:

In the early months of l962, there was restiveness in certain political quarters of the Right. The concern was primarily the growing strength of the Soviet Union, and the reiteration by its leaders of their designs on the free world. Some of the actors keenly concerned felt that Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona was a natural leader in the days ahead.

But it seemed inconceivable that an anti-establishment gadfly like Goldwater could be nominated as the spokesman-head of a political party. And it was embarrassing that the only political organization in town that dared suggest this radical proposal—the GOP’s nominating Goldwater for President—was the John Birch Society.

The society had been founded in 1958 by an earnest and capable entrepreneur named Robert Welch, a candy man, who brought together little clusters of American conservatives, most of them businessmen. He demanded two undistracted days in exchange for his willingness to give his seminar on the Communist menace to the United States, which he believed was more thoroughgoing and far-reaching than anyone else in America could have conceived. His influence was near-hypnotic, and his ideas wild. He said Dwight D. Eisenhower was a “dedicated, conscious agent of the Communist conspiracy,” and that the government of the United States was “under operational control of the Communist party.” It was, he said in the summer of 1961, “50-70 percent” Communist-controlled.

Welch refused to divulge the size of the society’s membership, though he suggested it was as high as 100,000 and could reach a million. His method of organization caused general alarm. The society comprised a series of cells, no more than twenty people per cell. It was said that its members were directed to run in secret for local offices and to harass school boards and librarians on the matter of the Communist nature of the textbooks and other materials they used.

The society became a national cause célèbre—so much so, that a few of those anxious to universalize a draft-Goldwater movement aiming at a nomination for President in 1964 thought it best to do a little conspiratorial organizing of their own against it.

The remainder of the essay elaborates Buckley's immediate pattern of "conspiratorial organizing."

William F. Buckley was an interesting man. He had an intriguing, kind of airy way about addressing people, with a roll of the eyes or a long pause before speaking, and his manner sometimes seemed, to me, like that of a true American aristrocrat.

May he rest in peace.

Teenagers Ignorant on Basic History and Literature

From the "Department of Tell Me Something I Didn't Already Know," here comes a new survey finding that America's teenagers are ignorant of basic American history (via the New York Times):

Fewer than half of American teenagers who were asked basic history and literature questions in a phone survey knew when the Civil War was fought, and one in four said Columbus sailed to the New World some time after 1750, not in 1492.

The survey results, released on Tuesday, demonstrate that a significant proportion of teenagers live in “stunning ignorance” of history and literature, said the group that commissioned it, Common Core.

The organization describes itself as a new research and advocacy organization that will press for more teaching of the liberal arts in public schools....

In the survey, 1,200 17-year-olds were called in January and asked to answer 33 multiple-choice questions about history and literature that were read aloud to them. The questions were drawn from a test that the federal government administered in 1986.

About a quarter of the teenagers were unable to correctly identify Hitler as Germany’s chancellor in World War II, instead identifying him as a munitions maker, an Austrian premier and the German kaiser.

On literature, the teenagers fared even worse. Four in 10 could pick the name of Ralph Ellison’s novel about a young man’s growing up in the South and moving to Harlem, “Invisible Man,” from a list of titles. About half knew that in the Bible Job is known for his patience in suffering. About as many said he was known for his skill as a builder, his prowess in battle or his prophetic abilities.

The history question that proved easiest asked the respondents to identify the man who declared, “I have a dream.” Ninety-seven percent correctly picked the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

About 8 in 10, a higher percentage than on any other literature question, knew that Harper Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird” is about two children affected by the conflict in their community when their father defends a black man in court.

Read the whole article, for I've ommitted the sections discussing how the sponsoring organization is using the findings to attack the Bush administration's No Child Left Behind Act as "crowding out" history and literature in the schools.

I'm not wading into this debate, except I will say that while NCLB has its flaws, the law is possible one of the greatest attempts to expand equal protection in education opportunity in education in decades. I get these students at my college, unable to place the Civil War - or the Vietnam War - in historical context.

But more fundamentally (and sadly), I get these students (way too many) who can barely read and write, and then who are expected to master a curriculum (in my department, at least) that would be challenging for an average freshman at San Diego State or UCLA .

