The optimists view of today’s extra-curricular fracas between Obama and Clinton [PBS News Hour MP3 Download]: the media (and, to a lesser degree, voters) are eager to differentiate between these candidates.
Now, back to the issues:
Solid analysis of the “globalization and technology” policies of the candidates who have won primaries so far from Information Week blogger Mary Hayes Weier:
Not much in the way of insight, but she covers the breadth of what these candidates have presented thus far.
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Clinton, Huckabee, McCain, Obama | 
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Posted by Andrew Bennett
Fox News’ Republican debate in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina just ended. The network’s focus group and talking heads gave Fred Thompson two thumbs up, though I felt he was upstaged throughout by Huckabee who did a great job considering he was on the defensive most of the night. I also caught a glimpse of Romney finally understanding that he may be able to push the other candidates around a bit when it comes to the economy. Romney has to assert himself as the Republican candidate who can help Americans feeling the pinch. I know this sounds a little ridiculous, but none of the other Republicans are any closer to pulling it off either.
As usual, one of the best analyzes of the debate comes from NBC’s Chuck Todd. And while I personally think he should be allowed in every debate as long as he’s polling above 5%, I also agree with Todd’s characterization of Paul as a “distraction.” Ron Paul’s supporters in the audience were even more detached from the real debate than he was and their predictable boos and cheers were never rooted in rational, analytic reactions to that debate - an interesting case of life reflecting virtual life.
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Debates, Fred Thompson, Huckabee, Republicans, Romney, Ron Paul | 
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Posted by Andrew Bennett
More from the Boston Globe: an analysis of all the candidates’ most recent “autobiographies” and “memoirs” (many have co-authors). Some highlights:
Hillary Rodham Clinton
“Living History,”She concedes her husband is a creep when it comes to predatory sexual behavior. Does she come across as defensive from time to time when trying to rebut her critics? Yes, but even that defensiveness reveals her character so starkly that she seems almost naked on the page.
Barack Obama
“The Audacity of Hope,”At times, the book is revealing and interesting. At other junctures, it is fair to ask: Where is the “audacity” suggested in the title? Especially in the chapters that are issue-oriented, it seems like Obama decided to write a book that would offend nobody.
Mike Huckabee
“From Hope to Higher Ground: Twelve STOPs to Restoring America’s Greatness,”Everything about Huckabee’s book, including its weaknesses (periodic artless phrasing and hackneyed thinking), seems authentic.
Mitt Romney
“Turnaround: Crisis, Leadership, and the Olympic Games,”Whether the US government can be run like a Fortune 500 company seems doubtful, but maybe somebody with Romney’s corporate experience and obvious brainpower can make it work. Whether any politician is driven by altruism seems doubtful, too, but maybe he means what he says in the final paragraph of his book: “There is not one day when I have regretted making a full commitment to public service. The battles, the triumphs, the personal associations are more rewarding than I could have ever imagined. I could have made a good deal more money . . . had I stayed at my investment job. . . . Instead, I have come to know many more people and to help many more people I do not know.”
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Clinton, Democrats, Huckabee, Obama, Republicans, Romney | 
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Posted by Andrew Bennett
Washingtonpost.com’s The Trail presents just one of many hyperbolic reactions to the results in Iowa, calling it an “earthquake in the midwest:”
Eight years after Iowa voters did the conventional — sending George W. Bush and Al Gore on to meet in the election of 2000, they shook up the status quo in both parties as never before.
The victories of Barack Obama and Mike Huckabee jolted the expectations of establishment candidates with far stronger conventional credentials.
Neither victory was nationally determinative, but early favorites Hillary Rodham Clinton and Mitt Romney were badly damaged by the Iowa results and may have a hard time recovering.
Ok, the last sentence holds some truth, but was this result really that surprising? Have things been shook up like never before? I’m pretty sure the only candidates Iowans have ever agreed with the rest of the country on are George W. Bush (2000) and Jimmy Carter (’76). Shook up? Maybe, but like never before? From what I understand Iowa has always been a tricky predictor and an anomalous result would basically be like every time before.
Anyone who was following the race and the polls would have predicted the Huckabee win, though the margin was a bit surprising. As was Obama’s, but given the nature of the Dems selection process in Iowa, I wouldn’t give too much creed to his margin of victory.
