The spin has begun, but so has some serious reflection. Our good friend Joe Gandelman put together some thoughts:

Democratic voters in Connecticut sent the Democratic party establishment, President George Bush and — to be sure — Joe Lieberman a strong and angry message. They want a more assertive brand of partisanship. And they also indicated that bipartisanship has a limit: it's unacceptable if it's perceived to be cooperating with and "enabling" the political enemy or bashing your own side. Bush's kissing Lieberman was the kiss of death among many Democratic voters, as was Lieberman's lecture to Democrats about the need to support the Commander in Chief. Problem: this Commander in chief was perceived to be mega-partisan.

Its hard to disagree with this view, but its just as obvious that this is bad for the party as a whole--the big tent party is now the Studio 54 party.

Don't count Joe Lieberman out. He did not lose by a landslide. If he runs as an independent and get substantial independent and Republican support he has a good chance of winning....if last night's vote tallies hold. Some polls had suggested Lieberman is more popular among Republicans than Democrats .

This underscores the rather silly triumphalism of the far-left. 20% of register Democrat voters turned out to vote in the primary (280,000 voters), nearly splitting down the middle, which means that Lamont has 10% of the Democrats in the bag--not a very impressive start for the general election, particularly since his support is overwhelming rich liberals and he's tapped out that well.

Lieberman could very well take on Schlessinger and Lamont and come out a convincing winner in November.

Lamont must broaden his appeal if he wants to win in the general election. He can't win if he doesn't expand his support beyond the segments of his party that supported him, anti-war Democrats and Democrats whose prime priority was to send Bush a strong message.

Hard to see how Lamont can do that since so much attention has already been placed--at the behest of the candidate himself, on a single issue--the war. Had Lieberman dropped out, Lamont could plausibly change focus, but he's stuck with fighting the same election on a larger battlefield.

The "netroots" — dubbed the "nutroots" by some conservative bloggers — cannot be dismissed as a laughing matter today. The liberal blogs were credited with putting Howard Dean on the political map in 2004 but that feat seemed to lack a major component: turning Internet financial, moral and organizational support into a winning campaign. Dean flamed out as well as screamed out in the primaries. THIS time, there was a win. So it is no longer accurate to say these blogs raise money and only emit political hot air. A candidate they supported and worked for won. Look for the power and influence of these blogs to INCREASE within the Democratic party now.

Joe seems to suggest that some had dismissed netroots as a laughing matter--I don't see where that is the case. Democrats have been playing to the left since Howard Dean's surprising performance, and conservatives have been watching the situation quite intensely. "Rightroots" seeks to emulate netroots in most respects, and imitation is always the sincerest form of flattery.

This is all about the struggle within the Democrat party itself to assert control. Will the moderates or the far left call the tune? Up until now, elite Democrats have been respectful of the newly aggressive liberal wing of the party, but still convinced that the ultimate electoral power lay with the moderates. "Neddy's" win in the primary hasn't really changed that dynamic, but will require politicians with national ambitions to recalibrate their rhetoric.

Life just got a lot more difficult for Evan Bayh and other moderate presidential hopefuls...

A key unanswered (and vital) question is how many Democrats who don't agree with Lamont are turned off and feel read out of the Democratic party. Is Lieberman's defeat and Lamont's victory a harbinger of a new direction for the Democratic party with many parts of the party on the same page — or the beginning of a self-defeating split that will cause the Democrats to grab defeat from the jaws of victory in November? People are split on this question; and their answer usually gives an indicator of who they wanted to win in this race.

This is one battle in a larger war. Democrats will be struggling for the soul of the party until they actually win back power. The bottom-line is that the netroots have performed the equivilent of kidnapping a couple of soldiers and launching some rockets into enemy territory--it has captured some attention, but the meaningful battle is still ahead.

Ultimately, netroots has to not just win real elections (not just primaries), but political power. As it stands, netroots is a threat, not a path to power.

E.J. Dionne's column reverbrated with me after my perplexity over the views of some on the right that "Israel lost the war".

Militarily of course, that view is ridiculous, but we being so many political junkies, we can't help but view things in terms of propaganda victories and defeats--afterall, this is a democracy and people presumably vote based on what they think or have been led to think. In our world, perception is reality, or rather perception gets converted to reality. Convince Americans that we've lost the war in Iraq and --bingo! We lose the war in Iraq.

Yet Dionne's column highlights the maddening reality of American politics--Democrats consistently win the propaganda war ("owning" virtually all the media helps...), and yet consistently lose elections.

Democrats in particular have bought into the perception-is-reality myth that when reality slaps 'em upside the head after yet another lost election, they resort to fabulous conspiracy theories about electronic voting machines, disenfranchised black voters, bought-and-paid-for Supreme Courts and other patent nonsense. In 2004, the confidence in perception was so overwhelming that when Florida exit polls diverged significantly from the actual election results, they instantaneously assumed there was something wrong with the election. For reasons I'll never understand, they simply could not conceive how or why exit polls would be manipulated, even though Democrats have long made an art of manipulating polls to get "the right answer".

Even among the right, reliance on perception is not unknown. I've read several conservative blogs over the weekend that declared Israel the loser simply on the basis of Arab and left-wing media elan.

Yet Dionne has uncovered a larger truth that applies to the Israel-Hezbollah conflict as well as it does to American politics--the rhetoric is not the reality.

...The odd result is that Republicans, who defend individualism in theory, act like communitarians where their party is concerned. Democrats claim to be more community-minded but act like radical individualists in their penchant for candidate-centered, one-cause-at-a-time politics.

