US BATTLE GROUPS NEAR PERSIAN GULF:  Four U.S. Aircraft Carrier battle groups are poised near The Persian Gulf.  Of course, Iran knows this.  So does Israel.  What we don't know is whether this is a show of force or a lineup for an attack on Iran. 
-- TheLatest.Net

THE FINANCIAL MARKETS FACE MORE MORTGAGE PROBLEMS THIS SUMMER:  Moody's Economy.com estimates that 10.6 million homeowners will have zero or negative equity by the end of this June, 2008, or about 21-percent of first-mortgage holders.
The impact of a new wave of defaults this Summer will also be potentially important. Banks and other investors in mortgages are in for  further hits to their already weakened capital.

PAKISTAN IS A TRAGEDY WAITING TO HAPPEN: 
It's a loose confederation of tribes and army rule, a pressure cooker of politics, a home for violence, poverty -- and the Taliban, Al Qaeda -- and the only Muslim country that has nuclear weapons.  Half the nation is out of control.   All that stands in the way of anti-Western chaos and potential disaster is Pakistan's President Musharraf.  And his position is precarious at best. 
 -- TheLatest.Net
 

An 8th Grade Final Exam From 1895 You Probably Can't Pass
-- Just for fun (?)
from TheLatest.Net
 

We Still Kind of, Y'know, Like America and, Well, Yes, Most of Its Leaders

Of course the most important question you'll have about this website is: What's it about? The answer is easy: We believe that America is a great place and it may seem like a radical idea or dumb notion, but we also believe that our leaders have done a great job in putting this country together and getting us to today.

We're independents.  We criticize both sides of the political spectrum and the middle, too. But we have respect, not bile, to demonstrate our points of view.  We're not Pollyannas, we're pragmatists and we're not cranky and we're not curmudgeons.

Yes, we believe that Bill Clinton was a great leader, but so is George W. Bush, and so was Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, Eisenhower, Truman, Roosevelt. They all had something to contribute that made us wiser as a nation.

Radical idea, huh?  Disagree?  Okay, name me the leaders of another country who have done a better job in putting together a nation of freedom, civil and economic rights, capitalism and security.

Flat out: American leaders are flawed and self-centered individuals.  They also have placed the United States in a rightful place of leadership to the world.  Democracy is catching on worldwide -- sometimes despite our leaders -- but here we are, and despite what you may hear or think otherwise, America is still the strongest, most secure and prosperous, boldest and most God-worshipping nation on earth.

I've lost you, haven't I?  It's an American pastime to criticize and vilify our leaders, especially the current ones.  Oh, we do that here, it's the American tradition and right to speak out.  But fundamentally we're believers in the system, chaotic as it is, and yes even our leaders, those politicians.  We don't believe radical, overnight changes are needed. 

Does that make us conservative?  Well, a lot of conservatives I talk to are calling for some bizarre, radical changes in America.  So are progressives and they want it NOW, but each extreme of politics wants to bolt in a different direction, quickly.

To me, the odd thing about it is that both the proposed progressive and conservative directions are not all that dissimilar. 

Does it truly matter anymore who becomes president?  We invest a lot of hope and fear in the presidency, but in fact the president can't change things tomorrow or even next year, at least not much.

Politicians promise a lot, but their power is much more limited, I believe, than most people will recognize.  All politicians.  Even the president.  Could the next president get us out of Iraq in 90 days?  No.  Absolutely not. Anyone who promises to do such a thing is a liar. 

The president can order troops in relatively "quickly," but getting them out of a foreign entanglement without putting their lives in danger is a meticulous process that can take many months.  The presidential candidates who promise a "quick" withdrawal from Iraq are either lying or need to state their definition of "quick."

I think it's entirely possible that whoever becomes the 44th president of the United States will be a good leader for the nation.  As both George W. Bush and Bill Clinton have demonstrated, you can't pull the nation to extremes without pulling it apart.  So what you end up with is moderate, though not modest, changes. 

The president's powers lie in emergency actions and war, and it would take an emergency for sweeping changes.  A new Great Depression might be a cause for sweeping changes, but that remains the province of the popular mood of Americans, not in the whim of the presidency.  One president does, the next undoes.

