October 11, 2008 5:26

Stepping Back From The Brink

John McCain may not like Barack Obama, and he definitely wants to beat Obama in this election. But McCain also thinks Obama is an admirable American. How do I know that? He has said so, repeatedly. He has promised a "respectful debate" more times that I can count. On Friday, McCain faced a supporter at a town hall who said of Obama, "He's an arab." McCain cut her off. "No, Ma'am," he said. "He's a decent family man, citizen, that I just happen to have disagreements with on fundamental issues. And that's what this campaign is all about."

The problem for McCain--and the nation--is that McCain's campaign message now systematically encourages voters to believe that Obama is secretly something awful. And on one level, that's fine. Candidates call their opponents awful all the time. That's what a competitive democracy is all about. But at the same time, McCain has a burden to be more careful than just any other candidate, given the unprecedented nature of this race. As it stands, McCain's effort to paint Obama as awful appears to be stirring up widespread racial, religious and xenophobic prejudices which are not acceptable.

In the space of one week, the McCain campaign has in one way or another, and often in misleading ways, accused Obama of a whole host of bad things that, taken alone and without context, could be seen as nothing more than hard ball politics. Obama is said to be pals with a domestic terrorist, to be trying to deny funding for American fighting troops, and to see America in a different way than most Americans. "Who is Barack Obama?" an ominous question has become the watchword of the campaign.

But taken together, and in the context of a nation still struggling to overcome a legacy of racial bigotry, the McCain message has proved problematic. Three times Friday, McCain was forced to chide his own supporters, including the woman I mentioned who called Obama an Arab and a man who said he is "scared of an Obama presidency." (TPM compiled a video montage here.) It was a bizarre situation for a major party candidate three weeks out from Election Day, and McCain should be credited for pulling back the reins.

But McCain's message strategy is unlikely to change, and he will continue to bear the burden of the uglier reactions it inspires. In the meantime, our political debate is in danger of disintegrating. On Friday, Georgia Rep. John Lewis, a civil rights icon and personal role model for McCain, posted a statement over at Politico comparing McCain to George Wallace, the segregationist governor of Alabama. "George Wallace never threw a bomb," Lewis noted. "He never fired a gun, but he created the climate and the conditions that encouraged vicious attacks against innocent Americans who were simply trying to exercise their constitutional rights. Because of this atmosphere of hate, four little girls were killed on Sunday morning when a church was bombed in Birmingham, Alabama. As public figures with the power to influence and persuade, Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin are playing with fire, and if they are not careful, that fire will consume us all."

McCain responded in a statement, saying, "I am saddened that John Lewis, a man I've always admired, would make such a brazen and baseless attack on my character and the character of the thousands of hardworking Americans who come to our events to cheer for the kind of reform that will put America on the right track. I call on Senator Obama to immediately and personally repudiate these outrageous and divisive comments that are so clearly designed to shut down debate 24 days before the election."

Hours earlier, on Saturday morning, a pastor giving the invocation for McCain at a rally in Iowa, said the following: "I also would also pray, Lord, that your reputation is involved in all that happens between now and November, because there are millions of people around this world praying to their god--whether it's Hindu, Buddha, Allah--that [McCain's] opponent wins, for a variety of reasons." This is dangerous stuff. Need anyone be reminded, Obama is a practicing Christian.

This election is going to end ugly. But let's hope it's the kind of ugly that democracies like ours are able to handle in stride, the kind where candidates and parties fight fiercely, and even unfairly, for their teams, without forgetting the basic human respect that unites us all. That ugly may be contemptible, but it does not offend our most basic ideals. The sort of ugly that McCain was forced to knock down on Friday, the sort that showed up Saturday in Iowa, that stuff is another matter altogether.

October 10, 2008 8:57

Troopergate Probe: Palin Abused Power

UPDATE: TIME's Nathan Thornburgh analyzes the Troopergate report, with this conclusion:

"[T]he Branchflower report still makes for good reading, if only because it convincingly answers a question nobody had even thought to ask: Is the Palin administration shockingly amateurish? Yes, it is. Disturbingly so. The 263 pages of the report show a coordinated application of pressure on Monegan so transparent and ham-handed that it was almost certain to end in public embarrassment for the governor." Read it all here.

UPDATE II: The McCain campaign's statement:

"Today's report shows that the Governor acted within her proper and lawful authority in the reassignment of Walt Monegan. The report also illustrates what we've known all along: this was a partisan led inquiry run by Obama supporters and the Palins were completely justified in their concern regarding Trooper Wooten given his violent and rogue behavior. Lacking evidence to support the original Monegan allegation, the Legislative Council seriously overreached, making a tortured argument to find fault without basis in law or fact."

From the Anchorage Daily News (report .pdf here):

Finding Number One

For the reasons explained in section IV of this report, I find that Governor Sarah Palin abused her power by violating Alaska Statute 39.52.110(a) of the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act. Alaska Statute 39.52.110(a) provides

The legislature reaffirms that each public officer holds office as a public trust, and any effort to benefit a personal or financial interest through official action is a violation of that trust.

