McCain’s Continuing Lobbyist Trouble

The Phil Gramm scandal deepens. Last week McCain’s top economic adviser was revealed to have been a corporate lobbyist for the Swiss Bank UBS to stop the Congress from passing bills which would have helped relieve the mortgage crisis. However, Newsweek is reporting that the bank is also being investigated for using overseas tax havens to help the wealthiest Americans hide their money and avoid paying their fair share. In addition to this, on September 20, 2001 the New York Times reported that Senator Gramm opposed legislation which would have helped the US government track financial networks, including “The bin Laden organization.” However, despite all of that Senator Gramm still supports his decision and was lobbying Congress to defend the use of tax havens until 2007. If John McCain wants to truly help the American people and show that he wants to reform Washington he must fire Sen. Gramm and all of the other lobbyists surrounding him such as his campaign adviser, Charlie Black.

McCain Official Believes the President has “near dictatorial powers”

Conservative commentator William Kristol has announced that a staffer from his magazine, Weekly Standard has become John McCain’s deputy communications director. That staffer’s name is Michael Goldfarb. The McCain campaign taking on a conservative partisan propogandist as their communications director would typically be no big deal, but Goldfarb has written some truly horrifying things for anyone who doesn’t believe in the Imperial Presidency.

In an article about withdrawal from Iraq, which was published on April 11, 2007, Mr. Goldfarb wrote:

Pam Hess, the UPI reporter who gave us this extremely moving and persuasive glimpse of the liberal case for the war in Iraq, asked if timetables for withdrawal “somehow infringe on the president’s powers as commander in chief?” Mitchell’s less than persuasive answer: “Congress is a coequal branch of government…the framers did not want to have one branch in charge of the government.” True enough, but they sought an energetic executive with near dictatorial power in pursuing foreign policy and war. So no, the Constitution does not put Congress on an equal footing with the executive in matters of national security. (emphasis mine)

When writing about waterboarding, Mr. Goldfarb wrote:

The Times indicts the Bush administration for exposing terrorists captured abroad to “head-slapping, simulated drowning and frigid temperatures.” Boo hoo.

Yes, “boo hoo.” Mr. Goldfarb apparently thinks it is acceptable for the United States of America to engage in the very practice which we exected Japanese soldiers for. But wait, there’s more. In an article about the GOP’s desire to give the telecom companies immunity for spying on American citizens at the President’s request Mr. Goldfarb said:

“And second, if federal agents show up at a corporate headquarters for a major American company and urgently seek that company’s officers for assistance in the war on terror, the companies damn well ought to give it as a matter of simple patriotism, whether the CIA wants a plane for some extraordinary rendition or help in tracking terrorists via email. The companies affected by the new draft Senate bill acted in the interests of their country when they decided to comply with the government’s requests. If the requests were inappropriate, that’s another matter, but to expect a company to resist a plea from the government for help in a time of war is ridiculous. To subject them to the whimsy of our judicial system would be outrageous.”

It would be interesting to see McCain questioned about these statements, but I’m not holding my breath that he ever will be.

The End Is Nigh

After months of primaries, it appears that the fight for the Democratic nomination is finally starting to come to an end. The last primaries will take place tomorrow and the Clinton campaign is starting to make statements which indicate that they know they have lost. While stumping for his wife in South Dakota President Clinton said:

“This may be the last day I’m ever involved in a campaign of this kind,”

This of course shows that Bill knows Hillary is at the very least on the brink of defeat. However, it also shows that Bill will not campaign for Senator Obama when he becomes the Democratic nominee(possibly fueling interparty divisions.) Senator Clinton also made a comment which is more definitive than that of her husband:

“I’m just very grateful we kept this campaign going until South Dakota would have the last word,”

Kept. She referred to her campaign in the past tense. I could just be reading too much into her phrasing, but it seems fairly significant to me.

Clinton Wins Puerto Rico

On Sunday, Senator Clinton won the Puerto Rico primary with two-thirds of the vote. The question is, does it really matter? The people of Puerto Rico can’t vote in the General Election and it does very little to stop Obama’s near-inevitability as the Democratic nominee. In fact, it made him even more inevitable as Senator Obama picked up 17 delegates from the primary and is now just 47 short of the new “magic number” of 2,118. The only real boost the Clinton campaign gets is that it adds more fuel for her popular vote argument. However, Senator Clinton is having to use very twisted math to argue her popular vote lead as outlined by Jonathan Alter of Newsweek. Of course, the nominee isn’t chosen by popular vote but rather by delegates, which as mentioned before Obama leads in significantly(he has over half of the pledged delegates.) So, as far as I can tell, Puerto Rico really didn’t change a thing.

Kennedy’s Brain Surgery Is Successful

Doctors have started treatment on Sen. Ted Kennedy’s brain tumor. The doctor who performed the surgery said:

“I am pleased to report that Senator Kennedy’s surgery was successful and accomplished our goals,”

The next steps will be radiation treatment and chemotherapy. We can only hope that further treatment will be equally successful and that the “liberal lion” will be able to live as long and healthy of a life as possible post-brain tumor. Thankfully, he can afford the best health-care in the nation due to his health-care plan as a member of the U.S. Senate and the Kennedy family’s vast wealth.

DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee Agrees To Seat FL and MI delegations at half-strength

Over the weekend the Democratic National Comittee’s Rules and Bylaws committee had their much publiscized meeting to determine the fates of Florida and Michigan. They heard arguments from people such as Robert Wexler and Carl Levin before taking a lunch break which stretched into 3 hour deliberations. When the committee returned they first voted on seating Florida in full, which was defeated. They then nearly unanimously agreed to seat it at 50%. The subject of Michigan proved more contentious with the proposed plan to give 69 delegates to Clinton and 59 to Obama with all seated at half-strength. Harold Ickes grandstanded and reserved the right for the Clinton campaign to go to the credentials committee but, it passed anyway(we also later learned that the Obama campaign could have gotten a 50/50 split passed but didn’t even try it in the interest of party unity.) This angered the protestors which the Clinton campaign had bussed to Washington D.C. They hissed, booed, yelled “Nobama”, and many pledged they were going to vote for John McCain in November.

Now, my assumption is that many of these people are simply emotionally involved in the Clinton campaign and thus are making what will amount to be empty threats in the Fall. However, some of them will probably do it which makes no sense. McCain has said that he will appoint conservative justices which will result in the overturning of Roe v. Wade. McCain won’t end the Iraq War and won’t fix our economy. Obama and Clinton are almost identical in their policies while McCain is a continuation of the policies of George W. Bush.  It seems to me that any Clinton voter who supports McCain over Obama never really cared about Hillary’s policies in the first place.

Edit: Just to further illustrate the point, I decided to add some video clips.

(she simultaneously says things which imply McCain shouldn’t be president yet will vote for him and says anyone who doesn’t support Hillary is Unamerican)

(the least bad of the bunch, though they’re still supporting McCain)