BYUSA Election Part II

After last week's post about BYUSA, we've re-thought a few things. Sure, it's a popularity contest. There's no denying that the promises made by the candidates are ridiculous. And there is really no excuse for simple spelling errors and poor grammar. But maybe we were a little too hard on BYUSA and the candidates.

As we walked through the Wilkinson Center earlier this week, we narrowly avoided being accosted by some of the BYUSA candidates. Our brother, who walks the gauntlet every day, said that feigning an animated conversation with no one on his cell phone is the only thing that saves him. Rather than being annoyed, we were sympathetic.

BYUSA isn't a representative student organization. Unlike other universities, it is very distinctly, a "student service" organization. And in that sense, they are successful. If there's any representation going on, it's only to appear at devotionals and other student events. It's not as though they are making or even advising on University policy. Things have changed since Jody's grandfather served as BYU student body president.

And we suppose that much of this was born of necessity, or at least, expediency. The university is focused on service--enter to learn, go forth to serve--and would like to avoid the confrontational relationship that exists between students and student government organizations at other universities. None of this is to argue the point one way or the other.

Anti-establishmentarians and contrarians will obviously be and are up-in-arms about this relationship. But we guess we don't care all that much. When we had problems with the university, we've voiced those concerns on this blog and in letters to the editor of the Daily Universe. Even if the BYUSA President could do something to affect University policy, we doubt they would.

However, there is one role for leadership and student representation that the BYUSA President could fill--with the Provo parking kerfuffle. We first wrote about it here. A BYUSA President could represent student interests in negotiation with the Provo City Council. Part of the problem is that there is not a coherent student message. Lots of students have opinions, but there is no organization of thought or policy. The next BYUSA President could bring leadership and legitimacy to any future discussions with the Provo City Council.

***

Since we're following this election so you don't have to, we figured we'd post a few of the things we found about the election on the interweb. Enjoy.

Summer Price, current BYUSA Prez argues in favor of, well, voting in the BYUSA election.
Caitlin "hates" the BYUSA election.
Rie is disappointed he/she didn't get a free t-shirt for voting.
Justin Hileman wants to know what you think about the election.
Cory thinks BYUSA should do something to affect American domestic and foreign policy.
Commodore can't stand the apathy surrounding any election.
Alan doesn't care to help someone add to their grad school resume.
Aric Johnstone thinks BYUSA has an "important and misunderstood responsibility" at BYU.

And finally, the very latest on the election:

BYUSA Elections Draw one Step Closer (because they're down to two sets of candidates)

If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

HIllary Clinton, "Back From The Brink" OR "Step Away From The Ledge"

The political fairy granted us our two wishes last night: Huckabee dropped out and Hillary stayed in. Huzzah!

This guarantees a bitter fight between Barack and Hillary at least until the Pennsylvania primary on 22 April AND ensures that McCain will be able to fundraise without having to simultaneously worry about Obama's non-stop tv attack ads (not that there's anything wrong with attack ads, we love 'em).

We've been thinking a lot about the ideological similarities and superficial differences between the Democratic candidates. One friend of ours says it's because the Democratic party is unified. Okay, fair enough. But, if unified, they have also moved waaaaay left of where they were when they were successful in the '90's. Back then, free trade was Democratic orthodoxy.

Kind of makes us nostalgic.

Last week, Daniel Henninger explained this perfectly in his WSJ column, Wonder Land:

Hillary's politics is the world of Eleanor Roosevelt, when it was all being born anew. The Washington of LBJ's Great Society in the mid-1960s was alive with policy debates -- among Democrats. By now, the Democratic Party's ideas are largely generic. Everyone noticed that the Democratic presidential candidates were largely singing from the same script. Health care, public schools, green energy, the eternal shafting of the middle class, the unions, protecting Social Security and Medicare. This common script means that the Democratic primaries are largely an audition. The candidates are reading for a role. The lines are known.

With this general lack of difference (salute), Hillary and Barack have had to seize on things that strike us as really, really small differences. Hillary's success last night seems to have been sparked by two things: Barack's lack of experience and his inconsistency on trade.

You know, as opposed to her vast experience and "consistency" on Nafta. Still, her quote yesterday about experience--interestingly, both hers and John McCain's--was fantastic:

I think that I have a lifetime of experience that I will bring to the Whitehouse. I know Senator McCain has a lifetime of experience he will bring to the Whitehouse. And Senator Obama has a speech he gave in 2002.

Oooh, burn.

***

Be sure to check out the latest edition of BYU Political Review. This issue focuses on human trafficking and our friend, Zach Davis, has a particularly interesting article. Take a look, also, at "Obama: The Candy Man Can!" by Ryan Decker, econ major. Decker's blog is also worth a look.

*UPDATE 2:58pm MST: More from Decker (hat tip: Matt Lybbert) and this is really, really good stuff:

The most obvious disappointment Obama will bring will be failure to deliver national unity. Obama portrays himself as a post-partisan unifier. However, he is the most liberal senator in Congress. His record (what little record he has) is very liberal, and his policy promises (what few he has) are equally liberal. This is my main point. America is divided on Iraq, foreign policy, abortion, taxing and spending, healthcare, trade, and just about everything else. If Obama begins making these liberal policies, he will not unite America. America is divided on these issues because they are difficult—there are many different interests and value systems involved. We are divided because the issues are difficult, not because we lack a charismatic president. Obama will bring charisma to the White House, but he will not bring unity to America.

(bold in original, italics by Matt L.)


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Post #300: "Duty Calls"

Image Link (hat tip: Morgan Habedank, lost boy)


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

It's The E! TV, Stupid: A Couple Of Thoughts On Hillary & Barack

If Hillary plays true to form, we expect that she will fight on even if she loses Ohio and Texas. And this, we think, will reveal her true political motivation: power.

Contesting votes in Florida and Michigan and reportedly, Texas, could do irreparable damage to the Democratic party (cue schadenfreude). As they are pretty much ideological twins, her only motivation for fighting on would be ambition. To do so would make it more likely that John McCain beats the eventual Democratic nominee.

Here's to hoping Hillary keeps on keeping on(!)--till the Democratic convention.

***

We watched Hillary on last week's Saturday Night Live. At one point with both Hillary and Amy Poehler on screen together, Poehler started imitating Hillary's "signature" laugh and Hillary turned and said, "do I really laugh like that?"

(Click here to see the video: the moment to which we refer occurs at the 9:20 mark)

For a robotic candidate, whose tearful moments seem manufactured, this was by far the most human we have ever seen her.

***

It occurred to us last night that Barack Obama's appeal to Democratic voters makes more sense than we previously thought.

Yeah, we know, for our part, this is a pretty big admission.

To wit, for a party obsessed with it's Hollywood celebrity endorsements, of course they would vote for a rock star.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Independent Joe Lieberman: Still Awesome

It's been awhile since we wrote about Joe Lieberman--too long, in fact.

Last night as we were scanning the news channels, we happened across Sean Hannity's interview with OL&L favorite, Senator Joe Lieberman (I), Connecticut.

***

Hannity: The big question is, how are Democrats reacting to you supporting Senator McCain?

Lieberman: Well, not unexpectedly, generally they're not happy. one of the most noticeable, ridiculous things that has happened in response to my endorsement of John McCain is that the headquarters of the connecticut Democratic party in Hartford, they've taken my picture off the wall. That sounds a little bit like the Soviet Union, when a member of the Politburo didn't do well. Generally speaking, I think the people in Connecticut, who re-elected me, God bless 'em, know that I'm doing what I think is right for the country and that's more important than party loyalty. I feel good about it.

Hannity: It sounds a little like Alan Colmes. He took my picture down off his wall as well. You're in good company. Let me ask you: you were also a super-delegate and I understand that status has been stripped from you as well. Don't the Democrats realize that if they lose your support, that they potentially lose power?

Lieberman: Well, that's their call. You know, I wouldn't go to the Democratic National Convention this year as a super-delegate which I was entitled to do because obviously I'm not going to support the nominee of the Democratic convention. My appeal to Democrats has been to essentially come home, come back to the proud tradition of the Democratic party--Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy, Hubert Humphrey, Scoop Jackson--you can be progressive on domestic policy, but you better be strong and tough and principled on foreign policy. Until we do that, as Democrats, I don't know that the American people are going to trust a Democrat to run this country, to be the president.

