The ineligible Senator McCain

This is really starting to be funny.

First we find out that the soon-to-be Republican nominee for president has a criminal defense attorney on retainer, and now it turns out that he may not be eligible to run for president.

The New York Times reports today that Senator John McCain has asked former Solicitor General Ted Olson to prepare "a detailed legal analysis" of the U.S. Constitution's requirement that only a "natural-born citizen" can become president of the United States.

The problem seems to be that Senator McCain, the son of a Navy officer, was born in the Panama Canal Zone where his father was stationed. There's no question that he's a citizen. The question is whether someone who was not born on American soil is a "natural-born" citizen.

Well, sure, it sounds like an idiotic Internet conspiracy theory, but it turns out that the question has never been answered in a court of law.

The New York Times reports that lawyers have been unable to determine who would have the standing to bring a lawsuit, or whether a lawsuit could even be filed before the person in question was sworn in as president.

You can't make it up.

The Republicans are going to nominate a man who might not be eligible to run.

The next time Hillary Clinton talks about the sophisticated and powerful Republican machine that's coming after the Democratic nominee, pay no attention. This is a bunch of people who shouldn't ride escalators, because if the power went out, they might be trapped for days.


Copyright 2008

Editor's note: You might be interested in the earlier post, "Why John McCain needs Bob Bennett."

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Hillary Clinton's real record

Send the kids out of the room and let's talk.

Hillary Clinton has been campaigning for president for what feels like twenty years on the claim that she has a thirty-five-year record of accomplishment, fighting for and making change on behalf of women and children and fill-in-the-blank Americans.

Hillary Clinton does have a record of accomplishment, but it's not the one she's touting.

This is Hillary Clinton's record of accomplishment: She has saved Bill Clinton's ass.

Many times.

When Gennifer Flowers came forward in 1992 and revealed her twelve-year affair with the married governor of Arkansas, Hillary Clinton went on "60 Minutes" and saved Bill Clinton's ass.

When Paula Jones sued Bill Clinton for defamation and the discovery process unearthed an affair with a White House intern, Hillary Clinton saved Bill Clinton's ass.

When investigators asked questions about questionable financial links to a failed savings and loan, when the White House Counsel committed suicide and papers from his office safe vanished before investigators could get there, when FBI files of Republican opponents were improperly reviewed by White House political aides, when the White House Travel Office staff was fired and then smeared with false allegations of criminal conduct, when the Lincoln Bedroom was booked full of Democratic donors like a high-roller suite at a Las Vegas hotel, when Bill Clinton was impeached for perjury and obstruction of justice, Hillary Clinton saved Bill Clinton's ass.

If not for Hillary Clinton, Bill Clinton might still be in Arkansas harassing beauty queens.

Hillary Clinton is a sharp cookie.

Too sharp to run on her real record.

So she claims to have a record of achieving children's health care and fiscal discipline and job growth and prosperity and good relations with countries around the world.

Saying it doesn't make it so.

Hillary Clinton has a record of saving Bill Clinton's ass.

If you think that's a skill we need in the Oval Office, go ahead and vote for her.

You'll never find anybody who's better at it.


Copyright 2008

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The Democrats' ludicrous health care debate

If you feel like wasting your time, there must be something you can do with it that's more fun than bending your brain around the details of Hillary Clinton's and Barack Obama's universal health care proposals, which is what the New York Times did on Saturday.

Shouldn't somebody point out that a candidate's health care policy, no matter how detailed, does not automatically become law on Inauguration Day?

In comedian Argus Hamilton's memorable words, "By the time it gets through Congress it will be a dam in Idaho."

Wow. Argus made the headache go away.

Read his column every day at http://www.ArgusJokes.com.


Copyright 2008

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Why John McCain needs Bob Bennett

Last December 20, when the Drudge Report posted an item about Senator John McCain trying to spike a New York Times story about his close ties to a lobbyist, Senator McCain acted like a man who thought he was in serious trouble.

He could have refused to comment on the report but instead he held a press conference to address it, which became a story in itself.

"McCain responds to Drudge," headlined The Politico. "On Thursday, John McCain responded to an unsubstantiated story on the Drudge Report," Jonathan Martin and Michael Calderone reported. The writers noted that McCain had untruthfully stated he had not personally been in talks with the New York Times; in fact, he had spoken with Executive Editor Bill Keller about the paper's reporting.

The Politico further reported that John McCain had hired Washington power lawyer Bob Bennett to represent him. Mr. Bennett is a criminal defense attorney, named by Legal Times magazine as one of the top ten in Washington D.C.

You had to wonder: What did the New York Times have?

Last Thursday they finally published their report, but there wasn't anything in it to explain John McCain's reaction in December. There was certainly nothing in it to explain why the senator was spending his money on Bob Bennett. And it is his money--Mr. Bennett told The Politico he is representing Senator McCain personally, not the campaign.

