I came home from the meeting in Unity and immediately went to dinner and a play, then a day full of grandchildren. My priorities are in order, therefore, and I can now write a reflection on the day -- not on the meeting, but on what it may represent: the changing of the guard in American politics.
Though the numbers are already improving (47 O, 40 M), one group that is truly torn between Obama and McCain is Catholics. There is a single issue causing this split; unsurprisingly, it's abortion. Despite loud, official pronouncements by some in the hierarchy, Catholics are divided on abortion -- not so much on whether or not it's wrong, but how wrong it is in comparison to other wrongs.
Given the right forum and the right language, Obama is in a position to move a substantial number of Catholics to his side, without compromising his stance on Roe v. Wade. If enough Catholics move from McCain to Obama, Ohio, Indiana and Pennsylvania are sealed deals -- and McCain cannot win.
Steny Hoyer, Silvestre Reyes, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid: You should all be ashamed of yourselves. It apparently takes a Republican to tell the ACLU what Congress should be doing about the telecom immunity:
Sen. Arlen Specter (Pa.), a Republican long known for breaking with his party over the reach of post-9/11 executive power, is still at it. Monday, the five-term senator again demanded a judicial examination of the phone companies' role in the Bush administration's warrantless wiretapping program...
"It's very important that there be judicial review of what the phone companies have done," Specter told a large audience gathered in Washington Monday for a conference of the American Civil Liberties Union. "It seems to me that it'd be very difficult to grant retroactive immunity when you don't even know for sure what you're giving retroactive immunity for."
Dear Democratic leadership: Is that really difficult?
"Before I begin, I want to say that I know some provocative e-mails have been circulating throughout Jewish communities across the country," he said. "A few of you may have gotten them. They’re filled with tall tales and dire warnings about a certain candidate for president.
"All I want to say is, let me know if you see this guy named Barack Obama, because he sounds pretty scary."
"But if anyone has been confused by these e-mails, I want you to know that today I’ll be speaking from my heart, and as a true friend of Israel."
(T)he Clinton campaign intends to argue that Mr. Obama should receive zero delegates from Michigan because those delegates awarded to "uncommitted" have to go to the convention uncommitted.
"It’s impossible to discern the mind of each of the 238,000 people who voted for ‘uncommitted,’" Mr. Ickes said. He said the Clinton campaign’s view is that the 55 delegates representing ‘uncommitted’ "can support whomever they want but they must remain uncommitted and be certified to the D.N.C. as uncommitted." He said that 36 of those delegates have been chosen so far.
Fine, Mr. Ickes. Let's take that at face value. By my count, that reduces Clinton's Michigan numbers by 55, because we can discern something about those 238,000 people.
Murdoch has yet to endorse a U.S. presidential candidate but considers Barack Obama very promising, the media magnate said in an interview by two Wall Street Journal reporters at an annual conference for high-tech industry insiders...
"You have probably the making of a complete phenomenon in this country," Murdoch said in describing what he predicted will be a sweeping victory for Democrats in November...
In the 2008 U.S. Presidential race, Murdoch said he is not yet backing anyone, but then quickly added: "I want to meet Obama. I want to know if he going to walk the walk."
Despite all the anecdotal evidence, I am not yet prepared to assume the Hillary Clinton is trying to force her way onto the ticket as Veep candidate. The fact is, that possibility doesn't really matter now. An uglier possibility has surfaced, and its potential to wreak havoc is so serious, that it must be addressed. Fortunately, addressing it happens to cut most of Clinton's argument out from under her.
"Anybody who has ever voted for me or voted for Barack has much more in common in terms of what we want to see happen in our country and in the world with the other than they do with John McCain," Clinton said on CNN's "The Situation Room."
"I'm going to work my heart out for whoever our nominee is -- obviously I'm still hoping to be that nominee, but I'm going to do everything I can to make sure that anyone who supported me ... understands what a grave error it would be not to vote for Sen. Obama."
Five weeks after Mr. Wallace introduced "Obama Watch," a weekly countdown clock marking the number of days since he said Mr. Obama had committed to an interview, the Fox News Channel announced Thursday that the Democratic presidential candidate would appear on its Sunday morning public affairs show this weekend.
In an interview, Mr. Wallace said Mr. Obama had agreed to an interview in March 2006, but had not followed through.
...
