PolitiFact has a chronic problem with the failure to offer charitable interpretation. Particularly when the subject is a Republican.
The issue:
The fact checkers:
Louis Jacobson: writer, researcher
Morris Kennedy: editor
Analysis:
Some of Louis Jacobson's introductory comments seem revealing:
(I)t came as a surprise to us when McCain was quoted on Newsweek magazine's Web site on April 3, 2010, saying, "I never considered myself a maverick. I consider myself a person who serves the people of Arizona to the best of his abilities."
Debunking this one wasn't a question of "if" but rather "how can we avoid piling on?"
If that last statement hints that Jacobson's mind was made up as soon as he saw the quotation of McCain, the rest of the story does nothing to dispel that impression. Jacobson's story offers no evidence that he attempted any critical examination of the context of McCain's statement, though later he will inadvertently stumble over some statements that ought to have forced him to reconsider his course toward the "pants on fire" rating.
Many of the GOP's most faithful, the kind who vote in primaries despite 115-degree heat, tired long ago of McCain the Maverick, the man who had crossed the aisle to work with Democrats on issues like immigration reform, global warming, and restricting campaign contributions. "Maverick" is a mantle McCain no longer claims; in fact, he now denies he ever was one. "I never considered myself a maverick," he told me. "I consider myself a person who serves the people of Arizona to the best of his abilities." Yet here was Palin, urging her fans four times in 15 minutes to send McCain the Maverick back to Washington.
(Yellow highlights added)
The context: McCain was apparently engaged in private conversation with the Newsweek reporter, David Margolick. We do not have the context of that conversation, but rather the context in which Margolick chose to present the quotation. The "I never considered myself a maverick" line is probably not the sort of thing McCain would push minus some explanation. Any such explanation was up to Margolick to provide. There isn't much to stop a reporter from dropping the context, unfortunately.
But rather than try to give consideration to the context, PolitiFact's Jacobson went immediately from his "piling on" comment to the following:
We ignored cases in which Palin or other campaign surrogates used the term on McCain's behalf, sticking instead to instances when McCain himself used it, or when he blessed television advertisements using that term with the words, "I approve this message." (This message, by the way, is a requirement of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002, which McCain himself spearheaded.)
In other words, Jacobson took for granted that a wooden-literal interpretation minus any nuance of understanding was in order for McCain's statement. At worst we ought to have seen Jacobson blame that interpretation on Margolick, for that is pretty much the way Margolick presented it in his story. But is trusting the uncorroborated implications from a reporter really fact checking?
Jacobson proceeded to provide a list of statements where McCain embraced the label "Maverick" to one degree or another.
It makes sense to conclude that if a person embraces a label that he thinks the label applies to him in at least some sense. But is there more than one sense of the word "maverick"? Merriam-Webster only lists one relevant sense. But John McCain has emphasized some nuance with respect to the term. Jacobson uncovered a clue without recognizing its worth:
In McCain's (slight) defense, we should say that he has on a number of occasions expressed a degree of ambivalence about the title "maverick" -- including his highest-profile use of the word, in his 2008 Republican National Convention acceptance speech. “You know, I’ve been called a maverick; someone who marches to the beat of his own drum," he said. "Sometimes it’s meant as a compliment and sometimes it’s not. What it really means is I understand who I work for. I don’t work for a party. I don’t work for a special interest. I don’t work for myself. I work for you.”
(Blue highlights added)
This quotation of McCain seems to make clear that he found at least two meanings in the term "maverick." "Maverick" can refer to a person who marches to the beat of his own drum. McCain rejected that uncomplimentary meaning as applied to his political career in favor of the positive one in his subsequent explanation of "(w)hat it really means."
Jacobson, after interpreting McCain's remarks as "ambivalence" toward the "maverick" label, counts this as a "slight" defense. More likely it was the entire key to properly understanding McCain's statement to the Newsweek reporter.
Let not evidence stand in the way of a foregone conclusion:
(E)ven if McCain is now listening more closely to his inner ambivalence about the term, it cannot erase the eagerness with which his 2008 presidential campaign touted that particular characteristic as a major selling point for candidacy. So we rate his statement that "I never considered myself a maverick" to be Pants on Fire!
McCain's statement to Margolick seems consistent with his resistance to the negative connotation of "maverick," though the lack of context makes a firm conclusion elusive. PolitiFact takes the lack of context as a license to place the least charitable interpretation on McCain's statement.
The grades:
Louis Jacobson: F
Morris Kennedy: F
I'd like to have your parents in for a conference.
Chris Wallace of Fox News Channel pressed McCain on the "never considered myself a maverick" comment. McCain pretty much dodged the question with more comments consonant with the attempt to keep to a positive take on his failure to maintain strict party loyalty.
The video doesn't add much to the story except to contribute to the impression that McCain has trouble giving a clear and straight answer on the issue.
As a long time critic of the PolitiFact fact checking operation, I was annoyed that PolitiFact was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for its 2008 reporting leading up to the election.
The Pulitzer committee supposedly awards prizes to examples of journalism reflecting the highest standards of journalism. An inquiry regarding those standards ended up directing me to the definition of categories provided at the Pulitzer Web page. Though it is not stated explicitly, it is implied that the high standards represent honesty, accuracy and fairness on top of more purely artistic and literary considerations.
It took months, but the Pulitzer site eventually identified the works for which PolitiFact received its Pulitzer Prize. I have resolved to second-guess the Pulitzer jury by examining in turn each of the thirteen works that collectively earned the award.
The first such work from the list was a page from January 2008 featuring five "Truth-O-Meter" ratings for some of the major presidential hopefuls (three Democrats and five Republicans).
The page relies in turn on numerous sub-stories for its accuracy and fairness, and I am perfectly willing to operate under the assumption that PolitiFact writers and editors would never intentionally misinform their readers. It is not practical to examine each contributing story in detail, and I doubt that the Pulitzer jury bothered with that in any case.
The page does represent one area of concern, however:
With the Florida primary three days away, we have collected five of our most revealing rulings for each of the major candidates.
The above statement from the comments introducing the individual rulings unavoidably constitutes an opinion. Traditional "objective" journalism strongly discourages opinion except where it is labeled as such. PolitiFact wantonly flirted with a journalistic taboo.
That opinion does lead to some potentially fruitful examinations of the individual claims. Is it really highly significant that John Edwards pledged to use his presidential power to take away Congress' health care benefits when he has no such powers? Edwards could either be mixed up about presidential powers or he could be making one of the easiest campaign pledges a presidential candidate could make. Granted, the "Pants on Fire" grade Edwards received goes along with "ridiculous" claims under the PolitiFact system. Edwards' claim certainly was ridiculous whether he misunderstood presidential powers or simply made a literally truthful yet empty pledge.
More seriously, the Pulitzer jury apparently overlooked a major flaw in the fairness of the reporting, one that was relatively obvious even without examining the underlying details:
The statement: "John Edwards never - has ever from the beginning of his political career has never taken PAC money or the money of Washington lobbyists. Ever." Joe Trippi, senior campaign advisor to John Edwards, on Sept. 20, 2007, in a television interview The ruling: Edwards accepted $14,900 from employees at lobbying firms through June 2007. Given the absolute ironclad statement, we rule it Half True.
Compare the forgiveness of Edwards' absolutism with the hard line taken on John McCain:
The statement: "I have never asked for nor received a single earmark or pork- barrel project for my state." --John McCain, Jan. 6, 2008, in a debate in Manchester, N.H. The ruling: We find three examples of McCain seeking pork-barrel projects for Arizona, which puts a few blemishes on an otherwise stellar record against pork.
Though it does not appear in the text of "the ruling," PolitiFact found McCain flatly "False" for having some dubious examples of pork spending on his record.
It certainly appears that PolitiFact gave Edwards an easier ride than McCain on this point of comparison.
