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31
3DHS / Hillary Should Get Out Now
« on: February 24, 2008, 02:11:21 PM »
Hillary Should Get Out Now
Clinton has only one shot?for Obama to trip up so badly that he disqualifies himself.

By Jonathan Alter
NEWSWEEK
Updated: 1:39 PM ET Feb 23, 2008
If Hillary Clinton wanted a graceful exit, she'd drop out now?before the March 4 Texas and Ohio primaries?and endorse Barack Obama. This would be terrible for people like me who have been dreaming of a brokered convention for decades. For selfish reasons, I want the story to stay compelling for as long as possible, which means I'm hoping for a battle into June for every last delegate and a bloody floor fight in late August in Denver. But to withdraw this week would be the best thing imaginable for Hillary's political career. She won't, of course, and for reasons that help explain why she's in so much trouble in the first place.

Withdrawing would be stupid if Hillary had a reasonable chance to win the nomination, but she doesn't. To win, she would have to do more than reverse the tide in Texas and Ohio, where polls show Obama already even or closing fast. She would have to hold off his surge, then establish her own powerful momentum within three or four days. Without a victory of 20 points or more in both states, the delegate math is forbidding. In Pennsylvania, which votes on April 22, the Clinton campaign did not even file full delegate slates. That's how sure they were of putting Obama away on Super Tuesday.

The much-ballyhooed race for superdelegates is now nearly irrelevant. Some will be needed in Denver to put Obama over the top, just as Walter Mondale had to round up a couple dozen in 1984. But these party leaders won't determine the result. At the Austin, Texas, debate last week, Hillary agreed that the process would "sort itself out" so that the will of the people would not be reversed by superdelegates. Obama has a commanding 159 lead in pledged delegates and a lead of 925,000 in the popular vote (excluding Michigan and Florida, where neither campaigned). Closing that gap would require Hillary to win all the remaining contests by crushing margins. Any takers on her chances of doing so in, say, Mississippi and North Carolina, where African-Americans play a big role?

The pundit class hasn't been quicker to point all this out because of what happened in New Hampshire. A lot of us looked foolish by all but writing Hillary off when she lost the Iowa caucuses. As we should have known, stuff happens in politics. But that was early. The stuff that would have to happen now would be on a different order of magnitude. It's time to stop overlearning the lesson of New Hampshire.

Hillary has only one shot?for Obama to trip up so badly that he disqualifies himself. Nothing in the last 14 months suggests he will. He has made plenty of small mistakes, but we're past the point where a "likable enough" comment will turn the tide. When Obama bragged in the Austin debate about how "good" his speeches were, the boast barely registered. He has brought up his game so sharply that even a head cold and losing the health-care portion of the debate on points did nothing to derail him. Hillary's Hail Mary pass?that Obama is a plagiarist?was incomplete.

So if the Clintonites were assessing with a cold eye, they would know that the odds of Hillary's looking bad on March 4 are high. Even Bill Clinton said last week that Texas and Ohio are must-win states. If she wants to stay in anyway, one way to go is to play through to June so as to give as many people as possible a chance to express their support. While this would be contrary to the long-stated wish of many Democrats (including the Clintons) to avoid a long, divisive primary season, it's perfectly defensible.

But imagine if, instead of waiting to be marginalized or forced out, Hillary decided to defy the stereotype we have of her family? Imagine if she drew a distinction between "never quit" as it applies to fighting Kenneth Starr and the Republicans on the one hand, and fellow Democrats on the other? Imagine if she had, well, the imagination for a breathtaking act of political theater that would make her seem the epitome of grace and class and party unity, setting herself up perfectly for 2012 if Obama loses?

The conventional view is that the Clintons approach power the way hard-core gun owners approach a weapon?they'll give it up only when it's wrenched from their cold, dead fingers. When I floated this idea of her quitting, Hillary aides scoffed that it would never happen. Their Pollyanna-ish assessment of the race offered a glimpse inside the bunker. These are the same loyalists who told Hillary that she was inevitable, that experience was a winning theme, that going negative in a nice state like Iowa would work, that all Super Tuesday caucus states could be written off. The Hillary who swallowed all that will never withdraw.

But in her beautiful closing answer in the Austin debate, I glimpsed a different, more genuine, almost valedictory Hillary Clinton. She talked about the real suffering of Americans and, echoing John Edwards, said, "Whatever happens, we'll be fine." She described what "an honor" it was to be in a campaign with Barack Obama, and seemed to mean it. The choice before her is to go down ugly with a serious risk of humiliation at the polls, or to go down classy, with a real chance of redemption. Why not the latter? Besides, it would wreck the spring of all her critics in the press. If she thinks of it that way, maybe it's not such an outlandish idea after all.

URL: http://www.newsweek.com/id/114725

32
3DHS / Ralph Nader enters presidential race
« on: February 24, 2008, 01:58:56 PM »
Ralph Nader enters presidential race

Story Highlights
"Dissent is the mother of ascent," Nader says in announcing his presidential run
Nader turns 74 this week
Obama on Nader: "He seems to have a pretty high opinion of his own work"

Nader: Political consultants "have really messed up Hillary Clinton's campaign"

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Ralph Nader is entering the presidential race as an independent, he announced Sunday, saying it is time for a "Jeffersonian revolution."

"In the last few years, big money and the closing down of Washington against citizen groups prevent us from trying to improve our country. And I want everybody to have the right and opportunity to improve their country," he told reporters after an appearance announcing his candidacy on NBC's "Meet the Press."

Asked why he should be president, the longtime consumer advocate said, "Because I got things done." He cited a 40-year record, which he said includes saving "millions of lives," bringing about stricter protection for food and water and fighting corporate control over Washington.

This marks his fourth straight White House bid -- fifth if his 1992 write-in campaign is included.

Nader said Thomas Jefferson believed that "when you lose your government, you've got to go into the electoral arena."

"A Jeffersonian revolution is needed in this country," he said.

Nader told NBC that great changes in U.S. history have come "through little parties that never won any national election."

"Dissent is the mother of ascent," he said. "And in that context I've decided to run for president."

