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From Face the Nation, Nov. 16, 2008: Newt Gingrich and Bobby Jindall discuss why the Republicans lost this year. As usual there were trying to fob it off on George Bush. Never mind that Bush went along with every single policy that is at the core of Republican ideology. And the fact they they defended him at every turn which led us down a path that has almost left the country completely bankrupt. Jindall tries to pump the "we're a center-right nation" line that is littering our airwaves, but the facts don't support it and neither did the election. And as usual, Newt wraps it up by saying Obama won because he was "Reaganite".

Gingrich: I think that's right and if you look at the [...] you look at Sen. Obama's campaign he's promising a middle class tax cut. That was a Reaganite position.

I seem to recall that what was being spewed by Conservatives and Newt was that Obama is a Socialist leading up to Obama's victory. Maybe the people want Socialism, Newt?

Full transcript to follow.

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From Face the Nation Nov. 9, 2008. Following his interview with Raum Emanuel Bob Schieffer talks to David Brooks and John Harris about what Obama does once elected and Brooks says that he took away from Emanuel's interview that the Democrats are going to try to move too quickly and get everything done at once and that it will "freak people out" if he does that. Harris reminds him that would not happen even if he wanted it to with the make up of the Congress. So again we have more of this don't dare to possibly do what the people elected you to do, or at least don't try to do it too quickly or you'll be punished for it. I'm sure with Republicans determined to obstruct before Obama is even sworn in that won't be a problem.

What's really astounding about this segment though is that Brooks then goes on to say that the Republican party has no belief system, it's a circular firing squad and adds that the conservative movement has failed because it hasn't addressed the problems of today.

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If you ever wondered how it was possible that we could possibly have this close an election when the vast majority of the American people highly disapprove of the job George W. Bush has done, yet there is still a disconnect with John McCain supporters that his would be a third Bush term, look no further than what passes for political debate on this morning's Face the Nation.  My head is still hurting from the stupidity of it. 

Still playing to the media narrative that the selection of Sarah Palin should somehow bring women to the McCain camp, they bring on four female proxies--Kay Bailey Hutchinson and former Mass Gov. Jane Swift for McCain, Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano and FL Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz for Obama--to frame the debate as Obama vs. Palin.  Strange that.  All this time, I thought it was John McCain running for the office.  You know, the same guy that calls his wife an unforgivable slur and laughs at Hillary Clinton being referred to as a b*tch, and now the Republicans saying they're going to call out sexism when they see it? Maybe my silly little female head got confused.

And when Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz throws down the gauntlet on all the GOP distractions and says that the truth matters and Gov. Swift opts to spin this into an inane deflection of whether Palin was actually in Iraq, wasting close to four minutes of airtime.  Wasserman Schultz holds her ground, pointing out that these embellishments to her record just show what a lightweight Palin truly is, but it's host Bob Schieffer that has to side with the Republicans by pointing out that Palin's actions 'have been alleged' to be less than her claim, but it's up to the voters to decide "the truth."

Um, Bob, isn't that supposed to be your function?  To help the voters know the truth from the spin?

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What is it about McCain ignoring the actual questions and answering questions never asked?  And of course, Bush golfing buddy Bob Schieffer never points out that he didn't actually answer question about why there are so few African-Americans in the Republican Party and how that might affect the long term outlook on his party but lets him instead go on a five minute, rambling non-sequitur about education vouchers. 

SCHIEFFER: I want to ask you about the composition of the...of the convention. There were 36 African American delegates out of 2300 plus delegates there. How can you survive as a party if you become just the party of white people?

McCAIN: We can't. We can't. I saw a bit of information the other day that by, I forgot, I think...don't hold me to it, 2042 or something like that, white Americans will be in the minority in the population of this country. We can't. We've got to reach out; we gotta do a better job. We have to have the Hispanic as well as the African American voters. I've traveled all over this country. I've been to places where there were literally no Republican votes. I have to convince them I'll be the president of everybody. And the Republican party has a job to do. And frankly, it's a job that also spills over into other issues. You've seen the generic ballot difference that we have...[..]

SCHIEFFER: So what are you going to do about that?

