The Swamp

Michelle Obama ties black, white women?

2008-07-05T21:19:00Z

by Amanda Erickson

Gina McCauley's blog on African-American women in pop culture has never attracted this kind of attention.

The 3-year-old site has a mostly African-American audience. But she launched a new Michelle Obama Watch blog in June to monitor and critique media coverage of the potential first lady, and since then, feminists of all colors have been linking and commenting.

"I think new bridges are being built, and I'm excited about that," said McCauley, 32, of Austin, Texas, who noted the response to the new blog has been exponentially greater from feminist bloggers around the country.

Her experience reflects what some hope will become a trend--that interest in ensuring fair coverage of Michelle Obama will bring together black and white feminists who have often had different goals and visions for the feminist movement.

Obama, who speaks openly about the challenges of balancing a successful career with the responsibilities of raising two young daughters, has the potential to reach a wide spectrum of women. Lately she's been hit by a spate of unflattering--and some say sexist--media portrayals.

Conservative pundits accused her of being unpatriotic. One blogger circulated unsubstantiated rumors that Obama gave a speech about the sins of "whitey." Fox News, in on-screen text that was quickly removed, called her a "baby mama," a derogatory term for an unwed mother. The conservative journal National Review wrote a cover story tagging her as "Mrs. Grievance."

]]> But the reaction, many black feminists complain, has fallen far short of the groundswell of anger from Hillary Clinton supporters who thought their candidate had been treated unfairly during coverage of her ultimately unsuccessful presidential quest.

Clinton has been more widely subjected to criticism, to be sure, but she was a candidate and Obama is a candidate's wife. Still, now that Sen. Barack Obama is the presumptive Democratic nominee, Michelle Obama's supporters worry that the attacks will get worse.

"You just don't hear the voices as loud as you did" when Clinton was attacked, said Mary Curtis, a Charlotte Observer columnist who wrote an opinion piece for The Washington Post about feminism and Obama. "You're reminded of Sojourner Truth asking, `Ain't I a woman?' "

Truth was an abolitionist and women's rights activist in the 19th Century, when the women's movement started with a clear goal: universal suffrage. But when black men were given the right to vote first, African-American women supported the decision, said Farah Griffin, an English and African-American studies professor at Columbia University.

White women, on the other hand, saw the move as a slap in the face. "Why Sambo before sister?" they asked, according to Griffin, raising a specter of racism into the campaign for women's rights.

The question of competing aims continued into the 1960s, as white women pushed for equal treatment in public life. They lobbied for equal pay and better representation in top corporate and government positions.

African-American women, however, sometimes chose instead to link issues of race and gender, lobbying for better quality of life for families and the poor. Author Alice Walker coined the term "womanism" to describe the movement, according to her daughter, feminist scholar Rebecca Walker.

These tensions bubbled to the surface during the Democratic primary campaign, when some black feminists felt as though they were again being asked to pick which factor might influence their vote--sex or race.

"There were some voices saying that if you're a woman and a feminist, you need to be for Hillary Clinton," Curtis said. "I felt like my very feminism was being questioned."

Similar to her husband espousing a new kind of political accommodation in Washington, Michelle Obama has tried to move beyond the sex-race divisions by appealing to both camps.

Barack Obama's campaign has tapped into that, turning her into an emissary to women. She has kicked off "Women for Obama" campaigns and hosted round-table talks with women across the country.

That appeals to women like Brittany Gwynn, 19, a University of Maryland student who embraces Obama's ability to be a strong woman and also a loving wife.

"I'm in college hoping to go to law school, and sometimes I feel like the men in my life ... are intimidated by my accomplishment," she wrote in an e-mail.

Obama, she said, has shown that it is possible to balance her goals with the needs of her family.

"She is a woman who is a force in her own right but also one who doesn't feel the need to be in the center of attention," Gwynn wrote. "I see her as a role model to women in my generation."

That has been true for many younger fans who have created Facebook groups and online fan sites lauding the potential first lady for her style and substance.

There do not appear to be similar Internet sites monitoring coverage of Cindy McCain, wife of presumptive Republican presidential nominee John McCain. A recent poll by the Pew Research Center found that Cindy McCain is less well-known than Michelle Obama.

As the presidential campaign unfolds, feminist supporters see the lack of attention toward Michelle Obama by some prominent feminists as an example of a fractured movement.

"Michelle Obama is getting short shrift ... from the mainstream white feminists who were screaming and screaming about Hillary Clinton," said Andrea Plaid, a Brooklyn-based blogger who contributes to Michelle Obama Watch.

White women bloggers, she said, still have trouble admitting their own prejudices. "There's still a sense of silence," she said. "People are shuffling their feet."

Not all white feminists agree. "I don't really see sexism in the coverage of Michelle Obama," said former Democratic vice presidential candidate Geraldine Ferraro.

Meagan Fredette, a Chicagoan who writes for Michelle Obama Watch, is hopeful. She's excited by the variety of people who visit the site, seeing comments from men, women, liberals and conservatives.

What impresses her most, though, is the number of women's Web sites that have been keeping up with her work. The blog Feministe, which had been closely following Clinton's race, recently began reporting more extensively on Michelle Obama.

Other mainstream women's groups, such as the National Organization for Women, are closely monitoring the coverage. NOW created its own online Media Wall of Shame to highlight what it says were unfair articles about women during the 2008 campaign. Reports on Michelle Obama are featured regularly.

"I think that women have become very sensitive to media sexism," NOW President Kim Gandy said. "They will be watching."

But Murray Lipp, a Clinton supporter and the founder of Hillary Clinton Forum, an online group dedicated to discussing the New York senator, said many Clinton supporters who use his forum still are angry--at the Obamas for not doing more to stop the slights against Clinton, and at the media for its coverage.

