VP Friday

Today's mini-boomlet: Tim Kaine, who cancelled a town hall event Sunday night, while the Obama campaign scheduled an event in Richmond, VA for Thursday. Mini-mini for Wesley Clark, who appeared on CNN (but his son suggests he hasn't been vetted.) Armbinder mentions a focus group test in VA that didn't come out too good for Kaine, whatever that's worth.

My favorite is from the Swampland blog of Time, mostly because it contains a name I hadn't heard before, and somebody I know, an old college acquaintance, former Clinton chief of staff John Podesta. Based mostly on announced speaking gigs at the Dem Convention for Biden, Bayh, Sebelius, Janet Napolitano, Claire McCaskill, those remaining in the running are: Kaine, Dodd, Clark, Bloomberg (the Mayor of NYC I presume), Reed (who I thought took himself out of consideration), John Kerry, Sam Nunn, Chet Edwards (Pelosi's fave) and...John Podesta.

The convention speaker list means nothing, of course, and would be a fine way to deflect attention from the actual nominee. The only tea leaves I read in the convention is the roll call vote for Hillary Clinton--that pretty much tells you that she's getting that moment, but not another one, like the v.p. nod.

(Offically, the Obama campaign told the NY Times: “We reserve the right to change the schedule when we want and you shouldn’t make any assumptions,” she said. “Any person speaking on any given night could speak again as vice president.”)

Al G. at the Field discusses all this, and favors Kaine or Dodd. . Al puts more stock in the elimination potential of the speaker list than I do, but I tend to agree with him: out of this group of choices, Dodd or Kaine seem the best. Dodd for the "experience"/foreign policy and for championing civil liberties, and the white hair. Obama-Dodd is a good sounding, good looking ticket. The only thing the GOPers can bring up about Dodd that I know about is this question of an improper loan. Dodd has that New England thing going for him, the Kennedy thing, which can help with older voters.

Kaine is the "change" candidate, Catholic, speaks Spanish, VA Gov with midwestern accent, reinforces the Obama brand. I'm not sure he's an effective speaker, but he's good in interviews. He also can counter the Obama isn't American bullshit in an unusual way: their grandparents come from the same small town in Kansas.

The choice will tell us to some extent how worried the Obama campaign is about the "experience" mantra.

Al notes that two speaking slots haven't been announced: the person who places Obama's name in nomination, and the VP's. I'd expect the VP introducer won't be announced until the VP choice is, but unless Obama wants to go the traditional route and have his fellow Illinois Senator (Dick Durbin) nominate him, a really great choice would be Al Gore.

Barocky II---It's Great!

More VP

More microanalysis of announced speakers at the Dem Convention has put some doubt in the Biden boomlet today. However, a report somewhere suggested the Obama camp is looking favorably on the "experienced" option, so suddenly Tom Daschle is in the running.

On the "change" side, there's this tea-leaf reading saying it's Gov. Kaine.

But here's how the two arguments seem to be breaking down, with an additional wrinkle (according to...well, me.) The "go for experience" camp is providing names with lots of Washington baggage, but also people known mostly for experience in foreign affairs and national security. The "go for change" argument is for someone outside dysfunctional Washington, looking towards the future of the party, proven ability to work with Repubs and Independents and--here's the wrinkle--a governor with accomplishments on economic/energy issues.

That last wrinkle is not to be ignored. Because Obama's campaign has already moved its emphasis from Iraq and foreign affairs to energy/economics (as with the first Olympics ad) and economics/energy as part of that (second ad.) This is where Obama is strongest, and clearly it will be how he wins. He has to pin a bad economy on Bush and McBush, and add healthcare to the argument along with energy. From now to the election.

So what does Obama do--does he pick an "experience" foreign policy/national security old white guy VP to mollify those with doubts, so he is free to make the economics case himself? Or does he pick a "change" young or female governor who can make both the change politics and the economic/energy/health care case?

Obama is likely to announce his choice, they say, on Monday or Tuesday. Then and probably only then will we know. But I think the argument for the "change" VP candidate is strong, and Tim Kaine and Kathleen Sibelius are strong possibilities. Sibelius has the extra advantage of being from the (mid)west, where Dem gains are going to be made this year and for the forseeable future, and she has a compelling record, especially in getting GOPers on her side. Kaine is smart, articulate, much more compelling in action than in still photos, and though he is gov of an eastern/southern state, with a mixed record, it is Virginia, where Obama has a good chance to win (probably even without Kaine on the ticket, though.)