However, I must admit that despite the polls showing Obama with a slim lead before last night, I thought Edwards would come away with a victory. Team Obama’s ability to convince and get people to caucus is hugely impressive. It appears the Senator from Illinois outranks all the other candidates when it comes to face-to-face campaigning, but will other primary states offer the same opportunities as Iowa for Obama to operate in this fashion?
I doubt it, but that only makes his Hawkeye State win all the more valuable.
No Comments » | Huckabee, New Iowashire, Obama | Permalink
Posted by Andrew Bennett
There is bigger and sadder global news at this, but the holiday schedule delays a blog post un-related to today’s assassination of Benazir Bhutto:
Plenty of magazine reading on holiday transit - it’s a shame that the one week you have all the time to read, the weeklies just cram a year’s worth of human interest stories or type that can’t be aged. Anyway, a piece by Matt Cooper in Cond Nast on John Edwards the phony populist, get a lot better in the context of Clive Crook’s op-ed in the FT today:
A recent poll by the Wall Street Journal and NBC found that 58 per cent of Americans think that globalisation has been bad for the US and that only 28 per cent believe that it has been good…
…the rising tide of economic populism makes the prospects for meaningful trade liberalisation and an intelligent resolution of the immigration conundrum even more bleak. Beyond next year, the real question is what happens in 2009, when (let us suppose) the main obstacles to a populist turn in policy have been removed. How far left, in economic policy, might America then veer?
Compare this to Cooper’s soothing tones for the American globalist:
Edwards is the most populist of the major presidential candidates, and there’s an understandable tendency on the part of business executives to recoil from him…
But should business really fear a President Edwards? I don’t think so. His public record and private comments suggest someone who’s less than a ferocious populist and more like the moderate Southern Democrat he was known as before this presidential bid…
When it comes to trade, Edwards is only marginally more protectionist than Clinton or Obama.
Crook’s data and interpretation add to some polling I’ve posted on this blog that shows that American’s are increasingly favoring a protectionist policy when it comes to immigration, trade, and military entanglement. Meanwhile, as Cooper and other reveal, even the most populist of the candidates is not really a populist. Maybe the voters are really smart and know Edwards is phony populist - so why the popularity for Clinton/Obama or even Giuliani/Romney on the other side? Where’s the true populist who can run with the growing protectionist sentiment in the electorate?
Uh oh.
I think both Crook and Cooper are focused solely on one of the more tangible components of populism: the restraints it offers voters who fear the market is going too far. But populism is also about zeitgeists, illusions, and…well…varments:
In fact, Huckabee said, not only had he hunted varmints himself — in addition to deer, ducks, antelopes and, now, pheasants — but he also was an experienced varmint-eater, having downed his share of fried squirrel, biscuits and Coke as a college student.
“I figured out you could put grease in a popcorn popper and heat that thing up, and you could cook anything,” he said in an interview. “So we fried squirrel.”
And with that the contest for the world’s most powerful job centered not on policy and substance in the run-up to next week’s Iowa caucuses, but on the question of authenticity.
No Comments » | Edwards, Huckabee | Permalink
Posted by Andrew Bennett
Not a whole lot of inspiration from the Sunday papers today. You get the sense that the candidates tried to plant a few seeds last week (Huckabee w/ the Mormon-baiting; Hillary camp w/ the drug comments; Bill w/ the “lack of experience” comments) and everyone’s just waiting around to see what sprouts. Will be interested to see if Obama joins in - kind of get the feeling that he’s better off just dancing in the ring instead of throwing punches. Speaking of which - it’s difficult to imagine Mike Huckabee getting through this week without taking a few shots.
The other interesting storyline will continue to be endorsements. McCain and Hillary got the DesMoines Register and word is McCain will get Joe Lieberman as well. This isn’t a huge boost for the Arizona Senator so much as it should serve as a reminder to the media, and perhaps the voters of New Hampshire, that he’s still alive. And something tells me, sadly, that you can’t count out Fred Thompson either. No link, just a gut thing. By this time next week I would hope there’s more than that to go on.
No Comments » | Clinton, Fred Thompson, Huckabee, McCain, Press | Permalink
Posted by Andrew Bennett
Mike Huckabee wonders aloud if Mormons believe that the devil and Jesus are brothers, but the saddest part of the coming saga over these comments will be Romney’s initial response: “That’s been something that’s been leveled at our church over many many years and of course that’s been set straight now.” Are you kidding me?
