The McCain Camp: We're Going to Smear

Given the New York Times' front-page article yesterday about ex-radical Weather Underground co-founder William Ayers, the McCain-Palin campaign has begun grasping at straws. In two separate events, Sarah Palin attempted to play up the tenuous relationship by saying that while she and McCain see America as the greatest force in the world, Obama has decided to "pal around" with terrorists who would attack their own country. Of course, had Palin read the entire Times article, she would see how both liberals and conservatives have come out to say that the relationship between Obama and Ayers was nearly non-existent. They worked together on a school board and have seen each other around the neighborhood, and that is essentially the extent of the relationship.

First of all, I thought that this Bill Ayers garbage was buried when George Stephonopolous threw away all of his journalistic integrity and got spoon-fed ridiculous questions from Sean Hannity. Obama responded forecfully, detecting ol' Georgy's career-maligning move. He said, "The notion that somehow as a consequence of me knowing somebody who engaged in detestable acts forty years ago when I was eight years old somehow reflects on me and my values doesn't make much sense, George." That should have been the beginning and end of it (similar to when the New York Times published that story about McCain banging a lobbyist, McCain quashed it, and that was the end of it).


The timing of the story is interesting, with less than a month to go in the presidential election. The McCain campaign is getting desparate. Their numbers are down and they need something - anything - to either buoy themselves or bring Obama down. They seem to be leaning toward the latter strategy, with an unnamed Republican strategist saying, "We're going to get a little tougher. We've got to question this guy's associations. Very soon. There's no question that we have to change the subject here." The subject that this mystery man is referring to is the economy, which McCain gambled on and lost last week.

What is surprising - at this point it should not be, but my naivete is showing through here - is that McCain would lower himself to this point, being a victim of the same sleazy politics in South Carolina back in 2000. The two events are similar in the amount of truth they hold. Rove and company conducted a push poll during the South Carolina primary in 2000 (after McCain had won New Hampshire) suggesting that McCain had fathered a black child out of wedlock. In reality, McCain and his wife had adopted a dark-skinned girl from Bangledesh named Bridget. So while they had a dark-skinned daughter, she was not fathered out of wedlock as Rove would have liked you to believe. In similar fashion, Obama has been accused by the McCain campaign as having been"palling around" with a self-proclaimed terrorist (let's not forget that with all of the outrage of Ayers' terrorism, he has never been convicted of anything terrorism-related because the FBI could not get their act together). In reality, Obama has met Ayers and served on a board or two with him. Everyone with knowledge of the relationship between the two (read: not McCain, Palin, or any Republican operative claiming the two were close) insist that the two were not considered "close" and that the media and everyone else is making mountains out of mole hills.

The reality of the situation is that the McCain-Palin campaign is desparate. In the immortal words of Police Chief Grady, "Desparation is a stinky cologne." Unfortunately, for the American people, the final stretch of this campaign may very well be characterized by smear tactics and attack politics as opposed to the issues, how to fix the American economy and, in the words of Ron Suskind, how to reassert this nation's moral authority. So while McCain has oft-claimed that he would rather lose an election than lose a war, it seems that he would rather win an election based on false information than lose an election based on the issues and what the American people deserve to hear about. Peace.

Photos - Bill Ayers (www.mugshots.com), Ayers and his wife (www.nytimes.com)

Karl Rove Assumes Position as the Pot

The pot that called the kettle black, of course. Today Rove said that some of McCain's attack ads went "a step too far" in that they would not pass the "100 percent truth test." My first reaction to this - and the Obama campaign's reaction to this - was, "Wow, even slime ball Karl Rove is speaking out against McCain's tactics." Then I thought a bit, and realized that Rove holds no legitimate place in the political discourse for this election or any election in the future.

One disturbing thing about the way that the media is presenting the story is the fact that they are leaving out the context of Rove's rant. In the same way that the "lipstick on a pig" comment by Obama was taken out of context, Rove's diatribe began with criticisms of the Obama campaign and discussion of the McCain campaign arose when Rove was prompted by Fox News Sunday's Chris Wallace. It was then that Rove said McCain's campaign has recently gone a bit too far in its ads about Obama.