McCAIN: Oh, education, economy, small business, create jobs....education, as I mentioned, civil rights issue of this century. Now everyone has equal access to a school. But what's the point of access to a failed school, or a failing school? We've got to give them more choice, more opportunity, all Americans. Because we know in low income America, the schools are failing, with the exception of NYC, now New Orleans and some others. But so, a quality education is really the dream of every parent. As you know in Washington DC, they have an experimental voucher system. Huge number of parents want to take advantage of that, thousands more than they have room for. So we got to provide the kinds of opportunities in education, one of the keys to it, help for small businesses, and get the economy back on its feet, don't raise the taxes, get it going again. Americans are hurting in a way that they have not hurt for a long time. I would probably argue to you that the 65 appearances - I hate to keep bringing that up - that we probably--you and I-never had a conversation when our economy was in greater difficulty than it is today.

Okay, McSame...obviously continuing Bush's policies will change the economy and the minorities' outlook on the GOP how?  Here's a helpful hint from someone who hopes you never step foot in the Oval Office:  if you really want to attract minorities to the GOP, you have to address these issues: (h/t Don Rumsfeld hater in the comments)

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Bob Schieffer interviewed three Democrats on Face The Nation this morning and all of them were able to cut through the GOP talking points with ease. Governors Ed Rendell, Kathleen Sebelius and Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. did a fantastic job of speaking the truths about John McCain, his elite, lavish lifestyle and how out of touch he is with average Americans.

Schieffer plays a clip of John McCain being interviewed by Katie Couric in which he once again, shamelessly exploits his POW experience to make excuses for why he doesn't know how many houses he has.  Again.  But luckily, the Democrats make quick work of him. This is what we need to see and hear every day from every Democratic politician and pundit -- driving home the message over and over again, that John McCain would carry on the same losing policies as George Bush and to elect him would be a disaster for our country.

Jackson: "...We don't want him in the White House. He says he has seven kitchen tables, we don't want to give him an eighth kitchen table.We understand he has a wonderful life, this is a great country, but millions of Americans at this hour are suffering through a housing market that is collapsed. Housing foreclosures. So when John McCain gets up in the morning and leaves his house to lock his door, he has to shuffle through a number of keys to figure out which key works in which door, in which home he's at at any given time."

Rendell: "What concerns me more than not exactly knowing how many homes he has, Bob, and Jesse's right, it shows he's out of touch, but when he said in January that Americans have done well under the George Bush economy, he's so out of touch. Hardly any American except people who make five, six hundred thousand dollars plus have done well under this economy. Wages are down, everything else is up, Americans - middle class, working Americans are getting slaughtered under this economy. How could he have said that?"

Sebelius: "And he wants  to continue those policies.  I think that's the most terrifying thing, he thinks we have done well and he thinks more of the same will do even better.  That's what we have to let Americans know across this country. He- his top financial advisor talked about the fact that it's a mental recession, and we have a nation of whiners. I'd like him to come to towns across Kansas and Pennsylvania and Illinois and see what's really happening in communities."

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Who is the last person on the planet that Barack Obama should take advice from?  Naturally, the person that Bob Schieffer asks on Face the Nation, Turd Blossom himself, Karl Rove.  Seriously, this guy is an advisor for the McCain campaign, he's the architect of one of the nastiest and most partisan campaigns in the history of the country and for some reason, Schieffer thinks it's legitimate to ask him his thoughts on Obama's VP pick.  Why?

Rove tries to spin this that if Obama selects a governor like Kaine from a red state, it's a political choice, rather than a presidential one, because all Obama is focused on is the electoral votes.  Okay.  Because Cheney was a real presidential choice...oh wait, Bush didn't make the choice.  Cheney chose himself. That's thinking big and broad.

What cracks me up the most is Karl Rove's attempt to diminish Kaine as a VP candidate:

I didn't say I thought he ought to, I said he probably would pick a Red State Democrat, because I think he's going to make an intensely political choice, not a governing choice. He's going to view this through a prism of a candidate, not through the prism of President. That is to say, he's going to pick somebody that he thinks on the margin will help him in a state like Indiana or Missouri or Virginia. He's not going to be thinking big and broad about the responsibilities as President. Well, with all due respect again to Gov. Kaine, he's been a governor for three years. He's been able but undistinguished; I don't think people could really name a big, important thing that he's done.

And this differs from GWB's tenure as Governor of Texas how?  Oh that's right, the Governor of Virginia actually works more than the constitutionally weak Governor of Texas.  And how did GWB distinguish himself, other than putting more people to death than all the rest of the states combined?  By failing at every other business he started. 

Talk about appealing to the low information voter.

