In the latter days of the Carter presidency, it became fashionable to say that the office had become unmanageable and was simply too big for one man. Some suggested a single, six-year presidential term. The president’s own White House counsel suggested abolishing the separation of powers and going to a more parliamentary system of unitary executive control. America had become ungovernable.

Then came Ronald Reagan, and all that chatter disappeared.

The tyranny of entitlements? Reagan collaborated with Tip O’Neill, the legendary Democratic House speaker, to establish the Alan Greenspan commission that kept Social Security solvent for a quarter-century.

A corrupted system of taxation? Reagan worked with liberal Democrat Bill Bradley to craft a legislative miracle: tax reform that eliminated dozens of loopholes and slashed rates across the board — and fueled two decades of economic growth.

Later, a highly skilled Democratic president, Bill Clinton, successfully tackled another supposedly intractable problem: the culture of intergenerational dependency. He collaborated with another House speaker, Newt Gingrich, to produce the single most successful social reform of our time, the abolition of welfare as an entitlement.

Krauthammer hits the nail on the head:

It turned out that the country’s problems were not problems of structure but of leadership. Reagan and Clinton had it. Carter didn’t. Under a president with extensive executive experience, good political skills and an ideological compass in tune with the public, the country was indeed governable.

One needs experience, depth of knowledge on policy and the workings of government as well as specific understanding of the needs of Americans in order to move this country forward. Tone deaf policies that do little to solve those needs will not lead to a good result.

Krauthammer continues:

It’s 2010, and the first-year agenda of a popular and promising young president has gone down in flames. Barack Obama’s two signature initiatives — cap-and-trade and health-care reform — lie in ruins.

Desperate to explain away this scandalous state of affairs, liberal apologists haul out the old reliable from the Carter years: “America the Ungovernable.” So declared Newsweek. “Is America Ungovernable?” coyly asked the New Republic. Guess the answer. [snip]

Yet, what’s new about any of these supposedly ruinous structural impediments? Special interests blocking policy changes? They have been around since the beginning of the republic — and since the beginning of the republic, strong presidents, like the two Roosevelts, have rallied the citizenry and overcome them.

Krauthammer goes on to dissect the latest liberal complaints about Republican’s use of the filibuster pointing out Democrats did the same in blocking GW Bush’s judicial appointments. Their complaints that Congress’ structure impedes progress is likewise blather to provide cover for an administration that has lost control of its message.

…Indeed, the Senate with its ponderous procedures and decentralized structure is serving precisely the function the Founders intended: as a brake on the passions of the House and a caution about precipitous transformative change.

Krauthammer took time to praise another Democrat along the way:

Leave it to Mickey Kaus, a principled liberal who supports health-care reform, to debunk these structural excuses: “Lots of intellectual effort now seems to be going into explaining Obama’s (possible/likely/impending) health care failure as the inevitable product of larger historic and constitutional forces. . . . But in this case there’s a simpler explanation: Barack Obama’s job was to sell a health care reform plan to American voters. He failed.”

He failed because the utter implausibility of its central promise — expanded coverage at lower cost — led voters to conclude that it would lead ultimately to more government, more taxes and more debt. More broadly, the Democrats failed because, thinking the economic emergency would give them the political mandate and legislative window, they tried to impose a left-wing agenda on a center-right country. The people said no, expressing themselves first in spontaneous demonstrations, then in public opinion polls, then in elections — Virginia, New Jersey and, most emphatically, Massachusetts.

That’s not a structural defect. That’s a textbook demonstration of popular will expressing itself — despite the special interests — through the existing structures. In other words, the system worked.

I also read an interesting piece by Joe Scarborough yesterday, discussing his own conservative principles. He stated that while he may not agree with President Obama’s agenda, he prays for him daily to find a successful way to lead for the sake of our country. He said “if his grandmother could pray for Carter, he could pray for Obama.”

My prayer is that the President starts paying more attention to the message Americans are sending him and less attention to those like Nancy Pelosi who are arrogant in continuing to tell the rest of us to get lost. Perhaps he would then find the country is governable.

Our reluctant allies on the Right believe McCain was struck by the perfect storm. McCain’s loss was less about campaign strategy failures than an incredibly unpopular president of the same party and an economic October surprise which underscored his Party’s difficulties. It really was about Change. From the National Review:

1) 2008′S OUTCOME AND THE BANKING CRISIS AND STOCK MARKET CRASHES –
The media talk was wrong, the media talk that had gone on all year and reached its height in the summer and early September about an irresistable Democratic trend and unstoppable Obama. After a successful Republican convention and a week of campaigning by McCain-Palin capped by Obama`s “lipstick on a pig” gaffe, McCain had a nice national lead and one so strong in Ohio there were rumors Obama was pulling out. For purposes of perspective on last night’s results, it’s good to remember some of McCain’s numbers in various polls that second week in September:

Florida: +8

North Carolina: + 18

Georgia: + 18

Oklahoma: + 31

Idaho: + 39

New Jersey: – 3

New York: – 6

Michigan – dead heat

Wisc —dead heat

Minnesota — tied.

And the Gallup poll released September 11 showed a GOP five point lead in the generic question which could have translated into twenty to thirty seat pickup.

2) HARD TO CALL – This Fall’s political environment was unprecedented — an economic crisis not seen since the Great Depression. So there was no prior experience to fall back on. Campaign Spot readers and loyal Jedi warriors wanted Obi to make his unapologetic predictions of the past. That prediction was impossible. What could be said was that McCain was still very much in it despite the burdens he faced, including everyone’s 401(k) turning to cinders.

3) MCCAIN CAME BACK – Striding into one of the worst political headwinds ever McCain actually staged a comeback. A week after his last debate performance, his “Joe the Plumber” initiative and excellent performance at the Al Smith dinner in New York, four good polls showed him one or two points away from a lead. Even Rasmussen, who still gave Obama a four point advantage, noted McCain was shaving
the Democrat’s national lead and had moved back into a slight lead in Florida and Ohio. Then came more days of market crash. Yet, even after that, the survey data showed undecided voters were inclined towards McCain but also wanted to vote their frustration and anger over the economy and were inclined, rightly or wrongly, to take it out on Bush and the GOP.

