Friday, October 31, 2008
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Sunday, October 26, 2008
Wonderwoman
The Sunday Times
October 26, 2008
Sexism rears its head in Palin’s wardrobe
India Knight
Sarah Palin’s folksy, down-home image took a bit of a battering last week with the revelation that the Republican party had spent $150,000 (£96,000) since September on sprucing up their vice-presidential candidate’s wardrobe and that of her family. The bill was paid out of campaign donations. Palin’s spokesman said last week that the clothes would be given away to charity once the campaigning was over; Palin said that the fuss people were making over the cost amounted to sexism.
“I think Hillary Clinton was held to a different standard in her primary race,” Palin said. “Do you remember the conversations that took place about her? Say, superficial things that they don’t talk about with men – her wardrobe and her hairstyles, all of that? That’s a bit of that double standard.”
Many of the clothes were sitting untouched on her campaign plane, she added. “Oh, if only people knew how frugal we are. It’s kind of painful to be criticised for something when all the facts are not out there and are not reported.”
It would be the most gigantic understatement to say that I don’t hold a candle for Palin, but she does have a point. When it comes to women and public life, the wardrobe question, from Marie-Antoinette on, is almost impossible to get right (unless you are Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, the former model, and obliged to wear John Galliano’s creations for Dior on grounds of patriotism – a tough job, granted, and God bless her for selflessly stepping up to the plate).
You can throw money at the problem, as the Republican party did, and you still end up with a candidate whose garments, despite being perfectly all right individually, end up looking oddly banal. You don’t think, “Sarah Palin, what a nightmare, but I really love her outfits”; you just think, “Sarah Palin, what a nightmare, wears red a lot”, even though it now turns out that she sometimes changes her outfits two or three times a day.
It also emerged last week that the highest paid staff member on the McCain campaign is Palin’s make-up artist, who earned $22,800 for a fortnight’s work (the make-up artist’s technique seems to involve slapping on a bit of eyeliner and then dunking the client in a pot of bronzer). Obviously these are vast sums of money, but they say more about the quandary that female politicians find themselves in than they do about female vanity.
For women in the public eye, who have a vested interest in looking as though they mean business, the whole business of dressing is fraught with pitfalls (I nearly typed “pitbulls”). As if it weren’t irritating enough to know in advance that every garment you wear is going to be scrutinised by teams of reporters as well as the public, who may also become overly preoccupied with your hairstyle or your shade of lipstick. You can never come out on top.
If you are unfortunate enough to have a decent figure, as Palin does, all those pencil skirts and little fitted jackets make you look weirdly vampy (my theory about the American public’s initial burst of enthusiasm for the vice-presidential candidate hinged on the fact that she looks like a porn star in some scenario involving a library, the unclasping of hair and the removal of glasses). Had Palin hidden her figure under smocky tops and giant ponchos, editorials would have been speculating on whether she had body dysmorphia, or an eating disorder, or both.
If you’re dumpy, which may not be your fault, you are doomed to years of media reports that always allude to your thick waist, or stumpy legs, or matronly frocks: the late Mo Mowlam, before she had announced she was being treated for cancer and was therefore bloated and balding from chemotherapy, was once compared to a truck driver in drag. The fact that I remember this years later is indicative of the power of the sartorial insult when directed at women, who use clothes as armour in the first place.
I can’t think of any male politician who has ever been so belittled in the name of aesthetics: “scruffy” or “unkempt" is as bad as it gets, which is not very bad at all since the implication is that the man is so busy thinking with his giant male brain that the egg on his tie is the least of his concerns.
Caroline Flint, who is a looker, is constantly getting it in the neck from parliamentary sketch writers for wearing attractive clothes; the subtext being that the minister for Europe must either be extraordinarily shallow or some sort of crazed, preening narcissist. Condoleezza Rice once wore knee-high leather boots of the kind millions of women pull on every winter; let’s just say the media reaction was such that she didn’t wear them in public again. Cherie Blair and Pauline Prescott were both ridiculed over their devotion to their coiffures, as though women shouldn’t mind walking around in a perpetual bad hair day. If they had, of course, walked around with haystacks on their heads, they would have been the source of endless hilarity.
In the real world, which politics constantly seeks to mirror, we have more or less got over the idea that you have to dress like a drudge to be taken seriously, or that anyone whose bosoms have the temerity to protrude is some sort of casting-couch imbecile. In politics, looking as though you have a chest is still seen as indicative of the fact that you’re stupid, or a slapper, or both.
There are, surely, enough sticks to beat women with for no one to have to resort to pulling apart their wardrobes. Nobody becomes a politician because they want to have the height of their heels dissected and even Palin deserves (a little) more respect than the acres of print devoted to the question of whether her lips are tattooed (especially as what the acres of print are trying to say, but don’t, is that tattooed lipliner is common).
So yes, $150,000 is an awful lot to spend on a wardrobe in a couple of months and no, the amount isn’t representative of the average hockey mom’s sartorial budget. That would be because – der! – Palin isn’t really a hockey mom: she’s an extremely savvy, ambitious woman who is trying to become vice-president of the United States. Besides, think of the stick she’d have got if she’d worn her own clothes. As I say, a woman dressing for public office can’t win. But it’s pretty low to blame her for trying.