Verdict: Based on this story, the Pulitzer jury had reason to fault PolitiFact for its fairness. On a scale of 0-10 with zero representing the greatest offense against journalistic standards, 10 representing the highest attainment of standards, and six representing a neutral grade with respect to Pulitzer worthiness, I give this entry a five. It counts slightly against PolitiFact's worthiness for the 2008 prize, in other words.
*****
Hat tip: I may not have taken special notice of PolitiFact's treatment of Edwards' statement were it not for the comments of Jeff Dyberg at PolitiFact's FaceBook site.
Of the portions I heard, John McCain did reasonably well and Obama's defensive ripostes were in tune with his misleading ad campaigns. I look forward to reviewing the transcript.
Though I don't ordinarily listen to the Fox radio station in my area (except for the Rush Limbaugh show), I caught Lanny Davis saying even if McCain did reasonably well it won't matter because Obama creates such a good impression on television. The Fox host cracked that perhaps the debates should only be broadcast on the radio, or something to that effect.
More later.
Update:
A-ha. This debate is available at Hulu. Apparently the other debates have been added there as well.
In brief, here's why the American people should vote for John McCain.
1) Economy.
John McCain's fiscal and economic policies make more sense than the Democrats' alternative. McCain would lower taxes on business and the wealthy. That stimulates growth, and the policy is badly needed at the current juncture. McCain also takes balancing the budget seriously. While it is not easy to see how McCain will meet his pledge to balance the budget by the end of his first term, Barack Obama's policies promise to balloon the budget deficit while also hamstringing the economy.
2) Health Care
John McCain's health care reform proposal should make health insurance more accessible for those who want it, and by taxing expensive employer-provided plans he will use the force of government to engender competition among health insurance providers. The Obama campaign has bent over backwards to misrepresent that aspect of McCain's plan.
3) Foreign Policy/Iraq War/War on Terror
While Obama has shown himself a foreign policy neophyte with moves such as his pledge to violate an ally's sovereignty in pursuit of Al Qaeda/Taliban targets, McCain has established a record of showing good leadership sense. McCain saw the value of a comprehensive counterinsurgency (COIN) strategy in Iraq and pushed for it before Bush opted to employ the surge strategy. That strategy has paid off hugely in Iraq and the United States is poised to witness the best possible scenario in terms of the ultimate outcome of that war: a democratic Iraqi state aligned with the U.S. against Iran and Islamic extremism. Obama's proposed policies would put that victory at substantial risk for the sake of politics.
4) Energy Policy
McCain's realism (not necessarily counting his acceptance of anthropogenic global warming and the carbon credit system) will be sorely needed in order to keep the U.S. economy healthy while pursuing efficient alternative energy sources. Obama appears not to understand the importance of energy efficiency, as illustrated by his willingness to subsidize inefficient means of energy production such as ethanol. Inefficient energy production translates to a shackled economy.
That covers what should be the top four concerns of American citizens. Those who regard Obama as the better choice for any of these four categories are mistaken and would place the nation at risk by allowing him the opportunity to implement his policies under a unified government.
Oct. 28, 2010 fixed a couple of typos. Better late than never.
Jed Lewison of The Huffington Post offers us a full paragraph's worth of fact-checking John McCain's claim of having warned about severe economic problems relating to subprime mortgages.
John McCain lied right out of the gate during tonight's debate, claiming that he had warned us about the financial crisis that we are now facing. But in November, 2007 he admitted that he hadn't seen the mortgage crisis -- the root of today's financial crisis -- coming.
Lewison does offer some bonus material. He writes "Here's the video" and provides the following YouTube video to support his argument.
It's certainly fair to say that McCain denies having predicted a particular economic crisis as of November 2007. It's also fair to say that the economic crisis then is not the same as the present one. So what was the state of the crisis then?
After viewing a clip (hat tip to ProPublica.org for pointing the way) of McCain speaking in context, McCain seems to be talking about the manner in which mortgage-based securities caused the subprime crisis to affect the entire world. McCain used the example of a city in Norway that invested in such securities.
I would suggest that McCain's warning concerning the fallout from the lack of backing specific to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac was specific to the United States economy and the government-associated financial entities. His statement in the video refers to a different aspect of the subprime crisis (the manner in which mortgage-based securities had tentacles touching everywhere).
As such, it is fair to say that McCain did not anticipate the current specific crisis nor the one from November 2007--but on the other hand the letter he signed does indicate that he anticipated frozen credit markets based on a crisis of confidence in the government if it was forced to back the red ink undergirding Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
It is also fair to say that the warning McCain signed is much more specific (and accurate) than the one Barack Obama sent to Bernanke and Paulson.
John Hinderaker over at Power Line live-blogged last night's presidential debate between Barack Obama and John McCain. I wish to highlight one nugget that elegantly expresses what I was thinking during the discussion on energy--particularly when Obama was decrying McCain's failure to support bills that provided tax breaks for alternative energy sources.
9:44--I suppose there is no point in trying to explain to a television debate audience that you don't create wealth by subsidizing inefficient production of energy.
That sums up the whole problem with Obama's energy plan. His plan is built on a pie in the sky.
As Hinderaker points out, inefficient energy production does not assist the economy. Let's say we figure out how to get electricity from rocks, but each rock involved in the process needs to be massaged by hand in order to produce electricity. It takes 100,000 such rocks to power a medium-sized city. On the bright side, one can claim that this system can create at least 100,000 jobs (full time rock masseurs and masseuses). Economically, however, the system simply cannot work. The cost of producing the electricity will hamstring the economy. At $1 per hour, the payroll costs without any overtime for the 100,000 employees would amount to $1 million dollars. The company would need to bring in $1 million in receipts just to break even on energy costs. And on $1 per hour, how much electricity do you think employees of Electrolith Inc. can afford to fit in the budget?
Relative to the costs of other businesses, this energy delivery system would be unworkable. The whole key is cost efficiency, and aside from nuclear power the world currently has no ready substitute of comparable efficiency to fossil fuels such as gasoline and natural gas. Until that occurs, alternative energy sources are an economic loser.
Obama's claims of adding jobs through his alternative energy plans, I suspect, are comparable to rock masseur jobs, except that he will subsidize the new less efficient system. Everyone in the city will be taxed in order to pay for rock masseurs and the electricity they produce--at least enough for the business to operate.
The pie in the sky is the techological breakthrough required to produce energy more efficiently (or at least comparably so) than we currently do using fossil fuels. Without that breakthrough, and it isn't on the drawing board, Obama's plan is a guaranteed failure.
For that reason, exploiting nuclear and fossil fuel energy must be done until the breakthrough occurs. The direction the Democrats are taking on this will probably be disastrous.
Apparently there are some stubborn folks over at PolitiFact.
PolitiFact recently floated again the suggestion that McCain has requested earmark spending, contrary to McCain's claims on the campaign trail. But there are different types of "earmark" spending, and one class in particular that represents an ethical problem in Washington.
I wrote about that distinction here, and PolitiFact/CQ notes and dismisses the objection.
McCain, meanwhile, has mostly eschewed earmarks, even if the Arizona senator should learn to never say “never” as he has claimed, erroneously, many times throughout the campaign.
As Politifact writer John Frank pointed out earlier this year, McCain has rarely sought pork but he has on a few occasions, such as his 2006 legislation that asked for $10 million for an academic center at the University of Arizona to honor the late Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist. Or McCain’s 2003 effort to use federal funds to buy property to create a buffer zone around Luke Air Force Base in Arizona, or his 1992 request that the Environmental Protection Agency provide $5 million toward a wastewater project in Nogales, Ariz.
While McCain advocates have argued in the past that these projects don’t meet the definition of pork barrel spending, pork critics disagree. “If it doesn’t meet the technical term of earmark, it would probably meet the public idea of one,” Pete Sepp, a vice president at the conservative, anti-pork National Taxpayers Union, told the New York Times in reference to the Rehnquist center request.
