JustOneMinute

Enjoy The Weekend

The traditional open thread.  Tonight it's Vegas, baby!  Not for me, but do feel free to discuss it.

McCain Calls For Tax Cuts (Freud Nods)

John McCain unveiled his tax cut program yesterday but (if the Times is quoting him correctly) his heart was not in it:

“Don’t listen to this siren song about cutting taxes,” Mr. McCain told supporters gathered here under a tent in a driving rain.

Let's have a little more context from the guy who opposed the Bush tax cuts:

Mr. McCain unveiled a tax-cut plan here in Columbia with a speech that was designed to reassure voters worried about the economy as well as fiscal conservatives who have been wary of him ever since he initially opposed President Bush’s tax cuts. Many who voted Tuesday in the Michigan primary, which Mitt Romney won, listed economic anxieties as their top concern.

...And Mr. McCain proclaimed himself a believer in the notion that cutting taxes increases revenue for the government by spurring economic growth. “Don’t listen to this siren song about cutting taxes,” Mr. McCain told supporters gathered here under a tent in a driving rain. “Every time in history we have raised taxes it has cut revenues. And is there anybody here that needs to have their taxes increased?”

The campaign did not put a dollar figure on the cost of the tax cut. Asked later how he would pay for it, Mr. McCain said that he would start by eliminating pork-barrel spending.

A Freudian slip, no doubt. 

In Which I Query David Brooks

In his latest column David Brooks puzzles over seemingly quirky voter behavior and irks us with this claim (emphasis added):

People in my line of work try to answer certain questions. Why did Hillary surge after misting up in New Hampshire? Why have primary victories produced no momentum for the victors? Why did John McCain win among Republicans who oppose the Iraq war in both New Hampshire and Michigan, but lose among voters who support it?

Matt Yglesias made a similar claim which I denounced bitterly in an update (see "MORE") here.

My gist - the Exit Poll question to which Mr. Brooks refers seems to be (as presented by MSNBC) "How do you feel about the war in Iraq?".  Respondents can strongly approve, somewhat approve, somewhat disapprove, or strongly disapprove.  And Sen. McCain did notably better in New Hampshire and Michigan amongst voters who disapprove of the war.

Which means what?  The exit poll question is so vague that Sen. McCain himself could very reasonably be counted among those who do not approve of the war as actually led by Bush and Rumsfeld.  Put another way, just how is a person supposed to respond to the exit poll question if they (a) supported the objective of removing Saddam by force; (b) deplored the minimalist planning of the post-liberation occupation; (c) supported the surge as a plausible attempt to turn defeat into victory?  Is such a person likely to say "Yes, I approve of the war"?  Their real position, which is that of McCain, is that they support the objectives of the war but broadly disapprove of Bush's leadership.

Consequently I am skeptical that Mr. Brooks equation of "Republicans who oppose the war" with "Republicans who disapprove of the war" is accurate, and I am skeptical that his use of McCain in this context as an example of quirky voters is appropriate.

I will further note that Ron Paul's greatest strength is among Republican voters who strongly disapprove of the war.  My guess is that they are the bloc that could be categorized as opposing the war and seeking a prompt withdrawal.  McCain's supporters might very well reflect McCain's view - the war was mismanaged but can still be won.

Childhood Passes...

Tough day in the obits:

Richard Knerr, 82; co-founded Wham-O, maker of the Hula Hoop and Frisbee

paired with:

Chess master Bobby Fischer dies at 64

Take away frisbees and chess and I can't imagine how I would have misspent my youth.

I will not address Mr. Fischer's later years but folks of a certain age will laugh out loud and have fond memories of this name - Shelby Lyman.

MORE:  You won't get it if you have to Google it but a little background on the Shelby Lyman Show is here.  And the Times interviewed him for their blog.

They Don't Like Her... They Really Don't Like Her

Looking for video of Hillary getting spanked?  I can't help, but I have five Hillary bashers today, two from the NY Times and three from the WaPo.

The NY Times editors blame the recent racial meltdown in the Dem Party on her:

Race And Politics

...The last thing Americans need is a loony debate over whether it is more important to choose the first woman or the first African-American nominee for president. That threatens to alienate voters more than they are already and obscures the fact that an American party actually managed to create that choice.

...By the time the campaigns got to New Hampshire, the Clinton team was panicking. Mrs. Clinton had to win or risk being out of the primaries entirely.

It was clearly her side that first stoked the race and gender issue.

Timesman Patrick Healy tries to sort out the multiple Hillary Personas for us in a piece not titled "What Fresh Hil Is This":

Clinton Seeks Blend of Policy and Persona

RENO, Nev. — There has been Commander in Chief Hillary Rodham Clinton, the steely leader who, voters were assured, would “destroy” terrorists and be Thatcher-like tough.

There has been Strong-and-Experienced Hillary Clinton, but that proved to be so uninspiring that Change-Agent Hillary and Likable-Since-I-Was-a-Kid Hillary were rolled out.

And Teary-Eyed Hillary, of course, won the New Hampshire primary last week, after the candidate choked up describing the rigors of the race.

But as her advisers said after New Hampshire, Mrs. Clinton cannot cry her way to the Democratic nomination. So she and her team have been searching for the right personality to help her connect emotionally with voters — an intuitive talent of her chief competitor for the Democratic presidential nomination, Senator Barack Obama — while also emphasizing her competence and experience.

Hillary has been bracing herself for this campaign for thirty-five years but still isn't sure how to present herself?  Maybe Naomi Wolf is available to guide this process of self-reinvention.

Mr. Healy gets a bit ahistorical here:

In response to one reporter’s question on Wednesday, for instance, Mrs. Clinton said that she had the experience to try to head off a national recession and that she “saw what it took to push through the Congress in 1993 the economic stimulus package.” (Only one problem: That package relied on Democratic votes, not the sort of bipartisanship that Mr. Obama is promising, and contributed to Democrats losing control of the House of Representatives in 1994.)

Can we say, "Only two problems"?  Mr. Healy is correct that Bill Clinton's original budget, including his tax hikes, passed with Democratic votes.  However his separate stimulus package was ground down to a fine powder by Bob Dole in the Senate.  Mr. Healy could benefit from a quick trip to the Times archives - here is Adam Clymer, who later went big time:

G.O.P. Senators Prevail, Sinking Clinton's Economic Stimulus Bill

Senate Republicans killed President Clinton's economic stimulus program today, maintaining their filibuster until Democrats surrendered and agreed to limit the bill to $4 billion for extended unemployment benefits.

Mr. Clinton's first serious legislative defeat was marked by complaints from Democrats in the Senate and the White House. But Bob Dole, the Senate minority leader, was satisfied that the Republicans had shown that they deserved to be taken seriously. He avoided gloating, and promised occasional cooperation with the President.

Hard to believe that Ms. Clinton wants to cite that on her resume, or that Mr. Healy would let her.

Meanwhile over at the WaPo, George Will and Robert Novak target Hillary and David Broder smites all the Democratic candidates.

George Will:

Endorsements of politicians by politicians may matter little to voters, but they are indicators of the endorsers' estimates of strengths and dangers. So what do Sens. Kent Conrad of North Dakota, Tim Johnson of South Dakota, Claire McCaskill of Missouri and Ben Nelson of Nebraska; former senator

Posted by Tom Maguire on January 18, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (107)

Here is some good news on abortion:

Abortions Hit Lowest Number Since 1976

The number of abortions performed in the United States dropped to 1.2 million in 2005 -- the lowest level since 1976, according to a new report.

The number of abortions fell at least in part because the proportion of women ending their pregnancies with an abortion dropped 9 percent between 2000 and 2005, hitting the lowest level since 1975, according to a nationwide survey.

