William Kristol Loves Driving in the Ditch

Remember how, eight years ago, William Kristol admitted that George W. Bush had driven the nation into a ditch? He then backpedaled furiously, and argued that the guy who drove us into the ditch was the best guy to drive us out? And how, his having received his wish, we got an outcome that resembles the conclusion of Thelma and Louise?

Kristol has now assessed Barack Obama's performance as President:

If this election’s just about the last four years, that’s a muddy verdict. Bush was president during the financial meltdown. The Obama team has turned that around pretty well.

Kristol appears to find terrifying the prospect of reelecting a president who can actually drive.

Muddy, indeed.

Romney's Lack of Policy Detail

Bill Kristol is complaining that Mitt Romney isn't sharing enough policy details:

Is it too much to ask Mitt Romney to get off autopilot and actually think about the race he's running?

Adopting a prevent defense when it's only the second quarter and you're not even ahead is dubious enough as a strategy. But his campaign's monomaniacal belief that it's about the economy and only the economy, and that they need to keep telling us stupid voters that it's only about the economy, has gone from being an annoying tick to a dangerous self-delusion.

To the extent that he critiques this sort of behavior, Kristol is correct:

But what are voters to think when they hear the GOP nominee say, as he did yesterday to CBS’s Jan Crawford, "As long as I continue to speak about the economy, I'm going to win"? That they're dopes who don't know the economy's bad, but as long as the Romney campaign keeps instructing them that it is bad, they'll react correctly and vote the incumbent out of office?

No, I'm not talking about treating voters as dopes, lamentable though that may be, as that's pretty much how political campaigns are won. I'm talking about actually stating your policy in terms so blunt that, if the "dopes" don't figure out what you're up to, your opponent can plug your statement into a campaign ad and make it obvious. There's a difference between joking or poking your opponent about the economy, making it the center of your campaign, and describing that as your plan. It's like when the villain in a James Bond movie reveals the details of his previously inscrutable scheme - you tell everybody exactly what you're doing and let your opponent identify and exploit your vulnerabilities. If Romney were a coach, one wonders if he would give the other team his playbook.

Daniel Larison responds,

According to the emerging conventional wisdom, Romney’s political fortunes would improve if he would only be more specific about what he would do. That seems incorrect. Romney isn’t going to win the election on the strength of his “detailed policy proposals,” and we all understand that. Dukakis and Kerry weren’t lacking for policy proposals, and they didn’t lose because their proposals were considered insufficiently specific.

Larison also shares Jonathan Bernstein's observation that,

Exactly no one is going to vote against Romney because he declines to advocate specific policies, but there’s always the risk that embracing one set of policy choices could alienate voters who otherwise might just want to throw the bums out.

Charles Pierce, on the other hand, is trying to figure out where Kristol is going with this, pointing to Kristol's own history of attacking political positions not on their merits, but with the hope of harming their proponent. That ties in with Larison's argument that policy details can potentially alienate more voters than they attract.

But are they overlooking the elephant in the room? Kristol, a narcissist par none, has rarely given good campaign advice and is better known for the opposite.¹ But pierce the veneer and you see what you usually see with pundits like Kristol - they're not saying "You need to take a position" - they're actually stating, "You should take my position. Were Romney to endorse key positions shared by Kristol, and it may boil down to just one, Kristol would be happy as a clam.
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1. "Ooh.. I know who you should pick for your Veep!"

Clowns to the Left of Me, Jokers to the Right

I appreciate the push-back coming from the left on the gutting of the healthcare reform bill. It's a shame that the bill has been gradually stripped of elements that could constrain costs and increase competition due to the disgraceful conduct of certain members of both political parties. I don't have a great deal of sympathy for the idea that we should accept a bill full of table scraps as reform. But if the good outweighs the bad, passage of a seriously flawed bill is better than doing nothing. Howard Dean, the new public face of "the present bill is crap" movement, has made that point.

Michael Tomasky lists provisions that he believes will be in the final bill and asks why anybody on the left would oppose a bill that includes those provisions. If those provisions are all that are in the bill, he's right - the political left should embrace it as a starting point for reform. But add in poison pills, such as a mandate to buy overpriced, inferior insurance,¹ or various elements that can be exploited by employers to increase the cost of insurance beyond what their "less fit" employees are able to pay, and the calculus shifts. It's unreasonable to attack people for not seeing the benefits of a bill that has not been finalized, and with each passing day is stripped of provisions that would benefit significant numbers of Americans.

A word for those on the left who supported Hillary Clinton in the presidential campaign and have stated or implied since that time that she would be a better President, and use healthcare reform as an example, remind me again... which of the remaining reforms were passed into law during President Clinton's push for reform? That's right - none of them. Really, get off the idea that the President has magic powers that can make Senators with secure seats (that is, virtually all of them) fall in line.

For those who howl, "You should have used reconciliation" every time something negative happens in the legislative process, think about it. There are provisions in the current proposed legislation that could not be passed through reconciliation, even assuming the Senate had been willing to pursue that path - and it wasn't. So again, if there's enough good in this bill that it's worth passing, stop whining about how reconciliation would have been better, and start pressing for a follow-up bill that fixes this legislation's most serious problems (to the extent possible) by reconciliation. It's not as if we pass a bill and then the Earth stands still.

I'm with Paul Krugman in relation to the attacks on those who would favor passage of a flawed but helpful bill as being "just like the 'liberal hawks' who supported the Iraq war". Even if we assume that there were no good reasons to support a war in Iraq (and I for one thought the probable downside outweighed the possible upside), there's no meaningful parallel. It's a dubious tactic - poisoning the well. If you want to argue that people are wrong, fine, but if you can't do better than that - if you can't logically substantiate your analogy - what do you think you're accomplishing?

On the other hand, I disagree with Krugman that just because the passage of any healthcare reform seemed like an impossible dream after Bush's reelection, we should just the current bill by comparison to nothing. It's a profound disappointment that the Democratic Party, particularly a handful of shameless self-aggrandizers and opportunists in the Senate, have not worked hard to make this the best possible bill instead of being so self-absorbed, so dim-witted, and/or so in the pockets of industry that serious concessions had to be made from the outset and we continue to shed helpful provisions from an what has gradually become at best a mediocre bill. Robert Reich has a more accurate assessment, that "We are slouching toward health-care reform that's better than nothing but far worse than we had imagined it would be".

Frankly, the behavior of the Republican Party, from top to bottom, has been disgraceful. The party of "no" - no ideas, no cooperation, no cost savings... A handful of Republican Senators could, right now, come across the aisle with a set of serious cost-savings measures and, as long as they were willing to accept the majority of the terms of the present bill, could squeeze the obstructionists like Lieberman and Nelson out of the picture. Instead they obstruct and obfuscate, and openly hope that the bill fails because they anticipate that its failure will bring them political advantage. Screw the people. "The uninsured don't vote for us anyway".

To get a sense of the significance of even what's left of the reform bill, take a look at some Republican commentary on the subject. First, after pretending to be thoughtful, David Brooks gives his inevitable "thumbs down" - like the liberal critics of the bill, he doesn't need to see a final version of the legislation to know that he opposes it.