4) THE DEMOCRATIC PROCESS IS A BLUNT BUT ULTIMATELY BENEFICENT INSTRUMENT — One place your Obi worked for Barry in 1964 was the New Hampshire primary and he vividly remembers that loss and then the carnage in November. (Even Sooners Coach Bud Wilkinson, one of the state’s religious figures, lost a Senate bid in Oklahoma.) But two years later came a GOP blowout marked by Ronald Reagan’s first election to political office. And back in `76 some of us thought
nothing was more important than electing Jerry Ford. But defeat that year ultimately led to a new Republican party and the Reagan era.

So when you ask: How could the American people do this? Don’t they know what they are getting? Well, unfortunately the blunt instrument approach — shock therapy — is like that. Lots of collateral damage in the hope the GOP will get itself together and give America a better time, a newer era.

6) FIGHT HARD; FIGHT FROM THE START TO STOP THE COLLATERAL DAMAGE – So the problem with the blunt instrument is the unintended consequences. The 1964 results meant the social tragedy, especially for the poor, of the Great Society programs. The 1974 Democratic Congressional blowout cost 13 million South Vietnamese their freedom. The 1976 defeat meant Carter era malaise at home and one of the most perilous periods for U.S, national security.

The liberals in Congress will soon push to discourage entrepreneurship and economic growth, nationalize the medical system, weaken the military, use state power to coerce Americans into removing mentions of God from the public square, accepting abortion on demand and the altering the definition of marriage. And an early test for President Obama will be his reaction to pressure in two areas from his own party that may brand his administration early as decidedly leftist. He will be pushed to take various measures to stifle dissent through enacting the Fairness Doctrine and ending the secret ballot in union elections. And he will be pushed to make a decision that cost the newly elected President Clinton his honeymoon period — changing the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy about gays in the military. On all of this, the congressional liberals and their media allies will be unrelenting. And yet all this represents opportunity for the GOP. The last Congress was the most unpopular in history because of its radical liberalism. Yet the GOP failed entirely to enumerate for voters that Congress’s transgressions. That opportunity is coming again.

Also, the liberals know that neither in 2006 nor 2008 did the American people vote for the left-wing agenda. They are hoping conservatives will again go along after some polite demurrals. So, if loud and noisy but enlightened opposition is offered at every turn, much of the collateral damage can be avoided. And the American people will see the real agenda of the liberal elites.

7) REJOICE — Electing an African American president closes a painful but proud chapter in American history. What a country.

8 ) TOUJOURS L’AUDACE —We gather our armies. We go forward.

Finally, Dick Morris chimes in that McCain did better than the media predicted:

For political historians, it’s worth noting that Obama hasn’t scored the knockout that many predicted. As I write, it seems clear that John McCain will lose by a few points in the popular vote, not by the double digits so confidently predicted in the media polls. The fact is that most of the undecided voters went to the Republicans.

What do you think? Is there anything McCain could have done differently? Or were the conditions too unfavorable for any Republican?

Murray refers to a report coming out of the NYTimes:

If small donors are going to be the fuel that powers campaigns from here on out, then the disclosure laws are probably going to have to change because there is a GIANT loophole. “An analysis of campaign finance records by The New York Times this week found nearly 3,000 donations to Mr. Obama, the Democratic nominee, from more than a dozen people with apparently fictitious donor information. The contributions represent a tiny fraction of the record $450 million Mr. Obama has raised. But the questionable donations — some donors were listed simply with gibberish for their names — raise concerns about whether the Obama campaign is adequately vetting its unprecedented flood of donors.”

Ya think? If someone is entering gibberish for names, as LisaB pointed out in her excellent stories covering the donations of someone named “Derty Pouiiy”, are you really telling me that wouldn’t or shouldn’t raise any red flags for the Obama campaign?

“It is unclear why someone making a political donation would want to enter a false name. Some perhaps did it for privacy reasons. Another, more ominous possibility, of course, is fraud, perhaps in order to donate beyond the maximum limits. There is no evidence that questionable contributions amount to anything more than a small portion of Mr. Obama’s fund-raising haul. The Times’s analysis, conducted over a few days and looking for obvious anomalies, like names or addresses with all consonants, identified about $40,000 in suspect contributions that had not been refunded by the campaign as of its last filing with the Federal Election Commission, in September.”

I’m also not sure just how we can believe the NYTimes “tiny fraction” comment, particularly since last week, the NYTimes erroneously reported that Obama’s ties to unrepentant terrorist William Ayers amounted to ‘nothing to see here folks, let’s move on.’ We see what nonsense that was. The man launched his political career in Ayers’ living room, served on two boards with him and Obama has had continued significant contact with him over many years. I’d say that’s a little more noteworthy than Obama’s statement that Ayers “is just a guy who lives in my neighborhood.”

Perhaps a little further investigation on the part of the MSM will bear more fruit in reference to Obama’s receiving both fraudulent and foreign donations as well.

Next on Murray’s watchlist, per the Wall Street Journal,

“The Obama campaign said it was a mistake for an outreach coordinator to join a meeting last month attended by leaders of two controversial Muslim groups as it seeks votes from large Muslim populations in swing states. Minha Husaini, newly named as head of the campaign’s outreach coordinator to Muslims, attended a discussion session Sept. 15 with about 30 Muslim leaders and community members in suburban Washington, the Obama campaign confirmed. Participants included leaders of the Council of American-Islamic Relations and the Muslim American Society, which have been cited by the government in the past for ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas.”

Since Hamas has already endorsed Obama – not really the kind of endorsement a future President would want, I would have thought – wouldn’t it have been wise for them to do a little checking before looking for votes with organizations that have questionable ties? And that, by the way, is not to offend or exclude members of the Muslim community who have no such ties.

“The Obama campaign’s Muslim outreach director participated in a meeting in mid September that was attended by several controversial Muslim activists,” NBC News’ Jim Popkin adds on the NBC Deep Background blog. “The Obama campaign now concedes that was a misjudgment, and that its top Muslim staffer would not have attended the meeting if she had known the full participant list beforehand. ‘Would a campaign staffer have attended if they were aware of the complete list of attendees? No,’ said Obama spokesman Ben LaBolt in an email statement to NBC.”