The PolitiFact analysis, as I pointed out before, represents a fallacy of equivocation. PolitiFact, in effect, is quote-mining Pete Sepp in order to attack McCain. And the technique is obvious given a close look at the final paragraph.
Sepp admits the existence of a technical meaning for "earmark" as well as a "public idea of one." And by implication they aren't the same thing, even as presented by PolitiFact. And given PolitiFact's association with Congressional Quarterly, the distinction cannot be wholly unknown to their writers and editors, either.
Here's what Pete Sepp would say if given enough space:
I do wish there were more room for appreciating the complexities of earmarking in the fact check piece. My point is that the average voter may or may not agree with Senator McCain's assertions on earmarking, depending upon what bothers that voter the most about the issue. If the voter's primary objection to this process is that lawmakers introduce too many spending bills that benefit only narrow local interests, then that voter may not be all that impressed with McCain's stance (even though there are many more prolific practitioners of this art in the Senate than McCain). If, on the other hand, the voter's primary objection is that earmarking circumvents public debate and other budget processes, then they would likely be quite satisfied with Senator McCain's philosophy. (Pete Sepp e-mail, first published here)
Nobody should be satisfied with a fact-checking outfit that engages in the fallacy of equivocation, however.
"Sharon" over at Common Sense Political Thought (she also blogs at Gold-Plated Witch on Wheels) has a nice summary of the subprime mortgage crisis and the etiology of blame. Click the link and read the rest once your appetite is whetted.
As Ed Morrissey of Hot Air points out, the collapse of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae happened on George W. Bush’s watch, and for that, Democrats will try to pummel him. And he certainly didn’t pursue any regulatory solutions wholeheartedly, but it’s not like this was unpredictable. Indeed, the New York Times ran a story on this five years ago. (read more)
***
Hey, "Inside the political football" garners no Google hits. It's nice to think up something first for a change, especially after I discovered that "Elastic Waste Band" had already been used by a Grateful Dead tribute band.
Though I suppose somebody could have thought of the football thing and dumped it for something much better ...
Ed Morrissey today devotes a Hot Air blog entry to an issue I almost felt driven to address early this morning: the manner in which the mainstream media (including The Wall Street Journal) have failed to make important distinctions between funding requests and the corrupt earmarking system members of Congress use to do each other and key constituents favors.
The level of federal spending requests have dropped under Palin’s administration both years, but quite obviously she still puts in requests for Congressional cash. The question that the WSJ never really answers is how those requests come to Congress. If they come in earmark form, then the McCain campaign has some explaining to do about its rhetoric the past three weeks. If not, then this is a non-story, and in fact shows Palin weaning Alaska off of Washington’s largesse.
Earmarks are not equivalent to all federal spending, as McCain himself notes. If these requests did not come in earmark form, then Congress has the opportunity to vote directly on spending the money in Alaska based on the legitimacy of the projects. Earmarks, on the other hand, get slipped into bills without such Congressional scrutiny and are almost impossible to remove regardless of the uselessness of the project.
Comparing Obama's earmarks to Palin's without making any distinction between the type of earmark conveys a very misleading impression. Obama spent his first two years in the Senate wallowing in the existing trough of secret earmarks. That is why Obama's earmarks were discovered through his own admission rather than via media exposure as in the case of Alaska's requests for federal funding.
Apparently the British Broadcasting Corporation is also confused!
The question is - are Iranian weapons only being brought across the border by smugglers for profit or are elements of the Iranian state also donating arms?
The Taleban commander and other sources in the south told me both routes were operating.
The British ambassador in Kabul, Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles, made the same allegation.
Robyn "Blumñata" Blumner, editorial columnist for The St. Petersburg Times (often called The SlantPetersburg Lies by a local radio personality) took this week's column to make herself a living example of her past exhortation that Democrats attack Republicans in order to get their own elected.
It doesn't seem to matter what the facts are or how directly they contradict the candidates' claims, the McCain-Palin campaign is sticking with its fantasy version.
You can't reverse the facts opposite the claims much better than Barack Obama's reversal on campaign finance reform. For some reason the Democrats get a pass on that one from Blumñata. Regardless of team Obama's failings, however, legitimate examples of falsehoods by the McCain campaign should interest citizens of good conscience.
Of course, the most obvious example is the leviathan pork-barrel $223-million bridge to nowhere that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin claims to have opposed. She has put this at the top of her resume for the job of Vice Maverick-in-Chief.
It doesn't seem to matter, as has now been reported endlessly, that when Palin ran for governor she endorsed the bridge project that would have connected a tiny island with few residents to the mainland city of Ketchikan. She only abandoned it when the project became politically radioactive. Then, as governor, Palin kept the hundreds of millions in taxpayer money, redirecting the cash for other transportation projects.
It reflects no inconsistency for Palin to favor infrastructure to link Ketchikan to Gravina Island and its airport and ultimately kill the earmark version of the project, and Palin did voice opposition to the scope of the proposed solution from an early point in her service as governor. Palin did oppose the project, and as a result her statement is true. The lie here is from Blumner for portraying the truth as a lie. See my more detailed analysis of the bridge project and the GOP claims about it here.
We also know that Palin is queen of winning federal earmarks. As mayor of Wasilla, she hired a private lobbyist to help bring in $27-million in earmarks to her town of 7,000. As governor, she has made the largest per-capita federal earmark request in the nation, totalling nearly $750-million.
So when the McCain-Palin campaign runs on an end-to-earmarks message and seeks to tar Barack Obama with his earmark requests that are modest by comparison, it is once again resorting to those Lying Eyes.
It does not reflect any distortion of the truth by McCain/Palin if Palin sought earmarks while mayor of Wasilla or governor of Alaska unless the campaign portrays it otherwise. Somehow Blumner forgets to include any such thing in her column. Did her editor delete that paragraph?
But speaking of lying, note how easily Blumñata downplays Obama's earmarks as "modest by comparison." Blumnata apparently trusts the reader to think in terms of per capita spending, because Obama requested $740 million. That amount is hardly "modest" compared to $750 million over the same span of time. Could that be why Blumñata neglected to reveal the price tag on Obama's earmarks? More importantly, Obama's requests came from within the corrupt congressional system whereas Palin's came from outside.
Senator Barack Obama on Thursday released a list of $740 million in earmarked spending requests that he had made over the last three years, and his campaign challenged Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton to do the same.
The list included $1 million for a hospital where Mr. Obama’s wife works, money for several projects linked to campaign donors and support for more than 200 towns, civic institutions and universities in Illinois. (The New York Times)
We're halfway through the column and so far Blumñata has nothing to back up her thesis.
Now let's talk about taxes. The campaign of John McCain has put out a series of scary campaign ads about Obama's tax plan. Newsweek has dubbed them a "pattern of deceit."
We now have a nugget of truth. Newsweek did make that claim about the McCain ads, and in fact the claim stemmed from the normally dependable Annenberg fact checkers (FactCheck.org). Newsweek accords them space from time to time. But is it an accurate claim? Popular analysis of the tax plans offered by the candidates tends to omit the trickle-down effects of higher corporate tax rates on the middle-income earners that Obama claims will get larger tax breaks under his tax plan. Further complicating the analysis, Obama has recently hedged on his intention to raise taxes on high income earners, acknowledging that the move would hurt the economy at an inopportune time. In addition, comparison of the tax plans tends to ignore Obama's spending proposals. Regardless of whether McCain's tax plan results in a larger deficit, Obama more than makes up for it with his proposed spending ($6.9 billion proposed by McCain, $287 billion by Obama, according to the National Taxpayers Union).
Apparently Blumñata used the same faulty reasoning that came from FactCheck.org, which analyzed a McCain ad suggesting "years of deficits" following Obama's prescription solely in terms of tax policy. But the ad copy printed along with the analysis plainly deals with Obama's spending proposals:
Crowd: Obama, Obama… Announcer: Take away the crowds, the chants. All that's left are costly words. Barack Obama and out of touch congressional leaders have expensive plans. Billions in government spending, years of deficits, no balanced budgets, and painful tax increases on working American families. They're ready to tax, ready to spend, but not ready to lead. (red emphasis added)
One day even Democrats (perhaps even Blumñata herself) will have to acknowledge that budgetary spending affects the deficit.