If you pass a health care bill without systemic incentives reform, you set up a political vortex in which the few good parts of the bill will get stripped out and the expensive and wasteful parts will be entrenched.

So what do you think he and his party offer up as an alternative? One joke after another? The Republican Party presently offers little more than a head count: forty Senators, at least thirty-seven of whom (and arguably all of whom) are stuck in their "terrible twos".

But at least Brooks has enough self-respect not to pull this trick, Matthew Dowd begging us not to throw the Republican Party into the briar patch. Aw, shucks, it's always wonderful to have a Republican operative tell the Democratic Party, "Don't let your lying eyes or Michael Steele's lying words deceive you - if you pass healthcare reform, you'll only hurt yourselves." Wow. The only way that sort of caution might be more credible is if it were penned by Karl Rove or Bill Kristol. I mean, that would be convincing.

Come up with a health-care bill that draws real bipartisan support.

Remind me again, Dowd, what brilliant initiatives the Republican enfants terribles in the Senate have brought to negotiations for bipartisan reform? I mean, even if they didn't recognize the joke earlier, that zinger would push it over the top for pretty much everyone, no?
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1. I recognize the importance of a mandate to reform, but the quality of insurance available to the public must be at least adequate for that to be a fair requirement - there's potential that people will be forced to choose between paying a penalty or overpaying for garbage.

But What Does "Conservative" Mean?

Bill Kristol is urging the Republican Party to continue its hard tack to the right, pointing to a Gallup poll in which 40% of Americans described themselves as "conservative". Um... as if there's only one definition of conservative, and any person who self-describes as "conservative" lacks even an ounce of moderation? And what does that mean for the future of the Republican Party?

That nominee seems unlikely to be a current officeholder. Right now, the four leading candidates for the GOP nomination are private citizens. In a recent Rasmussen poll, the only candidates with double-digit support among Republicans were Mike Huckabee (at 29 percent), Mitt Romney (24 percent), Sarah Palin (18 percent) and Newt Gingrich (14 percent). These four are running way ahead of various senatorial and gubernatorial possibilities.

I have never been particularly impressed with the concept of Newt Gingrich as a man of ideas - at least if we're limiting the discussion to good ideas. But really, he's running behind Mitt Romney and Sarah Palin, two candidates whose prior national campaigns suggest that if either came up with an idea it would be very, very lonely.¹ As for trying to pick a candidate a couple years in advance of the start of the next Presidential campaign, potential candidates people have heard of do better in the polls than potential candidates most haven't heard of. News to Kristol, perhaps, but no real surprise to anybody who actually pays attention to these things.

Indeed, I suspect that the person most likely to break into this group of front-runners would be a businessman who stands up against President Obama's big-government proposals, a retired general who objects to Obama's foreign policy or a civic activist who rallies the public against some liberal outrage.

Where are Al Haig and Ross Perot when the Republican Party needs them? A civic activist? Surely he's not thinking of Sarah Palin (despite his undying crush) - a "civic activist" sounds like somebody Palin would describe as having no real responsibilities. What might we expect from a Palin candidacy? Angry, bitter, mean-spirited devolution into self-parody, and perhaps an electoral vote count favoring the incumbent that would make Reagan's 1984 landslide look weak by comparison.

On to the next poll:

One reason is that many Republicans lack confidence not just in Congress but even in Republican members of Congress. In last week's Post-ABC News poll, a plurality of respondents disapproved of Obama-type health-care reform. In other words, they agree with the Republicans in Congress. But when asked how much confidence they had in congressional Republicans to make the right decisions for the country's future, only 19 percent of respondents expressed much confidence in the GOP -- well behind the confidence levels in congressional Democrats (34 percent) and Obama (49 percent).

Well, no. Imagine that the Democrats proposed painting the Oval Office blue. And the Republicans angrily insisted not only that the Democrats were going to use green paint, but that it must be painted red. An opinion poll might show that a number of Americans opposed the color choice of blue, and others were confused by the Republican Party's misinformation and were adamantly against the color green. But that doesn't mean that they prefer red or, going back to healthcare, a mysterious, undisclosed Republican alternative to the current healthcare system or reform ideas. (Could Kristol really be so dense as to believe what he's writing?)

The center of gravity, I suspect, will instead lie with individuals such as Palin and Huckabee and Gingrich, media personalities like Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh, and activists at town halls and tea parties.

He's comfortable with that?

The lesson activists around the country will take from this is that a vigorous, even if somewhat irritated, conservative/populist message seems to be more effective in revitalizing the Republican Party than an attempt to accommodate the wishes of liberal media elites.

The strange thing is Kristol was able to name two Republican media elites, and cheerlead the angry, often hate-filled rhetoric and misinformation they (and Sarah Palin, another "leader" he again singles out) use to "lead" the Republican Party. But when he drops in a bromide about "liberal media elites" he's unable to name even one - let alone one of any real influence.

If nothing else, he's made clear which party is being run by grown-ups.

Kristol's fantasy of a conservative movement uniting behind a Sarah Palin, or some other "leader"² who represents only one faction of convervatism (religious right conservatives / social conservatives, economic conservatives / free market conservatives, foreign policy conservatives / interventionists / non-interventionists... there are factions within the factions). That's the same sort of foundation upon which Ross Perot built his Reform Party - not so much "vote for us" but "don't vote for them". And when the Palin/Gingrich ticket brings in 19% of the vote....³
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1. I don't want to be unfair to Romney, who was once a successful corporate raider (who now prefers "venture capitalist"), but the image he seemed intend upon presenting during the last campaign was that of an empty head propped on top of a stuffed shirt.

2. Palin has demonstrated little ability to lead those who aren't already in lockstep with her message. While the modicum of leadership she demonstrates by telling her devotees what they want to hear may qualify her as a "leader" in Kristol's book, her failure as an executive both at the state and local level may give others pause.

3. While Kristol was heartened that 40% of Americans deem themselves "conservative", he somehow forgot to mention (or perhaps failed to read) that only half of that number (20%) describe themselves as "Republicans".

Disdain for Factory Workers

William Kristol, who at times seems to look down on everybody, cautions both parties and the media about looking down at auto workers.

Today, G.M., Ford and Chrysler get no respect. Maybe they don’t deserve much. Detroit has many sins to answer for, and it’s been doing plenty of answering. But — and I say this as someone who grew up in non-car-driving family in New York and who is the furthest thing from an auto aficionado — there is a kind of undeserved disdain, even casual contempt, that seems to characterize the attitude of the political and media elites toward the American auto industry.

Was noblesse oblige a lesson taught at Irving Kristol's dinner table? Today, the wealthiest like to pretend that they were born with no advantage, that no serendipity, inheritance, and nepotism played no role in their success, and that if you are less fortunate it's an indictment of your lack of resolve.