October 26, 2008
Sexism rears its head in Palin’s wardrobe
India Knight
Sarah Palin’s folksy, down-home image took a bit of a battering last week with the revelation that the Republican party had spent $150,000 (£96,000) since September on sprucing up their vice-presidential candidate’s wardrobe and that of her family. The bill was paid out of campaign donations. Palin’s spokesman said last week that the clothes would be given away to charity once the campaigning was over; Palin said that the fuss people were making over the cost amounted to sexism.
“I think Hillary Clinton was held to a different standard in her primary race,” Palin said. “Do you remember the conversations that took place about her? Say, superficial things that they don’t talk about with men – her wardrobe and her hairstyles, all of that? That’s a bit of that double standard.”
Many of the clothes were sitting untouched on her campaign plane, she added. “Oh, if only people knew how frugal we are. It’s kind of painful to be criticised for something when all the facts are not out there and are not reported.”
It would be the most gigantic understatement to say that I don’t hold a candle for Palin, but she does have a point. When it comes to women and public life, the wardrobe question, from Marie-Antoinette on, is almost impossible to get right (unless you are Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, the former model, and obliged to wear John Galliano’s creations for Dior on grounds of patriotism – a tough job, granted, and God bless her for selflessly stepping up to the plate).
You can throw money at the problem, as the Republican party did, and you still end up with a candidate whose garments, despite being perfectly all right individually, end up looking oddly banal. You don’t think, “Sarah Palin, what a nightmare, but I really love her outfits”; you just think, “Sarah Palin, what a nightmare, wears red a lot”, even though it now turns out that she sometimes changes her outfits two or three times a day.
It also emerged last week that the highest paid staff member on the McCain campaign is Palin’s make-up artist, who earned $22,800 for a fortnight’s work (the make-up artist’s technique seems to involve slapping on a bit of eyeliner and then dunking the client in a pot of bronzer). Obviously these are vast sums of money, but they say more about the quandary that female politicians find themselves in than they do about female vanity.
For women in the public eye, who have a vested interest in looking as though they mean business, the whole business of dressing is fraught with pitfalls (I nearly typed “pitbulls”). As if it weren’t irritating enough to know in advance that every garment you wear is going to be scrutinised by teams of reporters as well as the public, who may also become overly preoccupied with your hairstyle or your shade of lipstick. You can never come out on top.
If you are unfortunate enough to have a decent figure, as Palin does, all those pencil skirts and little fitted jackets make you look weirdly vampy (my theory about the American public’s initial burst of enthusiasm for the vice-presidential candidate hinged on the fact that she looks like a porn star in some scenario involving a library, the unclasping of hair and the removal of glasses). Had Palin hidden her figure under smocky tops and giant ponchos, editorials would have been speculating on whether she had body dysmorphia, or an eating disorder, or both.
If you’re dumpy, which may not be your fault, you are doomed to years of media reports that always allude to your thick waist, or stumpy legs, or matronly frocks: the late Mo Mowlam, before she had announced she was being treated for cancer and was therefore bloated and balding from chemotherapy, was once compared to a truck driver in drag. The fact that I remember this years later is indicative of the power of the sartorial insult when directed at women, who use clothes as armour in the first place.
I can’t think of any male politician who has ever been so belittled in the name of aesthetics: “scruffy” or “unkempt" is as bad as it gets, which is not very bad at all since the implication is that the man is so busy thinking with his giant male brain that the egg on his tie is the least of his concerns.
Caroline Flint, who is a looker, is constantly getting it in the neck from parliamentary sketch writers for wearing attractive clothes; the subtext being that the minister for Europe must either be extraordinarily shallow or some sort of crazed, preening narcissist. Condoleezza Rice once wore knee-high leather boots of the kind millions of women pull on every winter; let’s just say the media reaction was such that she didn’t wear them in public again. Cherie Blair and Pauline Prescott were both ridiculed over their devotion to their coiffures, as though women shouldn’t mind walking around in a perpetual bad hair day. If they had, of course, walked around with haystacks on their heads, they would have been the source of endless hilarity.
In the real world, which politics constantly seeks to mirror, we have more or less got over the idea that you have to dress like a drudge to be taken seriously, or that anyone whose bosoms have the temerity to protrude is some sort of casting-couch imbecile. In politics, looking as though you have a chest is still seen as indicative of the fact that you’re stupid, or a slapper, or both.
There are, surely, enough sticks to beat women with for no one to have to resort to pulling apart their wardrobes. Nobody becomes a politician because they want to have the height of their heels dissected and even Palin deserves (a little) more respect than the acres of print devoted to the question of whether her lips are tattooed (especially as what the acres of print are trying to say, but don’t, is that tattooed lipliner is common).
So yes, $150,000 is an awful lot to spend on a wardrobe in a couple of months and no, the amount isn’t representative of the average hockey mom’s sartorial budget. That would be because – der! – Palin isn’t really a hockey mom: she’s an extremely savvy, ambitious woman who is trying to become vice-president of the United States. Besides, think of the stick she’d have got if she’d worn her own clothes. As I say, a woman dressing for public office can’t win. But it’s pretty low to blame her for trying.
