I just got this email outlining the presidential debate schedule and format:
Debate Schedule Is Set
Sept 16, 2008
The campaigns of Barack Obama and John McCain announced they have formally accepted the lineup of presidential debates this fall.
“The campaigns have come to the earliest agreement on presidential debates reached in any general election in recent history,” the joint statement said.
The campaigns said they also accepted the Commission on Presidential Debates’ rules on third-party candidates, guidelines that make it unlikely that either Libertarian Bob Barr or independent Ralph Nader will be included unless they get a large and unexpected rise in the polls. The rules require a candidate to reach at least 15 percent in an average of five national public opinion polls.
The debates are all scheduled to air at 9 p.m. Eastern and will last 90 minutes: (more…)
Anyone who’s read this blog knows that I’m a big fan of Rep. Mike Pence. That’s because he’s a fighter who picks the right side of the biggest fights. Energy policy is a perfect example of his leadership. This morning, Rep. Pence delivered this speech in the House Chamber:
The American people are hurting. They’re struggling under the weight of record gasoline prices and in that cause, Republicans have been fighting for a comprehensive energy bill that includes more drilling. Three-quarters of Americans agree with us.
Just last week, the drill-nothing Democrat Congress announced they would bring an energy bill to the floor that includes more drilling and now they say Republicans have to take ‘yes’ for an answer.
Well, I would suggest to my countrymen that they look at the fine print. The drill-nothing Democrat Congress has brought a bill that actually includes basically ‘drill-almost-nothing’ provisions.
They say ‘yes’ to drilling, but not in Alaska, not in the Eastern Gulf and not within 50 miles. They say ‘yes’ to drilling but states can decide, even though they get absolutely no revenues for choosing to drill. I guess states are just going to allow drilling out of the goodness of their hearts. They say ‘yes’ to drilling but litigation rules will allow environmental lawyers to tie up all leases from the very day they’re filed.
I say to my House Democrat colleagues from my heart, on behalf of our constituents who are struggling under record gasoline prices: ‘End the charade! Stop playing politics with American energy independence! Bring a full and fair debate to this floor, and we will achieve a bipartisan result.
Joe Biden, aka Slow Joe 2.0, is living proof of why airheads shouldn’t be tapped as the VP nominee. This speech offers abundant proof that Sen. Obama should’ve ignored experience and went with someone talented. Listen to this long list of whining complaints:
We’ve seen eight straight months of job losses. Nearly 46 million Americans without health insurance. Average incomes down, while the price of everything, from gas to groceries, has skyrocketed. A military stretched thin from two wars and multiple deployments.
A nation more polarized than I’ve ever seen in my career. And a culture in Washington where the very few wealthy and powerful have a seat at the table and everybody else is on the menu.
Eight years later, we have another Republican nominee who’s telling us the exact same thing:
This time it will be different, it really will. This time he’s going to put country before party, to change the tone, reach across the aisle, change the Republican Party, change the way Washington works. (more…)
In 2004, Bob Beckel, Susan Estrich and other Democratic pundits told us that that year’s race was Kerry’s to lose. Shortly after starting blogging, I said that it’s a good thing that John Kerry, who fought in Vietnam, was more than up to the task. Along those same lines, Bob Beckel, Julian Epstein and other liberal pundits have predicted that it’s Sen. Obama’s race to lose. Based on the polling I’ve seen lately, it appears as though Sen. Obama is equally up to the task.
If Barack Obama loses this election to John McCain, something which, for the first time, I regard as a real possibility, history will point to August 29 as the pivotal moment. That was when Mr McCain announced that Sarah Palin would be his running-mate, and when livid Democrats and their friends in the media voiced their feelings about her and much of the electorate, and gravely harmed their candidate’s prospects. (more…)
Democratic strategists are so worried about Sen. Obama being a drag downticket that they’ve started planning for that contingency. Here’s what an anonymous fundraiser said about that problem:
“If people are voting for McCain, it could help Republicans all the way down the ticket, even in a year when the Democrats should be sweeping all before us,” said the fundraiser, a former Hillary Clinton supporter. “There is a growing sense of doom among Democrats I have spoken to . . . People are going crazy, telling the campaign ‘you’ve got to do something’.”
This quote tells me several things, starting with the fact that this is proof that Washington insiders shouldn’t run campaigns. Washington insiders, by nature, are defeatists. Defeatists are easily rolled. They’re often panicky.
Second, that quote tells me that the Democrats aren’t anchored to something solid that they can turn to when they’re experiencing a rough patch. When Sen. Obama’s ‘friends’ told him he can’t get swiftboated, he started taking ill-advised shots at Gov. Palin, something that’s backfired badly on him. (more…)
Everything you need to know about the effect Sarah Palin is having on the race is summed up in this Washington Times article. You can’t get more explicit than this:
Despite the talk about a changing electoral map and new strategies, Barack Obama is pulling back from his 50-state plan as John McCain has solidified Republican support, turning November’s presidential election into a contest for the same handful of states that have swung the last two contests.
