Op-Ed Columnist | If Terrorists Rock the Vote in 2008

By FRANK RICH
Published: June 29, 2008

DON’T fault Charles Black, the John McCain adviser, for publicly stating his honest belief that a domestic terrorist attack would be “a big advantage” for their campaign and that Benazir Bhutto’s assassination had “helped” Mr. McCain win the New Hampshire primary. His real sin is that he didn’t come completely clean on his strategic thinking.


Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times


Barry Blitt

In private, he is surely gaming this out further, George Carlin-style. What would be the optimum timing, from the campaign’s perspective, for this terrorist attack — before or after the convention? Would the attack be most useful if it took place in a red state, blue state or swing state? How much would it “help” if the next assassinated foreign leader had a higher name recognition in American households than Benazir Bhutto?

Unlike Hillary Clinton’s rumination about the Bobby Kennedy assassination or Barack Obama’s soliloquy about voters clinging to guns and faith, Mr. Black’s remarks were not an improvisational mishap. He gave his quotes on the record to Fortune magazine. He did so without thinking twice because he was merely saying what much of Washington believes. Terrorism is the one major issue where Mr. McCain soundly vanquishes his Democratic opponent in the polls. Since 2002, it’s been a Beltway axiom akin to E=mc2 that Bomb in American City=G.O.P. Landslide.

That equation was the creation of Karl Rove. Among the only durable legacies of the Bush presidency are the twin fears that Mr. Rove relentlessly pushed on his client’s behalf: fear of terrorism and fear of gays. But these pillars are disintegrating too. They’re propped up mainly by political operatives like Mr. Black and their journalistic camp followers — the last Washington insiders who are still in Mr. Rove’s sway and are still refighting the last political war.

That the old Rove mojo still commands any respect is rather amazing given how blindsided he was by 2006. Two weeks before that year’s midterms, he condescendingly lectured an NPR interviewer about how he devoured “68 polls a week” — not a mere 67, mind you — and predicted unequivocally that Election Day would yield “a Republican Senate and a Republican House.” These nights you can still find Mr. Rove hawking his numbers as he peddles similar G.O.P. happy talk to credulous bloviators at Fox News.

But let’s put ourselves in Mr. Black’s shoes and try out the Rove playbook at home — though not in front of the children — by thinking the unthinkable. If a terrorist bomb did detonate in an American city before Election Day, would that automatically be to the Republican ticket’s benefit?

Not necessarily. Some might instead ask why the Bush White House didn’t replace Michael Chertoff as secretary of homeland security after a House report condemned his bungling of Katrina. The man didn’t know what was happening in the New Orleans Convention Center even when it was broadcast on national television.

Next, voters might take a hard look at the antiterrorism warriors of the McCain campaign (and of a potential McCain administration). This is the band of advisers and surrogates that surfaced to attack Mr. Obama two weeks ago for being “naïve” and “delusional” and guilty of a “Sept. 10th mind-set” after he had the gall to agree with the Supreme Court decision on Gitmo detainees. The McCain team’s track record is hardly sterling. It might make America more vulnerable to terrorist attack, not less, were it in power.

Take — please! — the McCain foreign policy adviser, Randy Scheunemann. He was the executive director of the so-called Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, formed in 2002 (with Mr. McCain on board) to gin up the war that diverted American resources from fighting those who attacked us on 9/11 to invading a nation that did not. Thanks to that strategic blunder, a 2008 Qaeda attack could well originate from Pakistan or Afghanistan, where Osama bin Laden’s progeny, liberated by our liberation of Iraq, have been regrouping ever since. On Friday the Pentagon declared that the Taliban has once more “coalesced into a resilient insurgency.” Attacks in eastern Afghanistan are up 40 percent from this time last year, according to the American commander of NATO forces in the region.

Another dubious McCain terror expert is the former C.I.A. director James Woolsey. He (like Charles Black) was a cheerleader for Ahmad Chalabi, the exiled Iraqi leader who helped promote phony Iraqi W.M.D. intelligence in 2002 and who is persona non grata to American officials in Iraq today because of his ties to Iran. Mr. Woolsey, who accuses Mr. Obama of harboring “extremely dangerous” views on terrorism, has demonstrated his own expertise by supporting crackpot theories linking Iraq to the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing and 1993 World Trade Center bombing. On 9/11 and 9/12 he circulated on the three major networks to float the idea that Saddam rather than bin Laden might have ordered the attacks.

Then there is the McCain camp’s star fearmonger, Rudy Giuliani, who has lately taken to railing about Mr. Obama’s supposed failure to learn the lessons of the first twin towers bombing. The lesson America’s Mayor took away from that 1993 attack was to insist that New York City’s emergency command center be located in the World Trade Center. No less an authority than John Lehman, a 9/11 commission member who also serves on the McCain team, has mocked New York’s pre-9/11 emergency plans as “not worthy of the Boy Scouts.”

If there’s another 9/11, it’s hard to argue that this gang could have prevented it. At least Mr. Obama, however limited his experience, has called for America to act on actionable terrorist intelligence in Pakistan if Pervez Musharraf won’t. Mr. McCain angrily disagreed with that idea. The relatively passive Pakistan policy he offers instead could well come back to haunt him if a new 9/11 is launched from the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

Should there be no new terrorist attack, the McCain camp’s efforts to play the old Rove 9/11 fear card may quickly become as laughable as the Giuliani presidential campaign. These days Americans are more frightened of losing their jobs, homes and savings.

But you can’t blame the McCain campaign for clinging to terrorism as a political crutch. The other Rove fear card is even more tattered. In the wake of Larry Craig and Mark Foley, it’s a double-edged sword for the G.O.P. to trot out gay blades cavorting in pride parades in homosexual-panic ads.

Some on the right still hold out hope otherwise. After the California Supreme Court’s decision on same-sex marriage, The Weekly Standard suggested that a brewing backlash could put that state’s “electoral votes in play.” But few others believe so, including the state’s Republican governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, who has vowed to enforce the law and opposes a ballot initiative to overturn it. Even Bill O’Reilly recently chastised a family-values advocate for mounting politically ineffectual arguments against same-sex marriage.

Mr. McCain is trying to swing both ways. While he no longer refers to the aging old-guard cranks of the religious right as “agents of intolerance,” his actions, starting with his tardy disowning of the endorsement he sought from the intolerant Rev. John Hagee, sometimes speak as loudly as his past words.

The Ohio operative behind that state’s 2004 anti-same-sex marriage campaign was so alienated by Mr. McCain’s emissaries this year that he told The Los Angeles Times, “He doesn’t want to associate with us, and we don’t want to associate with him.” Mr. McCain instead associated himself with Ellen DeGeneres. He visited her talk show to extend his good wishes for her forthcoming California nuptials while seeming almost chagrined to admit his opposition to same-sex marriage, a stand he shares with Mr. Obama. Since then, Mr. McCain has met with the gay Log Cabin Republicans.

