Tag: TNR

Vicki don’t lose that number.

“Early in Senator John McCain’s first run for the White House eight years ago, waves of anxiety swept through his small circle of advisers. A female lobbyist had been turning up with him at fund-raisers, visiting his offices and accompanying him on a client’s corporate jet. Convinced the relationship had become romantic, some of his top advisers intervened to protect the candidate from himself — instructing staff members to block the woman’s access, privately warning her away and repeatedly confronting him, several people involved in the campaign said on the condition of anonymity.“

Remember the hubbub back in December over a spiked NYT story about John McCain and some lobbyist shenanigans? Well, it finally dropped, and it involves possible favorable treatment for — and a possible romance with — a young female telecom lobbyist, Vicki Iseman (who, it must be said, looks eerily like Cindy McCain.) “In interviews, the two former associates said they joined in a series of confrontations with Mr. McCain, warning him that he was risking his campaign and career. Both said Mr. McCain acknowledged behaving inappropriately and pledged to keep his distance from Ms. Iseman.” So there’s definitely smoke, but is there fire? This story doesn’t quite stick the landing on either the romance (both parties deny it, although they did seem to spend some time together) or the lobbyist favors (it does mention McCain urging the FCC in 1999 (before my time there) to back an Iseman client, Paxson Communications, at her request, and it rehashes McCain’s involvement with the Keating 5.) But perhaps there’s more to the story? If there isn’t, I don’t really see this having legs. Update: The WP follows up with their own version, which notes that Iseman used to tout her McCain connections to other lobbyists. Still no smoking gun, tho’.

Update: The McCain campaign has responded here, calling the piece a “hit and run smear campaign.” (This response, however, sidesteps the question of a possible affair. For what it’s worth, McCain has admitted to extramarital affairs during his first marriage. And, while he voted to convict Bill Clinton during the impeachment fiasco, he also said then that “I do not desire to sit in judgement of the President’s private misconduct. It is truly a matter for him and his family to resolve…I have done things in my private life that I am not proud of. I suspect many of us have.“)

Update 2: It looks like release of the NYT piece was prompted by a TNR story about the Grey Lady holding back, which [Updated] came out today. (Apparently, other news outlets have been chasing the story too.) In the meantime, we can content ourselves with a better documented, albeit less sexy, McCain scandal, namely his obvious gaming of the public financing system: “What we know is that McCain found a way to use the public funds as an insurance policy: If he did poorly, he would use public funds to pay off his loans. If he did well, he would have the advantage of unlimited spending. There’s a reason no one’s ever done anything like this. It makes a travesty of the choice inherent in voluntary public financing, between public funds and unlimited spending…Legal or not, it should bring to an end whatever tiny thread of credibility John McCain still has as a straight-talker or reformer of the political process.“

Wisconsin Battle Stations.

“Two senior Clinton advisers, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the race candidly, said the campaign feels the New York senator needs to quickly change the dynamic by forcing Obama into a poor debate performance, going negative or encouraging the media to attack Obama. They’re grasping at straws, but the advisers said they can’t see any other way that her campaign will be sustainable after losing 10 in a row.” Last night was grand, but there’ll be no resting on laurels just yet. The Clinton campaign redoubles its efforts in Wisconsin, putting out a new ad attacking Obama for the debate schedule. (Of course, allegations of debate-ducking is usually the last province of the also-ran. TNR, for example, dug up this campaign ad by NY Dem Jonathan Tasini attacking Sen. Clinton for…refusing to debate.) Update: A new Obama ad responds with class.

In the meantime, AP’s Ron Fournier argues that many of the superdelegates are more than ready to balk the Clintons: “Some are folks who owe the Clintons a favor but still feel betrayed or taken for granted. Could that be why Bill Richardson, a former U.N. secretary and energy secretary in the Clinton administration, refused to endorse her even after an angry call from the former president? ‘What,’ Bill Clinton reportedly asked Richardson, ‘isn’t two Cabinet posts enough?’“

But if not Richardson, what of Edwards? While Sen. Obama delves into rhetorical Edwards/Feingold country (in Sen. Feingold’s hometown of Janesville, WI, no less), ABC News suggests the Senator from North Carolina might be leaning towards endorsing Clinton at this point. That’d be a surprise, to say the least.

