Joe Scott 3: The Body Politic

Republican Convention, 1932

31 August 2008 |permalink | email article

“You better pick your best, and then may the best team win - that is, the best for the country, be it Democratic or Republican, for a guiding hand in any business now needs encouragement and especially in guiding… read full story

GOP Odd Couple

31 August 2008 |permalink | email article

As Hurricane Gustav threatens New Orleans and scrambles the Republican convention in St. Paul to pass on the mantle of leadership the Sunday New York Times Magazine ledes with bombshell details about the enduring hostility between B43 and his… read full story

Is Palin Ready?

30 August 2008 |permalink | email article

Palin dissed the VP job in a cable news interview just a month ago.

Larry Kudlow of CNBC asked the hard right conservative about the possibility of being McCain’s running mate.

Palin replied: “As for that VP talk… read full story

Obama’s Forceful Call to Change

29 August 2008 |permalink | email article

Barack Obama, accepting the Democratic nomination for president in Denver last night before 80,000 in a football stadium, erased any doubt that his campaign would be a repetition of past failed efforts by party nominees to successfully fight George… read full story

Bill Clinton Delivers

28 August 2008 |permalink | email article

Hours after Hillary Clinton moved to make the nomination of Barack Obama by acclamation – making him the first African-American to become a major party nominee for president – Bill Clinton made the pivotal speech of the Democratic convention.

Hillary: Grand Slam

27 August 2008 |permalink | email article

Clinton’s opening salvo, “No way, no how, no McCain,” set the tone for a speech which could do much to unify her legions of voters behind Obama.

She said that the time had come to put aside lingering divisions… read full story

Passing the Torch

26 August 2008 |permalink | email article

The start of the Democratic National Convention was significant for three reasons: 1) Ted Kennedy’s unexpected, but powerful speech last night about the “dream lives on,” marking the passage of one era; 2) speeches by Hillary Clinton tonight and… read full story

McCain and Doublespeak

25 August 2008 |permalink | email article

The Republican nominee offered a revealing comment Saturday in an interview with Katie Couric of CBS “Evening News” at his ranch in Sedona, Ariz. after Biden was chosen by Obama.

Biden is a “formidable” and “wise” choice for the… read full story

First Impressions

24 August 2008 |permalink | email article

When Biden unexpectedly went to Georgia last weekend to assess the Russian invasion it was my immediate sense that there was more to the visit than his chairmanship of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

If Obama was still… read full story

Waiting for Biden

22 August 2008 |permalink | email article

No text message tonight from the Obama campaign about the name of the Democratic presidential nominee’s choice for vice president. It will be texted to supporters very early Saturday morning.

The choice almost certainly is Joe Biden based on… read full story

McCain Gaffe, Obama Advantage

22 August 2008 |permalink | email article

When Politico.com asked John McCain in an interview how many houses he and his wealthy wife own the candidate was caught off guard. “I think—I’ll have my staff get to you. “It’s condominiums where –I’ll have them get to… read full story

Patriotism

21 August 2008 |permalink | email article

Playing off Mark Penn’s ad hominem game plan John McCain shamelessly continues to assail Barack Obama’s patriotism.

There is McCain’s own “country first” slogan, the unsubtle hint that Obama is not American enough and that, in his ambition to… read full story

Obama’s VP Announcement

20 August 2008 |permalink | email article

Obama, subject to change, will announce his vice presidential choice either Friday night in a text message to supporters or Saturday noon (CST) in Springfield, Illinois where his long march to the presidency began on Feb. 10, 2007.

The… read full story

It’s the Electoral Map, Stupid!

20 August 2008 |permalink | email article

NATIONAL polls show a tight race. But the media obsession about who’s ahead in the national polls is irrelevant, along with its 2004 fixation on red and blue states.

The name of the game now is 270 electoral votes… read full story

Obama Veep Pick Settled

19 August 2008 |permalink | email article

The New York Times reported Monday evening being told by aides that Barack Obama has “all but settled” on his choice for a running mate, with an elaborate rollout plan for his decision, beginning with an early morning alert… read full story

Gold Rush: Politics or Sport?

18 August 2008 |permalink | email article

China, like the Soviet Union at the zenith of the cold war, is obsessed with a desire to win more Summer Olympic gold medals than the United States.

But Matthew Forney, a former Beijing correspondent for Time now writing… read full story

Is Biden O’s Pick?

17 August 2008 |permalink | email article

Joe Biden is off to Georgia at the request of President Saakashvili to probe Moscow’s incursion into Georgia.

The Democratic chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee will gather facts on last week’s clashes for Barack Obama and make… read full story

Faith Forum

17 August 2008 |permalink | email article

For 36 seconds, as the New York Times described it, “it was the hug heard around the country.”

