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OCTOBER 16,  2015

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:56 P.M. ET:

HILLARY GAINS IN NEW HAMPSHIRE – From The Politico:  Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders are in a dead heat among likely New Hampshire primary voters, according to the results of a Suffolk University/Boston Globe poll released Friday.  Approximately 37 percent went for the former secretary of state, while 35 percent threw their support behind Sanders. Vice President Joe Biden, who has not announced a run, received just 11 percent. Additionally, just 36 percent want Biden to get into the race, while about 50 percent say the vice president should not seek a third run for the White House (he previously ran in the 1988 and 2008 cycles). This is clearly a reaction to Clinton's strong performance at Tuesday night's debate.  We'll see if it lasts. 

GETTING STUDENTS CORRECT FOR HALLOWEEN – From College Insurrection:   Now that Columbus Day is over, Wesleyan University is turning its attention toward the next controversial date on the calendar: Halloween.  Wesleyan’s Office of Student Affairs has placed posters throughout campus, an example of which was obtained by Inside Higher Ed, featuring a “Halloween Checklist” to help students determine whether their costume ideas might be offensive.  “Is your costume offensive?” the poster asks. “Check yourself and your friends.”  There follows a list of several general questions that students are encouraged to ask themselves before settling on a costume, such as whether it “[mocks] cultural or religious symbols such as dreadlocks, headdresses, afros, bindis, etc.” Another red flag, according to the flyer, are costumes that “attempt to represent an entire culture or ethnicity.”  I'll be careful not to wear my "British gentleman" costume.  British lives matter!

HERE IT COMES – There were justifiable fears that the Iran nuclear deal would cause a nuclear arms race in the Mideast.  From AP:   WASHINGTON (AP) — Amid fears of an atomic arms race in the Middle East, a senior United Arab Emirates official has told a top US lawmaker that it too might seek the right to enrich uranium that Iran has asserted under the recently signed nuclear deal.  The landmark Iran accord to curb its nuclear weapons in exchange for economic sanctions relief allows Tehran to enrich uranium. In barely noticed testimony last month, Rep. Ed Royce (R-California), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said the UAE’s ambassador in Washington, Yousef al-Otaiba, had informed him in a telephone call that the country no longer felt bound by its previous nuclear agreement with the United States.  This is just what we need.  Makes the world safe for hypocrisy.

October 16, 2015       Permalink

JOE – AT 9:45 A.M. ET:  There's an old saying in presidential politics that a candidate is never so popular than on the day before he announces for president.   So CNN and the others are now hyping the "excitement" over an expected announcement by Joe Biden regarding his election intentions.  Oh the heat!  Oh the wanting of Joe!  From the LA Times:

Vice President Joe Biden is nearing a final decision on a possible White House run, according to a message to his political network from one of his closest advisors.

"If he decides to run, we will need each and every one of you -- yesterday," says the message from Biden's longtime aide Ted Kaufman.

The campaign would be motivated by his “burning conviction” to boost the middle class, the message says.

Biden is aware of looming deadlines for getting on the ballot in some states, but his “first and foremost consideration” remains the welfare of his family, Kaufman said in the message, which was obtained by The Times.

“He has been in public and political life a long time and he has a good grip on the mechanics around this decision,” Kaufman writes. “It will not surprise you, as it does not surprise me, what he will weigh in the decision and what -- being Joe Biden -- he will not.”

COMMENT:  Frankly, I think many people are getting tired of the Biden watch.  True, latest polling shows that he would defeat any leading Republican candidate, whereas Hillary would lose to almost all of them.  But Hillary had a good debate Tuesday night, and that will be considered in Biden's decision.

And what will happen if Joe jumps in?  He'll get a bump, then reality will set in as Dems contemplate a very divisive and possibly ugly primary race.

I love it.

October 16, 2015       Permalink

THE FIELD MARSHAL MARCHES ON – AT 8:57 A.M. ET:  Obama's latest decision on Afghanistan reflects a long pattern, which has resulted in one American loss after another.  From the Washington Times: 

In the end, President Obama was forced to listen to his generals — not his political instincts — on Afghanistan troop levels, and he decided to split the difference.

