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[This column is as appropriate today as when I wrote it. The only thing that needs changing is what is considered "astronomical" for a barrel of oil. Analysts are now predicting $200 or $300 a barrel (or even higher) were America or Israel to attack Iran. But I think that all the other points are still as valid now as when I originally wrote this last fall.]
Think about that for a moment -- a former Justice Department legal counsel couldn't answer whether the President of the United States of America could legally order a prisoner buried alive. These were the people who were responsible for drawing the lines on what was (in their opinion) legally allowable, and what wasn't, and they can't even publicly state whether the president ordering someone buried alive is legal or not.
At the very least, it would be worth pointing out what we could face if we (or Israel) attacks Iran. An unnamed oil market analyst on NBC last night put the price of a barrel of oil after an attack on Iran as "name your price," and then went further with "$300, $400 a barrel." Put in perspective, this would be around $10.00 to $13.50 per gallon to fill up your car. If your tank held 15 gallons, this would cost you from $150 up to almost two hundred dollars for a single fill-up.
As we enter the long summer days of the general election, the tradition in American politics is for the candidates to run as hard as they can to the vaunted "middle of the road." What this may mean is that by Election Day, the foreign policy positions on Iraq of John McCain and Barack Obama are going to get a lot closer and indeed may be different mainly in philosophy (rather than in substance) by November.
And that is my point -- there is no proof. Because John McCain refuses to let the press and the public see it. And that, to me, is an issue worth exploring in someone who is trying to get elected president.
This column was born out of my frustration with the seeming inability of many Democrats to perform well in the Sunday morning interview shows on television. It's often been said that Democrats have an inherent "herding cats" problem, so I set out to do my tiny part to help.
President Bush is in the news today declaring, in essence, that North Korea need no longer be considered as part of his "Axis Of Evil." With absolutely no proof whatsoever, Congress is now supposed to remove North Korea from the list of countries which are considered state sponsors of terrorism. So much for all that fiery rhetoric Bush used to use about terrorism.
George Bush's term in office will be remembered for the precedents it set, particularly in relation to the power of the presidency, and the separation of powers between the three branches of American government. Vice President Dick Cheney has been at the forefront of this effort to "restore power" to the presidency, which he believes was unjustly taken from the office in the aftermath of Richard Nixon and Watergate.
Anyone who thinks that the treatment Barack Obama has gotten from the media during this campaign is remotely the same as the treatment John McCain has received just has not been paying much attention. Because this pro-McCain prejudice has been both pervasive and unremarked-upon throughout almost the entire news media during the entire campaign season. McCain has even joked that the media is "his base" of support. It was a funny line, but there is an enormous truth at its core: the media has been hard on Obama but unbelievably light on John McCain. And this has to stop. Now. Because the election might just hinge on the media's portrayal of the two, so now is the time to point out the uneven nature of the press coverage to date on the two candidates. In time for the mainstream media to correct itself before the general election season really heats up.
Come to think of it, if anything in Cindy's past were part of Michelle's life history, I would bet my bottom dollar that we'd have heard about it by now. Over and over and over again. This is called "media bias," and it deserves to be spotlighted immediately.