So while I'm not surprised that 17 year-olds don't know much about history, I'd like to see more discussion of the fundamental family, cultural, and community traditions that prevent these kids from gaining the underlying skills to needed master these texts, skills they'll need to develop into a meaningful, fully realized participatory citizenry.

Public Favors McCain Over Democrats

A new Los Angeles Times poll finds GOP frontrunner John McCain edging ahead of both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama in potential general election matchups (via Memeorandum):

As he emerges from a sometimes- bitter primary campaign, presumptive Republican presidential nominee John McCain poses a stiff challenge to either of his potential Democratic opponents in the general election, a new Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll has found.

The findings underscore the difficulties ahead for Democrats as they hope to retake the White House during a time of war, with voters giving McCain far higher marks when it comes to experience, fighting terrorism and dealing with the situation in Iraq.
Both Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton have made ending America's involvement in the war a centerpiece of their campaigns. And even though a clear majority of those polled said the war was not worth waging, about half of registered voters said McCain -- a Vietnam vet who has supported the Bush administration's military strategy -- was better able to deal with Iraq.

In head-to-head contests, the poll found, McCain leads Clinton by 6 percentage points (46% to 40%) and Obama by 2 points (44% to 42%). Neither lead is commanding given that the survey, conducted Feb. 21-25, has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

The Arizona senator is viewed favorably by 61% of all registered voters, including a plurality of Democrats.

The survey showed that McCain's potential advantages extend even to domestic issues, where he is considered to be most vulnerable. Even though McCain has joked about his lack of expertise on economic issues, voters picked him over Obama, 42% to 34%, as being best able to handle the economy. However, Clinton led McCain on that issue, 43% to 34%.

"I just think he's older, he's more experienced, and he's got the betterment of the country in mind," said Robert Fear, 79, a registered Democrat from Newton, Ill., who said he planned to support McCain in November.

The findings are particularly important in light of recent left-wing attacks on McCain's purported 100 year commitment to the Iraq deployment, as well as continued attacks on the success of the surge (like Andrew Sullivan's).

However, the poll indicates that McCain has yet to rally the GOP's conservative base:

Nearly one in four Republican primary voters said they were "unhappy" that he would win the GOP nomination. And of those voters, about half said they would either vote for another candidate in November or stay home, an ominous sign for Republicans at a time when Democrats are expected to be highly motivated.

Some have indicated that the response to last week's New York Times hit piece against McCain is evidence that conservatives have turned the corner and will back the Arizona Senator after all.

This hypothesis is not supported by the Times poll, at least for the hardened, Malkinite base. McCain's still got some work to do.

See also my earlier entry on November trial heat matchups, "McCain is Competitive Against Likely Democratic Nominee."

McCain and the Iraq Issue

Will Iraq be a winning election issue for John McCain in November? Ramesh Ponnuru poses things this way:

Senator John McCain blurted out that if he can't convince Americans that our military effort in Iraq is succeeding, he'll lose the election. He then softened his assessment, saying that while his candidacy would not stand or fall on the Iraq question, it would be one of the top issues in the campaign.

I think Senator McCain is wrong. He can win the election even if a narrow majority of the country doubts that the surge is succeeding, and he may lose it even if people think that it is succeeding. (Right now, according to Gallup, 43 percent of Americans believe the surge is improving conditions in Iraq while 35 percent say it is making it worse.)

He is going to have to fight back against misrepresentations of his record. Senator Barack Obama, for example, has said that McCain favors a "100-year war in Iraq." In fact, McCain said that if the violence were to end, it might be possible to maintain a long-term American military presence in Iraq: the same type of presence we have maintained in South Korea, without extending the Korean war for decades.

My guess, though, is that the war will not be the top issue in this election. The big challenge for Senator McCain is not to sell the surge. It isn't even to demonstrate that he can fight a recession. It's to prove that he has answers to the economic concerns that middle-income Americans have, recession or no recession. In particular, he is going to have to make the case that his health-care plan is better than that of his Democratic opponent.

Do you agree that domestic issues are going to decide the 2008 election?

I agree up to a point. His job is to make the case that he'll provide competent and innovative economic, health, and social policy management, while at the same time he must convince the public that the war's too important to leave to a national security novice espousing recklessly ill-considered foreign policy proposals.

