Posts Tagged ‘Palin’

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Mine, Baby, Mine!

Thursday, October 23rd, 2008

First the polar bears. Then the beluga whales. Now this, from yesterday’s NY Times:

As governor, Ms. Palin has helped ease the way for a proposed copper and gold mine of near-mythic proportions at the headwaters of Bristol Bay, the world’s greatest spawning ground for wild salmon.

If state regulators give their approval, mining companies plan to carve an open pit that would rival the world’s largest mines, descending half a mile and taking as much energy to operate daily as the city of Anchorage …

Scientists and former state and federal biologists warn that toxic residue from the project, known as Pebble Mine, would irreparably harm a centuries-old salmon fishing industry that employs 17,000 and hauls in $100 million annually …

Ms. Palin has remained officially neutral, saying that the state will evaluate the project when it receives a formal permit application. But she has embraced resource extraction in ways that are likely to help Pebble. On the presidential campaign trail in coal country this month, she led supporters in chants of “Mine, baby, mine!”

Oh, and this:

Other moves by the Palin administration could also help Pebble. It plans to use a $7 million federal earmark — a practice she criticizes on the campaign trail — for a major upgrade of a road through the snow-capped Chigmit range, records show. There are no villages along this route, but it would form the first leg of a proposed 200-mile thoroughfare between Pebble Mine and the Pacific Ocean.

And, finally, this:

The environmental challenges to mining there are formidable.

“It is one giant wetland, and no one really understands how it works,” said Carol Ann Woody, a biologist who served on the Pebble advisory team for the United States Geological Survey and views the mine as a threat.

Rain falls in torrents, winter temperatures hit 50 below and a geologic fault — capable of producing catastrophic earthquakes — sits 30 miles away. The proposed mine could produce seven billion tons of toxic waste rock; even traces of copper can disable a salmon’s ability to navigate.

Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised that Palin, a hero of the far right, is such a rabid anti-environmentalist. What’s truly alarming, though, is the insidious nature of Palin’s assault. Consider that she said this, nearly two years ago, in the tiny village of Ekwok, Alaska:

“I am a commercial fisherman; my daughter’s name is Bristol,” said Ms. Palin, then a candidate for governor. “I could not support a project that risks one resource that we know is a given, and that is the world’s richest spawning grounds, over another resource.”

Verlyn Klinenborg put a fine point on Palin’s dangerous approach in an article in yesterday’s Times. He noted that Palin doesn’t argue against environmental protections; she argues, for instance, that it is “premature” to place beluga whales on the endangered species list. (See blog post: “Kill the Whales.”) He writes:

Palin can be a skillful politician. “Premature” is such a subtle, reassuring word. It implies that she won’t always be opposed to protecting belugas, just not right now.

By “premature,” Ms. Palin might mean that scientific studies of the beluga whale population are incomplete. It is hard to see her as a proponent of exacting science; some of the studies her aides cited to justify her earlier opposition to listing the polar bear as endangered flatly ignored the threats posed by climate change and were financed by the oil industry. There is little doubt that her real concern is protecting Alaska’s gas-and-oil development.

Presumably, the time for listing the belugas will be mature when the gas-and-oil infrastructure in Cook Inlet is in place and the shipping lanes are running full and the fishing industry is going gangbusters. After humans have gotten everything they want out of those waters, then it will be time.

The problem, of course, is that by that time, the whales will be gone. Writes Klinkenborg:

What makes Ms. Palin an especially effective anti-environmentalist is that she comes from Alaska. She touches the expansionist chord, the ancestral American feeling that there will always be enough nature, although it is already clear that the systemic balance of nature is beginning to break down over much of the globe. I picture Governor Palin as an old-time buffalo hunter, wielding a Sharps buffalo rifle as skillfully as she wields a misstatement. “There will,” she says, “be time” — BOOM — “to protect those buffalo there, but at the moment” — BOOM — “it is premature.”