Regular readers with a long memory will recall that we have been tweaking the "reality based" community on this topic since shortly after the 2004 election, when we finally took notice of an absurd Bush-bashing study that gained credence amongst the reality based.  John Kerry and Howard Dean were prominent Dems who promoted the fact-free notion that abortions rose under Bush; Nick Kristof of the Times  recycled and defended the nonsense; and amongst bloggers I especially noticed that Matt Yglesias and Kevin Drum were casually recycling misinformation in pursuit of some other point.

The WaPo is describing a study by the Alan Guttmacher Institute; the same group did an earlier study which had (I thought) settled this issue.

And do I have a larger point?  Sure - the left is not immune to the promotion of junk science that overlaps with their agenda.

From The Politico comes word of a new strategy for anti-war groups, which have failed in their repeated attempts to cut funding for our troops in Iraq:

In recognition of hard political reality, the groups instead will lower their sights and push for legislation to prevent President Bush from entering into a long-term agreement with the Iraqi government that could keep significant numbers of troops in Iraq for years to come.

The groups believe this switch in strategy can draw contrasts with Republicans that will help Democrats gain ground in November and bring the votes to pass more dramatic measures. But it is a long way from the early months of 2007, when Democrats were freshly in power and momentum for a dramatic shift in Iraq policy seemed overpowering.

And the NY Times editors cover this by reprinting the newly agreed talking points; here is their lead editorial:

Don’t Tie the Next President’s Hands

President Bush is discussing a new agreement with Baghdad that would govern the deployment of American troops in Iraq. With so many Americans adamant about bringing our forces home as soon as possible, a sentiment we strongly share, Mr. Bush must not be allowed to tie the hands of his successor and ensure the country’s continued involvement in an open-ended war.

That is the new message, all right.  Interesting that the Times editors simply reprinted what was sitting on the fax machine rather than covering this as a political story, but there we are.

The Captain has more.

The NY Times rallies around the media darling with not one, not two, but three pieces boosting John McCain.  And there is a bonus Rudy-basher in case independent voters can't figure out which unorthodox Republican to back.

On the front page is 'Won't Get Smeared Again', as the McCain campaign airs their grievances and pushes back against a reprise of some of the smears and dirty tricks played in South Carolina in 2000.   The WaPo has the same story but surprisingly, both resist temptation heroically and do not deploy a verb form of "swift-boat".

The op-ed page has two McCain-boosters.  Adrian Wooldridge, the Washington bureau chief for The Economist, attempts to assure righties by making the improbable case that McCain is a true conservative:

Mr. Right

...There is a reason Republican primary voters are so confused by Mr. McCain. He is a Republican who is disliked by the hard core of his party but loved by many independents and Democrats. He is almost universally regarded as a moderate and a maverick, a combination that independents love and conservatives loathe. The trouble with this widespread understanding of Mr. McCain’s politics is that it is entirely wrong.

...But there is a radical difference between disagreeing with your fellow conservatives and fudging on basic principles. Mr. McCain has a solid record on the defining principles of the modern conservative movement — traditional values, the free market and national defense — a record that is far more solid on these core beliefs than Mr. Romney’s.

In fact, Mr. McCain’s squabbles with his fellow conservatives have almost always been in the name of fundamental conservative principles. He opposed torture because he thought it was a violation of the American tradition of respect for human life and human rights. He opposed President Bush’s tax cuts because he thought the goal of small government required Congress to cut spending also. He excoriated pork-barrel spending and unlimited campaign donations because he thinks these practices institutionalize bad (and big) government. He promoted immigration reform because he thought the “conservative” alternative (encouraging illegal immigrants to go home) is unworkable economically and dubious morally. Business interests, which have been growing disenchanted with the Republicans, would hardly disagree.

And he promoted McCain-Feingold because of his commitment to free speech...  Whatever.

The insightful and eminently readable Roger Cohen (he's a Times regular - do I need to tell you he is a lib?) promotes McCain to independents and moderates:

A Center Called McCain

Nobody’s been right all the time on Iraq, but Senator John McCain has been less wrong than most. He knew a bungled war when he saw one and pressed early for increased force levels. He backed the injection last year of some 30,000 troops, a surge that has produced results.

Mr. Cohen delivers tempered praise for the success of the surge in reducing violence before delivering this astonishing analysis:

McCain was politically dead six months ago, his campaign undone by his backing of President Bush’s Iraq policy. His remarkable resurgence, which has put him in the lead among Republican candidates, according to recent polls, is one measure of the Iraq shift.

McCain was undone amongst Republicans and conservatives because of his support for the surge?  That is either stupid - it was immigration that buried him - or subtle and Mr. Cohen is a long, long way from stupid, so let me expand his thought a bit. 

More than most Republicans, McCain has three fairly distinct constituencies - Republicans and conservatives, independents and moderates, and the media. Amongst likely Republican voters McCain was crushed over the summer by his front and center support of comprehensive immigration reform and kept afloat by his credibility on national security.  However, that relationship was reversed with the media, which loved him on immigration but was appalled that "Straight Talk" did not include an abandonment of Iraq.  Independents and moderates may track the media in this regard, or at least, Mr. Cohen thinks so - a bit later he offers this:

McCain’s attractiveness to independents, between 10 percent and 30 percent of the vote nationally, involves policy and personality. His readiness to take on global warming, back immigration and demand legal representation for war on terror detainees give him centrist appeal at the price of opposition within his party.

So a liberal columnist writing to liberal readers likes McCain again because the surge produced results.  Fair enough, but let's not fully misdiagnose McCain's fall and rise.

And go, John.

MORE:  Lots of good news for McCain in this WaPo/ABC News poll from a few days back.

Two things caught my eye - first, on question 15, the Republican personality contest, McCain has taken support from Giuliani on "strongest leader" and "most electable".

Secondly, and perhaps more striking, on the Dem side the personality issues (Question 10) break sort of as one might expect - Hillary is more experienced, Obama is more honest, Obama is more inspiring, Hillary is a stronger leader.  And, bottom-lining it here, Hillary has a five point lead over Obama amongst likely Dem-leaning voters.

But on the Republican side, McCain sweeps the board (Question 15) - he is number one in every virtue, from strongest leader to most experienced to most empathetic.  He does have a slightly larger lead amongst likely Rep leaning voters (Question 13) - McCain 28%, Huckabee 20, Romney 19, Giuliani 15.

The highly regarded (by me, anyway) Ron Fournier of the AP pummels Mitt Romney:

WASHINGTON - Mitt Romney's victory in Michigan was a defeat for authenticity in politics.

The former Massachusetts governor pandered to voters, distorted his opponents' record and continued to show why he's the most malleable — and least credible — major presidential candidate.

And it worked.

The man who spoke hard truths to Michigan lost. Of all the reasons John McCain deserved a better result Tuesday night, his gamble on the economy stands out. The Arizona senator had the temerity to tell voters that a candidate who says traditional auto manufacturing jobs "are coming back is either naive or is not talking straight with the people of Michigan and America."

Instead of pandering, McCain said political leaders must "embrace green technologies," adding: "That's the future. That's what we want."

Romney jumped all over McCain, playing to the fears of voters in a state with the nation's highest unemployment rate. "I've heard people say that the auto jobs are gone and they're never coming back," Romney told his audiences. "Well, baloney, I'm going to fight for every single good job."

Romney certainly has grabbed the "phony" mantle more recently worn by Democrats Gore and Kerry.

MORE:  CNN Exit poll for the Republicans in Michigan.  And having read them, Matt Yglesias is enduring a reader revolt in his comments for this post:

Ah, The Electorate

...Looks like John McCain's big pocket of strength among Michigan voters was from people who don't approve of the Iraq War. Because, of course, the man who's managed to always position himself to George W. Bush's right on the whole "should we squander the nation's blood and treasure in Iraq for no reason" issue is exactly the kind of guy you want to turn to if you're disgruntled with the course things are taking.