It's unfair, he said, to expect those supporters to simply get up and lobby for the wife of the man who beat Clinton.

"The wounds are so deep," he said. "It'll be a time before those are healed."

Obama backs late, mental-health abortion

2008-07-05T20:54:00Z

by Frank James

Sen. Barack Obama clarified his position today on mental-health exceptions to late-term abortions, saying he supports such exceptions and that comments he made during a recent magazine interview shouldn't be interpreted as opposing them.

As I wrote in an earlier posting, Obama raised eyebrows with an interview in Relevant magazine in which he said he opposed "mental distress" as a reason for aborting a fetus at or after roughly 22-weeks into a pregnancy, a so-called late-term abortion.

In saying that, it appeared that Obama was placing himself at odds with Roe v Wade and subsequent Supreme Court rulings which have upheld the constitutionality of mental-health exceptions.

But in a press availabilty on his campaign plane today on the flight from Butte, Mont. to St. Louis, Obama clarified what he meant.

Here's a transcript of the interchange as provided by the campaign.

Reporter: You said that mental distress shouldn't be a reason for late-term abortion?

Obama: "My only point is this -- historically I have been a strong believer in a women's right to choose with her doctor, her pastor and her family. And it is ..I have consistently been saying that you have to have a health exception on many significant restrictions or bans on abortions including late-term abortions.

In the past there has been some fear on the part of people who, not only people who are anti-abortion, but people who may be in the middle, that that means that if a woman just doesn't feel good then that is an exception. That's never been the case.

I don't think that is how it has been interpreted. My only point is that in an area like partial-birth abortion having a mental, having a health exception can be defined rigorously. It can be defined through physical health, It can be defined by serious clinical mental-health diseases. It is not just a matter of feeling blue. I don't think that's how pro-choice folks have interpreted it. I don't think that's how the courts have interpreted it and I think that's important to emphasize and understand."

]]> According to Linda Douglass, the Obama campaign's senior spokesperson, the senator from Illinois was making a distinction in the magazine interview between medically diagnosed mental illness and the kind of mental distress that an unwanted pregnancy causes many a pregnant mother.

"Mental distress is not an illness." Douglass said. "He absolutely believes and has always said there has to be a health exception for serious physical and mental illness."

That makes sense and conforms to the senator's co-sponsorship of the Freedom of Choice Act legislation which, among other things, would codify a mental-health exception to late-term abortion prohibitions.

The problem for the senator was when he appeared to be making a clear demarcation between physical and mental health in his magazine interview by saying:

Now, I don't think that "mental distress" qualifies as the health of the mother. I think it has to be a serious physical issue that arises in pregnancy, where there are real, significant problems to the mother carrying that child to term...

He clearly needed to add one more thought to that statement. He did it today.

Does the gun ruling hurt the NRA?

2008-07-05T19:42:01Z

by James Oliphant

Here, on the weekend that we celebrate the successful armed rebellion by America's founders, is the thought question of the day.

For years, anti-gun activists and others have whispered that the National Rifle Association, the most powerful gun lobby in the nation and one of the most powerful Washington lobbies on any issue, has really never wanted the Supreme Court to define the Second Amendment.

Why? Well, the theory went that a ruling such as the one the court handed down last week in District of Columbia v. Heller could dent the group where it hurts the most: fundraising.

After all, the NRA became the powerhouse that it is today largely because of the basic proposition it offered the American voter: The government wants to take your guns away.

]]> (It's similar to the conspiracy theory that holds Republicans never really want Roe v. Wade overturned, because of the money and political support that would rush to pro-choice groups.)

And in fact, it wasn't the NRA that filed the lawsuit that brought Washington, D.C.'s gun ban down, it was a group of libertarians, acting on their own with help from the CATO Institute.

After the Heller decision, in which the court found, for the first time, a constitutional right to gun ownership for self-defense, can the NRA still suggest to the public at large that the government is able to pull firearms from households? The court's ruling suggests that no regulation can deny a resident the right to keep a functional handgun at the ready.

It's interesting that the legislative arm of the NRA, which conducts its public message-making, has already adopted an approach in reaction to the ruling: eternal vigilance.

A right gained, the NRA says, can easily become a right lost.

In an email the association sent out Thursday, it warned about about the decision inflaming the media's "anti-gun hysteria."

The email invoked many of the conservative bogeyman in one ready-to-go package: Rev. Jesse Jackson, Adrian Fenty, the mayor of D.C,. Chicago mayor Richard Daley, the New York Times and, yes, the Chicago Tribune's editorial page, which, after the decision, (with some collective tongue in collective cheek) suggested the Second Amendment should be repealed.

Here is an excerpt from the NRA missive:

[T]he sad truth is that [the Heller decision] will motivate the Second Amendment's enemies to redouble their efforts to destroy the right to arms. Given the timing--just over four months before the November elections--we all have more than ample reason to redouble our efforts to ensure that November's winners will be the kinds of elected officials who will help us build upon the victory achieved in the Supreme Court.

Of course, the landscape after Heller is not a defined one. More questions remain than answers, the primary one being whether the decision applies to gun bans in localities such as Chicago and San Francisco. Also, whether the government can ban short-barreled shotguns, automatic weapons, concealed weapons or guns outside the home. Some analysts (including pro-gun ones) believe the Heller decision may have damaged the gun-rights movement by suggesting that there is a great amount of room for the government to regulate guns, more than many Second Amendment absolutists would like.

The debate has shifted, and an avalanche of litigation lies ahead, which should keep the money flowing to the NRA and its opposition, at least in the short-term. The game has changed, but it hasn't gone away. Not by a long shot.

Obama for weakening Roe v Wade?