The organizational gap has spurred national Democrats to countermeasures. Emanuel has hired Michael Whouley, one of his party's premier organizers, to create turnout programs in the 40 most contested congressional races. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee's two top staffers, J.B. Poersch and Guy Cecil, have long experience in field operations. The unions are kicking up their turnout efforts. And an anti-incumbent tide against the Republicans could counter the GOP's organizational advantages.

But Republicans -- from President Bush on down -- have long dismissed the fashionable claptrap about political parties becoming meaningless. If Democrats are to shed their self-image problem and create a durable majority, they, too, will have to learn to operate as a party.

Organization isn't sexy. It doesn't make your emotions soar like a good rousing speech or moral cause, but it wins elections--predictably, regularly.

Organization is a "facts-on-the-ground" reality that no amount of perception can change. Historically, very historically, the Celts were technologically and militarily the equals if not the superiors of the Romans. The had effective iron weapons and tactics. What they didn't have was the organizational genius of the Romans. The Celtic chieftain Vercingetorix managed to unite, with much difficulty, the celtic tribes to confront the Romans, but in the end, Rome's organizational advantages were the decisive factor in not just defeating the Celts, but keeping them under their thumb for half a millenium.

Dionne may hope and pray for victory this fall, but give him credit--he knows that long-term, the Republican organization advantage is going to be decisive in creating a long term political hegemony.

Similarly, Hezbollah, Iran and Syria can push their narrative all they want, but in the end, the rhetoric is meaningless. What will count are hard facts. The inescapable facts are that south Lebanon is a ruin and Hezbollah is greatly diminished. That may not be a permanent condition, but a lot of things will have to go right for Hezbollah and their sponsors. They are now relying on the good will of their rivals in Lebanon (and they are such nice people...), and the absence of competition from Israel, the U.S. and the numerous Sunni Arab states in filling the power gap.

Good luck with that.

And to the Democrats too...

As in every election cycle, the Democrats promise to win, and jittery conservative pundits feel they might. The effect is a virtual tsumani of media opinion that "the Republicans are in real trouble" this November.

You don't see me writing that and here's why.

Most obviously, the Democrats always promise to win--and always lose. That in itself isn't determinative, but along with the predictable rhetoric are the predictable structural, or should I say "cultural" problems within the Democrat party. Thing don't appear to change from cycle to cycle, so why should I expect different results?

Beyond that, there are some simple "realities" that drive election outcomes far more strongly than current opinion on theoretical subjects like the Iraq war (ask yourself, what do you really know about what's going on in Iraq?).

Those realities tend to be persistent over several election cycles because it takes time for a new generation to arise and for a region's economic and demographic profile to change. Similarly, issues with a broad, generalized effect can skew the patterns for one party or the other--war favors Republicans, peace favors Democrats.

There has been lots of talk about the Gingrich "Contract with America" and the 40 seats or so that changed hands in 1996, but the suddenness of that tidal change was more an issue with the media's habit of chasing the hot story of the moment, and ignoring trends that occur over longer periods. Republicans had been building a majority party since the late seventies, but the effort's visible fruits were only evident in the early to middle nineties.

The Democrats have had no such effort, until very recently. Perhaps in 20 years or so, we will see Democrat majorities again, but don't bother marking it on your calendar.

So what about the polls that predict a wipeout this November?

Jay Cost, a doctoral candidate at the University of Chicago, enlightens the willing student.

Currently - the average June/July Gallup generic ballot of "national adults" shows the Democrats leading the GOP 51.8% to 38.4%. If we take only the people who are registering a party preference (what is known as the "two-party vote"), we can see that the Gallup generic ballot shows the Democrats leading 57.4% to 42.6% among people who prefer either the Democrats or the Republicans. That amounts to a very hefty 14.8% lead.

But this does not factor in the skew.

Historically speaking, when the Democrats have that kind of edge in June/July, by November their victory in the popular vote "shrinks" to a much more modest 51.75% to 48.25%.

In other words, today's Gallup generic ballot does not predict a Democratic blow-out. Not at all. It predicts another squeaker on the order of Bush v. Kerry. Bush's share of the two-party vote in 2004 was 51.2%. Kerry's was 48.8%. Michael Barone's "49-49 Nation," if you believe the generic ballot, has not actually gone anywhere. This year will be Round 3.

I'd recommend reading the entire article to understand the mechanics of the skew, but basically it comes down to the fact that polls always include a lot of people who say that they'll vote but won't. So why do they skew so reliably to the Democrats?

I think that the reason for both violations relates to the presence of non-voters who are registering a party preference. We know two things about non-voters that are relevant for this discussion - they are more inclined to the Democrats than voters are, and they know less about politics than voters do. This could make all the difference.

That's a polite way of saying that dummies and slackers tend to be Democrats. Oh, I'm so sorry, that was rude.

The generic polls means precisely nothing. What does mean something are factors like encumbency, money, organization and candidate quality. There have been some small stories out there that I think have a highly predictive value--particularly as it concerns the condition of the Republican party. For all the worry that Republicans were fractionalizing, not much sign of it survives today. In the words of one author--Republicans are "like a rock". There isn't the drama and bluster that always seems to follow the Democrats, but Republicans are decided, organized, determined and ready--and they have a lot of money--huge amounts dwarfing the Democrat war chest.

The Democrats on the other hand, are failing to bring some fundamentals to the table--like quality candidates. Candidate quality is huge in an election mainly for what it says about the chances of winning. Quality candidates usually wait for an opportunity to win, since losing isn't much of an asset to an ambitious political career. When they do run, they usually have excellent support from the party and a whole whack of cash on hand. Here in Utah, Jim Matheson, son of the popular former Democrat governor (huge statue of him in the justice building in Salt Lake), was a quality candidate biding his time for a grab at the brass ring. Perennial candidate Merrill Kook, I mean Cook (ten races, eight losses), lost the Republican primary after two mercurial terms in Congress to Derek W. Smith, a self-financing political neophyte. For Matheson, it was the dinner bell, and he handily won the race in a heavily Republican district. Looking over the this year's candidate slate for the Democrat party and its almost uniformly a bunch of party hack placeholders.

