Posts For: November 18, 2010

Despite Hype, Does Bloomberg Candidacy Have a Rationale?

11.18.2010 - 5:20 PM

The Washington Post pitches in today to join those hyping the notion that New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg is a viable third-party candidate for president in 2012. The Bloomberg boomlet, such as it is, is mostly the result of the nonstop efforts of the mayor’s staff and the billionaire’s various publication and public relations businesses, such as the Bloomberg Government website. But there have always been enough non-Bloomberg employees attracted by the mayor’s supposed centrism and independence to keep the idea alive.

So what’s the scenario for a Bloomberg candidacy? Of course, it starts and ends with money: Bloomberg has enough money to fund a first-class 50-state presidential run. And as his three mayoral victories demonstrate, he will spend as much money as is necessary.

Another integral element of the scenario is the ideological slot into which Bloomberg can fit. The former member of both the Democratic and Republican parties and his paid flacks have carefully crafted an image of a pragmatist middle-of-the-road technocrat who eschews labels and ideological rigidity. With American politics becoming increasingly polarized and the nation basically split between Red Staters who watch FOX News and Blue Staters who listen to NPR, Bloomberg is supposedly the perfect man to appeal to independents and partisans who are sick of gridlock.

The putative Bloomberg candidacy is helped by the current state of both major parties. The Democrats, led by an unpopular hyper-liberal Barack Obama, have lost the center. At the same time, the Bloomberg boosters are whispering that the Republicans, though on the rebound from their 2008 disaster, have swung too far to the right to appease their conservative base and the Tea Party insurgents to capture the centrists they’ll need to recapture the White House in 2012. And if Sarah Palin is the Republican nominee, they claim the GOP will be doomed. With the nation split between a leftist Obama and a right-wing Palin, a centrist Bloomberg will slip neatly between them and, lubricated by a campaign war chest that could dwarf even the impressive amounts raised in the last cycle by Obama, the mayor will cakewalk to victory, becoming the first ever third-party president.

It’s a neat plan, and if Palin is the GOP standard-bearer and if the economy is still in the doldrums in the summer and fall of 2012, thereby sinking Obama’s hopes, it’s just possible the wealthy mayor could win. Read More

Obama’s Anemic Public Diplomacy

Jennifer Rubin 11.18.2010 - 5:18 PM

The latest Quinnipiac poll reports:

American voters say 50 – 44 percent that the U.S. should not be involved in Afghanistan, the first time the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pe-ack) University poll finds more voters opposed to the war. This compares to a September 9 survey in which voters said 49 – 41 percent that the U.S. was doing the right thing in Afghanistan. … Support for President Barack Obama’s policy in Afghanistan turns the political landscape upside down. Democrats say 62 – 33 percent the United States should not be there, even though they strongly support President Obama heavily on virtually all other issues. Republicans, who oppose Obama on most issues, back the war 64 – 31 percent. Independent voters say 54 – 40 percent the United States should not be in Afghanistan. Military families are divided, as 49 percent believe the U.S. is doing the right thing in Afghanistan while 47 percent say the U.S. should not be involved.

There are two issues here. First, given the example the Democrats set during the Iraq war, it is remarkable that Republicans have stuck to their principles and continued support for that war. It’s not a theme that the mainstream media have dwelled on all that much — OK, they’ve entirely ignored it. But when Obama and the White House start whining about GOP partisanship and its being the party of “no,” someone should remind them that on one of the most controversial aspects of Obama’s agenda, the GOP has hung tight.

The second issue is that Obama’s lack of public diplomacy and mixed messaging on our timeline for withdrawal have allowed public support for the war to slide. He’s not made the case forcefully and consistently for why we are there and why we must prevail. At the FPI conference this week, administration figures suggested that at the upcoming NATO summit in Lisbon, Obama would issue a forceful statement on the war effort. This is good, but it shouldn’t be a single declaration. Obama seems to think he has a “communications” problem. While that may be a lame excuse for an election wipeout, it’s an accurate indictment of his war effort. He should commit to remedying that deficiency.

WEB EXCLUSIVE: The Never-Ending Worst Week Ever

Abe Greenwald | @abegreenwald

11.18.2010 - 4:59 PM

Barack Obama is on an open-ended run of “worsts.” The New York Post’s Michael Goodwin opened his November 7 column thus: “He took a ‘shellacking,’ a 2012 poll shows him trailing two Republicans, and losing candidates in his own party are griping about his ‘tone deaf’ leadership. And the Mad Hatter, Nancy Pelosi, refuses to exit quietly. Welcome to Barack Obama’s worst week in the Oval Office.”

Days later, on November 12, Baruch College political scientist Doug Muzzio told the Daily News: “This certainly was the worst 10 days of [Obama’s] political life.” Commenting on the president’s failed Asia trip, Muzzio noted, “He came back with bupkis,” and said, “Given that he’s not going to be able to get any domestic achievements with the Republicans in control of the House … if he doesn’t do it in foreign policy that’s a big problem for him.”

