Franken refuses more time to Lieberman, McCain stunned

The longest 47 seconds ever

For some strange reason — it might have something to do with George W. Bush’s disapproval rating, which is the highest recorded for any president — John McCain’s campaign apparently doesn’t want its candidate seen in public with the president.

The two appeared together at a fundraiser in Arizona on Tuesday, but the fundraiser was closed to the press. Then, McCain accompanied Bush to the airport for the president’s flight out. Their time at the airport was the only moment when the press could capture images of the two together, and even then, according to Fox News, they were within camera shot for only 47 seconds, and were together on the tarmac for just 26 seconds. They gave each other a very quick hug, and an even quicker handshake, before Bush boarded Air Force One.

Video is below.

(Continue reading: War Room-Salon.com)

Paying for War at the Pump

What’s it got to do with the price of gas? Would some reporter with access to the Republican presidential candidate please ask John McCain why he wants to continue President Bush’s Mideast policy when it has proved so ruinous for American taxpayers? Because McCain is determined to ignore our economic meltdown and shift the debate to foreign policy, shouldn’t he have to explain why an open-ended military presence in the Mideast will make us economically and militarily more secure when the opposite is clearly the case?

Let’s not waste too much time on the military side of the equation. The argument that troops on the ground have made us militarily more secure is absurd on its face. American resources and lives have been squandered in an inane effort that McCain aptly criticized before becoming a presidential candidate. As a Senate watchdog, he distinguished himself by sharply denouncing one defense contractor boondoggle after another in cases involving hundreds of billions for modern weapons that had nothing to do with fighting cave-based terrorists. But as a presidential candidate, McCain now unabashedly apologizes for every twist of the downwind spiral of the Bush administration foreign policy, from wasteful weapons to inhuman torture.

McCain’s strategy is clearly that of distracting attention from the calamitous economy by sounding the demagogue’s alarm about enemies at the gate. This week, McCain again blasted Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama on the grounds that he underestimated the threat from Iran while ignoring the vast increase in Iran’s power—an increase actually resulting from Bush eliminating Iran’s only effective enemy, Saddam Hussein. The other winners in this folly have been the oil kingdoms that Hussein periodically threatened, led by the Saudi royal family. Seizing upon the opportunity presented by the 9/11 attacks, Bush knocked off not the Saudis, who had produced Osama bin Laden and 15 of his hijacker minions, but rather the royal family’s sworn enemy in Iraq, who had absolutely nothing do with 9/11.

(Continue reading: Truthdig)

Bush’s Attack Helps Obama

In the wake of George W. Bush’s thinly veiled attack on Barack Obama from Israel’s Knesset, in which the president aimed parallels between the appeasement of Nazi Germany and weakness on terror at the Illinois Senator, Democrats were enraged.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called it, “beneath the dignity of office.” Senator Joe Biden of Delaware, never one to mince words, called it “bullsh*t.”

And while the Obama campaign expressed it’s own outrage, it may want to hold its fire: George Bush may have just given the Democrats enough ammunition to take the White House in November.

True, Bush’s comments were inflammatory. He raised the issue of Nazi Germany, mentioned the name of Adolph Hitler in- of all places- Israel. And while the setting and delivery might have come as somewhat of a shock to the political world, it’s substantively nothing new. In fact, a central focus of John McCain’s summer and fall campaign will be to paint Obama as being soft on terror. But the significance of Bush’s statements has less to do with what he said than it does with the fact that he said it at all.

In firing a salvo of his own, George W. Bush planted himself firmly in John McCain’s camp. Consider what kind of dead weight that is for the Arizona Senator: Bush’s approval rating stands at a paltry 27%. Essentially, the president put a target on McCain’s chest at which Obama can take aim.

(Continue reading: Eyes on Obama)

Poetry vs. fear

The Obama-McCain contest will hold up a mirror to America’s soul.

The coming presidential election will present America with the starkest political choice it has faced in a generation. On one side, we have Barack Obama — the first black candidate to make it to the finals, a staunch liberal who opposes the Bush administration’s Iraq war and its massive giveaway to the rich. On the other, we have John McCain, a onetime maverick who expeditiously crawled back into the far-right bosom of the GOP and is running as Son of Bush.

It’s the collision of an irresistible force with an immovable object. Obama, combined with Bush’s disastrous legacy, is the irresistible force. Obama is a consummately skilled and pragmatic politician who has inspired millions of young voters, owns the black vote, and has demonstrated he can appeal to independents and swing voters outside the traditional Democratic constituency. Forget the recent polls showing that some Hillary Clinton supporters won’t vote for him — once Clinton gracefully bows out of the race, her supporters will close ranks around Obama. Anyone who seriously thinks a significant number of them are going to vote for McCain is delusional. The Democrats will go into November united and energized.

And, of course, they will benefit enormously from the train-wreck presidency of George W. Bush. According to a CNN poll, Bush is the most unpopular president in modern American history: a staggering 71 percent of Americans disapprove of how he is handling the job, the first time any president’s disapproval rating has reached into the 70s. Support for Bush’s signature achievement, the war in Iraq, is also at an all-time low, with 68 percent opposed to it. Things are no better for the Republicans on the domestic front, with voters battered by record-high gas prices and a tanking economy. On the issues, there is simply no ray of hope anywhere for the GOP.

(Continue reading: Salon.com)

Officials: ‘Good possibility’ McCain will pick Rice

Palestinians ‘told we may be dealing with her in the future as vice president’

JERUSALEM – There is a “good possibility” Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice could be chosen as Sen. John McCain’s presidential running mate, Palestinian officials here say they were told by U.S. politicians in recent days.

“We were told by U.S. politicians there is a good possibility we may still be dealing with Rice in the future, but this time as vice president,” one Palestinian official told WND.

Another Palestinian official also said he recently heard from U.S. politicians Rice is likely to be McCain’s running mate.

Neither Palestinian official would say which U.S. politicians provided them with the information.

Both Palestinian officials regularly meet with Rice, including during her trip to the region earlier this month to push through Israeli-Palestinian negotiations started at last November’s U.S.-sponsored Annapolis summit.

The Palestinian officials also meet regularly with U.S. regional security coordinators and State Department officials.

Rice in February denied she is seeking the vice presidential slot.

“I have always said that the one thing that I have not seen myself doing is running for elected office,” Rice said at a news conference. “I didn’t even run for high school president. It’s sort of not in my genes.”

The State Department has not replied to WND’s request for comment.

(Continue reading: WorldNetDaily)

Obama Lawyer: Bush Manipulating FEC For McCain

Obama counsel Bob Bauer, on his always-punchy personal blog, considers the newest appointments to the FEC and writes that the regulatory body is being put back together to exclude a Republican commissioner who had taken a critical stance toward McCain’s attempt to thread the needle on public financing.

In this one move, the White House ended McCain’s accountability for his use or abuse of the primary public financing system while putting him in position to take money for the general.

For this maneuver to have been arranged for the benefit of Senator McCain, of all people–the John McCain who has regularly, severely criticized the FEC as a “corrupt” agency–is a remarkable turn in his career as a reformer. A Commissioner who acted to enforce the law, to just raise an important question of enforcement, has been stripped of his post. This was clearly in Senator McCain’s interest, this raw power play. It is also in his interest to have the FEC, back in business minus Mason, arrange for his money for the fall campaign.

(Continue reading: POLITICO)