Early voting has begun in Texas and Coach Saban speaks!
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Half the proceeds from the sale of my modestly priced book goes to The Wounded Warrior Project!
The soft cover version is now available.
Dick Berkowitz, has written a booklet entitled:"A Conservative Capitalist Offers: Eleven Lessons and a Bonus Lesson for Raising America's Youth Born and Yet To Be Born."
By Dick Berkowitz - Non Expert
Dick wrote this booklet because he believes a strong country must rest on a solid family unit and that Brokaw's "Greatest Generation" has morphed into "A Confused, Dependent and Compromised Generation."
He hopes this booklet will provide a guide to alter this trend.
You can now order a .pdf version from www.brokerberko.com/book that you can download and read on your computer, or print out if you want. Cost is $5.99
The book is also now available in soft cover format at a cost of $10.99 and can be ordered from the same www.brokerberko.com/book
Booklet illustrations were by his oldest granddaughter, Emma Darvick, who lives and works in New York.
Testimonials:
Dick, I read your book this weekend. I hardly know where to start. You did an excellent job of putting into one short book a compendium of the virtues which only a relatively short time ago all Americans believed. It’s a measure of how far we have fallen that many Americans, perhaps a majority of Americans, no longer believe in what we once considered truisms. I think your father would have agreed with every word, but the party he supported no longer has such beliefs.
I would like to buy multiple copies of your booklet..
You did a great job. I know your parents would have been proud and that your family today is proud.
Mike
You wrote a great book. The brevity is one of its strong points and I know it was hard to include that in and still keep it brief. Your father in haste once wrote an overly long letter to our client, then said in the last sentence, “I’m sorry I wrote such a long letter, but I didn’t have time to write a short one.”
"Dick, I indeed marvel at how much wisdom you have been able to share with so few words. Not too unlike the experience in reading the Bible. I feel that with each read of "A Conservative Capitalist Offers:…." one will gain additional knowledge and new insights…
Regards, Larry"
Dick ,
Your book is outstanding! Due to illness, I've been unable to read it in entirety until today .Your background is often very similar to mine (e.g. Halliburton's influence was very important in my life), and your thoughts reflect very closely the the teachings that I received from my parents and granddad. I will write a more detailed statement in the near future!
All the best, Bob
Your book is outstanding! Due to illness, I've been unable to read it in entirety until today .Your background is often very similar to mine (e.g. Halliburton's influence was very important in my life), and your thoughts reflect very closely the the teachings that I received from my parents and granddad. I will write a more detailed statement in the near future!
All the best, Bob
Regarding your booklet, I have begun to read it and look forward to finishing it this weekend. Congrats on getting it published and on the great reviews. I know how much this booklet means to you and how important getting this message out to the public is.
P------
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Obama Campaign Co- Chair, Longoria, gets Malkin slap down. (See 1 below.)
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Candy Crowley is no cookie and if she were she crumbled this week. (See 2 below.)
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Advice for Romney on how to win last debate. (See 3 below.)
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'Kraut' hammers Obama regarding Hofstra Libyan gaffe. (See 4 below.)
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Peggy Noonan socks it to Obama, as well. (See 5 below.)
For those who read what I write, in the early days when Obama blamed everything and everyone I dubbed him The Pinata President. Well what goes around comes around and now he has become his own Pinata and the beating he is getting has made him quite dispirited.
I always wrote Oama was thin skinned and now that the heat is rising he is melting before our very eyes..
In my recent booklet of raising children I devote a chapter to thriftiness, saving and how doing so permits one to always lead from strength.
Noonan points out , as have others, an economically weakened America is incapable of executing a strong foreign policy. It costs a great deal of money to support a foreign policy and a military component to make it credible.
Woe is us! (See 5a below.)
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This is what Romney understands is happening and offers our economy a huge boost if the government will get out of the way.
Obama has spent and lost tons of money selecting energy projects that have gone bust while preventing pipeline development etc.
Would you want Obama or Romney to be your investment adviser?
If you vote for Obama you have answered my question. (See 6 below.)
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Obama calls Ryan a policy wonk yet, when on Comedy Central Show, he embraces wonkish language to describe the four Libyan deaths as not 'optimal.' (See 7 below.)
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You wanted big government well you got it and with it all the costs, incompetence and waste: Subject: "Government gone wild http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=xOAgT8L_BqQ&feature=player_embedded"
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Romney a class act who could be our president if voters can see the light!
Obama's comments are also available - just click on them.
Romney was clever, enjoying himself and appeared relaxed.
Obama had some clever comments as well but he seemed to wish he was elsewhere. I truly believe the pounding he has taken these last few weeks is getting to him.
It is becoming more evident to more voters he has functioned beyond his level of competence.
All idols have clay feet! (See 8 below.)
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Obama calls Ryan a policy wonk yet, when on Comedy Central Show, he embraces wonkish language to describe the four Libyan deaths as not 'optimal.' (See 7 below.)