The success of the surge is a huge asset to McCain and the GOP, as it innoculates the party from Democratic attacks on war-making incompetence and provides a model for what we need to do in Afghanistan.

The Democratic agenda of retreat is an election year downer. I doubt either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama can gain much traction on the issue.

But see Andrew Sullivan's post on Iraq, where he poses this challenge for McCain:

If McCain is going to give us straight talk - one thing the Bush administration has been completely unable to do - and believes that Iraq should remain a permanently integrated part of a new, expanding American protectorate in the Middle East, then he needs to say so. He needs to be honest about what his goal of turning Iraq into a stable, non-despotic, unified country, permanently occupied by US troops, requires. It will require trillions of dollars, a bare minimum of another decade of occupation, over 100,000 troops (probably more) committed indefinitely, and no lee-way to tackle any major security threats anywhere else on the planet including Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran, without a draft. Oh, and then there's a need to maintain US public support for the Sisyphean task of nation-building a place where there is no nation, in a place a long way away, where our reward for such an effort will be fathomless contempt and hatred.

Sullivan's attacking an alleged infinite commitment to the Iraqi people and wants McCain to justify it. But Sullivan provides no context: We have military commitments around the globe. Where can we redeploy and reduce in an effort to consolidate our more recent gains in Iraq?

Germany? South Korea?

What percentage of GDP is this "trillion dollars" Sullivan throws out? Is that an accurate figure? Will the costs of an Iraq foreward basing commitment be commensurate with the costs of earlier postwar security guarantees the U.S. has offered after its great conflicts?

These are the questions that McCain is best prepared to answer. Sure, Americans want to focus on domestic issues. They also want to reduce commitments overseas to allow a redirection of attention back home.

Yet, they don't want to lose in Iraq, and they're still concerned about radical Islamist terrorism. The U.S. is not making an unlimited, 1000 year guarantee to the Iraqi people. Putting our ongoing deployment in fiscal and historical context is the challenge for McCain in November.

Barack Obama and the Power of Words

I've noted a number of times now that Barack Obama's lofty rhetoric cannot hide his advocacy of policies that would take the country in a radically different direction, on both domestic and foreign issues.

But many on both sides of the political spectrum underestimate the power of words, according to Stephen Hayes:

These are words that move and uplift, that give hope to the hopeless. These words inspired millions of voters nationwide to join the grand experiment called democracy, casting votes for their candidate, their country, their destiny:

"More than anything else, I want my candidacy to unify our country, to renew the American spirit and sense of purpose. I want to carry our message to every American, regardless of party affiliation, who is a member of this community of shared values . . . For those who have abandoned hope, we'll restore hope and we'll welcome them into a great national crusade to make America great again!"

Whose words are these? Ronald Reagan's in 1980.

As Hayes notes, Democrats dismissed Reagan's lofty statements that year, but he went on to win a landslide election, winning 44 states and 489 electoral votes.

Are Republicans making the same mistake with Obama?

For months now, Hillary Clinton has suggested that Mr. Obama is all rhetoric, no substance. This claim, or some version of it, has been at the center of her campaign since November. One day after losing to him in Wisconsin and Hawaii -- her ninth and tenth consecutive defeats -- she rather incredibly went back to it again. "It's time we moved from good words to good works, from sound bites to sound solutions," she said -- a formulation that could be mistaken for a sound bite.

As she complained about his lack of substance, tens of thousands of people lined up in city after city, sometimes in subfreezing temperatures, for a chance to get a shot of some Mr. Obama hopemongering. Plainly, her critique is not working.

And yet, Republicans are picking it up. In just the past week, conservative commentators have accused Mr. Obama of speaking in "Sesame Street platitudes," of giving speeches that are "almost content free," of "saying nothing." He has been likened to Chance the Gardner, the clueless mope in Jerzy Koscinski's "Being There," whose banal utterances are taken as brilliant by a gullible political class. Others complain that his campaign is "messianic," too self-aggrandizing and too self-referential.

