McCain Quote Is Similar to Herbert Hoover Quote

by: Mike Caulfield

Mon Sep 15, 2008 at 23:38:07 PM EDT

"The fundamental business of the country is on a sound and prosperous basis."

"Our economy I think, still, the fundamentals of our economy are strong."

-- John McCain, today

I saw Krugman mention offhand on Olbermann that McCain was channeling Hoover, so I went looking for the relevant quotes. I'm not sure if this is what Krugman was referring to, or if others have dug it up yet. I'm assuming they have. It's not hard to find.

I think it's interesting that despite the slight phrasing difference, the point is essentially the same. We're not going to change policy because of financial disasters. We're going to stay the course. The same course that got us here.

U.S. Chamber of Commerce Asks You To Jam Shaheen Campaign's Phones

by: Mike Caulfield

Wed Sep 03, 2008 at 21:28:58 PM EDT

The infamous AJS Ad is back. I'm watching it right now on MSNBC during the Republican convention.

Except there seem to be some differences since last time we encountered it:

1. It's not AJS anymore, it's by AJS godfather organization the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

2. It's not a radio ad -- it's a TV ad.

Oh, right, almost forgot --

3. The last frame gives you the Shaheen for Senate phone number and asks you to call it if you're upset with taxes.

Here's a photo of my TV here, a luddite screenshot:

I could be wrong, but I remember the radio ad asking listeners to call Jeanne Shaheen, but I don't remember the radio ad giving out the phone number of the campaign.

To me that seems like it hits a little too close to old history, doesn't it? Keep in mind Shaheen, unlike Sununu, is currently not in elected office. This is not a a call to action to phone your Rep or Governor. This is asking you to bother the campaign office, after riling you up with a misleading ad.

I think it's likely that the Chamber of Commerce merely tacks on the phone number of the campaign so that it can continue the charade that it is doing issues based lobbying (Mad about taxes? Call the person not in office!).

Still, it says something that this out-of-state defender of Sununu is so tone-deaf to our local history that they would post the campaign number in the ad, don't you think?

Will they be running this election day?  

"Head Fake" Myth Put On Life Support

by: Mike Caulfield

Sun Aug 31, 2008 at 11:12:35 AM EDT

Rick Davis, McCain's campaign manager and the person at the point of the vice presidential process, said there was no abrupt change of course in the final hours. Nor, he said, was Palin selected without having gone through the full vetting process that was done for other finalists. That process included reviews of financial and other personal data, an FBI background check and considerable discussion among the handful of McCain advisers involved in the deliberations.

"Nobody was vetted less or more than anyone in the final stages, and John had access to all that information and made the decision," Davis said. "It's really not much more complicated than that."

I won't detail all the evidence that shows this is a baldfaced lie (C & L has a Cliff Notes here). But it's noteworthy they are starting to kick back against this.

Why? Because while few may vote Democratic based on Palin's inexperience, an awful lot of people are starting to wonder if McCain's temperament is Presidential. It's one thing for a sitting Senator to spout one's mouth off and say "We are all Georgians now" or to indicate an Iraq/Anthrax link in the absence of evidence days after the anthrax attacks.

The country can survive a couple people acting recklessly in the Senate. The system was designed to absorb such things.

But it's quite another thing for a President to act in such a way.

Senator McCain has shown throughout this presidential campaign an ignorance of this simple fact -- a President cannot act as an agent of his own impulsive will.

In the first presidential decision of his career, Obama gave us for VP not his soulmate or someone who had caught his fancy, but a person who made sense for America.

McCain gave us someone who made sense for him. And it's looking increasingly likely that McCain gave us someone that made sense to him on that particular hour of that particular day he had to make the decision.

Country first, indeed.

Palin on Bridge to Nowhere: Take the Money And Run!

by: Mike Caulfield

Fri Aug 29, 2008 at 20:41:47 PM EDT

Palin also shares McCain's opposition to earmarks, opposing the infamous "Bridge to Nowhere," a pet project of two titans of Alaska politics, Rep. Don Young and Sen. Ted Stevens.

"I told Congress, 'Thanks, but no thanks' on that Bridge to nowhere," said Palin, who describes herself as a foe of the "good-old-boy network."

Um, not quite. As noted here, Palin supported the project until well after the initial money was siphoned off.

What's worse than taking $200 million  for a bridge to nowhere? How about taking the $200 million and not even building the freaking bridges?

