Wednesday’s political round-up

August 1, 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:

* I plan to offer a more detailed report later, but the big campaign-related news of the day is a major national security speech from Barack Obama: “In a strikingly bold speech about terrorism scheduled for this morning, Democratic presidential candidate Illinois Sen. Barack Obama will call not only for a withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq, but a redeployment of troops into Afghanistan and even Pakistan — with or without the permission of Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf. ‘If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf won’t act, we will.'”

* Vanity Fair wrote a very unflattering piece about Rudy Giuliani’s third wife, Judith, which characterizes her as obsessed with power, ego, and social climbing. A reporter asked the former NYC mayor for a reaction to the piece, and he lashed out at the journalist for even asking. “One of the terrible prices that unfortunately families pay in a situation like this is that they get castigated and attacked,” Giuliani said, before adding, “And, usually, most reporters don’t even ask about it. They actually have more dignity than to ask about it.” (Note to reporters: he’s going to try to bully you into submission.)

* With less than two weeks to go before the closely-scrutinized Ames Straw Poll, Mitt Romney is launching a new ad in Iowa focused on immigration. “We should put in place an employment verification system,” Romney tells an audience member in a scene from one of his “Ask Mitt Anything” town hall meetings. “And then, when an employer is thinking of hiring someone, the federal database immediately tells them whether they’re available to be working or not. If they’re not, you can’t hire them.”

* The AP reported that John Edwards is going after Bush’s proposed sale of $20 billion worth of weapons to friendly Arab states, including Saudi Arabia. “Edwards said the United States should require the Saudi government to shut down the movement of terrorists across its borders, help stabilize the Iraqi government and participate more seriously in regional security before they are offered weapons.”

* “The California Republican Party is swimming in red ink” because “state campaign finance reports that were due by midnight Tuesday will show that the party has millions of dollars more in debt than money in the bank, according to party officials,” the Los Angeles Times reports. “The party’s dire financial situation has alarmed Republican activists, who worry that it will not have the resources needed to run an effective get-out-the-vote campaign in key congressional and legislative districts during the upcoming election.”

“One of the terrible prices that unfortunately families pay in a situation like this is that they get castigated and attacked,” –Rudolf “Hess” Giuliani

Thanks for standing up for the 9/11 Victims’ Family Members who are demanding a re-investigation of the events of 9/11, Hess. You might also want to explain to them why you did not evacuate the Twin Towers when you were “told that the World Trade Center was going to collapse.”

  • If you haven’t read the Vanity Fair piece on Judi G yet, you really should–not because of what it reveals about her, but because of how it reflects upon him.

    Giuliani’s a narcissistic scumbag. He asked a friend to lie about how the happy couple met, he lied to his own staff about who Judi was, his own kids don’t speak to him, and his greed evidently has no bounds.

    Like all of us who saw this bullying goon in action here in NYC, I’ve been waiting for him to blow up on the campaign trail–at a reporter, a questioner at a Town Hall meeting, anyone, everyone. If anyone in the campaign press has the guts to push this, they’ll bring him down. And it couldn’t happen to a more deserving sonuvabitch.

  • “We should put in place an employment verification system,” Romney

    i thought republicans were AGAINST big government.

  • “We should put in place an employment verification system,” Romney tells an audience member in a scene from one of his “Ask Mitt Anything” town hall meetings. “And then, when an employer is thinking of hiring someone, the federal database immediately tells them whether they’re available to be working or not. If they’re not, you can’t hire them.”

    Sounds like a stroke of Big Brother Genius from Clark Willard “Romney” Griswold. I can’t wait to get my mark of the beast from Mitler!

  • What “situation like this” is Rudy talking about? You mean, like, every time a man with multiple divorces and scandal about the transitions between marriages, and previous reports of discord with his children runs for President with an attitude that he has the right to tell others how to live? That situation?

    And just who created that “situation” again? Hmm?

    I think reporters keep from asking not out of ‘dignity’, but being unwilling to test their stomachs with the rank cesspool of Rudy’s home life.

  • “The party’s dire financial situation has alarmed Republican activists, who worry that it will not have the resources needed to run an effective get-out-the-vote campaign in key congressional and legislative districts during the upcoming election.”

    “…Hi, my name’s Biff, I’m with the California Republican party. Can you please loan me ten bucks so I can eat lunch? I’m starving, and I need to eat before I go out and campaign to defeat all the losers who are always looking for a handout….”

    Heh.

    I’m sure their problem has nothing to do with Bush and Iraq. Or Duke Cunningham and the other Republicrooks. And these are the people who think they can be trusted to figure out how to get our finances in order?

    It’s like putting Paris Hilton in charge of the liquor cabinet.