Nader, who turns 74 this week, complained about the "paralysis of the government," which he said is under the control of corporate executives and lobbyists.

Nader was criticized by some Democrats in 2000 for allegedly pulling away support from Democrat Al Gore and helping George Bush win the White House. Nader has long denied that portrayal of his candidacy.

Long-shot GOP contender Mike Huckabee said Nader's entry would probably help his party.

"I think it always would probably pull votes away from the Democrats and not the Republicans, so naturally, Republicans would welcome his entry into the race," Huckabee said Sunday on CNN.

But Nader -- citing the Republican Party's economic policies, the Iraq war, and other issues -- told NBC, "If the Democrats can't landslide the Republicans this year, they ought to just wrap up, close down, emerge in a different form."

Nader's entry into the race did not come as a surprise to political watchers.

On Sunday, Sen. Barack Obama criticized him. "My sense is that Mr. Nader is somebody who, if you don't listen and adopt all of his policies, thinks you're not substantive," Obama told reporters when asked about Nader's possible candidacy.

"He seems to have a pretty high opinion of his own work."

Obama said Nader "is a singular figure in American politics and has done as much as just about anyone for consumers."

"I don't mean to diminish that," he said. "There's a sense now that if someone's not hewing to the Ralph Nader agenda, he says they're lacking in some way."

Responding to those remarks during his "Meet the Press" interview, Nader encouraged people to look at his campaign Web site, votenader.org, which he said discusses issues important to Americans that Obama and Sen. John McCain "are not addressing."

Nader called Obama "a person of substance" and "the first liberal evangelist in a long time" who "has run a good tactical campaign." But he accused Obama of censoring "his better instincts" on divisive issues.

He also said political consultants "have really messed up Hillary Clinton's campaign."


Find this article at:
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/02/24/nader.politics/index.html 

33
3DHS / Clinton resolute but aides are wondering
« on: February 24, 2008, 12:42:23 AM »
Clinton soldiers on, horizon darkens
She's resolute, but the supreme confidence is missing now
By Patrick Healy
The New York Times
updated 8:26 p.m. ET, Sat., Feb. 23, 2008

To her longtime friends, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton sounds unusually philosophical on the phone these days. She rarely uses phrases like ?when I?m president? anymore. Somber at times, determined at others, she talks to aides and confidants about the importance of focusing on a good day?s work. No drapes are being measured in her mind?s eye, they say.

And Mrs. Clinton has begun thanking some of her major supporters for helping her run for the Democratic presidential nomination.

?When this is all over, I?m really looking forward to seeing you,? she told one of those supporters by phone the other day.

Mrs. Clinton has not given up, in her head or her heart, her quest to return to the White House, advisers say. But as resolute as she is, she no longer exudes the supreme confidence that was her trademark before the first defeat, in Iowa in January. And then there were more humbling blows, aides say: replacing her campaign manager on Feb. 10, then losing the Wisconsin primary and her hold on the women?s vote there last Tuesday.

Cold, hard political realism
If she is not temperamentally suited to reckon with the possibility of losing quite yet, advisers say, she is also a cold, hard realist about politics ? at some point, she is known to say, someone will win and someone will not.

?She has a real military discipline that, now that times are tough, has really kicked into gear,? said Judith Hope , a friend and informal adviser to Mrs. Clinton, and a former chairwoman of the New York State Democratic Party. ?When she?s on the road and someone has a negative news story, she says, ?I don?t want to hear it; I don?t need to hear it.? I think she wants to protect herself from that and stay focused.

?That said, she knows that there will be an end,? Ms. Hope said. ?She is a very smart woman.?

Over take-out meals and late-night drinks, some regrets and recriminations have set in, and top aides have begun to face up to the campaign?s possible end after the Texas and Ohio primaries on March 4. Engaging in hindsight, several advisers have now concluded that they were not smart to use former President Bill Clinton as much as they did, that ?his presence, aura and legacy caused national fatigue with the Clintons,? in the words of one senior adviser who spoke on condition of anonymity to assess the campaign candidly.

The campaign?s chief strategist, Mark Penn, and its communications director, Howard Wolfson , have expressed frustration with the difficulty of ?running against a phenomenon? in Senator Barack Obama ; their attacks have not stopped Mr. Obama from winning the last 11 contests. Some aides said Mr. Penn and the former campaign manager, Patti Solis Doyle, had conceived and executed a terribly flawed campaign, something Ms. Solis Doyle disputes. Both she and Mr. Penn have been especially criticized as not planning a political strategy to compete in the primaries after Feb. 5.

?I do believe we built a good organization ? 700 people, $100 million, nationwide offices, and a strong base of support and endorsements that helped us win big states like California and New Jersey,? Ms. Solis Doyle said in an interview. ?Every time people have written us off, like after Iowa, we?ve come back.?

Comeback less likely?
There is a widespread feeling among donors and some advisers, though, that a comeback this time may be improbable. Her advisers said internal polls showed a very tough race to win the Texas primary ? a contest that no less than Mr. Clinton has said is a ?must win.? And while advisers are drawing some hope from Mrs. Clinton?s indefatigable nature, some are burning out.


Morale is low. After 13 months of dawn-to-dark seven-day weeks, the staff is exhausted. Some have taken to going home early ? 9 p.m. ? turning off their BlackBerrys, and polishing off bottles of wine, several senior staff members said.

Some advisers have been heard yelling at close friends and colleagues. In a much-reported incident, Mr. Penn and the campaign advertising chief, Mandy Grunwald, had a screaming match over strategy recently that prompted another senior aide, Guy Cecil, to leave the room. ?I have work to do ? you?re acting like kids,? Mr. Cecil said, according to three people in the room.

Others have taken several days off, despite it being crunch time. Some have grown depressed, be it over Mr. Obama?s momentum, the attacks on the campaign?s management from outside critics or their view that the news media has been much rougher on Mrs. Clinton than on Mr. Obama.

And some of her major fund-raisers have begun playing down their roles, asking reporters to refer to them simply as ?donors,? to try to rein in their image as unfailingly loyal to the Clintons.


