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07.23.08 -- 4:37PM // link | recommend (9)

TPMtv: Just a Matter of History

In the past week John McCain and his surrogates have done their best to focus the entire McCain-Obama debate on the question of which candidate was right about the troop surge in Iraq. So it was a little surprising to see McCain on the CBS Evening News last night get a basic historical fact about the surge so plainly wrong ...

High-res version at Veracifier.com.

Late Update: And if you do question McCain's version of history, all you're doing is trying to steal the credit the troops deserve, a McCain surrogate claims.

--Ben Craw

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07.23.08 -- 4:27PM // link | recommend (1)

The Secret to Obama's Success

M.J. Rosenberg: Turns out you're a better politician when you know what you're talking about.

--David Kurtz

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07.23.08 -- 2:19PM // link | recommend (11)

Rove: I Had Nothing to do with Siegelman!

TPMmuckraker has obtained written answers from Karl Rove to questions posed to him by Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) about the suspected politically-motivated prosecution of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman.

Says Rove repeatedly in response to a list of 14 questions from Smith, the ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee:

I have never communicated, either directly or indirectly, with Justice Department or Alabama officials about the investigation, indictment, potential prosecution, prosecution, conviction, or sentencing of Governor Siegelman, or about any other matter related to his case, nor have I asked any other individual to communicate about these matters on my behalf. I have never attempted, either directly or indirectly, to influence these matters.

Take a look.

--David Kurtz

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07.23.08 -- 1:05PM // link | recommend (60)

Halo

It's lucky for McCain that Barack Obama is the one with a hubris problem. Otherwise, this McCain poster in support of his campaign to be elected God might raise some eyebrows ...

--Josh Marshall

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07.23.08 -- 11:28AM // link | recommend (14)

Can You He'p a Bewildered Economist?

Dean Baker is looking for legitimate reasons for the federal government to bail out Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac shareholders.

--David Kurtz

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07.23.08 -- 10:30AM // link | recommend (21)

Deep, Deep in Denial

Fred Hiatt on Iraqis' thorough opposition to Obama's embrace of defeat.

In all candor, the Post's news reporting is so good. It must be an embarrassment for the reporters to have such a dead-ender running the editorial page. The tendentiousness, special pleading and denial now transcend farce. It's an embarrassment.

The reckless inexperience of Obama is now contained within the yawning gap between Obama's plan for 16th months and the Iraqis' plan for as long as 23 months.

--Josh Marshall

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07.23.08 -- 9:08AM // link | recommend (14)

Election Central Morning Roundup

When the Surge is all you got, as John McCain does, you stretch its time frame a bit to include as much good news as possible. (Next up: without the Surge, there would have been no polio vaccine!) That and the day's other political news in the TPM Election Central Morning Roundup.

--David Kurtz

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07.22.08 -- 11:23PM // link | recommend (33)

McCain loses Joe Klein.

--Josh Marshall

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07.22.08 -- 8:26PM // link | recommend (34)

That's The Ticket!

This a screen capture of the Times video on the Mitt-McCain rapprochement.

I think they should choose this as the official McCain-Romney campaign photograph.

--Josh Marshall

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07.22.08 -- 7:48PM // link | recommend (17)

TPMtv: A Chat With Gavin Newsom

We caught up with San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom at Netroots Nation, where he introduced the closing keynote speaker, environmental and social justice activist Van Jones. In a wide-ranging conversation, we talked about green policy measures he's implemented in his city, his possible candidacy for governor of California, and his wedding coming up this weekend ...

High-res version at Veracifier.com.

--David Kurtz

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07.22.08 -- 6:17PM // link | recommend (6)

The Big Sort

What happens to political minorities in communities with large political majorities?

According to author Bill Bishop, they shut up.

--David Kurtz

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07.22.08 -- 5:47PM // link | recommend (12)

White House Still Trying to Explain Away Maliki

The White House's reaction to Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's embrace of Sen. Barack Obama's 16-month withdrawal timetable is the like the five stages of grief.

When a guy you more or less install in power and keep there on a very short leash starts going off the reservation, you first claim there was some sort of translation error. Then you claim that what he says is not what he means. When he continues to reiterate the point, you assert that he knows not of what he speaks.

And when he becomes adamant on the point, you do what White House press secretary Dana Perino tried to do today, just pretend that nothing Maliki has said trumps the earlier joint statement issued by the U.S. and Iraqi governments last week: "It is no small thing for two leaders to issue a statement; it is one that was taken with care and with seriousness."

Fun times in the White House briefing room:

--David Kurtz

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07.22.08 -- 5:36PM // link | recommend (15)

Fascinating

Just to add more confirmation to the painfully obvious, it turns out that not only did Prime Minister Maliki say what he said. According to Der Spiegel, his office signed off on this specific quote before the article went to press. In other words, the entire misunderstanding, misstatement, mistranslation, miswhatever meme is utter nonsense. You knew that. But just to remove any doubt.

Also, as long as we're on the subject, and not to get too Frantz Fanon on anyone, but Sunday and Monday there was a meme circulating through a lot of the Maliki reportage that Maliki frequently misspeaks or says things that later need to be corrected. Well, sure. I guess that's one way of putting it. Maybe, this incident aside, Maliki is terribly gaffe-prone. Who knows? But this little circus puts that idea in a particular sort of light.