You heard right.

The Republican party's all-but-certain nominee for president has a criminal defense lawyer on retainer.

When President Nixon posed for that famous picture with Elvis Presley, no one knew they would someday be the two most-impersonated celebrities in U.S. history.

Let's give Senator McCain the benefit of the doubt and assume that he's not foolish, or paranoid, or stupid.

He has hired Bob Bennett for a reason.

But why?

America Wants to Know was forced to call in its resident detective, Lieutenant Columbo, even though he charges us double-time on Sundays.

"Jack Abramoff," Columbo said.

"Jack Abramoff?"

"Jack Abramoff. The lobbyist. The man who convinced Indian tribes to give him barrels of cash which he delivered all around Washington D.C. in exchange for favors."

"Indian tribes?" we asked. "Wasn't Senator McCain the chairman of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee for a while?"

"Yes, he was," Columbo said. "And he made sure the Indian tribes knew it, too. Once he held hearings on the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act just to remind the tribal chiefs that he was in a position to savage it. Very effective when you need to drum up some campaign contributions."

"Those puns are terrible," we pointed out.

"But not illegal," Columbo said.

"Then why is Jack Abramoff a problem for John McCain?"

"We may find out one of these days," Columbo said. "Jack Abramoff has been very cooperative with federal law enforcement authorities in their investigation into influence-peddling on Capitol Hill. Very cooperative. Last March the U.S. Attorney filed papers with the court asking for a reduction in Abramoff's sentence in a Florida fraud case. He's serving five and a half years right now. Something about a gambling boat."

"You think he could implicate John McCain in some kind of crime?"

Columbo shrugged and reached into the pocket of his trench coat for a small spiral notebook. "Jack Abramoff isn't the only one who's cooperating with prosecutors," he said. "There's a blonde."

"Not Vicki Iseman!" we said, thinking of the lobbyist that the New York Times had just linked to McCain.

"No, another one," Columbo said, leafing through the notebook. "Italia Federici. She ran a Republican environmental group which was actually a conduit for payoffs. She took money from Jack Abramoff's Indian clients and arranged access to officials in the Interior Department. Her boyfriend worked there, he was pretty high up. J. Steven Griles is his name. He went to prison."

"You don't say," we said.

"Yes," Columbo continued. "Italia Federici was convicted on tax charges and also of lying to Senator McCain's committee when he ran the Capitol Hill investigation, if you can call it that, into Jack Abramoff back in the fall of 2005. But in December, she was sentenced to just two months in a halfway house. Prosecutors told the judge she was cooperating with their investigation."

"Did you say December?" we asked.

"That's right," Columbo said. "The news that Italia Federici was cooperating with prosecutors hit the papers on December 14. That's just six days before the Drudge Report ran the item about Senator McCain trying to spike the New York Times story on his ties to lobbyists. And by that time, McCain had already hired one of the top criminal defense attorneys in Washington."

"Thanks, Lieutenant," we said, "you're indispensable."

"Wait, don't you want to hear about Susan Ralston?" Columbo asked as we pushed him toward the door, "and Rick Renzi?"

"Can't afford your weekend rates," we said. "Maybe on Monday."


Copyright 2008

Editor's note: You might be interested in the earlier post, "Shouting 'Fire!' in a crowded file cabinet."

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John McCain's Bill Clinton impression

Many moons ago, America Wants to Know worked for a high-profile Hollywood talent agent at a high-profile Hollywood talent agency and personally witnessed an astounding act of self-delusion that we thought at the time would never be topped.

The agent was attempting to convince a skeptical world that one of his clients, a certain singer, was generating the kind of excitement in the country that had not been seen since Elvis Presley broke free of the state fair circuit.

He got on the telephone to an entertainment reporter at the New York Times and fabricated a story about crowd reaction to the singer's performance at a recent live appearance. He told the reporter he had not seen anything like it since Elvis.

He was very convincing.

The next day, the New York Times carried an item about the singer that favorably mentioned the sensation her live performance had caused.

The agent showed the newspaper article to everyone in the office as if he was seeing the story for the first time. As if we hadn't all been there when he made it up. As if it was unquestionably true because it was printed in the New York Times.

By the time he finished telling us what the New York Times reporter had written, he genuinely, completely believed the fabricated story that he himself had fed him. Then he got on the phone and called a series of people to read them the article and to rave about the client. She is the next Elvis, he told everyone who would take his call. It's in the New York Times.

The point of this story is not that the New York Times doesn't check facts, but that there is a certain type of personality who is capable of convincing himself that he is telling the absolute truth when he is simply not. Not even close. Not in the ballpark.

John McCain is one of those personalities.

Today the New York Times posted on its web site a story about Senator John McCain's close relationship with a lobbyist named Vicki Iseman, a lobbyist who happens to be a woman, happens to be very attractive, and happens to be about thirty years younger than the married senator from Arizona.