And yet, advisers say, the mood was even grimmer in early February, when the campaign was running out of money and the possibility of losing some major Feb. 5 primaries, like California and New Jersey, was unsettling Mrs. Clinton, of New York, and her aides. (She ended up winning those states.) The turbulence this time, some advisers say, has turned into greater focus and determination toward clear targets: the Ohio and Texas primaries.

In interviews with 15 aides and advisers to Mrs. Clinton, not a single one expressed any regrets that they were not working for Mr. Obama. Indeed, some aides said they were baffled that a candidate who had been in the United States Senate for only three years and was a state lawmaker in Illinois before that was now outpacing a seasoned figure like Mrs. Clinton. And to a person, these aides and advisers praised Mrs. Clinton and said that she had been a better candidate than her campaign strategy and operation reflected.

?Whatever frustrations she may have, or that exist with the campaign and the missteps, her commitment to our country and her reasons for running are her guiding force now,? said Robert Zimmerman, a Democratic national committeeman from New York and a major fund-raiser for the campaign.

?That doesn?t mean she?s too disciplined or without feeling ? it means just the opposite,? Mr. Zimmerman said. ?It means her beliefs speak to real faith and dedication.?

Avoiding pep talks
As part of that focus, Mrs. Clinton has avoided giving pep talks to her aides, because a pep talk might suggest that the campaign is heading in an irretrievable direction. Instead, as she always has, she talks to her aides on the trail and at headquarters about the tasks at hand, pursuing them in checklist fashion ?impressing some with her hardiness, while suggesting a joyless or workmanlike feel to others.

?We talked recently and she sounded totally resolute, totally in it until the end, and in typical style she just isn?t getting into regrets,? said Susan Thomases, an old friend of Mrs. Clinton and a former aide to Mr. Clinton. ?Hillary is not a fatalistic person ? this is no woe-is-me woman.?

Mrs. Clinton has, though, increasingly sought to keep her fate in perspective. In her debate in Texas on Thursday with Mr. Obama, she delivered what some viewers saw as a valedictory ? but what she said was a simple expression from the heart ? when she spoke warmly about the race and her rival.

?I am honored to be here with Barack Obama. I am absolutely honored,? she said. ?And you know, whatever happens, we?re going to be fine.?

She found herself explaining on Friday that the remark was not meant as some sort of farewell. Yet to some friends, she is in fact acting differently; to others, the situation has become simply heartbreaking. When Mr. Clinton said last week that his wife had to win in Texas and Ohio, it was not only the first public admission by a senior member of her circle that her candidacy was on the line, it was also a moment that deepened the feeling of shock felt by some of her supporters.

?A lot of her friends are just feeling, ?How could this be happening to her?? ? said James Carville , a friend of the Clintons and a former strategist to Mr. Clinton. ?It?s just hard to understand. She is a very sympathetic person. I hope it turns around for her.?

Trying for an upbeat mood
Through it all, Mrs. Clinton has not retreated into a shell. She asks her aides about their children, spouses and partners. She tries to keep the mood upbeat on the campaign plane, such as recently joking about how Ohio is so diverse that it sometimes feels like five different states. She looks and seems at her happiest after working rope lines and talking to people after round tables, hearing their stories and receiving hugs.

On occasion she has looked backward. The strategy hatched by her advisers, her husband and herself ? to run as an incumbent on a strength-and-experience message ? was clearly not enough to carry her for 13 months. (It did work well for a time, if polls were any measure.) But mostly she has tried to look forward, and has pointedly not talked to her staff about the notion that she might drop out someday.

?Hillary is incredibly tough ? she grew up with two brothers and a strong father in the Midwest, so she knows a challenge,? said Ms. Solis Doyle, the former campaign manager, who has worked for her on and off since 1991 until she was replaced this month. ?She has gone through so much, where someone like me would hide under the covers. But she gets up. She works. She tries.?

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23310755/

34
3DHS / Clinton rips Obama as primary campaign intensifies
« on: February 23, 2008, 11:48:36 PM »
Clinton rips Obama as primary campaign intensifies

CINCINNATI (AP) ? Hillary Rodham Clinton angrily accused her Democratic rival Saturday of deliberately misrepresenting her positions on NAFTA and health care in mass mailings to voters, adding, "Shame on you, Barack Obama."

VIDEO: Hillary angry over Obama's mailings
Clutching two of Obama campaign mailings in her hand for emphasis, the former first lady said, "enough with the speeches and the big rallies and then using tactics that are right out of Karl Rove's playbook."

Obama rejected Clinton's complaints a short while later as a political ploy. "These are accurate," he said of the mailings. He said Clinton supported NAFTA when it passed during her husband's administration and has herself said she may try to attach the wages of Americans who do not purchase health care under her proposal.

The long distance clash erupted as the two Democrats campaigned separately across Ohio, one of two big states with primaries on March 4.

Obama has won 11 straight primaries and caucuses, and some of Clinton's supporters have said she must win both Ohio and Texas next week to keep her hopes alive of winning the party nomination. Recent polls show Ohio is close, and Texas closer.

Clinton's frustration was evident as she criticized Obama in unusually strong terms ? a few days after ending a nationally televised debate by saying she was "honored to be here with" him in a historic race between a black man and a woman.

She said by his actions, Obama was giving "aid and comfort to the very special interests and their allies in the Republican Party who are against doing what we want to do for America. ...

"Meet me in Ohio," she said. "Let's have a debate about your tactics and your behavior in this campaign." The two are scheduled to debate next Tuesday in Cleveland.

Clinton's advisers have repeatedly criticized the Obama campaign's mailings, both of which went out in the last several days.

One says her plan for universal coverage would "force" everyone to purchase insurance even if they can't afford it. Her plan requires everyone to be covered, but it offers tax credits and other subsidies to make insurance more affordable.

Obama's plan does not include the so-called "individual mandate" for adults, and he has argued that people cannot be required to buy coverage if they can't afford it. He has said his first priority is bringing down costs.

The Illinois senator's plan does include a mandate requiring parents to buy health insurance to cover children.

The second mailing, on the North American Free Trade Agreement, quotes a 2006 Newsday article suggesting Clinton believed the agreement had been a "boon" to the economy. NAFTA and other trade agreements are extremely unpopular in Ohio, which has suffered an exodus of blue-collar jobs to other countries in part due to such agreements.