John McCain has joined the fray. In a speech after he won primaries in Washington, D.C., Virginia and Maryland, Mr. McCain said: "To encourage a country with only rhetoric rather than sound and proven ideas that trust in the strength and courage of free people is not a promise of hope. It is a platitude." After Wisconsin, he sharpened the attack, warning that he would expose Mr. Obama's "eloquent but empty call for change."

The assumption behind much of this criticism is that because Mr. Obama gives a good speech he cannot do substance. This is wrong. Mr. Obama has done well in most of the Democratic debates because he has consistently shown himself able to think on his feet. Even on health care, a complicated national issue that should be Mrs. Clinton's strength, Mr. Obama has regularly fought her to a draw by displaying a grasp of the details that rivals hers, and talking about it in ways Americans can understand.

Read the rest.

Hayes speaks so glowingly of Obama's substantive firepower you'd think he too was totally in the tank!

I kid, of course, and frankly Obama's coming off as one of the greatest campaigners in the history of American presidential elections.

Still, the key question to remember is where will all these lofty calls to inclusion, equity, and equality lead? To an additional $400 billion in federal spending amid a time of steep budget deficits? That doesn't sound Reaganesque.

On foreign policy, when Obama declared the recent success in Iraq as "tactical" improvements in one of America's greatest strategic blunders, where do those words lead? To the abandonnment of America's hard work at overcoming initial failures to achieve what's now looking like one of modern warfare's greatest strategic corrections? Will Americans surrender the blood and treasure of our emerging victory in Iraq to the angry cries of the nihilist wing of the Democratic Party?

Public opinion's not demanding an unconditional retreat. Iraq can and should be a continuing outpost of American forward military leadership. In partnership with a sovereign Iraq, American power will mark the foundation of a political and strategic commitment to Iraq's democratic future, and to the region's long-term stabilty and progress.

So don't underestimate Obama's words, like these:

Iraq was a diversion from the fight against the terrorists who struck us on 9/11, and incompetent prosecution of the war by America's civilian leaders compounded the strategic blunder of choosing to wage it in the first place. We have now lost over 3,300 American lives, and thousands more suffer wounds both seen and unseen.

Hayes notes that if elected Obama will govern the same way he's campaigned.

That's exactly what worries me.

McCain Prospects Hinge on Iraq

The general election prospects of John McCain, the GOP nominee-in-waiting, depend on how well he can convince the public that America's winning the conflict and that our efforts have been worth it:

Senator John McCain said Monday that he needed to convince the American people that the troop escalation in Iraq was working and that American casualties there would continue to decline. If he did not, he said, “I lose” the election.

“Is there any doubt?” Mr. McCain said to reporters on his campaign bus.

But then he pulled back from his blunt assessment. “Let me not put it that stark,” he said, explaining that he believed people would judge his candidacy on his ability to handle the economy, which has emerged as a pre-eminent voter concern, as well as on national security.

Nevertheless, Mr. McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, made clear that he believed his prospects in November would rest in large measure on the way the situation in Iraq played out.

“If I may, I’d like to retract ‘I’ll lose,’ ” he said. “But I don’t think there’s any doubt that how they judge Iraq will have a direct relation to their judgment of me.”

Mr. McCain said he believed opinion was shifting to his point of view, referring to a recent USA Today poll that, he said, showed that “now the majority of Americans believe the surge is succeeding.”

The USA Today/Gallup poll he was apparently referring to, however, found that not a majority, but 43 percent of Americans believed the troop increase was “making the situation there better,” an increase from 22 percent last July.

The poll, conducted Feb. 8 to 10, also underscored just how unpopular the war continues to be, with 60 percent saying it was a mistake.

Yet the new dynamic in Iraq — with American casualties plummeting and violence in Baghdad falling to 2005 levels — has altered the political landscape for Mr. McCain since last summer, when American troop deaths spiked and his candidacy ran aground.

Mr. McCain has, of course, staked his candidacy on his support for President Bush’s escalation strategy, which was unveiled early last year and resulted in more than 30,000 additional troops in Iraq.

When Mr. McCain’s campaign stalled, he set about reviving it with a “no surrender” tour meant to identify him even more closely with the strategy. He invariably cites his early call for assigning more troops to Iraq as evidence of his ability to handle what he calls the “transcendent challenge” facing the country in the form of radical, violent Islam.

