Thought Alarm

Thursday, January 31, 2008

And then there were two: Edwards drops out

I know this happened yesterday but I didn't have internet access. Anyway, I was happy to see it. I never really liked Edwards for some reason. He talked about poverty the way Princess Dianna talked about land-mines. Who isn't against such things?

To me there's just something disingenuous about Edwards, a man who butters his bread raising awareness for poverty while getting $400 hair cuts and living in a 29,000 square foot house. He talks about lowering the cost of college for Americans while charging as much as $55,000 to speak at a university. Stories like this just seem to follow him around. Of course I'm anti-poverty, but that's like saying you're pro-education. How much awareness do we need about this? And how far can someone go on such an accepted platform?

People are already talking about whether or not he will be chosen as a running-mate for the November election. Let's remember how much he helped Kerry in 2004, and himself in 2008.

Having pointed that out, I'm sure that son of a mill worker will be just fine.

John Edwards, the progressive Democratic candidate who made a populist, antipoverty message the centerpiece of his campaign, announced his exit from the presidential primary race on Wednesday, saying he was stepping aside “so that history can blaze its path.”

Source: nytimes.com via Alarmed

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Sunday, January 27, 2008

The End of The Natural--Bill Clinton's last stand

William Jefferson Clinton's fairy-tale rise from broken family child to President of the United States was no accident. He was a man of sharp intellect, sincere concern, and incredible political acumen. By 1992, at the age of 46, those skills had melded together into an elite campaigning machine. George Stephanopoulus, then an adviser on Clinton's election team, later described the magic like this in his book All Too Human:

Every day Clinton showed how extraordinary he was. Like when he spent his downtime stroking the hand of a little girl, bald and yellow with cancer, and looked into her eyes until she believed she'd grow up to be a movie star. Or when you would prep him for a late-night-car-ride-to- the-airport interview after sixteen hours of nonstop campaigning. His eyes would float, the lids fluttering with fatigue, but once the reporter ducked into the backseat Clinton would repeat the briefing word for word and add six points we missed. We called him Secretariat, the ultimate political thoroughbred.

Former Newsweek reporter Joe Klein remembers another nickname for Clinton: The Natural, which was the title given to Roy Hobbs, the baseball phenom in Bernard Malamud's book of the same name. As political consultant Paul Begala said of Clinton, "He was the best there ever was." Clinton's singular abilities as a finely tuned political animal enabled him to become the third-youngest president in history. Along the way he became an icon of hope, youth, change. It is amazing what a difference a decade can make.

Now Bill Clinton bumbles around his wife's campaign trail, alienating voters, dismissing opponents, and falling asleep on stage. He's like an old pitcher who can no longer find the strike zone, hanging on to past glory. Bill Clinton was ushered into the White House nearly 16 years ago to the tune of Fleetwood Mac's "Don't Stop." Today he has us all thinking about yesterday. Meanwhile a new Democratic luminary, Senator Barack Obama from Illinois, looks forward. And, in a twist of fate, Obama is Hillary Clinton's chief rival for the Democratic nomination. But Obama, not Clinton, represents youth, and hope, and change, and even Bill can't summon that magic for his beleaguered wife anymore. Obama, not Clinton, drew 300,000 Democratic votes in South Carolina, an unprecedented amount. Obama, not Clinton, has stared a movement.

And after his victory in South Carolina Obama noted, "This election is about the past versus the future."

Many political pundits blamed Bill for Hillary's sizable defeat in that southern primary. And even afterwards Bill was back at work, dismissing Obama's victory by pointing out that Jessie Jackson won in South Carolina twice. Jackson, of course, never became president and it doesn't take a political genius to connect the sloppy dots Bill is trying to lay out. But the problem is he just doesn't do it with anything like his previous flair. The willingness is there, but the execution and timing are gone. His charisma has given over to surliness. His uncanny ability to tap an opponent's weakness now sounds like a weak jab. Bill's time has faded. It seems to belong to Obama now.

Bill Clinton's parallels to Roy Hobbs, the main character in The Natural, are worth noting. Both came from obscure, humble backgrounds, and rose on their incredible talent to heroic levels. Both were corruptible by women. And another similarity is how both characters end their journey.