There are a number of other factors, incumbency not the least of them, that strongly suggest that we will be seeing pretty much the status quo come this November.

As for me, I'm looking forward to more people wearing trash cans on their heads during the post-election recriminations.

Every election, Democrats insist they are going to recapture the House and the Senate.

They promised it in 2000.

They promised it in 2002.

They promised it in 2004.

Forgive me if I remain dubious of the breathless media reports and assurances by Crat pols that this time--they really mean it.

its funny how polls get reported when they look good for Democrats, and then ignored when the news is less salutory.

The surprising findings in a little-noticed Gallup Poll that were ignored by most of the national news media shows the Democrats barely leading the Republicans by just two points -- 47 percent to 45 percent. After months of generic polling numbers by Gallup and others showing the GOP lagged far behind the Democrats by a seemingly insurmountable nine to 10 points, the titanic political battle for control of Congress is virtually dead even. This means we may not experience the feared Category 5 political storm some election analysts have forecast that would topple the GOP's House majority and cut deeply into its grip on the Senate. The venerable and respected Gallup organization, which did the poll for USA Today, said the GOP's unexpected rise in the polls "represents the Republicans' best performance in a single poll during the 2006 election cycle on this important measure of electoral strength." In an analysis accompanying its findings last week, Gallup said, "The Republican increase does appear to be significant."

The news is even worse for Democrats than this poll suggest, because Democrats routinely poll 5 points better than they actually perform according to a long-established pattern..

I keep hearing a lot of talk of the political environment doesn't favor Republicans--really? The Gallup polls results are perhaps attributable to the foiled terror attacks. The economy is great, and gas prices are headed down. What exactly is so bad about this political environment.

What is so fascinating in all of this hand-wringing by some conservatives and elation by some Democrats, is that its all driven by polls taken in August. I seem to remember that Kerry was also a shoo-in through the summer and that similarly, Bush pulled even and then ahead in early September. From the Guardian; June 11, 2004

In a two-way contest, Mr Kerry leads Mr Bush by 51% to 44%. In a three-way race that includes the independent, Ralph Nader, Mr Kerry leads 48% to 42%, with Mr Nader on 4%. Mr Kerry's prospects have been boosted by the fact that a growing proportion of Americans - about 60% - believe the country is on the wrong track. It is the highest figure recorded by an LA Times poll during the Bush presidency.

Well, we all know how that turned out...

Rick Santorum was supposed to be dead meat a couple of months ago--18 points down. He's now in single digit striking range with momentum iin his favor. A lot can change in a few weeks and no doubt, a lot will.

I'll continue to stick by my earlier assessments--Republicans keep it all, but give up a few seats.

It occurs to me that Democrat love Hollywood and Hollywood loves Democrats because they both love the facade--the illusion of substance without all the hassle of actually having to put in the time and effort.

Case in point--the Crat attack on the economy.

Back Talk saves me the time in debunking the wage and productivity gap.

Essentially what the Crats are promising is a return to the dot.com age--the greatest economic mirage since the 1920s. To quote Atrios--how did that work out?

I think the economy is a great issue to run on when there actually is a bad economy, but talking down a good economy, much less a great economy is highly problematic. The economy as a political issue works because its personal, immediate and real. Unfortunately for the Democrats, their version of the "bad economy" is abstract, and its hard to motivate people who aren't already on a mission from God.

Interestingly, almost all of the Democrats issues are like this--abstractions. I find it interesting that the Democrats want to focus on Iraq--an abstraction for your average American, particularly in the liberal Northeast where military service is not exactly common. On the other hand, Bush and the Republicans are focusing on the war on terror, which for most Americans, feels deeply personal.

In my opinion, the furor within the Democrat party over the war on terror is all about the fact that they've lost the emotional high ground. They had so desperately hoped that issues like health care would be the burning issue of our times, but fate, or should we say gross negligence intervened.

We're going to continue to see the polls and pundits forecast yet another glorious Democrat victory just as we did in the previous three election cycles, but I don't think we can ignore the central reality that the Crats only have abstractions to work with and no real alternatives to the policies current in place.

I remain underwhelmed.

I chuckled a bit when I read Joe Gandelman's warning that the Crats have lost their steam. Gandelman is, like the blog says, a moderate Democrat, and so reality is creeping leftward. What I find curious is the lack of anger at Democrats blowing an advantage variously described as a tsunami, a sea change, etc...

Is it really just bad luck that this happens every election cycle?

What should be very obvious to anyone consistently following political news is that the left and their media lapdogs can't be taken seriously in their election prognostications.

There is of course some rather cynical manipulation of the news, but the larger problem is simply that Democrats have just terrible political judgment. A case in point is the candidacy of Keith Elison, a muslim with close ties with Louis Farrakan and a record an racist sentiment. Elison won the DFL primary in Minnesota's fifth district and not surprisingly, the poop is hitting the fan.

Why is the Excuse Brigade pouring so much energy into Ellison's defense? Any other candidate with half this record would likely be persona non grata in any political party.

The truth is plain, if unpalatable. Many are willing to overlook Ellison's record because they are breathless with excitement at the chance to send the first Muslim -- and the first black Minnesotan -- to Congress.

Ellison's candidacy may be a defining moment for the DFL. Is this the new face of the party of Hubert Humphrey? Heavy hitters such as Walter Mondale and Mayor R.T. Rybak have endorsed Ellison, and DFL fundraisers extraordinaire Sam and Sylvia Kaplan have raised big bucks for him.

