Gather chestnuts/leave ACORNS to steal elections!

Iran flexes it air muscle but would be no match for Israeli pilots. (See 1 below.)

ACORN may be an embarrassment but it will not win the election for McCain because the nation does not care about ACORN. The nation wants change whatever that means and most cannot tell you what change does mean so gather your "chestnuts" and leave the ACORNS to steal elections. (See 2 below.)

What change means is spelled out by Brent Budowsky. As I wrote earlier "Bend Over America." (See 3 below.)

Gerson softens the blow for McCain and seeks to put matters in a historical context.(See 4 below.)

The winner of tonight's debate was Joe The Plumber. The loser continues to be the nation. Ironically the current stock market will probably elect Obama president though it is tanking, in part, out of fear of his becoming president. I suspect the economy will improve over the next four years from when "whomever" takes office because nothing stays down for ever.

When GW came into office we experienced a short and mild recession. The next president will be engulfed by a more severe economic downturn so statistically four years from now things will look better comparatively speaking. Why? Because the housing glut will have abated, the mortgage loan problems will be mostly history and the government will probably have begun to receive some of its billions back. Timing and luck are everything.

The key for Obama, should he become president, is to let nature take its course but being an activist, with socialistic tendencies and with Pelosi and Reid in the buckboard seat, that will probably prove very difficult if nigh impossible and that, among other reasons, could possibly prove Obama's eventual undoing in addition to his obvious inexperience in confronting the list of ominous issues we and the world face.


Dick

1)Large-scale Iranian Air force exercise simulates attack on Israel

Military sources report that the drill beginning Thursday, Oct. 16 in northern Iran, is Tehran’s rejoinder to Israel’s big aerial maneuver last June.

Then, more than 100 Israeli fighter-bombers went through their paces over the Mediterranean and Aegean Seas, roughly the same distance from Israel as Iran.

Tehran’s media claim the exercise will test its air force’s ability to fly to Israel and back without refueling.

The exercise will also test the US-made FBX-T band anti-missile radar system delivered in September and installed at the IAF Nevatim air base in the Negev. The Iranians say they will be practicing their “state-of-the-art military equipment and flight tactics,” meaning an attempt to jam US and Israeli electronics and radar.

According to Iranian media, the entire range of Iran's fighter fleet will take part, including US-made F-4, F-5, F-7 and F-14 fighters and domestic Saegheh fighters. Mid-air refueling will be provided by Boeing 707 aerial tankers.

In mid-August, Iran's Air Force chief, Brigadier General Ahmad Miqani, maintained that its antiquated fighter jet fleet had been overhauled and upgraded to fly distances of 3,000 kilometers without refueling. That would be more than double the distance between Iran and Israel.

That is why Tabriz, in Azerbaijan, at the northwestern corner of Iran, was picked as the starting point of the exercise. The official communiqué said the planes would be flying from air fields in Tehran, Isfahan, Tabriz and Hamadan and Dezful.

Our military sources say that this means that the entire maneuver will take place over Iran and not venture out its air space. The planes will have to fly to Tabriz from bases in the south near the Pakistan border in order to replicate the more than 1,200 km distance between Iran and Israel.

The Iranian Air force also aims at deploying more than 100 warplanes for the exercise, matching the number Israel used in its maneuver four months ago.

Tehran has timed this large-scale drill for just three weeks before the US presidential election on Nov. 4, in response to speculation rife in the West that Israel may use the window between the US election and the swearing-in of the new president in January for an attack on Iran’s nuclear installations.

The Iranians aim to show they have a first and second strike capability - not just with ballistic missiles but also by aerial attack.

2) ACORN Becoming an Embarrassment for Obama
By Dick Morris

As Obama lengthens his lead, the Republicans are praying that the election becomes close enough for the Democrats to steal. But, meanwhile, ACORN, the radical community group, is becoming an embarrassment for Obama. It is not as if its shenanigans are likely to tip the result, with the Democrats so far ahead, but as they are raided by the FBI in state after state (11 so far) they are becoming identified as the electoral equivalent of Greenpeace -- extremists who will stop at nothing to get their way.

What makes ACORN particularly embarrassing for Obama is that he used to be one of them. He served as general counsel for ACORN in Illinois, channeled millions to the organization from the Chicago Annenberg Challenge (whose funds he distributed), and has lately spent $800,000 of his campaign money to subsidize the group's activities. For this emolument, ACORN has registered voters 15 times over, canvassed the graveyards for votes and prepared to commit electoral fraud on a massive scale.

