Year: 2008

LAT Columnist: New Budget Crisis Makes Conditions Right to Recall Schwarzenegger

Jon Ponder

Alarming news from California has been lost in the noise of the national election coverage. Nearly five years after ousting Gov. Gray Davis because California faced a $14 billion deficit, the state once again faces a $14 billion deficit — and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is threatening draconian budget cuts to education and healthcare, as well as the release of thousands of prison inmates and closure of 48 state parks, just for starters.

“Is it time for Total Recall: The Sequel?”
– Lopez

During the Republicans’ phony 2003 recall election, Schwarzenegger excoriated Davis over the financial crisis, which, in reality, was caused by the simultaneous dot-com collapse and the Enron shenanigans of Dick Cheney and Ken Lay that exploded California energy costs.

Now that the shoe is on the other foot, so to speak, Los Angeles Times columnist Steve Lopez has suggested that the time might be right for another recall:

[…]

Campaign ’08: ‘Fixin’ To Get Ready Fred’ Thompson Shuffles Offstage

Jon Ponder

The first rat deserted the Fred Thompson campaign’s sinking ship yesterday when former N.Y. Sen. Al D’Amato — who famously loathes fellow New Yorker Rudolph Giuliani — scurried onto the more seaworthy vessel of John McCain.

A few hours later, Thompson announced he was leaving the race:

Thompson bowed to what became inevitable after his third-place showing in Saturday’s South Carolina primary. Less than an hour after the polls closed that night, when it was already evident he would be an also-ran, Thompson addressed his supporters in the state — remarks that walked right up to a withdrawal but stopped just short of it. Since then, he has been absent from the campaign trail.

Thompson’s campaign was fabricated in the lofty realms of the Beltway’s GOP ivory tower: He was an actor like Reagan, a Southerner and a conservative. Never mind the fact he was a K Street lobbyist for 18 years, which was twice as long as he served in the U.S. Senate. What could go wrong?

In a rare, funny moment on “Saturday Night Live,” a send-up of Thompson captured what was wrong with his campaign. When asked to rate his desire to be president, the actor spoofing Thompson said something like, “I’d give it about a six.”

In the five contests so far, Thompson’s campaign accrued just five delegates to the GOP Convention this summer.

Poll: McCain Is Tied with ‘Undecided’ for Lead in California GOP Primary

Jon Ponder

A whopping 23 percent of California Republicans say they still don’t know who they will vote for.

In California, the leader in the GOP race in the run-up to the Feb. 5 primary has switched, according to the latest Field Poll, with Rudolph Giuliani dropping from a strong first to an anemic third, with 13 percent, falling behind John McCain and Mitt Romney, who are in a statistical tie, with 23 percent and 21 percent, respectively. Mike Huckabee is fourth, but in a statistical tie with Giuliani at 12 percent.

In the previous two editions of the poll, from December and October last year, Giuliani had a double digit lead. In December, Giuliani had 25 percent to Huckabee’s 17 percent. Romney had 15 percent and McCain 12 percent. In October, the poll showed Giuliani with 25 percent, Romney with 13 percent and McCain with 12 percent.

Perhaps the most interesting, and determinative, number in the new poll, however, is the number of California Republicans who are undecided two weeks before the vote: a whopping 23 percent say they still don’t know who they will vote for.

Update: Per the comment below, Ron Paul has 7 percent now, which is up from 4 percent in December and double his 3 percent support in October.

Romney Kickin’ Da 904: ‘Oh, You’ve Got Some Bling-Bling Here’

Jon Ponder

Mitt Romney was in da Ville on Monday, kickin’ it on ML King Day:

“Who let the dogs out?”
– Mitt Romney

In his dress shirt and tie, and with his unwavering smile, he walked over and posed for photographs with a group of black youngsters. Putting his arm around a teenage girl, he waved to the cameras and offered, “Who let the dogs out?” He added a tepid “woof woof.”

Somewhere, the Baha Men, the Bahamian group whose 2000 song the candidate was referencing, must have been shuddering…

Later, Mr. Romney admired a child’s gold necklace and said, “Oh, you’ve got some bling-bling here.”

To their credit, none of the young people got up in Romney’s grill for acting such a fool.