The question of the hour is this: Is Ellison's DFL also the party of Amy Klobuchar and Mike Hatch? We have six weeks to find out.

Various media flacks and DFL spokespersons are doing their best to spin Ellison's record as an anti-semite, anti-white extremist, but the real question has to be why bother with such an uphill battle--don't they have any other less troublesome candidates?

Incompetence, plain and simple.

On Friday, the Wallstreet Journal had an OpEd from Howard Dean talking about how the country needs a Democrat congress to fight the war on terror, "and to end the war on America's families". (available subscription only).

Its a litany of how terrible things are in this country under the Republicans--you know the drill, but what really caught my attention was this:

Democrats offer America a new direction in fiscal policy, for the middle class, and in the war in Iraq. We believe that America should work for everyone:

We will restore honesty in government, starting with the pay-as-you- go discipline in Congress that served Mr. Clinton so well. Balancing the Federal budget will be a high priority with concurrent limitation of spending. We will ease the burdens on middle class Americans and reverse Republican cuts in college tuition aid and health care. We will ensure that a retirement with dignity is the right and expectation of every single American, including pension reform, and preventing the privatization of social security.

We will dramatically expand support of energy independence in order to generate large numbers of new American jobs and reduce our dependence on foreign oil. We will have a jobs agenda that includes good jobs that stay in America, a higher minimum wage and trade policies that benefit the global labor force, not just multinational corporations.

We will have a defense policy that is tough and smart, starting with phased redeployment of our troops in Iraq, and shore up our efforts to attack al Qaeda and fight the war on terror. We also will close the gaps in our security here at home by implementing the 9/11 Commission recommendations.

We are ready to lead with a thoughtful, fiscally responsible long- term vision. We will reach out to all Americans who value hope over fear and begin moving the country forward again.

Hey great stuff, but where the plan? It seems to me that the Democrats were promising a plan before the 2006 elections and Dean reminded me that I haven't actually seen a plan. The plan was suppose to come out in the Spring, then the late summer and then....nothing.

Is the "new fiscal policy" raising taxes? Just a guess.

What is this retiring with dignity about? I seem to recall that Democrats were extremely proud of blocking Bush's attempt to reform social security and now they have their own plan? Why haven't I heard more details? Let me guess again--does it involve raising taxes?

Does Pay-as-you-go mean that Democrats go on spending and we get to pay for it? No one is particularly happy with the spendthrift Republican Congress, but I doubt anyone is under the illusion that the party of big government actually wants to spend less money.

Can I really expect honesty from people who lie to my face everyday? Who make promises but refuse to tell me what their "plan" is to accomplish heaven-on-earth is? Can I really expect honesty from Harry Reid whose taken more money from Abramoff than just about anyone else in Congress? Maybe I'm just too cynical, but I'm having a hard time associating the concept of honesty with the Democrats which always seemed more like the mafia than a political party.

What does being "smart and tough" on the war on terror mean? Can I have some details? Does it involve cutting? Does it involve running?

What Dean and the Democrats are offering, near as I can tell (because they won't tell, will they?) is a bridge back to the 1970s. Every discredited policy of the past is new again for the gang that can't shoot straight.

The day after the elections, when the Democrats have failed yet again to regain "their" power, there will the usual recriminations, the usual discussion about how the Democrats are intellectually bankrupt and of course the accusations of dirty tricks, conspiracy and other machinations to rob the Democrats of their rightful place as our masters and rulers.

In the end, they will change nothing consequential and 2008 will be more of the same. Its sad really--we could really use a second party with some good alterate ideas.

Over at the Huffington Post, where one would expect fist-pumping ephoria over Clinton "fighting back" against the "right-wing conspiracy", not everyone is impressed. Nora Ephron writes:

So Bill Clinton was sandbagged by Chris Wallace. By Chris Wallace? And he lost it. And he wasted a television appearance - when he could have been talking about taking back Congress - talking about (no surprise) Bill Clinton. Poor Bill Clinton. The victim of Fox News, the media arm of the right-wing conspiracy. The man who went after Bin Laden and was accused of wagging the dog. "I tried," he said. I tried? How lame is that? I haven't been able to listen to that since the sixties, when Werner Erhard, of all people, became famous for demolishing that excuse. When people said "I tried" to Werner Erhard, he would put a glass on a table and say to them, "Try to pick that up."

How does it happen? How does one of the smartest men ever elected president end up sandbagged by Chris Wallace? Is this what one docudrama does to the guy? I don't think so. I'm afraid this is classic Clinton, Clinton the monologist, Clinton the guy who used to keep his White House houseguests up until 4 a.m. while he went on and on about what the press was doing to him. What a waste. On top of which: Clinton calls George Bush "43"? Is he so confused about his role in the Bush family constellation that he has adopted their nicknames for one another?

It never occured to me that Wallace might be considered a wimp journalist. A real wimp journalist would never have asked the question in the first place. Its simply remarkable how much the left hate a single cable news channel with a fraction of the audience the broadcast networks have. I think the Clinton conniption resonates so much with the left because both the president and the far left can't stand to be challenged. They remind me of Islamic radicals protesting the popes un-PC-like but completely accurate comments on the nature of Islam.

All the coverage to this point is about Clinton's outburst, not the content of what he said, which in my view is a good indication that Clinton failed in his bid to rebut the narrative on his accountability for 9/11.

Nevertheless, the content is what is going to ultimately cause him the biggest problems.

In the panel discussion of Fox News Sunday, Chris Wallace debunks Clinton's persecution complex by pointing out that he had indeed asked Donald Rumsfeld why bin Laden wasn't a higher priority pre-9/11.

