Category Archives: Political Commentary

Humor, Political Commentary

We’re Saved!

Iowahawk remains in the race. I have to say, there are certainly some aspects of his platform that are not without appeal.

Drilling and exploration are important, but this only addresses the “supply” side of the equation. We must also tackle our insatiable “demand” for energy. Thanks to my Piranha Doctrine foreign policy, America’s military will be freed up to go after America’s worst energy demand scofflaws — the celebrity asshole community. Under my administration the Joint Chiefs of Staff will be directed to treat as hostile all private jets flying into Los Angeles airspace, backed up with coordinated pinpoint bombing of mansions and Priuses within the Malibu triangle. Not only will this reduce prices at the pump, it will increase the supply of much needed scrap metal and lumber.

I like the Piranha Doctrine as well. Though Park Slope may not have enough open territory for the cougar reserve.

Humor, Political Commentary

We’re Saved!

Iowahawk remains in the race. I have to say, there are certainly some aspects of his platform that are not without appeal.

Drilling and exploration are important, but this only addresses the “supply” side of the equation. We must also tackle our insatiable “demand” for energy. Thanks to my Piranha Doctrine foreign policy, America’s military will be freed up to go after America’s worst energy demand scofflaws — the celebrity asshole community. Under my administration the Joint Chiefs of Staff will be directed to treat as hostile all private jets flying into Los Angeles airspace, backed up with coordinated pinpoint bombing of mansions and Priuses within the Malibu triangle. Not only will this reduce prices at the pump, it will increase the supply of much needed scrap metal and lumber.

I like the Piranha Doctrine as well. Though Park Slope may not have enough open territory for the cougar reserve.

Political Commentary, Space, Space and Campaign 2008

A Glimmer Of Hope?

22 Comments

As current blog readers know, I’ve been pretty much of an agnostic as to which candidate would be best for space policy (at least in terms of actually advancing us toward becoming a spacefaring society). But I just saw a very interesting rumor over at Space Politics. The post is about whether McCain likes Mars, and was influenced by reading The Martian Chronicles (which are not, contrary to common belief, science fiction, but rather fantasy, like much of Bradbury’s work).

But the rumor is in comments, from two separate commenters:

My understanding is that Craig Steidle is formally advising the McCain campaign, and may be determining McCain’s NASA policy…

…Admiral Steidle has also adopted an EELV-based approach for Shuttle replacement, albeit with the Orbital Space Plane (OSP). I think it would be very easy for him to embrace an approach using a downsized Orion/CEV on top of an EELV.

The Admiral had a very forward focused program that didn’t play favorites with any of the NASA centers, particularly Marshall. This ticked off several of the congressional delegations. But I have a feeling that the Alabama contingent may not hold as much sway over the upcoming years.

It’s interesting that you brought up the Admiral here. I’ve heard rumors from several sources that he would be the likely NASA Administrator if McCain is elected. Unlike the current Soviet-style Design Bureau Culture at NASA, Steidle is a believer and practitioner of good old American free enterprise and competition.

Steidle was in charge of the VSE before Mike Griffin came in (O’Keefe was much more hands-off as an administrator, particularly because he wasn’t a rocket scientist, and didn’t pretend he was). Mike Griffin essentially tore up everything that Steidle was doing by the roots, and instituted his own plan. So while Steidle is hardly perfect, he’ll be a big improvement, and get the program back on track as it was when he left, with the loss of three years or so. If this rumor is true, for this reason alone, McCain now looks like a far preferable candidate to Obama, in terms of space. Of course, for me, and many others, space remains a lower-priority issue. But it does provide a reason to vote for McCain (as opposed to against Obama), which I’ve been having trouble coming up with.

Media Criticism, Political Commentary

Clintonian

34 Comments

The headline of this story is that “Obama denies a rumor,” but he doesn’t really, at least from what I can tell from the reporting:

Sen. Barack Obama on Thursday batted down rumors circulating on the Internet and mentioned on some cable news shows of the existence of a video of his wife using a derogatory term for white people, and criticized a reporter for asking him about the rumor, which has not a shred of evidence to support it.

“We have seen this before. There is dirt and lies that are circulated in e-mails and they pump them out long enough until finally you, a mainstream reporter, asks me about it,” Obama said to the McClatchy reporter during a press conference aboard his campaign plane. “That gives legs to the story. If somebody has evidence that myself or Michelle or anybody has said something inappropriate, let them do it.”

Asked whether he knew it not to be true, Obama said he had answered the question.

But as far as I can see, he hadn’t, unless there were words spoken that were not reported.

Let us parse.

“We have seen this before. There is dirt and lies that are circulated in e-mails and they pump them out long enough until finally you, a mainstream reporter, asks me about it.”

True enough. Who can deny that there is dirt and lies circulated in emails? But that doesn’t necessarily imply that the particular topic under discussion is a lie (though it’s arguably “dirt,” regardless of its truth value).

“If somebody has evidence that myself or Michelle or anybody has said something inappropriate, let them do it.”

Again, this is not a denial. It’s simply a challenge to produce proof (or at least evidence). And in the follow up, he apparently refused, once again, to deny it. It was what is called in the business a “non-denial denial.”

This is the game that Bill Clinton used to play a lot. When confronted about something, he would feign outrage, and attack the questioner, and say something like “I’m not going to even dignify that with a response.” But he wouldn’t actually deny it. The most classic case was the Juanita Broaddrick rape accusation. He never denied it. If anyone thinks that he did, provide a transcript. He sent out his lawyer to deny it, but his lawyer has no knowledge of whether it is true or not, other than hearsay from Bill. He wasn’t in the room with them.

This looks like exactly the same behavior. Of course, part of the problem is that he’s not sure what it is he should be denying, because the rumors are all over the place as to what she said or did. But it would have been better to say something like, “I’ve seen all these rumors running around on the Internet about some imminent bombshell concerning my wife, and I can tell you categorically that they are not true.”

That would be a denial. But he didn’t say that. I wonder why?

[Update a few minutes later]

I agree with the commenters that he shouldn’t be put in a position of denying non-specific rumors (as I noted in the last paragraph above). My main point, actually, is simply that the Politico headline is wrong, and misleading, because he hasn’t denied them (though he obviously hopes that we, like the reporter, thinks that he has).