The environment hasn’t gotten much play in an election cycle dominated first by Iraq and then by the economy. But in an era of global warming and declining biodiversity (See post: “My Debate Question“), can we really afford to have such an avid anti-environmentalist a heartbeat away?

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Posted in Environment | 3 Comments »

My Obama Minute: Sending a Message

Wednesday, October 22nd, 2008

Most of you have probably heard by now about the comments of GOP Rep. Michele Bachmann, who is running for reelection to her House seat in Minnesota. After suggesting that Obama has “anti-American views” she said:

“I wish the American media would take a great look at the views of the people in Congress and find out, are they pro-America or anti-America. I would love to see an exposé like that.”

Thing is, it’s not 1950 anymore. The House Un-American Activities Committee is in the dustbin of history, where it belongs. Americans, by and large, are sick and tired of Republican scare, divide, and conquer tactics. The folks I know back in Jersey don’t tend to respond well when Gov. Palin, the GOP’s pick for the future, says in North Carolina that she likes visiting the “real America,” praising the “pro-America areas of this great nation.”

(Palin apologized last night in a CNN interview, saying she didn’t intend to suggest other parts of the country were less patriotic or less American. “You know,” she said, ”when I go to these rallies and we see the patriotism just shining through these people’s faces and the Vietnam veterans wearing their hats so proudly and they have tears in their eyes as we sing our national anthem and it is so inspiring and I say that this is true America, you get it.” She added: “I certainly don’t want that interpreted as one area being more patriotic or more American than another. If that’s the way it has come across, I apologize.” Honestly,  no, Gov. Palin – I don’t get it. At the rallies, you were clearly using patriotism as a wedge — between people, between voters, between red states and blue states – and I judge your apology last night to be further obfuscation and incomplete, at best.)

But I digress.

Bachmann had been on a glide-path to relection. As the Washington Post reports, after her McCarthy-esque comments, her little known opponent  Elwyn Tinklenberg raised $1 million:

The backlash from Bachmann’s remarks gave Tinklenberg enough donations to quadruple his television advertising, prompted the nonpartisan Cook Political Report to flip its take on the race from “likely Republican” to “tossup” and inspired a Republican who lost to Bachmann in the party’s primary to launch a write-in campaign.

My wife and I felt it was important to join this effort to kick Bachmann out of the halls of Congress. We gave a donation to Tinklenberg this morning. You can too, by clicking here.

And we didn’t stop there.

Because in North Carolina, Republican Robin Hayes riled up a crowd Saturday by channeling Bachmann, saying, “”liberals hate real Americans that work and accomplish and achieve and believe in God.”

Ahhhh, he finally said it. Not only am I myself lazy, Godless, and treasonous, but I hate all those on the other side of that line.

Of course, moments later, he denied ever saying it. And when a reporter quoted him, he kept right on denying it. (Check out this incredible string of updates from Politico’s The Crypt.) In fact, he denied it right up until the point in time when an audiotape surfaced, confirming that he’d said exactly what he was quoted as saying. When that happened, he suddenly claimed that he was perplexed that it had come out of his mouth, because he’d actually been “trying to work to keep the crowd as respectful as possible.”

That climb-down is almost Palin-esqe.

What happens to these Republicans when they get in front of the mic that they say things apparently diametrically opposed to what they really believe? Are they not aware that people now have video recorders on their cell phones? Do they really have the hubris to spew division in one breath, and deny their very words in the next? Do they not recognize the damage they cause?

Words create worlds. It’s in the Torah. Once uttered, words can’t just be put magically put back in a bottle.

Which is why my wife and I this morning made a small donation to Larry Kissell, Hayes’ challenger. And as the Post reports:

Kissell is making his second run at Hayes after coming within 329 votes of unseating the veteran lawmaker in 2006. This time, Kissell is better funded, as the national Democratic Party is putting more than $1 million into his race.

You can help, too, by clicking here.