The overarching irony of Rove pointing out dirty political tricks seems to be lost on the mainstream media as well as the Obama campaign. While it may seem advantageous for Obama supporters to spread the word of Rove in order to get more independents on their side, in reality this could backfire. McCain could use this in his next ad, saying "Look, the human epitome of Washington insider-ism, Karl Rove, doesn't like the way I'm running my campaign. Of course he doesn't, because he's scared of change," or something to that extent. He could also turn it to say, "Look, Obama is embracing Karl Rove. That's not change."

The reason that the media is picking it up is because it thinks that it will generate viewers. I don't necessarily think that it is because of a liberal media bias. If James Carville had come out and said something similar about Obama, I think it would have gotten the same treatment (with Ike's aftermath still being treated like a feeding frenzy for the media, this story has not garnered the absolutely massive headlines it would have on a slower news day).

Like everything, however, we need to look at the source. To begin with, Karl Rove is not really a respectable individual. He started sleazy political tricks quite young - at 19 he used false identity to enter the office of Illinois Democrat Alan Dixon, stole the state treasurer's letterhead and put out a flyer using said letterhead advertising free alcohol and women to kick off Dixon's campaign. He seems to have been a minor player in Watergate, he headed the White House Iraq Group (the group responsible for drumming up the case for war with Iraq), and he seems to be involved in the Joe Wilson/Valerie Plame incident.

But one of the sleaziest Karl Rove moves (that we know of) occurred in the 2000 South Carolina Republican primary, when he took the generous actions of the McCains (Cindy had brought back Bridget, a baby from Mother Teresa's orphanage in Bangladesh for medical treatment in 1991 and she and John adopted her soon after) and turned them into a vicious lie. Through push polling, Rove and his cronies helped spread the lie that the 8 year-old dark skinned girl that could be seen with McCain was, in fact, a bi-racial daughter that McCain had fathered out of wedlock. Despite winning New Hampshire in a landslide, McCain lost South Carolina, and Bush went on to win the primary and the White House. You have to be a pretty heartless individual to do something like that, and Rove seems to fit the bill.

So if Karl Rove points out the obvious (that McCain's campaign ads are not 100% true and that he went too far), why report on it? Rove pointing out that the McCain campaign is acting a little sleazy is like Hitler saying that Stalin was a bad guy - an obvious observation that is not made more or less true by that person's speaking out on it. In fact, Obama's and the media's embrace of Rove's "analysis" actually legitimize Rove's words (not a good thing considering his recent foray into newscasting). Obama's camp should not have touched this; they should have let the media pick it up (which they would have done because it is "controversial" and brings in viewers/readers). Again, the whole "self-destruct" theorem applies. Besides, Karl Rove is not someone I would want to cite to help argue my case. Peace.

Photos - Karl Rove (www.cnn.com), George W. Bush and Karl Rove (voices.washingtonpost.com), The McCain family (with Bridget third from right) in 1999, a year before Rove's infamous smear (www.nytimes.com)

Next They'll Be Calling Them Freedom Fighters

If you have not read Seymour Hersh's article in the latest New Yorker, do it. If you were alive during the 1980s you may think that Hersh's article is merely a history lesson from the Reagan era, complete with toppling Iranian governments, CIA-funded middle eastern minority factions, and moronic decisions coming from the White House. Alas, Hersh's article is a startling look at America's covert operations in Iran meant to destabilize the ruling government to make an invasion easier on the ground. What is even more worrisome is that Congress's intelligence leaders - a group Hersh calls the Gang of Eight - know little about the program, thus allowing the Bush administration to wield unchecked power (kind of like in late 2002 and early 2003 leading up to the Iraq War).

