Gotcha

This is not the first campaign where we’ve heard whining about “gotcha” –type questions from reporters. Usually, these complaints come from Republicans; George W. Bush has a record of complaining about them. Now Governor Palin makes the same claim. Perhaps it’s not a matter of party affiliation; it could just be page 31 of the Karl Rove playbook.

Both Bush and Palin are correct—among the softballs, fastballs and curves the media throw at you, there are some “gotcha” questions mixed in.

But, remember—in the White House, they’re ALL gotcha questions.

Issues don’t reach the White House unless they’re at some critical point.

Spin-meisters aside, there are no questions you can “hit out of the ballpark.” There are going to be thousands of decisions that make winners and losers—you balanced your budget but cut funding for pre-school kids; you shored up our military, but left in money for failed weapons systems; you pushed through a plan to bail out our financial institutions, and in doing so abandoned your own administration’s economic plans and promises.

The questions you’ll have to deal with, as President, are going to be much tougher than “What’s your foreign policy experience?” and “Do you agree with the Bush Doctrine?”

Those are questions for sophomores. Those questions are in “Politics for Jocks.”

The job requires that you constantly give your answer to questions that don’t have answers. Even if that means you begin by saying, “I don’t know,” a phrase that neither the President nor the Governor feel confident enough to say.

Before You Bail on the Bailout

Recent chats with experts, including my brother Paul, who knows more about economics than you do--okay, more than I do-- have given me a glimpse of what we’re in for, if we don’t do something immediately about our nation’s plummeting credit confidence.

I’ll share with you a few things that I now understand:

Lifestyle

What’s going on in your day-to-day life? Do you use credit cards? Are you paying off a mortgage? A car loan? Have you borrowed against the equity of your home for any reason? Are you, or is anyone in your family planning on going to college?

Do you have an IRA, a 401K, a pension fund, money market accounts?

Does your city or your state issue bonds to fund roads, schools, colleges, firefighters, police, or other municipal or state costs?

Do your favorite stores order constantly restore their shelves, make improvements, rent their facilities? Do you, or your friends, relatives or neighbors work at businesses that work this way?

All of these fundamental parts of our lives work through a flow of credit. Without that flow of credit, each of these parts start to weaken, wobble, or even collapse.

Their greed made you money

Did we get in this mess because banks and brokerages, fancy folks in fancy clothes, got too greedy? Yes. Shouldn’t an institution have more tangible assets at hand when they make these loans? Probably. Should these markets operate with a lifeguard watching the pool, in the form of regulation? Sure. Did deregulation by both Democrats and Republicans set these corporations free to take these risks? Absolutely.

That doesn’t change the fact that, over the past ten to twenty years, these greedy #$&*( -ers made us money. The reason your home has increased in value, the reason your IRA gained value, the reason for a lot of our prosperity over the last couple of decades, has been that with easier credit, we’ve all been gaining by hitching our wagons to these less traditional forms of investment, whether directly or indirectly. And those same personal assets will wither if our country’s credit flow doesn’t improve. And quickly.

Angioplasty/ Bypass

It’s now commonplace for a cardiologist to say, “Don’t go home. We need to get rid of this blockage now.”

Yes, we want conditions and safeguards attached to any money the government is sending to relieve this credit crunch. We don’t want to send money that ends up in some CEO’s payoff deal.

Reckless behavior got us into this mess. We don’t want our government to follow it with more reckless behavior.

And yet, we can’t afford to let the patient go home. As the credit crisis deepens, and confidence drops, these problems won’t worsen at a constant speed—they will accelerate very quickly.

Action must be taken right now. Let’s sign the release form for the “surgery” before the patient is flat-lining.

Value for your Dollar

Your taxes are too high.

Guess what. Your taxes will always be too high. Mine, too. They may jump a bit or dip a bit, but we always wish we could pay less.

The question is, as long as you're paying taxes, wouldn't you like to get something for your money?

In the last eight years, despite all the money you’ve sent to Washington, the EPA has taken a vacation, the infrastructure of the country is falling apart, the Food and Drug Administration is understaffed, our food is unhealthy, our jobs have left the country, terrorism has gotten worse, world opinion of the U.S. has made it more difficult for us to lead the world community, gas is close to four dollars a gallon, we owe $9 trillion dollars, much of it to China, America’s home financing system has become a pyramid scheme, and we’re treating our soldiers, their families, and our veterans, like they’re broken cell phones we can just throw away.

And it gets worse. The National Guard, the Police and Fire Departments, and any benefits the cities and counties used to get, afterschool programs and preschool programs and music programs are rapidly disappearing, because the federal funds that used to help make these things happen, and the staffers that used to do the work, have been shipped off to Iraq.

That’s what you’ve gotten for your money.
I’m voting for Barack Obama not because of what my tax bill will be, but because, for once, I’d like to get something for my money.

Our Bravest, Without Question

There are people in our society who, when there is danger, they head toward it, and we are grateful for that. Police officers, fire fighters, and of course, the heroic soldiers of our military.