Obama and McCain on Saturday night briefly smiled and shook hands, belying the nasty campaign ahead, at Pastor Rick Warren’s evangelical… read full story

A Question of Propriety

16 August 2008 |permalink | email article

McCain has chided Obama for having the audacity to act too presidential in his visits to the Mideast and Europe.

What really blew McCain’s mind, and his obsession with the phony issue of “celebrity,” was Obama’s outdoor rally in… read full story

Swift Obama Response

15 August 2008 |permalink | email article

‘Smear’ best describes a new book, “The Obama Nation,” by James Corsi – number one this weekend and for a second week on the New York Times’ best seller list.

Its context recalls similar attacks by the author… read full story

Russia: McCain Plays Prez

14 August 2008 |permalink | email article

The assumed GOP nominee has put his foreign policy expertise squarely at risk as a president-in waiting over the conflict in Georgia. He’s sending top surrogates Graham and Lieberman to Tbilisi to comfort democratic Georgian President Saakashvili who has… read full story

McSmears Escalate

13 August 2008 |permalink | email article

JOE Lieberman is the body man for John McCain, just as McCain was for Bob Dole, the hapless 1996 Republican presidential candidate crushed by Bill Clinton.

McCain, as if peeking at Mark Penn’s diabolical playbook in search of… read full story

McCain First Defined Celebrity

12 August 2008 |permalink | email article

THE former maverick describes Barack Obama as “the biggest celebrity in the world.” His new web ad mocks him as “bigger than the Beatles” while raising the issue of his sex appeal for the first time.

His respected former… read full story

Clinton Memos: Obama Too Foreign

11 August 2008 |permalink | email article

The Atlantic’s forthcoming September issue offers demonizing advice from Mark Penn, Hillary Clinton’s chief strategist, which urged her to portray Barack Obama in the primaries as having a “limited” connection “to basic American values and culture.”

The magazine reports… read full story

Georgia: First ‘09 Foreign Policy Test?

10 August 2008 |permalink | email article

Imagine again that mythical three a.m. in the morning ad conjured up for Hillary Clinton to asset that she alone was ready to lead on Day One.

Politico reminds that the invasion of Georgia on Thursday night presents candidates… read full story

Edwards and Hypocrisy

09 August 2008 |permalink | email article

“I think this President has shown a remarkable disrespect for his office, for the dimensions of leadership, for his friends, for his wife, for his precious daughter. It is breathtaking to me the level to which that disrespect has… read full story

Rove, McCain, Keating Five Scandal

09 August 2008 |permalink | email article

Bush’s Brain, in the Wall Street Journal, seemed less than impressed with the performance so far of the presumed Republican nominee.

Noting that Obama “has the easier path to victory,” Rove wrote that McCain’s challenge is to persuade… read full story

Electoral College Edge?

07 August 2008 |permalink | email article

Striving for 270 votes to be elected President on Nov. 4 Barack Obama has expanded his lead over John McCain in NBC’s latest electoral map.

He has 217 votes in his column versus 189 for McCain, building on his… read full story

Real Debates

06 August 2008 |permalink | email article

While McCain and Obama continue to calculate their choice for vice presidential running mates, three 90-minute presidential debates – especially the first – that could decide the 2008 election surface on the political horizon.

Jim Lehrer, anchor of… read full story

Predicting President 44 Premature

05 August 2008 |permalink | email article

BUZZ by the media and the political commentariat about whether Obama or McCain will win based on   national polls during the Dog Days of August means little or nothing now.

For the record the latest RealClearPolitics average… read full story

Race Card

04 August 2008 |permalink | email article

John McCain thinks ads like linking Barack Obama with Britney and Paris Hilton are funny. “I kind of enjoy ‘em. You gotta have a sense of humor in this.”

But when Obama warned voters against attacks that he looks… read full story

Read the Times and Weep

04 August 2008 |permalink | email article

Billionaire businessman Sam Zell plays liege lord and Tribune Company executes his orders with the Los Angeles Times now reduced to a hapless vassal.

Sure, the Times’ plight is about declining revenue that reflects economic realities. But the once… read full story

Sunday Talk

02 August 2008 |permalink | email article

EXPECT the most fireworks on NBC’s “Meet the Press” when Democrat John Kerry goes mano-a-mano with apostate Democrat turned independent Joe Lieberman who backs John McCain. Moderator Tom Brokaw will need to separate them.

Kerry, backing Barack Obama, narrowly… read full story

Issues, Not Insults

01 August 2008 |permalink | email article

A steady string of taunting McCain ads by veteran Bush 2004 operatives has been effective. Part of a calculated pattern to distract Obama they have forced him off message as the Democratic convention draws nearer. 

Whether race becomes… read full story