2008-07-05T18:48:00Z

(Editor's note: Sen. Barack Obama clarified his position on the mental-health exception for late-term abortions today; he supports such exceptions. Read this subsequent post for more details.)

by Frank James

Jan Crawford Greenburg, our former Chicago Tribune colleague, now legal correspondent at ABC News, has a very valuable posting on her Legalities blog that should be causing teeth-gnashing over at Sen. Barack Obama's presidential campaign this weekend.

Jan picked up on an interview Obama did with Relevant Magazine in which the senator from Illinois said he opposed the mental-health exception that allows abortions to be performed in some cases after fetuses become viable.

As Jan writes:

Obama's remarks are printed verbatim in the interview, published yesterday in Relevant Magazine. Read them -- there's no mistaking that Obama says he no longer will support what's long been a cornerstone of the abortion rights debate: The Court's insistence that laws banning abortions after the fetus is viable (now about 22 weeks) contain an exception to allow doctors to perform them if necessary to protect a pregnant woman's mental health.

'I have repeatedly said that I think it's entirely appropriate for states to restrict or even prohibit late-term abortions as long as there is a strict, well-defined exception for the health of the mother. Now, I don't think that 'mental distress' qualifies as the health of the mother," Obama said. "I think it has to be a serious physical issue that arises in pregnancy, where there are real, significant problems to the mother carrying that child to term. Otherwise, as long as there is such a medical exception in place, I think we can prohibit late-term abortions."

Wow.

This has been a central battleground issue in the Supreme Court going back 35 years, to Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton, when the Court ruled a woman had a constitutional right to abortion. The decisions said state's can ban all abortions after the fetus is viable -- but that any restrictions must include exceptions to protect a woman's physical and emotional health.

Jan is right to say wow. This is something of a bombshell.

]]> Between presidential candidates Obama and Sen. John McCain, Obama's the one most political observers would expect to protect the legs on the Roe v. Wade stool. McCain's obviously the one most would expect to see with a saw in his hand. But Obama apparently has one too.

What makes Obama's position on the late-term abortion mental-health exception even more head-scratching is reflected in these two additional paragraphs from Jan about proposed abortion legislation called the Freedom of Choice Act:

The Freedom of Choice Act specifically allows abortions after viability where necessary to protect a woman's health, and the legislation refers repeatedly to the guarantees of Roe and Doe, which protect the right to an abortion where necessary for a woman's physical and mental health.

One of its co-sponsors? Barack Obama.

As Jan would say, wow!

Jan and others have noted that Obama sided with conservatives on two notably controversial recent Supreme Court decisions.

He sided with the Supreme Court majority in the Washington D.C. gun-ban case in which the court in a landmark ruling overturned the city's gun-control law. In Kennedy v. Louisiana, in which the high court declared as unconstitutional the death penalty for child rapists, Obama sided with the conservative minority.

While Obama may have arrived at these positions on the merits, the Obama campaign will have to forgive many observers for being skeptical.

Having been dubbed, unfairly or not, the most liberal member of the Senate by National Journal, and winning more delegates for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination than Sen. Hillary Clinton largely because he was left of her on the Iraq War, it was expected that Obama would move to the political center once the primaries were over.

But it appears that he's not just moved to the center but, in some respects, gone past it.

The danger for Obama is that one of his greatest weakness with voters comes from his being relatively new to the national political scene. Many voters don't know very much about him.

Because he appears to be shifting so greatly on so many issues, including how quickly he'd withdraw U.S. combat troops from Iraq, he may be running the risks of reinforcing voter perceptions that he's too unknown and unpredicatable to entrust the nation's fate to.

And his apparent position on the mental-health exception to late-term abortions is only going to raise questions in the minds of many of the liberal activists who have helped him get this far. Some of the larger questions will be: what does he really believe and is he the person we thought we were voting for in the primaries?

Obama anti-rumor fight spreads

2008-07-05T15:14:11Z

by Mike Dorning

Barack Obama's campaign to fight damaging Interent rumors with his own Web-based viral counter-offensive appears to be building.

The Obama campaign last month unveiled a web site, www.fightthesmears.com, that rebuts rumors about the candidate. The candidate has been the target of many damaging rumors, most notably that Obama is Muslim. (The candidate is, in fact, a Christian who embraced his faith as an adult after being raised by a secular mother.)

The campaign encouraged supporters to go to the web site and e-mail the rebuttals to friends, a classic viral-marketing technique to further spread the campaign's message.

An e-mail recently received by a friend of The Swamp now suggests the anti-rumor effort is organized and growing.

The email is an invitation to join a "blog force that will spread the truth," organized with volunteer leaders recruiting groups of 7 to 10 friends and associates to troll the Internet for "lies" and rebut them with campaign-supplied "links to the truth."

"Are you volunteering to be part of the blog force that will spread the truth?" reads the email. "We need you to give links to the truth wherever you see the lies. And we need you to recruit more volunteers to do the same. We recommend a ratio of one leader/7 - 10 volunteers, and our volunteer mantra is 'respect, empower, include.'"

While it's unclear how the campaign will track the volunteers' activities, the email indicates the Obama campaign has set up an incentive structure to reward those most active in rebutting anti-Obama rumors.

"Top volunteers get perks on scale with top donors (plane trips with Barack, phone calls, speaking opportunities, etc)... so let everybody know, please, that we take your work very seriously," the email adds.

Durbin channels Adams: use freedom well

2008-07-05T15:06:00Z

by Matthew Hay Brown

President Bush used his weekly radio address this morning to talk about an American creed. The Democrats are using theirs to talk about Republican filibusters and the Medicare bill.

