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Title: A Joe of His Own?
Source:
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URL Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/25/o ... l?_r=1&ref=opinion&oref=slogin
Published: Aug 27, 2008
Author: William Kristol
Post Date: 2008-08-27 00:03:46 by christine
Keywords: None
Views: 144
Comments: 8
The anguished cries of Hillary supporters pierced the midday calm here on Saturday, as Barack Obama confirmed that his vice presidential choice was not Clinton, who got about 18 million votes this year running against him, but rather Joe Biden, who gained the support of a few thousand caucusgoers in Iowa before dropping out of the race. (OK, I didn’t personally hear any anguished cries from my work space near the Pepsi Center. But I’m an empathetic guy — I felt as if I could hear them.) McCain operatives were pleased by the Biden selection, which they considered, as one said to me, “a pick from weakness.” Still, it complicates McCain’s vice presidential calculations. The two leading G.O.P. prospects have been Tim Pawlenty, the Minnesota governor, and Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor. But with Biden’s foreign policy experience as a contrast, could McCain assure voters that the young Pawlenty is ready to take over, if need be, as commander in chief? Also, Biden is a strong and experienced debater. Pawlenty is unproven. If he is the choice, there will be many anxious Republicans in the run-up to the vice presidential debate in St. Louis on Oct. 2. Romney might match up better against Biden in debate. But it’s clear that the Obama-Biden campaign is moving aggressively to embrace a traditional Democratic populist economic message. Such a message will have appeal this year — especially, one supposes, against a doubly multimansioned G.O.P. ticket of McCain and Romney. If not Pawlenty or Romney, how about a woman, whose selection would presumably appeal to the aforementioned anguished Hillary supporters? It’s awfully tempting for the McCain camp to revisit the possibility of tapping Meg Whitman, the former eBay C.E.O., Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, or Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska. But the first two have never run for office, and Palin has been governor for less than two years. So what’s to be done? McCain could well decide the obstacles to Pawlenty and Romney aren’t insuperable, and pick one of them. He could choose a different Republican governor or ex-governor, senator or congressman. Or he could decide that Obama’s conventional pick of Biden allows him to seize the moment by making a bold choice. He could select the person he would really like to have by his side in the White House — but whose selection would cause palpitations among many of his staffers and supporters: the independent Democratic senator from Connecticut, Joe Lieberman. Lieberman could hold his own against Biden in a debate. He would reinforce McCain’s overall message of foreign policy experience and hawkishness. He’s a strong and disciplined candidate. But he is pro-abortion rights, and having been a Democrat all his life, he has a moderately liberal voting record on lots of issues. Now as a matter of governance, there’s no reason to think this would much matter. McCain has made clear his will be a pro-life administration. And as a one-off, quasi-national-unity ticket, with Lieberman renouncing any further ambition to run for the presidency, a McCain-Lieberman administration wouldn’t threaten the continuance of the G.O.P. as a pro-life party. In other areas, no one seriously thinks the policies of a McCain-Lieberman administration would be appreciably different from those, say, of a McCain-Pawlenty administration. Would McCain-Lieberman have a better prospect of winning than the more conventional alternatives? If they could get over the early hurdles of a messy convention and an awful lot of conservative angst and anger, I’ve come to think so. Obama and Biden will try to frame the presidential race as a normal Democratic-Republican choice. If they can do that, they should win. That would be far more difficult against a McCain-Lieberman ticket. The charge that McCain would merely mean a third Bush term would also tend to fall flat. And an unorthodox “country first” Lieberman selection would reinforce what has been attractive about McCain, and what has allowed him to run ahead of — though not yet enough ahead of — the generic Republican ballot. A Lieberman pick should help with ticket splitters. But can such a ticket hold the support of pro-lifers, conservatives and Republicans? If you’re conscientiously pro-life, you will have reservations about a pro-abortion-rights V.P. If you’re a proud conservative, Lieberman hasn’t been one. If you’re a loyal Republican, you’d much prefer someone from within the ranks. But if you’re pro-life, conservative and/or Republican, you certainly don’t want Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid running the country. If a McCain-Lieberman ticket is the best way to thwart that prospect, you could probably learn to live with it — even perhaps to like it. And Hillary supporters could protest Obama’s glass ceiling by voting for John McCain and the Democratic Party’s 2000 vice presidential nominee.
Poster Comment: here we go....let's see if i've been right all along with my prediction of a mcCain/lieberman ticket.
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#1. To: christine (#0)
What he said.
They say they are for "diversity". What they really are for is slavery.
Oh, sure, the Israelis wouldn't have any designs on the White House even though they're only one heart attack away from it! Neocon Kristol is such a lying ass weasel. Suuure, Lieberman-McCain would be the perfect ticket for Jews who are nervous about Obama.... and then it's a no-lose election!