Well, just for starters John McCain himself can serve as the Exhibit A answer to the question "Are there people dissatisfied with the way the Iraq war is going who think more effective leadership could have delivered a result that looks more like victory?"  Or, from Matt's comments, here is Toady from the left:

Those of us entirely opposed to the war, because of our obvious bias, could very easily be misreading these "feeling about the Iraq war" polls. While I'd like to believe that dissatisfaction with the conduct of the war automatically translates to a desire to see it ended now, I wouldn't be at all surprised to see a significant percentage express dissatisfaction because the war has not been conducted aggressively enough.

And from Ralph Phelan on the right:

The above is a badly written poll question (not that that's unusual) that fails to distinguish between "disapprove because I want out" and "disapprove because I want it fought more aggressively."

Seems clear.

 

Tell me what happens next on the Republican side.

I want a transcript but did Hillary say that the next President will be attacked by Al Qaeda?  I certainly heard her say it is "a fact" that Gordon Brown of the UK was greeted with a Qaeda-backed attacked after taking over from Tony Blair.  [Old news; where have I been?]

I thought it was Bush and Evil Dick Cheney that were keeping fear alive for their own sinister political ends.  Baffling.  Of course, I have been assured that Republicans had a monopoly on race-baiting, but Hillary sure turned me around on that.

MORE:  In the debate transcript Brian Williams refers to old Hillary criticism of Bush and Rove; here we go from Hillary.2006:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton on Wednesday accused Republicans of "playing the fear card" of terrorism to win elections and said Democrats cannot keep quiet if they want to win in November.

The New York Democrat, facing re-election this year and considered a potential White House candidate in 2008, said Republicans won the past two elections on the issue of national security and "they're doing it to us again."

She said a speech by presidential adviser Karl Rove two weeks ago showed the GOP election message is: "All we've got is fear and we're going to keep playing the fear card."

And from the debate:

Question for Senator Clinton. In 2006, you railed against Karl Rove and the Republicans for playing what you called the fear card.

But on the eve of the New Hampshire primary, you said this: "I don't think it was by accident that al Qaeda decided to test the new prime minister, Gordon Brown, immediately. They watch our elections as closely as we do, maybe more than some of our fellow citizens do. They play our, you know, allies. They do everything they can to undermine security in the world. So let's not forget you're hiring a president, not just to do what a candidate says he or she wants to do in an election. You're hiring a president to be there when the chips were down."

You were suggesting, it's been suggested that you would be a better president to deal with a possible terrorist attack than, perhaps, Senator Obama.

CLINTON: Well, what I said is what you quoted, and I'm not going to characterize it, but it is the fact. You know, the fact is that we face a very dangerous adversary, and to forget that or to brush it aside, I think, is a mistake.

So I do feel that the next president has to be prepared because we are up against a relentless enemy. And they will take advantage of us. They will certainly, as they have over the last several years, continue their attacks against our friends and allies around the world.

You know, we haven't talked as much about homeland security as I think is necessary in this campaign. Maybe I feel it acutely because I do represent New York.

CLINTON: But the highest and greatest duty of the president of the United States is to protect and defend our country. And at the end of the day, voters have to make that decision, among all of us, Democrats and Republicans, who are vying for the votes.

Because it is a critical question. It always is. There are, you know, reasons going back in our history why that is so.

But in this time, in this period, where we're going to have to repair a lot of the frayed relationships coming out of the Bush administration, where we're going to have to summon the world to a concerted effort to quell the threat of terrorism, to root them out wherever they are, it's going to be one of the biggest jobs facing our next president.

And I feel prepared and ready to take on what is a daunting but necessary responsibility.

She really is shameless.  Here is a bit of Obama:

WILLIAMS: Senator Obama, if you look just outside where we are tonight, they're building 40,000 new hotel rooms in this city. National security is never far from their minds in Las Vegas, either.

You are fond of saying you won't use 9/11 as a kind of hook.

WILLIAMS: Do you think some of that goes on in both parties?

OBAMA: Well, I think there's no doubt that we've been dominated by a politics of fear since 9/11. Now, some of that's understandable. We have real enemies out there. The tragedy in New York was a trauma to the country that it is going to take a long time for us to work out.

And Senator Clinton did good work in terms of helping the city recover. But I have to say that when Senator Clinton uses the specter of a terrorist attack with a new prime minister during a campaign, I think that is part and parcel with what we've seen the use of the fear of terrorism in scoring political points. And I think that's a mistake. Now, I don't want to perpetuate that.

NEVER UNDERESTIMATE THE PSYCHIC POWER OF AN AGGRIEVED VIEWER:  At two critical junctures I was able to exert mental control over the proceedings.  Stand back, Pack!  I will be using my new-found powers on behalf of the Eli Giants this Sunday.

Oh, as to the incidents themselves - first, I have no doubt it was my yelling at the television that prompted this guy to get up and get himself tased.

Secondly, when the candidates were asked to identify their greatest strength and weakness I was able to mind-meld John Edwards into delivering the extended-play version of "I care too much".  However he did a great job of keeping a straight face.

SOME KEEN OBSERVER:  I lost count of how many past Senate votes Edwards repudiated.  I am sure of one on the 2001 bankruptcy bill, and I think Hillary mentioned another two related to Yucca Mountain.  Can't they get this guy off the stage?

WORST EVER?  There have been a lot of debates over the years so I am reluctant to fully concur with Ezra Klein when he writes "WORST. MODERATORS. EVER."  But anyone keeping a list of nominees needs to keep this performance in mind.

SECOND AMENDMENT:  From K. Seelye of the NY Times excellent live-blog:

10:48 p.m. | Gun Laws Wow, if you ever needed evidence that the Democratic party has lost the national conversation over guns, this debate offers it on a silver platter. Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Edwards are both against a national registration and licensing plans for guns. “I believe in the Second Amendment, people have a right to bear arms,” Mrs. Clinton says. Mr. Edwards agrees with a statement from Mr. Russert, that it’s fair to say you can’t win a national election by favoring gun control.

Here is an odd one [now probably solved in "A WINNER!", below]- in the course of bemoaning her heroic sacrifice in order to deliver a better America to the rest of us (hard to type while I'm tearing up), Hillary said this in a no-holds-barred interview with Tyra Banks:

Hillary Clinton likens White House to prison

Not that it's going to diminish her ambition to live there again, but Hillary Clinton says she views the White House as something of a prison.

She also thinks that when she gets there, she'll have to have some kind of national contest to decide what to call her husband because First Lady wouldn't be appropriate.

This and other minutiae Clinton shared with Tyra Banks during a Monday taping of her syndicated TV show that will be broadcast nationally Friday.

"Do you ever get lonely?" Banks asked the New York senator. "Do you ever sit in your room by yourself sometimes and just feel alone?"....

"I don't feel lonely," Clinton said. "But I do feel sometimes isolated. Because when you are in these positions that I have been in, it can be very isolating. It is one of the reasons I put on the dark glasses and the baseball cap and go out of the White House. President Harry Truman once said that the White House was like the crown jewel of the American penal system because you can feel confined."

That Harry Truman was such a wit, and its easy to see why any politician would like to wrap herself in his coattails.

But did Truman really say that?  The only source for that info seems to be a West Wing episode from 2003.  [But Truman frequently talked about "the great White jail"!  See A WINNER! below.]