Mr. Obama is keeping 5,500 troops in Afghanistan beyond his presidency, about half the strength recommended by his top general in-country. It marks the sixth time he has rejected the advice of a ground commander on the force size in the long Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Military experts call that streak unprecedented for a commander in chief.

Like the current 9,800 U.S. troops there, the drawdown force of 5,500 will maintain a noncombat stance in training Afghan forces and hunting al Qaeda terrorists, Mr. Obama said Thursday. Administration officials said the U.S. will spend about $14.6 billion a year to house the troops at a total of four bases in Kabul, Kandahar, Jalalabad and Bagram — an increase over the estimated $10 billion annual cost of keeping a force at the U.S. Embassy in the Afghan capital.

The president had wanted to deliver a speech saying that all American troops were out of Afghanistan at the end of next year, as he did in 2011 for the U.S. withdrawal from Iraq. But he was swayed by the dark picture of the Afghan conflict that the top brass has been drawing for him, and now Mr. Obama will pass the war onto the next president in 2017.

COMMENT:  I heard a remark from a high-ranking military figure – I cannot confirm the truth of this – that Obama has received about 115 recommendations from military leaders, and has turned down every one of them.  It wouldn't surprise me.

Obama just isn't interested in military affairs, doesn't much like the military, and, bottom line, doesn't much like his own country.  We just have to get through the next 15 months with him, and it will be difficult.

October 16, 2015       Permalink

THIS GETS SERIOUS – AT 8:35 A.M. ET:  Comments by President Obama have gotten under the skin of FBI agents investigating Hillary Clinton.  Not a good thing.  From The New York Times: 

WASHINGTON — Federal agents were still cataloging the classified information from Hillary Rodham Clinton’s personal email server last week when President Obama went on television and played down the matter.

“I don’t think it posed a national security problem,” Mr. Obama said Sunday on CBS’s “60 Minutes.” He said it was a mistake for Mrs. Clinton to use a private email account when she was secretary of state, but his conclusion was unmistakable: “This is not a situation in which America’s national security was endangered.”

Those statements angered F.B.I. agents who have been working for months to determine whether Ms. Clinton’s email setup had in fact put any of the nation’s secrets at risk, according to current and former law enforcement officials.

Investigators have not reached any conclusions about whether the information on the server had been compromised or whether to recommend charges, according to the law enforcement officials. But to investigators, it sounded as if Mr. Obama had already decided the answers to their questions and cleared anyone involved of wrongdoing.

The White House quickly backed off the president’s remarks and said Mr. Obama was not trying to influence the investigation. But his comments spread quickly, raising the ire of officials who saw an instance of the president trying to influence the outcome of a continuing investigation — and not for the first time.

COMMENT:  Read the whole well-reported article.  Obama doesn't want Hillary to succeed him – he'd clearly prefer Biden – but he doesn't want to appear personally to be sinking her.   It's a destructive balancing act, but agents conducting the investigation are clearly not amused.  Presidential words are bound to have some effect, if not on the FBI, then on the prosecutors – political appointees in many cases – who must decide what cases to prosecute.

October 16,  2015     Permalink

OCTOBER 15,  2015

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:55 P.M. ET: 

GOP ROMPS IN PENNSYLVANIA – New polling in Pennsylvania by PPP, generally regarded as a tilting-Democratic pollster, shows every major GOP presidential candidate except Jeb Bush beating Hillary Clinton in the general.  Trump is up 2, Carson 4, Carly 1, Rubio 3.  Clinton only beats Bush, by 5.  But no candidate reaches the 50 percent mark.  Many are undecided.  Pennsylvania usually goes Democratic, so these early numbers can't be encouraging to the Democrats.

DEM INFIGHTING – The media likes to play up infighting within the GOP, but the Dems are having their own battles.  There are charges flying that Democratic National Committee Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz, has been playing the dictator and that she is just a front operator for Hillary Clinton.  From The Hill:   A vice chair of the Democratic National Committee says the chairwoman, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (Fla.), did not consult others about the party's primary debate schedule as she claims and is questioning her leadership.  R.T. Rybak, a former mayor of Minneapolis, told The New York Times on Thursday that Wasserman Schultz had made statements that were "flat out not true."  “This is not a back-and-forth between a chair and a vice chair,” he said, according to the Times.  “This is a chair of the Democratic Party wrongly stating that she consulted with all of the party officers. I was not consulted. I know that [Rep.] Tulsi Gabbard [D-Hawaii] was not consulted. And this is becoming about much more than debates.” Rybak's comments are the latest salvo in an internal party fight over the number of presidential primary debates.  Let 'em fight over the wreckage that Barack Obama is leaving.

