Sounds like a Hail Mary pass from your own two yard line with 10 seconds on the clock. Is this what you get when you "use a Google" for your vetting process?

Someone who isn't ready for prime time? (per Politico):

“[A]s for that V.P. talk all the time, I’ll tell you, I still can’t answer that question until somebody answers for me what is it exactly that the V.P. does every day? I’m used to being very productive and working real hard in an administration. We want to make sure that that V.P .slot would be a fruitful type of position, especially for Alaskans and for the things that we’re trying to accomplish up here for the rest of the U.S., before I can even start addressing that question.”

Sounds like a Hail Mary pass from your own two yard line with 10 seconds on the clock. Is this what you get when you "use a Google" for your vetting process?

Someone who isn't ready for prime time? (per Politico):

“[A]s for that V.P. talk all the time, I’ll tell you, I still can’t answer that question until somebody answers for me what is it exactly that the V.P. does every day? I’m used to being very productive and working real hard in an administration. We want to make sure that that V.P .slot would be a fruitful type of position, especially for Alaskans and for the things that we’re trying to accomplish up here for the rest of the U.S., before I can even start addressing that question.”

Sounds like a Hail Mary pass from your own two yard line with 10 seconds on the clock. Is this what you get when you "use a Google" for your vetting process?

Someone who isn't ready for prime time? (per Politico):

“[A]s for that V.P. talk all the time, I’ll tell you, I still can’t answer that question until somebody answers for me what is it exactly that the V.P. does every day? I’m used to being very productive and working real hard in an administration. We want to make sure that that V.P .slot would be a fruitful type of position, especially for Alaskans and for the things that we’re trying to accomplish up here for the rest of the U.S., before I can even start addressing that question.”

Sounds like a Hail Mary pass from your own two yard line with 10 seconds on the clock. Is this what you get when you "use a Google" for your vetting process?

Someone who isn't ready for prime time? (per Politico):

“[A]s for that V.P. talk all the time, I’ll tell you, I still can’t answer that question until somebody answers for me what is it exactly that the V.P. does every day? I’m used to being very productive and working real hard in an administration. We want to make sure that that V.P .slot would be a fruitful type of position, especially for Alaskans and for the things that we’re trying to accomplish up here for the rest of the U.S., before I can even start addressing that question.”

"Cindy's father, who barely finished high school, went off and distinguished himself in World War II in a B-17 and came back with practically nothing and realized the American dream, and I am proud and grateful for that, and I think he is a role model to many young Americans who serve in the military and come back and succeed."

John McCain
Aug 24, 2008

Now that John McCain has made his second father-in-law a legitimate subject of debate, is Jim Hensley really a role model for our youth? Wasn't he a convicted felon? Wasn't his beer fortune -- which launched McCain's political career -- a result of his mob ties? Is the media paying attention to this part of McCain's story?

So Hillary Clinton has joined John McCain in his call for a "holiday" in the federal gasoline tax. Of course we're all sick of high gas prices. But at least Barack Obama has the brains and courage to see that this is a very bad idea. The Federal Highway Trust Fund is already going broke. To cut off all incoming revenue would curtain highway maintenance. Thousands of good paying jobs could be lost. Does this make sense in the face of a growing recession?

Of course not. Democrats usually support creating jobs like these at times of economic downturn -- not eliminating them.

Why doesn't Hillary Clinton get it?

It was the summer of 1972. I was working retail to pay for college. An FBI agent entered the store and flipped his badge at the boss. They talked in hushed tones. The FBI wanted to use a second-floor office for a stakeout. I later learned that they had a tip that Bill Ayers was going to visit a building across the street and they were trying to nab him. The stakeout room was also the place where I ate my bag lunch. So on this particular day I ate my peanut butter & jelly while a GMan peered through venetian blinds with binoculars.

So the question is this: am I guilty by association for the many sins of the FBI during the Hoover Era because I ate lunch in the same room with an agent who was staking out Bill Ayers?

David Broder has a typically lame column today on addressing the problem of seating delegations from Florida and Michigan. Of the various options thrown around, many seem to focus on (a) using the results of the discredited primaries; but (b) cutting those states delegations in half.

This approach is doubly wrong because the results from those earlier contests are entirely bogus and cutting those delegations in half will create a lot of bad feeling in two key states among those who like to join the party in Denver.

Here is a much more elegant solution:

In the next two weeks Howard Dean holds a press conference and announces his support for a plan that will seat full delegations from both states with delegates apportioned by a formula that will represent each candidate's percentage share of pledged delegates after the last primary is held in early June. For example, if Obama and Clinton split pledged delegates 53% to 47% during the entire primary season, that would represent the composition of the Florida and Michigan delegations.

The double benefits of this approach is that full delegations are seated from both states, but the delegations will reflect -- but not influence -- the outcome in the race for pledged delegates.

What do YOU think?

I understand what Josh is trying to say but I think he papers over a key issue that merits discussion.

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/184975.php

While the policy differences between the two campaigns are minimal, IMHO, there are marked differences in the candidates themselves and the way the two campaigns have conducted themselves.