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You wanted big government well you got it and with it all the costs, incompetence and waste: Subject: "Government gone wild http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=xOAgT8L_BqQ&feature=player_embedded"
---
Romney a class act who could be our president if voters can see the light!
Obama's comments are also available - just click on them.
Romney was clever, enjoying himself and appeared relaxed.
Obama had some clever comments as well but he seemed to wish he was elsewhere. I truly believe the pounding he has taken these last few weeks is getting to him.
It is becoming more evident to more voters he has functioned beyond his level of competence.
All idols have clay feet! (See 8 below.)
---
Dick
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------1)Obama Campaign Co-Chair Eva Longoria Gets Schooled
Liberal celebrities want all of the adoration that social media engagement has to offer -- but none of the accountability that actual engagement requires. For the Hollywood elite, it's "do as they say, not as they tweet." But actress and outspoken Obama campaign co-chair Eva Longoria learned a hard lesson this week on Twitter:
Conservatives online are mad as hell and aren't taking it anymore.
On Tuesday night after the second presidential debate, Longoria shared a "retweet" from one of her 4.4-plus million followers on the micro-blogging network. "I have no idea why any woman/minority can vote for Romney," the message read. "You have to be stupid to vote for such a racist/misogynistic tw*t." (I'm editing the vulgarity for family newspapers, but the tweet's foul reference to a woman's reproductive organs was neither censored nor disavowed by Longoria on her Twitter timeline.)
On Wednesday morning, the editors at Twitchy.com, my Twitter curation/aggregation site, captured and saved Longoria's retweet for posterity. Conservative minorities and women raised their voices. A representative sample:
Wrote Diana Yellow (@navajochic): "I don't appreciate u call'n me stupid. Ur ignorant, selfish and stupid urself! I'm a Romney/Ryan voter, I'm female and a minority."
Becky Gonzalez (@nanabec2) tweeted: "You can vote with your lady parts -- I'll vote with my lady smarts. VOTE ROMNEY!!!"
Melissa (@melissaDiva) responded: "So @EvaLongoria b/c I am a woman and support @MittRomney I am stupid? Your comment is disgusting and disrespectful to women. Shame on you."
Mayelin de Villegas (@mayelinddv) informed the starlet: "I am Hispanic. I am very informed on all issues. Will be voting for Romney and proud to say it."
After Twitchy.com called attention to the Obama campaign co-chair and "War on Women" propagandist's backhanded swipe, she tried to cover her tracks by deleting the message. But Twitter and Twitchy are forever. On Thursday morning, the panicked actress launched into damage-control mode -- and made matters even worse.
First, she claimed that "twitter (was) bugging out" and asserted that "there are things in my timeline I didn't retweet today." Longoria then absurdly assured followers that she was under the social media hood searching for an imaginary glitch: "Standby trying to fix!" The naked attempt to channel disgraced Democratic Rep. Anthony Weiner, who shamelessly blamed a nonexistent hacker for posting lewd photos of himself on Twitter, flopped among tech-savvy Twitter users.
"Blame it on A) The altitude B) The 'video' C) Hillary!" joked one reader.
"She inherited all her re-tweets from the previous twitter user," jibed another.
"She has binders full of excuses," chimed another.
Writer Derek Hunter mused: "(Y)ou've got to find it amusing how @evalongoria is 'trying to fix' her twitter like she's writing code or something."
Faced with an avalanche of mockery and disbelief, Longoria finally tossed aside her make-believe monkey wrench and 'fessed up. Well, kinda sorta, in that classic crapweasel politican's way. She tweeted that she was "(s)orry if people were offended by retweet" and that "I respect all Americans."
"Sorry if." Give her the award for Worst Performance by a Self-Destructing Celeb on Social Media. Longoria topped off her faux-pology by explaining that she was merely trying to create "dialogue" and then pivoted faster than an Olympic speed skater by protesting that we should all be talking about "real issues" such as "equal pay, the economy and our health care choices" instead of "tweets."
Not so fast there, missy. You should know that Longoria is guilty of retweeting at least one other crude message bashing Republicans. Twitchy.com staff noted that on October 11, the night of the vice presidential debate, Longoria retweeted this appalling observation from soap opera star Nancy Lee Grahn: "Biden is making Paul Ryan his prison b****!" Longoria retweeted the offensive prison rape analogy without any censorship or disapproval whatsoever. And on the campaign trail, Longoria has expressed similar views disparaging conservative women. In Colorado this July, she asserted that "there is no way you can vote Republican" if you're a woman.
The real issue with "dialogue"-seeking Longoria, who refused to answer any of my questions on Twitter, is that she is a phony spokeswoman for American women outside the Hollywood-D.C.-Manhattan bubble. She has unmistakable contempt for women who reject the Obama campaign's radical "lady parts" identity politics.