As I stated in my earlier post, I though Clinton would regret pointing the Fox News audience towards Richard Clarke as an authoritive source on the Clinton administration's actions, attitudes and plans for bin Laden.

On a background briefing in 2002 to a number of reporters, including Fox News' Jim Angle, Clarke said the following:

RICHARD CLARKE: Actually, I've got about seven points, let me just go through them quickly. Um, the first point, I think the overall point is, there was no plan on Al Qaeda that was passed from the Clinton administration to the Bush administration.

Clinton implied that Clarke was completely reliable, so I guess that means we have to take him at his word.

As to Clinton's attempt to create the inference that the Bush administration demoted the best guy on terrorism (Clarke):

QUESTION: What is your response to the suggestion in the [Aug. 12, 2002] Time [magazine] article that the Bush administration was unwilling to take on board the suggestions made in the Clinton administration because of animus against the — general animus against the foreign policy?

CLARKE: I think if there was a general animus that clouded their vision, they might not have kept the same guy dealing with terrorism issue. This is the one issue where the National Security Council leadership decided continuity was important and kept the same guy around, the same team in place. That doesn't sound like animus against uh the previous team to me.

JIM ANGLE: You're saying that the Bush administration did not stop anything that the Clinton administration was doing while it was making these decisions, and by the end of the summer had increased money for covert action five-fold. Is that correct?

CLARKE: All of that's correct.

Clarke was confronted with this interview during his testimony before the 9/11 commission and explained it by saying that he was lying. Clarke has changed his mind on a variety of issues as time as passed, including whether there was any link between Saddam and al Qaeda. The bombing of the al Shifa pharmaceutical was at his behest, with the explanation that the plant was a joint venture between Saddam and bin Laden. Yet in an interview in March of 2004, Clarke denied there was any suppport for al Qaeda from Iraq. Incredibily, only weeks later, he reaffirmed the link between al Qaeda, Iraq and the al Shifa plant during his testimony before the 9/11 commission.

Can we believe anything Clarke says? I guess it depends on what you want to believe. I suppose Clinton hopes you'll read the statements by Clarke favorable of his actions, and ignore the rest, like this:

QUESTION: Had the Clinton administration in any of its work on this issue, in any of the findings or anything else, prepared for a call for the use of ground forces, special operations forces in any way? What did the Bush administration do with that if they had?

CLARKE: There was never a plan in the Clinton administration to use ground forces. The military was asked at a couple of points in the Clinton administration to think about it. Um, and they always came back and said it was not a good idea. There was never a plan to do that.

Byron York has an excellent article on what precisely Richard Clarke's book actually says, and rather than exonerate Clinton, its a devastating indictment.

But Clarke’s book does not, in fact, support Clinton’s claim. Judging by Clarke’s sympathetic account — as well as by the sympathetic accounts of other former Clinton aides like Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon — it’s not quite accurate to say that Clinton tried to kill bin Laden. Rather, he tried to convince — as opposed to, say, order — U.S. military and intelligence agencies to kill bin Laden. And when, on a number of occasions, those agencies refused to act, Clinton, the commander-in-chief, gave up.

One particular point that York pulled out of the book really hit me.

Because of the intensity of the political opposition that Clinton engendered, he had been heavily criticized for bombing al Qaeda camps in Afghanistan, for engaging in ‘Wag the Dog’ tactics to divert attention from a scandal about his personal life. For similar reasons, he could not fire the recalcitrant FBI Director who had failed to fix the Bureau or to uncover terrorists in the United States. He had given the CIA unprecedented authority to go after bin Laden personally and al Qaeda, but had not taken steps when they did little or nothing. Because Clinton was criticized as a Vietnam War opponent without a military record, he was limited in his ability to direct the military to engage in anti-terrorist commando operations they did not want to conduct. He had tried that in Somalia, and the military had made mistakes and blamed him. In the absence of a bigger provocation from al Qaeda to silence his critics, Clinton thought he could do no more. (page 225, "Against All Enemies")

I'm sure glad that Bush didn't let political opposition derail his anti-terror efforts.

Ahmadinejad has Hezbollah and Hama, the Democrats have CIA insurgents.

Its campaign season and the leaks are coming fast and furious from the plotters in the CIA.

From the leaker-pimp, er-r-r the New York Times

The intelligence estimate, completed in April, is the first formal appraisal of global terrorism by United States intelligence agencies since the Iraq war began, and represents a consensus view of the 16 disparate spy services inside government. Titled “Trends in Global Terrorism: Implications for the United States,’’ it asserts that Islamic radicalism, rather than being in retreat, has metastasized and spread across the globe.

Radicalism is an ideology and its growth is really little surprise to me. The really contentious issue is of course attributing the growth of radicalism to the U.S. presence in Iraq (oddly enough, no mention of the U.S. presence in Afghanistan, which I guess must be OK with the radicals...)

For more than two years, there has been tension between the Bush administration and American spy agencies over the violence in Iraq and the prospects for a stable democracy in the country. Some intelligence officials have said the White House has consistently presented a more optimistic picture of the situation in Iraq than justified by intelligence reports from the field.

Would those officials be Democrats? Valerie Plame's coworkers?

What should be clear from the 9/11 commission in that analysts have opinions, often incorrect opinions. Specifically I see no reason to lend credence to "intelligence analysts" who would leak their views to the pimp--how am I supposed to divorce the "informed opinion" from the politics?

The allegation that our presence in Iraq creates terrorists strikes me as unbelievably silly when we've seen riots over rumors--just rumors over flushed Korans, newspaper cartoons and papal remarks.

Muslims appear to be extraordinarily easy to radicalize, and Iraq doesn't seem to have a disportionately large impact on the collective martyrdom impulse of people with nothing better to do or to hope for.