Heath Ledger, Dead at 28

Jon Ponder

Heath Ledger, 2006 Academy Award nominee for his role in “Brokeback Mountain,” has died in his home in New York:

He was found dead in his bed in one of his residences in Soho by his housekeeper at 3:35 PM ET today. Law enforcement sources tell TMZ they believe it was not a crime, adding that prescription pills were found near his body.

According to NYPD a masseuse arrived at Ledger’s apartment and was let in by a housekeeper. When Ledger didn’t answer his bedroom door, the housekeeper and the masseuse opened it and found him unconscious. They attempted to wake him; when they couldn’t, they called 911.

We’re told when paramedics responded, the actor was in full cardiac arrest. They attempted to perform CPR on him, but were unsuccessful. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

The 28-year-old actor has a two year old daughter with former fiancee Michelle Williams — they separated in September, 2007. He plays The Joker in the upcoming Batman film, “The Dark Knight” and is perhaps best known for his groundbreaking role as Ennis in “Brokeback Mountain.”

Quote du Jour

Buck Banks

There are no atheists in a foxhole and there are, apparently, no atheists in the Ku Klux Klan. God sometimes moves in mysterious ways, His lip service to exact.

— Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American author and journalist

Abandoned by God, Huckabee Needs a New Miracle

Jon Ponder

The problem with crediting God for your successes, as Mike Huckabee did in November when he claimed that his rise in the polls was a divine miracle, is that when things go badly, as they are for him now, there can only be one explanation for the reversal: God is expressing His disfavor.

Despite what evangelicals tell themselves — as creationists, they still believe the sun and stars rotate around them — there simply are not enough true believers to win the presidency. Never have been and never will be. Thank God.

A chronic lack of campaign money may finally be catching up to Mike Huckabee.

After a disappointing loss to Senator John McCain in the South Carolina primary — in a state his campaign considered among the most favorable in the country for his evangelical-populist message — Mr. Huckabee has cancelled press buses or charter flights to conserve his cash…

He won the Iowa Republican caucuses by relying on his quick wit, oratory and as many talk-show appearances as he could schedule. He traveled with the actor Chuck Norris and played the bass guitar with local rock bands to help attract crowds.

His Iowa victory drew more attention and several millions of dollars in new contributions, his advisers said, but he spent relatively heavily in South Carolina and his loss there has extinguished his Iowa momentum.

His pullback from Florida and the biggest Feb. 5 states is likely to remove him from serious contention for the nomination, although Mr. Huckabee said he did not believe he was out of it yet.

What’s really going on here, of course, has nothing to do with God and everything to do with political science. The sham marriage between the Republican Party and Christian nationalists has come undone, in large part because during the six years Republicans had complete control of the government, they did not nothing to further the evangelical agenda to amend the Constitution to prohibit abortions and gay marriage.

Except for Sen. Sam Brownback, who dropped out last fall, Huckabee was the only evangelical candidate among the Republicans. But support for him was so tepid that TV preacher Pat Robertson endorsed Rudolph Giuliani, quixotically hoping to build a movement among terror-addicted Christianists behind the tough-talking, albeit thrice-married and socially liberal, mayor of 9/11. When that didn’t work, Christian conservatives had nowhere to go but Huckabee.

Like Robertson, who came in second in the Iowa caucuses in 1988 before flaming out, Huckabee never had, nor ever would have, the support of the Republican establishment. This is especially so because he often spouts populist ideals,which are anathematic to today’s GOP and its helter-skelter drive to hand over U.S. treasure and sovereignty to multinational corporations.

Huckabee never had the money; he had only raised $2.3 million in the first three quarters of 2007. But mainly, he never had the votes. Despite what evangelicals tell themselves — as creationists, they still believe the sun and stars rotate around them — there simply are not enough Christian nationalists to win the presidency. Never have been and never will be.

Thank God.

Rudy on the Ropes – Running on ‘9/11 24/7’ Puts Him 3rd in Florida, 2nd in NY, But He Says All Is Going According To Plan

Jon Ponder

Running exclusively on a platform of “9/11 24/7” appears not be working out so well for Rudolph Giuliani. Too bad (for him), it’s all he’s got.