To finish reading this COMMENTARY Web Exclusive, click here.

Political Malpractice, Say the Clintonistas

Jennifer Rubin 11.18.2010 - 4:31 PM

You knew this was coming:

Two former advisers to President Bill Clinton accused the Obama administration of minimizing the economic crisis and botching a narrative that could have limited Democratic losses this midterm election cycle.

“The White House had the best and the brightest, but they, what would Bush say, misunderestimated, whatever the word is,” said Democratic consultant James Carville Thursday at a breakfast with reporters held by the Christian Science Monitor.

Pollster Stan Greenberg said Obama downplayed “an almost Depression-like economic crisis,” by inaccurately projecting the magnitude of job losses. “They predicated everything on the jobs coming back from March. They’re still in the middle of this crisis. This is a total misframing of this moment. Some of it’s policy … a lot of it is giving the people in this crisis a sense of what the scale of it is, and what has to be done to get out of it,” he said.

Does this mean that Hillary is running for something? No. Does it mean that either Carville or Greenberg opposed the stimulus or ObamaCare or other parts of the Obama agenda that enraged the electorate? Come to think of it, no. In fact, their message seems to be that Obama wasn’t anti-business enough.

But the Democratic pols can’t resist the temptation to take a poke at the White House, in large part because the central theme of Hillary’s 2008 campaign — that Obama was not ready for prime time — was accurate. It just wasn’t politically timely in a “change” election year.

The challenge for the White House now is to devise not only a policy agenda that makes sense but also to convince the Democrats in Congress and around the country that as a strategic matter, the “best and the brightest” know what they are doing. The Democrats who survived or who will be up for re-election in 2012 will not be inclined to follow the political advice of a White House that has paraded them off the political cliff.

Nerves of Steele

Jennifer Rubin 11.18.2010 - 3:34 PM

The contrast is great: one party can’t eliminate the personification of its problems, while the other is moving swiftly to dump its baggage. The Dems can’t bear to part with Nancy Pelosi, who gets another stint at the helm of the increasingly liberal House Democratic caucus. Yet the Republicans have no qualms when it comes to booting Michael Steele from the RNC chairmanship:

Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele’s prospects for a second term dimmed Wednesday as Republicans went public with their concerns about the committee’s fundraising and two prominent governors indicated a preference for new leadership atop the party.

Asked in an interview at the Republican Governors Association (RGA) meeting here if there should be a new chairman of the party, Mississippi Gov. and outgoing RGA Chairman Haley Barbour flatly said: “Yes.”

Tim Pawlenty echoed that sentiment, citing a letter by outgoing RNC political director Gentry Collins. (“You have to have a high-functioning, effective ground game and the RNC has to be able to deliver that consistently every cycle and it appears based on this letter that that didn’t happen.”)

Unlike Pelosi, there is no “Steele constituency” pleading to keep the gaffe-prone chairman. And unlike the House Dems, the RNC isn’t about to pretend that everything is just swell at the RNC.

Why the Silly Deal Is a Bad Deal

Jennifer Rubin 11.18.2010 - 2:57 PM

Some genuine friends of Israel have shrugged their shoulders over the latest foolish attempt by the Obami to lure the parties back to the non-peace talks. OK, they concede, it won’t work and is absurd (another 90 days won’t matter), but what is the harm? Besides, Israel gets those planes (but what if after 90 days the talks end?). Elliott Abrams succinctly explains in a Voice of America interview why the deal is not just ludicrous but also dangerous:

“They have been negotiating for a very long time and they have not been able to overcome the differences on some critical issues like Jerusalem or security arrangements,” said the former foreign policy advisor to U.S. Presidents Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush. “It may be too optimistic to expect the Israelis and Palestinians to come to an agreement by 2011 on all issues which separate them when they have not yet started negotiations.” …

“It is the linkage.” he says. “The Israeli agreement to extend their construction freeze in the West Bank by 90 days is now linked to a squadron of jets and to U.S. vetoes in the U.N. Security Council.”

Abrams believes neither of these linkages should be connected with the issue of a West Bank construction freeze by the Israelis. He said the U.S. should be making decisions in the Security Council on the basis of principle.

“If it is a bad resolution we should veto it,” the Middle East scholar says. “Similarly the U.S. should give Israel what it needs, but it should not be linked to a 90 day extension of the freeze.”

For the same reason that it is unseemly for the U.S. to make the offer, it is unwise for the Israelis to play along.

And really, isn’t it time to pull the plug on this destructive and distracting sideshow? If the U.S. and our allies spent half the time and effort on constructing a viable plan to prevent Iran from going nuclear as they do trying to badger Israel into making concessions to Palestinian “leaders” who can’t and won’t make a deal, we’d all be a lot safer, and Obama’s reputation abroad might rebound. Pro-Israel groups and lawmakers would do well to start making that point.

