Thursday’s Mini-Report

June 5, 2008

Today’s edition of quick hits.

* This is pretty huge: “The top military and civilian leaders of the U.S. Air Force will be fired Thursday after a critical report regarding the mistaken transport of nuclear-tipped missiles, military sources said. Defense Secretary Robert Gates will ask Chief of Staff Gen. T. Michael Moseley and Secretary Michael W. Wynne to resign after a report on the August flight in which a B-52 bomber crew mistakenly flew across the country with nuclear weapons, sources said.”

* Some very good advice: “Barack Obama said Thursday he’s in no rush to pick a vice presidential candidate, telling CNN ‘everybody needs to settle down’ and let the vetting process run its course.”

* McCain’s trip to Florida was marked by some very effective criticisms from the Obama campaign over his opposition to a National Catastrophic Insurance Fund (a big issue in the hurricane-targeted Sunshine State).

* I know Bristol, Va., is on the southern end of Appalachia, and Appalachia is Obama’s worst-performing region, but locals seemed pretty excited about seeing him this morning.

* Senate Republicans would rather “make political points” than debate how best to combat global warming. How do we know? Because they admit it in private memos.

* Typical: “As President Bush’s health chief, Tommy Thompson was criticized for not doing enough to help workers exposed to toxic debris from the Sept. 11 attacks at the World Trade Center. Now, a company he leads has won a $11 million contract to treat some of those workers who responded to New York’s ground zero.”

* Might Patrick Fitzgerald talk to Congress?

* Major Clinton backers are, not surprisingly, rallying behind Obama (including Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland, who’s bound to get some serious VP consideration).

* Looks like Sen. Robert Byrd is headed home from the hospital.

* I suspect veterans of the war in Iraq with PTSD would find recovery easier if they weren’t in barracks across the street from an Army infantry firing range. (thanks to reader K.Z.)

* VoteBoth really hasn’t formulated an effective strategy if Lanny Davis is joining the team.

* To add a coda to a story we’ve been following: “Two protesters who were inappropriately strip searched after protesting at a George W. Bush campaign rally in 2004 have been awarded $750,000. Alice McCabe and Christine Nelson had brought a civil suit related to their arrest and later strip search at the jail. An eight-member jury found Wednesday that the Secret Service took lawful action, but that a strip search at the Linn County Jail was not warranted because the women were being charged with a simple misdemeanor. McCabe was awarded $250,000 and Nelson $500,000. Charges against the women had already been dropped.” (thanks to B.D. )

* Wyden’s right; Rumsfeld should be held accountable.

* It’s a great logo, and some terrific branding, but for McCain to steal Obama’s stuff is just kind of cheap for a Republican presidential campaign.

* On a related note, I think the McCain campaign is taking “golf gear” a little too seriously.

* Why am I cautiously optimistic about Dems’ chances this year? Because: “Nobody under 40 really remembers it, but the recession around the middle of Reagan’s first term was really, really, really bad. It licked inflation, but at the cost of sky-high unemployment and the worst recession since the Great Depression. And even then the public’s view of their personal finances was rosier than it is now.”

Anything to add? Consider this an end-of-the-day open thread.

Why does Carly Fiorina’s head jerk around so much when she talks?

It’s a great logo, and some terrific branding,

But the old guy isn’t wearing a flag pin.

  • My fav stories du jour:

    Bush’s approval rating drops to ‘all-time low’ of 25 percent.

    In a CBS News poll released last night, President Bush’s approval rating dropped to just 25 percent, “an all-time low for him and among the lowest approval ratings ever recorded for a President.” At the same time, 67 percent said they disapprove of the job Bush is doing, “the highest such figure in CBS News polls since he assumed office.” Only Presidents Richard Nixon and Harry Truman have had lower approval ratings than Bush with 24 percent and 22 percent, respectively.

    And then theres:

    ‘American Idol’ too ‘embarrassed’ to have Bush on the show.

    In 2007, President Bush and his wife appeared on Fox’s “American Idol” and thanked viewers for helping to raise $70 million during the show’s charity special, “Idol Gives Back.” This year, however, the show’s producers didn’t want the President back because they were so disappointed in his efforts combating poverty. They eventually relented under pressure from the White House.

