Month: February 2015

Marco Rubio And Rand Paul, The Presidency, And Their Senate Seats

Ronald Leave a comment

Senators Marco Rubio of Florida and Rand Paul of Kentucky are both seriously considering running for the Presidency, but they both face the quandary that if they so decide, they must forfeit running for reelection to the Senate in 2016. State laws in Florida and Kentucky prevent them running for both jobs at the same time.

This was not the case in other Presidential elections, as shown by:

Lyndon B. Johnson running for Vice President in 1960 while running for reelection to the Senate in Texas.

Lloyd Bentsen running for Vice President in 1988 while running for reelection to the Senate in Texas.

Joe Lieberman running for Vice President in 2000 while running for reelection to the Senate in Connecticut.

Paul Ryan running for Vice President in 2012 while running for reelection to the House Of Representatives in Wisconsin.

All four were elected to their Congressional seats, with only Johnson vacating it to become Vice President.

But notice that in all four of these cases, the position they were running for was Vice President, not President.

So both Rubio and Paul face a difficult situation, and one would advise that they think long and hard about giving up their Senate seats, even though both seem, clearly, too ambitious to be President, and do not seem to love their Senate positions, as simply too restrictive for their egos!

New Presidential Poll Of Scholars Of Political Science Changes Rankings Substantially, And Puts Barack Obama 18th!

Ronald Leave a comment

A 2014 poll of 162 Political Science scholars, members of the American Political Science Association, is the latest rankings of our 43 Presidents, and it is eye opening.

The top four are the standard four Presidents–Lincoln, Washington, FDR, and TR, no surprises there.

But then the debate begins, with Jefferson, Truman, Ike, Clinton, Jackson, and Wilson finishing out the top ten list.

Truman slips and Jefferson moves up, and Eisenhower reaches the highest he has ever been in a poll.

Andrew Jackson makes it back to the top ten, but should he be in the top ten, considering his entire record in office?

Wilson slips further, to the bottom of the top ten, having gained more critics in recent years on his civil rights and civil liberties record, major issues for Jackson as well, but to put Jackson above Wilson is odd.

But then, Bill Clinton number eight? Really? This is easily the highest Clinton has ever been, and most observers on the outside would think that he is way overrated, by putting him n the top ten.

Reagan and Lyndon B. Johnson follow, both being knocked down a peg from earlier rankings, and then, inexplicably, James Madison ends up 13th, even though his Presidency was far from great, although he was a great man!

Kennedy being rated fourteenth brings him down to a reasonable perch, after having, crazily, been listed as high as sixth in the C Span poll of 2009.

The next four are John Adams, Monroe, George H. W. Bush, and then Barack Obama. How Madison ended up above Monroe is hard to fathom. Bush Senior seems in a fair place, a bit higher than before, and John Adams seems about the right spot.

But Obama, in midstream in 18th place? Recently, he had been ranked 15th, and it seems to this blogger that he should NOT be knocked down, and might be worthy of being above Adams, Monroe and Bush Sr.

The next six, all still above 50 percent in rating are, in order, Polk, Taft, McKinley, JQ Adams, Cleveland, and Ford. It seems to many that Polk and McKinley might be rated higher, while the rest of this group seem in the proper places on the list.

Notice that Jimmy Carter is not in the top 24, which seems surprising, as one would think he would rank near the bottom of this list of 24, but his rating is, apparently, below 50 percent support, the reason he is not rated higher.

And notice neither Nixon nor Bush Jr have any real chance of making this list of 24, basically the top 60 percent of the 43 Presidents, and are unlikely to have a realistic chance of ever reaching that level!

Presidents Who Were Fortunate To Become President Since 1900!

Ronald Leave a comment

Today is Presidents Day. There is a tendency to look back on the Presidency’s history, and assume that those who made it to the White House were a certainty, when the opposite is, actually, often the case!

Since 1900, many of our Presidents gained that office by pure luck and timing.

Theodore Roosevelt would never have been President if Vice President Garret Hobart, under President William McKinley, had not died in office in 1899, and therefore, not on the ticket with McKinley in 1900.

Woodrow Wilson would never have been President if the Republican Party had not split in 1912 between President William Howard Taft and former President Theodore Roosevelt, and if there had not been a two thirds rule for the Democratic nominee in place, preventing Speaker of the House Champ Clark from being the Democratic nominee for President.