It's a particularly sensitive matter for Clinton, whose husband championed and pushed for passage of the agreement as president. She is counting on the support of white, working class voters in the state.

"I am fighting to change NAFTA," she insisted. "Neither of us were in the Senate when NAFTA passed. Neither voted one way or the other."

Clinton said Newsday had corrected the record about her views on the agreement. Indeed, the paper published a blog item earlier this month saying Obama's use of the word "boon" was unfair.

"Obama's use of the citation in this way does strike us as misleading," the paper said. "The quote marks make it look as if Hillary said "boon," not us. It's an example of the kind of slim reeds campaigns use to try to win an office."

Earlier, Newsday published an item saying the word "boon" had been the paper's "characterization of how we best understood her position on NAFTA, based on a review of past stories and her public statements."

As evidence of their concern about the issue, the Clinton campaign released two new ads in Ohio, including one featuring John Glenn ? a former astronaut and U.S. senator from Ohio for 24 years ? saying Clinton would fix trade agreements like NAFTA.

Clinton said she felt good about her prospects in Ohio and Texas but refused to say whether she needed to win both states to stay in the race.

"Let's let the people of Ohio vote. Let's actually have an election and then we can look at the results," she said.

 
Find this article at:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/election2008/2008-02-23-clinton-mailings_N.htm 

35
3DHS / U.S. reports violence decline in Iraq
« on: February 23, 2008, 11:46:29 PM »
U.S. reports violence decline in Iraq BAGHDAD (AP) ? Extremists fired an explosive barrage Saturday into Baghdad's heavily protected Green Zone, targeting the heart of America's diplomatic and military mission in Iraq.
The U.S. military said there were no injuries or damage from the early morning volley, which could be heard all around downtown Baghdad. The earth-jarring detonations, nearly 10 of them, even shook buildings across the Tigris River from capital's fortified core ? which house the U.S. embassy, military facilities and the Iraqi government.

The attack came shortly before Brig. Gen. Mike Milano, a top U.S. military official tasked with restoring security to Baghdad, said that nearly 80% of the capital's districts were now considered free of organized extremist activity.

The strikes were the most recent involving what Maj. Brad Leighton, a U.S. military spokesman, described as indirect fire ? the military's term for a rocket or mortar attack.

Similar volleys in the past week, including one against an Iraqi housing complex at Baghdad International Airport and its adjoining U.S. military base, killed "31 men, women and children," Milano said. He blamed the attacks on "al-Qaeda and Iranian-backed special groups."

Special groups is a term usually reserved for Shiite extremist groups that have broken away from radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army. Many are thought to be backed and trained by predominantly Shiite Iran.

In an upbeat assessment, Milano said a year-long operation by the U.S. military and Iraqi security forces to bring safety to the capital had improved the situation.

According to Milano, when the operation began only 20% of Baghdad's 479 districts ? known as mahallas ? were relatively free of organized violence.

"Today 78% of the mahallas are considered free of organized extremist activities," said Milano, who is the deputy commanding general of the U.S. Army's 4th Infantry Division.

He added that since June 2007 there had been a 75% decrease in attacks in Baghdad, a 90% decrease in civilian casualties, and an 85% decrease in murders.

"All these indicate to me an improved security situation," he said.

Baghdad, however, remains far from safe and the Iraqi military indefinitely banned all hand-pushed and horse-drawn carts from the streets on Baghdad. The decision came after a bomb hidden under a horse-drawn cart exploded in downtown Baghdad on Friday Feb. 22, killing three civilians.

The operation launched last February peaked in June 2007 with the deployment of thousands of extra troops to Baghdad and other parts of Iraq.

It was also bolstered by two other key elements. One was a decision by al-Sadr to declare a six-month cease-fire last August, and a plan funded by the American military to recruit and pay Sunni tribesmen and neighborhood groups to fight al-Qaeda in Iraq. The groups are often referred to as "Awakening Councils."

The U.S. military has reported a 60% overall drop in violence around Iraq since last June.

Milano said a decision Friday by al-Sadr to extend the cease-fire six more months was "welcome news."

But Milano added that "al-Qaeda in Iraq is still our number one enemy."

In the latest clashes with the group, Iraqi security forces reported killing 11 alleged al-Qaeda in Iraq members during operations just north of Baghdad on Friday and Saturday.

The first operation took place Saturday near the city of Tikrit, the hometown of former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, and killed eight members of al-Qaeda. Among those killed was a man identified as Abu Talha al-Arabi, a regional leader, the police said.

Police said two others were killed late Friday near the town of Samarra as they planted a roadside bomb, while an al-Qaeda area leader was killed Saturday near Samarra, 60 miles north of Baghdad.

According to Iraqi police, a suicide bomber killed the leader of one Awakening Council in Saqlawiyah, a town in Anbar province 45 miles west of Baghdad, and his bodyguard. Fallujah police identified him as Sheik Ibrahim Mutayri al-Mohamaday.

Separately, the head of the Iraqi Journalists Union was shot and wounded Saturday. Shihab al-Timimi was attacked by unidentified gunmen as he was being driven to an art gallery in Waziriya, near central Baghdad, police and union officials said. He had just left the nearby union headquarters.

AP Television News footage showed him with what appeared to be a gunshot wound to the chest and bandaged shoulders and arms. Al-Timimi, who is in his mid-70s, was elected president of the union in 2004. There was no immediate explanation for the attack.

Find this article at:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2008-02-23-saturday_N.htm 

36
3DHS / The 44th president's $4 trillion headache
« on: February 23, 2008, 12:16:35 PM »
The 44th president's $4 trillion headache
The candidates want to do things like reduce taxes and fix health care. But they'll have to deal with the cold realities of the federal budget.
By Jeanne Sahadi, CNNMoney.com senior writer
February 22 2008: 3:07 PM EST

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The presidential candidates all have big plans for their time in the White House. Reform health care. Reduce taxes. Close corporate loopholes. Encourage savings. The list goes on.

Like college graduates whose career choices may be limited by their student loan debt, however, the next president could be constrained by the federal budget.