"Just last month, they blocked bills to combat global warming, halt the mortgage meltdown and bring down fuel prices," says Sen. Dick Durbin, Democrat of Illinois. "Last week, Republican Senators blocked a bill protecting the ability of many Medicare beneficiaries to see the doctor of their choice. The bill would have cancelled a 10.6 percent cut in Medicare payments to doctors."

That cut, which went into effect this week, affects active-duty and retired military members and their families, Durbin says, because their TRICARE health insurance is tied directly to Medicare payment rates.

"There will be a lot of talk about patriotism over this Fourth of July weekend and many Senators will rightfully praise our military," he says. "But true patriotism means honoring the men and women in uniform who defend our freedoms -- not just with words and flag lapel pins, but with actions befitting their great sacrifices."

The complete address follows.

]]> "Hello, this is Senator Dick Durbin from Illinois.

"More than 230 years ago, John Adams - one of the architects of America's independence - wrote a letter describing the human cost of establishing our new nation - a nation unlike any the world had ever seen - a nation dedicated to freedom.

"The letter was sent to his wife, Abigail. Two lines near the end of that letter speak directly to us.

"He wrote, 'Posterity! You will never know how much it cost the present generation to preserve your freedom.

" 'I hope,' he added, 'you will make good use of it.'

"On this Fourth of July weekend, as we celebrate our nation's independence, we can be proud that the generations of Americans who followed John Adams have preserved -- and expanded -- our heritage of freedom.

"Today, women and African Americans can not only vote for President, they can run for President. That is progress that would have astonished John - and maybe even Abigail - Adams.

"But there is another change in America that would trouble our Founders greatly if they could see it -- that is the political gridlock today in Washington.

"With gasoline at $4 a gallon and rising ... an energy crisis ... a global warming crisis ... our economy in trouble ... our military stretched thin ... and more Americans every week losing their jobs, their homes, their pensions and their health care, America must change course.

"But in the Senate, the Senate Republican leadership is determined to stop efforts to bring change to Washington. They have now shattered the record for the highest number of filibusters in history. Filibusters of course are the age-old procedural obstacles used to slow down or stop the Senate from debating and voting. Now before this Congress the record was 57 filibusters in a two-year period of time. This Republican leadership has waged 78 filibusters and we still have six months to go.

"Just last month, they blocked bills to combat global warming, halt the mortgage meltdown and bring down fuel prices. Last week, Republican Senators blocked a bill protecting the ability of many Medicare beneficiaries to see the doctor of their choice. The bill would have cancelled a 10.6 percent cut in Medicare payments to doctors.

"That cut, which took effect on July 1st, could force many doctors to stop seeing new Medicare patients.

"But it's not just the seniors who will suffer. Military families are also at risk because of this Republican filibuster.

"Payments under TRICARE, the health care plan for active-duty and retired military members and their families, are tied directly to Medicare payment rates.

"Now in my state of Illinois, nearly 156,000 TRICARE patients could be hurt by the Medicare cuts. All told, 8.9 million veterans and military personnel nationwide face reduced medical services because of these cuts.

"And while Medicare and TRICARE payments to doctors are being cut, the Bush Administration is giving insurance companies that offer private 'Medicare Advantage' plans a 3.6 percent raise.

"These private 'Medicare Advantage' plans - created in 2003 when the Republicans controlled Congress -- cost taxpayers, an average of 13 percent more than regular Medicare.

"According to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office, private insurers will reap $150 billion in overpayments over the next decade - money we could better use to improve Medicare and cover some of the 47 million Americans who are uninsured. Instead, much of that money is going to advertising, overhead, big salaries for insurance company CEOs, big dividends for their stockholders.

"There will be a lot of talk about patriotism over this Fourth of July weekend and many Senators will rightfully praise our military. But true patriotism means honoring the men and women in uniform who defend our freedoms -- not just with words and flag lapel pins, but with actions befitting their great sacrifices.

"That's why the Veterans of Foreign Wars ... the Military Officers Association ... the National Guard Association ... the National Military Family Association ... the Military Order of the Purple Heart and more than two dozen other organizations representing millions of active-duty military members, veterans, and military families and survivors ... all oppose the Medicare and TRICARE payment cuts.

"House Democrats and Republicans have already come together with a strong bipartisan vote to block these cuts. It's time for the Republican Senators who are filibustering this measure to put our seniors and our military families ahead of private insurance companies and let the Senate pass this bill as soon as possible.

"I'm Dick Durbin from Illinois. Have a happy Fourth of July weekend and thanks for listening."

Polls: Obama leads by 100

2008-07-05T14:09:09Z

by Jim Tankersley

We're inside four months from the Nov. 4 presidential election, and state-by-state polling suggests a big lead for Sen. Barack Obama over Sen. John McCain.

State polling numbers compiled by electoral-vote.com show the Democrat from Illinois winning 26 states for a total of 320 electoral votes. That's a 102-electoral-vote margin over the Arizona Republican. It includes seven states Democrat John Kerry lost to President Bush in 2004: Iowa, Indiana, Ohio, Virginia, Colorado, Montana and New Mexico.

Speaking of Kerry, here's a huge caveat for Obama fans: The Web site's numbers on this date four years ago predicted a Kerry win in the electoral college.

Here's another: Obama's lead in several states, including Ohio and Pennsylvania, is narrow. A shift of a few percentage points across the Rust Belt would tip 52 electoral votes to McCain and give him the 270 he needs for the White House.

The numbers suggest that whoever wins will have a Democratic Congress to deal with. They predict a 55-45 Democratic margin in the Senate after Elecction Day, due to GOP seats flipping in Virginia, Colorado, New Mexico and New Hampshire.

Of course, there's a lot of campaigning to be done over the next four months - running mates to pick, conventions to stage, debates to be conducted. So we'll ask you: What do you make of these polls, what trends do you see, and what final score (in electoral votes) do you predict for November?