The Republican-controlled Congress still gave Alaska the $452 million it had requested for the two bridges, merely removing the earmark directing where the state should spend the money. Gov. Frank H. Murkowski (R), who was once Stevens's junior colleague in the Senate, intends to spend that money on the bridges.

And after they got the money? Out of the highway bill and into Alaska's treasury?

Oh... bridges? We said we needed it for *bridges*?

"We will continue to look for options for Ketchikan to allow better access to the island," Gov. Sarah Palin said. "The concentration is not going to be on a $400 million bridge."

In other words -- we got the money. We're good.

Wow. Is there room for an addendum in Profiles in Courage?

But hey, I'm sure siphoning off that money to Alaska didn't hurt anybody, right?

Just last month, presidential candidate Sen. John McCain, R-Arizona, said pet projects could have played a role in a Minnesota bridge collapse that killed 13 people earlier this year.

"Maybe if we had done it right, maybe some of that money would have gone to inspect those bridges and other bridges around the country," McCain told a group of people in a town-hall style meeting in Ankeny, Iowa.

"Maybe the 200,000 people who cross that bridge every day would have been safer than spending $233 million of your tax dollars on a bridge in Alaska to an island with 50 people on it."

Turn Your Friends Into Activists

by: Mike Caulfield

Wed Aug 27, 2008 at 17:07:39 PM EDT

This is a old idea, but a good one. It's a great way to get friends that may political but not politically active exposed to the variety of ways they can make a difference. Press release and schedule below the fold.

Read the release and consider dragging a friend to one of these. Hack the system, and spread the participation virus.

Why McCain's "Cross in the Dirt" Rewrite Should Scare You

by: Mike Caulfield

Mon Aug 18, 2008 at 17:18:55 PM EDT

They are wrong, and here's why.

In the initial version of McCain's gun guard story, given in 1973, there is a foreigner who helps him by loosening his ropes. Assumed to be Vietnamese, he'd be either a Taoist, Buddhist, or Confucian. He's the "the only real human being that I ever met over there" according to McCain at that time.

But in the 1973 version, he's not Christian. He doesn't have to be. And what the story is about there is someone who doesn't share your religion sharing your values.

For McCain in 1973, that's still a possibility.

When McCain tells his more recent, doctored version the whole point is changed. The only decent person over there turns out... to be a Christian! They venerate the Cross together on Christmas Eve.

Funny, that. In the doctored version it's a story about taking care of your own kind. Religious belief as more powerful than nationality.

When a man who talks about "Islamofascism" obsessively contorts his own personal history -- possibly even in his own mind -- to make the one person who was kind to him in his captivity a Christian -- this is not only something that can be discussed. This is something that must be discussed.

It's frankly indicative of a bit of a complex. And given that, it would behoove the press to start asking him some simple questions before he gets control of our nuclear arsenal. Like, for instance:

What development has there been in his thought that has caused him to remove the kindness of a non-Christian from his personal history so dramatically? Why is it so impossible for a non-Christian to have given him aid?

And what does this shocking rewrite of personal history portend for a man who believes that Islam is a religion that has been perverted, and that the great challenge to the West is to assert Judeo-Christian ideals through military force in the face of "Islamofascism"?

If he can contort the most meaningful act in his imprisonment into a story of a clash of religions, imagine the violence he can do to our understanding of the Middle East once in office.

Crowdsourcing the 2004 Kenai Guest List

by: Mike Caulfield

Mon Aug 11, 2008 at 07:30:00 AM EDT

Courtesy of the Wayback Machine, I have put the 2004 Kenai Guest list below the fold.

Part of the reason for doing this is to get this info out of the Wayback Machine and back into a Google-friendly place.

But I'd love some discussion on the list as well (formatted version is here). Notice, for instance, how absolutely brazen the 2004 list is in its original format, separating Senators and VIPs (the main attraction) from the CEO and executive guests. There's no attempt to conceal this is a dating service for CEOs looking for a Senator.

Here's a couple things you can do in the comments:

1) For the bold, just take a minute and run one or two corporation names below through opencongress.org, govtrack.us, or even just the Google [for say Sununu + Fannie Mae], and let us know if you find anything of interest.

2) For the more time-limited: Just scan the list and make an observation. Any observation. The observations don't have to be about Sununu either. I found it amazing how many Administration officials were involved here, and find it particularly interesting they brought the Deputy Secretary of the Interior to this oil-fest.

List below the fold...Thanks in advance for your help. If everyone can pitch in a comment, the effect here could be huge.