According to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), the annual budget deficit will improve during the next president's four-year term and end in a surplus of $61 billion by 2013.

But that baselineprojection is based on financial assumptions that no one expects to pan out. Two of the biggest roadblocks threatening to upend budgetary nirvana: What to do about the looming expiration of tax cuts enacted in 2001 and 2003, and the growing cost of fixing - or nixing - the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT).

Depending on how you address them, those two factors alone could add close to $4 trillion to the federal budget deficit by 2018, according to estimates by the Tax Policy Center.

Add in the costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the growing costs of Medicare and Social Security, and you end up with something more like a budgetary nadir.

"A substantial reduction in the growth of spending, a significant increase in tax revenues relative to the size of the economy, or some combination of the two will be necessary to maintain the nation's long-term fiscal stability," the CBO warned in a recent report.

Deficit experts doubt that the candidates' plans will pare back the deficit.

"None of the candidates has any proposals that would lead us to believe they would cut the deficit," said Joshua Gordon, senior policy analyst at the Concord Coalition, a deficit watchdog group. They even may add to it, he said. "Their 'pay-fors' are much harder to do politically, and there are fewer of them."

Can they hold the line?

All of the candidates claim their proposals are fiscally responsible and, at the very least, will not add to the deficit.

Take Democratic frontrunner Barack Obama.

"Obama has committed to pay for anything he proposes in the campaign," said Austan Goolsbee, Obama's top economics adviser.

Goolsbee cited a list of revenue-generating and spending-cut measures that Obama supports. Among them: drawing down the war, letting tax cuts expire for high-income households, closing corporate loopholes and cracking down on tax havens.

"Qualitatively they may be right - but quantitatively, I don't know how they get the numbers," said Roberton Williams, principal research associate at the Tax Policy Center and the former deputy assistant director for tax analysis at the CBO.

For example, how much revenue would be generated by Obama's plan toclose corporate loopholes? Until the ink dries on any final measure approved by Congress, said Williams, "you can claim any number you want, but it's totally unproveable."

Extending the tax cuts

One of the main challenges facing the next president involves whether to extend a series of tax cuts set to expire in three years.

The leading candidates of both parties want to preserve the tax cuts to some extent. The Republicans want to extend all the cuts. According to the Tax Policy Center, that would reduce federal revenue by $2 trillion over 10 years.

The Democrats want to preserve them only for lower- and middle-income households. Obama and Hillary Clinton say they would let them expire for couples who make more than $250,000, a move they say will help pay for their new proposals. The Tax Policy Center says, however, that could reduce revenue by $783 billion compared to the CBO baseline, which assumes that all the tax cuts expire.

Gene Sperling, Clinton's economic adviser, contends the baseline is more formalistic than realistic.

"A lot of people who don't like the way the Bush tax cuts were passed still believe they're in the baseline," Sperling said. Democrats think that letting all the tax cuts sunset would be "too harsh on the middle class in a time of wage stagnation," he added.

On the Republican side, John McCain sees the cure for deficits on the spending side of the ledger, not the tax side.

"Sen. McCain believes that a comprehensive effort to target discretionary spending on genuine national needs in defense and non-defense areas, as well as comprehensive reform of the entitlements, can lead to a balanced budget," said his senior economic policy adviser, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, former director of the CBO.

Even with the tax cuts and AMT relief in 2007, the government still collected a higher-than-average amount of tax revenue and it usually spends more than it takes in, Holtz-Eakin explained. "So the tax system will support the typical revenue needs of the government."

AMT changes on tap

There's another political reality that the next president won't be able to ignore: providing permanent relief to most if not all taxpayers from the AMT - something that both Democrats and Republicans in Congress have said they want to do.

McCain has pledged to eliminate the AMT. Holtz-Eakin says such a move could be paid for by another of McCain's pledges - to eliminate earmarks. Earmarks are funds for lawmakers' special projects that may benefit only their constituencies.

Holtz-Eakin noted that the cost of the latest annual budget "patch" to fix the AMT was $60 billion, roughly the same as the amount assigned annually to earmarks by the CBO. He figures eliminating earmark funding could free up $650 billion over ten years and make up for lost revenue if the AMT iseliminated.

Even if every earmark dollar were cut - an unlikely scenario, experts say - the cost of AMT repeal could still trump the savings. The Tax Policy Center estimates that revenue will be reduced by roughly $880 billion over 10 years if Congress lets all the tax cuts sunset or $1.85 trillion if they extend them.

The cost would be somewhat less if the AMT was simply structured to protect middle-class taxpayers, which both Obama and Clinton favor.

Changes to the AMT, combined with extending the tax cuts, mean the next president will need to figure out whether and how to replace up to $4 trillion in revenue.

If the lost revenue is not replaced, the government will need to slash spending, raise taxes or borrow more since projections for the federal budget assume the AMT stays on the books as is and the tax cuts expire.

The political friction over which route to take will play a big part in shaping the next president's initiatives. Gordon of the Concord Coalition said it's not hard to find ways to balance the budget mathematically. But, he said, "it's hard politically."

Juicing the economy will come at a cost.

Find this article at:
http://money.cnn.com/2008/02/22/news/economy/candidates_deficit/index.htm?cnn=yes 
 

38
3DHS / The jihadis aren't going away
« on: February 20, 2008, 05:43:15 PM »
News flash: The jihadis aren't going away    
     
One of the popular topics of confrontation among this year's crop of presidential hopefuls is what to "do" about the war in Iraq, as if "war" was merely one option among many.

It's when pressed for alternative options that the candidates start stammering and seeking inventive ways to answer a different question instead.

There are two "options" being presented for consideration by the American electorate this year.

The first option is to remain on the battlefield until the other side is either killed, captured or has surrendered. That is generally the working plan on both sides when the war breaks out. (Neither side goes to war planning to lose.)

The second option, after the war has begun, is for one side to surrender and the other side to declare victory. It doesn't much matter what euphemisms are used to describe it. When you get into a fight and the other side didn't lose, it means that you did. Half a victory is equally half a defeat.