Inspired, I decided to go for a trifecta.

I’m sure you all remember what happened to Georgia Sen. Max Cleland. Here’s a refresher, from the NY Times:

Six years ago, Democratic Senator Max Cleland was defeated by Republican Saxby Chambliss, who ran ads accusing Mr. Cleland of not being patriotic enough and of being soft on Osama Bin Laden.

The thing is, Mr. Cleland is a decorated Vietnam veteran, who lost an arm and two legs fighting for his country …

It was dirty politics at its dirtiest. Mr. Cleland, who gets around with the help of a wheelchair, struggled mightily every day with his war wounds. When he was campaigning and making television appearances, it took him an hour and a half to get dressed. But his injuries did not stop the ads — or some of Mr. Chambliss’s supporters from saying even worse.

After his loss in 2002, Mr. Cleland said he underwent treatment for depression.

Well, Saxby’s back on the campaign trail in what used to be the solidly Republican Georgia, asking for people’s vote. He’s again running harsh attack ads. But his opponent Jim Martin, ala Obama, is fighting back. And this time, Georgia voters are telling Chambliss, Not so fast. As the Times reports:

Until recently, nobody thought State Representative Jim Martin, Senator Chambliss’s Democratic opponent, could raise much of a challenge. Mr. Martin is not a flashy guy. He has the demeanor of a deacon, a far cry from Georgia’s history of Talmadges and other flamboyant politicians.

But polls have started to show Georgians almost split on this race (some are even suggesting that Mr. Martin is ahead). And the national Democratic Party has moved money in over the last few weeks.

We gave a small donation to Martin this morning, to let him know we’re pulling for him in Akron, Ohio. (You can too, by clicking here.)

Something’s happening. It’s happening all across the country.  The kinds of jingoistic attacks that seem encoded in the GOP DNA — attacks that instilled fear in my heart four years ago — are backfiring, from Georgia, to North Carolina, to Minnesota, to the places in between.

Something’s happening, and it has to do with the fact that we are, at last, sick and tired of being told who is different from us and why we should hate and mistrust them.

Something’s happening. And I think it’s safe to say that whatever it is, exactly, it gathered steam four years ago, when Barack Obama stood up at the DNC, looked over the dais, straight into millions of living rooms across the nation, and said:

Now even as we speak, there are those who are preparing to divide us, the spin masters, the negative ad peddlers who embrace the politics of anything goes.

Well, I say to them tonight, there is not a liberal America and a conservative America — there is the United States of America. There is not a Black America and a White America and Latino America and Asian America — there’s the United States of America.

The pundits, the pundits like to slice-and-dice our country into Red States and Blue States; Red States for Republicans, Blue States for Democrats. But I’ve got news for them, too:

We worship an awesome God in the Blue States, and we don’t like federal agents poking around in our libraries in the Red States.

We coach Little League in the Blue States and yes, we’ve got some gay friends in the Red States.

There are patriots who opposed the war in Iraq and there are patriots who supported the war in Iraq.

We are one people, all of us pledging allegiance to the stars and stripes, all of us defending the United States of America. In the end, that’s what this election is about. Do we participate in a politics of cynicism or do we participate in a politics of hope?

Yes, we do.

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Posted in Jewish Interest, My Obama Minute | 5 Comments »

My Obama Minute: A Half Hour With a McCainiac

Sunday, October 19th, 2008

I spent another two hours canvassing the Jewish community in Beachwood today. I spoke to 16 voters. Fifteen were voting for Obama. One for McCain.

Extrapolating these results out, I think we can all safely expect an Obama landslide on Election Day.

(Hey — I’m a creative writer, not a statistician. There’s a reason.)

It was another one of those fall days ripped from an Ohio Tourism brochure. High sun. Chilly, until you started walking, until you stepped out of the shadows of the houses and into the sunlight.

