But during those two terms in the White House, Mrs. Clinton did not hold a security clearance. She did not attend National Security Council meetings. She was not given a copy of the president’s daily intelligence briefing. She did not assert herself on the crises in Somalia, Haiti and Rwanda.
And during one of President Bill Clinton’s major tests on terrorism, whether to bomb Afghanistan and Sudan in 1998, Mrs. Clinton was barely speaking to her husband, let alone advising him, as the Lewinsky scandal sizzled.
Hillary's high-profile role in the failed health care initiative of the early 1990s is well known, but little is known about her involvement in foreign policy and national security.
Healy interviewed talked with 35 Clinton administration officials and reviewed books about Hillary's White House years concludes Hillary was little more than a sounding board, and learned through osmosis rather than decision-making:
She did not wrestle directly with many of the other challenges the next president will face, including managing a large-scale deployment — or withdrawal — of troops abroad, an overhaul of the intelligence agencies or the effort to halt the spread of nuclear weapons technology. Most of her exposure to the military has come since she left the White House through her seat on the Senate Armed Services Committee.
[. . .]
Asked to name three major foreign policy decisions where she played a decisive role as first lady, Mrs. Clinton responded in generalities more than specifics, describing her strategic roles on trips to Bosnia, Kosovo, Northern Ireland, India, Africa and Latin America.
Asked to cite a significant foreign policy object lesson from the 1990s, Mrs. Clinton also replied with broad observations. “There are a lot of them,” she said. “The whole unfortunate experience we’ve had with the Bush administration, where they haven’t done what we’ve needed to do to reach out to the rest of the world, reinforces my experience in the 1990s that public diplomacy, showing respect and understanding of people’s different perspectives — it’s more likely to at least create the conditions where we can exercise our values and pursue our interests.”
Hillary wasn't involved in one of Bill Clinton’s hardest moments on national security — the 1998 bombings of the United States Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, and subsequently whether to bomb Afghanistan and Sudan. Hillary was barely speaking to Bill at the time. It was right after Bill acknowledged to the public and a grand jury that he had an inappropriate relationship with his intern, Monica Lewinsky:
“It was the height of Monica, and they were barely talking to each other, if at all,” said one senior national security official who spoke with both Clintons during that time.
Other Clinton administration officials, are skeptical that the couple’s conversations and Hilary's 79 trips abroad add up to presidential experience:
She was not independently judging intelligence, for the most part, or mediating the data, egos and agendas of a national security team. And, in the end, she did not feel or process the weight of responsibility.
Susan Rice, a National Security Council senior aide and State Department official under Mr. Clinton who now advises Mr. Obama, said Mrs. Clinton was not involved in “the heavy lifting of foreign policy.” Ms. Rice also took issue with a recent comment by a Clinton campaign official that Mrs. Clinton was “the face of the administration in foreign affairs.”
“Making tough decisions, responding to crises, making the bureaucracy implement decisions that they may not want to implement — that’s the hard part of foreign policy,” Ms. Rice said. “That’s not what Mrs. Clinton was asked or expected to do as first lady.”
Then there is the time in 1999 when Hillary sat silently through an event on the West Bank as the wife of Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat, accused Israel of poisoning Palestinian women and children with toxic gases. Hillary was sharply criticized for not confronting Mrs. Arafat over her remarks and for kissing her goodbye afterward. Hillary later admitted attending the event with Suha Arafat on the West Bank was a mistake.
Michelle Tsai explains that presidential candidates can get paid to run for the presidency:
Can candidates pay themselves a salary from these funds while campaigning?
Yes, in some cases. According to rules from the Federal Election Commission (PDF), candidates who meet certain criteria can receive a salary from their campaign committees. It won't be a raise from their last job, though, since the amount can't exceed either their earnings from the previous year or the minimum annual salary of the office they seek—whichever is less. (In the case of the presidency, the salary is $400,000.) They're paid on a pro-rata basis, so a candidate who drops out of the race after six months can pay himself only half of this annual salary.
Not all candidates can qualify to be paid to run. The FEC bars incumbent officeholders in the presidency, Senate, and House of Representatives from drawing salaries as candidates in addition to their in-office salaries. Also, a candidate's salary is not considered a qualified expense for candidates receiving public financing.
According to Tsai, among the current front runners only Rudy Giuliani, Mike Huckabee, and Mitt Romney would qualify to be paid a salary as a presidential candidate. They won't do it. Rudy and Mitt don't need the money. No one needs the criticism that would come with drawing a salary to run. Consider how Alan Keyes, was criticized back in 1992 for paying himself more than $8,000 a month out of campaign contributions for his senate race in Maryland. Then there is the criticism of Huckabee's speaking fees. Maybe Huckabee doesn't a salary either.
The clemency decisions go to the heart of Mr. Huckabee's message: part Christian moral conservatism, part liberal-leaning social conscience. Little Rock lobbyist J. J. Vigneault, a former political aide to Mr. Huckabee, says of his former boss's faith: "I do think it has the potential to influence everything he does."
[. . .]
Mr. Huckabee plays down the idea that arguments for redemption influenced his clemency decisions. "Everybody in jail will always claim to have a conversion," he says. "You look at institutional records, disciplinaries, recommendations from prosecutors, police, friends, family, whether they have a job."
Huckabee's overly generous use of his clemency powers will come back to haunt him just like statements from his first political campaign. Huckabee should embrace his obvious belief in redemption and the role it played in his clemencies. Downplaying its role comes across as less than honest.
Asked on "Fox News Sunday" if he had an interest in running for president, Petraeus invoked the words of General Sherman:
A leading Union general in the war, Sherman said in a telegram to the Republican National Convention in 1884, when he was being urged to run for president, "I will not accept if nominated, and I will not serve if elected," according to "The Yale Book of Quotations."
Here's the video. Petraeus talks about the decline of news coverage about Iraq before he is asked about the presidency.
A new Boston Globe Hew Hampshire poll finds Barack Obama now leads Hillary Clinton, 30 percent to 28 percent. In last month's Globe poll Hillary had a 14-point lead.
The Globe poll also found John McCain is still surging in New Hampshire. The resurgent McCain is now within three percent of front-runner Mitt Romney. Last month McCain was in third place behind Romney and Giuliani.
The bad news belongs to Rudy Giuliani and Mike Huckabee and Hillary Clinton:
Yet while Romney's support has declined from recent polls, the survey has more ominous signs for Giuliani, who once vied for the lead in New Hampshire.
Giuliani's support has diminished in every category of candidate characteristics - from leadership and experience to electability and judgment.
Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, despite a surge in polls in Iowa and nationally, has not translated that success to New Hampshire, winning the support of just 10 percent of voters. More than 40 percent of respondents said Huckabee was the leading GOP candidate for whom they were least likely to vote.
[. . .]