Another Obama “misjudgment.” They are piling up like crazy. Who’s minding the mint over there?

Murray further tells us that talk radio is all over this today:

A Washington Times report essentially accuses Obama of doing something the Dems accused Reagan of doing in 1980. “At the same time the Bush administration was negotiating a still elusive agreement to keep the U.S. military in Iraq, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama tried to convince Iraqi leaders in private conversations that the president shouldn’t be allowed to enact the deal without congressional approval. Mr. Obama’s conversations with the Iraqi leaders, confirmed to The Washington Times by his campaign aides, began just two weeks after he clinched the Democratic presidential nomination in June and stirred controversy over the appropriateness of a White House candidate’s contacts with foreign governments while the sitting president is conducting a war.”

“Some of the specifics of the conversations remain the subject of dispute. Iraqi leaders purported to The Times that Mr. Obama urged Baghdad to delay an agreement with Mr. Bush until next year when a new president will be in office – a charge the Democratic campaign denies.”

Well, of course the Obama campaign denies it. We have been asking this question for several weeks – did Senator Obama violate the Logan Act?

Please take a look at NancyA story, Obama’s Iraq Double-Take Gate Response and decide for yourself.

Interesting that the most significant story, in re Obama’s possible misconduct during his visit to Iraq, was buried at the bottom of Mr. Murray’s report. Were they hoping we wouldn’t notice?

I find it amazing that internet reporting is ‘suspect,’ meanwhile NoQ has been shouting about the above stories and more for months. ACORN fraud in particular is growing huge legs on TV and talk radio. See NancyA’s excellent reporting on this subject.

I have to wonder if MSNBC dipping a toe in the water in at least mentioning the above indicates the backlash they feel from viewers – their ratings have been tanking as a result of their egregiously biased coverage in favor of Senator Obama.

Money seems to be the bottom line with the corporate controlled media in terms of what they will report and who they favor. If their bottom line starts to hurt at the hands of more angry viewers turning them off, it will be interesting to see if more stories like this start cropping up in unlikely places.

But don’t hold your breath.

Not unlike a naughty child who just threw a water balloon at teacher and doesn’t want to get caught.

First we have the Obama Presidential Seal – i.e., Obama as Übermentsch. This blue hellaciousness was a grotesque lift of the real Presidential seal even though he is only the presumptuous nominee. Remember, he hasn’t yet ‘arrived’ at the Convention. How arrogant and how sad. To think he needs to stand behind a symbol like this to make himself “look” more presidential. You know, sort of like subliminal advertising in commercials and/or the ‘Vulcan mind-meld.’

Gee, Senator, how about doing your job once in a while? You know, like holding even one subcommittee meeting on Afghanistan these past 18 months, you know, since, umm, you are, like, the Chairman of the Subcommittee on European Affairs. That might be kinda presidential. And our troops and our citizens might really appreciate it.

When his ‘logo’ was met with outrage and ridicule, suddenly it was ‘oh gee, this was only a one time deal, for a special event, we never really intended to use it.’ Right.

Then we have Obama deciding to give another one of his glorious speeches at the Brandenburg Gate in Germany. While I don’t usually find myself in agreement with Charles Krauthammer, his new opinion piece, The Audacity of Vanity, is spot on:

What Obama does not seem to understand is that the Brandenburg Gate is something you earn. President Ronald Reagan earned the right to speak there because his relentless pressure had brought the Soviet empire to its knees and he was demanding its final “tear down this wall” liquidation. When President John F. Kennedy visited the Brandenburg Gate on the day of his “Ich bin ein Berliner” speech, he was representing a country that was prepared to go to the brink of nuclear war to defend West Berlin.

When Chancellor Merkel kinda sorta told Obama that was not a good idea, the basic response was: ‘No worries, we were never really planning to do it anyway. We’ll just find some other powerful monument to stand in front of for our campaign backdrop.’

Senator Obama’s self-congratulatory European/Iraq tour is merely another marketing ploy designed to make him “look” more presidential – without ever actually having done anything that is Presidential. So just flying around a bunch of foreign countries is supposed to give him foreign policy street cred? Not unlike sitting in Rev. Wright’s church for 20 years was supposed to give him Chicago street cred? Got it.

Instead of doing his American Idol victory lap, dragging the three biggest news anchors in tow to worship at his feet, why doesn’t he consent to do a town hall meeting or two and face Senator McCain? You know – talk to the American people. Umm, yeah, like, the ones who he is supposed to be helping out of the morass we are in as a nation right now.

And now, the pièce de resistance. His treatment of Senator Max Cleland. I would say it is the latest of his blunders, but, sadly, there is a new one every day.

From Politico:

Former Georgia Sen. Max Cleland was an icon of Sen. John Kerry’s 2004 campaign, a badly wounded war hero who lost his seat, Kerry deplored, after a television advertising campaign questioned his commitment to national security.

But to the Obama campaign, Cleland has another qualification: Registered lobbyist.

So Cleland — despite his iconic status — was abruptly disinvited from appearing with Obama in Atlanta July 8, three sources familiar with the incident said.

“This was a hard decision regarding Senator Cleland,” said Obama’s deputy campaign manager, Steve Hildebrand, in an email. He cited Obama’s policy of banning lobbyists from participating in fundraising or giving money.

“If we make exceptions, we will open ourselves to criticism,” he said.

Cleland has told associates he was asked to appear at an Obama fundraising event in Atlanta on July 8, only to be told at the last minute that he wouldn’t be welcome.

The policy has been a key symbol of Obama’s outsider status, but many Democrats have also quietly questioned whether it goes too far when prominent party figures like Cleland, who an associate said has never actually lobbied in Washington, are left out in the cold on a technicality.

Cleland is registered to lobby for a company whose products are aimed at helping soldiers recover more quickly from battlefield injuries, Tissue Regeneration Technologies.