I am sympathetic to the "experience" option, and if there was a candidate identified that was convincing, I'd be happier. My instinct says not to get a Senator, and those are the only names mentioned. Bayh would be the worst choice of those mentioned a lot, and I think it would be a mistake.

Meanwhile, don't miss the Baracky II viral video above.

McCainonomics

VP Buzz

Today's Dem VP buzz is about Joe Biden, a perennial favorite at MSNBC, at least. But the one part of the buzz today that sounded like it could have substance is that Biden isn't saying anything. Biden not saying anything! Something is afoot!

The pluses with Biden are name recognition, an exciting personality, foreign policy experience, white hair. Obama-Biden is a good sounding ticket.

The minuses are potentially significant, though. Depending on the vetting, Biden's past associations with lobbyists, particularly for banks etc. (he's from Delaware, after all, the big bank HQ tax haven) could substantially undercut one of the Obama campaign's best arguments against McCain--Mc's lobbyist connections. Biden is old politics, Washington, and that also undercuts the new politics of Obama.

Another minus: the Senate. Even though Del has a dem gov, so the seat won't be lost in the short term, it's less certain long term. And besides, Biden's seniority and leadership in the Senate would be missed. The Dems are going to lose Obama and Leiberman. Depending on electoral outcomes, that can shave the majority President Obama will need.

Biden is East Coast as well as Washington. My instincts still tell me that Obama is looking to the Midwest or West, and he's better off with a Governor. But I'm of course not privvy to the vetting, or to internal polls which might indicate whether the experience and foreign policy arguments for McCain are significant problems. Even so, how much can a VP help? Cheney probably helped Shrub, but with people who wanted to vote for Shrub and were reassured by what appeared to be a rep of the GOPer foreign policy establishment. Is there a significant bloc of voters with similiar feelings about Obama? Clinton voters perhaps? Again, I can't gauge the reality of that.

Meanwhile, Huffpost has several posts about progressive pushback on the Evan Bayh boomlet, especially on his support for the Iraq War. Again, I say it ain't gonna happen.

President Bush at the Olympics, apparently in
his own mirror universe. Or is that a distress
signal?

Georgia Out of His Mind

The warfare in Georgia is a fast-moving story at the moment, but one part of it struck me immediately: President Bush condemning Russia for invading a sovereign country.

As well he should, but is anyone in Russia doing anything but laugh? Or anywhere else for that matter. Bush invaded a sovereign country, and has occupied it for years, and one of the motives--as apparently in Georgia--was oil. But with him as President, America's outrage is pathetic.

I heard someone on Charlie Rose say that this needs to bring western allies together. But do those allies trust Bush, after all the bullying he did over Iraq? With the support, if I remember correctly, of his pal Putin and Russia?

It may well be a dangerous moment, made more dangerous by this lame duck loser who did his best to screw America's future. We're only beginning to pay.

Celebrity McCain

How Lucky We Are (with updates)

Among the reasons I have increasing confidence in Barack Obama is that he seems to be lucky. FDR was lucky. Until the obvious moment he wasn't, JFK was lucky. Obama is very intelligent, in all kinds of ways: on policy, on vision, on strategy, and he's acute about himself--he's got more of an introspective side than most pols. He's a good manager with a very good eye for talent, and his team continues to perform very well. But he's also been lucky, which may be yet another way of saying, this is our moment, this is our time.

But at least a couple of events during the last few days have shown how lucky the Democrats are that he's their nominee. What if it had been John Edwards, and all this sordid news broke just as the convention was about to start? What if it had been Hillary Clinton, who could not run her own campaign, let alone the country?

That's the conclusion of Joshua Green in his article in the Atlantic about what went wrong with the Clinton campaign: " Above all, this irony emerges: Clinton ran on the basis of managerial competence—on her capacity, as she liked to put it, to “do the job from Day One.” In fact, she never behaved like a chief executive, and her own staff proved to be her Achilles’ heel. What is clear from the internal documents is that Clinton’s loss derived not from any specific decision she made but rather from the preponderance of the many she did not make. Her hesitancy and habit of avoiding hard choices exacted a price that eventually sank her chances at the presidency."