The other findings after the jump. . . .

October 10, 2008 8:19

Ambinder vs. Scherer: The Emails

On Friday morning, The Atlantic's Marc Ambinder, whom I count among the cycle's indispensable campaign reporters, wrote a blog post arguing that John McCain was not serious about his William Ayers attacks. On Friday afternoon, I responded with a post saying that McCain was serious, to the extent that serious is a thing that matters.

Ambinder and I continued our debate privately in email. After a few exchanges, we decided to post our entirely friendly and respectful give-and-take, in a slightly edited form. Read the original Ambinder post here. Read my blog response here. The emails follow after the jump.

October 10, 2008 6:48

Races to Watch

Yes, there are other races going on outside of the presidential campaign. Here’s a rolling package that will update daily of the top congressional races (I did the Warner/Gilmore race which is not exactly a nail biter but is the Dems most likely pick up in the Senate). And for the trifecta: will Schumer get his 60 seats?

October 10, 2008 6:23

McCain Denounces Pitchfork-Wavers

Here in Lakeville, the traveling press was pretty sure we'd see more of the kind of vicious anti-Obama attitude that's becoming a hallmark of McCain rallies of late.

As the town hall started, McCain was off with more pep than usual. Making the same old jokes, but with energy that reminded us of "the old McCain." But would he use his power for good or evil? An audience member teed up a great big softball that could totally hit a dark side home run, asking, "We want you to fight at your next debate... we want to see s REAL fight at the debate, we want a STRONG leader for the next four years." That is Minnesota nice for "RevWrightACORNAyers," etc.

But then something weird happens: He acknowledges the "energy" people have been showing at rallies, and how glad he is that people are excited. But, he says, "I respect Sen. Obama and his accomplishments." People booed at the mention of his name. McCain, visibly angry, stopped them: "I want EVERYONE to be respectful, and lets make sure we are."

The very next questioner tried to push back on this request, noting that he needed to "tell the American the TRUTH about Barack Obama" -- a not very subtle way, I think, to ask John McCain to NOT tell the truth about Barack Obama. McCain told her there's a "difference between record and rhetoric, and I plan to talk about his record, respectfully... I don't mean that has to reduce your ferocity, I just mean it has to be respectful."

And then later, again, someone dangled a great big piece of low-hanging fruit in front of McCain: "I'm scared to bring up my child in a world where Barack Obama is president."

McCain replies, "Well, I don't want him to be president, either. I wouldn't be running if I did. But," and he pauses for emphasis, "you don't have to be scared to have him be President of the United States." A round of boos.

And he snaps back: "Well, obviously I think I'd be better. "

Of course, this is kind of the best of both world: Crazy base-world gets to bring up Ayers and whatever else, really, and he gets to say, "Be respectful." But I think he means it.

UPDATE: Indeed, he just snatched the microphone out the hands of a woman who began her question with, "I'm scared of Barack Obama... he's an Arab terrorist..."

"No, no ma'am," he interrupted. "He's a decent family man with whom I happen to have some disagreements."

October 10, 2008 3:29

McCain: Relief For That Crucial 100-plus Demographic

Justin Fox takes a look at the latest idea that John McCain has unveiled to grapple with the financial crisis--lifting the requirement that seniors withdraw a certain amount of their retirement account each year. McCain argues that investors shouldn't be forced to sell their stocks when the market is taking a beating.

But Justin notes that if you look at how that requirement actually works, McCain's proposal won't mean a lot to most people--unless they happen to be over 100 years old:

First of all, the only people the suspension would help are those who don't need the money right now. And for the bulk of retirees (that is, people in their 70s) the required annual withdrawal amount is 5% or less of the total in the account. Still, this could be a big deal for 100-year-olds, who must withdraw as much as 16% a year. They should definitely vote for McCain.

October 10, 2008 3:18

Is McCain Serious About Ayers?

Marc Ambinder has written a post arguing that McCain is not serious about the William Ayers attacks his campaign has been launching all week. The argument goes like this:

To truly drive Ayers into the public conversation, to trick what they consider an irredeemably biased press corps into biting, McCain has three vehicles gassed up and ready to go.

(1) He could put lots of money into an Ayers ad -- video press releases don't cut it.
(2) He could devote a stump speech to Obama's associations and Obama's associations only
(3) He could mention Ayers in a debate.

So far, McCain has done none of those things. On top of doing none of those things, he has declared Obama's association with Rev. Jeremiah Wright as off-limits.