So Fox found a visible way to push for an interview: an "Obama Watch" graphic, complete with the tick-tock sound and split-screen effect used on the Fox counterterrorism drama "24." It debuted on March 16 at "730 days, 13 hours, 53 minutes, and 18 seconds." Every week since, he has reminded the audience of the standing invitation to Mr. Obama.
You may now officially stop worrying about last night's debate. Obama has stopped worrying about it, and has started using it as a weapon:
"I will tell you, it does not get much more fun than these debates. They are inspiring events," Mr. Obama quipped. "Last night, I think we set a new record because it took us 45 minutes before we even started talking about a single issue that matters to the American people. It took us 45 minutes!"
"Forty-five minutes before we heard about health care. Forty-five minutes before we heard about Iraq," he continued. "Forty-five — 45 — minutes before we heard about jobs. Forty-five minutes before we heard about gas prices."
If he keeps this up, the powers that be won't know what hit them.
You read that correctly. Please don't tell the traditional media to diss McCain. We want them to treat him with kid gloves... for now.
We especially don't want them bringing up the "100 years" comment (unless they treat it this way). We don't want them discussing this, either. It's okay if this flies under the radar, too.
There have been two short diaries on this report from the ACLU:
A newly disclosed secret memo authored by the Department of Justice's Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) in March 2003 that asserts President Bush has unlimited power to order brutal interrogations of detainees also reveals a radical interpretation of the Constitution's Fourth Amendment protection from unreasonable search and seizure. The memo, declassified yesterday as the result of an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit, cites a still-secret DOJ memo from 2001 that found that the "Fourth Amendment had no application to domestic military operations."
This is the handiwork of my good buddy, John Yoo. And since he's my BFF, I think it would be useful to list a few Fourth Amendment cases for JY to peruse to make absolutely certain that he can square his opinion with case law. I'm sure, being a law professor and all that, he's head and shoulders above me in this regard.
How hard has it been to be a career employee in the Justice Department? Ask Leslie Hagen:
Hagen received the highest possible ratings for her work as liaison between the Justice Department and the U.S. attorneys' committee on Native American issues. Her final job evaluation lists five categories for supervisors to rank her performance. For each category, a neat X fills the box marked, "Outstanding." And at the bottom of the page, under "overall rating level," she also got the top mark: Outstanding.
The form is dated February 1, 2007. Several months before that evaluation, Hagen was told her contract would not be renewed.
I spent the weekend alternating between refinishing furniture and babysitting small grandchildren. There's nothing like watching a deliberately unsleeping five month old at 4 AM -- unless it's running a detail sander for an hour straight -- to get a body to thinking. What I found myself thinking about was how much good we could do our eventual nominee if we could provide solid oppo for the fall. There are some brilliant folks here: some with deep knowledge, some with insight, some with a talent for pithiness. Harnessed in some way, we could provide our candidate with oppo that, essentially, would be wiki'ed, focus-tested and ready to rock and roll.
Here's what I'd like to do, starting with this diary:
It's just a little blurb of a news story in the WaPo today, but it could be explosive:
The Air Force lawyer who quit as chief prosecutor for the Guantanamo Bay war court five months ago because of what he called political interference has asked to leave the U.S. military, he said. Col. Morris D. Davis said he submitted retirement papers last week, because of fallout from his criticism of the Guantanamo court and because of family concerns.
Sen. John McCain has officially broken the limits imposed by the presidential public financing system, reports filed last night show.
McCain has now spent $58.4 million on his primary effort. Those who have committed to public financing can spend no more than $54 million on their primary bid.
The question, as it always is IYAR, is: will he get away with it?
Hundreds of thousands of dollars are missing and presumed stolen from the chief fund-raising arm of House Republicans, according to party officials who described the findings of emergency internal audits.
The financial records of the group, the National Republican Congressional Committee, may also have been falsified for several years, Republican officials said. The campaign committees of several Republican lawmakers may also have been victims of a scam that is now under criminal investigation by the F.B.I.
I feel so bad for the NRCC (cough,cough, BWAAAHAAHAAHAAAAAA!!!!)
After that title, why should I write anything at all? :-)
Seriously, I'm thrilled that John McCain is the one either Clinton or Obama are going to face; aren't you? After all, he's only attracting GOP votes by being attached to You-Know-Who. Here's USA Today a full year ago:
In a turn that's nearly Shakespearean, McCain — Bush's chief rival for the Republican nomination in 2000 and a critic since then on everything from tax cuts to torture — finds his fate inextricably tied to the fortunes of his onetime adversary and the increasingly unpopular war he is prosecuting.
