Fantasy Politics USA

Conservative radio host and political commentator Alan Keyes has announced he will join the GOP field for President. Keyes has already run for President twice in 2000 and 1996. He also has a couple of failed Senate runs including one in Illinois where he ran against Barack Obama in 2004. During that race Keyes said that Jesus Christ would not vote for Obama because of some of his views. He also refused to congratulate Obama for his victory saying, “I’m supposed to make a call that represents the congratulations toward the triumph of that which I believe ultimately stands for … a culture evil enough to destroy the very soul and heart of my country? I can’t do this. And I will not make a false gesture.” Last Friday Keyes filed a Statement of Candidacy (Form 2) with the Federal Election Commission which makes it official. He has already signed on to debate with the rest of the Republicans tonight at the Values Voter Presidential Debate in Florida. Keyes doesn’t expect to jump out into the front of the pack like Thompson, but he does expect to make some noises at the debates, something he is very good at. He already has a website, and a following.
Alan Cosgrove

Retired General Wesley Clark announced today he will endorse Hillary Clinton for President. Clark ran as a Democratic candidate in 2004. Clark was the Supreme Allied Commander of NATO, and led the allied military operation in the Kosovo war in 1999 under President Bill Clinton. Clark is an old friend of the Clintons. “I’m very pleased today to announce my endorsement of Senator Clinton to be our next President of the United States,” Clark told a group of reporters. “She’ll be a great leader for the United States of America, and I think she’ll be a great commander in chief for the men and women in the armed forces.” According to his website WesPac, “Senator Hillary Clinton has earned the support of millions of Americans in her campaign for president — and today I am pleased to count myself among them. The world has reached a critical point, and we need a leader in the White House with the courage, intelligence and humility to navigate through many troubling challenges to our security at home and abroad. I believe Senator Clinton is that leader, and I whole-heartedly endorse her for President of the United States. Senator Clinton and I share a worldview in which diplomacy is the best first-strike tool in our arsenal; in today’s complicated global system, the United States should be making more friends than enemies.” Clark adds, “Never before have so many Americans had our well-being so closely tied to world events. Our economic and national security has become more complicated than ever before, and we deserve a leader who draws on wisdom, compassion, intelligence and moral courage — in short, we need Hillary Clinton. She is tough but fair, a rock-solid leader equal to the many weighty challenges ahead of us.” After Clark’s announcement Clinton said on her website, “I am deeply admiring of General Clark’s record of leadership for our country and his appreciation of the complexity of the world in which we live today. I’m looking forward to his involvement in my campaign and working together to bring the change this country needs.”
Alan Cosgrove

According to a study released by the non-partisan group Center for Responsive Politics, Barack Obama and Ron Paul receive the most campaign contributions from people who work for the four branches of the military and National Guard. Obama, who has never served in the military, brought in the most money from the military. Obama has called for our troops to be out of Iraq by 2008. Ron Paul is the only Republican candidate currently running that has come out against the war. He comes in second in contributions from people in the service. John McCain, who supports our efforts in Iraq, comes in third. The center counted the money that was donated by those that call the Air Force, Army, Marines, Navy and National Guard as an employer. Overall most contributions from this group go to Republican candidates when you add in Congress. This year 40% goes to Democrats and 60% to Republicans. For Democrats this is up from 23% in 2004.
Alan Cosgrove