I'm not so sure "serious" or "not serious" is the best measure for understanding McCain and Ayers. Campaigns regularly dispatch surrogates, including a vice presidential pick, to lead harsh attacks. And McCain has not exactly shied away from the topic of Ayers. He talked about him yesterday during his Wisconsin town hall, and in a recent interview with ABC's Charlie Gibson. As for the television buy, there is no real need. The Ayers charges are explosive enough to get plenty of viral, free news media attention. As for the Wright parallel, Ambinder gets at an odd quirk in the McCain strategy. Going back to the spring, McCain's advisers ruled Wright out of bounds. The reasons were multiple: McCain had his own pastor problem at the time; the campaign did not want to be tarred with the racial overtones of the Wright criticism; and, I suspect, McCain believed personal religious observance to be an inappropriate campaign topic. But the campaign's official avoidance of Wright has always made its embrace of other "association" attacks seem odd. [Update: At a town hall Friday afternoon, McCain appeared to respond to concerns that his campaign was too fiercely negative. “I have to tell you," McCain said of Obama. "He is a decent person, a person that you do not have to be scared [of] as president of the United States.” Minutes later, he again raised concerns about Obama's association with Ayers.]

That said, something has been lost in the media's shock and awe over McCain's sharply negative "Manchurian Candidate" attack on Obama over the last few weeks: None of this is really that surprising.

More after the jump. . .

October 10, 2008 2:59

Petraeus on Reconciliation

Fred Kaplan has, as usual, a smart account of David Petraeus's recent speech at the Heritage Foundation, in which the general talked about the need to negotiate with enemies. Kaplan points out the crucial difference between preparations and preconditions when you're about to talk to your foes:

Asked about a British officer's recent statement that at some point, we'll have to strike a deal with the Taliban in Afghanistan, Petraeus said, matter-of-factly, "You have to talk to enemies."
He added that the British know this especially well, as they've "sat down with thugs throughout their history, including us, I suspect."
Petraeus quickly added that, of course, you have to go into the talks with an agenda, and you have to know what your objectives are. But his point and these particular caveats are consistent with the distinction that Obama has repeatedly made between "preparations" and "preconditions"—the former being common sense and the latter being an insistence that the other side satisfy our demands before we so much as sit down with them (a position that even President Bush, its most dogmatic advocate, has recently begun to reconsider, especially in North Korea).
In Iraq, the general recalled in his Heritage speech, "we sat down with some of those who were shooting at us"—a painful task but "an explicit part of our campaign." These talks formed the basis for the Anbar Awakening—in which Sunni insurgents allied themselves with U.S. forces to beat back the common foe of al-Qaida in Iraq—and for the tactical success of the "surge" itself.

A couple of additional points here:

A great many generals--Tommy Franks comes to mind--have broadbrushed and overstated progress as egregiously as politicians (John McCain comes to mind) do. Petraeus has never been like that. He has always sought to keep himself separate from politics, despite McCain's efforts to portray the general as the campaign's mascot. He has never talked of "victory" in Iraq--since he know that "victory" is something only the Iraqis can do for themselves. In my conversations with Petraeus and his staff, they've always been open to all sorts of ideas--eager, in fact, to think the unthinkable, to try anything within reason to reduce the level of violence. It is hard to imagine what President McCain would have said if Petraeus--or, better still, some non-mythologized general--had proposed, "Well, Mr. President, we're thinking about negotiating with some of the jihadi tribes that support Al Qaeda in Iraq and see if we can pay them to switch sides." ("You're talking like that one!" McCain might have blustered.)

On Afghanistan and Pakistan: I've been reading an excellent book called "Descent in Chaos" by the Pakistani journalist Ahmed Rashid, who agrees with Petraeus about negotiating with the Taliban--who, as with AQI, are a plural, disorganized phenomenon. Rashid points out that a number of Afghanis wanted southern Pashtun tribes (most of which were Taliban-affiliated, but not religious extremists) to attend the Bonn peace conference in 2002, but the proposal was rejected by Franks and Bush--consequently, Hamid Karzai was the only southern Pastu involved in the negotiations. We're paying the price for that now.

Rashid also writes, in astonishing detail, about how Pakistan's pro-Taliban ISI played us for fools in the early stages of the war, enabling the Al Qaeda leadership to get out of Dodge. Really depressing stuff...(And something McCain should consider before he criticizes Obama again for wanting to stage targeted hits on Al Qaeda positions in Pakistan.)

It'll be interesting to see how Petraeus, who is just getting his feet wet in Afghanistan, evaluates and responds to the deteriorating situation there.

October 10, 2008 11:58

Conn. Supreme Court Declares Gay Marriage Rights

The Hartford Courant reports:

Same-sex couples won the right to marry in Connecticut in an historic ruling by the Supreme Court today.

Citing the equal protection clause of the state constitution, the justices ruled that civil unions were discriminatory. In a 4-3 decision released at 11:30 a.m., the majority wrote that the state's "understanding of marriage must yield to a more contemporary appreciation of the rights entitled to constitutional protection."

"Interpreting our state constitutional provisions in accordance with firmly established equal protection principles leads inevitably to the conclusion that gay persons are entitled to marry the otherwise qualified same sex partner of their choice," the majority wrote. "To decide otherwise would require us to apply one set of constitutional principles to gay persons and another to all others."

October 10, 2008 11:50

SNL Spoofs Last Debate