By way of example, has Mitt Romney ever admitted the significance of his father's success and name to his own achievements, let alone acknowledged that he's the millionaire son of a millionaire in no small part due to the efforts of unionized auto workers? When he speaks of his father's blown opportunity to negotiate a new type of labor-management relationship with the UAW, could it be because George shared (perhaps inculcated) Mitt's contemptuousness of unions? Can you imagine candid admissions of how privileged childhoods and powerful parents paved a path to easy prominence from, say, Jonah Goldberg, George W. Bush, David Frum, John Podhoretz, Michael Reagan, Robert and Fred Kagan.... I'm not sure that Kristol has ever candidly acknowledged his own privilege, but this editorial suggests that he is aware of it. Sure, there's a cynical part of me that thinks he's advancing the political reality described by Dick Cheney - that causing the Big Three to fail will turn the Republican Party into the "Party of Hoover," and I'm not endorsing his simplistic analysis of the motivations of either party - but for now I'll give him the benefit of the doubt. Particularly given this:

Now there are other ways to explain the disparate treatment of G.M. and Citigroup. Finance is different from manufacturing, and banks from auto companies. It may be that the case for a huge bank bailout was strong, and that the case for a more modest auto package is not. Still, it seems to me true that the financial big shots haven’t been treated nearly as roughly in Congress or in the media as the auto executives, who have done nothing remotely as irresponsible as their Wall Street counterparts.

As you know, it's worse than that. Companies that would have collapsed in a free market are paying shareholder dividends, gargantuan salaries, and even larger "retention bonuses" (to workers who would otherwise... go where?) with taxpayer money.

Meanwhile, on the right, free-market analysts have explained that our regulatory scheme of fuel-efficiency standards is counterproductive. But despite the fact that the government is partly responsible for the Big Three’s problems, the right hasn’t really been stirred to enthusiastically promote a deregulatory agenda to help the auto companies. What excites it is mobilizing to oppose bailouts for unionized workers.

I have to take issue with that. Kristol's point might be stronger but for the fact that every major car company that is not failing is headquartered in a nation that imposes greater regulation, and in which tax policies have long created high gas prices. Congress has been complicit in preventing the regulations it passes from having teeth, such that the domestic auto makes were able to build huge gas guzzling fleets outside of the limits set by CAFE, but it now appears that had those regulations been more comprehensive, the Big Three would not have experienced their huge drop off in sales the second gas hit $4/gallon. If a regulatory lesson is to be learned, it's that Congress could have better shaped the product line of domestic manufacturers by raising gas taxes than through a body of complex, loophole ridden regulations.

Last week, Senate Republicans picked a fight with the U.A.W. on union pay scales — despite the fact that it’s the legacy benefits for retirees, not pay for current workers, that’s really hurting Detroit, and despite the additional fact that, in any case, labor amounts to only about 10 percent of the cost of a car. But the Republicans were fighting Big Labor! They were standing firm against bailouts! Some of the same conservatives who (correctly, in my view) made the case for $700 billion for Wall Street pitched a fit over $14 billion in loans for the automakers.

Whoah - Kristol's actually bringing facts into the debate. Is that allowed?

I personally don't think the case was made for the $700 billion financial industry bailout, save in the sense that "we don't know what will happen if we don't try to bail out the banks". Sure, you can get my support to build a $700 billion wall between myself and a freight train if I can't otherwise avoid being hit, but that leaves no time for serious reflection or evaluation of how that money is best spent. I'm not convinced at this point that we should continue to bail out financial institutions - they have not been responsible with the money that's been given to them, they're not using the injected liquidity to increase lending, and there does not appear to be any good reason why the government can't tell them, "You have time to put together Chapter 11 plans, so do that. If you're failing, come to us and we'll try to arrange for you to be taken over by a stable institution, or perhaps help ease you into that Chapter 11 reorganization."

The real issue is, should it be the role of government to bail out businesses? Should we (supposedly) champion free markets then declare, "That company is 'too big to fail'" the moment managerial incompetence threatens the viability of a large company, stepping in with a multi-billion dollar bailout? Kristol is right to question why self-professed conservatives are pitching a fit over a $14 billion bailout after signing on to a $700 billion bailout. But he errs in suggesting that it's the size that matters - that if you support the large, it follows that you should support the small. The fundamental question, if you actually believe in free markets, is whether you should bail out any companies at all. Had the managers of these financial giants seriously believed that Uncle Sam would tell them to go to bankruptcy court, at least some of them would probably have made better decisions. And it would be harder to feel sorry for those who didn't. (Assuming it's possible to feel sorry for them.) But back to Kristol's larger point:

Whichever party can liberate itself from its well-worn rut to propose policies that help both American businesses and workers has a great opportunity. That party’s leaders could begin by offering management and labor at the Big Three a little more sympathy, and heaping upon them a little less calumny.

Oh, I'm not sure how much sympathy they deserve, and I somehow doubt that Kristol is the hugging type. But some understanding?

Truly, The Man Has No Shame

Bill Kristol spins out all the latest Republican talking points in favor of Sarah Palin, with her eager assistance.

As for the campaign, Palin made clear - without being willing to flat out say so - that she regretted allowing herself to be overly handled and constrained after the Republican convention. She described the debate on Thursday night as “liberating,” and she emphasized how much she now looked forward to being out there, “getting to speak directly to the folks.”

You mean, by ignoring the questions? By insisting on hamstringing the format to avoid direct challenge of her evasions and misrepresentations? (I don't think the Democrats should have agreed to that, but on the other hand it might have looked bad had Biden been given the opportunity to directly challenge her. Which isn't to say that appearances should trump substance, but....)

The excessive handling, of course, included a broad effort by hack pundits aligned with the Republican Party to spin the "She's gonna crash and burn" line, as part of a concerted effort to drive the expectations for her performance down to ground level. As SNL put it, she didn't throw up so at worst we should call it a tie, right?

Since she seemed to have enjoyed the debate, I asked her whether she’d like to take this opportunity to challenge Joe Biden to another one.

There was a pause, and I thought I heard some staff murmuring in the background (we were on speaker phones). She passed on the notion of a challenge. But she did say she was more than willing to accept an invitation to debate with Biden again, and even expressed a preference for a town hall meeting-type format.

So she won't challenge Biden to a debate, but she'll accept an invitation? And she prefer a format that isn't actually a debate format, but ties into one of McCain's favorite themes, the "town hall meeting"? Alright....

And, really, shouldn’t the public get the benefit of another Biden-Palin debate, or even two? If there’s difficulty finding a moderator, I’ll be glad to volunteer.

Oh, I get it now. The whole column is a joke!

Part of who Obama is, she said, has to do with his past associations, such as with the former bomber Bill Ayers. Palin had raised the topic of Ayers Saturday on the campaign trail, and she maintained to me that Obama, who’s minimized his relationship with Ayers, “hasn’t been wholly truthful” about this.

With the misrepresentation or omission being what?

I pointed out that Obama surely had a closer connection to the Rev. Jeremiah Wright than to Ayers — and so, I asked, if Ayers is a legitimate issue, what about Reverend Wright?

I can see why John McCain is tentative about making stupid "attacks by association" on Obama, given his own background, but it's perhaps even more absurd for Palin to do so. Her husband was a member of a secessionist party, and she was clearly friendly to that party and its leadership. She has been happy to obstruct and decline cooperation with the investigation of her firing Alaska public safety commissioner, Walt Monegan. She attends a church where she was happily present as a visiting minister prayed to protect her from witches and made what some interpret as an anti-semitic comment (but in language that is really hard to parse). But who am I to judge. Maybe that's typical for a Jane Six-Pack hockey mom, and I'm elitist to suggest otherwise.

If Kristol, Reich, Mallaby and Krugman Are All Skeptical....