Advice to Mitt - try this tact:
It’s sad that Mike Huckabee, an apparently experienced Minister, would give creedence to such religious myths. Thinking the devil and Jesus are brothers is ridiculous, almost laughable - Mormons have never believed this, I hope Mike Huckabee does not believe this, and please, someone send a message to the good Minister that I don’t believe this.
Team Mitt can not afford to drop the ball on this - this should only hurt Huckabee if it’s played correctly.
No Comments » | Huckabee, Religion, Romney | Permalink
Posted by Andrew Bennett
Instant-classic Stanley Fish column - from his New York Times Blog - includes the Tags: John Milton, Katie Couric, Machiavelli…
Fish is focusing on Katie Couric’s “beyond politics” questions for the candidates as, to be modest, a sign of the downfall of humanity. While Fish’s argument is founded on a great point (and even better philosophical roots):
Why, when the office the candidates seek is a pre-eminently political one, does it make sense to go “beyond politics”? (It is as if you were looking for an office manager and decided to go “beyond organizational skills” by inquiring into the applicants’ tastes in books or music.)
But one has to wonder if it may not hurt to ask Mike Huckabee a question beyond politics, like “Mike, when was the last time you lied or stole?”
Probably wouldn’t get very far with the Huckster, but my point is “beyond politics” does not mean beyond the political and a well crafted question from Couric may enable the media to pressure candidates beyond stock political positions and force them to stumble when they have to answer questions like “do you know anyone who is gay?”
Fish is still brilliant though, read on:
CBS News may be right to rely on an “informal poll” indicating that “come November, policy issues may not rule the day.” The voters may well prefer the candidate who breathes virtue and rectitude to the candidate who demonstrates the kind of knowledge often associated with “policy wonks.”
If that in fact happens, the American electorate will have allied itself with one position in a long-running philosophical quarrel between those who think that the best persons make the best leaders and those who think that the best leader is the one most likely (by virtue of experience and skills) to get the job done.
Do you start with the inner landscape of the individual and project outward to his or her performance in office, or do you leave the inner weather of the candidates’ spiritual and psychological health to their therapists and pastors?
Each of the alternatives has had its powerful champions. In “The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates,” John Milton tells us that when men first felt the need to institute government in order to ensure civil order, they chose one “above the rest” because of “the eminence of his wisdom and integrity.” If only Adam had not fallen, Milton adds, there would have been no necessity to choose anyone, for in the beginning “all men were naturally born free, being the image and resemblance of God himself” and were therefore born “to command not to obey.”
That’s just the trouble, declared his contemporary (and philosophical opposite) Thomas Hobbes. Hobbes agrees that in the abstract all men are equal and equally free, but that means that, left to their own devices, they will prey on one another and produce a general instability that will lead to most lives being “nasty, brutish and short.” Hobbes doesn’t believe in the natural goodness invoked by Milton (“the eminence of his wisdom and integrity”), and so he opts for the artificial solution of granting to one man (called the sovereign) all the rights and powers in the state provided that he secure the property of every man against the depredations of his neighbors and protect the country from its foreign enemies.
The sovereign’s ability to make good on these obligations will have nothing to do with his moral character — “the question of who is the better man,” Hobbes says, “has no place in the condition of mere nature” — and everything to do with his political skills. Hobbes insists that the “worthiness” to lead is different from “the worth or value of a man and also from his merit.” What is important is “a particular power or ability for that wherof he is said to be worthy; which particular ability is usually named fitness or aptitude.” Is he good at the job? — does he have the aptitude? — is a more pertinent question than is he good?
Hobbes was anticipated by Machiavelli, who noted that everyone always proclaims “how praiseworthy it is in a prince to keep faith and to live with integrity and not with craft.”
But, says Machiavelli, everyone is wrong…
No Comments » | Huckabee, Press | Permalink
Posted by Andrew Bennett
The latest from Pew confirms the ground Huckabee has gained in Iowa while Romney has an almost comfortable lead in New Hampshire.
Meanwhile, Romney’s much-anticipated speech on Mormonism is expected tomorrow on the heels of another Pew survey that concludes:
Overall, one-in-four respondents to a recent nationwide Pew survey said that they would be less likely to vote for a Mormon candidate for president, and those who take this point of view express substantially more negative views of Romney, compared with those who express no such reservations about voting for a Mormon.
