No More Incumbents Presidential Race

If there’s any indication that we are marred in chaos indefinitely, or as I put it ” up Shiite creek with no paddle,” it is in John McCain’s ludicrous statements from the stump (”A Hundred Years”). These startling statements reveal a man so detached from reality and so utterly afraid to confront Hilary and Obama on the economy, an issue he readily admits little knowledge of, that the so called maverick has no other choice but to tout the surge. Scary enough, a lot of Americans are still miserably uninformed when it comes to Iraq. For example, more Americans than ever before - 42 percent - say the troop surge in Iraq has made things better, the percentage of Americans who say the war is going well is now ten points higher than it was in September of last year and, worse yet, twenty-eight percent of Americans still believe Saddam was personally involved in the Sept. 11 attacks.

This radical and seemingly inconceivable disconnect implies that Americans aren’t paying attention, and why should they? The coverage of the war has dropped precipitously — down to 3 percent of available news space and air time this year, according to the Project for Excellence in Journalism. Indeed, war coverage did make a comeback last week ( no Govs Gone Wild?) because of the American death toll reaching 4000, which I suppose reflects the media’s affinity for round,easy numbers (3,557 is fluff; bring out the horny governors!)

Enter Barack and Hillary (she still in it?)

In order to demystify the belief that the surge is working, Messrs. Barack and Hillary are going to have to do more than call for vague timetables. Rather, the candidates will have to constantly remind Americans of the astronomical costs for this monumental foreign policy blunder, link it to the crumbling domestic economy, and offer real and imaginative solutions in the face of a war hero while simultaneously highlighting McCain’s gaffes (the Iran/Sunni connection) on the issue. In short, they will have to demonstrate that gravitas and war hero status, although admirable and noteworthy, do not equate to sound and reasoned judgement.

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 A great many of fellow democrats have expressed a lot of dismay over the Democrat’s decision to support a bill allocating $100bn (£50bn) of new funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan until the end of September. The bill is a compromise measure between Republicans and Democrats, after the Democrats dropped demands for a timetable for a US troop withdrawal. Now I would wholeheartedly agree with my fellow Dems if they had enough bipartisan support to overturn a presidential veto, but alas that simply wasn’t the case. If this were indeed true then I would be the first one to criticize them for ignoring Americans demands of ending this war at the polls back in November. As far as the classic Republican platitude of “not supporting the troops,” I would argue that by continuing to support a hopeless quagmire we are endangering the lives of every one of our fighting men and women, serving in a country in the midst of a full-blown civil war.

A total of 14 senators voted against the bill , including Senators Hillary Clinton, Barak Obama, and Chris Dodd (if anyone even cares). Senator Joe Biden, the democratic candidate whom I have supported in previous columns, voted in favor of the bill for the same reasons I described in the previous paragraph.

While I agree with the assertion that the Democrats have failed miserably at showing gumption in the face of Republican bullying, I believe that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was off to a good start when he declared the war ‘lost’. What troubled me, however, was the total lack of debate that followed. The Democrats should’ve followed up with a heavy-handed explanation as to why the war was never winnable to begin with; thus, reframing the debate. Yet although the Saddam/Bin Laden theory has long been debunked, President Bush continues to justify his bloody quagmire as necessary in the war on terror-a phrase so vague as to be incomprehensible. Now, let’s pretend that we all have the memory of Alberto Gonzalez and forget that our invasion precipitated an al-queada presence in Iraq. Moreover, lets take it up a notch and forget that we have brainstems and pretend that Iraq poised a immanent danger to us and that it didn’t rank second in oil production…you follow? So Iraq is a cauldron of arab frustration, a supporter and breeder of terrorism with Saddam Hussein and Bin Laden pulling the strings. Now do we assume that by invading Iraq and deposing its autocratic leader we are winning or have won the War on terror? Morever, do we think that the war on terror can be won in the first place?

What I’ve learned from reading experts and scholars on terrorism is that it isn’t a war at all, but rather a conflict with no decided outcome. Terrorism, in their view, can only be attenuated and lessened. Though if the primary objection of countering terrorism is the protection of democratic institutions, the rule of law, and uprooting undemocratic regimes, then it’s utter hypocrisy that we haven’t taken any action against Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran, and to a lesser a degree, Lukashenko of Belarus.

