“I believe we need a president who doesn’t just say ‘start your engines,’ but says ‘we’re here to start the engines of the economy by putting America back to work” — John Kerry

Bad soundbite. Doesn’t have any zip to it. Granted, it goes into the generic theme that is being crafted for the 2004 campaign — the president does a photo-shoot; refer to the limitations that the photo-shoot has and destroy the myth (“Mission Accomplished?”, and “Hey, NASCAR Dads… are you better off than you were 4 years ago?”

But… predictable and lingering is this soundbite.

Ah, Pat Buchannan. Paleo-Conservative of the first order, odious in many respects. But his paleo-conservatism makes him isolationist by nature, thus he can write this angry review of the Richard Perle / David Frum book An End to Evil, a bit of
pornography.

Lewis Lapham also wrote a biting review in the latest issue of Harpers Magazine. As is his usual style, he took some space just to leave excerpts to stand for themselves. My favourite line:

“A free society is not an un-policed society. A free society is a self-policed society.”

I would like to see that in context to make sure that that line means what I think it means.

Anyway, I confess that I haven’t read the book. I’ve read a few reviews, and I have heard David Frum and Richard Perle do the interview circuit, most notably on “Fresh Air”, so I am aware of their defense from the critics.

Nonetheless, I take the basic theme of the book to be this:

David Frum and Richard Perle essentially recommend that we charge ahead and swing a big stick around wildly. By doing so, we will surely hit our targets and indeed hit some targets that we were not aware that we were aiming for. We will also make some targets step aside instead of standing in our way. If we get disoriented when swinging the stick around, and fumble forward with too much momentum because we misjudged the man who stepped aside at the last moment, and — say– accidentally stub our toe and fall down, we ought to get up and swing the stick around with more urgency and more pronounced determination… never mind that we’re a little dizzy at that point, and getting dizzier all the time.

The current book on George W. Bush (as suggested by… the current book on Bush is that he is a smart man with keen political insights and gut-level instincts, whose intellectual curiosity just happens to be relatively limited.

Some comments he made last September about not reading the newspaper, and considering his cabinet “objective”, caused a minor stir. A google search for the quotations turns up a fair amount of left-wing carping about how insular this tight group causes a “Bubble-effect”, and a fair amount of right-wing carping on how Bush is well-advised to avoid the “Elitist Liberal Media”.

Bush’s September interview on the RNC News Network.

BUSH: I get briefed by Andy Card and Condi in the morning. They come in and tell me. In all due respect, you’ve got a beautiful face and everything.

I glance at the headlines just to kind of a flavor for what’s moving. I rarely read the stories, and get briefed by people who are probably read the news themselves. But like Condoleezza, in her case, the national security adviser is getting her news directly from the participants on the world stage.

BUSH: I appreciate people’s opinions, but I’m more interested in news. And the best way to get the news is from objective sources. And the most objective sources I have are people on my staff who tell me what’s happening in the world.

On the other hand, as George Carlin once said, the media acts like a bulletin board for the people in charge anyway, sooo…

The newspaper-reading habits of males under the age of, say, 18 looks to be the Comics and the Sports section. I was a little different. When I read the papers in the middle school library, I would read the Comics section and the USA Today Life Section. This was due to the fact that I had less than zero interest in sports at the time… I think it might be difficult to find a boy less interested or less knowledgable of the world of professional sports than I was at the age of 13. On the other hand, I did find the “Late Night Wars” between Jay Leno and (tight-lipped) David Letterman an oddly fascinating storyline.

Gradually, the world opens to the newspaper reader, and they realize that they should really follow the going ons of world players, since they have a tendency to affect people’s lives.

Getting back to Bush: he doesn’t read the newspaper…

Except for the Sports Section. He reads the Sports Section.

“I was just as surprised as the Yankees fans and Red Sox fans when I opened up my paper today,” President Bush told NBC television in an interview at the Daytona 500. “It, obviously, is a big deal. A-Rod’s a great player and the Yankees are going to wind up with a heck of a team with him in the infield.”

It’s good to see that the president is helping us out with Pro- Sports Analysis.

Kerry says that Bush is owned by special interests. The RNC throws out an internet ad saying that Kerry is owned by special interests. The DNC responds with their own internet ad saying that Bush is owned by more special interests than Kerry is owned by.

All of which is true. And I’m happy that the two candidates are already drawing such stark lines of contrast.

Who owns whom? Which conglomeration of (frequently overlapping) owners is less scary than the other group of owners? These are the questions that one must ask themselves when deciding which candidate to support.

Mark Shields, courtesy of Billmon:

I’ll focus on the last sentence of the larger-themed “Party Unified” quote:

I have never seen the Democratic Party as united as it is, they’re discovering virtues in John Kerry that his mother never knew existed.”

Yes indeed. A career politician who’s been running for president since 1972, duplicitous and rather– how do we say — career equivicator (in large measure)… Meet John Kerry.

Well, Howard Dean apparently doesn’t agree… at least not yet. That should change fairly shortly, however. At least publicly.

