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Elizabeth Warren Should Run Against Obama

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Now that President Obama has thrown Elizabeth Warren under the bus by nominating Richard Cordray to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), she is free to challenge Obama in the 2012 election.  It’s not a very likely scenario, although it’s one I’d love to see:  Warren as the populist, Independent candidate – challenging Obama, the Wall Street tool – who is already losing to a phantom, unspecified Republican.

A good number of people were disappointed when Obama failed to nominate Warren to chair the CFPB, which was her brainchild.  It was bad enough that Treasury Secretary “Turbo” Tim Geithner didn’t like her – but once the President realized he was getting some serious pushback about Warren from Senate Republicans – that was all it took.  Some Warren supporters have become enamored with the idea that she could challenge Scott Brown for his seat representing Massachusetts in the Senate.  However, many astute commentators consider that as a really stupid idea.  Here is the reaction from Yves Smith of Naked Capitalism:

We argued yesterday that the Senate was not a good vehicle for advancing Elizabeth Warren’s aims of helping middle class families, since she would have no more, and arguably less power than she has now, and would be expected to defend Democrat/Obama policies, many of which are affirmatively destructive to middle class interests (just less so than what the Republicans would put in place).

A poll conducted in late June by Scott Brown and the Republican National Committee raises an even more basic question:  whether she even has a shot at winning.

*   *   *

The poll shows a 25 point gap, which is a massive hurdle, and also indicates that Brown is seen by many voters as not being a Republican stalwart (as in he is perceived to vote for the state’s, not the party’s, interest).  A 25 point gap is a near insurmountable hurdle and shows that Warren’s reputation does not carry as far as the Democratic party hackocracy would like her fans to believe.  But there’s no reason not to get this pesky woman to take up what is likely to be a poisoned chalice.  If she wins, she’s unlikely to get on any important committees, given the Democratic party pay to play system, and will be boxed in by the practical requirements of having to make nice to the party and support Obama positions a meaningful portion of the time. And if she runs and loses, it would be taken as proof that her middle class agenda really doesn’t resonate with voters, which will give the corporocrats free rein (if you can’t sell a liberal agenda in a borderline Communist state like Massachusetts, it won’t play in Peoria either).

Obviously, a 2012 challenge to the Obama Presidency by Warren would be an uphill battle.  Nevertheless, it’s turning out to be an uphill battle for the incumbent, as well.  David Weidner of MarketWatch recently discussed how Obama’s failure to adequately address the economic crisis has placed the President under the same pressure faced by many Americans today:

He’s about to lose his job.

*   *   *

Blame as much of the problem on his predecessor as you like, the fact is Obama hasn’t come up with a solution.  In fact, he’s made things worse by filling his top economic posts with banking-friendly interests, status-quo advisers and milquetoast regulators.

And if there’s one reason Obama loses in 2012, it’ll be because he failed to surround himself with people willing to take drastic action to get the economy moving again.

In effect, Obama’s team has rewarded the banking industry under the guise of “saving the economy” while abandoning citizens and consumers desperate for jobs, credit and spending power.

There was the New York Fed banker cozy with Wall Street: Timothy Geithner.

There was the former Clinton administration official who was the architect of policies that led to the financial crisis: Larry Summers.

There was a career bureaucrat named to lead the Securities and Exchange Commission:  Mary Schapiro.

To see just how unremarkable this group is, consider that the most progressive regulator in the Obama administration, Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Chairman Sheila Bair, was a Republican appointed by Bush.

*   *   *

The lack of action by Obama’s administration of mediocrities is the reason the recovery sputters.  In essence, the turnaround depends too much on a private sector that, having escaped failure, is too content to sit out what’s supposed to be a recovery.

*   *   *

What began as a two-step approach:  1) saving the banks, and then 2) saving homeowners, was cut short after the first step.

Instead of extracting more lending commitments from the banks, forcing more haircuts on investors and more demands on business, Obama has let his team of mediocrities allow the debate to be turned on government.  The government caused the financial crisis.  The government ruined the housing market.

It wasn’t true at the start, but it’s becoming true now.

Despite his status as the incumbent and his $1 billion campaign war chest, President Obama could find himself voted out of office in 2012.  When you consider the fact that the Republican Party candidates who are currently generating the most excitement are women (Bachmann and the undeclared Palin) just imagine how many voters might gravitate to a populist female candidate with substantially more brains than Obama.

