As Dem John Edwards gets a shot in the arm today with a major union endorsement by the NH chapter of the SEIU, it’s worth pondering if only for a moment last night’s Dem semi-debate in Philadephia -- which was most certainly not a city of sisterly or brotherly love for Hillary Clinton. MSNBC moderators Brian Williams and Tim Russert did their best to stir things up from the beginning by lobbing Barack Obama an anti-Clinton set up pitch (one his advisors had begged for publicly the past few days) that turned into a living room conversation act. But it was just the beginning for Hillary and the others weren’t so accommodating. The MSNBC boys kept at it and gave the other Dems every chance to throw punch after punch at Hillary. For her part, Hillary stood tough but her rope-a-dope strategy of taking the hits and coming back for more (and even referring to her rivals as friends) revealed a potential fatal weakness -- someone who can win an election but may have trouble governing, a point brought home no so kindly by the interrogation firm of Edwards, Obama, Dodd, and Biden (Gov. Bill Richardson stood out by not jumping on the anti-Hillary bandwagon and Rep. Dennis Kucinich was as usual in his own orbit and deserves an award for bring up impeaching George bush and talking about UFOs during a single show ). She looked equal parts in control and on the defensive and she went out of her way to be so very careful that someone new to the race might wonder just what she stands for. Her explanations about Iran, releasing her White House records and New York’s immigration policy left her debating herself at times.

Her main calling card seemed to be that the Republican candidates are “obsessed” with her which is both true and a strange insertion. Anybody paying attention the past 15 years knows all too well it’s less her policy positions (which are as mainstream as can be) than her simple existence that, quite unfairly I might add, make her a target of the “obsessed” GOP candidates. Chris Dodd brought it up that, in his estimate, half the country wouldn’t vote for her or doesn’t like her. If anything, last night’s scuffle showed, the Dem race is anything but a coronation even though Clinton remains the main attraction. In my daily link, John Dickerson of Slate gives his take on the best debate of the bunch so far.

No surprise that Joe Biden won line of the night with his zinger about the Mayor of 9/11, Rudy Giuliani. When sizing up the qualifications issue, Biden said: "And the irony is, Rudy Giuliani, probably the most underqualified man since George Bush to seek the presidency, is here talking about any of the people here. Rudy Giuliani... I mean, think about it! Rudy Giuliani. There's only three things he mentions in a sentence -- a noun, a verb, and 9/11. There's nothing else! There's nothing else! And I mean this sincerely. He's genuinely not qualified to be president."

Posted by Michael McCord at 11:30 AM| Permalink | Comments (0)

Sign of the strange times: In previous primary election cycles we might hear candidates debate the finer points of social security indexing or the importance of having a humble and thoughtful foreign policy outlook (see Bush, George W., 2000). Ah, but in the 2008 fun house we see some GOP candidates working to define torture and giving a cost-benefit analysis on its impact. Needless to say, this trends slightly to the bizarre for the world’s most powerful country to (1) need to resort to torture as if we were living in a real episode of ‘24’ and (2) to have politicians make political hay out of it. It leads one to wonder just what kind of crowd Rudy Giuliani is teasing when he ponders the details of water boarding and gives an ambivalent answer about whether it’s torture -- mind you this is a form of deadly coercion developed nicely in the Spanish Inquisition. That we are discussing it is a double-edged sword -- it’s healthy in the same way that honestly discussing a disease is more beneficial than not but it’s sobering to think we have sunk to this point in an unhealthy quest for pristine security.
In my daily link, Walter Shapiro of Salon chronicles the heightened “macho” line taken by GOP candidates -- what I call the Village People campaign theme. And you have to give it the Republican candidate comedy writers who continue to turn out unforgettable quips -- first there was John McCain being all “tied up” during Woodstock in 1969 and then yesterday in Londonderry Giuliani accused the Dems of being acid-laden daydream believers. Dean Barker at Blue Hampshire had this post capturing the Giuliani routine at its psychedelic best:
“This is the world we live in. It’s not this happy, romantic-like world where we’ll negotiate with this one, or we’ll negotiate with that one and there will be no preconditions, and we’ll invite (Iranian President Mahmoud) Ahmadinejad to the White House, we’ll invite Osama (bin Laden) to the White House,” Giuliani said.
“Hillary and Obama are kind of debating whether to invite them to the inauguration or the inaugural ball,” he added.
The best comeback came from Kate Bedingfield of the Edwards campaign. Barker quoted her as saying “Rudy Giuiliani’s convoluted foreign policy theories sound like George Bush, without all the thinking.”

UPDATE 1
As if on cue, Dem presidential hopeful Sen. Joe Biden sent out this press release (in his Senate capacity) urging senators to support his legislation that call for, among other things, banning torture. In a letter to fellow Senators he noted "it is sad that a nation with a longstanding, proud tradition of condemning torture finds itself embroiled in a debate regarding whether torture is legal. Both domestic law and international treaties clearly ban torture. Unfortunately, the current Administration's cramped, disingenuous arguments necessitate such a debate."

Biden might have added the same thing goes for too many presidential candidates whose tough talk defies both practicality and even highly flexible definations of sanity.

Posted by Michael McCord at 11:34 AM| Permalink | Comments (0)

So Sen. Judd Gregg has given his seal of approval to Mitt Romney which may prove to be little more than a passing headline for a majority of GOP primary voters here. “Mitt Romney embodies New Hampshire’s values — values that stress government living within its means, lower taxes, a stronger military and stronger families,” Gregg said via a Romney campaign statement about the endorsement made in Concord earlier today. “Governor Romney is the strong leader we need to lead America forward.” This raises a question: just where would Romney move America forward to?

Gotta give some notice to Dem hopeful John Edwards: we don't know if he's gonna win here in New Hampshire or Iowa (the two states wehre he is betting everything) but it appears like he won't leave anything in reserve. His latest rhetorical shotgun blast at free trade agreements -- a boondoggle he contends was designed by corporate interests to serve mostly corporate interests -- may not persuade the pundit elite but he raises intriguing points that chllenges the entire premise of free trade agreements in the past two decades (jncluding NAFTA, put into play by a President Bill Clinton who has more than a passing interest in the fortunes of his wife Hillary Clinton who Edwards criticizes for being a bought and paid lobbyist for corporate interests: really, you couldn't make this stuff up if you tried).

Edwards has been doing a good job of driving a lot of the ideas debate: and blogger/labor organizer Jonathan Tasini believes the other Dem candidates would be wise to follow. You can read his post here. I will follow up with Edwards in person later today as he visits the Portsmouth editorial board for a friendly grilling before campaign appearances in Exeter and Portsmouth.

Posted by Michael McCord at 12:35 PM| Permalink | Comments (0)

There's nothing quite like using the front page of the Sunday New York Times to make a point -- in the case of Barack Obama, it's a forum to lob a few rhetorical salvos against the fortress of Dem rival Hillary Clinton. In the lengthy Times inside baseball peek into the campaign, Obama and his campaign said they were stepping into the ring with a new set of gloves, with Obama attempting to sharpen his differences with Clinton. Of course he wasn't trying, Obama quipped, to “kneecap the front-runner, because I don’t think that’s what the country is looking for," but if not a knee cap, then it's certainly a punch.

In what might be called the campaign's Soprano's awakening, the Obama folks have decided it's time to stop letting Clinton get away with being the experience/change candidate without taking a look at what Obama called Clinton's "agenda" and her being less than forthcoming, if not exactly truthful about her political calculations and policies.

Here's an excerpt (read complete article here):
“I don’t think people know what her agenda exactly is,” Mr. Obama continued, citing Social Security, Iraq and Iran as issues on which he said she had not been fully forthcoming. “Now it’s been very deft politically, but one of the things that I firmly believe is that we’ve got to be clear with the American people right now about the important choices that we’re going to need to make in order to get a mandate for change, not to try to obfuscate and avoid being a target in the general election and then find yourself governing without any support for any bold propositions.”