She has no more supposed examples of "Lying Eyes" from McCain. What she offered was bogus.
John McCain can forget about trying to make a campaign issue out of Barack Obama's relatively thin foreign policy resume.
First, Obama's foreign policy resume is not "relatively thin." It's just plain thin. Second, the selection of Palin keeps Obama's inexperience in the mind of anyone who would question Palin's inexperience. Even the anonymous editorial writer led off with a sugar-coated version of that bitter pill.
In an effort to blunt Obama's postconvention momentum, McCain made history Friday by choosing Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate, the first woman to be nominated for vice president by the GOP. It is a risky move that stunned even some party leaders who fear that voters will have trouble imagining the former beauty queen as commander in chief, if it should ever come to that.
Well, the "former beauty queen" has already served as the commander of Alaska's National Guard as the governor of that non-contiguous state, abutting Canada and a stone's throw from Russia. One wonders what happened to the Times editorial noting what a "risky move" it was for the Democrats to nominate a freshman senator with "relatively thin" foreign policy experience and no apparent understanding of economics.
After a paragraph intended to paint Palin as out of her league compared to Joe Biden, the Times editorial gets to its real point:
McCain is betting the farm on gender. He is gambling that his choice will appeal to women voters, particularly disaffected Hillary Clinton supporters, and create an air of excitement at this week's Republican National Convention in St. Paul. But party leaders are concerned that the choice of Palin could complicate McCain's central attack line against his Democratic opponent — Obama's lack of experience on national security issues.
Gender was undoubtedly a part of Palin's selection, given the lousy treatment Hillary Clinton received from the Democratic Party and to some extent from the mainstream media. Democrats sour on the fact that Obama passed up his strongest running mate (Clinton) in favor of one of the all-time Washington insiders to back up his claims of new politics might give McCain some consideration based on that alone.
But Palin represents far more than just a female candidate. She is a Washington outsider who helps sharpen McCain's image as the true agent of positive change in the federal government. She also has that feature that is so important in national electoral politics. She is eminently likable, and that represents a minefield for Biden. Biden, of course, is the guy who hitched his wagon to "the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy." In short, Biden can stick his foot in his mouth even when he's trying to praise his opponent.
Although McCain is a familiar figure to most Americans, he has muddled his political identity this year by changing long-held positions to appeal to his party's conservative base.
What long-held positions has McCain changed other than his willingness to drill on the transcontinental shelf? The Times apparently has no time for examples.
The presumptive Republican nominee for president has his work cut out for him. Obama landed some hard blows against him at the Denver convention. Somehow, McCain has to recognize the Bush administration and then distance himself from an unpopular two-term president who led the country into an unnecessary war, presided over a soaring federal deficit triggered in part by irresponsible tax cuts for the wealthy, and disregarded fundamental constitutional protections.
Biden thought the war was necessary (it was, given intelligence reports at the time), the federal deficit was triggered by responsible tax cuts for the wealthy that helped revive the 2001 economy. The irresponsible part was in allowing entitlement spending to continue its balloon pattern, though Bush gets credit for at least attempting to fix the Social Security mess by making private accounts a Social Security option.
Did any of the editors at the Times ever figure out that former presidential nominee Al Gore's Social Security lockbox notion would have had the same type of effect on the budget as Bush's Social Security plan--only much worse? Color me skeptical.
If the Democrats achieved anything last week, they wrapped the last eight years around McCain and warned he would bring more of the same. This is McCain's opportunity to break out of that straitjacket and reassert the independence and wit that once made him such an attractive candidate to a wide swath of voters that included independents and conservative Democrats.
Mr. Obama used the spotlight to denounced the “Bush-McCain foreign policy” that has squandered international goodwill and undermined long-term American interests in the Middle East and Eastern Europe.
“If John McCain wants to follow George Bush with more tough talk and bad strategy, that is his choice – but it is not the change we need,” Mr. Obama said, and “if John McCain wants to have a debate about who has the temperament, and judgment, to serve as the next commander-in-chief, that’s a debate I’m ready to have.”
Mr. Obama also blasted Mr. McCain as out of touch with ordinary Americans’ economic struggles, invoking the quip that got Phil Gramm ousted as an official McCain adviser.
“A nation of whiners?” Mr. Obama said, drawing boos from the crowd without naming the Texas senator behind the assessment. “I don’t believe that Sen. McCain doesn’t care what’s going on in the lives of Americans. I just think he doesn’t know. Why else would he define middle class as someone making under $5 million a year
Other than that the point is granted.
The advice offered to McCain is hilarious.
This may be odd advice for a Republican convention, but it would be a mistake to spend this week offering up the usual sound bites against abortion, taxes and activist judges. McCain has an opportunity to lure away some Democrats who aren't sold on Obama or are disappointed Hillary Clinton is not their party's nominee. Throwing red meat to Republican conservatives could drive away those voters.
Judges are the key to the abortion issue; it won't have to be emphasized. Americans favor judges like Alito, Roberts, Scalia and Thomas when they understand the issue, as with the Kelo decision. Taxation is the key to the economy, though neither Obama nor the Times editorialists appear to have a clue about that. The McCain ticket probably just needs to appeal to voters on what voters perceive as the two most important issues facing the country. Palin helps McCain steal the thunder from Obama's rhetoric of change. McCain doesn't need your advice.
McCain, an American hero and former prisoner of war, can be expected to emphasize his foreign policy experience and qualifications to be commander in chief. But polls already show most voters believe he is more qualified than Obama in those areas. A better strategy would be for the candidate who cannot remember how many houses he owns to show some empathy for Americans struggling to make ends meet and offer concrete solutions beyond extending tax cuts for the wealthy. That would be of particular interest in Florida, where job losses in July ranked the highest in the country and the unemployment rate is the highest in 13 years. Fighting to eliminate congressional earmarks in the federal budget, however commendable, does not resonate with homeowners behind on their mortgages.
What "concrete solutions" to the housing crisis does the Times recommend, other than simply having "the rich" foot the bill (in the grand Democratic tradition of economic fairness, of course)?
If the federal government doesn't reign in its high-spending ways then home foreclosure will be the least of our worries--along with the risk of a deep recession based on Obama's proposed protectionist policies (the same type that helped deepen and prolong the Great Depression).
If only newspapers were willing to help educate people about economic realities in their editorials instead of merely shilling for their preferred political party ...
I visit Hot Air mostly for Ed Morrissey's writing, but Allahpundit is breathing the flames of truth on this one:
I actually like the fact that McCain voted to confirm Ginsburg and Breyer, not because I have any use for either of them but because his vote was obviously based on legal qualifications, not an ideological litmus test. Conservatives have suffered grievously from the politicization of the confirmation process (a point I made in the earlier post) and will only have it worse as Congress turns a deeper blue. Having clean hands in this regard gives President McCain moral leverage with the Senate vis-a-vis his own nominees and political leverage over Obama right now as proof that he was being the true bipartisan pol while Barry O was busy voting against someone as ostentatiously qualified as John Roberts.
The McClatchy folks have printed a story about the ground game in Afghanistan. The story deals with the issue of more troops, counterinsurgency strategy and NATO.
So why are more troops required?
Some U.S. commanders have complained privately for years that after President Bush diverted resources and troops to Iraq they lacked the manpower to conduct an effective counter-insurgency in Afghanistan, especially in the Taliban's southern heartland.
"An increase in troops . . . is absolutely necessary, albeit insufficient to alone stabilize Afghanistan," said a U.S. defense official who requested anonymity because he wasn't authorized to comment publicly. "We can lose Afghanistan for too little of securing the people."
Hey, great! If you stay anonymous then you can break the rules and get around the fact that you're not allowed to comment publicly. Let's assume that the report is accurate, however, for the sake of analysis.