The disillusionment factor afflicting Obama is not something which can be easily overlooked.  The man I have referred to as the “Disappointer-In-Chief” since his third month in office has lost more than the enthusiasm of his “base” supporters – he has lost the false “progressive” image he had been able to portray.  Matt Stoller of the Roosevelt Institute explained how the real Obama had always been visible to those willing to look beyond the campaign slogans:

Many people are “disappointed” with Obama.  But, while it is certainly true that Obama has broken many many promises, he projected his goals in his book The Audacity of Hope.  In Audacity, he discussed how in 2002 he was going to give politics one more shot with a Senate campaign, and if that didn’t work, he was going into corporate law and getting wealthy like the rest of his peer group.  He wrote about how passionate activists were too simple-minded, that the system basically worked, and that compromise was a virtue in and of itself in a world of uncertainty. His book was a book about a fundamentally conservative political creature obsessed with process, not someone grounded in the problems of ordinary people.  He told us what his leadership style is, what his agenda was, and he’s executing it now.

I expressed skepticism towards Obama from 2005, onward.  Paul Krugman, Debra Cooper, and Tom Ferguson among others pegged Obama correctly from day one.  Obama broadcast who he was, through his conservative policy focus (which is how Krugman pegged him), his bank backers (which is how Ferguson pegged him), his political support of Lieberman (which is how I pegged him), and his cavalier treatment of women’s issues (which is how Debra Cooper pegged him).  He is doing so again, with his choice to effectively remove Elizabeth Warren from the administration.

I just wish Elizabeth Warren would fight back and challenge Obama for The White House.  If only   .   .   .


 

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The Return Of Jeb Bush

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December 4, 2008

I was surprised when I read the December 2 report by Beth Reinhard in the Miami Herald concerning the announcement by Mel Martinez, that he would not seek re-election to the United States Senate in 2010, at the end of his first term.  He has always been such an ambitious guy.  Immediately after the mid-term elections in 2006, Senator Martinez was named Chairman of the Republican National Committee (although he ultimately resigned from that post in October of 2007).  As Martin Kady reported in the November 14, 2006 edition of the New York Times:

Republicans are hoping that Martinez, whose family fled communist Cuba in 1962, will appeal to the pivotal Hispanic voting bloc, which went heavily for Democrats in the Nov. 7 elections.

Beth Reinhard’s article in the Miami Herald quoted the Senator’s explanation for not seeking another term:  the simple desire to spend more time in Orlando with family and friends.  However, Ms. Reinhard provided an alternative explanation for the motivating factors behind this decision:

His slumping poll numbers and lackluster reelection fundraising have fueled speculation for months that he would not seek another term.  But Martinez, a reluctant Washington insider recruited by President George W. Bush, insisted that he wasn’t deterred by the prospect of a tough race.  He added that he announced his retirement early to give potential candidates enough time to build campaigns.

The article went on to disclose that “a close ally” of former Governor Jeb Bush indicated that Jeb “was thinking about the race”.

A December 3 report by Carol Lee and Jonathan Martin on the Politico website bore the headline:   “Jeb: I am considering Senate run”.  They noted the likelihood that in the event Jeb should seek the Senate seat relinquished by Mel Martinez, he would not likely face any Republican opposition.  What really stood out in this piece was Jeb’s strategic vision for the future of the Republican Party in the wake of the 2008 elections.  At a time when many Republicans expressed dread that the only “rising star” in their party might be Sarah Palin, it must have been nice to hear “the smart one” from the Bush family provide an enlightened perspective on the future:

In an interview with Politico immediately after November’s election, the former governor said the Republican Party should take four primary steps to regain favor with voters: Show no tolerance for corruption, practice what it preaches about limiting the scope of government (“There should not be such a thing as a Big Government Republican”), stand for working families and small business, and embrace reform.

Bush said conservatives should “do the math of the new demographics of the United States,” explaining that the Republican Party “can’t be anti-Hispanic, anti-young person — anti many things — and be surprised when we don’t win elections.”

Jeb let everyone know that there is at least one Republican who “gets it” and can provide change the Republicans can believe in.  The obvious next question is:  When is he planning on a run for the Presidency?  If his plan is to run in the 2012 Presidential election, he would have to begin campaigning immediately upon being sworn in as a Senator in January of 2011.  That simply would not make sense.  He would more likely spend a few years in the Senate, re-defining himself as a centrist and demonstrating the capacity for bipartisanship that his brother lacked.  He would then likely set his sights on the 2016 Presidential election, when President Obama’s term expires.

In the mean time, the Democrats need to focus on nominating a worthy opponent for Jeb in the Senatorial election.  Their best chance for victory would be the nomination of a Latin-American woman as their candidate.  Jeb’s wife, Columba, is a native of Mexico and this has always endeared him to the Latin-American voters in Florida.  A female candidate could attract the votes of independent female voters.