Should Obama Take Soros’s Threat Seriously?

Jonathan S. Tobin | @tobincommentary

11.18.2010 - 2:23 PM

The billionaire funder of everything left-wing may be the puppet-master source of all evil to Glenn Beck and his fans, but the White House may be thinking of George Soros as more of a pain in the rear end than anything else today. Yesterday Soros spoke to a private session of wealthy lefty donors at the Democracy Alliance, a group that funnels money into various liberal causes. According to Politico, Soros merely declared, “Obama shouldn’t compromise” with the Republicans. But according to the Huffington Post’s Sam Stein, Soros was a bit more blunt than that in his off-the-record remarks. According to Stein, Soros told his audience “We have just lost this election, we need to draw a line. And if this president can’t do what we need, it is time to start looking somewhere else.”

That sounds like a direct threat that Soros and the rest of the assembled lefty moneybags would fund a primary challenge to Obama unless he toes the line on liberal doctrine. Soros later denied that’s what he meant, but his remarks were a warning shot fired over the presidential bow.

Should Obama take the threat seriously? Soros and the rest of the crew at Democracy Alliance have the financial power to mobilize the leftist grass roots that can make the difference in any Democratic primary. If they can find a credible liberal who had the guts to run to Obama’s left on issues like a demand for an immediate U.S. pullout from Afghanistan (remember, Obama won the Democratic presidential nomination running as an anti-war candidate) or the president’s failure to ram through an even more leftist version of health care, then Obama would be in for a fight. But the idea that we are on the eve of a massive left-wing revolt against Obama in the coming year is probably more a Republican fantasy than anything else.

First, while Obama will never satisfy the hard left, the chances that he will emulate Bill Clinton and shift to the center in 2011 are slim and none. Obama’s arrogant and unrepentant view of the elections make it more likely that he will take Nation editor Katrina vanden Heuvel’s advice and govern largely by executive fiat in the coming months than he will make nice with the GOP, let alone steal Republicans’ thunder by signing conservative bills and claiming credit for them as Clinton did. Other than Afghanistan, which Obama may defuse as a liberal issue by starting his bugout of the country as promised in 2011, there may not be much room to the president’s left to run on in 2012.

Second, for all the big talk on the left about holding Obama’s feet to the fire and the dangers that a challenge to the incumbent presents for the White House, as John pointed out in his article in the December issue of COMMENTARY, he is still the first African-American president and, as such, has a certain immunity to criticism from Democrats that an ordinary chief executive would not have. The Moveon.org crowd’s influence cannot be underestimated, but the African-American voting bloc is still just as, if not far more, powerful in Democratic primaries. Moreover, the backlash against any white liberal who dares to challenge Obama — a move certain to be characterized by blacks as a stab in the presidential back — may be a greater deterrent to potential candidates than any of Soros’s admonitions directed at Obama. Even a fearless independent such as Russ Feingold would have to think twice about becoming the man most hated by African-Americans.

Thus, while Obama has plenty to worry about in the next two years, especially if the economy does not recover, he still has the whip hand over his party’s left. Despite the unhealthy obsession that some on the right have about the unsavory billionaire, Soros really isn’t the puppet master of the Democratic Party, let alone someone who has the power to manipulate the American political system the way he did some foreign currencies. The man to watch on the left is still Barack Obama, not George Soros.

Center for Constitutional Rights: What It Means to Hate America

John Podhoretz | @jpodhoretz

11.18.2010 - 2:02 PM

There is appropriate horror being expressed today all over the blogosphere about the statement released by the radical leftist group called the Center for Constitutional Rights on the verdict in the Ghailani trial: “CCR questions the ability of anyone who is Muslim to receive a truly fair trial in any American judicial forum post-9/11,” it says. “However, on balance the Ghailani verdict shows that federal criminal trials are far superior to military commissions for the simple yet fundamental reason that they prohibit evidence obtained by torture. If anyone is unsatisfied with Ghailani’s acquittal on 284 counts, they should blame the CIA agents who tortured him.”

The astounding and vicious vulgarity of the sentiments expressed here — no Muslim can get a fair trial, anyone dissatisfied with the fact that a man who confessed to his role in the murder of 224 people has been acquitted of those killings should be more upset that the person who killed those people was treated roughly by agents of the U.S. government — tells you everything you need to know about the Center for Constitutional Rights. Atop a CCR website posting by a member of the organization’s board denouncing the guilty verdict and sentencing of Lynne Stewart, a lawyer who served as a courier for terrorist messages sent through her from her imprisoned client to his network, is a quote from Karl Marx: “At all times throughout history the ideology of the ruling class is the ruling ideology.” That same item described Stewart’s client, the “blind sheikh” Abdel Rahman, as “was the leading oppositionist to the U.S.-sponsored Mubarak dictatorship in Egypt,” whereas in fact what he did was oversee the bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993.