Aside from a CNN/WMUR poll conducted by UNH last week, which had Clinton with a 12-point edge, surveys have generally shown Obama closing in.
Once trailing Clinton by more than 20 points, Obama appears to have benefited from voters' increasingly positive perceptions of him. Clinton is still viewed by far as the most experienced Democrat, and her supporters are firmest in their preference. But Obama has cut into her leads in the areas of electability and leadership. Voters indicated they also now believe he possesses the best judgment and is the candidate most likely to bring change.
The survey was conducted from December 16 to December 20, and has a margin of error for each party subsample of plus or minus 4.9 percent. It should also be noted that about 40 percent of likely voters in both parties indicated they are still undecided.
Arizona enacted a new law in an attempt to lessen economic incentives for illegal aliens. Under the new law, which takes effect January 1, businesses found to have knowingly hired illegal workers will be subject to sanctions from probation to a 10-day suspension of their business licenses. A second violation would bring permanent revocation of the license.
Arizona employers have started to fire workers who can't prove they are in the country legally. As a result illegal aliens are returning to their home countries or moving other states.
The departure of the illegals from Arizona proves that attrition by enforcement works. When illegal aliens don't have jobs, they don't stick around.
On Fox News Channel's "The Big Story," Tancredo further explained why he endorsed Romney:
I had an interesting and lengthy discussion with him this morning about his plan. I believe it's viable. I believe he'll stick with it, and he's got the best shot.
Tancredo's endorsement will help Romney in overcoming Huckabee, but by how much? The endorsement also makes it more difficult for Thompson to place in the top three in the Iowa caucuses. It may also slow McCain's resurgence by reminding folks of McCain's support for the Senate's failed so-called immigration reform, which many saw as providing "amnesty" for illegal aliens.
I didn't see the famous floating cross. What I saw when I watched Mike Huckabee's Christmas commercial was a nice man in a sweater sitting next to a brightly lit tree. He had easy warmth and big brown puppy-dog eyes, and he talked about taking a break from politics to remember the peace and joy of the season. Sounds good to me.
Only on second look did I see the white lines of the warmly lit bookcase, which formed a glowing cross. Someone had bothered to remove the books from that bookcase, or bothered not to put them in. Maybe they would have dulled the lines.
Is there a word for "This is nice" and "This is creepy"? For that is what I felt. This is so sweet-appalling.
I love the cross. The sight of it, the fact of it, saves me, literally and figuratively. But there is a kind of democratic politesse in America, and it has served us well, in which we are happy to profess our faith but don't really hit people over the head with its symbols in an explicitly political setting, such as a campaign commercial, which is what Mr. Huckabee's ad was.
I wound up thinking this: That guy is using the cross so I'll like him. That doesn't tell me what he thinks of Jesus, but it does tell me what he thinks of me. He thinks I'm dim. He thinks I will associate my savior with his candidacy. Bleh.
The ad was shrewd. The caucus is coming, the TV is on, people are home putting up the tree, and the other candidates are all over the tube advancing themselves and attacking someone else. Mr. Huckabee thinks, I'll break through the clutter by being the guy who reminds us of the reason for the season, in a way that helps underscore that I'm the Christian candidate and those other fellas aren't. As a break from the nattering argument, as a message that highlights something bigger than politics, it was refreshing.
Was the cross an accident? Please. It was as accidental as Mr. Huckabee's witty response, when he accused those of questioning the ad of paranoia, was spontaneous. "Actually I will confess this, if you play this spot backwards it says 'Paul is dead, Paul is dead, Paul is dead,' " he said. As Bill Safire used to say of clever moves, "That's good stuff!"
Ken Mehlman, the former Republican chairman, once bragged in my presence that in every ad he did he put in something wrong--something that went too far, something debatable. TV producers, ever hungry for new controversy, would play the commercial over and over as pundits on the panel deliberated over its meaning. This got the commercial played free all over the news.
Ali A. Akbar predicts that Huckabee's downfall will come at the hands of Southern Baptists:
Huckabee is the dream candidate for the democrats and although Novak cites Huckabee’s “surge” as “real” and in the same breath calls Thompson the “X Factor” in Iowa, I don’t believe people will be so easily influenced to vote for Huckabee in the primary.
[. . .]
Expect many Southern Baptists to come out of the wood work. I predicted this over a month ago and wrote about it on the third of this month. We have a tradition of ending our own when it’s time. It is time.
The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee (minority report), debunks the man-made global warming "consensus" mantra. The report found more than 400 prominent scientists, including several former members of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, disputed man-made global warming claims in 2007:
Over 400 prominent scientists from more than two dozen countries recently voiced significant objections to major aspects of the so-called "consensus" on man-made global warming. These scientists, many of whom are current and former participants in the UN IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), criticized the climate claims made by the UN IPCC and former Vice President Al Gore.
[. . .]
Even some in the establishment media now appear to be taking notice of the growing number of skeptical scientists. In October, the Washington Post Staff Writer Juliet Eilperin conceded the obvious, writing that climate skeptics "appear to be expanding rather than shrinking." Many scientists from around the world have dubbed 2007 as the year man-made global warming fears "bite the dust." (LINK) In addition, many scientists who are also progressive environmentalists believe climate fear promotion has "co-opted" the green movement. (LINK)
This blockbuster Senate report lists the scientists by name, country of residence, and academic/institutional affiliation. It also features their own words, biographies, and weblinks to their peer reviewed studies and original source materials as gathered from public statements, various news outlets, and websites in 2007. This new "consensus busters" report is poised to redefine the debate.
Randall Hoven makes the point that the United States is accomplishing a lot more to reduce carbon dioxide emissions due to consumption of fossil fuels than the mainstream media or the rest of the world would have you believe.
The U.S. government lists the carbon dioxide emissions due to consumption of fossil fuels by various countries. Hoven used those statistics, crunched the numbers and discovered a secret - the U.S. is doing more than most nations to reduce carbon dioxide emissions:
If we look at that data and compare 2004 (latest year for which data is available) to 1997 (last year before the Kyoto treaty was signed), we find the following.
* Emissions worldwide increased 18.0%. * Emissions from countries that signed the treaty increased 21.1%. * Emissions from non-signers increased 10.0%. * Emissions from the U.S. increased 6.6%.
In fact, emissions from the U.S. grew slower than those of more than 75% of the countries that signed Kyoto.
On July 25, 1997, before the Kyoto Protocol was finalized, the U.S. Senate unanimously passed the Byrd-Hagel Resolution, by a margin of 95-0.
The Resolution stated the sense of the Senate was that the United States should not be a signatory to any protocol that did not include binding targets and timetables for developing as well as industrialized nations or "would result in serious harm to the economy of the United States."
