Maureen Dowd, The New York Times, June 6, 2007 In mythic tales from “Superman” to “Star Wars” to “Spider-Man,” there comes a moment when the young superhero has to learn to harness his powers. That’s the challenge Barack Obama faces now. Clearly, the 45-year-old senator is blessed with many gifts. He can write and talk, think and walk, with exceptional grace and agility. When he wants to, Mr. Obama can rouse the crowd to multiple ovations, as he did yesterday when he talked with a preacher’s passion about the “quiet riot” of frustration of blacks in this country, on issues like Katrina, in a speech before black clergy at Hampton University in Virginia. But often he reverts to Obambi, tentative about commanding the stage and consistently channeling the excitement he engenders. At times, he seems to be actively resisting his phenom status and easy appeals to emotion. When he should fire up, he dampens. When he should dominate, he’s deferential. When he should lacerate, he’s languid. Futilely, he chafes at the notion that debates and forums are rituals for showing a sense of command with a forceful one-liner, a witty takedown or a “shining city on a hill” moment. He keeps trying to treat them as places where he can riff, improvise, soothe, extrapolate or find common ground. He skitters away from the subtext of political contests, the need to use your force to slay your opponents. In the first two Democratic debates and Monday night’s forum on faith, Hillary Clinton commanded the stage, just like a great squash player dominates the T. The woman radiated more authority than the glamour boys flanking her — and she did it despite the pressure of having a few new books published with salacious and unflattering nuggets about her. In the South Carolina debate, Senator Obama was — absurdly — taken by surprise when Brian Williams asked the requisite Dukakis question designed to elicit manly passion: How would he respond if Al Qaeda hit two American cities? The senator ignored the visceral nature of the question and rambled on cerebrally about natural disasters, working with the international community and about how he would have to see if there was “any intelligence on who might have carried it out so that we can take potentially some action to dismantle that network.” He was already told that it was Al Qaeda in the question, and “potentially,” “some” and “dismantle” are not the sort of fast-and-furious words the moment required. A bit later, he doubled back to say he would hunt down terrorists, but it was too late. Read More Here

Well, Bush is such a hypocrite it makes me furious. Irving Lewis Libby's 30 month sentence is, arguably, a lot less severe than a lethal injection. Yet Bush never seemed to "feel terrible" for those people whose death warrants he signed or their families. I find it incredibly infuriating that Bush's standards for justice are so obviously situational and personally motivated. Libby was convicted by a jury of his peers. So, for the record, Libby is GUILTY, GUILTY, FRIGGING GUILTY of lying to investigators and obstructing justice. That makes Libby just as guilty of his crimes as Karla Faye Tucker was of her crimes. The difference is Karla Faye Tucker admitted her crimes and apologized. She became a born-again Christian - obviously not the same kind Bush became. When Georgie starts feeling "terrible" about depriving Scooter's family of Scooter for 30 months I just can't be sympathetic. Mr. Culture of Life has been all too happy to kill people he feels have been found guilty by the system. And only a fool would believe the system is perfect. So eat your own dog food bucko. Accept that the system found Lying Libby GUILTY and live with it. That's more than Karla Faye Tucker can do.

"In the first place, we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the person's becoming in every facet an American, and nothing but an American...There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag.... We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language... and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people." Theodore Roosevelt 1907