Green's article is informed by hundreds of emails and memos donated by still bitter Clinton staffers. You might notice that other still-bitter Clinton acolytes are still trying to force Obama into ceding his campaign to her, if not abdicating before it's too late. Which suggests that it's not just her non-management style, but her judgment of people she depends on. And sure enough, one of her faves, Howard the Wolf's Son, the wolfman of press relations, put out his spin on the Edwards awfulness, by asserting that if this had been revealed last year, before the Iowa caucus, Hillary would have gotten enough Edwards' votes to win, and hence would have won the nomination. Nobody is actually buying this, because the numbers don't support it, but that's the quality of advice Clinton got. (Even Chuck Schumer gives lousy advice.) And also where the loyalties of these folks still lie (other than to themselves.)

Meanwhile, the Obama campaign is following the same kind of strategy that won them the nomination: organizing and targeting messages at the local and state levels, looking to win electoral votes. This piece at Five Thirty Eight is about part of that strategy. Update: And this great idea: give cell phones to the people standing in line for Obama's acceptance speech, with lists of voters they can call! It's brilliant!

As for the broader strokes, maybe all Obama needs is a tie. He's got the more uplifting ad on the Olympics, while McCain's is deadly, mostly because it is one outright lie after another. Even the hot air networks have noted this, but if you're willing to engage in Big Lie politics, you're going to turn some people who aren't paying much attention, and are looking for a reason not to vote for the new/black/young/guy.

But McCain has to win some other blocs of voters besides racists, neocons and the clueless. But he's not doing it. As noted before, he's losing Latinos, Jewish voters, etc. He no longer has a lock on Evangelicals, who are tepid at best about him, and some of whom are voting for Obama--maybe as many as 40%. Update: Obama is actually ahead among Christians by 9 points, according to this poll, and McCain has only a slight lead among Evangelicals.

McCain's not even so popular with military veterans. Meanwhile, he's got to fend off charges about his campaign financing, Big Oil contributions and lobbying.

The next bit of campaign news is likely to be Obama's choice for VP. You may have heard that the Obama campaign is offering to email its supporters immediately once that decision is made. I'll be on that list, so if I'm anywhere near a computer, the news will be here when it breaks.

Fact Check

Get To Work! MoveOn's Latest

Break Time

So basically what happened the past week or so since Obama came back from overseas was this: the Obama campaign began to flesh out domestic policy, first on the economy and then on energy. Obama met with experts on the economy, made speeches, and set out his energy plan. The McCain campaign, seeing the schedule or intuiting it or just getting lucky, went on the attack while Obama was trying to stay positive, so he could answer the question of exactly what his domestic programs are, which the pundits used to say he needed to do, but when he did, they paid absolutely no attention.

So McShame launched one scurrilous and eventually racist attack after another, and that got all the hot air blowing. This week Obama went on the counter- attack, while still talking substance, and hit McCain for his triviality and lies, while the Obama ads hit hard at McCain as McBush. That will probably continue the rest of this week, until Obama goes on vacation Friday for a week. McCain has tried to return to the positive this week, and his pronouncements and appearances suggest that the best thing Obama can do right now is leave the stage to him, because what Obama needs is for people to pay more attention to McCain, and what an utter embarrassment he is.

I'm hoping to take a vacation from the politics, too, although I hope to continue posting at Dreaming Up Daily on the substance of the Obama energy plan, which is a really significant change of direction for this country, and a very necessary one.

But there is this VP thing going on, so who knows. The latest on that: Obama did not announce Bayh as his choice today, so he won't announce anything until after his break, and one story indicated that Hillary was back on the short list. Then Hillary announces that she's trying to figure out how to let her supporters have their say at the convention, like by placing her name in nomination after all. So that's the shortest stay on the short list in history. Obama would no more pick her than Joe Lieberman. Despite the joint statement just issued by Obama and Hillary saying they are working on the convention thing together.