He and Mr. Obama also share the antipathy of James Dobson, the Focus on the Family fulminator so avidly courted by the Bush White House. Perhaps best remembered for linking the cartoon character SquareBob SpongePants to a “pro-homosexual video,” Mr. Dobson last week used the word “fruitcake” in a rant against Mr. Obama. He has been nearly as dyspeptic, if not quite as “fruit”-fixated, about Mr. McCain.

Mr. Dobson’s embarrassing lashing out is the last gasp of an era. His dying breed of family-values scold is giving way to a new and independent generation of evangelical leaders (and voters) who don’t march to the partisan beat of Mr. Rove or his one-time ally, the disgraced Ralph Reed. Perhaps in belated recognition of this reality, Mr. Rove has been busy lately developing a new fear card for 2008 — fear of the Obamas.

Its racial undertones are naked enough. Earlier this year, Mr. Rove wrote that Mr. Obama was “often lazy,” and that his “trash talking” during a debate was “an unattractive carry-over from his days playing pickup basketball at Harvard.” Last week Mr. Rove caricatured him as the elitist “guy at the country club with the beautiful date.” Provocative as it is to inject Mr. Obama into a setting historically associated with white Republicans, the invocation of that “beautiful date” is even more so. Where’s his beautiful wife? Mr. Rove’s suggestion that Mr. Obama might be a sexual freelancer, as an astute post at the Web site Talking Points Memo noted, could conjure up for a certain audience the image of “a white woman on his arm.”

But here, too, Mr. Rove reeks of the past. Should Mr. Black and Mr. McCain follow this ugly lead, I bet it will help them even less than the assassination of Benazir Bhutto.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jon-soltz/right-on-general-clar...


Jon Soltz

Right On, General Clark. Do Not Back Down.

Posted June 30, 2008 | 11:47 AM (EST)

Boy, talk about your echo chamber in the media. Yesterday, General Wesley Clark went on CBS' Face the Nation, and repeated something he's said many times before. If you missed it, here's the full quote in context :

Bob Schieffer: Well you, you went so far as to say that you thought John McCain was, quote, and these are your words, "untested and untried," And I must say I, I had to read that twice, because you're talking about somebody who was a prisoner of war. He was a squadron commander of the largest squadron in the Navy. He's been on the Senate Armed Services Committee for lo these many years. How can you say that John McCain is un- untested and untried? General?


GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Because in the matters of national security policy making, it's a matter of understanding risk. It's a matter of gauging your opponents, and it's a matter of being held accountable. John McCain's never done any of that in his official positions. I certainly honor his service as a prisoner of war. He was a hero to me and to hundreds of thousands and millions of others in Armed Forces as a prisoner of war. He has been a voice on the Senate Armed Services Committee, and he has traveled all over the world. But he hasn't held executive responsibility. That large squadron in Air- in the Navy that he commanded, it wasn't a wartime squadron. He hasn't been there and ordered the bombs to fall. He hasn't seen what it's like when diplomats come in and say, 'I don't know whether we're going to be able to get this point through or not. Do you want to take the risk? What about your reputation? How do we handle it-'

Bob Schieffer: Well-

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: ' -it publicly.' He hasn't made those calls, Bob.

So, in short, General Clark respects John McCain's service, calls him a hero to millions, but notes that experience doesn't make him qualified to be Commander in Chief.

Now, VoteVets.org isn't getting into the presidential race, but I don't see what is so wrong about what General Clark said. And yet, immediately and unsurprisingly, the McCain campaign let loose with a response that expressed shock and dismay. Almost right after that, all of the media was up in arms about how 'wrong' this was. Pretty disappointingly, even progressive surrogates couldn't muster the strength to back up General Clark on TV.

Why?

This wasn't a swift boating, or any low politics. General Clark called McCain a hero to millions for his sacrifice. And, that's a pretty big statement coming from a man who, himself, left Vietnam on a stretcher. But, facts are facts:

• Senator McCain's service and experience, both as a POW and as a Senator apparently hasn't infused him with a dose of good judgment.

• Senator McCain's experience hasn't led him to realize that the war in Iraq and it's continuance has empowered and emboldened Iran, and destabilized the region.

• Senator McCain's experience hasn't caused him to recognize that we're losing ground in Afghanistan, and Osama bin Laden is still out there, plotting.

• Senator McCain's experience didn't lead him to support the 21st Century GI Bill -- he opposed it. It didn't even make him feel the need to get back to Washington to vote on this -- one of the most important veterans' bills this Congress. He twice skipped votes on the GI Bill, to fundraise.

• Senator McCain's experience didn't help him empathize with troops are overstretched and overdeployed, when he voted against the bipartisan Webb-Hagel "Dwell Time Amendment," which would have given troops as much time at home as in the field.

Senator McCain is running on his experience, saying it makes him ready to lead right away. By doing so, he is asking people to look at what that experience taught him. By looking at Senator McCain's positions and votes (or lack of them), it seems that experience has not given him the right judgment on important issues of our time. And, while we should all honor Senator McCain's service, that doesn't mean we should necessarily honor it by putting him in the White House to take up George W. Bush's third term.

So, General Clark is 100 percent absolutely right, and he should not back down. I'd hope that some of the so-called progressives on television back him up on this, and not get intimidated by the media and McCain campaign press releases. These are important times, and deserve a blunt and honest debate.

In some circles, that's just called 'straight talk.'

UPDATE: Since a lot of you are sending words of support on here for General Clark, we started a petition where you can sign to thank him, and tell him to keep it up. We will take the petition to General Clark, personally. Also, it's important to sign, so we can show the media that we've got his back.

Dobson vs. Obama

By Peter Wehner
Saturday, June 28, 2008; 12:00 AM

Earlier this week, Focus on the Family's James Dobson criticized Sen. Barack Obama, accusing him of "deliberately distorting the traditional understanding of the Bible to fit ... his own confused theology," of having a "fruitcake interpretation of the Constitution" and of appealing to the "lowest common denominator of morality."

Dobson's judgment was based on Obama's keynote address at a "Call to Renewal" conference on June 28, 2006. In fact, this speech was impressive in many respects. As an evangelical and conservative who has deep concerns about Obama's policies and political philosophy, I nonetheless welcome such a statement by a leading Democrat.