It is not a waste of time to respond to Hollywood hatred of conservative women and minorities. It is a waste of the First Amendment to be silent. Longoria, after all, is one of Obama's highest-profile campaign co-chairs spearheading femme fear-mongering. She and a bevy of other like-minded lib Hollywood actresses (including Kate Walsh, Scarlett Johansson and Kerry Washington) are flooding swing states to woo independent/undecided women who could determine this election. Silence is complicity.
For decades, conservative women and minorities had limited public opportunities to tell the Beautiful People that they didn't speak for us. The game has changed. The walls have crumbled. The era of one-way political monologues from Tinsel Town hypocrites is over. To borrow language they understand: That's a wrap. You've been schooled.
Michelle Malkin is the author of "Culture of Corruption: Obama and his Team of Tax Cheats, Crooks and Cronies" (Regnery 2010). Her e-mail address is malkinblog@gmail.com.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------2)
Candy Crowley Self-Destructs
Just how badly did CNN's Candy Crowley destroy her first (and hopefully last) attempt as a presidential debate moderator? More than 65 million people saw that she is to debate moderation as CNN is to "news."
Barack Obama made a fatal mistake when he lied, claiming he'd labeled the Libya attack as an act of terrorism. The look on Romney's face said it all: Mr. President, here comes checkmate.
Then Crowley leapt to Obama's defense, declared a lie a truth, changed the subject, and Obama was free.
It was a travesty.
Let's get beyond the perennial partisan toe-taggers Rachel Maddow (touting Romney's "political disaster") and Ed Schultz ("The president destroyed Mitt Romney on foreign policy"), who credited Obama. Look at those who gave the bouquet to Crowley for saving Obama.
That night on PBS, John Heilemann of New York Magazine insisted the subject of Libya would have been disastrous for Obama. "The worst hand that the administration and President Obama have to play in this debate was on Benghazi, and because particularly of Candy Crowley's follow-up on that question, it allowed Barack Obama to win an exchange that I didn't necessarily think it was possible for him to win."
Obama shouldn't have won, but Crowley saved him.
The next morning, Current TV host Eliot Spitzer told Current TV host Bill Press that Crowley caused the "emotional highlight of the night" by declaring Romney was wrong. "I think that really deflated what otherwise should have been on the Benghazi issue a moment when Romney could have hit it out of the park. But instead he took the step too far. Crowley came in as sort of the voice of neutrality and took the victory away from Romney."
Crowley crushed Romney. Even Spitzer wouldn't defend Crowley as staying within a moderator's role.
Crowley knew exactly what she'd done: validate a lie. Time for damage control. Within minutes of leaving the journalistic crime scene, Crowley was back on CNN admitting that Romney was right "in the main" -- whatever that means -- but he chose "the wrong word" by focusing on Obama's cursory use of the term "these acts of terror." If Romney was correct, why not just say it?
Again, Crowley rallied behind Obama -- even repeating her verdict when the president egged her on to "say it a little louder."
So let's say it a little louder: Team Obama engaged in a massive cover-up, hiding and denying what it knew about this deadly terrorist attack for weeks. Even Heilemann and Spitzer admit that this scandal (SET ITAL) should (END ITAL) be a "homerun" for Romney. Journalists know that the White House lied horribly day after day, and -- with a few exceptions -- have enabled that badly disguised cover-up. Obama claimed nobody cares about finding the facts more than he does. It's lie after lie at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
Crowley knows full well that it's Team Obama that needs to be held accountable here, not the challenger. Back on September 30, Crowley herself pinned down Obama spinner David Axelrod on this point: "Why did it take them until Friday [September 28], after a September 11 attack in Libya, to come to the conclusion that it was premeditated and that there was terrorists involved? John McCain said it doesn't pass the smell test, or it's willful ignorance to think that they didn't know before this what was going on." Of course, Axelrod shot back that Obama in the Rose Garden called it an "act of terror."
How does Crowley square her October 16 performance with her September 30 performance? Try this theory: after liberals savaged Jim Lehrer as "useless" for somehow allowing Obama's first-debate fiasco, they've successfully worked the refs, both Crowley and Martha Raddatz, to push back at the "lies" of the Republicans.
Journalists now know Obama lied repeatedly about protests outside the consulate in Benghazi. In a September 20 interview with Univision, Obama said of Libya, "I don't want to speak to something until we have all the information.
What we do know is that the natural protests that arose because of the outrage over the video were used as an excuse by extremists to see if they can also directly harm U.S. interests.
There were no "natural protests." The story line had changed the day before when Matthew Olsen of the National Counterterrorism Center cracked under congressional questioning and said, "the facts that we have now indicate that this was an opportunistic attack." On the 20th, Obama spokesman Jay Carney suddenly jerked his knee and declared, "It is, I think, self-evident that what happened in Benghazi was a terrorist attack."
"Self-evident?" If so, then Team Obama is guilty, period.
Instead, so many in the shameless media are still trying to pin the tail on Romney. They'll do anything to reelect Obama. Just ask Candy Crowley.
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3)Here's How Romney Wins The Monday Night Debate
I confess a certain fascination with debate prep. What is it, exactly?
