There has been a lot of focus on Barack Obama’s movement toward the political center. But lately it’s been the Bush administration doing the moving – toward Obama. Administration officials met last week with Iranian officials about Iran’s nuclear program (just a couple of months after President Bush labeled as “appeasement” Obama’s willingness to meet with Iran). The administration also agreed last week to a “time horizon” for reducing troops in Iraq (after years of opposing any sort of withdrawal deadline, even a vague “horizon”). And the administration has been acknowledging the problems in Afghanistan, which Obama has long said should be a main focus in the war on terror.
Obama’s position on withdrawing from Iraq also appears to have the support of the Iraqi government, though that has been difficult to keep straight. Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki appeared to endorse it, then the next day indicated he had been “mistranslated.” But today his government issued a statement saying that it hoped American combat units could be out of Iraq by the end of 2010, which almost matches Obama’s timetable.
The Justin Timberlake-Janet Jackson “wardrobe malfunction” was hardly a proud moment for free expression or even entertainment. But it was a relief to see the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals conclude that the Federal Communications Commission “acted arbitrarily and capriciously” in fining CBS $550,000 for the incident during the 2004 Super Bowl halftime show, because “the nine-sixteenths of one second glimpse of a bare female breast” didn’t meet the FCC’s long-held standard of what merits a fine – something so “pervasive as to amount to ‘shock treatment’ for the audience.” If there must be such punishments for broadcasters, they should fit the crime and the FCC’s own guidelines.
While President Bush and oil companies call for expanded offshore drilling to address America’s energy crisis, Democrats in Congress are pointing out that oil companies aren’t drilling in millions of acres of federal lands already open to oil exploration.
“As I write this, there are 68 million acres of publicly leased lands available for drilling that are not being drilled,” Rep. Nancy Boyda, D-Topeka, wrote in an e-mail letter. “80 percent of the oil available on the Outer Continental Shelf is already open for drilling. Today, these leases are in place; the environmental hurdles have been cleared, but no drilling is happening. The American people want to know why. So do I.”
Boyda calls it “Big Oil’s dirty little secret”: Companies don’t have the equipment necessary to do more drilling, she says, and new rigs for offshore exploration won’t be available for years.
Legislative candidate Sean Tevis made the popular boingboing and crooksandliars Web sites with a cartoon pitch to help him unseat Rep. Arlen Siegfreid, R-Olathe. Boingboing says that Tevis is “a geeky geek from Kansas who’s fed up with his state rep, an anti-abortion, anti-evolution, pro-censorship, pro-surveillance, anti-gay incumbent.” Tevis called for 3,000 people to each donate $8.34 in support of open government, personal property and ending the sales tax on food. He’s already more than met his goal. What will he do with all that Internet dough? Boingboing said it will help him kick Siegfreid’s “(extremely tight) ass.”
Gas prices are driving up the cost of politicking this summer, especially in lesser-populated rural areas. An article on the subject by Harris News Service noted that one Wichita district is the smallest in the Kansas House: District 88, held by Democratic Rep. Jim Ward, consists of 4.59 square miles. At 6,568 square-miles, the House’s biggest is District 118, represented by Republican Virginia Beamer of Oakley. The smallest Senate district, 15.83 square miles, is represented by Sen. Barbara Allen, R-Overland Park. The Senate’s largest district, represented by Sen. Ralph Ostmeyer, R-Grinnell, consists of 16,637 square-miles — a whopping 20 percent of the state.
At the National Governors Association meeting recently in Philadelphia, there was a bit of buzz about whether any of the assembled might win the running mate lottery this year — after three decades during which presidential showdowns always featured either a former or sitting governor in either the Republicans’ or Democrats’ top spot. Gov. Kathleen Sebelius garnered attention as a possible Barack Obama pick, of course, as did Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine, whose mother, like Obama’s, grew up in El Dorado. Associated Press noted that no governor has been chosen as a running mate since 1968, when Richard Nixon tapped Maryland Gov. Spiro Agnew. That ended badly five years later, when Agnew resigned amid a bribery scandal. “Maybe that’s why — it took that long to forget,” said Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack, who was considered for John Kerry’s ticket in 2004.
There has been a lot of focus on Barack Obama’s movement toward the political center. But lately it’s been the Bush administration doing the moving – toward Obama. Administration officials met last week with Iranian officials about Iran’s nuclear program (just a couple of months after President Bush labeled as “appeasement” Obama’s willingness to meet with Iran). The administration also agreed last week to a “time horizon” for reducing troops in Iraq (after years of opposing any sort of withdrawal deadline, even a vague “horizon”). And the administration has been acknowledging the problems in Afghanistan, which Obama has long said should be a main focus in the war on terror.