So let me get this straight. A man who is in a wheel chair, an icon of the Democratic party, who works to help wounded soldiers’ recovery when he himself lost three limbs in the war is told he is not welcome because – I must repeat this – if the Obama camp makes exceptions they will “open themselves to criticism”?

Hold fast my heart, Obama – you wouldn’t want to be criticized!! Horrors. Better to defecate on a man who almost died for his country, who served honorably in the Senate only to be swift boated in 2002. Now you – the standard bearer of the Democratic Party – tell him to get lost? Nice going, Senator.

Truly, this is among the worst of his idiotic, insensitive and cowardly behaviors. Once again, Senator Obama has proven there is no one person, no policy, no ideal, nor code of conduct he won’t throw under the bus for his own political gain or to cover his own shape-shifting persona.

For someone who is running on his great judgment, he seems to exercise none.

Senator Obama’s endless gaffes and misstatements, his blunders and the well of seemingly never ending arrogance are given grateful audience by his supporters and unfathomable political cover from mainstream news outlets and the Party powerful.

A good friend said to me today, a cruise ship is slow to turn. I’m still waiting for all those aboard this particular Titanic to change course.

There is discussion that by moving the Democratic National headquarters to Chicago, he is not only increasing revenue for these characters, he is setting up Chicago as a site for the Olympics. Knowing Obama’s associations in the Windy City suggests that this move is not altruistic.

Now we are hearing that Obama will once again break with tradition during the Democratic National Convention to give his acceptance speech at a huge rally in the stadium of the Denver Broncos, known as Invesco Field. (See NewHampster’s post for some financial information on Invesco.)

The New York Times describes it this way:

The Democratic National Convention Committee and the Obama campaign announced on Monday that they would break with tradition and move the final day of convention activities, including the acceptance speech, from the Pepsi Center in Denver to Invesco Field… which can hold more than 75,000. A sea of 75,000 people swarmed around Senator Barack Obama at a rally in Portland, Ore. in May ..and Mr. Obama is planning a repeat performance at the Democratic National Convention in August..

Wanting an auspicious event, Obama will deliver his speech on August 28th, the 45th anniversary of Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech. And if that is not propitious enough, Obama’s campaign is broadcasting that the last person to give such a speech to such a large crowd was in 1960, when John F. Kennedy addressed a similarly sized audience at Memorial Stadium in Los Angeles. Not everyone is convinced that bigger is better. Matt Burns of the RNC stated:

Not surprisingly, Senator Obama and his fellow Democrats are more focused on stagecraft and theatrics than providing real solutions to the challenges facing our nation.

Nor does everyone see the double omens of King and Kennedy as a positive reflection of Obama. Conservative commentator, Michael Barone said:

No one has done it since Kennedy because no one thought he could fill a stadium since Kennedy. Evidently Obama feels he can and feels he can stop it raining too.

Of course Howard Dean is excited about the decision. Dean said of moving the speech:

This is very much in keeping with Senator Obama’s philosophy and, I might add, my philosophy as well. I think it’s very fitting, especially the way Sen. Obama got here with his enourmous grassroots operation.

One thing we can be sure is part of Dean’s “philosophy” is that the Obama campaign has turned the change of venue into a fund raising event, something absolutely necessary for the impoverished Democratic Party. As the Washington Post put it:

And how did the campaign break the news to supporters? How else? Through an Internet fund-raising appeal.”I wanted you to be the first to hear the news,” campaign manager David Plouffe wrote in an e-mail to Obama’s millions of contributors. “…Barack has made it clear that this is your convention, not his.”

Prior to the August convention, during his trip to Europe this month Obama’s campaign wants him to give a speech at the Brandenburg Gates in Berlin. By doing so, Obama will accomplish an ancestral hat trick and evoke Ronald Reagan who addressed West Berliners there in 1987.

I understand that for Barack Obama, attempting to emulate powerful and famous people is essential. Obama himself has no record of achievement. He is now known as Backtrack Obama for all his flip flopping, and no doubt he feels he must persuade people by imitating his successful forebears.

But it’s creepy that he’s using the propaganda strategy of rallying huge crowds to hear him, while calling it an event for the people. It’s creepy because this tactic of using an energized mob has been utilized by tyrants throughout history. One doesn’t have to go back to ancient Greece, where the word tyrant comes from, to understand my use of the term as it is defined in Wikipedia:

In ancient Greece, tyrants were influential opportunists that came to power by securing the support of different factions. The word “tyrant” then carried no ethical censure; it simply referred to anyone who illegally seized executive power to engage in autocratic, though perhaps benevolent, government, or leadership. Support for the tyrants came from the growing class of business people and from the peasants who had no land or were in debt to the wealthy land owners.

As Heidi Li Feldman of The Denver Group said in her interview with Bud White for NQ, “you can’t legitimize something that is not legitimate.”In fact, at his request, Leni Riefenstahl made an amazing documentary about the rise of Adolph Hitler. The film, Triumph of the Will, is a beautiful and moving account of the early days of the Third Reich, of a time when Hitler brought hope and promise to a suffering nation. It is a haunting reminder that the faith and enthusiasm of German people gave rise to arguably the most horrendous deeds in the modern world . But the film itself portrays ordinary people coming together because they heard the charismatic and powerful rhetoric of a leader who promised to improve the lives of all German people. Here is the description from Wikipedia:

The primary aspect of the Nuremberg Rallies was to strengthen the personality cult of Adolf Hitler, portraying Hitler as Germany’s saviour, chosen by providence. The gathered masses listened to the Führer’s speeches, swore loyalty…the rallies served to demonstrate the might of the German people. The visitors of the rallies by their own free will were subordinate to the discipline and order in which they should be reborn as a new people.

I’m not suggesting that Barack Obama is Adolph Hitler. I am suggesting a cautionary tale of tyranny from recent history that has many eerie similarities.

When you write, “Who are these women, and why are they such buzzkills?”

When you fail to acknowledge the primary reason that PUMAs oppose Barack Obama — which is his utter lack of qualifications and experience?

Especially since you did not interview a single member of the JustSayNoDeal.com or PUMA08 coalition? Particularly since, without referring to the group by name, or speaking with (let alone interviewing) any of its leaders, you refer to our top-of-the-tier organizing force, JustSayNoDeal.com, and only in passing, as “this one“?