The American soldier is fully committed to the task at hand. On the field of battle our troops don’t waver. They commit to the objective and they go out and do what must be done. If there are setbacks, they regroup and once again go out and do the job. Failure is not an option.

It’s because of this attitude that the United States has the greatest fighting force on Earth.

It’s also because of this attitude that the United States Armed Forces are subordinate to our civilian government.

It doesn’t always work for the best. Over the last seven-plus years, our military has had its expert advice thrown back in its face and its traditions ignored.

In the long run, though, we don’t ask for or expect objectivity from the American soldier. Because, an American soldier won’t say, “This is the wrong mission,” “You shouldn’t have sent me here,” or “Who, exactly, am I protecting by attacking this country?” It’s not their place to question.

It is our duty, though. Those of us out of harm’s way owe it to these courageous soldiers to only summon them to battle when we have exhausted all other options.

For our political leaders to use the enthusiasm of our soldiers to justify acts of war, is unethical and unfair. Of course our soldiers are enthusiastic. They are brave heroes, taking orders and fighting on our behalf without question.

We don’t ask our soldiers for perspective, and they’re in a bad position to provide it. We ask them to accept the mission, pick up our flag, and move forward. When they do so, it’s not a sign of our wisdom. It’s a sign of their character.

Favorite Olympic Moment

Matt Lauer is charming, self-effacing, and constantly improving as an interviewer.

Mr. Lauer, may you have many more healthy and happy years to come.

That having been said, Lauer (or someone in his ear) created my first Golden Moment of the 2008 Olympic Games.

The opening night of the Olympics, with its parade of nations, gives each one of us a chance to learn about the world beyond our borders, and about the people, cultures and history all around our planet.

That’s why I was so delighted to learn from Matt, as the team from Malawi entered the stadium, that we’ll recognize Malawi because that’s the country where Madonna built an orphanage.

So, if you’re scoring at home, that’s Greece, birthplace of the ancient Olympics, Turkey, crossroads between Asia and Europe, and Malawi, where Madonna did some nice things.

Ooh. Here comes Norway. Don’t bore me with stories of Valhalla and Odin and Thor. Don’t tell me about Norwegian resistance in World War II. Just tell me—what does Leonardo di Caprio think of it?

We learn so much from the stars.

Beijing! Awhawww ....Mmmm!!!

In the Simpsons episode "Lisa Gets an A," Homer buys a small lobster named Pinchy, and brings him home to fatten him up, to eventually have a large lobster dinner.

Homer becomes attached to his red friend, and when it comes time to eat him, Homer cries as he remembers their friendship, and then says “Mmmm” after every bite, because the lobster is so delicious. “Aw-haww...Mmmm! Aw-hawww....Mmmm!”

It’s the experience I had watching Beijing’s opening ceremonies to the 2008 Olympics. Boy is that beautiful—my God, they’re so repressive. Gee, look at all the people who worked on that— How many of them at gunpoint?

Look at the beautiful children of China— whose parents needed a permit to have them in the first place! Such strong and limber gymnasts—what happened to the kids who didn’t make the cut? Are they in camps somewhere?

How lovely… there’s the symbol for peaceful unity… and there’s the symbol for Walmart!

Eyes Open, Please.

Already, the mumbling and grumbling have begun. Liberals are discovering that, lo and behold, Barack Obama is—horror of horrors!—a politician.

People have, for months, been crusading for a new kind of politics, and a clear choice against war, and a candidate who will bring us all together, a pure candidate. Now they’re discovering that Senator Obama first, and foremost, wants to win the election.

The liberals made the same miscalculation about Governor Howard Dean, the current Democratic Party Chairman. He, like Obama, believed in a fair and well-run government, but he was also a politician.

I disagree with Alvy Singer, Woody Allen’s character in his masterpiece, “Annie Hall,” who says “Lyndon Johnson’s a politician. That’s one notch underneath child molester.”

There’s no purity in politics. It’s not a field for people who don’t want their food to touch on the plate. In a democratic republic, the American form of government, compromise is called for in the Constitution. That was the whole point of dividing up the power.

Any candidate for the Presidency is committed to formulate policy that will work best for the United States. If that means you pledged “no new taxes,” but now find you have to raise taxes, you do it. Not because you lack character, but because nobody campaigning for the White House can possibly know how our circumstances will change.

If the Illinois senator has shared a detail or two about potential future policies, and those details don’t fit the liberal or independent orthodoxys, that’s no reason to withdraw your support.

The devil is in the details, of course. Which leads me back to my original reservation about Obama. Not that it would ever sway me over to vote for Senator Doubletalk.

My reservation is, Mr. Obama’s enjoys listing all the specific ways that the politicians and the politics of the last thirty years have failed. But he talks about the future in lofty generalities.

While he’s spoken nobly of improving all of our lives, and the character of our country, in general, I know of no one precise policy that Mr. Obama has promised to uphold. Perfect for an era where specifics make you vulnerable.

And just like a politician.