What did Mitt Romney do that earned him such a commanding win in his first debate with President Obama? What did the President not do?
In the second debate, was President Obama better prepared, or just more energetic and focused? Could Mitt Romney have prevented an underwhelming moment on Libya with a few more drills alongside Rob Portman?
I raise these questions because as the final debate draws near, I wonder how Governor Romney’s time is best spent. Is it a matter of homework alone, or something deeper?
National Review’s Robert Costa has done some compelling reporting on Team Romney’s behind-the-scenes discipline, which obviously paid off in Denver. Sen. Portman is generous in his praise of a candidate who showed a tireless devotion to the task of absorbing data and engaging in mock debates.
But with just one opportunity left to make a case before tens of millions of people at once, the Romney campaign should consider a strong possibility: the homework is not what won it for him in Denver, and was not responsible for his best moments in the second debate Tuesday.
Absorbing numbers is a good thing. So is studying the style of an opponent. But Mitt Romney’s chances of winning over undecided voters Monday night does not hinge on encyclopedic knowledge or hours spent studying past Obama debates.
He will succeed with the same formula that brought him success in the first debate. To large numbers of uncommitted voters, he looked like a man who should be President of the United States.
A broad, nebulous concept, to be sure, but a vital factor in any successful run for the White House. Without regard to any particular quote or any particular moment, Romney exuded a vibe of confidence and competence that earned the approval of voters unsure of him mere hours before.
I had the chance to visit with Rick Santorum during a Texas visit this week. Recalling the debate that even MSNBC had to admit was a Romney win, he told attendees at a fundraiser: “I debated Mitt Romney twenty times. I never saw that guy.”
Santorum saw what many Republicans (and potential Republicans) saw-- a nominee who may have picked just the right time to become comfortable in conservative skin. This has led to the erosion of some doubts that have dogged his campaign, even as it steamrolled to the nomination.
The GOP base knows about his business acumen, his strong faith and his beautiful family. What we have wondered about is his passion for conservatism. Is it a recently discovered enthusiasm born of political expediency, or a genuine journey leading to the kind of enlightenment that yields a far better candidate and perhaps a great President?
So on Monday night, debate success will not stem from some skillfully-placed factoid about Syria or even a pithy retort the tenth time the President reminds us he got bin Laden.
Romney needs to address foreign policy the way he mastered domestic issues on October 3-- with the determination to take an unacceptable situation and make it better.
It is unacceptable that Iran marches toward a nuclear weapon without a steadfast American response.
It is unacceptable that America has forfeited a leadership role around the world, leaving power vacuums to be filled by terrorists and tyrants.
It is unacceptable that we seem more interested in coddling the Muslim world than in confronting the portion of it that still threatens us.
It is unacceptable that we have neglected our alliance with Israel.
And to make it as fresh as today’s headlines, it is completely unacceptable to hear of embassy personnel security requests going ignored, and for the resulting deaths to be dishonored by a politically-driven campaign of deceptions.
Only the most entrenched Democrat partisans can assert that this presidency has been a foreign policy success. With moderator Bob Schieffer unlikely to run interference as Candy Crowley did, President Obama will be left to defend the decline of America on a world stage still swirling with dangers.
In shattering the falsehoods leveled at him by Obama attack ads, Mitt Romney has offered himself up to independents and undecideds as a thoroughly palatable alternative to the President on domestic issues. Similar success on foreign policy matters could seal the deal, establishing a momentum storyline that could spur the polls-- and thus the election-- to break his way.
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Obama’s bluster and non-response on the Libya question will come back to haunt him.
Fight night at Hofstra. The two boxers, confined within a ring of spectators — circling, feinting, taunting, staring each other down — come several times, by my reckoning, no more than one provocation away from actual fisticuffs, of the kind that on occasion so delightfully break out in the Taiwanese parliament. Think of it: The Secret Service storming the ring, pinning Mitt Romney to the canvas as Candy Crowley administers the ten count.
The actual outcome was somewhat more pedestrian. President Obama gained a narrow victory on points, as borne out by several flash polls. The margin was small, paling in comparison to Romney’s 52-point victory in the first debate.
At Hofstra, Obama emerged from his previous coma to score enough jabs to outweigh Romney’s haymaker, his dazzling takedown of the Obama record when answering a disappointed 2008 Obama voter.
That one answer might account for the fact that in two early flash polls Romney beat Obama on the economy by 18 points in one poll, 31 in the other. That being the overriding issue, the debate is likely to have minimal effect on the dynamics of the race.
The one thing Obama’s performance did do is re-energize his demoralized base — the media, in particular. But at a price.
The rub for Obama comes, ironically enough, out of Romney’s biggest flub in the debate, the Libya question. That flub kept Romney from winning the evening outright. But Obama’s answer has left him a hostage to fortune. Missed by Romney, missed by the audience, missed by most of the commentariat, it was the biggest gaffe of the entire debate cycle: Substituting unctuousness for argument, Obama declared himself offended by the suggestion that anyone in his administration, including the U.N. ambassador, would “mislead” the country on Libya.