In one sense, there's nothing new here because Obama has always offered himself as the 'big bang' leader and said all along I'm not your guy if you want a potential more of the same D.C. presidency. What's different and perhaps inevitable from the early days of the campaign is that it he's showing some campaign fire in the belly and not let the Clinton steal some of his 'hope and bold' thunder and get bullied around. You can bet the Clinton's are firing back with all their ammo and reminding everyone that Mr. 'Hope' is as calcualting as any other politician (in fact, one of the Clinton campaign tricks of the trade is to relentlessly remind reporters that Obama isn't all that special or different than say, Hillary Clinton).

It's worth noting that John Edwards has been pounding the pulpit about Clinton for months and now he has a partner of sorts to redefine the bulleye on Hillary's back -- who has also become a convenient target for Republicans like Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani and John McCain (McCain in a particular has released a raw ad against Clinton, sort of round 522 of the 60s Culture Wars by portraying her as Sen. Woodstcok while he was "tied up" in Vietnam.)

It's a good sign for the Dems because the last thing they need is a potential coronation. They need a political street brawl to decide what they want to be and who they want to represent.

Posted by Michael McCord at 08:58 AM| Permalink | Comments (0)

PollMulling: The Saint Anselm College Institute of Politics just released its Primary Poll among likely voters here in primary land and uncovered no major polling surprises. On the Dem side, The Hillary Clinton polling juggernaught remained strong as she leads Barack Obama by a 43-22 margin (with John Edwards at 14 percent). On the GOP side, Mitt Romney leads Rudy Giuliani 32-22 (with John McCain at 15 percent). The most interesting polling nuggets are on the GOP side. Internet/Libertarian favorite Ron Paul is at 7 percent, ahead of Mike Huckabee (6 percent) and Fred Thompson (5 percent). While deciphering poll numbers is always a risky proposition at best (more blind luck than science), what is revealing is that Paul is gaining serious name recognition while having not spent much time in the state (a sign of his loyal and growing following) while Thompson is dropping fast while having not spent hardly any time in the state (a sign of indifference).

One interesting finding is that among the undeclared (independent) voters, most are leaning Democrat by a 41 to 19 percent margin while 40 percent are still making up their minds. That's not a good trend for John McCain who used independent support in 2000 to catapult to victory in New Hampshire. But then again, he's on the wrong side of the Iraq war issue in this state among independents. But if this poll does anything it shows "there is still indecisiveness among likely voters in New Hampshire,” said NHIOP senior fellow Michael Dupre. In other words, we don't know much.

Next time you see GOPer Rudy Giuliani on the campaign trail here in first-in-the-galaxy primary land you might want to ask him 'Hey Rudy, how's World War IV going?' I kid you not. In my daily link, there's a Halloween-type reminder that Giuliani may really mean what he says about staying on the offensive against, well, the Islamofascist hordes which could include just about eveybody in the Middle East and the Islamic world. And if you listen to neocon nutcase Norman Podhertz, who just happens to have Rudy's ear as a top foreign policy advisor (a truly scary thought), he recently gave Mr. 9/11 a briefing on his thoughts about World War IV (the title of a new Podhertz book). In an interview with the New York Observer the excitable Podhertz laid out a Mafia-type agenda that will keep Rudy and the country busy on the military front for decades. America should be working to overthrow governments in Saudi Arabia, Syria and Egypt and “every one of the despotic regimes in that region, by force if necessary and by nonmilitary means if possible,” he said. “They are fronts of the war. You can’t do everything at once. And to have toppled two of those regimes in five years or six years is I think a major achievement. And maybe George Bush won’t be able to carry it further, but I think he will. It may have just been given to him to start act one of the five-act play.”
Maybe in this play, Rudy sees himself as a Shakespearean military maven. It's no wonder that more and voters in New Hampshire have become increasingly distressed about war with Iran. The inmates are running the asylum.

Posted by Michael McCord at 08:20 AM| Permalink | Comments (0)

There's no shortage of work here at gaffe tracking central.

If there’s any doubt about the effectiveness of Barack Obama’s response team — and especially their assertiveness against sloppy mainstream media reporting — it should be laid to rest by their reaction to a rookie reporter foul up by veteran Washington Post columnist Harold Meyerson. In an otherwise lukewarmly interesting take on the sometimes uneasy alliance between main street and Wall Street Dems, Meyerson said that Obama had voted for the punitive bankruptcy bill in 2005.
Ah, not true at all, said the fast-to-the-draw Obama folks who, at least in New England, were enjoying a moment of glory with a huge rally in Boston yesterday as Obama secured the endorsement of Massachusetts Gov. Duval Patrick.
The campaign wasted no time in responding and hit back with a statement and Senate links (here and here) showing that not only had Obama voted against the bill but spoke at rather forcefully against it.
The Obama response folks must have fallen off their chairs when word came out about Patrick's predecessor, Republican presidential wannabe Mitt “You say Osama, I say Obama” Romney. The former attendence-challenged Governor laid a painful rhetorical egg yesterday in South Carolina. The Mittster is setting new standards of unintentional campaign stand up comedy. It’s almost freakish when you would think that Romney — who saw his father George Romney deleted from the 1968 campaign after he claimed to have been ‘brainwashed’ by the Pentagon establishment about military progress in Vietnam — would be slightly aware of the consequences when one is no longer speaking in the privacy of a corporate boardroom.
In serious damage control mode, the Romney campaign said their guy “misspoke” but according to the Associated Press report, it was a serious case of misspeaking while he was attacking the Dems for being soft on terrorism. “Actually, just look at what Osam — Barack Obama — said just yesterday,” Romney said in Greenville, S.C. Tuesday. “Barack Obama, calling on radicals, jihadists of all different types, to come together in Iraq. That is the battlefield. ... It’s almost as if the Democratic contenders for president are living in fantasyland. Their idea for jihad is to retreat, and their idea for the economy is to also retreat. And in my view, both efforts are wrongheaded.”
Talk about mixing your metaphors and enemies. No wonder the campaign made Romney very unavailable for further comment.
In years to come, perhaps pundits and medical doctors will cite a new campaign malady in honor of Mitt Romney. Perhaps they will call Political Attention Deficit Disorder.
Speaking of the mainstream media, Republican Ron Paul got some love from Howard Fineman of Newsweek. Fineman sort of fancied Paul’s chances to muck up the primary scrum here among the GOPers. Me thinks that Fineman may not be far off the mark because I’ve never seen such a combination of discord and confusion among Republican voters (read here) as I have in the 2008 edition of the primary circus here.

Posted by Michael McCord at 12:40 PM| Permalink | Comments (0)

When a sitting U.S. Senator runs for President the potential for constructive and not so constructive mischief in the hallowed halls of power is never far away. In the constructive mischief department, we offer Dem hopeful Chris Dodd who is showing some backbone (and flirting with potential political suicide) by threatening to muck up the Dem leadership determination to suck up to George Bush again (all to keep that dreaded ‘soft on security’ necktie from being tightened) on FISA reauthorization (the one where the Bush brigades spy illegally on potentially all of us in the name of something resembling national security). One of Dodd’s campaign themes is about restoring the constitution to being, well, a relevant document and he’s determined to make a show of this in a showdown over FISA. He has threatened a parliamentary move called a hold or a one-man filibuster if Senate leadership gives him the back of their collective hand. In my daily link, Dodd goes on the liberal Huffington Post to make his point. While it’s hard not to forget the political opportunism angle, Dodd makes a rational case for taking our time and actually paying attention to the constitutional details. Of course, being reasonable rarely helps anyone in the viper’s den of D.C. But Dodd deserves credit for bringing our Bush-ravaged Constitution up as a debate topic. Our elected leaders in D.C. -- and almost all the presidential candidates -- have too often taken a pass at it.
Poke in the eye
John McCain’s campaign here in first-in-the-solar-system primary land got a zero sum shot of adrenaline when Dan Hughes of New Castle, a longtime Republican leader with deep roots in the state, joined McCain as vice-chair of his leadership team. We’re not sure exactly what the leadership team does but getting Hughes was a finger in the eye to Fred Thompson’s not so much of a NH campaign — Hughes was an advisor of sorts to Thompson. We suspect but cannot confirm that Hughes perhaps got tired of waiting around to advise Thompson on, well, anything — including, just maybe, on just why Thompson is running.

