2008 August 04 | Hanlon's Razor

Whoa, Evan Bayh for Obama?

By Hanlon, on August 4th, 2008 at 11:18 PM

Hot on the heels of the big-ass article on McCain’s possible VP choice, it looks like we’ve got a hell of a hint about Obama’s: Indiana senator Evan Bayh.

You can peruse Bayh’s record at OnTheIssues just like with all the other candidates and I suggest that you do so. One thing you might notice is that I was right, he’s pretty centrist by a lot of their metrics. 50% by NARAL, 60% by the ACLU, 43% by the US COC, 33% by the Christian Coalition, etc. I’m pretty jazzed about his big church-state separation push, though. While a touch moderate, he’s good where it counts.

The kicker, and the reason I’m writing this, is that http://obamabayh08.com directs to… the DNC’s homepage. If that doesn’t seal the deal in most peoples’ eyes, I’m not sure what will.

Let the speculation begin!!

UPDATE: Will just said this, and it’s so bad but yet so funny that I have to relay it: If you’re going to sell a candidate, what better way than E. Bayh? Well played, Will. Well played.

UPDATE 2: Commenter Pete points out that there’s nothing to say that the DNC owns the domain, it merely redirects to it. However, I’m more than a little suspicious of that as a WHOIS returns nothing substantial other than it was registered in May of 2007. It does, however, say that it was updated in February of 2008. There’s nothing for it in the Internet Archive to say what was before that, but perhaps that’s when it started to redirect?

UPDATE 3: Other sites are picking up on the fact that Bayh is on a very, very short list of potential Obama VP’s, so we’ll see how this plays out.

Eric Cantor potential McCain veep

By Hanlon, on August 4th, 2008 at 11:08 PM

I’m not sure why the VP hunt has been brushed by the wayside in the past month or so, frankly. If there’s one thing Dick Cheney has taught us, it’s that the running mate can prove just as influential on policy as, if not more than, the president himself.

This is why we should all be a little concerned that Eric Cantor (R-VA) is being floated around as a potential veep for McCain. I’m not just talking about his voting record, although that’s pretty terrifying as well. As I so often do, I suggest we pop over to OnTheIssues.org and see what his overall rating is.

Rated 0% by NARAL, indicating a pro-life voting record
Rated 100% by the NRLC, indicating a pro-life stance (190 members)
Rated 19% by the NAACP, indicating an anti-affirmative-action stance
Rated 0% by the HRC, indicating an anti-gay-rights stance
Rated 92% by the Christian Coalition: a pro-family voting record
Rated 0% by the AU, indicating opposition to church-state separation
Rated 0% by the LCV, indicating anti-environment votes
Rated 0% by the CAF, indicating opposition to energy independence
Rated 0% by SANE, indicating a pro-military voting record

So right off the bat, I want it noted that for the most part he’s either 100% for or against something. He’s as doctrinaire conservative as it gets. No gay anything, screw the environment, stay in Iraq forever, abortion is murder even if it happens before sex, etc. He’s placed himself pretty far to the right of McCain himself, disagreeing on quite a number of key issues, amongst them immigration, finance reform, torture, expanding stem-cell research, and the gay marriage amendment.

Now, a comment here might be “well so what? McCain’s running mate doesn’t need to be lockstep with him.” ABC puts it like this:

Cantor has strong support among the party’s conservatives, perhaps comforting a segment of the GOP base that has been reluctant to embrace McCain, who has often been at odds with members of his own party on several issues, including a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, federal funds for embryonic stem cell research and campaign finance reform.

That’s where I have a problem. I’m sure not many people have an issue with McCain picking an extra-conservative running mate (a Jewish one, no less), because that’s what he needs to do to hold onto an ambivalent Republican base that nearly threw him over a cliff while on fire because of his obstinacy until recent flip-flops.

It’s not out of line to suggest that while Democrats and Independents are annoyed at McCain’s reversals, saying he’s selling his soul to be more appealing to the base, the base itself probably doesn’t have too much confidence in McCain’s recent far-right proclamations, possibly seeing them as a transparent attempt to get votes. Actually putting a guy like Cantor on the ticket would say to them “see? I’ve got a capital-C Conservative, I mean what I’m saying.”

Which, sadly, would prove that he has sold his soul. Even if McCain doesn’t take Cantor himself, any severely neocon running mate will sully his own “maverick” brand. John McCain is where he is because he refused to back down and pander to even his own party when he truly believed in something, and that earned lots of respect from independents and even some Democrats.

There’s no way to get a VP that’s exactly your own views. To a great extent, a running mate you butt heads with is a good thing, because out of disagreement can come greater understanding and thus compromise. I don’t expect Obama to have a VP that’s right with him. However, when McCain’s most media-beloved trait is that he refused to march in lockstep with his party, and then he picks up a guy who did just that, it sends a message that his former refusal to back down has been replaced by a desire to win. Either he’ll stand up to the party or he won’t, and a guy like Cantor hints at the latter.

By the way, isn’t it curious that McCain needs a neocon like Cantor to appeal to the base, but Obama needs someone centrist to appeal to moderates. Why the hell doesn’t the liberal base count for anything? We changed the majority in Congress, dammit!

Obama and offshore drilling

By Hanlon, on August 4th, 2008 at 10:08 PM

Listen, I’m no Obama ass-kisser. When he does something stupid, I call him on it. Just recently I found myself a little perplexed at his changing opinion on the Florida and Michigan delegates. But I’m tired of hearing about his “offshore drilling flip-flop”. It ain’t one, and not only that but he brings up a good point.

“My interest is in making sure we’ve got the kind of comprehensive energy policy that can bring down gas prices,” Obama told The Palm Beach Post in Florida on Friday.

“If, in order to get that passed, we have to compromise in terms of a careful, well thought-out drilling strategy that was carefully circumscribed to avoid significant environmental damage — I don’t want to be so rigid that we can’t get something done.”

Listen. There are two reasons offshore drilling is bad, both of which I’ve gone into myself. One is that it’s bad for the environment, the other is that it’s like giving extra booze to an alcoholic when he gets a hangover.

Sometimes it’s the messenger that gives meaning to the message. If a priest says “give me your money”, you’ll likely react differently than if a bum does.

That’s my point here. One thing we know about Barack Obama is that he does not think we can just keep going with oil as long as we want to. He’s not beholden to Big Oil, and this is not the kind of stance he would take because it’ll satisfy our oil greed and give us some instant gratification.

One thing that offshore drilling could certainly do, if environmentally safe, would be to remove our reliance on foreign oil. If we can lower our reliance on oil in general and open up drilling in the United States, it can eliminate foreign oil and make our transition a little smoother by getting our balls out of OPEC’s hand.

Before I’m accused of hypocrisy myself, consider the perceived difference between handing a scalpel to a doctor and handing one to a pissed off child. The instrument hasn’t changed, but don’t you trust one more with it?