“What happened is, it became a competitive race.”
– Giuliani

Rasumussen yesterday:

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey finds Mitt Romney with a slight lead in Florida’s Republican Presidential Primary. John McCain and Rudy Giuliani are close behind in what may develop into a three-man race. It’s Romney at 25 percent, McCain at 20 percent, and Giuliani at 19 percent. Romney has picked up seven points over the past week while McCain and Giuliani each inched up a point … Mike Huckabee has slipped to 13 percent in the current poll.

But the worst news for Rudy may be waiting back home when New York state votes in its primaries on Feb. 5:

The WNBC/Marist Poll in New York shows McCain beating Giuliani 32 to 22 percent, followed by Mitt Romney at 14 percent and Mike Huckabee at 11 percent, with Fred Thompson trailing at 4 percent. Fifteen percent of 401 Republicans polled last week were undecided. The survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 5 percent.

A second poll, by Siena College Research Institute, found the former New York mayor trailing the Arizona senator by 12 points for the New York primary Feb. 5. Siena put Giuliani second, with 24 percent of support among Republicans, behind McCain’s 36 percent. Romney had 10 percent, Huckabee 7 percent, and Thompson 6 percent. That poll has a margin of error of 7.4 percent.

About six weeks ago, Giuliani had a commanding, 33-point lead over the then-number two candidate, John McCain. Yesterday, he explained the new dynamics to New York Newsday:

“What happened is, it became a competitive race,” he said during a stop at Daytona International Speedway, where he rode his campaign bus around the banked NASCAR track. He said all the candidates who recently descended here were “in a very similar situation” and called the race “wide open.”

“It’s playing out the way we thought it would,” he said.

Yes, all according to plan.

Muslimism: Questions of Obama’s Faith are Really Motivated by Racism

Buck Banks

muslim-protest-1.jpg
According to an Associated Press story published today, Barack Obama has come out preaching about his Christian faith in the wake of a pesky Internet chain letter that tries to characterize him as definitely a Muslim and probably a terrorist in disguise. As the race in South Carolina heats up, Obama is waving his Bible — not the Koran, mind you — in response to nasty and false rumors:

“I’ve been to the same church — the same Christian church — for almost 20 years,” Obama said, stressing the word Christian and drawing cheers from the faithful in reply. “I was sworn in with my hand on the family Bible. Whenever I’m in the United States Senate, I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America. So if you get some silly e-mail … send it back to whoever sent it and tell them this is all crazy. Educate.”

Obama is referring to a debunked chain e-mail circulating widely on the Internet that suggests he is hiding his Islamic roots and may be a terrorist in disguise. It says he was sworn into the Senate on the Quran and turns his back on the flag during the pledge.

There are some truths in the e-mail’s details. Obama’s middle name is Hussein. His father and stepfather were Muslim. And he spent part of his childhood in Indonesia, a largely Muslim country. But he attended secular and Catholic schools, not a radical madrassa.

Both co-editor Trish and I have received the e-mail, and both from people who, as Trish says, “should know better.” The letter is so mean, nasty and false that the motivation behind sending it can only be racism.

Sure, some would argue that the motivation is fear of terrorist attacks by Muslim extremists, but I would argue that it’s a much older fear — the fear of the black man, of the Other — but in today’s post-9/11 world it can masquerade as something else. I call it Muslimism.

Muslimism says it’s OK to be wary of anyone in a turban or burka because they might be out to kill you, or better yet, kill all of us. They hate us and want to take over our country and convert or kill us — every last one of us — because that’s what Islam teaches them. Muslimism provides a socially acceptable platform from which to launch an irresponsible smear campaign because the normal rules of engagement are off when it comes to people who are willing to blow themselves up to kill Americans.

So people who would never consider commenting on Obama’s blackness are more than happy to criticize him and spread false rumors that he’s — gasp! — a Muslim! And that’s OK, according to the new rules of political engagement. An e-mail that, if the N-word were substituted for “Muslim,” would shock the very people who so uncritically read this offensive letter and then sent it on to 10 more people.

And they could feel good about that because everyone should know that this uppity nig… uh, Illinoisan, running for president is actually a Muslim terrorist in a charcoal suit who can’t wait to win the election and then turn our own nuclear weapons against us in the biggest suicide bombing imaginable.

Muslimism — all it takes is that old familiar mixture of fear and hate.