Politico Notices Sununu's Kenai Trip, Raises Ghost of Abramoff

by: Mike Caulfield

Fri Aug 08, 2008 at 17:22:46 PM EDT

Already, most Republicans running for re-election this year have given thousands in Stevens- and VECO-linked donations to charity. Senators Elizabeth Dole, Gordon Smith, Susan Collins, Norm Coleman, Mitch McConnell and Pat Roberts have joined Sununu in contributing a total of about $75,000 to charity.

Stevens isn't a lobbyist with a penchant for black trench coats and fedoras, but he is the most senior Republican in the U.S. Senate and any voter can understand the seven felony counts he faces. Abramoff was a symbol for all that was wrong with Washington in 2006, and if Shaheen is lucky, her campaign can help make Stevens that symbol this year.

I still maintain the problem is not so much the cost of the fishing trip as it is what Kenai was -- a dating service to hook Big Oil and defense contractors up with legislators that could help them. And a show of power for Stevens -- a way for Stevens to signal to his backers that he had all these legislators in his pocket.

Actually "dating service" doesn't quite hit it. I'll let you all think of some other names in the comments. Nice to see this story finally working its way up the chain though.

Stevens on Kenai: "We invite ... people they want to meet"

by: Mike Caulfield

Thu Aug 07, 2008 at 12:53:42 PM EDT

Sununu spokesman Julie Teer said Sununu's 2004 trip [to the Kenai event] was funded by a joint fundraising committee comprising Stevens for Senate, Stevens' Northern Lights PAC and Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski's campaign committee. She said his 2006 trip was funded by Stevens for Senate and said payment for both trips "fully met Senate rules."

That's great, but actually that's not what's being implied here.

What's being implied is not that Sununu was the audience for this event, but that he was the talent.

Here, maybe it'll be clear if Ted "Tubes" Stevens explains the Kenai event to you:

''We invite people we think can afford to put a contribution into the till,'' [Stevens] said, ''and people they want to meet.''

Sununu is "people they want to meet."

And there's nothing wrong with that I suppose. It's like a charity dinner, except it lasts for a weekend. And except that it was run by a guy that has been indicted for corruption. Corruption involving people at the event who paid to see Sununu. Who were some of the same people that donated to Sununu's campaign.

People that are also up on charges of corruption for trading favors to promote more Alaskan drilling.

But hey, keep moving, nothing to see here. I'm sure with Stevens at the helm, nothing untoward happened at the little expedition, right?

Sununu Voodoo

by: Mike Caulfield

Thu Aug 07, 2008 at 08:01:14 AM EDT

"The simple committment to pursue those reserves will have an effect on prices nationally and worldwide, because energy futures are just that, a forecast on the way the market is headed."

So a drilling policy that a decade away from now may be supplying 0.2% of the world's oil will affect futures by dropping gas prices now?

By how much, Engineer Sununu?

I have a new theory about Sununu and the Republicans -- they can't possibly be this stupid. But they are desperately afraid the Stop Excessive Energy Speculation Act will drop gas prices.

The amendment for drilling has to go on so that they have something to point to if oil prices do drop. Because on the off-chance the anti-speculation bill goes through w/o drilling and gas prices drop, they are finished. It will have meant that regulation, not deregulation, was the answer here, and provide a powerful parable for this and future elections.

Congressman Hodes Asks for Answers on Iraqi Oil Revenue

by: Mike Caulfield

Wed Aug 06, 2008 at 07:33:52 AM EDT

Congressman Paul Hodes today called on the Bush Administration to answer questions regarding a new Government Accountability Office (GAO) Report showing that the Iraqi government had produced nearly $90 billion in oil revenue from 2005 to 2007. From 2003 until 2007, the United States spent nearly $48 billion for Iraq's reconstruction effort. GAO finds that Iraq has spent only 1% of total expenditures to maintain roads, bridges, vehicles, buildings, water and electricity installations, and weapons for security forces.

While his most recent statements come on the heels of the new GAO report, this is an issue Hodes has been following for some time. In April, Hodes pressed the House Oversight and Government Reform Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs to hold hearings on whether Iraq's oil revenues were being spent on the reconstruction effort.

So far there's silence on this issue from Gregg and Sununu. Which is a bit strange from two people making "fiscal conservatism" their watchwords, no?