In Iraq, the U.S. was criticized for "going it alone." In contrast, the Afghanistan situation is much worse than it might have been because of poor coordination between the troops of various nations. German and Turkish troops in particular have drawn attention because of policies that essentially prevent them from engaging in violence.
Obama favors more troops in Afghanistan because it accords with his narrative of losing focus on the real Islamist threat. I suppose I can be charitable in allowing that he favors more troops in Afghanistan because of the problem we have in squeezing useful help out of European allies and the (recent) requests of U.S. commanders. Whatever his true rationale, it has been braided together with his distraction narrative.
Obama makes himself a target for charges of inconsistency, however. If Iraq has had plenty of time to stand up while we stand down, then what of Afhanistan? The Afghans had a head start on the Iraqis and they're behind. What happened to the Obamish genius of encouraging self-sufficiency by removing the military training wheels?
McCain favors more troops in Afghanistan because of troop requests from U.S. commanders, from what I can judge. Happily for Obama, McCain's change of position on troops for Afghanistan plays into the hands of Democratic election strategists.
It seems that coordination of the NATO effort edges U.S. troop levels in terms of importance to the campaign in Afghanistan. McCain is on the right track in wanting to apply a version of the surge strategy (COIN operations) to Afghanistan, but the McClatchy story notes that increasing troop levels may make things worse if the cohesive strategy continues to lack.
So what's Obama's strategy?
Ending the war is essential to meeting our broader strategic goals, starting in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where the Taliban is resurgent and Al Qaeda has a safe haven. Iraq is not the central front in the war on terrorism, and it never has been. As Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently pointed out, we won’t have sufficient resources to finish the job in Afghanistan until we reduce our commitment to Iraq.
As president, I would pursue a new strategy, and begin by providing at least two additional combat brigades to support our effort in Afghanistan. We need more troops, more helicopters, better intelligence-gathering and more nonmilitary assistance to accomplish the mission there. I would not hold our military, our resources and our foreign policy hostage to a misguided desire to maintain permanent bases in Iraq.
The number of fibs and inaccuracies in the whole of the Obama op-ed was impressive. Beyond telling us that his supposed strategy for Afghanistan is new, Obama literally gives us no detail. Whatever the strategy, it requires more troops, more helicopters, better intelligence-gathering and more nonmiitary assistance to accomplish the mission.
Perhaps if we change the strategy and combine that change with hope, then we will accomplish victory in Afghanistan.
McCain has the more concrete and reasonable proposal by far. Obama, in contrast, never believed that the surge COIN strategy would succeed in Iraq, and apparently continues to believe that its success was a mere stroke of luck (saying even with what he knows now he would have repeated his political opposition to the surge).
PolitiFact continues to gamely support my contention that their methods tend to end in misleading results. Yes, it's time for another in the "Grading PolitiFact" series.
Sen. John McCain isn’t used to criticism about his support for veterans. After all, he spent five years in a Vietnamese prison camp and has staked his presidential campaign on a pledge to carry on the Iraq war.
Is this objective reporting? Looks like editorial judgment to me, and we're not even to the True/Mostly True/Partly True/Mostly False/False/Pants-On-Fire stage yet. I don't think that writer/researcher Shawn Zeller objectively knows whether or not Sen. McCain is "used to criticism" about his support for veterans. An objective reporter might attempt to count the number of times McCain has received such criticism, but there is reason to doubt that Zeller performed that type of research, for we might expect objective evidence of it in his reporting.
Zeller should perhaps also answer for the "carry on the Iraq war" statement, for that phrasing feeds into partisan portrayals of McCain's stated policy on Iraq, which is to succeed in Iraq. But my PolitiFact entries might quickly turn infinite if I allowed myself to routinely digress on such points. So back to Zeller's op-ed, eh, I mean unbiased objective reporting (pardon the redundancy):
But of late, McCain has taken heat from antiwar veterans groups such as VoteVets.org for hedging his support for legislation to expand federal funding to help veterans go to college and then for failing to show up for the Senate vote on a supplemental war spending bill that secured passage of the expanded GI Bill benefits last month.
So when a man confronted McCain during a July 7, 2008, town hall meeting — accusing the Arizona senator of speaking out against the GI bill — McCain got testy.
Three paragraphs, and at least two editorial judgments already. Now McCain is "testy." That is not the sort of description that is easily passed off as an objective observation. Fortunately, Zeller is fair and balanced in the subsequent paragraph as he explains McCain's rationale for voting as he did.
After that, Zeller is small enough to take a Space Mountain ride on another magnified molehill.
All that was true. But then McCain took it too far.
“The reason why I have a perfect voting record from organizations like the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the American Legion and all the other veterans service organizations is because of my support of them,” he said.
And here we'll have to interrupt Zeller for a while, because the reader is not going to understand what happened without more background. Zeller does not provide adequate background in his story, but at least PolitiFact is nice enough to provide the means to contradict the work of their fact-checkers. The Zeller story has a YouTube embed featuring the town hall exchange in question. So does my version:
The transcript of that exchange, along with the rest of the event, is available through Congressional Quarterly. As is plain from the video, a question was asked and McCain was in the process of answering the question. While McCain was answering, the questioner interjected additional questions or comments. In my judgment (since one does not objectively call somebody else "testy" without good physical evidence), McCain did become irritated with the interruption but handled it fairly regardless. Here is the relevant portion of the transcript:
My friend, I -- all I can say is I don't know what you're pointing to, but I've received every award from every major veterans organization in America. I've received every organization in America their awards, sir.
QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)
MCCAIN: I don't -- I don't know what you're referring to, nor do...
QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)
MCCAIN: ... sir, I'm responding to your question. And then I will let you speak again, if you'd like. But you want to -- the way we try to conduct these is let people finish and then I will go back to you. I'll go right back.
(APPLAUSE)
So I don't know what bill you're referring to. And I don't know what you're referring to. And I'll be glad to have you refer to it. But the reason why I have a perfect voting record from organizations like the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the American Legion, and all the other veterans service organizations is because of my support of them.
But you can go ahead and respond if you want to. Go ahead. Give him the microphone back.
QUESTION: I'll respond by saying this, that you do not have a perfect voting record by the DAV and the VFW. That's where these votes are recorded.
And the votes were proposals -- they were proposals by your colleagues in the Senate to increase health care funding of the V.A. in 2003, '04, '05, and '06 for troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. And you voted against those proposals.
I can give the specific Senate votes, the numbers of those Senate votes right now.
MCCAIN: Right. I thank you, and I'll be glad to examine what your version of my record is. But, again, I've been endorsed in every election by all of the veterans organizations that do that. I've been supported by them, and I've received their highest awards from all of those organizations.
So I guess they don't know something you know. So I thank you very much. And I will continue to be proud of my support for the veterans of this country and proud of their support.
McCain's statement about having a "perfect voting record" draws the attention of PolitiFact. And that's fair, to a point, because the statement is not true any more than is Obama's statement that he had already visited 57 of the United States. And I don't write that to belittle the point. It's more likely that somebody would be misled on a point of fact by McCain's statement than by Obama's statement, since most of us are pretty well aware of the number of contiguous United States.
The problem? It isn't likely, given the context, that McCain was trying to convey a false impression. PolitiFact fact-checkers sometimes display a sensitivity to the context and intent of a statement, but sometimes they do not. One entry will tease out the "underlying argument" while the next entry displays an exclusive focus on the superficial. It seems plain enough in this case that McCain's "underlying argument" consisted of his solid record on veterans' issues and support from veterans' organizations. It is possible that McCain meant to deceive listeners by claiming that all veterans' organizations rated him with a perfect voting record. More likely he misspoke, just as Obama did in referring to 57 contiguous United States. The controversial statement occurred in an off-the-cuff and unscripted exchange, and beyond that it was sandwiched between two other statements that more accurately portrayed the level of support McCain enjoys from veterans' organizations.