But for the sake of argument, let's pretend there is a way to withdraw from Iraq that doesn't involve decisively defeating the enemy. Call it "peace with honor" or "strategic redeployment" or whatever substitute for "surrender" suits you.

The problem with Option No. 3 is that it only counts if both sides agree to surrender at the same time. If the enemy isn't defeated, he remains the enemy. Many of those we've released from Gitmo to go home to their families have turned up later either being killed or captured after they returned to the battlefield.

It isn't like we should be surprised when the enemy doesn't quit and go home. What will he do without the infidel enemy to fight? Go back home and resume civilian life?

Maybe go to school on the Jihadi Bill? Get a good-paying factory job? Start a small IED manufacturing business? Vocational rehab?

Or just seek out a new battlefield?

The Jerusalem Post reported this week that a Palestinian Authority security official said thousands of jihadis poured into Gaza after Hamas blew up the border wall between Gaza and Egypt.

Most of the foreign fighters who entered Gaza, the paper reported, were fighters who had previously fled the fighting in Iraq.

This is something the advocates of Option 3 should note carefully. The jihadis fled Iraq in defeat. But not in terror. They didn't go back home to return to herding goats and chasing camels. They "fled" to the Gaza Strip, where they offered to join Hamas and Jihad Islami in the war against Israel.

"Hamas has turned the Gaza Strip into an international center for global jihad," said one official quoted by the Post. "Most of the men who entered the Gaza Strip through the breached border are now being trained in Hamas' camps and schools."

Another official quoted by the Post said, "They brought with them tons of explosives and various types of weapons, including anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles. ? What's happening in the Gaza Strip is very dangerous not only for Israel, but for many Palestinians as well."

If the jihadis that America's finest have defeated in Iraq simply packed up in search of a new, less defended battlefield, then where is the logic in assuming that they will go home and "tend goats" if we withdraw, albeit "honorably"?

If they run away from defeat simply to fight another day, why would they run away from victory, whether real or perceived?

If the jihadis think that we are on the run, both logic and the historic lessons about jihadist fighters teach that, rather than running "the other way," he will take off in hot pursuit of the one who "withdraws with honor."

And once we withdraw, the thousands of jihadist fighters, "with tons of explosives and various types of advanced missiles," that didn't "run" from Iraq to take advantage of the breach in Gaza's border will run to America's porous borders to fight us.

It is absolutely impossible to successfully protect ourselves from an enemy we don't understand. Americans have never misunderstood an enemy as much as the one who is now determined to destroy us.

Our common enemy is unlike any enemy ever faced by the modern Western world. We don't understand them because in the West our goals are primarily no longer religiously based.

Our goal is to die peacefully in our beds of old age with the least amount of personal sacrifice. Anything less than that is considered a tragedy. If one of our prominent congressmen stood up and said, "I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death," we would send him out for psychological evaluation. We just don't have any Patrick Henry's around any more.

However, our enemy's life-long goal, indeed his crowning achievement in this life, is to die in battle against the infidel. According to his religion, it is his only guarantee of Paradise. If we withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan, he will rush to our soil "to guarantee his Paradise" by dying in battle here.

To us, war is an evil that many Americans today do not believe is ever necessary. Virtually nothing is worth dying for to most Americans today.

To our enemy, jihad is a rare opportunity and death by jihad is a rare blessing to be sought after. And don't forget: His ultimate hope is spending eternity in Paradise with his own harem of 72 virgins. That's a powerful motivator for sex-starved young men.

So there aren't three options for the war in Iraq, no matter how hard the candidates try to convince the American public that there are.

The actual options are these: We can fight the enemy on his turf, or we can fight him on ours.

The perceived option of not fighting is an illusion. The jihadis aren't going to go away. Even if we do ? especially if we do!
 
http://hallindsey.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=245&Itemid=56

39
3DHS / Obama continues to chip away at Clinton's base
« on: February 20, 2008, 10:37:20 AM »
Analysis: Obama continues to chip away at Clinton's base

Story Highlights
Barack Obama wins Wisconsin, his ninth win in row over Hillary Clinton
Obama sways Clinton's base of blue-collar, older, working-class voters
Clinton hopes to make comeback next week in Ohio, Texas
John McCain wins Wisconsin, remaining Washington state delegates

By John Helton
CNN

(CNN) -- If Ohio and Texas weren't already must-win states for Sen. Hillary Clinton, they certainly are now.

Sen. Barack Obama continued his winning streak since Super Tuesday two weeks ago, picking up his ninth state in a row.

But as significant as Obama's accelerating momentum is how he is increasingly swaying voters that Clinton could count on at the beginning of February.

While Obama has been solidifying his base of younger, college-educated, higher-paid voters, he has steadily been chipping away Clinton's base of blue-collar, older, working-class voters.

On Tuesday, Obama captured 53 percent of Wisconsin's white voters compared to 41 percent on Super Tuesday. He won 48 percent of women in Wisconsin compared to 41 percent on Super Tuesday.

He increased his standing with white seniors by 8 points, from 31 percent to 39 percent since Super Tuesday. He split the non-college-graduate vote 50-50 with Clinton compared to getting 42 percent of it on Super Tuesday.Watch how Obama is swaying Clinton's core voters ?

Obama won almost half of the Catholic vote compared to a third of it two weeks ago, and he did the same thing with the rural vote.

He also seems to be taking the economy away from Clinton as an issue. He won 44 percent of those voters who said that was the most important issue for them on Super Tuesday, but he won 55 percent of those voters on Tuesday. Watch how exit polls favor Obama ?

Heading into Wisconsin, most thought the contest was a toss-up. Obama's sweeping win there Tuesday can't be encouraging for the Clinton camp heading into Ohio as there are a lot of similarities between the blue-collar, Rust Belt states.

If the demographic trends continue, it doesn't look good in Texas. Obama won the Latino vote in Maryland and Virginia last week, a segment of the electorate that was solidly in the Clinton camp at the beginning of the race.

Polls in Texas show the contest there being a dead heat, but they showed the same thing in Wisconsin.

Clinton's post-primary speech on Tuesday might be setting the tone for the next two weeks. She says Obama is offering rhetoric while she's offering solutions.