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Actually, it's hard to think of anything that the talking heads inside the Beltway Bubble think would hurt John McCain's chances.  But this is so slippery and the terminology so vague that it's troublesome to see the potential to sway a lot of low information voters.   With the news that we are considering drawing down forces in Iraq, beginning in September (reg. req'd), Roger Simon of The Politico, who never met a Republican for whom he wouldn't apologize, insists that this "October Surprise" will help John McCain.

SIMON: Yeah. It may be an October surprise in July. I think anything that signals that the war in Iraq is generally winding down would be good news for John McCain. He has always said that he wants to leave Iraq, too, but he wants to leave it with victory and honor. And if a drawdown of troops is seen to be militarily justified because we're winning, because the surge is working, and not political trickery because Republicans need it for the fall elections, then that is likely to be effective. 

So how many caveats did you count?  There's a lot of stars that have to line up just so to make that work, but let's focus on the purposeful vagueness and empty rhetoric. 

McCain has ALWAYS said that he wants to leave Iraq? Does anyone ever explain how you can leave an occupation (remember, we "won" the war back in 2003) with "victory"?  Is there any honor to that? 

'The surge is working' meme is working my last nerve as well.  Yes, violence is down within Baghdad (where the majority of those escalation-designated troops were sent), but outside of that area, in Kirkuk, Diyala, Mosul and Fallujah?  Not so much. And is it considered a "win" when we're talking about 4.5 million Iraqi refugees?

What happens if the "drawdown" (which is Beltway speak for returning to pre-surge levels) is NOT militarily justified but politically justified?  Is it still a "drawdown" if we're simply moving them to Afghanistan where violence and attacks has jumped lately?  Will it still help McCain when the number of troop deaths in Afghanistan increase even more, like today's attack in Kabul?

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  While making the case yesterday on "Face the Nation" about how John McCain has changed his position on far more issues than Barack Obama, John Kerry was accused by Bob Scheiffer of "challenging John McCain's integrity."

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You see, when Republicans relentlessly attack a Democrat's military service record and position on the issues, it's acceptable, even promoted by the librul media. When a Democrat does the same thing, they are guilty of disrespecting the entire military and questioning a hero's integrity. There in a nutshell is the M.O. of McCain's Media™.

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McSame's BFF Sen. Joe Lieberman appeared on Face The Nation to talk up McCain and his plan for Iraq, using those same old tired Republican talking points, which as we all know, are less than factually-based:

SCHIEFFER: That of course begs the question if he's ready to be president. Do you believe that Barack Obama is not ready to be president?

LIEBERMAN: Let me put it affirmatively, which is what I really mean, because ultimately, we rarely make a choice between perfect and terrible. John McCain is more ready to be President, on foreign and domestic policy, because of his extraordinary experience. And it's good experience. It's experience where he's had the guts to do what's right for his country, including in Iraq, where he opposed the administration's policy for a long time. The surge was implemented by President Bush, it's now working. Senator Obama, unfortunately, like a lot of the Democratic leadership, continues to take a position that we ought to withdraw, which to me is "retreat, accept defeat" even though the new policy is working. I hope that Barack Obama goes to Iraq and frankly, I hope he changes his position, because if we had done what Senator Obama asked us to do for the last couple of years, today, Iran and al Qaeda would be in control of Iraq. It would be a terrible defeat for us and our allies in the Middle East and throughout the world. Instead, we have a country that's defending itself, that's growing economically, where there's been genuine political reconciliation and where Iran and al Qaeda are on the run. And that's the way it ought to be.

SCHIEFFER: You're saying if we had done a drawdown, as Senator Obama had suggested, that Iran would now be in control of Iraq?

LIEBERMAN: Yeah, and here's what I mean: And it's not just Sen. Obama, it's generally the leadership of the Democratic Party. On this issue, I respectfully but deeply disagreed. Because, they were saying a year ago, two years ago, Iraq was lost. They were saying...they were proposing amendments that would have ordered our withdrawal, a retreat of our forces, to begin and end rather rapidly. If that had happened, in Iraq today, there wouldn't be an Iraqi government, there'd be chaos, there'd probably be genocide, definitely civil war. And the main beneficiaries of that would be Iran and al Qaeda. Instead, al Qaeda is on the run, and on the verge of a terrible defeat, one of our most significant victories over them since 9/11, maybe the most significant. Iran is being pushed back. And just a couple of weeks ago, Prime Minister Maliki of Iraq went to Tehran and Ahmadinejad and the Supreme Leader Khamenei pleaded with Maliki, "don't enter into a long term strategic agreement with America," and he said, "sorry, folks, I want to have good neighborly relations with you, but the Americans are our friends. We appreciate what they've done for us and we're sticking with them."