There is this interesting piece about John Kerry as Obama's best surrogate, and Bob Shrum--not everybody's favorite consultant--saying that if Kerry hadn't run for the big chair in 04, he'd be hands down favorite for VP this year. And maybe...

As for McBush, the latest fave has been Pawlenty again, and then today Pawlenty goes and compliments Obama on running a positive campaign, and suggest GOPers do the same. So unless McCain is planning on switching the usual roles--having his VP be positive while he as the prez candidate becomes the attack dog--Pawlenty is a goner as well. Although to be fair at this same appearance, Pawletty showed himself to be just as capable as McCain at irrelevant negativity.

By the way, every major poll shows Obama holding his lead, and the race essentially unchanged since June. That's actually pretty good news for Obama, in that the GOPers haven't stuck on image on him before the convention, as they did on Kerry. People will start to pay more active attention with the VP selections and the conventions. There will be a period in early September that the polls will go nuts a few times, before settling down to say something useful. Then come the debates, and there will be 3 presidential ones, two sit downs and a town hall, with Jim Leher, Bob Sheiffer and Tom Brokaw moderating--a decent chance at substance. If Obama is leading in October, his superior ground game and the enthusiasm of his young supporters should do the rest. Game, set, match. Pass the lemonade.

Maverick Reality Check

The Oil Company Candidate

Who's Presumtuous Now?

First he couldn't win the votes of women. He's winning their votes handily. Then he had a Latino problem. He's winning by growing margins among Latinos in every poll. And a Jewish problem. He's running away with the Jewish vote. So then there was this problem with "hard-working Americans"--white ones anyway.

So today the Washington Post writes about their latest poll, in which Barack Obama leads John McCain among low-wage workers by a 2 to 1 margin. His support among African Americans is overwhelming--but so is his support among Latinos.

And guess what? He leads among white low-wage workers--by ten points.

So it has to be just because he's a Democrat, or because they like his programs and they're willing to overlook his "presumptuousness" and his arugula-eating, way too skinny self.

Because the pundits all tell us that they're suspicious of him, they don't think he is one of us/them. So that's it, right?

The Post:

"The group, which accounts for nearly a quarter of U.S. adults, gives the Democrat the nod both as the more empathetic candidate and as the one who more closely shares their values."

Huh? How can that be? They support him because he's the more empathetic candidate who SHARES THEIR VALUES?

Quick--get Chris Matthews and his August sub some smelling salts. Make sure Dana Milbanks is on his meds. And don't let the McCain smear machine hear about this!

I wouldn't expect much crow consumption, though. More along the lines of this marvellously dry observation in the Post story:

"Obama's standing with the white workers runs counter to an impression, dating from the primary season, that he struggles to attract support from that group. "

YA THINK?

McCain thought he had a real chance with Latinos, but he's been sadly mistaken. And now...McCain advisers have said for months that they think the Republican can win a significant share of those voters because of Obama's performance in the spring. The survey suggests it will be difficult, but not impossible, for McCain to increase his appeal."

Maybe he'd like to try some arugula?

Rumors and Update

The first new name with the smell of credibility surfaces today: McCain is reportedly considering a relatively unknown congressman, Eric Kantor for VP. He is a member of the GOPer House leadership though, plus he's young, conservative, Jewish and from Virginia. At first glance, he looks like the best of the choices McCain's reportedly been considering. His obscurity may even be an asset: McCain needs a fresh face, because his certainly isn't. Lots of pluses, no apparent drawbacks, which is more than can be said for the other names generally believed to be on McSame's list. As a conservative ideologue, he won't have trouble filling the attack dog role in a campaign that seems to be going all negative, all the time.

Update: Here's a more reliable link to the story on this in the LA Times.

Meanwhile, an incomplete schedule which has Obama in South Bend, Indiana for almost 24 hours is suggesting to some folks that he's about to announce Sen. Evan Bayh of Indiana as his VP choice. Some have speculated Obama might name his choice before his vacation to Hawaii during the Olympics, others figure he won't. I don't buy Bayh myself, but you knew that.

If McCain does pick Kantor, I think that puts more pressure on Obama to come up with an equally creative choice, and a strong one.

It's the 1st of August--Do You Know Where Your Candidate Is?

