Pure Horserace: Making Sense Of A Mess
Michigan began the process of introducing even more confusion into the 2008 primary calendar today with state Senate passage of legislation establishing a presidential primary on Jan. 15, 2008. The move would, at least for now, put Michigan ahead of every state except Iowa and New Hampshire and give the Midwestern industrial state a key role in the nominating processes of both parties.
Michigan lawmakers were inspired to make the move after Florida moved its primary to Jan. 29. A major backer of the proposal is Democratic Sen. Carl Levin, who has long been agitated about what he says is the disproportionate influence Iowa and New Hampshire have in picking the Democratic and Republican nominees.
If the state House passes the bill and Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm signs it into law — both of which are expected — it would further compress the time in which Iowa and New Hampshire would be able to hold their contests since they will both stay true to their desire to host the first-in-the nation caucuses (Iowa) and primary (New Hampshire).
Those two states had already been deliberating on when to vote, thanks to the South Carolina Republican Party's Aug. 9 decision to move its primary to Jan. 19. But even after that move, it was still possible to have both Iowa and New Hampshire hold contests in January — provided they were somewhat flexible on the amount of time that would pass between the caucuses and the primary. But Michigan's move complicates matters even further.
New Hampshire is not willing to share its primary day with any other state, so a shift in Michigan would force the Granite State to vote no later than the second week of January. If Iowa wanted to maintain the traditional breathing room between it and New Hampshire, the state would have to hold its caucuses no later than the first week of January — a problem considering that campaigning would be scant and ineffective in the just-concluded holiday season.
Therefore, Iowa could be pushed into mid-December of 2007. It's unclear if this would be good or bad for the Hawkeye State. The early contest could establish pecking orders in both parties that would remain untouched throughout the holidays, or it could come so early that it has little impact on New Hampshire and the states following it.
The Democratic National Committee is trying to bring some order into this chaos. This Saturday, its rules and bylaws committee will meet to decide whether to punish Florida, thus far the only state to officially break party rules with its Jan. 29 primary — Michigan's move won't become official until next week at the earliest. But even if the panel takes a hardline stance against Florida and future line-jumpers by taking away their convention delegates, their work could be undone if the eventual Democratic nominee insists that delegates from Florida and other rule-breaking states be given a seat in Denver at the party's convention, a request unlikely to be declined.
It now seems almost quaint that so much attention was given a few months ago to states rushing to hold contests on Feb. 5 (for those keeping score, Arizona has joined that growing club). If there is any comfort in this game of musical chairs, it is that it may make the issue prominent enough to forge a permanent solution that reasonably balances the desires of individual states with the parties' hope for a more deliberate process.
But there's no way that solution will be imposed for the upcoming election, which was already unique in so many other ways. You can now add to that list the possibility that nominees in both parties will be effectively decided by mid-January. — David Miller
A Shift On The Surge: Gen. David Petraeus isn't expected to give his report on the effectiveness of President Bush's surge strategy in Iraq until mid-September, but news accounts suggest that, at least in terms of reducing violence, the influx of troops into Iraq is paying dividends — a perception that seem to have taken hold with Americans, based on recent opinion polls. One effect of this has been a shift in rhetoric on the surge from Democrats — including the party's presidential hopefuls who see the still-unpopular war as a winning issue for them in the campaign.
In his speech before the Veterans of Foreign Wars, Barack Obama suggested the surge may be "brilliantly performed" but that it provided no long-term solution for Iraq, where the government led by Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki continues to struggle to hold together the country's competing factions. The real solution, Obama said, would come not from the U.S. military, but from "political reconciliation and a surge in diplomacy in Iraq and the region."
The Democratic front-runner has also changed her tune somewhat. In her speech before the VFW, Hillary Clinton said the surge had resulted in progress, particularly in Anbar province. But she said the action came too late to produce a lasting peace in Iraq.
Obama's and Clinton's actions suggest that if Petraeus' report paints an optimistic picture, they're unlikely to disagree with him too harshly — directly criticizing a military leader is still considered taboo. But they are also likely to argue that while the surge may have worked, it is only a Band-Aid solution. That claim may be bolstered by the continued problems of al-Maliki's government and reports this week that the U.S. Army has been stretched to its limits and troop levels would be forced to decline in spring 2008. — David Miller
Tough Talk From Thompson: In a further sign that Fred Thompson's non-campaign is about to drop the "non," the former Tennessee senator and "Law & Order" star made a not-so-thinly-veiled attack on Rudy Giuliani in a blog posting on his Web site.
Like a radio ad launched by Mitt Romney this week about immigration, Thompson criticizes Giuliani by casting New York City, the city he led as mayor for three terms, as a haven for liberal policies. But for Thompson, the issue isn't immigration — it's gun control.
