American political effect of the assassination

Washington Times:

Rudolph W. Giuliani and Sen. John McCain stand to gain the most politically from the assassination of Benazir Bhutto just days before the crucial Jan. 3 Iowa caucuses, political observers said yesterday.

"On the Republican side, this could have serious implications for Giulilani or McCain, particularly as they duke it out in Iowa for third place," pollster John Zogby said. "This may be one of the most important third-place showings in Iowa history, and the stakes are high for both candidates."

For Democrats, most observers agreed that the timing of the former Pakistani prime minister's assassination plays to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's experience as the wife of a two-term president.

"On the Democratic side, will liberal caucus voters decide to accent Clinton's leadership and experience or Barack Obama's identity?" Mr. Zogby asked. "My gut instinct tells me that Clinton is helped by this, especially with her husband by her side."

Mrs. Bhutto's assassination also could help lagging candidates, such as Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr., Delaware Democrat, get a second look from voters.

...

I don't think anything can help Biden's candidacy. He is a mental light weight who tries to make up for that deficiency with a monumental ego. Like his fellow plagiarists, Ted Kennedy, he wields for more stroke on capitol hill than his intellect would suggest, but when it comes to a national race his defects are exposed.

I don't think it helps Hillary Clinton that much either, because she is far to divisive a candidate to inspire or rally people in a crisis.

While both Giuliani and McCain have raised their experience as a reason to support them following the murder, neither seems all that persuasive at this point. I do think this hurts Democrats more than Republicans, because it shows their holiday from history attitude about the war being waged against the world by Islamic religious bigots is far more serious than they would like to believe. It is going to keep on interfering with their hopes of diverting funds from the war to domestic spending on their constituents.

E.J. Dionne focuses on the Democrat political reaction.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Should Republicans go ahead and add Supreme Court Justices to head off Democrats

Washington Post: Some Democrats eye adding more justices to the Supreme Court to change its ideological bent The once-remote idea has gained the attention of liberals angered by the GOP push to remake the federal courts. Probably the easy way to defeat this court-packing scheme is for Trump to propose doing the same thing now.  It would lead to Democrat denunciations and claims that it would be wrong, thereby blowing up any attempt by them in the unfortunate event of Democrats winning a presidential election.
Read more

29 % of companies say they are unlikely to keep insurance after Obamacare

Conn Carroll: A new survey of 368 midsize to large companies found that 29% of them are considering terminating their active employee health care plans when Obamacare is full implemented in 2014. Only 71% of employers surveyed said they did not expect to drop their health coverage, while 20% said they did not know and 9% said they were planning to exit. The latest survey, conducted by Towers Watson, echoes an ealier survey by McKinsey & Co. finding that 30% of private-sector employers were planning to drop their employee health insurance coverage by 2014. When the Congressional Budget Office crunched Obamacare's spending numbers, they estimated that only 7% of employees currently covered by employer-sponsored plans would lose their plans. ... This means the cost of the health care fiasco will be hundreds of billions more than estimated by the CBO and Congressional Democrat. It is also clear that Obama's pledge that you could keep your health care plan if you wanted t...
Read more

Is the F-35 obsolete?

Headline USA: Pentagon Fires Back after Musk Calls Its Most Expensive Project ‘Obsolete’ 'Yeah, as I'm sure you can appreciate, Mr. Musk is, currently, a private citizen, I'm not going to make any comments about what a private citizen may have to say about the F-35....'   ... ... Drones appear to be replacing jets for many operations.  The Russia-Ukraine war is an example of that.  Drones are often hard to detect and can be used for intelligence operations as well as for attacking enemy targets.  It would not surprise me to see drones engaging other drones in combat.  They also cost much less than manned fighters.  
Read more