We’ve posted two reactions to Rebecca Traister’s June 23rd Salon story, “Why Clinton voters say they won’t support Obama,” with the subtitle, “The attack of the PUMAs, or a dozen reasons why Clinton voters are still too angry to come home“:

• “Rebecca Traister’s Safe Expectations — No Deal,” by Charles Lemos
• “A Response to Salon’s Story on PUMA: The Most Important Reason Clinton Voters Will Not Support Senator Obama,” by Ani

Here’s Ms. Traister’s YouTube response to the torrent of comments and e-mails:

Our MALE contributor, Charles Lemos, replied to Ms. Traister’s question, “Who are these women, and why are they such buzzkills?.”

A buzzkill? A buzzkill would be a disasterous Presidency from a dangerously inexperienced 46-year-old Senator who misspeaks on issues ranging from the status of Jerusalem to meeting global dictators and sponsors of global terrorism without preconditions and has no core convictions and for whom everything is a matter of political expediency. That’s a buzzkill. And PUMA, at least for me, stands for People United Means Action.

Ani emphasized the primary reason that millions of us oppose Obama’s candidacy:

Here is the main thing your article fails to take into account, and the main thing every single media outlet in this country likewise ignores: The number one reason we will not support Senator Obama for President is that he is not qualified for the job.

Surprised? Let’s examine this more closely.

This man has missed over 40% of his votes in the Senate. If one examines the votes he has missed, they actually are politically risky and require moral courage. So far, he has exhibited little.

He voted “present” 130 times in the Illinois State Legislature and voted “wrong” six times, i.e., he said “oops, I accidentally pressed the wrong button” — so either he is incapable of multitasking, or he is dishonest, just making choices for political expediency.

Aah. Thou hast hit it. What are the clues to his actions as nothing more than political expedience and opportunism:

A man who sits in a divisive and racist church for 20 years and lies about his knowledge of the contents of these sermons, then throws the church under the bus when it becomes politically critical for him to do so.

A man who is closely associated with the likes of the convicted criminal Tony Rezko, buys a house with his help, receives $250K in campaign contributions and allows Rezko’s slum holes to flourish in his State Senate district while likewise claiming ignorance — yet lies before the American people and says he barely knows the man and only did five hours of work for him years ago.

I will not even delve into his long working relationship with the man from the Weather Underground, ex-terrorist Bill Ayers, which he has likewise downplayed and/or denied.

This is a man with a questionable record on women’s rights, voting ‘present’ numerous times, who has also said “many pro-choice Democrats don’t understand that abortion is a wrenching moral issue.” Really? How insulting.

This is a Democrat who campaigns in South Carolina with Donnie McClurkin, an “ex-gay” man “reformed through prayer.” I wonder to whom Senator Obama was pandering in that state?

This is a man who runs slightly to the left of Hillary Clinton only to flip flop on every position he originally took including: public financing, FISA, his positions of Iraq withdrawal, the Iran threat, Israel, NAFTA and more.

Senator Obama is a man who insults the Bill Clinton presidency, a time of peace and prosperity, while extolling virtues of the disastrous Reaganomics. He calls himself a Democrat?

Most devastating, Senator Obama is a man who, together with his campaign manager and surrogates advantage themselves at every opportunity by playing the race card unjustly.

Senator Obama is the product of splendid marketing. Nothing more …

Read all of Ani’s story, “A Response to Salon’s Story on PUMA: The Most Important Reason Clinton Voters Will Not Support Senator Obama.”

A FINAL NOTE: Your story uses the pronoun “they” over and over and over. Did you SPEAK WITH any of the “they” PUMAs? Did you call a single one? Did you exchange any e-mails with any of the major activists in the JustSayNoDeal.com and PUMA collaborative movements? In Number 11 of your story, you link to 5 sites, at least one of which is not part of the PUMA / JustSayNoDeal.com movement.

Journalism 101 requires direct contact with, and interviews of, the principals involved in these movements — none of which you did for your story.

That is why the Obama campaign is trying so hard to tie McCain to Bush — it’s the maverick thing. If Clinton voters see that McCain can be “worked with” they might jump to him rather than hang with a nominee who has so offended them for the past several months.

Obama advisors are confident the Clinton supporters’ flirtation with candidate McCain will wane and they will vote Democratic in the fall.

Polls do not necessarily bear this out, however.

Over the past three months, Washington Post-ABC News polls showed an average of 25 percent of those backing Clinton in the primaries “defecting” to McCain in a hypothetical match-up with Obama. A new poll from the Pew Research Center conducted just before the final Democratic primaries put the number at 28 percent.

Other data in the new Pew poll may add to the concern among some Democrats. In that survey, the percentage of Clinton supporters holding a positive view of Obama continues to slide: Forty-five percent of them view Obama favorably, down from 58 percent in December, before the voting started.

Apparently to further know Obama isn’t necessarily to like him.

In addition, those Clinton supporters voting for Obama in the fall may actually be soft support. While they will vote for Obama, it is not a positive vote for Obama, just one against McCain. If these aren’t “Obama people,” they might be won by some judicious mix of argument and policy. We shall see.

Nearly 6 in 10 of those backing Clinton over Obama in the primary said they would support Obama in the fall, with about half of those voters saying they are motivated to do so primarily to vote “against McCain” rather than “for Obama.”

Lastly, this WP piece noted that in the 1980 election when Ted Kennedy contested all the way to the convention, a higher percentage of Kennedy’s supporters (47) said they would NOT vote for Carter. Although only about half that number followed through, it was enough to help sink Carter and elect Ronald Reagan to his first term.