In the end, I agree with PolitiFact's judgment that the statement was false. But I judge PolitiFact "Mostly False" because their account does quite a bit of misleading.
It indulges in editorial judgments in advance of reporting the facts
It feeds gratuitously into the "angry McCain" meme
It ignores the underlying argument
It ignores the context
In addition, when PolitiFact gets around to collecting all their misbegotten ratings, this one looks just as important and underhanded as a deliberate and obvious lie on an important subject, like whether or not somebody has altered his position on the Iraq War.
I should no longer feel astonishment when the editors of The St. Petersburg Times write as though they live in an ideological bubble cut off from realistic political observations. While most pundits are noting BarackObama's shift toward the center, Philip Gailey uses his Sunday opinion column to call Republican candidate John McCain a panderer.
Is he wearing infinite blinders along with a special set of earplugs that deaden the auditory nerves?
With the netroots in a frenzy over Obama's perceived vacillation on the Iraq War after two speeches in one day and now a op-ed column intended to make sure everything is clear, Gailey puts the focus on McCain.
And here's the kicker. After leading off with the header "So long, maverick; hello panderer," Gailey forgets to include any concrete examples of McCain's supposed pandering. No, I'm not kidding. Gailey leads off by criticizing McCain for his foreign policy emphasis (that is, Iraq) rather than on economic policy. Those blinders and earplugs must be doing their work well. McCain has emphasized a robust and realistic energy policy that includes a key component favored by voters: Drilling domestically for fuel. Gailey might have used that as an example of McCain's pandering if he hadn't started out by suggesting that McCain was ignoring domestic policy. Come to think of it, what kind of pandering can a candidate really do in the first place by emphasizing foreign policy? Wouldn't pandering work much better with an emphasis on domestic policy?
The Arizona Republican, who once said economics was not his strong suit, has been struggling to convince voters that he feels their economic pain, which he proposes to ease with more tax cuts, deregulation and trade.
If McCain really wanted to pander on the economy then wouldn't he be better served to say that he would raise taxes only on the very rich or something like that?
That's it. Gailey's impotent salvo is spent. The rest of his column is a mix of dopey criticisms of McCain that have nothing specific to do with pandering, unless we count Gailey pandering to his fellow progressive editors and staff.
The "PolitiFact" enterprise launched jointly by The St. Petersburg Times and Congressional Quarterly appears intent on establishing itself as an unreliable source.
The latest example comes in the form of PolitiFact's apologetic on behalf of Sen. Barack "Can't I just finish my waffle?" Obama in covering for his double-dipping Thursday press conferences from July 3. PolitiFact provides its cover by finding McCain campaign claims that Obama has flip-flopped on his Iraq policy "False" according to their dopey "Truth-O-Meter." Obama's Iraq Position(s)
I'll invoke the "paper of record,"The New York Times, to paint the initial picture:
Senator BarackObama said Thursday that he might “refine” his plans for a phased withdrawal from Iraq after meeting with military commanders there later this summer. But later, he hastily held a second news conference: to emphasize his commitment to withdrawing all combat troops from Iraq within 16 months of taking office.His two statements, made just hours apart in Fargo, N.D., reflected how the changing dynamics on the ground in Iraq have posed a challenge to Mr. Obama, as he tried to retain flexibility as violence declines there without abandoning one of the central promises of his campaign: that if elected he would end the war there.
The NYT noted that Obama's first news conference (at Hector International Airport) appeared as an attempt to preserve flexibility. We owe it to Sen. Obama to use his own words to inform our assessments, but I've had trouble finding any transcript.
After delaying this post for few days, I finally located a video of Obama's statement. I expect I'll have one of the better transcripts in terms of capturing the context.
I've always said that I would listen to commanders on the ground. I've always said that the pace of withdrawal would be dictated by the safety and security of our troops and the need to maintain stability. That assessment has not changed, and when I go to Iraq and have a chance to talk some of the commanders on the ground I'm sure I'll have more information and will continue to refine my policies.
The end of the video makes it sound like Obama said "policies" rather than "policy" as it has appeared in most quotations (the PolitiFact version is plural). It is possible that the edit produces the "s" sound, but after repeated listens I'm satisfied that I have the more accurate transcription here.
The PolitiFact entry assigns truth values to the statements made by the McCain campaign to the effect that Obama has reversed himself regarding Iraq policy. Because of the nature of this controversy, I'll deal with the statements of the McCain campaign at the end.
We reviewed Obama's statements on Iraq from the campaign to try to uncover whether he was back-tracking on earlier promises. Iraq was one of the most pressing issues of the Democratic primary, discussed and dissected during more than 20 debates.
We found that Obama has made a few points about Iraq over and over again: that he opposed the war "from the start"; that U.S. troops should leave Iraq quickly and in an orderly fashion ("as careful getting out as we were careless getting in"); and that the U.S. should not have permanent bases inside Iraq.
The portions of Obama's statement that caused people (not just members of the McCain campaign) to question it were his use of the conditional "the need to maintain stability" and his willingness to refine his position based on discussions with military leaders. It is conceivable that the military leaders will have a view of maintaining stability that would be incompatible with Obama's plans for leaving Iraq "quickly."
Note that the PolitiFact analysis utterly misses this point. Their subsequent review of Obama's statements fails to fill the hole.
His campaign Web site says the following: "Obama will immediately begin to remove our troops from Iraq. He will remove one to two combat brigades each month, and have all of our combat brigades out of Iraq within 16 months. Obama will make it clear that we will not build any permanent bases in Iraq. He will keep some troops in Iraq to protect our embassy and diplomats; if alQaeda attempts to build a base within Iraq, he will keep troops in Iraq or elsewhere in the region to carry out targeted strikes on alQaeda."
The hole persists. Stability in Iraq is not mentioned except if taken as an incidental symptom of alQaeda activity.
"I think it's hard to project four years from now, and I think it would be irresponsible. We don't know what contingency will be out there," Obama said. "I will drastically reduce our presence there to the mission of protecting our embassy, protecting our civilians and making sure that we're carrying out counterterrorism activities there. I believe that we should have all our troops out by 2013, but I don't want to make promises not knowing what the situation's going to be three or four years out."
Nothing really new, here. The hole persists.
"As soon as I take office, I will call in the Joint Chiefs of Staff, we will initiate a phased withdrawal, we will be as careful getting out as we were careless getting in. We will give ample time for them to stand up, to negotiate the kinds of agreements that will arrive at the political accommodations that are needed."
This one might be taken as spackle, if not hole-filler. The problem is in reconciling "ample time for them to stand up" with a sixteen month withdrawal time frame. The context of Obama's statement is instructive, however, as it came in response to Tim Russert's question as to whether he would withdraw U.S. troops if Iraq demanded it.
RUSSERT: Let me talk about the future—let me talk about the future about Iraq, because this is important I think to Democratic voters particularly.
You both have pledged a withdrawal of troops from Iraq. You both have said you’d keep a residual force there to protect our embassy, to seek out Al Qaida, to neutralize Iran. If the Iraqi government said, President Clinton or President Obama, you’re pulling out your troops this quickly? You’re going to be gone in a year? But you’re going to leave a residual force behind? No. Get out! Get out now! If you don’t want to stay and protect us, we’re a sovereign nation, go home now. Will you leave?
OBAMA: Well, if the Iraqi government says that we should not be there, then we cannot be there. This is a sovereign government, as George Bush continually reminds us.
Now, I think we can be in a partnership with Iraq to ensure the stability and the safety of the region, to ensure the safety of Iraqis and to meet our national security interests. But in order to do that, we have to send a clear signal to the Iraqi government that we are not going to be there permanently, which is why I have said that as soon as I take office, I will call in the Joint Chiefs of Staff. We will initiate a phased withdrawal. We will be as careful getting out as we were careless getting in. We will give ample time for them to stand up to negotiate the kinds of agreements that will arrive at the political accommodations that are needed. We will provide them continued support.