MORE SCANDAL FOR HILLARY – From Fox:   A watchdog group is asking the Internal Revenue Service to investigate whether the Clinton Foundation broke federal law by making payments to Hillary Clinton's failed 2008 presidential campaign.  Matthew Whitaker, executive director of the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust, pressed the IRS on whether the nearly $350,000 the Clinton Foundation paid to rent Clinton's email list after she failed to secure the Democratic nomination was above "fair market value," which is the benchmark used to determine whether such payments constitute veiled donations rather than typical transactions.   The Clinton Foundation made a payment of $274,297 to the campaign in Feb. 2009 and another payment of $75,000 in March of that year, Federal Election Commission filings show.  As an American, I'm sickened by these constant attacks on our former first lady.  I have personally seen her warmth, integrity, and graciousness.  I use a large telescope for that purpose.

October 15,  2015     Permalink

THE DEM DEBATE – QUOTE OF THE DAY – AT 11:25 A.M. ET:  Karl Rove nails the reality of Hillary Clinton's famous victory in Tuesday's Democratic debate.  From The Wall Street Journal:

The Democratic debate Tuesday revealed the best thing that Hillary Clinton has going for her: the weakness of her challengers.

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders came off as an elderly, dyspeptic Bilbo Baggins attending a British Labour Party meeting. Former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley sounded like an overly earnest, slightly too intense 1950s ad man making a bad pitch. Former Rhode Island Gov.Lincoln Chafee was as hapless as a puppy stranded in a hurricane. And former Virginia Sen. Jim Webb, probably sensing how inconsequential he is, was angry all night. It’s hard to believe this crew will draw many viewers for future debates.

Hillary Clinton, on the other hand, reminded the crowd that she is a good debater who bested then-Sen. Barack Obama in most of their 2008 matchups. She was knowledgeable, in command and much less mechanical than usual. Team Clinton was right to be elated with her performance.

There is little doubt now that Mrs. Clinton will be her party’s nominee, barring an indictment or similar dramatic event. Still, Mrs. Clinton’s managers shouldn’t kid themselves: Her intraparty competition is pitiful, and her challenges in the general election remain enormous.

It is striking how far left the Democratic Party—including Mrs. Clinton—has moved. Candidates spent the debate trying to outdo one another on gun control, climate change and busting up Wall Street.

One example: When asked to state America’s greatest national-security threat, Mr. Sanders did not say Islamic State, which controls much of Syria, Iraq and Iran. He did not say Russia, entrenched in Ukraine and emerging as a dominant power in the Middle East, or even China, threatening its neighbors in the west Pacific.

He named climate change. One can imagine President Sanders ordering special forces to the headquarters of Exxon, Shell and Chevron to haul off oilmen to re-education camps cooled and heated by renewable energy.

COMMENT:  Very well said.  But Hillary will have one enormous advantage in the general election – press bias, the same force that mightily helped put Barack Obama in the White House.  Countering that must be a major factor in Republican planning, and I think it will be.

October 15, 2015       Permalink

PLANNED PARENTHOOD – AT 10:31 A.M. ET:   Planned Parenthood, considered the holy of holies in the abortion movement, has taken some hits recently in the form of secretly recorded videos exposing the organization's alleged sale of fetal body parts.   Andrew Malcolm at IBD reports on the effect on the organization's once pristine reputation:

Despite a series of shocking, secretly-recorded videos of Planned Parenthood officers discussing sale of body parts from aborted babies, the American public still thinks favorably of the organization.

The new Gallup Poll found that 59% of 1,015 adults surveyed this month still have a positive overall opinion about the organization.

