Irish Trojan in Tennessee

Top Ten Obama Campaign Promises

By Brendan Loy

P.S. Older but funnier:

Attorney General Edwards?

By Brendan Loy

The Boyz 4 Change alliance emerges at last!... maybe. Quoth Robert Novak:

Illinois Democrats close to Sen. Barack Obama are quietly passing the word that John Edwards will be named attorney general in an Obama administration. ...

In public debates, Obama and Edwards often seem to bond together in alliance against front-running Sen. Hillary Clinton. While running a poor third, Edwards could collect a substantial bag of delegates under the Democratic Party's proportional representation. Edwards then could try to turn his delegates over to Obama in the still unlikely event of a deadlocked Democratic National Convention.

That's one way to do it. Another way would be for Edwards to drop out now (or soon), and to not just endorse Obama but to actually join forces with him -- before Super Tuesday. The concept of an "anti-Hillary vote" may be an oversimplification, but surely Edwards could convince a whole lot of his supporters to jump on the "Boyz 4 Change" bandwagon, as I called it two weeks ago when I suggested a similar course of action (though I assumed it would take a vice presidential carrot to bring Johnny Boy along). As I wrote then, "imagine the political power of such a development." Barack Obama and John Edwards, the kinder-and-gentler reformer and the mad-as-hell crusader, campaigning together, promising that "together they will change America. Hillary wouldn't know what hit her."

That said, if Obama and Edwards are essentially already on the same page on this Attorney General thing, but Edwards isn't dropping out, that means one of two things. Either: a) Obama is the world's worst negotiator, having offered Edwards a cabinet position in exchange for Edwards's merely "often seem[ing] to bond together in alliance" with Obama against Hillary (not a very high price!); or b) Obama thinks it's in his best interest for Edwards to stay in the race at this point, perhaps because, as suggested here, Edwards "drain[s] white male votes away from Senator Clinton." Me thinks option "b" seems more plausible (though perhaps not as plausible as option "c," which is that there is no Obama-Edwards deal, and this talk is just that: talk).

P.S. If it is option "b," there's a pretty decent argument to be made for Edwards staying in the race for, oh, about another 24 hours -- long enough to siphon off those all-important "white male votes" in South Carolina -- and then dropping out, perhaps tomorrow night, followed by... hmm... a Monday-morning endorsement splash, perhaps? ... "Up next on Today: the Boyz 4 Change!" ... Talk about a massive infusion of energy into the Obama campaign! And then, with eight days until 24 states vote on February 5, the A.G.-in-waiting would go on the campaign trail for his new buddy and future boss, doubling the pre-Super Tuesday campaign reach of the Obama/Edwards juggernaut. ... I'm not predicting anything, but if it happens, you heard it here first! :)

Go Zags, Beat Tigers!

By Brendan Loy

Big game at noon tomorrow on ESPN as Gonzaga visits #1 Memphis. Between USC losing to Memphis and Gonzaga losing to Tennessee, my teams are 0-for-2 against Jay's teams so far this year (0-for-3 if you count UConn losing to Memphis); this is my last regular-season opportunity to get a win against him. Go Zags!!

Senate threatens to meddle with tax rebates

By Brendan Loy

Prediction: the Senate will back down. Nobody benefits politically from headlines like "Senate May Scuttle Stimulus," particularly not when the public will feel that it has essentially already been promised $1,200 per couple. The Republicans need this to pass, because they'll be the ones primarily blamed for a recession, and they need the voters to think they tried to do something to stop it. And the Democrats need to avoid painting themselves into a corner where they're the "obstructionists" who prevented Mr. & Mrs. John Q. Public from getting a $1,200 check in the mail. This is one issue where both parties in both houses will find some way to work together, in relatively short order.

Fire on the Vegas strip

By Brendan Loy

Whoa! Not sure where the CNN Breaking News alert is on this, but Las Vegas's iconic Monte Carlo casino/hotel is on fire. "The fire, which was reported around [2 p.m. EST], was spreading from the center section of the hotel across the roof. Flaming embers fell to the street below." Live video here.

UPDATE: The fire is reportedly contained.