But it is important for us not to be held hostage by the Iraqi government in a policy that has not made us more safe, is distracting us from Afghanistan, and is costing us dearly not only and most importantly in the lost lives of our troops, but also the amount of money that we are spending that is unsustainable and will prevent us from engaging in the kinds of investments in America that will make us more competitive and more safe.
I'm inclined to view this as an earlier incarnation of the same flip-flop Obama blurted out in Iowa. Note Jeffrey Feldman's post-debate take on the Obama response:
Curiously, BarackObama is already using the word 'partnership' to define his position Iraq--the word the Bush administration and the Republican Party are using to try to take control of the debate heading into the general election. And that's not the only Republican language Obama used in that answer. He also said -- as George Bush has said many times -- that he would give the Iraqi's time to "stand up" (as in, 'when they stand up, we'll stand down') and assured the Iraqis that America will provide them continued support. Those parts of his position on Iraq are clear, but they also clearly come from the Republicans. The part about 'calling in the Joint Chiefs of Staff' to 'initiate a phased withdrawal' is not so clear. Why will Obama need to call in the Joint Chiefs? Why not just start the withdrawal. And why use the exceedingly bureaucratic phrase 'initiate a phased withdrawal' instead of just saying 'begin withdrawing'? Nobody knows. The answers remain vague.
Feldman had pretty much the same problem with Obama's statement then as many Democrats are having now with Obama's Iowa blurtation.
But as far as PolitiFact can see, Obama has been consistent. Back to their litany of consistent statements.
"Now, I will always listen to our commanders on the ground with respect to tactics. Once I've given them a new mission, that we are going to proceed deliberately in an orderly fashion out of Iraq and we are going to have our combat troops out, we will not have permanent bases there, once I've provided that mission, if they come to me and want to adjust tactics, then I will certainly take their recommendations into consideration; but ultimately the buck stops with me as the commander in chief."
Note the heavy emphasis on sustaining stability in Iraq. Yeah, only kidding.
On "Meet the Press" on May 4, 2008, Russert asked Obama what he would do if advisers thought "a quick withdrawal" from Iraq would result in genocide. Obama replied, "Of course, I would factor in the possibilities of genocide, and I factored it in when I said that I would begin a phased withdrawal. What we have talked about is a very deliberate and prudent approach to the withdrawal -- one to two brigades per month. At that pace, it would take about 16 months, assuming that George Bush is not going to lower troop levels before the next president takes office. We are talking about, potentially, two years away. At that point, we will have been in Iraq seven years. If we cannot get the Iraqis to stand up in seven years, we're not going to get them to stand up in 14 or 28 or 56 years."
If a guy can use that many words and still leave the canvas blank then truly he must be some sort of artist. This snippet suggests the Iraqis will have had "ample time to stand up" within his stated 16 month time frame. And it also provides plausible deniability of the type that would absolutely infuriate the hard left antiwar camp. After all, even if we can't get the Iraqis to stand up in seven years it doesn't mean that we can't get them to stand up in 10 years. Fourteen is a different story, though! Again, one is reminded of the slick talk that came from Bill Clinton.
PolitiFact buys it:
Taken in their entirety, Obama's comments reflect a philosophy of "about 16 months" for withdrawal. He also appears to be willing to take advice from commanders on the ground that might affect the general pace, but not the overall goal of withdrawal. Yet Obama has been artful in his rhetoric. His campaign has clearly emphasized "16 months" when speaking to anti-war audiences and "about 16 months" when answering questions from withdrawal skeptics. But Obama never urged a "precipitous" withdrawal; even a bill he offered in January 2007 that set a deadline for getting out of Iraq contained an exemption for national security.
"Artful in his rhetoric." I love that one.
Sixteen months is a precipitous withdrawal. The leading Democratic presidential candidates all effectively agreed on that earlier in the campaign during an Iowa debate when the recognized that withdrawal would take a year.
But Senator Joseph Biden of Delaware, chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, said a pullout would take a year and would also mean leaving some troops behind to protect an estimated 4,000 US civilians working in Iraq. His assertion was supported by Clinton, Obama, and former senator John Edwards of North Carolina. (The Boston Globe)
For the mathematically challenged, 16 months is four months longer than a year. Now imagine walking out of a movie theater precipitously in the minimum of 12 seconds. Then imagine claiming that leaving the theater in 16 seconds is not precipitous.
PolitiFact buys it.
Weighing all these statements together, we find the McCain campaign is off-base in saying Obama has changed position. Obama repeatedly said facts on the ground could affect the tactical moves of an overall withdrawal. Obama's position was not an iron-clad withdrawal timeline in the first place. We find the McCain campaign's statement that Obama has reversed position to be False.
We've gone clean through the analysis, albeit not quoting the entire thing, and the piece never recognizes that Obama's consideration of ensuring the stability in Iraq does not pair well with a 16 month "phased withdrawal."
And how Ms. DrobnicHolan missed this one I have no clue:
All Combat Troops Redeployed by 2009: BarackObama would immediately begin redeploying American troops from Iraq. The withdrawal would be strategic and phased, directed by military commanders on the ground and done in consultation with the Iraqi government. Troops would be removed from secure areas first, with troops remaining longer in more volatile areas. The drawdown would begin immediately with one to two combat brigades redeploying each month and all troops engaged in combat operations out by the end of next year. ("Obama's Plan to Responsibly End the War in Iraq"--pdf, Sept. 2007)
From the same source:
"My plan for ending the war would turn the page in Iraq by removing our combat troops from Iraq’s civil war; by taking a new approach to press for a new accord on reconciliation within Iraq; by talking to all of Iraq’s neighbors to press for a compact in the region; and by confronting the human costs of this war." [Speech in Clinton County, IA, 09/12/07]
Note that in 2007, less than one year ago, Obama was all about getting our troops out of Iraq's civil war. In July 2008, Obama's rhetoric emphasized sustaining Iraq's stability. That is a substantial change, but PolitiFact takes no note.
*** The McCain Campaign statement
Why deal with the McCain Campaign's statement at the end? It promotes understanding to place the comment in context. Above, thanks in large part of PolitiFact, one gets a taste of the varied and (ahem) "artful" statements made by the junior senator from Illinois. When I sought out the entire statement I discovered that PolitiFact had left out an important part of the story. I should not have been surprised.
I will present the entire statement, adding bold highlights to the portion quoted at PolitiFact.
"Since announcing his campaign in 2007, the central premise of BarackObama's candidacy was his commitment to begin withdrawing American troops from Iraq immediately. He campaigned in Iowa, New Hampshire and across the country reaffirming this pledge to the American people.
"Today, BarackObama reversed that position proving once again that his words do not matter. He has now adopted John McCain's position that we cannot risk the progress we have made in Iraq by beginning to withdraw our troops immediately without concern for conditions on the ground. There is nothing wrong with changing your mind when the facts on the ground dictate it. Indeed, the facts have changed because of the success of the surge that John McCain advocated for years and BarackObama opposed in a position that put politics ahead of country.
"Now that BarackObama has changed course and proven his past positions to be just empty words, we would like to congratulate him for accepting John McCain's principled stand on this critical national security issue. If he had visited Iraq sooner or actually had a one-on-one meeting with General Petraeus, he would have changed his position long ago."
First, note that the statement implicitly emphasizes the portion of Obama's statement ignored by PolitiFact: Redeployment would take into account the stability of Iraq. It is no longer removing our troops from the midst of a civil war. Second, though I haven't emphasized it in this post, plenty of others (not PolitiFact, unfortunately) have duly noted Obama's expectation that the surge strategy would not only fail but would make things worse in Iraq.
In short, the facts on the ground in Iraq have made Obama's withdrawal plan rationale absurd. With no civil war there is no reason to extricate our troops from a civil war. With Iraq making rapid political and security progress, there is no reason to apply pressure for rapid political and security progress. As a result, Obama changed the rationale. With the rationale altered, his time frame for withdrawal appears much more elastic--rather akin to the existing plans expressed by President Bush, along with those announced by candidate McCain.
