From the Department of Unrelated Thoughts:
Boeing should cool it. With regard to the air
tanker program awarded to Northrup Grumman rather than to Boeing,
the latter has implemented a tawdry, heavily politicized campaign
to fight the award, even though politics is expressly not
supposed to play a role in competitively bid military contracts —
a point made in a letter signed by 22 retired Air Force generals on
Monday that strongly supported the Air Force decision in favor of
Northrup Grumman. What’s amazing is that Boeing even feels as if it
has any political ground to stand on, considering its record. This
is the same Boeing that lost the tanker contract the first time
because some of its people cheated (and went to jail) in the
earlier bid. This is the same Boeing that just last month had to
admit that the “virtual fence” technology it was supposed to
develop for Mexican border security just flat-out doesn’t work,
meaning that a key part of the border will go unfenced for at least
three years longer than earlier promised. This is the same Boeing
that just weeks before the contract award was praising the Air
Force for the openness and fairness of the competition. Yet now,
this twice-disgraced company is not merely appealing the award, but
ginning up all sorts of political hardball efforts by Members of
Congress who act like Boeing’s puppets. What the retired generals
said in their letter is the important thing, though: “Delays in the
tanker program will only serve to put the lives of crews flying
these aging systems in greater jeopardy.” And that’s what this
really is all about: the safety of our crews and the effectiveness
of their missions. Already, because of the earlier Boeing scandal,
the new tanker program has lost about four years. If it loses much
more time, Boeing could have blood on its hands.
Hillary Clinton has no conscience. The Bosnia
lie was bizarre. But some of her manifold other lies were arguably
more sinister. The best compendium of Hillary mendacity (and
at-least-near-criminality) available right now is Hillary: The
Movie, and the book version thereof, produced by Citizens
United and its indefatigable leader, Dave Bossie. (Full disclosure:
Last fall, I did a final copy-edit for — but did not write — the
book.) And no, this isn’t a mere rehashing of the familiar scandals
of the 1990s — although an appendix by Deroy Murdock, reprinted in
the February issue of The American Spectator, does delve
into the old story of Hillary’s crooked cattle futures trading and
reports some startlingly overlooked facts — but rather an
examination of more recent scandals that never received the
attention they deserved. For instance (according to Dick Morris),
there was Hillary’s direct involvement with securing pardons for
Puerto Rican terrorists. And there was her direct involvement
(proved by newly released video) in planning for a major Hollywood
fund-raiser for which her campaign was found in major violation of
campaign finance laws. And much more. The woman couldn’t tell the
truth if you spotted her the R, U, T, and H.
John McCain still needs to reach out to
Reaganites. McCain might become a great president, because
he is terrific on supporting a strong defense and terrific against
wasteful government spending. But he’ll never become president
unless he convinces Reaganite conservatives not just to vote for
him, but to work for him — because it is the Reaganites who do the
work (envelope stuffing, phone calling, organizing, etc.) without
which no Republican can win the presidency. Yet despite all of the
hard feelings between McCain and conservatives, McCain’s forces
still seem to act as if they believe conservatives are going to
fall in line like sheep. Several of his campaign appointments have
given conservatives the willies, and his continuing nonsense about
global warming doesn’t help. (Memo to McCain: global temperatures
actually fell in 2007, and if 1998 is used as the baseline, they
have fallen, not risen, during the last decade.) And so far his
campaign has spent most of its post-primary time emphasizing not
any conservative initiatives, but his already-familiar biography.
All of which is all the more reason why he needs to consciously
reach out to conservatives now, to get them not just grudgingly
supportive but excited. And he also needs to name a Reaganite —
not a Bush man (or woman), and not a liberal-leaning Republican to
reach out to independents (if McCain can’t appeal to independents
by himself after all of his time as a “maverick,” he doesn’t have a
chance anyway), but a principled Reaganite who also shares Reagan’s
reassuring nature — as his running mate.
Congressional Republicans who protect earmarks are
politically obtuse. I challenge anybody, any time, to show
evidence that pork wins more elections than it loses. As Rep. Jeff
Flake said in a briefing for conservative bloggers on Tuesday, “the
whole smell that comes with earmarks” is a large part of what
caused Republican losses in 2006. And Flake, an Arizonan who has
spent time on the campaign trail with McCain, noted that McCain’s
“biggest applause lines anywhere he speaks” are when he pledges to
“make the authors of earmarks famous” — as examples of everything
that is wrong with the system.
And speaking of federal spending issues, Democratic leaders are
reportedly planning to load lots of extra domestic spending this
month onto a “supplemental” spending bill for the Iraq War. This is
a classic end-run around budget constraints. But the extra spending
is worth a fight, if President Bush will only lead it. Said Flake
(in response to my question): “We have the numbers to sustain
vetoes on these kinds of things,” but, “absent that firm commitment
from the president, it is very difficult.”
Questions for national Democratic leaders:
What, if anything at all, have any one of you ever said or done to
actually promote winning the war in Iraq rather than complaining
about it? Do you even think the United States has a just cause in
Iraq? More broadly speaking about the overall war against jihadist
terrorists, who do you think is more dangerous to American liberty:
the terrorists, or President Bush? Why do you think the telecom
companies should be liable for multi-trillion-dollar
lawsuits for their help in electronic surveillance of terrorists if
your own Senate Intelligence Committee chairman (and more than
two-thirds of the whole Senate) says their help was essential for
national protection and that they acted in good faith upon
convincing assurances of the program’s lawfulness? And if
international jihadist terrorists are a threat only because they
have been provoked by President Bush, as you seem to believe, how
do you explain the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center, the
bombings of our African embassies in 1998, the attack on the USS
Cole in 2000, and, for that matter, 9/11? And if you don’t
think Saddam Hussein was a key instigator of terrorism, how do you
explain his deliberate harboring of vicious terrorists Abu Nidal
(involved in the 1986 hijacking of Pan Am Flight 73) and Abu Abbas
(hijacking of the cruise ship Achille Lauro), and his
sponsorship of the Salman Pak terrorist training camp just outside
of Baghdad? Or do you even care? Do you think that somehow we
Americans are actually to blame for the terrorists’ hatred of us?
And do you think that U.S. national interests are by their very
nature moral and just because of the moral and just nature of our
very society — and if, as I suspect, you do not so think, then why
not? And would you be willing to have an open debate on whether or
not U.S. national interests are moral and just in and of
themselves?
I am sure John McCain would willingly debate you on that
question. And McCain would be right.