"Look at him standing there, like a goddamn gorilla," a character in Malamud's book says about Roy walking to the plate one last time with the winning run on third. "Look at his burning eyes. He ain't human."

"That ain't what I see," Someone else says. "He looks old and beat up."

That seems to me how Bill Clinton looks now. Old. Tired. Past his time. And more and more people see it. His unflappable confidence is waning. The limelight which seemed to expand him has turned. You can see how bad he wants one more crack in the big game, but his magic is gone. He is the child of another age. One whose time was, and will forever be, 1992. And where he goes, Hillary is bound. Their sword has been broken. Every day more and more people recognize 2008 seems to be Obama's time.

And how does it end? With the game on the line, Roy Hobbs walked to the plate one last time to face off against a rookie relief pitcher. This pitcher was also from an obscure background, and nobody even knew who he was. But he was a kid a world of talent, and the time to see it to fruition. The blessing had passed on to another. Roy dug in at the plate and reached deep down for one last miracle, but it was not there. The ball "lit its own path" and went right past him. In the end of The Natural--the book, not the movie--Roy Hobbs strikes out. The power was gone. It belonged now to someone else: the young pitcher facing him on the mound. And by the time Roy realized it, the game was over.

The New York Times Hillary / Obama round-up

I find it interesting today, after Barack Obama's commanding win in South Carolina, that no less than four of the top ten most e-mailed articles from the New York Times are anti-Hillary.

Two deal specifically with the emergence of former President Bill Clinton as Hillary's new hatchet man.

Questions for the Clintons, by Bob Herbert

Two Presidents Are Worse Than One, by Gary Willis

The latter is provocative, sighting the founder's desire to keep the Presidency to a single person, and why.

But as the debate went forward a consensus formed that republican rule would check the single initiative of a president. In fact, accountability to the legislature demanded that responsibility be lodged where it could be called to account. A plural presidency would leave it uncertain whom to check. How, for instance, would Congress decide which part of the executive should be impeached in case of high crimes and misdemeanors? One member of the plural executive could hide behind the other members.

The next article, The Billary Road to Republican Victory, accurately pins Hillary (and Bill) as incredible assets to the Republican party if they are to get the nomination.

The last article is A President Like My Father, in-which Caroline Kennedy compares Obama's ability to inspire and unite to President Kennedy. Considering the source, I think that speaks for itself.

Chicago Tribune endorses Obama

My first reaction to this was: well of course the Trib endorsed Obama, he's from Illinois. But then I remembered: so is Hillary Clinton (Park Ridge).

The article is fair, citing Obama's link to Tony Rezko, but also believing that gaff is not a deal breaker. The article also serves as a pithy summary of the two leading Democratic candidates, articulating much of what I have been trying to say about both Clinton and Obama.

Obama inspires people. He can draw from the middle and the right, and seeks to do so. He speaks what is not necessarily politically expedient. He works to form consensus. In an age of skepticism, people tend to disbelieve his charisma. It is as if we have battered wife syndrome, returning to the old political game we know too well. This game is embodied by Clinton who is a lightning rod unifying opponents, working from savvy political acumen to defeat those who oppose her rather than rise victorious for a nation. And her new reliance on her husband is simply uninspiring.

The article also admits that on the issues Clinton and Obama are very similar and so it's less about which one you agree with more, and more about which one can get the country behind their bid for the presidency (and, consequentially, which one will be able to get anything done in the White House).

The candidates' differences on issues are minor and largely irrelevant: Presidents don't dictate laws, they tussle over legislation with Congress. Much of the "experience" Hillary Clinton touts in that realm instead was proximity to power. Bill's power.
Source: chicagotribune.com via Alarmed

Well said.

To the contrary, the professional judgment and personal decency with which he has managed himself and his ambition distinguish Barack Obama. We endorse him convinced that he could lead America in directions that the other Democrats could not.
Source: chicagotribune.com via Alarmed

Viva, Obama!