It's been a week of relentless attack by McCain and the GOPer chorus, as well as some members of the hot air media, and it ends with the Gallup tracking poll tied. So these are anxious times for Obama?

First of all, a video message that fellow contributors received today from the Obama campaign says that these attacks helped generate some 200,000 campaign contributions this week, and 100,000 yesterday alone, the last day of the month (on the last day of June, the Obama campaign took in almost as much as the McCain campaign did all month, perhaps in honor of my birthday, or maybe not.) A third of these contributors were new. Also during the month, Obama field offices opened all over the place, and after these attacks, volunteers were "pouring in."

As for the polls, the head-to-head national polls using whatever method still show Obama ahead, but the states are where the electoral votes are, and they look very good for Obama. Reviewing the most recent ones, FiveThirtyEight concluded: This is generally a pretty good set of polling for Barack Obama. Abstract these numbers for a moment. If you had told a Democrat a year ago that, on the last day of July, their candidate would be ahead in Ohio and Florida, well ahead in Pennsylvania , way ahead in California, tied in Montana, within single digits in a couple of states that went really red in 2000 and 2004, they'd be pretty thrilled with that set of polling."

Recall for a moment that John Kerry came with a few electoral votes of being elected President in 2004. The Gallup demographic data shows that Obama is scoring higher than Kerry in every demographic group, except that he's a few points behind in Democrats as a whole--he's winning them 80%-11%. Obama is now showing great strength in virtually every poll among Latinos--and that could be the ball game right there.

Speaking of the final score, Kos posted his monthly analysis, based on pollster.com aggregates of the polls of the month, and he calculates that Obama is winning 336 electoral votes to McCains 202. His June analysis showed Obama ahead 317 to 221. So Obama gained ground in July. The Obamagic number is 270.

Of course the race is still changing, but remember again: John Kerry was only a few electoral votes short--and factor this from Kos: Obama is winning all the Kerry states, most of them with bigger margins than Kerry won them. So Obama has a base of 210 safe votes. McCain has all of 72.

And we haven't had the conventions, we haven't had the debates, and the real ground game campaign is a month away from really beginning (although off the radar, the Obama army is registered voters all over the place.)

It's no time for complacency. But it's certainly no time for panic.

Convention news: Hillary Clinton will be the keynote speaker on Tuesday of convention week, and her name will not be entered in nomination.

Obama Responds

Polls, Veeps and Smears (with Updates)

Veeps first. I've just watched Tim Kaine being interviewed by Charlie Rose for 50 minutes, and I'm sold. I'd be very comfortable with him as Obama's VP. I think he'd add a lot to the dialogue, he's very positive, his vocabulary can connect with everybody--especially those much discussed white working men--he has a good grasp of Obama's vision and shares it, and he has a real presence in motion (as opposed to the still image.) He's fresh and refreshing, he talks sense and that's motivating. I think in his own quieter way he can bring some excitement to the ticket.

He's not likely to be the cliche of the attack dog VP, but the way McCain is going, what's there to attack? By attacking Obama so much so early--a smart strategy in some ways, for as Craig Crawford explained it Wednesday on Countdown, the McCain people want to burst the Obama balloon before they lose hold of it and it floats up, up and away--McCain is giving the Obama campaign ample opportunity to learn what works in defense. And they're starting to get good at it. Obama himself is calling McCain out, challenging him to articulate his positive vision---if he has one. Meanwhile, refutation of McCain lies seems to be working--but more on that in a minute.

As all this pertains to the VP, Obama doesn't need an attack dog, but maybe somebody like Kaine who can defend with a genial half smile and that great flat midwestern accent (for this Governor of Virginia is from Kansas City.) I don't much like the sound of Obama-Kaine, for several reasons (confusion with "McCain," the sound of it as one word and various associations) but if the campaign avoids using it as much as possible, looks to me like Kaine is a plus.

But for all the speculation, a NY Times piece indicates that the selection process is chugging along but not at the decision stage, and may not be for a few weeks. Their reporting shows that Obama hasn't yet become directly involved. Update: Chris C. of the WAPost agrees, saying that the list of names under consideration is still longer than generally believed.