The Lynne Stewart monstrousness is of a piece with the monstrous work done by CCR altogether. It is run by Michael Ratner, who conveniently espouses a hate-America and evils-of-capitalism philosophy even as he swims in his own family’s real estate billions. (His brother Bruce is, among other things, the Machiavellian developer of Atlantic Yards, the Brooklyn megaproject.) It is, and I say this advisedly, an evil organization. In the guise of protecting civil liberties, it uses the American legal system to attack the American political system and the American way of life. Its approach is to offer aggressively self-righteous defenses of the morally indefensible — i.e., the logic that says a waterboard is worse than a killing — in a classic bait-and-switch according to which any form of state action against anyone is unacceptable unless that person happens to be a cop, a soldier, or an official of the U.S. government, in which case he is guilty until proven innocent.

So while I share the disgust expressed by Benjamin Wittes, Tom Joscelyn, and others, it just seems all in a day’s work for the Center for Constitutional Rights, an organization whose loathing of America is exceeded only by its masterful exploitation and manipulation of America’s blessings.

NATO Going Cold Turkey

Emanuele Ottolenghi | @eottolenghi

11.18.2010 - 1:03 PM

More evidence that NATO is in trouble has come alive as the alliance prepares for its summit this weekend. As reported in several news sources, Turkey has gotten its way, and NATO officialdom will make no mention of Iran as a missile threat so as not to complicate things for NATO’s only Islamist member. The whole thing is, of course, a farce. NATO secretary-general, Anders Fogh Rasmussen (who, as Danish prime minister during the cartoon affair, has already had a flavor of Turkish tolerance), has confirmed that NATO’s new strategic concept, due to be released at the summit, will not name Iran as a particular threat. Pressed by journalists, NATO spokesman James Appathurai was quoted as saying that “[t]here are at least 30 countries, more than 30 countries, acquiring, that have or are acquiring ballistic missile capability,” he replied. “So this is not just about one country. It’s about a growing and, in essence, generic potential threat to our territory.”

Now, we will not argue with the fact that NATO’s readiness to embrace missile defense may be more than just about Iran — after all, Syria and Libya have missiles (Libya actually shot missiles once at a NATO ally — Italy — in 1986, in lame retaliation for the U.S. raid over Tripoli). If Pakistan ever fell into the wrong hands, there would be even more reason to worry. And North Korea may one day have ICBMs to threaten NATO countries (it already threatens NATO allies and partners).

But why not point out Iran, given that Libya has renounced its nuclear program and Syria is an Iran proxy whose nuclear program benefited from Iranian and North Korean support? And the 30-country myth is especially silly — as it includes countries too far away to threaten NATO countries, friendly countries, NATO members, countries with obsolete missile programs, and then, well, and then Iran.

If missile defense is to be an essential component of NATO’s new doctrine of nuclear deterrence in a world populated in the future by rogue states with ballistic missiles and nuclear weapons, then it would be desirable to recall that another essential element of any deterrence doctrine is some kind of declaratory policy. If all we get from NATO is denial for Turkey’s appeasement’s sake, the credibility of NATO’s deterrence is harmed.

Which all comes down to a simple matter — why is Turkey still a member of the alliance?

Well, People Do Change Their Minds

Jennifer Rubin 11.18.2010 - 12:30 PM

He said he’s not interested in a run in 2012. He jokingly asked if he’d have to commit suicide to convince the press he wasn’t running. But Chris Christie has become a rock star in conservative circles — chiding the press, whacking the teachers’ union, refusing to raise taxes, slashing spending, and now cutting public broadcasting and radio in New Jersey. Yup:

New Jersey Network, the state’s non-commercial radio and TV operation has sent out 45-day layoff warnings to all 170 state workers, and would effectively shut down all TV & radio operations. The layoff notices come after Gov. Chris Christie ordered state funding for NJN to be ended. He had already cut the network’s budget in half for 2010-2011.

It’s that sort of decisive, no-nonsense fiscal hawk who many on the right are looking to lead the party in 2012. Christie might really be serious about sitting out 2012, but I suspect the base is going to try to convince him otherwise. Dumping public TV and radio is just one more item on the list of actions he’s taken in the first year on the job, which just convinces more conservatives that, to borrow a phrase, he’s the one they have been waiting for. And if he really isn’t going to run, the GOP would be wise to find someone with the same moxie, determination, and governance skills as Christie possesses.

New Reports Show Another Freeze Won’t Buy Israel Quiet with U.S.

Evelyn Gordon | @evelyng1234

11.18.2010 - 11:57 AM

When the emerging U.S.-Israel deal on another three-month settlement freeze was first reported, I could understand the argument (ably made by Jonathan) that despite the freeze’s many negative consequences, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should acquiesce. But if subsequent reports are true, another extension would be disastrous. If Israel is going to spend the next two years fighting with Washington over construction with or without the deal, it can so do more effectively without another freeze.