PolitiFact behaves as we might expect from an Obama apologist. Obama has been consistent, the fact-checkers say, with the implication that those on the left who took that hard 16 month withdrawal thing seriously are at fault. They failed to follow the artful nuance of their candidate.
It is bad enough that PolitiFact was blind to the shifting rationale coming from Obama. That alone is enough to discredit this entry. Worse yet, it gives us yet another example of inconsistent criteria from the supposedly objective fact-checkers.
What am I talking about?
Earlier this year, PolitiFact graded McCain false on the claim that he had not accepted earmarks. Rather than permitting McCain a nuanced understanding of earmarks, PolitiFact used the notion that people would be misled by McCain's statement sufficient to rate him flatly "False." In the current case with Obama, it evidently doesn't matter how Obama's own supporters read his statements.
To paraphase the apostle Paul, Let Obama be true and everyone else a liar.
The widespread conviction among Democrats that we are destined to fail in Iraq was the key to Barack Obama's emergence as Presidential front-runner. He postured himself as the candidate who had opposed the war from the beginning. But what helped Obama in the Democratic primaries may prove his undoing in the general election. Through the months when Obama's dedication to failure was bringing him closer to the nomination, conditions in Iraq were improving, not worsening. This contradiction is now becoming acute, and Obama faces it squarely as he tries to decide whether, how and when to go to Iraq.
The cornerstone of Barack Obama's qualification for office has been his recognition--minus access to intelligence--that going to war in Iraq was the wrong thing to do. As Power Line and others note, Obama's position on the war served him well in the Democratic primary race. On the other hand, it has also been noted that Obama's position has been suspiciously political, coming to the fore as Obama vied for votes among a primarily anti-war black constituency and then moderating into agreement with the president's strategy later on.
The incongruity between Obama's position on the war and the reality of the situation in Iraq is growing, threatening to turn into a yawning abyss that will ultimately swallow Obama's credibility. Right now it looks likely that the administration's goals for the Iraq War will pan out, with Democratic defeatism the greatest threat to a positive outcome. With one day to go in the month of May, deaths among coalition forces and deaths among Iraqi civilians/Iraqi security forces both seem poised to end up at historic lows dating back to the very beginning of the war.
John McCain's strategy of inviting Obama to Iraq for a lookaround does seem intended to play up the latter's insulation from the facts on the ground.
Update: The newest addition to the Jedi blogroll, American Power, treated the same subject (Obama and Iraq) and provided a Youtube video accompaniment that seems a perfect match.
See Obama. Hear Obama campaign on the surge. See Obama. See Obama on the surge. See Obama campaign contradict Obama on the surge.
The surge has done what Obama (the guy with the awesome judgment) said it would not do. It provided for a moderation of sectarian violence and a stepped-up pursuit of AQI safe havens that enabled the Iraqi government to begin to consolidate its role as a non-sectarian peacekeeping force.
PolitiFact is apparently continuing its effort to give Media Matters a relative boost to its credibility.
John McCain recently attacked Obama after Obama had focused on the deficiencies of Bush's foreign policy with the statement that he would meet, for example, with the leaders of Iran without any preconditions.
In trying to portray Sen. Barack Obama as a neophyte when it comes to international relations, Sen. John McCain seized on some comparisons Obama made between the relative threat of Iran now vs. the Soviet Union during the Cold War.
If I were into minor points, "seized on" is rather prejudicial language. Let's just say that it doesn't particularly fit the paradigm of objective news reporting. But the PolitiFudging hasn't really even started yet.
The first part of McCain’s recap of Obama’s quote puts the context accurately, that Obama noted the threat from Iran was tiny “compared to the threat once posed by the Soviet Union.”
But McCain veers off the rails when he takes the next step, claiming that Obama characterized the threat from Iran as tiny or insignificant. Obama never said that.
Uh--where did McCain supposedly claim that Obama characterized the threat from Iran as tiny or insignificant?
Here is how PolitiFact reported McCain's words:
“Senator Obama claimed that the threat Iran poses to our security is ‘tiny’ compared to the threat once posed by the former Soviet Union,” McCain said before the National Restaurant Association in Chicago on May 19, 2008. “Obviously, Iran isn’t a superpower and doesn’t possess the military power the Soviet Union had. But that does not mean that the threat posed by Iran is insignificant."
“On the contrary, right now Iran provides some of the deadliest explosive devices used in Iraq to kill our soldiers. They are the chief sponsor of Shia extremists in Iraq, and terrorist organizations in the Middle East. ... Should Iran acquire nuclear weapons, that danger would become very dire, indeed. They might not be a superpower, but the threat the government of Iran poses is anything but ‘tiny.’ ”
That is at most an implication that Obama called the Iranian threat insignificant. But finding that implication demands that McCain be read less than charitably. Happily for those with a liberal bent, PolitiFact is up to that task.
How should one charitably read McCain?
Obama emphasized that since talking to the Soviet Union took place despite the USSR's considerable nuclear and conventional firepower that therefore talking with a less threatening foe makes good sense. Read with only modest charity, McCain addressed Obama's point directly: Iran, despite its relative weakness in conventional military terms, serves as a major threat because of its rogue nature and willingness to use terrorism. McCain is saying the same thing that PolitiFact notes that Obama admits about Iran, and proceeded after the comments quoted by PolitiFact to use that point to undermine Obama's rationale for having unconditional meetings with Iran.
"... is anything but tiny.
Senator Obama has, Senator Obama has declared, and repeatedly reaffirmed his intention to meet the President of Iran without any preconditions, likening it to meetings between former American Presidents and the leaders of the Soviet Union. Such a statement betrays the depth of Senator Obama's inexperience and reckless judgment. These are very serious deficiencies for an American president to possess. An ill conceived meeting between the President of the United States and the President of Iran, and the massive world media coverage it would attract, would increase the prestige of an implacable foe of the United States, and reinforce his confidence that Iran's dedication to acquiring nuclear weapons, supporting terrorists and destroying the State of Israel had succeeded in winning concessions from the most powerful nation on earth. And he's unli- unlikely to abandon the dangerous ambitions that will have given him a prominent role on the world stage."
Let me emphasize the point again. McCain no more claimed that Obama said the threat from Iran was tiny than Obama said the threat from Iran was tiny. If PolitiFact flunks McCain's truthfulness on that point--and they did, just one notch above "Pants-on-Fire"--then they should equally flunk their own truthfulness. But of course they won't. At most you'll see a correction minus the stupid graphic implying an immoral twisting of the truth. And probably not even that.
But the ineptitude at PolitiFact gets even more stupefying in this entry. The authors (Update: actually just Robert Farley, unless we count his editor) found a source saying that the threat from Iran is actually worse than the threat from the Soviet Union because Iran cannot presently be regarded as a rational actor.
Iran is attempting to develop nuclear weapons, Dale said, while unapologetically supporting terrorist groups like Hamas, who would have little hesitation about setting off a nuclear weapon in the United States.
“You could definitely say it’s more dangerous than the Cold War,” he said.
PolitiFact has apparently succeeded in proving that one of Obama's statements, that the threat from Iraq is tiny compared to that of the Soviet Union, is less than true. Don't expect it to warrant its own entry, even though it helps make McCain's point (according to PolitiFact) that Obama is a foreign policy neophyte.
This is amazing stuff. A publication that is supposedly set up to separate fact from fiction completely flubs the judgment on McCain and overlooks its opportunity to shine the light of truth on Barack Obama. Granted, the information is buried in the item for those with the inclination and wherewithall to dig it out--but the cheesy Truth-O-Meter proclaims McCain false and renders no judgment on Obama in this case. People will believe the graphic.
Writer/researcher Robert Farley gets the credit (blame) for this one, if I interpret the credits properly.
