Blue Collar Muse

I’ve been engaging in a debate in the comments section of a piece I cross-posted at Media Lizzy’s blog. Over there, I’ve had a great, respectful give and take with a reader named Eric. It’s the sort of exchange we all enjoy - no profanity, not snarkiness - just the excellent literary stick-and-jab that makes political blogging interesting and fun. Would that all commenters were like Eric.

I wanted to respond here to something Eric said as this likely will be longer than your usual comment. Eric, as have so many others in the last few days, has made the mistake of viewing Sarah Palin’s comments on the Bush Doctrine question from Charlie Gibson through the “Best response for the Left” lens and not the more proper “Response most grounded in Reality” lens. When I read Eric’s statement in comment #14,

However, this issue is dead now that Sarah “In what respect, Charlie?” Palin has shown how vapid her knowledge on wordly issues really is. I think independents will view this performance, and ask themselves, “Do I REALLY want this woman to be a heartbeat away from the presidency?”

my response was

I haven’t seen the entire interview yet as I’m in Phoenix for a conference. I’ll be interested to see the quote you reference. As I mentioned, the Left will be going over her remarks with a fine tooth comb hoping to find some payback.

Vapid is not likely a word I would use for Palin. It’s unlikely that anyone accomplished enough to be considered for a VP slot would be vapid.

Sure enough, it turns out the “Sarahnator” was right and Eric was wrong. Not that he’s alone in that. Charlie Gibson was wrong, too. Turns out, even Barack Obama got it wrong! From their place on the floor, laid out from where the “Sarahnator” coldcocked them, one can almost imagine Palin extending a hand to them and saying, “Come with me if you want to live!” They see her as the enemy but she may yet save them all.

On what am I basing my opinion that Palin isn’t a vapid housewife, unfit to lead should she be called on to assume the Presidency? Here are just 3 authoritative comments on Sarah’s response to Charlie Gibson’s “gotcha” on the Bush Doctrine:

First up, a humorous and snarky response to the media from Catron at Health Care BS. In ‘Dear Mediatards, Thank You!’ Catron writes

Dear MSM,

Thank you for your mean-spirited and mendacious coverage of Sarah Palin. You have accomplished what no Republican strategist, talk radio host, or blogger could have managed—-you have energized conservatives and convinced many independents that they should vote for McCain-Palin. …

Also, I will be eternally grateful to ABC for using its exclusive Palin interview to take her quotes out of context, distort facts, and do a general hatchet job on her.

And I can’t forget to thank AP for insinuating that Palin is unqualified to be VP because she was allegedly “unable to describe President Bush’s doctrine of pre-emptive strikes against threatening nations.”

On a more serious note, one of my favorite intellectual types, Joshua Trevino writes in ‘Defining the “Bush Doctrine”‘

The consequence of this exchange has been the predictable and familiar litany of hand-wringing over Palin’s purported ignorance of basic foreign policy principles, and her concurrent fitness (or lack thereof) to lead the country. See Andrew Sullivan for a succinct demonstration of the shrieking; the rest may be found via the usual suspects.

Sullivan writes: “[A]ny serious person who has followed the debates about US foreign policy knows what the Bush doctrine is.” Charlie Gibson apparently agrees. They’re both wrong. The fact is that the “Bush Doctrine” is a term which has had an evolving definition over this decade. Though it’s obvious Palin was momentarily baffled by the query, she was far closer to the truth when she interpreted the phrase as signifying the President’s “world view.” What we know as the “Bush Doctrine” has many meanings.

Josh follows this up with a lengthy list of the various ways the term has been used, complete with links so you can see for yourself.

Finally, in the WaPo online edition, Charles Krauthammer’s article Charlie Gibson’s Gaffe also shreds Eric’s contention that Palin was confused and ignorant and thus, unqualified. Krauthammer notes that he knows something about the term “Bush Doctrine” as he was the first to use it. His analysis?

The New York Times got it wrong. And Charlie Gibson got it wrong.

There is no single meaning of the Bush doctrine. In fact, there have been four distinct meanings, each one succeeding another over the eight years of this administration — and the one Charlie Gibson cited is not the one in common usage today. It is utterly different.

He asked Palin, “Do you agree with the Bush doctrine?”

She responded, quite sensibly to a question that is ambiguous, “In what respect, Charlie?”

Sensing his “gotcha” moment, Gibson refused to tell her. After making her fish for the answer, Gibson grudgingly explained to the moose-hunting rube that the Bush doctrine “is that we have the right of anticipatory self-defense.”

Wrong.

Sarah Palin will weather this weak and baseless criticism. The Sarahnator is stronger than ever. I can hear it now in that confident Alaska cadence that’s more T888 than pitbull, “I’ll be back!”

Blue Collar Muse

SEE ALSO:

The Klein Doctrine by Pete Wehner at Contentions Blog.