Set against that is the fact that Bill Clinton used the line in this 1993 speech and then claimed credit for it in a subsequent chat with Don Imus:

Mr. Imus. Somebody said the White House is the crown jewel in our penal system. [Laughter]

The President. Yes, that was one of my better lines, did you think?

Mr. Imus. Oh, that was yours. Oh, okay.

The President. Yes. I said I couldn't figure out whether it was America's most beautiful public housing or the crown jewel of the penal system. [Laughter]

As to who is on board, Maureen Dowd, New York magazine, About, and the WaPo all credit Wild Bill with the line [as does this book on Presidential foibles and follies through history].  Support for Truman?  I can't find it, although I had a now-lost [now found] link to an article suggesting Hillary also made the Truman attribution in "Living Herstory History" (and while stumping in New Hampshire recently).

How to resolve this?  This is a job for the blogosphere!  Possible explanations include:

1.  Bill knew it was a Truman quote but lied.  What are the odds?

2.  Bill claimed credit erroneously - maybe a speech writer put it in a Truman quote without attribution but revealed the source in time for Hillary's book.  Good cover story, especially if true.

3.  Hillary knows darn well the quote came from Bill but would rather associate herself with Harry Truman, especially when the topic is "Presidents in Prison".  Possible!

4.  Hillary's researchers get all their best ideas from the West Wing.  Yikes.

We are tackling the tough ones here.  Someone get Hitchens on this - he can't wait to explore the quirks of the Clinton marriage again.

BONUS HECKLING:  I deplore Hillarity's continued use of racial code - her real message (obviously) is that there are too many black men in prison already and it would be a shame to send one more there.

LET'S HEAR IT FOR HARRY:  Human Events and the WaPo (Diamond Jim VandeHei  and Peter Baker) attribute the quip to Truman in articles that followed the West Wing episode and Hillary's book.

WHERE IS HIS CERTAINTY (OR MINE?):  Here is a cryptic quote from Bill Clinton at a DNC dinner in 2000:

One of the things that strikes me as strange is that some people who have been in this position--even people I very much admire--talk about what a terrible burden it is, and how the White House is the crown jewel of the Federal penal system, and how they can't wait to get out of there, and what a terrible pain it is. Frankly, most of those guys didn't have a tougher time than I've had there--[laughter]--and I don't know what in the heck they're talking about. [Laughter]

And an unsourced difference-splitter:from 2003 (shortly after the West Wing episode aired):

President Bill Clinton once gave political consultant Paul Begala a tour of the White House. As Begala stood in awe of the Oval Office, Clinton, quoting Harry S. Truman, murmured: "Don't let it get to you...This is the crown jewel of the Federal Penal System."

A WINNER!:  The Appalled Moderate splits the difference with this, following some research at the Truman Library:

Truman did refer to the White House incessantly as the "Great White Jail".

I'll toss in a cite:

"I told Ike," Truman records, "that if [MacArthur] did that he (Ike) should announce for the nomination for President on the Democratic ticket and that I'd be glad to be in second place, or Vice President. I like the Senate anyway. Ike & I could be elected and my family & myself would be happy outside this great white jail known as the White House. Ike won't quot[e] me & I won't quote him."  No record of the conversation was found among Eisenhower's papers at the Eisenhower Library.

In an entry for January 6, Truman writes about Presidential ghosts in the White House. "This great white jail is a hell of a place in which to be alone...

So there we go - looks like Bill, or a speechwriter, dressed up Truman's sentiment a bit and used it for a joke.

IF IT'S NOT OBVIOUS:  I love this game.

Go, Republican debaters.  Sorry, go, Republican voters and Democrat debaters.

Where is my scorecard?

The debate is at 9 EST, MSNBC.

Was it only yesterday that Mickey Kaus predicted that Obama's controversial minister would be dragged into the news?  Today Richard Cohen of the WaPo links Obama's minister to Louis Farrakhan.  And here is the Farrakhan interview with the church magazine.

From Minister Wright:

“When Minister Farrakhan speaks, Black America listens,” says the Rev. Dr. Jeremiah A. Wright, likening the Minister’s influence to the E. F. Hutton commercials of old. “Everybody may not agree with him, but they listen…His depth on analysis when it comes to the racial ills of this nation is astounding and eye opening. He brings a perspective that is helpful and honest.

“Minister Farrakhan will be remembered as one of the 20th and 21st century giants of the African American religious experience,” continues Wright. “His integrity and honesty have secured him a place in history as one of the nation’s most powerful critics. His love for Africa and African American people has made him an unforgettable force, a catalyst for change and a religious leader who is sincere
about his faith and his purpose.”

Hmm, should Obama denounce his minister?  [The Captain deplores this guilt by second-hand association as "thin gruel".]  Or perhaps he can enlist Joe Lieberman to go meet with Farrakhan.  Richard Cohen was in the mix then as well (denouncing Joe Lieberman), so we will rely on him to cover it.  FWIW, Farrakhan was agreeable but the meet-up didn't go down before the election.

MORE RESULTS:  The Obama campaign releases a statement:

I decry racism and anti-Semitism in every form and strongly condemn the anti-Semitic statements made by Minister Farrakhan. I assume that Trumpet Magazine made its own decision to honor Farrakhan based on his efforts to rehabilitate ex-offenders, but it is not a decision with which I agree.

As noted by David Bernstein, the mini-apology for the magazine - "I assume that Trumpet Magazine made its own decision to honor Farrakhan based on his efforts to rehabilitate ex-offenders" - is not an assumption supported by the facts.

I expect that will nip this.

The NY Times tells us that Hillary and Obama are competing for Hispanic support but offers little else.  From Jeralyn Merritt of TalkLeft comes a request for more:

Ok, let's talk about the issues. How are the two candidates different on issues of importance to this increasingly influential group of voters? Which one has proposed a policy for them to rally behind? Who's got the better track record?

We'll all be better off if we keep the discussion on that level.

Hmm, waddya mean, "we"?  I am not miserable watching the hara-kiri Dems in actions.  But this is not about me!  On a particular point which deepley vexed the Hillary campaign, she and Edwards flip-flopped while Obama stood firm (sort of) in the face of overwhelming polls telling him to cut and run.

I refer of course to the question of whether illegal immigrants should be issued driver's licenses.  Hillary was asked about this in a Democratic debate and drew gales of laughter by firmly planting herself on both sides of the issue, before tracking with Governor Spitzer and finally coming down on the side of pollsters and common political sense.

But Obama boldly Kept Hope Alive or at least, declined to deliver the full flip-flop, electing to filibuster the question when it was put to him in a subsequent debate.

If the Times wants to write about the attempt of the two candidates to appeal to Hispanics they ought to mention driver's licenses for illegals and give Obama props for his poll-defying, politically suicidal (but helpful with Hispanics!) pander.  And Times editors are crafty enough that they ought to be able to do that while side-stepping their laughable coverage of the Spitzer debacle.

One for the "We don't need no stinkin' statistics" file: Don Boudreaux of Cafe Hayek passes along a bit of Hillarity from the Boss's Wife:

"You know, the economists can argue about [whether the country is headed for a recession].  Some say, yes, it's going there. Some say, not yet. Some say, oh, no. But the statistics are one thing, the stories are something altogether different....  It doesn't matter what you're told.  It's what you feel, what you feel deep down."

I am not going to pass along what I am feeling deep down right now.

LIKE A STOPPED CLOCK THAT'S RIGHT TWICE A DECADE:  If you predict enough recessions eventually reality will catch up to you.  And since we are reviewing predictions, let's reprise Krugman's classic predictions from 2003 - higher interest rates, a stock market swoon, rising unemployment - all wrong.

Let's see:

Interest rates, March 11, 2003:

I'm terrified about what will happen to interest rates once financial markets wake up to the implications of skyrocketing budget deficits.