On the GOPer front, I saw a fairly startling quote from Mitt Romney at the Political Wire, but no one else seems to have picked it up or read it the way I did--as a disavowal of interest in being McCain's VP. Meanwhile the debate goes on as to whether he'd be a plus or minus to McCain.

Which brings us to smears and lies. I'm trying to focus politics at this blog, but when this election has such a major impact on the future, I revert to posting about this stuff at Dreaming Up Daily, so there are pertinent posts about the latest round of McCain lies and negative ads here and here and here. What's been interesting about the lying doesn't care about the troops ad--which was directed at McCain's base: the media, since it has been played much more on the hot air networks for free than as a paid ad--is that while the bloviators, especially on cable, started by treating it as a false "controversy" the way they did the Swift Boat Liars in 2004, there was a backlash in the past couple of days thoroughly exposing the lies.

Partly that's because the facts were known to reporters traveling with Obama, and some of them took umbrage (although some at first simply allowed the lies and talked about how the Obama campaign should have handled the situation.) But part of the reason probably is that Obama enthusiasts aren't sitting still for it, whether on the blogosphere or in direct contact with networks and newspapers. Witness Wednesday's idiocy, when a Washington Post reporter (with a reputation for GOPer sympathies) took an Obama quote out of context to make it sound directly opposite to Obama's meaning. That inspired this call to let the Post know about it, and we'll see if that's also effective.

Update: Here is the revealing story of the campaign so far--David Kiley's column in Business Week (hat tip to Political Wire.) Kiley begins with a summary of the ad technique used by Faux News Hannity and political adsters of repeating a lie relentlessly until it becomes real in the political dialogue. He then turns to McCain. "I've written good things about McCain's ads in the past, and I expect I will again if they ever return to a level of at least being for grown-ups." But after reaffirming that the charges in the McCain ad on Obama not going to visit wounded soldiers in Germany were blatant lies, he reveals the other ad that the McCain people were preparing.

Recall that Obama ultimately decided not to visit that hospital after the Pentagon questioned whether bringing his military advisor would constitute a partisan campaign stop. Obama didn't want the visit to be politicized, and decided that it now would be, so rather than subject the troops and the hospitals to becoming political fodder, he didn't go.

Here then is what Kiley reveals: What the McCain campaign doesn’t want people to know, according to one GOP strategist I spoke with over the weekend, is that they had an ad script ready to go if Obama had visited the wounded troops saying that Obama was...wait for it...using wounded troops as campaign props. So, no matter which way Obama turned, McCain had an Obama bashing ad ready to launch. I guess that’s political hardball. But another word for it is the one word that most politicians are loathe to use about their opponents—a lie. End o update.

Is this this corporate media trying to fix the election, the result of a comfort level with the old buddy McCain over the new Obama and his new political team, or the frantic attempt to inject drama into an election that may be one-sided already? Well, it could be the first, but the second and third are sufficient. In any case, the controversy is more often about Obama than McCain. Tuesday's was: Sure Obama is leading in the polls and he has been for weeks (the recent Gallup poll showing McCain ahead has been pretty much discredited as using a lunatic likely voter model), but why can't Obama break 50%? Much bloviating on that matter, and then the CNN poll came out Thursday: Obama 51%, McCain 44%.

Today's blather was about Obama being presumptuous and arrogant (though that same poll showed the voters aren't buying it.) And supporting that was the misquote of something Obama has often said, that the campaign is not about him, he's just the symbol of the change America wants.

Some attention is being paid to McCain going relentlessly negative--even some GOPers aren't too pleased about it. But more apropos is Mark Green's focus in his piece titled "McCain's 1968 Heroism Can't Excuse His 2008 McCarthyism" : Pundits on the talks shows say that the '08 election is all about Barack Obama: Can he pass the commander-in-chief test and avoid gaffes and reassure white voters? The burden is always put on him. But another question is whether John McCain can pass the character test. So far, he's failing.

It's time that McCain's acolytes and the mainstream media stopped assuming that his extraordinary military service nearly 40 years ago gives him immunity to questions about being President today in a different century...Start with the truth that a maverick has morphed into a McCarthy -- and that the honorable McCain of 2000 wouldn't vote for the angry McCain of 2008.

Or wasn't eight years of a Liar-in-Chief enough?

Move On for Obama