Bush: No American race, just creed

2008-07-05T14:06:00Z

by Matthew Hay Brown

In his final Fourth of July weekend in the White House, President Bush takes a stab today at defining the American creed.

"In the United States, we believe in the rights and dignity of every person," he says this morning in his weekly radio address. "We believe in equal justice, limited government, and the rule of law. And we believe in personal responsibility and tolerance towards others."

Bush takes the opportunity to talk about the citizenship ceremony he attended Friday, and traces the service of American soldiers from Bunker Hill to Baghdad.

The complete address follows.

]]> "Good morning. This weekend, Americans are celebrating the anniversary of our Nation's independence. Two hundred and thirty-two years ago, our Founding Fathers came together in Philadelphia to proclaim that all men are created equal and that they are endowed by their Creator with unalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

"The man who wrote those immortal words was Thomas Jefferson. Yesterday, I celebrated the Fourth of July at Monticello, Jefferson's home in Virginia. While there, I witnessed an event that would have made the author of the Declaration of Independence proud. On Monticello's lawn, more than 70 men and women from dozens of countries raised their right hands to take the oath of American citizenship. They swore their allegiance to the Constitution. They promised that they would defend the laws of the United States. And they reminded everyone in attendance that the promise of America is open to all.

"These new citizens come from countries as diverse as Burma, Afghanistan, Norway, and Iraq. These new citizens are proof that there is no American race, just an American creed. In the United States, we believe in the rights and dignity of every person. We believe in equal justice, limited government, and the rule of law. And we believe in personal responsibility and tolerance towards others. This creed of freedom and equality has lifted the lives of millions of Americans, whether citizens by birth or citizens by choice.

"This creed of freedom has required brave defenders, and every generation of Americans has produced them. From the soldiers who fought for independence at Bunker Hill and Yorktown, to the Americans who broke the chains of slavery, liberated Europe and Asia from tyranny, and brought down an evil empire, the people of this great land have always risen to freedom's defense.

"Today, the men and women of America's Armed Forces continue this proud tradition of defending liberty. In places like Afghanistan and Iraq, many risk their lives every day to protect America and uphold the principle that human freedom is the birthright of all people and a gift from the Almighty. These brave Americans make it possible for America to endure as a free society. So on this Fourth of July, we owe all those who wear the uniform of the United States a special debt of gratitude. And we thank their families for supporting them in this crucial time for our Nation.

"The Fourth of July is a day when all Americans take a moment to share a collective sense of pride in our country. We live in a Nation founded on the power of an idea, a Nation where opportunity is limited only by imagination, and a Nation that has done more than any other to spread the light of liberty throughout the world. Today, that light shines as brightly as it did in 1776. And with 'the protection of Divine Providence' it will continue to shine brightly for generations to come.

"Thank you for listening."

VP picks: Gore, or somebody like him

2008-07-05T12:40:00Z

by Paul West

Before he reinvented government, Al Gore revolutionized the way vice presidents are made.

When he joined Bill Clinton's ticket, it violated the old rules. Regional diversity? Not with two southerners from neighboring states. Ideological balance? A couple of left-of-center moderates. Age? Both younger than Barack Obama is today.

And yet, Gore is widely regarded by strategists in both parties as the best vice-presidential pick in at least 20 years.

"Everything about that ticket communicated change," say Michael Feldman, who worked in the campaign and became a senior Gore aide. "In an election that was very much about change, it was a winning combination."

Change is in the air again this year. Does that mean John McCain and Obama can -or should-- come up with a Gore-like choice?

If they do, it will be a surprise.

]]>

"A big part of the Gore success in '92 was that it had such a large element of surprise," says Scott Reed, who managed the Dole-Kemp campaign four years later.

Handlers for Obama and McCain are trying to lower expectations and keep a lid on the process. They want to preserve the element of surprise when the announcements are made--perhaps not until late summer, just before the national conventions.

Obama "doesn't have a lot of good choices," insisted a top campaign aide, with a straight face. The Republican line: Our party's bench is very thin this season.

There are a few rules for choosing running mates: First, do no harm to your election chances. Second, pick someone who could take over as president. Third, get a compatible partner you can work with every day.

An inspired choice would generate a "wow factor" for the campaign. And that would advance the political goals: energizing supporters, making voters take a fresh look at the nominee and, if necessary, changing the dynamic of the election.

Getting someone who'd also help win a swing state would be "kind of a side benefit," according to David Plouffe, manager of Obama's campaign. He pointed out that Dick Cheney, whose selection as George W. Bush's running mate was widely praised at the time, comes from one of the safest Republican states in the country.

By now, it's fair to say that somewhere, online or in print, the eventual running mates for both parties have already been identified, and analyzed in depth.

One Democrat drawing attention lately as a Gore-like VP pick is Gore himself.

The case for Gore goes something like this: He's become an outsider but still knows how Washington works. He's got impeccable credentials on global issues, from climate change to national defense. That argument, however, overlooks the fact that, having done the job for eight years, he's extremely unlikely to want it again.

One intriguing possibility, if Obama doesn't target a single state or try to amplify the change message: Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island. That state's four reliably Democratic electoral votes aren't in doubt and Reed is unknown nationally, but he could help Obama in several ways.

He's a Catholic with working-class roots (his father was a school janitor), and could enhance the ticket's appeal to those swing voters. He has expertise on issues at the center of the campaign debate, economics and the housing crisis.

More important, he would offset Obama's lack of national security experience. Reed, 58, has a reputation as a serious thinker and is a respected voice on defense matters. He's a West Point graduate and Army Ranger, with views that are right in line with Obama's. He voted against the 2002 Iraq war resolution and became an early critic of the way the war was fought while working to increase the size of the Army.