Then again, real sweeping changes would take the cooperation of Congress.  When Congress and the president are at odds, then you have a real American republican democracy at work, and we like that.

As long as one person cannot come in and screw things up badly, then we can define our leaders as competent and the system as functional.  That's why I don't worry about who'll be the next president, and that's one indication of the confidence I have in the American Voter. 

We do take it seriously and we're not easily fooled, we voters.  It may seem like we're focused on American Idol and basketball, but our peripheral vision is good and focused on the race for president, breads and circuses notwithstanding.

Is America a great place?  Yes, absolutely.  Are some changes in order?  Of course they always are!  Because no nation, no system, no leader, no citizen is perfect or even close to it.  We're a nation of people, not automatons, remember.

But hating Bush, hating Clinton, Reagan, Carter, even Nixon is to miss the point of a republican democracy and to invite cliche after cliche: We're a grand experiment, capitalism isn't perfect but it's the best system devised so far, human beings are not and never will be perfect and justice is a goal, not a certainty in a very unjust world.  You may hate him or her, but that The President you're talking about, show a little respect.

The United States, through our leaders and our citizens, has given a lot to the rest of the world in order to help others.  The justice in the way we have done it may not seem clear, but it's there.  The intentions may not seem humanitarian, but they are.  The goals may seem selfish, but so often they are not.  The actions may not seem beneficial, but they are.

If you want to bring up Hiroshima, Nagasaki and Dresden here, you're part of the problem.

Hey look, I'm sorry, but this nation has done -- and is still doing! -- more for the benefit of the world in making order and prosperity out of chaos -- of rightly or wrongly fighting evil! -- than any other, so I don't hold any animosity toward leaders who don't meet my high standards and criteria.

I read history. I look for similarities in epochs and civilizations. And the more I read the more humble I become in the judgment of leaders of great powers over the millennia. The struggle of humanity ends only in the Great Millennium.  Until then, reason, progress, sympathetic action and respect for wisdom can suffice for an open mind.

Is this nation the epitome of the lofty ideals that our founders envisioned?  Nope. It's a work in progress, as is every other collection of people.  Is your life the ideal result of the lofty dreams you had as a child?

=========================

Prepping for The Comeback Kid II

Houston, TX -- Just before the March Texas primary:  It's up to the news media to attempt a spin on tonight's primary elections results, but one thing you can look for: The Comeback Kid.

Just as Bill Clinton did in 1992, it's absolutely essential that Hillary Clinton's campaign have the ability to spin tonight's primaries as Her Comeback from nearly a dozen primary defeats by Barack Obama.  But she and her campaign will provide the cues.  Her campaign rests on it. 

There are several ways she can do it.  If Hillary Clinton were to win both Ohio and Texas -- which is what she really needs -- she can lose the race for delegates so far but claim momentum, "the Big Mo."  Then it doesn't matter that she may fall way behind in the delegate count, because the Clintons always rely on popular belief rather than facts and if she says she won and the numbers say so, she'll claim victory despite the facts.  After all, the Clintons have always relied heavily on the lack of knowledge on the part of the average person to shape their political realities. 

The Clintons have been lately downplaying their abilities to make a comeback, a sure sign that their strategy is to lower expectations so that victory can be defined in several ways.  In the past, Bill Clinton has defined victory as not losing a contest, or even defined victory as not losing big in a contest.  When people count you out going into a match, not getting bloodied is a form of winning.

Then again, Hillary Clinton can continue her campaign simply by winning Ohio tonight.  Just one win will seem to be the start of a new winning trend, especially after losing 11 primaries in a row.  That, too, will seem to begin a new momentum, "The New Mo," because she'll be able to claim in new resurgence in popularity.  Hence, the Comeback Kid II.  It's a PR ploy aimed at getting people to believe that those on her side are on the winning side, despite the delegate problem.