Hannity: We've got this big primary, "Super Tuesday 2," taking place: those that think that Hillary is out of this, do you think that she has any chance to catch up here?

Lieberman: The momentum is clearly with Senator Obama and against Senator Clinton. At this moment he's touched by magic dust. I'd never count Hillary Clinton out. She's able. She's a tough fighter. But I'd say the momentum is going against here right now.

Hannity: I don't know if you've had this experience, I've never had anybody faint at a Sean Hannity speech. We have these instances we've been showing our audience on a fairly regular basis. What do you make of Barack Obama? What do you make of Obama-mania--the fact that people are reacting to him this way? It seems that people know very little about him. When I ask people if they know anything specific about him, they don't. What do you make of his popular support?

Lieberman: There's no question that he evokes a feeling of hopefulness and change. All of us feel good about the fact that in this country an African-American, for the first time, is a credible candidate for President. But after you go beyond the broad expressions of hopefulness and change, the programs and policies he's recommending are not programs of change. And if he's talking about change, it's in the wrong direction: to pull our troops out of Iraq, just when they're succeeding against the al-Qaeda enemy; to try to be a protectionist again. In fact, I think John McCain is going to emerge in this campaign as the real reformer. This is a guy who says what he believes, is restless for change. Look, some people don't like John McCain because he says what he believes. There's not a single group within the Democratic party that Barack Obama has taken on. I think as time goes on, the American public are going to ask themselves, "is this very gifted young man really ready to be the President we need at this time in our history?"

Hannity: I'm very concerned about his association with from the weather underground, William Ayers, a guy that admitted to bombing the Pentagon, police headquarters in New York,. His spokesman said that they have a friendly relationship, that he's gotten friendly contributions from. In light of this being your overriding issue and mine for this campaign, do you think that's going to be trouble for him as we move forward?

Lieberman: It may be. He's got to deal with those kinds of associations. Anybody in public life knows that anything about your life--public and maybe private--can become public in an instant. It's true that none of these radicals are running for President, Barack Obama is. But he's got to make clear to the voters why he has these associations and make clear that he doesn't share their point of view, because that's not the point of view that the overwhelming majority of Americans have.

Hannity: Senator, just to make it fair, the next time you give a speech, I'm going to make sure that there are people in the crowd who will faint.

Lieberman: God bless you.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Drudge, Patriotism, & Prince Harry

We suppose our biggest mistake was calling for consistency from a friend with thin skin. In the subpoint of our last post, we linked to a good post by Friend of Lybberty, Ben Treasure, about Drudge's outing of Prince Harry.

We didn't (and don't) really know about the circumstances surrounding the kerfuffle, so we deferred, and based on what we knew, agreed with Ben's take. It may surprise some of you to know that we don't have the time or knowledge to weigh in on every injustice in the world. Would that we could, can't so we won't. This is why we generally link to blog posts like Ben's with which we are sympathetic. Our only caveat in Ben's case was to ask for consistency: when the New York Times reveals intel about US troops and anti-terror actions (something they do frequently), we hope Ben will similarly condemn their actions as cowardly.

That said, we disagree with some of the sentiment reflected in the comments here, on Ben's blog, and in his blog's facebook mirror (subscription required).

Sidebar: we find it ironic that it is a liberal calling into question people's patriotism when liberals have always been the ones who complained about conservatives questioning their patriotism based on their war views. We guess they really do like having the shoe on the other foot. And further, we point out (and longtime readers will know this is true) we have never questioned someone's patriotism based on their Iraq War views. Examine our archives closely if you don't believe us: no scorched earth blogging here.

Back to our original point of contention. We agree with those who say that the disconnect between the all-volunteer military and the American public and government is a problem. The public and government don't know what it is like to be shot at while in the service of this country. Neither do we. We're grateful for and to those who serve. Many of them are our friends. We read daily about their struggles and successes in Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere. They are on our minds constantly.

We disagree with those who say that only those who can and do serve in the military can be said to support the war. This is incredibly flawed logic. It's the old "chickenhawk" trope. Taking this line of argument to its logical conclusion, neither the young, old, physically unable, female, etc., can support the war.

Some even extend this flawed logic to say that only those who pay more in taxes than they reap in government benefits can be in favor of winning the War on Terror or can be said to support it. Again, this excludes the young, old, disabled, poor (not even just poor, but anyone below middle class). Because they aren't net payers of tax, their opinion doesn't count, their view isn't valid.

Right.

The reason this line of argument has become so popular is because the people "peddling" it are unable to argue against the war (as it stands now) on its merits. They know, we know, everyone knows we have to stay and finish the job or condemn Iraqis to a fate worse than '80's-'90's Afghanistan. In fact, premature withdrawal would be more like a combination of Southeast Asia post Vietnam (over a million dead, tens of thousands imprisoned and "re-educated"), the aforementioned terrorist haven in Afghanistan (you know, where Obama wants to send the troops), plus a complete destabilization of the Middle East, nuclear Iran, and skyrocketing oil prices (more than they are now).

We can take the ad hominem calls of cowardice and un-patriotism because, for one, we're not thin skinned and, because we know better. More importantly, we understand the anti-war left's penchant for demonization and bombast is a product of their frustration with the corner into which they have painted themselves.

With Harry Reid, they looked forward to the electoral advantage to be gained from an American loss in Iraq and (unwittingly or otherwise) allied themselves ideologically with America's enemies.

This is why their ideological mover and shaker (moveon.org) called General Petraeus, General "Betray Us" (where was your condemnation then, Ben?). This is why one of their like, totally awesome candidates, Hillary Clinton, essentially called him a liar when he testified before the Senate, saying his report required a "willing suspension of disbelief."

And furthermore, this is why the largely liberal press has ignored the positive gains of the surge for the last six+ months. (incidentally, National Review and the Weekly Standard have never called our military leaders, liars; and they're still reporting the news from Iraq)

Bloggers, columnists, pundits, reporters and more--whether they fight the war or not--have an important role to play in helping to inform and form American public opinion with regards to Iraq, Afghanistan, terror, torture, etc., etc. Could they do a better job? Of course. This is why it's important for good bloggers like Ben to condemn irresponsible journalism--especially that which does damage to us or our troops.

Those who have "been there, done that" clearly have a greater degree of authority when they hold forth on a given topic. Just as the educated and informed generally add more to a discussion and debate in their area of expertise.

But that does not mean that everyone else should just shut up.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

BYUSA Elections

It's that time of year again. Time for the BYUSA student elections for President and Executive(?) Vice President. We've written about this annual train wreck before here and here. In microcosm, BYUSA's strict campaign rules are an example of what happens when speech is limited by rules no one understands.

Only, they can't blame John McCain.

The first BYUSA election we can remember was significant because one of the guys looked like Robert Downey Jr. When it's a show election for a show office, might as well have a face primed for showtime.

After that, we remember another BYUSA President who was the funny fat guy. Everybody loves that guy.

This year's election theme seems to be brother/sister teams. Check out the candidates and their platforms here:

• Steele & Amanda Kizerian (bro & sis)
• Paul Hoybjerg & Brooke Stevens
• Chayse Myers & McKell Myers
• Brandon Roman & Chad Johnson
• Adam Ruri & Chance Basinger

You'll be surprised not to see "hope" and "change" anywhere (at least that we could detect) on their websites. Even if they're not Democrats, you'd think they'd know a winning superficial campaign message when they see it. And copy it.

As it is, Steele and Amanda misspell "initiaition" [sic] and Paul and Brooke's flash slideshow resulted in this really weird transgender morphing action. Initiation? Come on, guys. And Paul, buddy, you're scaring the kids.

Alright, we're equal opportunity grammar/spelling police: McKell Myers was "Chairmen [sic] of the Teenage Republican Club for Comal County." Brandon Roman is an "extravert" and a political science major. Meanwhile, Adam Ruri was a "male vocalist in a band." (emphasis added) Yup. We sort through the inanities of this campaign so you don't have to.

Click here and here for the Daily Universe's usual hard-hitting journalism.