I wrote this about two years ago. It still applies today. g There are two basic elements that will result in a vibrant, fully productive American economy: low taxes, and a stable non-inflating dollar. President Bush is working hard on one element, lowering taxes, for which he is receiving grief from liberals who stubbornly maintain we need higher taxes to fix our problems, this in the face of an economy that has steadily produced lower unemployment, and solid growth. Robert Reich, a former Clinton Labor Secretary, is one of these leftists. He dangerously claims the supply-side economists are dreaming and it will soon come to an end. He wants higher taxes and more government solutions. He is wildly wrong, as will be shown in a moment. Basically, the so called supply-side economists believe in low taxes and a monetary standard that produces no inflation, such as the gold standard, and history shows that this has repeatedly worked in the past. The difference today is that We The People can understand what is going on here, rather than just trusting our fate to confusing elitists like Reich, who have a track record of being wrong anyway. As an example of history proving that supply-side economics works, look at Britain from 1815 until about 1875. To quote from Jude Wanniski’s book, The Way The World Works: What made the Industrial Revolution and the Pax Britannica possible was the audacity of the British Parliament in 1815. Spurred by middleclass agitators such as Henry Brougham, the legislature rejected the stern warnings of the fiscal experts (people such as Robert Reich and Ben Bernanke) and in one swoop eliminated Pitt's income tax, which had been producing £14.6 million or a fifth of all revenues, and tariffs and domestic taxes that had been producing £4 million more. Had the British left their tax rates high in an attempt to quickly pay down their debts, the sixty-year bull market that followed would not have been possible. As it was, the nation moved down the Laffer Curve in a "return to normalcy" (from war) on tax rates. As the economy surged in the following decades, expanding revenues were used both to pay down the debt and reduce other tax rates. By 1855, the £900 million debt had been paid down to £808.5 million, and although the Russian War of 1855-57 added £30 million, by the end of the century the debt was chiseled down to £639 million. Over the same eighty-five year period, interest rates on government bonds dropped steadily, from almost 6 percent in 1815 to less than 2% percent. When Sir Robert Peel brought back the income tax in 1846, the effect was not to push the economy back up the Curve, because Peel's sole intent was to use the income-tax revenues to repeal the Corn Laws, the duties on foreign grains. The reform was enormously beneficial, because the income tax fell across all lines of production, while the Corn Laws subsidized agriculture at the expense of all other producers. The economy became more efficient as a result of the reform. But it is hardly accurate to suggest that British economic expansion did not get underway until Peel ended the Corn Laws and brought back the income tax. Modern (liberal) historians who have been taught that the income tax is a "good tax" often seem troubled that it was removed in 1815, as if the economy could not do without it." Between 1816 and 1875 Britain was to become the world's workshop, the world's banker, and the world's trader. . . . By 1860 she was supplying half the world's output of coal and manufactured goods. In 1830 world production of coal was about 30 million tons, of which Britain produced four-fifths; in 1870 it was about 220 million tons, of which Britain produced half. . . . In 1870 the external trade of the United Kingdom was greater than that of France, Germany, and Italy combined and three times that of the United States. The output of pig iron had risen from 700,000 tons a year in 1830 to about 3,800,000 in 1869-71, and to over 6,500,000 in 1871-73. While many industries were dependent on the coal fields, the main growth had been in cotton. Cotton was the one industry into which mechanization had cut deeply by 1820. Textile operatives were more than 10 percent of the working population in 1841. . . . Between 1815 and 1851 occurred the most rapid economic development of domestic resources in the whole of British economic history. Great Britain had a stable gold backed pound, one element, and as soon as the government began lowering taxes, the other element, an economic explosion occurred. But the people of England didn’t really understand the economics of their prosperity, and today suffer under a floating, fiat pound and high interest rates, thanks partly to their leftist labor party. If we, the American people, once get a good grasp on this, we will demand a non-inflating dollar and low interest rates. There is simply no other formula that works as well. Ben Bernanke will claim he has inflation under control by artificially raising interest rates. What that really means is he is going to induce a recession the same as his processor Greenspan did in 1999 with the excuse he “needs to control inflation.” This is hogwash, and history proves it. Please, please get a copy of The Way The World Works by Jude Wanniski and read it.

The Pull-it Prize “Rewarding a-holes who jerk us off with one rotting chicken carcass. They must pay for it… and the shipping.” And the Weiner IS… the judge in the Scooter case. Only 30 MONTHS!!!????? Jumphim Jim, the skinhead jailcell Nazi and rapist, will be sooooooooooooo disappointed. Maybe Scooter will LIKE it. After all, he’s been part of an administration that loves giving it to everyone up the… Ye Olde Scribe’s Links to Oblivion and Other FUN Places “Surfing the net like seawaves… is that fiberglass board or ‘got wood?’”

WASHINGTON: The Bush administration said Tuesday it will fight to keep meatpackers from testing all their animals for mad cow disease.

The government isn’t interested in beating anyone’s meat… and wants to make sure industry doesn’t either. Soon, following the “got milk” campaign, meat packers might ask, “Got maggots?” Surprised? Shouldn’t be. That’s what’s infested the White House. Now, on to the main attraction….“08″ Hear ye, hear ye! Ye Olde Scribe, the YOS with the most, declares the 08 ticket will be… Should be? Before opening the envelope, let’s review… Think about it, gentle reader. On the left, Hillary has her crucial Achilles Heel caused by multiple fractures: she is neither considered left enough, consistent enough or divorced, in any sense, from donations and being to easy on the corrupt corporate world to be viable. Hillary’s husband signed NAFTA. So who might lower the chuckle level a little when the MAHHHHVELOUS Stephanie Miller and her cartoon voice master, Jim Ward (Any relation to Jay, of Bullwinkle fame?) imitate Hill with less of Hillary’s unintended imitation of the aliens in Mars Attacks!? (ACK! ACK! ACK!!!!) Who? Well… IF Hillary is the candidate, not Scribe’s choice but that’s not the point… she needs someone who is articulate and a true representative of the Franklin Roosevelt wing of the party. Plus, if elected, someone who the Radical Reich would cringe at the very thought of “President…” Impeachment would be a little further on the table. And Scribe friggin guarantees that no matter who might win as a Democrat, the Reich will be eager to slap it down on the table. Who might our unmasked man be? Dennis Kucinich. Dennis would finally be given the podium, the national stage, from which to speak he so richly deserves. The media could no longer treat him as part pariah and other part Beatles song : Nowhere Man. The only recent press Dennis received was being given undeserved title of “perennial candidate” by the MSM. (What, one runs TWICE and suddenly the Reich Wing, Junior ass kissing media proclaims you’ve become Harold Stassen?) Given such a stage Dennis would be hard to beat. His rhetorical skills are quite good. But, on the downside, he would look VERY bad in a tank wearing a helmet. Almost as bad as No-momentum Joe in Iraq. But, of course, the media hasn’t make fun of THAT, have they? Surprised? You SHOULDN’T be.

