Bush Berra

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How Yogi Berraisms define the Bush presidency:

• "You can't think and hit at the same time.": His mantra #1: Bush doesn't think; he just takes action. He believes that he is a man of action, not words.
  
• "When you come to a fork in the road, take it.": His mantra #2: Bush hasn't come to a fork he hasn't taken.
• "I really didn't say everything I said.": His problem #1: Bush has trouble collecting thoughts and phrasing them
• "This is like deja vu all over again.": Bush's remarks to Rove after he won the second term.
• "You give 100 percent in the first half of the game, and if that isn't enough in the second half you give what's left.": Bush's idea of how a two-term President should apply himself.
• "Baseball is 90% mental -- the other half is physical.": Bush justifying how hard it is to be a 'Decider'.
• "A nickel ain't worth a dime anymore.": Bush's reasoning for the latest gas prices.
• "Slump? I ain't in a slump ... I just ain't hitting.": Bush's concept of the economic slowdown - It's because people aren't spending enough.
• "I take a two hour nap, from one o'clock to four.": Bush talking about his daily routine.
• "It gets late early out there.": Bush's explanation why he's in bed by 9:00pm
• "I made a wrong mistake.": What Bush may sometimes think about the Iran invasion; he wanted to go to Iran.
• "We're lost. But we are making good time.": Bush's description of the Iraq war
• "The other teams could make trouble for us if they win.": Bush's constant reminder to Americans about terrorists.
• "I wish I had an answer to that, because I'm tired of answering that question.": Bush's response to whether water-boarding is torture.

"You've got to be careful if you don't know where you are going, because you might not get there.": This is sure to be Bush's legacy.

Hillary's recurrent problem

From The Financial Times, Published: April 20 2008

Them Gates

I think there needs to be a change in the calender either of the Olympics or of the US presidential election. Especially this year, when there is so much fun and games in them US elections. I am listing the "GATES" various candidates have committed and I'm sure it will come to bite them in the fall, if they haven't already.

I will keep this updated. The latest ones will be at the top.


McCAIN

1. TROLLOPGATE: "The Real McCain" by Cliff Schecter, which will arrive in bookstores next month, reports an angry exchange between McCain and his wife that happened in full view of aides and reporters during a 1992 campaign stop: "Three reporters from Arizona, on the condition of anonymity, also let me in on another incident involving McCain's intemperateness. In his 1992 Senate bid, McCain was joined on the campaign trail by his wife, Cindy, as well as campaign aide Doug Cole and consultant Wes Gullett. At one point, Cindy playfully twirled McCain's hair and said, "You're getting a little thin up there." McCain's face reddened, and he responded, "At least I don't plaster on the makeup like a trollop, you cunt." McCain's excuse was that it had been a long day. If elected president of the United States, McCain would have many long days.
   
2. FLIPFLOPGATE: Republicans called Kerry a flip-flopper; now the Democrats will do the same for McCain. He is now pandering to the religious right he denounced some as "agents of intolerance" eight years ago. A balanced-budget hawk, he now calls for permanently extending the Bush tax cuts that he voted against and has some of his own.
   
3. ECONOGATE: "It's NOT the economy, stupid", may well be the slogan of the McCain Campaign. He has admitted that he knows very little about economics, so his advice to people who are victims of the home-mortgage fiasco to just sit back and relax and that the fear of a recession is merely psychological should not come as a surprise. However, he plans to make the Bush tax cuts permanent and eliminate the alternative minimum tax; these two proposals alone would reduce tax revenue by $1 trillion over four years. He proposed doubling the dependent exemption, to $7,000 per child, cutting revenue by $171 billion more over four years. Add to that the reducing of corporate taxes to 25 percent from 35 percent. This would provide companies like ExxonMobil, flush with record profits, an addtional reward of $1.4 billion. The price for these cuts: $3.3 trillion by the end of a President McCain's second term in 2017.
   
4. FINANCEGATE: Last year, when John McCain's campaign appeared moribund, the he applied to join the presidential public financing system. Under this program he agreed to certain spending limits and, in turn, received access to federal matching money. But in January, after some early success in the primaries, the public financing system wasn't looking like such a good deal anymore. So McCain moved to opt out. Now that it seems Obama will win the Democratic nomination, and will 'outraise' him by multiples for the general elections, McCain is now wanting to go back into the public financing system. This time, he is saying that Obama, who once said that he will accept the public system if nominated and the GOP candidate accepts it too, "is breaking the promise made to the American people". He is not telling the electorate how he disused the system himself (also see LOANGATE below).
   