Although you may not get a sense of it from reading this blog, as I focus on the 10% at issue, I don't much care for the brand of debate where people focus exclusively on the 10% of issues that give rise to contentious political debate, rather than the remaining, soft 90% of issues where people are mostly indifferent or are largely in agreement. Despite occasional controversy, it's hard to find someone who gets hot under the collar because our nation "doesn't have the sense" to eliminate the Electoral College. You would have to work pretty darn hard to find somebody who is incensed that we don't have a unicameral legislature, or that Presidents are elected every four years. You may find people who scoff in one direction or the other at notions of an "ownership society", but general concepts of capitalism and private property are uncontroversial.

But sometimes the stars align in funny ways, and a consensus forms among people on an issue that is controversial despite their political differences, or get incensed on a topic where the mainstream media seems to be largely reacting with a shrug. Perhaps it isn't too surprising that Paul Krugman, economist, and Sebastian Mallaby, defender of the financial industry, both question the Bush Administration's proposed $700 billion financial industry bailout. Given what's known of the plan, I would be surprised to see any economist not demand additional details or question the viability of the plan as proposed. And Mallaby's defense of the financial industry necessarily involves making the industry responsible for its own failings. When you advocate leaving the industry largely unregulated such that financial geniuses can find clever ways to make money without the interference of government, you can't credibly argue that when those geniuses mess up - big time - that the government should bail them out with a blank check.

Krugman's instinct may be toward more regulation and Mallaby's toward less, but their common ground is to try to hold financial institutions responsible. Putting things in very simple terms, with regulation you risk stifling innovation, and you may still the source of an eventual financial crisis. With less regulation (and I'm not aware of anybody who is seriously involved with these issues who advocates none) you risk what we're seeing right now, but you enjoy the fruits of the innovation that might otherwise occur. Under the Mallaby approach, holding financial institutions responsible for their own failures is even more critical, as that's the check that is supposed to keep them responsible in their experimentation and innovation.

Robert Reich is a very smart man, but he also has a clear political affiliation, as does Bill Kristol. Reich offers some proposals that, apparently, would make this bailout acceptable to him. (Contrast that with Mallaby, who proposed alternate plans that might achieve the desired effect without a taxpayer subsidy.) Reich's credulity - this is a plan he seems to believe we can fix - lends credence to Kristol's worry, which is sufficient in magnitude to overwhelm his more typical deference to the latest party memo:

[The plan] would enable the Treasury, without Congressionally approved guidelines as to pricing or procedure, to purchase hundreds of billions of dollars of financial assets, and hire private firms to manage and sell them, presumably at their discretion There are no provisions for - or even promises of - disclosure, accountability or transparency. Surely Congress can at least ask some hard questions about such an open-ended commitment.

And I’ve been shocked by the number of (mostly conservative) experts I’ve spoken with who aren’t at all confident that the Bush administration has even the basics right — or who think that the plan, though it looks simple on paper, will prove to be a nightmare in practice.

But will political leaders dare oppose it?

It depends upon how much cover they get. And despite Kristol's skepticism of the plan as a whole, his proposed fixes for the plan are far less significant than Reich's.

Comments by McCain on Sunday suggest he might propose an amendment along the lines of one I received in an e-mail message from a fellow semi-populist conservative: “Any institution selling securities under this legislation to the Treasury Department shall not be allowed to compensate any officer or employee with a higher salary next year than that paid the president of the United States.” This would punish overpaid Wall Streeters and, more important, limit participation in the bailout to institutions really in trouble.

Reduced salaries for one year? You could drive a semi through the loopholes that idea creates. But to his credit, Kristol ends up more in Mallaby's and Krugman's territory than in Reich's:

While assuring the public and the financial markets that his administration will act forcefully and swiftly to deal with the crisis, [McCain] could decide that he must oppose the bailout as the panicked product of a discredited administration, an irresponsible Congress, and a feckless financial establishment, all of which got us into this fine mess.

Many have observed our society's tendency to cheer on capitalism and private profits, but to socialize losses. This appears to be a grotesque example of the Bush Administration doing exactly that - with the financial industry eagerly demanding an even larger bailout of all of its junk assets. I'll credit Reich, Mallaby and Krugman with far more knowledge of economics and market theory than I, so (dare I say, like Kristol - I guess we're in that area of overlap that's so often hidden in plain sight) I'm operating more on instinct. But my instincts are screaming, "This is an incredibly bad deal for everybody but Bush, Paulson and a handful of financial elites."
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Update: Dean Baker observes,

If the bailout were properly structured, firms would not be lining up to get in. It should be a last resort that involves selling most of the firm to the government, as happened with AIG. If banks are lining up to get in, then the people who designed the bailout should be chased out of town.

Qualifications Don't Matter?

At the American Conservative, Dan Larison continues to display shell shock over McCain's choice of Palin:

But one sign in Albuquerque may have summed it up for Republican stalwarts: “Sarah - you had us at hello.” ~The Los Angeles Times

That really is the point, isn’t it? All Palin had to do was to show up, and these people were overjoyed regardless of what Palin had or hadn’t done. Much of the enthusiastic response from rank-and-file Republicans seems to be based in a simple desire for validation from the higher-ups, and in satisfying this disturbing hunger for approval it is as if all of McCain’s errors are forgiven and forgotten. This is exactly what Bush thought would happen when he nominated Harriet Miers on the assumption that evangelicals and religious conservatives would see her as one of them, and to some extent that is what happened. When the Bush administration tried to browbeat critics of the Miers nomination (which, I must stress, was a terrible nomination) with accusations of sexism and elitism, the same kinds of people who are now flinging those charges at Palin’s critics were outraged and became even more fiercely opposed to Miers.

What's the difference this time? Larison expresses concern about the "irrationality of mass democracy" and suggests why individual voters might react differently to the two situations. But the difference isn't coming from the bottom. I suspect that the "grass roots" would be as hostile to Palin as they were to Miers if they were told by their opinion leaders that they should oppose Palin. The difference is, key opinion leaders are ecstatic about Palin because they believe she is firmly wedded to a particular orthodoxy, and to them that is far more important than any understanding of the issues, experience, or objective qualification. They were uncertain about Miers - did she hold their political beliefs, and if so was she sufficiently dogmatic in her beliefs that she could be counted on to consistently hold their way as a Supreme Court Justice - so they advocated against her. They don't have those doubts about Palin.

You want to talk sexism? Take William Kristol, who can't seem to avoid making treacly, condescending comments about women.

Look the only people for Hillary Clinton are the Democratic establishment and white women… it would be crazy for the Democratic party to follow the establishment that’s led them to defeat year after year… White Women are a problem - but, you know… we all live with that…

“It’s the tears. She pretended to cry, the women felt sorry for her, and she won [the New Hampshire primary].”

If not Pawlenty or Romney, how about a woman, whose selection would presumably appeal to the aforementioned anguished Hillary supporters?

When speaking about men, Kristol finds experience to be of the utmost importance:

The two leading G.O.P. prospects have been Tim Pawlenty, the Minnesota governor, and Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor. But with Biden’s foreign policy experience as a contrast, could McCain assure voters that the young Pawlenty is ready to take over, if need be, as commander in chief?