• Carter v. Reagan: Carter = big loser in a sweater. Reagan = shiny happy winner
• Reagan v. Mondale: Reagan = winner. Mondale = sleepy demeanored loser
• Bush I v. Dukakis: No further elaboration needed
• Bush I v. Clinton and Perot: Bush I = the guy who tanked the economy and lied about taxes. Clinton = slippery dissembling hounddog. Perot = populist lunatic. No candidate gets the majority.
• Clinton v. Dole: Clinton: “Slick Willy” is a “scandal” plagued loser. Dole = experienced insider with a great sense of humor, even though he’s a cranky old bastard who sobbed at Nixon’s funeral.
• Bush II v. Gore: Bush: down to earth winner you’d love to hoist a beer with. Gore = stiff, nerdy, earthtone wearing loser.
• Bush II v. Kerry: Bush: a winner who can protect us from the terrists. Kerry: a Frenchified loser who lied about Vietnam.

Notice the pattern. Political journalism is by definition a zero sum game.

So since Obama (the Son) and McCain (Mr. Straight Talk) are both beloved by the press corps and have managed to make it this far with negligible vetting, what will happen now? I can imagine reporters getting whiplash as they try to decide which side they’re on. But make no mistake: One will be chosen as the Annointed One while the other will be punished and humiliated. Who will they choose?

Your thoughts welcome.

You especially can’t rewrite what you originally said to make yourself again palatable to Democratic voters who are furious with 1) your expressed admiration for Ronald Reagan and 2) with your specious claim that the GOP has been the “party of ideas” for the last 10 to 15 years.

What he said tonight: Barack Obama lied in the CNN debate tonight. He told Hillary Clinton, in a heated exchange (I backed up my DVR and typed each word):

You just said I complimented the Republican ideas. That is not true. That isn’t what I said, and I will provide you with a quote, what I said was is that [sic] Ronald Reagan was a transformative political figure because he was able to get Democrats to vote against their economic interests to form a majority to push through their agenda, an agenda that I objected to because while I was working on those streets, watchin’ those folks …

What he really said: Here is exactly what Barack Obama told the conservative editorial board of the Reno Gazette, via Matt Stoller at Open Left — who provides both the video and a transcript:

I don’t want to present myself as some sort of singular figure. I think part of what’s different are the times. I do think that for example the 1980 was different. I think Ronald Reagan changed the trajectory of America in a way that Richard Nixon did not and in a way that Bill Clinton did not. He put us on a fundamentally different path because the country was ready for it. I think they felt like with all the excesses of the 1960s and 1970s and government had grown and grown but there wasn’t much sense of accountability in terms of how it was operating. I think people, he just tapped into what people were already feeling, which was we want clarity we want optimism, we want a return to that sense of dynamism and entrepreneurship that had been missing.

DO YOU SEE ANYWHERE IN THAT ORIGINAL TRANSCRIPT that, as Barack claims tonight, he said that Reagan “was able to get Democrats to vote against their economic interests”? No. Because he never said that until TONIGHT.

Here’s Paul Krugman’s take, and the kicker line is bold-faced. From “Debunking the Reagan Myth,” Paul Krugman, New York Times, January 21, 2008:

… [T]he furor over Barack Obama’s praise for Ronald Reagan is not, as some think, overblown. The fact is that how we talk about the Reagan era still matters immensely for American politics.

Bill Clinton knew that in 1991, when he began his presidential campaign. “The Reagan-Bush years,” he declared, “have exalted private gain over public obligation, special interests over the common good, wealth and fame over work and family. The 1980s ushered in a Gilded Age of greed and selfishness, of irresponsibility and excess, and of neglect.”

Contrast that with Mr. Obama’s recent statement, in an interview with a Nevada newspaper, that Reagan offered a “sense of dynamism and entrepreneurship that had been missing.”

[HERE's THE PUNCH LINE.] Maybe Mr. Obama was, as his supporters insist, simply praising Reagan’s political skills. (I think he was trying to curry favor with a conservative editorial board, which did in fact endorse him.) But where in his remarks was the clear declaration that Reaganomics failed?

Exactly.

Here is the video from last Monday, via Open Left:

Again, I give you what Barack attempted to say was his real statement, countering Hillary Clinton who, of course, doesn’t have the benefit of YouTube at her podium (how I wish she did):

You just said I complimented the Republican ideas. That is not true. isn’t what I said, and I will provide you with a quote, what I said was is that [sic] Ronald Reagan was a transformative political figure because he was able to get Democrats to vote against their economic interests to form a majority to push through their agenda, an agenda that I objected to because while I was working on those streets, watchin’ those folks …

Today’s San Francisco Chronicle has a must-read story, “Edwards still has a role in nominating process,” which begins with a contrast between the latte-elite crowd that Barack Obama attracts with the budgeting middle- and lower-class Americans that John Edwards attracts:

On a sunny weekend day in front of San Francisco’s Ferry Building, volunteers at the Barack Obama for president table were selling an inch-thick booklet explaining Obama’s policy positions for $5. A few feet away, volunteers supporting John Edwards were handing out campaign flyers – that they made and paid for themselves.

One flyer read: “It’s not over until everyone votes. Don’t let the pundits take away your voice for 2008.”

There’s so much to ponder in today’s article, but I’ll just add this additional quote:

Even after Edwards finished second in the Iowa caucus this month, he received only a fraction of the media coverage that Obama and Clinton did in the following days, and slightly more than former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, a Republican who barely competed there, according to the Project for Excellence in Journalism’s campaign coverage index.

“There’s no oxygen left in the room after Obama and Clinton,” said Carrick, who ran Richard Gephardt’s 1988 presidential campaign. “It’s hard to get any when there’s a three-candidate field. Look at the Michigan primary. Rudy Giuliani is one of the best-known men in American, and he didn’t get more than 3 percent of the vote there.”
“Talking about the substantive issues of the campaign, which John is doing, is getting drowned out by the rush to judgment or the rush to celebrity,” said Jeff Soukup, a co-chair of California for Edwards.

But as Carrick and others say, those “who love Edwards really love him.” …

John Edwards has been good for this presidential campaign. He raises issues we need to debate and act upon as a nation. I only wish the media were more interested in discussing these vital issues than his haircut or psychoanalyzing Bill and Hillary.

Yes, I’m a supporter of Sen. Hillary Clinton. But Edwards is my strong second choice, and I plan to keep that foremost in my mind when I attend our state’s caucus in February.

