Month: August 2015

There are a lot of parallels between Jeb!* and Hillary.  They’re the candidates of the smart money, the conventional wisdom, the lobbyists and the moneyed interests.  And they both suck as candidates.

As we’ve watched Jeb! on the campaign trail it’s obvious he’s out of his element.  He just doesn’t seem comfortable or natural.  It’s as though he’s playing a part, badly.  He’s not a forceful, or gregarious, or confident man.  Sure, it’s August, but he seems to be getting worse.

I’ve argued that a candidate is judged more by the eye than by the ear.  Women, in particular, don’t listen to the words as much as they watch the man.  They pick up on things that most men don’t see.  The Gipper was a good judge of character, but he always acceded to Nancy’s take on somebody.  Just about every politician I’ve known personally does the same thing.  When it comes to sizing someone up, you listen very closely to your wife.

It boils down to comportment.  A man is judged to be a man because he acts like a man.  And women are better at doing the judging.  Jeb! simply does not come across as a strong man.  He seems like a nice man, sure, and well meaning.  But we want strength in our President, and he comes up way short.  There’s really nothing he can do about it.  You can’t fake manhood.  If you try you look like a bully or a fool.

I’m not talking about physical courage.  There are incredibly brave men, physically, who are moral cowards.  And there are physically weak men who are made of iron.  For all I know Jeb! is a master of the martial arts and could kick everybody on the stage’s ass.  Wouldn’t matter.

Strength in a politician begins with a clear understanding of exactly who you are, what you want, what you are and are not capable of, and complete confidence in yourself to handle any challenge along the way.  Jeb! doesn’t have it.

Politics is the smart person’s reality TV, except that it’s real.  Josh the importance of being Earnest was the highlight of today’s episode.  It was a beautiful performance.  This guy has some talent.  His job is to give Biden the green light without stepping too hard on Hillary’s toes.  A bravura performance.  Everybody got the message.  The President would like to see Joe run.  If he had wanted to, he could have nixed it.  Biden simply can’t run without his blessing.  It looks as though the decision has been made.

Hillary’s toast.

* A visit to the Daily Kos shows the left has also picked up on the exclamation point!

Here’s the link to my piece in AT:

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2015/08/trumping_the_donald_on_affirmative_action_.html

There’s another bit of evidence pointing toward a Biden run:  he did it in ’08.  Hillary was expecting a coronation, and Joe Biden stepped up to take her on.  He withdrew when Obama, who was considered “clean”, emerged as an alternative to her.  Whatever made him think he could beat her seven years ago?  Whatever it was, it holds true today, more than ever.

He thinks she’s corrupt, and reckless, politically incompetent and unfit to serve as Commander in Chief.  Does Elizabeth Warren agree?  If she does she’ll be tempted to sign on with Joe.  Do Obama and the Queen of the Hive, the NYT, agree as well?  Judging from the Hive’s buzzing, they’re heading in that direction.

His son Beau was with him back in ’08.  He’s gone now.

Or is he?

So I saw this piece in The Federalist by some Pecksniff named Ben Domenech, who says Republicans are following Trump into oblivion by catering to working class whites.  Talk of mass deportation of illegals is political poison.  And I’m thinking the Donald needs to expand his critique of immigration policy to include denunciation of affirmative action.  That would really get the Church Ladies of the Republican Party up in arms.  I’m assuming Trump’s position, which is always dangerous, since the first three letters of assume are ass.  I google it and lo and behold the Donald is fine with affirmative action. The WaPo published a transcript of last week’s Meet the Press interview, and in a part that was not broadcast Trump says he’s cool with it.

I had already written a piece for American Thinker in my head.  Al I had to do was write it down.  Then I find out the Donald’s actual position, and I have to start over.  I submitted it, and will link it or print it tomorrow.