Bottom feeding troll that shouldn't be allowed near America's government! American or Israeli? It's Anyone's Guess. by Timothy Gatto | April 5, 2008 - 1:28pm The practice of carrying two passports from two different nations is something that I really can’t wrap my mind around. While I’m sure that it could be convenient to have two different passports in the event you may want to visit a nation that has bad relations with the US, or in case one of your passports is seized or lost, having two different citizenships in two different nations could be a problem. This would be a problem especially if you happened to work for one of the governments of which you hold dual citizenship. Let’s presume that you work for the United States government, and let’s go a step further and presume that you hold a top-secret security clearance. This could pose a significant risk if you held citizenship in a country that had a significant interest in something that the US was doing or someone or something that the US was investigating. Where would your loyalties lie? If we take this a step even further and imagine that the US was going to deliberately withhold information from your “other” country or even worse, somehow double-cross that country, what would you do? Where would your loyalty to the United States end and the loyalty to that other country begin? We can even take this further. Let’s say that the “other” country in which you hold citizenship in was not only a country that represented your brethren, people that had your same culture and language, but lets say that this other country you belong to also was based on your religion? Now that’s a whole new ballgame. When you take an oath to your government to get a federal job, you must pledge to support and defend the Constitution of the United States, so help you God. Now that’s a dilemma that nobody would want to face if the other nation you belong to happens to represent your religion too. The question would probably be answered by how religious you are or aren’t. Those that put God first and their country second would have a real moral dilemma. You are probably wondering where I’m going with this. Well the facts are that we have a host of people that work or have worked with this administration that hold dual citizenship in both the US and Israel. The problem with this is that the Middle-East is the area that the US is currently concerned the most with. Israel of course, also has legitimate security concerns with the area. In fact, some information that crosses American official’s desks could possibly decide whether Israel continues to exist. This is a position that I wouldn’t want to find myself in if I were a citizen of both nations. Believe it or not, this country and Israel aren’t exactly joined at the hip, even though it may seem like that at times. That is no wonder, look at the people that hold this dual citizenship; Michael Chertoff; Attorney General on 9/11, Director of Homeland Security That’s quite a list, is it not? Where do these men’s loyalties lie? Don’t you believe that it is in US interests to bar people with dual citizenship from working at the highest levels of the US government? Do you believe that the cozy relationship we have with Israel could have been fostered by any of these men? I wonder how many decisions made were a direct result of their input. Maybe the time is right to stop the practice of dual-citizenship. That’s the way I see it. _______ "If you love wealth more than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, depart from us in peace. We ask not your counsel nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains rest lightly upon you and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen.”—Samuel Adams
FOREIGN policy should be the LEAST of our worries at this point. The U.S. DOMESTIC economy and financial system is rapidly IMPLODING. And that is precisely because the U.S. government has blown many trillions of dollars on an ineffective military conducting disastrous foreign policy. What would Washington and Jefferson think of us today?
“I would give no thought of what the world might say of me, if I could only transmit to posterity the reputation of an honest man.” - Sam Houston
Interesting.
What is your take on foreign lobbyists or domestic lobbyists working for foreign interests? Rout them out?
"If you love wealth more than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, depart from us in peace. We ask not your counsel nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains rest lightly upon you and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen.”—Samuel Adams
Well I don't have a problem with lobbyists for the most part but I do have a problem with foreign lobbyists holding security clearances and making policy from within.
Watch it now, next thing you know the Fox Union will be all pissed off at you for costing them their jobs down at the chicken coup.
And they write innumerable books; being too vain and distracted for silence: seeking every one after his own elevation, and dodging his emptiness. - T. S. Eliot
Now as a matter of governance, there’s no reason to think this would much matter.
#2. To: christine (#0)
And as a one-off, quasi-national-unity ticket, with Lieberman renouncing any further ambition to run for the presidency,.....
#3. To: Christine, *Constitution Party* (#0)
(Edited)
William Kristol
Ari Fliescher; Former Press Secretary to President Bush
Jack Abramoff: Jailed Lobbyist (supposedly entertained Mohammed Atta on his Yacht Days before 9/11)
Mark Grossman: Under Secretary for political affairs (Met with General Mahmoud Amhoud, head of Pakistani ISI on or about 9/11 the supposed financier of the hijackers.
Douglas Fein: Undersecretary of War and former member of PNAC (Project for a new American Century)
Paul Wolfowitz: Fein’s Boss, Former PNAC member, investigated for spying for Israel, resigned in World Bank scandal.
Dov Zakheim: Pentagon Comptroller when 2.3 Trillion Dollars went missing, former CFR member.
Elliot Abrams; Member of PNAC, NSA lied about Iran-Contra scandal plead guilty.
Lewis “Scooter” Libby: Former PNAC member, guilty of lying about outing of Valerie Plame, studied under Paul Wolfowitz.
Henry Kissinger: Sat on War Policy Board under Perle, first chosen to lead 9/11 Commission
William Kristol; PNAC Co-founder, strong advocate of Iraq War.
Phillip Zelkow: Advisor to Bush in 2000 campaign, led 9/11 Commission
Larry Silverstien: Owned WTC Complex, made several million dollars off 9/11.
Timothy V. Gatto
#4. To: christine (#0)
#5. To: Rotara (#3)
"You have delusions of adequacy."
#6. To: farmfriend (#5)
Interesting.
#7. To: Rotara (#6)
What is your take on foreign lobbyists or domestic lobbyists working for foreign interests? Rout them out?
"You have delusions of adequacy."
#8. To: farmfriend (#7)
I do have a problem with foreign lobbyists holding security clearances and making policy from within.
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