Richard Cohen, The Washington Post, June 5, 2007 Some years ago I ran into Fred Thompson at Washington's Reagan National Airport and had a chat with him as we waited for a (very) delayed flight. I found him to be affable and nice -- good company, if you want to know -- but I cannot remember a single thing he said. Alas, it is about the same with his Senate career. If Thompson's name came up in some sort of free-association game, he would be a genuine stumper: Thompson and what? There is no Thompson Act, Thompson Compromise, Thompson Hearing, Thompson Speech or Thompson Anything that comes to mind. No living man can call himself a Thompsonite. Instead, Thompson came and went from the Senate as if he were never there, leaving only the faint scent of ennui. "I don't want to spend the rest of my life up here," he once said. "I don't like spending 14- and 16-hour days voting on 'sense of the Senate' resolutions on irrelevant matters." As a call to action, this lacks a certain something. Such a sentiment may be the telltale tick of a normal man. But the presidency that Thompson now seeks is won not by the normal, the average, the ordinary, but by people fueled by an explosive combination of overriding ambition and charming megalomania. The world needs them, they are convinced. God wants them, they have been told. The country calls; they answer and march smartly into history. This is the stuff of parody (and I exaggerate a bit), but you don't get to be president by waiting for others to ask -- unless you are the son of one. Let us not repeat that mistake. Thompson is often likened to Ronald Reagan. In fact, if you couple "Thompson" with "Reagan" and do a data search of newspapers, you will be inundated with quotes, observations and references -- nearly 1,000 of them in the past month alone. The similarities are obvious -- both tall, good-looking men, personable and, most important, actors. The conclusion is supposed to be almost inescapable: If Reagan the actor could become president, why not Thompson the actor? If the host of TV's "General Electric Theater" could do it, why not District Attorney Arthur Branch of "Law & Order"? For all I know, this is precisely what will happen. Yet, that possibility ought to give us some pause. Reagan, you might remember, went from show business to politics, while Thompson has gone the other way. He went from being bored in the Senate to waiting around a movie set so he could mouth words written by others -- maybe not all that different from the Senate, when you think about it. If there is a passion, an overriding sense of purpose in Fred Thompson, it is not apparent from his record. More apparent, clearly, is that he lacks any such thing. Read More Here

Paul Krugman, The New York Times, June 4, 2007 One of the lessons journalists should have learned from the 2000 election campaign is that what a candidate says about policy isn’t just a guide to his or her thinking about a specific issue — it’s the best way to get a true sense of the candidate’s character. Do you remember all the up-close-and-personals about George W. Bush, and what a likeable guy he was? Well, reporters would have had a much better fix on who he was and how he would govern if they had ignored all that, and focused on the raw dishonesty and irresponsibility of his policy proposals. That’s why I’m not interested in what sports the candidates play or speculation about their marriages. I want to hear about their health care plans — not just for the substance, but to get a sense of what kind of president each would be. Would they hesitate and triangulate, or would they push hard for real change? Now, back in February John Edwards put his rivals for the Democratic nomination on the spot, by coming out with a full-fledged plan to cover all the uninsured. Suddenly, vague expressions of support for universal health care weren’t enough: candidates were under pressure to present their own specific plans. And the question was whether those plans would be as bold and comprehensive as the Edwards proposal. Four months have passed since then. So far, all Hillary Clinton has released are proposals to help reduce health care costs. It’s worthy stuff, but it’s hard to avoid the sense that she’s putting off dealing with the hard part. The real test is how she proposes to cover the uninsured. But last week Barack Obama, after getting considerable grief for having failed to offer policy specifics, finally delivered a comprehensive health care plan. So how is it? First, the good news. The Obama plan is smart and serious, put together by people who know what they’re doing. It also passes one basic test of courage. You can’t be serious about health care without proposing an injection of federal funds to help lower-income families pay for insurance, and that means advocating some kind of tax increase. Well, Mr. Obama is now on record calling for a partial rollback of the Bush tax cuts. Read More Here