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It has been a big week on the foreign policy front, with the death of Libya's dictator and President Obama's announcement today that all U.S. troops would be out of Iraq by the end of this year (leaving roughly 150 to guard the embassy). But before we get to all of that, I've got some domestic advice for the president's re-election team.
Last night, at yet another Republican presidential candidate debate, Herman Cain was roundly criticized for his simplistic 9-9-9 tax plan by his fellow Republicans. I have to admit, it was a little bizarre (in a "Nixon goes to China" sort of way) to see Republicans disparaging a tax plan for being "regressive." Ron Paul was unafraid to actually use this word, and while several other candidates avoided the term they in essence leveled the same charge: 9-9-9 would wind up increasing taxes on the poor and the middle class. Being Republicans, though, they didn't also speak of the other side of this coin -- the fact that 9-9-9 would lower taxes on the wealthy and really lower them on the ultra-wealthy. But still, it was odd enough to see candidate after candidate speak of their concern for the tax burden of the lower-class and middle-class, since this is usually a Democratic argument. Perhaps all those 99 Percenters out there demonstrating in the streets are getting through to the Republican politicians? Stranger things have happened.
The last time we wrote, Rick Perry had just jumped in the race. Since then, nobody else has gotten in, while two prominent names decided to sit this one out. Several candidates caught fire, and several also burned out (at least, poll-wise). So it goes, on the campaign merry-go-round.
Well, it's been great fun and all, but we are sorry to inform you that your viable candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination is hereby over.
Since the president is not facing a primary challenger, and since the president has raised a whopping big pile of money already, and (most importantly) since the president has rediscovered the joys of speaking directly to the American people about his agenda -- why not buy some political ads, now?
President Barack Obama opened his re-election campaign last night with a wowzer of a speech to a joint session of Congress. But we'll get to that in detail in a minute. First, we must mark an important anniversary this week.
It's silly season in the political world, once again. And this year -- just like every year a Democrat occupies the White House -- an old favorite of a story is making the rounds. It involves some very thinly-veneered outrage, which is completely fabricated and hypocritical in the extreme.
A word here about timing is necessary, I think. While the blog post is quite obviously meant as a semi-joke, wouldn't this have been more fun in, say, mid-October -- a few weeks before Hallowe'en? Instead of this week, with the "End of Days" prophesied for midafternoon this Saturday? I'm just saying....
It's rare for me to have a moment of pity for someone like Newt Gingrich, but I have to admit I'm feeling a little sorry for the guy this week. But before we delve into Newt's campaign problems in greater detail, it seems to me that most pundits are missing a big underlying new reality in the Republican Party. The focus has all been on Newt himself, what he said, and the subsequent ire directed at him by prominent Righties. But after the dust settles on the incident itself, people are going to notice the bigger fact this fracas has illuminated: Republicans are doubling down on Paul Ryan's budget rather than backing away from it, to the point where it has now become the acid test for Republicans in 2012. Which should be good news for Democrats.
I don't care how ironic that sounds to some, it's true. Osama Bin Laden declared war on America, waged that war for years (and killed Americans in doing so), then hid for many more years, and was finally hunted down and killed like an animal. Mission accomplished.