The Democratic Party’s response to Jeb’s likely senatorial bid is already taking shape.  The Politico website ran a second article on Jeb’s Senatorial aspirations on December 3, written by Amie Parnes and Charles Mathesian, entitled:  “Will voters elect a Bush again?” They quoted the response from Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz about the prospect of a Senator Jeb Bush:

“I don’t think Jeb Bush’s leadership style is a good fit for the US Senate or any legislative body. He governs with ‘my way or the highway’ politics. He was literally the most inflexible public official I’ve ever encountered in my 16 years in office,” said Wasserman Schultz. “I think they’re very similar in terms of his leadership style. When they decide that they are correct there’s no telling them that they are not.”

Who would have thought that before George W. Bush could move out of the White House, there would be serious discussion of another Bush candidacy?

The Secret Candidate

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September 8, 2008

They’re out there … all around you.  You just don’t know who they are yet.  Right now, all across America, they’re out shopping for those Kawasaki eyeglass frames … trying to re-style their hair into that half-beehive/half-mullet look.  They’re the Sarah Palin wanna-bes — forcing their sons to join hockey teams – each hoping to earn that coveted title for herself:  “Hockey Mom” — a ticket to success in today’s America.  There is no question that Sarah Palin will be the most popular Halloween costume subject for 2008.  Beyond that, there are many thousands of American women, currently adapting their lives to accommodate Sarah Palin as their new role model.

The rest of us just aren’t sure we know who Sarah Palin is yet.  The McCain campaign is obviously training her on the difficult subject of interviews with journalists.  As of this time, there are no Palin interviews scheduled, other than the rumored possibility of an interview with ABC’s Charlie Gibson.  As I write this, McCain campaign CEO, Rick Davis, is holding out for “ground rules”.  I suspect that if the campaign’s senior strategist, Steve Schmidt, were to have his way, any such interviews would be tightly scripted and choreographed, with all questions and answers written in advance by Schmidt.  Meanwhile, Joe Biden appeared on the September 6 edition of Meet The Press.  Biden had to answer at least one question with:

I don’t know what Governor Palin’s position on this issue is, because I haven’t heard it yet.  I have to assume that her position will be the same as Senator McCain’s.

When asked about the impending federal government takeover of mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, Biden pointed out that he had just discussed the subject with Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson on the previous evening.  I could not help but wonder what the hell Sarah Palin would have said in answer to that question   …  “Freddie Mac cracked a lot of sexist jokes at an Obama rally.  Didn’t he die recently?”

Nevertheless, we are beginning to obtain information about Palin for ourselves by using our computers over the Internet.  The mainstream media have nothing for us, other than the superficial biography offered by the Republican National Committee.  What we have initially learned is that Sarah Palin spent six years working toward her Bachelor’s Degree, while attending five different schools in that effort.  Many consider this as evidence that she may be significantly dumber than our current President.  Although I refer to Governor Palin as “The Gumball”, I don’t consider her six-year college tour as a justifiable basis for criticizing her.  Many of us who attended college either made school transfers ourselves, or had friends who did so  — at the cost of lost course credits.  For someone to change colleges five different times, yet graduate in only six years, is quite an accomplishment!  Congratulations, Sarah!

Additional information about Palin has been provided by David Hullen in the September 4 edition of the Anchorage Daily News.  Hullen quoted an e-mail written by Anne Kilkenny of Wasilla, Alaska, where Palin was formerly mayor.  Ms. Kilkenny was described by Hullen as a “stay-at-home mom, letter-to-the-editor writer and longtime watcher of Valley politics.”  This article and e-mail are essential reading for anyone with more than a nanobyte of curiosity about who Sarah Palin really is.  Before I quote a passage from Ms. Kilkenny’s e-mail … let’s revisit The Gumball’s quip about Barack Obama, included in her acceptance speech, as written by Matt Scully:

I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a community organizer, except that you have actual responsibilities.

Ms. Kilkenny of Wasilla informed us about the consequences for Sarah Palin’s failure to fulfill those responsibilities:

During her mayoral administration most of the actual work of running this small city was turned over to an administrator. She (Palin) had been pushed to hire this administrator by party power-brokers after she had gotten herself into some trouble over precipitous firings which had given rise to a recall campaign.

In other words, Palin’s duties as “mayor of a small town” had to be “outsourced” to someone else, because Palin was in over her head and on the verge of being recalled.  Was this administrator from Bangalore, India, by any chance?