As someone who only worked as a field manager on a few national and senatorial campaigns, I obviously lack the power to influence the debate in Washington. It’s up to Democrats in control of capitol hill to start flexing a little muscle instead of always cowering in the heat of the moment.

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Thomas Friedman, author of “The World is Flat” and Eminent Foreign Affairs Columnist for the New Yoirk Times, told Wold Blitzer that he feels Biden, as of now, appears to be the only candidate with a real vision for Iraq. While not officially endorsing Joe Biden, as it’s not allowed, Thomas Friedman clearly thinks highly of Senator Biden.  

Read excerpts below:

WOLF: Which candidate, Democrat or Republican, do you think has the most credibility when it comes about talking about what to do in Iraq?

FRIEDMAN: You know, I really would have a hard time rating any of them frankly, not up or down. We’re not allowed to endorse candidates as columnists.

WOLF: Don’t endorse any. But does Hillary Clinton, a Joe Biden, a John McCain…who really understands the issues there and comes to the table with a lot of knowledge?

FRIEDMAN: If you’re asking like right today, Wolf, the person I think who has been where I’ve been from the very beginning, seeing the potential, you know, that this could have for a positive outcome but really, really cautious and worried all the time, that if we weren’t doing it right is, Joe Biden.

I think Joe Biden has been on top of this from the very beginning. He was on top of the opportunity. He was on top of what stakes we needed or what we needed to do to get some chance of realizing that opportunity and he’s been on top of saying this isn’t working. So, if there’s anybody I felt in sync with since the very beginning I would say it’s Joe Biden.

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Four years after the United States invaded Iraq, Iran is ascendant– partially due to high gas prices and regional hegemony, many in the region view the Americans in retreat, and Arab countries, their own feelings of impotence punctuated, are awash in sharpening sectarian currents that many blame the United States for exacerbating.

Iran has deepened its relationship with Palestinian Islamic groups, assuming a financial role once filled by Iraq, in moves it sees as defensive and the United States views as aggressive. In  Lebanon and Iraq, Iran is fighting proxy battles against the United States with funds, arms and ideology. And in the vacuum created by the U.S. overthrow of Iranian foes in Afghanistan and Iraq, it is powerfully exerting a prestige reminiscent of the heady days of the 1979 Islamic revolution, when Iranian clerics led the toppling of a U.S.-backed government. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran’s messianic and fiery leader, isn’t all that favorable at home however. Many Iranians, particularly its well-educated members, are increasingly troubled by his braggadocio and foreign extravagances.

It’s painstakingly obvious that the US invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq has given rise to Shiite supremacy. At the core of the Shia resurgence lies a fiesty firebrand in Muquta Al Sadr, viewed by many as the legitimate ruler of Iraq. Prior to the invasion Mr. Muqtada’s Mahdi army was a but a small nuisance–with Sunni power well in tact. Now, the capricious cleric is perhaps the most influential person, with a large supply of adorning followers that routinely practice his militant anti-American message. Muquata is doing to Iraq what Hassan Nasrallah did to Lebanon more than twenty years ago when he formed Hezbollah following the Israeli invasion–a militant group that employs terrorism to resist Israel, which, not surprisingly, is on the State Department’s list of groups that sponsor and/or engage in terrorism. Like his predecessor in Iraq his fiery sermons drew the admiration of the uneducated and dispossessed. The only difference between the two is Mr. Nasrallah carved out a reputation on his own while Mr. Al Sadr came to prominence by riding the coattails of his father Mohammed Al Sadr.

After going into hiding in neighboring Iran so as to avoid being targeted in the Baghdad security drive–President George Bush’s vaunted “surge– that was just starting, he appears to have returned to vamp up his anti-American message. Many argue that the fervent leader is exploiting the cult-like dedication he inspires among his legion of mainly poor and uneducated Shia believers to evoke the image of the Shias’ “hidden imam” whose reappearance on earth is assumed to foretell an era of peace and justice, which is analogous in respects to premillenialism–in Christian eschatology is the belief that Christ will literally reign on the earth for 1,000 years after his second coming. Not surprisingly, in order for this occur conditions in the temporal must worsen; hence, politics is futile. This radical ideology is supported and entertained in America by such irrational madmen as Jerry Fallwell. This very radical and unthinking belief is the cornerstone of the ruling mullahs in Iran, so the very notion of appearing in Iraq is worrisome but inevitable.