It could be successfully argued that the biggest contribution to Islamic radicalism missonary effort is the internet. It stands to reason that if Iraq is making radicalism a bigger problem, then we should perhaps shut down the internet and cell phone networks too.

On the other hand, this could be a "good" leak in the sense that it produces a worthwhile discussion--if the growth of radical Islamist ideology is the problem, the clearly you fight ideology with ideology. That is in fact what Iraq is about--fighting radicalism and general thuggery with a better alternative--democracy.

A democracy or two or three in the region is going to be the most powerful counterargument to Islamic radicalism that can be had.

As expected, Bush released the key findings of the NIE and guess what--the Democrats were lying to the American public again.

What a surprise.

Harry Reid is trying to cover his butt by demanding that the rest of the NIE be release--knowing full well it won't because the Republican administration actually cares about the war on terror and would prefer that the bad guys don't find out how we know what we know. I'd be disgusted, but its like changing diapers--its never pleasant, but you get used to it.

You can find the CIA pdf here

This is what was leaked:

Although we cannot measure the extent of the spread with precision, a large body of all-source reporting indicates that activists identifying themselves as jihadists, although a small percentage of Muslims, are increasing in both number and geographic dispersion..

Note it says jihadist--not al Qaeda. This does not, as I imagine some of the left infer, mean that the "jihadist" is a bomber, it refers to anyone expressing an overt sympathy to Jihadism, including by rhetoric alone.

This is what the Crats didn't want you to see:

Greater pluralism and more responsive political systems in Muslim majority nations would alleviate some of the grievances jihadists exploit. Over time, such progress, together with sustained, multifaceted programs targeting the vulnerabilities of the jihadist movement and continued pressure on al-Qa’ida, could erode support for the jihadists.

..which of course has been characteristic of the Bush plan. There are two key elements to damaging the ideological appeal of Jihadism--failure of Jihadist enterprises and alternatives to extremism, meaning of course economic opportunity. Not surprisingly, the Democrat's plan, or rather "plans" insures that Jihadism would be emboldened by our leaving Iraq and create significantly more jihadis by ensuring that Iraq goes back to starving. More importantly though, we know that failed states are sought-after bases for al Qaeda to conduct training and launch terror projects. The fantastic wealth of explosives, firearms and ammunition lying around all over Iraq are a bonanza al Qaeda would dearly love to get its hands on.

So can we expect that the obdurate Democrat far left is taking this NIE seriously? Do they view it as authoritive? Will they accept its key findings? Like this one?

The Iraq conflict has become the “cause celebre” for jihadists, breeding a deep resentment of US involvement in the Muslim world and cultivating supporters for the global jihadist movement. Should jihadists leaving Iraq perceive themselves, and be perceived, to have failed, we judge fewer fighters will be inspired to carry on the fight.

My guess? Not a chance.

Four underlying factors are fueling the spread of the jihadist movement: (1) Entrenched grievances, such as corruption, injustice, and fear of Western domination, leading to anger, humiliation, and a sense of powerlessness; (2) the Iraq “jihad;” (3) the slow pace of real and sustained economic, social, and political reforms in many Muslim majority nations; and (4) pervasive anti-US sentiment among most Muslims—; all of which jihadists exploit.

So how do you deal with problems with corruption, injustice, anger, humiliation and sense of powerlessness? How did we deal with it? That's right--democracy. So when you hear that Bush has no plan, you know its a damn lie.

What I found really interesting was this paragraph

Anti-US and anti-globalization sentiment is on the rise and fueling other radical ideologies. This could prompt some leftist, nationalist, or separatist groups to adopt terrorist methods to attack US interests. The radicalization process is occurring more quickly, more widely, and more anonymously in the Internet age, raising the likelihood of surprise attacks by unknown groups whose members and supporters may be difficult to pinpoint.

We judge that groups of all stripes will increasingly use the Internet to communicate, propagandize, recruit, train, and obtain logistical and financial support.

This is the dark side of a process that has been quite evident since the early nineties--the internet brings people together along very narrow lines of interest. No matter how esoteric your hobby is, the internet serves to create a global community almost instanteously. There is however a bright spot in this--the internet also makes it possible to track the activities of the cyber-jihadis and in most cases identify them as well. Its a key vunerability because there is simply no good alternative to the internet to form these virtual communities in the first place. Vigilance by law enforcement has a good chance to keep this part of the jihadis community off-balance and eventually deter jihadis wannabes from even making the attempt.

Nothing in the NIE is particularly surprising, unless you've been living in a fishbowl, which is probably a pretty fair description of much of the anti-Iraq-war constituency in this country. Facts are never interesting to ideologues.

George Allen sure seems to be having a hard time lately. First the Macaca kerfuffle, then the revelation that Allen is Jewish and a bigot to boot.

I have to wonder about all these people with clear recollections about what was said 35 years ago, which would be 1971. Can you remember what people said 35 years ago? Are you sure?

It looks to me that some of his former schoolmates may be a little envious of George and think this might be a good time to put a stick in his spokes.

Allen has had a pretty consistent 5 point lead on Webb throughout September, which is why this is coming out now--Webb desperately needs something to close the gap. Unfortunately, for the Democrats, Allen is a pretty likeable guy to begin with, and its doubtful these kinds of late accusations can dent Allen's long-term relationship with Virginia voters (the guy's been a Congressman, Governor and Senator...).

I was watching a bit of ABC News last night when Charlie Gibson intoned omniously that Washington expected a bombshell today about "undisclosed" ties between Abramoff and the White House.

You expect these things during an election season, but if this is the best the Democrats can do, then kudos to the Bush administration. No intern scandals, no leak scandals (expected in the moonbat's fevered imagination), no financial improprieties--and its been six years.