Articles from " Der Spiegel "
26. Oktober 2008, 12:03 Uhr
US-REPUBLIKANER
Palin fürchtet Schuldzuweisung nach verlorener Wahl
Sarah Palin schwant Böses: Offenbar wird sie von republikanischen Parteistrategen schon jetzt für eine mögliche Niederlage verantwortlich gemacht. Dagegen wehrt sich die Gouverneurin aus Alaska jetzt. Obama lässt derweil Berichte dementieren, wonach er bereits eine Antrittsrede vorbereite.
Hamburg/Washington - Zunächst galt sie als Geheimwaffe der Republikaner : Alaskas Gouverneurin Sarah Palin, Newcomerin in der nationalen Politikszene der USA, sollte der lahmenden Kampagne des republikanischen Präsidentschaftskandidaten John McCain zu neuem Schwung verhelfen. Einige Tage lange schien diese Rechnung aufzugehen, mit der frischen Palin als Vize-Kandidatin schaffte McCain sogar den Anschluss an Gegenkandidat Barack Obama in den Umfragen - um dann jedoch abermals einzubrechen. Seitdem gilt Palin eher als Klotz an McCains Bein: Zu unerfahren, zu naiv, zu kenntnislos sei seine Vize-Dame, heißt es nun.
AFP
Vize-Kandidatin Palin: Keine Lust auf den schwarzen Peter
Diesen schwarzen Peter will sich Palin im Falle einer Niederlage allerdings nicht zuschieben lassen - weswegen einem Bericht des US-Internet-Portals "Politico" zufolge heftige Streitigkeiten bei den Republikanern ausgebrochen sind. Denn die Gouverneurin von Alaska beschuldigt die Berater von McCain, sie bereits für eine mögliche Pleite bei den Wahlen am 4. November verantwortlich zu machen. Anhänger der Gouverneurin von Alaska sehen demnach vor allem McCains Chefstrategen, Steve Schmidt, als Urheber der parteiinternen Kritik an Palin.
Die Webseite beruft sich auf vier Menschen aus dem engen Umfeld Palins. Demnach ist die Gouverneurin von Alaska erbost über Äußerungen aus dem republikanischen Beraterstab über einige ihrer verbalen Entgleisungen. Die Vize-Kandidatin sei deshalb mehr und mehr entschlossen, die Ratschläge der Berater nicht mehr zu berücksichtigen. Ein Vertreter der Republikaner sagte laut "Politico", Palin habe bereits mehrere Erklärungen in ihrem Wahlkampf im Alleingang getroffen.
Die Gouverneurin von Alaska ist auch deswegen zu einer Belastung für die Kampagne McCains geworden, weil sie unter dem Verdacht steht, ihre Macht missbraucht zu haben, als sie ihren Sicherheitschef entließ. Ein Untersuchungsausschuss hatte befunden, dass die Gouverneurin den Mann drängte, einen Polizisten zu entlassen. Der Polizist war mit Palins Schwester verheiratet und befand sich damals in einem äußerst kontroversen Scheidungsverfahren. Auch die Affäre um Palins teure Garderobe während des Wahlkampfs macht den Republikanern zu schaffen.
Obama dementiert Berichte über Antrittsredenentwurf
Ganz andere Sorgen hat dagegen der in den Umfragen weiterhin deutlich führende Obama: Sein Wahlkampfteam hat Anschuldigungen zurückgewiesen, nach denen der Präsidentschaftskandidat der Demokraten bereits seine Antrittsrede als neuer US-Staatschef vorbereitet hat. Dieser Vorwurf sei absolut falsch, sagte Obamas Kampagnensprecher Bill Burton am Samstag.
Die US-Zeitung "New York Times" hatte zuvor berichtet, dass das Obama-Team bereits einen Entwurf für eine derartige Ansprache erarbeitet habe. Sie bezog sich dabei aber auf einen Text, den ein Berater Obamas ganz allgemein für den nächsten US-Präsidenten geschrieben und schon in einem Buch veröffentlicht hatte.
Die Republikaner um McCain hatten Obama daraufhin als arrogant und anmaßend beschimpft. Viele Wähler seien noch unentschlossen, aber Obama sei bereits siegessicher, kritisierte McCain bei einer Wahlkampfveranstaltung in New Mexico. "Vielleicht schreibt er auch noch eine Rede zur Lage der Nation, bevor diese Sache (die Wahl) erledigt ist", spottete McCain. Die USA bräuchten hingegen jemanden, der das Rennen zu Ende liefe, bevor er mit der Ehrenrunde beginne.
Der künftige Präsident der USA hat nach den Wahlen im November Zeit bis zum 20. Januar 2009 für die Vorbereitung auf das neue Amt. Erst dann beginnt offiziell die Amtszeit.
Clinton wird mit Obama in Florida auftreten
Unterstützung bekommt Obama erneut von Ex-Präsident Bill Clinton: Er soll dem demokratischen Präsidentschaftskandidaten am kommenden Mittwoch in Florida erstmals bei einem Wahlkampfauftritt zur Seite stehen. In dem stark umkämpften US-Bundesstaat werde es einen gemeinsamen Auftritt in der Stadt Orlando geben, teilte das Wahlkampfteam von Obama am Samstag mit. Orlando liegt auf der Grenze zwischen dem konservativen Norden und dem liberalen Süden Floridas. Jüngste Umfragen sagen ein Kopf-an-Kopf-Rennen zwischen Obama und McCain in Florida voraus.