So the question is will his return to Iraq sabotage American objectives and instigate a full-blown theocracy, or will it be quashed by American and Iraqi security forces. I’m afraid with Iraqi forces so helplessly inadequate and American forces overstretched and enervated, the former seems more likely.

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Two weeks ago presidential candidate Joe Biden (D-DE) appeared on the Tonight Show to shoot the breeze, do a little crowd work, and, oh yeah, articulate his solution to the bloody quagmire in Iraq. Before delving into the esoteric nature of this plan, Joe Biden played along with Jay with apparent ease, much to the pleasure the audience (although I’m sure his spring break crowd was still high from the Ferrel appearance). Once again, the foreign policy guru demonstrated his remarkable expertise on the subject by reiterating some of the finer points of his Iraq Plan. Biden’s transition into to talking seriously about Iraq, however, was more awkward than catching your parents ‘doing the nasty’, given the flippant mood of the audience following the absurdist Ferell appearance. Kudos to Biden!

Now, onto the GOP Bloodbath!

Watching this year’s republican candidates jockey for GOP support is going to be like watching hemophiliacs juggle chainsaws. In any highly contested Republican presidential primary, the opposing campaigns will ineluctably go besmirching each other as closet-fags, fetus-haters, or gun hating nancies. Interestingly enough, they really won’t be lying. If one thing is for sure, it’s that you’ll be seeing Guiliani and Romney flip-flops selling like swift boats. Guiliani leads the pack with two: partial-birth abortion and gun control. However, I’m absolutely positive that a certain Kerik will be his ultimate demise.

McCain, although minimal in ideological importance, once denounced the Bush tax cuts only to now pledge to uphold them. Let’s not forget the little touchy-feely on his part of one time ‘agent of intolerance’ Jerry Fallwell. As far as party loyalty, both Romney and Guiliani broke their party ranks at one time to support democratic candidates (Guiliani with Mario Cuomo and Romney with Paul Tsongas). McCain is a much harder case, as he’s more bipartisan than Anne Heche. Over the years McCain has pursued an agenda that at times stands in direct opposition to the core beliefs of his party. For example, McCain cosponsored a bill on campaign finance reform, legislation to allow imported prescriptions, higher automotive emissions standards (Kyoto-friendly), and a piece that is surely to eliminate the gun show loophole. In 2001 he went so far as to consider a party switch, after meeting with Tom Daschle and other top democratic lawmakers. So the question for the GOP is how far are they willing to go to beat Hillary. I wouldn’t be surprised if they choose McCain.

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Pardon the hackneyed slogan, but there’s nothing more decisive and succinct to say in regards to who should occupy the White House for the next four years. Now, Joe Biden has been mired in controversy–unduly and wrongfully–after some comments of his regarding Barak Obama’s race were sadly taken out of context, not surprisingly, by political correctness. Consequently, one of the sharpest and most presidential candidates is being forced to squander all-important media time on making pathetic apologies in leu of doing what he does best, like offering real and imaginative solutions to one of the most pressing issues of our time: who or what killed Anna Nicole Smith?

Joe Biden certainly isn’t the first viable and respectable candidate to be judged unfairly. Can anyone say “The Scream??” In a moment of regrettable exuberance, Howard Dean celebrated his fourth place victory in the 2004 Iowa caucus with an ear-piercing “yee-haw,” subsequently, reducing the sincerest (only) opponent of the Iraqi War to a late-night casualty. Okay, I’m not saying that as a comedian I wasn’t ripping into Howard Dean like it was going out of fashion; but as a citizen I wasn’t too jocular. How can someone ahead by twenty points in the polls suddenly fizzle out? Perhaps it was a pre-emptive move by the giant media enterprises to strike Howard before he could strike them. “We’re going to break up the giant enterprises,” said Howard Dean in an interview with Chris Matthews.

Then, during the week leading up to the New Hampshire primary, the media obsessed about Dean’s “bizarre” rally incident, adding “un-presidential” and “emotionally unstable” to its descriptions of the governor. That Howard yelped in an explosive manner (as if there’s any other way to yelp) had little to do with the public’s perception of him as presidential, I think. Howard Dean fell because he advocated media divestment, a policy that would hold media responsible not to shareholders, but to the public where it belongs.