Yesterday, Haaretz reported that contrary to previous reports, Barack Obama isn’t promising not to seek further moratoriums: his proposed letter to Netanyahu would merely say that “progress over the next three months would render another freeze unnecessary.”

Yet the chances of progress during these months rendering “another freeze unnecessary” are nonexistent. Nothing less than a signed-and-sealed deal on borders would let Israel build in “its” parts of the West Bank without Palestinian objections, and even Washington doesn’t believe that’s achievable in just three months. Thus, when the three months end, Palestinians will once again object to Israeli construction on “their” land — and Obama will once again back them by demanding another freeze.

Then came today’s report — again contradicting earlier ones — that the U.S. won’t really exempt East Jerusalem from the moratorium. A “senior U.S. official” told Haaretz that even if Israel extends the freeze, “we will continue to press for quiet throughout East Jerusalem during the 90 days.”

The official added that President Barack Obama had committed in an oral message to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas last April that the U.S. expects both sides to refrain from “actions that would seriously undermine trust,” including in East Jerusalem, and would respond with “steps, actions, or adjustments in policy” to any such provocative actions as long as negotiations are underway.

The U.S. administration has defined “actions that would seriously undermine trust” as including major housing announcements, demolitions, or evictions in East Jerusalem.

“This policy will continue if the negotiations resume under a 90-day moratorium and the Israelis know it”, said the US official.

In other words, even if Israel extends the freeze, it won’t get quiet: it will spend the next three months fighting with Obama over Jerusalem, followed by another major fight over the West Bank when the three months end.

And if so, better to have the fight now, when Netanyahu can still reasonably argue that the original 10-month freeze was a one-time gesture that Abbas wasted by refusing to negotiate, and that the onus is therefore now on Abbas, not him, to make the next gesture.

But the minute Netanyahu agrees to another freeze, he accepts two dangerous principles: that the freeze wasn’t an exceptional one-time gesture but instead a tolerable long-term policy, and that it’s never Abbas who needs to make gestures; it’s always and only Israel’s turn. And that leaves him no justification for not extending the freeze again in another three months.

For two years of quiet with Washington, another three-month freeze might be worth it. But if what Israel will really get is just two more years of continued fighting, the only sensible answer is “no.”

Civilian Trials for Terror Suspects and America’s Image Abroad

Max Boot | @MaxBoot

11.18.2010 - 11:21 AM

The case for handling terrorists outside the civil legal system has now received support from an unlikely quarter: Judge Lewis Kaplan of Federal District Court in Manhattan. Judge Kaplan presided over the trial of Ahmed Ghailani, who was just acquitted in 284 out of 285 counts relating to the 1998 bombing of two U.S. embassies in Africa. The verdict is largely the result of the prosecution’s decision not to introduce Ghailani’s own confession, obtained while he was being held at Guantanamo, and of the judge’s decision not to admit the evidence of a witness who said he had sold Ghailani the explosives used to blow up the embassy in Tanzania. In a fascinating tidbit, the New York Times notes:

The judge himself recognized the significance of excluding the witness when he said in his ruling that Mr. Ghailani’s status of “enemy combatant” probably would permit his detention as something akin “to a prisoner of war until hostilities between the United States and Al Qaeda and the Taliban end, even if he were found not guilty.”

In other words, the judge fully expected that Ghailani would not be released regardless of the outcome in his court. Thankfully, that seems a good bet. For all President Obama’s miscalculation in sending Ghailani to a normal criminal court, he also remains committed to holding some detainees indefinitely simply because of the risk they would pose — a risk that has been amply documented by the number of Gitmo detainees released by the Bush administration who have gone back to terrorism. Ironically, Obama’s decision to employ criminal courts was designed to improve America’s image in the world, but our image will actually suffer more from holding indefinitely a suspect who has been largely acquitted by a jury than it would if there were no jury trial to begin with.

The NY Times‘s Overblown Reaction to New START

Max Boot | @MaxBoot

11.18.2010 - 10:30 AM

Yesterday I suggested that there was no need for Republicans to get too worked up over New START, because it won’t compromise America’s nuclear deterrent. The same advice applies to liberals touting the treaty: Keep calm, everyone. It’s just not that big of a deal.

Yet to read the New York Times editorial page today, you would think that this is the most important issue since … well, pretty much ever. In a seriously overwrought editorial, the Times claims: “The world’s nuclear wannabes, starting with Iran, should send a thank you note to Senator Jon Kyl. After months of negotiations with the White House, he has decided to try to block the lame-duck Senate from ratifying the New Start arms control treaty.”