These things happen.

The story says that in 1999, as Senator McCain was making a run for the presidency, his campaign aides were so dismayed by what appeared to them to be a romantic relationship with a lobbyist that they confronted him, told him he was risking the campaign and his political career, and took steps to bar Ms. Iseman from coming around to see him.

The aides told the New York Times that Senator McCain "acknowledged behaving inappropriately" and promised to "keep his distance from Ms. Iseman."

Today, the senator denies that he had a romantic relationship with Ms. Iseman, and Ms. Iseman denies that she had a romantic relationship with the senator, and unless one of them decided to telephone Linda Tripp and ask for advice, no one will likely prove otherwise.

Still, it's a fair question to ask if a married presidential candidate who is campaigning on his I-can't-be-bought-by-any-lobbyist high horse ought to be seen around town with a lovely young lobbyist on his arm, especially one who represents companies with business before the Senate commerce committee that McCain chaired.

"Recklessness" is not the answer given by many focus group participants when they're asked what qualities they're looking for in a president.

Scarier than the recklessness, though, is the self-delusion. Over and over the Times cites instances of McCain grasping for cash and free plane rides from lobbyists, then sanctimoniously sponsoring legislation to put a stop to that kind of thing. Once he set up a "Reform Institute" and funded it with hundreds of thousands of dollars in unlimited contributions from businesses seeking favor with the Senate commerce committee. Citing "bad publicity," he severed his ties to the Reform Institute, four years later.

John McCain likes to spend his time riding on a bus with reporters and telling them he's a maverick, he's a reformer, he's the only one in Washington who's going to put a stop to the lobbyist-driven pork barrel spending and the waste and the corrupt influence and... LOOK! He's the next Elvis! It says so right here in the paper!

Congratulations to the New York Times for finally having the courage to run a perfectly legitimate story that raises perfectly legitimate questions about the ethics and the judgment of a man who is running for president on his ethics and his judgment.

Too bad they held the story until everybody dropped out of the Republican race except Mike Huckabee and Ron Paul.

Ron Paul for president. If you're reading this in Texas or Ohio, buy a button and don't forget to vote on March 4.


Copyright 2008


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The Romantic appeal of Barack Obama

"Romanticism," Ayn Rand wrote, "is a category of art based on the recognition of the principle that man possesses the faculty of volition."

"Volition," the dictionary says, is "the act or an instance of making a conscious choice or decision. The power or faculty of choosing. The will."

In The Romantic Manifesto, Ayn Rand describes the two broad categories of art as "Romanticism, which recognizes the existence of man's volition--and Naturalism, which denies it."

"If a man does not possess volition, then his life and his character are determined by forces beyond his control," she wrote, "he is impotent to achieve his goals or to engage in purposeful action--and if he attempts the illusion of such action, he will be defeated by those forces."

Hillary Clinton spoke at a General Motors plant in Warren, Ohio, on Thursday. "Over the years you've heard plenty of promises from plenty of people in plenty of speeches and some of those speeches were probably pretty good, but speeches don't put food on the table," she said. "Speeches don't fill up your tank. Speeches don't fill your prescriptions or do anything about that stack of bills that keeps you up at night."

What is she really saying?

"Catch a clue, you powerless, helpless lump of a voter. Don't go thinking you can accomplish anything you set out to do. Don't start dreaming about possibilities. I'm your only hope, I'm the only one who can work the system and help you survive in an ugly world that's stacked against you."

Here it is in her words, from her victory speech in New Hampshire last month: "Politics isn't a game. This campaign is about people. About making a difference in your lives. About making sure that everyone in this country has the opportunity to live up to his or her God-given potential. That has been the work of my life. We are facing a moment of so many big challenges. We know we face challenges here at home, around the world, so many challenges for the people whose lives I've been privileged to be part of. I've met families in this state and all over our country who've lost their homes to foreclosures, men and women who work day and night but can't pay the bills, and hope they don't get sick, because they can't afford health insurance. Young people who can't afford to go to college to pursue their dreams. Too many have been invisible for too long. Well, you are not invisible to me."

Does she make you feel crushed by the unfairness of the world? It's the Naturalistic premise: your life is determined by forces beyond your control, and they are defeating you. You are impotent to achieve your goals.

This is what Barack Obama said that same night in New Hampshire: "No matter what obstacles stand in our way, nothing can stand in the way of the power of millions of voices calling for change. We have been told we cannot do this by a chorus of cynics. They will only grow louder and more dissonant in the weeks and months to come. We've been asked to pause for a reality check. We've been warned against offering the people of this nation false hope. But in the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope. For when we have faced down impossible odds, when we've been told we're not ready or that we shouldn't try or that we can't, generations of Americans have responded with a simple creed that sums up the spirit of a people: Yes we can."

Feel better?