  • just bill – Republicans are against government that geets in the way of their making as much money as possible, especially if it helps them with one of their other goals – keeping the underclass at bay – but they are happy to call upon government to fan the flames of xenophobia and make sure their personal beliefs about sex and abortion are imposed upon as many people as possible.

  • Wow – I really should have previewed that comment of mine at #7.

    What I meant to say was they are against government that gets in the way of their making money, unless it helps with their other goal of keeping the underclass at bay.

    (Preview is my friend – especially when I am doing three things at the same time)

  • Edwards going after the Saudi arms deal is a good thing, but will it get any coverage in the press?

  • naschkatze

    Agree about arms deal.

    Will it get any press? Maybe if he shows some man-cleavage.

  • What is man-cleavage? If it involves man-breasts, yuck; if it’s something else, maybe I don’t want to know.

    He could always try really tight pants or a Speedo – that would probably do it.

  • The Friends of Fred Thompson IRS Form 8872 filed yesterday reported $74k in payroll expenditures and $35k in IRS payroll tax expenditures. That can’t be right – payroll is not taxed at a 47% rate.

    If the IRS payroll tax number is right, Thompson’s payroll was either $280k or $483k higher than reported, depending on whether Friends of Thompson was reporting just the employer portion or the employer and employee portion together.

    I wrote to Josh Marshall about this last night but I don’t know if he read my email. Someone should follow up on this question because it bears directly on Fred’s ability to finance his campaign at the rate he had been going in June.

  • Obama is trying to be against Iraq, while still looking tough. His proposed policy of rushing over the Pakistan border at will seems feasible (it’s not like they can stop us, and possibly they wouldn’t even learn about it in some areas), but it seems unwise. It could provide some benefits, but it builds up bad precedents and would definitely be a loser in the larger battle for hearts and minds. I don’t like it.

    What do other people think?

  • What is man-cleavage? He could always try really tight pants or a Speedo – that would probably do it. – Comment by Anne

    Very discerning, Anne, as usual. If I would have said “manly-cleavage” – that would best be accomplished by use of loose fitting jeans and a tool-belt.

  • Tell Mitt Romney “We don’t need another sticking data base!”

    We have: credit, driver’s license (REAL ID), cell-phone and email, library use/books purchased, pedophiles/sexual predators, NCIC, parolees, medical procedures**, terrorists, travelers’ watch-list, too-many-to-count intelligence dBs (most of whom seem to be illegal) – even truck drivers have the DAC, a credit-like report on every company s/he ever worked for! Only companies can ask for it, unless you’ve been turned down for a job because of DAC info; then you are entitled to “rebuttal”.
    Why do neocons think data-bases are the answer to everything? Perhaps they still believe they’re helping Santa Claus – or gawd:

    He sees you when you’re sleeping/He knows when you’re awake/He knows when you’ve been bad or good/So be good for goodness’ sake…

    **I recently saw a grief-counselor who never took notes. I asked her why. She said she didn’t like to put things in files, either on paper or electronically, saying she dreaded getting FBI “letters”. To her, what a patient said was totally confidential; she wanted to keep it that way.

  • Ohhh…that kind of cleavage…that would mean facing away from the audience, though, and that’s not usually a winning move…

    Can you believe it has come to this kind of thing?

  • Obama’s plan is workable—only so long as he takes into consideration that he’d be invading a sovereign nation with a viable nuclear deterrent. Other than that, it would be American troops going after the right target for once.

    I’d like to see Snowflake and shrill little man-cub at foxnoise spin THAT to the Right’s advantage….

  • Can you believe it has come to this kind of thing? – Comment by Anne

    It’s really sad. Maybe Edwards could try committing some kind of crime if the “sexy” angle doesn’t get notice. Oh, wait, that’s pretty much been saturated by the Repugnicants.

    Seriously, I think this is a good issue for Edwards to jump in the lead on. The Saudis a getting a pass on everything since 2000, and there’s lots of “sexy” news (in the sense we political junkies mean) in the underlying stories surrounding this issue. It reminds me a wee bit of the UAE ports flap, but much less jingoistic on the surface.

  • “That can’t be right – payroll is not taxed at a 47% rate. ”

    if you include both halves of the social security tax (15%) and a marginal federal rate of 28%, you get 43%. add in state taxes and unemployment taxes and 47% is not out of line.

    scary huh?

  • just bill, Thanks. I didn’t consider that withholding taxes were in the IRS payment.

  • Yep—Snowflake on the Obama speech, from an AP story:

    ***Said Bush spokesman Tony Snow: “Our approach to Pakistan is one that not only respects the sovereignty of Pakistan as a sovereign government, but is also designed to work in a way where we are working in cooperation with the local government.”***

    See? Iraq had no terrorists before we attacked, and we didn’t give a rat’s patootie about their sovereignty. Pakistan has thousands of terrorists in those mountains—but we’re supposed to “worry about sovereignty now.”

    Only in Bushylvania….

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