Clinton war der einzige demokratische US-Präsidentschaftskandidat, der in den vergangenen 30 Jahren die Wahlmänner in Florida für sich gewinnen konnte. 2000 hatten sich die Kandidaten Al Gore und George W. Bush wochenlang um die Auszählung dort gestritten, ehe Bush den Sieg mit wenigen hundert Stimmen Vorsprung per Gerichtsbeschluss zugesprochen bekam.
Clinton hatte Obama bereits auf dem Nominierungsparteitag der Demokraten im August demonstrativ den Rücken gestärkt. Clintons Frau Hillary bestritt bereits mehr als 50 Wahlkampfauftritte für ihren früheren Rivalen. Als Hillary Clinton noch mit dem Senator aus Illinois um die demokratische Präsidentschaftskandidatur konkurrierte, hatte sich Bill Clinton mehrfach negativ über Obama geäußert.
flo/AFP
US-REPUBLIKANER
Palin fürchtet Schuldzuweisung nach verlorener Wahl
Sarah Palin schwant Böses: Offenbar wird sie von republikanischen Parteistrategen schon jetzt für eine mögliche Niederlage verantwortlich gemacht. Dagegen wehrt sich die Gouverneurin aus Alaska jetzt. Obama lässt derweil Berichte dementieren, wonach er bereits eine Antrittsrede vorbereite.
Hamburg/Washington - Zunächst galt sie als Geheimwaffe der Republikaner : Alaskas Gouverneurin Sarah Palin, Newcomerin in der nationalen Politikszene der USA, sollte der lahmenden Kampagne des republikanischen Präsidentschaftskandidaten John McCain zu neuem Schwung verhelfen. Einige Tage lange schien diese Rechnung aufzugehen, mit der frischen Palin als Vize-Kandidatin schaffte McCain sogar den Anschluss an Gegenkandidat Barack Obama in den Umfragen - um dann jedoch abermals einzubrechen. Seitdem gilt Palin eher als Klotz an McCains Bein: Zu unerfahren, zu naiv, zu kenntnislos sei seine Vize-Dame, heißt es nun.
AFP
Vize-Kandidatin Palin: Keine Lust auf den schwarzen Peter
Diesen schwarzen Peter will sich Palin im Falle einer Niederlage allerdings nicht zuschieben lassen - weswegen einem Bericht des US-Internet-Portals "Politico" zufolge heftige Streitigkeiten bei den Republikanern ausgebrochen sind. Denn die Gouverneurin von Alaska beschuldigt die Berater von McCain, sie bereits für eine mögliche Pleite bei den Wahlen am 4. November verantwortlich zu machen. Anhänger der Gouverneurin von Alaska sehen demnach vor allem McCains Chefstrategen, Steve Schmidt, als Urheber der parteiinternen Kritik an Palin.
Die Webseite beruft sich auf vier Menschen aus dem engen Umfeld Palins. Demnach ist die Gouverneurin von Alaska erbost über Äußerungen aus dem republikanischen Beraterstab über einige ihrer verbalen Entgleisungen. Die Vize-Kandidatin sei deshalb mehr und mehr entschlossen, die Ratschläge der Berater nicht mehr zu berücksichtigen. Ein Vertreter der Republikaner sagte laut "Politico", Palin habe bereits mehrere Erklärungen in ihrem Wahlkampf im Alleingang getroffen.
Die Gouverneurin von Alaska ist auch deswegen zu einer Belastung für die Kampagne McCains geworden, weil sie unter dem Verdacht steht, ihre Macht missbraucht zu haben, als sie ihren Sicherheitschef entließ. Ein Untersuchungsausschuss hatte befunden, dass die Gouverneurin den Mann drängte, einen Polizisten zu entlassen. Der Polizist war mit Palins Schwester verheiratet und befand sich damals in einem äußerst kontroversen Scheidungsverfahren. Auch die Affäre um Palins teure Garderobe während des Wahlkampfs macht den Republikanern zu schaffen.
Obama dementiert Berichte über Antrittsredenentwurf
Ganz andere Sorgen hat dagegen der in den Umfragen weiterhin deutlich führende Obama: Sein Wahlkampfteam hat Anschuldigungen zurückgewiesen, nach denen der Präsidentschaftskandidat der Demokraten bereits seine Antrittsrede als neuer US-Staatschef vorbereitet hat. Dieser Vorwurf sei absolut falsch, sagte Obamas Kampagnensprecher Bill Burton am Samstag.
Die US-Zeitung "New York Times" hatte zuvor berichtet, dass das Obama-Team bereits einen Entwurf für eine derartige Ansprache erarbeitet habe. Sie bezog sich dabei aber auf einen Text, den ein Berater Obamas ganz allgemein für den nächsten US-Präsidenten geschrieben und schon in einem Buch veröffentlicht hatte.