When VECO met Johnny

by: Mike Caulfield

Tue Aug 05, 2008 at 17:23:35 PM EDT

On June 24th, 2002, John Sununu was named by the League of Conservation Voters as one of the "Dirty Dozen", one of the politicians with the worst environmental records of any person running for Congress or Senate:

"Republicans and Independents who care about New Hampshire's air and water should know about his votes for almost $6 billion in taxpayer handouts to the air-polluting coal industry, against less arsenic in drinking water and against holding polluters accountable for their actions," said League president Deb Callahan.

That was June 24th.

Here's some donations that came in for Sununu over the next 6 days:

June 25

$5,000 -- Northern Lights (Ted Stevens' PAC)
$1,000 -- Roger J. Chan, VECO Corporation

June 28

$1,000 -- Richard M. Hobbs II, Alutiiq Management Services (Stevens loyalist, I think)
$2,000 -- Jim Jansen, Lynden Inc. (fishing trip buddy)

June 29

$1,000 -- Steven J. Leathard, VECO Corporation

June 30

$2,000 -- Carl H. Marrs, Cook Inlet Region Inc. (fishing trip buddy).
$1,000 -- Bill J. Allen, VECO Corporation (fishing trip buddy)
$1,000 -- Mark J. Allen, VECO Corporation
$1,000 -- Peter Leathard, VECO Corporation
$1,000 -- Richard L. Smith, VECO Corporation

I could be wrong, but doesn't that look like Sununu being named one of the "Dirty Dozen" set VECO's heart aflutter? And convinced Ted Stevens to double-down?

I had no idea that the League's Dirty Dozen awards were the Miss America pageant for Big Oil. But I'm really not surprised.

Of course, that was merely how they met. Soon their love would blossom:

Between mid October and late November of 2002 Northern Lights' non federal account received a $25,000 contribution from VECO. Northern Light sent the Sununu Victory Fund $25,000.

And all Sununu did in return, apparently, was take a little fishing trip with the people that gave him tens of thousands of dollars, so that they could all talk about, um ... "fish" ...

Ah, young love.
 

Tire Inflation, Basic Information Literacy Skills, and the Modern Conservative Mind

by: Mike Caulfield

Mon Aug 04, 2008 at 17:17:54 PM EDT

And they've all pulled out their calculators, hoping for their next Rathergate moment.

It's been a long time since they broke any stories, I can understand why they're excited. But reading how they go about calculating the effect of offshore drilling on daily production gives some insight into why our country is so screwed up. Here's the National Review Online:

I'm doing a back-of-the-envelope calculation of how many gallons of gasoline that would save, daily and annually. But one of the problems of trying to contrast that total with the amount of oil produced domestically is that because of bans on exploration, it's tough to get a solid number of how many gallons of gasoline could be produced, daily and annually, by additional drilling.

Really? I could have sworn the government had an office that put out just those kind of reports. Like this report, which tells you exactly how many barrels offshore drilling would produce.

Confused by the lack of information, he finally finds a report by private entity, then goes on to make a bunch of super-neat assumptions.

So we have one third of those commuters - 43 million - saving .153 gallons per day, or almost 6.58 million gallons.

...

That is a nice healthy amount, even if getting 100 percent tire inflation compliance in the country is an impossible dream.

But this 2006 report from the federal Minerals Management Service puts the recoverable oil from the Outer Continental Shelf at just under 86 billion barrels of oil; one barrel of crude oil yields approximately 19.6 gallons of finished motor gasoline.

So it would indeed be nice if Americans pumped up their tires sufficiently, and we started seeing some of that 4.9 million to 6.5 million gallons saved per day. But why it has to be an either/or in regards to the 1.6 trillion gallons of gasoline in the OCS (not even getting into ANWR), as Obama insists, is not clear.

OK, let's put aside the fact that this "either/or" choice is a straw man created by the writer. Can you explain why gallons saved per day is compared to total reserves of the OCS? That's not even an apples and oranges comparison. That's comparing daily apple consumption to the number of apples likely to be on trees in the U.S. for all time.

Here's my brilliant idea. Let's use the government projections for actual oil production (not oil reserves) of the OCS model vs. reference and compare it to oil consumption.

Get it? Production per day as offset by a change in consumption per day. A consumption to production ratio. Econ 101, dude.

Well, using my superpower called "reading a government report", I come to this projected figure from the Energy Information Administration:

For the lower 48 OCS, annual crude oil production in 2030 is projected to be 7 percent higher-2.4 million barrels per day in the OCS access case compared with 2.2 million barrels per day in the reference case (Figure 20).

So that's an increase of 0.2 million barrels a day in the OCS model.