Steven Warshawsky argued yesterday that Iraq's likely to be a losing issue for McCain, and that he needs to stake out a new position on the conflict - some type of "Iraqi Peace Plan" - that reassures voters that American troops will be coming home sooner rather than later.

Warshawsky badly misreads the polling data, however, and labeling a U.S. redeployment from Iraq a "peace plan" will open up the Arizona Senator to charges of appeasement from Defense hawks in his own party. Even Democrats aren't going to be sold by a "Republican Jimmy Carter."

McCain needs to make the case that a limited, long-term presence in Iraq is a vital U.S. interest. American forces are still in Germany, Japan, and other World War II-era missions, and Iraq will likely see a similar outcome.

We don't need 100,000 troops in Iraq permanently. We do need some kind of secure strategic basing arrangements that facilitate interoperability with other continuing American military operations, air, land, and sea. McCain's already articulated portions of that message on the hustings. He might think about making that theme a key part of upcoming stump speeches.

Photo Credit: New York Times

100 Years in Iraq? The Left Takes Aim at McCain

The left's hammering John McCain's statement that U.S. troops could stay "maybe 100" years in Iraq, hoping to paint the Arizona Senator as an unhinged neo-imperialist.

While 100 years sounds like a long time, McCain implied a 100 year commitment to the Iraqi people rather than a permanent Iraqi protectorate. The comment's the focus of a liberal veterans' group attack advertisement, via YouTube:

Allahpundit puts McCain's comments in context:

As McCain has explained numerous times now, the “100 years” comment isn’t a call for another century of hot war; it’s a projection of a token presence in a stable country along the lines of our “occupation” of Okinawa, one that certainly wouldn’t require the trillions of dollars being disingenuously tossed around here. The left knows a good talking point when it sees it, though — and so does Maverick, who’s decided to run away from what he said as fast as his feet will carry him. Let me know when the left makes its stand about getting U.S. troops out of Germany and I’ll start caring about nonsense like this.

Marc Ambinder puts Allah's "run away" statements in context himself:

Today, some new language from Sen. John McCain on the length of the United States's military commitment to Iraq.

Listen to it, here.

The Iraq War, Mr. McCain said, will be over "soon."

He continued: "...the war for all intents and purposes, although the insurgency will go on for years and years and years, but it will be handled by the Iraqis, not by us, and then we decide what kind of security arrangement we want to have with the Iraqis. ... "

The full context:

“And by the way, that reminds me of this hundred year thing. I was asked in a town hall meeting back in Florida, how long would we have a presence in Iraq? My friends, the war will be over soon, the war for all intents and purposes although the insurgency will go on for years and years and years, but it will be handled by the Iraqis, not by us, and then we decide what kind of security arrangement we want to have with the Iraqis. ... "

See also my earlier post on our strategic commitments in Afghanistan and Iraq, which will likely be threatened by a Democratic victory in November.

McCain is Competitive Against Likely Democratic Nominee

New polls from the New York Times and USA Today find Barack Obama favored over Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination.

The Times' survey also shows voters seeing Obama as more electable than John McCain, the GOP frontrunner (see Memeorandum).

Yet, Gallup's new survey finds McCain running competitively in trial-heat matchups against either of the Democratic hopefuls:

Democratic front-runner Barack Obama and likely Republican nominee John McCain are essentially tied in likely voters' preferences for president if the general election were held today.

Forty-eight percent of likely voters say they prefer McCain for president, and 47% Obama, according to a new USA Today/Gallup poll, conducted Feb. 21-24. The two have been closely matched each of the three times the question has been asked of likely voters this year.

The contest would be about as tight if Hillary Clinton were the Democratic nominee. In that test ballot, 50% of likely voters choose McCain and 46% Clinton.

The Democratic candidates do slightly better among all registered voters, but the two hypothetical races are still a statistical tie among this larger group of voters.

These close contests come in a political environment that is currently quite favorable to the Democratic Party: Democrats have a significant edge in terms of current party identification; the Democratic Party has much higher favorable ratings than the Republican Party; and when various polling organizations ask the "generic ballot," Americans decisively say that in theory they would prefer a Democrat to a Republican in office....