You know what they say, denial ain't just a river in Egypt.   But I have to hold up this lovely little soundbyte as the MOST egregious:

(The Democratic leadership in Congress) were proposing amendments that would have ordered our withdrawal, a retreat of our forces, to begin and end rather rapidly. If that had happened, in Iraq today, there wouldn't be an Iraqi government, there'd be chaos, there'd probably be genocide, definitely civil war 

Reality to Lieberman:  There IS chaos, there IS genocide and what the hell do you think the combat is but a civil war?

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Lord, save us from the idiot pundit class. The smackdown the Supreme Court gave the Bush administration is making the GOP very unhappy. I mean, how dare we consider a fundamental building block of justice since the Magna Carta anything less than an unacceptable allowance for activist judges?

And how do we know it's a bad decision? Fear, fear, fear!!!! Newt says it'll cost us a city! A notion not far off from Scalia's remarkably legal citation-free dissent that this decision "will almost certainly cause more Americans to be killed." Oooohhh....be afraid, America. Little obnoxiously liberal notions like the right for people like Maher Arar to know why he was detained and to prove his innocence are things that the Republicans don't think they should have to held to.

Mr. GINGRICH: On the other hand, I will say, the recent Supreme Court decision to turn over to a local district judge decisions of national security and life and death that should be made by the president and the Congress is the most extraordinarily arrogant and destructive decision the Supreme Court has made in its history.

REID: In its history.

Mr. GINGRICH: In its history. Worse than Dred Scott, worse than--because--for this following reason: The court has now knowingly stepped in--and this morning's newspapers say smugglers had actually gotten the design of a nuclear weapon, that we now have the evidence that people out there had a nuclear weapon design. And this court is saying that any random district judge, based on whatever their personal caprice is, whatever their personal ideological bias, can intervene with a terrorist in such a way--and this is something that the Italians will tell you about fighting the mafia.

Worse than Dred Scott? Wasn't that a dog whistle used by GWB for indicating the kind of justices he'd pick for SCOTUS? And the whole "mushroom cloud" fear of smugglers getting nuclear plans? Dude, it's called the Google. It's not hard to get bomb plans online or in the library, for that matter--manufacturing them is another issue. But that has NOTHING to do with the Boumediene case. Boumediene said that habeas corpus still applied at Guantanamo, despite its location in Cuba because the US has sovereign rights over it and the Military Commissions Act of 2006 was an unconstitutional suspension of habeas corpus.

But again, facts have a liberal bias, don't they, Newt?

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This morning on Face The Nation, host Bob Schieffer gave props to Hillary Clinton for her speech yesterday. While noting that there were parts of her campaign that weren't pretty, and that she ultimately came up short, there were other victories to be found in her work.

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"...She told her followers that she had not run to be the first woman president, but had been a woman running for president and that the next time a woman runs, it will no longer be so remarkable. As a father of two daughters and three granddaughters, I believe she's right about that. She lost this race, but she has advanced the cause of women everywhere."

There are still lingering frustrations felt by supporters of both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama as we can see from the comments.  And nobody can argue that there weren't some pretty significant mistakes made by her campaign, but it would be equally dishonest to not acknowledge the historic nature of her running as well, and how she has opened doors (as well as delineated some media land mines) for future campaigns by women.  Clinton's call for unity and rallying behind Obama was exactly the note she needed to hit and she deserves credit for that, as Schieffer points out.

It's important to remember that  John McCain and the Republicans are on the ropes in the general public's estimation and they know it. Hell, McCain is already trying to co-opt Barack Obama's campaign themes, which is a sure sign he's scared to death. Their only hope is to divide the Democratic Party and pray that we fail to unite behind our candidate in the fall.  Let's not fall for their trap.

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I don't know where Bob Schieffer's been these last seven years, but he thinks that the White House might have an credibility problem:

I saw a story in the Washington Post the other day, where a reporter granted a government official anonymity in order as the newspaper put it, 'for the government official to speak more candidly.' Well, that made me wonder. Do we no longer expect government officials to tell the whole story if they must take responsibility for what they say? Even worse, do we believe that is acceptable?