Richard Nixon would never have been President if the Democratic Party had not divided over Vietnam in the mid 1960s, and if George Wallace would not have run as a third party candidate in 1968.

Gerald Ford would never have been President if Vice Spiro Agnew had not been caught in corruption, forcing his resignation in 1973, and if there was no 25th Amendment, providing for a replacement Vice President by appointment of the President and approval by a majority of both houses of Congress.

Jimmy Carter would never have been President if the Watergate Scandal had not occurred, disillusioning many Americans about their national government, and finding a state governor as an appealing alternative, with his image as an “outsider” who would always tell the truth.

Bill Clinton would never have been President if the economy had not declined as it did in 1992, and if Ross Perot had not run on a third party line in that election, undermining George H. W. Bush.

George W. Bush would never have been President if the Supreme Court had not intervened, a revolutionary action, to stop the vote recount in Florida in 2000, with the reality that Al Gore had more than a half million popular vote lead nationally, and yet would lose the Presidency because of that action by the Supreme Court.

This list also does not include Calvin Coolidge, Harry Truman, and Lyndon B. Johnson, all of whom would never have been President if Warren G. Harding, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and John F. Kennedy had not died in office.

Obama And The Anti War Cabinet: First In American History In Modern Times!

Ronald 5 Comments

This week, when President Barack Obama spoke before journalists about his wish for a Congressional resolution to give him limited authority to expand war against ISIL (ISIS), he surrounded himself with two former Democratic Senators and one former Republican Senator, who made up his top cabinet advisers in the past two years—Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of State John Kerry, and outgoing Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel.

As Senators from Delaware, Massachusetts, and Nebraska, these three former Senators were clearly skeptical about war resolutions. Biden voted against the Persian Gulf War Resolution in 1991, and all three were critics of the Iraq War and how it evolved. Also, Kerry and Hagel were Vietnam War veterans who were always skeptical about war prosecution by different Presidents.

In many ways, one could say that the four men, including President Obama, make up the most anti war group ever to govern together, and this is refreshing, as all four, while seeing the need to fight against ISIL (ISIS), do not wish to send combat troops back to the Middle East, after failed wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which have caused 6,500 deaths combined, over 30,000 wounded veterans, and a reality that Post Traumatic Stress Disorder has become a major problem, with 22 veterans every day committing suicide, and hundreds of thousands of homeless veterans.

The American people have made clear in polls that while they are ready to fight ISIL (ISIS), they have no desire to become engaged in a long, drawn out war with American troops fighting and dying, when it should be the people of the area to fight to protect themselves, with appropriate American financial aid and weapons, but not large numbers of American troops committed to a ground war that goes on endlessly!

Meanwhile, there is the pro war element in the Republican Party, led by Arizona Senator John McCain and South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham, with much of the party joining their war chants, but with Kentucky Senator Rand Paul representing the anti war group, that wishes to avoid major ground troop involvement, setting up a major conflict within the GOP for the next Presidential election.

Nixon, Bush Domination Of Republican Party 1952-2016: Unprecedented In American History!

Ronald 1 Comment

It is truly amazing how two names–Nixon and Bush—have so dominated the Republican Party over the past two thirds of a century from 1952-2016.

If one had to bet right now on who the GOP Presidential nominee will be in 2016, it clearly would be Jeb Bush, the former Governor of Florida, who is raking up large amounts of money to win the funding race for the Republican Party.

Were that to happen, it would mark the SEVENTH time that a Bush family member was on the national ballot for the Republican Party since 1980—seven out of ten potential times—four times for George H. W. Bush, twice as Vice Presidential nominee, and twice as Presidential nominee—two times for his son George W. Bush, as Presidential nominee—and now Jeb as potential Presidential nominee in 2016.

Additionally, Richard Nixon was on the national ballot five times—twice as Vice Presidential nominee, and three times as Presidential nominee.

Only one other person, Democratic President Franklin D. Roosevelt managed to be on the national ballot five times–as Vice Presidential nominee in 1920 and losing, and as Presidential nominee four times and winning in 1932, 1936, 1940, and 1944.

Remember that the Bush name has been triumphant each time till now, except 1992, and the Nixon name was triumphant also each time, except 1960. And one could argue that many observers think Nixon actually won in 1960, and that the John F. Kennedy victory was accomplished through fraud in Chicago by Mayor Richard J. Daley. And one could argue that George H. W. Bush would have won in 1992, had Ross Perot not been on the ballot as a strong third alternative to Bush and Bill Clinton.