For one thing, Obama took on liberals "who dismiss religion in the public square as inherently irrational or intolerant" and "caricature religious Americans ... as fanatical." He went on to say: "Secularists are wrong when they ask believers to leave their religion at the door before entering into the public square.... To say that men and women should not inject their 'personal morality' into public policy debates is a practical absurdity. Our law is by definition a codification of our morality, much of which is grounded in the Judeo-Christian tradition."
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So Obama was doing what people like Dobson have long urged: making the public square more hospitable for people of faith and calling for a halt to their demonization. Obama made his case in ways I found to be respectful and authentic.

Dobson took particular umbrage, for at least one obvious reason, with this passage from Obama's speech: "And even if we did have only Christians in our midst, if we expelled every non-Christian from the United States of America, whose Christianity would we teach in the schools? Would we go with James Dobson's, or Al Sharpton's? Which passages of Scripture should guide our public policy? Should we go with Leviticus, which suggests slavery is okay and that eating shellfish is an abomination? Or we could go with Deuteronomy, which suggests stoning your child if he strays from the faith? Or should we just stick to the Sermon on the Mount -- a passage that is so radical that it's doubtful that our own Defense Department would survive its application? So before we get carried away, let's read our Bibles now. Folks haven't been reading their Bibles."

Dobson was critical of Obama's biblical references here and suggested that he had set up a series of straw men to support his "confused theology." But as I understand him, Obama was pointing out why the words of Scripture do not provide a ready policy blueprint for modern American society. Indeed, many of us have grappled with how to arrive at a theologically informed and fair-minded reading of the Bible that takes its moral principles seriously without simplistically applying to our time the cultural norms of previous eras. The chief defect of Obama's speech was that he didn't provide more insight into how to navigate these theological waters.

The passage of the speech that prompted Dobson's "fruitcake interpretation of the Constitution" and "lowest common denominator of morality" comments was this: "Democracy demands that the religiously motivated translate their concerns into universal, rather than religion-specific, values. What do I mean by this? It requires that their proposals be subject to argument, and amenable to reason. I may be opposed to abortion for religious reasons, to take one example, but if I seek to pass a law banning the practice, I cannot simply point to the teachings of my church or evoke God's will. I have to explain why abortion violates some principle that is accessible to people of all faiths, including those with no faith at all."

Dobson paraphrased this as "unless everybody agrees, we have no right to fight for what we believe in." But that's not what Obama was saying at all. Rather, he was arguing that in a pluralistic nation like ours, politics depends on people of faith being able to persuade others based on common and accessible ground and appeals to reason -- which sounds entirely reasonable. Christians who oppose abortion can make an effective case by talking about sonograms, fetal development and the moral imperative to protect the most vulnerable. That doesn't mean one's faith shouldn't inform the question of abortion -- or, for that matter, war, poverty and other issues. After all, President Lincoln's argument against slavery was partly grounded in faith. But appeals to the Bible or church teaching aren't sufficient in a pluralistic nation. That's why Lincoln talked primarily about the Declaration of Independence.

There are certainly reasons for evangelicals to have concerns about Obama -- based on his extreme views on abortion, judicial nominees, Iraq (his plans for a precipitous withdrawal would probably trigger mass death and perhaps even genocide) and other issues. But critics of Obama have an obligation to provide a fair and honest critique, and the attacks leveled by Dobson fall terribly short of that standard.

If Christian conservatives want to be taken seriously, they need to make serious arguments and speak with intellectual integrity. In this instance, Dobson didn't. He has set back his cause and made some of us who are evangelicals and conservatives wince.

======================================================
Peter Wehner is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and a former deputy assistant to President Bush.

Cheney's Fingerprints

By Dan Froomkin
Special to washingtonpost.com
Monday, June 30, 2008; 12:43 PM

Seymour Hersh's latest New Yorker article describes an expansion of covert operations inside Iran and provides more evidence of Vice President Cheney's zeal to address the Iranian nuclear threat -- possibly by force -- before he and President Bush leave office.

Hersh writes: "Late last year, Congress agreed to a request from President Bush to fund a major escalation of covert operations against Iran, according to current and former military, intelligence, and congressional sources. These operations, for which the President sought up to four hundred million dollars, were described in a Presidential Finding signed by Bush, and are designed to destabilize the country's religious leadership. The covert activities involve support of the minority Ahwazi Arab and Baluchi groups and other dissident organizations. They also include gathering intelligence about Iran's suspected nuclear-weapons program.

"Clandestine operations against Iran are not new. United States Special Operations Forces have been conducting cross-border operations from southern Iraq, with Presidential authorization, since last year. These have included seizing members of Al Quds, the commando arm of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, and taking them to Iraq for interrogation, and the pursuit of 'high-value targets' in the President's war on terror, who may be captured or killed. But the scale and the scope of the operations in Iran, which involve the Central Intelligence Agency and the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), have now been significantly expanded. . . .
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"'The Finding was focussed on undermining Iran's nuclear ambitions and trying to undermine the government through regime change,' a person familiar with its contents said, and involved 'working with opposition groups and passing money.'"

What's behind such a confrontational move? On CNN yesterday, Hersh said: "I do have some access into some of the thinking, particularly in the vice president's office. They do not want -- Bush and Cheney do not want to leave Iran in place with a nuclear program, with, they believe, a nuclear weapons program. They simply don't believe the National Intelligence Estimate that came out late last year that said they haven't done anything in nuclear weapons since '03. They just don't believe it.

"So they believe that their mission is to make sure that, before they get out of office next year, either Iran is attacked or it stops its weapons program."

Yet Hersh describes considerable pushback from the Pentagon. He writes in the New Yorker: "Military and civilian leaders in the Pentagon share the White House's concern about Iran's nuclear ambitions, but there is disagreement about whether a military strike is the right solution. . . .

"A Democratic senator told me that, late last year, in an off-the-record lunch meeting, Secretary of Defense Gates met with the Democratic caucus in the Senate. (Such meetings are held regularly.) Gates warned of the consequences if the Bush Administration staged a preemptive strike on Iran, saying, as the senator recalled, 'We'll create generations of jihadists, and our grandchildren will be battling our enemies here in America.' Gates's comments stunned the Democrats at the lunch, and another senator asked whether Gates was speaking for Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney. Gates's answer, the senator told me, was 'Let's just say that I'm here speaking for myself.'"

With preemption evidently off the table, some have speculated that Cheney is trying to come up with alternate ways the U.S. can be drawn into a conflict with Iran. See, for instance, my Aug. 10, 2007, column, Cheney's Secret Escalation Plan?

Hersh writes: "The potential for escalation became clear in early January, when five Iranian patrol boats, believed to be under the command of the Revolutionary Guard, made a series of aggressive moves toward three Navy warships sailing through the Strait of Hormuz. . . .

"The crisis was quickly defused by Vice-Admiral Kevin Cosgriff, the commander of U.S. naval forces in the region. . . .

