Entries for April 2008

The Democratic presidential nominee this fall—whether Sen. Barack Obama or Sen. Hillary Clinton—is going to be flawed.

And this is long before the Republicans and their wild-eyed, right-wing allies unload on either one.

Senator Clinton bears more of the blame than her younger rival. At nearly every crazy turn in this long race, she has behaved as if she is entitled to the nomination come hell or high water.

Score 1 against the military-media complex.

On April 25, the Pentagon announced it would suspend its briefings for retired brass hats who often go on TV to give the military's line on the war. At last, it was recognized that this practice has amounted to a surge in propaganda on the Pentagon's part.

Two disturbing questions linger on the follow-up to the New York Times story exposing that former military officers presented as experts on TV were actually spouting Pentagon spin on the war in Iraq:

1. Why did TV outlets, the networks as well as the more culpable cable units, rush these folks on the air with little regard to potential conflicts of interest?

2. Why did the story attract little or no interest from other print organizations when it certainly should have?

With only nine months remaining until George W. Bush returns to Texas, let's examine some of the associates who made the journey with him during these eight long years. It is not a pretty roll call.

• Dick Cheney is a Wyoming transplant who started making his millions when he moved to Houston to head Halliburton. The vice president's former company has made big bucks as a contractor in Iraq, and Cheney has become a strange and unpopular figure with his dissembling on the war.

• Alberto Gonzales came to the capital as Bush's legal adviser before becoming attorney general. Members of both parties were not amused at his convenient memory loss while testifying before Congress. He can't seem to land a job now.

Sen. John McCain once admitted that economics was not one of his strong points. He proved it this week with the issuance of a crazy-quilt tax package for the future.

In fact, the presumptive GOP nominee for president reversed his stand on previous tax policy. He also made a big pitch to the Republican right to the likely detriment of winning over independents and even some conservative Democrats.

April 15 is customarily a day for moaning and groaning by taxpayers across the country, but too often the complaints are unfounded. People who complain about taxes don't understand a lesson my late father—a conservative Republican—taught me. He used to say that he was honored to pay his taxes because he knew some government was necessary and taxes are the price. (My late mother-in-law, a Democrat, added that people should be happy that they earn enough to owe taxes.)

But that isn't to say that this tax season doesn't have a few true targets for taxpayer ire, including the bill quietly racked up for President Bush's marathon war in Iraq. Or—for those who live in the District of Columbia—the scandal that has engulfed the Office of Tax and Revenue.

If the Democrats add to their majority in the Senate in November, as widely predicted, they should invite Sen. Joseph Lieberman, the Connecticut independent, to step across the aisle. He should be far more comfortable on the Republican side.

Lieberman's unbending support of Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain, the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, must be galling to Democrats in Congress and beyond.