And that's a huge problem, because the delegates will decide who's the candidate for president, not the popular vote.  You may recall that Hillary Clinton came out after the 2000 election, speaking against the Electoral College which determined the winner of that election (the Supreme Court notwithstanding, and a lot of Democrats still don't believe the high court was upstanding).  She could easily decry the delegate system and declare support for reform, with a direct-electoral system.

There have also been hints that the Clinton campaign (and/or the Obama campaign, whichever has the most to gain) will bring suit over the rather convoluted way that Texas Democrats designate their delegates, with a direct vote for 2/3 of the delegates, then a written vote in caucuses, after the polls close, for the other 1/3. 

But no matter how the campaigns spin tonight's results, it's most important how the news media spin it.  Despite her complaints of media bias against her, networks such as NBC, CNN and others appear to me to have bent over backwards to keep her fresh in the public mind, and I'm talking about news shows, not "Saturday Night Live."  If the networks were as bent on seeing Obama as the candidate as Mrs. Clinton would have us believe, we wouldn't be seeing nearly as much of Mrs. Clinton as we've seen these past few weeks and, especially, days.

Both Democrats are in Texas today.  Hillary was here in Houston this morning, shaking hands near the polls.  She's off to Austin to take in tonight's results with a number of like-minded people who are betting the farm that she wins the presidency.  It's their lifelong wish, philosophically and policywise. It's where Hillary Clinton will feel comfortable, though it sends no particular message to voters.

Barack Obama is scheduled to be in San Antonio, a good political move because the city is known for his large population of Latinos.  Obama may or may not feel comfortable there, but it's a good political move since there are so many Latino votes available in this campaign. 

The advantage today is with the Obama campaign: in delegates, in momentum, in running an efficient campaign, in fundraising and in popularity.  The Clinton campaign has to overcome much more than just a deficiency in delegates and money and momentum. 

It's been the Clinton Way in the past to declare victory when victory had to be most narrowly defined in order to claim it.  I fully expect the same to happen tonight.  It would be the Clinton Way to seize any advantage tonight and declare it a victory and continue.

That's why I'll be among the more shocked if the Clinton campaign calls it quits anytime soon.  And even if the campaign ends in a few weeks or months, she's still going to be a major power at the convention and there will be at least some pressure for an Obama-Clinton ticket, despite rumors to the contrary.

========================

21 Observations

Because of personal obligations, I haven't had time to do much lately but observe the national scene, the electioneering and the state of the economy.  Here are just a few of those observations:

1. People are comparing the United States today to ancient Rome, for several reasons.  People have been comparing the U.S. with ancient Rome ever since I can remember.  That does not mean they're wrong.

2.  Alan Greenspan sure got out of his job at the Federal Reserve just in time.

3.  The U.S. let Saddam Hussein do what he wanted for a long time as a counterbalance to Iran. Then we went in and booted him out because it was more important to ensure the flow of oil than to let him continue playing dictator. 

Pakistan and Iran -- to name two -- are real threats and a few years ago so was Libya. This is nothing like Vietnam.  Our actions in Iraq are of particular importance if you understand that the world will in our lifetimes begin to "run out" of oil.  Some countries that might surprise you are already "running out," and I'm not talking about the U.S.

4.  Hillary Clinton is on the wrong track with her campaign.  When Bill Clinton ran, there was an easy-going, slightly humorous feel to the rhetoric and bluster.  Hillary Clinton seems humorless and strident.  I wish she could change that.  Even Bill is all cold, hard stares and finger-wagging these days, it seems.  Where's the outrage?  Hell, where's the fun?

5. The state of the world economy is very dicey.  I've read opinion after opinion from the doomsayers (The Great Depression -- The Sequel!) to the mods (The Economy Is Sound!) and the key seems to be, like everything else in life, really just in how you look at it. 

Are we about to descend into a leaderless chaotic abyss?  Not because of the economy alone.  It'll take something else to trigger that.  Will life always be as carefree as it's been these last few decades in the West?  Nope.

6.  People in America are too greedy, too money-grubbing in general.  They didn't get the memo that productivity has been up for many years.  You don't have to gouge your employees and the public so you can get rich(er).  You might just get rich(er) anyway.  Either way, put down the cell phone while you're driving, putz, because you're putting people's lives in danger.