--Josh Marshall

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07.22.08 -- 5:08PM // link | recommend (12)

Bacillus Whinius Spreads

It appears that the whininess virus may be spreading out from the McCain campaign to various pro-McCain journalists. You may have noticed that Robert Novak caused a stir yesterday by floating word that the McCain campaign was on the brink of choosing a vice presidential nominee. Now Novak suspects that the McCain folks tricked him into floating the now-allegedly-bogus story to pull a little attention from the Eurasian Obamathon. And now Novak says bamboozling him for a few cheap news hits was "reprehensible" ...

--Josh Marshall

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07.22.08 -- 4:26PM // link | recommend (6)

Who's Actually Moving?

A number of readers flagged George Stephanopoulos' appearance on World News Tonight last night, in which he seemed to suggest that Obama had moved toward McCain's position on more troops for Afghanistan, when in fact as we all know it was McCain who last week changed positions and basically adopted the Obama policy prescription. Now I see that Media Matters is calling out ABC on it, too.

Maybe I come at this from a slightly different angle because the initial reports from readers were that Stephanopoulos claimed Obama had taken McCain's position on Afghanistan. So when I first saw the video myself, it fell short of being as egregious an error as I had expected:

It's a terribly awkward and essentially misleading construction that Stephanopoulos uses three times there to describe the Bush-McCain collapse on key policies toward Afghanistan, Iraq and Iran. But it's also clear that the underlying point he's trying to make is accurate: that so long as the lines between Obama and McCain are blurred, then McCain has lost what he believe to be his own signature issue.

Then again, maybe George is so brainwashed by GOP foreign policy dominance that he may simply think it's great for Obama that he's now in lockstep with the Republicans, even though the Republicans came to him.

--David Kurtz

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07.22.08 -- 4:19PM // link | recommend (42)

Bush's 12-Step Economic Analysis

The Houston Chronicle has posted some video by the local ABC affiliate down there from inside a fundraiser President Bush attended there last week. Apparently Bush asked that cameras be turned off before saying, "Wall Street got drunk ---that's one of the reasons I asked you to turn off the TV cameras --- it got drunk and now it's got a hangover." But not everyone turned off their cameras:

--David Kurtz

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07.22.08 -- 3:44PM // link | recommend (17)

GOP Throws Stone in Glass House

A minor GOP attack line of the day on Obama's Iraq trip fails under the weight of its own hypocrisy.

--David Kurtz

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07.22.08 -- 1:18PM // link | recommend (27)

Strategic Whining

From TPM Reader KB ...

Josh, I guess Phil Gramm was right. There are more than a few whiners in this country. Unfortunately for John McCain most of them seem to be working on his campaign. Right now his campaign's message seems to have devolved into a pathetic meta critique of the media. Are they running for the White House or for best commenter on Gawker? This focus on the media seems so pointless that, as an Obama supporter, I hope they stick with it to the neglect of a real message such as something on the economy, health care, border security, or anything that might actually move voters.

In truth, the nonsense is even thicker than KB can conjure. As you may know, the McCain campaign has just put out a web video called 'Obama Love' a mash-up of clips of various TV commentators gushing over Obama. But let's remember we've all seen the McCain Love video. It's called watching the last dozen years of political television. Indeed, the political press's reckless and giddy love for McCain is so universally acknowledged that McCain himself has often joked about the press as his "base." So what do we have here but a candidate who can't brook the idea of not campaigning on a wave of press adulation? And now he's framing his whole candidacy around a campaign of strategic whining about the claim that the political press is treating his younger opponent like he's been treated for over a decade. He's got the preening and envy of a sore losing runner-up for prom queen.

--Josh Marshall

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07.22.08 -- 1:13PM // link | recommend (29)

Hard to Overstate McCain Trainwreck

Josh and I were discussing a little while ago just how complete the Republican collapse on foreign policy has been in the short span of just a few weeks. It's remarkable and hard to think of any recent historical parallels.

The implications for John McCain are hard to overstate, and Matt Yglesias gets it just right:

[McCain had] spent, several weeks with the main theme of his campaign being, quite literally, to criticize Barack Obama for not having been physically present in Iraq recently. This (of course) got Obama to go to Iraq, thus setting up a dilemma. Either Obama would survey the "progress" in Iraq and change his position, thus making him a flip-flopper, or else he would refuse to change his position, thus making him obstinate and out of touch with reality.

But instead of either of those things happening, Obama went to Iraq and Iraqi leaders said he'd been right all along! That's about as close to "game, set, match" as you get in terms of real world events influencing your political campaign. What's more, given the domestic situation and John McCain's inability to talk about domestic issues persuasively, he can't afford to play for a draw on Iraq.

This is what happens when you build your entire campaign on the shifting sands of Iraq.

Late Update: Spencer Ackerman has more.

--David Kurtz

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07.22.08 -- 12:39PM // link | recommend (12)

Ohio All Over the Map

A new Rasmussen poll just out gives McCain a 10-point lead in the key swing state. But a PPP poll out yesterday gave Obama an 8-point lead.

--David Kurtz