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It would seem to be so obvious as to not need saying that the best advocate for the Barack Obama campaign is Barack Obama.  Ditto for John McCain.  That being the case, it seems a no brainer that there would be controversy surrounding things a candidate says.  That particular sword, however, cuts both ways.  If the candidate is saying good things, newsworthy things, appropriate things - the candidate gets good press.  On the other hand, if the candidate says ignorant things, stupid things, ill advised things - the candidate is going to get lots of press, likely of an undesireable variety.

Which brings us to the case of recent comments by Barack Obama.  A few days ago, speaking to George Stephonopolous on matters of faith, Obama referred to his own faith as “my Muslim faith”.  Yesterday, Obama made a reference to the old saw about “lipstick on a pig”.  Both comments drew immediate fire from the Right and the national debate was joined.

Let me say at the outset that there is politics happening on both sides of the comment controversies.  Discussion on the Right is that Obama has finally admitted that he is a Muslim and not a Christian and that he also has insulted Sarah Palin by calling her a pig.  The Left has countered that the comments were taken out of context and that the other side is making mountains out of molehills.

For the record, I think the Left has a strong case when they argue the comments are being taken out of context.  When the entire section of video is viewed for both comments as opposed to just the 5 second soundbites, it is clear that the Muslim remark was a mere slip of the tongue of the variety we’ve all made.  The terms “Muslim” and “Christian” were both in the discussion and the wrong one came out connected to his faith.  The lipstick comment was a wrap up of a discussion of Obama’s spin on McCain’s views and seems to be an appropriate use of the phrase.  In this context, the Obama campaign should get a pass on the Muslim comment at least.  The lipstick comment is more problematic.

Because the real problem for Obama isn’t what he said, it’s that he said it at all!  The biggest complaint coming out of the Obama campaign over the last couple of days apart from the comment dustup is that Sarah Palin has not been interviewed by the media or let loose to speak freely.  What Obama understands is that speaking publicly like that can be a very treacherous undertaking.  They want Palin out and on tape so they can do to her what the Right is doing to Obama.  Be it on policy or a verbal misstep, the Obama campaign wants the same exposure for Palin that Obama has been subject to.  The problem, of course, is there is no guarantee Palin will be accomodating and provide the desired ammunition for her own political assassination at the hands of a cruel and amoral Left.

During the time frame in which Obama made the remarks for which he is being pilloried, Biden, McCain and Palin have all been on the stump.  Owing to his proven history over decades, smart money was on Biden as the guy most likely to say stupid things in front of a camera.  So far he has not although there’s a storm gathering around his comments on stem cell research and special needs children.  Nor have McCain or Palin provided any verbal gaffes.  But Obama has and that’s a problem.  There maybe an explanation for what he actually meant.  But there is no denying that he said what he said.  It’s a problem for him now and these two comments may follow him for a long while.  If he continues to add to them it is not going to get any better, regardless of the spin and explanation that come out of Obama’s campaign.   One need only look at the consequences of one word, “Macaca”, to understand the import of Obama’s mistakes.

Obama is squandering his reputation as a good speaker while tightly scripted and living down to his reputation as a poor spontaneous speaker.  The occasional slip of the tongue as evidenced by the “my Muslim faith” comment will tend to be less damaging.  Everyone has done that and we understand.  However, while Obama can legitimately claim his remarks about pigs and lipstick concerned John McCain, if he expects that anyone with a scintilla of intelligence will not make the connection between his comments and Palin’s comments then he’s not as sharp a knife as he would have us believe.

For whatever reason, Obama chose that phrase as opposed to any one of several others that would have illustrated the same point.  Thus he can try and explain his meaning but he cannot realistically say he didn’t understand his comments would be taken as a swipe at Palin.  Not personal - he wasn’t calling her a pig.  But it strains credulity to the breaking point to ask me to believe he wasn’t trying to connect the popularity of Palin and her lipstick comment and take away some of the power and popularity of Palin’s words.

I don’t fault him for doing that.  It’s smart politics.  But such efforts don’t always work.  This one didn’t.  Obama and his campaign need to look for better attacks or just give up the practice if they cannot stop doing it so badly.  Obama has enough negative baggage on his record and the issues without adding to the ammunition his opponents will use against him by handing them bullets and helping them load the gun.  Obama can try to explain away his missteps but it’s clearly a losing fight.  As Obama has famously said, you can put lipstick on a pig - but it’s still a pig!

Blue Collar Muse

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When unexpected good things happen, we call it Serendipity. Not so with unexpected bad things. The Law of Unintended Consequences, abbreviated LUC and pronounced “luck” as in “If it weren’t for bad LUCk I’d have no LUCk at all!”, is perhaps the most famous non-scientific Law. No need to be a rocket scientist to recognize no matter how hard you try to avoid it, bad things will happen which you did not foresee and did not intend.