One of the cosponsors of the Byrd-Hagel resolution, Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel, explained in an interview with PBS that the purpose of the resolution was intended to make it clear that the Senate would not ratify an environmental treaty as unfair to the U.S. as the Kyoto agreement:
PBS: Back in 1997, you were a co-sponsor of a nonbinding resolution in the Senate. Did you mean, then, to kill the Kyoto climate treaty, or did you mean to change it?
HAGEL: Well, if you go back to that time when Sen. [Robert] Byrd [D-W. Va.] and I introduced the Byrd-Hagel Resolution, it was to put the Senate on record as to what kind of environmental treaty the Senate would ratify and what kind of an environmental treaty we would not ratify. It's a very simple, straightforward resolution. It says the Senate will not ratify an environmental treaty ... if it does not include all the nations of the world in some way, and second, if it does economic damage ... to our country. Those are the two guidelines.
I don't think that [Kyoto] was in the interest of our country. I don't think it was in the interest of the world.
It was not set out to specifically kill Kyoto. Most of us knew at the time that Kyoto was headed in a different direction. Some of us worked hard to try to maneuver that ... in a way that we could, in the Senate, come to some resolution where we could support it. But this was, I think, in July of 1997; Kyoto was signed in December of 1997. I was there at Kyoto and recall it rather vividly. And then you might recall that after that protocol was signed by Vice President [Al] Gore, of course then-President Clinton never brought it before the Senate, knowing that he would lose. ...
PBS: Do you think that Clinton should've brought it to Congress? Do you think there should've been a debate?
HAGEL: Well, that was up to the president, but I thought it was a little disingenuous to try to score political points and go sign the treaty and never bring it before the Senate or even fight for it or even push it on us. ...
PBS: Why didn't he do that? Why do you think he didn't come back and make the argument?
HAGEL: Well, I don't know why he didn't come before the Senate to make the argument. I do know that the following year, 1998, Sen. [John] Kerry from Massachusetts attempted to work on some kind of an alternative to Byrd-Hagel that would essentially rescind the Byrd-Hagel Resolution. And I do know that President Clinton worked quietly with a number of Democrats in the Senate to try to enlist their support to find an alternative to Byrd-Hagel.
But there were a number of senior Democrats -- starting with the most senior of the Democrats, Sen. Byrd from West Virginia -- who would not agree to that, as well as others like Sen. [Fritz] Hollings from South Carolina, who was very senior at the time. The president and Sen. Kerry and others just could not find a way to undermine or rescind Byrd-Hagel.
Then-President Clinton knew that he could not bring that treaty before the Senate, because it would suffer a rather humiliating defeat, after we had passed Byrd-Hagel in 1997 with the specific mandates that it addressed. And we had passed it, I believe, with a vote of 95-0.
Out of sync with the rest of the country on global climate change, the Clinton-Gore administration set up an international public opinion ambush for the U.S. and smugly walked the country right into it.
On November 12, 1998, less than four months after the Senate sent then President Clinton the Byrd-Hagle message, Clinton arrogantly had vice president Al Gore symbolically sign the protocol while a Deputy U.S. Ambassador did the official signing at the United Nations.
MARGARET WARNER: But Gore said the White House would not ask the Senate to ratify the agreement as it now stands.
VICE PRESIDENT GORE: As we've said from the very beginning, we will not submit this for ratification until there's meaningful participation by key developing nations.
You can watch Gore deny the Clinton administration intended to even try to ratify the treaty in the following video:
Even though Gore and the mainstream media have tried to convince the world that only a lunatic would dare to question the “consensus” that the global warming debate is “settled,” facts are still stubborn things.
The researchers compared predictions of 22 widely used climate "models" — elaborate schematics that try to forecast how the global weather system will behave — with actual readings gathered by surface stations, weather balloons and orbiting satellites over the past three decades.
The study, published online this week in the International Journal of Climatology, found that while most of the models predicted that the middle and upper parts of the troposphere —1 to 6 miles above the Earth's surface — would have warmed drastically over the past 30 years, actual observations showed only a little warming, especially over tropical regions.
"Can the models accurately explain the climate from the recent past? It seems that the answer is no," said lead study author David H. Douglass, a physicist specializing in climate at the University of Rochester.
Journalists have warned of climate change for 100 years. The trouble is, no one can decide whether we face global warming or global cooling. Which way will the climate change pendulum swing in 2025?
As expected, Republican Colorado Congressman Tom Tancredo announced today he's ending his presidential campaign. Tancredo threw his support, what little there was, behind Mitt Romney.
Henry Kissinger, who served as secretary of state under Presidents Ford and Nixon, says Senator McCain is the best person to serve as president at a dangerous time for America and the world:
"I tremendously admire his service to the nation," Mr. Kissinger said. "I believe that he's the best candidate to serve our nation in an extremely difficult and complicated period." He added that he was "doing something that I am not comfortable with" in making an endorsement, but that Mr. McCain and the nation deserved it.
In what may have been a criticism of Mr. Romney, Senator Clinton, Mayor Giuliani, or a number of the candidates running in the 2008 race, Mr. Kissinger stressed the strength and depth of Mr. McCain's commitment to his belief in America and freedom. "This is not a question of a focus group advising what to say on a talk show," he said.
Kissinger also took the opportunity to criticize the recent National Intelligence Estimate on Iran:
"They had a footnote that said a weapons program is the production of warheads," Mr. Kissinger said. "In fact, there are three elements to a weapons program, the production of fissionable material, the production of missiles, and the production of warheads. …We cannot dismiss it by defining it into one category, and this is a problem that will be with us for the rest of this administration and into the beginning of the next administration."
Kissinger had an important article in the Washington Post about misreading the Iran report and the recent tendency of the intelligence community to turn itself into a kind of check on the executive branch.
The Associated Press reports Republican Colorado Congressman Tom Tancredo, plans to announce he is abandoning his presidential campaign:
The five-term Colorado congressman planned to make the announcement at a news conference in Des Moines, Iowa, on Thursday, the person said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak for Tancredo or his campaign.
Tancredo's campaign would only say he planned a "major announcement" Thursday.
Tancredo announced in October that he would not seek a sixth term in Congress, but he may run for the Senate next year when Republican Wayne Allard retires.
Gallup's hypothetical 2008 general election trial-heat matchups between Democratic and Republican presidential candidates found Obama does better than Hillary Clinton against the Republican candidates:
The Dec. 14-16 USA Today/Gallup poll pitted Clinton and Obama against Giuliani, Romney, and Huckabee -- yielding six separate matchups (all data reported here are among registered voters).
[. . .]
Obama does as well as or better than Clinton against the three Republican candidates. These results are of interest against a backdrop that shows that an increasing number of Democrats are interested in nominating a candidate who has the best chance of beating the Republican in the November 2008 election.
Polls such as this are little more than interesting discussion material for political junkies. National polls aren't worth much in the presidential campaign, which consists of 50 separate races. Opinion surveys polling on registered voters should always be taken with a bigger grain of salt than surveys of likely voters.