Some Republican should go after Trump on this issue.  If he had a pair, Jeb! is the logical choice.  As Governor he took strong action to curb affirmative action in Florida.  He should Trumpet it, but he won’t  — because he’s a Church Lady himself, and is the candidate of the Church Lady wing of the party.  So somebody else.  Cruz is the next obvious choice.  Cruz is one of those guys who knows he’s really smart and loves to show it.  But being smart and understanding politics are two different things.  In Alaska I knew guys who were room temperature IQ, but had great political skills.  They had a kind of low, animal cunning.  I underestimated these guys, and paid for it.   I have yet to see Cruz show any real political skill.  Attacking Trump’s support of affirmative action would call for some deft politics.  Is Cruz capable, politically?  I kind of doubt it.  Some old hand like Huckabee could pull it off, no sweat.

I read somewhere that the Donald has it in, personally, for Jeb!, and is telling people if he goes down Jeb!’s going with him.  This is because the Bushes used their clout with Univision to get them to dump Trump.  If this is true  — and it rings true — it’s a big deal.  Bush has decided to take Trump on, and this will only encourage him to wreak vengeance, if need be.  Trump will not be nominated, but he is fully capable of taking Bush out.  That’s the kind of thing he knows.

I figured Biden might pull a Polk, and pledge to be a one-termer, but what I didn’t see was preannouncing his running mate as Sen. Elizabeth Warren.   If that’s the plan, it’s brilliant.  It sounds like something an old political pro like Biden would come up with.  I’m beginning to gain a Strange New Respect for Crazy Joe.  He’s cunning, like those guys I knew in Alaska.  A man with great political skills, unbridled ambition, and a sense of destiny; and a man of enormous self confidence.  An honest man, who has watched the Clinton money grubbing with disgust for over twenty years.  A man who wants to say yes to his son’s dying wish.

Joe really, really wants to run.

So Jeb! gets on the soapbox at the Iowa State Fair and a guy starts asking him about the Iraq War and Paul Wolfowitz and his brother’s disastrous foray into the Middle East, and Jeb! gets frustrated and can’t really give a satisfactory answer.  This is why he won’t win.  For conservatives, Bush II was a disaster.  We’re all talking about what Obama did to the Democratic Party.  Let’s remember that Bush II cost us the House of Representatives.  We wouldn’t have Obamacare and an 18 trillion dollar deficit if it wasn’t for Nancy Pelosi, and it was the political incompetence of Bush II that gave us to her.

The Bush Brothers are joined at the hip, politically.  Conservatives gave George the nomination because he was from Texas and had a lack of competition.   He blew it.  In Iraq and domestically, he was a disaster for conservatism.  Jeb! is his political clone, without the Texas swagger.  And he’s got lots of competition.   When the time is right, after the field has been winnowed a bit, it will be time to talk about the $3 trillion in debt accumulated by his brother.  He won’t be able to respond any more effectively than he has about the Iraq fiasco.  He has to defend his brother’s record, and he can’t do it.  He’s in a box.  The political class is already fixated on the Presidential race.   The vast majority of voters are barely paying attention.  So the time is not ripe for the $3 trillion dollar question.  But when the time comes, if it’s done properly, it will be the beginning of the end of Jeb!

Chuck Todd’s not that smart.  He’s interviewing Trump, who starts talking about our $1.8 trillion debt.  He’s off by a decimal point, of course, but Todd didn’t pick up on it.  He could have stuck it to the Donald if he was a little quicker.  At some point in this process the candidate who’s quick, and deft, will have a chance to shine.  Hint:  it won’t be Jeb!

Trump’s not going anywhere.  He’s under control, he’s the center of attention, and he’s speaking for millions.  What’s not to like?

I’m beginning to think he could win Iowa.  It’s a caucus state, so casual Trump fans won’t show.  But there’s a real chance a lot of his people are so pissed off at the Republican establishment they can be organized into attending.  Trump’s got a dozen or so paid staffers there, and he should not be dismissed out of hand.  I’m a little over my head here, never having been to Iowa, but I get the impression that Iowa caucus goers realize they are not actually picking the next President.  Look at some of the past winners:  Santorum, Huckabee.  And Pat Robertson and Pat Buchanan each won about a quarter of the vote.  If you’re willing to vote for Pat Robertson or Pat Buchanan, you’re going to be willing to vote for Trump.  And 25% would put you in first place this go round.