Posted by Michael McCord at 01:37 PM| Permalink | Comments (0)

My favorite sign of the primary season had nothing to do with politics but baseball while I was watching the Red Sox complete their remarkable comeback against the Cleveland Indians last night (and while I wasn’t watching the latest faux debate among the GOP elephants). I saw fan in Fenway Park hoist up ‘Don’t Worry, Be Manny,” a catchy twist combining the song (‘Don’t worry, be happy’) with of the infamous ‘Manny being Manny’ which ranks as being one of the better and most analyzed nonsensical catch phrases of all sports time (it’s an existential state of being that could mean, well, most anything regarding Manny Ramirez, the Red Sox hitting savant who has a touch of Zen to his personality).

What we need is a good campaign slogan combining popular recognition and a catchy, deeply existential catch phrase. I’m not holding my breath.

Republican John McCain is back in the neighborhood tomorrow; in Hampton for a town hall meeting and at the Portsmouth Herald for an editorial board grilling. Timothy Noah of Slate gives McCain decent grades for his health care reform proposals which, Noah notes here, have been largely forgotten because the campaign hasn’t bothered to either explain them or emphasize them. Read more here.

In my daily link, Salon has a witty and abridged take on the faux GOP debate I bypassed while suffering continued sleep deprivation while rooting for the Red Sox. Note from Mother Superior: The whole ‘who’s got the bigger and better Republican street cred’ bragging really has to stop. If a Republican candidate has to waste time on earth convincing fellow Republicans he’s a real Republican, then it becomes a public identity crisis issue. Not a pretty sight at all.

Posted by Michael McCord at 12:46 PM| Permalink | Comments (0)

While we contemplate Bill Gardner’s existential contemplation about when our first-in-the-universe primary circus will take place and begin to say goodbye to Republican not-so-much a presidential hopeful Sam Brownback (Sam, we hardly knew you here), here’s something to brighten up your day (in a perverse way).
In my daily link, Ken Silverstein of Harper’s chronicles the massive consulting artifice behind a majority of our major political campaigns. In this case, Silverstein follows the step-by-step process in the selling of Mitt Romney as a conservative and runs into so many layers of political consulting and manipulation that you almost feel sorry for the candidates.
Reminds me how some things never change: it seems like only yesterday when I was in high school (sometime near the end of the 2nd quarter of the 20th Century) reading The Selling of the President by Joe McGinnis about the packaging of Richard Nixon in 1968. Hard to believe it’s gotten worse but yes, Virginia, it has.

Posted by Michael McCord at 11:10 AM| Permalink | Comments (0)

One of my Top 5 quotes of the season here in first-in-the-solar-system primary land comes not from a candidate but from retired CNN financial news guru Myron Kandel who is spending time up here trying to lasso candidates into televised discussions about their policies on good corporate governance and investor protection (Kandel is the president of the N. H. Initiative for Corporate Responsibility and Investor Protection: find out more about Kandel's quest here).

Kandel has invited all the candidates to sit down with him for a taped television program to be shown on N.H. Public Television; only one, Republican Mike Huckabee has found the time in his schedule to do it (the program will take place tonight at Daniel Webster College in Nashua and is open to the public.)

When I caught up with Kandel yesterday, he was excited about the potential of getting candidates to talk about these economically important issues and underwhelmed by their lack of response. He told me: “I’d hate to believe that some of the candidates are reluctant to discuss these issues publicly because so many campaign contributors are from the business sector. If that were true -- and I hope it isn’t -- it would be a sad commentary on the integrity of the candidates themselves.”

My mother would call that an example of making a point politely but rather forcefully.

4th place anyone?
Gotta love Democrat Joe Biden and his method dealing with the expectations parlor game that journalists and campaigns are beginning to play (after all, talking too much about issues can be a fruitless enterprise). I mean, just keep lowering them until you’re a winner of something, especially when rivals Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama continue to set fundraising records (not exactly Biden’s forte to this point) and suck up all the front running media oxygen.

Biden’s solution was brilliant. In a move only a U.S. Senator like Biden could pull off, he revised and extended his remarks from early September when he said a third place finish was required to keep his boat afloat. Not anymore. When Biden was in Boston Tuesday to raise cash and secure a few Massachusetts endorsements, he told the AP that finishing fourth place in Iowa would be a job well done. “If I finish in the top three or close fourth, I’m in the game coming into New Hampshire. If I don’t, I’m gone,” Biden said.

In my daily link, Dem Bill Richardson went the blog route on Huffington Post to see that he, as Governor of New Mexico, was going to take George W. Bush to the courthouse woodshed over the SCHIP funding controversy. Nothing like merging local, state, national and primary politics into a one sweet bundle with the extra added emotional boost of children's health care at stake. That's a multi-fer that no candidate can resist.

Posted by Michael McCord at 12:32 PM| Permalink | Comments (0)

Farrell Seiler continues to have visions of Al Gore running for President. Seiler, a Littleton resident, is the state coordinator for the Draft Gore New Hampshire organization and living proof that not all Dems are satisfied with the current pool of Dem canddiates. I met Seiler earlier this summer when Hillary Clinton stopped by our offices for a forum on her environmental and energy policies. He knew the chances were slim but there was a chance that Al, who should have been our 43rd president but likely got a far greater honor by winning the Nobel Peace Prize , might want to take a run at being 44.

Roger Simon of Politico writes today there is no way Al will take the plunge because he’s reached a rare stage for a politician -- transcendence in a manner that Emerson or Thoreau or even Melville could envision. Or to make it even stranger, Gore is transcendent enough to endorse Hillary, Simon muses. (And speaking of Hillary, who’s in the state today making her 945th major policy speech of the campaign , in my daily link catch a review here of her appearance on The View -- and how, I kid you not, it didn’t tickle the fancy of the Republican National Committee. I mean really, The View? Does the RNC have no shame to go along with their lack of imagination.)

Don’t tell that to Forrest Seiler. It didn’t take long for him to send out the press release that I received this morning. The release was clearly designed to stir speculation that Al might be thinking ever so slightly about running with its ‘Gore speaking out visibly on the issues’ hopeful tone (despite the fact that Al Gore has been speaking out about the issues since he became our popularly elected but not real president -- was he not speaking visibly before?) But hey, hope still lives -- unless Barack Obama has trademarked the phrase.

Here's the release:
Farrell S. Seiler,
State Coordinator 603-568-4916
Draft Gore New Hampshire
Littleton, New Hampshire
http://www.DraftGoreNH.com

Gore Begins Speaking Out on Major Domestic, Foreign Policy Issues

(Littleton, New Hampshire) - Within 48 hours of receiving the
Nobel Prize, former Vice President Al Gore is speaking out
visibly on critical issues affecting all Americans.

In videos appearing on his company's web site,
http://current.com/people/algore, Gore discusses Iraq,
health care and constitutional protections of our rights.

"Al Gore has many concerns that touch the lives of all
Americans," says Farrell Seiler, State Coordinator of
the draft Gore effort in New Hampshire. "In the next few
weeks, Gore will be talking forcefully on domestic
and foreign policy issues and elaborating on the vision
he has for the future of our country."

Gore wants to get our troops out of Iraq "as quickly as possible,"
expand universal health insurance to cover all Americans
as "a matter of right" and require the executive branch
"to follow the requirements of the Constitution."

The complete text of Gore's comments are available on the
New Hampshire Draft Gore web site:
http://www.DraftGoreNH.com/on_the_issues.