Wait, there's more: "Yes we can. It was a creed written into the founding documents that declared the destiny of a nation. Yes we can. It was whispered by slaves and abolitionists as they blazed a trail towards freedom through the darkest of nights. Yes we can. It was sung by immigrants as they struck out from distant shores and pioneers who pushed westward against an unforgiving wilderness. Yes we can. It was the call of workers who organized, women who reached for the ballot, a president who chose the moon as our new frontier, and a King who took us to the mountaintop and pointed the way to the promised land. Yes we can, to justice and equality. Yes we can, to opportunity and prosperity. Yes we can heal this nation. Yes we can repair this world."

It's the Romantic premise: Men have free will, volition, control of their own destiny. You have it in your power to do great things, to overcome tough obstacles, to accomplish what other people say cannot be done.

"We are one people," Senator Obama said in New Hampshire, "we are one nation, and together, we will begin the next great chapter in the American story with three words that will ring from coast to coast, from sea to shining sea. Yes we can."

"Words," Senator Clinton said Thursday in Ohio, "are cheap."

What she pays her speechwriters is her own business.


Copyright 2008

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Government at gunpoint

"Do what I tell you, or everybody dies."

That was President Bush's message today to the United States House of Representatives. The president told the House to drop everything and pass the new Protect America Act reauthorizing expanded powers to spy on Americans without a warrant. If the House didn't pass this vital update to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) immediately, the president warned, the nation's intelligence professionals would not have the tools they need to protect Americans, and the terrorists who are plotting ever more spectacular attacks on us might exploit a deadly opening.

The House leadership was unmoved.

There is no gap in protection, Speaker Nancy Pelosi said, because existing law gives the intelligence community all the tools they need to keep the nation safe. And if President Bush really believed it was dangerous to let the Protect America Act expire, he could have agreed to sign the 21-day extension that the House was willing to pass, instead of vowing to veto it.

That raises the obvious question: Why did President Bush refuse to sign an extension of an expiring law that he says is urgently needed to protect your safety?

Maybe he did it because there's no such thing as executive privilege.

All that thundering about imminent terrorist destruction may have been intended to intimidate House leaders so they wouldn't schedule a vote to hold White House chief of staff Joshua Bolten and former White House counsel Harriet Miers in contempt of Congress for refusing to appear before a committee investigating the firing of U.S. attorneys.

But the House leaders were not intimidated. They scheduled the vote and they held the White House aides in contempt.

President Bush was forced into his fallback position, a noisy effort to discredit and minimize the contempt citations by claiming that House Democrats were wasting their time on politics instead of doing the people's work. White House Press Secretary Dana Perino was out in front of cameras today telling anyone who would listen that the House leaders chose to vote on contempt citations instead of keeping the nation safe.

"It is astonishing and deeply troubling," Ms. Perino said, "that after months of delay on passing a bill that will help our intelligence professionals monitor foreign terrorists who want to kill Americans, the House has instead turned its attention to the silly, pointless, and unjust act of approving these contempt resolutions."

What is this really all about?

President Bush really, really, really, really doesn't want Harriet Miers to go under oath in front of a congressional committee. That's what it's about.

When Harriet Miers was a Supreme Court nominee, President Bush withdrew her nomination the moment Republican senators threatened to subpoena documents about her work in the White House [See "Senate Republicans fire the big gun"]. What was in those documents? We still don't know, but Harriet Miers was at the president's elbow when he was reviewing pre-9/11 intelligence that warned about al-Qaeda's threats. She was there when the president reviewed pre-war intelligence about Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction. She was there when the administration formulated its policy on interrogations and detention of terror suspects. She was there when Patrick Fitzgerald sent out subpoenas for information about the leak of a CIA employee's identity.

She was also there when the decision was made to fire a group of U.S. attorneys, which is why she was subpoenaed by Congress in this case. If the White House claim of executive privilege fails to keep her from testifying about that incident, there will be no way to keep her out of the witness chair for all the other things Congress might investigate, now or in the future.

That's the president's problem.

That's why he has labored so mightily to frighten Congress away from enforcing its subpoenas for the testimony of Ms. Miers and his other top aides. That's why last July he ordered the Justice Department not to prosecute White House aides for contempt of Congress.

But why, you might ask, doesn't the president just go to court and assert executive privilege to prevent his aides from testifying?

Because executive privilege is fiction, not fact. The Constitution gives Congress the power to impeach the president, the vice president, and all civil officers of the United States. Inherent in the power to impeach is the power to investigate. The president cannot logically or legally have an unwritten constitutional privilege to block the exercise of one of Congress' explicit constitutional powers.

Executive privilege is like the emperor's new clothes. It's only real if everybody agrees, for their own reasons, to pretend it exists.

Today, Congress refused to pretend. The House even voted for a resolution to authorize a civil suit against the administration to force Ms. Miers and Mr. Bolten to testify.