"Cosgriff's demeanor angered Cheney, according to the former senior intelligence official. But a lesson was learned in the incident: The public had supported the idea of retaliation, and was even asking why the U.S. didn't do more. The former official said that, a few weeks later, a meeting took place in the Vice-President's office. 'The subject was how to create a casus belli between Tehran and Washington,' he said."

And Hersh describes what sounds like micromanagement of the covert operations from Cheney's office.

"'Everybody's arguing about the high-value-target list,' the former senior intelligence official said. 'The Special Ops guys are pissed off because Cheney's office set up priorities for categories of targets, and now he's getting impatient and applying pressure for results. But it takes a long time to get the right guys in place.'"

The Reaction

Joby Warrick writes in The Washington Post: "The article drew a sharp reaction from administration officials, who denied that U.S. forces were engaged in operations inside Iran.

"'I can tell you flatly that U.S. forces are not operating across the Iraqi border into Iran, in the south or anywhere else,' U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan C. Crocker said yesterday during an interview on CNN's ' Late Edition.'"

But appearing after Crocker on the same show, Hersh suggested that Crocker's denial was both narrow and potentially uninformed: "[W]hen you run secret operations. . . . you may not tell the ambassador everything. Sometimes it's better not to have the ambassador know."
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Hersh summed up the dangers presented by Bush's actions this way: "We have the special operations people, and they're great people. They're very loyal soldiers. They do what they're told, going around, killing people around the world without ambassadors knowing it, without the CIA station chiefs knowing it, without Congress knowing.

"If that doesn't sound like -- you know, with this president, if that doesn't make people nervous, I don't know what else would, I can just tell you."

In October, Hersh reported that Cheney was pushing limited strikes against Iran, ostensibly in defense of American troops in Iraq. The White House responded by challenging Hersh's credibility-- while failing to refute any of his allegations.

Borzou Daragahi, blogging for the Los Angeles Times, points out that in an " interview with the Times last week, Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Mohammed Ali Hosseini said there was 'plentiful' evidence that the U.S. was waging a secret war against Iran, which included funding dissident groups, planting bombs and supporting militants such as the ethnic Baluchi group Jundollah, cited in the Hersh article as a potential recipient of U.S. aid."

Najmeh Bozorgmehr writes in the Financial Times: "The commander of Iran's Revolutionary Guards warned at the weekend that Iranian retaliation for a strike on its nuclear facilities could include blocking oil routes and striking Israel with long-range missiles.

"'Any confrontation between Iran and non-regional countries would surely be extended to oil which would definitely lead to a huge increase in prices,' Mohammad-Ali Jafari told the state-owned Jam-e Jam newspaper."

Michael T. Klare writes in a Toronto Star op-ed that "the Bush administration's greatest contribution to rising oil prices is its steady stream of threats to attack Iran, if it does not back down on the nuclear issue. The Iranians have made it plain that they would retaliate by attempting to block the flow of Gulf oil and otherwise cause turmoil in the energy market. Most analysts assume, therefore, that an encounter will produce a global oil shortage and prices well over $200 per barrel. It is not surprising, then, that every threat by Bush/Cheney (or their counterparts in Israel) has triggered a sharp rise in prices. This is where speculators enter the picture. Believing that a U.S.-Iranian clash is at least 50 per cent likely, some investors are buying futures in oil at $140, $150 or more per barrel, thinking they'll make a killing if there's an attack and prices zoom past $200. . . .

"[I]f this administration truly wanted to spare Americans further pain at the pump, there is one thing it could do that would have an immediate effect: declare that military force is not an acceptable option in the struggle with Iran. Such a declaration would take the wind out of the sails of speculators and set the course for a drop in prices."

Oversight (Non) Watch

David Bromwich blogs for Huffingtonpost.com: "The complete failure of congressional oversight, to which the article points, is a larger subject that will be with us until the election and beyond. For if the vice president and his neoconservative advisers have their way -- and they remain, in spite of setbacks, the most active, energetic, and ambitious faction within the Bush administration -- the U.S. will be at war with Iran or on the way to war by January 2009. And if that is so, it will matter less than we think who is elected in November. The momentum will be there; the country will be committed. . . .

"Vice President Cheney learned long ago that he can outplay the Democrats in the game of power, because he is willing to use power. The Democrats, by contrast, don't even want to be responsible for the power that they have."

Craig Crawford blogs for CQ: "If Democratic congressional leaders are signing on to George W. Bush's covert war against Iran, as Seymour Hersh reports in The New Yorker, does it really matter which party wins the White House in November? On this front at least, it seems that Bush gets a third term no matter which party wins."
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Afghanistan Watch

In the New York Times is an expose of Bush's failed campaign against al Qaeda.

Mark Mazzetti and David Rohde write: "After the Sept. 11 attacks, President Bush committed the nation to a 'war on terrorism' and made the destruction of [Osama] bin Laden's network the top priority of his presidency. But it is increasingly clear that the Bush administration will leave office with Al Qaeda having successfully relocated its base from Afghanistan to Pakistan's tribal areas, where it has rebuilt much of its ability to attack from the region and broadcast its messages to militants across the world. . . .

"The story of how Al Qaeda, whose name is Arabic for 'the base,' has gained a new haven is in part a story of American accommodation to President Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan, whose advisers played down the terrorist threat. It is also a story of how the White House shifted its sights, beginning in 2002, from counterterrorism efforts in Afghanistan and Pakistan to preparations for the war in Iraq. . . .

"Current and former military and intelligence officials said that the war in Iraq consistently diverted resources and high-level attention from the tribal areas. When American military and intelligence officials requested additional Predator drones to survey the tribal areas, they were told no drones were available because they had been sent to Iraq.

"Some former officials say Mr. Bush should have done more to confront Mr. Musharraf, by aggressively demanding that he acknowledge the scale of the militant threat. . . .

"Even critics of the White House agree that there was no foolproof solution to gaining control of the tribal areas. But by most accounts the administration failed to develop a comprehensive plan to address the militant problem there, and never resolved the disagreements between warring agencies that undermined efforts to fashion any coherent strategy."

Mazzetti and Rohde write that after Bush's overhaul of his national security team left no senior officials with close personal relationships with Musharraf, the president decided to talk to Musharraf himself. Apparently he was less than forceful.

"The conversations backfired. Two former United States government officials say they were surprised and frustrated when instead of demanding action from Mr. Musharraf, Mr. Bush repeatedly thanked him for his contributions to the war on terrorism. 'He never pounded his fist on the table and said, "Pervez you have to do this,' ' said a former senior intelligence official who saw transcripts of the phone conversations. But another senior administration official defended the president, saying Mr. Bush had not gone easy on the Pakistani leader."