So if Jeb Bush ends up as the GOP Presidential nominee in 2016, it would mean that a total of TWELVE times out of seventeen national elections had a Bush or Nixon on the national ballot. And imagine if he were to become President, and win two terms, as that would mean by the end of 2024, we would have EIGHT times that a Bush was on the national ballot, and a total of 32 years out of the last 44–talking about dominance! And behind Jeb is his son, George P. Bush of Texas, who was just elected Land Commissioner, and would be 48 by election time in 2024, and carries a famous name!

And the other five times—Barry Goldwater in 1964, Gerald Ford in 1976, Bob Dole in 1996, John McCain in 2008, and Mitt Romney in 2012—–the Republicans lost the Presidency!

Philadelphia The Site Of The Democratic National Convention The Week of July 25, 2016!

Ronald Leave a comment

So the Democratic National Committee has chosen Philadelphia, the “City of Brotherly Love”, the city of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitutional Convention, the city of Benjamin Franklin, to be the host for the Democratic National Convention, which will nominate the next Democratic nominee for President of the United States.

The convention will be held in the last week of July, the week after the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio.

So therefore, there will be little time for a “bump” in the polls for the GOP Presidential nominee, and an extra month for the official campaign, which will now start in August, rather than around Labor Day in September.

This author had predicted that Columbus, Ohio, would be the site, and concedes that this time, unlike Tampa and the Republicans in 2012, that he turned out to have predicted incorrectly. The reasoning was that Ohio was in play as a “swing” state, while Pennsylvania is not really such.

However, Philadelphia is a great choice, and the general term “City of Brotherly Love’ actually fits perfectly, as the Democrats are the party of equal rights for gays and lesbians, while the Republicans, with a very few exceptions of office holders, still defy and oppose such equality, including marriage, although it is clear that the Supreme Court is about to declare this June that gays and lesbians may marry everywhere in the United States!

A Massive Loss Of Quality Journalism In Just Two Days: Brian Williams, Jon Stewart, Bob Simon!

Ronald 3 Comments

American journalism has suffered a tremendous loss in just two days—the six month suspension of Brian Williams from NBC News; the announcement that Jon Stewart, the brilliant anchor of the Daily Show on Comedy Channel is leaving later this year; and the tragic death of Bob Simon of CBS News and Sixty Minutes in an automobile accident.

In a time when quality journalism is hard to find, and we have so many ignorant, stupid, biased so called “journalists” on Fox News Channel who lie on a regular basis, it is tragic that Brian Williams, a good guy, well liked by many, has been dealt a six month suspension without pay, and yet based on so far only one confirmed blunder.

It is also sad that Jon Stewart, the best comedian in the business, is leaving his path breaking show that was the major way most young people received their news of the day, and Stewart was brilliant in exposing the hypocrisy of politicians on an everyday basis for 16 plus years.

And worst of all is the tragic death of Bob Simon, a true professional, who worked for CBS for nearly 50 years, and was always highly admired for his vast experiences in news gathering. He survived captivity in the Gulf War, the fall of Saigon, and Middle East conflict, to end up dying in an accident on the West Side Highway in New York City.

All three will, of course, be trashed by the right wing, because all three were liberals, who really cared about people and would not be afraid to expose the truth about what was going on in the nation and overseas.

But no attacks by anyone at Fox News Channel in particular, and conservative talk radio as well, will take away from the reality that these are a few of the very small number of quality journalists still working, at a time when propaganda, hate, and deception are the norm much too often!

Diversity In The Presidential Race? Not Really As Much As Advertised!

Ronald Leave a comment

The Republican Party, which has gained a reputation of being anti black, anti Hispanic immigrant, anti women is trying to convince Americans that they are really a diverse party, when it comes to the Presidential competition for 2016.

So they will point out the following:

Florida Senator Marco Rubio is Cuban American.

Texas Senator Ted Cruz is Cuban American.

Pediatric surgeon Dr. Benjamin Carson is African American.

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal is Asia American (India)

Former Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiorina is female.

Many potential GOP candidates are Catholic, including Rubio, Cruz, Jeb Bush, and Rick Santorum.

But of course, the fact that Rubio and Cruz are Cuban Americans means they represent about three percent of the Hispanic community, and it is highly unlikely that Mexican Americans (65 percent) and Puerto Rican Americans (about 25 percent) would support them in large numbers, with both groups being heavily Democratic.