Forty-percent of Americans said they would vote against Clinton, a New York Democrat, according to a Fox 5-The Washington Times-Rasmussen Reports poll.
[. . .]
"Hillary Clinton is better known than any (other) presidential candidate on either side. She has a lot of people who love her and a lot of people who hate her" said pollster Scott Rasmussen.
Sixty-four percent of Republicans and more than half of adult men under 40 said they would use their vote against Clinton, the poll found.
Giuliani drew the strongest opposition from Democrats, with 30 percent saying they would vote to bar him from the presidency, according to the poll.
According to the Washington Times, the dislike for Hillary is generational:
While Mrs. Clinton performed poorly among most demographics, younger male voters were particularly cold. More than half of the adult men younger than 40 said they would use their vote to keep Mrs. Clinton from returning to the White House.
"If you look at the age breakdowns, younger people are more likely to put Clinton at the top of the list than older" people, Mr. Rasmussen said.
Mrs. Clinton performed best among older females, highlighting her strength but also pointing to the inroads Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, her chief rival for the Democratic presidential nomination, has made with younger voters.
"I think that's some of the generational change you're seeing Obama tap into," Mr. Rasmussen said.
The Anti Hillary poll results come out as Reuters reports on the importance of "likeability" in presidential elections:
Candidates trumpet their voting records, their experience and their strong principles. But unless they pass a basic test of likeability, their chances of making it all the way to the White House are slim.
[. . .]
"Image is extremely important. Issues always come in a dismal last," said Saint Louis University political science professor Ken Warren.
It can't be good for Other polls have found Hillary is more likely to polarize voters than other candidates and that people who dislike her are prone to hold that opinion strongly.
“I know a lot of people" the questioner began "they just, for some reason don’t like you,” he said. “I like you,” he added quickly. But what could she do about all the rest?
The questioner wasn't convinced by Hillary's lengthy long-winded response:
“I’m leaning toward Obama,” he said after the event. The 25-year-old from Iowa City said he’d been to two Clinton events now, two Obama events and had seen Edwards once.
Yes, he does “like” the Senator. He wasn’t just saying that to be nice.
But he worries that she might not be electable if too many other people simply don’t like her.
With all the mania over the Huckaboom, one could be forgiven for concluding the Republican presidential race is all over in Iowa but for the counting and writing the "Huckabee Wins" headline.
It is still two weeks before Iowans tell the country who should be the nominees for the 2008 presidential campaign. Despite all the Huckahype, I think Patrick Ruffini got it right in his "Romney’s Race to Lose:"
1. The surging candidates (Huckabee and McCain) are flaky and/or can’t win. This empowers the institutional frontrunners, Rudy and Romney. And Rudy is in trouble.
1a. Huckabee has solved Romney’s expectations game in Iowa. A win for Romney out of the Hawkeye State translates to a big win and momentum. A narrow loss is within expectations. Only a double digit loss or third would significantly damage Romney.
1b. Huckabee’s momentum out of Iowa isn’t actionable in New Hampshire, so some other external force would need to rise to kill Romney’s lead in NH.
In politics, affinity groups are affinity groups and great things. Barack Obama will do better among African-Americans than other candidates. Joe Lieberman got huge electoral and financial turnout from Jews. And the Wall Street Journal talks about Mitt Romney’s support from Mormons:
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints says it has more than 22,500 members in Iowa in 68 congregations. Joseph Cheney, the president of one of seven "stakes," or geographical groups within the church, estimates that as many as 7,000 Mormons are likely to show up on caucus night, and that nearly three-quarters of the Mormons in the state support Mr. Romney.
[. . .]
The bottom line is that Mitt Romney will win a caucus that looks close. Romney starts with 5-7% of the vote. Any attempt to play down Romney’s chances in Iowa is just a game, the expectations game.
The Los Angeles Times article focuses on the impact California's Mormon population might have on the California primary, but it contains a couple of points that bear on Iowa as well:
Though hard to boil down into campaign dollars or potential votes, the impact of the Mormon support for Romney is significant.
[. . .]
Gillam and other church members are careful to say that they don't support Romney just because of his religion. That may have caught their eye at first, they say, but ultimately they were won over by his accomplishments as governor of Massachusetts and as a business leader, and by his role in rescuing the bribery-tainted 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.
"I'm not voting for him because he is Mormon. I think he's the best-qualified person for the job," said Jack Wheatley, a former Palo Alto mayor and longtime Republican donor who is Mormon. "Our country needs a turnaround. With Massachusetts, he did a good job there. With the Olympics, he did a good job there. With his business, helping improve companies, he did a great job. Who else has come close to that?
Regarding the current Huckahype, we should keep in mind that it is not easy to accurately predict the results of the Iowa caucuses:
The New York Times also reports that when it comes to Iowa predictions, caution is important:
All of the eccentricities of the Iowa caucuses make polling Iowa something most pollsters would rather not do. That night, it will be hard enough to depend on those entrance polls, taken moments before Iowans cast their votes. But in these last weeks ahead of the vote, to try and define the electorate and come up with a framework for polling is to rely as much on luck as savvy.
[. . .]
The biggest obstacle to polling in Iowa is drawing the sample in the first place. Some polls use lists of past caucus goers, but they risk missing first-time caucus goers, who accounted for more than half of the Democratic caucus goers in 2004, according to the network entrance poll. Other polls use lists of registered voters provided by the state, but they risk missing those who haven’t yet registered to vote but who plan to participate in the caucuses.
We will talk, read and write a lot about Iowa in the next couple of weeks. None of all that punditry will matter much. All that counts is what those headlines say on January 4, 2008.
Huckabee's faith in redemption is now the target of the mainstream media.
NBC reports on Huckabee's generous use of clemency while governor:
In all Huckabee granted 1,023 commutations and pardons in ten years as governor, twice as many as his three predecessors combined.
[. . .]
At the time Huckabee acknowledged that his belief in redemption factored into his decisions.
You can watch NBC's Lisa Myers NBC Nightly News report in the following video:
As the mainstream media catches hold of this story, eventually rival presidential campaigns will launch Willie Horton ads similar to to this YouTube video.
Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee's latest campaign ad is a warm and fuzzy Christmas greeting:
I disagree with the political punditry, which has judged the ad "brilliant." The common wisdom among the pundits is that Huckabee's pleasant greeting will protect him from the negative ads that the election calendar ensures will be launched during the holiday period. Attack ads focusing on opponents' record work. Such ads will still work during the holiday season. It may be more difficult to reach voters distracted by holiday celebrations, but the message will get through.
A campaign without sufficient resources such as Huckabee's should use what little cash it has to respond to the coming attacks. I still expect the Huckaboom to collapse.
Congressman Steve King (R), one of Iowa's most strident critics of illegal immigration and a champion of the state's rural conservatives, has endorsed Romney.