The Aloha of Obama.

Honolulu is no utopia; its socioeconomic climate is far from Edenic. However, Honolulu’s complexity and diversity are great gifts for a reflective future leader. To grow up in Hawaii is to see the United States from the inside and the outside. The inside view comes from pride in statehood and military tradition. Long before September 11, residents of Hawaii knew what foreign attack was like and valued American protection–Pearl Harbor remains a vital piece of Hawaiian history. The outside view of the United States comes from geographic distance. The Hawaiian islands stand as tiny meeting points for immigrants from Japan, China, Korea, the Philippines, and the far reaches of Polynesia. Hawaii is an outpost among many nations, not a state connected by highways to other states. As a meeting place, the islands are cosmopolitan. As an isolated island chain, the islands are also parochial. The haves in Hawaii travel and see the world. The have-nots, many of them native Hawaiians, lack the means to get away. To grow up in Hawaii is to envision the future of a multiracial society, and also to view up close the disappointment of those left behind.

In TNR, Allegra Goodman makes a case for the importance of Barack Obama’s Hawaiian youth. “To envision a world where racial identity is more fluid, where men and women are more mobile, and where segregation is a thing of the past is not to envision a post-racial world. Obama knows this, as anyone who has lived in Hawaii must.”

Foer the Republic.

Congrats to DC friend Franklin Foer, who was recently named to replace Peter Beinart at TNR. My advice to him would be much the same as Jack Shafer’s: “The New Republic needs revival, but Foer can’t hope to revive it by pleasing [owner Marty] Peretz.” With a long and illustrious history ranging back to Herbert Croly and Walters Lippmann and Weyl, TNR should be a flagship of progressivism, and so much more than just the “Joe Lieberman Weekly.” Godspeed, Frank.

The Bitter Fruits of Defeat.

Following up on a Franklin Foer TNR article I first saw over at Value Judgement, Hannah Rosin examines the plight of DC’s Deaniacs now that the party’s over. Although it wasn’t nearly as well reported, I remember a similar purge happening after Bill Bradley went down last cycle, and, trust me, they can get ugly. (But, at least last time, all was forgiven after Al Gore screwed up the general.)

Howard’s End?

So…New Hampshire has spoken, and John Kerry wins by 12 over fellow New Englander Howard Dean, Clark and Edwards tie for a distant third, and Lieberman falls to fifth. The game now shifts to the South and Midwest, including South Carolina.

Well, while it’s a bit off-putting to put this race in the fridge after only two states have spoken, I say it’s now definitely looking to be John Kerry’s year. That is, barring a strong showing by John Edwards on more favorable terrain, who has to win South Carolina convincingly next week to stay alive. As everyone’s known for months, Lieberman is clearly done, despite his ridiculous talk of a three-way tie for third in NH. (So much for the vote-swinging ability of the New Republic.) Wesley Clark may be able to pick up Oklahoma, but momentum counts for a lot, and he was fading fast all last week. So, barring something crazy happening, I’d say the general is also on his way out.

And Dean? Well, obviously he’s still got a large war chest and the frenzy of the Deaniacs to fall back on…but where does he go from here? The pre-NH polls have him dropping to fourth or fifth in every one of the polled February 3rd states, except New Mexico (and even that’s based on pre-Iowa numbers.) It’d be one thing if he had pulled closer to Kerry in New Hampshire, or even to within ten points, but a twelve-point loss is pretty decisive in terms of being a momentum-killer. (Consider in 2000 that Bradley got to within four points (52%-48%) of Gore in NH, something that was also spun by the pundit class as a “still-kicking” comeback after Iowa, and he got hammered in all 15 states the Tuesday next.) As Chris Suellentrop notes, Dean’s only hope may be to go “underground” for awhile, but it’s hard to see how a hail-mary play like that will have generated much mojo once the big states actually vote. It’s remarkable how Dean and Kerry switched places so quickly, but they did…and just as Kerry would be toast had he not won New Hampshire, the same now looks true for the governor of Vermont.

The Last Debate, the First Deserter, and the Primal Scream.