On Iraq:
"We are becoming a magnet for the kind of violence that is
feeding the civil war. We ought to withdraw as quickly
as possible while keeping an eye on the obligation we have
not to make an already terrible situation even worse in
the manner of our leaving."
http://current.com/items/84986481_get_the_troops_home

On Health Care:
"Health care is a right. I strongly support universal,
single payer, government provided or government funded,
health care."
http://current.com/items/84987281_health_care_is_a_right

On Protecting Privacy:
"Americans deserve more protection against the government
being able to eavesdrop on our tlelphone conversations,
on our email conversations and private conversations."
http://current.com/items/84986911_americans_deserve_more_protection

Posted by Michael McCord at 10:14 AM| Permalink | Comments (0)

Imagine this wild political thriller of a movie: Being Bill Gardner. Well, it seems there is no shortage of explorers waiting to travel into NH Secretary of State Bill Gardner's brain as he contemplates what date to set the New Hampshire primary.

Of course, Gardner is not lacking for advice including for folks like me who can't shut up about the topic. But, Bill, here's a thoughtful conisderation for you. In my daily link, veteran political reporter Walter Shapiro of Salon makes a valiant plea to Gardner to avoid being foolish enough to either (1) schedule the primary in December (we would become Grinch-style laughingstocks) or (2) schedule it too close to Iowa is they go Jan. 3 or Jan. 5. In other words, screw Michigan (by ignoring its boorish attempt to elbow in this time around) and don’t get stuck on a date or a legislative terminology. I agree with Shapiro 100 percent: if we believe in the importance of the primary, don’t demean by giving into outside pressures. We will stop being the first-in-the-solar system primary when we downgrade its vitality by choosing a more controversial than necessary date.

Posted by Michael McCord at 02:06 PM| Permalink | Comments (0)

Before we begin the countdown in earnest about whether Nobel Al Gore will or will not run for President, it's time for some shameless promotion on my part: In my Sunday Out on a Limb colum will focus on Repulbican Presidential hopeful and former Ark. Gov. Mike Huckabee who continues to get positive press coverage, including from liberal media bias slaves to fashion like me.

So why hasn't this social conservative, former preacher, and guitar player with a great sense of humor (and an endless arsenal of one-liners, among other things) caught fire with voters or gotten a bigger bump in the polls or raised bucketloads more of money? Frankly, I don't know but it may say more about the current chaotic and dispirited environment for Repubs than anything else. But Huckabee has made bigger inroads in Iowa than anyone could have forseen and perhaps the same is happening sotte voce here in first-in-the-galaxy primary land. For his part, Huckabee is predicting victory in Iowa which would probably result in an even louder scream from Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani than that of Howard Dean in 2004. He says frequently the supporters he has are really with him. Perhaps they like the fact that he can talk global warming, question evolution, talk about the importance of music and art in education, talk about being pro-life and anti-gay marriage in a political sermon style easy to the ear.

When I talked to NH primary savant Dean Spiliotes about Huckabee's campaign (one office in Cocnord and three staff members and a lot of living off the land), he told me that Huckabee risks an interesting expectations trap: after a while people wonder why he hasn't struck a great chord among voters and their next step is to not give him a second look. He ends up becoming, ugh, another media favorite (Jack Kemp, Bill Bradley) who can't cut the primary muster.

By the way, Spiliotes has started a primary political web site for junkies and wonkies called NH Political Capital. You can find it here.

In my daily link, I pondered bigger thoughts than the primary when I read this latest installment in dumping our antiquated electoral college system for choosing presidents. "Let's abolish the Electoral College"
by constitutional law professor Garrett Epps in Oregon is well-reasoned and incorporates history and nasty modern politics. He makes yet another persuasive case to dump the system that had to more with protecting slavery than insuring the political safety of "small" states. Of course like all the other articles written over the past 100 years advocating such rational change, it will be ignored.

Posted by Michael McCord at 04:58 PM| Permalink | Comments (0)

I watched a fair amount of the replay of the GOP “economic” debate yesterday in Michigan. It confirmed a long-held belief of mine that the only worse than listening to economisst talk economics is when politicians jump into the moss pit. But at least with the politicians it can be entertaining.

Back to the faux debate: Beyond the almost manic obsession with Democratic hopeful Hillary Clinton (tactic: fixate on Hillary and you don’t have to say anything of substance) and the elementary school yard taunting between Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney, I thought the winners (a loose term, mind you) were Texas Rep. Ron Paul and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee.

With each passing day, Paul looks like a politician from another planet when he speaks about fiscal responsibility (something about living within our means so we don’t end living beneath them) in a gathering dedicated to an orgy of tax cuts at all costs. In a rare moment of high intelligence, Sen. John McCain made reference to Adam Smith and the “Wealth of Nations” and suggested that Paul take a read. I’m willing to be bet it’s more than likely that Paul has read it and wondered where the intellectual justification is for massive deficit spending combined with tax cuts that help run up those deficits (where’s that supply side mojo when you need it?) It's no wonder that Paul remains popular not just among libertarians but among conservatives who value liberty and rational behavior.

The ever smooth and humourous Huckabee is another political brand altogether. In one of the few times he was allowed to share a complete (if homogenized) thought, he struck a populist tone (sort of a Yin to Dem John Edwards’ Yang) “We’re losing jobs here. That’s why people in Michigan are going — looking for something to do. And that’s what has to change and it’s not being changed. And this party is going to have to start addressing it or we’re going to get our britches beat next year.” While touting a more forward-thinking energy policy, Huckabee even manage to throw in a folksy reference to “Goober and Gomer” from the 60s television program, the Andy Griffith Show.

What was less populist and somewhat revealing came later when Huckabee showed himself willing to play muscle man with Congress and slap it aside to launch attacks against Iran (or Pluto, we can infer) if time was running tight and Congress was playing wimpy wimpy. Sounds like an episode of ‘24.’ Just what we need: another President with more muscle instincts than brain matter.

In my daily link, a Texas blogger (and financial analyst) named Hale “Bonddad” Stewart expertly dissects the Republican economic mantras (markets and tax cuts religiously righteous; government and regulation and lawyers and yes, even gays — courtesy of an odd Sam Brownback analogy that produced a form of mental whiplash — bad) that flowed at the debate: even though he didn’t watch it. I guess he’d seen and heard it all before.

Posted by Michael McCord at 10:29 AM| Permalink | Comments (0)

On Second thought. Nothing ages faster than a blog post that has been rendered moot and ancient by breaking headlines: in this case, the mass defection from the still-born Michigan primary by Barack Obama, John Edwards, Bill Richardson and Joe Biden. This smack in Michigan’s face will render the event, which had been vying for prime time status, to a second rate beauty contest. No wonder NH Dem chief Ray Buckley was gloating when he immediately sent out a release stating “Today’s turn of events only further amplifies the fact that the Michigan primary is irrelevant. Our Secretary of State, Bill Gardner, now has more flexibility in his scheduling decision because the Michigan event is no longer a ‘similar event’ to the New Hampshire primary.”

Christopher Dodd has chosen to play both sides of the fence. He will stay put in Michigan while preaching fidelity to the Iowa and New Hampshire power brokers. “We are committed to the importance of Iowa and New Hampshire going first, and we signed the four-state pledge to hopefully prevail upon the DNC and the state parties to add clarity to that situation,” Dodd said in a statement. “However, it does not benefit any of us if we are the nominee to pull our name off the ballot and slight Michigan voters.”
The only significant drama left is whether Hillary Clinton will follow suit: she just might stay put, get a cheap victory and endear herself to Michigan voters who may have been ill-suited at best by their legislators.

As for the ‘Primary Hi Jinx’ sentiments written earlier by your humble blogger (see below), consider it a case of “never mind.”