5. LOANGATE: This is how John McCain tried to circumvent campaign-finance rules that he helped create: Around the time McCain opted out of the public campaign financing system (see above), his campaign went to the bank looking for a loan. Bank officials, lacking confidence in the candidate's future fundraising success, worried that they would never see their money again. So what did McCain do? Rather than pledge his existing certification for matching funds as collateral for the loan, which would bind him to the system and thus the spending limits, he carefully pledged to seek to re-enter the system later, and to use a non-existent future certification as collateral. In other words, this was a promise to perpetuate a fraud on the American taxpayers: if McCain no longer intended to seek the presidency, he made a legally-binding promise to pretend to remain in the race just long enough to collect public money to repay the loan.
   
6. SUNNIGATE: McCain claimed that Iran (entirely Shia) is helping and training Al-Qaeda (entirely Sunni) to operate in Iraq, during a press-conference. Later, he corrected himself, at Liberman's prompt, that Iran was actually helping and training terrorists (a generic term). This was a big embarrassment to a candidate who is running almost exclusively on a platform of security and foreign policy, especially since this comment had been repeated several times over several days. Critics see this a proof of early stages Alzheimer's due to his old age. McCain, at 72, is an year older than Reagen was when he ran for his second term. Reagen had advanced stages of Alzheimer's within a few years after leaving office, but the disease was thought to have started much earlier, around the time he ran for his second term.
7. BROWNOSEGATE: McCain is now pandering to the far-right religious extremists whose rhetoric he had found so repugnant that he denounced some as "agents of intolerance" eight years ago.
8. PARSLEYGATE: His "spiritual guide", according to McCain, is the Ohio megachurch pastor named Rod Parsley, who has compared Planned Parenthood to the Nazis and has called Islam a "false religion" that America must see "destroyed."
9. HAGEEGATE: McCain has welcomed the support of pastor John Hagee of Texas, who has called the Catholic Church a "great whore" that conspired with Hitler "to exterminate the Jews"; called Hurricane Katrina "the judgment of God against the city of New Orleans" because of a planned "homosexual parade" and other "sins"; and advocated a U.S.-Israeli strike against Iran to help launch Armageddon.
10. TEMPERGATE: It has always been known that McCain has a temper. It was captured on TV when he dresses down a reporter on his private plane. Critics say he suffers PTSD after being taken and beaten during the Vietnam war.
11. ISEGATE: New York Times ran a story of a beautiful lobbyist, Ms. Iseman, having 'relations' with McCain, being a part of his entourage for many years. While it is unlikely that there is anything romantic or sexual between them, it does show how his campaign has the influence of lobbyists. Although all political campaigns have advisors who are lobbyists, McCain's has the most with a number about 50.

OBAMA

1. BOWLINGGATE: Guttering two balls, scoring 37 and wearing 13 1/2 size shoes (though it was 47 and size 12) will become political legend. Since
   
2. BITTERGATE: The mother of all GATES. Obama made a these comments at a fund-raiser in San Francisco: "You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania, and like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are going to regenerate and they have not. And it's not surprising, then, they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations." This has set off a storm. Clinton was first to criticize, calling him "elitist" and "out of touch" from the populace. And the McCaon campaign was quick to react, saying that this statement "...shows an elitism and condescension towards hardworking Americans...". 'Pundits' are parsing his words, debating whether his use of the word 'bitter' was worse or 'cling'. The excitement has just begun.
   
3. MICHELLEGATE: The statement from Obama's wife that "for the first time in my adult lifetime, I am really proud of my country". She also said that this country is "just downright mean" and "guided by fear"; that "our souls are broken"; and that most Americans' lives have "gotten progressively worse since I was a little girl." Critics find it disingenuous that these words come from a woman who had the fortune to attend Ivy-League schools and is a successful lawyer, despite coming from a lower middle-class background.
   
4. WRIGHTGATE: Obama's pastor who 'introduced him to Christianity', the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, said that the US government is responsible for the ills that plague the black community; "instead of saying 'God Bless America', we should say 'God Damn America'". He also characterized the 9/11 terrorist attack on the US as "chickens coming home to roost". Critics question Obama's judgment and fortitude from the fact that he sat passively in the pews for 20 years and gave money and took his children while Wright, his friend and "spiritual adviser," spewed far-left, America-hating, white-bashing, conspiracy-theorizing, loony, "God damn America" vitriol from the pulpit.
5. NAFTAGATE: Reports that an official of the Obama Campaign met with the Canadian diplomats to assure them that Obama's stance on NAFTA was merely to endear him to the Democratic primary voters in Ohio have died down somewhat after the revelation that the Canadian Government, run by the conservative party, leaked this 'in-camera' affair to benefit McCain and/or Clinton, and was seen as them interfering in the US electoral process.
   