We set out around 11:30 a.m. — just after Meet the Press — and, I think it’s safe to say, we were propelled through the streets of Beachwood with Colin Powell’s endorsement at our backs.

People were, by and large, glad to see me. Even when they didn’t have time to talk, they let me know they appreciated the work I was doing. I spoke to one guy, in his doorway, for 15 minutes. I asked a 59-year-old woman if her daughter and son-in-law, who lived with her, were Obama voters, too.

“They better vote for Obama,” she said, “or else they’re out of the will.”

Perhaps my most satisfying conversation, though, was my last one — with a seventy-something McCain voter.

I started out by speaking to his wife, an Obama supporter, at the doorway of their modest ranch house, shaded by a low-slung roof. I’m happy to talk about Obama’s positions on Israel, I said.

“I don’t trust him on Israel,” the man said, unseen inside the house.

I answered his wife. Obama’s a great friend of the Jewish state.

“I don’t trust him on Israel,” the man said.

I heard Obama speak in Cleveland to a small group of Jewish leaders, I said. Obama said he would work tirelessly for a safe and secure Israel. He repeatedly spoke of the importance of Israel as a Jewish homeland. He has AIPAC’s stamp of approval. And a perfect voting record on Israel. He introduced a bill in the Senate to sanction Iran.

She invited me inside.

I’m not going to change my mind, he said. He sat at the living room table with his bare foot up on a chair — said he was nursing some ailment or another. Apologized for it. His kids, he said, were working their tails off for Obama, despite him.

You’re not going to move him, his wife said.

Still, we engaged in a spirited back and forth. He complained that Obama was going to be a tax and spend spread the wealth president. I told him I didn’t think so. Obama believes that trickle down economics has been class warfare against the middle class, and he wants to right that wrong. Further, I said, Obama is not a panderer. He was booed, after all, by the teacher’s union, for advocating standards for educators. He lost the progressive wing of the party when he agreed to immunity for the telecom companies. He supports gun ownership, and backed the Supreme Court ruling that called a DC law banning handguns unconstitutional.

I told him that McCain, in picking Palin, had in fact proven more tightly tied to his party’s extreme wing than Obama.

The man had a curt reply: Politicians pick the person who will most help them win. Obama did the same thing. End of story.

No, I said. If Obama wanted to pick the person most likely to help him win, he would have picked Hillary. Even Tom Delay and Newt Gingrich said as much. Obama, I said, picked the person he felt would help him govern, while also, hopefully helping him politically. No guarantee, though. Big, material difference.

His wife shook her head, smiling.

The man smiled, too. I haven’t voted for a Democrat since Adlai Stevenson, he said, and I’m not about to start now.

You’re man is going to win, anyway, he added.

Clearly, he had no idea who he was talking to.

I wouldn’t count on it, I said. The polls are contracting. The swing states are a dead heat.

Trust me, he said, you’re going to win. But, I tell you, you are doing the right thing — you can’t assume anything. You have to play this one through to the bitter end.

His wife went into the kitchen, came back with a copy of David Brooks’ column from the New York Times last week, in which the conservative columnist kind of gives a grudging stamp of approval to Obama. Take this, she said, it’s excellent. I’d already read it — but you don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.

I don’t like either of them — Obama or McCain, the man admitted. Truth is, he said, if Hillary had won — I might have actually considered switching parties, to vote for her.

Now we’re getting somewhere, I thought.

I love the political process, he said. I love elections. I only hope I live another four years, so I can be here for the next one.

From your lips to god’s ears, my friend. I’ll stop back in 2012.

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Posted in Israel, Jewish Interest, McCain, My Obama Minute, Obama | No Comments »

Kill the Whales

Saturday, October 18th, 2008

It’s a bad time to be an endangered species in Alaska.

The federal government on Friday moved to put beluga whales that live in Alaska’s Cook Inlet on the endangered species list. This, despite the best efforts of Gov. Sarah Palin, who fought them tooth and nail.