DAILY LINK
Meanwhile in my Daily Link, Roger Simon of Politico.com muses on how GOP hopeful Fred Thompson is running the lowest expectation campaign in modern political history. See if Fred can meet those low expectations (no specifics, no proposals but plenty of unrelated platitudes) in the GOP debate scrum later today (two hours of pure torment courtesy of CNBC at 4 p.m. with a replay at 9 p.m. on MSNBC.). My belief is that is he will beat low expectations and get another bump in the polls.
What does it — Thompson’s lighter-than-air campaign — all mean? Just ask Matt Taibbi of Rolling Stone who followed Mr. Law & Order around in Iowa and New Hampshire and sees something scary in Thompson’s campaign that goes far beyond the candidate and into something deeper in the entire American psyche. Can you say sheep? Read more here and be afraid, be slightly afraid.

PRIMARY HI JINX
Leave it to NH State Rep. Jim Splaine of Portsmouth to talk about the unthinkable: a December primary. Splaine has been one the biggest boosters of our first-in-the-galaxy extravaganza FOR ALMOST THREE DECADES in the legislature. But in a recent blog post, he’s acting like a Grinch (a pleasant one at that) who would steal Christmas but it would be for our own good. If it happens, it could be the final nail in the coffin of the old system because it will be an unmatched act of absurdity. You can read Jim’s reasonable proposal below.

By Jim Splaine
How About A December New Hampshire Presidential Primary?

As way of introduction to this idea, if you've been hearing my commentary in Blogs and speeches about the New Hampshire Presidential Primary for a while, you'll note that I've been rather close in some of my predictions. Since I've been working on the cause of keeping New Hampshire "first" and "relevant" longer than most, dating back to the early 1970s, I have seen a lot of strategies employed -- both by our state, and others, and participated in some of those strategies.

When the Democratic National Committee began playing games with the schedule some two years ago and a lot of people said New Hampshire wouldn't survive their sanctions, I said we would, we'd remain "first," and we'd be ahead of Nevada. At this point, Nevada is quite irrelevant to the discussion, and they certainly won't come before us. And about a year ago I suggested we might even see the NH Primary scheduled in the first two weeks of January, while most others then thought it would be January 22nd. Now, January 8th is about the latest most people are anticipating that it will be.

Well, now I'd like to introduce another thought-- for others' comments and talk --and that's of a December date.

Just during the past couple of days, there have been strong indications that both Democrats and Republicans in Iowa have determined that they are going to have their Caucuses on Thursday, January 3rd. There is also a possibility the Republicans will hold their Caucus on that date, with the Democrats going Saturday, January 5th.

In light of that, let's do some serious thinking about the options for the date of the New Hampshire First-In-The-Nation Primary, and also take a look at our opportunities.

If Iowa does go January 3rd or 5th, the problem with setting our date for Tuesday, January 8th would be that for the entire Holiday Season, the Presidential candidates of both parties may well camp out in Iowa. It's not that we should be jealous about that. That's not the point. But the Iowa Caucus is not a real election -- it is an organizational event where it takes intense staff and special interest groups to get their most dedicated supporters to the meeting rooms throughout Iowa on a cold Winter night to stand up, publicly, and "be counted" for their choice. In other words, it's not much of a secret vote, like a "real" election is. The New Hampshire Primary IS a real election, where people go to the polls and vote in privacy to choose their nominee. A Caucus isn't much more than a straw poll, which Iowa's Republicans already had -- a straw poll without the right to vote in secret.

I have no problem with the Iowa Caucus going first before New Hampshire, as has been traditional back to 1972, but I've been concerned that the Iowa Caucus this election cycle is potentially having way too much influence on whether candidates of either party will even remain as candidates after that event is held. It is very likely we'll see some candidates drop out after Iowa, even though a real election won't even have occurred yet.

So, with the very serious possibility that the Iowa Caucuses will be on January 3rd, New Hampshire now has to make a choice. Should we have ours right after Iowa, with a reduced "window" between it and us, or use this opportunity to have our Presidential Primary during the first two weeks of December? The second Tuesday in December is the 11th, and that date would do some interesting things for us:

1. A NH Primary on or around December 11th would give the Presidential candidates of both parties an opportunity to focus on real voters for the next two months. Our Secretary of State has already announced the Presidential Primary filing period for October 15th to November 2nd. By filing their candidacies, that's the best "pledge" to run here that we can get from the candidates themselves. So by November 2nd, we'll know for sure who is on the ballot, and those ballots can go to the printers. If about the time the filing period ends he sets our official date for sometime during the first two weeks of December, that prevents any other state from jumping ahead of us -- thus guaranteeing our state law requirement of "...7 days or more..." before a similar election. Plus, it pre-dates Iowa by a good three weeks.

2. A NH Primary on or around December 11th would encourage the Presidential candidates and their campaigns to spend intensive, quality time here for all of November into the first week or two of December. We could ask for nothing better for democracy than having some concentrated time with the candidates -- face to face, eye to eye, one-on-one, New Hampshire-style; before the campaigning in the bigger states which vote on January 29th and February 5th really gets underway.

3. A NH Primary on or around December 11th would mean that after our event, the "winners" and those "exceeding expectations" would be exposed to a great deal of nationwide analysis during the Holiday Season as to just why they did so well, or not, and how their showing in New Hampshire will affect the next race in Iowa and other states beginning the first week of January. That contributes to the respected "impact" of the NH lead-off primary, and sets us in good position to remain first and relevant for 2012 and beyond.

4. A NH Primary on or around December 11th would considerably "backload" the "frontloading" of the current schedule, where so many states are going to be holding their election events on January 29th and February 5th. Face it, if the contests begin on January 3rd in Iowa, then New Hampshire (8th?), then maybe Nevada (12th?), then Michigan (15th), then South Carolina (19th), with lots of states scheduled for January 29th and February 5th (Florida, New Jersey, New York, California, Connecticut, Tennessee, Georgia, Alaska, Minnesota, Missouri, and several others), it will all be over in a month. If the NH Primary is moved up a full three weeks or so into December, that can fulfill the role of spreading out the process very, very well, and reduce the impact of the current frontloading.

5. A NH Primary on or around December 11th would greatly enhance the importance of doing well in New Hampshire, yet allow candidates who don't finish so well some time to recover their campaigns. No state, whether Iowa or New Hampshire or any other, should be able to by itself render the knock-out punch to a candidate. We're not about that, nor should we let Iowa be.

The New Hampshire First-In-The-Nation Presidential Primary has never been "about us." And the law dating back to the 1970s giving our Secretary of State the authority to set the date of the NH Primary "...7 days or more..." before a similar election is meant to do more than just preserve a tradition. The New Hampshire Presidential Primary is about continuing an election process where people can dream about running for President without having to sell their souls on the issues just to be popular, or sell their future administrations to special interests just to have the money to run. By making sure that we continue to be relevant to the process, we're serving democracy.

The campaigns are well underway, so by setting our primary in December it's not like we're starting the election process itself any earlier. And while we'd be losing the attention of the candidates in those weeks of the Holidays leading to January 8th, we'd be gaining their more intense campaigning here throughout November into December.

Consider that if we do go January 8th shortly after Iowa, the candidates will only have divided time between here and there in December, perhaps focusing on Iowa. If we went to January 15th, the same day as Michigan's "beauty contest," we'd be sharing the January 16th headlines and impact with whatever happened in Michigan, and besides a lot of candidates would be spread out after Iowa from here, to Michigan, and to the South and West where other states are about to hold their contests within the following couple of weeks.

And most importantly, we'd be contributing to spreading out the election calendar so that all the voters' decision-making isn't just from January 3rd through February 5th.

Give an early-December date some thought. Talk about it. Consider the alternatives. I'm not necessarily proposing it yet, but I'm offering it to get us to think even more about our options, which is all part of the process of our Secretary of State setting our date. I think he's listening to all ideas, and it's his decision to make rather soon.

I hope he's not drinking too much coffee.