    Both are music to my ears! Sing with me now!

  • Evidently the firing of the USAF top guys was not about the nukes. Somethin’ else is goin’ on. Quoting Noah Schachtman (h/t Laura Rozen):

    Despite reports you may be reading elsewhere, this firing was not about nukes or missiles, well-placed sources say. “Far and away the biggest issue was the budget stuff, not the nuclear stuff. The UAV [unmanned aerial vehicle] fight, the F-22 deal… Gates really didn’t appreciate it,” one of those sources tells Danger Room. Now, with the botched missile and nuke shipments, “the SecDef [Secretary of Defense] has good cover to do something that suits him bureaucratically.”

    “The problem seems to be a philosophical difference between Gates and the USAF [U.S. Air Force], not anything to do with nuclear weapons,” another adds. And Moseley and Wynne may not be the last to go. Rumors are swirling of more top-level Air Force officers getting the axe. Stay tuned.

  • It’s a great logo, and some terrific branding, but for McCain to steal Obama’s stuff is just kind of cheap for a Republican presidential campaign.

    Actually, as I read it I think the design concept was to deliberately pick up his own branding to send their counter to his message. If so, it doesn’t seem like it was a very successful attempt from a communications standpoint, since it seems to have fostered confusion about whether he’s just copying. Might be a little clearer in context.

  • I think the design concept was to deliberately pick up his own branding

    Indeed, but it would only work if it … worked. Just one example of how bad this is: Notice how Obama’s stripes invite us to go off into the sunset together, while McCain’s track us straight off a cliff. Yikers.

  • Just a quick note to say that I’m glad I followed Steve back from Salon’s War Room after his all-too-brief time there… The current War Room is about as interesting as eating sand.

  • I suspect veterans of the war in Iraq with PTSD would find recovery easier if they weren’t in barracks across the street from an Army infantry firing range.

    I spoke to one my friends recently who’s back in Afghanistan. He was injured first time around and came home with that and nasty case of PTSD. He says he feels better there because you don’t have much time to think when things are exploding.

    So maybe bullet therapy works. Sure costs a lot less than real treatment.

  • Defense Secretary Robert Gates will ask Chief of Staff Gen. T. Michael Moseley and Secretary Michael W. Wynne to resign after a report on the August flight […] — CB

    If that had been the reason, heads would have rolled by September, not nearly a year later… Sorry. I’m not buying.

    * McCain’s trip to Florida was marked by some very effective criticisms from the Obama campaign over his opposition to a National Catastrophic Insurance Fund — CB

    The cheeseparing SOBs are only willing to fund *one* National Catastrophe — I-wreck.

    * It’s a great logo, and some terrific branding, but for McCain to steal Obama’s stuff is just kind of cheap for a Republican presidential campaign. — CB

    Jeeze, Benen… There’s no pleasing you, is there? You bitch about McCain being too close to Bush but, when he tries to cozy up to Obama, does that make you happy? No siree, it doesn’t; it’s still whine, whine, whine. And not even a mention of how cunningly McCain has taken that wimpy (dare I say: feminine?) “O” of Obama’s and gave it a more masculine look by squaring it. Shame on you!

  • re Manan @ 3 and the article on permanent bases in Iraq…

    The administration’s response seems to based on some sort of distinction between “permanent bases” and a security agreement with no endpoint… Did I miss something or is that how others read this too?

  • I wanted to share this, one of the funniest comments about McCain’s speech I’ve seen yet:

    By now, McCain’s “green speech” has been widely praised as one of the funniest half-hours of television since Arrested Development was canceled. The speech aimed to turn Obama’s “Change We Can Believe In” slogan into a surprise Mac Attack by inserting the words “That’s Not” at the beginning of it. As if this wasn’t exciting enough, McCain proceeded to deliver the speech with all the energy and eloquence of Frankenstein on barbiturates….

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/seth-grahamesmith/6-other-things-that-arent_b_105505.html

  • I have to give McCain credit for his hijacking of the “change” theme Obama has been running on for quite some time.

    I think Obama can actually use that in his advantage, by pointing out some of the ways that McCain is different from Bush and how that relates to ‘change’.

