Quote of the Day
Dignity consists not in possessing honors,
but in the consciousness that we deserve them.
Aristotle
Petraeus Takes One for Team Obama
Let me be clear: although I've never been married, I believe in traditional values, including lifelong faithful marriages, like my own folks' and my siblings'. But as far as I'm concerned, whereas I understand it's a legitimate character issue for voters to take into consideration for elected officials, except for certain circumstances (say a President whom can be blackmailed), I don't see it as a job issue. The gist seems to be the FBI stumbled across email exchanges between Petraeus and a flattering biographer. Whereas the use of funded government communications does allow for some discretionary use, I don't see the issue here unless Petraeus was suspected leaking classified data (this is purely speculative).
I do recall several years back I had done a reply-all to one of my nieces' emails; my sister's government email address was on my niece's email list (which I hadn't noticed); my sister exploded at me (although clearly the fault was her daughter's for not using her mother's private email address in the first place). I've worked for multiple government contractors and am pretty anal retentive about the rules.
Petraeus has been widely revered by the neo-cons since the almost miraculously successful counter-insurgency strategy during the 2007-8 Iraq surge operation; in fact, his name was mentioned during the Romney veepstakes as someone whom could balance Romney on military and foreign policy matters
However, Petraeus came under fire from House Republicans for providing Obama cover over his knowingly false scapegoating of a controversial Youtube video for the terrorist attack killing our ambassador to Libya in Benghazi. He was scheduled to appear before Congress soon, and leftists have scoffed at suggestions pointing out Petraeus' convenient resignation right after his reelection.
I don't believe in conspiracies, but I don't believe for a second this was about marital infidelity. There may in fact have been an infidelity, which serves improbably as a face-saving matter but I think the resignation was forced over a more serious matter (say, why Petraeus was being monitored, say, as a suspected source of leaks). I'm simply speculating. I think he lost Obama's trust, and I think there was a subtle warning the mainstream media would break the story if Petraeus stayed on; I think Petraeus wanted to mitigate the scandal on his own terms. Petraeus served a useful purpose through Obama's reelection, evidence of his "bipartisanship". After the election he was no longer useful.
Dick Morris, Polls and the Election
Dick Morris explains how he "goofed" in predicting a Romney landslide here. I 'll hit the highlights here: the more optimistic Romney polls assumed the election 2008 results were an anomaly; it turned out 3 groups: blacks, Latinos and young people favoring Obama turned out in disproportionate numbers up to or bettering 2008 performance.
(However, Obama's totals and margin of victory were way down from 2008; the photo finishes of multiple swing states, despite a much superior ground game, speak for themselves). I'll simply add that all the polls had narrowed--in Gallup and Rasmussen to a point and even UnSkewedPolls had dropped from about 320 to 276 electoral votes and reversed their Senate control call. All pollsters admit it's hard to measure intensity.
I disagree this is a new permanent paradigm--for example, I think blacks will revert to more normal voting patterns in the future. However, I do agree that the GOP has largely ceded these groups and hoping people won't turn up to vote for unsustainable free government stuff is not a strategy. As Rush Limbaugh pointed out, it's tough to win an election against Santa Claus.
I'll point out that 2016 will be a change election, and I expect younger, more charismatic, positive candidates will surface. I expect there will be a strong pro-liberty candidate to succeed Ron Paul; the GOP nominated two resume candidates these past 2 cycles. I think Bobby Jindal could be the sleeper--flat-out one of the brainiest politicians, period. He needs to work on his public speaking skill and update the dated Reagan formula politics with, hopefully, a pro-liberty message
A Plug For the Mises Institute
Tom Woods (along with DiLorenzo, Gary North and a few others) is one of my favorite Austrian economists (I bought a couple of his books, e.g., the Catholic Church and Western civilization, before I got interested in the Austrian school). The second video is a good introduction to Mises. Lew Rockwell, a Ron Paul associate whose own website I've cited, is behind the Institute, and the Mises Institute (see my blogroll) makes a number of important e books available for free download (and many more resources).
Musical Interlude: My Favorite Groups
The Carpenters, "Yesterday Once More". Another original hit song written by Richard (technically he worked with some lyricists), this was the siblings' fifth #2 hit between 1970-3 and tenth #1 on the adult contemporary chat. I'm embedding a bonus Barry Manilow classic on a similar nostalgic songs theme.