Finally, in 2007, Cheney went to Islamabad in March 2007, along with Stephen R. Kappes, the deputy C.I.A. director, "to register American concern."

Mazzetti and Rohde write that "while Mr. Bush vowed early on that Mr. bin Laden would be captured 'dead or alive,' the moment in late 2001 when Mr. bin Laden and his followers escaped at Tora Bora was almost certainly the last time the Qaeda leader was in American sights, current and former intelligence officials say. Leading terrorism experts have warned that it is only a matter of time before a major terrorist attack planned in the mountains of Pakistan is carried out on American soil."

Iraq's Oil

Andrew E. Kramer writes in the New York Times: "A group of American advisers led by a small State Department team played an integral part in drawing up contracts between the Iraqi government and five major Western oil companies to develop some of the largest fields in Iraq, American officials say.

"The disclosure, coming on the eve of the contracts' announcement, is the first confirmation of direct involvement by the Bush administration in deals to open Iraq's oil to commercial development and is likely to stoke criticism.
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"In their role as advisers to the Iraqi Oil Ministry, American government lawyers and private-sector consultants provided template contracts and detailed suggestions on drafting the contracts, advisers and a senior State Department official said....

"The deals have been criticized by opponents of the Iraq war, who accuse the Bush administration of working behind the scenes to ensure Western access to Iraqi oil fields even as most other oil-exporting countries have been sharply limiting the roles of international oil companies in development."

Today's report would appear to contradict Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who said on Fox News this month: "The United States government has stayed out of the matter of awarding the Iraq oil contracts. It's a private sector matter."

Similarly, as Anne Flaherty reported for the Associated Press last week, the White House insisted there was no U.S. involvement: "'Iraq is a sovereign country, and it can make decisions based on how it feels that it wants to move forward in its development of its oil resources,' said White House spokeswoman Dana Perino.

"'And if that means that our companies here in the United States can compete and win business, then that's for them and the Iraqis to decide,' Perino added. 'But I don't think the federal government of the United States needs to get involved.'"

Peter S. Goodman writes in the New York Times: "From the first days that American-led forces took control of Iraq, the conquering army took pains to broadcast that it was there to liberate the country, not occupy it, and certainly not to cart off its riches. Nowhere were such words more carefully dispensed than on the subject of Iraq's oil. . . .

"Many critics of the invasion derided that characterization. In Arab countries and among some people in America, there was suspicion that the war was a naked grab for oil that would open Iraq to multinational energy giants. President Bush had roots in the Texas oil industry. Vice President Cheney had overseen Halliburton, the oil services company. Whatever else happened, such critics said, energy players with links to the White House would surely wind up with a nice piece of the spoils."

Iraqi Agreement Watch

Alissa J. Rubin writes in the New York Times: "Iraqi government officials on Sunday criticized the American military for two recent attacks in which soldiers killed people who the government said were civilians. . . .

"An Iraqi government statement demanded that the soldiers be held accountable in Iraq. The issue is particularly delicate now because the two countries are negotiating a long-term security agreement and among the chief points of disagreement are whether the American military will be free to conduct operations and detain suspects and whether, if its soldiers kill civilians, they will have immunity from Iraqi law."

One of those attacks took place in Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's home town, and killed a relative. Qassim Zein and Hannah Allam write for McClatchy Newspapers that "residents said the prime minister's office privately has reassured them that Maliki is furious with his American allies but that he wanted to keep the ensuing diplomatic crisis out of the media spotlight."

Cheney and North Korea

Philip Sherwell writes in the Telegraph: "Vice President Dick Cheney fought furiously to block efforts by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to strike a controversial US compromise deal with North Korea over the communist state's nuclear programme, the Telegraph has learned.

"'The exchanges between Cheney's office and Rice's people at State got very testy. But ultimately Condi had the President's ear and persuaded him that his legacy would be stronger if they reached a deal with Pyongyang,' said a Pentagon adviser who was briefed on the battle.
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"Mr Cheney's office is believed to have played a key role in the release two months ago of documents and photographs linking North Korea to a suspected nuclear site in Syria that was bombed by Israeli jets last year."

Cheney acolyte and former United Nations ambassador John R. Bolton writes in a Wall Street Journal op-ed: "The only good news is that there is little opportunity for the Bush administration to make any further concessions in its waning days in office. But for many erstwhile administration supporters, this is a moment of genuine political poignancy. Nothing can erase the ineffable sadness of an American presidency, like this one, in total intellectual collapse."

Subpoena Watch

Laurie Kellman writes for the Associated Press: "A House panel on Friday subpoenaed Attorney General Michael Mukasey for transcripts of interviews with President Bush and Vice President Cheney during the federal probe into the leak of a CIA agent's identity.

"Signed by Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich., the subpoena requests all documents from the office of former Special Counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald relating to interviews of Bush, Cheney and their aides that were conducted outside the presence of the grand jury investigating the leak.

"The subpoena requests similar accounts of interviews with former presidential adviser Karl Rove; I. Lewis 'Scooter' Libby, Cheney's former chief of staff; former White House spokesman Scott McClellan; former presidential counselor Dan Bartlett; and former White House Chief of Staff Andy Card."

I first wrote in December about Waxman's attempts to get the Justice Department to turn over evidence from Fitzgerald's investigation that isn't covered by grand jury secrecy rules.

In a letter he sent Fitzgerald on Friday, Waxman noted that Fitzgerald reportedly did not object to the release of the FBI reports on Bush and Cheney's testimony. But Waxman wrote that the Justice Department has now officially refused to comply with his subpoena.

In order to "assist the Committee in evaluating the Department's position," Waxman asked Fitzgerald to provide information on "the date and terms of all agreements, conditions, and understandings" between Fitzgerald's investigators and Bush or Cheney.

EPA Watch

Ian Talley and Siobhan Hughes write in the Wall Street Journal (subscription required): "The White House is trying to prevent the Environmental Protection Agency from publishing a document that could become the legal roadmap for regulating greenhouse-gas emissions in the U.S., said people close to the matter.

"The fight over the document is the latest development in a long-running conflict between the EPA and the White House over climate-change policy. It will likely intensify ongoing Congressional investigations into the Bush administration's involvement in the agency's policymaking.

"The draft document, which has been viewed by The Wall Street Journal, outlines how the government, under the Clean Air Act, could regulate greenhouse-gas emissions from mobile sources such as cars, trucks, trains, planes and boats, and from stationary sources such as power stations, chemical plants and refineries. The document is based on a multimillion-dollar study conducted over two years.

"The White House's Office of Management and Budget has asked the EPA to delete sections of the document that say such emissions endanger public welfare, say how those gases could be regulated, and show an analysis of the cost of regulating greenhouse gases in the U.S. and other countries.