Talk about over the top. How on earth will Kyl’s opposition to the treaty help Iran and other rogue states? The Times again: “If the treaty founders, it would … do huge damage to American credibility just as Mr. Obama is making progress rallying many countries — including Russia — to press Iran to curb its illicit nuclear program.” That’s quite a stretch: the Times assumes that if the treaty passes, Russia will take harsh steps to crack down on the Iranian nuclear program. I wish it were so, but I very much doubt it. Russia has its own reasons for not cracking down on Iran, with which it has a longstanding business relationship, and that is unlikely to change no matter what happens with New START.

The rest of the Times‘s editorial is just as unconvincing — it consists primarily of hyping this modest treaty out of all recognition by claiming that it’s “central to this country’s national security” and that “the stakes couldn’t be higher.” Actually, as I argued yesterday, the stakes are pretty low — which is why I don’t think it will do any harm for the GOP to pass the treaty in return for Obama’s commitment to modernize our nuclear arsenal. But the bullying tone of the Times‘s editorial is the sort of thing that is likely to drive Republicans into the anti-ratification camp.

The Palin Quandary

Jennifer Rubin 11.18.2010 - 10:15 AM

Sarah Palin has the ability to make news anytime, anyplace. She did that with the upcoming interview in the New York Times Magazine and in additional comments in which she explained the difficulty of remaining governor while bogus ethics charges and real security concerns plagued her. (“I don’t have the funds to pay for my family to travel with me, and the state won’t pay for it, either. I can’t afford to have security at my home — anybody can come up to my door, and they do. Under the laws of Alaska, anybody can file suit or an ethics charge against me, and I have to defend it on my own. I’m going into debt.”)

But the question remains: does she run for president and put herself in a position to lose her iconic standing, or does she continue as the organizer-fundraiser-newsmaker, which has made her wealthy and famous but not more popular with voters outside the conservative base? In a must-read piece of solid reporting, Jon Ward goes out among Tea Partiers to find out if Palin’s most devoted fans want her to run. The answer may surprise some:

Interviews over the last few months with numerous Tea Party and conservative voters in states around the country yielded no one who was enthusiastic about Palin running for president, though a handful said they were open to it. In addition, conservative and Tea Party leaders who are speaking to the grassroots regularly report that they have consistently heard the same thing.

These are the sorts of comments he hears from Tea Party activists:

“She’s got too many negatives, not for me, but for too many people. So I think she’s better off on the outside looking in.”
“I would like to see someone else emerge. I think she’s too divisive. … It’s good for her to be part of the party. I have nothing against her. But I just think a leader has to be more articulate than she is. I just don’t think that person’s emerged yet.”

“I’m not sure if we have seen the one who needs to run. It has to be someone who can articulate the conservative message like a Buckley or Reagan. … We have time to find someone. I do like Chris Christie, and Marco Rubio.” Read More

Pelosi and the GOP Win

Jennifer Rubin 11.18.2010 - 9:00 AM

As a Republican reader e-mails, “The Dems want Pelosi as their leader, and so do we!” Well, that’s the Obama era for you. The vote and the post-vote grousing by dismayed Blue Dog Democrats tell us a few things.

Most important, Pelosi has a lot of disgruntled moderates who are very nervous that in 2012 they will join their defeated 2010 colleagues, among them more than 30 Blue Dogs. As the New York Times reported, there are a number of Democrats who weren’t about to go along with the “everything is fine, perfectly fine” narrative:

“It’s time for new leadership after the worst electoral defeat since 1948,” said Representative Jim Cooper, Democrat of Tennessee.

Some of the Democrats defeated this month counseled strongly against keeping Ms. Pelosi, and one did not mince words. “Have they lost their minds?” asked Representative Allen Boyd, a defeated Democrat, as he passed by the Cannon Caucus Room, where the election was occurring.

The dissenters didn’t go quietly:

Appearing with Reps. Mike Ross (D-Ark.), Larry Kissell (D-N.C.) and Jim Matheson (D-Utah), who formally nominated Shuler for the post, Shuler said “there was a lot of unrest in the room” surrounding the votes. …

“I consider myself one of Nancy Pelosi’s closest friends in Congress. I think we missed an opportunity today to send a signal to America that we understand what happened in this past election,” said Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-N.J.), who wanted the elections pushed back.

But the purposefully oblivious, like Rep. Barney Frank, weren’t giving any ground:

Asked if Pelosi’s abysmal approval ratings among independents pose a problem for the party looking ahead to 2012, Frank said they don’t, “because she’s not running for president.”

“You people are focused on this; the voters aren’t,” he said, referring to the media. “The general public is much more focused on substance.”

Frank asserted that Pelosi had “virtually nothing” to do with the poor election outcome for Democrats.

“Going forward,” he said, “we will be judged on what the public policies are.”

The question remains: does Pelosi now become a useful foil for the Republicans or for the president? If Obama is cagey enough, he’ll pick some fights with her, get serious about spending reduction, and ignore her advice on national security. Should he go that route, he’ll regain some lost ground. But if Pelosi entices the president to stay the course, gives no ground on spending, and remains the poster girl for the left wing of the left wing, then Republicans in 2012 will run once again at the Obama-Pelosi-Reid agenda.