The first round of post-convention polling shows Mr. McCain, in picking Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate, has enthused Republicans. Meanwhile Mr. Obama, the Democrats’ nominee, is pulling back resources from Georgia, a state he once boasted he would flip Democratic; is stepping up efforts to hold Democrats in Pennsylvania and Michigan; and is showering attention on Ohio, the lynchpin in Republicans’ 2004 victory.
“The Republican brand has been revived, and the conservative base has been solidified,” said pollster John Zogby. “McCain has had a few good weeks, so now what we have to do is see if Obama can come back because it is still very competitive.”
The only change I’d make to this article would be to modify Mr. Zogby’s last quote. Here’s how I would’ve characterized it: “Sen. McCain has strung together a series of impressive weeks recently which started with Steve Schmidt’s arrival, which them got strengthened by the House Oil Party, then which got the ultimate boost when he picked Sarah Palin as his running mate.” (more…)
When Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska took center stage at the Republican convention last week, she sought to burnish her executive credentials by telling how she had engineered the deal that jump-started a long-delayed gas pipeline project.
Stretching more than 1,700 miles, it would deliver natural gas from the North Slope of Alaska to the lower 48 states and be the largest private-sector infrastructure project on the continent.
“And when that deal was struck, we began a nearly $40 billion natural gas pipeline to help lead America to energy independence,” said Ms. Palin, the Republican vice-presidential nominee. “That pipeline, when the last section is laid and its valves are opened, will lead America one step farther away from dependence on dangerous foreign powers that do not have our interests at heart.”
Does the NY Times think that building a 1,700 mile pipeline is an overnight project? Or is it that they think that we’re too stupid to figure that out? Her point in highlighting the project was to highlight her ability to affect change despite entrenched powers opposed her. That’s what we’re hiring her to do. (more…)
Dick Harpootlian is the former chairman of the South Carolina Democratic Party. Last night, while appearing on Fox Report With Shepard Smith, Harpootlian went into Joe Biden Mode:
Here’s a partial transcript of Shep’s interview with Harpootlian:
Harpootlian: Well, she’s very apologetic about it. She sorta didn’t really mean to say to have an abortion, that she meant to say that she was against abortion but here’s the other thing: Who really cares what Carol Fowler says? I talked with the Obama campaign and they reject what she says. She rejects what she says. The key question is do you want a 72 year old man who’s been in Washington 30 years as the president of the United States?
Shep: Is that an age dig?
Harpootlian: who hasn’t brought about change, or Barack Obama, who has promised change, who has brought about change in a number of different ways. So those are your choices.
Shep: Is that an age dig? (more…)
People that’ve watched Joe Biden’s career know that he’s likely to say anything. Based on this ABC report, it’s apparent that he’s now inflicting that damage onto Sen. Obama’s sinking ship. Here’s what he’s said this time:
At a rally in Nashua, New Hampshire, a man in the audience told Biden how glad he was that Obama picked him over Hillary “not because she’s a woman, but because look at the things she did in the past.”
“Make no mistake about this,” Biden responded. “Hillary Clinton is as qualified or more qualified than I am to be vice president of the United States of America. Let’s get that straight. She’s a truly close personal friend, she is qualified to be president of the United States of America, she’s easily qualified to be vice president of the United States of America and quite frankly it might have been a better pick than me. But she’s first rate, I mean that sincerely, she’s first rate, so let’s get that straight.”
I’m betting that Team Barry is thinking that they should’ve gone with Kathleen Sebelius right about now. She isn’t thought of as a foreign policy expert but at least she doesn’t have the reputation of being a loose cannon. (more…)
Last night, I got another email from the Obama campaign, this time from David Plouffe. Here’s the content of Mr. Plouffe’s email:
Gary –
The McCain campaign has finally admitted that this election is about change.
Their new ad uses what news organizations are calling “naked lies” to reinvent two politicians whose records embody the same culture of corruption and far-right policies we’ve seen from the Bush administration.
The biggest whopper in the ad (that’s still being repeated day after day by McCain and Palin on the campaign trail) is that Governor Palin stopped the infamous “Bridge to Nowhere”; in fact, she supported it, and even hired a lobbyist in Washington to get more pork-barrel projects like it.
If the McCain-Palin campaign wants to have a debate about who is prepared to bring the change we need, we’re more than ready.
Before we get into whether the McCain-Palin tick has told some “whoppers”, let’s ask if Plouffe’s boss really is “more than ready” to debate this or any other issue. He’s said that he’s ready to deebate McCain “any time, any place” about a number of things. Thus far, he’s refused to debate “any time, any place.” It’s been more like “under no circumstances, at no place.” (more…)