He's got an attractive wife and toddler at home, which might produce the sort of family tableau that boosted the Clinton-Gore ticket (Reed met his future wife, a Senate staffer, on an official trip to Afghanistan with McCain).

Like Obama, he's got a Harvard Law degree and spent time teaching at the college level (West Point). The two men are reported to have a good personal relationship.

Reed isn't flashy, and he wouldn't upstage the star. If he joins Obama's upcoming visit to Iraq (it would be Reed's 12th since the war began), his running-mate stock could soar.

For McCain, the underdog, the electoral map may dictate a more conventional running mate.

That's why Mitt Romney has emerged as a consensus VP pick. He could help the ticket in many ways, including in the key state of Michigan, where he's got family ties.

But McCain doesn't like him. And for a guy who values his buddies much more than most politicians, the idea of having Mitt right down the hall for the next four or eight years could be extremely hard for McCain to swallow.

An alternate possibility: Rob Portman. A former congressman from Ohio--a must-win state for Republicans--he's got expertise where McCain is weak, on economics. He's been the nation's budget director and top trade negotiator. He's well-liked by members of both parties in Congress, where he once worked as a White House lobbyist, and could help smooth over relations between a President McCain and his former colleagues on Capitol Hill.

His biggest liabilities are his long and deep Bush connections (he served both the current president and his father). Portman bailed out of the White House last summer, with an eye toward re-entering politics. At 52, he'd inject some youthful energy into the Republican ticket.

If Portman's Bush ties are too much to overcome, McCain could turn to a longshot who has escaped national attention: Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. of Utah, 48, a popular politician with business and foreign policy experience and a good personal relationship with McCain. He went against Romney and the Mormon church to endorse McCain early, then stuck with him during the darkest hours of the primary fight.

A former ambassador to Singapore who worked in the Reagan White House, Huntsman is the son of a petrochemical billionaire, the wealthiest man in Utah--as reliably Republican as Rhode Island is Democratic, and with almost as few electoral votes.

On a personal level, Huntsman and McCain both have adopted children from Asia (Huntsman's are from China and India; McCain's is from Bangladesh). Their moderate-conservative political views are in synch, and Huntsman has gone out of his way to praise McCain's stance on immigration reform.

Their states share a border, so McCain and Huntsman, a pair of westerners, would offer voters neither ideological balance nor geographic diversity. An unlikely pairing, it would seem.

Sort of like Clinton and Gore.

Obama, McCain vulnerabilities ranked

2008-07-05T12:00:00Z

by Katie Fretland

In this week's National Journal, political insiders were asked to identify the biggest weaknesses about candidates John McCain and Barack Obama.

Here are some examples of what the Democrats said about Obama and what the Republicans said about McCain.

Obama's vulnerabilities

Inexperience 69 percent
Liberal voting record 56 percent
Race 25 percent

"No matter how he tries to paper it over, [inexperience] is on people's minds," one Democratic insider told the magazine.

McCain's vulnerabilities

President Bush's unpopularity 66 percent
Economy 42 percent
Age 31 percent

"In the fall, he must completely divorce himself from President Bush," one Republican insider told the magazine.

To see full results and a list of the 173 political insiders, visit the National Journal.

'Patriot Games' of the wrong kind

2008-07-05T11:51:54Z

By Michael Tackett

The Republican consultant had it all figured out.

His candidate: The hero. Wounded in war, stand-up guy, the real face of a generation. His opponent: No military service. Suspicious activity in his past.

He had an unofficial slogan in mind: The patriot vs. the punk.

He said this in 1996, when Bob Dole, the last leader of the World War II generation to seek the presidency, was facing Bill Clinton, who avoided the draft during Vietnam and protested against the war, in a race that Dole would lose by a near-landslide.

]]> It is not that the consultant had the wrong framing. But he clearly did not have a good fix on what really motivates voters.

Last week we saw, repeatedly, the same kind of argument being offered, only this time it seemed to be coming from both sides. A supporter of Barack Obama's had the temerity to question the national security expertise of John McCain, the son of admirals who also was a prisoner of war in Hanoi for more than five years.

If the election were merely a function of who was the better warrior or flag waver, McCain would have an easy time of it. But in the last four presidential elections, the candidate with the greater military credentials lost.

Patriotism is fairly easy to demagogue. Just recall the photos in which Obama was shown not holding his hand over his heart during the national anthem. Or the scurrilous allegations that he didn't wear a flag pin because of some anti-American animus. Then there is the stubborn fact that his father was Muslim and gave him the middle name that in the Muslim world is as common as, well, John.

So it is not surprising that there are those who think a race to the bottom--focusing on all these non-issues--is the path to victory.

Obama, clearly mindful of that, started a patriot game of his own with a speech in Independence, Mo., where he tried to be the arbiter of what is and is not out of bounds on the patriotism debate. As he has done several times in the campaign, he delivered a forceful, coherent and convincing argument. At least as long as no one else was talking.

But that is not the world he lives in, and so the talking continued. And he wasn't helped when his own surrogates, such as former Gen. Wesley Clark--who may have talked himself out of consideration for vice president or any other prominent post--started to make some sleights about McCain's experience in Vietnam. It was bad enough when Republicans made swift-boating a verb while challenging John Kerry. Surely no one will seriously try a version of that with McCain.

The distressing part of this is that Obama and McCain claim to be where they are in part because they were willing to take the high road and not engage in overtly personal attacks. So far, that is not what is happening.

What do voters care about on this 4th of July weekend? Gas prices well over $4 a gallon. A stock market in bear territory. Home prices in decline, or homes in foreclosure. College tuition rising faster than inflation. Manufacturing jobs that will never come back.

Oh, and those hot wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the cold one with Iran.