Thus, it appears McCain is doing better than what might be expected of the Republican nominee in general. One reason for this is that McCain is able to attract support beyond just Republican Party loyalists. McCain currently attracts more support among likely voters who identify as Democrats than either Democratic candidate attracts among Republicans who are likely to vote. Also, McCain is competitive with Obama among politically independent likely voters and leads Clinton by 10 percentage points among this group.

Implications

Gallup polling on the general presidential election thus far has suggested the contest may be quite close, and the outcome could be similar to what occurred in the prior two presidential elections. This is in spite of the fact that everything else being equal, the Democratic candidate this year should be leading the Republican candidate. As these data show, McCain is able to transcend party to some degree, because he has more crossover appeal than either Democrat. Also, the general election campaign is just getting started. Over the next eight months, Democrats will attempt to link McCain to an unpopular incumbent president, and to hold the Republican Party responsible for a faltering economy and general discontent with the way things are going in the country. If they are successful in doing so - assuming Americans' attitudes do not improve considerably between now and November -- then the Democratic candidates may run stronger in future general election trial heats. At the same time, of course, Republicans will be attacking the Democratic nominee - all to suggest that a lot can change between now and next Nov. 4.

A lot could change between now and November, but the data provide more support for my contention that the election's no slam dunk for the Democrats, despite all kinds of indicators to the contrary (see here, here, here, and here).

Democratic Promises May Break Treasury

USA Today adds a cautionary note to election debates by showing how a Democratic administration in 2009 will cost the treasury hundreds of billions of dollars in new spending:

To listen to Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama campaign in Ohio and Texas is to hear pledges on health care, middle-class tax cuts, mortgage assistance, tuition help, energy initiatives and more.

It's all very appealing. It's also almost certainly too good to be true.

In 2009, when the next president takes office, the government is expected to spend $400 billion more than it takes in, adding to a national debt that tops $9 trillion. Yet Clinton and Obama both offer a long list of new spending proposals that suggests a lack of seriousness in confronting the nation's fiscal condition...both candidates have major new health care initiatives and other spending proposals; Obama tacks on a major tax cut for working Americans to offset Social Security tax payments.

While it's hard to come up with a precise price tag given the lack of specifics in many of their proposals, these plans are likely to cost the Treasury well into the hundreds of billions of dollars a year. The National Taxpayers Union, a conservative group that favors lower taxes and smaller government, gives a very rough estimate of $287 billion for Obama and $218 billion for Clinton.

How would the candidates pay for all these new programs without driving the deficit to new heights? Some have specific funding sources; some don't. The candidates rather vaguely claim that costs would be covered primarily by repealing President Bush's tax cuts and ending the Iraq war.

This is where the math gets fuzzy.

Not that fuzzy, actually, if one's realistic about this.

The Democrats will have to raise taxes to finance their spending proposals, and the potential "savings" from winding down America's deployments in Afghanistan and Iraq will add to the already overwhelming demands for surrender among the Democratic Party's antiwar base.

Already, hare-brained theories are being developed among some far-lefties justifying Robin Hood-style confiscatory policies to soak the rich.

The truth is - in this time of potential recession - the country needs expansionary fiscal policies in the form of tax cuts to stimulate spending, precisely the opposite likely to happen under a left-wing presidency.

Budgetary politics is going to be one of the hottest areas of debate in the months ahead.

Will big government sell in public opinion? I wouldn't bet against it.

Election '08: No One Has a Clue

Noemie Emery makes a good case that we're politically clueless on what will happen this year, in "Six Things We Don't Know" about election '08.

Here's what she says about McCain:

John McCain: Does his appeal to independents, centrists, and Lieberman Democrats outweigh the ennui, nausea, and revulsion he evokes among those on the right of the right? In a sense, this is a row between conservatives who are politicians, and concerned with assembling a center-right coalition they can use to wield power, and movement conservatives who are theoreticians and see the coalition as a vessel to contain their ideas. The first camp are mainly in Congress, the second on the radio and online. When the latter realized after the Florida primary that McCain might become head of the party, it set off a week of ferocious assaults; some struck a pose like that of Rebecca in Ivanhoe, and threatened to throw themselves over the parapet rather than submit to the stranger's embrace. Damage control was commenced by McCain allies such as Tom Coburn, Sam Brownback, Jack Kemp, and George Allen, who have strong ties to movement conservatives.