So I multiply that figure (200,000) by gallons in a barrel (i'll take his word here and call it 19.6), and voila, I come up with this figure:

3.92 million gallons a day from OCS drilling

Compared to his number of gallons saved by tire inflation (which is probably equally bogus, but I can't fix everything):

4.9 million to 6.5 million gallons

Even on the low end of the estimate (which is suspect anyway because it tracks commuter miles in a really roundabout way), the NRO has to favor Obama's estimate.

I actually want to avoid the tire inflation debate in some ways -- the real key to driving efficiency  in a number of studies has been reducing aggressive acceleration, and the effects of that are far better than tire inflation. And of course, once we get into increasing CAFE standards, you're talking the equivalent of many OCS's coming online.

But to have any sort of discussion we have to start with a number of barrels the OCS will produce, and we have to understand that production does not equal reserves divided by years.

The National Review's frantic search for information, where it never occurs to them once that maybe the government commissions reports on such things so they can make better informed decisions -- this is to me the perfect example of  the modern conservative mind.

After all, why in the world would the government be producing nonpartisan reports to help with decision making? That would be treating government more than politics, and how could that be?

Obama's Energy Speech

by: Mike Caulfield

Mon Aug 04, 2008 at 12:50:29 PM EDT

I'm glad I waited though. I just saw the tail end of his speech today, and I was impressed. In the portion I saw, he managed to frame his position on offshore drilling as being against the massive giveaway to the oil companies that it represents -- which I believe is the correct frame. It's a massive giveaway for very little gain. We can argue about the safety and environmental concerns, but the economics of it are undisputed -- millions in profits for oil companies exploiting our national resources in exchange for a 0.2% increase in global production.

Here's the issue for our state though. This bipartisan compromise he's speaking of supporting -- will the Sprinter sprint towards it?

If so, and if the frame of that compromise is based on what we saw today, that's a great thing for New Hampshire, which desperately needs the aid for this winter the Republicans have been blocking, and of course it's the right thing for the country, which has to move forward into the energy economy. But such a compromise may come at the expense of papering over Sununu's dismal record on energy issues in the past six years. It's a trade I'm happy to make, but I'm wondering if anyone here has some thoughts on whether:

a) Senator* Sununu will sprint towards the compromise, and

b) He will be able to use that as cover, despite his record as Big Oil's BFF.

Thoughts?

0.2%

by: Mike Caulfield

Fri Aug 01, 2008 at 16:44:10 PM EDT

Graph from DOE.

Sununu and Gregg return home today, having in the past week voted against both heating aid  (Gregg) and defense funding (Gregg and Sununu). Why? Because they had their eyes on the big prize: opening up the Outer Continental Shelf to oil companies.

The expected effect on world oil production when such action comes online many, many years from now?

0.2%

The expected effect on domestic oil production? Well, it's in the graph above.

For the lower 48 OCS, annual crude oil production in 2030 is projected to be 7 percent higher-2.4 million barrels per day in the OCS access case compared with 2.2 million barrels per day in the reference case (Figure 20). Because oil prices are determined on the international market, however, any impact on average wellhead prices is expected to be insignificant.

Keep thinking big, guys.

You Don't Get Your Troop Funding Until Big Oil Gets Its Pork

by: Mike Caulfield

Fri Aug 01, 2008 at 07:27:27 AM EDT

Update: So I've been away from blogging for a while, and my context skills have waned. Here's the background: Last night Sununu, Gregg, and the Republicans voted against cloture to bring the Defense Authorization to the floor. That's a preliminary vote which should have sailed through, but Gregg and Sununu want to talk about offshore drilling. So today in the Senate they will be debating whether to fund troops, or keep talking about offshore drilling. There, context. Lovely.

A quick look at today's Senate calendar reveals the following on the schedule:

Convenes: 9:30am
Resume consideration of the motion to proceed to S.3001, Defense Authorization bill, with senators permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes each.

Oh no! Major problem. The Republicans had scheduled this week (and most of September) for more theater on the offshore drilling.

How embarrassing to be double-booked.

Luckily Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has his priorities straight:

McConnell made it clear that if Republicans and Democrats fail to reach an agreement on energy amendments, the stalemate in the Senate on a wide range of bills will continue. "We all want to do the defense authorization bill, but right now the No. 1 issue in the country is the price of gas at the pump," McConnell said. "Why would we want to get off that issue and go to anything else?"