Posted by Michael McCord at 11:09 AM| Permalink | Comments (0)

There’s a thoughtful piece in today’s Salon by Michael Scherer about how truly corrupt and awful and downright undemocratic and frankly absurd our primary system is. I say thoughtful because it’s the sort of fact-based opinion piece that should send a shiver down the spine of us good burghers in first-in-the-universe primary land because we are one of the main culprits (but then there’s nothing about us getting ‘Why New Hampshire?’ sucker punch.)
Scherer has conducted a time-honored, quadrennial journalistic autopsy. Like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, this is latest version of peeking behind and finding, well, a large scale con game (or in this case, multiple cons) at the heart of our electoral dog and pony show. Thanks Michael for the heartburn. Thanks goodness the candidates keep playing along -- otherwise New Hampshir emight have to surrender a significant part of its idenity.

Posted by Michael McCord at 11:58 AM| Permalink | Comments (0)

Not so sneaky attack:
In a move guaranteed to raise the temp at Romney central, a press release has been sent out in the guise of the Cato Institute and it's designed to touch a nerve into all tax-phobic voters here in first-in-the-galaxy primary land. It's all about taxes of course with the cute title of ROMNEY’S TAXACHUSETTS HYPOCRISY with an even better sub head of "Romney Raised Taxes On Out Of State Commuters – Including Those From New Hampshire – Repeatedly."
I've pasted this poison letter (call it "Rudy says I love you with a twist of the knife") below.

Inevitable: maybe, maybe not
I got multiple messages from a few campaigns sending out a link to Scott Lehigh's column in the Boston Globe today saying why Hillary Clinton isn't so inevitable. Really, I didn't know the campaigns needed this boost of artificial media-induced hope (especially one heavy in coventional wisdom of 'don't count your chickens...') but perhaps they are feeling low in the hope department.

Dodd's bark
Chris Dodd took his fellow and mostly passive Dem rivals to task in an OpEd piece in the Union Leader. He's the only Dem besides Dennis Kucinich who is ready to stop funding for the Iraq war. "We all know the result we want—getting out of Iraq—but too many of my opponents seem content to follow rather than lead when it comes to the only way we can get it: by terminating the funding," he wrote. It will be interesting to see if shaking Congressional timidity in D.C. could actually lead to a more explosive Iraq debate in New Hampshire. Dodd certainly hopes so. You can see his complete OpEd below.

Phony Outrage
Much to my surprise, I became tangled up with some Rush Limbaugh defenders after I quoted his "phony soldiers" sneer correctly last week in my Out on a Limb column about a recently returned soldier from Iraq. The blowback was hilarious and illuminating and I will write more about this phony outrage -- and the perils of 21st Century political journalism -- in Sunday's column.

For now, in my daily link Joe Conason columnist for the New York Observer puts this latest bout of lunacy in context. Read here.

Extras 1
Democrats' so-called leaders are not leading on Iraq
Sen. Chris Dodd

In looking over the Democratic candidates for President, some say there are no differences in our policy toward the Iraq war. I disagree.

In the Hanover debate on September 26th, moderator Tim Russert asked, "Will you pledge that by January 2013, the end of your first term, more than five years from now, there will be no U.S. troops in Iraq?" For a Party that is supposedly united in wanting to end this war, the answers were hardly reassuring.

Barack Obama: "I think it's hard to project four years from now."

Hillary Clinton: "It is very difficult to know what we are going to be inheriting."

John Edwards: "I cannot make that commitment."

My response: "I will get that done…Yes, I will, sir."

I respect and believe that my opponents want to end the war. I know we all do - it's making us less safe and more vulnerable. But as we have seen these last nine months, getting that result won't just happen on its own.

Senator Clinton says if the President hasn't withdrawn our troops by 2009, she would begin doing that when she takes office.

That's all fine and good, but who knows how many more troops will have died by then. Who knows how much worse America's name will be in the world.

As Democrats in the Congress and candidates for the Presidency, we have an opportunity to lead now - not in 2013. Not when (or if) Democrats take the White House in 2009. Now.

By now, no one is holding their breaths for President Bush to change course on Iraq. With not a single result to point to in Iraq in the last four years, he wants somewhere between 100,000 and 130,000 troops in Iraq through next year.

What's clear is that by saying we might still be there in 2013, we only strengthen George Bush's hand. Saying you want to end the war while taking actions that prolong it do a tremendous disservice to the efforts of those who are doing everything they can to bring the war to a close.

Being in Iraq for another six years is simply unacceptable - and it should be to anyone who believes this war is making us less safe. We all know the result we want—getting out of Iraq—but too many of my opponents seem content to follow rather than lead when it comes to the only way we can get it: by terminating the funding.

I know it isn't easy. But timetables and harshly worded statements won't end this war - standing up to the President and using our Constitutional power of the purse will.

It's not as if this situation is unprecedented, with Congress facing an intransigent President who presses an unpopular, failed foreign policy. In the 1980's, Ronald Reagan was insistent on funding the Contra forces in Nicaragua. Some said we couldn't stop him, even as it had become clear the Contras were making the country more violent and less stable. I saw things differently. Leading the opposition, I knew that if we stood up and stood our ground that we could change that policy - not wait until the next President came along, but force a change in the policy. And we did, paving the way to free and fair elections that have since stabilized that country.

No one is guaranteeing Iraq will become some kind of paradise after we leave. There may well be genocide we have to deal with on an international basis sooner or later. But just as before, we can get the results we want if we bring people together and challenge the President. To date, this Democratic Congress hasn't; neither have the so-called "leading" candidates running for President. Because saying we could well be in Iraq by 2013 isn't leading at all. It's following this President and down a rabbit hole we may never dig ourselves out of.

Extra #2

ROMNEY’S TAXACHUSETTS HYPOCRISY
“Mitt Romney has no choice but to hide behind false attacks - one look at his record as Governor shows he increased government spending, proposed millions of dollars in tax increases, and even raised taxes on New Hampshire commuters repeatedly.”

– Katie Levinson, Communications Director

Romney Raised Taxes On Out Of State Commuters – Including Those From New Hampshire – Repeatedly

As Governor, Romney Increased Income Taxes On Individuals Who Did Not Reside In Massachusetts, Including On Their Pensions, Deferred Compensation, And Sick And Vacation Pay. “A nonresident’s income relating to employment in Massachusetts or the nonresident’s trade or business in Massachusetts, including gain from the sale of an interest in the business, separation pay and deferred compensation and nonqualified pension income not prevented from taxation under federal law and income from a covenant not to compete, is subject to Massachusetts personal income tax regardless of the taxpayer’s residence or domicile in the year it is received and regardless of whether the taxpayer has actively engaged in a trade or business or employment in Massachusetts in the year of receipt, effective for tax years beginning on or after January 1, 2003.” (Goodwin Proctor Website, “Financial Services Alert -- Developments Of Note,” www.goodwinprocter.com/getfile.aspx?filepath=/Files/FSAS/FSA_3_11_03.pdf, 3/11/03, Accessed 8/29/07; Massachusetts Department Of Revenue, “Annual Report FY2003,” www.mass.gov/Ador/docs/dor/Publ/Annual_Rpt03/AR2003.pdf, 2003, Accessed 8/29/07; “The Governor’s Budget Recommendation House 1A Fiscal Year 2004,” http://www.mass.gov/bb/fy2004h1/downloads/house1.pdf, 2003, Accessed 9/12/07)

Romney Expanded State Income Tax To Include Income From Business “Whether Or Not The Nonresident Is Actively Engaged In A Trade Or Business Or Employment In The Commonwealth In The Year In Which The Income Is Received.” “Taxation of Nonresidents: Massachusetts gross income of a nonresident is determined solely with respect to items of gross income from sources within the Commonwealth. M.G.L. c. 62, § 5A(a). In relevant part, the prior law at 5A(a)(1) defined gross income from sources within the Commonwealth as the income ‘derived from or effectively connected with … any trade or business, including any employment carried on by the taxpayer in the Commonwealth.’ Effective for tax years beginning on or after January 1, 2003, this act effectively reverses a judicial interpretation of § 5A(a). Newly enacted § 5A(a) defines gross income from sources within the Commonwealth as any income ‘derived from or effectively connected with … any trade or business, including any employment carried on by the taxpayer in the commonwealth, whether or not the nonresident is actively engaged in a trade or business or employment in the commonwealth in the year in which the income is received.’ Thus, unless otherwise exempt, Massachusetts source income of a nonresident, regardless of the year in which it is actually received, will be taxable in the state.” (Massachusetts Department Of Revenue, “Annual Report FY2003,” www.mass.gov/Ador/docs/dor/Publ/Annual_Rpt03/AR2003.pdf, 2003, Accessed 8/29/07)