UPDATE: Something else occurred to me after I posted this, as I was washing the morning dishes, and I had to come back to the computer : At my caucus in 2004, we had a few Edwards supporters as well as Howard Dean and John Kerry supporters. If there are Edwards supporters at my caucus in February, and if by some chance they need another vote to become viable — and Clinton has sufficient viability — I will definitely join the Edwards supporters. It’d be my pleasure to display that I support Edwards too!

Mr. Obama, get over your iconic view of Ronald Reagan’s message: Reagan was a racially divisive and socially regressive president. From the New York Times editorial page on March 21, 1988:

Ronald Reagan appears determined to go down in history as a President who sought actively to set back the cause of civil rights. How else can one read his veto of the four-year, bipartisan effort to restore the reach of antidiscrimination laws narrowed by a Supreme Court ruling? Congress appears to have the votes to override the veto. Decency argues for doing so, without delay. [...]

The Administration has consistently pursued a disruptive policy on civil rights, from its attempt to give tax exemptions to racially discriminatory Bob Jones University to its efforts to weaken the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. …

Yes, President Ronald Reagan fought the IRS denial of tax exemption to the racist Bob Jones University. President Reagan also:

• introduced an amendment to the Voting Rights Act would require evidence of intent to discriminate and thus weaken the act;
• expressed concern over the cost of honoring Martin Luther King with a national holiday (but signed the law because Congress seemed “bent” on it);
• launched his 1980 election campaign with endorsements of “states rights” in Philadelphia, Mississippi, a city famous for the murder of three civil rights workers; and
• joined Barry Goldwater in opposing the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

And what about President Bill Clinton, whose two terms in 1990s you disparage and discount?

What did William Jefferson Clinton do for blacks and Latinos?

Really, Mr. Obama? The Republicans have been the party of ideas for the past ten to fifteen years? Including the last seven years of Bill Clinton’s administration? Really, Mr. Obama?

Since the economy is the hot topic these days, let’s just look at what President Clinton did for minorities in terms of economic gains — even though Obama dismisses those achievements. From a U.S. government Web site in April 1999:

Unemployment Rate for African Americans and Hispanics Remains Historically Low. Under President Clinton and Vice President Gore, the Hispanic unemployment rate has dropped from 11.3 percent in January 1993 to a record low of 5.8 percent in March 1999. The unemployment rate for African Americans has fallen from 14.1 percent in January 1993 to 8.1 percent in March 1999–one of the lowest levels on record for African Americans.

Here are additional economic accomplishments of the Clinton/Gore administration — as of 1999 (during the administration’s second term) — that also had a direct positive effect for minorities:

• 18.2 Million New Jobs. …
• Unemployment at 4.2 Percent in March …
• Highest Share of New Jobs in Private Sector in 50 Years. Since the President and Vice President took office, the private sector has added 16.7 million new jobs–with 2.4 million jobs added in the past year. Since 1993, 92 percent of the 18.2 million new jobs have been in the private sector–the highest percentage in 50 years.
• Fastest and Longest Real Wage Growth in Two Decades. Last month, average hourly earnings increased 0.2 percent. Under the Clinton-Gore Administration, real wages have risen 6.1 percent–compared to declining 4.3 percent during the Reagan and Bush Administrations. After adjusting for inflation, wages have increased almost 2.7 percent in 1998–the fastest real wage growth in more than two decades and the third year in a row–the longest sustained growth since the early 1970s.
• Construction Jobs Are Coming Back. …
• Manufacturing Jobs Have Increased. After losing 2.1 million manufacturing jobs between 1981 and 1992, the economy has created 350,000 new manufacturing jobs since 1993. After losing 46,000 jobs in the auto industry during the Bush Administration, the United States has 147,000 new auto industry jobs under the Clinton-Gore Administration.
• Inflation Rate Is the Lowest Since the 1950s. …

President Clinton signed the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1993, “which passed Congress without a single Republican vote.”

It raised taxes on the wealthiest 1.2% of taxpayers,[35] while cutting taxes for 15 million low-income families and making tax cuts available to 90% of small businesses.[36] Additionally, it mandated that the budget be balanced over a number of years, through the implementation of spending restraints.

Listen, Mr. Obama. If you think that President Clinton and Vice President Gore accomplished those amazing turnarounds for the economy and for minorities by singing “Kumbayah” with Republicans, you’ve just shown how naive you are.

And you’ve exposed how uninformed you are about the brutal history of U.S. politics where every progressive step is spattered with the blood, sweat and tears of all who fought so hard for those gains.

Two more videos, including the above, have emerged from Sen. Barack Obama’s interview with the rightwing editorial board of the Reno Gazette-Journal which later endorsed him (small wonder). [EDITOR'S NOTE/Correction: It is the Las Vegas Gazette-Journal that is conservative, according to MyDD. But it's a small point in that Obama's words stand, as do John Edwards' words below.]

It’s not just more evidence that Obama was willing to say whatever it took to get the conservative editorial board to endorse him. It’s worse. It’s much worse.

It is further evidence that not only does Obama have no sense of the history of the last half of the 20th century — wait until you see the video below the fold — but also that he really is as conservative as his weak health care plan and far weaker economic stimulus plan have hinted. (Then there’s his use of GOP scare-tactic talking points on Social Security, and how he has been embraced by the right — including George Will who last year compared Obama to Ronald Reagan [See "Obama Channels Reagan II."] .)

Paul Krugman is clearly dumbfounded, as am I. Here is the entirety of Krugman’s New York Times blog post today at 3:41 pm:

Reagan and Obama

Read Rick Perlstein. Rick is our premier historian of the rise of modern movement conservatism, and knows whereof he speaks.

What does Perlstein say?

One of the Democratic candidates is getting a bit of abuse for lionizing Ronald Reagan. Here’s part of the relevant quote:

Perlstein quotes Obama:

he just tapped into what people were already feeling, which was we want clarity we want optimism, we want a return to that sense of dynamism and entrepreneurship that had been missing.

Perlstein adds, “Matt Stoller criticizes Obama thus“:

if you think, as Obama does, that Reagan’s rise to power was premised on a sunny optimism in contrast to an out of control government and a society rife with liberal excess, then you don’t understand the conservative movement. Reagan tapped into greed and fear and tribalism, and those are powerful forces. Ignoring that isn’t going to make them go away.