The Dems held one more for the road last night in New Hampshire and, given that a rather bland Kerry didn’t stumble, it’s starting to look dire for Dean, who was subdued and chagrined most of the evening and only now seems to be turning the corner on his Muskie Moment. Edwards did reasonably well despite invoking states’ rights (which never sounds good with a southern accent) to support his convoluted gay marriage position. And I actually liked Clark better than usual, and thought he handled his recent party switch as well as he could.

But, I have to say, I was extraordinarily irritated by the way the whole Dubya Deserter thing played out last night. First Peter Jennings tells Wesley Clark that Michael Moore’s deserter comment was “a reckless charge not supported by the facts” and asks him if it’d have been “a better example of ethical behavior” to contradict him. Clark doesn’t go either way on it, claiming not to know all the facts. (Which is lame — What’s the point of having a General in the running if he’s not going to call out Bush on exactly this question?) Then, once the show’s over, Fox News pulls out Team Bespectacled White Guys (Mort Kondracke and Fred Barnes), who both immediately argue that Clark irreparably damaged his candidacy by not refuting this baseless charge, yadda yadda yadda.

Um, am I missing something? It’s been substantiated quite well that Bush seems to have gone AWOL by the Boston Globe and others, and I’m not talking about the six or seven critical hours on September 11 when he was toodling around above the Heartland. While absence of evidence isn’t necessarily evidence of absence, Dubya seems to have disappeared from the Air National Guard for almost a year between 1972-73, conveniently right before a drug test (an offense for which he was grounded), and, to this day, he has never satisfactorily explained where he was. (In fact, as the Straight Dope notes, later reports in The New Republic (by Ryan Lizza, if I remember correctly) even cast doubt on the half-hearted “some recollection” explanation Dubya gave during the 2000 campaign. (By the way, this all happened several years after Bush scored in the underwhelming 25th percentile on the pilot’s aptitude portion of the entrance exam, thus having to rely on his congressman-daddy’s connections to jump the year-long waiting list for the Air National Guard in the first place.)

Does all of this prove beyond the shadow of a doubt that Dubya pulled a Cold Mountain? Well, no, but it’s definitely enough to suggest that Bush has some serious explaining to do. (And he revoked any “youthful indiscretion” type-defense when he began parading around in flight gear on the USS Lincoln.) So, I mean, c’mon, now, a baseless charge about Bush? At this point it seems more correct to say that the bases were “Bush-less.” Next thing you’ll know Fox News will be screaming at John Kerry for perpetuating the “vicious rumor” of Dubya’s DUI.

At any rate, regarding other matters, I didn’t see Diane Sawyer or Letterman last night so can’t ascertain how Dean damage control went there, but I did catch the Dallas-Laker game on TNT, and during Inside the NBA EJ, Kenny and Charles must have played the Dean Scream about thirty times…in fact Ernie had it connected to his desk button. “Nash kicks to Dirk, Dirk from the corner…YEEEEEAAAAGH! Sacramento’s up big in the third…YEEEEEAAAGH!” And so on, so on. Pretty much the first political content I’ve ever seen on the show, and, yeah, it was funny every time. Poor Dean.

Same Old Republic.

In another endorsement news, and in yet another sad reminder of how far the once-proud mag has fallen, the New Republic endorses Joe Lieberman. Basically, they feel he’s the best representative of the “hawkish liberalism” that should define the party, as evidenced by his continual support for Dubya’s Gulf War II. That’s bad enough, but you have to read the article to get a sense of how utterly ridiculous it all is. Exhibit A, the opening lines: “Recall for a moment the political climate in the United States in January 2001. Ralph Nader and the Supreme Court had made George W. Bush president.” (My italics.) Give it up, y’all. Or, here’s another, “Liberals resent Lieberman’s moralism. But what they see as sanctimony, many ordinary Americans see as overdue concern about the toxic influences that saturate their children’s lives.” They do? Really? Are these the same Americans who’ve made Joe Millionaire and The Simple Life hit shows? I like some of the writers on staff at TNR — some of ’em are even my friends from the DC days — but let’s face it, Marty Peretz and Peter Beinart are to Democratic Party politics what Stanley Kauffmann is to film: conservative, condescending, and hopelessly out of touch.