Under Romney’s Change, Non-Residents Now Have Their Separation, Sick Or Vacation Pay, Deferred Compensation, Nonqualified Pension Income, And Other Income Taxed. “For purposes of M.G.L. c. 62, § 5A, the act further provides that “gross income derived from or effectively connected with any trade or business, including any employment, carried on by the taxpayer in the commonwealth” shall include, but not be limited to, “gain from the sale of a business or of an interest in a business, distributive share income, separation, sick or vacation pay, deferred compensation and nonqualified pension income not prevented from state taxation by the laws of the United States and income from a covenant not to compete.” (Massachusetts Department Of Revenue, “Annual Report FY2003,” www.mass.gov/Ador/docs/dor/Publ/Annual_Rpt03/AR2003.pdf, 2003, Accessed 8/29/07)

Romney Imposed State Income And Sales Taxes On Out-Of-State Residents For Their Share of In-State Partnership’s Real Estate. “A nonresident of the commonwealth who is a member of a partnership that is engaged in the conduct of a trade or business in the commonwealth or that owns or leases real property in the commonwealth, except a nonresident limited partner of a limited partnership engaged exclusively in buying, selling, dealing in or holding securities on its own behalf and not as a broker, shall be subject to the taxes imposed by this chapter on his distributive share of the income received or earned by the partnership from sources taxable under this chapter.” (Massachusetts Department Of Revenue, “Annual Report FY2005, http://www.mass.gov/Ador/docs/dor/Publ/Annual_Rpt04/AR2004.pdf, 2006; “The Governor’s Budget Recommendation House 1A Fiscal Year 2006,” http://www.mass.gov/bb/fy2006h1/06print/06budrec/pbudrec.htm, 2005, Accessed 9/12/07)

Why Is Romney Misleading On Spending And Taxes?

Perhaps Because…

Between 2002 And 2006, Massachusetts State Tax Burden Rose 10.75% (U.S. Department Of Commerce Bureau Of Economic Analysis, Regional Economic Information Systems, Downloadable Files Available At: http://www.bea.gov/regional/reis/CA1-3fn.cfm, Accessed 8/14/07; U.S. Census Bureau, http://www.census.gov/govs/statetax/02staxrank.html, Accessed 8/15/07; U.S. Census Bureau, http://www.census.gov/govs/statetax/03staxrank.html, Accessed 8/15/07; U.S. Census Bureau, http://www.census.gov/govs/statetax/04staxrank.html, Accessed 8/15/07; U.S. Census Bureau, http://www.census.gov/govs/statetax/05staxrank.html, Accessed 8/15/07; U.S. Census Bureau, http://www.census.gov/govs/statetax/06staxrank.html, Accessed 8/15/07)

During Giuliani’s Tenure, New Yorker’s Tax Burden Decreased 17% To Lowest Level In Three Decades. (The City Of New York Office Of Management And Budget, City Of New York Executive Budget Fiscal Year 2002 Budget Summary, pp. 8, 11 )

Romney’s Recommended Budgets Increased Real Per Capita Government Spending By 7.77%. (“Governor’s Annual Budget Recommendations, FY2003-FY2007,” http://www.mass.gov/bb/, Accessed 8/20/07; U.S. Census Bureau, "Annual Estimates Of The Population For The United States, Regions, And States And For Puerto Rico: April 1, 2000 To July 1, 2006," http://www.census.gov/popest/states/NST-ann-est.html, Accessed 8/20/07; Bureau of Labor Statistics, "Consumer Price Index - All Urban Consumers: 1997-2007," http://data.bls.gov/PDQ/servlet/SurveyOutputServlet, Accessed 8/20/07)

Total Spending In Recommended Budgets Grew 22.2% Under Romney’s Watch, From $29.477 Billion In Fiscal 2003 To $36.021 Billion In Fiscal 2007. (“Governor’s Annual Budget Recommendations, FY2003-FY2007,” http://www.mass.gov/bb/, Accessed 8/14/07)

Cato Institute Rated Romney “C” In 2006 For His Tax Policy. “As Mitt Romney launches his bid for the Republican presidential nomination, his fiscal record as governor should be scrutinized. Romney likes to advance the image of himself as a governor who has fought a liberal Democratic legislature on various fronts … But Romney will likely also be eager to push the message that he was a governor who stood by a no-new-taxes pledge. That’s mostly a myth. His first budget included no general tax increases but did include a $500 million increase in various fees. He later proposed $140 in business tax hikes through the closing of “loopholes” in the tax code. He announced in May 2004 that he wanted to cut the top income tax rate from 5.3 to 5 percent, but that was hardly an audacious stand. Voters had already passed a plan to do just that before Romney even took office. In his budget for 2006, he proposed $170 million more in business tax hikes, almost completely neutralizing the proposed income tax cut. If you consider the massive costs to taxpayers that his universal health care plan will inflict once he’s left office, Romney’s tenure is clearly not a triumph of small-government activism.” (Stephen Slivinski, “Fiscal Policy Report Card On Amercia’s Governors: 2006, Cato Institute Policy Analysis, pg. 42, 10/24/06)

Posted by Michael McCord at 10:24 AM| Permalink | Comments (0)

The Republicans are finally 'fessing up their fundraising numbers and there's a reason why no one's shouting like Hillary or Barack: they can't. Mitt Romney hints at having raised $10 million, including loaning himself (again) more than he'd like. Despite himself, Fred Thompson may have raised as much as $8 million.

John McCain just released his 3rd quarter figures a short time ago -- around $6 million, or only about $1 million more than long shot but Internet popular Rep. Ron Paul of Texas. It's a good thing that McCain has chosen to live off the land because he has no choice with only $3.6 million on hand. Can you say matching funds? Campaign manager Rick Davis put the best spin on matters with a non-denial denial: "We are thrilled that with so many Americans supporting John McCain, we're now on sound financial footing and running a robust campaign gaining clear momentum in the early states. Heading into the fall, we have the resources to communicate that John McCain is the only candidate with the experience, character and judgment to lead as commander in chief from day one."

Of course, McCain can boast he raised more than Ron Paul's $5 million: which is more than former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee who raised $1 million despite becoming a media dandy in August.

Rudy's audio touch
I like the new radio ad by Republican prez hopeful Rudy Giuliani that’s been released here in first-in-the-solar-system primary land. (Listen for yourself here)
The title is “Tested” and Rudy tells me he’s been tested more than most. In the 60-second ad, Saint Rudy of 9/11 tells me he’s dealt with crisis “on a regular basis” and, befitting a leader who has proclaimed himself America’s mayor, he’s “had results.” And best of all, he fought the “impossible” odds to get those results. The strong female voice over chimes in to tell me that Rudy is “principled, experienced” and has delivered the goods. Rudy tells me he’s going on the offense against terrorists and for a growing economy led by less government and lower taxes. SFVO tells me that Rudy is “The Republican that Democrats just don’t want to run against.” I like how he strips matters down to the basics. No talk of Iraq, Blackwater, SCHIP, President Bush, or other crisis matters that don’t require his attention. By doing so, he allows me to focus on matters that really count such as keeping on the lookout for deviants like Democrats, moveon.org, school teachers, anti-war advocates, and artists yearning to cave in to the terrorists. It makes me, feel, well, more manly, more in touch with that Republican steroid reserve buried deep within me, yearning to be freed.
Most of all Rudy tells me that compromise is for sissies. “We laid out a very, very specific set of goals that we want to achieve because I want people to look at those and say if I agree with most of them, then this is a person who can bring them about,” Rudy states. “And if they disagree with it, they should vote against me, because I am going to bring it about.”
In other words, resistance is futile.