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Saturday, January 26, 2008

Men aren't as smart as they think

Shocking news out of England from researcher Adrian Furnham: men aren't as smart as they think. Surprisingly, this is also news to women, who tend to inflate male intellect, while deflating their own self-perceived intelligence. I say "surprisingly" because anyone who has seen how men are portrayed on TV must know that the gig is up.

Are men smarter than women? No. But they sure think they are. An analysis of some 30 studies by British researcher Adrian Furnham, a professor of psychology at University College London, shows that men and women are fairly equal overall in terms of IQ. But women, it seems, underestimate their own candlepower (and that of women in general), while men overestimate theirs.

Source: newsweek.com via Alarmed

Fascinating, doctor.

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Tags: British | London | Health | Researcher

Friday, January 25, 2008

My plan to stimulate the economy

1. A bottle of red wine
2. Some candles
3. Flowers
4. Chocolates
5. Home cooked meal
5. Personal time with me

Economy, Valentine's Day is coming up. If my plan can't stimulate things, nothing will.

Wolfowitz Returns to U.S. Government as Adviser

I was worried Paul Wolfowitz might be going cold and hungry this winter. It's a tough job market for anyone, but especially someone like Mr. Wolfowitz, a brazen, damaging erudite, whose track-record over the last eight years is so dismal he was forced to resign from his last, almost child proof job at the World Bank. Ahh, but there'll always be room for nepotism at the Bush table.

Paul D. Wolfowitz, who resigned as World Bank chief after serving as second-in-command at the Pentagon, has returned to the Bush administration, albeit in an advisory role.

Preceding Mr. Wolfowitz was former Senator Fred Thompson, who resigned

as chairman in the summer to run for president. But his successor

wasn’t appointed until two days after his campaign crashed and burned on Tuesday.

Source: thelede.blogs.nytimes.com via Alarmed

No, Mr. Thompson, you can not have your old job back.

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Thursday, January 24, 2008

Kucinich drops presidential bid

Congressman Dennis Kucinich is dropping out of the Democratic race for president noting the only meaningful attention he gets is from his incredibly beautiful European-style wife.

Cleveland Congressman Dennis Kucinich is dropping out of the Democratic race for president.
Kucinich will make the announcement Friday at a news conference in Cleveland. In an exclusive interview with Plain Dealer editors and reporters, Kucinich said he will explain his "transition" tomorrow.
"I want to continue to serve in Congress," he said.

Source: blog.cleveland.com via Alarmed

Then he added: and spend more time with the wife.

His wife, the tall, thin, fair skinned Elizabeth Harper, when informed that her husband would not be, and never would be, the most powerful man in the world, was later found hanging around Barack Obama.

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Tax rebates deal announced to anxious citizens

Congressional leaders announced a deal with the White House Thursday for the release of more bread to citizens that would free up valuable coin for the attendence of circuses.

Leaders sighted a widely noted poll which concluded that the People, who once upon a time handed out military command, high civil office, batallions - everything, now restrains itself and anxiously hopes for just two things: bread and circuses.

Congressional leaders announced a deal with the White House Thursday on an economic stimulus package that would give most tax filers refunds of $600 to $1,200, and more if they have children.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Congress would act on the agreement — hammered out in a week of intense negotiations with Republican Leader John A. Boehner and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson — "at the earliest date, so that those rebate checks will be in the mail."

Source: news.yahoo.com via Alarmed

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Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Database assembles U.S. warnings of Saddam threat

I found this article interesting because it shows how hard the White

House worked to get this war going, to say nothing of the methods they

employed, or the end result. I can't help but think if they had been

so enthusiastic about a domestic agenda, if they had put this much work

into economic independence from oil, maybe some of our current financial crisis could have been averted. If they had tackled domestic and economic issues they way they went after Saddam, who knows..

WASHINGTON, Jan 23 (Reuters) - The Bush administration's warnings about prewar Iraq, from Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's "mushroom cloud" to Vice President Dick Cheney's statements on weapons of mass destruction, were released on Wednesday in a searchable online database.

The Center for Public Integrity, a Washington research group highly critical of U.S. policy in Iraq, put together 935 comments uttered by eight top administration officials including President George W. Bush in the run-up to the March 2003 U.S.-led invasion.

Source: reuters.com via Alarmed

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