With friends like this, Obama doesn't need enemies. As their radical activities make headlines every day, Obama's intimate involvement with these radicals becomes more and more of a political liability.

The other Obama scandals have no topical relevance. Rev. Wright no longer spews hatred from the pulpit and has apparently been persuaded to stay away from media interviews. Likewise, William Ayers is making himself scarce; the Obama/Ayers relationship, whatever it may have been, is clearly in the past. Rezco is facing sentencing in his own corruption case, but isn't likely to turn on the one man who may acquire the power to pardon him.

But, as Election Day approaches and early balloting proceeds in many states, ACORN's tactics will get more and more media attention. As election officials discover ACORN frauds, the association will become more injurious to Obama, particularly when it is his own campaign that is funding many of the fraudulent activities. At the very least, the negative publicity ACORN will attract will paint Obama as a radical with questionable judgment. At the most, it might cause voters to wonder if he is not involved in electoral fraud.

The recent book by Wall Street Journal editor John Fund, "Stealing Elections: How Voter Fraud Threatens Our Democracy," discusses the prevalence of voter fraud, made newly possible by lax enforcement of laws requiring identification to vote. As Fund indicates, the motor/voter laws have encouraged waves of new voters, many of them ineligible to participate. Let us remember that eight of the 9-11 hijackers were registered to vote!

So ACORN is the gift that will keep on giving as its activities attract attention while Election Day nears.

But are these McCain attacks on Obama going to work? Clearly they haven't so far. Obama has lower negatives than McCain and his unfavorable rating has not risen, despite the avalanche of attack advertising to which he has been subjected. Possibly, voters are just inured to the attacks and disregard them. But they are more likely just distracted by the financial meltdown all around them. We have never had a presidential race, since 1944, where the contest was not the most important news in the four weeks before the election. (In 1944, the war overshadowed the election much to the frustration of the Republican candidate Thomas E. Dewey). The candidates seem unable to get a word in edgewise as the financial news dominates. People follow the Dow Jones more than the Gallup, Rasmussen or Zogby polls.

If the presidential race remains an afterthought, crowded out by the financial news, Obama will waltz into the White House by a comfortable margin. But if the stock market stops its gyrations for a while and no new household name/corporation or bank goes broke, the negatives against Obama will compel attention at last. And then the race may close swiftly and dramatically.

3) The next New Deal
By Brent Budowsky





The Gilded Age of George Bush ends; the era of reform with Barack Obama begins. The great realignment is at hand, with prospects rising for a Democratic president and Congress with expanded majorities to initiate a new era of historic patriotic reform.

Let’s revive and revolutionize the auto industry with the next JFK moon shot to create a new generation of fuel-efficient cars that reach 100 miles per gallon or better within five years, and create a wave of new jobs to lift the economy and conserve historic energy.

Congress should return after the election, as the Speaker suggests, to enact a major economic stimulus of at least $150 billion, to give a booster shot to our domestic economy.

The Federal Reserve and global central banks should give the world economy a booster shot with another coordinated interest rate cut of 50-100 basis points. Now.

We need sweeping reforms of Wall Street to protect the integrity of markets, restore the integrity of credit rating agencies and bring stability and fiduciary trust back to banking and investing.

The Treasury Department has adopted the Plan B for Buffett plan I outlined in a recent column. This plan will help stabilize banking while protecting taxpayers, and could well make money for the treasury.

This plan can be applied to the auto industry beyond the recent bill. Government can provide substantial capital to auto companies to achieve a five-year, 100 mile-per-gallon goal. This can be done through government purchases of preferred stock, a 5 percent dividend for taxpayers and warrants to purchase the common stock of auto companies, with the warrants later auctioned to private investors at a profit to taxpayers.

With banks, government financing must be accompanied by an effective foreclosure freeze, as I proposed last year and Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) and Obama (Ill.) have proposed. With auto companies, government financing should be focused on a revolution in fuel efficiency with a five-year, 100 mpg target.

This would create a wave of jobs and promote massive energy savings. The common stock of auto companies would soar, reaping a profit for taxpayers by auctioning the warrants, and through revenue from taxes of newly hired workers.

This Buffett-like formula works for banking and auto companies because of historically distressed industry assets. It merges the interests of companies and taxpayers behind JFK-like goals.

While some progressives get nervous, we can provide a capital gains tax holiday for private investors who buy distressed housing assets, including a foreclosure freeze, and who invest in auto companies that reach the 100 mpg goal within five years. This moves massive private capital into public-spirited missions and puts more private capital on the side of historic energy savings, major job creation and support for homeowners.