“He’s right,” Perlstein observes, then goes on:

He’s also right that accepting the right’s successful fantasy-frame about what Reagan was all about surrenders to one of their most successful strategies: affecting innocence about the terrible consequences of their own ideology in the here and now—helping conservatism, as an ideology, survive to fight another day:

“Why would the conservative movement create such idolatry around Reagan? Is is because they just want to honor a great man? Perhaps that is some of it. Or are they trying to escape the legacy of the conservative movement so that it can be rebuilt in a few years, as they did after Nixon, Reagan, and Bush I?

“Liberals always talk as if only the conservatives of our own generation were scary, and the conservatives of a previous generation kind of cuddly,” notes Perlstein. (Read all.)

Here’s the second new YouTube video from the conservative newspaper interview with Obama:

In one fell swoop, Obama disparages the success-filled, non-stop efforts of millions of people during the 1960s and 1970s, efforts that Matt Stoller lists vividly at Open Left blog:

Obama admires Reagan because he agrees with Reagan’s basic frame that the 1960s and 1970s were full of ‘excesses’ and that government had grown large and unaccountable.

[STOLLER'S KEY LIST IS HERE] Those excesses, of course, were feminism, the consumer rights movement, the civil rights movement, the environmental movement, and the antiwar movement. The libertarian anti-government ideology of an unaccountable large liberal government was designed by ideological conservatives to take advantage of the backlash against these ‘excesses’.

It is extremely disturbing to hear, not that Obama admires Reagan, but why he does so. Reagan was not a sunny optimist pushing dynamic entrepreneurship, but a savvy politician using a civil rights backlash to catapult conservatives to power.

I remember what I did in 1981 after Ronald Reagan became president. I spent every lunch hour in downtown Seattle gathering signatures on Sierra Club petitions demanding that President Ronald Reagan fire James Watt, his Secretary of the Interior who was ready to bulldoze and sell off those “excesses” that Obama disparages — our country’s national parks, national lands, the Endangered Specist Act, the Marine Mammal Protection Act, and on and on.

It was clear to me that President Reagan was trying to undo all the progressive gains that our nation had made in the last decades.

I felt like I was part of a desperate fight to stop us from sliding backwards.

John Edwards also remembers that era well. Via Dale Carrico at Amor Mundi blog:

As usual, it is John Edwards who responds as a person of democratic left actually should:

“When you think about what Ronald Reagan did to the American people, to the middle class to the working people,” said Edwards.

“He was openly -– openly -– intolerant of unions and the right to organize. He openly fought against the union and the organized labor movement in this country. He openly did extraordinary damage to the middle class and working people, created a tax structure that favored the very wealthiest Americans and caused the middle class and working people to struggle every single day. The destruction of the environment, you know, eliminating regulation of companies that were polluting and doing extraordinary damage to the environment.”

“I can promise you this: this president will never use Ronald Reagan as an example for change.”

Carrico nails it:

In my Audacity of Hype post earlier this week I castigated uncritical Obamaniacs that Hope Without Fight Is Hype and tried to illustrate this point with what I imagined at the time to be something of a stretch as analogies go: Reagan talked about hope. Reagan talked about “Morning in America” as he set out to destroy the achievements of the New Deal and the Summer of Love. That’s when our long national nightmare of corporatism and theocratic pandering began.

Well, Sen. Obama, there was the Reagan public persona, and then there was the Reagan private agenda: Ronald Reagan “borrowed Teddy Kennedy’s nationalist rhetoric … echoed Carter’s incessant talk against Washington, and festooned his speeches with quotations from FDR,” writes Sidney Blumenthal in his 2003 memoir. But, Reagan — just like George W. Bush — “was astonishingly successful in his plan to paralyze the federal government.”

After a rush in his first year to pass an enormous regressive tax cut, accompanied by a large increase in the military budget … Reagan was a president at leisure. He delegated his authority and paid little attention to detail. … His achievement of presiding over a government that permitted the federal deficit to grow to astronomical proportions made a federal social policy virtually impossible to realize. Once he learned that the supply-side economic theory his advisers had advocated was backfiring, producing deficits instead of the promised Niagara of revenues, he was pleased with the deadening effect. He revived the grandeur of the presidency for his stage set but put the executive branch to sleep.

Obama has a dreamy attitude about the presidency. He thinks he can just be the “vision” guy and get “smarter people” around himself, and that the governing will take care of itself.

Never mind that George W. Bush — taking off where Ronald Reagan began — has decimated all key federal agencies of their most experienced staffers and devastated the agencies’ budgets, so much so that some will have to be rebuilt from the ground up.

Where will that new president begin? The devastated Department of Justice? The Food and Drug Administration? The Consumer Protection Safety Commission? Every branch of the U.S. military? The Veterans Administration? The Evironmental Protection Agency? Medicare? The Department of Education?

The list of essential federal agencies near death from personnel and budgetary starvation goes on and on. Then there’s our decimated military suffering from worn-out soldiers and equipment.

The new president will have innumerable Herculian tasks to face. Only the most dedicated and hardest-working president will begin to succeed in rebuilding these vital federal institutions.

And Obama thinks that being inspirational will cut it? That being sunny like Reagan — one of our laziest presidents in history — will get the job done?

Give me the worker. Good god, give me the worker.

:::::::::::::::::::

P.S. Screw the Democratic party and the Democratic primary . Republicans, you can be a Democrat for a single day, and then go back to your Trent-Lott-lovin’, Tom-DeLay-lovin’, Mitch-McConnell-lovin’ ways! Come on!

P.P.S. I’m a lot more like you than I let on to the Democrats. (Wink.) Just so you know, I’m on your side! Shhhh, don’t let ‘em know. I’m not on the side of those tax-and-spend liberals! Oh yeah, baby, we can make music together! That’s why my economic stimulus plan has TAX CUTS as its feature, not that mortgage help that John and Hillary want to give people. No sirree. Just tax cuts for you people who HAVE jobs. Those without can make do. That’s right.