The Rhetoric of Electioneering

The buzzwords currently flying around about the current election cycle are "experience" versus "change". After an eight year term by any President, the election is always about change. Eight years always tires the public of whoever the sitting administration happens to be.

It is interesting to watch the Democrats. particularly Hillary Clinton going down in flames as she argues for herself on the "experience" side. In fact, the candidates with actual experience have all failed to gain any traction. For a resume, you can't get much better than Bill Richardson (Governor, Ambassador, Cabinet-member, etc.) but he never made it out of single digit poll land. Joe Biden and Christopher Dodd were long term Senators and received little support. The fact that they sounded like raving maniacs trying to attract the attention of the media that they never received probably didn't help. The media long ago decided that the Democratic race was Clinton, Obama, and Edwards and basically didn't cover anyone else.

Clinton constantly touts her experience. What experience? She was an attorney in an apparently disreputable law firm. Then she was the wife of an elected official who managed to screw that up. Finally, she is a second term Senator in the carpetbagger tradition who has no significant legislative accomplishments. How does that translate into experience? Simply put, it is the best argument her campaign could come up with to put up against Obama. Obama shouldn't even be a Senator except that his opponent who would have beaten him dropped out of the race. He won against Alan Keyes (essentially a forfeit). He has done nothing in the Senate. Therefore, Clinton thought she could use that argument against him. Big mistake. After an eight year administration, having a nothing record is probably an advantage. Edwards is not really a factor. There is virtually no chance of him being elected. The reason he didn't run for re-election in North Carolina is that he knew there was no chance he would win.

On the Republican side, Huckabee has emerged in Iowa to the surprise of most. He will get little support in New Hampshire but may do well in South Carolina. If he does, it could represent a sea change in American politics. Mitt Romney continues to decline in popularity because he represents the status quo (big money, negative campaigning). While studies show negative campaigning works, the public dislikes it intensely. Romney is creating the impression that he is trying to buy the election, and will do anything, no matter how smarmy, to win it. It is not a way to get popular. Huckabee's strategy of not answering with attack ads may not work, but if it does, it could change future elections to the positive. McCain has taken a page from Huckabee's book and stayed a bit more positive than usual, despite the fact he is well known as (to put it mildly) an acerbic character. Basically, he is a prick. However, that could serve him well as President. Giuliani decided to tank Iowa and New Hampshire. The problem there is that if you get off the media radar, it is hard to get back on it. It will take a big showing somewhere else soon to get back in play when you have a lot of negatives. Thompson is both figuratively and literally a non-starter. You can't make an announcement on the Leno show than never show up again. Ron Paul comes off as your nutty old uncle who no one ever takes seriously. He has no shot.

New Hampshire is today. It will be interesting.

The Real Culture of Corruption

I find it really interesting that the sex offender and convicted perjurer, William Jefferson Clinton, is still the most popular person to the Democrats. The Democratic Party constantly talks about the Republican Party as having a "Culture of Corruption". In examining history though, that conclusion may not be so obvious.
1) Rep. Mark Foley, Republican from Florida, sent some clearly inappropriate (horny) emails to Congressional pages. There was never any indication that he engaged in any sexual activity with those pages. There was a national uproar which led to the ousting of Rep. Foley from the House of Representatives. By contrast, Rep. Gary Studds, Democrat from Massachusetts, was actually caught in the act of having sex with an underage Congressional Page. Did the Democrats scream for the pedophile predator's expulsion? Did the Democrats wail about ethical standards in Congress? No. They made him a committee chairman and supported his re-election to three or four more terms.
2) When Rep. William Jefferson, Democrat from Louisiana, is caught red-handed with $90,000 in cash in a freezer in his house, he is not investigated by the Ethics Committee. He is given a committee chairmanship by the Democratic leadership. Just for completeness, the same Rep. Jefferson was recently indicted on nineteen counts of corruption. There is still no uproar from the Democrats in Congress.
3) Sandy Berger steals classified documents from the National Archives to cover up what the Clinton Administration knew prior to the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States and only has to pay a fine. Despite being neither indicted or accused of anything, the Democratic Party calls on Karl Rove to resign during the Patrick Fitzgerald investigation. The hypocrisy is astounding.
4) Senator Harry Reid, Democratic Majority Leader, makes hundreds of thousands of dollars from real estate he does not own. In his defense, I suppose it is impossible to be elected in Nevada without having connections to crooks, given the history of the state.
5) The most obvious example, however, is how despite abusing his power as President to have sex with a White House intern and being convicted of perjury, William Jefferson Clinton continues to be the most popular Democrat in the party. The Democrat's argument about his perjury at the time was "It is only about sex". Apparently, in the Democratic Party, individuals are free to choose which subjects they are allowed to perjure themselves about. A question was asked at the Democratic Party debate about how to use former President Clinton in a new Democratic administration. All of the candidates had grandiose plans for him. Not one candidate has the nerve or moral fortitude to call him to task for his past actions and to not hold him up as a superb leadership example.
The party that owns the true "culture of corruption" is obvious.