Die Republikaner um McCain hatten Obama daraufhin als arrogant und anmaßend beschimpft. Viele Wähler seien noch unentschlossen, aber Obama sei bereits siegessicher, kritisierte McCain bei einer Wahlkampfveranstaltung in New Mexico. "Vielleicht schreibt er auch noch eine Rede zur Lage der Nation, bevor diese Sache (die Wahl) erledigt ist", spottete McCain. Die USA bräuchten hingegen jemanden, der das Rennen zu Ende liefe, bevor er mit der Ehrenrunde beginne.
Der künftige Präsident der USA hat nach den Wahlen im November Zeit bis zum 20. Januar 2009 für die Vorbereitung auf das neue Amt. Erst dann beginnt offiziell die Amtszeit.
Clinton wird mit Obama in Florida auftreten
Unterstützung bekommt Obama erneut von Ex-Präsident Bill Clinton: Er soll dem demokratischen Präsidentschaftskandidaten am kommenden Mittwoch in Florida erstmals bei einem Wahlkampfauftritt zur Seite stehen. In dem stark umkämpften US-Bundesstaat werde es einen gemeinsamen Auftritt in der Stadt Orlando geben, teilte das Wahlkampfteam von Obama am Samstag mit. Orlando liegt auf der Grenze zwischen dem konservativen Norden und dem liberalen Süden Floridas. Jüngste Umfragen sagen ein Kopf-an-Kopf-Rennen zwischen Obama und McCain in Florida voraus.
Clinton war der einzige demokratische US-Präsidentschaftskandidat, der in den vergangenen 30 Jahren die Wahlmänner in Florida für sich gewinnen konnte. 2000 hatten sich die Kandidaten Al Gore und George W. Bush wochenlang um die Auszählung dort gestritten, ehe Bush den Sieg mit wenigen hundert Stimmen Vorsprung per Gerichtsbeschluss zugesprochen bekam.
Clinton hatte Obama bereits auf dem Nominierungsparteitag der Demokraten im August demonstrativ den Rücken gestärkt. Clintons Frau Hillary bestritt bereits mehr als 50 Wahlkampfauftritte für ihren früheren Rivalen. Als Hillary Clinton noch mit dem Senator aus Illinois um die demokratische Präsidentschaftskandidatur konkurrierte, hatte sich Bill Clinton mehrfach negativ über Obama geäußert.
flo/AFP
New York Times
October 24, 2008
Editorial
Barack Obama for President
Hyperbole is the currency of presidential campaigns, but this year the nation’s future truly hangs in the balance.
The United States is battered and drifting after eight years of President Bush’s failed leadership. He is saddling his successor with two wars, a scarred global image and a government systematically stripped of its ability to protect and help its citizens — whether they are fleeing a hurricane’s floodwaters, searching for affordable health care or struggling to hold on to their homes, jobs, savings and pensions in the midst of a financial crisis that was foretold and preventable.
As tough as the times are, the selection of a new president is easy. After nearly two years of a grueling and ugly campaign, Senator Barack Obama of Illinois has proved that he is the right choice to be the 44th president of the United States.
Mr. Obama has met challenge after challenge, growing as a leader and putting real flesh on his early promises of hope and change. He has shown a cool head and sound judgment. We believe he has the will and the ability to forge the broad political consensus that is essential to finding solutions to this nation’s problems.
In the same time, Senator John McCain of Arizona has retreated farther and farther to the fringe of American politics, running a campaign on partisan division, class warfare and even hints of racism. His policies and worldview are mired in the past. His choice of a running mate so evidently unfit for the office was a final act of opportunism and bad judgment that eclipsed the accomplishments of 26 years in Congress.
Given the particularly ugly nature of Mr. McCain’s campaign, the urge to choose on the basis of raw emotion is strong. But there is a greater value in looking closely at the facts of life in America today and at the prescriptions the candidates offer. The differences are profound.
Mr. McCain offers more of the Republican every-man-for-himself ideology, now lying in shards on Wall Street and in Americans’ bank accounts. Mr. Obama has another vision of government’s role and responsibilities.
In his convention speech in Denver, Mr. Obama said, “Government cannot solve all our problems, but what it should do is that which we cannot do for ourselves: protect us from harm and provide every child a decent education; keep our water clean and our toys safe; invest in new schools and new roads and new science and technology.”
Since the financial crisis, he has correctly identified the abject failure of government regulation that has brought the markets to the brink of collapse.
The Economy
The American financial system is the victim of decades of Republican deregulatory and anti-tax policies. Those ideas have been proved wrong at an unfathomable price, but Mr. McCain — a self-proclaimed “foot soldier in the Reagan revolution” — is still a believer.
Mr. Obama sees that far-reaching reforms will be needed to protect Americans and American business.
Mr. McCain talks about reform a lot, but his vision is pinched. His answer to any economic question is to eliminate pork-barrel spending — about $18 billion in a $3 trillion budget — cut taxes and wait for unfettered markets to solve the problem.
Mr. Obama is clear that the nation’s tax structure must be changed to make it fairer. That means the well-off Americans who have benefited disproportionately from Mr. Bush’s tax cuts will have to pay some more. Working Americans, who have seen their standard of living fall and their children’s options narrow, will benefit. Mr. Obama wants to raise the minimum wage and tie it to inflation, restore a climate in which workers are able to organize unions if they wish and expand educational opportunities.