We have modest goals for this election: an election-decided winner. This would be a departure from the winner-by-default outcome of the last few years.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

William F. Buckley Jr., RIP

William F. Buckley Jr., father of modern conservatism and another of our heroes, passed away today. We cannot do justice to Mr. Buckley's personal history and accomplishments. Our personal experience with Mr. Buckley through the written word and ideas will have to suffice.

Our first encounter with Mr. Buckley was through one of his spy novels. We can't now remember the name of the book, but it was a gift from our dad. We remember thinking that the simple cloak and dagger of Mr. Buckley's books was more entertaining than the superficiality of 007.

We also remember watching or at least being in the room when our father was watching Mr. Buckley on Firing Line, his PBS political debate show. For a long time, he was the only conservative on TV.

We grew up in a largely conservative community, but most of our politically savvy friends and teachers were Democrats. Whether it was on a debate trip or in our senior government class, we were often the only person arguing the conservative side of the debate. Looking for good material, we remember coming across a series of articles by Mr. Buckley. He and they were smart, understandable, and conservative (not Republican).

As a freshman at BYU, one of the first books we bought at the bookstore fall sale was The Right Word, by William F. Buckley Jr. We didn't actually read the book until after returning home from a 2-year church mission, but this book taught us a love for the English language. From it we learned a love of words and crafting of coherent sentences (yes, we leave something to be desired).

This November, we will have been subscribed to William F. Buckley's magazine, National Review, for four years. Mr. Buckley's sections "Notes & Asides" and "On The Right" have always been our favorite reads. His intellectual and principled approach deeply affected our approach to politics.

Mr. Buckley formed the foundation of modern conservatism. It's a lot healthier now than it was when he got his start with God and Man at Yale over 50 years ago. We and other conservatives may not always agree with Mr. Buckley, but because of the intellectual heavy lifting he has done for the movement, we must all acknowledge and refer to his conservative political doctrine.

Our final memory of Mr. Buckley is of our shared love--Alta. We happened across an account of Mr. Buckley's annual visits to Alta, Utah for a week of skiing at the center of the skiing universe. We've had a season's pass at Alta for 5 years. We worked in Alta's Alf Engen ski school. For years Mr. Buckley would take his family to ski at Alta. He would often meet another of our political intellectual heroes, Milton Friedman at Alta for a few days of skiing and Alta conviviality (link: scroll to the bottom).

We wish we could have ridden a chairlift with those two. Tomorrow, when we head to Alta, we'll be sure to ski a run or two in memory of both those great men. We feel fortunate to have something in common with Mr. Buckley--we're both conservatives who love Alta.

*UPDATE 3:55pm MST: For a collection of all the best on WFB, check out The Corner at National Review Online.

**UPDATE 10:48pm MST: A further collection of NRO reader-responses to WFB's passing.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Prison Break Politics

We watched/listened to most of the Democratic debate tonight. In our opinion, Hillary showed better than most pundits seemed to think. We were particularly amused by her reference to the SNL sketch we linked to in our last post. No doubt she read about it first here at OL&L.

After the debate, we watched (re-watched, actually) a few episodes of Prison Break Season 2 with our dad and brother. It may seem funny to some of you, but while watching, it occurred to us why so many on the left are paranoid about FISA, Gitmo, the Patriot Act, etc. Prison Break is one of many shows in which the evil actor is [is: homer nods] some nebulous, nefarious organization called simply, "the company." This "company" tortures, listens in on phone calls, falsifies evidence, starts wars, buys elections, kills people (lots of 'em)--everything the paranoid left has ascribed to the Bush administration for the last 7+ years.

Somewhere along the way, people started to blur the lines between news and tv drama. Of course, Prison Break isn't the only show to blame. Each successive season of 24 comes up with another set of corrupt government/business people who are bent on destroying American civil liberties (at the least), world domination, and killing lots of people.

The more we think about it, the more we realize how common these themes have become. Somehow, this corrupt government/business meme has become incredibly popular. Even Heroes, (ah, Heroes) with its hope for a better day (the good doctors narration in these shows makes us want to bang our head against the wall, repeatedly) has bought into the tired sinister government/business take-over-the-world through the US meme.

We don't think the paranoid left or anyone else is stupid. We're sure that, if asked seriously, they would admit that these types of things happen only in Hollywood. But it's impossible to deny the subtle influence these shows have on our attitudes towards government and corporations.

Sure, it's only in TV and the movies, but what if? What if the government is killing off its opponents and listening in on every critical conversation about President Bush? What if Gitmo and the secret hidden bunker-prisons in Eastern Europe are full of, not terrorists, but liberal Democrats? What if?

This probably sounds all too familiar to all you 9/11 truthers out there.

The point of all this is to ask for a little bit of sanity when it comes to discussing our intelligence gathering and security issues. The government is not listening in on the conversations you have with your friend in Berkeley about how great that Keith Olbermann is or how much you hate Rush Limbaugh. The only conversations this legislation applies to are ones that originate and end in other countries. We personally think it's ridiculous that there should be any legislation about this type of intelligence gathering.

The only reason it has come under the courts purview is because like every phone call made in the world, it's routed through some US based servers. This does not make it domestic spying. Even then, their computers are looking for specific words from a hot list developed from their intel contacts. They're not listening to every overseas conversation where someone mentions the word "terrorist." Remember, terrorists don't refer to themselves as terrorists and when they talk to each other, they usually use a lot of code.

This is why we were so disappointed when House Democrats decided to go on vacation rather than passing the bill that had already been passed with a bipartisan majority in the Senate. Whether they were appeasing their trial lawyer-donors or appeasing the paranoid left or whatever, it was highly irresponsible. They were, in effect, playing politics with national security.

In Congressional elections this fall, Republican candidates can justly say that Democrats went on vacation rather than passing intelligence security legislation designed to let us listen to terrorists' conversations. In England or France or Germany, they would laugh that this is even an issue--that somehow there would be limitations on listening to overseas communications.

And they're right, it is ridiculous.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Obama's Somali Dress: Harbinger Of Things To Come?

Mirroring, in physical terms, the political battle being waged between Hillary and Barack, two brother's in law fought, with the Clinton supporter eventually stabbing the Barack supporter in the stomach. At least it wasn't in the back, right?

(hat tip: dmz)

Clinton(ite) Stabs (Obama Supporter)

Yeah, dems, we're SO jealous of your two awesome, awesome candidates.

[schadenfreude alert]

After 16 or so years of seeing the Clinton attack machine bully conservatives (to the shameful delight of their party), we suppose we feel the same way about Hillary's attacks on Barack as we do when we hear of a terrorist accidentally blowing himself up with his own bomb.

Isn't it great to see one of the Clintons complain about media bias? Incidentally, the Clinton team is right, the press is unabashedly backing their candidate, Barack. Just like they would do if it were Hillary vs. McCain in the general election (salute).

If you haven't seen it already, check out the SNL sketch parodying the media love for Obama. Good stuff.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

The Difference Between "Appealing To" and "Becoming"

Our recent Obama posts have incited a lot of defensive comments. We've been called alternately unprincipled (new one), hypocritical (not new), full of crap (overused), an idiot (ditto), and intellectually dishonest (uncommon, but not new).

The following are the most common complaints:

1. your religion was once, or is now, considered a cult so you shouldn't call Obama's followers a cult.

OR

2. Bush, Reagan and others used religious rhetoric or appealed to the religiosity of their party, so what Obama is doing is nothing new.

OR

3. Obama is not using, appealing to, or becoming anything remotely religious.

***

3. We'll start with the last one first because it is the easiest. Obamamessiah.blogspot.com has done an incredible job of drawing out the pseudo-religious elements of the Obama campaign from all available press reports. You can't read the too-numerous-to-count articles and not see it.

For dems who already have religion, Obama simply appeals to their religiosity. We don't have a problem with this. As Justin and Ben pointed out, this is no different than what Republicans have done with the religious right for years.

Where things get a little sketchy is when Obama veers into becoming the religion. Democrats tend to be less religious than Republicans. But this does not mean that these people don't seek something to fill that gap. For many Democrats, that gap is filled by politics. This explains, in part, how personally the DailyKos kids and Huffington Post crowd take their politics. It explains why they tend to be more fixated on the candidate than they are on the candidate's policies and politics. For them, Obama doesn't just appeal to religious rhetoric in the way that Reagan or Bush or even Huckabee did and do, he has become the leader of their religion.