Here in reality, the conventional mortgage rate has moved from 5.61% to 6.07% as of Jan 7, 2008; the ten year Treasury has moved from 3.6% to 3.9%.

Stock market, June 20, 2003:

Or, to put it another way: it's hard to find any real news to justify the market's leap. Instead, investors seem to be buying stocks because they are rising — which is pretty much the definition of a bubble.

The S&P has since risen from 995 to 1400.

Employment, Aug 15, 2003:

Meanwhile, employment is chasing a moving target because the working-age population continues to grow. Just to keep up with population growth, the U.S. needs to add about 110,000 jobs per month. When it falls short of that, jobs become steadily harder to find. At this point conditions in the labor market are probably the worst they have been for almost 20 years. (The measured unemployment rate isn't all that high, but that's largely because many people have given up looking for work.)

From Econommagic we see that total non-farm employment in Aug 2003 was 129.8 million; it has risen to 138.5 million as of Dec 2007.  8.7 million new jobs in 52 months works out to about 167,000 new jobs per month.

None of that means we are not on the brink of a recession, finally.  But it's been a long wait.

In a preview of a line we will hear all autumn if Obama is the Democratic nominee, we are now being told that Hillary's surrogates are attacking Obama with racially coded messages.  Geraldine Ferraro has this to say now:

Geraldine A.  Ferraro, who was the Democratic candidate for vice president in 1984, said she thought Mr. Obama and his campaign were fanning the issue to draw black voters away from Mrs. Clinton before the primary in South Carolina, where about 50 percent of the electorate is expected to be black.

“As soon anybody from the Clinton campaign opens their mouth in a way that could make it seem as if they were talking about race, it will be distorted,” Mrs. Ferraro said. “The spin will be put on it that they are talking about race. The Obama campaign is appealing to their base and their base is the African-American community. What they are trying to do is move voters from Clinton by distorting things. What have they got to lose?”

Ms. Ferraro will reverse her field if and when Obama is the nominee and it is Republicans criticizing him.  That said, some of the things being said ("shuck and jive" and "Barack Obama was doing something in the neighborhood") really don't lend themselves to an innocent interpretation.

However, I too would give Bill Clinton a pass on his "fairy tale" comment, especially since a moment later Clinton added "Ken Starr spent $70 million and indicted innocent people to find out that I wouldn't take a nickel to see the cow jump over the moon."

Maybe Bill and the Huck have been swapping reading lists.

WOW:  OK, I am not exactly Tim Russert's biggest fan, but his presentation of Bill Clinton's truncated "fairy tale" quote as described by Media Matters was shameless.

Maybe some lefty who wants to take a shot at Russert can ask him about David Gregory, Andrea Mitchell, and early, undetected Valerie Plame leaks.  Think of it as weasel control.

MORE CODE:  Let's dredge up the old Times story about Barack's controversial minister - there must be a coded attack in there somewhere.  [A note on how sausage is made - you might think that I flagged that old Obama story in response to this Insta-post, or the latest Mickey Kaus "Undernews Alert".  In fact, my traffic meter registered some surprising and unexpected hits on my old post and away I went.  So now I know where the traffic came from and you know how I happened to recycle it.]

Hillary adviser Sidney Blumenthal busted in New Hampshire for going 70 in a 30 MPH zone while apparently under the influence - will Hillary's supporters get MADD about this?  C'mon, this is now!  Obama's abuse was years ago.

No One Left To Gloat To

Here is some good news on abortion:

Abortions Hit Lowest Number Since 1976

The number of abortions performed in the United States dropped to 1.2 million in 2005 -- the lowest level since 1976, according to a new report.

The number of abortions fell at least in part because the proportion of women ending their pregnancies with an abortion dropped 9 percent between 2000 and 2005, hitting the lowest level since 1975, according to a nationwide survey.

Regular readers with a long memory will recall that we have been tweaking the "reality based" community on this topic since shortly after the 2004 election, when we finally took notice of an absurd Bush-bashing study that gained credence amongst the reality based.  John Kerry and Howard Dean were prominent Dems who promoted the fact-free notion that abortions rose under Bush; Nick Kristof of the Times  recycled and defended the nonsense; and amongst bloggers I especially noticed that Matt Yglesias and Kevin Drum were casually recycling misinformation in pursuit of some other point.

The WaPo is describing a study by the Alan Guttmacher Institute; the same group did an earlier study which had (I thought) settled this issue.

And do I have a larger point?  Sure - the left is not immune to the promotion of junk science that overlaps with their agenda.

Looks Like The NY Times Got (And Reprinted) The Memo

From The Politico comes word of a new strategy for anti-war groups, which have failed in their repeated attempts to cut funding for our troops in Iraq:

In recognition of hard political reality, the groups instead will lower their sights and push for legislation to prevent President Bush from entering into a long-term agreement with the Iraqi government that could keep significant numbers of troops in Iraq for years to come.

The groups believe this switch in strategy can draw contrasts with Republicans that will help Democrats gain ground in November and bring the votes to pass more dramatic measures. But it is a long way from the early months of 2007, when Democrats were freshly in power and momentum for a dramatic shift in Iraq policy seemed overpowering.

And the NY Times editors cover this by reprinting the newly agreed talking points; here is their lead editorial:

Don’t Tie the Next President’s Hands

President Bush is discussing a new agreement with Baghdad that would govern the deployment of American troops in Iraq. With so many Americans adamant about bringing our forces home as soon as possible, a sentiment we strongly share, Mr. Bush must not be allowed to tie the hands of his successor and ensure the country’s continued involvement in an open-ended war.

That is the new message, all right.  Interesting that the Times editors simply reprinted what was sitting on the fax machine rather than covering this as a political story, but there we are.

The Captain has more.

It's "Go, McCain" Day At The NY Times

The NY Times rallies around the media darling with not one, not two, but three pieces boosting John McCain.  And there is a bonus Rudy-basher in case independent voters can't figure out which unorthodox Republican to back.

On the front page is 'Won't Get Smeared Again', as the McCain campaign airs their grievances and pushes back against a reprise of some of the smears and dirty tricks played in South Carolina in 2000.   The WaPo has the same story but surprisingly, both resist temptation heroically and do not deploy a verb form of "swift-boat".

The op-ed page has two McCain-boosters.  Adrian Wooldridge, the Washington bureau chief for The Economist, attempts to assure righties by making the improbable case that McCain is a true conservative:

Mr. Right

...There is a reason Republican primary voters are so confused by Mr. McCain. He is a Republican who is disliked by the hard core of his party but loved by many independents and Democrats. He is almost universally regarded as a moderate and a maverick, a combination that independents love and conservatives loathe. The trouble with this widespread understanding of Mr. McCain’s politics is that it is entirely wrong.

...But there is a radical difference between disagreeing with your fellow conservatives and fudging on basic principles. Mr. McCain has a solid record on the defining principles of the modern conservative movement — traditional values, the free market and national defense — a record that is far more solid on these core beliefs than Mr. Romney’s.

In fact, Mr. McCain’s squabbles with his fellow conservatives have almost always been in the name of fundamental conservative principles. He opposed torture because he thought it was a violation of the American tradition of respect for human life and human rights. He opposed President Bush’s tax cuts because he thought the goal of small government required Congress to cut spending also. He excoriated pork-barrel spending and unlimited campaign donations because he thinks these practices institutionalize bad (and big) government. He promoted immigration reform because he thought the “conservative” alternative (encouraging illegal immigrants to go home) is unworkable economically and dubious morally. Business interests, which have been growing disenchanted with the Republicans, would hardly disagree.

And he promoted McCain-Feingold because of his commitment to free speech...  Whatever.