What word would Kristol give to his application of a different standard to the genders, such that what disqualifies a man in no way disqualifies a woman?

Should voters be alarmed by a relatively young or inexperienced vice-presidential candidate? No.

Kristol didn't suddenly triumph over his misogynistic tendencies. He's comfortable with Palin's rigidity on certain issues he deems key, and thus to him her inexperience and lack of qualification is irrelevant. One moment he's lobbying for Lieberman, and in almost the next breath he's lobbying for Palin. While I have joked about the differences between those candidates, let's not overlook the commonalities near and dear to Kristol's heart - with her sincere Pentecostal beliefs she is unlikely to retreat from the Iraq war, and perhaps broader war in the Middle East, Kristol is comfortable that her positions on the war align with her own. Just as he was comfortable with Lieberman's dogmatism on the war.

Note also that although Kristol was quick and strong in his dismissal of Pawlenty on the basis of inexperience, his lobbying for the choice of Palin long predates that column. There was not one sincere word in his opposition to Pawlenty.

Even now, as he defends his vice presidential candidate of choice, Kristol finds himself unable to speak to her merits. Instead he sneers at the media for daring to ask such questions as,

Who is Sarah Palin to suddenly show up on the national stage? We didn’t vet her. And we don’t approve of her.

You know, a media reaction like this:

I'm disappointed because I expected John McCain to nominate someone with a visible and distinguished track record on the national issues - someone like Joseph Lieberman, Condoleezza Rice, or Mitt Romney - to say nothing of Elizabeth Dole, Meg Whitman and Kay Bailey Hutchison. Sarah Palin has an impressive record as a small town mayor and a couple of years as governor. She has no national or foreign policy credentials that I know of.

I'm depressed. Having polls this close meant everything rode on this nomination - and that McCain had to be ready to choose a strong nominee. Apparently, he wasn't. It is very hard to avoid the conclusion that McCain flinched from a fight on social issues. Palin is undoubtedly a decent and competent person. But her selection will unavoidably be judged as reflecting a combination of cronyism and capitulation on the part of McCain.

I'm demoralized. What does this say about a possible McCain administration - leaving aside for a moment the future of the country? Surely this is a pick from weakness. Is McCain more broadly so weak? What are the prospects for a strong McCain presidency? What are the prospects for gaining solid GOP majorities in Congress in 2008 if conservatives are demoralized? And what elected officials will step forward to begin to lay the groundwork for conservative leadership after McCain?

Yes, that approach is absolutely deplorable when you're not at the heart of it. Then it was "How dare they call us sexist for opposing a clearly unqualified candidate." Now it's, "Qualifications don't matter, and it's sexist to even look at her history as governor and mayor." The common theme? People like Kristol spin up accusations of sexism as a shield against addressing the issues - why is Miers unqualified, or why is Palin qualified?

The Vice President has two job responsibilities. First, she presides over the Senate and casts an occasional tie-breaking vote. Second, she sits around waiting to see if the President dies, in which case she assumes his office. Kristol assures us that this second role is some sort of historical footnote.

Should voters be alarmed by a relatively young or inexperienced vice-presidential candidate? No. Since 1900, five vice presidents have succeeded to the presidency during their term in office: Teddy Roosevelt in 1901, Calvin Coolidge in 1923, Harry Truman in 1945, Lyndon Johnson in 1963, and Gerald Ford in 1974. Teddy Roosevelt took over at age 42, becoming our youngest president, and he’s generally thought to have proved up to the job. Truman was V.P. for less than three months and had been kept in the dark by Franklin Roosevelt about such matters as the atom bomb — and he’s generally thought to have risen to the occasion. Character, judgment and the ability to learn seem to matter more to success as president than the number of years one’s been in Washington.

Did you catch that? Experience is irrelevant even in a President, because what really matters is "Character, judgment and the ability to learn". I suppose that makes this comment a demonstration of media misogyny?

And what exactly is her extensive experience in foreign policy or in anything? She's been a senator for six years. Obama's been a senator for two years. So, I mean, big deal.

She hasn't passed any legislation. He hasn't either. She sat in the White House while her husband was president.

And let's not forget Kristol's sneering at Obama's inexperience. Asserting different standards for a white candidate than a... no, let's not play Kristol's game on that one.

Columns We Won't See From Richard Cohen

The Richard Cohen line of thinking on Obama's choice of running mate is so... trite. And so easy. After describing Biden's good qualities - "Joe Biden is a gentleman", although "wrong on Iraq, he has been right on so much else", "he has been loyal - to his party and to his president," Cohen mind-reads Obama and tells us,

Biden's selection represents an implied admission by Obama that he lacks what Biden has: foreign policy credentials. In that sense, the Delaware senator does not make the ticket whole. Instead, he calls attention to what it lacks.

If you're going to trot out Republican Party talking points, at least have the honesty of doing so Kristol-style - just regurgitate them exactly as they were given to you:

McCain operatives were pleased by the Biden selection, which they considered, as one said to me, “a pick from weakness.”

The purpose of that talking point, lovingly embraced by Cohen, is to present any choice as being one that evidences weakness. Pick somebody whose strengths supplement your own, and your choice highlights your "weakness". Pick somebody without those strengths and the pick also only serves to highlight your "weakness". The best part is, it doesn't matter who you pick.

Let's run through some of Kristol's possible VP choices for McCain and imagine the columns Cohen won't be writing:

• Tim Pawlenty - "Pawlenty's selection represents an implied admission by McCain that he lacks what Pawlenty has: health, youth, vigor, charisma. In that sense, the Minnesota governor does not make the ticket whole. Instead, he calls attention to what it lacks."
  

• Mitt Romney - "Romney's selection represents an implied admission by McCain that he lacks what Romney has: an understanding of economics and the needs of business. In that sense, the former Massachusetts governor does not make the ticket whole. Instead, he calls attention to what it lacks."
  

• "A woman"¹ - "[A woman's] selection represents an implied admission by McCain that he lacks what [a woman] has: appeal to Hillary Clinton's supporters.² In that sense, [a woman] does not make the ticket whole. Instead, she calls attention to what it lacks."
  

• Joe Lieberman - "Lieberman's selection represents an implied admission by McCain that he lacks what Lieberman has: following his flip-flops and embrace of Bush's economic policies and the religious right, credibility with the political center. In that sense, the Connecticut senator does not make the ticket whole. Instead, he calls attention to what it lacks."

This is really quite easy - the sort of editorial you can phone in. But somehow I expect Cohen will be much more respectful of McCain's choice.
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1. Kristol believes that women are fungible, and thus rolls "Meg Whitman, the former eBay C.E.O., Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, or Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska" into a single entry.

2. Kristol speaks of McCain's selecting "a woman, whose selection would presumably appeal to the aforementioned anguished Hillary supporters." If you take issue with the notion that all a woman could bring to McCain's campaign is appeal to Clinton's supporters, and you would be correct to take issue, you should take it up with Kristol.

Good News for McCain - Hillary's Available

McCain is apparently upset that Obama didn't pick Clinton as his running mate.

Lucky for him, as he sees her as such a great choice, he can now choose her for his own campaign.