Hope and change are their foundational religious principles. Adherence to the gospel of environmentalism, nanny-state entitlements and regulations, civil liberties, anti-Iraq, etc., are the required bylaws. And Obama is the charismatic leader. People faint when he speaks, try to touch him when he passes by, and shout "I love you" when there's silence (this is just a small sampling). Obama is Martin Luther King Jr., JFK, Nelson Mandela, and FDR all rolled into one. If not a messiah, at least a political messiah--a messiah for the rest of us, if you will.

***

2. Can we help it if Democrats are more susceptible to cults of personality? Ben and Justin and MJ derided Republicans for how little love we have for our candidate. We think this is a good thing. We're only interested in a politician to the extent that their politics match ours. We didn't love GW in 2000 and we didn't love Reagan until long after the end of his presidency. Democrats loved FDR, JFK, Bill Clinton, and now, Barack Obama. They love to love their leaders. We don't.

Since the rise of the religious right in conservative politics, Republican candidates have used rhetoric and adopted policies to appeal to these voters for their support and votes. Liberals have accused Republicans for years of trying to set up some sort of theocracy. Whatever. Values voters may have wanted to stop abortion and gay marriage, but they never wanted to run the government.

Enter Obama. Irreligious or anti-religious democrats have replaced religion with secularism. It may not have an omnipotent/omniscient being in charge, but like any other religion, it has its tenets (mentioned above, environmentalism, etc.), language (political correct speech), and now it has its charismatic leader. The left has always worshipped at the fountain of youth, so Barack is the perfect blank canvass. Barack isn't all-knowing, but progressive liberalism certainly knows better.

Barack Obama has become the charismatic leader of his pseudo religion. Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush appealed to conservatives' already held religious beliefs. Even Mike Huckabee only set himself up as a religious leader, never The Religious Leader.

***

1. Disparagers of Mormon history and Joseph Smith can rightfully call the early movement part cult of personality--right, not because they are correct, but because they have the right to be wrong.

Whatever anyone thinks of the LDS religion then or now (cult or otherwise), the fact that we or anyone else happen to be members of or affiliated to some organization that others might consider a cult does not take away our right to identify elements of personality cults in other movements.

We aren't voting for the LDS church to take over the leadership of the United States. Mitt Romney didn't set himself up as the leader of a religious-like movement. He was satisfied to run for President.

***

Questions remain about the pseudo religious nature of Obama's movement. What we don't know is the extent to which Obama has invited the following seen everyday and documented by obamamessiah.com. Is he the instigator or simply a willing participant? Some of the rhetoric and the fainting routine seem to indicate the former.

Obviously, this phenomenon that has sprung up around Obama is not the sum of the man. We freely admit that he is intelligent, articulate, and an inspiring speaker. We won't use the hyperbole of Spikers in yesterday's comments, mostly because it is still way early in the game. We believe that once Obama's policies are fleshed out (as, eventually they will be), he will prove to be an old style liberal cloaked in the attractive apparel of a charismatic. There's nothing wrong with that if you like charismatic, old school liberals. Think, Jimmy Carter with personality.

If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

"Will NCMO For Utah vs. BYU Ticket"

From the, "you can't make this up" file, there's this:

Will NCMO for Utah-BYU ticket on February 20th

---

Reply to: serv-573073774@craigslist.org
Date: 2008-02-13, 2:10PM MST


I would be willing to donate a full day of my "services" for anyone that would like to give me a ticket to the Utah/BYU basketball game. I am willing to go as far as giving a little NCMO, holding hands, meeting your roommates and showing off so you look cool. All I ask in return is a ticket to this game.

Female 18-30 with upstanding oral health is required.

Serious inquiries only!

• Location: Provo/Orem
• it's NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests

PostingID: 573073774

---

Copyright © 2008 craigslist, inc. terms of use privacy policy feedback forum

It gets better. The Craigslisting was successful and the Cougarboard contributor posted a narrative of the evening's events under the title, "How I got my Utah-BYU Ticket." With details like this...:

We decided to go back to her place and watch a movie. Her roommates rented "Stardust" earlier in the week, and she had been too busy to watch it, so we decided to put it in. Things seemed fine and relaxed at first, but then she started to scoot closer to me and stroke my arm. I was enjoying it, so I ran my fingers through her hair and playfully tickled her.

...we don't even care if the story is true or not.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

"Name Barack Obama's Legislative Accomplishments"

BYU Political Review: More Econ, Less Poly Sci

Just finished reviewing the latest copy of the BYU Political Review. We'll give them this: they're miles ahead of the opinion writing in the Daily Universe. But all articles are not created equal. And for some reason, some political science majors misuse big words, presumably to make themselves sound smart.

Anywho, we general-ly (salute) find ourselves agreeing more with the articles written by econ majors than we do poly sci majors.

(Full disclosure: we were once a poly sci major. Whew. Feels good to get that one off the chest.)

Click the links to see what we mean.

Good (in our opinion):

• Critiquing Society by Ryan Fairchild
• Stupor Tuesday by Tim Taylor
• Mitt Can't Blame The Ref by Ryan Decker
• Why Romney Lost by Zach Davis

Bad (as above):

• Why You Will End Up Voting For Obama by Craig Janis
• Why I'm Voting For McCain by Austin Baird
• So What If Democrats Like McCain? by Robert Liddle
• An Open Letter To The President Of Banana Republic by Tristan Call

Among the ones we liked, there are many points and even entire articles with which we did not agree. But we liked them. Because they were logical and made sense. And didn't try to use or misuse too many big words to make themselves sound smart (cue someone's critique of us for using schadenfreude). Additionally, one of the ones we didn't like was written by one of our friends. Just because he's our buddy doesn't mean he gets a pass.

Our liberal friends will be happy to note that many of these articles embrace, at the very least, a liberal foreign policy agenda. And though we've mentioned it before, it merits bringing up again in this post: BYU professors politics by-and-large match the politics of their peers at other universities. That is to say, they tend to be Democrats.

Of the 39 or so professors in our major (history), two were registered as Republicans. An informal poll of the poly sci department showed some 80-90% were dems. Economics is probably more conservative/libertarian. Business school is no doubt conservativeish. But if they're in an arts, humanities, social science department(engineering probably leans conservative as well), they're more likely to be left-leaning. We're sure they do their best to be fair. But it's hard not to let your bias infiltrate your teaching. As anyone knows, it's the biases we're not aware of that are often most damaging.

All of this is by the by. Back to BYU PR. The article that annoyed us the most was the protectionist, "open letter to the president of Banana Republic." The condescension of this little article probably matches the condescending tone we use when critiquing other writers' word usage and grammar. Seriously. Take for example, this line:

I am unconvinced by your rationale for not publishing a list of the factories that Gap contracts with. The reasoning, from your online FAQ, was that: “We invest a lot of time, effort and money in identifying factories that meet our product-quality and vendor-compliance standards…We believe it would be unwise to provide a complete list of approved factories for our competitors to use.” Without question, I believe that protection and accountability for labor standards is worth the cost and the competition. I do not accept that obscuring specific and detailed information on particular contracts and factories is necessary for Gap’s financial survival.

How, exactly, does Tristan expect Gap to gain a competitive advantage over their rivals if they disclose all of this information? Tristan's lecturing tone belies a total ignorance of economics and business. When confronted by a so-called sweat shop, the only question he should ask is, "can they quit if they want?" That's it. Because if they can, and they don't, it's because their sweat shop job is better than the alternative. And who is he to tell them otherwise? It's that kind of sanctimonious, condescending, know-it-all-ism, that really chaps our asterisk.

His last graph centers on the "excesses" of executive pay. Again, Tristan, it's basic economics. Low level workers get paid like low level workers because they are easily replaced. Top level execs get paid gazillions of dollars because they are not easily replaced. And they do the things that keep Gap in business and employ all the people at those 2000 factories you mentioned. If they weren't doing their jobs or weren't worth the money, they would get fired.

Congratulations, Tristan. You bought the talking points of the protectionists--especially labor unions. They don't care about the environment in Brazil or Chinese working conditions. They just care about their jobs. The truth is, who are we to tell Brazil what to do with their rain forest? Or to tell the Chinese workers that they shouldn't work 15 hour days for 25 cents? Obviously they chose that job because it was better than the alternative.