I'm not completely sure if Reid's success in bringing this motion to the floor with the ten minute limit removes the threat of filibuster. I think it may.

If I was Sununu though, I'd be hoping that it does kill the filibuster threat. When the Republicans filibustered heating aid this weekend, he was a vulnerable Senator in the oil-heated Northeast. He was guaranteed the catch and release pass.

If they were to filibuster against the Defense Authorization Act, however, there'd be a lot of competition for those catch and release passes. Not good.

There's still a number of games the Republicans could play with the authorization though, and with  Judd Gregg in the mix, there's always the possibility that a completely new perversion of parlimentary procedure will be invented. So hold on tight, and if you have C-SPAN, tune on in.

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UL in favor of Death by Amendment. Heating Aid, not so much.

by: Mike Caulfield

Wed Jul 30, 2008 at 20:48:17 PM EDT

That's noble of them. It's also rather stupid, because it's pretty easy to prove them wrong.

Let's get to it.
The UL:

On Tuesday, Republicans voted with Democrats to open debate on Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's Stop Excessive Energy Speculation Act. To avoid a vote on offshore drilling, Reid refused to allow any amendments to the bill. Republicans, holding out for amendments, offered to allow a vote on the LIHEAP bill if Reid allowed amendments to the speculation bill. Reid said no.

Well, no. The Senate did vote 94-0 to proceed to the bill. That's true. After that everything in that paragraph is just truthy.

First of all,  

A Blatant Lie on Heating Assistance From Sununu

by: Mike Caulfield

Tue Jul 29, 2008 at 22:41:11 PM EDT

But it was interesting that Sununu, in his recent UL ode to filibustering to protect the interest of Big Oil, said that one of the things the Democrats have blocked in order to get an oil speculation bill passed was heating aid for New Hampshire families:

-- Heating assistance for low-income families. It may be summertime, but in New Hampshire we know that the combination of winter months and $4 per gallon heating oil will strain family budgets across the Northeast. Sen, Judd Gregg and I recently introduced legislation that would increase funding for LIHEAP by $2.53 billion, more than doubling funds for New Hampshire families most in need. By acting early, we can get these funds in place well before the cold sets in.

What a frickin liar.

As I detail here, the Republicans spent Saturday refusing to allow S. 3186, a bill that would have doubled heating aid to low income families, from coming to the floor.  

Sprintin Sununu and the Phil Gramm School of Economics

by: Mike Caulfield

Mon Jul 28, 2008 at 22:44:39 PM EDT

Asked whom he most admires in Washington politics, Sununu names Phil Gramm -- the retiring senator from Texas whose bona fides as a social conservative were sometimes overshadowed by his passion for free-market economics.

Lurvely. It's like the missing link between Sununu's health care "is so darn expensive because it's worth it" quote, and this "mental recession" we "whiners" have been going through.

Of course, in 2002 Sununu was the great hope as a successor to Phil Gramm. Seriously:

On taxes, energy, and trade, Sununu places ahead of Smith in free- market philosophy, which explains why the liberal League of Conservation Voters calls him one of this year's "Dirty Dozen" in Congress. And why the Chamber of Commerce and the Business Industry Political Action Committee have taken the unusual step of endorsing the primary challenger over the incumbent. The supply-side Club for Growth gave Sununu a $1,000 contribution, though many of its members are still fond of Smith. But, says co-founder Steve Moore, "With Phil Gramm retiring, it will be healthy for the Senate to have John Sununu as a member."

So here's a simple question for Mr. Sununu: is Phil Gramm still your favorite Senator?

I wouldn't ask, but this "mental recession" just has me tied up in knots.

Canal Zone/Gitmo Soundbite Contest

by: Mike Caulfield

Sat Jul 12, 2008 at 18:09:34 PM EDT

Put simply, the argument that McCain is a "natural-born" citizen derives from an argument that unincorporated territories of the U.S. are to be considered part of the United States for Constitutional purposes (even if not for federal law).

If one concedes that, that automatically has some pretty radical effects on the legality of Gitmo. Mainly, everything in the Bill of RIghts that is being ignored has to complied with. There is no seperate standard that derives from being outside of the United States "proper".

That's wonky talk above, and an interesting thought experiment. But here's the challenge. Write a statement that neatly soundbites the contradiction. A one two or three sentence idea-bomb. Something Obama could use in a debate, and that we can throw around on the talk shows and get into the meme-stream.

Put your soundbite in the comments (and comment on others). I'll collect them all next week and we'll vote on the best one.