Instead, we keep hearing the hollow, hectoring calls about each candidate's sense of country. Obama and McCain keep talking about rising above it.

Now would be a good time to start.

Swamp Sunrise

2008-07-05T11:45:00Z

Bush's noisy first visit to Monticello

2008-07-04T21:08:00Z

by Frank James

President Bush was heckled today by anti-war and civil-liberties protestors at an Independence Day naturalization ceremony he attended at Thomas Jefferson's old slave-plantation home, Monticello.

As the president started his speech protesters, at least one of whom appeared to be from the group Code Pink, started shouting "war criminal" and "fascism" at the president.

Bush, who doesn't even generally like to be interrupted by cell phone ring tones while he's talking, appeared to take the interruption in stride.

In fact, he adeptly played off the protestors to make a point about American democracy.

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you, and happy Fourth of July. (Applause.) I am thrilled to be here at Monticello. I've never been here before. (Audience disturbance.)

To my fellow citizens to be, we believe in free speech in the United States of America. (Applause.)

That Bush had never been to Monticello before was perhaps the biggest news of the event. Monticello is right up there with George Washington's Mount Vernon in terms of places that are must-sees on the list of presidential sites. For a man who has a helicopter at his disposal, it seems he would have made what's around a 100 mile trip as the crow flies a lot sooner than the last few months of his second term.

Of course, a president doesn't really plan his itinerary; the staff does. In any event, we're glad he got to Monticello and we hope he took the tour. Jefferson was quite the innovator. For instance, he designed a dumbwaiter that brought wine up from his basement wine cellar into the dining room and placed a bed where a wall separating two rooms, his study and bedroom, would normally be, allowing him to roll out of bed to either area, depending on what he wanted to do.

You can view the entire speech or read the transcript.

Teachers work through the 4th

2008-07-04T19:29:15Z

by Jim Tankersley

It's a federal holiday and (this year) a three-day weekend to boot. But not everyone is taking the Fourth of July off - including a whole bunch of teachers.

Today in Washington, more than 9,000 members of the National Education Association are continuing their Representative Assembly, a sort of smaller-scale national political convention complete with speeches, floor votes and strict parliamentary procedure.

The NEA's web site says the delegates will celebrate America's independence today and tackle "a full agenda of Association business." They'll honor an Idaho elementary school teacher who launched into space on the shuttle Endeavor last summer, along with their Education Support Professional of the Year.

"The day set aside to celebrate the nation's democratic tradition is also an important election day for the Association," the Web site continues. "Delegates will elect a new Secretary-Treasurer, choose two new members of the NEA Executive Committee, and decide whether to reccomend to NEA members the election of Barack Obama as President of the United States."

There's little drama in that last question -- the NEA is a perennial supporter of Democratic presidential candidates. It's also America's largest professional union, with some 3.2 million members. Most of whom are gladly taking today off.

Jesse Helms, 1921-2008

2008-07-04T16:16:00Z

Sen. Jesse Helms high-fives Johnathan Prevette, 6, of Lexington, N.C., during pre-race activities at Charlotte Motor Speedway near Concord, N.C., October 1996. (AP Photo/Nell Redmond, file)

by Frank James

Jesse Helms, a conservative stalwart who for decades enraged liberals and African Americans, died this morning at age 86.

During his time in the Senate, Helms was one of that chamber's more larger-than-life characters, with his take-no-prisoners style and views he often seemed to express with a slight sneer.

A former journalist, he was one of the most hawkish senators during his tenure in that chamber during the Cold War years. He was also famously known as Senator No because of his opposition to many social-spending programs and cultural issues like gay rights.

What's more, he had, fairly or not, a reputation as one of the Senate's most retrograde members on race issues.

Helms was more complicated on racial issues than the caricature he became for many Americans. He actually had African Americans on his staff including James Meredith who integrated the University of Mississippi.

But he was a master at racial politics. The Village Voice once reported that before Helms allowed a photo to be taken of him during an interview, he got up and removed a photo that included a black man from the wall behind him, explaining that some people in North Carolina might not understand.

Helms was definitely an irascible American original who left his mark on our national politics and culture.

Sen. Mitch McConnell, (R-Ky), Senate Minority Leader, issued the following statement:

"Today we lost a Senator whose stature in Congress had few equals. Senator Jesse Helms was a leading voice and courageous champion for the many causes he believed in. Jesse and Dot were great friends to Elaine and me. We mourn his passing and extend our deepest sympathies to the extended Helms family.

Fox News Channel had the following lengthy report:

]]> Here's how the Associated Press is reporting on Helms's death:

BY DAVID ESPO and WHITNEY WOODWARD, Associated Press Writers

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) -- Former Sen. Jesse Helms, who built a career along the fault lines of racial politics and battled liberals, Communists and the occasional fellow Republican during 30 conservative years in Congress, died on the Fourth of July.

He was 86.

Helms died at 1:15 a.m., said the Jesse Helms Center at Wingate University in North Carolina. The center's president, John Dodd, said in a statement that funeral arrangements were pending.

"He was very comfortable," said former chief of staff Jimmy Broughton, who added Helms died of natural causes in Raleigh.

Helms, who first became known to North Carolina voters as a newspaper and television commentator, won election to the Senate in 1972 and decided not to run for a sixth term in 2002.

"Compromise, hell! ... If freedom is right and tyranny is wrong, why should those who believe in freedom treat it as if it were a roll of bologna to be bartered a slice at a time?" Helms wrote in a 1959 editorial that foretold his political style.

As he aged, Helms was slowed by a variety of illnesses, including a bone disorder, prostate cancer and heart problems, and he made his way through the Capitol on a motorized scooter as his career neared an end. In April 2006, his family announced that he had been moved into a convalescent center after being diagnosed with vascular dementia, in which repeated minor strokes damage the brain.