And the odds that any of the above will be the Republican nominee for President is extremely low, other than Jeb Bush, who has switched his religious beliefs to Catholicism.

But the Democrats, in a much shorter list of potential candidates, also have diversity.

Hillary Clinton and Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren are females.

Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders is Jewish.

Vice President Joe Biden, Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley, and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo are Catholics.

If Hillary Clinton were not a prohibitive favorite, it would be likely that New Jersey Senator Cory Booker and former Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick, both African Americans; and Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar, a female, would have entered the race.

Alabama And Gay Marriage: The Shame Of Roy Moore, Clarence Thomas, And Antonin Scalia

Ronald Leave a comment

So Alabama becomes the 37th state to see gay marriage in effect, and it is to the shame of Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore, and Supreme Court Justices Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia, that they will go down in history as hateful, divisive jurists who use Christianity to justify their hate and defile Jesus Christ at the same time.

Moore is the controversial top jurist in a state which still has the shame of being the center of civil rights controversies, including the bombing of a church in Birmingham which killed four young black girls; the use of police dogs, tear gas and high pressure water hoses against peaceful civil rights marchers in Birmingham; the spectacle of Governor George Wallace standing in the door of the Registrar’s Office at the University of Alabama to try to prevent two black students from registering for classes; and “Bloody Sunday” in Selma, Alabama, when police attacked peaceful demonstrators on the Edmund Pettus Bridge, shocking Americans who could not believe what was happening, over what was the push for voting rights.

Fifty years later, the spectacle of the leading jurist in the state of Alabama, ordering legal authorities in the state to refuse to grant same sex marriage licenses, is a mockery of the rule of law, and of obedience to federal courts and the Constitution. And to see Supreme Court Justices Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia make a public denunciation of their colleagues on the Court, refusing to stop gay marriage until the Court decides in June on this matter, is a rearguard action by two Justices who are a disgrace to the Court, and has displayed constant conflict of interest in their dealings with the Koch Brothers and others who they should steer clear of. It is a clear indication of the incompetence and arrogance of these two right wing Justices, the most right wing members of the Court in the past hundred years, and a disgrace to the Court’s history with their narrow mindedness and intolerance!

And the idea that Christianity is brought into this by Moore, and indirectly by Thomas and Scalia, is a mockery of a religious doctrine, which distorts the true teachings of Jesus Christ, a man who promoted tolerance, open mindedness, and understanding!

Presidents And Age: An Issue For 2016!

Ronald Leave a comment

Historically, Americans have tended to vote for a President who is younger than his predecessor, sometimes dramatically so, as with John F. Kennedy after Dwight D. Eisenhower (27 years difference); as with Bill Clinton after George H. W. Bush (22 years difference); as with Barack Obama after George W. Bush (15 years difference); and as with Jimmy Carter after Gerald Ford (11 years difference).

In fact, only the following Presidents were older than their predecessors: William Henry Harrison, Zachary Taylor, James Buchanan, Chester Alan Arthur, Benjamin Harrison, William Howard Taft, Woodrow Wilson, Lyndon B. Johnson, and Ronald Reagan. And only W. H. Harrison, Taylor, Buchanan, Lyndon B. Johnson, and Reagan were five years or more older than their predecessors.

But now, in 2016, we are likely, almost certainly, to elect a President who will be substantially older than Barack Obama. This includes Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders,Jim Webb, Hillary Clinton, Elizabeth Warren, Jeb Bush, John Kasich, Carly Fiorina, Dr. Benjamin Carson, Rick Perry, Rick Santorum, Lindsey Graham, Mike Pence, Rick Snyder, Jon Huntsman and Mike Huckabee, a total of 16 potential candidates.

The odds of a younger President than Barack Obama are quite low, including Chris Christie, Rand Paul, Andrew Cuomo, Martin O’Malley, Scott Walker, Marco Rubio, Bobby Jindal, and Ted Cruz, a total of 8 potential candidates.

This oddity makes one wonder if the younger generation (under 45) will be as motivated to vote, as they are, naturally, attracted to comparative youth, as John F. Kennedy, Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama represented, when they were elected, and with the extra appeal of being, respectively, the first Catholic (JFK); the first two Southern governors (Carter and Clinton); and the first African American (Obama).