This bluster — unchallenged by Romney — helped Obama slither out of the Libya question unscathed. Unfortunately for Obama, there is one more debate — next week — entirely on foreign policy. The burning issue will be Libya and the scandalous parade of fictions told by this administration to explain away the debacle.
No one misled? His U.N. ambassador went on not one but five morning shows to spin a confection that the sacking of the consulate and the murder of four Americans came from a video-motivated demonstration turned ugly: “People gathered outside the embassy and then it grew very violent and those with extremist ties joined the fray and came with heavy weapons.”
But there was no gathering. There were no people. There was no fray. It was totally quiet outside the facility until terrorists stormed the compound and killed our ambassador and three others.
The video? A complete irrelevance. It was a coordinated, sophisticated terror attack, encouraged, if anything, by Osama bin Laden’s successor, giving orders from Pakistan to avenge the death of a Libyan jihadist.
Not wishing to admit that we had just been attacked by al-Qaeda affiliates perhaps answering to the successor of a man on whose grave Obama and the Democrats have been dancing for months, the administration relentlessly advanced the mob/video tale to distract from the truth.
And it wasn’t just his minions who misled the nation. A week after the attack, the president himself, asked by David Letterman about the ambassador’s murder, said it started with a video.
False again.
Romney will be ready Monday.
You are offended by this accusation, Mr. President? The country is offended that your press secretary, your U.N. ambassador, and you yourself have repeatedly misled the nation about the origin and nature of the Benghazi attack.
The problem wasn’t the video, the problem was policies for which you say you now accept responsibility. Then accept it, Mr. President. You were asked in the last debate why more security was denied our people in Libya despite the fact that they begged for it. You never answered that question, Mr. President. Or will you blame your Secretary of State?
E
sprit de l’escalier (“wit of the staircase”) is the French term for the devastating riposte that one should have given at dinner, but comes up with only on the way out at the bottom of the staircase. It’s Romney’s fortune that he’s invited to one more dinner. If he gets it right this time, Obama’s narrow victory in debate number two, salvaged by the mock umbrage that anyone could accuse him of misleading, will cost him dearly.
It was a huge gaffe. It is indelibly on the record. It will prove a very expensive expedient.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------5)The Year the Debates Mattered
Will Obama's crass presidential style become the rule or prove an exception?
By PeggyNoonan
The presidential debates this year have been more consequential than such debates have ever been.
They've been historic, shifting the mood and trajectory of the race. They've been revealing of the personalities and approaches of the candidates. And they've produced a new way in which winners and losers are judged. It's a two-part wave now, the debate and the postdebate, and you have to win both.
In a way this has always been true. That's why there are spin rooms. But this year it's all more so—more organic, more spontaneous and powerful. And everyone knows what spin is. They're looking for a truth room. Through a million websites and tweets they're trying, in some rough, imperfect way, to build one
Mitt Romney won the first debate clearly and decisively, we know that. But even more he won the days and weeks after the debate, when public opinion congeals in certain directions. It was in the postdebate that people, very much including Democrats, let out for the first time their dismay at Barack Obama and their dislike of the personality he presented.
The vice presidential debate seemed more or less a draw, with Joe Biden maybe having an edge. But it was in the postdebate, in the days afterward, that Mr. Biden seemed to slip, because the national conversation didn't move off his antics—the chuckles, the grimaces, the theatrical strangeness of it all. A draw, or a victory, began to seem like a loss.
Mr. Obama won the second debate Tuesday night with a vigorous, pointed performance. He showed up, fought, landed some blows. It was close and he was joyless, a bit of a toothache, but he emerged in marginally better shape than he entered. But he doesn't seem to be winning the postdebate. No one is talking about his excellence or his stunningly good performance—no one is talking about that. Instead the national conversation has been about the terrorist attacks in Benghazi. Did the president tell the truth at the time? Was he telling it now? Did Mr. Romney fail to unmask his dishonesty? People are asking what is the truth of the economy, as opposed to the factoids deployed. Have drilling permits on federal lands been cut or not? These issues are not good for the president, and they'll be the subject of discussion up until the next debate.
In the postdebate, the president's win is starting to look like a draw.
***
At some point after the Hofstra debate, we are going to find out whether a certain part of the old school American political style is now officially gone, or whether Mr. Obama, in ignoring it, paid a certain price. This is how the president started out: "Gov. Romney's says he's got a five-point plan? Gov. Romney doesn't have a five-point plan. He has a one-point plan. And that plan is to make sure that folks at the top play by a different set of rules. That's been his philosophy in the private sector, that's been his philosophy as governor, that's been his philosophy as a presidential candidate." Mr. Romney, the president said, likes a world in which "you can ship jobs overseas and get tax breaks for it. You can invest in a company, bankrupt it, lay off the workers, strip away their pensions, and you still make money."