The insightful and eminently readable Roger Cohen (he's a Times regular - do I need to tell you he is a lib?) promotes McCain to independents and moderates:

A Center Called McCain

Nobody’s been right all the time on Iraq, but Senator John McCain has been less wrong than most. He knew a bungled war when he saw one and pressed early for increased force levels. He backed the injection last year of some 30,000 troops, a surge that has produced results.

Mr. Cohen delivers tempered praise for the success of the surge in reducing violence before delivering this astonishing analysis:

McCain was politically dead six months ago, his campaign undone by his backing of President Bush’s Iraq policy. His remarkable resurgence, which has put him in the lead among Republican candidates, according to recent polls, is one measure of the Iraq shift.

McCain was undone amongst Republicans and conservatives because of his support for the surge?  That is either stupid - it was immigration that buried him - or subtle and Mr. Cohen is a long, long way from stupid, so let me expand his thought a bit. 

More than most Republicans, McCain has three fairly distinct constituencies - Republicans and conservatives, independents and moderates, and the media. Amongst likely Republican voters McCain was crushed over the summer by his front and center support of comprehensive immigration reform and kept afloat by his credibility on national security.  However, that relationship was reversed with the media, which loved him on immigration but was appalled that "Straight Talk" did not include an abandonment of Iraq.  Independents and moderates may track the media in this regard, or at least, Mr. Cohen thinks so - a bit later he offers this:

McCain’s attractiveness to independents, between 10 percent and 30 percent of the vote nationally, involves policy and personality. His readiness to take on global warming, back immigration and demand legal representation for war on terror detainees give him centrist appeal at the price of opposition within his party.

So a liberal columnist writing to liberal readers likes McCain again because the surge produced results.  Fair enough, but let's not fully misdiagnose McCain's fall and rise.

And go, John.

MORE:  Lots of good news for McCain in this WaPo/ABC News poll from a few days back.

Two things caught my eye - first, on question 15, the Republican personality contest, McCain has taken support from Giuliani on "strongest leader" and "most electable".

Secondly, and perhaps more striking, on the Dem side the personality issues (Question 10) break sort of as one might expect - Hillary is more experienced, Obama is more honest, Obama is more inspiring, Hillary is a stronger leader.  And, bottom-lining it here, Hillary has a five point lead over Obama amongst likely Dem-leaning voters.

But on the Republican side, McCain sweeps the board (Question 15) - he is number one in every virtue, from strongest leader to most experienced to most empathetic.  He does have a slightly larger lead amongst likely Rep leaning voters (Question 13) - McCain 28%, Huckabee 20, Romney 19, Giuliani 15.

Ron Fournier Thumps Mitt

The highly regarded (by me, anyway) Ron Fournier of the AP pummels Mitt Romney:

WASHINGTON - Mitt Romney's victory in Michigan was a defeat for authenticity in politics.

The former Massachusetts governor pandered to voters, distorted his opponents' record and continued to show why he's the most malleable — and least credible — major presidential candidate.

And it worked.

The man who spoke hard truths to Michigan lost. Of all the reasons John McCain deserved a better result Tuesday night, his gamble on the economy stands out. The Arizona senator had the temerity to tell voters that a candidate who says traditional auto manufacturing jobs "are coming back is either naive or is not talking straight with the people of Michigan and America."

Instead of pandering, McCain said political leaders must "embrace green technologies," adding: "That's the future. That's what we want."

Romney jumped all over McCain, playing to the fears of voters in a state with the nation's highest unemployment rate. "I've heard people say that the auto jobs are gone and they're never coming back," Romney told his audiences. "Well, baloney, I'm going to fight for every single good job."

Romney certainly has grabbed the "phony" mantle more recently worn by Democrats Gore and Kerry.

MORE:  CNN Exit poll for the Republicans in Michigan.  And having read them, Matt Yglesias is enduring a reader revolt in his comments for this post:

Ah, The Electorate

...Looks like John McCain's big pocket of strength among Michigan voters was from people who don't approve of the Iraq War. Because, of course, the man who's managed to always position himself to George W. Bush's right on the whole "should we squander the nation's blood and treasure in Iraq for no reason" issue is exactly the kind of guy you want to turn to if you're disgruntled with the course things are taking.

Well, just for starters John McCain himself can serve as the Exhibit A answer to the question "Are there people dissatisfied with the way the Iraq war is going who think more effective leadership could have delivered a result that looks more like victory?"  Or, from Matt's comments, here is Toady from the left:

Those of us entirely opposed to the war, because of our obvious bias, could very easily be misreading these "feeling about the Iraq war" polls. While I'd like to believe that dissatisfaction with the conduct of the war automatically translates to a desire to see it ended now, I wouldn't be at all surprised to see a significant percentage express dissatisfaction because the war has not been conducted aggressively enough.

And from Ralph Phelan on the right:

The above is a badly written poll question (not that that's unusual) that fails to distinguish between "disapprove because I want out" and "disapprove because I want it fought more aggressively."

Seems clear.

 

Mitt? On To Confusion.

Tell me what happens next on the Republican side.

Fearmongering From Hillary?

I want a transcript but did Hillary say that the next President will be attacked by Al Qaeda?  I certainly heard her say it is "a fact" that Gordon Brown of the UK was greeted with a Qaeda-backed attacked after taking over from Tony Blair.  [Old news; where have I been?]

I thought it was Bush and Evil Dick Cheney that were keeping fear alive for their own sinister political ends.  Baffling.  Of course, I have been assured that Republicans had a monopoly on race-baiting, but Hillary sure turned me around on that.

MORE:  In the debate transcript Brian Williams refers to old Hillary criticism of Bush and Rove; here we go from Hillary.2006:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton on Wednesday accused Republicans of "playing the fear card" of terrorism to win elections and said Democrats cannot keep quiet if they want to win in November.

The New York Democrat, facing re-election this year and considered a potential White House candidate in 2008, said Republicans won the past two elections on the issue of national security and "they're doing it to us again."

She said a speech by presidential adviser Karl Rove two weeks ago showed the GOP election message is: "All we've got is fear and we're going to keep playing the fear card."

And from the debate:

Question for Senator Clinton. In 2006, you railed against Karl Rove and the Republicans for playing what you called the fear card.

But on the eve of the New Hampshire primary, you said this: "I don't think it was by accident that al Qaeda decided to test the new prime minister, Gordon Brown, immediately. They watch our elections as closely as we do, maybe more than some of our fellow citizens do. They play our, you know, allies. They do everything they can to undermine security in the world. So let's not forget you're hiring a president, not just to do what a candidate says he or she wants to do in an election. You're hiring a president to be there when the chips were down."

You were suggesting, it's been suggested that you would be a better president to deal with a possible terrorist attack than, perhaps, Senator Obama.

CLINTON: Well, what I said is what you quoted, and I'm not going to characterize it, but it is the fact. You know, the fact is that we face a very dangerous adversary, and to forget that or to brush it aside, I think, is a mistake.

So I do feel that the next president has to be prepared because we are up against a relentless enemy. And they will take advantage of us. They will certainly, as they have over the last several years, continue their attacks against our friends and allies around the world.

You know, we haven't talked as much about homeland security as I think is necessary in this campaign. Maybe I feel it acutely because I do represent New York.

CLINTON: But the highest and greatest duty of the president of the United States is to protect and defend our country. And at the end of the day, voters have to make that decision, among all of us, Democrats and Republicans, who are vying for the votes.

Because it is a critical question. It always is. There are, you know, reasons going back in our history why that is so.

But in this time, in this period, where we're going to have to repair a lot of the frayed relationships coming out of the Bush administration, where we're going to have to summon the world to a concerted effort to quell the threat of terrorism, to root them out wherever they are, it's going to be one of the biggest jobs facing our next president.