The problem with the liberals’ insistence that they need Pelosi to remain a resolute defender of the left is that Obama needs to run roughshod over her and the rump liberal caucus in order to survive. For all the talk of a GOP “civil war,” the real action won’t be on that side of the aisle; from what we’ve seen so far, the Tea Partiers and establishment Republicans are working things out with a minimum of acrimony. The same, I suspect, won’t be true for the Democrats.

Add at Least One More Name to the 2012 List

Rick Richman | @jpundit

11.18.2010 - 8:15 AM

In her post about potential 2012 Republican presidential candidates, Jennifer noted that “the most widely discussed contenders (Mitt Romney, Sarah Palin, Mike Huckabee, Mitch Daniels, Tim Pawlenty, Newt Gingrich, etc.) haven’t filled the base and party activists with optimism” and that fresher faces such as Chris Christie and Marco Rubio are not interested.

Even with the addition of Christie and Rubio, however, that list contains only eight names. Consider the following from Jimmy Carter’s White House Diaries, indicating that only a year and a half before being nominated, Carter ranked considerably lower than ninth:

About the time I announced my candidacy for president in December 1974, Gallup published a poll that included the question “Among Democrats, whom do you prefer as the next nominee?” There were thirty-two names on Gallup’s list of potential candidates, including George Wallace, Hubert Humphrey, Henry (Scoop) Jackson, Walter Mondale, John Glenn, and even Georgia legislator Julian Bond. My name was not mentioned.

This is not to say that Republicans should be looking for a new face simply because the usual suspects carry varying weights of baggage. Someone may seem an attractive alternative only because he lacks the baggage any person who has been in the arena will have acquired. Surely the past two years have taught us that the presidency is not the right place for someone, no matter how attractive, who does not have much on his resume under the categories of “Experience,” “Accomplishments,” and “Significant Votes Other Than Present.”

But there is at least one person who combines a relatively fresh face with substantial experience and accomplishments: Mike Pence. The current issue of Imprimis features his remarkable Hillsdale College speech, “The Presidency and the Constitution,” worth reading in its entirety. Here are excerpts from the final paragraphs, which reach a level of eloquence considerably beyond hope, change, and receding oceans:

As Americans, we inherit what Lincoln in his First Inaugural called “the mystic chords of memory stretching from every patriot grave.” They bind us to the great and the humble, the known and the unknown of Americans past—and if I hear them clearly, what they say is that although we may have strayed, we have not strayed too far to return, for we are their descendants. … We owe a debt to those who came before, who did great things, and suffered more than we suffer, and gave more than we give, and pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor for us, whom they did not know. …

Many great generations are gone, but by the character and memory of their existence they forbid us to despair of the republic. I see them crossing the prairies in the sun and wind. I see their faces looking out from steel mills and coal mines, and immigrant ships crawling into the harbors at dawn. I see them at war, at work and at peace. I see them, long departed, looking into the camera, with hopeful and sad eyes. And I see them embracing their children, who became us. …

They are silent now and forever, but from the eternal silence of every patriot grave there is yet an echo that says, “It is not too late; keep faith with us, keep faith with God, and do not, do not ever despair of the republic.”

It may be worth noting that Pence also gave a significant speech last month at the 10th Annual Friends of the Family Banquet. It was in Iowa.

Scooter Libby Has His Say

Jennifer Rubin 11.18.2010 - 8:05 AM

Quin Hillyer of the Washington Times provides essential reading: an interview with Scooter Libby — the first time Libby has gone on the record to discuss his conviction and President Bush’s refusal to grant him a complete pardon. It should be read in full to appreciate how ludicrous was the decision to prosecute and how shaky was the evidence that Libby intentionally lied about hearing Valerie Plame’s name from Tim Russert. The key graph:

Never mind that Mr. Russert’s own memory had proved flagrantly untrustworthy in a previous instance. Never mind that equally famous journalist Bob Woodward testified that his own notes of a near-simultaneous conversation with Mr. Libby indicated that Mr. Woodward might have said to Mr. Libby what Mr. Libby remembered being told by Mr. Russert — in other words, that the conversations easily and innocently could have become conflated in Mr. Libby’s mind. And never mind that Mr. Libby was never shown to have a motive for lying about his conversation with Mr. Russert.

When considered with another solidly reported piece on the topic, one is left mystified as to how he could have been convicted, let alone denied a pardon. In his masterful analysis, Stan Crock explains:

Even at the end of the long ordeal, poor memory — and irony — continued to played a role. Libby called White House counsel Fred Fielding as the clock was winding down on Bush’s term to ask if he could meet with the president to make his case for a pardon. Fielding mentioned he had received a call from a senator who had defended Libby. That surprised Libby, who knew the senator but had not considered him an ardent supporter. And Libby suggested it might have been another senator who Libby knew had spoken to Fielding.