Will McCain run ads endorsing Clinton as "speaking the truth" if she turns her sights on him?
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Addendum: Even better, McCain's picking Hillary Clinton will reassure Bill Kristol that the GOP doesn't have a "glass ceiling". Apparently, that's a huge concern for Bill....

Obama Was Too Christian?

At least, that's what Bill Kristol is suggesting:

So while Obama talked of confronting evil, McCain spoke of defeating it. Obama took the view that evil is generally abroad in the world; McCain focused on radical Islam and 9/11. Obama claimed that all of us must be metaphorical “soldiers” against evil; McCain paid tribute to actual American soldiers. And McCain couldn’t resist saying again Saturday night that if he has to follow Osama bin Laden to the gates of hell¹ to get him and bring him to justice, he’ll do so.

Now, I'll forgive Kristol for not being up on the teachings of Christ, but this was a quasi-religious forum. Which answers are more consistent with the Christian view of evil?
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1. To the gates of Hell, yes, but not into Pakistan. Not that I would expect Kristol to remind us of the facts.

Predictable, As Always

William Kristol reminds us today why he opposed the reelection of George Bush, a man whose Iraq war policies he acknowledged as disastrously incompetent on national television, out of his concern that he would continue to serve as a mindless rubber stamp for a Republican-controlled Congress.

Oh, wait... I guess that was... different?

Brilliant Insight....

Bill Kristol shares,

McCain has been a major figure in American public life for quite a while. And yet his campaign has made him seem somehow smaller. Obama is a first-term senator with no legislative achievements to speak of. His campaign has helped him seem bigger, more presidential.

There are two obvious potential explanations for this, and they're not mutually exclusive:

• McCain's campaign has lessened him. His eagerness to win has resulted in his moving away from a lot of the positions that once attracted people to him.

• Obama is "bigger" and more presidential than McCain.

Kristol continues,

Even Obama’s adjustments for the general election — his flip-flops — have served in an odd way to enhance his stature. Some of them suggest, after all, that he is at least trying to think seriously about what he would do if he were actually president. So Obama has achieved the important feat, as the campaign has moved on, of seeming an increasingly plausible president. McCain seems a less plausible president today than he did when he clinched the nomination.

This is where McCain is hoist on his own petard. He can do little to directly attack Obama as "flip-flopping" as he has done at least as much (to my eye, far more) flip-flopping himself, including on issues that previously defined him (e.g., campaign finance reform, immigration, balanced budgets). When he chooses to mischaracterize Obama as having abandoned prior positions (e.g., his timetable for ending the Iraq War) and that Obama's positions are becoming indistinguishable from his own, that doesn't come across as "straight talk."

In terms of changing his campaign's leadership in order to bounce back,

The current McCain campaign is chock full of G.O.P. establishment types, many of whom aren’t great fans of the irreverent [GOP strategist Mike] Murphy. Murphy’s also made no secret of his low opinion of the Bush-Rove political machine that has produced many of these operatives.

And that's a real problem. When you load up your campaign with people whose stock and trade is a type of campaigning you claimed to deplore in 2000 and 2004, you're going to end up with a campaign that is inconsistent with your professed values. And if you decide your ship is sinking, you're going to trigger enormous ripples through your entire campaign if you try to shift it into a new direction that is just as anathematic to the scores of Bush-Rove "do anything to win" types you previously hired.

Kristol continues,

The McCain campaign this year desperately needs a message and a narrative that is both appropriate for the candidate and for the times. Thinking such a complex challenge through, and executing it, is Murphy’s strength.

Wait a minute - isn't McCain's message, "I'm the outsider on the inside; the maverick who stands up to my own party, can bridge the center, and can transform Washington"? If that message has failed, what sort of rebranding could resuscitate McCain's Campaign?

It Should Be Easy Pickin's, But....

If I were a right-wing columnist, fresh out of ideas on what to complain about today, I might say to myself, "What's MoveOn been up to lately?" Then I make fun of it, and I'm done. It should be easy, right?

I was having trouble putting my finder on just why until I came across a post by a mother of a soldier recently deployed in Iraq, at the Web site BlueStarChronicles.com.

I was having a little bit of trouble putting my finder finger on what was wrong with that sentence, then I realized... Kristol doesn't even proofread his own work. He's entirely reactive, presents no new ideas, and mostly regurgitates Republican talking points. He's blogging for the New York times, for an easy six figures per year. But, okay... he's picking on MoveOn, they do things that are easy to pick on, so a typo should be about the worst defect in his column, right?

The ad is simple. A mother speaks as she holds her baby boy:

“Hi, John McCain. This is Alex. And he’s my first. So far his talents include trying any new food and chasing after our dog. That, and making my heart pound every time I look at him. And so, John McCain, when you say you would stay in Iraq for 100 years, were you counting on Alex? Because if you were, you can’t have him.”

Take that, warmonger!

Now it might be pedantic to point out that John McCain isn’t counting on Alex to serve in Iraq, because little Alex will only be 9 years old when President McCain leaves office after two terms.

"Pedantic"? Does Kristol know the meaning of the word? The ad uses hyperbole, sure, but is it necessary for Kristol to pretend to be stupid? The reference is to McCain's willingness to keep troops in Iraq indefinitely - long after the end of his presidency. It's explicitly stated. Although Kristol yammers for a while about what McCain supposedly meant with his 100 years in Iraq comment, the fact remains - the ad doesn't suggest that there will be a century of active warfare, and is entirely consistent with McCain's comments. And McCain has yet to explain the magic by which Iraq will be transformed from its current state of active warfare to a peaceful idyll where U.S. troops are posted to protect its borders from potentially hostile neighbors. (If the Maliki government holds, Iran seems more likely an ally to Iraq than a potential invader.)

Kristol carries on,

But it is surely relevant to point out that the United States has an all-volunteer Army. Alex won’t be drafted, and his mommy can’t enlist him. He can decide when he’s an adult whether he wants to serve. And, of course, McCain supports the volunteer army.

Sure, we have an all volunteer military. We also have Selective Service, "just in case" we change our minds. Kristol is seriously promising that the United States will never again have a draft, no matter what the circumstances, at any time in the future? My goodness, where can I get one of those rose-colored Kristol crystal balls?

And then Kristol devolves into self-parody:

Here’s what the mother of an actual soldier has to say about the remarks of the mother of the prospective non-soldier in the ad:

“Does that mean that she wants other people’s sons to keep the wolves at bay so that her son can live a life of complete narcissism? What is it she thinks happens in the world? ... Someone has to stand between our society and danger. If not my son, then who? If not little Alex then someone else will have to stand and deliver. Someone’s son, somewhere.”

This is the sober truth. Unless we enter a world without enemies and without war, we will need young men and women willing to risk their lives for our nation. And we’re not entering any such world.

It's too easy. Kristol came of age during the Vietnam war. When did he serve, again? How respectful is Kristol of actual war veterans?

Can you even imagine young Billy sitting at the dinner table with Irving (who, it is fair to note, did serve in the military) and saying, "Dad, I want to join the military to serve my nation against the communist menace." No, like Dick Cheney and so many of his right-wing, war cheerleading peers, Kristol had "other priorities". They didn't serve, their children don't serve, but they put forth a jingoistic pro-military face in public while privately regarding military service as beneath them. And it is thus in defense of self, not nation, that Kristol adds,

We do, however, live in a free country with a volunteer army. In the United States, individuals can choose to serve in the military or not. The choice not to serve should carry no taint, nor should it be viewed with the least prejudice. If Alex chooses to pursue other opportunities, he won’t be criticized by John McCain or anyone else.