Which makes me question the Romney strategy on this front for two reasons:
1. What can this possibly accomplish for the candidate if the folks he’s trying to bring-along have such a negative view of him anyway?
2. What can this possibly accomplish for Romney if Iowa Republicans are religious enough that they can’t be brought along and New Hampshire voters aren’t religious enough that this may actually remind them of some facts that they had been trying to ignore?
Also, some data on the Democratic side that’s a bit older (December 3) but contains some interesting results regarding “strength of support:”
Based on what the experts say, I would have guessed that New Hampshire voters would have had higher marks in the ’strength’ category for 2007. I had been thinking that Hillary had a good hold on NH, but these numbers make me think that there’s enough space in the Granite State that performances in Iowa could have a big impact on NH Democrats.
No Comments » | Democrats, Huckabee, New Iowashire, Polls, Religion, Republicans, Romney | Permalink
Posted by Andrew Bennett
Just some links to wrap-up some of the themes that wound their way through the weekend talk shows and wider press.
It’s NYtimes.com’s most-emailed story, so you’ve probably read Frank Rich’s Sunday piece - but the salient theme, that Barack Obama is poised to “upend the beltway storyline,” is important because of how it emerges in other contexts.
For example, Garrett Graff in the Washington Post opines about the importance of technology policy for the next presidency and wonders why we’d want someone in office who can’t “work the machine.” He also mentions this interesting fact: “Part of the problem is simply generational. According to the Senate historian, the Senate is the oldest it has ever been, with an average age of 62 during the 110th Congress.” As I’ve said before, Obama is leading the candidates when it comes to tech. policy and as Andrew Sullivan has made clear, the candidate pundits are really talking about when they talk about generational change is Barack Obama.
This all makes me wonder how helpful it is to be billed as the revolutionary candidate? Perhaps it is in the primaries, but my bet is this ’storyline’ kills any candidate who makes it to the big show.
Meanwhile, plenty of talk about the Republicans going after each other on immigration following last week’s debate and The Wall Street Journal [no link, subscription only] does that debacle justice in today’s editorial while getting in their usual pot-shots:
When not fielding questions from Democratic moles at last week’s GOP Presidential debate, Anderson Cooper and CNN had a grand time portraying Republican voters as Bible-thumping, gun-wielding Confederacy hold-outs. On immigration, however, the candidates didn’t need any media help as they continued their descent into self-parody.
Mitt Romney persisted in attacking Rudy Giuliani for turning New York into a “sanctuary city,” an accusation that even the restrictionist editors at National Review have come around to dismissing as “spurious.” Mr. Giuliani shot back that Mr. Romney ran a “sanctuary mansion” as Governor of Massachusetts, because the landscaping company that maintained the grounds of his home employed illegals. Mr. Romney replied that he couldn’t be expected to verify the immigration status of everyone with a “funny accent.” Normally, you’d have to seek out a high school cafeteria to hear such repartee. Well done, gentlemen.
The GOP exception continues to be John McCain, who is calling for reform that balances stepped up border enforcement with a guest worker program for future labor flows. And Mike Huckabee, who’s been rising in the polls, at least tried to explain to Mr. Romney why it’s inhumane to punish the children of illegal immigrants “for what their parents did.”
Interestingly enough, Mr. Huckabee appears to be the only candidate not going after his opponents. He passed up taking down Rudy for the Hampton Fling Security Detail scandal and didn’t battle back against Romney (who said Huckabee lacked vital private-sector experience) in an interview with George Stephanopoulos on ABC Sunday. However, he did a nice job of subtly attacking Mormons, gays, and women when talking about Romney, Giuliani, and Clinton respectively. Huckabee will charm the pants off of an influential minority of this country and it’s comical that these folks think he is fit to lead the US in the global arena.
Finally, living within broadcast range of New Hampshire, I can assure you the campaign ads are cranking right now - you can get a good wrap-up and review of most of them at Slate’s Damned Spot. Slate’s review of Joe Biden’s latest campaign is favorable, though it took them long enough - it was apparent from the first debate that this should have been Biden’s strategy all along:
No Comments » | Biden, Campaign Advertising, Clinton, Debates, Democrats, Huckabee, Immigration, Obama, Religion, Republicans | Permalink
Posted by Andrew Bennett