Libby, who answered questions for this article, asked Fielding three times if he was sure it was the senator Fielding mentioned, and Fielding insisted that it was. But a little later, Fielding realized that he had made a mistake and that the senator Libby had mentioned was the one who had called. “Fred,” Libby said wryly, “you could be indicted.” The incident evidently didn’t convince Fielding that Libby may have made a similar memory error. Fielding didn’t return calls seeking comment.

After reading through these and contemporaneous accounts of the trial and investigation (and when we consider Patrick Fitzgerald’s overzealousness, revealed in his most recent trial flop), one cannot but agree that something went terribly wrong. Or, put more bluntly: “And to Fred Fielding, wherever you are: Shame, shame, shame!”

Flotsam and Jetsam

Jennifer Rubin 11.18.2010 - 8:00 AM

Hooray for Newton, Massachusetts!: “Temple Beth Avodah, a Reform Jewish synagogue in Newton, has abruptly canceled an event with the president of J Street, a lobbying group that supports liberal positions on Israel, because of vociferous objections from some members of the congregation about J Street’s politics.” Bravo — why should Jews, even liberal ones, keep up the facade that the Soros-funded group is a legitimate, pro-Israel organization.

Three cheers for hope and change: “The House speaker, Nancy Pelosi of California, was re-elected on Wednesday to lead the Democrats in the next Congress, despite her party’s loss of more than 60 seats and its majority control of the House in the midterm elections. Officials said that Ms. Pelosi defeated Representative Heath Shuler of North Carolina in an internal party vote, 150 to 43.” We now know that there are 43 Dems who have sense enough to perhaps join their Republican colleagues on key votes.

Bingo! “The whole TSA procedure is hugely frustrating to travelers because not only is it needlessly invasive, but it is also a complete waste of time. Other countries facing similar threats respond in much less irritating and much more intelligent and effective ways. Israel, for example, does not do body scans and invasive pat-downs. If the Republicans want to cut government spending, a good place to start would be to abolish TSA. I say this as a very frequent traveler who regularly flies 150,000 miles per year.”

Wow-wee. Look what $1.5B in aid and Muslim Outreach got us: “Financial ties between Egypt and Iran have recently improved as a result of the Misr Iran Development Bank (MIDB), jointly owned by the two countries, according to a report by the Atlantic Monthly on Monday. According to the report, the MIDB, founded in 1975, has become a potential route for Teheran to bypass imposed economic sanctions with Egypt. The bank serves as evidence of the complex challenge faced by the US in enforcing international sanctions against Iran.”

Bravo, Just Journalism, for documenting 10 years of the London Review of Books‘s noxious anti-Israel screeds. “The LRB consistently portrayed Israel as a bloodthirsty and genocidal regime out of all proportion to reality, while sympathetic portraits abounded of groups designated as terrorist organisations by the British government such as Hamas and Hezbollah. While the Palestinian narrative was fully represented, Israel’s narrative on its legitimate security concerns, Arab rejectionism and terrorism was near absent.” Do you think they could do the New York Review of Books next?

Kudos to Lela Gilbert, who highlights this: “Recent terrorist attacks against Christians in Iraq have spotlighted their desperate circumstances in the Middle East, characterized by threats of terror and bloodshed, and culminating in a silent exodus from their ancient homelands—an exodus that mirrors that of the Jews half a century before. Murders, rapes, beatings, extortions, the burning and desecration of houses of worship and mob violence are abuses are all too familiar to surviving Jews who remember their own perilous journeys.” Where’s our Islam-Explainer-in-Chief, and why doesn’t he ever talk about this topic?

Way to go! First an earmark ban and now this: “House Republicans announced Wednesday they plan to force a floor vote on defunding NPR in response to the firing of analyst Juan Williams last month. House GOP Whip Eric Cantor (Va.) and Rep. Doug Lamborn (Colo.) said that cutting funds to the publicly subsidized news organization was the winner of the conference’s weekly ‘YouCut’ contest, in which the public votes online on spending items they want eliminated.”

Whew. No candidates like Mary Robinson for the Medal of Freedom this year. But Stan “the Man” Musial, Yo-Yo Ma, and Angela Merkel will get their awards. Also Bush 41. Bush 43 will have to wait to get his — maybe in Marco Rubio’s first term. (Yeah, yeah — Maya Angelou is an awful poet, but harmless enough.)

Better late than never. A gathering of 100 CEOs delivered the administration some long overdue pushback: “The CEOs, in a vote, said the government’s top priority should be to foster global trade and create a more business-friendly environment. But CEOs also said uncertainty about government policy on taxes and regulation remained a barrier to unlocking $2 trillion in capital sitting in the treasuries of U.S. non-financial businesses.”

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