The White House may fold before the civil suit is filed. The president has less than a pair of deuces in his hand. It would be foolish to go all-in, to battle for a made-up confidential-advice privilege that will be laughed right out of the courtroom.

Watch for Harriet Miers and Josh Bolten to plead the Fifth Amendment while a small army of White House spokesmen disparage the hearings as a partisan kangaroo court unworthy of serious attention.

That might work, especially if there's something interesting on the other channels. Let's just hope it's not the bombing of Iran.


Copyright 2008

Editor's note: You might be interested in the 1974 book by the late Harvard law professor, Raoul Berger, Executive Privilege: A Constitutional Myth.


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The big leagues of lying

Every player in Major League Baseball is a great athlete. Each one was the best athlete in college, high school, Little League, neighborhood parks, or wherever he played from the time he was old enough to walk.

Congress is exactly like Major League Baseball, for liars.

Not only are Members of Congress skilled liars, they have spent their entire careers staring down other liars and beating them in elections for offices all the way back to president of the junior high school student council.

Onto this playing field today walked Roger Clemens, a fierce competitor who is determined not to be beaten in the post-season battle for his reputation.

No helmet, no shin pads, no protective cup.

Even if he's telling the truth about everything, Roger Clemens could end up in jail for perjury. His sworn testimony conflicts with the sworn testimony of Brian McNamee and Andy Pettitte, and this is now a runaway freight train that no one can control. House Oversight Committee Chairman Henry Waxman and ranking member Tom Davis said they don't know if they'll make a referral to the Justice Department for a criminal investigation into perjury, but the Justice Department doesn't need a referral to pursue those charges.

What a travesty.

We have reached this sorry point because Congress chose to exceed the constitutional limits of its power by enacting national bans on some drugs and limits on the distribution of others. You may be surprised to hear this, but the U.S. Constitution doesn't give the federal government the authority to regulate drug use. That's why Prohibition required a constitutional amendment. [See "Marijuana, Prohibition and the Tenth Amendment."]

But drugs are bad and dangerous and parents across the country will vote for politicians who promise to protect their children, and so we have the Controlled Substances Act and a federal government that sends agents to California to bust up rings of cancer patients in possession of medical marijuana.

Still, the constitutional ground for a federal ban on steroid use in sports is very, very shaky.

That's why Congress has harangued Major League Baseball for years to take action on its own to stop steroid use. Any law they passed to compel drug testing would be very unlikely to survive a test in the courts. [See "Barry Bonds' big asterisk."]

Major League Baseball could have told Congress to take a flying leap off the Capitol dome. Instead, the commissioner and the head of the players' union dutifully showed up for public abuse at congressional hearings.

Why?

Because Congress threatened legislation to revoke baseball's anti-trust exemption. [Read our earlier post, "Tackling the NFL," to find out why team owners didn't want to risk that.]

Faced with a future of unknown congressional vengeance in legal and tax matters, Major League Baseball placated Congress by appointing a commission headed by George Mitchell, a former senator widely respected on Capitol Hill (see above), to make a good show of self-investigation.

Although Senator Mitchell's report urged everyone to look away from the past and toward the future, the Mitchell Report named some names, and some people objected to having their names destroyed just to give baseball's self-investigation a patina of credibility.

Roger Clemens is one of those people.

Clemens' lawyers, Rusty Hardin and Lanny Breuer, said today they advised him that coming out publicly to deny the allegations in the Mitchell Report would set in motion a chain of events that one day could land him in jail for lying to Congress.

Roger Clemens came out publicly to deny the allegations in the Mitchell Report.

Everyone looked a little bit ill in that hearing today. Lawmakers who have to face the voters every two years don't really want their names and faces in news reports about the greatest pitcher in baseball being investigated, indicted, tried and jailed for lying to Congress.

But the ship has sailed.

After the hearing, Congressmen Henry Waxman and Tom Davis tried hard not to look like bullies. "The only reason we had this hearing," they told reporters, "is that Roger Clemens insisted upon it."

Clemens' lawyers said that was a flat lie.

Wow, it sure sounded true when they said it.

Those guys are the best in the game.


Copyright 2008

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Tabloid update: "Clinton Secret Divorce Deal!"

If you don't do your own grocery shopping, you can always count on America Wants To Know to keep you apprised of the latest developments in the supermarket tabloids.

This week the Globe has skipped over the marital problems of the Bush family and gone straight to that bottomless well of tabloid material, the marriage of Bill and Hillary Clinton.

"World Exclusive!" the tabloid says, "Feuding Clintons' marriage doomed!"

World exclusive?

The Globe reports that Bill and Hillary have a "secret divorce pact" that will become effective if she loses her bid for the Democratic nomination for president. "If she's elected, the marriage continues," the paper quotes one "Beltway insider" as saying, "If she fails, it's over."

Well, that's not very credible. If the Clintons get divorced, they can be subpoenaed to testify against each other.