This was the president of the United States standing with the other major party's presidential candidate and saying things that were harsh and personal—you're selfish and greedy, you care for nothing but yourself, you have no sense of responsibility to others. Later Mr. Obama called Mr. Romney "a good man" who "loves his family," but it sounded pro forma and hollow because it was. He does not think Mr. Romney is a good man: He'd started the evening telling us at some length that he was a bad one.
What the president said at the debate was nothing he hadn't said on the trail. His campaign has been personal, accusatory and manipulative. But there in the room on a tiny stage, for a sitting president to come out with that kind of put-down—I couldn't imagine a JFK doing it, with his cool, or a Jerry Ford with his Midwestern decency, or a Reagan, or the Bushes. When you are president, you don't stand next to an opponent and accuse and attack. You keep a certain almost aesthetic distance. You know the height of the office you hold. You let the debate come to you, and if at some point you get an opening to uncork a joke or a more-in-sorrow-than-in-anger criticism, you move.
The president was trying to look strong and commanding, to take control. Did he look strong, or did he look like a hack, like a tough Chicago pol who isn't quite big enough to be where he is?
We may look back on 2012 as the point at which old school officially ended, and some new school began. Maybe the public isn't so impressed by old school. Maybe this is how people like their politics now.
It was Mr. Obama's aggressive foray that allowed Mr. Romney to diss him in return. When he said the president is weak on energy—"I don't think anyone really believes that you're a person who's going to be pushing for oil and gas and coal"—he wasn't critiquing a policy but a person. When Mr. Obama attempted to jump in, Mr. Romney stopped him cold: "You'll get your chance in a moment. I'm still speaking."
If Mr. Romney wins, that's going to be one cold, stony limo ride they share from the White House on Inauguration Day.
***
The heart of the debate? Romney and the price of gas: "The proof of whether a strategy is working or not is what the price is that you're paying at the pump. If you're paying less than you paid a year or two ago, why, then, the strategy is working. But you're paying more. When the president took office, the price of gasoline here in Nassau County was about $1.86 a gallon. Now, it's $4 a gallon. The price of electricity is up. If the president's energy policies are working, you're going to see the cost of energy come down."
Mr Obama's reply seemed like a non sequitur: Gas prices were lower when he came in "because the economy was on the verge of collapse, because we were about to go through the worst recession since the Great Depression."
***
And so on to the third and final debate, on foreign policy. The most pressing questions there are the biggest, and have remained largely unanswered throughout the campaign: What is our role in the world now? What is our job? What is it we should be trying to do? What are our priorities?
And true or false:
Everything—America's military might, its ability to defend itself, its ability to have an army and a navy and a diplomatic corps, its ability to be a friend and encourage good trends—depends on one thing: American wealth. If we are wealthy, we can be strong. If we are not wealthy, we won't be strong for long. Our foreign policy depends on our economic policy. True or not?
5a) Why Foreign Policy Counts
Last week in this space we questioned the validity of the view that the economy is all-important in presidential elections. This is an ancient notion enshrined as conventional wisdom since 1992 when Bill Clinton’s strategist James Carville memorably declared, "It's the economy, stupid!"
Today we turn our attention to a corollary of the Carville Doctrine, which is that foreign policy doesn’t matter -- or at least not much -- in presidential elections.
Until recently, Mitt Romney had based his entire campaign on the belief that President Obama could not survive continued high unemployment and lagging U.S. growth. Romney was encouraged by polls that gave him an edge on management of the economy. The same polls gave Obama an advantage on foreign policy, the topic of the presidential candidates’ third (and mercifully last) debate on Monday.
Foreign policy has been consequential in presidential campaigns since 1800, when Thomas Jefferson and John Adams clashed over U.S. policy toward England and France. It’s mattered even more in the 20th and 21st centuries, with the advent of global war and the development of weapons of mass destruction.
Woodrow Wilson was re-elected president in 1916 on the slogan “He kept us out of war.” In 1917, in response to unrestricted German submarine warfare, he put the United States into what was then called the Great War on the side of Britain and France. Disillusionment with this war contributed to the election of Warren G. Harding in 1920.
Foreign policy was dominant in the 1940 election when Americans were divided on whether to help the British hold out against the Nazis. President Franklin D. Roosevelt was helped when Wendell Willkie, like FDR an internationalist, won the Republican nomination. Even so, FDR found it necessary in his successful campaign for a third term to promise voters that he would “not send your boys to fight in foreign wars.”
FDR, frail and months from death in 1944, was re-elected to a fourth term on the slogan “Don’t change horses in midstream.”
The unpopularity of the Korean War contributed to President Harry Truman’s decision not to seek re-election in 1952, and the unpopularity of the Vietnam War was the reason President Lyndon Johnson declined to run again in 1968. Richard Nixon was elected that year partly on a promise to end the war with what Democrats called “a secret plan.”