I disagree. If you are going to champion wars, sending other people's kids off to fight in wars, and whinge that others view the sacrifice of soldiers as "unnecessary and deplorable relics of the past"¹, I think you should be able to point to at least one tiny incident in your life where you demonstrated a modicum of physical courage. Otherwise, at least have the rhetorical courage to admit that your life choice involves having other people go off to fight and die in the wars you champion, with no consequence to yourself or your family, and you like it that way.
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1. Kristol attacks the ad:

The ad boldly embraces a vision of a selfish and infantilized America, suggesting that military service and sacrifice are unnecessary and deplorable relics of the past.

Although the ad is critical of the Iraq War and McCain's Iraq policy, there's actually nothing in the ad that is even slightly critical of the military or of military service. That part's all Bill.

Kristol On Debates

Funny, when Kristol was cheerleading for Bush back in 2004 I don't recall him ever complaining, "But Bush is doing the country and electorate a genuine disservice by only agreeing to three debates." No, that sort of complaint is reserved for Democratic primary candidates, who have "only" participated in twenty-one debates. Kristol smirks,

On Friday in Indiana, Obama talked tough in response to a question: “I get pretty fed up with people questioning my patriotism.” And, he continued, “I am happy to have that debate with them any place, anytime.” He’s happy to have fantasy debates with unnamed people who are allegedly challenging his patriotism. But he’s not willing to have a real debate with the real person he’s competing against for the nomination.

... For the twenty-second time.

Let's get real for a moment. What's the advantage to Obama in participating in a debate? It's not like G.W., where he was fortunate enough that an obeisant media led by people like Kristol handed him "wins" for performances that, shall we say, involved significant departures from reality. ("I own a lumber business? That's news to me... Need some wood?") Or where hacks and tools like Kristol were happy to facilitate his hiding from any one-on-one encounter where he might actually have to, you know, think on his feet. Even within the context of the exceedingly complex, self-serving rules Bush and Kerry created for their "debates", hacks like Kristol were pleased to see their man avoid further scrutiny in a context where other people might shape the message.

This is no different. Particularly after the shameful performance of the moderators in the last debate, why would Obama choose to risk having somebody else again attempt to define him and his image in the light of various rumors and petty scandals, when he can instead present the image he prefers? Oh yes, there is a difference - for Kristol, it's only the candidate he favors who should be permitted to retreat from debates and control his own image.

There's something to the idea that debates do the public a service, forcing candidates to speak about the issues or address matters they would prefer fall into the background. That's part of the supposed justification for the smearfest at the start of the last "debate" - who cares about Iraq, health care, energy policy, whatever. "We" want to know more about Rev. Wright, and why Obama didn't conduct a full background check and pull a rap sheet for every person he's associated with over the last forty years. Clinton's offer of an unmoderated debate? Do you think she would stick to actual issues - the economy, health care, Iraq, etc., or do you think she'd be right back in the gutter, confronting Obama on the "issues" Gibson and Stephanopoulos prefer? I have nothing against Clinton, but I think at this point it's obvious that she is perfectly happy to splash around in the gutter if it helps her win.

I would prefer more debates. Perhaps Obama should counter Clinton's proposal by offering her a public debate, but only on specific issues - the ones voters supposedly care about, like health care, tax policy, and the Iraq war. No mention of sniper fire in Bosnia or sitting on charity boards with ex-radicals. But barring that, we're likely to get more of the same - and I can't recall the last time I learned something substantive from one of these debates. Like it or not, in the present context, Obama's choice to decline another debate allows him to better control his message and his image. You and I don't have to like it, but that's what they call "good politics".

Oh, Spare Me

William Kristol pretends,

And an experienced Democratic operative e-mailed: “Finally, I think [McCain’s] going to win. Obama isn’t growing in stature. Once I thought he could be Jimmy Carter, but now he reminds me more of Michael Dukakis with the flag lapel thing and defending Wright. Plus he doesn’t have a clue how to talk to the middle class. He’s in the Stevenson reform mold out of Illinois, with a dash of Harvard disease thrown in.”

Because that's what anonymous "experienced Democratic operatives" do... they send emails to meretricious Republican hacks, savaging Democratic candidates.

"I once thought he could be Jimmy Carter..."? Please.

How Could *They* Do Such A Thing....

I know Kristol has a brain somewhere in his head, but sometimes he does a good job hiding it.

Consider our last four presidential elections. If voters had simply looked at the biographies of the major-party candidates, they would have chosen George H. W. Bush in 1992, Bob Dole in 1996, Al Gore in 2000 and John Kerry in 2004. Instead, they rejected four veterans who served in wartime (and who also had considerable experience in public life) for Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, who had lesser résumés, both civilian and military.

Of those, how many times did Kristol get behind the candidate with the better résumé? Maybe 1996? How many times did he get squarely behind a disastrously bad president, despite his lack of qualification and lack of service to the nation? At least twice. I spoke to a life-long Republican last year who commented on his voting history, "I only made two mistakes, and both of them were named 'George Bush'". Kristol seems happy to say, "Yes, that guy made a mistake," but refuses to concede the implication for his own bad choices.

Campaign consultants like to say elections are about the present and the future more than the past. To the degree they are about the past, they’re about the very recent past: “What have you done for me lately?” But we don’t even hear that question much anymore. Today’s campaigns are designed to capture the present and imagine the future.

Let's be honest, Bill Clinton makes Kristol's list while Reagan does not, only because of the disaster that is George W. Bush. We could push it back further - look at, say, 1980 and 1984? Whatever you think of his record in office, isn't Reagan the quintessential example of the triumph of image over experience at the ballot box?

These comparisons also implicate a subjective question: What exactly is it that constitutes "good experience" for a presidential candidate? Being a governor? Being a Senator? Serving in the House of Representatives? Business experience? Maybe part of the problem is that Kristol's sense of what constitutes the best qualifications for the Presidency don't correspond to those of the electorate.

If we look at Kristol's voting history, unless he's admitting that he will let an infatuation for a candidate overwhelm his common sense or objectivity, he's not even accurately describing his own preferred résumé. Here, Kristol depicts "military service plus a long Senate career" as the ultimate résumé for a Presidential candidate, but his personal record betrays his contempt for such a résumé in practice. There are even hints of it in this attempt to buttress McCain. Compare and contrast:

McCain knows this. As an elected official, he’s never rested on his P.O.W. laurels, remarkable though they are. He’s been a major player in the Senate — in foreign policy and military matters, and as a successful sponsor of (sometimes misguided) domestic reform legislation.

versus the next paragraph,

As a presidential candidate, McCain is running, as one would expect, a substantive foreign policy campaign, as shown by his fine speech last week before the Los Angeles World Affairs Council. But with recession on the horizon, three-quarters of the American public thinking the country’s on the wrong track, and the president and Congress at historically low approval levels — shouldn’t we be seeing more of McCain the domestic reformer?

