Broder writes about the VP debate. Fallows calls him out:
Such an assessment can be true only if you have decided to assess debate performance on one factor alone, perky self-assurance, and to assign no weight whatsoever to such items as logic, responsiveness to questions, clarity in explaining views, factual knowledge, sentence by sentence coherence, and so on.
The long and short of it is that established media punditry has liked McCain more than Obama in the last couple of weeks, but the country disagrees. As such, what we are seeing is the fundamental problem with much election analysis: is the punditry trying to describe what is happening, or are they trying to create the reality themselves? Whenever polls numbers and pundits opinions of the campaign move in opposite directions, the answer is clearly the latter.Unsurprisingly, Broder is railing about public finance. Heh.
The Wall Street Journal decided this was important enough to make a news alert:
Public discontent with the Iraq war has eased slightly, a new Wall Street Journal-NBC News poll shows, suggesting President Bush may have a little more maneuvering room at a critical point in debates over war costs and troop levels.Of course the fact that Murdoch now owns it hasn't changed anything, posh! But what I really can't wait for is the inevitable media pile-on, more specifically the next David Broder column. From February:As Mr. Bush prepares to follow congressional testimony by the top general in Iraq, David Petraeus, with a televised speech to the nation tonight, the poll shows an uptick in support for the president's handling of the war as well as a small increase in the proportion of Americans who believe the troop surge is helping and that victory remains possible.
It may seem perverse to suggest that, at the very moment the House of Representatives is repudiating his policy in Iraq, President Bush is poised for a political comeback. But don't be astonished if that is the case.Now that Broder - thinks he - has been vindicated, can he take his ball, go home and leave the rest of us alone? But in the meanwhile, let the lovefest begin!!!
Thanks, Washington Post.After an initially tepid reception from policymakers, the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group are getting a second look from the White House and Congress, as officials continue to scour for bipartisan solutions to salvage the American engagement in Iraq.
With negotiations continuing this week on a new war funding bill, the administration is strongly signaling that it would accept the idea of requiring the Iraqi government to meet political benchmarks or else risk losing some assistance from the United States. That was one of the key proposals from the group headed by former secretary of state James A. Baker III and former Indiana congressman Lee H. Hamilton, but it was initially dismissed by the White House when first proposed last December.
A word to the wise: no matter what song and dance Bush does, the White House will never support any initiative that will lead to the U.S. leaving Iraq. Bush's plan is to leave the mess for the incoming Democrat, who will get us out of Iraq - worst case significantly draw down the number of troops deployed, so the Republicans can use the stabbed in the back line on Democrats.
Of course, David Broder will immediately see this as the epitome of bipartisanship and declare that Democrats go along with everything else Bush wants.
I think the country is closely balanced, with a controlling group in the center that rejects extreme positions and seeks practical solutions drawn from the agendas of both liberals and conservatives. Most Americans I meet are not ideologues of any sort; they are practical people seeking practical solutions to real challenges.