BCM’s corollary to LUCk postulates the larger the pool of original actions from which to derive consequences of any sort, the greater the odds of realizing a Spontaneous Unintended Consequence, abbreviated SUC and pronounced “suck” as in, well, you’re likely way ahead of me here! All of which puts Democrats, with their emphasis on more regulation, bigger Government and expanding bureaucracy at huge risk for SUCking on a regular basis.

News reports this week show Dems SUCking in 2 ways which don’t bode well for Americans. As always, in November, remember who got you into this mess.

Both instances of Democratic SUCking stem from their Energy policy which refuses to acknowledge both the value of drilling for American oil and of increasing our ability to refine oil we are able to acquire from any source. While Democrats publicly pretend to hate high prices for items impacted by oil costs, privately they are jubilant.  High fuel prices are  particularly joyous as they force Americans to drive less thereby ushering in the long awaited dream of planetary salvation. But just here, things start to SUCk for the country.

World Net Daily reports BusinessWeek is running a story on a new Ford, the Fiesta ECOnetic. It gets a stunning 65 mpg, but the carmaker can’t sell it in the US. Only Europeans will be able to buy the ECOnetic.

“We know it’s an awesome vehicle,” says Ford America President Mark Fields. “But there are business reasons why we can’t sell it in the U.S.” The main one: The Fiesta ECOnetic runs on diesel.

Automakers such as Volkswagen (VLKAY) and Mercedes-Benz (DAI) have predicted for years that a technology called “clean diesel” would overcome many Americans’ antipathy to a fuel still often thought of as the smelly stuff that powers tractor trailers. Diesel vehicles now hitting the market with pollution-fighting technology are as clean or cleaner than gasoline and at least 30% more fuel-efficient.

Yet while half of all cars sold in Europe last year ran on diesel, the U.S. market remains relatively unfriendly to the fuel. Taxes aimed at commercial trucks mean diesel costs anywhere from 40 cents to $1 more per gallon than gasoline. Add to this the success of the Toyota Prius, and you can see why only 3% of cars in the U.S. use diesel. “Americans see hybrids as the darling,” says Global Insight auto analyst Philip Gott, “and diesel as old-tech.”

Higher taxes, higher production costs and decades of irresponsible environmentalism - all thanks to Democrats - leave Americans out of fuel, walking on the roadside. Meanwhile, world citizens in Europe reap benefits from American technology, manufacturing jobs and the economic benefit of both.

The second instance of Democrats as LUCky charms also comes via World Net Daily, this time pointing to an ABC News story that the Highway Trust Fund, in which monies are held to be disbursed to the several states for infrastructure upkeep and repair, will run out of money at the end of this month.

… the Transportation Department said that this month it is expecting to bring in $2.7 billion in gas tax revenues but anticipates needing $4.4 billion to reimburse states for their highway and road projects. The department said it will start the upcoming fiscal year that begins Oct. 1 with no money in the trust funds if patterns continue as is.

Why? The story reports that Americans are driving less due to the high cost of fuel. A lot less. Try 10 billion miles less in May of ‘08 than in May of ‘07. Music to Democratic ears. But wait. The Highway Trust Fund is kept chuck-full-o-bucks by fuel taxes. Less driving means less fuel purchases. Less fuel purchases means less revenue to the Fund. And less Fund revenue means that “…starting next week [The Transportation Department] will begin delaying payments to states …” for the projects they are working on. Oooops, the favorite Democratic tactic of raising taxes to generate income doesn’t work yet again!

The solution? Democrats want yet another $8 billion in tax money for the Fund. Is there no end to the SUCkiness? The Bush administration recently opposed that plan. Democrats merely criticize the President, pointing to projects that will suffer if the Fund stops paying. Leaving alone, for this post anyway, the waste inherent in sending money from the states to the Feds to be sent back to the states, another factor is at work here. Railing at the GOP, Democrats conveniently forget another truth.

In this highly charged political season, Transportation Secretary [Mary] Peters blamed the financial crisis on earmarks included in the last transportation bill, which she said amounted to $24 billion in pet projects.

The last transportation bill, the one passed by a Democratic Congress, the Congress with a 9% approval rating, contained enough Pork to fund the Highway Trust Fund for almost 6 months! But it’s the GOP who is wrong for not simply ponying up another $8 billion. Democrats in control of purse strings don’t have to exercise fiscal constraint or oversight. If Bush and Co. won’t go along, open fire on the GOP. If the Right continues to balk and Dems need another few billion dollars for something, they’ll just raise another tax.

But which candidate is campaigning on reforming the earmark tradition so taxpayers get the most for the money taken from them in taxes? And which Party wants to reduce the size of Government so it doesn’t continue to cost Americans 54% of every dollar they make just to fund some level of Government? Which leads inexorably to the crucial question, “Who offers realistic hope to Americans that their SUCky LUCk can change?” How you answer that question on November 4th will have a profound impact you both of our lives. Choose well.

Wondering if that’s enough talk about the Economy for Senators Obama and Biden …

Blue Collar Muse

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