But Dean needs to give it up. Resign himself to figuring out what the heck a “Dean Democrat” is and lend his support to them in particular in the 2004 races… and the party in general (though they don’t really like him). Resign himself to whatever the hell Joe Trippi is trying to do. Resign himself to a Senate run whenever Jim Jeffords or Patrick Leahy decides to retire. Or so goes my amateur analysis.

Kerry. Kerry. Kerry.

We’re also entering that phase of a political campaign where there is no news until October. With the, um, exception of the picking of the vice-president. But then again, politics is essentially devoid of meaning anyway.

Loads of fun all around.

Okay. Found the transcript from last December’s Hardball. Zell Miller Part Two.

MATTHEWS: But who did you vote for in ’92 and ’96?

MILLER: I didn’t say he welshed. I’m not going to use that kind of language. But I would say he disappointed me, because he ran as a centrist Democrat and he governed-I mean, and he governed, of course, as a more liberal, old Democrat.

Not that I want to defend Bill Clinton (I don’t know the definition of a “good president”), but… I’m dumbfounded. Balanced budget? (Oh, and… didn’t he sign the Republican’s own damned Welfare Bill?)

And Trent Lott is giddily agreeing here:

MATTHEWS: Merry Christmas, gentlemen. I’m sorry.

LOTT: I just want to say, Zell Miller has been consistent. When he was governor of Georgia, he had balanced budgets. He focused on education and jobs creation. He hasn’t changed. The party has continued to move to the left. They left him.

There’s that phrase again. “Balanced budget.” And… “Jobs”. Did I miss something here?

But the reality of our narrow political discourse is… schizoid and obnoxiously fake.

At a certain point, you just have to turn this stuff off and prime your eyes to something better connected to reality. This’ll do, I suppose.

Apparently the broadcast of today’s Bush speech on weapons proliferation experienced technical glitches… satellite interference or something. The metallic interference sounds that you might hear on a ham radio (just a guess, really) or a police blotter radio.

So, if CNN had actual transcripts of their broadcast of the event it’d go like this:

ahem

n recent years, another path of proliferation has become clear, as well. America and other nations are learning more about black-market operatives who deal in equipment and expertise related to weapons of mass destruction. These dealers are motivated by greed, or fanaticism, or both. They find eager customers in outlaw regimes, which pay BZZT BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZT. Eow Eow!!! CLick Clack BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZt. deadly technology and expertise going on the market, there’s BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZT BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZT. Eow! Eow! Clickety Click. BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZEowEowZZZZZZZZZZZclickZZZZZZZZZTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT. sophistication of such networks can be seen in

Or something to that effect.

We await to see how it goes over.

Paraphrase of the day, taken from somewhere I don’t know. I’ve googled it and I can’t find precision anywhere.

“Voting for Kerry is like voting for the editorial board of the New York Times. Surely an improvement over the editorial board of the American Spectator, but burrowed deeply into establishment politics.”

Sounds about right.

Bill O’Reilly’s Mea Culpa.

Conservative television news anchor Bill O’Reilly said Tuesday he was now skeptical about the Bush administration and apologized to viewers for supporting prewar claims that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.

“What do you want me to do, go over and kiss the camera?” asked O’Reilly, who had promised rival ABC last year he would publicly apologize if weapons were not found.

Hey, O’Reilly…

SHUT UP!! You had your turn!

While critical of President Bush, O’Reilly said he did not think the president intentionally lied. Rather, O’Reilly blamed CIA Director George Tenet, who was appointed by former President Clinton.

Oh, you’re just mouthing Right-wing Spin. SHUT UP!!

Now, as always, we give the guest the last word.

My book has outsold Al Franken’s book and is running neck and neck with Hillary Clinton’s book.

Cut the mic!

We’ll be right back with more from the “No Spin Zone”, on this chattering network, the home of “Fair and Balanced” blathering.

………..
This seems to be about the best blogger comment on this development that I can find.

As a rule, avoid Crossfire. Not much of substance ever comes out of the cross-current debates, and there isn’t a whole lot of surprises that are going to come out of the mouth of Carville, Carlson, Novak, or that other guy. (All apologies to “that other guy”, but I can’t think of his name.)

But, here’s a good exchange from last November anyway, where James Carville does hit on something:

CARLSON: I understand that. But I want to put up, actually, an astute observation about your party from one of its own members, Senator Zell Miller, still a Democrat, of Georgia. Here’s what he wrote yesterday in the “Wall Street Journal”. And I’d be interested to know what you think of this.

CARVILLE: Why would anybody get the idea that Dick Nixon was a liar?

……….

Senator Zell Miller, DINO and conservative Democrat (beyond “conservative Democrat”, but never mind) of Georgia, retiring this year. If you look at the AP totals of delegates, you’ll see that “Other” has one delegate pledged to them. This is a “superdelegate” (to give more weight to the insiders after McGovern and Carter, the Democrats vetted the process by giving their Congressional Caucuss votes — so that they could nominate Walter Mondale, I … guess). This is Zell Miller’s vote. He’s voting for George W. Bush in the Democratic Primary.

More on Zell Miller in a later post.