"The OMB instead wants the document to show that the Clean Air Act is flawed and that greenhouse-gas regulations should be developed under new legislation, several people close to the matter said. The EPA needs to clear a final draft with the White House in order to release the document."

Torture Watch

Johanna Neuman blogged on Friday for the Los Angeles Times: "Democrats in Congress are still reeling over the lip they got [Thursday] from the Bush administration's key experts on torture. Vice President Dick Cheney chief of staff David Addington was so disdainful that some are wondering if he can be prosecuted for lying to Congress.

"'Of all the hearings I've attended since I started serving on the Judiciary Committee four years ago, I have never felt more strongly that a witness was lying,' Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) said in an interview. 'At the end of the day I'm not sure how much we can do -- we can't prove what he says he doesn't recollect.'"

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer editorial board writes that Thursday's hearing "makes us wonder if anyone in this administration will ever be held accountable for anything at all."

Del Quentin Wilber writes in The Washington Post that lawyers representing detainees in the U.S. military prison at Bagram air base have cases that could turn "into the next legal battleground over the rights of terrorism suspects apprehended on foreign soil. More lawsuits are expected on behalf of Bagram detainees in coming months, the lawyers said."

W, the Movie

John Horn of the Los Angeles Times reports on location with Oliver Stone, director of "W.," his "forthcoming -- and potentially divisive -- drama about the personal, political and psychological evolution of the current president."

Horn writes that it's "possible to see that 'W.' could be, in a complicated way, sympathetic." But he wonders "if Stone is, in some way, muzzling himself to craft a mass-appeal movie, has he cast aside one of his best selling points?"

Cartoon Watch

Monte Wolverton on Bush's Iraqi mission accomplished; Heng Kim Song on how North Korea is playing Bush.

June 30, 2008
by Faiz Shakir, Amanda Terkel, Satyam Khanna, Matt Corley, Ali Frick, and Benjamin Armbruster

ECONOMY | McCain Tax Cuts = Bush On Steroids

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) consistently fearmongers that "Democrats...want to raise your taxes...I want to lower your taxes" and threatens that under Sen. Barack Obama's (D-IL) tax plan, "Americans of every background would see their taxes rise." Not only is McCain's claim that Obama will raise every American's taxes false, but in reality, it is McCain's economic and tax plans that Americans should fear. His plan would double President Bush's tax cut while offering little in the way of offsetting those costs. As New York Times columnist and Princeton University economics professor Paul Krugman noted, McCain's economic proposals are "Bush made permanent" that "would leave the federal government with far too little revenue to cover its expenses." But while McCain tries to rebut claims that his administration would not represent a continuation of Bush's policies, even his top surrogate, Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-SC), acknowledged reality, admitting recently that McCain's economic policies would "absolutely" be an "enhancement" of Bush's. Oddly though, McCain's top economic adviser Douglas Holtz-Eakin has tried to claim Obama is a continuation of Bush, a remark even conservatives find absurd. Today, a Center for American Progress Action Fund event -- dubbed "McCain University" -- will educate and inform voters, reporters, and pundits about the consequences of adopting McCain's policies.

BIG CORPORATIONS WILL CASH IN: Part of McCain's overall economic policy is to reduce the federal corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 25 percent. What does this actually mean for America's largest corporations? According to a new report from the Center For American Progress Action Fund, McCain's tax plan would save corporations $175 billion per year, with $45 billion going to America's 200 largest corporations as identified by Fortune Magazine. McCain has also said the "nation cannot reduce its dependency on oil unless we change how we power our transportation sector." But at the same time, he is calling for increased oil exploration and production, which will not only do little to relieve energy prices here at home but also will put billions more into Big Oil's pockets. McCain's corporate tax rate reduction plan would save the five largest U.S. oil companies a grand total of $3.8 billion per year. Exxon Mobil, whose $11.7 billion 2007 fourth quarter profits shattered records, will see an extra $1.2 billion under McCain's tax plan. America's big corporations seemed to have taken notice of the potential benefits. A recent analysis by the Public Campaign Action Fund found that McCain's campaign has received $5.6 million from the PACs and executives of the Fortune 200, including nearly $800,000 from oil and gas industries.

THE RICH WILL GET RICHER: The largest American corporations aren't the only ones who will cash in under McCain's plan. Add the richest Americans to the list. In a recent study, the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center has found that McCain's tax plan "would primarily benefit those with very high incomes, almost all of whom would receive large tax cuts that would, on average, raise their after-tax incomes by more than twice the average for all households." Indeed, McCain offers no benefit for the poorest taxpayers; Obama's plan increases after-tax income for the poorest taxpayers by 5.5 percent. The Tax Policy Center also found that Obama "offers three times the break for middle class families than" McCain. While Obama will raise taxes on the richest 1 percent of taxpayers, McCain will increase after-tax income of the richest 3.4 percent. In fact, another beneficiary of McCain's plan are the McCains themselves. A recent paper by the Center for American Progress Action Fund found that John and Cindy McCain would save $373,429 under McCain's tax plan.

INCREASED DEFICITS: McCain has not explained how he would pay for these reckless tax cuts. His plan would cost nearly $300 billion and, so far, he has accounted for just $33 billion, or 11 percent of that total. Holtz-Eakin himself said, "You have to pay for that somehow or you are George Bush III." Indeed, a Center for American Progress Action Fund analysis released last month confirms Holtz-Eakin's assessment. McCain's entire economic plan, tax cuts included, would create massive deficits by the end of a two-term presidency -- the highest federal budget deficit in 25 years -- and would accumulate the biggest debt since the Second World War. Under McCain, yearly deficits would increase sharply, beginning with $505 billion in FY2009 that would skyrocket to $1.2 trillion by FY2017. In 2018 these deficits would reach 6 percent of GDP, tied with the largest deficits since WWII, while McCain's plan would leave a debt of $12.7 trillion after a two term presidency. McCain has claimed that he would eliminate earmarks (citing a constantly shifting figure of costs saved) to pay for his economic plan. The Washington Post FactChecker, however, gave McCain's plan to pay for his doubling of the Bush tax cuts through eliminating earmarks "Four Pinocchios" (the highest rating for deceit), calling it "largely fantasy" and "voodoo economics."

During the June 25 edition of CNN's The Situation Room, host Wolf Blitzer asked Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), "So how is Senator [John] McCain going to, as they say here in Washington, pay for $300 billion in new tax cuts?" Following Graham's response, Blitzer said, "But there's no waste -- with all due respect, Senator ... you're going to find $300 billion in waste, are you?" Graham responded, "No, no, $35 billion from earmarks, but there are other programs up here that can be reined in, including the Department of Defense." But rather than asking Graham which specific "programs" McCain would "rein[] in" to "pay for $300 billion in new tax cuts," Blitzer allowed Graham to attack Sen. Barack Obama.