Or, as President Clinton once put it, "How many of you have ever taught constitutional law?"

This week's Globe does contain a few errors. In addition to the "World Exclusive" goof, the Globe's story incorrectly characterizes some of the former president's relationships, describing "pretty Kathleen Wiley" as "linked to" him. Actually, Kathleen Willey is on the "non-consensual" list along with Paula Jones and Juanita Broaddrick, not on the "linked to" list with Gennifer Flowers.

Small details, perhaps, but these are the kind of errors that will keep the Globe from winning a Pulitzer.

More interesting is the guessing game of who, if anyone, wanted this story on the front page of a supermarket tabloid this particular week, with Democratic voters going to the polls on Saturday, Sunday and Tuesday to vote for a nominee for president. Is it a plant from the Clinton team to drum up sympathy for the victim of a philandering husband? Is it a plant from the Obama team to remind voters how tired they are of the Clinton soap opera? Did the "Laura Claws Boozing Bush" issue not sell enough copies to merit a follow-up?

We'll never know.

But at least we saved you $3.29.


Copyright 2008

Editor's note: You might be interested in the earlier post, "Tabloid update: 'Laura Claws Boozing Bush.'" And if you've just joined us, catch up on your tabloid reading with "Laura's secret divorce diary," "Bush marital turmoil," "Laura Bush's cover story" and "All right, let's dish."

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A principled walkout?

Where is everybody?

With voters in Louisiana, Washington, Nebraska and Kansas going to the polls today in the most dramatic and unpredictable primary season in decades, MSNBC -- the self-described "place for politics" -- ran taped programming all afternoon and then finally went on the air at 8:00 p.m. Eastern without Chris Matthews, Keith Olbermann, Tim Russert, Tom Brokaw or Brian Williams.

Norah O'Donnell is in the anchor chair.

America Wants to Know sincerely hopes that what we are witnessing is a principled walkout in protest of NBC News' decision to "suspend" star political reporter David Shuster over a comment that displeased Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Mr. Shuster said Thursday on MSNBC that the Clinton campaign had "pimped out" Chelsea Clinton in "some weird sort of way" by having her telephone Democratic Party superdelegates and beg them to support her mother.

Clinton campaign spokesman Howard Wolfson held a conference call with reporters on Friday and trashed David Shuster as "beneath contempt" and "disgusting." Then today, Hillary Clinton personally commented to reporters to express her outrage and released a copy of a letter she sent to NBC News president Steve Capus. "No temporary suspension or half-hearted apology is sufficient," the senator wrote.

Senator Clinton complained to Mr. Capus about "the pattern of behavior on your network that seems to repeatedly lead to this sort of degrading language," a reference to earlier comments by Chris Matthews that she had not liked.

Then the roundhouse punch: "There's a lot at stake for our country in this election," Senator Clinton wrote, "Surely, you can do your jobs as journalists and commentators and still keep the discourse civil and appropriate."

Did you catch that?

She's telling NBC News -- NBC News -- that their on-air talent is improperly affecting the outcome of the election.

That is a mortally serious charge to level at a news organization.

To respond to such a charge with anything except forceful profanity is to concede that Senator Clinton is correct.

We'd like to think that Chris Matthews, Keith Olbermann, Tim Russert, Tom Brokaw and Brian Williams responded to Senator Clinton's letter today with language that shook the walls of Rockefeller Center.

America Wants to Know doesn't think David Shuster said anything wrong and believes Senator Clinton has her own motive for the noisy effort to discredit him. [See our earlier post, "The Clintons play smashmouth."] But no matter what David Shuster said, no matter what Chris Matthews said, no matter what Tim Russert asked Senator Clinton during a debate, a news organization cannot cave in to office-seeking politicians who write letters demanding that its employees be fired.

It's one thing for a politician to request airtime, or a correction, or even an apology. It's another thing entirely to demand the termination of a reporter's employment.

That's an abuse of power.

The government has a lot of power over NBC/Universal's business. From broadcast licenses to station ownership to the catch-all category of antitrust [See our earlier post, "Tackling the NFL"], a senator can make a lot of trouble for a media conglomerate.

NBC/Universal doesn't want any trouble.

But we're guessing that in the dressing rooms at NBC News tonight, they've got some.


Copyright 2008

Editor's note: David Shuster's e-mail correspondence with the Clinton campaign was published by The Politico and can be read at this link.

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The Clintons play smashmouth

In the opinion of America Wants to Know, NBC's David Shuster is one of the finest reporters ever to stand in front of a television camera.

So we were more than a little irritated to read today that he has been "suspended" from appearing on all NBC News broadcasts over a comment he made while guest-hosting "Tucker" on MSNBC Thursday.

Mr. Shuster said the Clinton campaign had "pimped out" Chelsea Clinton by having her call Democratic party superdelegates to ask them to support her mother's candidacy.

