John McCain has resorted to doing “nyah-nyah” name-calling attacks on Barack Obama, likening him in a new campaign commercial to Britney Spears - classy stuff. Here’s the best response - a funny Slate voice-over parody of a teen’s anguished defense of Britney (remember this one?). Leave Barack alooooone!
Meanwhile, Obama is having to denounce and distance himself from a Ludacris song that, among other offensive lyrics, calls Hillary Clinton the B-word.
Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., and others in Congress are uncomfortable enough with the seven felony counts against Sen. Ted Stevens (in photo), R-Alaska, to return political contributions they got from Stevens. But columnist Margaret Carlson notes how differently Congress reacted to Stevens’ scandal and that of Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho: “A full ranking of congressional sins would put gay sex at the top (Craig and former Florida Rep. Mark Foley, both quickly abandoned); heterosexual sex next (bad but not fatal, with Republican Sen. David Vitter of Louisiana surviving his extensive dealings with the ‘D.C. Madam’); and way, way down, corruption. You can practically be caught with a bag of cash, as Rep. William Jefferson was (in his freezer) and continue serving.”
The Eagle editorial board met Wednesday with oil man T. Boone Pickens (there’s a video excerpt on kansas.com). He went over his plan for reducing the $700 billion the U.S. spends importing oil. He wants to use wind turbines to replace much of the electricity being produced by natural gas. He then wants to use natural gas to fuel trucks, thereby reducing our need for imported oil.
Pickens said that there is no personal business motive behind his effort. Rather, he believes that America has a huge energy problem that will only get worse unless we take bold action.
Many people are still mad at Pickens for helping finance the Swift Boat ads against John Kerry. And there are plenty of doubts about his plan, particularly using natural gas for trucks. But give him credit for drawing attention to the need for a national energy strategy and to drastically reduce our dependency on foreign oil.
John McCain has claimed in recent days that Barack Obama “would rather lose a war in order to win a political campaign” and has run advertisements accusing Obama of being responsible for high gas prices. But in going negative so soon, McCain risks putting off the independent voters he needs to win. Still, Dan Schnur, who worked on McCain’s 2000 campaign, told the New York Times that the McCain camp seems to be responding to the primary fight between Obama and Hillary Clinton. “Obama is at his best when he talks from the mountaintop, and Clinton showed that the best hope for an opponent is to pull him back down to earth,” Schnur said. “McCain’s campaign quickly decided not to wait as long as she did.”
Topeka Capital-Journal columnist Ric Anderson is going to miss our own state Sen. Phil Journey, R-Haysville — calling him “an individual in a place with a lot of suits. He worked hard, was conscientious and became a go-to guy for reporters looking for a tasty quote. A gun-rights advocate, he stocked his apartment with handguns, a rifle and a shotgun when he stayed here during sessions. He delighted in saying he rubbed elbows with Charlton Heston and Ted Nugent during NRA events.” Journey is running to become a Sedgwick County District Court judge, a job that would position him far less well to serve reporters with quotes, tasty or otherwise.
Wonder how many Kansans know most or all of U.S. News & World Report’s “10 Things You Didn’t Know About Kathleen Sebelius.” Here’s one: “Kathleen attended all-girls schools all the way through college. She thrived in that environment, where, she has said, she ‘was never told, overtly or covertly, girls couldn’t do everything.’”
A major Rand Corp. study has come out confirming the wrongheadedness of the Bush administration’s “war on terror” strategy. In the first place, it’s not a conventional war; defeating terrorism is best done by disrupting networks and arresting leaders; in most cases, this is best carried out by law enforcement and intelligence agencies, not armies, according to the report’s authors. And terrorists should be treated as criminals, not holy warriors.
The idea of international police action against al-Qaida was mocked by the neoconservative crowd when presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry advocated it in 2004.
In fact, Kerry was dead-on.
From a column by Dick Morris: “According to the latest Fox News survey, Obama is winning among women under 40 by 13 points, but McCain is winning among women aged 41-45 by four points. Among women 50 and over, McCain is three points ahead. Obama’s 48-35 lead among women under 40 is normal for a Democrat, but to trail among women in their 40s by 45-41 and by women over 50 by 38-35 is extraordinary.”
“I hope nobody thinks that Congress has done all, or even a large fraction, of what needs to be done,” columnist Paul Krugman wrote about the Fannie and Freddie bailout bill that President Bush signed. “This bill is the latest in a series of temporary fixes to the financial system — attempts to hold the thing together with bungee cords and masking tape — that have, at least so far, succeeded in staving off complete collapse. But those fixes have done nothing to resolve the system’s underlying flaws. In fact, they set the stage for even bigger future disasters — unless they’re followed up with fundamental reforms.”
A main, underlying problem, Krugman said, is that traditional banks have been pushed aside by unregulated financial players. He said that “financial regulation needs to be extended to cover a much wider range of institutions. Basically, the financial framework created in the 1930s, which brought generations of relative stability, needs to be updated to 21st-century conditions.”
Good for Sedgwick County Sheriff Gary Steed for speaking out on the issue of whether the county needs a jail expansion. “We need more beds. The potential for lawsuits gets higher with overcrowding,” he told The Eagle, taking issue with County Manager William Buchanan’s proposal to shelve a $54 million jail expansion and cut county property taxes by 1 mill. Unfortunately, Steed’s lament neither provides much clarity nor settles the issue. County commissioners won’t be inclined to forge ahead with a bigger jail — and without a tax cut — in light of Buchanan’s plan. So Steed, who is not seeking re-election, may not be able to avoid seeing the jail issue pass to his successor. Meanwhile, county residents are left to wonder whether a bigger jail is needed or not — the population numbers still seem to support it — and how long the county can go without one.