We'd like to go on and pound on all the fair traders, but it's late, and mom says it's time for us to get off the soap box.

Justin, Spikers, can we agree on free trade?


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

How Does It Feel To Have A "Kool" Candidate?

Cartoon link

*UPDATE 1:57pm MST: Schadenfreude Watch: Remember our post last week about the coming Clinton-Obama storm? Drudge has a taste of things to come: War Over Words: Clinton Team Accuses Obama of 'Plagiarism''

**UPDATE 2:45pm MST: Like us, Mark Steyn doesn't like Che Guevara. Jeff Jacoby doesn't either. You Say You Want A Revolution by Mark Steyn (worth reading in its entirety):

Do Obama’s volunteers even know who Che is? Apart from being a really cool guy on posters and T-shirts, like James Dean or Bart Simpson, I doubt it. They’re pseudo-revolutionaries. Very few people in America want a real revolution: Life is great, this is a terrific country, with unparalleled economic opportunities. To be sure, it’s a tougher break if you have the misfortune to be the victim of one of Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society programs or a decrepit inner-city grade school with a higher per-student budget than the wealthiest parts of Switzerland. But even so, to be born a U.S. citizen is, as Cecil Rhodes once said of England, to win first prize in the lottery of life. Not even Obama supporters want real revolution: They’re messy, your cities get torched, the economy collapses, much of your talent flees. Ask the many peoples around the world for whom revolution means not a lame-o Sixties poster above your desk but the carnage and horror of the day before yesterday.

Ah, but revolutionaries are so romantic.

***UPDATE 4:14pm MST: Michael Barone on the electoral implications of upcoming Democratic primaries and caucuses. Interesting stuff, this:

The Democrats, in contrast, have been split on demographic lines, between blacks and Latinos, old and young, upscale and downscale. The delegate selection rules, based on their notion of fairness, are heading the party not to a clear outcome but to a conflict in which the losing side is likely to feel profoundly aggrieved.

Where/how will it end? Regarding Michigan and Florida, should the rules change now the vote is done? Voters in those states knew the election rules--they'd been well-publicized. Wouldn't it have changed the outcome if they knew their votes would count (remember, Obama's name wasn't even on the ballot in Michigan)? It isn't as cut and dry (Spikers) as simple disenfranchisement of the Michigan and Florida voters (count 'em!); there's a lot more to it. Do you want the courts to resolve this?

****UPDATE 5:14pm MST: This blog--obamamessiah.blogspot.com--does a better job of tracking the religious nature of Obama's campaign than we do.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Lincoln & Washington

We celebrate these President's birthdays today because it's the Monday that falls roughly in the middle of their birthdates. That's why we celebrate it today, but it's not why we celebrate these men.

We celebrate and honor them because they were the leaders of this country when America faced its greatest existential threats: Revolutionary America the the Civil War.

Both of them were great wartime leaders. Washington led when no one else could or would. Against overwhelming odds, he won a war against a far superior force. When it was over, rather than seizing power or leading his men in a coup, he peacefully resigned his post. Later, when America needed his influence to construct the Constitution, he was there. He was our first President and set many important precedents still followed today. He could have made himself President for life, but he declined to run again after his 2nd term.

Abraham Lincoln was President during the Civil War. In fact, it was his election to the Presidency that prompted the southern states to make their break. Before and after pictures of President Lincoln (before and after the Civil War) show the great strain this conflict put on him.

Lincoln was not popular during the Civil War. After the war and even after his death, he was not popular anywhere in the South. But it was his duty to match the ideals of the Declaration of Independence with the reality of mid 19th Century America. He called the Civil War an American transformation, a second birth, an opportunity to realize the promise of 1776.

The Civil War cost America more in terms of blood and treasure and national trauma than all other American conflicts combined. We're still dealing with the aftermath.

Neither of these men were perfect--either in their personal lives or in their leadership of this country. But their missteps and mistakes pale in comparison to their accomplishments. We can thank them, more than any other two individuals, for the liberties, freedoms, and prosperity we enjoy today.

Happy Presidents' Day.

*UPDATE: Fantastic article about Washington's history of service.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Barack Obama: He Hasn't Cried (Yet)...

...but boy, does he make the women swoon.

From Breitbart, Best of the Web, and Radio Vice Online.

• Montecito, Calif., Sept. 8, 2007. "A woman standing in front of the stage appeared to faint as Obama spoke about Iraq," the Associated Press reported. "The candidate paused and asked the crowd to make way for firefighters. One supporter shouted, 'You're a good man,' leaving Obama momentarily at a loss for words. 'Well, I'm not the only one stopping to help her,' he said, sounding almost embarrassed."

• Madison, Wis., Oct. 22, 2007. "This excitement mirrored the aura in the room that grew throughout his speech," reported WISN-TV. "Before the senator arrived, students were tossing around an inflatable cow above the crowd. Three people fainted in the midst of all the enthusiasm."

• Hanover, N.H., Jan. 8, 2008. "Barack Obama's first and only rally on election day came to a sudden and lengthy stop when a young woman in the Dartmouth College gym fainted, and was eventually rolled off on a gurney by emergency medical technicians," the Los Angeles Times reported. "At first Obama half-narrated the episode, saying soothing things like, 'She's OK,' 'She's talking.' But the longer she lay on the floor, the quieter Obama got, standing on the podium, arms folded, looking worried as the medical crew worked." Minneapolis's WCCO-TV has video showing Obama handing a bottle of water to the Dartmouth damsel in distress.

• Hartford, Conn., Feb. 4, 2008. "And when a woman appeared to faint in the standing-only VIP section in front of the podium, Obama paused his speech for over a minute as he directed the crowd to make way for an EMT team and tossed a bottle of water from the stage," reported the Yale Daily News.

• Seattle, Feb. 8, 2008. "Climate change, the Iraq war and Obama tossing a bottle of water to a woman about to faint all received big cheers," MSNBC.com reported. "As Obama told the crowd to part so that the woman in question could leave and called for help, a young girl in the crowd shouted out, 'What a man!' The audience roared with laughter (although the press that has seen this happen before rolled its eyes)."

There are no policy differences between Hillary and Barack. The only differences, for the party of diversity, are superficial. She is a white woman and he is a black man. Yay, diversity. Of course, he is able to inspire with his message of hope(!) and change(!) and the closest she comes to eliciting an emotional response (besides revulsion) is her fortnightly crying sessions.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Weekend Update

With just over 36 days until the start of the official On Life and Lybberty Fantasy Baseball League, there's not much time for you to join. If you love statistics, baseball, or just plain old competition, join up! The rosters are set small and only require once-a-week maintenance.

Fox Sports Fantasy Baseball

League ID: 32043
League Password: lybberty

Join and tell your friends.

***

Your weekend reading assignment:

- The Democrats are playing politics with our national security. Here's the nuts and bolts about what this means for our intelligence: When the Clock Strikes Midnight, We Will Be Significantly Less Safe.

- Know how many terrorists have actually been waterboarded since 9/11? Three. That's it, just three. And each one gave us valuable intelligence. If Democrats were serious about stopping waterboarding, they would have made it illegal. But they didn't. Know why? Because they didn't want to be blamed if we missed getting key intel by using waterboarding--a very effective interrogation technique. Read Jonah Goldberg's Five Minutes Well Spent.

- The Senate passed the Protect America Act, but for some reason (moveon.org) Nancy Pelosi refused to even permit a vote in the House (it would have passed with a large bipartisan majority). But this shouldn't surprise anyone. Read Dems' Dangerous FISA Game.

- We've had our issues with John McCain--McCain/Feingold, McCain/Lieberman, McCain/Kennedy, class warfare rhetoric opposing Bush tax cuts, Gitmo, etc.--and these things haven't gone away. But we are pragmatic about our politics and we recognize that the alternative to McCain is much, much worse. We were already resigned to this mindset. But after reading Larry Kudlow's The Case For McCain we're fired up about a McCain presidency.

*UPDATE 3:01am MST: Our friend, Benjamin Treasure, penned a fantastic piece about the ridiculous protest going on down at Berkeley. The California Patriot has also blogged about it regularly. Like Ben, we support the Semper Fi Act. And you should too.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Michigan & Florida - Count 'em!