The Clinton campaign expected a cake walk to the nomination. Instead, they have faced the most remarkably effective and uplifting presidential campaigns in my lifetime.

The manner in which the Clinton camp responded to the Obama threat has not been pretty. Bill Clinton's performance during the South Carolina primary was appalling. I was a mid-level staffer in the Clinton White House for many years. I defended him with friends and family during the Lewinski scandal. I thought he was a damned good president. My opinion of him has declined considerably.

After Wisconsin, the Clinton campaign responded like a cornered animal. As it became clearer that the delegate math was against them, the campaign concluded it's only chance was to tear down Obama. Their long-shot scorched earth strategy has been an ugly thing to witness. It has been a "say anything, do anything," ends-justifies-the-means approach to politics. I expect such behavior in a general election. But primaries are different, especially when there are no meaningful differences in policy between the candidates.

I had always assumed that I would support Clinton if she got the nomination. But my conscience began to be troubled by this question: Should I reward a Democrat with my vote who uses Republican political tactics to beat a fellow Democrat? Should I overlook the despicable means if the ultimate end is to beat a Republican in November?

I've tried to approach this as a pragmatic realist. I'm not a naive newbie when it comes to politics. I labored on my first campaign in 1972 when I worked for McGovern. I've since made a career of politics/policy advocacy.

In the end, it wasn't "emotional infantilism" that caused me to reach the idealistic conclusion that I couldn't support Clinton if she got the nomination. It wasn't childishness, rather, it was my advanced age and long experience in politics. I'm just too old for politics as usual. I have not been so excited by a political figure since I was mesmerized by RFK while in high school. I believe in Obama deep in my soul. He is truly a once-in-a-lifetime leader and I know that if this opportunity passes I will never see the likes of him again. OTOH, I find no inspiration whatsoever in Hillary Clinton.

After years of anger at the Atwater/Rovian tactics of the Republican Party, I concluded that I simply could not support a Democrat who would use such tactics to undermine such a remarkable Democratic candidate. So I shocked family and co-workers when I casually mentioned that I would sit the presidential election out if Clinton were the nominee. And I have stubbornly held that position for weeks despite the pleadings of my friends.

I would like to close with a plea to fellow Obama supporters. It is now becoming clearer by the day that Obama will be the Democratic nominee.

This will be the last time this year that I tell this story or speak unkindly of Hillary Clinton in any way. While I remain disappointed and bitter concerning her actions, continuing to express those feelings will do Barack Obama no good whatsoever.

It's time to for the healing to begin. I know that the feelings of some Clinton supporters mirror my own. I am not going to gloat or try to convince them that they have been wrong. But I think it's the obligation of all Obama supporters to refrain from fueling those bad feelings and hope that the party can come together to defeat John McCain in the fall.

In this morning's WaPo, Michael Gerson audaciously judges that Barack Obama's speech on America's racial divide "fell short." But we must ask: As we mark the 5th anniversary of the disastrous decision to invade Iraq, who is Gerson to stand in judgment of another?

Gerson, you will recall, was George W. Bush's speechwriter and a central player in the White House's march to war. Gerson penned the infamous line about "a smoking gun in the shape of a mushroom cloud" to scare the American people into believing that Iraq had nuclear weapons.

Obama courageously and eloquently addressed the issues swirling around his relationship with his pastor.

Gerson, however, cowardly chose to ignore the 5th anniversary of the invasion of Iraq and his role in the debacle -- focusing instead on how Obama "fell short."

Gerson has blood on his hands. The blood of 4,000 Americans and at least 100,000 Iraqis. Until he has the guts to publicly discuss his own culpability in this tragedy, his judgments of others must be judged audacious, indeed.

In the midst of the spin wars, two facts are indisputable: (1) Clinton ended her long losing streak; and (2) Clinton remains  way behind in pledged delegates because she has yet to prove dominant in winning at any point in the primary season.

To date, of the 13 states she has won, she was the victor in only five states with a margin of 55% or greater: Arkansas (70); Rhode Island (58); New York (57); Massachusetts (56); and Oklahoma (55) -- two of which qualify as home states.

The cold, hard conclusion is inescapable: if Clinton is unable to score convincing victories in her own party's primaries, how is she going to build the broad-based coalition necessary to beat John McCain in November?

And if Clinton is successful in gaining the nomination and beating McCain, she'll do it by the skin of her teeth. We will be looking forward to four more years of a 51-49 America, with a politics defined by polarization -- not progress.

John McCain's unwillingness to provide a straight answer to Janet Hooks question at Wednesday's debate was revealing. When asked if he would vote for the bill that he had previously championed, McCain equivocated, refusing to provide a clear yes or no answer. His dilemma is obvious. If he says yes, he's for AMNESTY. If he says no, he's a Romney-like flip flopper. But to avoid either of those traps, he must act like a slippery politician who refuses to engage in "straight talk."

While this exchange provided a good measure of schadenfreude, the broader implications are that McCain's nomination might greatly reduce the GOP's ability to use immigration as a wedge issue in the presidential campaign. When McCain has been all but counted out, many assumed that immigration would be the one national issue that might play to the GOP's advantage. Now it appears that even that may be gone.