A little closer reading and the source for all these undisclosed contacts turns out to be the Abramoff billing records.

Its been established that Abramoff is a crook, but for some reason, Democrats are hailing his billing records are the model of corporate accounting. Jack Abramoff would never, ever overbill his clients for fictional meetings with White House staff, would he? Nah.

What's really funny though is that these are simply contacts by Abramoff's lobby firm--a distinction that Harry Reid thought was so important in his own extensive contacts with Abramoff's. You see Harry's contacts were "routine" as opposed to the Bush administration contacts, which are "nefarious"

The article mentions Abramoff associate Ronald Platt several times, describing him as a member of the "Democratic team" at Abramoff's firm, and quotes Reid spokesman Jim Manley saying that Reid met regularly with Platt to discuss policy issues. But while the story notes that Reid met with Platt in June 2001 to discuss the minimum wage bill, and reports that Platt "began billing for routine contacts and meetings with Reid's staff" in March 2001, it did not quote Platt at any point. Further, blogger Joshua Micah Marshall reported Platt's assertion that the AP reporters did not even attempt to contact him for the article.

Harry Reid of course, did not disclose any of this.

I am waiting to hear what the Democrats are going to say about the alleged Abramoff contacts with the Bush administration since it would only be fair for Reid to judged by the judgment by which he judges others...

Anybody who reads this blog regularly knows that I am not buying the whole "Democrats will take back the House" meme. There are lots of reasons not to believe it, not the least of which is that Democrats are always on the "brink of regaining power".

The polls keep suggesting that Republicans could be in for a historic drubbing. And their usual advantage--competence on national security--is constantly being challenged by new revelations about bungling in Iraq. But top Republican officials maintain an eerie, Zen-like calm. They insist that the prospects for their congressional candidates in November's midterms have never been as bad as advertised and are getting better by the day. Those are party operatives and political savants whose job it is to anticipate trouble. But much of the time they seem so placid, you wonder whether they know something.

Yeah--they know how elections are won.

The Democrats are simply hoping that the Republican voters don't show up this year, as attested to by Rahm Emmanuel's remark.

...G.O.P. voters have been more certain to vote than Democrats--meaning that the party tends to perform better than the final opinion polls suggest. Representative Rahm Emanuel of Illinois, head of the House Democrats' campaign committee, recently told TIME that gap had counted for as much as 5 to 7 points for the Republicans. But he thinks this election year might be different. "Their voters are unhappy," he says. "They're despondent about a failed President."

I always get a kick out of the Democrats propensity to make statements like this-as if they have the pulse of conservatives much less the country.

Hope is not a strategy, and Emmanuel must have gone white as a sheet when he saw this poll.

When you see Nancy Pelosi pumping her fist up and down out of concern for "children", you know the issue has jumped the shark.

A 17 year old young man is not a child, unless your a Democrat and you need to make political hay. Everybody seems to be either overeager to characterize this as pedophilia or terribly frightened that if they don't condemn it in the strongest terms then they'll alienate "values voters".

Lets be clear about this--these aren't altar boys. At seventeen you know enough to say "bug off creep" unless you don't want to, and clearly this was a two-way conversation. How many young men are sexually abstinent at this age? Having said that, Foley is guilty of precisely the same crime that Bill Clinton was--sexual exploitation of a subordinate.

Its wrong. Foley was right to resign, but flailing away at Hastert or pumping your fist self-righteously when your party derives a large part of its power base from the sexual permissiveness lobby is just too much. Lets face it--if Foley was a Democrat this would be par for the course (and they have the history to prove it..).

I think this whole thing has and will backfire on the Crats. Is the media talking about Woodward's book or Foley's shenanigans?

Right.

In the end, the Crats are still the party of partying, and the Republicans are still the family-values guys and in the meantime the Crats aren't getting their Iraq-is-a-disaster message out.

Curt at Flopping Aces has extensive analysis and commentary.

Blog P.I. breaks down the reaction in the conservative blogosphere.

Don Surber echoes me (or I echo him, anyways there is an echo...):

Let us get real as to what happened here: A 16-year-old boy was sent e-mails that made him feel creepy. Evidently, several other pages were sent more explicit messages. May I suggest that upper middle class minors approaching their 18th birthdays are not as vulnerable as some in the press are making them out to be and gosh, a few might have even heard of the word "ho-mo-sex-u-al-it-y."

John Hawkins rescues the Kossack apologetic for Gerry Studs from PC oblivion.

Here's part of the description of the Daily Kos's dkosopedia on Gerry Studs, a Democratic Congressman who had sex with a male page. This is the April version of the entry. Since the Foley scandal broke and the Democrats decided to use it as a political issue, there have been a series of edits and this section has been removed.

"On July 20, 1983, Gerry was censured for having an affair 10 years earlier with a male page. He...turned his back] as the charges against him were read. The anti-gay crew had worked hard to demonize him (as they would [[Barney Frank]] several years later over allegations of a male prostitute having clients in Frank's apartment). Gerry held a press conference with the page and admitted to a relationship. They each firmly stated that what had gone on in their bedroom was their business, and absolutely no one else's."

That's right, folks. According to the people at the Daily Kos before the Foley scandal, criticizing a Congressman for having sex with a 17 year old page was nothing but the, "anti-gay crew (working) hard to demonize him."

Now today, the very same liberals who have that morally bankrupt view are insisting that people like Dennis Hastert resign for not figuring out sooner, with no hard evidence whatsoever, that Foley was another Studds.

It has been interesting to observe the "random" new stories coming one on top of the other as the former wanes. Bob Woodward's "State of Denial" was followed by the Foley affair, which has now been succeeded by David Kuo's book tour.