[. . .]
*** UPDATE *** King just announced that he's supporting Thompson. Team Romney is in the back of the room looking bewildered. They were all here, leading all the press to conclude that it was an endorsement for Romney.
A couple of weeks ago, The Hill said Steve King’s endorsement “could provide a boost for one of the GOP candidates in the all-important first-in-the-nation caucus state.”
Congressman King’s leadership in support of the sanctity of life and his efforts in the fight against illegal immigration have made him one of Iowa’s great Republican leaders. He’s a tireless fighter for the 5th district of Iowa and I’m honored by his support. I look forward to working with Congressman King over the next three weeks and into 2008 in support of the traditional conservative values he and I share.
There has to an interesting story behind MSNBC's report that King had endorsed Romney….before the endorsement was even announced.
The picture reminds me of the first time I saw Ronald Reagan. When Martin Luther King, was assassinated I went to Sacramento and joined a protest march to the State Capitol. Governor Reagan addressed the crowd. I am still amazed at how wrinkled he looked.
Two former Republican legislators from Arkansas were in Iowa this week, criticizing Huckabee's record on immigration and taxes on trips paid for by Ron Paul:
Critics of Republican presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee visited Iowa to challenge the former Arkansas governor's record on rival U.S. Rep. Ron Paul's dime.
"He's a pro-gun, pro-life Bill Clinton," said former Arkansas state Sen. Jim Holt, R-Springdale, "(with) his communications skills, his likability and the way he's governed with taxes and all."
The jaunt to Iowa by Holt and former Arkansas state Rep. Randy Minton, R-Cabot, was funded by Paul's presidential campaign, the Arkansas News Service reported Friday.
Speaking at a VFW hall in Hillsborough, New Hampshire Monday morning, Connecticut's Independent Democratic Senator Joe Lieberman endorsed Republican Jon McCain for president. Lieberman said his endorsement of McCain is based primarily on their common view of U.S. foreign policy:
"I know it's unusual for a Democrat to be supporting a Republican, but there are some things that are more important than the political parties," Lieberman said in a joint appearance with McCain on Fox News. "One is friendship, and the other is that I happen to think this guy is the best of all the candidates to unite our country across political lines so we can finally begin to solve some of the problems people have in this country and, of course, to lead us in the war against Islamist terrorism."
[. . .]
"At town hall meeting after town hall meeting, people stand up and say, 'Why can't you all work together for the good of the country?' I think that's what this message is today with this endorsement," McCain said.
Isn't it sad that working together for good of the country seems unusual?
"We've got to win New Hampshire," he says, or at least exceed expectations there. "And then I think we can do well in South Carolina. In South Carolina we've got the base this time.
“I think this guy is going to implode and, if he doesn’t implode, he gets the Republican nomination, I think the Republicans might as well just write it off,” Beck said on CNN’s The Situation Room Friday.
Asked about the naming of Ed Rollins, who is credited with President Reagan’s landslide re-election, as Huckabee’s new national campaign chairman, Beck said, “I am so sick and tired of hearing people talk about how much they’re like Ronald Reagan.” “I wish people would be themselves, not Ronald Reagan,” he added.
Beck also criticized Huckabee’s recent controversial comments about Mormonism, the religious faith Beck shares with Huckabee rival Mitt Romney.
Watch Beck’s interview with Wolf Blitzer in the following video:
On the Democratic side, the Globe endorsed Barack Obama while Des Moines Register backed Hillary.
The Des Moines Register, Iowa's statewide newspaper, focused on competence and called McCain and Clinton the candidates it believes are most competent and ready to lead:
"The times call for two essential qualities in the next American president," the Register's editorial board said on the paper's Web site. "The times call for competence. Americans want their government to work again. The times call for readiness to lead. Americans want their country to do great things again."
The Register's endorsement is a bad omen for Hillary. The paper has a track record of backing the losing Democratic candidate in the Iowa caucuses. In the past 20 years no Democrat endorsed by the Register has gone on to win the party's presidential nomination.
The paper chose Edwards in 2004, Bill Bradley in 2000 and Paul Simon in 1988. The Democratic caucuses were uncontested in 1992 and 1996.
The Globe's editorial board praised McCain for his straight talk and honesty regardless of the political cost:
The antidote to such a toxic political approach is John McCain. The iconoclastic senator from Arizona has earned his reputation for straight talk by actually leveling with voters, even at significant political expense.
[. . .]
As a lawmaker and as a candidate, McCain has done more than his share to transcend partisanship and promote an honest discussion of the problems facing the United States. He deserves the opportunity to represent his party in November's election.
In Endorsing Obama, the Globe seized upon his inexperience and his audacity of hope:
Obama's critics, and even many who want to support him, worry about his relative lack of experience. It is true that other Democratic contenders have more conventional resumes and have spent more time in Washington. But that exposure has tended to give them a sense of government's constraints. Obama is more animated by its possibilities.
[. . .]
Obama's story is the American story, a deeply affecting tale of possibility. People who vote for him vote their hopes. Even after seven desolating years, this country has not forgotten how to hope.
As the Des Moines Register's track record demonstrates, endorsements don't necessarily mean much. Nevertheless, These two endorsements, along with that of the Manchester Union-Leader, mean much more to the McCain campaign which has shown signs of a resurgence after trailing badly in the polls since nearly imploding earlier this year.
Meir Javedanfar writes that hope of a strong united international front against Iran is gone, after the NIE gave state sponsor of terrorism a clean bill of health regarding nuclear weapons:
It is one thing when the IAEA gives Iran positive points for being “generally truthful about its past.” After all, many argue that the IAEA is a toothless bureaucratic organization, at the mercy of different governments and their political agendas.
But when the multi-billion dollar US intelligence machine declares Iran halted its nuclear weapons program back in 2003, then as far as many Middle Eastern countries are concerned, the “danger” label has been taken off Iran’s nuclear program.
Although many Sunni countries are worried about Tehran’s activities in Iraq and Lebanon, they were more worried about the prospects of war between Washington and Tehran. Now that this danger has dissipated, it is likely that even more countries in the region will decide to engage Iran, as means of influencing its strategy and behavior in the Middle East. This will make the job of imposing sanctions against Iran much more difficult than before.
It will also enable Iran to come out of regional isolation, thus ruining all the celebration that took place in Washington and Jerusalem following the Annapolis show of solidarity.
In just one document, in which incendiary conclusions are misrepresented and not supported by the substance of the report and which some suggest was artfully written to damage President Bush, the writers have managed to undo years and years of effort to contain the world's leading state sponsor of terror and its nuclear ambitions.
This will only embolden Iran. A more confident and less vilified Iran is more likely to continue to engage in activities which will make war more likely.