The results of Super Tuesday, which McCain won in the face of an all-out assault from the right, suggested that while movement leaders may be in touch with their base, the base itself is only part of a large coalition. Yet in a country this size, even a niche movement can account for millions of voters, and in close elections every vote counts. If some people don't vote, the states in which they don't vote could be important: A poll done by SurveyUSA in 2007 showed both McCain and Giuliani falling below the Bush totals in some red states (though not by enough to lose), but doing better than Bush in blue states and swing states, the latter of which they might win. Low blows from the left, like the New York Times's muckraking last week, not to mention Democratic attempts to define McCain as a right winger, may be just the thing he needs. Nothing arouses the right like the enmity of the left. Will it be enough to compensate for McCain's enthusiasm gap with conservatives? This is one thing we don't know.

Here's what she says about Obama:

Barack Obama: What goes up must come down, but the Obama balloon has so far defied gravity. Will it still be going up in November? If it falls, will there be a swift collapse, a slow deflation, or just a soft, gentle hissing? So far, his rise is beyond precedent: The two charismatic presidents of the postwar era, Reagan and Kennedy, were canonized in retrospect. Nobody seemed to pass out at their rallies, and they each had a great deal more substance behind them: Reagan, the two-term governor of one of the largest states in the union, and an established conservative spokesman; Kennedy, a 13-year member of the House and the Senate, with a long-standing interest in foreign affairs. The strongest Obama parallels come up in other primary campaigns, and then always with people who lost--with Clean Gene McCarthy and Robert F. Kennedy, who ran against each other in 1968 (until Bobby was murdered); with Gary Hart in 1984, who lost to the über-prosaic Walter F. Mondale; and with Howard Dean in the 2004 cycle, who lost to the very pedestrian John Kerry after the misfortune of being endorsed by Al Gore.

On the plus side for Obama is the fact that his ascent has gone on longer than all of the others; that his low-key appeal is in the style of Reagan and Kennedy, and more durable than the louder variety of charm; that his base is broader than that of most Democratic insurgents, as he links upscale whites to minority voters; and that he is feeding off of a seemingly bottomless urge for civility, after decades of partisan wars. On the minus side is the fact that he shows little substance--there isn't much mention of what he would change to--and that his call for bipartisanship in governing is at odds with his orthodox liberal record, giving no sign of what--if anything--he and the opposite party could compromise on. One sign of trouble is that he has never been seriously challenged by anyone to his right (Alan Keyes does not count). Another is the gap between his soaring and infinite promise and his less than original program.

In the end, Reagan and Kennedy were about winning the Cold War, which is how they defined themselves; and their most famous speeches concerned the advancement and value of liberty. Obama defines himself by his personality. "The message is becoming dangerously self-referential," writes Joe Klein, who notes that the Obama campaign is all too often about how terrific the Obama campaign has been. "Obama's people are so taken with their Messiah that they'll soon be selling flowers at airports and arranging mass weddings," writes David Brooks--who admires him. With Chris Matthews noting that he gets a "thrill up my leg" listening to Obama give one of his speeches, the whole thing verges on parody that may not go over well with Middle America. Middle America has been also ticked off by Michelle Obama, whose comment that she is "proud of her country" for the first time in her adult life because her husband "has done well" shows a trace of the insularity that lost 49 states for McGovern and Mondale, as well as a very tin ear. This is the sort of thing that results in small tears in the fabric, through which small currents of air may shortly be hissing. Thus could happen tomorrow, it could happen in August, it could happen in the first week of November, or it just might not happen. This is still one more thing we don't know.

Emerie - who's always a pleasure to read - also indicates what we don't know about Hillary Clinton, Iraq, the economy, and the unforseen things that erupt - beyond normal expected unexpected situations - to throw years of campaign planning out the window.

The article's an excellent rebuttal to the argument that John McCain's actually not as well positioned to win on the Iraq issue as most observers have assumed.