To begin with, to invade Iran would be a grievous mistake. It would prove that the leaders of the current administration have learned absolutely nothing from the situation in Iraq. One would think that Vietnam would be an indication that America should stop fucking with other parts of the world where it has no business, but if that is not enough, then Iraq should certainly prove to be sufficient evidence. But when you're as thick-headed as Dick Cheney and the rest of the administration, logic is as scarce as cheap gas. Hence, the step-up of covert ops in Iran.

The most mind-boggling part of all of this is the complete and utter resemblance it has to Reagan's mistakes of the 1980s. Where do you think the Taliban and Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda came from? If you think they just popped out of the blue in the early 1990s and came to existence solely to do harm to the United States for no reason, then I truly feel sorry for you. With the millions and millions of dollars pumped through Pakistani intelligence to Afghan mujahideen fighting the Soviets, the Taliban formed, followed by Bin Laden's Al-Qaeda. Washington's logic was that both the United States and the ultra-extremist (and America-hating) "freedom fighters" both wanted the Soviets out of Afghanistan. It's middle school philosophy: the enemy of my enemy is my friend.

But 9/11 showed us how flawed Reagan's logic was. Without American help in the Middle East, Bin Laden and company would not have existed. Bin Laden has been kicked out of every country in the Middle East; only the Taliban (formed with American help) would accept this wealthy outcast. So he sets up shop in the tunnels of Tora Bora (again, with American help) and plots his revenge on America (who left him and his new country in ruins once the Soviets were defeated).

So what do we do in 2008? We pump money into minority factions, just like Reagan did in the 1980s, in order to fight a common enemy using the same philosophy, even after it proved tragically wrong on 9/11. The funny thing is, the 2008 case is almost a carbon copy of the 1980s. Instead of Khomeini spouting anti-American rhetoric to stir the masses, we have Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (both figures were inspired to rail against America due to CIA reasons - Khomeini because of revelations that the CIA and Israeli intelligence helped form and fund the oppresive, brutal secret police of the Shah [SAVAK] and now Ahmadinejad due to covert American ops in Iran's borders). Replace the mujahideen, Reagan's "freedom fighters," with new minority groups like the Kurds and the Mujahideen-e-Khalq. Replace the setting of Afghanistan's mountains to the deserts of Iran. Brilliant.

Let's look at one of the factions we are funding: the Kurds. The Kurds are a significant minority spread throughout northern Iraq, western Iran, and southern Turkey. The Kurds probably do not like America too much due to our dealings with Turkey allowing Turkish forces to enter soveriegn Iraqi land to attack Kurdish extremists (some of whom we are now currently funding). Just like the mujahideen, the Kurds are not America's biggest fans. When all is over and the proverbial dust settles, the Kurds will want America to set up a Kurdistan, just like Britain set up Israel for the Jews. However, America will not set up a Kurdistan because it will bring more instability to the region, just like Israel did. Turkey will be pissed, as will Iraq (though by then we will have set up a puppet government to do whatever Washington wanted) and Iran will be in pieces and won't have time to deal with the headache. We'll be there for decades trying to sort shit out, or we'll leave after stirring the shit beyond recognition and wait 12-15 years for a major terrorist attack to happen on American soil to realize we made a huge mistake. Either scenario is unacceptable.

If Cheney, Rove, and company are not going to be put in jail, they should at least be forced to read a history book. Of course, Bush's legacy will be forever stained by the leeches he surrounded himself with. Bush is not bright enough to come up with all of this (look at his one piece of legislation - No Child Left Behind - that was his pet project). Of course, what can you expect when you surround yourself with Nixon-era crooks (Cheney and Rumsfeld in particular). To end this post I will quote Immortal Technique on a song from his new mixtape: "The government pimped 9/11 to go to Iraq / And now history repeats itself right on track / Cuz it's a tragedy and then the comedy begins / Because it's funny motherfuckers don't see it come around again." Peace.

Photos - Two men making a huge mistake (Time), Bin Laden, whose power is arguably a product of disastrous American foreign policy during the Reagan/Bush era (Encyclopedia Britannica), Neo-Cons, a major threat to American security (Writing Shop)