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By Steven L. Taylor
By Steven L. Taylor
Via the LAT (Could the bailout turn a profit for taxpayers?) comes this interesting graphic: ![]() Filed under: Uncategorized | Comments Off|
By Steven L. Taylor
Yes, another Palin post.1 I fully understand that the vast majority of McCain supporters find themselves in the position of simply having to ignore Palin’s lack of experience and, more importantly, her lack to date of actually engaging intelligently in the major questions of the day. I fully and totally understand that in a two-party race, voters have no choice but to cast their lots with the candidate who most closely mirrors their general policy preferences, and that sometimes means averting eyes to particularly bad aspects of one’s chosen candidate.2 What I find interesting (indeed, fascinating on one level and very frustrating on another) is the cognitive dissonance displayed by some in support of her selection. There is almost no evidence to date that she is ready to be the President of the United States (something that one would like a veep to be ready to be). And yet, if this is pointed out, there are attacks on the one doing the pointing out (not real defenses of Palin’s readiness–and where defenses are offered they are non-substantive, such as saying she is the next Reagan or the next Truman). Note: if one wishes to assert that Palin is a good choice for veep, some positive evidence in that regard is needed, not wild fantasies about might be. Her answer on foreign policy experience discussed the other day was a joke and here’s her response on the bailout proposal: If you do not wish to view the video, or prefer to read the transcript,3 here’s the response COURIC: Why isn’t it better, Governor Palin, to spend $700 billion helping middle-class families struggling with health care, housing, gas and groceries? Allow them to spend more and put more money into the economy? Instead of helping these big financial institutions that played a role in creating this mess? To watch/read that and come away with the sense that she has even a basic grasp of the situation requires a great deal of charity, if not self-delusion. And is she looking at noted during the response? if someone can translate that, or make a cogent argument that it is a legitimate response, I would love to read it. Sarah Palin is a pefect embodiment of what I termed a long time ago the Deion Sanders Effect4: the idea that we will often support (even like) someone only because they are on our team. As I wrote at the time: We too often treat politics like a spectator sport–everything is seen in terms of whether it helps our side move the ball forward or not. If our side says it, it is good; if the other side says it, it’s bad. Such thinking diverts us from genuine, efficacious public dialogue. We altogether seem too interested in making sure our side scores (or, at least, that the other side doesn’t) than we are in actually having a worthwhile discussion about what our national priorities should be, and what solutions are needed to address them. I don’t expect Republicans to en masse vote for Obama because of Palin–for any number of reasons that would be an odd expectation to have. What I would like to see, however, is some intellectual honesty about her selection and her qualifications.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Comments/Trackbacks (32)|
By Steven L. Taylor
By Steven L. Taylor
By Steven L. Taylor
By Steven L. Taylor
One other thing I noticed last night in watching the post-debate discussions on CNN, MSNBC and Fox, is that I saw Biden on at least two different nets, and yet Palin was nowhere to be found. It is curious that the McCain campaign clearly does not feel that it is in their interest to allow Palin to go out and fill the “attack dog” role that veeps are allegedly supposed to fulfill. They are, in essence, hampering themselves by removing what should be an asset (the running mate) from the field of play. Filed under: Uncategorized | Comments/Trackbacks (7)|
By Steven L. Taylor
Unless it happened when I glanced away, up until this moment, 77 minutes into the 90-minute debate, John McCain has not once looked at Obama — while listening to him, while addressing him, while disagreeing with him, while finding moments of accord. I am not sure if Fallows is correct that McCain never looked at Obama, but I do agree that Obama was treating it more like a conversation than was McCain. This is striking only because it seemed that the goal of the format was direct interaction between the participants(at least to listen to Lehrer’s early admonition that they talk to one another). I did distinctly notice that Obama rather smartly looked directly into the camera on several occasions to address the viewers. Filed under: Uncategorized | Comments/Trackbacks (4)|
By Steven L. Taylor
CNN Money reports that: More gas shortages on the way While Congress and Bush administration officials have been working to complete a bailout plan and stem the financial contagion on Wall Street, a different kind of economic crisis emerged across the South this week: A severe, hurricane-related gasoline shortage has curtailed trucking from Atlanta to Asheville, N.C., and created a wave of panic buying among motorists. This comports with my own initial experiences post-Ike (as noted here and here). Even now there have been cases of stations running out of supply (I pulled into our local Costco earlier in the week to be waved off by the attendant, as they had just run out of gas). Prices also remain high relative to their pre-Ike levels. The phenomenon appears to be specifically acute in, if not limited to, the southeastern US: The scenes over the past several days in places like Nashville, Tenn., Anniston, Ala., and western North Carolina looked like file footage from 1979 – with bags over empty gas pumps and quarter-mile long lines of cars waiting to fill up at stations that hadn’t run out. AAA reported that drivers were so desperate that they were following tankers to gas stations to ensure a fill-up. I have seen the plastic bags phenomenon, but the only serious gas line I have witnessed was the day before Ike when there was a run on Costco, as at the time it had gas far cheaper than any of the other stations, most of which had already jacked their prices in anticipation of supply problems. The article paints a gloomy picture: But while the current shortages can be traced directly to the two hurricanes, the severity of the problem points out a bigger issue: The U.S. has been operating for a while with razor-thin spare gasoline capacity. It goes on from there too look at a worst-case scenario, but it was also basing much of its information from Matt Simmons, who is known for his especially pessimistic view of oil supply. Filed under: Uncategorized | Comments/Trackbacks (2)|
By Steven L. Taylor
CNN is reporting that Paul Newman died today of cancer at the age of 83. May he rest in peace. Filed under: Uncategorized | Comments Off|
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