Moreover, while Graham claimed that "there are programs up here that can be reined in, including the Department of Defense," Blitzer did not point out that while McCain has suggested paying for "additional investment" in the military by "cutting wasteful spending," he has also asserted that we "can afford to spend more on national defense." In a November 2007 Foreign Affairs article, McCain wrote, "Along with more personnel, our military needs additional equipment in order to make up for its recent losses and modernize. We can partially offset some of this additional investment by cutting wasteful spending. But we can also afford to spend more on national defense, which currently consumes less than four cents of every dollar that our economy generates -- far less than what we spent during the Cold War."

Graham also claimed, "[W]e believe the tax cuts, the capital gains cuts and the dividend cuts actually increase revenue to the government and over time will help us. The key to this is controlling spending and cutting taxes." But Blitzer did not point out that numerous economists have challenged the suggestion that cutting dividend tax rates and capital gains tax rates leads to increased long-term revenue. Indeed, the nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation estimated in June 2006 that the 2006 extension of the 2003 cuts on capital gains taxes would result in decreased revenues of $20 billion over 10 years.

From the June 25 edition of CNN's The Situation Room:

BLITZER: All right, let's talk a little bit about tax cuts because there is a huge difference between these two candidates on the issue of tax cuts. Here's what Senator Obama says about Republicans in general, and Senator McCain, that they simply will go forward with all these new tax cuts, and they don't have a way to pay for it. It's only going to increase the national debt and our children and grandchildren will wind up paying for it. Listen to this.

OBAMA [video clip]: Republicans love to say, he's tax-and-spend, he's tax-and-spend. The truth is that my tax plan is going to give almost all the benefits to people who are making $150,000 or less. In contrast, John McCain's got a plan where -- that will cost $300 billion.

BLITZER: All right. So how is Senator McCain going to, as they say here in Washington, pay for $300 billion in new tax cuts?

GRAHAM: Washington will spend less under a McCain administration, so we can give you some of your money back -- controlling spending. Republicans love to cut --

BLITZER: But there's no waste -- with all due respect, Senator --

GRAHAM: Yeah.

BLITZER: -- you're going to find $300 billion in waste, are you?

GRAHAM: No, no, $35 billion from earmarks, but there are other programs up here that can be reined in, including the Department of Defense. But we believe the tax cuts, the capital gains cuts and the dividend cuts actually increase revenue to the government and over time will help us. The key to this is controlling spending and cutting taxes.

If you just cut taxes, you don't control spending. You haven't solved the problem. If you increase spending and increase taxes, you're gonna drive people offshore to other countries. So, the Obama solution is to increase spending and increase taxes. That will not lead to a vibrant economy.

BLITZER: And as you can see, we're standing by to hear from Senator Obama. He's got a news conference coming up.

GRAHAM: Yes, sir.

BLITZER: We'll go there shortly. Another major source of difference -- another major difference is on energy policy, which is been foremost with $4-plus a gallon of gas, $130, $140 a barrel, whatever it is right now.

—J.H.

On the June 26 edition of CNN's The Situation Room, host Wolf Blitzer aired an audio clip of Sen. John McCain saying, "Right now, if the election were tomorrow, we would lose -- we Republicans would lose seats in both the House and the Senate. I mean, that's just a fact." Blitzer then said: "All right, that's straight talk from John McCain. If the election were right now, the Republicans would lose more seats in the House and Senate." Blitzer then asserted as fact that McCain is a "straight-talker," asking Republican strategist John Feehery, "Should he be saying that right now? I know he's a straight-talker, but what do you think?" Blitzer has referred to McCain as a "straight-talker" on several previous occasions, despite McCain's flip-flops and list of false assertions.

As Media Matters for America has documented, Blitzer has said that McCain "usually takes pride in" his "straight talk"; that "[t]here was some straight talk from the Straight Talk Express" in response to McCain's call for Sen. Larry Craig (R-ID) to resign; and that "[t]here was a lot of, I guess a lot of straight talk from John McCain today, but some are suggesting maybe it was a little too much straight talk," in response to McCain's statement that he would lose the election if he doesn't convince voters that the U.S. policy in Iraq is succeeding -- even though McCain had already retracted his statement. Additionally, Blitzer once teased a report on Focus on the Family chairman James Dobson's statement that he "would not vote for John McCain under any circumstances" by claiming that "Senator John McCain likes straight talk. But you can bet he won't like what a leading Christian conservative is saying about him."

Further, Blitzer did not explain why McCain's assertion that Republicans would lose seats in Congress if the election were held today constituted "straight talk," given that other Republicans, including the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) have predicted losses for Republicans in Congress. The Wall Street Journal political blog Washington Wire reported in a June 12 post that during a meeting with reporters hosted by the Christian Science Monitor, NRSC chairman Sen. John Ensign (NV) "said his best-case scenario" would be a loss of three Republican Senate seats. The post quoted Ensign saying: "That would be a terrific night for us, absolutely ... I don't want to slip below the four-seat loss. That's kind of where we've set our absolute worst goal is to be down to 45 seats."

Also, in a May 14 memo to the Republican leadership, Rep. Tom Davis (VA), a former chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), asserted that "[t]he political atmosphere facing House Republicans this November is the worst since Watergate and is far more toxic than the fall of 2006 when we lost thirty seats (and our majority) and came within a couple of percentage points of losing another fifteen seats." Davis also predicted that "without some meaningful changes in direction, the GOP is heading for losses bordering on another twenty seats in the House and up to a half dozen Senate seats." Further, a June 26 Associated Press article quoted NRCC communication director Karen Hanretty saying in reaction to an "internal review" by House Republicans, "This is a challenging environment. ... Any Republican running for office has to run basically on an independent platform, localize the race and not take anything for granted. There are no safe Republican seats in this election."

From the June 26 edition of CNN's The Situation Room:

BLITZER: Here is a sound bite from John McCain speaking about the conservative brand right now, and I want to discuss this, so I'll play it.

McCAIN [audio clip]: Right now, if the election were tomorrow, we would lose -- we Republicans would lose seats in both the House and the Senate. I mean, that's just a fact.

BLITZER: All right, that's straight talk from John McCain. If the election were right now, the Republicans would lose more seats in the House and Senate. Should he be saying that right now? I know he's a straight-talker, but what do you think?

FEEHERY: Well, I mean, it's -- he is a straight-talker. And the fact is, we probably lose a couple seats in the House and a couple seats --

BLITZER: A couple, is that all?

FEEHERY: Well, you know, I'm not sure what the exact number will be. But I think it's straight talk.

—M.G. & B.J.L.