Rollins served as the National Campaign Director to Ronald Reagan in the 1984 presidential election in which Reagan won 49 states while defeating former Vice President Walter Mondale.
“I can promise this man comes as close to anyone as filling those shoes,” Rollins said, joking that “this is the only campaign I’ve ever been in where there are no doughnuts and booze.”
With the appointment of Rollins and Huckabee now surging in poll after poll I was clearly wrong in assuming that Huckabee was no more than a distraction that would scare the living daylights out of a lot of moderates of both parties.
You can watch Rollins discuss his new gig with Lou Dobbs in the following video:
Tony Snow discussed faith in the Republican presidential campaign with Bill O'Reilly on "The Factor" (12/13/07):
Snow nails it when he describes the mainstream media as "filled with people who don't go to church" and who consider religious people to be quacks. Nevertheless, the discussion misses a lot of recent history which has reminded the Democrat's that the Party was once less secular. These memories, along with the failure to overcome President Bush convinced the Democrats that the Party should attempt to regain its religion.
Democrats recaptured the Catholic vote they had lost two years ago. They sliced the GOP's advantage among weekly churchgoers to 12 percentage points, down from 18 points in 2004 congressional races and 22 points in the 2004 presidential contest. Democrats even siphoned off a portion of the Republican Party's most loyal base, white evangelical Protestants.
[. . .]
In House races in 2004, 74 percent of white evangelicals voted for Republicans and 25 percent for Democrats, a 49-point spread, according to exit polls. This year, Republicans received 70 percent of the white evangelical vote and Democrats got 28 percent, a 42-point spread.
The Democratic campaign to close the God gap continues in the Presidential race. Jonathan Turley writes that the candidates are talking so much about faith that one would think they wanted to be in the College of Cardinals rather than the Hall of Presidents:
On the Democratic side, the candidates have competed equally in the parade of the pious. Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois led the way and recently proclaimed his intention to be "an instrument of God" and to create "a Kingdom right here on earth." Even the title of Obama's book, The Audacity of Hope, was taken from sermons by his controversial spiritual adviser, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr.
Other Democratic candidates have responded by proselytizing on their own divine qualifications. In one debate, the Democrats held forth on the power of prayer and the role of their faith in their public lives. Hillary Clinton has described her own "faith journey," her experiencing "the presence of the Holy Spirit on many occasions," and how she is assisted by an "extended prayer family" and "faith warriors."
I am not suggesting that every progressive suddenly latch on to religious terminology. Nothing is more transparent than inauthentic expressions of faith – the politician who shows up at a black church around election time and claps – off rhythm – to the gospel choir.
But what I am suggesting is this – secularists are wrong when they ask believers to leave their religion at the door before entering into the public square. Frederick Douglas, Abraham Lincoln, Williams Jennings Bryant, Dorothy Day, Martin Luther King – indeed, the majority of great reformers in American history – were not only motivated by faith, but repeatedly used religious language to argue for their cause. To say that men and women should not inject their "personal morality" into public policy debates is a practical absurdity; our law is by definition a codification of morality, much of it grounded in the Judeo-Christian tradition.
O'Reilly does have a valid point when he calls the mainstream media out over its less than even handed treatment of the religiosity of the presidential candidates.
Axelrod, Penn, and Trippi, the campaign advisors of the three leading Democratic candidates go at it discuss recent campaign developments on "Hardball."
Bill Shaheen may have resigned as co-chair of Hillary's campaign, and Hillary may have apologized to Obama for Shaheen's remarks suggesting Obama's admitted drug use in the past could make him vulnerable as a candidate, but Mark Penn is still playing the story. Makes one wonder just how sincere Hillary was in her apology. Could the apology have been motivated by politics?
Two different focus groups, one from CNN, as well as one from FoxNews, conclude that Hillary came in third in today's Des Moines Register Democratic debate.
In interviews conducted immediately after Thursday's Des Moines Register debate, most of the 23 undecided Democratic voters surveyed said they thought former Sen. John Edwards came out on top and said he would get their vote if the election were held today.
Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois placed second in a focus group conducted by CNN when asked who would get their vote, and Sen. Hillary Clinton was the third choice.
Frank Luntz’s Fox News focus group also had Hillary in third place behind Edwards and Obama:
Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and John Edwards — all had excellent afternoons. But nothing happened to knock Obama off his stride. Since he leads in the polls in Iowa, the event still leaves him ahead in the contest.
The vaunted Hillary juggernaut has hit a proverbial brick wall and there is fury in Hillaryland.
Across 90 minutes, the fierce competition between the two Iowa front-runners shone through only once when Obama was asked how he could offer a new type of foreign policy since several of his advisers once worked for President Clinton.
Hillary Clinton laughed out loud at that, and said with a smile, "I'm looking forward to hearing that."
Obama, also smiling, waited for the laughter to die down before saying, "Hillary, I'm looking forward to you advising me as well."
Will the ghost of Willie Horton haunt the U.S. campaign trail of Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee?
As you may recall from the 1988 presidential campaign, Willie Horton was serving life in prison on a murder conviction in Massachusetts and raped a woman in Maryland after he was released in 1986 under a weekend furlough program backed by then-Massachusetts Democratic Gov. Michael Dukakis.
Horton was used by the George H.W. Bush presidential campaign to portray Dukakis as weak on crime.
Wayne Dumond may be Mike Huckabee's Willie Horton:
Dumond was serving a life prison term for raping a 17-year-old cheerleader in Arkansas in 1984. In 1996 his appeals for clemency attracted the attention of Huckabee, a Baptist preacher, after the inmate was said to have found religion.
Dumond gained freedom when paroled by the state's parole board -- with Huckabee's endorsement -- and moved to the Kansas City area in 1999.
Less than a year later, Carol Sue Shields died of suffocation, and Dumond was convicted in her murder.
Huckabee blames the Arkansas state parole board, saying the board made the decision to free Dumond:
"Should this guy have been let out in retrospect? No. But at the time, the parole board in making the decision to let him go, felt it was a prudent decision to make," Huckabee said.
According to Reuters, not everybody remembers it that way:
Former state Rep. Pat Flanagin, a Democrat who fought the release of Dumond said:
Huckabee pressured the parole board to free Dumond despite a personal protest from Stevens, who during a meeting pressed her face close to Huckabee's and said this is how close Dumond was to her for an hour.
"It is even more so (like) Willie Horton, because he was given very ample warning about the guy, about his background, about his previous sexual offenses and a murder he was involved in previously," Flanagin said.
Huckabee had better expect a lot of advertising like the above video. Blaming the parole board isn't going to cut it.
Republican presidential wannabee Mike Huckabee, apologized to rival Mitt Romney for Huckabee's questionable question contained in an upcoming New York Times Magazine article that appear to disparage the Mormon faith:
"I said, I would never try, ever to try to somehow pick out some point of your faith and make it an issue, and I wouldn't," Huckabee said.