Mr. McCain, who once opposed President Bush’s tax cuts for the wealthy as fiscally irresponsible, now wants to make them permanent. And while he talks about keeping taxes low for everyone, his proposed cuts would overwhelmingly benefit the top 1 percent of Americans while digging the country into a deeper fiscal hole.
National Security
The American military — its people and equipment — is dangerously overstretched. Mr. Bush has neglected the necessary war in Afghanistan, which now threatens to spiral into defeat. The unnecessary and staggeringly costly war in Iraq must be ended as quickly and responsibly as possible.
While Iraq’s leaders insist on a swift drawdown of American troops and a deadline for the end of the occupation, Mr. McCain is still talking about some ill-defined “victory.” As a result, he has offered no real plan for extracting American troops and limiting any further damage to Iraq and its neighbors.
Mr. Obama was an early and thoughtful opponent of the war in Iraq, and he has presented a military and diplomatic plan for withdrawing American forces. Mr. Obama also has correctly warned that until the Pentagon starts pulling troops out of Iraq, there will not be enough troops to defeat the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan.
Mr. McCain, like Mr. Bush, has only belatedly focused on Afghanistan’s dangerous unraveling and the threat that neighboring Pakistan may quickly follow.
Mr. Obama would have a learning curve on foreign affairs, but he has already showed sounder judgment than his opponent on these critical issues. His choice of Senator Joseph Biden — who has deep foreign-policy expertise — as his running mate is another sign of that sound judgment. Mr. McCain’s long interest in foreign policy and the many dangers this country now faces make his choice of Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska more irresponsible.
Both presidential candidates talk about strengthening alliances in Europe and Asia, including NATO, and strongly support Israel. Both candidates talk about repairing America’s image in the world. But it seems clear to us that Mr. Obama is far more likely to do that — and not just because the first black president would present a new American face to the world.
Mr. Obama wants to reform the United Nations, while Mr. McCain wants to create a new entity, the League of Democracies — a move that would incite even fiercer anti-American furies around the world.
Unfortunately, Mr. McCain, like Mr. Bush, sees the world as divided into friends (like Georgia) and adversaries (like Russia). He proposed kicking Russia out of the Group of 8 industrialized nations even before the invasion of Georgia. We have no sympathy for Moscow’s bullying, but we also have no desire to replay the cold war. The United States must find a way to constrain the Russians’ worst impulses, while preserving the ability to work with them on arms control and other vital initiatives.
Both candidates talk tough on terrorism, and neither has ruled out military action to end Iran’s nuclear weapons program. But Mr. Obama has called for a serious effort to try to wean Tehran from its nuclear ambitions with more credible diplomatic overtures and tougher sanctions. Mr. McCain’s willingness to joke about bombing Iran was frightening.
The Constitution and the Rule of Law
Under Mr. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the justice system and the separation of powers have come under relentless attack. Mr. Bush chose to exploit the tragedy of Sept. 11, 2001, the moment in which he looked like the president of a unified nation, to try to place himself above the law.
Mr. Bush has arrogated the power to imprison men without charges and browbeat Congress into granting an unfettered authority to spy on Americans. He has created untold numbers of “black” programs, including secret prisons and outsourced torture. The president has issued hundreds, if not thousands, of secret orders. We fear it will take years of forensic research to discover how many basic rights have been violated.
Both candidates have renounced torture and are committed to closing the prison camp in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.
But Mr. Obama has gone beyond that, promising to identify and correct Mr. Bush’s attacks on the democratic system. Mr. McCain has been silent on the subject.
Mr. McCain improved protections for detainees. But then he helped the White House push through the appalling Military Commissions Act of 2006, which denied detainees the right to a hearing in a real court and put Washington in conflict with the Geneva Conventions, greatly increasing the risk to American troops.
The next president will have the chance to appoint one or more justices to a Supreme Court that is on the brink of being dominated by a radical right wing. Mr. Obama may appoint less liberal judges than some of his followers might like, but Mr. McCain is certain to pick rigid ideologues. He has said he would never appoint a judge who believes in women’s reproductive rights.
The Candidates
It will be an enormous challenge just to get the nation back to where it was before Mr. Bush, to begin to mend its image in the world and to restore its self-confidence and its self-respect. Doing all of that, and leading America forward, will require strength of will, character and intellect, sober judgment and a cool, steady hand.
Mr. Obama has those qualities in abundance. Watching him being tested in the campaign has long since erased the reservations that led us to endorse Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton in the Democratic primaries. He has drawn in legions of new voters with powerful messages of hope and possibility and calls for shared sacrifice and social responsibility.
Mr. McCain, whom we chose as the best Republican nominee in the primaries, has spent the last coins of his reputation for principle and sound judgment to placate the limitless demands and narrow vision of the far-right wing. His righteous fury at being driven out of the 2000 primaries on a racist tide aimed at his adopted daughter has been replaced by a zealous embrace of those same win-at-all-costs tactics and tacticians.
He surrendered his standing as an independent thinker in his rush to embrace Mr. Bush’s misbegotten tax policies and to abandon his leadership position on climate change and immigration reform.