And I feel prepared and ready to take on what is a daunting but necessary responsibility.

She really is shameless.  Here is a bit of Obama:

WILLIAMS: Senator Obama, if you look just outside where we are tonight, they're building 40,000 new hotel rooms in this city. National security is never far from their minds in Las Vegas, either.

You are fond of saying you won't use 9/11 as a kind of hook.

WILLIAMS: Do you think some of that goes on in both parties?

OBAMA: Well, I think there's no doubt that we've been dominated by a politics of fear since 9/11. Now, some of that's understandable. We have real enemies out there. The tragedy in New York was a trauma to the country that it is going to take a long time for us to work out.

And Senator Clinton did good work in terms of helping the city recover. But I have to say that when Senator Clinton uses the specter of a terrorist attack with a new prime minister during a campaign, I think that is part and parcel with what we've seen the use of the fear of terrorism in scoring political points. And I think that's a mistake. Now, I don't want to perpetuate that.

NEVER UNDERESTIMATE THE PSYCHIC POWER OF AN AGGRIEVED VIEWER:  At two critical junctures I was able to exert mental control over the proceedings.  Stand back, Pack!  I will be using my new-found powers on behalf of the Eli Giants this Sunday.

Oh, as to the incidents themselves - first, I have no doubt it was my yelling at the television that prompted this guy to get up and get himself tased.

Secondly, when the candidates were asked to identify their greatest strength and weakness I was able to mind-meld John Edwards into delivering the extended-play version of "I care too much".  However he did a great job of keeping a straight face.

SOME KEEN OBSERVER:  I lost count of how many past Senate votes Edwards repudiated.  I am sure of one on the 2001 bankruptcy bill, and I think Hillary mentioned another two related to Yucca Mountain.  Can't they get this guy off the stage?

WORST EVER?  There have been a lot of debates over the years so I am reluctant to fully concur with Ezra Klein when he writes "WORST. MODERATORS. EVER."  But anyone keeping a list of nominees needs to keep this performance in mind.

SECOND AMENDMENT:  From K. Seelye of the NY Times excellent live-blog:

10:48 p.m. | Gun Laws Wow, if you ever needed evidence that the Democratic party has lost the national conversation over guns, this debate offers it on a silver platter. Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Edwards are both against a national registration and licensing plans for guns. “I believe in the Second Amendment, people have a right to bear arms,” Mrs. Clinton says. Mr. Edwards agrees with a statement from Mr. Russert, that it’s fair to say you can’t win a national election by favoring gun control.

Hillary Whacks Bill In The Crown Jewels

Here is an odd one [now probably solved in "A WINNER!", below]- in the course of bemoaning her heroic sacrifice in order to deliver a better America to the rest of us (hard to type while I'm tearing up), Hillary said this in a no-holds-barred interview with Tyra Banks:

Hillary Clinton likens White House to prison

Not that it's going to diminish her ambition to live there again, but Hillary Clinton says she views the White House as something of a prison.

She also thinks that when she gets there, she'll have to have some kind of national contest to decide what to call her husband because First Lady wouldn't be appropriate.

This and other minutiae Clinton shared with Tyra Banks during a Monday taping of her syndicated TV show that will be broadcast nationally Friday.

"Do you ever get lonely?" Banks asked the New York senator. "Do you ever sit in your room by yourself sometimes and just feel alone?"....

"I don't feel lonely," Clinton said. "But I do feel sometimes isolated. Because when you are in these positions that I have been in, it can be very isolating. It is one of the reasons I put on the dark glasses and the baseball cap and go out of the White House. President Harry Truman once said that the White House was like the crown jewel of the American penal system because you can feel confined."

That Harry Truman was such a wit, and its easy to see why any politician would like to wrap herself in his coattails.

But did Truman really say that?  The only source for that info seems to be a West Wing episode from 2003.  [But Truman frequently talked about "the great White jail"!  See A WINNER! below.]

Set against that is the fact that Bill Clinton used the line in this 1993 speech and then claimed credit for it in a subsequent chat with Don Imus:

Mr. Imus. Somebody said the White House is the crown jewel in our penal system. [Laughter]

The President. Yes, that was one of my better lines, did you think?

Mr. Imus. Oh, that was yours. Oh, okay.

The President. Yes. I said I couldn't figure out whether it was America's most beautiful public housing or the crown jewel of the penal system. [Laughter]

As to who is on board, Maureen Dowd, New York magazine, About, and the WaPo all credit Wild Bill with the line [as does this book on Presidential foibles and follies through history].  Support for Truman?  I can't find it, although I had a now-lost [now found] link to an article suggesting Hillary also made the Truman attribution in "Living Herstory History" (and while stumping in New Hampshire recently).

How to resolve this?  This is a job for the blogosphere!  Possible explanations include:

1.  Bill knew it was a Truman quote but lied.  What are the odds?

2.  Bill claimed credit erroneously - maybe a speech writer put it in a Truman quote without attribution but revealed the source in time for Hillary's book.  Good cover story, especially if true.

3.  Hillary knows darn well the quote came from Bill but would rather associate herself with Harry Truman, especially when the topic is "Presidents in Prison".  Possible!

4.  Hillary's researchers get all their best ideas from the West Wing.  Yikes.

We are tackling the tough ones here.  Someone get Hitchens on this - he can't wait to explore the quirks of the Clinton marriage again.

BONUS HECKLING:  I deplore Hillarity's continued use of racial code - her real message (obviously) is that there are too many black men in prison already and it would be a shame to send one more there.

LET'S HEAR IT FOR HARRY:  Human Events and the WaPo (Diamond Jim VandeHei  and Peter Baker) attribute the quip to Truman in articles that followed the West Wing episode and Hillary's book.

WHERE IS HIS CERTAINTY (OR MINE?):  Here is a cryptic quote from Bill Clinton at a DNC dinner in 2000:

One of the things that strikes me as strange is that some people who have been in this position--even people I very much admire--talk about what a terrible burden it is, and how the White House is the crown jewel of the Federal penal system, and how they can't wait to get out of there, and what a terrible pain it is. Frankly, most of those guys didn't have a tougher time than I've had there--[laughter]--and I don't know what in the heck they're talking about. [Laughter]

And an unsourced difference-splitter:from 2003 (shortly after the West Wing episode aired):

President Bill Clinton once gave political consultant Paul Begala a tour of the White House. As Begala stood in awe of the Oval Office, Clinton, quoting Harry S. Truman, murmured: "Don't let it get to you...This is the crown jewel of the Federal Penal System."

A WINNER!:  The Appalled Moderate splits the difference with this, following some research at the Truman Library:

Truman did refer to the White House incessantly as the "Great White Jail".

I'll toss in a cite:

"I told Ike," Truman records, "that if [MacArthur] did that he (Ike) should announce for the nomination for President on the Democratic ticket and that I'd be glad to be in second place, or Vice President. I like the Senate anyway. Ike & I could be elected and my family & myself would be happy outside this great white jail known as the White House. Ike won't quot[e] me & I won't quote him."  No record of the conversation was found among Eisenhower's papers at the Eisenhower Library.

In an entry for January 6, Truman writes about Presidential ghosts in the White House. "This great white jail is a hell of a place in which to be alone...

So there we go - looks like Bill, or a speechwriter, dressed up Truman's sentiment a bit and used it for a joke.

IF IT'S NOT OBVIOUS:  I love this game.

Debate Open Thread

Go, Republican debaters.  Sorry, go, Republican voters and Democrat debaters.

Where is my scorecard?

The debate is at 9 EST, MSNBC.

Mickey Kaus Gets Results! [And More Results!]