7.  President Bush is not the worst president in history.  People who say that aren't very old or aren't very smart. 

8.  The number of people in America who can't see past their cultural and partisan proclivities is growing.  It's true that there are people who still believe we should go back to the values of 1963 and they literally hate anyone who disagrees.  I know a number of progressives who fall into this category.

9.  Gangs have been around for many, many decades, but the latest incarnations are destroying cities.  Have you been to L.A. lately?

10.  Communism, Socialism, Marxism and other collectivist ideologies have not disappeared, but are alive and well in various forms here in the United States and throughout the world, including Russia.

11.  Many Americans are getting progressively lazier, and I find this to be alarming.  They use any number of excuses in order not to do what was considered to be required behavior just one generation ago.

12.  As a member of the news media, it's incredible to see Hillary Clinton bashing "The Media" for appearing to be partial to Barack Obama.  We used to like her best!  That is, until she started to resemble the schoolteacher who smirked while she rapped you with a ruler, made fun of you in front of the class and then sent a note home to your parents too.

13.  I consider Ralph Nader to be an honorable man.  So why does he keep running for president when he knows he can't win?

14.  Don't you wish you could get Peggy Noonan drunk just once so she'd say how she feels without trying to be so eloquent and reserved?

15.  Liberals secretly love Ann Coulter, the same as conservatives secretly fear Hillary Clinton.  I use the terms "love" and "fear" quite sublimely here, much as Peggy Noonan might use them.

16.  To me, Ron Paul is not a crackpot.  He's just unelectable for the presidency.

17.  I've noticed that you can apply for three dozen jobs in one month -- jobs for which you're experienced and well-suited -- and never hear another word about them.  Some of these jobs go unfilled for years.

(It's funny when you answer a job ad and never hear from the company, but then they re-post the ad, saying "If you've already sent your resume, please don't send another one."  Why don't they just be honest and say, "If you've already sent your resume, you'd have already heard from us if you were good enough, wouldn't you?  But you're not.")

18.  The number of people who are getting tired of e-mail is increasing.  Now this is just based on anecdotal evidence, but I know people who just loved e-mail a few years ago who now consider it annoying. 

Maybe it's the spam, or maybe it's too many unreturned messages, I don't know. But some people do think it's an appropriate substitute for cards, phone calls and snail mail, and it's not. 

19.  The governments are out of control in America, and they need to be put back in control.  I warned politicians at the local and state level on this very website six years ago that they should stop complaining about how tax revenue was down so low they had to cut services. 

I told them that when the economy goes up again they should put some savings aside for the bad times, just like us plebeians have to do.  Did they listen to me? No. Of course not.  Fools.  And now the economy is starting to dip again and they're starting to complain again.  Do I have to tell you idiots again?

20.  Governments cover up too much.  A perfect example is economic data.  There are "money experts" all over the Internet who say you can't believe the federal government's inflation figures.  It's not 3%, they say, it's more like 6%.  Well, maybe they make more money than people like I do, so they don't notice, but according to my budget, inflation is running at more like 10% a year, at least for a number of staple items.  That's one reason the mortgage people are knocking at the door.

There was a time when the feds told us how much of a real percentage of the population was unemployed.  Now they exclude people who've been looking for work for a long time.  Well, they're still looking for work aren't they?  If not, they're still unemployed, aren't they?  Tell us the truth, we can take it.

21.  Many people feel more powerless today than in the past.  I know a guy who's emphatic about supporting Barack Obama for president.  I asked Why?  He said Because he'll be good for America.  I ventured the idea that the president isn't nearly as powerful as we think.  Oh, he said.  Yeah, that's probably right.  So who do I vote for?

M.S.

No, No, Not Again!

Hey, look, I've got nothing against Hillary Clinton. If she wants to run for president, that's great.  Anyone who wants to run for president should be able to.  The problem is, not everyone who wants to run for president can get all that money together and gather all those political contacts.  And running is a hard thing to do while carrying lots of baggage.  Still, I think her candidacy is a good thing.