This is what happens when "trial lawyers" are your most important donor group.
(what also happens is you play politics with basic national security and don't renew FISA, Ms. Pelosi)

With Hillary falling in the polls, a delegate comeback looking increasingly unlikely, and Putin bashing your candidacy (restoring America's reputation, one tyrant at a time!), it appears as though the Clinton machine might have to resort to the nuclear option.

You might remember this option for its use during the 2000 and 2004 Presidential election. Remember those? In 2000 Gore and his team of lawyers demanded a recount in violation of Florida election rules (incidentally, the recount showed Bush won) while arguing against a recount in any of the close states Gore won.

In 2004, Democrats hoped to replay 2000 (with a different outcome, obviously) in Ohio. Kerry ended up losing by over 100,000 votes.

Now, with the New England Patriots of candidates, the inevitable, unbeatable, wife-of-Bill, on the ropes, it looks like she just might sick the dogs on her own party.

And we can't help but enjoy a bit of schadenfreude. Ah, schadenfreude. (and dramatic irony)

Michigan and Florida violated Democratic party rules by moving their primaries up. The DNC de-certified their elections and the candidates agreed not to campaign in either place--Edwards and Obama didn't even have their names on the ballot. Well, now we're hearing the same rhetoric we did in 2000 and 2004--"everyone's vote should count!"

Eventually, the Clinton's are going to want this one to be played out in court and Obama will be put in the uncomfortable position of having to argue in favor of election rules and against allowing "everyone's vote [to] count(!)."

And if you don't think that will tear up the Democratic party, well, you haven't paid any attention to the Clinton's scorched earth tactics. Hillary, whatever else anyone says about her, is a win-at-all-costs type of candidate--even against someone in her own party. You wont see any of the grace we've seen from Republican candidates. Nope, and it's going to be fantastic.

In case anyone wondered what might happen if Clinton did become president, you need look no further than the state of her campaign team. People are quitting. They're attacking each other. They're playing the blame game. Her campaign is in complete disarray. Where is Hillary, the voice of calm and reason?

No doubt our friends in the hope/change camp (aka Obama backers) are happy the way things have turned out. But what will you do if Hillary tries to steal the election in the courts? Meanwhile, our Democratic establishment friends (aka Clinton/'90's nostalgists) can't be pleased.

In any event, both groups better hope this thing gets settled quickly. And with less mess than appears will be the case. Else a Democrat in the White House will be a lot less inevitable than everyone thought.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Interview With Brian Jones, Former RNC Director Of Communications - Part 3

Part 3, the conclusion to our interview with Brian Jones.

***

OL&L: There are some among our conservative friends who, as much as they despise the Clintons, and don’t want them back in the White House, if there must be a Democratic President, they actually prefer Hillary to Barack because they know she’ll do what’s popular, what’s safe, and wont veer hard to the left.

Brian Jones: I think there’s a pragmatism to Hillary Clinton that’s hard to get away from. Hillary is someone to took a poll about where she should live in New York when she ran for the Senate. She’s driven by ambition and calculation. There’s a belief among some that that ambition will keep her kind of on the straight and narrow. She won’t go too far off the deep end. Whether that’s true or not, I’m not sure. It makes sense to me that that’s how she operates, and that’s how she’ll continue to operate. It’s how her husband operated and why you had him talking about things like seat belts and school uniforms and never really doing anything big in his presidency.

Obama is much more of an unknown. Sometimes it seems like he’s coming at Hillary from the right, but then you look at his voting record and find that he is a dyed-in-the-wool liberal.

I do believe there is something to this notion that she would be more of a centrist candidate. And maybe that helps her in the general election.

OL&L: One of our friends, a self-described Libertarian, said that he will vote for Obama because he views him as a symbol of hope and he believes his rhetoric about change. But the thing that struck us about his support for Obama, and we wonder if this is common among Obama supporters, is that despite what Obama is saying to appeal to the base, he believes Obama is smart enough that once he gets in office, he’ll make the good decision, that he won't be ultra liberal. Do you believe that to be true?

Brian Jones: There’s no doubt he’s a very intelligent person. And it’s the game that every politician plays in the primary—some better than others. They start off appealing to the base and then try to broaden their appeal in the general election. They search for ways to appeal to more people—whether that’s through compassionate conservatism or whatever. Ronald Reagan was able to successfully appeal to a group now referred to as Reagan Democrats,

In the case of Obama, I’m not sure you can say which way he’ll go. For anyone who goes through the process, is ambitious enough to seek the Presidency and reach the level Barack Obama is at right now, there have to be elements that, for lack of a better word, are commonsensical. In an Obama Presidency you’re going to see higher taxes. You’re going to see a larger federal bureaucracy. You’re going to wind up seeing more government spending. Remember, Bill Clinton came into office and within a year passed the largest tax increase in the history of the country. You’re going to see policies that aren’t going to get many centrists and Republicans excited.

OL&L: With Democrat turnout and campaign donations at current levels, you don’t see a Democrat in the White House as an inevitability, do you?

Brian Jones: Now way. I don’t see it at all. Elections are about choices. Right now you see a lot of energy for the Democrats. But at the same time, we haven’t reached the point where you’ve got one candidate vs. another candidate where you can really begin to engage on the issues. In the last months or so, as the campaign has become front and center for people, the generic ballot, which tracks whether someone would vote for a Democrat or Republican for Congress, the Democrats, who had a double digit lead for a number of months, have seen their lead shrink to 4 or 5 points. I think that, as soon as we get to focus on the issues, realize what’s at stake, and have a candidate who’s the manifestation of that, it will wind up changing. This notion that the Democrats have it in the bag is a complete misnomer. You could have talked to many Democrats in February 2004who would have said that there was no way George Bush was going to get reelected. And this year we’re going to have a new face, and I think there’s a very good chance Republicans could wind up keeping the White house.

OL&L: Fantastic. Thank you very much for your time, Mr. Jones.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Is He Sure It Wasn't A Warm Sensation Going Down His Leg?

(because he needs Depend Adult Incontinence Products. after all, he was a speech writer for Jimmy Carter and that was like a bajillion years ago)

Chris Matthews:

It's part of reporting this case, this election, the feeling most people get when they hear Barack Obama's speech. My, I felt this thrill going up my leg. I mean, I don't have that too often. [emphasis added]

If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Barack Obama's Cult Of Personality

Image Link

Love this cartoon.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Interview With Brian Jones, Former RNC Director Of Communications - Part 2

Here's part two of our three part conversation with Brian Jones, former RNC Communications Director and John McCain for President Communications Director.

***

OL&L: Our concern, and maybe the concern of other conservative voters is that when it comes to the general election, and there are more than just ardent Republicans and Democrats voting, do you think that “like-ability” will have a better or broader appeal? How will the Republican candidate combat that superficial appeal?

Brian Jones: Hillary’s appeal may be superficial and image based, but let’s face it, she’s not a like-able candidate. Even Democrats I talk to—and I think most Democrats would agree—say she’s not as like-able as Obama.

The challenge for Obama, if he gets the nomination, is how does he maintain this rockstar-like status? How does he maintain that aura for eight, nine, ten months? It just seems that in today’s media environment, we’ve seen what can happen with other candidates. It doesn’t take long to be this inevitable, floating-above-everything candidate, like Rudy Giuliani. Then, the next thing you know, you’re on the outside looking in.

One thing McCain does have is that like-ability factor, a certain honesty, a genuineness that people appreciate. Sometimes it works against him. Sometimes that genuineness strikes people as a little too much candor or even anger. I think it’s just genuineness, honesty, candor. And I think most people connect with him on that level. They might not always agree with him, but they know he’s always going to give it to them straight.

OL&L: So you see him as being able to rival the like-ability of Barack Obama?

Brian Jones: You see it with members of the press and I think you see it with voters too. He may not be able to match Obama’s like-ability, but that will be offset by other facets of McCain’s personality. In McCain you have someone with impeccable foreign policy credentials. Granted, the economy has taken center stage, but there’s news out of Iraq today that al-Qaeda is training children to shoot weapons and be suicide bombers. This problem is not going to go away. For people who are fed up with government spending, McCain has a long record of fighting government waste.

If it’s Barack versus McCain, Obama may be the more like-able candidate, but that’s not going to take him all the way. And McCain’s straight talking will help offset that.