Here’s the nut, from today’s New York Times:

The relatively small, whitish whales, sometimes visible from downtown Anchorage, declined by almost 50 percent in the late 1990s, and federal scientists say they have not rebounded despite a series of protections, including a halt to subsistence hunting by Alaska Natives. …

As with the polar bear, Ms. Palin’s administration opposed the beluga listing in part because of its potential to restrict coastal and offshore oil and gas development. The beluga listing could also affect other projects, including the expansion of the Port of Anchorage and a proposed bridge over Knik Arm that would connect Anchorage to the Matanuska-Susitna Valley and Ms. Palin’s hometown, Wasilla.

“I am especially concerned,” the governor said in a written statement in August 2007, when her administration submitted documents to fight the listing, “that an unnecessary federal listing and designation of critical habitat would do serious long-term damage to the vibrant economy of the Cook Inlet area.”

At least she’s clear about her priorities. Build the bridge over Knik Arm, beluga be damned.

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Posted in Environment | No Comments »

My Obama Minute: A Day at the Beachwood

Friday, October 17th, 2008

This was a tough one for me.

I know not to place too much emphasis on the day-to-day shifts in the polls, but still, my sense is that they are starting to contract. The Drudge Report was touting the Gallup tracking poll, which shows a 2 point Obama edge for the second-straight day. An AP-Yahoo Internet poll today has Obama at 44, Mccain at 42. Even Daily Kos, which has had Obama with a 10-plus point lead, had him at only plus 6 today.

At Barberton Chicken, where I ate lunch with a friend, he told me not to worry — the best electoral vote Web sites have been modeling for this contraction, all along.

On my way to Cleveland, Uncle Jon told me not to worry — McCain’s debate performance is going to hurt him, ultimately, with independents.

Loyal, too, told me not to worry — Obama had a few days with lower averages, but in a few days, when the polls start reflecting the final debate, they’ll go back up again. Still, Loyal did note that “the only thing that has me concerned” is the Daily Kos figure.

And that’s Loyal. If he had a Web site, it’d be called OptimisticDemocrat.com.

And then, I spent the afternoon in Beachwood, Ohio, a suburb of Cleveland, canvassing.

I’ve been out a number of times this cycle doing voter registration. This was my first day canvassing. I have to say, I was very impressed.

We were targeting the Jewish community — folks with names like Baruch, Tali, and Yury. We were armed with hand-outs about Barack Obama’s positions on Israel. We spoke, ahead of time, about how to address any concerns people had about Jesse Jackson’s recent comments. (See blog: “Has Jesse Jackson Lost His Mind?”)

My wife and I canvassed four years ago for Kerry in Iowa City, and it was a disappointing experience. Some of the people we spoke to had already been contacted four and five times. It seemed like no one was really keeping track. One woman was so angry with repeat canvassers, she told us that she was a Democrat — but was voting Bush out of spite. Then she slammed the door on us.

This was a much more organized effort. I went only to homes identified as Jewish and undecided. If folks were home, we were to place them on a seven-point scale — from strong Obama to strong McCain. Also, we were to ask them if they wanted to volunteer, or if they’d consider voting early.

It was a beautiful fall afternoon. Leaves blowing lazily in the street. Kids walking home from school. When I rang doorbells and stood waiting, I’d turn my face up, and feel the sun on my cheeks. Many homes were decorated with cob webs and black cats and skeletons; sneering pumpkins and laughing witches.

I met six Jewish voters, all told. Five said they were definitely voting, or had already voted, for Obama. The other was undecided, but he’d recently had surgery, and confessed to being drugged up on something that made him wobbly at the door.

“I love Obama,” one woman said. “I talk him up all the time.”

Another woman said she’s voting for Obama, despite her fear that someone will try to assassinate him. She had been on the fence, she said. The turning point, for her, was when McCain picked Palin as a running mate. As a woman, she said, that felt like a slap in the face.