Clinton fatigue, 2008 edition

By Brendan Loy

At NRO, Victor Davis Hanson writes that, as a result of Bill Clinton's antics in recent days, "liberals are waking up from their 20-year slumber and blurting out that the shameless Clintons 'will say and do anything...'." In the WSJ, Peggy Noonan sounds a similar theme, writing that "many serious and thoughtful liberals and Democrats ... are seeing Mr. Clinton in a new way and saying so." Quoting a Nation columnist as calling the Clintons "high minded" on the surface but "smarmily duplicitous underneath," Noonan notes that this is "exactly what conservatives have been saying for a decade." Now that Democrats are seeing it too, the Clintons "are tearing the party apart," according to Noonan.

TNR's Jason Zengerle rebuts Noonan, to a certain extent. But he, too, has noticed the "Clintonites against Clinton" trend. Back at NRO, Hanson says that if Billy Boy "keeps it up, it is very likely that he will alienate so many moderate voters that many could hold their nose and vote for someone like John McCain in the general election."

I witnessed this trend, albeit in microcosmic and anecdotal form, at a UT Students for Obama rally that I stopped by en route home from work yesterday afternoon. One of the student organizers for Obama was chatting with her friends about the "Barock the Vote" signs they'd made, and suddenly blurted out something to the effect of, "Maybe we should make a sign with Hillary's face on it, and people could stomp on it." Someone suggested using Bill's face instead, which was met with general approval. The student organizer then mused aloud, "This [election] is really souring my opinion of the Clintons," or words to that effect.

Of course, everybody has a different take on Bill Clinton's effect on the race. Pundits have been saying since Iowa that he's hurting Hillary, but then the exit polls keep suggesting that Democrats still love him, and he's helping. Personally, I think people's opinions of Bill Clinton are very complex, nuanced, and difficult to measure in a poll. This has been true for a long time: back in 2000, polls showed Clinton was extremely popular, yet it was clear to everyone involved that "Clinton fatigue" played a major role in hindering Al Gore's campaign. (Gore might deny it now, but his pick of Lieberman for VP proves he believed it at the time. And from what I understand, Bush's advisers are convinced that Clinton's tarnished legacy helped them eke out an election they should have lost handily.)

The truth is, a lot of people have two or three different opinions of Bill Clinton, and in many cases those opinions are not fully reconciled with one another. They fondly remember the peace and prosperity of his presidency ... they not-so-fondly remember the lies and deception and embarrassment of his scandals ... they remember their anger at the Republicans for overplaying their hand with the impeachment ... yet they're still a bit ticked off at Clinton for creating the situation in the first place ... and they're not sure if he was really as good a president as they sometimes give him credit for ... but then again, aw shucks, he felt their pain ... and he was the victim of a vast right-wing conspiracy, after all ... but on the other hand, that blue dress ... etc., etc. Basically, if America in general, and the Democratic Party in particular, tried to classify its relationship with Bill Clinton in a Facebook profile, the classification would be "It's Complicated."

Mix up the unpredictable and volatile stew of Americans' (particularly Democrats') feelings about Bill Clinton with the always unpredictable and volatile stew that is race relations in this country, with a dash of gender tension to boot, and you get, well, something really unpredictable and volatile -- and not at all susceptible to resolution or understanding through a straightforward yes-or-no poll question about people's attitudes toward Bill, Hillary, etc. I think this is why Obama still seems to be tiptoeing around the issue a bit more than he potentially could: he's just not sure what will happen if he takes Bill on directly. Frankly, I don't think anyone's sure.

My instinct says that Hanson and Noonan are right, and that the student organizer at UT is representative of a broader phenomenon whereby staunch Democrats who once respected or even admired the Clintons are now becoming disillusioned with them, in a way that won't just go away after the primaries are over. But my instinct could be wrong; it certainly has been numerous times this young election season. :) I wonder, though, whether Bill & Hill have fully thought through the risks they're taking with this tactic? Or are they simply depending on fate to smile upon them once again, as it has so many times before -- opponents overplaying their hands, external conditions falling into place, etc., and making the Clintons look like geniuses? At some point, their luck has to run out.