This would seem to suggest that, entering a volatile presidential election year, politicians should tread carefully when considering involvement in the emotional public and congressional debate over defunding Planned Parenthood of the $548 million in taxpayer money it's awarded annually.

IBD's editorial board examined the issues at play here amid suggestions that media coverage of the grisly videos and the nonchalant luncheon discussion of harvesting infant body parts for sale was limited for ideological reasons.

However, the survey also found that PP's 59% favorable rating is actually down significantly from the 81% favorables it held in 1993, the last time that Gallup polled this question.

Meanwhile, the group's overall very unfavorable rating has jumped from 5% in 1993 to 23% this month.

COMMENT:  Planned Parenthood's image is certainly being eroded, but only a limited number of viewers saw those videos.  If more had seen them, the numbers would be worse.

Coverage of the videos by the media was disgraceful, with only Fox giving them the attention they deserved.

October 15, 2015       Permalink 

THE FIELD MARSHAL DECIDES – AT 9:28 A.M. ET:  Whoops.  Guess Plan A didn't work out.  Field Marshal Obama, having been so completely successful in all his other strategic planning, has now decided to reverse a decision.  I am left breathless by the brilliance of his thinking.  From Fox: 

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama will keep 5,500 U.S. troops in Afghanistan when he leaves office in 2017, according to senior administration officials, casting aside his promise to end the war on his watch and instead ensuring he hands the conflict off to his successor.

Obama had originally planned to pull out all but a small, embassy-based U.S. military presence by the end of next year, a timeline coinciding with the final weeks of his presidency. But military leaders argued for months that the Afghans needed additional assistance and support from the U.S. to beat back a resurgent Taliban and hold onto gains made over the last 14 years of American bloodshed and billions of dollars in aid.

The president was to announce the changes Thursday morning from the White House. Officials said he would outline plans to maintain the current force of 9,800 troops in Afghanistan through most of next year, then draw down to 5,500 troops in 2017, at a pace still to be determined by commanders.

COMMENT:  Yeah, the next president will have to pick up the job not done by Obama.  Obama never seems to have a real fix on strategy.  He doesn't seem interested.  He's probably trying to avoid a total collapse of our position in Afghanistan so he won't be blamed, which is what it's always about.

October 15, 2015       Permalink

NOT ENCOURAGING – AT 8:55 A.M. ET:  A few weeks ago a clueless Donald Trump was saying we should allow Russia to do our job for us by knocking out ISIS in Syria.  Now he's saying that he isn't convinced pro-Russian separatists took down a Malaysian airliner, despite newly released evidence that they did.  Trump is hardly coming off as a credible voice in foreign policy.  When you start siding with Russia...  From CNN:

Washington (CNN) Donald Trump doesn't believe there is enough evidence to blame pro-Russian separatists for last year's downing of a commercial airliner over Ukraine -- despite the fact that the U.S. intelligence community believes "with confidence" that pro-Russian separatists shot it down.

Trump was asked on MSNBC Wednesday about a new report from Dutch investigators that Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was shot down by a Russian-made rocket and warhead -- and asked what he would do as president to hold Russia accountable.

"They say it wasn't them," he replied. "It may have been their weapon, but they didn't use it, they didn't fire it, they even said the other side fired it to blame them. I mean to be honest with you, you'll probably never know for sure."

Trump later said the culprit was "probably" Russia and pro-Russian fighters, but he said the U.S. needs to focus on its own problems right now and not "get involved" in overseas conflicts, even one as "horrible" as this.

"I think it is horrible," Trump said of the incident. "But they're saying it wasn't them. The other side says it is them. And we're going to go through that arguing for probably for 50 years and nobody is ever going to know. Probably was Russia."

COMMENT:  Gee, Donald, thanks for such a sophisticated analysis.  And thanks for undercutting the Dutch investigators, who have a solid reputation. 

All Donald had to do was say that he wouldn't comment until he'd studied the matter.  That's what experienced pros do. 

Trump appears to have stalled in the polls, with Carson coming up behind him. 

The next debate is October 28th, and maybe we'll be able to make further judgments.  But there will still be too many Republican candidates on the stage, and that is causing severe damage to the process.  The Democratic debate had four contenders, producing far more useful focus on each individual.

October 15,  2015     Permalink