As we learn more about The Gumball, we are repeatedly reminded of our current President.  Here’s another remark about Palin, from Ms. Kilkenny’s e-mail:

She’s not very tolerant of divergent opinions or open to outside ideas or compromise.  As Mayor, she fought ideas that weren’t generated by her or her staff. Ideas weren’t evaluated on their merits, but on the basis of who proposed them.

If you thought that John McCain was becoming a lot more like President Bush, Sarah Palin appears to have a head start.  No wonder she is being kept under wraps!

Many have criticized the mainstream media for “not doing their job” during the run-up to the Iraq war.  Those same news sources appear to be well on the way toward repeating that performance, as we enter the run-up to the Presidential election.

A Base Hit

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September 4, 2008

Throughout John McCain’s Presidential campaign, he had been unable to enlist the support of the coveted Republican “base”.  His choice of Sarah Palin as his running mate, appears to have been a big hit with those people.  At the Republican Convention, she received an adoring response from the audience.  Perhaps Jay Leno had it best when he said:  “As an Alaskan, she must have felt right at home there.  She could look out from the podium, over an endless sea of white.”

Sarah Palin has indeed won the hearts of the “hard right” Republican voters and politicians.  At this point, the only obstacle to the acceptance of her as the candidate, seems to be: getting everyone familiar with her name (literally).  Geriatric Jo Ann Davidson, Co-Chair of the Republican National Committee, referred to the Vice-Presidential candidate as “Sarah Pawlenty” before the Convention audience.  This provided Jon Stewart with yet another “Moment of Zen”.

As reported by Juliet Eilperin and Robert Barnes in the September 3 Washington Post, Palin’s acceptance speech was written by Matt Scully:

An initial version of the address, which speechwriter Matthew Scully started crafting a week ago for an unnamed male vice presidential pick, included plenty of attacks aimed at Democratic nominee Barack Obama along with ample praise for McCain, aides said.

It is ironic to observe that Matt Scully (a former speechwriter for George W. Bush) is an outspoken defender of the rights of those animals considered prey by human hunters.  The “Annie Oakley” image of Sarah Palin as a moose hunter, seems to make her the kind of person Scully wouldn’t @font-face { font-family: “Calisto MT”; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: “Times New Roman”; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }necessarily like.  She’s lucky Scully wrote that speech before he knew she would be the one delivering it.  Worse yet, Palin’s pleasant persona will likely result in the targeting of Scully for the factual misrepresentations contained in the speech (i.e. that Obama will raise taxes for all Americans).  Rather than “shoot” the charismatic messenger, critics may choose to level their attacks at Scully himself, as the author of the speech.  It would serve him right for not going along on the moose hunt!

It remains to be seen whether McCain’s secondary strategy in choosing Palin (to win the support of the disgruntled supporters of Hillary Clinton) will work.  Susan Page and Martha Moore of USA Today have been following this subject and how it is playing out in the polls.  Page and Moore reported:

In USA TODAY polls, McCain’s standing among women didn’t budge with the pick of Palin. He was backed by 42% of women in a poll taken before the convention, another on the day of her announcement and a third taken Saturday and Sunday.

Whether these numbers hold as the campaign progresses, will be another matter.  In the mean time, the Democrats cannot afford to be pulling their punches as Palin establishes her own style of pugilism on the stump.  Time will tell whether she can live up to the expectations and the enthusiasm of the Convention crowd, the Republican base and the McCain team itself.  Her most likely problems (aside from the “abuse of power” scandal) will result from the video clips of her saying things inconsistent with the message du jour.   There will be plenty of opportunities ahead for negative campaign ads, especially as Republican luminaries continue to get caught, on the record, disclosing their low regard for McCain’s selection of Palin.  Over an open microphone during a commercial break on MSNBC, Peggy Noonan expressed dismay that the McCain camp “…  went for this – excuse me – political bullshit about narratives.”  Noonan later defined the term “narrative” as:  “The story the campaign wishes to tell about itself and communicate to others.”  Is that really it?  Or, is the “narrative” in this case, Palin’s life story, which is supposed to endear her to us.  Noonan is promoting that bullshit herself, so it’s hard to imagine her objecting to it.  Peggy Noonan also complained about how Republican leaders believe that “whatever the base of the Republican Party thinks is what America thinks”.  At this point, Sarah Palin is doing fine with the Republican base.  Meanwhile, the rest of America will be reading about Palin’s track record on “earmarks”, the unfolding “abuse of power” saga, as well as whatever important information the McCain camp never read in the local Alaska newspapers.  Whether we admit it or not, we will all be anxious to see if the National Enquirer can outdo its John Edwards exclusive with its juicy tale involving this new darling of “the base”.