For sure, the White House won no prize for candor last week; it gave the outgoing head of the General Services Administration, Lurita Doan, a big send off by thanking her for making government buildings more energy-efficient or some such, when in truth, she was forced out. She was the object of multiple investigations, suspicious dealings on government contracts, and asking government employees what they could do to help political candidates, which is, of course, against the law. Even the government’s watchdog agency recommended she be disciplined to the fullest extent. Yet the White House spokesman declined to say if her resignation had anything to do with any of that. From the White House came only thanks and confirmation she was gone. The government saw no obligation to say why, which leads me to this: have decades of secrecy, spin and stonewalling conditioned us to accept less than the whole story from the government? Is telling the whole truth no longer a given? Frankly, I’m not sure. What I do know is more and more people seem skeptical everything the government says and does. What we saw last week may be one reason why.

Oh Jiminy Christmas. The Lurita Doan scandal is such a minor one relative to all the other lies, spin, incompetence and outright negligence of the Bush administration that it's tragically laughable that this is the one that Schieffer thinks exemplifies why the American people are skeptical to what comes out of the White House.

But the $64,000 question that Schieffer refuses to address is how much responsibility should the establishment media take upon itself for unconditionally and unquestioningly putting out White House talking points with no context or independent fact finding. Where is the onus on the Fourth Estate?

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With any luck, Bob Schieffer's commentary at the close of Face The Nation will end all further discussion of lapel pins.

Finally, today, I watched the ABC debate the other night when that question came up again about why Senator Obama doesn’t wear a flag pin in his lapel.  Since no one asked me, here is my thought on all that.  I think it’s a nice thing if people want to wear a flag on their lapel.  But I believe it more important to keep the flag behind our lapel in our hearts.  I feel the same way about wearing my religion on my sleeve.  It just fits me better on the inside.  When I go to see our local baseball team, I do wear my Washington Nationals baseball cap.  But am I less a fan if don’t wear it to work?  The truth is I have been known to wear a red, white and blue stars and stripes tie on the Fourth of July.  But am I less patriotic when I trade it for my Santa Claus tie at Christmas?  Patriotism is no more about signs or pins than religion is about reminding others how pious we think we are.  No, the proof in these puddings is not the signs that we wear, but how we act.  Wouldn’t that also be a better way to judge our presidential candidates than by the jewelry they wear?

Are you listening, MSM?   Let's get back to the issues.  Not the cult of personality issues, but actual issues facing this country and how we're going to get out of the mess we're in.

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General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker's Iraq testimony before Congress this week was a hot topic and this morning on Face The Nation, host Bob Schieffer says he doesn't believe either party knows what will happen when we finally pull our troops out of Iraq:

"The administration believes there will be chaos if we leave Iraq, Democrats see chaos if we stay. The more I listen, the more I came to believe that neither side really knows what to do now, that we have reached a point where there are no longer any good answers. Whatever we do, there will be consequences."

Schieffer is correct in one sense; we don't know exactly how things will go when we finally pull out of Iraq. But, to say that "Democrats see chaos if we stay" is misleading and not entirely accurate -- we ALREADY see chaos in Iraq on a daily basis, and it's not just Democrats who recognize this. Our destructive occupation of Iraq, which is manifests itself now in large part to putting up concrete barriers to corral and divide the citizenry, is the destabilizing factor that keeps the country in a constant state of chaos.

As Think Progress notes, the average Iraqi doesn't know who the hell Petraeus and Crocker are. All they know is they want us to leave so they can move on with their lives and repair the damage we've done to their country. One thing we CAN say for sure is that things are moving backwards in Iraq. This week was the deadliest week for U.S. troops in 2008 and there is still no end in sight.

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CBS' Chief Foreign Correspondent, Lara Logan, spoke with Bob Schieffer on Face The Nation about the real situation on the ground in Iraq and General David Petraeus' upcoming appearance before Congress to dump propaganda give a progress report on the Bush/McCain surge. As Logan puts it, the recent fighting in Basra may have all but negated nearly all progress that the surge may have brought:

"Well, the last few weeks have really been brutal for General Petraeus because he really was looking at a year where he had managed to be quite successful in reducing violence, particularly in Baghdad and some of the surrounding areas. One of the main reasons for that are the agreement with the Sunni tribes and also with some Shiite tribes, the militias that they were forming and working with the Americans. But, those gains have almost disappeared in the face of the recent violence which spread so quickly from Basra in the south of Iraq..."

John Amato: Twenty people were killed last night which as she puts it was a very determined defense by these militias---not wanting to give up their power base and as the American Commander in charge of Sadr City said:

"He said this fight began as a fight for these rocket launch sites and it's now all about killing Americans."

I thought this was an Iraqi operation all along---sorry, I'm confused.