Fred Thompson has been campaigning in Florida and he talked about education, life and death issues, and why he doesn’t like debates. Thompson voted for President Bush’s No Child Left Behind program in 2001, but now he thinks it is not working. He said he would provide federal dollars for education with fewer strings attached. “We’ve been spending increasing amounts of federal money for decades, with increasing rules, increasing mandates, increasing regulations,” Thompson said. “It’s not working.” He said there are problems with the testing with Bush’s No Child Left Behind program. “No Child Left Behind, good concept, I’m all for testing, but it seems like now some of these states are teaching to the test and kind of making it so that everybody does well on the test, you can’t really tell that everybody’s doing that well. And it’s not objective,” Thompson said. A Republican that actually agrees with the folks that are in the trenches with our kids, the teachers union. Thompson said education should be more of a local problem. “We expect you to get objective testing done and publicize those tests for the local parents and for the local citizens and suffer the political ramifications locally if things don’t work out right,” he said. “It’s your responsibility,” Thompson said. “If you don’t like what’s going on, don’t get in your car and drive by your school board and maybe drive by the capitol and get on an airplane and fly to Washington and say, ‘I don’t like the way the school down the street is being run.'” Thompson was also asked what he thought about the Terri Schiavo case. Schiavo was the brain dead lady that Congress tried to save in 2005 when her feeding tube was removed. Congress passed a bill, and President Bush returned from his Texas ranch to sign the bill into law. But a federal judge refused to order the tube reinserted, a decision that was later upheld by the Supreme Court. Meanwhile Terri Schiavo died. Just like education Thompson felt this was a local matter. “Local matters generally speaking should be left to the locals. I think Congress has got an awful lot to keep up with.” But really he didn’t know the details of the case. “I can’t pass judgment on it. I know that good people were doing what they thought was best,” Thompson said. “That’s going back in history. I don’t remember the details of it.” Later in the day he was asked why he was not participating in Values Voter debate in Fort Lauderdale on Monday. He said he would like to participate in as many debates as possible, but his schedule always doesn’t allow it. “Debates are important, but let’s don’t let the tail wag the dog here. Standing up there 10 in a row, you know, like a bunch of seals waiting for someone to throw you the next fish is not necessarily the best way to impart your information to the American people,” Thompson said. “I’m not above acting like a seal every once in a while and waiting for the next fish. I just don’t want to do it all the time.” The Thompson lazy factor is showing up here. On Fox he said he liked debates to be more one on one, and then Mike Huckabee challenged him to one of those. Thompson hasn’t replied to Huckabee yet. This is the second debate he could have participated in, and it appears he will not. He turned down the first one to go on The Tonight Show, a much more relaxed atmosphere. For Thompson it seems easier to just let the locals work it out, because Washington is just to busy to deal with it. Besides I bet a President Thompson will be on vacation or something.
Alan Cosgrove

Yahoo with Slate and the Huffington Post have come with the first online debate, the Democratic Candidate Mashup debate. Just go to Yahoo and you can see eight of the Democratic candidates with three issues and one called The Bill Maher Grill. You pick as many candidates as you want, and one of the issues or grill, and you get a video with your candidates addressing that issue.
Alan Cosgrove

The full page MoveOn.org ad that called General Petraeus General Betray Us in The New York Times is still causing a storm among conservatives. Cross town rival newspaper The New York Post found out that MoveOn.org only had to pay $65,000 for the full page ad. They reported that this was a $116,000 discount from the Times’ usual $167,000 price. According to director of public relations for the Times the open price for an ad that size is $181,692. A Post reporter called the paper yesterday and was quoted a price of $167,000 for an ad that size. Two of the Republican candidates saw this and felt they needed to comment about this obvious liberal slant of the Times. Rudy Giuliani wanted to run an ad that size in the Times too, and felt he should get the same discount. Giuliani said, “give us the same rate, the heavily discounted rate they gave MoveOn.org for that abominable ad.” Fred Thompson also reads the Post. Thompson said the Times gave the group “a discount to make sure it (the ad) gets the widest possible circulation.” I’m not sure how giving discounts increases circulation, but all this fuss sure did. There is one problem with all this fuss. $65,000 is the normal rate for an advocacy ad from a non-profit group, according to newspaper spokeswoman. I guess at the Post investigative journalism isn’t as thorough as it should be. Not surprising since they are part of the Murdoch empire. “We do not distinguish advertising rates based on the political content of the ad,” the Times said in a statement. “In fact, the advertising department does not see the content of the ad before a rate is quoted.” “We believe the broad principles of freedom of the press confer on us an obligation to keep our advertising columns as open as possible,” the statement continued. “In fact, there are many instances when we have published opinion advertisements that run counter to the stance we take on our own editorial pages.” The Giuliani campaign has developed an ad, and if you go there now you can contribute to Giuliani’s campaign. They hope to get it in the Times for the same discounted price. His ad also attacks Hillary Clinton who Giuliani said smeared General Petraus. If the Times does give in and give Giuliani the discount they should give it to any other candidate that wants it. His ad is not to rebut MoveOn’s ad, but is clearly nothing more than a campaign ad. He doesn’t even address any of the issues brought up by MoveOn.org or Hillary Clinton during the Petraeus testimony.
Alan Cosgrove