Helms' public appearances had dwindled as his health deteriorated. When his memoirs were published in August 2005, he appeared at a Raleigh book store to sign copies but did not make a speech.

In an e-mail interview with The Associated Press at that time, Helms said he hoped what future generations learn about him "will be based on the truth and not the deliberate inaccuracies those who disagreed with me took such delight in repeating."

"My legacy will be up to others to describe," he added.

Helms served as chairman of the Agriculture Committee and Foreign Relations Committees over the years at times when the GOP held the Senate majority, using his posts to protect his state's tobacco growers and other farmers and place his stamp on foreign policy.

His opposition to Communism defined his foreign policy views. He took a dim view of many arms control treaties, opposed Fidel Castro at every turn, and supported the contras in Nicaragua as well as the right-wing government of El Salvador. He opposed the Panama Canal treaties that President Jimmy Carter pushed through a reluctant Senate in 1977.

Early on, his habit of blocking nominations and legislation won him a nickname of "Senator No." He delighted in forcing roll call votes that required Democrats to take politically difficult votes on federal funding for art he deemed pornographic, school busing, flag-burning and other cultural issues.

In 1993, when then-President Clinton sought confirmation for an openly homosexual assistant secretary at the Department of Housing and Urban Development, Helms registered his disgust. "I'm not going to put a lesbian in a position like that," he said in a newspaper interview at the time. "If you want to call me a bigot, fine."

After Democrats killed the appointment of U.S. District Judge Terrence Boyle, a former Helms aide, to a federal appeals court post in 1991, Helms blocked all of Clinton's judicial nominations from North Carolina for eight years.

Helms occasionally opted for compromise in later years in the Senate, working with Democrats on legislation to restructure the foreign policy bureaucracy and pay back debts to the United Nations, an organization be disdained for most of his career.

And he softened his views on AIDS after years of clashes with gay activists, advocating greater federal funding to fight the disease in Africa and elsewhere overseas.

But in his memoirs, Helms made clear that his opinions on other issues had hardly moderated since he left office. He compared abortion to both the Holocaust and the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

"I will never be silent about the death of those who cannot speak for themselves," the former senator wrote in "Here's Where I Stand."

Helms never lost a race for the Senate, but he never won one by much, either, a reflection of his divisive political profile in his native state.

He knew it, too. "Well, there is no joy in Mudville tonight. The mighty ultraliberal establishment, and the liberal politicians and editors and commentators and columnists have struck out again," he said in 1990, after winning his fourth term.

He won the 1972 election after switching parties, and defeated then-Gov. Jim Hunt in an epic battle in 1984 in what was then the costliest Senate race on record.

He defeated former Charlotte Mayor Harvey Gantt in 1990 and 1996 in racially tinged campaigns. In the first race, a Helms commercial showed a white fist crumbling up a job application, these words underneath: "You needed that job ... but they had to give it to a minority."

"The tension that he creates, the fear he creates in people, is how he's won campaigns," Gantt said several years later.

Helms also played a role in national GOP politics -- supporting Ronald Reagan in 1976 in a presidential primary challenge to then-President Gerald R. Ford. Reagan's candidacy was near collapse when it came time for the North Carolina primary. Helms was in charge of the effort, and Reagan won a startling upset that resurrected his challenge.

During the 1990s, Helms clashed frequently with President Clinton, whom he deemed unqualified to be commander in chief. Even some Republicans cringed when Helms said Clinton was so unpopular he would need a bodyguard on North Carolina military bases. Helms said he hadn't meant it as a threat.

Asked to gauge Clinton's performance overall, Helms said in 1995: "He's a nice guy. He's very pleasant. But ... (as) Ronald Reagan used to say about another politician, 'Deep down, he's shallow."'

Helms went out of his way to establish good relations with Madeleine Albright, Clinton's second secretary of state. But that didn't stop him from single-handedly blocking Clinton's appointment of William Weld -- a Republican -- as ambassador to Mexico.

Helms clashed with other Republicans over the years, including fellow Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana in 1987, after Democrats had won a Senate majority. Helms had promised in his 1984 campaign not to take the chairmanship of the Foreign Relations Committee, but he invoked seniority over Lugar to claim the seat as the panel's ranking Republican.

He was unafraid of inconveniencing his fellow senators -- sometimes all of them at once. "I did not come to Washington to win a popularity contest," he once said while holding the Senate in session with a filibuster that delayed the beginning of a Christmas break. And he once objected to a request by phoning in his dissent from home, where he was watching Senate proceedings on television.

Helms was born in Monroe, N.C., on Oct. 18, 1921. He attended Wake Forest College in 1941 but never graduated and was in the Navy during World War II.

In many ways, Helms' values were forged in the small town where his father was police chief.

"I shall always remember the shady streets, the quiet Sundays, the cotton wagons, the Fourth of July parades, the New Year's Eve firecrackers. I shall never forget the stream of school kids marching uptown to place flowers on the Courthouse Square monument on Confederate Memorial Day," Helms wrote in a newspaper column in 1956.

He took an active role in North Carolina politics early on, working to elect a segregationist candidate, Willis Smith, to the Senate in 1950. He worked as Smith's top staff aide for a time, then returned to Raleigh as executive director of the state bankers association.

Helms became a member of the Raleigh city council in 1957 and got his first public platform for espousing his conservative views when he became a television editorialist for WRAL in Raleigh in 1960. He also wrote a column that at one time was carried in 200 newspapers. Helms also was city editor at The Raleigh Times.

Helms and his wife, Dorothy, had two daughters and a son. They adopted the boy in 1962 after the child, 9 years old and suffering from cerebral palsy, said in a newspaper article that he wanted parents.