In 1980, a campaign that in some ways resembles the present one, Ronald Reagan emphasized the economy in his challenge to President Jimmy Carter. But the underlying issue was Americans held hostage in Iran whom Carter had tried and failed to rescue. Reagan rarely mentioned the hostages. He didn’t have to, because the issue was on the minds of voters, many of whom blamed Carter for their continued plight.
Fast-forward to 2008, when Obama was the irresistible candidate of hope and change. Running more against outgoing President George W. Bush than his actual opponent, John McCain, Obama promised to withdraw U.S. forces from Iraq. He has kept that promise, partly because Iraq would not agree to U.S. conditions on a status-of-forces agreement to extend the American deployment.
Foreign policy has ostensibly taken a back seat in the 2012 campaign. Journalist Peter Beinart contends that’s because the differences between Obama and Romney on foreign policy are relatively minor when compared to their disagreement on domestic issues. This view was bolstered during the debate between Vice President Joe Biden and Romney running mate Paul Ryan, when effective questioning by ABC correspondent Martha Raddatz helped flesh out the similar foreign policy views of the two sides.
Both Obama and Romney plan to withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan in 2014. The quibble is whether the withdrawal date should be announced ahead of time. Neither candidate bothers to mention that the United States is committed to keeping thousands of trainers and advisers in Afghanistan for years after the bulk of forces are withdrawn.
Both the president and his challenger also promise to maintain pressure on Iran to prevent it from developing a nuclear weapon. Obama claims with scant evidence that sanctions against Iran are working. Romney promises to intensify them but typically provides few details.
It would be refreshing on Monday if the candidates acknowledged to each other and the world that they at least share mutual goals of bringing home U.S. troops, reducing global tensions, and trying to find new options for peace in the Middle East.
It would also be useful if the candidates acknowledged that “foreign policy” and “national security” are not neatly separated from the economy in an age of globalism. Economists on both sides know that the economic success of China is vital to global recovery. It would be constructive for Obama and Romney to concede as much instead of continuing their China-bashing. It would also be a step in the right direction if Romney recognized that his proposed increases in the defense budget would add to the deficit or if Obama conceded that taxing the rich won’t raise enough to balance the budget.
Candidates don’t make concessions in tight races, so don’t hold your breath on any of this. But they could at least admit that domestic spending decisions have global consequences. In reality, Obama and Romney have been talking about foreign policy all along.
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| "This place used to be a ghost town," my friend Cactus told me… We were in his mud-covered Chevrolet Silverado, driving by the new Wal-Mart in Karnes City, Texas. About five years ago, the town's population was less than 3,500. "Main Street" consisted of a gas station, a post office, and a small place to eat. The average household income was about $25,000. And an acre of land cost about $350 in Karnes County. That's no longer the case… Today, Karnes City is booming with activity. Restaurants are now packed at lunchtime as workers go on break. Many of them make six-figure salaries. Most of the land now fetches $10,000-$15,000 an acre. That's 3,650% higher in just five years! Karnes City sits on top of one of the largest shale formations in the world… The Eagle Ford shale is 50 miles wide and spans 400 miles through the entire state of Texas. Most of the towns lying on top of it were small and sparsely populated. But in recent years, they've transformed into "boomtowns" as some of the largest energy companies in the world have moved into the area to take advantage of the region's rich oil and natural gas resources…  Despite all the research that's been published, the Eagle Ford is still in its infancy in terms of oil production and exploration… You see, this shale region is what we call an "unconventional" oil and gas play… meaning it isn't a traditional reservoir, where we can drill a well that acts like a straw and sucks up the oil and gas. Instead, the Eagle Ford is a series of thin rock layers. The oil and gas are trapped between these layers, which makes traditional oil drilling useless. But thanks to new drilling technologies like "fracking," major oil producers can rejuvenate wells long thought to be dry. Cactus says only 5% of natural gas is recovered – on average – through new drilling methods. For unconventional oil, it's more like 10%. Cactus Schroeder knows what he's talking about. He's one of the smartest men you'll find in the oil business. He has been drilling for oil in Texas for more than 30 years… with personal interests in over 1,000 drilling projects. And if he's right, five to 10 years from now, recovery rates in the Eagle Ford could double… Right now, wells in the Eagle Ford are producing 300 to 600 barrels of oil per day. That's more than the Bakken shale that runs through Montana and North Dakota. Total oil production in the Eagle Ford is currently 300,000 barrels per day. Global energy research provider Platts estimates total production in 2016 could reach 1.6 million barrels per day in the Eagle Ford. According to the Railroad Commission of Texas, there were only 72 oil-producing leases in the Eagle Ford in 2011. In 2011, it jumped to 368. This year, the number could easily top 500. And it's just the beginning… Most energy companies in the Eagle Ford have been exploring areas southwest of Gonzales and DeWitt counties. (You can see this in the map above.) But some of the largest oil companies in the world are just starting to drill in the counties northeast of Lavaca. Cactus and I drove through most of these counties during our three-day, 400-mile haul through the region. Every few miles, we'd see 100-foot drilling rigs with steel pipe casings stacked up alongside them. The rigs towered next to large water pits. From the passenger seat, I observed 40-man crews preparing to "frack" for oil and gas 5,000-plus feet below the surface. Within the next decade, oil companies will find ways to recover much more oil from unconventional wells. That's great news for the premier energy companies – like EOG Resources, Pioneer Natural Resources, and Range Resources – that operate in the region. They have huge growth potential. They also have hedging strategies in place to help reduce their exposure to volatile oil prices. Right now, these three stocks are trading near their 52-week highs. Things could get bumpy over the next few months through earnings season and the presidential election. I suggest using any weakness as a buying opportunity. Good investing, Frank Curzio -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------7)Obama on Libya Response: Four American Deaths 'Not Optimal' President Barack Obama is pushing back against critics who say there was confusion within his administration following the deadly attacks on the U.S. Consulate in Libya.