Thompson's post centers on a judge's ruling that, according to Thompson, allows the state to sue out-of-state gun stores who sold weapons that ended up in the hands of people who used them to commit crimes in New York City. Though this ruling happened recently, Thompson still links it to the former mayor, saying the "same activist federal judge from Brooklyn who provided Mayor Giuliani's administration with the legal ruling it sought to sue gun makers" was responsible for the recent decision.
Giuliani has sought to make his time spent leading the city on and after Sept. 11, 2001, the highlight of his campaign. But if Romney and Thompson's attacks are any indication, he may have to start defending the rest of his tenure instead. — David Miller
Funny Name, Serious Contender? When Barack Obama characterized himself as a "skinny kid with a funny name" in the 2004 Democratic National Convention speech that made him a star, few thought he would end up being one of the leading hopefuls for his party's presidential nomination in 2008. But now that he is, a somewhat unpleasant question has come up — can someone with an unusual and "foreign-sounding" name win the presidency? That's the question examined by CBS News director of surveys Kathy Frankovic in this week's edition of Poll Positions. Kathy says public opinion polls suggest few people think they're prejudiced by Obama's name, but they don't have the same feelings about their neighbors. To learn more about what's in Obama's name, check out this week's column
Editor's note: Pure Horserace is a daily update of political news as interpreted by the political observers at CBSNews.com. Click here to sign up for the e-mail version.
By David Miller
Copyright 2009 CBS. All rights reserved. Michigan lawmakers were inspired to make the move after Florida moved its primary to Jan. 29. A major backer of the proposal is Democratic Sen. Carl Levin, who has long been agitated about what he says is the disproportionate influence Iowa and New Hampshire have in picking the Democratic and Republican nominees.
If the state House passes the bill and Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm signs it into law — both of which are expected — it would further compress the time in which Iowa and New Hampshire would be able to hold their contests since they will both stay true to their desire to host the first-in-the nation caucuses (Iowa) and primary (New Hampshire).
Those two states had already been deliberating on when to vote, thanks to the South Carolina Republican Party's Aug. 9 decision to move its primary to Jan. 19. But even after that move, it was still possible to have both Iowa and New Hampshire hold contests in January — provided they were somewhat flexible on the amount of time that would pass between the caucuses and the primary. But Michigan's move complicates matters even further.
New Hampshire is not willing to share its primary day with any other state, so a shift in Michigan would force the Granite State to vote no later than the second week of January. If Iowa wanted to maintain the traditional breathing room between it and New Hampshire, the state would have to hold its caucuses no later than the first week of January — a problem considering that campaigning would be scant and ineffective in the just-concluded holiday season.
Therefore, Iowa could be pushed into mid-December of 2007. It's unclear if this would be good or bad for the Hawkeye State. The early contest could establish pecking orders in both parties that would remain untouched throughout the holidays, or it could come so early that it has little impact on New Hampshire and the states following it.
The Democratic National Committee is trying to bring some order into this chaos. This Saturday, its rules and bylaws committee will meet to decide whether to punish Florida, thus far the only state to officially break party rules with its Jan. 29 primary — Michigan's move won't become official until next week at the earliest. But even if the panel takes a hardline stance against Florida and future line-jumpers by taking away their convention delegates, their work could be undone if the eventual Democratic nominee insists that delegates from Florida and other rule-breaking states be given a seat in Denver at the party's convention, a request unlikely to be declined.
It now seems almost quaint that so much attention was given a few months ago to states rushing to hold contests on Feb. 5 (for those keeping score, Arizona has joined that growing club). If there is any comfort in this game of musical chairs, it is that it may make the issue prominent enough to forge a permanent solution that reasonably balances the desires of individual states with the parties' hope for a more deliberate process.
But there's no way that solution will be imposed for the upcoming election, which was already unique in so many other ways. You can now add to that list the possibility that nominees in both parties will be effectively decided by mid-January. — David Miller
A Shift On The Surge: Gen. David Petraeus isn't expected to give his report on the effectiveness of President Bush's surge strategy in Iraq until mid-September, but news accounts suggest that, at least in terms of reducing violence, the influx of troops into Iraq is paying dividends — a perception that seem to have taken hold with Americans, based on recent opinion polls. One effect of this has been a shift in rhetoric on the surge from Democrats — including the party's presidential hopefuls who see the still-unpopular war as a winning issue for them in the campaign.
In his speech before the Veterans of Foreign Wars, Barack Obama suggested the surge may be "brilliantly performed" but that it provided no long-term solution for Iraq, where the government led by Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki continues to struggle to hold together the country's competing factions. The real solution, Obama said, would come not from the U.S. military, but from "political reconciliation and a surge in diplomacy in Iraq and the region."