Mr. McCain could have seized the high ground on energy and the environment. Earlier in his career, he offered the first plausible bill to control America’s emissions of greenhouse gases. Now his positions are a caricature of that record: think Ms. Palin leading chants of “drill, baby, drill.”
Mr. Obama has endorsed some offshore drilling, but as part of a comprehensive strategy including big investments in new, clean technologies.
Mr. Obama has withstood some of the toughest campaign attacks ever mounted against a candidate. He’s been called un-American and accused of hiding a secret Islamic faith. The Republicans have linked him to domestic terrorists and questioned his wife’s love of her country. Ms. Palin has also questioned millions of Americans’ patriotism, calling Republican-leaning states “pro-America.”
This politics of fear, division and character assassination helped Mr. Bush drive Mr. McCain from the 2000 Republican primaries and defeat Senator John Kerry in 2004. It has been the dominant theme of his failed presidency.
The nation’s problems are simply too grave to be reduced to slashing “robo-calls” and negative ads. This country needs sensible leadership, compassionate leadership, honest leadership and strong leadership. Barack Obama has shown that he has all of those qualities.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2008/10/23/opinion/20081024-endorse.html
October 24, 2008
Editorial
Barack Obama for President
Hyperbole is the currency of presidential campaigns, but this year the nation’s future truly hangs in the balance.
The United States is battered and drifting after eight years of President Bush’s failed leadership. He is saddling his successor with two wars, a scarred global image and a government systematically stripped of its ability to protect and help its citizens — whether they are fleeing a hurricane’s floodwaters, searching for affordable health care or struggling to hold on to their homes, jobs, savings and pensions in the midst of a financial crisis that was foretold and preventable.
As tough as the times are, the selection of a new president is easy. After nearly two years of a grueling and ugly campaign, Senator Barack Obama of Illinois has proved that he is the right choice to be the 44th president of the United States.
Mr. Obama has met challenge after challenge, growing as a leader and putting real flesh on his early promises of hope and change. He has shown a cool head and sound judgment. We believe he has the will and the ability to forge the broad political consensus that is essential to finding solutions to this nation’s problems.
In the same time, Senator John McCain of Arizona has retreated farther and farther to the fringe of American politics, running a campaign on partisan division, class warfare and even hints of racism. His policies and worldview are mired in the past. His choice of a running mate so evidently unfit for the office was a final act of opportunism and bad judgment that eclipsed the accomplishments of 26 years in Congress.
Given the particularly ugly nature of Mr. McCain’s campaign, the urge to choose on the basis of raw emotion is strong. But there is a greater value in looking closely at the facts of life in America today and at the prescriptions the candidates offer. The differences are profound.
Mr. McCain offers more of the Republican every-man-for-himself ideology, now lying in shards on Wall Street and in Americans’ bank accounts. Mr. Obama has another vision of government’s role and responsibilities.
In his convention speech in Denver, Mr. Obama said, “Government cannot solve all our problems, but what it should do is that which we cannot do for ourselves: protect us from harm and provide every child a decent education; keep our water clean and our toys safe; invest in new schools and new roads and new science and technology.”
Since the financial crisis, he has correctly identified the abject failure of government regulation that has brought the markets to the brink of collapse.
The Economy
The American financial system is the victim of decades of Republican deregulatory and anti-tax policies. Those ideas have been proved wrong at an unfathomable price, but Mr. McCain — a self-proclaimed “foot soldier in the Reagan revolution” — is still a believer.
Mr. Obama sees that far-reaching reforms will be needed to protect Americans and American business.
Mr. McCain talks about reform a lot, but his vision is pinched. His answer to any economic question is to eliminate pork-barrel spending — about $18 billion in a $3 trillion budget — cut taxes and wait for unfettered markets to solve the problem.
Mr. Obama is clear that the nation’s tax structure must be changed to make it fairer. That means the well-off Americans who have benefited disproportionately from Mr. Bush’s tax cuts will have to pay some more. Working Americans, who have seen their standard of living fall and their children’s options narrow, will benefit. Mr. Obama wants to raise the minimum wage and tie it to inflation, restore a climate in which workers are able to organize unions if they wish and expand educational opportunities.
Mr. McCain, who once opposed President Bush’s tax cuts for the wealthy as fiscally irresponsible, now wants to make them permanent. And while he talks about keeping taxes low for everyone, his proposed cuts would overwhelmingly benefit the top 1 percent of Americans while digging the country into a deeper fiscal hole.
National Security
The American military — its people and equipment — is dangerously overstretched. Mr. Bush has neglected the necessary war in Afghanistan, which now threatens to spiral into defeat. The unnecessary and staggeringly costly war in Iraq must be ended as quickly and responsibly as possible.
While Iraq’s leaders insist on a swift drawdown of American troops and a deadline for the end of the occupation, Mr. McCain is still talking about some ill-defined “victory.” As a result, he has offered no real plan for extracting American troops and limiting any further damage to Iraq and its neighbors.
Mr. Obama was an early and thoughtful opponent of the war in Iraq, and he has presented a military and diplomatic plan for withdrawing American forces. Mr. Obama also has correctly warned that until the Pentagon starts pulling troops out of Iraq, there will not be enough troops to defeat the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan.