But it's upsetting to see the photograph that suddenly appeared on the Internet, showing Hillary and Bill Clinton flanking Antonin "Tony" Rezko, the Syrian-born Illinois political fixer under indictment on corruption charges, who has close ties to the Middle East.

It's just politics, you say?  Okay, it's interesting that the photo shows up just now, days after Hillary Clinton herself brought up Rezko's name during the Democrats' debate this week, using Rezko as a slam against Barack Obama, who also has some ties to Rezko. 

But I got a terrible feeling of deja vu when Senator Clinton said on The Today Show Friday morning that she doesn't remember meeting Rezko.  So what if there's a picture of her with him, y'know? 

It's that "don't remember" stuff that really makes me queasy because it reminds me of ten years ago, and it reminds me of what Bill and Hillary Clinton are and whom they represent.

See, people have been saying for years that George W. Bush represents Big Business and Big Oil and Big Pharma.  I won't argue with that.  But there should be no implication that Bill Clinton didn't represent Big Law and Big Unions and Big Media. He did, and he proved it many times while president.

George W. Bush used to be in the oil business.  Hell, Rezko reportedly even threw a fundraiser for Bush, but this isn't about the lame duck president.  It's about Bill and Hillary Clinton, who are lawyers.  People still like to quote Bill's deposition in relation to perjury charges against him, that "depends on what your definition of 'is' is" thing. 

In a criminal trial, you're expected to answer examination by answering "yes," "no" or "I don't remember."  Hillary Clinton's saying she doesn't remember ever meeting Rezko reminds me that she's a lawyer.  No one can ever prove whether she does or doesn't remember Rezko. 

So what?

So Barack Obama has already admitted he made a "mistake" in some of his dealings with Rezko.  He sounded in the debate like he honestly regretted that property entanglement he had with Rezko.  Hillary Clinton should take a page from Obama's playbook and find a different answer from "I don't remember."

In admitting a mistake, Obama sounds like you and me, we make mistakes.  Hillary Clinton ends up sounding like a tremendously rushed Big Star, someone who's too busy to admit to the people that she makes mistakes.  Maybe she wants to name her memoirs "No Time For Scandal."

"I don't remember" is something both Bill and Hillary Clinton said many times in 1998 during Clinton's impeachment.  They said it both to investigators and to us.  And now it's suspicious when they say that.

Because as every lawyer knows, to say "Yes I've met Rezko" puts you on the record for having dealt with someone who's under close investigation by the FBI.  To say "No I've never met Rezko" puts you on the record as a liar if anyone can come up with any real proof that you knew him.  So to cover yourself in case some real proof turns up, "I don't remember" is always the best legal strategy, since no one can ever prove you right or wrong.

All someone could do, should you say "I don't remember meeting him," is produce a photograph of you and Rezko standing together and wave it in front of a jury and say, "Really?  Here you are standing next to him, posed and smiling like it's an official photograph rather than among a crowd at a  fundraiser, and yet you don't remember meeting him? A highly influential man from the state where you were born?"

To which you might reply, "I've probably taken hundreds of thousands of pictures. I can't remember them all."  Again, no one can prove or disprove that.  And it's just what Hillary Clinton said on The Today Show.  It doesn't ring true.  Unlike Obama admitting a "mistake," trying to distance himself from the whole matter.  It sounds like trial testimony.

Which reminds me, against my will, that Hillary Clinton is, like her husband, a lawyer. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

But it also reminds me of 1998.  Bill Clinton and his Big Unions and Big Trial Lawyers and Big Hollywood.  Skirting the truth within the letter of the law.  Then George W. Bush with his Big Pharma Karma and Big Oil.  Manipulating the truth to meet an agenda.  Now Hillary Clinton, with James Carville and Paul Begala and Ann Lewis and Sidney Blumenthal -- all the faces we saw way too much of ten years ago, going from talk show to talk show with talking points defending Bill Clinton during his impeachment -- turning up on TV again these days as "consultants" and "advisors" and "observers."

And of course you can't watch a news show this early 2008 without seeing Bill Clinton stumping for Hillary Rodham Clinton.