Obama says on Comedy Central's "The Daily Show" that he "wasn't confused" about the need to ramp up diplomatic security around the globe and investigate the Libya attack, which killed Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans.
When host Jon Stewart pressed Obama to admit that government coordination was not "optimal," the president says that when four Americans are killed, quote, "it's not optimal. We're going to fix it. All of it."
Republican Mitt Romney has challenged Obama on why U.S. officials initially argued that the Sept. 11 attack was prompted by a protest against an American-made film ridiculing Islam.
In his appearance on the show, Obama joked that his vice president looked good in a swimsuit and said screw-ups can happen in government as he discussed the Libya controversy, mixing comedy and serious issues.
In a appeal to young voters, Obama largely played it straight in his sixth appearance on the liberal-leaning comedy show, which enjoys a broad following among younger viewers.
He touted the steps he had taken to lower college costs and expand rights for gays and lesbians and warned that Republican rival Romney would bring back economic policies that would favor the very wealthy over everyone else if he won the Nov. 6 election.
"Here's what I will say to everybody who's watching: The stakes on this could not be bigger," Obama said. "There's no excuse not to vote."
Voters under age 30 made up a crucial part of Obama's winning coalition in 2008, and Reuters/Ipsos polling data indicates they back him again this year by wide margins.
Younger Americans voted in near-record levels in the 2008, but it is unclear whether they will turn out again in such numbers this year. Obama's campaign has harnessed social media and set up an extensive network of on-campus volunteers to help ensure young supporters vote this year, and an appearance on "The Daily Show" is likely to help.
With an average audience of 1.1 million, the Comedy Central cable network show reaches roughly one-third of the viewership of the most popular late-night talk show, NBC's "Tonight Show with Jay Leno," according to Nielsen data provided by Horizon Media.
But it ranks first among viewers under the age of 50, according to figures provided by the show.
Obama promised viewers he would keep working to help the economy recover from the deepest recession since the 1930s, but he also emphasized issues like student loans and civil liberties that are normally not a central part of his stump speech. He said he still wanted to close the Guantanamo Bay military prison for terrorism suspects, which he has been unable to do so far.
Asked about the administration's shifting assessment of last month's deadly attacks on a U.S. diplomatic mission in Libya, Obama said his administration was still piecing together the evidence.
"The government is a big operation. At any given time, something screws up and you make sure you find out what's broken and you fix it," he said.
The edgy humor that Stewart is known for surfaced occasionally.
"How many times a week does Biden show up in a wet bathing suit to a meeting?" Stewart asked in an unprompted reference to Vice President Joe Biden.
"I had to put out a presidential directive on that. We had to stop that," Obama said. "I gotta say, though, he looks pretty good."
SEXY REFORMS?
At another point, when Obama said some of his proposed legal reforms were not "sexy," Stewart stopped him.
"You don't know what I find sexy," Stewart said.
Obama nearly took the bait, mentioning that the erotic bestseller "Fifty Shades of Grey" had come up in an earlier segment of the show. Then he appeared to catch himself.
"We're not going to go there, Jon. I'm still the president," he said.
The Democratic incumbent has rebounded since a sharp debate performance on Tuesday night in which he was widely judged to have gotten the better of Romney.
A Reuters/Ipsos daily tracking poll showed Obama holding a slight but steady lead, with 47 percent of likely voters saying they planned to vote for Obama, compared with 44 percent for Romney.
Other polls show a tighter race, and the focus is on swing states like Ohio and Florida that will likely decide the election. The Romney campaign said it was moving resources out of North Carolina, where it sees an increasing chance of winning, to allocate them to other battleground states. The campaign said its communications director for the state was redeploying to Ohio.
Romney's economic plans have "resonated strongly" in the Southern state and polls are increasingly widening, spokeswoman Sarah Pompei said.
The two men face off in their last debate on Monday in Florida, where the topic will be foreign policy.
They will meet before then in New York on Thursday night, where they are expected to deliver humorous remarks at a political dinner.
Romney spent the day at a Manhattan hotel preparing for the debate and his evening speech.
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