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Politics : American Presidential Politics and foreign affairs -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Peter Dierks who wrote (43487)	5/26/2010 8:43:48 AM
From: Peter Dierks	Respond to of 71588

The Left's Hollow Pleas for "Centrism" By Mona Charen May 18, 2010 Recent liberal laments about the increasing "polarization" of American political life are as predictable as the seasons. But pleas for centrism ring pretty hollow in light of recent history. The Washington Post editorial board, after noting Sen. Robert Bennett's loss in Utah and Sen. Blanche Lincoln's primary challenge, asked: "Is there a way to push back against the movement toward partisanship and paralysis -- to carve out some space for those who strive to work across party lines in the national interest? We can think of no more important question ... " Really? How about the question as to whether the trajectory of government spending will drag the United States into insolvency? How about the problem of a governing class unmoored from the Constitution? Following up on the Post's invitation to fret, William Galston and Thomas Mann of the Brookings Institution propound that "Washington's schism" is mostly a Republican problem. "What The Post's editorial missed is that these developments have not produced two mirror-image political parties. We have, instead, asymmetrical polarization." Sounds contagious. What is it? "Put simply: More than 70 percent of Republicans in the electorate describe themselves as conservative or very conservative, while only 40 percent of rank-and-file Democrats call themselves liberal or very liberal." Two possible reasons for this spring to mind. 1) Many liberals, like some of those at the Washington Post, don't think of themselves as liberals. They imagine that they occupy the sensible center whereas you, well, you are an extremist. 2) Even acknowledging that self-labeling can be problematic, there are nearly twice as many self-identified conservatives (40 percent according to a 2009 Gallup survey) as liberals (21 percent) in the U.S. The Post regrets that this polarized electorate prevents "anything from getting done," which is an odd complaint in a year that has witnessed an $800 billion stimulus bill, the federal acquisition of General Motors and AIG, a more than $1 trillion health bill, the multibillion-dollar mortgage bailout, and the nation's deliverance from the curse of salty food. This call to a high-minded spirit of compromise was utterly absent in the winter of 2009, when it seemed that the Democrats would carry all before them. When newly inaugurated Barack Obama airily spurned Republicans who objected to aspects of the stimulus bill with the reply "I won," the Post did not pull its chin about the problem of polarization. Nor did the great stewards of bipartisanship turn a hair when Speaker Pelosi declared, during the health care debate, that "a bill can be bipartisan without bipartisan votes." The Post is expressing a slightly more refined version of the broader liberal assault on conservative activism. In this construct, massive rallies for Obama are a sign of hope and human progress, but massive rallies against Obama's health care plan are evidence of "fringe sentiments" (Gov. Jennifer Granholm) or "fear" (Rep. Steve Driehaus), or are "un-American" (Rep. Steny Hoyer). When Michael Moore asked, during the Bush administration, "Dude, Where's My Country?" that was social commentary. When tea partiers say similar things, they are proto-fascists. But the greater weakness in the liberal cant about meeting somewhere in the middle is this: The great domestic question of our time is whether we can restrain and even reverse the catastrophic expansion of government debt before it is too late. And until just yesterday, Republicans were AWOL. Or, to put it another way, they were just where the great conciliators of the Washington Post claim they should be. They had abandoned limited government and were reconciled to tinkering with huge federal entitlements to make them slightly less bankrupting than they otherwise would be. The advent of the Obama administration, with its pell mell rush to transform us into Greece, is transforming the Republican Party as well. Grassroots activists are reasserting the virtues of limited government, personal responsibility, and public accountability. Our best hope is that tea party principles will prevail. Those are the very principles that can save us from Europe's fate. We've done what the Post recommends. We met in the "middle." It didn't work out very well for Republicans or for America. realclearpolitics.com

To: Peter Dierks who wrote (43487)	6/3/2010 1:32:05 AM
From: Peter Dierks	1 Recommendation Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 71588

Obama dodges, but Sestak questions won't go away By: Byron York Chief Political Correspondent May 28, 2010 How interested is Barack Obama in discussing Rep. Joe Sestak's allegation that the White House offered him a big government job if he would not challenge Sen. Arlen Specter, the White House's favored candidate in the Pennsylvania Senate primary? Well, when the president was asked about it at his news conference Thursday -- the question didn't come up until the very last reporter was called on -- the normally long-winded Obama spoke for a total of 32 seconds. "I can assure the public that nothing improper took place," Obama said, echoing earlier statements from White House officials who denied any wrongdoing. "There will be an official response shortly." And that was that. Obama's brief answer brought a smile to Rep. Darrell Issa, who has been pursuing the Sestak issue in his role as ranking Republican on the House Committee on Government Oversight and Reform. "That means the answer will be forthcoming after the lights go out for the weekend," Issa said shortly after the news conference. "While the president is away and nobody's available, a statement will come out." The way Issa sees it, the White House has to thread the needle when it finally responds to Sestak's charges. A retired Navy admiral, Sestak is now the Democratic candidate for Senate from Pennsylvania, and the White House wants all the Democratic senators it can get. So they can't come out and call Sestak a liar or a hack. On the other hand, they can't admit that what Sestak is saying is true, because that would be, in the words of top White House adviser David Axelrod, a "serious breach of the law." So what can the White House do? "They can say we're sorry, that the job offer was not intended to be a quid pro quo," Issa says. "They can say that we offered a job to a person who was in the process of running for a Senate seat but who we felt he was better suited to be secretary of the Navy, and we never intended for it to be a quid pro quo but rather to fill our Cabinet with good people. That's the only thread-the-needle that I see." It might thread the needle, but it won't end the questions. Say it turns out, as everyone believes, that White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel was the official who talked to Sestak, and the job in question was secretary of the Navy. "Everybody is going to ask [Emanuel], Did you talk to the president about this?" Issa says. "What happened when [Sestak] turned you down? Did you believe he would get out of the race for this job? Did you talk to Arlen Specter about this? All those questions are inevitable." Inevitable that they'll be asked, but not that they'll be answered, or that the answers will satisfy critics. The matter at hand is a conversation that took place between Sestak and the White House. To determine whether any wrongdoing occurred, we have to learn both sides of the conversation. If the White House releases its side of the story, then we'll have to hear from Sestak, who has so far refused to provide any details. Only then can investigators evaluate both versions of events. Which is why on Wednesday all seven Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee -- a group that included the moderate Sen. Orrin Hatch -- wrote to Attorney General Eric Holder to ask that a special prosecutor be appointed to look into the Sestak matter. Citing Axelrod's statements, the senators wrote, "We do not believe the Department of Justice can properly defer to White House lawyers to investigate a matter that could involve a 'serious breach of the law.' " Holder has already rejected a similar request from Issa. And no Democrats in the House or Senate support a Justice Department investigation, nor does the White House. With total one-party control of the government, a formal probe is highly unlikely. But some Democrats do want the issue to be resolved and have urged both sides to get the facts out. The next move is up to the White House. Nobody expects a holiday-weekend news release to end the matter, but it will be the start of what could be a long process. "Everyone is going to have follow-up questions," says Issa. "And I'm a patient man." Read more at the Washington Examiner: washingtonexaminer.com