RobertEmmet

RobertEmmet wishes Ted Kennedy a speedy and complete recovery, and sends our love to the missus.

By John Aloysius Farrell

Good. Now do it again tomorrow, and for the next 150 days.

By Robert Schlesinger

So if we take George W. Bush at his word that he wasn’t talking about Barack Obama … who was he talking about? If he wasn’t trying to distort Obama’s policies, who is the real-world person or people who want to negotiate with terrorists?

UPDATE: Apparently the answer to my question is: Jimmy Carter. Wow, the Bushies really cranked up the wayback machine to bring him into the debate. What’s next? Criticizing Truman for loss of China?

By Robert Schlesinger

Jamie Rubin has a devastating column on McCain’s ideological contortions in today’s Washington Post, recalling when McCain had no problem with talking to Hamas. The critical point is indicated below, thanks to TPM.

By John Aloysius Farrell

Let’s pretend that, in the middle of the Irish peace process, Bill Clinton gave a speech in Belfast and used the dramatic moment and the prestige of the presidency to attack Bob Dole.

As an Irish-American, I would have been angry that Clinton was crudely exploiting Ireland’s pain for votes; worried that the Catholic and Protestant rivals of Northern Ireland would walk away from what now had been revealed as an obviously insincere U.S. involvement in their affairs, and furious because what should have been an American cause had, by the president’s deliberate action, been reduced to one more divisive, partisan football.

It is an incomplete analogy, because what George W. Bush did yesterday was worse. He chose to misuse a happy occasion - a speech to the Knesset on the occasion of Israel’s 60th birthday - with a speech that, aside from lacking class and insulting his hosts, hurts Israel.

Let’s leave aside the president’s dumb claim that talking with enemies is appeasement. I will let the brave and brilliant diplomatic strokes of Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan and Menachem Begin speak for themselves.

The defense of Israel is an American cause. Not a Democratic cause. Not a Republicans cause. Israel is stronger when all Americans are united in its support.

Instead of uniting, George W. Bush reverted to form yesterday. He did what he knows best, and sought to divide America for political gain.

As an American who has spent many happy times in Israel, I regret what Bush did. If I were an Israeli, or an American Jew, I would be furious.

By Robert Schlesinger

I tore into McCain pretty well for his judicial philosophy speech, which frankly put Bob Dole into my mind circa 1996 when he was wandering around from conservative interest group to conservative interest group saying all the required things.

Today he said this:

The powers of the presidency are rightly checked by the other branches of government, and I will not attempt to acquire powers our founders saw fit to grant Congress. I will exercise my veto if I believe legislation passed by Congress is not in the nation’s best interests, but I will not subvert the purpose of legislation I have signed by making statements that indicate I will enforce only the parts of it I like. I will respect the responsibilities the Constitution and the American people have granted Congress, and will, as I often have in the past, work with anyone of either party to get things done for our country.

Amen, brother McCain. Obama, where do you stand on this issue?

By Robert Schlesinger

This had me howling and hand-clapping to the point where co-workers asked me what was so funny:

No appeasement here, in any case.

By Robert Schlesinger

Did I watch the same John McCain speech as everyone else today?

The bloviators — and even my esteemed colleague — heard McCain’s speech as being a walk-back from his promise to stay in Iraq for 100 years. I didn’t hear anything today that contradicted his dream of a century in Iraq.

Keep reading →

By John Aloysius Farrell

Obambi better get his head in the presidential race. And fast. The Democrats got killed today.

In a three-pronged assault President Bush compared Obama to Neville Chamberlain; John McCain announced his hopes to get troops out of Iraq by the end of his term as president, and the Tennessee state party produced a video attacking Michelle Obama.

Not a bad trifecta. McCain makes a bid to independent voters, assuring them that he’s not going to stay in Iraq for a hundred years. Bush reminds the Republican faithful, and Jewish voters, that Obama wants to play cozy with Iran. And they both leave it to the state parties to take the low road.

In Tennessee, the party of family values showed its continued willingness to go after the Democratic presidential candidate by attacking the mother of his children, in this case for being insufficiently patriotic. Of the last four potential Democratic First Ladies, only Tipper Gore has not been targeted - though the kneecapping of Mrs. Obama is still stunning in how early, and blatantly, it occurred.

If I were the Democrats, I would have the Arizona Democratic Party produce a video accusing Cindy McCain of being a demented drug addict, and asking why she refuses to disclose her finances, and show it once at a press conference - if only to make the point that both sides can play dirty, and that McCain would be wise to rein in his dogs.

And then of course there was the California Supreme Court, which just revived the gay marriage issue, in time for the 2008 election.

If this keeps up, Obama will be lucky to carry Illinois.

By Robert Schlesinger

My quick-hit thoughts for this Monday morning are that I’m surprised to learn that Hillary Clinton’s Ohio victory margin was actually not double-digits and that while the NYT’s Karl Rove story was interesting, the reporters not surprisingly miss much of the history (as I relate it in White House Ghosts).