OL&L: As you mentioned before, McCain has the next 10 months to point out that there’s more to being President than just being well liked—we aren’t voting for the junior class president.

Brian Jones: McCain can sometimes be a little streaky as a politician, but he is a great story teller. I saw it when I traveled with him. He has this ability to really get people wrapped up in what he is saying. I don’t think it has come out in this campaign yet. I remember one instance, when we were riding on the bus all day long and he was telling stories about the ’96 Dole campaign and other campaigns. There were staffers and reporters and a couple of local supporters on the bus for the last stretch. We got to the hotel and no one had realized the bus had stopped because they were so in to the stories he was telling. The bus driver had to come back and say, “hey, we’re at the hotel now.”

He’s got that ability to connect with people in a way that other politicians don’t. That hasn’t received as much attention because of the media infatuation with Obama. Huckabee is also a great communicator. But McCain clearly has strengths there, too.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

David McCullough & ConSource

ConSource is a good and worthy effort to digitize relevant primary source documents related to the Constitution and make them available to everyone.

We received the following information via email and pass it along to you, dear reader.

***

Join us today for:

George Washington: From Commander in Chief to Chief Executive

Taught by:

David McCullough
Pulitzer Prize-Winning Author

Webcast at www.ConSource.org
Wednesday, February 13th
2:00-3:00 p.m. EDT

All students are invited to learn and ask questions about George Washington first-hand by participating in this online President's Day celebration.

For more information, please visit www.ConSource.org.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

American Historical Perspective (formerly, Responding To Your Comments)

We felt left out of the good dialogue erupting in the comments section here at OL&L. Frankly, we can't keep up with everything everyone writes, but we did want to respond to a couple of things.

Side note: glad to see our three "contrarians" ringing in, as usual, in a contrary way (MJM, JW, BT--thanks). Lest anyone think otherwise, we appreciate what they add to the discussion here. They keep us honest and keep us from devolving into an echo chamber--you know, like the DailyKos and Huffington Post folks.

Justin, we didn't give up on Bush. Why, just a couple of weeks ago we wrote this: State of the Union (this is what happens when you don't check OL&L every day). To summarize: on balance, we think he's done more good than bad.

Regarding this loss of purpose and American division about which you speak, we ask you this: did you only become politically aware during the Bush presidency? Do you truly believe this nation was united until GWB was elected President? Do you really think the world loved us until he was elected President (subquestion: do you seriously care what the world thinks of us?)? (maybe we should have said until we went to war in Iraq)

(Segue into addressing the entire readership)

People who think that things are horrible now, that the US sucks right now, that world opinion of the US is at an all-time low, etc., etc., do not have a sufficient knowledge of American history. They forget or never knew how bad things were during WWI, the Great Depression, WWII (it wasn't always as popular as it is now), the 1960's (1968 in particular), Vietnam, the stagflation of the 1970's, Nixon, Carter, the Cold War.... we could go on.

In our opinion, these people are engaging in too much national narcissism and navel gazing.

If you think America has reached rock bottom, wake up and familiarize yourself with American history. Or, we don't know, maybe compare our history to pretty much any other country in the world. The point is, you need a little (just a little) perspective.

On balance, things have never been better than they are right now. We have our warts, But more countries are freer, more countries abide by the rule of law, more people live longer, more people are healthier, more people have more money, more people are educated--than at any time in the history of the world. Sure, bad things still happen. Duh. But don't buy into the doom-and-gloom of, well, anyone.

If you start from that premise, you will vote for a candidate who, we fear, does little more than inspire and persuade--one whose idealism (like yours) will get knocked in the head by reality. Republicans have never "been in love" with our candidates (including Reagan, well, at least not until he was dead) the way liberal progressives are. Maybe it's because we're not as idealistic and more realistic than Democrats. We don't know.

We focus more on their experience, the substance of their principles, and their voting record, because these things are tangible. We can look and see how candidate X voted and examine his record. We can analyze candidate Y's policy proposals and see how they match our priorities. We can review candidate Z's management of a state or other entity and see whether or not he was successful. All of this we do because we care less about their personality, less about their eloquence, less about their charisma than Democrats seem to. This is why insults about Bush's poor communication skills never bothered us. We don't take insults to our favored candidates personally. Democrats poked fun because it bothers them if their candidates can't speak well. Congrats, Democrats. In Barack Obama, you've got your good speakin' man.

And yes, we know a President won't be able to follow through on all his campaign promises and proposals. And we know that many of the things he says are only meant to curry favor with this or that special interest group. We don't care. Seriously, we could not care less. We know this is the game he has to play to get elected. Part of it (in the case of McCain/Feingold) is our candidates own fault. But by looking at what he has done and comparing that to what he says, we make the best guess we possibly can about the candidate's core principles. Hopefully they match ours.

At least, this way we don't get bitter and jaded when they don't live up to our unrealistic expectations.

We repeat: nostalgic notions of how America was supposed to have been are inaccurate. And no candidate, however inspiring, will ever unify and make a utopia out of America.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Premature IED

From the, "you can't make this stuff up" file, a Mullah, prepping a bomb (presumably for coalition forces) blew up himself and his sons:

A LANDMINE blew up in the home of a religious cleric in southern Afghanistan, killing the mullah, two of his sons and two other men who had been preparing an attack, police said today.

Ace of Spades notes:

Coalition forces have reported "a significant uptick in dramatic irony" in the Helmand province lately, and called this latest incident "as worrisome as it is hilarious."

Apparently our efforts to infiltrate terrorist training centers in Afghanistan/Pakistan and teach "how (not) to build a bitchin' IED" are finally bearing fruit. Here's to hoping for a few more premature IED's.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Interview With Brian Jones, Former RNC Director Of Communications - Part 1

Last week we conducted an interview with Brian Jones, Managing Director at Mercury Public Affairs. Thanks to Mr. Jones for taking time out of his busy work day to speak with us.

We'd originally planned on distilling the interview into a single post but with the large amount of good material, we decided to post the transcript in its entirety (divided in 3 because we know at least half of our readers are ADD/ADHD). This is part 1.

Thanks also to Liz Mair, Online Communications Director at the RNC for making all the arrangements.

***

OL&L: First off, would you mind giving a quick bio?

Brian Jones: Sure. I’m currently a managing director at Mercury Public Affairs where I deal with a number of corporate clients, some political clients. I was previously communications director for the John McCain for President Campaign earlier last year till some challenges arose. I was communications director at the Republican National Committee during the 2006 cycle. I was a senior communication advisor to the 2004 Bush-Cheney campaign. Before that I worked for Mercury Public Affairs as their Vice President of Polling and Advertising. I ran the research operation at the NRCC during the 2002 cycle and worked on host of local, state, and national political campaigns and some public relations work along the way.

OL&L: Where did you receive your academic training?

Brian Jones: I was an undergrad at the University of Massachusetts which isn’t necessarily known for producing for Republicans. I did graduate work and got a Master’s degree at the University of Washington.

OL&L: The first thing we wanted to ask you about is something we’ve discussed amongst my politically minded friends. We’ve been trying to understand the appeal of the Democratic candidates. We contrast this, of course, with those of us who are Republican voters. We get into the nitty gritty of their politics, policies, their background and experience. But when we ask our liberal friends to describe to us why they’re voting for Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama, they have a real tough time. Could you provide some insight into the appeal of either of them or maybe into how voters are able to distinguish the one from the other?

Brian Jones: Good question. They’ve been attacking each other non-stop for the last month plus. But they’re not that different. Their proposals would result in higher taxes, larger government and weakened national security. One of the things that’s interesting about Hillary is that she is saying there will be no new bureaucracy with her health care plan. That’s a little like saying, I’ve got news for you: the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus really do exist. It’s just not true.

I think the appeal is a couple of things: one is, Democrats are obviously motivated by seven years of a Republican in the White House. They’ve got this baseline of motivation right now that the party out of power often ends up feeling. I do think people underestimate the Republican turnout effort—what you’re going to end up seeing in 2008. Democrats were motivated in 2004. Ultimately Republicans turned out in better numbers than did the Democrats.