Mr. McCain, like Mr. Bush, has only belatedly focused on Afghanistan’s dangerous unraveling and the threat that neighboring Pakistan may quickly follow.
Mr. Obama would have a learning curve on foreign affairs, but he has already showed sounder judgment than his opponent on these critical issues. His choice of Senator Joseph Biden — who has deep foreign-policy expertise — as his running mate is another sign of that sound judgment. Mr. McCain’s long interest in foreign policy and the many dangers this country now faces make his choice of Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska more irresponsible.
Both presidential candidates talk about strengthening alliances in Europe and Asia, including NATO, and strongly support Israel. Both candidates talk about repairing America’s image in the world. But it seems clear to us that Mr. Obama is far more likely to do that — and not just because the first black president would present a new American face to the world.
Mr. Obama wants to reform the United Nations, while Mr. McCain wants to create a new entity, the League of Democracies — a move that would incite even fiercer anti-American furies around the world.
Unfortunately, Mr. McCain, like Mr. Bush, sees the world as divided into friends (like Georgia) and adversaries (like Russia). He proposed kicking Russia out of the Group of 8 industrialized nations even before the invasion of Georgia. We have no sympathy for Moscow’s bullying, but we also have no desire to replay the cold war. The United States must find a way to constrain the Russians’ worst impulses, while preserving the ability to work with them on arms control and other vital initiatives.
Both candidates talk tough on terrorism, and neither has ruled out military action to end Iran’s nuclear weapons program. But Mr. Obama has called for a serious effort to try to wean Tehran from its nuclear ambitions with more credible diplomatic overtures and tougher sanctions. Mr. McCain’s willingness to joke about bombing Iran was frightening.
The Constitution and the Rule of Law
Under Mr. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the justice system and the separation of powers have come under relentless attack. Mr. Bush chose to exploit the tragedy of Sept. 11, 2001, the moment in which he looked like the president of a unified nation, to try to place himself above the law.
Mr. Bush has arrogated the power to imprison men without charges and browbeat Congress into granting an unfettered authority to spy on Americans. He has created untold numbers of “black” programs, including secret prisons and outsourced torture. The president has issued hundreds, if not thousands, of secret orders. We fear it will take years of forensic research to discover how many basic rights have been violated.
Both candidates have renounced torture and are committed to closing the prison camp in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.
But Mr. Obama has gone beyond that, promising to identify and correct Mr. Bush’s attacks on the democratic system. Mr. McCain has been silent on the subject.
Mr. McCain improved protections for detainees. But then he helped the White House push through the appalling Military Commissions Act of 2006, which denied detainees the right to a hearing in a real court and put Washington in conflict with the Geneva Conventions, greatly increasing the risk to American troops.
The next president will have the chance to appoint one or more justices to a Supreme Court that is on the brink of being dominated by a radical right wing. Mr. Obama may appoint less liberal judges than some of his followers might like, but Mr. McCain is certain to pick rigid ideologues. He has said he would never appoint a judge who believes in women’s reproductive rights.
The Candidates
It will be an enormous challenge just to get the nation back to where it was before Mr. Bush, to begin to mend its image in the world and to restore its self-confidence and its self-respect. Doing all of that, and leading America forward, will require strength of will, character and intellect, sober judgment and a cool, steady hand.
Mr. Obama has those qualities in abundance. Watching him being tested in the campaign has long since erased the reservations that led us to endorse Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton in the Democratic primaries. He has drawn in legions of new voters with powerful messages of hope and possibility and calls for shared sacrifice and social responsibility.
Mr. McCain, whom we chose as the best Republican nominee in the primaries, has spent the last coins of his reputation for principle and sound judgment to placate the limitless demands and narrow vision of the far-right wing. His righteous fury at being driven out of the 2000 primaries on a racist tide aimed at his adopted daughter has been replaced by a zealous embrace of those same win-at-all-costs tactics and tacticians.
He surrendered his standing as an independent thinker in his rush to embrace Mr. Bush’s misbegotten tax policies and to abandon his leadership position on climate change and immigration reform.
Mr. McCain could have seized the high ground on energy and the environment. Earlier in his career, he offered the first plausible bill to control America’s emissions of greenhouse gases. Now his positions are a caricature of that record: think Ms. Palin leading chants of “drill, baby, drill.”
Mr. Obama has endorsed some offshore drilling, but as part of a comprehensive strategy including big investments in new, clean technologies.
Mr. Obama has withstood some of the toughest campaign attacks ever mounted against a candidate. He’s been called un-American and accused of hiding a secret Islamic faith. The Republicans have linked him to domestic terrorists and questioned his wife’s love of her country. Ms. Palin has also questioned millions of Americans’ patriotism, calling Republican-leaning states “pro-America.”
This politics of fear, division and character assassination helped Mr. Bush drive Mr. McCain from the 2000 Republican primaries and defeat Senator John Kerry in 2004. It has been the dominant theme of his failed presidency.
The nation’s problems are simply too grave to be reduced to slashing “robo-calls” and negative ads. This country needs sensible leadership, compassionate leadership, honest leadership and strong leadership. Barack Obama has shown that he has all of those qualities.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2008/10/23/opinion/20081024-endorse.html
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