Posted by Michael McCord at 01:23 PM| Permalink | Comments (0)

I will be slightly busy as we at the Portsmouth Herald are hosting a forum this afternoon on Iraq with Dem hopeful John Edwards. But behind the scenes -- and in a follow up segue to yesterday’s post -- Edwards has taken his fundamentalist view (stop the war at all costs) and unloaded on rival Barack Obama for being a hypocrite on the war by always voting for war funding. The attack, chronicled here by Sam Youngman of The Hill, has Edwards also accusing Obama of being a idea thief on the Iraq issue.

Extra points:
MCain doubter back on board. Courtesy of Jon Greenberg at New Hampshire Pulbic Radio and his Primary Place project in Exeter, there’s an excellent post by an Exeter Republican who has given Sen. John McCain another primary look. Read the submission here and get a glimpse into the thought process of a NH voter.
Can we stop with the Hillary cackle commentary? I mean it’s getting surreal how a few public laughs by Clinton recently has become a cottage industry for political reporters and pundits -- mostly as a way to twist in the knife. Blogger Jeralyn Merritt smells an establishment and sexist plot. Not sure I go that far -- after all the laughing outbursts seemed odd but then you or I would be laughing madly if we tried keeping to a campaign schedule -- but she makes an interesting case. Read more here.
Really, Fred? Knowing how to play to a primary audience, Fred Thompson raised a few eyebrows during a recent campaign stop in Iowa when he insisted there were WMDs in Iraq in 2003 but that we just haven’t found them. Thompson later had a script rewrite and said he meant to say that such weapons were used against the Kurds by Saddam Hussein (in 1988 when Saddam was an ally) and that the dictator had bad intentions and would have acted on those bad intentions had we not invaded. How do you like reason #987 for why we are stuck in Iraq?
Daily Link. My favorite campaign video of the season comes courtesy of the Obama campaign who had supporters read portions of his 2002 anti-war speech. It’s smart and inspired and caught my attention -- it also hammers home his point about experience not being the same as good judgment. See it here.

Posted by Michael McCord at 11:51 AM| Permalink | Comments (0)

To paraphrase William Faulkner, the past is never far away because it's really not past -- and the political past is much closer than it appears in the mirror. Consider media-anointed Dem frontrunner Hillary Clinton who should have had the headlines all to herself today after raising all those bucket loads of cash. She took it on the chin courtesy of a roundhouse historical punch from Barack Obama. In a speech noting the fifth anniversary of a speech he gave against the coming war in Iraq, Obama told students at DePaul University in Chicago earlier today in essence: some have experience but I have judgment.

In theory, Obama gave a major foreign policy speech. In reality, it was anything but and it had quite the taser effect to it. Further translation: Hillary blew it when she voted to support the war in 2002 and is too tied up into Washington groupthink to be much of a serious force for change if she wins.

“There is a choice that has emerged in this campaign, one that the American people need to understand. They should ask themselves: who got the single most important foreign policy decision since the end of the Cold War right, and who got it wrong,” Obama said. “This is not just a matter of debating the past. It’s about who has the best judgment to make the critical decisions of the future.”

Well, he's not debating the past, per se but he's certainly using it to make a potent jab at a certain candidate's moment of political truth and how she explained (or not) this fateful vote. And Obama isn't talking about John Edwards or Joe Biden.

"Some seek to rewrite history. They argue that they weren’t really voting for war, they were voting for inspectors, or for diplomacy. But the Congress, the Administration, the media, and the American people all understood what we were debating in the fall of 2002. This was a vote about whether or not to go to war. That’s the truth as we all understood it then, and as we need to understand it now. And we need to ask those who voted for the war: how can you give the President a blank check and then act surprised when he cashes it? "

Obama has beaten this drum before but never so forcefully or quite so obviously -- and of course he didn't mention any names (no need: this is a political soap opera that keeps on giving). With all the Dems anti-war to lesser or greater degrees, Iraq isn't much of an cutting wedge issue despite the fact that it is the biggest elephant in the room.

Now the HIllary folks have been beating their own drum for months, saying in effect that Obama isn't quite the anti-war Messiah he's cracked up to be -- that's he wasn't really being politically courageous in 2002 (Illinois was solidly anti-war; not that it mattered as Congress or the White House or the Washington pundiburo treated the anit-war contingent as surrender monkeys), that he's had the same voting record as her since he came to the Senate in 2005 and that's he wasn't all that anti-war when he arrived. There are fair points and some are more valid than others but they are distracting and raise more questions -- namely where was Hillary (don't ask, don't tell) during the first two years of the war with all of her experience in Washington? Being politically courageous or not cuts both ways.

When I asked Dante Scala at UNH about the Iraq war issue and how it's playing in the primary he told me he was surprised that so many anti-war Dems were trending to Hillary because of the war vote in 2002 that she would rather bury. "They aren't punishing her," he said about the well-analyzed (imagine the Da Vinci Code) vote.

Obama may not be seeking punishment. I suspect he'd settle for accountability at the polls here.

Posted by Michael McCord at 10:23 PM| Permalink | Comments (0)

Now that NH Sec of State Bill Gardner has set the primary starting line (filing begins two weeks from today, Oct. 15), it’s time to count our blessings and be glad we aren’t in Florida.
Gotta love the rampant surrealism of Florida as a thorn in everyone’s side this primary season. Just ask Barack Obama, who went panning for campaign gold in the Sunshine state Sunday night -- and ended up looking if not foolish, then certainly like a politician masquerading as a thief in the night and exchanging shouts with a reporter (It seems that because Florida is primary blacklisted, candidates can fund raise but not campaign, not talk to supporters or, it seems, talk to pesky reporters doing their job. See story by Adam Smith of the St. Pete Times. It’s a restrained hoot.)
Florida, oh Florida, land of the Butterfly ballot and other unique quirks that make it a land all its own. The latest Florida step into the comic spotlight is a reminder that we have it so smooth and easy here in first-in-the-galaxy primary land. As of today, Florida Dems are essentially unwilling captains of a pirate primary ship and one where Democratic voters could potentially not have their votes count. Call it Deja Vu 2000 all over again -- this time the blue meanies are not the fluently and proudly corrupt Republican-dominated Florida legislative and executive junta that screwed them in 2000 (who can forget the dynamic duo team of Jeb Bush and Katherine Harris?). This time it’s D.C. Dems -- the national party trying to do its part to keep intact a outdated primary system from flying apart at the seems -- screwing loyal Florida Dems in a state the Dems need come general election time.
This is a saga with infinite b-grade comedy material that turns irony green with envy. The national Dems are punishing the Florida Dems because those Republican wise guys and gals in the legislature moved the primary date early so Florida could screw South Carolina and become the first primary in the South. Got it? Now hold your breath for more self-inflicted stench. More or less, the Florida Dems have no choice but to hold their primary when the legislature says -- for their trouble, they are being punished by the national party which is cutting off its nose and chopping apart its face in a bold attempt to spite itself. To add insult to injury, the Republicans are playing good samaritan and telling Dems to register as Republicans so they can make their primary votes count. It’s enough to make a Florida Dem laugh and cry and wonder if anyone really cares about them.
And here in first-in-the-galaxy primary land, we have it made. That so many states end up looking primary foolish trying to replace us with their own illusions of self-importance, only makes the comedy all the more entertaining — and instill a little doubt that maybe our time is running out. The pirates could be coming for us.
Daily Link
In my daily link, Walter Shapiro of Salon smartly dissects the collective punditboro contempt for John Edwards -- and completely ignores his considerable powers on the campaign trail which I have seen as well. It’s easy to obsess about $400 haircuts and ignore his progressive and increasingly populist message which raises serious questions about the status quo stench in D.C.

Posted by Michael McCord at 05:00 PM| Permalink | Comments (0)