Has Kristol truly lost track of what other right-wingers (including the lunatic fringe) and Republican party hacks have said about McCain's domestic record? Let's look to George Will: By signing on to McCain-Feingold, G.W. Bush "forfeited his right to be trusted as a custodian of the Constitution". From the perspective of the political right, isn't that just one of the "sometimes misguided" domestic policies Kristol references? Immigration "amnesty" anyone?

Am I surprised that McCain wants to depict himself as a set of bookends - from "war hero" to "elder statesman"... with a lot of experience in between, but let's not look at it too hard? No. I'm also not surprised by jingoistic campaign slogans. (I think he's currently going with something like "Americans For John McCain, An American President For Americans In America".) If Kristol is truly advocating for McCain to take up the mantle of "Mr. Domestic Policy", he needs to talk to some of his colleagues about the possible ramifications to McCain's campaign.

Syndicated Columnists Are Often Cowardly, Shallow And Dishonest....

And, of course, Bill Kristol is a syndicated columnist.

Seriously, let's take a look at his latest smear piece:

• "But orators often ask themselves the convenient questions, not the difficult ones. And Barack Obama is an accomplished orator."
• "After all, politicians sometimes indulge in ridiculous and unfair comparisons to make a point. And Barack Obama is an able politician."
• "But ambitious men sometimes do a disservice to the best in their own communities. And Barack Obama is an ambitious man."

Kristol could have added to my amusement by couching his observations in the form of questions, but... close enough. As I previously observed,

I'm left wondering if Kristol writes his editorials at a desk, or while sitting in front of a highly polished vanity mirror.

Who is he really writing about?

If he were really writing about Barack Obama, he wouldn't need to dance around his accusations. He could say, "Barack Obama is indulging in ridiculous and unfair comparisons to make a point." But instead he utilizes faulty logic to make a smear he is apparently afraid to present directly. Instead we get things like this:

• Party hacks are often spineless cowards.
• Bill Kristol is a party hack.
• Draw your own conclusion.

But don't prejudge Kristol - while the bulk of his column is composed of that type of smear by innuendo, we haven't gotten to the meat of his attack yet:

The last thing we need now is a heated national conversation about race.

Hm. Some might argue that the last thing we need is a rich, white Republican party hack telling us that we don't need a national conversation about race. But let's hear him out.

Luckily, Obama isn’t really interested in getting enmeshed in a national conversation on race.

Okay, Bill... then the point of this column was to share the fact that you shuddered about something that you don't expect to happen? Really, couldn't you find a better foundation for your smear piece than, "I shudder at the bogeyman, even though he doesn't exist?" Particularly given that your smears about things that don't make you shudder once again reveal your trademark sloppiness with the facts.

The real question, of course, is not why Obama joined Trinity, but why he stayed there for two decades, in the flock of a pastor who ... suggested soon after 9/11 that “America’s chickens are coming home to roost.”

For the "chickens" line, Wright was quoting Ambassador Edward Peck. You know, one of those wild, out-of-control Republican appointees....

Meanwhile, we're five years into the war under a leadership Kristol describes as having driven us into a ditch. He's not only comfortable in the passenger seat, he insists upon keeping the same driver while screaming "Step on it!" Yeah, he's one to lecture Obama for hanging with the wrong crowd....

... Miniature American Flags for Others ...

William Kristol takes belated note of the fact that Barack Obama stopped wearing an American Flag lapel pin at the time it became a leading example of Republican tokenism - that is, after the 9/11 attacks, when Republicans (including G.W.) who were rarely if ever seen to wear a flag pin on their lapels made it part of their standard wardrobe.

But Obama chose to present his flag-pin removal as a principled gesture. “You know, the truth is that right after 9/11, I had a pin. Shortly after 9/11, particularly because as we’re talking about the Iraq war, that became a substitute for I think true patriotism, which is speaking out on issues that are of importance to our national security, I decided I won’t wear that pin on my chest.”

Leave aside the claim that “speaking out on issues” constitutes true patriotism. What’s striking is that Obama couldn’t resist a grandiose explanation. Obama’s unnecessary and imprudent statement impugns the sincerity or intelligence of those vulgar sorts who still choose to wear a flag pin. But moral vanity prevailed. He wanted to explain that he was too good — too patriotic! — to wear a flag pin on his chest.

Kristol builds a fascinating false dichotomy here - between flag pins and "speaking out" as the only possible illustrations of patriotism, with declining to wear a flag pin being pitched as the wrong choice.

I think Obama's is a peculiar approach to the issue, but the explanation was not volunteered by Obama at the start of his silent protest. It was elicited when a reporter asked about the issue. And let's be honest, Kristol wouldn't care what answer Obama gave. Just as it doesn't matter to Kristol that his Republican masters are once again using the flag as a political prop. Wrapping yourself in the flag for political gain, I guess, is what Kristol would deem "patriotism." It's fascinating how quickly Kristol is willing to leave aside "speaking out on issues that are of importance to our national security" as an illustration of patriotism - perhaps because the politicians he favors are so craven? At the end of his column, Kristol writes, "[McCain's] patriotism has consisted of deeds more challenging than “speaking out on issues" - an attack built off of the earlier false dichotomy. Are we to pretend Obama could have avoided this attack by wearing a flag on his lapel?

Kristol then proceeds to make the usual idiot's assertion about Michelle Obama's comments on pride.

Michelle Obama’s adult life goes back to the mid-1980s. Can it really be the case that nothing the U.S. achieved since then has made her proud?

Obviously it is possible to be proud in many specific accomplishments of a person, institution, or country without extrapolating that pride to the everything the person, institution or country does. For example, you can be impressed that Bill Kristol told the truth about G.W. driving the Iraq war into a ditch, while being appalled at his continued cheerleading of what he knows to be an incompetent effort. It goes both ways, as well. I'm sure a lot of people who work at the New York Times are proud of their paper, yet are horrified that somebody as willfully obtuse as Kristol now has a regular gig on the Op/Ed page.

The idea of an Obama "cult of personality" where the Democrats push forward a candidate who " tends too much toward the preening self-regard of Bill Clinton, the patronizing elitism of Al Gore and the haughty liberalism of John Kerry? Isn't that how a growing number of Republicans are presently describing G.W.?

In some senses, it's pathetic that the right-wing attack machine can find so little ammunition against Barack Obama that they are trying to turn Michelle Obama into Hillary, redux. How long will it be before she has to bashfully appear on daytime TV with a plate full of freshly baked cookies?

Parliamentary Systems Versus Ours

If your mind is still reeling from Kristol's ability to draw the lesson of "Shut up and trust the government" out of an Orwell essay, you'll quickly recognize this as a much smaller defect in Kristol's editorial. But it's worth noting that when Orwell criticized a "permanent and pensioned opposition, as in England", he was referencing a parliamentary minority. In a parliamentary system, the Prime Minister is the leader of the ruling party. If that party has a majority of the seats in Parliament - a "majority government" - it can run roughshod over the minority party (or parties). We had something similar happen during the first six years of GW's Presidency. To conflate a parliamentary majority with control only of the executive, as Kristol did, reflects ignorance - be it actual or willful.

Why bother reading Orwell if you don't have sufficient knowledge or intellectual curiosity to figure out what he's talking about?