By mentioning Howard Dean I’m not suggesting that his maverick attitude toward corporate power in any way relates to Joe Biden’s recent brainfart (which is exactly what it was); however, I am merely pointing out how invidious the media can be toward presidential candidates. I don’t think Biden’s “the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy” remark is equivalent to saying, “We’re proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn’t have had all these problems over all these years either,” which were Trent Lott’s segregationist remarks at Strom Thurmond’s 300th birthday celebration. To those of you who say that I’m favoring implicit racism or ‘soft bigotry’ over explicit racism, go and masticate the excessively hot fascia of an excessively hot gallus domesticus:) But seriously, as a misanthrope I hate mankind on a whole. As far as the articulate, bright and clean gaffe, I sincerely don’t think he was discounting the verbal prowess of some of the past black candidates (i.e., Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton), but rather making a clear-cut distinction between lofty and genuine speech that’s designed to inform, from merely incendiary demagoguery that’s designed to inflame.

Here’s what the media should but isn’t covering about Joe Biden (courtesy of his webpage):

A Five Point Plan for Iraq

1. Establish One Iraq, with Three Regions

Federalize Iraq in accordance with its constitution by establishing three largely autonomous regions - Shiite, Sunni and Kurd — with a strong but limited central government in Baghdad
Put the central government in charge of truly common interests: border defense, foreign policy, oil production and revenues
Form regional governments — Kurd, Sunni and Shiite — responsible for administering their own regions

2. Share Oil Revenues
Gain agreement for the federal solution from the Sunni Arabs by guaranteeing them 20 percent of all present and future oil revenues — an amount roughly proportional to their size — which would make their region economically viable
Empower the central government to set national oil policy and distribute the revenues, which would attract needed foreign investment and reinforce each community’s interest in keeping Iraq intact and protecting the oil infrastructure

3. Convene International Conference, Enforce Regional Non-Aggression Pact
Convene with the U.N. a regional security conference where Iraq’s neighbors, including Iran, pledge to support Iraq’s power sharing agreement and respect Iraq’s borders
Engage Iraq’s neighbors directly to overcome their suspicions and focus their efforts on stabilizing Iraq, not undermining it
Create a standing Contact Group, to include the major powers, that would engage Iraq’s neighbors and enforce their commitments

4. Responsibly Drawdown US Troops
Direct U.S. military commanders to develop a plan to withdraw and re-deploy almost all U.S. forces from Iraq by the end of 2007
Maintain in or near Iraq a small residual force — perhaps 20,000 troops — to strike any concentration of terrorists, help keep Iraq’s neighbors honest and train its security forces

5. Increase Reconstruction Assistance and Create a Jobs Program
Provide more reconstruction assistance, conditioned on the protection of minority and women’s rights and the establishment of a jobs program to give Iraqi youth an alternative to the militia and criminal gangs
Insist that other countries take the lead in funding reconstruction by making good on old commitments and providing new ones — especially the oil-rich Arab Gulf countries

Afghanistan and Darfur

If we should be surging forces anywhere, it is to Afghanistan. That country is not lost, but it is on the brink of a major comeback by the Taliban, Al Qaeada, warlords and drug traffickers. Our necessary investment in blood and treasure risks being squandered — we need an infusion of military and economic assistance and a plan to wean that country away from drugs.
This administration rightly called what’s going on in Darfur geneocide, but it has failed to match its words with deeds. Joe Biden has been calling for NATO to declare and police a “No Fly Zone” over Darfur; for an international peacekeeping mission we should impose if Khartoum says no; and serious sanctions against the regime which is aiding and abetting the slaughter of innocents.

Energy

Joe Biden believes that domestic energy policy is at the center of our foreign policy and economic policy. Most of the world’s oil is concentrated in nations that are either hostile to American interests or vulnerable to political upheaval and terrorism. Our oil dependence undercuts the advance of freedom and limits our options and influence around the world because oil rich countries pursuing policies we oppose can stand up to us and undermine the resolve of our allies. Profits from the sale of oil help fuel the fundamentalism we are fighting. High energy prices hurt business’ bottom line.
Joe Biden’s first priority is energy security. He believes we can strengthen security by reducing our oil consumption by increasing fuel efficiency, transitioning to farm-grown fuels like ethanol and biodiesel, and expanding the use of renewable energy. But we cannot stop there. Joe Biden would make a substantial national commitment by dramatically increasing investment in energy and climate change research and technology so that that United States becomes the world leader in developing and exporting alternative energy.

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