I thought this election was supposed to be about a fresh start, a new direction for America, and it was time to kick the bums out, move on, change direction, put some outsiders inside the Beltway, bring in some new blood, blow out the cobwebs and get some fresh ideas into Washington.  Someone who represents the people of the United States, not Big Anything!

Instead, it sounds like 1998.

No, no, not again!

Please.

More by Mike Shiloh

==============================

What's "Upsetting" About Hillary Clinton Winning New Hampshire?  Nothing.
Some newspapers and newscasters are saying that Hillary Clinton winning the first primary of the election year is an "upset." Why? Because the TV pundits and polls proved that Barack Obama would win?  That's ridiculous.

This is all part of the playbook.  I most admire someone in the Clinton campaign for planting a story on Matt Drudge's popular website saying Hillary Clinton is worried and considered dropping out of the race after her defeat in the Iowa caucuses.  Drudge bit!  He placed one of his relatively rare personally-written pages on his site saying that Clinton might be considering dropping out. "Developing"!

Ten quick points:

1. Iowa was a caucus.  Non-binding.  A great tradition that leads off the campaign season (season? It's more than a year long now) but not much more than a measure of which way the wind blows. For now.

2. Now that the average age of the news staffers at the networks and newspapers is getting lower and lower, I can only guess that their political experience is increasingly shallow.

3. You judge presidential campaigns by overall wins over a number of primaries, not by a caucus or by one or two or even three primaries.  The old political hands in the Clinton campaign and the other campaigns know this.  Do the TV pundits?  They don't appear to.

4. Clinton's people knew she was bound to win one of these primaries, so having her cry on-camera (on cue? Remember, just the day before Clinton's public tears came a friendly columnist's call for Hillary to stop being managed and just be herself) and planting a story saying she might be considering dropping out rather than facing humiliation is merely a ploy, a PR setup so that when she does win she's The Comeback Kid -- The Sequel.  Bill Clinton's campaign of 1992 was arranged in a similar way, with emphasis then on the "Kid" aspect of the nickname, a marketing ploy to distinguish the 40ish Clinton from competitors such as Bush Sr.

5. There are primaries on the way in which Obama isn't campaigning or isn't on the ballot.  Unless Edwards were to pull out a strong showing, Clinton and her campaign are just being coy by acting worried.

6. New Hampshire was only an "upset," as the network and print news people have been saying, if you believed the polls about Obama being out front.  Polls only indicate.  That's why we newspeople use that term.  "The polls indicate..."  The polls don't "prove" or "show for certain" any more than a bite of a banana proves the whole banana is edible.

7. By calling New Hampshire an "upset victory for Hillary" news media are helping the Clinton campaign's desire for a Comeback Kid - The Sequel scenario.  And they got it.

8. A Comeback Kid scenario proves that the Clinton campaign didn't get back on track with the New Hampshire win, it proves that the campaign was on track all along.

9. The Clinton people know this game well.  They've thought it out with respect to Bill Clinton's campaign 15 years ago.  The big difference is, as some have pointed out, Hillary Clinton represents the establishment now, whereas Bill Clinton was a Washington Outsider back in '92. 

10. There are some surprises coming, even for the Clinton people. Voters are not in the mood to keep the status quo, and Hillary Clinton represents the establishment while Obama represents a new direction.  There are scandals waiting in the wings for the Clinton campaign, so the war room will go 24/7.  And the big question: Are there other possible entries into the presidential race around the corner that will change the whole dynamic of the campaign?

More by Mike Shiloh

===============================

Besides Hillary, here's another candidate for president: Fred Thompson.  As one blogger said, what a first lady she'd make!  Men would be reading the paper every day to see what's she's been up to!  This will polarize women's votes if Thompson goes against Clinton.  How many women want a Hollywood starlet-type in the White House?  Younger women may relate to Fred's wife, though.  Don't let her looks fool you, she's a professional. Her name is Jeri Kehn. Google her. She is in effect managing her husband's White House bid and has hiring and firing authority over staff, according to the The Telegraph.