There does seem to be this kind of split among Democrats. There are two different camps right now. Obviously Obama is the more transformational/change type candidate. People are flocking to him because of the aura around him. He is still someone who has voted Democrat 95% of the time. He’s got the most liberal ranking in the National Journal which is quite a feat, because the Senate also has Bernie Sanders who is a self-described Socialist from Vermont. I think what you’re seeing now is people project onto Obama this desire for change. He is a strong order, he comes across as very likeable. So I think it’s kind of an image thing with Obama as much as anything else, because the substance and the background isn’t really there.

Then you have the status quo branch of the Democratic Party going with Hillary Clinton. They’re going more with the known quantity, maybe someone who’s not as interesting or inspiring, but someone who you think you know what you’re going to get with her. Being potentially the first woman President has some appeal too.

What I think is interesting is that Clinton has done a good job of courting more blue collar voters. I’m not sure how that will all flesh out or exactly what it means, but it does seem that she may offer a bit more substance than Barack. But with both of them, it does seem that they are more image candidates than substantive candidates.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Rep. Tom Lantos, RIP

This morning we were saddened to learn from Drudge that Human Rights champion Tom Lantos had passed away.

We didn't know Congressman Lantos well, and we didn't agree with many of his political positions, but we certainly admired his leadership on human rights issues. He was one of the few in his party, indeed, all of Congress, to decry human rights abuses in North Korea, the Middle East, Cuba, China--around the world.

Our interest in history and Holocaust history in particular made us admire his personal story as a Holocaust survivor. He was one of the many saved by Raoul Wallenberg.

He was a staunch defender of Israel--a position we share. He was also one of the few who was consistently critical of Saddam Hussein and did not, once he was out of power and executed, forget Saddam's atrocities.

A friend of ours interned with Congressman Lantos and knew him to be honorable and principled. When we were involved with the Sutdent Campaign for Child Survival, we attended a conference at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. Congressman Lantos was the featured speaker to a relatively small, intimate group of student activists. We asked him questions during the Q&A and briefly spoke with him afterward. We found him to be kind and gracious and patient in answering our questions. We found the following excerpt from a report on the first SCCS conference:

Our very first speaker, Representative Tom Lantos (D-CA), updated us on child survival and the Millennium Challenge Account. He then gave us tips on how we could be more effective and pledged his own supporting leadership for Child Survival.

He followed through on his pledge. We're sorry to see him go and send our deepest condolences to his family and all who knew him. Representative Tom Lantos, RIP.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

We Aren't Just Self-Promoters...

...we're friend-promoters, too.

Our friend, Michael J. Mouncer, who blogs for Gooses Ganders (a Friend of Lybberty), recently produced a music video for the Blakes. The song is "Don't Bother Me" and it will be appear on MTV2's Subterranean late tonight.

Congrats to MJ. And to the rest of you: watch it.


*UPDATE 8:20pm MST: For the Marxist in the family, cruise on over to The People's Cube and take their Fun With Quotes: Interactive Collective Quiz.


**UPDATE 11 February 2008 1:01am MST: We just checked and the 27 comments registered under last week's post about Romney dropping out of the Republican primary broke the previous OL&L comment record of 26. Way to go, everybody! Keep up the good work and let's see if we can push that record to 28, or something.

If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

It's A Beautiful Saturday Afternoon...

....and we hope you're not indoors like we've been, but outside enjoying some sort of athletic activity.

So, with spring in the air, we're thinking about baseball, and fantasy baseball. Email us if you're interested in joining our official, OL&L Fantasy Baseball League. Who knows, Morgan, maybe you'd find you liked baseball?

***

They linked to us, we'll link to them:

BYU Weekly (see "Faces of BYU")

***

We just finished transcribing our interview with Brian Jones of Mercury Public Affairs, formerly John McCains Director of Communications, RNC Director of Communications, and lots of other really cool stuff. Our Bush-hating readers will be glad to know he helped the Bush-Cheney campaign in 2004.

Anyway, we got it typed up and are figuring out how to put it on the web. Stay tuned.

***

Thanks to everyone for their comments and the healthy discussion that has resulted here at OL&L. Don't burn all your good thoughts on one post--we need y'all for the long haul. So, post early, post often--even if it's just to say, "Jake, you're an idiot."

***

Regarding Spikers' point about the President's influence over social issues: agreed that he/she has very little personal influence over those issues. However, he or she will choose at least one Supreme Court Justice. It is highly likely that this new Justice will, along with the rest of the Supreme Court, rule on cases related to abortion, gay marriage, and less likely, stem cell research.

Furthermore, this new Justice will be either be constructionist in their judicial philosophy or activist. For these reasons, we want a Republican President committed to picking a judge like Clarence Thomas, Antonin Scalia, John Roberts, and Samuel Alito.

The thought of having another David Souter makes us want to throw up.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Charles Barkley, Great American

Charles Barkley is the only reason we watch basketball on TNT. He is smart and funny. And now, it appears we have something in common with Sir Charles: neither of us like Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton (click here & here for examples).

From the NY Post Page 6, this fantastic quote from Charles Barkley, future Governor of Alabama regarding Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton:

I don't believe in them. They always play the race card, and you can't always play the race card, sometimes the race card is needed but not in every situation. We have to hold blacks more accountable for their actions.

We have disliked the influence held by "black leaders" Jesse Jackson & Al Sharpton. So we appreciate anyone who has the guts to stand up to them and their cronies. Props to Charles Barkley and good luck in his future race for the governorship.

Now, watch for the thought police of the left to demonize Barkley, just like they demonized Bill Cosby, Thomas Sowell, and Clarence Thomas before him.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

OL&L On BYUTV's BYU Weekly

Thanks to our friend EJB (and LC), we will appear in this week's edition of BYU Weekly.

(We suppose this will settle, once and for all, the debate about our multiple personality which manifests itself in the use of the editorial or royal first personal plural.)

In it, we talked about our inclusion in the America's Future Foundation College Blogger Contest 2008 and our experience at grad school in London. BYU Weekly was interested in how BYU is being represented here and around the world.

You can watch BYU Weekly at 4:30pm MST on Dish channel 9403 and DirectTV channel 374. Additional broadcast times can be found here (scroll down, in "additional resources, BYU Television). If you don't have DirectTV or Dish, click here to find out about BYU TV availability in your area.

Thank you for your continued support.


*UPDATE 8:12pm MST: We've got conflicting reports about the airtime of this show. The Dish listing and the internet say 4:30pm MST, but our friend EJB and her producer Ben say 4pm MST. To be safe, set your Tivo to record the entire hour. According to our email from him, it will also run at the following times:

February 09 at 4 PM on BYU-TV
February 10 at 9 AM on BYU-TV
February 10 at 2:30 PM on KBYU-TV
February 11 at 5 PM on BYU -TV
February 12 at 6 PM on BYU -TV
February 12 at 9 PM on BYU -TV
February 13 at 11 AM on BYU -TV


**UPDATE 9 February 2008, 2:49pm MST: It's definitely airing at 4:30pm today.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.

Mitt Romney Bows Out

Just watched Mitt Romney's speech to CPAC where he announced that he will drop out of the race. Click here for the transcript.

They're reporting on Fox News that Romney initially decided to continue the race, but as he worked on his CPAC speech, it occurred to him that to fight on would hurt the conservative and Republican cause and more importantly, it would hurt America.

As our father said, "what else would you expect from Romney. He's the man we thought he was."

And so he is.

You can question whether or not his current positions are genuine--we don't, not anymore--but you can't doubt his love of country.

Mark Halperin at time.com has a list of 10 suggestions of things Romney could have done differently to perhaps win the nomination.

We've laid out very plainly our problems with McCain--primarily here and here. We hope he seizes the opportunity to appeal to conservatives and assure them he will fight for the things that are important to them.

If he continues to appear dismissive or disdainful of the Reagan coalition, in favor of his independent, liberal, and media friends, he will not have a snowballs' chance of beating Hillary or Barack. His contemptuous and condescending attitude towards conservatives won't win him many votes.

We will vote for the Republican candidate for President, because as Mitt Romney said in his speech, "we cannot allow the next President of the United States to retreat in the face of evil extremism."

*UPDATE 12:18pm MST: Romney to try again in 2012.


If you have tips, questions, comments, suggestions, or requests for subscription only articles, email us at lybberty@gmail.com.