"I've stayed away from talking about Mitt Romney's faith," Huckabee said. "I told him face-to-face, I said I don't think your being a Mormon ought to make you more or less qualified for being a president."
Romney was "gracious" in accepting the apology:
"The governor accepted the apology," Romney spokesman Kevin Madden said. "He continues to believe that this campaign should not be about questioning a candidate's faith. While it is fair to criticize an opponent's record or policy positions, it is out of bounds for one candidate to question another's personal faith."
You can watch the following video and see Huckabee's apology.
Huckabee apologized but the damage is done. Huckabee managed to start a dialogue questioning Mormon beliefs.
The Los Angeles Times< reports that Huckabee's quetionable question "dwarfs GOP debate:"
The controversy, which overshadowed a GOP debate here, came less than a week after Romney, who had been leading in Iowa polls, delivered a speech aimed at overcoming any political impediment posed by his membership in the Mormon church.
And it was the latest instance of the newly ascendant Huckabee having to explain his statements now that he is facing closer scrutiny.
[. . .]
Some, however, think Huckabee's comment was not as innocent as he suggested, especially after he ran a TV ad in Iowa in which he discussed faith and the words "Christian Leader" flashed across the screen.
You can count me in the group that thinks Huckabee's questionable question was not an innocent mistake taken out of context. Huckabee's assertion that he Mormon question was taken out of context is well, wrong. I posted the context here. The only thing out of context was Huckabee's insertion of the Mormon question. Like the LA Times I also expressed concern about Huckabee's "CHRISTIAN LEADER" ad, in which Huckabee dealt the religion card he continues to play.
The highlight of today’s Des Moines Register Republican Debate was when Fred Thompson led a rebellion against the moderators hand show game.
At a post-debate campaign stop, Republican candidate Fred Thompson explained his reason for refusing to answer a debate question by a show of hands, calling it "monkey business:"
"I just decided that I wasn't going to engage in any of this monkey business that they like to engage us on sometimes -- making us look like trained monkeys reaching for peanut or something ... 30 seconds is brief enough and when they try to reduce your answer to just a hand raise -- I 'aint going to play that game," the former Tennessee senator said.
Candidates have run into difficulties when they have gone along with a moderator's request for a show of hands regarding a complicated question.
On the road to Pella, Huckabee talked about the enthusiasm he now encounters everywhere he goes. For example, he said, his driver in California not only declined payment but also wrote the governor a $50 personal check right on the spot. It was, I thought, a dangerous anecdote to tell within earshot of a professional driver traveling along an icy highway at high speed, but Huckabee was feeling invulnerable, and the driver, I later realized, was already on the governor’s team. Huckabee normally starts his mornings by running 6 to 10 miles and reading a chapter from the Book of Proverbs. Today he was too pressed to do either, but he planned to catch up later. Anyway, he knew much of the day’s assignment, Chapter 3, by heart. ‘‘Trust in the Lord,’’ he quoted, ‘‘and lean not upon thine own understanding.’’ Not a bad motto for a campaign that is still too broke to do any independent polling.
Chapter 3 also contains the admonition to ‘‘keep sound wisdom and discretion.’’ Huckabee is, indeed, a discreet fellow, but he has no trouble making his feelings known. He mentioned how much he respected his fellow candidates John McCain and Rudolph W. Giuliani. The name of his principal rival in Iowa, Mitt Romney, went unmentioned. Romney, a Mormon, had promised that he would be addressing the subject of his religion a few days later. I asked Huckabee, who describes himself as the only Republican candidate with a degree in theology, if he considered Mormonism a cult or a religion. ‘‘I think it’s a religion,’’ he said. ‘‘I really don’t know much about it.’’
I was about to jot down this piece of boilerplate when Huckabee surprised me with a question of his own: ‘‘Don’t Mormons,’’ he asked in an innocent voice, ‘‘believe that Jesus and the devil are brothers?’’
Huckabee didn't walk into a fall into a clever political/religious trap. No, instead the Huckabee volunteered his questionable question, even after admitting that he's not well-versed in LDS theology.
Unfortunately, we can see from the context that Huck went and volunteered his thoughts on this point, even after admitting that he doesn't know what he is talking about when it comes to Mormonism.
When one doesn't know much about what one is talking about, they should remain quiet. The campaign for the Republican presidential nomination should be about ideas that can move the country forward. It should not be about inciting discord over one another's religious beliefs.
Huckabee has put out a statement concerning the article that originally caused me to post about the questionable question:
A report released tonight cites an upcoming article in the Sunday edition of The New York Times Magazine which quotes former Arkansas Governor and Presidential Candidate Mike Huckabee asking a question about the content of the Mormon faith. In fact, the full context of the exchange makes it clear that Governor Huckabee was illustrating his unwillingness to answer questions about Mormonism and to avoid addressing theological questions during this campaign.
“Governor Huckabee has said consistently that he believes this campaign should center on a discussion of the important issues confronting our nation,” said Senior Advisor, Dr. Charmaine Yoest, “and not focus on questions of religious belief. He wants to assure persons of all faith traditions of his firm commitment to religious tolerance and freedom of worship. Governor Huckabee believes that one of the great strengths of our nation lies in its diversity of thought, opinion and faith.”
Huckabee's That statement can not be squared with Huckabee's questionable question and the context in which is was asked.
Romney retorted to questions about Huckabee's questionable question by declaring that "attacking someone's religion is really going too far:"
"But I think attacking someone's religion is really going too far. It's just not the American way, and I think people will reject that," Romney told NBC's "Today" show.
Asked if he believed Huckabee was speaking in a coded language to evangelicals, Romney praised his rival as a "good man trying to do the best he can," but he added, "I don't believe that the people of this country are going to choose a person based on their faith and what church they go to."
A new WMUR/CNN poll, finds Romney retains comfortable lead in New Hampshire. Mitt Romney is leading with 32 percent, Rudy Giuliani and John McCain both have 19 percent, Mike Huckabee has climbed slightly to 9 percent, and Ron Paul is at 7 percent.
Hillary's 20-point lead has vanished. Hillary now has 31 percent and is in a statistical tie with Barack Obama who has 30 percent. John Edwards is third with 16 percent, and Bill Richardson has slipped slightly to 7 percent.
The poll was conducted by the University of New Hampshire Survey Center over the weekend and is evidence that Oprah's Obama tour may have had an impact.
Earlier this year, Huckabee said, “Nobody's going to find some YouTube moments of me saying something radically different than what I'm saying today.” Maybe there are no YouTube videos, but the answers Huckabee provided in responding to an Associated Press questionnaire during his first run for political office in 1992 are coming back to haunt him.
