McCain's new convention strategy

While I believe John McCain has a better than not chance of being the next President of the United States, he will face a serious obstacle on September 4th when he will be forced to address the Republican Convention in Minneapolis.

The problem won't be so much that his stance on issues such as immigration reform and global warming will be in stark contrast to most of the delegates amassed at the Xcel Energy Center, rather it will be that the delegates will all be Republicans, and they will put their differences with Arizona Senator aside and cheer him enthusiastically.

Then McCain will be forced to acknowledge the crowd's cheers, and perhaps look towards the rafters and smile at President Bush, who will be doing his own cheering from a special box. Unfortunately for McCain, cameras will capture all of this cheering and smiling and acknowledging, and the images will be beamed to homes all over America, reminding people how much they don't like a lot of the people who have just become very excited about John McCain.

There isn't a lot poor John McCain can do about this. (If some sort of devastating disaster befalls the Twin City region in late August, be very suspicious.)

His one saving grace, if you can call it that, is he will probably have his good friend Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman to introduce him. Lieberman is no great shakes, but he is not a Republican either -- in fact he ran on the Democratic ticket for Vice President just eight years ago.

But is there another failed Democratic Vice Presidential candidate out there that John McCain can recruit to help him survive Minneapolis?

Yes there is! In interviews over the last couple days, Geraldine Ferraro has given every indication she would still like to work hard to defeat Barack Obama, whose campaign she feuded with earlier in the year over race and gender issues.

Ferraro didn't add much to the Democratic ticket in 1984, but she just might be what the Republicans need to get through another hour of prime time convention coverage without alienating most of America.

With Lieberman and Ferraro on board, McCain would have the support of two out of the four living failed Democratic Vice Presidential nominees, and would only need John Edwards and Sargent Shriver to complete the set. (Mondale actually won in '76, so he doesn't count.)

Getting the endorsements of Edwards or Shriver is probably a bridge too far. Although on the off-chance McCain was able to build an insurmountable lead on Obama before the convention, Edwards could surely be convinced to jump ship with some flimsy promise of a "poverty tour." McCain might also try to get Arnold Schwarzenegger, a fellow member of the super exclusive popular Republican club, to lean on Shriver, who happens to be the action-star-turned-governor's father-in-law.

But two out of four ain't bad. In fact the slogan for the 2008 Republican Convention could be "Now With the Support of 50 Percent of the Living Failed Democratic Nominees for Vice President."

Anyone have a better one?

Joementum revisted

I was going over some of my old posts and I came across one I wrote in August about Joe Lieberman, right before he lost his own party's primary for the Senate seat he had held for three terms to Ned Lamont. (Remember that poor sap?)

In light of recent reports that Lieberman, who still prevailed with ease in the general election, is considering switching parties -- which would swing the Senate back into Republican control -- I couldn't help but link the old post because so far it has been quite prescient.

I'll try not to be this lazy and self-referential in the future. It shouldn't be hard. Usually it suits me to keep the wacky predictions I made well buried.

Follow the link for pure unadulterated battle tested wisdom.

Joementum suddenly real like a slap in the face

Joe Lieberman's ability to go from a Sore Loserman spoiler to a Rovian front-runner in a matter of days -- if not hours -- has left observers wondering what other super powers this new Indie Joe possesses.

Beyond a second poll that shows Lieberman with a clear lead over Ned Lamont, Lieberman has a 53 percent approval rating in Connecticut. A higher percentage than Russ Feingold, John Kerry or Dick Durbin have in their respective states.

With Lieberman jumping out in front, and a fifty-fifty split in the Senate looking like one of the more probable November 3rd scenarios, I wonder how long it is going to be before the prominent Democrats who lined up for Lamont last week hedge their bets or even venture into the void of the middle and endorse the Joe they know.

It will be a hoot to see what the senator-counting netroots do if their party-by-default turns its back on the candidate not named Joe. I will be so bold as to predict nasty words posted on blogs and message boards.

The early lead and overall majority is nice, but Lieberman still dances a dangerous bi-partisan dance. The key for Lamont's campaign is in making the 35 percent of Connecticut Democrats who support Lieberman uncomfortable that their guy is also being supported by 75 percent of state Republicans and an extremely unpopular president.

Doable, but they should be a concerned that, despite all the focus on the race and the war in Iraq, it hasn't been done.

Late word is that popular actress Nicole Kidman has endorsed the Lieberman line on the War on Terror.

More evidence of Joementum gone wild.

Europe, still the sophistication capital of the world

What happens, here in the States, is one political party or candidate will fire an over-the-top, vitriolic attack at the other party or candidate. In response, the aggrieved will express shock, shock at such unfair rhetorical excess.

It was once custom for the aggrieved to wait a certain period of time -- so as to claim moral high ground -- before launching an over-the-top vitriolic attack of their own and continuing the cycle.

Lately that "certain period of time" has been reduced to however long it takes to process the assault and formulate an equally venomous comeback. Yet, surprisingly, moral high ground is often still claimed. A wary public asks "when will it end."

I have no answer to that question, but I do have a pretty good idea as to what will come next in the battle to see what political "team" can out-slime the other.

It started in more of a geopolitical context when, a few months back, a British tabloid printed a photo of German Chancellor Angela Merkel changing out of her bathing suit. A century ago this would have triggered world war, but in the new, neutered European Union Germany could only strike back at England by printing unflattering photographs of England's soccer captain David Beckham's family.