I have to say, if you are a neurotic Democrat like me, and the days have started to seem stuck in the sludge — is the world still turning? have we moved any closer to Election Day in the last few hours? – the best thing you can do is grab a clipboard and go ring doorbells.

Sniff the air. Leave some literature in someone’s door handle. Ask people what it is they are still worried about.

There’s something about the concrete gesture of speaking to another voter, one to one, that — at least momentarily — makes all the other stuff — from the polls to the pundits to the latest robocalls — seem, well, invented.

It’s scary as hell to pick yourself up and knock on doors to have political conversations with people you don’t know. But, take it from me, it’s scarier not to.

Watch this Sunday to see if Colin Powell endorses Obama. That could be a huge lift for the campaign.

Shabbat Shalom.

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Posted in Israel, Jewish Interest, My Obama Minute | 6 Comments »

Why I Remain, Forever Yours, Neurotic Dem

Friday, October 17th, 2008

On CNN tonight, David Gergen, the most even-handed, least hyperbolic of the punditocracy, noted that the daily tracking polls going in to the debate showed movement, finally, in McCain’s direction.

Oh — and then there’s this, from Talking Points Memo: “McCain Camp Unleashing National Robocall Blitz.” Here’s the nut:

Even as McCain said at the debate he regrets campaign negativity, his camp is releasing a nationwide blitz of robocalls attacking Obama on Ayers, national security, Hollywood, and the old infanticide smear, TPM Election Central reports.

Robocall: Obama Voted To Let Babies Die
Robocall: Obama And ‘Terrorist Bill Ayers’
Robocall: Dems Want Rights For Enemies
Robocall: ‘Hollywood Above America’

And people think this election is over?

The Obama campaign has called the Robocalls dishonorable. He needs to go beyond that. Obama has had the answer for every McCain-Palin gutterball this campaign. He can’t let this October Sleaze go un-countered.

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Posted in McCain, Media, Obama | No Comments »

Dad: ‘Obama Looked Just Like a President Should’

Thursday, October 16th, 2008

My Dad’s a Reagan Democrat — more Democrat, than Reagan, but still. That’s why I often look to him, at crucial political moments, to gauge how something might be playing outside my own head.

Dad, I said this morning. What’d you think of the debate?

“McCain was squirming all over the place,” he said.

I pressed him on it. What do you mean by squirming?

“With that little half-smile he has 90 percent of the time — like he has disdain for his opponent.”

What about Obama? How’d he do?

“I think Obama handled himself very well — McCain looked like a tired old man,” Dad said. “Obama looked just like a president should: Cool, calm, with all the facts.”

Dad keeps going back to this — that Obama seems presidential.

McCain got in some zingers last night (“You didn’t tell the truth to the American people,” “I am not President Bush,” “Why would you want to increase anyone’s taxes right now?”). Especially for the first third of the debate, McCain had Obama firmly on the defensive. Obama wasn’t so much flat as he was muted and unfocused in his response.

I was disappointed, frankly, that Obama didn’t punch back harder, as he’s done in past debates. As my Uncle Jon pointed out, when McCain accused him of playing class warfare by “spreading around the wealth,” Obama could have hit back with: “Republicans have been playing class warfare at the expense of the middle class for decades.” When the moderator asked Obama if he felt Palin was qualified, Obama could have just answered, flatly: “No.” (Also Jon’s idea.) I understand that Obama wanted to seem above the fray, but the moderator asked him a direct question, and he dodged it. And why did he let McCain get away with changing the subject from McCain’s bloodthirsty rallies, making it seem as if Obama was somehow criticizing Korean War vets? Why didn’t Obama demand that McCain repudiate those comments?

It makes me nervous. As any sports fan will tell you, when you play to run out the clock — when you stop trying to score — you always always always lose.

What my Dad is trying to tell me, I think, is that Obama did score — probably, in the way that matters most.

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Posted in McCain, Obama | 4 Comments »

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