Kansas Sens. Pat Roberts and Sam Brownback need to support the Free Flow of Information Act, which the Senate is expected to vote on this week. The act would protect the public’s right to know by preventing reporters from being imprisoned and fined if they don’t reveal confidential sources. The protection isn’t absolute; reporters would have to provide confidential source information if it could prevent acts of terrorism or other significant harm to national security, as well as some other exceptions. But in order for the press to serve as a watchdog and provide the public with information it needs, it must be able to protect its sources.
The following satirical headlines come from borowitzreport.com:
OBAMA LEADS McCAIN IN FREQUENT FLIER MILES; Next Trip to Iraq Will Be Free, Aides Say
McCAIN MAKES HISTORIC FIRST VISIT TO INTERNET; Will Spend Five Days at Key Sites
OBAMA RELEASES LIST OF APPROVED JOKES ABOUT HIMSELF; Bid to Help Late-Night Comics
Barack Obama reportedly is having “very serious” conversations with Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine about being his vice presidential pick. Obama’s campaign staff reportedly also is seriously vetting Sens. Evan Bayh, D-Ind., and Joe Biden, D-Del.
If Obama picks Kaine, it will put El Dorado in the spotlight again. Kaine grew up in Overland Park, but his mother was from El Dorado. Obama’s grandfather grew up in El Dorado, and Obama’s mother lived there briefly as a child before the family moved to Seattle.
Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, was charged with seven counts of making false statements on his financial disclosure forms. For years, Stevens was the king of earmarks as head of the Senate Appropriations Committee. The indictment accuses Stevens of concealing payments of more than $250,000 in goods and services from an oil company that wanted Stevens’ help.
“I think it’s a pretty good timetable,” John McCain said Friday about the 16-month timeline for pulling out of Iraq. So is he now backing Barack Obama’s proposal, too? And isn’t this a policy change, given how McCain has said for months that he didn’t support a timetable for withdrawal? No, McCain said Sunday. He contends that the difference is that he would base his decisions on “the conditions on the ground.” But this looks like a shift based on the conditions of the election.
Three officials at the Justice Department broke the law by using politics to guide their hiring decisions, according to a new report by the department’s inspector general and internal ethics office. The report focused primarily on Monica Goodling (in photo), the department’s former White House liaison and senior counsel. But it determined that former chief of staff Kyle Sampson and Goodling’s predecessor, Jan Williams, also violated federal law and department policy. An earlier report concluded that the department improperly used politics to pick candidates for honors and internship programs. But the new report determined that the violations were much more extensive and included political hiring for some of the department’s most senior career positions, including immigration judges and assistant U.S. attorneys, the Washington Post reported.
The Eagle has a new politics Web page that you might want to bookmark. It groups national, state and local politics-related news articles, as well as political opinion (including this blog). It also includes a comments area in which you can react to what you read.
Gov. Kathleen Sebelius is often criticized by Republicans for her busy travel schedule. But Wichita should thank her for taking the time and trouble to visit the recent Farnborough International Air Show near London, where she drew some extra attention because of the Obama veepstakes buzz surrounding her. The governor’s presence at the air show helped convey to the world the mammoth role that Kansas and Wichita play in aviation manufacturing, and their determination to defend and build on that role in a highly competitive global economy.
The federal budget deficit is projected to be nearly $490 billion this fiscal year, a new record. The deficit will add to the national debt, which already is more than $9 trillion and requires annual interest payments of about $235 billion.
This means that the next president will face a huge financial hole. But that hasn’t caused John McCain and Barack Obama to stop digging - both are proposing more tax cuts.
It’s difficult to remember another election year with so many revelations about local candidates’ serious personal and professional issues. A stalking protection order, bad personal debts, bad business debts, a personal bankruptcy, a Kansas Supreme Court censure - and it’s just the primary season. Some explanations may inspire empathy in potential voters also going through tough stuff in this economy. But you have to wonder what makes people overlook their failings to file for elective office, then expect voters to overlook them as well.
Barack Obama promises to remove barriers preventing homosexual men and women from serving in the armed forces, while John McCain wants to preserve Bill Clinton’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, columnist Rowland Nethaway wrote. Meanwhile , the House Armed Services Committee’s Military Personnel Subcommittee held a recent hearing on the policy. One person who has changed his mind is John Shalikashvili, the retired Army general who was chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff when the current “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy was adopted. Shalikashvili now believes that allowing homosexuals to serve openly in the military “would not undermine the efficacy of the armed forces,” Nethaway wrote.
“He based his opinion in part on a 2007 Zogby poll that reported 75 percent of the troops interviewed who served in Iraq and Afghanistan said they were comfortable around gay men and lesbians and did not believe morale would be hurt.”
John McCain has resorted to doing “nyah-nyah” name-calling attacks on Barack Obama, likening him in a new campaign commercial to Britney Spears - classy stuff. Here’s the best response - a funny Slate voice-over parody of a teen’s anguished defense of Britney (remember this one?). Leave Barack alooooone!