I’m principally concerned with knocking Jeb! out of the race, and the longer Trump stays in, the worse it is for him. Trump is everything that Jeb! is not.  All of Jeb!’s shortcomings are magnified when he’s compared to the Donald.  Jeb!’s a button down, goody two shoe, do-as-he’s-told bore with a sense of entitlement.  When Trump drops out, his people are not going to Jeb!  Since nobody knows anything, I can envision a scenario where Trump outlasts Jeb!, when you think about it.  If Jeb! gets creamed in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina he may throw in the towel.

George Wallace asked for votes in order to “send a message” to the Ruling Class in Washington D.C.  A lot of people wanted to send a message back in ’68.  A whole lot more people want to send a message today.  It’s a simple message, which can be boiled down to a few words, the last of which is “yourself”.

Trump’s the man for that message.

After the guys finish golf, the Obamas and Clintons will both attend Vernon Jordan’s birthday party tonight.  They won’t be talking about email, I’d wager.  Everyone knows that Obama could squash Hillary’s campaign like a bug, and may be in the process of doing just that.  But do Bill and Hillary have anything on Obama?  Are they capable of damaging him?

Meanwhile, in South Carolina, Biden is bidin’ his time.  He’ll chat with the prez tomorrow, and get a feel for where things stand.  If he runs it will for one term only, just like James K. Polk, one of our most effective Presidents.  But Polk was an American imperialist and a protege of Jackson, so Biden can’t make reference to him.  The news today is that Joe would bypass Iowa and New Hampshire and start in South Carolina, where black Democrats will be 50% of primary voters.  Obama beat Hillary by 29 points there in 2008.

To win South Carolina Biden will need to win the black vote, and that can only be done by embracing everything Barack Obama has done, declaring his fealty to Obamaism forever, and pledging to defend the magnificent legacy of our first black President.  He’ll play the race card, for sure, for as he once said of Republicans to a black audience, “They want to put you in chains.”

You can see this working, but it’s poison in the general election.  People don’t want Obama to have a third term.  Enough is enough.  But to win the nomination, Biden has no choice.  He can’t afford to have any daylight between himself and Obama.

This bodes well.

My review of Ricki and the Flash was a bomb, according to the commenters at American Thinker.  But somebody posted it at Lucianne.com, which was very nice.  I looked up the rankings of conservative websites, and to my surprise I found AT has more viewers than Lucianne.  In fact, at #36, it’s only one rank behind Instapundit, which I thought everybody reads.  I’ve dealt with three editors there, Lifson, Dunn and Moran, and all of them have been kind enough to do a little editing of my stuff.  I intend to keep submitting pieces on at least a weekly basis.  At some point I’ll circle back to Article V and our BBA campaign.  If I’ve developed some credibility through the pieces I’ve submitted maybe readers will wake up to the potential of Article V.  In the best case scenario the readership could be seduced into fans, and even cheerleaders, of what we’re doing.   I could give like a weekly update.  There’s plenty of time for all that.  I’m just thankful I have a foot in the door. I wrote my first article when I was fourteen, and a sophomore at St. Mary’s High in Berkeley.  Study hall was at 2:10 in the afternoon, so I titled it 2:10 Chaos.  Everybody was supposed to sit at their desk and do homework.  There was no teacher present, just a Senior acting as monitor.  So we all tried to figure out ways to annoy him, up to and including spit balls, rhythmic tapping of the feet, and all simultaneously yelling “Root!’ at the slightest provocation.

I remember the first line.  “It’s not held in the hall, and doesn’t have anything to do with study, so why do we call it study hall?”

I haven’t changed.