The Gilded Age is ending. Americans will no longer tolerate an economy in which only the few boats rise while many boats are sunk in oceans of corruption, scandal and economic injustice.

For Democrats, a new era of patriotic reform led by a Democratic president and Congress will require navigating stormy financial seas. This will demand powerful reform, financial acumen, and policy creativity that merges public and private capital to effect the next New Deal.


Budowsky was an aide to U.S. Sen. Lloyd Bentsen and Rep. Bill Alexander, then chief deputy whip, U.S. House. He received an LL.M. degree in international financial law from the London School of Economics, and can be read on The Hill’s Pundits Blog and reached at brentbbi@webtv.net

4) Ambushed by History
By Michael Gerson

WASHINGTON -- For all their talk about respecting the constraints of reality, conservatives generally hold to the great man theory of history. It is leftists who embrace economic determinism. Conservatives read biographies of Winston Churchill and wait in constant expectation for the second coming of Ronald Reagan. Charisma and truth, in this view, can always overwhelm material conditions.

And this often leads to the small man theory of electoral setbacks. A losing Republican is not merely unfortunate; he must be incompetent, politically blind, and betrayed by his bumbling underlings. If he is not a winner, he is a fool.

John McCain has reached this stage of criticism among conservatives. Some attack him for "frenetic improvisation," while others urge him to frenetically improvise. His campaign is in a "defensive crouch" while also being "obnoxious" in its "phony populism." McCain's running mate is a "fatal cancer" who should "read more books."

This kind of cheap shot is, thank goodness, the prerogative of the commentator -- an option I will doubtlessly exercise in the future. But having once been on the political side of the divide, I remember how truly obnoxious such advice can become. If only the candidate would fire his entire campaign staff and travel the country in a used Yugo, speaking in the parking lots of 7-11s, the gap would be closed. If only the candidate would buy three hours in prime time and give a bold, historic speech (which has been helpfully sent under separate cover), the entire election would be turned around. If only the candidate would finally highlight his opponent's ties to Colombian drug cartels, the illuminati and the British royal family -- or perhaps abandon all this suicidal negativity -- the election could certainly be won. And yes, above all, the candidate must be himself.

McCain might benefit from shifts in strategy: a retooled stump speech has already been rolled out. But sometimes a candidate down in the polls is not an incompetent but a bystander. While America remains a center-right country, this may well be a Marxist election in which economic realities are determining the political superstructure.

The diverging political fortunes of Barack Obama and McCain can be traced to a single moment. In the middle of September, the net favorable rating for each candidate was about the same. By Oct. 7, Obama was ahead on this measure by about 16 points. Did McCain suddenly become a stumbling failure? No, the world suddenly went into an economic slide. Americans blamed the party with executive power, which is also the party most closely tied in the public mind to bankers and Wall Street. None of this was fair to McCain, who has never been the Wall Street type. But party images are vivid, durable and almost impossible to shift on short notice.

Previous to this economic free fall -- and after his transformative vice presidential choice -- McCain was about tied in a race he should have been losing by a large margin. The public clearly had questions about Obama's leadership qualities. But the McCain campaign also proved itself capable of constructing an effective narrative: Obama as lightweight celebrity, McCain as maverick reformer. Until history intervened.

Following the onset of the crisis, McCain was left with flawed options. He reasonably chose to work for a responsible bailout while hoping the markets would stabilize quickly. Instead, the bailout proved politically unpopular and the markets gyrated like the Pussycat Dolls. Then McCain raised Obama's past association with William Ayers -- a valid attack if properly raised. (Can anyone doubt that the past political association of McCain with a right-wing terrorist would attract some attention?) But this accusation naturally looks small compared to the nation's outsized economic fears.

Obama's task has been easier. He needs only to ride a historical current instead of fighting it. And this plays to his greatest political strength: the easy, laid-back, self-assurance of a 1940s crooner. During the financial crisis Obama has contributed nothing of note or consequence. His only recent accomplishment has been to say questionable things in the debates -- attacking Republicans and capitalism for a credit meltdown congressional Democrats helped to cause, blaming America for Iran's nuclear ambitions, talking piously about genocide prevention when his own early Iraq policies might have resulted in genocide -- all while sounding supremely reassuring and presidential.

Obama's current success is not enjoyable for conservatives. But this does not make McCain an incompetent. Maybe he is a great man running at the most difficult of times.