His words accurately connoted the creepiness of Senator Clinton's decision to have her daughter plead with Democratic officeholders for their support. Imagine how uncomfortable it would be to get one of those phone calls. It is flatly unprofessional for Hillary Clinton to put people in the position of having to say "no" to her child.

Even though David Shuster's choice of words may have been "inappropriate," as he said in his apology on Friday, no one listening to him could possibly have believed he was suggesting that Chelsea Clinton is a whore.

Yet the Clinton camp made the decision to give David Shuster the full Don Imus.

Campaign spokesman Howard Wolfson held a conference call with reporters to complain about Shuster. "Beneath contempt," he said, "disgusting." Then he threatened that Sen. Clinton would boycott MSNBC's upcoming debate. "I, at this point, can't envision a scenario where we would continue to engage in debates on that network," he said.

MSNBC reacted immediately, issuing an apology, suspending their best political reporter, ripping their clothing and wailing in grief.

It's too bad that insincerity isn't a demonstration sport at the 2008 Olympics. The U.S. team would really bring home the gold.

The Clinton team was undoubtedly happy to slash at David Shuster because Hillary Clinton polls best when she's been insulted and hurt. There's a certain kind of female voter who will feel a sense of outrage and rush to the polls to stick up for a fellow victim.

If you haven't noticed yet, women who have been insulted and hurt and chose to stay in the relationship anyway are all supporting Hillary Clinton for president.

The attack on David Shuster accomplishes something else for the Clintons. It sends this message to every other reporter in the country: The Clintons can call your boss and get you fired, and they will, so watch it.

This is a smashmouth technique that goes well beyond spinning the press. It's like an American version of state censorship -- a nasty warning to reporters that if they don't want to pull their kids out of private school and lose their houses, they'd better not displease the Clintons.

Talk about "beneath contempt" and "disgusting."

In our politically correct country, where we act as if women and minorities are made of sugar and every insult is a bucket of hot water, MSNBC had no choice except to pretend that David Shuster had committed an unforgivable act.

But make no mistake, they're pretending.

Hillary Clinton doesn't make any friends in the media by trying to discredit David Shuster. Bill Clinton doesn't make any friends by sneering, "Shame on you!" at CNN's Jessica Yellin. Chelsea Clinton doesn't make any friends by refusing to answer questions from a nine-year-old reporter in Iowa.

But the Clintons know exactly what kind of headline they need in the morning paper on the day people go to polls and caucuses, and they're going to get that headline no matter whose career they have to destroy in the process.

As one of their friends once wrote, ruining people is considered sport.

And all this time you thought he was talking about the Republicans.


Copyright 2008

Editor's note: You might be interested in the earlier posts, "Female self-esteem and the Hillary Clinton vote," "Chelsea Clinton does Garbo," and "Hillary Clinton changes the subject."

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A guide to voting in Los Angeles

Well, there's nothing as entertaining as a California election.

It's exactly like a carnival midway, without the tedious pretense that you're going to win a stuffed animal.

This year's worst con game appears to be Measure S, a Los Angeles City proposition that will add a new 9 percent tax to your phone bills. Vote NO on Proposition S. It appears to be a tax cut from 10 percent to 9 percent, but that's a fraud, because the 10 percent tax is illegal and is probably about to be struck down by the courts. So Proposition S is actually a new 9 percent tax on your phone bills, and not just your phone bills, but all your "telecommunications" services. Of course, it's being sold as the only possible way the city can continue to pay for police, fire, and 911 services.

Statewide on the February 5 midway we have Proposition 91, which is trying to close a loophole that allows tax funds collected for public transit projects to get the old switcheroo and end up in the general fund. If you think it's a good idea to fund public transit with taxes that were collected to fund public transit, vote yes. If you think public transit is a giant special-interest boondoggle that builds things nobody wants anyway, vote no. Naturally, if the funds have to be used for public transit, the state won't be able to pay for police, fire and 911 services.

Proposition 92 mandates a good-sized chunk of funding for community colleges, which apparently means that the state will have to raise taxes in order to pay for police, fire and 911 services. If you think the community colleges need more money and you don't trust Sacramento to allocate it, vote yes. But be forewarned, you're going to be shot by a robber in your burning house and the ambulance will never get there in time to save you. So if you want to live, vote no.

Proposition 93 looks like a term limit proposal for state lawmakers but actually it erases the old term limit proposal and lets everybody stay in those jobs when they'd otherwise be kicked to the curb. If you love what you've got in Sacramento, vote yes. We're voting no.

Propositions 94 through 97 allow the expansion of Indian gaming in the state of California. Our Fearless Leader bravely negotiated with the bingo barons for a monstrous kickback to the state treasury in exchange for more slot machines. Massive campaign contributions may have been involved but we're not here to point fingers. If the Indian casinos bother you, vote no. If you found them a little too crowded the last time you visited, vote yes. And remember, if these measures don't pass, the state won't have the money to pay for police, fire and 911 services.