6. PINGATE: Obama's refusal to wear a flag-pin on his lapel as a protest against the Iraq war policy of Bush is seen by some as Obama being unpatriotic.
7. HANDGATE: In a video, Obama is seen to put his hands dangling over his crotch instead of his right hand over the heart while the national anthem is playing. To some, this is proof that Obama does not pledge allegiance to the US Flag.
8. LANEGATE: Obama scored 37 in a bowling game in Altoona, PA. Thereafter, he vowed to replace the bowling alley that Nixon installed in the White House with a basketball court. Mrs. Clinton has challenged him to a game, the rules of which, she said, will be "winner-takes-all".
9. REZKOGATE: The Obamas' undisclosed ties with their friend Tony Rezko, who helped them 'a little' to buy a $1.65 million mansion in Chicago. Mr. Rezko (a slumlord, according to Clinton) is now on trial on unrelated corruption charges, which started months after Obama's 2004 election to the Senate.

CLINTON

1. SNIPERGATE: Clinton described that she came under sniper fire when their plane landed in Bosnia, and she had to run to the waiting car ducking for cover. Soon after these remarks, CBS released a film showing her walking coolly with Chelsea from the plane towards the terminal, and being greeted by a bouquet of flowers. Clinton said she "misspoke", claiming that lack of sleep had distorted her memory.
2. HOSPITALGATE: Arguing about the necessity of universal healtcare, Clinton told a tale of woe about a young pregnant woman who sought medical care at a local hospital and was turned away for lack of insurance - and both she and the baby died. Though she didn't identify the hospital or the patient, they are now known. Ms. Bachtel went to the O'Bleness Memorial Hospital in Pomeroy, OH on Aug. 4 for a routine check-up and was told her baby was stillborn. Ms. Bachtel is fully insured.
3. REPORTERGATE: Clinton said "NO" when a reporter asked her whether she had told Bill Richardson, a superdelegate, to support her instead of Obama, because Obama was "not electable" in the November elections. When it came out that she had, Clinton's excuse was that she had not understand the question.
4. PENNGATE: Clinton campaign pollster and strategist, Mark Penn, was reported to have had a private meeting with the Columbian Government about the free-trade agreement his company had been hired to lobby for with the US government; Clinton opposes free-trade agreements. Mr. Penn claimed that he was representing his corporation, while the President of Columbia said he thought Mr. Penn was representing the Clinton campaign. Penn was let go as a strategist by Clinton (although he still is a pollster for the campaign); his firm has been fired by the Columbian Government.
5. FERRAROGATE: Comments about Obama—“if Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position”, made by Clinton campaign supporter and fundraiser Geraldine Ferraro, were published in a local California paper in late February, 2008. She is a US representative from New York and a former VP candidate. She defended her position, and after some hand-wringing, was let go from her position in the Finance Committee of the Clinton campaign.
6. MILLIONSGATE: The tax returns of the Clintons show that they made $109 million in the seven years since Bill was the president. The $10 million they have listed as given to charity is being reported to have gone to ones that benefits the Clintons themselves. This $15 million a year salary could not jibe well with her constituency of blue-collar workers who make less than $50,000 or are unemployed.
7. RACEGATE: Before the primary elections in South Carolina, Bill said that voters will demonstrate a 'race and gender' bias and that his wife may lose because of the higher percentage of blacks in the state. After Obama won, Bill discounted the victory by saying that even Jesse Jackson won SC. This cost Clinton dearly and she lost to Obama on Super Tuesday. About 50-60% of African-Americans were supporting the wife of the 'first black president' before these utterances; this dropped to 20-10% after the SC voting, and established Obama as a serious contender.

Are Republicans Oxymorons?

John McCain described himself as a "realistic idealist" at the World Affairs Council of Los Angeles. Haven't we heard something similar before? Bush described himself as a "compassionate conservative". How interesting that his successor is choosing another oxymoronic description of himself. Should we call him John McSimilar, if not McSame?

VP for McCain would decide election

In a Presidential election, it is usually the top of the ticket that influences a voter. Of course, the VP is 'a heartbeat away' from the presidency, but we tend not to pay much attention to that. Not this time for John McCain. This will be the first election, that I can recall, where the choice of the VP could make a big difference. Since the odds of him not completing his first term are higher that average, he has to choose someone who is much younger and can be ready to lead within the hour.

Such a person should be one who has already demonstrated, at least partially, his or her ability to be a President. In addition, given Mr. McCain's tense relations with the ultra-right wing of the party (a substantial GOP base), this VP candidate should be the one who can work hand-in-glove with this fringe. Two men come to mind: the reborn conservative Mitt Romney, and the preacher Mike Huckabee.

Undoubtedly, either of these will be disasters if they take the office. Maybe this should energize voters - Democrats, Independents and sensible Republicans - not to vote for Mr. McCain.