IBD cited McCain's " 'maverick' positions" on taxes and immigration, failed to note his reversal on those issues

Summary: An Investor's Business Daily article claimed that the Supreme Court ruling that overturned a handgun ban in the District of Columbia "is a potential lifeline for [Sen. John] McCain, who has failed so far to unite conservative voters behind him," many of whom "still resent his 'maverick' positions on taxes and immigration." But the article did not mention that McCain has reversed his positions on taxes and immigration, adopting positions more closely conforming to the views of the GOP base on both issues.

In a June 26 Investor's Business Daily article, staff writer Sean Higgins wrote that the Supreme Court ruling that overturned a handgun ban in the District of Columbia "is a potential lifeline for [Sen. John] McCain, who has failed so far to unite conservative voters behind him," many of whom, Higgins asserted, "still resent his 'maverick' positions on taxes and immigration." Higgins did not mention, however, that McCain has reversed his positions on taxes and immigration, adopting positions more closely conforming to the views of the GOP base on both issues. While McCain opposed President Bush's tax cuts in 2001 and 2003, he now supports making the tax cuts permanent, while misrepresenting his stated reason for previously opposing them. And on immigration, McCain stated during the January 30 Republican presidential debate that he would no longer vote for the immigration bill he co-sponsored with Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) if it came to a vote on the Senate floor. McCain now says that "we've got to secure the borders first" -- a position at odds with his prior assertion that border security could not be disaggregated from other aspects of comprehensive immigration reform without being rendered ineffective.

As Media Matters for America has noted, numerous news articles have uncritically reported McCain's past positions on issues such as immigration and taxes without noting that he has since reversed himself.

In contrast to Higgins, Elisabeth Bumiller reported in a March 3 New York Times article that McCain has made a "striking turnaround ... on the Bush tax cuts, which he voted against twice but now wants to make permanent," and has "moved from his original position on immigration." Bumiller also noted that "McCain went so far at a debate at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in January to say that if his original proposal came to a vote on the Senate floor, he would not vote for it."

Similarly, The Boston Globe's Brian Mooney wrote in an April 20 article that McCain's maverick image "has been scuffed on his way to becoming the presumptive Republican presidential nominee," adding: "The policy shifts are evident: He abandoned comprehensive immigration reform last year as it threatened to sink his candidacy and is supporting tax cuts for the wealthy he had criticized for years and twice voted against in the Senate."

Additionally, in a June 20 Politico piece, contributing columnist and Washington journalist Gebe Martinez reported on McCain's reversal on immigration:

McCain, the Arizona senator, dismayed Latinos last year when he stepped back from his immigration bill that would have tightened the borders and legalized undocumented immigrants. As boos and hisses from angry Republican conservatives grew louder at campaign events, he switched course and vowed to "first" secure the borders. Were his failed bill to come up again, he would not vote for it, he said.

[...]

Trying to regain Latino support, McCain has chastised Republicans who stoke the fires of the immigration at election time. And at a private meeting with Chicago-area Latinos last week, he promised to push for a comprehensive immigration bill.

"It sounds like he's trying to have it both ways, and it's not convincing anyone," said Frank Sharry, who also was involved in immigration bill negotiations when he headed the National Immigration Forum.

This is not the McCain Hispanics thought they knew. Even after the 2001 terrorist attacks placed an emphasis on national security, McCain's speeches to Latino audiences and on the Senate floor prioritized the compassionate side of the immigration argument.

He understood that border security "first" means "deportation only" in the eyes of immigrant activists, and he championed a broader approach.

As the Senate mulled immigration in 2006, McCain often stood in the Capitol's corridors, pounding his fist in the air, arguing that border enforcement would not work without simultaneously penalizing employers who hire workers illegally, creating a temporary worker program and finding a way to bring 12 million illegal immigrants "out of the shadows" of society.

"It won't work! It won't work!" he protested of suggestions to do enforcement first. The stool cannot stand on one leg.

From Higgins' June 26 Investor's Business Daily article:

Sen. McCain, R-Ariz., is "clearly for Roberts- and Alito-type justices," [Sen. Sam] Brownback [R-KS] said, mentioning two of the conservative justices who voted with the majority.

That is a potential lifeline for McCain, who has failed so far to unite conservative voters behind him. Many still resent his "maverick" positions on taxes and immigration. The court ruling, which McCain had called for in an amicus brief, may help him rally those voters.

The reaction of Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., to the ruling was muted but still critical. In a statement, the Democratic presidential nominee said that "crime-ravaged communities (need) to save their children from the violence that plagues our streets through common-sense, effective safety measures."

—L.K.A.

NPR Morning Edition co-host Renée Montagne, MSNBC political analyst Pat Buchanan, and CNN contributor Bill Bennett all referred to the National Journal's 2007 Vote Ratings, which ranked Sen. Barack Obama the most liberal senator that year, without noting the subjectivity of the ratings. The National Journal based its rankings not on all votes cast by senators in 2007, but on "99 key Senate votes, selected by NJ reporters and editors, to place every senator on a liberal-to-conservative scale." In contrast, a study by political science professors Keith Poole and Jeff Lewis, using every non-unanimous vote cast in the Senate in 2007 to determine relative ideology, placed Obama in a tie for the ranking of 10th most liberal senator. Media Matters for America has repeatedly documented instances in which media figures have cited the National Journal ratings without noting their subjectivity.

On the June 27 edition of NPR's Morning Edition, Montagne stated: "[A]s this presidential campaign goes on, Barack Obama has been moving steadily to the center. Obama was ranked the most liberal senator in Congress last year by the National Journal. Now it appears he's trying to moderate his image as he prepares for the general election." On the June 26 edition of MSNBC's Race for the White House, Buchanan referred to the National Journal ranking by saying: "He's got ... the most left-wing voting record in the United States Senate. As we've said, [Sen.] Bernie Sanders [I-VT] has been demanding a recount." On the June 25 edition of CNN's The Situation Room, Bennett said Obama "has got the most far-left record in the U.S. Senate." Moments later, Bennett cited the National Journal ranking, saying: "[CNN senior political analyst] Bill Schneider, not Bill Bennett, did the metrics for the National Journal review."

In a June 16 PolitiFact.com article analyzing the Journal ratings, St. Petersburg Times Washington bureau chief and PolitiFact editor Bill Adair reported that National Journal editor Charles Green "says voters shouldn't rely on a single rating to determine a candidate's ideology" and quoted Green as saying, "There's pluses and minuses to each rating system. If you look at a number of them, I think you have a pretty good picture." Additionally, American Enterprise Institute resident scholar Norman J. Ornstein has also criticized the National Journal's rating of Obama as the "most liberal senator" in 2007, calling it "pretty ridiculous."

From the June 26 edit