That's because absolutely every dime that currently comes into the California treasury is spent on something more important than police, fire and 911 services. Just don't ask what.

Three balls for a dollar, step right up.


Copyright 2008

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Why Ron Paul is right

When something is going wrong, it's important to correctly identify the problem.

Otherwise, you're likely to make the problem worse.

For instance, in the United States today, energy costs too much, food costs too much, education costs too much, housing costs too much and medical care costs too much.

We have lots of political candidates who are offering government programs that promise to help people pay their bills.

We have one political candidate who says the problem is the decreasing value of the U.S. dollar.

That one candidate is Ron Paul. He would like to change the policies in Washington in ways that increase the buying power of the U.S. dollar, making energy, food, education, housing and medical care more affordable.

This involves "monetary policy," which controls the total amount of money in circulation, and "fiscal policy," which refers to the money the government collects in taxes and spends on programs.

Ron Paul has correctly identified the source of the problem. Everything is increasingly unaffordable because the dollar is worth less and less every month.

In contrast, let's look at what the other candidates want to do.

They want the government to continue to spend money--whether on military operations or social programs--that the government doesn't have. Some of them want to raise taxes, and some of them want to borrow more money, and probably we'll end up with both.

These are monetary and fiscal policies that will worsen the real problem, which is the buying power of the dollar.

Then everything will be even more unaffordable.

And the politicians will stamp their feet for more government spending to "stimulate the economy" and "help people."

Which will worsen the real problem and make everything even more unaffordable.

The best thing the government can do for us is to maintain the buying power of our money.

The worst thing the government can do for us is "help" us by running record deficits to pay for programs that help us buy things, which we would be able to afford ourselves if the government didn't keep helping us.

Ron Paul wants to cut some of the trillion dollars a year we spend on foreign aid and overseas military operations. He wants to use some of the money to fund Social Security and Medicare for all the people who depend on those programs. He wants to use some of the money to reduce the deficit and restore the buying power of the U.S. dollar. He doesn't want to raise taxes, and he doesn't want to tell you how to spend your money or live your life.

If you agree with Ron Paul, you should vote for him. It's not a wasted vote. If you agree with him and you vote for somebody else, no one will know you exist, and you'll never get the policies that will really fix the problem.

Instead, we'll just get the same old thing.

That's something we really can't afford.


Copyright 2008

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The impending doom of John McCain

Senator John McCain believes in sacrifice.

That's a problem if you want to live in freedom.

The U.S. Constitution does not call on Americans to sacrifice. It restricts the power of the federal government to butt into your life and seize your freedom and your property.

Take the First Amendment, as John McCain has been trying to do for some time. It reads:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances."

Although the Constitution plainly says "Congress shall make no law...abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press," John McCain pressed for laws restricting campaign ads in the months before an election. He believed that freedom of speech had to be sacrificed to the goal of campaign finance reform.

Do you believe that? It doesn't matter, he doesn't care what you believe. He believes he knows best.

John McCain pressed for a law that would have made web site owners criminally liable for failing to report illegal images posted on their site by someone else. Under his proposed "Stop the Online Exploitation of Our Children Act," individuals who have a web site, or a blog with a comments area, would have to monitor the postings for pornography, determine if the images are illegal, forward them to the Center for Missing and Exploited Children, and retain "information relating to the facts or circumstances" of the incident for at least six months. Failure to comply precisely with the requirements would mean a fine of up to $300,000.

Protecting children is a laudable goal. But the Constitution does not allow politicians to do whatever they want in pursuit of laudable goals. You have rights. John McCain believes you should sacrifice those rights for a greater goal, and he wants to be the one to decide which goals merit the sacrifice of your freedom.

The trouble with a belief in sacrifice for the greater good is that it can be used to justify any abuse of government power. Here are just a few examples:

"John McCain's shakedown operation" part I and part II

"Saving children and losing voters"

"Brass knuckles and the First Amendment"

John McCain's web site says this:

"There is no greater nobility than to sacrifice for a great cause and no cause greater than protection of human dignity. Decency, human compassion, self-sacrifice and the defense of innocent life are at the core of John McCain's value system and will be the guiding principles of a McCain Presidency."

In practice, that means his pursuit of whatever he perceives as a greater good will justify any infringement of your rights, any increase in taxes, and any breach of the Constitutional limits on the federal government's power. If you don't agree, he'll call you a selfish special-interest impediment to the American dream and the salvation of the planet.

"To sacrifice for a cause greater than yourself, and to sacrifice your life to the eminence of that cause, is the noblest activity of all," McCain says on his web site.

Think about that before you vote. It's your life he wants to sacrifice.

Copyright 2008

Editor's note: You might be interested in the 2006 post, "The almost pointless fear of global warming."

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