Day: July 22, 2008

Arianna: Crist ‘Made a Downpayment’ on the Vice Presidency by Announcing He’s Getting Married

Jon Ponder

The subject of Florida Gov. Charlie Crist’s impending nuptials drew snickers from the crew at “Left, Right and Center,” my favorite weekly political chat show, which is produced by KCRW-FM, in Santa Monica.

The topic was “veep stakes,” and the moment of mirth came after guest host Lawrence O’Donnell, who represents the political center, asked Tony Blankley, the former editor of the Washington Times and the show’s token rightwinger, whether Mitt Romney had made a “downpayment” on the vice presidency by opting to eat his $45 million campaign debt.

Arianna Huffington, who represents the “independent progressive blogosphere” on the show, noted, “Well Gov. Crist also made a downpayment by announcing he’s getting married … So there are downpayments all around being made.”

Republicans really do think people are stupid. Honestly, who really thought this would work — a sudden announcement of marriage that appears to be, because it is, hastily arranged to make Crist a palatable candidate for vice president? It reminds me of George Bush Sr. saying he picked Dan Quayle to be his running mate because Quayle was good-looking and so would get the female vote.

Who, indeed.

A rough transcript of the exchange follows…

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Bush 2007: ‘If [the Iraqis] Were To Say Leave, We Would Leave’ – McCain 2004: ‘It’s Obvious We Would Have To Leave’

Jon Ponder

Does anything that George Bush and John McCain say matter? Based on this colloquy between Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow on “Countdown” last night, apparently not:
“We are there at the invitation of the Iraqi government. This is a sovereign nation. Twelve million people went to the polls to approve a constitution. It’s their government’s choice. If they were to say, leave, we would leave.”
— George Bush

OLBERMANN: …The Iraqi government is saying, “Get out,” and President Bush swore, you know, “Some day if they say ‘get out,‘ we‘ll get out.”

MADDOW: That‘s right. May 2007 in the Rose Garden, Bush said—and I went back and checked the quote directly so I could be sure to directly quote him — “If they were to say leave, we would leave.” Also, for what it‘s worth, in April of 2004, John McCain at the Council on Foreign Relation said, “It is obvious we would have to leave if they asked to us leave.”

I mean, they told us that the point of invading Iraq was to topple Saddam Hussein. Saddam Hussein was toppled; they told us that the point of staying there after, was to set up a sovereign Iraqi government. Well now, the sovereign Iraqi government is standing up on its hind legs enough to tell us to leave, and we‘re left with this situation where they need another explanation of why we can‘t leave. That‘s the real headline here.

Here’s the question Bush was asked in May 2007, as well as a bit of preamble to the money quote:

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