The Democratic front-runner has also changed her tune somewhat. In her speech before the VFW, Hillary Clinton said the surge had resulted in progress, particularly in Anbar province. But she said the action came too late to produce a lasting peace in Iraq.
Obama's and Clinton's actions suggest that if Petraeus' report paints an optimistic picture, they're unlikely to disagree with him too harshly — directly criticizing a military leader is still considered taboo. But they are also likely to argue that while the surge may have worked, it is only a Band-Aid solution. That claim may be bolstered by the continued problems of al-Maliki's government and reports this week that the U.S. Army has been stretched to its limits and troop levels would be forced to decline in spring 2008. — David Miller
Tough Talk From Thompson: In a further sign that Fred Thompson's non-campaign is about to drop the "non," the former Tennessee senator and "Law & Order" star made a not-so-thinly-veiled attack on Rudy Giuliani in a blog posting on his Web site.
Like a radio ad launched by Mitt Romney this week about immigration, Thompson criticizes Giuliani by casting New York City, the city he led as mayor for three terms, as a haven for liberal policies. But for Thompson, the issue isn't immigration — it's gun control.
Thompson's post centers on a judge's ruling that, according to Thompson, allows the state to sue out-of-state gun stores who sold weapons that ended up in the hands of people who used them to commit crimes in New York City. Though this ruling happened recently, Thompson still links it to the former mayor, saying the "same activist federal judge from Brooklyn who provided Mayor Giuliani's administration with the legal ruling it sought to sue gun makers" was responsible for the recent decision.
Giuliani has sought to make his time spent leading the city on and after Sept. 11, 2001, the highlight of his campaign. But if Romney and Thompson's attacks are any indication, he may have to start defending the rest of his tenure instead. — David Miller
Funny Name, Serious Contender? When Barack Obama characterized himself as a "skinny kid with a funny name" in the 2004 Democratic National Convention speech that made him a star, few thought he would end up being one of the leading hopefuls for his party's presidential nomination in 2008. But now that he is, a somewhat unpleasant question has come up — can someone with an unusual and "foreign-sounding" name win the presidency? That's the question examined by CBS News director of surveys Kathy Frankovic in this week's edition of Poll Positions. Kathy says public opinion polls suggest few people think they're prejudiced by Obama's name, but they don't have the same feelings about their neighbors. To learn more about what's in Obama's name, check out this week's column
Editor's note: Pure Horserace is a daily update of political news as interpreted by the political observers at CBSNews.com. Click here to sign up for the e-mail version.
By David Miller
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It''''s just a matter of time before John Kerry proclaims that he "voted for the war, before he voted against it, after which he thought the surge was working, before we secured the peace in Iraq, after which we brought our troops home, thanks to me".
Posted by One_American at 04:49 PM : Aug 22, 2007
+ report abus
Strange that, even amoung you fascist, YOU are the only one hearing this... maybe you should trade in that Magic Swastika there Sparky? ROFLMAO You really aren''t the sharpest tool in the old shed there are you? ROFLMAO Sieg Heil Bush!! Come on help me out here, it''ll make the facts go down a lot better! SIEG HEIL MEIN FUHRER!! Now don''t you feel so much better? ROFLMAO
These are people''s lives, see.
But if ya link up the databases.. git yer fukkkin sorry azzzes azzzes in gear fer once.. stuff like what happned at VA tech won''t happen again. Cuz they''ll be flagged, see.. they''ll be flagged: "Hey! Dis ************ is schizophrenic." And the guy won''t sell him the pistol..
The surge was billed as a means to give the Iraqi government time to get it together and move toward reconciliation. The theory was that tamping down the violence would effect a climate susceptible to Shia and Sunni cooperation. It hasn''t. Perhaps they have been vacationing together in sunny somewhere else.
Meanwhile, Iraqis are being killed at a rate comparable to pre-surge levels and U.S. troops are being killed at about the same rate. We lost 14 troops in a helicopter crash ... in part becasue more helicopter treks must be used for transport because the *** roads are chock full of IEDs.
Now that spin-meisters have created a new definition of ''progress'', perhaps they will weigh the political morass, living conditions of Iraqis, U.S. casualties http://icasualties.org/oif/
and costs http://www.nationalpriorities.org/Cost-of-War/Cost-of-War-3.html
against the thrills achieved by securing Anbar Province and arming Sunnis to fight al Qaeda (other American fools armed Saddam and others who eventually turned on the United States).
Our military has been heroic and pushed beyond human tolerance. Bush & Co. and the panderers to his support base have been derelict, immoral, and untrustworthy to lead the nation.