Last week, France incorporated this development into domestic politics when French tabloids printed photographs of socialist presidential hopeful Segolene Royal sporting a bikini. Soon enough a bathing suit shot of her likely conservative opponent, Nicolas Sarkozy, surfaced. Now French papers were able to run both images and allow potential voters to compare and contrast.

All reports point to Royal and Sarkozy being in-shape and stylish. British Prime Minister Tony Blair didn't fare as well this weekend when a photograph of him vacationing on a boat in Barbados, while his countrymen camped in Heathrow Airport, prompted the headline "Bold and Defiant. Well, the Trunks Are."

In the interest of equal time the British papers also critiqued the bathing suit choices and grooming habits of Tory head David Cameron.

When exactly this new trend for flesh in politics will cross the Atlantic, I don't know. But given our current political climate it will get nasty quickly.

In light of this, I've heard Independent Joe Lieberman has hired a personal trainer and is spending as much time on his abs as he is on the campaign trail.

Lieberman crashes own website, releases Indie Joe

Joementum lives in defeat. A new independent, but possibly less ironic, type of Joementum the world has never seen.

I predict this edgy, Indie Joe will have something to nod his liberated, yellow head about when the first three-way poll comes out a day or so from now. Whether that sticks and he follows through with a vengeful plot to destroy the D that abandoned him remains to be seen.

In my last post I stated "websites don't hack themselves." Literally, I'm still correct. But it appears the Lieberman campaign, not Lamont's web-savvy supporters, bears ultimate responsibility for joe2006.com's collapse yesterday -- and not in a jsb-approved Rovian way.

Rumor has it, camp Lieberman didn't know they needed to purchase extra bandwidth to keep the site up as the election neared and interest spiked.

Last week when another Senator, Ted Stevens, proudly told a Senate subcommittee the internet wasn't "A big truck" but instead a "series of tubes," smarty pants all over mocked the simple analogy from a man so old and Alaskan he was once married to a Polar Bear.

Well, if Lieberman's fancy Eastern Seaboard, Ivy League campaign had been able to evolve their thinking from big truck to series of tubes, joe2006.com wouldn't have gone down yesterday.

First the internet attacked Joe. Then the internet confused Joe. But it could be Joe that ends up teaching the internet a valuable lesson in Joementum.

The next team Lieberman brings in better grab all the "tubes" they can get their hands on in anticipation of the political event of season.

It's election day in Connecticut

Writing in the Wall Street Journal in support of Joe Lieberman, Ex-Clinton White House consul Lanny Davis dropped the McCarthyism bomb on the liberal blogsphere this morning. The liberal blogsphere struck back by hacking Joe Lieberman's campaign website.

I'm far from sure about the second part -- but websites don't hack themselves.

A few months ago I predicted message board content on political blogs was going to become an electoral issue. Now we have Lanny Davis reprinting, in an attempt to shame his own party and defend his friend, vicious anti-Lieberman message board entries originally posted on prominent liberal political blogs.

Davis compares the most extreme, usually anonymous voices in the liberal blogsphere to Ann Coulter and Russ Limbaugh.

He is wrong. They are not like Coulter or Limbaugh, who are somewhat reigned in by corporate responsibility and their own name, however good one thinks that might be.

In terms of "sanctimony and vitriol" there is not an equivalent voice on the right to these anti-American and increasingly anti-Semitic screeds. Or at least not one leaving foot prints on forums that log hundreds of thousand of views daily and often support specific candidates for office.

This time tomorrow these forums and the reckless rants they host could be a little more mainstream.

Caveat emptor.

Joe -- by the skin of his yellow country teeth

It appears the Junior Senator from Connecticut has run out of senatorial primary Joementum.

I've always liked Lieberman, largely because I find the phrase "Joementum" pleasing to speak or write. I am grateful his 36 year political ascent has added it to the lexicon. (And acknowledge it is often used sarcastically.)

Once Lieberman loses on Tuesday there will be much speculation on his next move.

Lieberman can be Machiavellian, as evidenced by his insistence on remaining on the Connecticut senate ballot while he was running for Vice-President. A decision that guaranteed Joe would have an important job come that January, but doomed his party's hope of regaining the Senate.

I'm also under the impression, despite his amiable demeanor, a cruel and unforgiving, Old-Testament-Joe lurks in Lieberman. That in mind, this is what I see going down:

After losing the primary, Lieberman enters the race as an independent, prevailing with relative ease in a three-way race. The Democrats pick up the six seats they need to capture the Senate, but Joe's decision to caucus with the GOP swings the tie-breaker to Cheney and denies the donkeys the subpoena power they are so giddy for. Lieberman further infuriates his old mates by becoming the first man to run for vice-president as a Democrat and a Republican.

The '08 election comes down to a close race in Florida. The McCain/Lieberman ticket prevails because of an unprecedented number of conservative voters in Palm Beach County -- a surge this time attributed to Lieberman's popularity there.

Once he becomes Vice President, Lieberman uses his executive privilege to force notorious Joe-hater Markos Moulitsas spend at least four years looking at himself in the mirror while reading the endless barrage of rants that appear on his popular political weblog.

On the off-chance this doesn't happen, I would recommend Lieberman spend his new free time doing something about his teeth. I think he may be under the impression his jaundiced hue camouflages his yellow teeth.

It doesn't.

Unless there is some sort of Talmudic provision against them, I suggest Crest White Strips.

Bonus video from the post title.