Was it only yesterday that Mickey Kaus predicted that Obama's controversial minister would be dragged into the news?  Today Richard Cohen of the WaPo links Obama's minister to Louis Farrakhan.  And here is the Farrakhan interview with the church magazine.

From Minister Wright:

“When Minister Farrakhan speaks, Black America listens,” says the Rev. Dr. Jeremiah A. Wright, likening the Minister’s influence to the E. F. Hutton commercials of old. “Everybody may not agree with him, but they listen…His depth on analysis when it comes to the racial ills of this nation is astounding and eye opening. He brings a perspective that is helpful and honest.

“Minister Farrakhan will be remembered as one of the 20th and 21st century giants of the African American religious experience,” continues Wright. “His integrity and honesty have secured him a place in history as one of the nation’s most powerful critics. His love for Africa and African American people has made him an unforgettable force, a catalyst for change and a religious leader who is sincere
about his faith and his purpose.”

Hmm, should Obama denounce his minister?  [The Captain deplores this guilt by second-hand association as "thin gruel".]  Or perhaps he can enlist Joe Lieberman to go meet with Farrakhan.  Richard Cohen was in the mix then as well (denouncing Joe Lieberman), so we will rely on him to cover it.  FWIW, Farrakhan was agreeable but the meet-up didn't go down before the election.

MORE RESULTS:  The Obama campaign releases a statement:

I decry racism and anti-Semitism in every form and strongly condemn the anti-Semitic statements made by Minister Farrakhan. I assume that Trumpet Magazine made its own decision to honor Farrakhan based on his efforts to rehabilitate ex-offenders, but it is not a decision with which I agree.

As noted by David Bernstein, the mini-apology for the magazine - "I assume that Trumpet Magazine made its own decision to honor Farrakhan based on his efforts to rehabilitate ex-offenders" - is not an assumption supported by the facts.

I expect that will nip this.

Hillary, Obama, Hispanics, And The Lost Pander

The NY Times tells us that Hillary and Obama are competing for Hispanic support but offers little else.  From Jeralyn Merritt of TalkLeft comes a request for more:

Ok, let's talk about the issues. How are the two candidates different on issues of importance to this increasingly influential group of voters? Which one has proposed a policy for them to rally behind? Who's got the better track record?

We'll all be better off if we keep the discussion on that level.

Hmm, waddya mean, "we"?  I am not miserable watching the hara-kiri Dems in actions.  But this is not about me!  On a particular point which deepley vexed the Hillary campaign, she and Edwards flip-flopped while Obama stood firm (sort of) in the face of overwhelming polls telling him to cut and run.

I refer of course to the question of whether illegal immigrants should be issued driver's licenses.  Hillary was asked about this in a Democratic debate and drew gales of laughter by firmly planting herself on both sides of the issue, before tracking with Governor Spitzer and finally coming down on the side of pollsters and common political sense.

But Obama boldly Kept Hope Alive or at least, declined to deliver the full flip-flop, electing to filibuster the question when it was put to him in a subsequent debate.

If the Times wants to write about the attempt of the two candidates to appeal to Hispanics they ought to mention driver's licenses for illegals and give Obama props for his poll-defying, politically suicidal (but helpful with Hispanics!) pander.  And Times editors are crafty enough that they ought to be able to do that while side-stepping their laughable coverage of the Spitzer debacle.

Hillarity, Reality-Based Except When She's Not

One for the "We don't need no stinkin' statistics" file: Don Boudreaux of Cafe Hayek passes along a bit of Hillarity from the Boss's Wife:

"You know, the economists can argue about [whether the country is headed for a recession].  Some say, yes, it's going there. Some say, not yet. Some say, oh, no. But the statistics are one thing, the stories are something altogether different....  It doesn't matter what you're told.  It's what you feel, what you feel deep down."

I am not going to pass along what I am feeling deep down right now.

LIKE A STOPPED CLOCK THAT'S RIGHT TWICE A DECADE:  If you predict enough recessions eventually reality will catch up to you.  And since we are reviewing predictions, let's reprise Krugman's classic predictions from 2003 - higher interest rates, a stock market swoon, rising unemployment - all wrong.

Let's see:

Interest rates, March 11, 2003:

I'm terrified about what will happen to interest rates once financial markets wake up to the implications of skyrocketing budget deficits.

Here in reality, the conventional mortgage rate has moved from 5.61% to 6.07% as of Jan 7, 2008; the ten year Treasury has moved from 3.6% to 3.9%.

Stock market, June 20, 2003:

Or, to put it another way: it's hard to find any real news to justify the market's leap. Instead, investors seem to be buying stocks because they are rising — which is pretty much the definition of a bubble.

The S&P has since risen from 995 to 1400.

Employment, Aug 15, 2003:

Meanwhile, employment is chasing a moving target because the working-age population continues to grow. Just to keep up with population growth, the U.S. needs to add about 110,000 jobs per month. When it falls short of that, jobs become steadily harder to find. At this point conditions in the labor market are probably the worst they have been for almost 20 years. (The measured unemployment rate isn't all that high, but that's largely because many people have given up looking for work.)

From Econommagic we see that total non-farm employment in Aug 2003 was 129.8 million; it has risen to 138.5 million as of Dec 2007.  8.7 million new jobs in 52 months works out to about 167,000 new jobs per month.

None of that means we are not on the brink of a recession, finally.  But it's been a long wait.

Cintonistas Attacking Obama In Racial Code

In a preview of a line we will hear all autumn if Obama is the Democratic nominee, we are now being told that Hillary's surrogates are attacking Obama with racially coded messages.  Geraldine Ferraro has this to say now:

Geraldine A.  Ferraro, who was the Democratic candidate for vice president in 1984, said she thought Mr. Obama and his campaign were fanning the issue to draw black voters away from Mrs. Clinton before the primary in South Carolina, where about 50 percent of the electorate is expected to be black.

“As soon anybody from the Clinton campaign opens their mouth in a way that could make it seem as if they were talking about race, it will be distorted,” Mrs. Ferraro said. “The spin will be put on it that they are talking about race. The Obama campaign is appealing to their base and their base is the African-American community. What they are trying to do is move voters from Clinton by distorting things. What have they got to lose?”

Ms. Ferraro will reverse her field if and when Obama is the nominee and it is Republicans criticizing him.  That said, some of the things being said ("shuck and jive" and "Barack Obama was doing something in the neighborhood") really don't lend themselves to an innocent interpretation.

However, I too would give Bill Clinton a pass on his "fairy tale" comment, especially since a moment later Clinton added "Ken Starr spent $70 million and indicted innocent people to find out that I wouldn't take a nickel to see the cow jump over the moon."

Maybe Bill and the Huck have been swapping reading lists.

WOW:  OK, I am not exactly Tim Russert's biggest fan, but his presentation of Bill Clinton's truncated "fairy tale" quote as described by Media Matters was shameless.

Maybe some lefty who wants to take a shot at Russert can ask him about David Gregory, Andrea Mitchell, and early, undetected Valerie Plame leaks.  Think of it as weasel control.

MORE CODE:  Let's dredge up the old Times story about Barack's controversial minister - there must be a coded attack in there somewhere.  [A note on how sausage is made - you might think that I flagged that old Obama story in response to this Insta-post, or the latest Mickey Kaus "Undernews Alert".  In fact, my traffic meter registered some surprising and unexpected hits on my old post and away I went.  So now I know where the traffic came from and you know how I happened to recycle it.]

The Long Arm (And Cold Beer) Of Karl Rove And The VRWC

Hillary adviser Sidney Blumenthal busted in New Hampshire for going 70 in a 30 MPH zone while apparently under the influence - will Hillary's supporters get MADD about this?  C'mon, this is now!  Obama's abuse was years ago.