The Crats wouldn't be trying to depress Republican turnout would they?

You bet they would. Notably, the Foley scandal and Kuo's 60 minutes interview with Leslie Stahl (which I thought was fairly balanced) are aimed directly at Evangelicals, who in the eyes of many Democrats (and a few so-called Republicans) shouldn't be allowed to vote anyways.

"Yes. I think that Christians, particularly evangelical Christians need to take a step back. To have a fast from politics," he replies. "People are being manipulated. Good well-meaning people are being told, ‘Send your money to this Christian advocacy group or that.’ And that’s the answer. It’s just not the answer. It’s not the answer."

In other words...stay home this November.

I'm sure Kuo himself is sincere, but he's a useful idiot in a larger game. His editors and the media aren't "accidentally" launching his book before the election any more than Woodward's book launch fell to the fates.

I consider myself a Christian conservative and this is how I see it:

1. Robertson in particular, is in fact a goof and nut. I'm not the only Christian to think so. I strongly suspect that liberals are extrapolating their own relationship with the black community by compariing this with dissing Martin Luther King. Nothing could be farther from the truth. I'd personally be a lot more worried if there was reverence for Pat Robertson in the White House.

2. Christians aren't necessarily all that enthusiastic about the so-called "faith-based" initiatives. With money comes strings, and not a few Christians are concerned about getting into bed with the federal government. The Mormon church (I'm blogging from Utah, so deal with it) has simply rejected any federal funds to compliment its own substantial charitable efforts. Who this really affects are the few politically-active pastors who by no means represent any where close to a majority of Evangelical Christians.

3. The odd thing about Kuo, is how much he is part of a problem that simply doesn't affect most Christians, Evangelical and otherwise. Frankly, I've never met this highly-politicized Evangelical Christian that Kuo seems to represent--they must be exceedingly rare birds. Evangelicals are concerned about the same things other Republicans are, with the addition of issues like abortion and gay marriage. Bush's supreme court picks have justified Evangelical votes to date, and the still-liberal character of the courts insures that Evangelicals and other conservative Christians will be voting Republican for the foreseeable future.

4. This isn't going to work. Once again, liberals betray a fundamental ignorance about who conservatives, and particularly Evangelical conservatives are, much less what motivates them. The Republican party's ties to Evangelicals aren't like the Democrats ties to the black community--brokered by "leaders". Evangelicals are an integral part of the process. They are precinct captains and committee members, not sheep waiting for a signal from the shepherd. The reaction so far has been more a sense of embarrassment for David Kuo, who is clearly being used.

Michael Stickings predictably calls it hypocrisy. It apparently never occurs to him that you can respect Evangelicals and still think Pat Robertson is a nut. Does his failure to make the distinction mean that he dismisses all Evangelicals as nuts?

Expect a spate of news stories like this one in the next couple of weeks.

“We’ve got new laws, new technology, heightened partisanship and a growing involvement of lawyers in the voting process,” said Tova Wang, who studies elections for the Century Foundation, a nonpartisan research group. “We also have the greatest potential for problems in more places next month than in any voting season before.”

Election officials in many of the states are struggling with delays in the delivery of machines before the election as old-fashioned lever and punch-card machines are phased out. A chronic shortage of poll workers, many of them retirees uncomfortable with new technology, has worsened matters.

Buried in the bowels of the article is the admission that things are much, much better than in 2000 and before (when no one complained...)

Charles Stewart, head of the political science department at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, published a study this year indicating that from 2000 to 2004, new technology helped reduce the number of improperly marked ballots by about one million votes.

When the Democrats fail to win the House, expect the voting machine conspiracy meme to explode...

With all the concern over rigged electronic voting machines we've been seeing for a couple of years now from the left, there never seems to be any concern over the demostrately 'rigged' quality of this country's political polls. Dan Riehl does some legwork to remind us of the accuracy of the polls in 2002 a mere seven days before the election and then extracts this gem from the memory hole.

And going back to Oct. 22, these pearls of wisdom from DailyKos via Charlie Cook:

Cook notes that Dems have a good shot at taking GOP seats in Arkansas, New Hampshire and Colorado, while the race in North Carolina has become unexpectedly competitive...Consider, perhaps the surest takeover bet is Arkansas, a GOP seat. And if the GOP loses New Hampshire, which I believe is likely, then forget it. There's no way the GOP can take the Senate.

Too bad Dems lost all of the above by 5 - 10 points.

MSNBC says Big Dem Wins Likely. Now where have I seen that before?

As I've mentioned earlier this week--polls in a mid-term election are like sticking your finger in the air to see which way the wind is blowing. With a national average of 39% turnout during the last mid-term election, its not how people feel about the election, its how voters feel.

Know-nothing pundits on cable news channels are dismissing Karl Rove's and the President's optimism as stiff-upper-lipism, but the real reason is far more substantive.

If you're ever read a profile of Ken Mehlman, you know he is obsessed with metrics. For him, one of the most important sources of data is a weekly e-mail his political team prepares called the "Weekly Grassroots Report." It meticulously records the work of tens of thousands of volunteers in targeted states, counties and congressional districts across the country. The data summary allows the RNC to determine which states are meeting goals and which states are falling behind.

The RNC declined to share the most recent report, which was issued Monday. But two independent sources who saw last week's report professed to be surprised: not only was their no drop off last week, 12 states broke new voter contact records.

In a month, the party completed more than a million phone calls and door contacts conbined. Bigger states are putting up big numbers -- even Ohio, which lagged behind its targets all summer, has caught up. The RNC is particularly pleased with their progress in New Jersey, where they've rapidly set up a more aggressive version of their 72 Hour Program in light of the state's more competitive Senate race.

I think we've seen that before as well...