On Tuesday, she told a crowd in Ohio that the Democratic race is "about picking a president who relies not just on words, but on work."

Obama was also the focus of part of Republican Sen. John McCain's victory speech on Tuesday. While not mentioning Obama by name, he suggested the general election would be a choice between his experience and the "confused leadership of an inexperienced candidate."

McCain won the Republican primary in Wisconsin and the remaining half of Washington state's delegates in the primary. However, he still can't convince conservatives to line up behind his candidacy.

While McCain won convincingly over former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in Wisconsin, half of the voters in the state who called themselves "very conservative" favored Huckabee, compared to 40 percent for McCain.

McCain got half of the voters who characterized themselves as "somewhat conservative" and two-thirds of the voters who called themselves moderates.

In addition, while 76 percent of Republican voters said they would be satisfied with McCain as their party's nominee, 44 percent of them said he wasn't conservative enough.

 
Find this article at:
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/02/20/feb19.analysis/index.html 

40
3DHS / Sorry, MT
« on: February 19, 2008, 09:23:05 AM »
Fidel Castro Resigns Cuban Presidency
 
Feb 19, 6:52 AM (ET)

By ANITA SNOW
 

HAVANA (AP) - An ailing Fidel Castro resigned as Cuba's president Tuesday after nearly a half-century in power, saying he was retiring and will not accept a new term when the new parliament meets Sunday.

"I will not aspire to nor accept - I repeat, I will not aspire to nor accept - the post of President of the Council of State and Commander in Chief," read a letter signed by Castro published early Tuesday in the online edition of the Communist Party daily Granma.

The announcement effectively ends the rule of the 81-year-old Castro after almost 50 years, positioning his 76-year-old brother Raul for permanent succession to the presidency. Fidel Castro temporarily ceded his powers to his brother on July 31, 2006, when he announced that he had undergone intestinal surgery.

Since then, the elder Castro has not been seen in public, appearing only sporadically in official photographs and videotapes and publishing dense essays about mostly international themes as his younger brother has consolidated his rule.

A new National Assembly was elected in January, and will meet for the first time Sunday to pick the governing Council of State, including the presidency that Fidel Castro has held since the assembly's 1976 creation. Before 1976, Castro was president under a different government structure, and previously served as prime minister.

There had been wide speculation about whether Castro, Cuba's unchallenged leader since 1959, would continue as president.

"My wishes have always been to discharge my duties to my last breath. That's what I can offer," Castro wrote. But, he continued, "it would be a betrayal to my conscience to accept a responsibility requiring more mobility and dedication than I am physically able to offer. This I say devoid of all drama."

Castro said Cuban officials had wanted him to remain in power after his surgery. "It was an uncomfortable situation for me vis-a-vis an adversary that had done everything possible to get rid of me, and I felt reluctant to comply," he said in a reference to the United States.

The resignation opens the path for Raul Castro's succession to the presidency, and the full autonomy he has lacked in leading a caretaker government. The younger Castro has raised expectations among Cubans for modest economic and other reforms, stating last year that the country requires unspecified "structural changes" and acknowledging that government wages that average about $19 a month do not satisfy basic needs.

As first vice president of Cuba's Council of State, Raul Castro was his brother's constitutionally designated successor and appears to be a shoo-in for the presidential post when the council meets Sunday. More uncertain is who will be chosen as Raul's new successor, although 56-year-old council Vice President Carlos Lage, who is Cuba's de facto prime minister, is a strong possibility.

In the pre-dawn hours, most Cubans were unaware of Castro's message. Havana's streets were quiet, and there was not even any movement at several party-run neighborhood watch groups known as Revolutionary Defense Committees in Old Havana.

It wasn't until 5 a.m., several hours after Castro's message was posted on the Internet, that official radio began reading the missive to early risers across the island.

President Bush was notified of Castro's resignation by his national security adviser while traveling in Africa, Bush spokesman Gordon Johndroe said.

Castro rose to power on New Year's Day 1959 and reshaped Cuba into a communist state 90 miles from U.S. shores. The fiery guerrilla leader survived assassination attempts, a CIA-backed invasion and a missile crisis that brought the world to the brink of nuclear war. Ten U.S. administrations tried to topple him, most famously in the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion of 1961.

His ironclad rule ensured Cuba remained communist long after the breakup of the Soviet Union and the collapse of communism across Eastern Europe.

Monarchs excepted, Castro was the world's longest ruling head of state.

"The adversary to be defeated is extremely strong," Castro wrote Tuesday, referring to the United States. "However, we have been able to keep it at bay for half a century."

Raul Castro had long been his brother's designated successor. The longtime defense minister had been in his brother's rebel movements since 1953 and spent decades as No. 2 in Cuba's power structure.

The United States, bent on ensuring neither brother is in power, built a detailed plan in 2005 for American assistance to ensure a democratic transition on the island of 11.2 million people after Fidel Castro's death. But Cuban officials insisted there would be no transition, saying the island's socialist political and economic systems would outlive Castro.

Castro's supporters admired his ability to provide a high level of health care and education for citizens while remaining fully independent of the United States. His detractors called him a dictator whose totalitarian government systematically denied individual freedoms and civil liberties such as speech, movement and assembly.

The United States was the first country to recognize Castro after his guerrilla movement drove out then-President Fulgencio Batista in 1959. But the two countries soon clashed over Castro's increasingly radical path. Castro seized American property and businesses and invited Soviet aid.

On April 16, 1961, Castro declared his revolution to be socialist. A day later, he defeated the CIA-backed Bay of Pigs invasion.

The United States squeezed Cuba's economy and the CIA plotted to kill Castro. Undaunted, the Cuban president supplied troops and support to revolutionaries in Africa and Latin America.

Hostility over Cuba reached its peak on Oct. 22, 1962, when President Kennedy announced there were Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba. After a tense week of diplomacy, Soviet Premier Nikita S. Krushchev pulled out the weapons.

With the end of the Cold War in the early 1990s, Castro eventually made peace with many governments that once shunned him. Pope John Paul II visited the island in January 1998.

The loss of Soviet aid plunged Cuba into financial crisis, but the economy slowly recovered in the late 1990s with a tourism boom.