    McCain is a Vietnam veteran, while Bush went AWOL instead.
    McCain willingly served overseas in a war zone, while Bush had his family secure a plush/safe State side deployment.
    Bush was born and raised in an ‘elite/patrician family, while McCain married into an elite family
    Bush was an alcoholic and used drugs freely, while there isn’t any evidence McCain did abuse it.
    Bush was a ‘girlie-man” cheerleader in college, while McCain was a stubborn bully at the naval academy.
    Bush coasted through college as a C-student, while McCain graduated 5th to last in his class.
    and then there are the more recent differences in policy… all a matter of nuance, but easily dissproven.

  • I’m 36 and I *totally* remember how bad things got during the Reagan recession. My father had a successful business selling Ford literature out of our home at the time. We went from having phones ringing all the time and Post Office/UPS runs with both domestic and international packages every day…to dead silence and no packages being sent anywhere. If Dad hadn’t had a day job at GE, who knows what would have happened. People hoping to open their own little business, or who already have one, would do well to brush up on that bit of history and vote accordingly. As my 74 year old Mama says, Republicans have never done anything for the poor. Not then, not now, not EVER.

  • Post 12…

    Dat Afrikaans is bijna het zelfde als nederlands.

    “exxagerator” seems to be infected with a virus, each time I try to go to it, I get a message that says a malicious virus is trying to infiltrate my computer.

  • From the Observer article, I don’t understand this line: “President Bush wants to push it through by the end of next month so he can declare a military victory and claim his 2003 invasion has been vindicated.”

    How exactly does forcing your puppet Iraqi government to agree to an unending occupation constitute any kind of military victory? That doesn’t make sense on any level, even wingnuts aren’t stupid enough to believe that kind of spin.

  • So Lanny Davis is signing on to the effort to demand that Obama makes Hillary his VP?
    If there’s one person that Obama wants to hear from less than Hillary, I would imagine that it’s Davis (well, Geraldine Ferraro or Mark Penn perhaps).
    This is as misguided as:
    – hiring OJ as a fundraiser for a Home For Battered Women
    – employing Goebbels to lobby for a Holocaust museum
    – nominating Gonzales to the Supreme Court

  • What does the Fall have in store for us?

    The Republican National Committee appears ready to roll out the red carpet for Hillary Clinton supporters, over a newly-registered internet domain ClintonsForMcCain.com.

    Though the web address does not yet go anywhere, the RNC registered the domain name on May 15, according to whois data from the registrar Network Solutions. That was nine days after Clinton’s disappointing showing in the North Carolina primary, which prompted NBC’s Tim Russert to declare the race effectively over for Clinton.

    An e-mail to two RNC officials about their plans went unanswered Thursday.

  • Append a quote time:

    The speech aimed to turn Obama’s “Change We Can Believe In” slogan into a surprise Mac Attack by inserting the words “That’s Not” at the beginning of it. As if this wasn’t exciting enough, McCain proceeded to deliver the speech with all the energy and eloquence of Frankenstein on barbiturates and Viagra.

    Sorry.
    Just had to.
    How else can you explain that creepy ogling smile that appeared willy nilly?

  • 25. ROTFLMLiberalAO

    LOL!

    21. Shalimar

    How exactly does forcing your puppet Iraqi government to agree to an unending occupation constitute any kind of military victory?

    Well, it wouldn’t be a military victory but certainly would be an imperialistic victory. I see the Independent says the number of bases will be 50. The number keeps growing as time goes by… But I guess the administration thinks they’re needed to control Iran from closeby.

    Even if the Iraqis signed that agreement, it could probably be declared null and void once Bush et al have been convicted of war crimes for their the illegal invasion and occupation of a sovereign nation. But it would be better if they don’t, if they can still hold out until after the election. Obama and Congress MUST deal with the Bush administration admission that they lied about the intelligence “used” to justify the invasion, and it isn’t likely to include Bush’s agenda.

  • I lived in Bristol, VA for five years, and worked just across the state line in Bristol, TN. (They’re really two halves of the same city – the state line runs down the middle of the main street through town.) It’s a long way from anywhere – an interesting place indeed for Obama to kick off his general election campaign.

    If he can get votes down in that corner of Virginia, he can win this thing going away.

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