Friday’s political round-up

May 18, 2007

Today’s installment of campaign-related news items that wouldn’t generate a post of their own, but may be of interest to political observers:

* There are 10 sitting members of Congress running for president right now, but only John McCain believes he doesn’t have to show up for work anymore: “Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) is the only presidential candidate in Congress to have missed a major vote on the Iraq war this year, and his absences are not sitting well with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.).” McCain has missed 42 consecutive votes, and this is the fifth straight week he hasn’t cast a vote.

* The New York Daily News noted today that Rudy Giuliani has been paying his third wife $125,000 a year to be one of his speechwriters. The payments go back to before they were married. GOP Strategist Nelson Warfield said, “It just looks odd. Most spouses view supporting their significant others as part of the package, not part of the compensation package.”

* The Wall Street Journal’s Peggy Noonan devoted her column today to former Sen. Fred Thompson, writing a lengthy love letter praising the actor/lobbyist/pol for “running a great campaign.” Acknowledging that there is no actual campaign right now, Noonan adds, “It’s a guerrilla campaign whose informality is meant to obscure his intent. It has been going on for months and is aimed at the major pleasure zones of the Republican brain.”

* My friend Cliff Schecter reports this week about an important Dem gubernatorial primary on Tuesday in Kentucky, when former Lt. Gov and AG Steve Beshear will face off against millionaire businessman Bruce Lunsford. As Schecter explains, Lunsford is from the Zell Miller wing of the party, having backed a variety of Republicans of late (including George W. Bush, Mitch McConnell, Ernie Fletcher, and Anne Northup).

* Saul Anuzis, the chairman of the Michigan Republican Party, is working on having Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) excluded from future GOP presidential debates. Paul backers have responded aggressively: “The Michigan Republican Party has been deluged with incoming missives, some inviting Anuzis to go become the Republican party chair of Cuba. They’re even calling his home.”

* And Al Gore continues to give unclear answers about his ’08 plans, though he appears to be leaning against a campaign. The former VP told Time, “I’m not convinced the presidency is the highest and best role I could play. The path I see is a path that builds a consensus — to the point where it doesn’t matter as much who’s running. It would take a lot to disabuse me of the notion that my highest and best use is to keep building that consensus.” And what would it take to disabuse him? “I can’t say because I’m not looking for it. But I guess I would know it if I saw it. I haven’t ruled it out. But I don’t think it’s likely to happen.”

Maybe all those missed votes is part of a McCain master plan, hoping that eventually enough votes will be cast to put some restrictions on Dubya toward Iraq and his fingerprints will be clean and he can complain about it afterward.

  • WOW!

    Acknowledging that there is no actual campaign right now, Noonan adds, “It’s a guerrilla campaign whose informality is meant to obscure his intent. It has been going on for months and is aimed at the major pleasure zones of the Republican brain.”

    So he’s blowing stuff up and having sex with gay hookers? Party on, Fred!

  • Thinking about ‘the major pleasure zones of the Republican brain’ makes me want to puke.

  • Hearing about Fred Thompson from Noonan is like hearing about Justin Timberlake from an infatuated 14 year old girl.

  • […] major pleasure zones of the Republican brain.”

    Since they tend to be against pleasure in any form (other than torture-watching), and since most of them seem to lack any brain — zoned or not… I really don’t know what she’s talking about.

  • Will wrote (comment #6): “Bush pulls lowest approval rating ever recorded by Rasmussen, two days in a row”!

    (In my best Mr. Rogers voice) Can you say “sky-high gasoline prices.” I knew you could.

  • Major pleasure zones of Republican brains:

    Criminal lobe
    Anal lobe
    Startabellum

  • Paul backers have responded aggressively

    No kidding. Check out this survey from WorldNetDaily, posted at Pandagon:

    http://pandagon.net/2007/05/17/humility/

    Of course, you get similarly skewed results on DailyKos, where John Edwards is the front-runner and Hillary Clinton is between “Anybody Else” and Mike Gravel.

  • Al Gore keeps going out of his way to make statements that initially seem unambiguous, only to end them with a question mark. I am a huge Gore fan and my vote is his for the asking, but I am starting to run out of patience with this approach.

  • I think that the political establishment as well as major news corporations are actively attempting to suppress the Ron Paul 2008 campaign because of his criticism of the government’s official account of 9/11.

    “…we see the investigations that have been done so far as more or less cover-up and no real explanation of what went on.”

  • I think Gore just enjoys flirting with those who are infatuated with him. My guess is he’ll never be serious (my hope as well). He may have rehabilitated himself in many eyes, but he and Tipper still held the PMRC hearings, he still blew the 2000 election by being so overly cute and trying to cherrypick Florida counties to recount instead of just asking for a statewide recount and, never forget, he thought Censorin’ Joe Lieberman would make a great vice president.

  • Those are extremely valid points, Edward. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if Al would either say “I am running” or “I will decide by such-and-such a date,” in which case we could have an intelligent discussion about just how important those points still are; or else say “I am not running, period, end of story, no cute loopholes in case I change my mind later” at which point we could set all that aside for the time.

  • ***I’m not convinced the presidency is the highest and best role I could play.***

    I propose that we make Gore our Environment Tsar (and I’m not falling for the Bushylvanian spelling of “czar” any more, either). After all, he’s probably the only guy who could honestly represent an American involvement in jump-starting the Kyoto. Give him a super-secretary portfolio that contains Agriculture, Interior, EPA—a few other things will come to mind as the day wears on—and then give him free reign (and some heavyweight authority) to open a can of whoop-a$$ on folks.

    Be afraid, Exxon—be very afraid….

  • Noonan’s right about Thompson – his campaign, since it is a fantasy and not an actual campaign involving seriously addressing real issues, is aimed directly at the pleasure centers of Republican brains. They LOVE being in a fantasy world, being able to project their own aspirations and beliefs onto others, and Thompson, by virtue of his blank-ness, is perfect for them. Most members of the hard-core GOP base would rather live in their individual pretend universes, and the problem with the real candidates is they don’t always inhabit the same pretend universe.

    The imaginary potential that is Thompson is so much better than the actual 10 fascist dwarves that were on the stage the other night. And he seemed so strong in Hunt for Red October!

  • The Republican party needs another Ronald Reagan, a common sense communicator, and Fred Thompson fits the bill. Look for a June announcement that FDT is entering the race.

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