During his unsuccessful race against Sen. Dale Bumpers, Huckabee didn't only reject the idea gays in the military, he added:
I believe to try to legitimize that which is inherently illegitimate would be a disgraceful act of government. I feel homosexuality is an aberrant, unnatural and sinful lifestyle, and we now know it can pose a dangerous public health risk.
Huckabee's questionnaire responses show a harder-edge than Huckabee wants to present today as he tries not to “scare the living daylights” out of moderates and independents.
On other subjects in the questionnaire, Huckabee:
# Called for the elimination of political action committees and campaign contributions from lobbyists. He also said candidates should not be allowed to receive contributions until one year before an election and said there should be limits on the amount of out-of-state money they could accept.
# Rejected the idea of women in combat “because of my strong traditional view that women should be treated with respect and dignity and not subject to the kinds of abuses that could occur in combat.”
# Said living together out of wedlock “is demeaning to the highest expression of human love and commitment. I reject it as an alternate lifestyle, because it robs people of the highest possible relationship one can experience: marriage.”
The Associated Press reports Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee, questions Mormons' belief.
In an article to be published in Sunday's New York Times Magazine, Huckabee asks:
Don't Mormons believe that Jesus and the devil are brothers?
According to the AP, Huckabee asked the question after saying he believes Mormonism is a religion but doesn't know much about it.
We will have to wait until the weekend to see if the Times Magazine provides some legitimate context for the headline grabbing quote. In the meantime, even though it's hard not to jump to the conclusion that Huckabee is questioning Mormons beliefs, we should give Huckabee the benefit of the doubt, or at least an opportunity to explain.
It is possible that Huckabee managed to fall into a clever political/religious trap. It is also possible that he was trying to set such a trap. It seems highly unlikely that Huckabee would engage in such a dirty trick as the Huckaboom continues to gain momentum.
I'm sure the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints can adequately defend Mormon beliefs while we wait.
Delaware Democratic senator Joe Biden, who has been in office since 1972 and is chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations, boasts of his experience:
"Being president is not the same thing as running for president," he says in the spot.
He then goes on to say that the squabbling about "experience" and "change," which has consumed the campaigns of the leading Democrats -- Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and John Edwards -- is about meaningless political slogans.
[. . .]
"You don't have to guess what I'll do as president," he says in the ad. "Just look at what I've done."
A new Associated Press-Ipsos poll finds people think the U.S. is making progress in Iraq, 52 percent to 41 percent. In September 2006, the AP-Ipsos poll fond 56 percent said the U.S. was losing ground.
In another sign of a gradually more positive view 42 percent now think history will judge the war to be a success. In September, only 34 percent said it would be considered successful.
Recent Gallup polling found that even though Americans remain negative about the status of the war right now, the vast majority believe Iraq will be better off in the long run -- 71% say the country will be better off as a result of the U.S. invasion, while 24% say it will be worse off. These results are similar to those measured last year.
There remains a huge partisan divide on what to do about Iraq: The vast majority of Republicans say the troops should stay until the job is done or until the United States wins, while Democrats say the troops should be removed immediately or as soon as possible.
Huckabee Was For Trade With Cuba Before He Was Against It.
Now that he is running for president and is no longer governor of Arkansas, Mike Huckabee has decided to change his mind about the U.S. trade embargo against Cuba:
As governor of Arkansas five years ago, Mike Huckabee joined a bipartisan chorus of politicians who concluded that the U.S. trade embargo against Cuba was bad for businesses. Now that he's a top-tier candidate for president, Huckabee has decided he favors the embargo -- so much so that he vowed Monday to outdo even President Bush in strangling the regime of Cuban President Fidel Castro and punishing those who do business there.
Huckabee admits his Kerry -like flip-flop on Cuba is all about political expediency:
"Rather than seeing it as some huge change, I would call it, rather, the simple reality that I'm running for president of the United States, not for reelection as governor of Arkansas," he said. "I've got to look at this as an issue that touches the whole country."
Watch the following video where he explains his change of mind on the Hannity & Colmes show.
According to the Los Angeles Times, Huckabee's 2002 letter reportedly argued that the embargo "continues to harm our own agricultural and business interests here at home and has certainly not helped the people of Cuba." Now in a successful effort to obtain an endorsement from Marco Rubio, Florida's Cuban American state House speaker, Huckabee takes the opposite view vowing to veto any effort to end the sanctions:
Huckabee pledged to adhere to provisions of a 1996 law that would permit U.S. citizens to sue in American courts for property taken from them during the 1959 Cuban revolution.
Those lawsuits could threaten European businesses with holdings on the island. Bush and President Clinton have routinely avoided conflict on the issue by suspending those provisions of the 1996 law.
"I really wasn't that aware of a lot of the issues that exist between Cuba and the United States," Huckabee said Monday, adding that his flexibility on policy should be viewed as a good thing.
How could Huckabee be unaware these issues?
Unfortunately, Huckabee's Cuban Flip-flop, has all the political expediency of Huckabee's new immigration plan, designed to counter the criticism that Huckabee has supported in-state tuition for the children of illegal immigrants.
Even though Chris Dodd served as a Democratic Congressman from Connecticut from 1975 until 1981, a U.S. Senator from 1981 until the present, served as general chairman of the Democratic National Committee from 1995 to 1997, and announced his bid for the White House on the Don Imus radio show back in January, he has decided to introduce himself.
Much more than a day late and a dollar short.
I was taken aback by Dodd's claim to be the only veteran among the Democratic presidential. It's true, if you don't consider Mike Gravel a candidate. Dodd served in the U.S. Army Reserve from 1969 until 1975.
To combat Mike Huckabee's surge in recent polls, Mitt Romney is airing a "contrast" ad in Iowa on illegal immigration.
The ad begins by highlighting the similarities shared by Romney and Huckabee on the life and marriage issues:
"Two former governors . . . two good family men . . . both pro-life . . . both support a constitutional amendment protecting traditional marriage," says the ad's narrator.
The ad then argues that the real difference between Romney and Huckabee is on illegal immigration.
It specifically targets Huckabee for having supported in-state tuition benefits as well as taxpayer-funded scholarships for the children of illegal immigrants.
In an interview with ABC News' Charles Gibson, Romney compared the Huckabee "surge" to previous surges and predicted like the McCain surge, the Giuliani surge, and the Fred Thompson surge, the Huckabee surge would eventually deflate:
And in the past, what's happened is, when the surge occurs, people look more closely at the record of the vision of the person running . . . and inevitably the surge kinda deflates. I think you will see the same thing here; I sure hope so.
Romney's contrast ad hit the airwaves shortly after Huckabee launched his own immigration ad, which calls for "no amnesty," building a border fence, and "doing it now."
The ad and Huckabee's new immigration plan are designed to counter the criticism that Huckabee has supported in-state tuition for the children of illegal immigrants.
Even if immigration is a hotter issue than Iraq, it's going to take more than Romney's the new contrast ad to deflate the Huckabee surge.