Castro later reasserted control over the economy, stifling the limited free enterprise tolerated during more difficult times.

Fidel Castro Ruz was born in eastern Cuba, where his Spanish immigrant father ran a prosperous plantation. His official birthday is Aug. 13, 1926, although some say he was born a year later.

He attended Roman Catholic schools and the University of Havana, where he received law and social science degrees.

Castro launched his revolutionary battle as a young man, organizing an unsuccessful July 26, 1953 attack on a military barracks in the eastern city of Santiago.

Later freed under a pardon, Castro went to Mexico and organized a rebel army that returned to Cuba and rallied support in the Sierra Maestra mountains. His rebels took power when Batista was forced to flee.

Entering Havana triumphantly, Castro declared: "Power does not interest me, and I will not take it."

A quiz: which one is Castro?



http://apnews.myway.com/article/20080219/D8UTC77G2.html


42
3DHS / Another Endorsement to Come?
« on: February 17, 2008, 11:22:06 PM »
Obama sneaks to N.C. to see Edwards

CHICAGO (AP) ? Barack Obama sneaked down to North Carolina Sunday and met with former rival John Edwards, who has yet to make an endorsement in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination.
Officials at North Carolina television station WTVD said they have video taken from a helicopter of Obama leaving Edwards' home in Chapel Hill. A producer said the station was "tipped off" about the meeting, but said the source was confidential.

The Obama campaign confirmed the meeting. Although reporters normally travel everywhere with Obama, he left them behind to fly down in secret from his hometown.

"Senator Obama visited this morning with John and Elizabeth Edwards at their home in Chapel Hill to discuss the state of the campaign and the pressing issues facing American families," said Obama spokesman Bill Burton. He would not comment on the possibility of an endorsement.

People close to the Edwardses, speaking privately, say they have been torn about whom to support. The former North Carolina senator is concerned that Obama may not be ready for the presidency and that his health care plan is inferior. But Edwards was highly critical of Clinton ? her policies, her ties to special interests and her character ? during his campaign, making it more difficult to support her now.

The couple has been impressed with Clinton, who has more effectively courted them since the 2004 vice presidential nominee dropped out, people who talk to the Edwardses say. Obama has been less attentive, they say, and some of those close to the Edwardses have been annoyed that Obama has continued to ridicule him for once saying his biggest weakness is that he has a powerful response to seeing pain in others.

Still, since Edwards has left the race, Obama often praises him in public. This week he told Wisconsin voters that Edwards will "be a major voice in the Democratic party for years to come, and I want him involved and partnering with me in moving this country forward."

None of the other former Democratic presidential candidates ? Chris Dodd, Joe Biden, Bill Richardson or Dennis Kucinich ? have endorsed Obama or Clinton, reflecting the party's split over who would be the best president.


 
Find this article at:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/election2008/2008-02-17-obama-edwards_N.htm?loc=interstitialskip 
 

44
3DHS / U.S. Resembling A 'Third-World Country'
« on: February 15, 2008, 08:42:13 PM »
Bloomberg Rips Government Over Failing Economy
NYC Mayor: U.S. Resembling A 'Third-World Country'

NEW YORK (CBS/AP) ― Mayor Michael Bloomberg has unleashed another flurry of jabs on Washington, ridiculing the federal government's rebate checks as being "like giving a drink to an alcoholic" on Thursday, and said the presidential candidates are looking for easy solutions to complex economic problems.

The billionaire and potential independent presidential candidate also said the nation "has a balance sheet that's starting to look more and more like a third-world country."

President Bush signed legislation Wednesday that will result in cash rebates ranging from $300 to $1,200 for more than 130 million people.

The federal checks are the centerpiece of the government's emergency effort to stimulate the economy, under the theory that most people will spend the money right away.

But Bloomberg does not believe it will do much good. And his harsh words at a news conference Thursday reflect the view among some of his associates that the country's economic woes present a unique opportunity for him to launch a third-party bid for the White House.

The theory among those urging him to run for president is that a businessman who rose from Wall Street to build his own financial information empire might be particularly appealing as the fiscal crisis worsens.

Publicly, Bloomberg says he is "not a candidate," and explained recently he is speaking out on national issues as part of an "experiment" to influence the dialogue in the race.

His tirade against the candidates and the economic stimulus package on Thursday began when he was asked how that experiment is going.

In his answer, he praised Democrat Barack Obama for the plan the Illinois senator outlined on Wednesday that would create a National Infrastructure Reinvestment Bank to rebuild highways, bridges, airports and other public projects. Obama projects it could generate nearly 2 million jobs.

Last month, Bloomberg and Govs. Arnold Schwarzenegger of California and Ed Rendell of Pennsylvania announced a coalition that would urge more investment in infrastructure.

"I don't know whether Senator Obama looked to see what I've been advocating, or not -- you'll have to ask him -- but he's doing the right thing," Bloomberg said.

But then the mayor went on to say that while the presidential candidates appear to be talking more about the economy now, they are looking for quick fixes to please voters instead of focusing on the roots of the problem.

"Nobody wants to sit there and say, 'Well there's no easy solution,"' Bloomberg said. "They want to send out a check to everybody to stimulate the economy. I suppose it won't hurt the economy but it's in many senses like giving a drink to an alcoholic."

A spokesman for the mayor said later that Bloomberg was trying to say Washington can't stop itself from spending, and was not insinuating that Americans who receive checks are part of the problem.

The mayor last month said the economic stimulus package was shortsighted, and presented his own views on where the federal government should be focusing its attention. Specifically, he said the government should adopt a capital budget to oversee long-term infrastructure spending, instead of the current year-to-year spending.

It should also offer financial counseling, modified loans, and in some cases, subsidized loans to homeowners who find themselves unable to afford their mortgages.

He says that the government should also think differently about immigration, and that bringing more workers in rather than keeping them out is the key to long term economic stability.

45
3DHS / Web site reveals speed traps
« on: February 15, 2008, 10:11:42 AM »
A new site allows users to see maps that reveal known speed traps:


see http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/tech/2008/02/14/johnson.or.speed.trap.website.katu

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